Reviewing featured articles This page is for the review and improvement of featured articles (FAs) that may no longer meet the featured article criteria. FAs are held to the current standards regardless of when they were promoted. There are three requisite stages in the process, to which all users are welcome to contribute. 1. Raise issues at the article's talk page
2. Featured article review (FAR)
3. Featured article removal candidate (FARC)
The FAR and FARC stages typically last two to three weeks, or longer where changes are ongoing and it seems useful to continue the process. Nominations are moved from the review period to the removal list, unless it is very clear that editors feel the article is within criteria. Given that extensions are always granted on request, as long as the article is receiving attention, editors should not be alarmed by an article moving from review to the removal candidates' list. To contact the FAR coordinators, please leave a message on the FAR talk page, or use the {{@FAR}} notification template elsewhere. Older reviews are stored in the archive. Table of Contents – This page: , Checklinks, Check redirects, Dablinks |
Featured article candidates (FAC) Today's featured article (TFA):
Featured article tools: |
Nominating an article for FAR The number of FARs that can be placed on the page is limited as follows:
Nominators are strongly encouraged to assist in the process of improvement; they should not nominate articles that are featured on the main page (or have been featured there in the previous three days) and should avoid segmenting review pages. Three to six months is regarded as the minimum time between promotion and nomination here, unless there are extenuating circumstances such as a radical change in article content.
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Featured article reviews
Gettysburg Address
- Notified: Kaisershatner, Donaldecoho, Tedickey, BartBenjamin, North Shoreman, WP American politics, WP Pennsylvania, WP US Presidents, talk page notification 2020-11-29
This 2005 promotion was last reviewed in 2008. It has uncited text, poor sources, dead links and incomplete citations. It has good bones, and a tune-up might see it through FAR if someone takes an interest. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:56, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Ecclesiastical heraldry
This August 2006 promotion has not been reviewed since and has significant amounts of uncited text. While some work occurred in mid-December, things have stalled since then, and it will take some heavy work finding the exact references used and making sure things haven't crept in. Hog Farm Talk 01:39, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Paul Stastny
- Notified: Maxim, Serte, WikiProject Biography/Sports and games, WikiProject Olympics, WikiProject Ice Hockey, Noticed 2021-03-14
I am nominating this featured article for review because the "Career" section needs to be summarized (specifically the Colorado Avalanche section), the "Style of play" section does not cite sources published post-2007, and there are some statements that need citations. Edits have not been made to the article since it was noticed. Z1720 (talk) 20:13, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- I 100% agree with this re-review and will be working to improve it. Not only does the Avalanche section need work but his ~4 season St. Louis Blues career is discussed in one paragraph! It definitely needs a lot of work on the more recent section but I believe I have added sources for everything.HickoryOughtShirt?4 (talk) 22:20, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Just a quick note to acknowledge that I've seen this FAR. I don't have a particularly strong motivation or interest to work in the topic area. That said, I'm very glad to see that HickoryOughtShirt?4 has taken an interest in the article. Maxim(talk) 13:34, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
Anna Laetitia Barbauld
- Notified: Carbon Caryatid, Bmcln1, Iridescent, WP England, WP Bio, WP Children's literature, WP Poetry, WP Women's History, WP Women writers, 2021-02-28
This is a 2007 FAR whose main editor is deceased. When noticed for a FAR at the end of February, the article had uncited text and original research.[1] I asked other editors if they had the sources to begin repair, but found no one able to take on the task. Subsequently, other editors pointed out that this article had earned for Wikipedia a spot in the journal literature, saying it spread inaccuracies, since corrected. [2] A new editor fixed some of them, but the article still has uncited text, original research, and now missing page numbers. Salvaging this requires access to a number of sources to sort out original research from citable text, and get the page numbers correct. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:01, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- This statement in the third para of the lead is lacking context: “Barbauld's reputation was further damaged when many of the Romantic poets ... “ The lead could benefit from expansion. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:35, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
Paul Kagame
- Notified: Amakuru, WikiProject Africa, WikiProject Military history, WikiProject Biography, WikiProject Politics, WikiProject Rwanda, 2020-11-11 talk page
I am nominating this featured article for review because I raised issues on the talk page about NPOV and comprehensiveness, but did not receive a response.
