Template talk:Infobox website

I'm going to do a repeat of @Verbcatcher's seemingly overlooked 2019 request for a parameter to complement launch_date (aka. date_of_launch), to represent the end date of a website. That is, the point in time at which the website stopped being online, or otherwise available to use, if this is known. This is not the same as the date of dissolution of the company – though they may be the same.

The main issue right now is that it isn't clear to a writer where in the infobox to put this information. Here are some examples picked at random:

• Justin.tv, Snip.it, Nupedia, Server.com use dissolved (which actually pairs founded, and refers to the company behind the website);
• MyDaughter, Pathfinder (website), Adequacy.org, Fabchannel.com use current_status (which, from my understanding, shouldn't contain a date);
• Google Lively, TwitPic, goatse.cx, Broadcast.com, MyCoke don't even have the information in the infobox.

There should be a clear-cut, single-purpose parameter – just like launch_date – representing this information. The name itself could be bikeshed. I personally like discontinued (maybe + _date), but there's lots of options: date_closed, close_date, date_of_closure, defunct (+ _date), [...]. I'm not super knowledgeable on this, but there's likely other templates with similar concepts whose parameter names Infobox Webiste could mimick.

"Doesn't current_status cover this use case?", you might ask. In my opinion, not exactly. Take Google Answers, for example. It has been read-only since 2006, but it's still online. The infobox currently reads "Current status: Online, and read only since December 2006". It could instead read something like: "Discontinued: December 2006 (N years ago)" and "Current status: Read-only". That is, instead of relying on current_status for both closure date and status, leave it communicating only the actual status of the website (closed, but still readable), and separate the date to a field of its own.

Hopefully this gets some traction this time! Cheers — Avelludo (Talk / Contribs / Log) 19:50, 6 October 2023 (UTC)Reply

Had a need for this just now for Elephind, which shut down recently. I opted to use dissolved, but it's not quite correct, because Elephind was a project by Veridian Software, and that company hasn't dissolved. The parameter itself wikilinks to "Dissolution (law)", which specifies it refers to a legal process – and there was no legal process, the website was just shut down. Am I being too nitpicky? Is this unreasonable or controversial? — Avelludo (Talk / Contribs / Log) 04:14, 15 December 2023 (UTC)Reply

Kinda surprised at the lack of attention this has gotten, but yeah I agree, having only a legal dissolution option and not just a regular date closed/shut down option is way too limiting. Ringtail Raider (talk) 05:59, 2 November 2024 (UTC)Reply

• Support. For the reasons cited above. Came across the Yahoo Photos article and had to go into the body of the article to find out when it was shut down and, from there, calculate for how long it was active. Dennis C. Abrams (talk) 17:30, 11 September 2024 (UTC)Reply
• Support. I came to this page to make the same proposal! And so did MB back in 2021. I suggest calling the parameter |discontinued= (partially to match discontinued date (P2669) on Wikidata) with label "Discontinued:", which should ideally have as a value {{end date and age}}, but could also just have a value of "Yes" if no editor knows or has bothered to figure out when it occurred. Daask (talk) 01:01, 4 January 2025 (UTC)Reply

Please can {{{image_upright}}} be added to the Check for unknown parameters list. It is used on line 9 of the template — GhostInTheMachine ^{talk to me} 23:24, 21 March 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Partly done: Renamed |image_upright= to |logo_upright= for consistency, as well. The Pirate Bay is the only article that uses the upright parameter. SWinxy (talk) 02:28, 23 March 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks. TPB was the one that turned up in my "evil infoboxen" report and triggered my request — GhostInTheMachine ^{talk to me} 08:12, 23 March 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hi, please change this codes

| titleclass = fn org
| title      = {{if empty|{{{name|}}}|{{{company_name|}}}|{{{websitename|}}}|<includeonly>{{PAGENAMEBASE}}</includeonly>}}

to this code:

| aboveclass = fn org
| above      = {{if empty|{{{name|}}}|{{{company_name|}}}|{{{websitename|}}}|<includeonly>{{PAGENAMEBASE}}</includeonly>}}

sandboxed here. Thanks, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 15:11, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Can the label for the business type be renamed to company type? This will bring it in line closer to {{Infobox company}}, as many websites and apps are managed by an eponymous company. This change will bring these two infoboxes closer to uniformity.

Sylphoid (talk) 18:22, 21 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{Edit template-protected}} template. I am not opposed to this change, but let's see if anyone wants to discuss it. If there are no comments in a week, please reactivate the request. – Jonesey95 (talk) 12:30, 22 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Having something labeled as "current" without context clearly goes against WP:RELTIME. I notice someone above commenting that they understood this field shouldn't contain a date; I would argue that a date should be mandatory.

Websites are often ephemeral, and Wikipedia articles often fall into disrepair. A status of "Active" without an "as of" date is not helpful. NapoliRoma (talk) 18:37, 30 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

... or we remove the field outright. There already is a field for a dissolution date, so we don't really need an extra field explaining that the dissolution date indicates a dissolution. IceWelder [✉] 19:13, 30 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

In the comment:

...set as "on", "y", etc, otherwise omit/leave blank. Does nothing for mobile users...

Can we add a trailing "." after "etc"? JS Wiki Browser/AutoWikiBrowser's regex is constantly complaining about it. I guess I could delete the comment on pages altogether, but might as well solve this forward for future users, imo. Smallangryplanet (talk) 13:08, 7 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

👍. IceWelder [✉] 17:36, 7 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks @IceWelder! Smallangryplanet (talk) 17:52, 7 August 2025 (UTC)Reply