The Article Feedback Tool project (AFT) was an experimental project of the Wikimedia Foundation. Article Feedback Version 5 (AFT5) was developed from November 2011 to June 2013, and tested in three pilots on the English, French and German Wikipedias. The goal of this AFT5 version was to engage readers to participate on Wikipedia -- and to help editors improve articles based on reader feedback. After careful review of pilot results, this project was discontinued in March 2014, as outlined in this report.

Here on the English Wikipedia, community members participating in an RfC in March 2013 recommended that the tool be implemented on a small-scale, opt-in basis, instead of being rolled out to every article. During a one-year period, feedback was enabled by editors on at least 4,005 articles, while it was also disabled on thousands of other articles by editors opposing this tool. In consultation with community and team members, the foundation removed the tool on March 3, 2014.

A new version of Article Feedback (AFT5) was released in April 2013 on the English, French and German Wikipedias, for evaluation by their communities. Article Feedback engages readers to make suggestions about articles they are reading — and invites editors to improve these articles based on this feedback. This version aims to surface useful feedback and increase editor productivity, with new features such better filters, simpler moderation tools and talk page integration.

AFT5 is available on an opt-in basis to editors interested in reader comments for articles they watch on the English Wikipedia. To enable feedback on articles you are working on, simply click "Enable feedback" in the Toolbox. Learn more in this project update. For tips on how to use this version, visit this testing page.

Learn more about the Article Feedback v5:

• watch this quick video tour
• read our walkthrough tutorial
• check our help page

You are invited to try out Article Feedback now, on one of these pages:

• article feedback form
• article feedback page
• central feedback page

Please let us know what you think of this new tool. We welcome your questions and suggestions on the Article Feedback Talk page.

The Wikimedia Foundation is now wrapping up new development for this project, fixing any critical bugs that remain, and will collect community suggestions through the end of the year on pilot sites like the French and English Wikipedias. To learn more about next steps about Article Feedback, check the 2013 release plan. The foundation would like to take this opportunity to thank all the Wikipedia community members who helped create Article feedback. We look forward to more collaborations on future editor engagement projects.

The Article Feedback Tool was initially deployed in 2010, and the previous version (V4) features a rating form at the bottom of each Wikipedia article, asking readers to "rate this page" on a scale from 1 to 5, using four different metrics: trustworthiness, objectivity, completeness and writing quality (see image). (Note that this earlier version AFTv4 has now been disabled on the English Wikipedia, at the community's request.) This version was intended to do two things: first, give the Wikipedia community a new tool for assessing article quality; second, provide a way for Wikipedia readers to get involved as editors. This tool enables anyone to rate a page, and some users are presented with a call to action asking "Did you know that you can edit this page?", with an edit button.

The Foundation is now recommending that Version 5 be used instead of Version 4, because it appears more effective as a reader engagement tool. AFT4 has been removed on the English Wikipedia.

The Wikimedia Foundation has involved the community at each step of the way during the development of this tool and is looking for more recommendations for future versions.

You're invited to give feedback about Article Feedback V5 on this article's Talk page.

To invite community participation during the development of this tool, the Foundation hosted many IRC chats during office hours, as outlined in the schedule below. We hope you will join us on future chats. In the meantime, here are logs of our earlier IRC chats on Oct. 27, Nov. 3, Nov. 10, Nov. 18 and Dec. 16, 2011 -- Jan. 6, Jan. 13, Jan. 20, Jan. 27 and Feb. 16, 2012.

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