One of the major issues with this article is that it neglects recent scholarship that analyzes the post-war situation in Rwanda. I made a long list on the talk page of various sources, at least some of which ought to be cited in the article. (t · c) buidhe 04:01, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Comment - In addition to the comments made by Buidhe at the talk page, I'll note that some of the info is straight up outdated. Under "Foreign Policy", the section on the Democratic Republic of the Congo gives a little too much detail on Laurent Kabila's death—why we need to know of its exact circumstances here befuddles me, as it's not as if Kagame was directly involved. There is also little talk of the rumoured deployment of Rwandan soldiers in Congolese territory, or of Kagame's efforts at a rapproachment with the DRC government under President Tshisekedi since 2019 (some detail on that here). For the Uganda section, there is no mention of the Rwanda/Uganda dispute of 2019. More on Kagame's personal relationship with Museveni could also be helpful (see previous source). American relations with Kigali have also improved since the 2012 freeze. His relationship with Burundi is also worth some exploration, considering the historical spillover of the Hutu-Tutsi conflict there and accusations that Kagame has tried to destabilize the country's government. -Indy beetle (talk) 07:03, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Comment - whoah Buidhe, isn't it customary to do informal discussions before initiating a formal review? Please can I request that we close this FAR, and we can move to addressing issues more informally. This is what I've seen with other FAs I've been involved with. I'm sure we can deal with the issues raised, but I'm not very happy that you've sprung this on me out of the blue. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 09:35, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Looking now I see that buidhe only left their concerns about the Kagame article on the talk page less than a week ago, which makes the time between the first questions about problems to the FAR less than the standard time normally left for people to address concerns there. While I do think this article does have some major areas for improvement, I could see this being moved to the talk page for the time being. -Indy beetle (talk) 12:39, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Amakuru I did follow the instructions: "In this step, concerned editors attempt to directly resolve issues with the existing community of article editors, and to informally improve the article. Concerned editors should give article watchers 5–7 days to respond to concerns." I both made efforts to improve the article and waited the required period. (t · c) buidhe 14:59, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Buidhe: how was I supposed to fix the issues you raised in 5 days? On fact I hadn't seven seen the talk page note until today, and as I said on the talk page today I am willing to work on the article and make the improvements you and Indy are suggesting, but this is likely to take months unfortunately as I don't have huge amounts of time to spare. Maybe SandyGeorgia can advise, as I've worked on other FAs with her, but generally in previous cases time is given to work through issues before FAR, something you haven't given me here. I can see where you're coming from on the article issues, but this bolt from the blue on an article I worked hard on, has honestly ruined my day and left me feeling quite despondent. Please let's come to an understanding on this. Thanks — Amakuru (talk) 15:37, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Amakuru my apologies for iPad typing, long medical appts today. Nikkimaria put this on hold so you can have additional time. I have an advantage that Buidhe may not have which is 15 years of knowing who will do the work ;) I know if I ping certain editors or visit their talk, they will bring articles to standard. One thing Buidhe might do going forward is check whether past-FAC nominators are still active, but Nikkimaria has granted time here and removed the FAR from the WP:FAR page. Probably giving Nikkimaria an idea of what time you need will be good. Please do not let this ruin your day, as time is always granted at FAR. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:03, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- I apologize. I assumed that you had seen the post on the talk page but lost interest in the article, because you did not reply. However, as long as improvements are ongoing then please take as much time as necessary. (t · c) buidhe 17:07, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Thanks Sandy and Buidhe. Unfortunately I did miss the talk page notification, and even the subsequent changes that you already made to the article. Probably a sign that I've got too much crap on my watchlist! I feel like it would be very useful to notify regular contributors and/or the FAC nominator at the time of the talk page notice, as well as when the formal FAR is opened. Maybe I'll propose that on the project talk page, unless there are good reasons for not doing so. Anyway, I'll do my best to make progress on updating and making the article more neutral, as time allows. Any tips or assistance from yourself would be gratefully received as well, Buidhe. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 20:58, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- I apologize. I assumed that you had seen the post on the talk page but lost interest in the article, because you did not reply. However, as long as improvements are ongoing then please take as much time as necessary. (t · c) buidhe 17:07, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Amakuru my apologies for iPad typing, long medical appts today. Nikkimaria put this on hold so you can have additional time. I have an advantage that Buidhe may not have which is 15 years of knowing who will do the work ;) I know if I ping certain editors or visit their talk, they will bring articles to standard. One thing Buidhe might do going forward is check whether past-FAC nominators are still active, but Nikkimaria has granted time here and removed the FAR from the WP:FAR page. Probably giving Nikkimaria an idea of what time you need will be good. Please do not let this ruin your day, as time is always granted at FAR. