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Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors/Backlog elimination drives/January 2026

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The following event is now closed. Please do not modify this page, unless you are a participant adding your final statistics within 24 hours of the closure. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate talk page.

This Copy Editing Backlog Elimination Drive was a one-month-long effort of the Guild of Copy Editors to reduce the backlog of articles that require copy editing: those carrying the {{copy edit}} tag (also {{copy edit section}}, {{copy edit inline}}, {{inappropriate person}}, {{cleanup tense}}, and their redirects) and those listed on the GOCE Requests page. It began on 1 January 2026, 00:00 (UTC) and ended on 31 January 2026, 23:59 (UTC). The goals of this drive were:

  • to reduce the backlog by as many articles as possible, especially the earliest-tagged articles (those tagged in April, May, June, July, August, and September 2024);
  • to complete all requests on the GOCE Requests page dating from November and December 2025, and January 2026.

Drive participants could earn barnstar awards based on the number of articles—and the word counts of the articles—they copy edit. Articles listed on the Requests page count towards your total; these articles are generally higher in quality than those tagged with {{copy edit}}. You will receive a bonus score of 50% over the article's word count for articles that were tagged with {{copy edit}} in April, May, June, and July 2024, and for articles listed on the Requests page. Awards will be given out once the drive has finished.

The drive was open to all Wikipedians; you don't have to be a member of the Guild of Copy Editors to participate. You must, however, be competent in your use of English grammar, spelling and punctuation. We strongly advise you to read Wikipedia's guide to basic copy editing before you begin working. If you're unsure about spelling, grammar or punctuation, consult the Wikipedia Manual of Style. Skilled use of English is especially important for articles listed on the Requests page.

Drives are under the purview of the Guild's coordinators. The drive's lead coordinator is Dhtwiki (talk), who is assisted by GoldRomean (talk), Miniapolis (talk), Mox Eden (talk), and Wikieditor662 (talk). If you have any questions, leave a message on the drive's talk page.


For brief instructions on recording your work, see below. For full instructions, visit the main drive page. Further details can be found on the drive FAQ page.

Full instructions, tips, and awards

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Full instructions for participants, tips, help for new copy editors, useful tags, and details of the many barnstars available for the drive can be found on the main drive page. Please read this page carefully before you begin. To sign up, please use the form in the Signing up section below.

Progress

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(Please update your own figures)

Leaderboard

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  • Gold Star Award Leaderboard
1 2 3 4 5
Total
Articles
LightlySeared (20) Mox Eden (16) GoldRomean (14) Plattenum (13)
Magnesium Cube (13)
Smallestredboy (11)
Total
Words[n 1]
Magnesium Cube (66,531) Mox Eden (60,818) LightlySeared (44,853) Crystalite13 (41,333) Lfstevens (34,909)
5k+
Articles[n 2]
Magnesium Cube (7) Cystalite13 (6) Lfstevens (5)
Mox Eden (5)
LightlySeared (4) Plattenum (2)
Augnablik (2)
Dhtwiki (2)
Wikieditor662 (2)
Jayowyn (2)
Oldest
Articles[n 3]
LightlySeared (19) Magnesium Cube (13) Plattenum (12) Smallestredboy (9) Dhtwiki (8)
Jayowyn (8)
Longest
Article[n 1][n 4]
Lfstevens (19,169) LightlySeared (14,077) Magnesium Cube (13,856) Augnablik (13,239) Wikieditor662 (10,932)
  1. ^ a b For requests and older articles, please include only the actual word count, without the 50% bonus.
  2. ^ Number of articles of 5,000 words or more. An article of 10K+ words counts as 2, of 15K+ as 3, and so on.
  3. ^ Oldest articles are those tagged in April, May, June, and July 2024.
  4. ^ The number of words in the longest article you copy edited. Only one entry for any editor.

Progress chart

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Progress chart
Date
  • Old articles
  • Apr–Sep 2024
  • Outstanding
  • tags
  • Change since
  • previous day
[N 1]
  • Change since
  • beginning
[N 1]
31 December 2025 241 1,747
1 January 2026 231 1,732 Positive decrease 15 Positive decrease 15
2 January 2026 225 1,706 Positive decrease 26 Positive decrease 41
3 January 2026 219 1,710 Negative increase  4 Positive decrease 37
4 January 2026 211 1,699 Positive decrease 11 Positive decrease 48
5 January 2026 203 1,684 Positive decrease 15 Positive decrease 63
6 January 2026 201 1,689 Negative increase  5 Positive decrease 58
7 January 2026 194 1,683 Positive decrease  6 Positive decrease 64
8 January 2026 190 1,684 Negative increase  1 Positive decrease 63
9 January 2026 189 1,678 Positive decrease  6 Positive decrease 69
10 January 2026 182 1,675 Positive decrease  3 Positive decrease 72
11 January 2026 180 1,673 Positive decrease  2 Positive decrease 74
12 January 2026 174 1,670 Positive decrease  3 Positive decrease 77
13 January 2026 168 1,666 Positive decrease  4 Positive decrease 81
14 January 2026 159 1,650 Positive decrease 16 Positive decrease 97
15 January 2026 156 1,643 Positive decrease  7 Positive decrease 104
16 January 2026 154 1,640 Positive decrease  3 Positive decrease 107
17 January 2026 150 1,647 Negative increase  7 Positive decrease 100
18 January 2026 146 1,641 Positive decrease  6 Positive decrease 106
19 January 2026 142 1,636 Positive decrease  5 Positive decrease 111
20 January 2026 138 1,635 Positive decrease  1 Positive decrease 112
21 January 2026 136 1,639 Negative increase  4 Positive decrease 108
22 January 2026 132 1,639 Steady  0 Positive decrease 108
23 January 2026 130 1,641 Negative increase  2 Positive decrease 106
24 January 2026 127 1,649 Negative increase  8 Positive decrease 98
25 January 2026 124 1,648 Positive decrease  1 Positive decrease 99
26 January 2026 119 1,635 Positive decrease 13 Positive decrease 112
27 January 2026 116 1,629 Positive decrease  6 Positive decrease 118
28 January 2026 113 1,620 Positive decrease  9 Positive decrease 127
29 January 2026 106 1,619 Positive decrease  1 Positive decrease 128
30 January 2026 103 1,620 Negative increase  1 Positive decrease 127
31 January 2026 102 1,636 Negative increase  16 Positive decrease 111
  1. ^ a b Change refers only to outstanding tags.