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:03, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Buidhe: how was I supposed to fix the issues you raised in 5 days? On fact I hadn't seven seen the talk page note until today, and as I said on the talk page today I am willing to work on the article and make the improvements you and Indy are suggesting, but this is likely to take months unfortunately as I don't have huge amounts of time to spare. Maybe SandyGeorgia can advise, as I've worked on other FAs with her, but generally in previous cases time is given to work through issues before FAR, something you haven't given me here. I can see where you're coming from on the article issues, but this bolt from the blue on an article I worked hard on, has honestly ruined my day and left me feeling quite despondent. Please let's come to an understanding on this. Thanks — Amakuru (talk) 15:37, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Amakuru I did follow the instructions: "In this step, concerned editors attempt to directly resolve issues with the existing community of article editors, and to informally improve the article. Concerned editors should give article watchers 5–7 days to respond to concerns." I both made efforts to improve the article and waited the required period. (t · c) buidhe 14:59, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Looking now I see that buidhe only left their concerns about the Kagame article on the talk page less than a week ago, which makes the time between the first questions about problems to the FAR less than the standard time normally left for people to address concerns there. While I do think this article does have some major areas for improvement, I could see this being moved to the talk page for the time being. -Indy beetle (talk) 12:39, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- On hold to allow for more time for discussion at talk. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:20, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Amakuru: Could we get an update on status? Nikkimaria (talk) 20:13, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Nikkimaria: apologies, I've lost momentum a bit on this one since January when Sandy last checked in with me but it hasn't slipped my mind. I will make it a priority in the next few days/week to carry on working through the article checking all the sections for updates based on the new sources. Once I'm done with that I'll check back in with Buidhe for any further suggestions or problems they may spot. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 10:04, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Amakuru and Nikkimaria: monthly check in. It has now been four months; can we please get this back on the page to get it moving? Buidhe how is it looking to you? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:47, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
- Since the start of the review I have made updates to the sections on the civil war and the genocide, to bring in material mentioned in Caplan's paper. I've also added bits to the "domestic situation" covering the exile and death of Sendashonga , and the subject of RPF killings/Kibeho is reiterated there. In presidency, there's a decent discussion on the circumstances of Kagame's taking over from Bizimungu, with the predominant argument that the latter was forced out and mentioning his later address, but also giving a brief mention to the version of events of Kagame himself, as relayed to Kinzer. Additional things that I think will need doing:
- Maybe rework "Congo wars" a bit so that the motives behind the wars are more objectively described.
- In presidency, more discussion on the claims of domestic human rights infringements.
- Some reworking of "personality and public image" to remove bits that at this point look somewhat biased in PK's favour, and also discuss differing views about whether he's truly popular within Rwanda. (I don't think we can give a definitive answer on that one way or the other, so just have to present whatever evidence exists).
- Obviously I'll be keen to hear Buidhe's views on what the next steps should be as well. — Amakuru (talk) 21:46, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
- So ... it sounds like we can now bring it back to an active FAR, so we can get other opinions and keep moving forward (towards closing a four-month-old FAR)? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:49, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
- Since the start of the review I have made updates to the sections on the civil war and the genocide, to bring in material mentioned in Caplan's paper. I've also added bits to the "domestic situation" covering the exile and death of Sendashonga , and the subject of RPF killings/Kibeho is reiterated there. In presidency, there's a decent discussion on the circumstances of Kagame's taking over from Bizimungu, with the predominant argument that the latter was forced out and mentioning his later address, but also giving a brief mention to the version of events of Kagame himself, as relayed to Kinzer. Additional things that I think will need doing:
- @Amakuru and Nikkimaria: monthly check in. It has now been four months; can we please get this back on the page to get it moving? Buidhe how is it looking to you? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:47, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Nikkimaria: apologies, I've lost momentum a bit on this one since January when Sandy last checked in with me but it hasn't slipped my mind. I will make it a priority in the next few days/week to carry on working through the article checking all the sections for updates based on the new sources. Once I'm done with that I'll check back in with Buidhe for any further suggestions or problems they may spot. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 10:04, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
I think that the "elections" section could use more perspective. For instance, I don't think there's any reliable source which says that the elections aren't rigged, but that doesn't clearly come across. Scholarly sources explain why the elections occur the way they do:
Around the 2017 Rwandan election, many journalists phoned us to discuss the polls, and most asked the same question: Why does President Paul Kagame bother holding elections at all? He had already won a fantastical 93 per cent of the vote in the 2013 election, and he had eliminated presidential term limits in 2010 meaning that he was legally allowed to stay in power until 2034. So why did he go through the motions of organizing a national poll that he was predestined to win? Why not just get rid of elections altogether?
When Kagame went on to take 99 per cent of the vote, these questions became even more pertinent.18 Kagame had clearly not even bothered to try and manipulate the election in the clever ways described in previous chapters. Yet even in spite of this, he benefited from polls that had become little more than a political charade.
Most obviously, even the stage-managed 2017 contest was important to secure a base level of international legitimacy. While counterfeit democrats often behave arbitrarily, they like to be seen to be men – with a small number of exceptions they are almost always men – of order and responsibility. This means that leaders want to make it look as if they are following the rule of law even when they are not. Kagame is no exception. (Yale UP, How to Rig an Election, pp. 214–215)
Later on the same page, the authors mention that not even pretending to hold elections will get a country kicked out of the African Union. (google books link)
Waldorf also discusses how "the RPF ensures that elections are neither free nor fair", and the historical background on why:
As a rebel movement, the RPF had difficulty attracting Hutu recruits despite its inclusive ideology and its prominent Hutu spokesmen. The RPF conducted an electoral campaign for mayors in the demilitarized north in 1993 but Habyarimana’s party took all the posts. “The RPF realized then that it stood no chance in an open political contest"
With regards to vote-rigging he states the following:
Similarly, Simpser (2013: xv) points out how “[m]anipulating elections excessively and blatantly [i.e. beyond what is necessary to win] can make the manipulating party appear stronger”. This helps explain Kagame winning more than 90% and the RPF more than 75% of the vote. Such vote tallies are not meant to be convincing; rather, they are meant to signal to potential opponents and the populace that Kagame and the RPF are in full control.
In an article called Behind the Façade of Rwanda's Elections [3](you can access through TWL) Reyntjens states:
Rwanda is a de facto one party state. The RPF maintains its political monopoly through intimidation, threats, human rights abuses, and the elimination of dissent. The regime fully controls the political landscape from the national to the local level. This control is exercised by an elite composed of the minority Tutsi ethnic group, and causes resentment and frustration among the Hutu majority. The RPF is fully aware that opening up the political system would eventually lead to a loss of power.
There's another interesting article, "Entrenched Dictatorship: The Politics of Rigged Elections in Rwanda since 1994"[4] by Susan Thomson and Madeline Hopper
Right now the article is structured to focus on the campaigns, which is the correct structure if these are typical electoral contests where both sides have a chance to win. Instead, I would add an overview with scholarly analysis on the overall strategy and give less detail on the individual campaigns, because the outcome actually is decided in advance. (t · c) buidhe 02:33, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Buidhe: I've rewritten the elections section this morning - it now has two paragraphs of general discussion at the top, as you suggested. I've then reduced the discussion on each individual election to a couple of paragraphs each. I think it's still worth keeping those, as each election did receive widespread coverage worldwide and there were different players around on each occasion, even if the general narratives are similar. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 12:10, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Relisted at FAR, over four months now since this FAR was opened. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:12, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- Right now I am seeing an issue with WP:FACR#4, length (well over 10,000 words, and the most obvious thing to trim would be the election section as each one has its own article) and some lingering false balance issues (#1d), such as "Assassination allegations" attributed to Human Rights Watch, when I'm not sure there's any reliable source that disputes that the Rwandan government has carried out assassinations. Most scholarly sources state that RPF carried out assassinations after the civil war as a fact, including [5][6][7] (not to mention the new book Do Not Disturb). (t · c) buidhe 12:27, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Sviatoslav I
- Notified: Briangotts, Ghirlandajo, Beit Or, WP Biography, WP Military history, WP Russia, WP Ukraine, WP Belarus, WP Bulgaria, WP Romania, WP Middle Ages, WP Norse history, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Politics, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Greece, 2021-02-25
This 2006 promotion really goes to show how much FAC standards have changed. In November 2006, the FAC had a whopping 16 supports. Now, it's not even that close to the criteria. There's large swaths of uncited text, some of what appear to be the references are really just uncited notes, and unclear citations such as "Primary Chronicle _____." Additionally, since the FA promotion, the layout of the article has declined. There are now multiple collapsed navboxes hidden in section, and at least on my system, MOS:SANDWICH is everywhere. Hog Farm Talk 23:25, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- The references are a complete mess, inconsistent reference style, heavily relying on primary sources, uncited notes. Seeing that the Russian WP article is GA with multiple uncited sections I don't see how this article can be restored to FA standards in the foreseeable future. I am going to go with delist on this one.--Catlemur (talk) 21:52, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - the referencing is seriously lacking, and there's been very little engagement. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 06:00, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
FairTax
- Notified: Morphh, WikiProject Business, WikiProject Economics, WikiProject United States, WikiProject Politics, diff for talk page notification
I am nominating this featured article for review because, as stated by Hog Farm on the talk page,
This article does not currently meet the current featured article criteria. There is an outstanding maintenance tag, bits of uncited text, and heavy use of advocacy sources instead of scholarly sources. I have concerns about the sheer amount of sourcing here to advocacy groups, political action groups, and sources that clearly take sides on this debate, such as "Fair Tax: The Truth: Answering the Critics" and sources with titles like " "The U.S. Corporate Income Tax System: Once a World Leader, Now A Millstone Around the Neck of American Business". I have serious concerns about the quality of this article.