Reviewing

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GOCE coordinators and other experienced Guild members will carry out random checks to ensure that copy edits are of a satisfactory standard. If you are willing to help with reviewing, please sign up below.

10% of each participant's copy edits from the backlog should be checked, and all copy edits from the Requests page should be reviewed, time permitting. Please choose articles at random and do not inspect your own copy edits. After checking articles, place a {{checked}} template after the article on the listing and sign your username with four tildes (~~~~). If a rough consensus finds that a copy edit is not of an acceptable standard, the tag will be re-added and the editor will be penalized 1,200 words plus the word count of the reviewed article. The reviewer may give advice on how the edit could have been improved without penalizing the editor. Please raise any questions on the Coordinators' talk page.

Reviewers sign-up

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Signing up

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This drive has now concluded and is no longer open to sign-up.

Totals

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How to record articles you have copy edited:

  • Remove any extant {{copy edit}} tags from the article.
  • When you sign up, your section is automatically populated with # {{Working}} [[]] () and # {{Completed}} [[]] ():
    • Article titles go in wikilinks [[]]. List the article's full title (not an abbreviated version) and avoid piped links, quotation marks and italics.
    • Article word counts go in round brackets (): use this script to get the page's word count. Count the words in the version of the article that existed before you started editing. These brackets should not contain anything other than this number; do not use additional brackets for comments. Avoid long calculation strings (more than one line) in your word total.
  • Place the article you are editing on the {{Working}} line. Only work on one article at a time. When you've finished your copy edit, change {{Working}} to {{Completed}}.
  • If the article is from the GOCE Requests page, place *R (using plain text) after the word count. If it was tagged in April, May, June, July, August, and September 2024, place *O (using plain text) after the word count.
  • Place any comments between the article title and the word count.
  • Do not list articles on which you have placed {{GOCEreviewed}} instead of copy editing them, or which needed no copy editing.
  • Do not add the 50% bonus for Requests or Oldest articles—a coordinator will apply the bonuses after the drive is over.
  • If you want your work checked, you can request this on the drive talk page.

Properly completed records look like this in the edit window:

# {{Completed}} [[Dark chocolate]] (1,234) *O

and like this on the rendered page:

1.  Completed Dark chocolate (1,234) *O
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 2137
  • Rollover words: 1495
  • Total articles: 8
  • Total words: 23,438
  • Rollover words: 4521.5
  • Total articles: 6
  • Total words: 17,644
  • Rollover words: 2,182
  • Total articles: 2
  • Total words: 2613
  • Rollover words: 216
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 13
  • Total words: 66,531
  • Total articles: 11
  • Total words: 13595
  • Rollover words: 2502.5
  • Total articles: 12
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 18
  • Total words: 65077
  • Rollover words: 6141
  • Total articles: 5
  • Total words: 5090
  • Total articles: 14
  • Total words: 29885
  • Rollover words: 1131
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 20
  • Total words: 44853
  • Rollover words: 7855
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 2
  • Total words: 34,909
  • Total articles: 4
  • Total words: 8753
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Rollover words: 717
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 13
  • Total words: 30,948
  • Total articles: 4
  • Total words: 3282
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 4
  • Total words: 17150
  • Rollover words: 19689.5
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 2
  • Total words: 1220
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Rollover words: 1732
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 425
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 8
  • Total words: 10679
  • Rollover words: 832.5
  • Total articles: 4
  • Total words: 3,476
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 715
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 268
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 2043
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 2543
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 227
  • Rollover words: 2301
  • Total articles: 2
  • Total words: 3413
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 3101
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 1949
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 2
  • Total words: 3583
  • Total articles: 2
  • Total words: 21121
  • Rollover words: 6713
  • Total articles: 7
  • Total words: 4845
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 1373
  • Rollover words: 37702
  • Total articles: 6
  • Total words: 8829
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0
  • Total articles: 7
  • Total words: 41333
  • Rollover words: 3638
  • Total articles: 8
  • Total words: 21021
  • Total articles: 1
  • Total words: 2273
  • Total articles: 0
  • Total words: 0