There has also been a POV tag on the article for a year, which is a bad look when paired with a star. (t · c) buidhe 16:32, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- I see Devonian Wombat has removed the "Millstone" source, which is an improvement, but only scratches the surface. As an additional comment, Bartlett holds the fringey viewpoint that FairTax is a Scientologist plot, so it seems like the usage of Bartlett should be trimmed/avoided for this subject. Hog Farm Talk 01:14, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - One dodgy source removed, but no progress since and the sourcing is not up to what is generally expected for FAs. Hog Farm Talk 01:54, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Order of St Patrick
- Notified: Lord Emsworth, Dr pda, Yomangani, Judgesurreal777, WikiProject England, WikiProject Orders, decorations, and medals, WikiProject Numismatics, WikiProject Ireland, 2021-03-31
I am nominating this featured article for review because there are uncited statements in the article, there are too many images that need to be trimmed and the references contain unformatted links (ref 16) and original research (ref 5). Note: there was an FAR conducted in 2006 under a previous name, which can be found at Wikipedia:Featured article review/Order of St. Patrick/archive1. Z1720 (talk) 20:00, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
British anti-invasion preparations of the Second World War
I am nominating this featured article for review because there are uncited paragraphs and sentences, the lede doesn't summarize the article, the format of references is inconsistent and short paragraphs needs to be merged with other sections. Z1720 (talk) 18:56, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
- Just a note that there is significant ongoing work to improve the citations. I'm hoping this one can be saved, given a bit of time - Dumelow (talk) 09:38, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Since Dumelow is also engaged in War of the Fifth Coalition's FAR, can we put this on hold until Fifth Coalition is complete? Z1720 (talk) 14:33, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Hold in FAR stage- significant work is being done, and with the Fifth Coalition winding down, there may be more available energy to throw at this one soon. Hog Farm Talk 16:40, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comment: G'day, I am trying to help out as best I can, but unfortunately I am limited to online sources as I am away from home. One of the hamstringing aspects of this is that often I can only get a snippet view of some Google Books entries. I have found this: London's Armed Police: 1829 to the Present - Page 105[8]. It might reference the paragraph ending "Thames division had the smallest rifle allocation with 61, and "S" Division the largest with 190. Fifty rifles were also issued to the London Fire Brigade, and Port of London Authority Police", but I can't tell how much of the paragraph it references because I can only see the snippet. Also, I am a bit concerned that our article might paraphrase the source a bit too closely. Can anyone see more than a snippet to check? Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 05:41, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- Hi AustralianRupert, I suspect I can only see the same snippet as you: "Thames Division had the smallest allocation - 61 rifles and ' S ' Division the highest with 190 . Fifty rifles were also issued to the London Fire Brigade and 100 to the Port of London Authority Police . As training ammunition was not available a..."? It was added by User:Police,Mad,Jack, who might be able to help, though they seem to only be sporadically active since 2010. I've been thinking about this paragraph and reckon it should probably be trimmed back a lot. It deals only with London: in September 1939 there were 40,000 police officers in other forces including the important southern and eastern coastal regions. What were their preparations? I think a brief summary that the police took over as armed guard at some locations, releasing troops for anti-invasion duties, would suffice. Also, if we can find anything discussing their proposed role in an invasion, our article implies they would join the fight alongside the armed forces - Dumelow (talk) 06:59, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- Cheers, yes, that is all I can see -- was hoping that it might have been a geographic limitation on Google Books -- sometimes those in different locations can view more than I can. I think your suggestion to trim this paragraph would be fine. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:23, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- Hi AustralianRupert, I suspect I can only see the same snippet as you: "Thames Division had the smallest allocation - 61 rifles and ' S ' Division the highest with 190 . Fifty rifles were also issued to the London Fire Brigade and 100 to the Port of London Authority Police . As training ammunition was not available a..."? It was added by User:Police,Mad,Jack, who might be able to help, though they seem to only be sporadically active since 2010. I've been thinking about this paragraph and reckon it should probably be trimmed back a lot. It deals only with London: in September 1939 there were 40,000 police officers in other forces including the important southern and eastern coastal regions. What were their preparations? I think a brief summary that the police took over as armed guard at some locations, releasing troops for anti-invasion duties, would suffice. Also, if we can find anything discussing their proposed role in an invasion, our article implies they would join the fight alongside the armed forces - Dumelow (talk) 06:59, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
Did anyone want to take a crack at the uncited section on the RAF? I don't have much interest in aerial warfare but it seems pretty non-contentious, and hopefully easy to cite - Dumelow (talk) 08:29, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- My wife sent me some scans from my copies of Hough & Richards' The Battle of Britain and Parker's work of the same name; unfortunately, while they imply some of these points, they don't really explicitly support most points in this paragraph. Sorry, there probably isn't much more I can add here. I'm sorry. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 10:02, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
St Kilda, Scotland
- Notified: Ben MacDui, WikiProject Scotland WikiProject Scottish Islands, WikiProject UK geography [9]
I am nominating this featured article for review because there are unsourced statements, poor quality sources, repetition of sources when cite bundling should be used, missing urls, bare urls, missing titles, dead links, stubby paragraphs that should be merged, disconnected lists of trivia in the final sub-section, and the lead is in breach of the Manual of Style. Talk page notice a month ago[10] was ignored. DrKay (talk) 17:44, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
- @DrKay: Apologies for not seeing the St K. talk page. I am relatively inactive these days but do drop by my talk page a couple of times a month so thanks for letting me know there. This was my first FA and unlike the last review the topic is much less likely to need ten years of new information. I very much doubt that many of the other early contributors will drop by here so I will do what I can to fix things. The main issue for me is timing - I may be a bit slow to respond and the weekends are generally the only times I can put any serious effort in. Ben MacDui 14:34, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- Glad to hear you will dig in, Ben MacDui; please ping me as you progress if there is some way I can be helpful. Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:55, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- I have made a start but oh dear - I had hoped that going through and fixing the obviously deficient refs might be a way to start but so much extra information has been added - some in in appropriate sections - that I fear this is going to be a long haul. "Wikipedia: the encyclopedia that anyone can mangle". Splendid. Ben MacDui 14:19, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Time is always allowed at FAR: just keep us posted, and let me know if I can help. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:51, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- I have made a start but oh dear - I had hoped that going through and fixing the obviously deficient refs might be a way to start but so much extra information has been added - some in in appropriate sections - that I fear this is going to be a long haul. "Wikipedia: the encyclopedia that anyone can mangle". Splendid. Ben MacDui 14:19, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Glad to hear you will dig in, Ben MacDui; please ping me as you progress if there is some way I can be helpful. Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:55, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- @DrKay: Apologies for not seeing the St K. talk page. I am relatively inactive these days but do drop by my talk page a couple of times a month so thanks for letting me know there. This was my first FA and unlike the last review the topic is much less likely to need ten years of new information. I very much doubt that many of the other early contributors will drop by here so I will do what I can to fix things. The main issue for me is timing - I may be a bit slow to respond and the weekends are generally the only times I can put any serious effort in. Ben MacDui 14:34, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- Already, certain problems jump out of the screen to me, and I haven't even read the full thing
- Many incomplete citations, particularly those that are just a title and link
- "It has been known for some time" This is too vague and informal
- "The first written record of St Kilda may date from 1202" In which researcher's viewpoint? This isn't a sentence that defines a fact, "may" implies the date isn't definitely known and has to depend on the research of authorities in a field to pinpoint this. They need attribution
- Looking at the other parts of this article, there are attribution problems like this, especially in the "Toponym" section; it might've come from this, it might've come from that, it might've started from here, and similar statements. These are not facts, and each hypothesis gets one to two citations, meaning they're liking not widespread enough to be taken as a fact we should accept as the prose in its current condition wants us to.
- "At 670 hectares (1,700 acres) in extent, Hirta is the largest island in the group" Wait, by group do you mean St. Kilda? Who thinks of group as synonymous of archipelago? Is this just my ignorance in geography terminology? Can someone let me know?... Please?
- The final half of "Evacuation and aftermath" is just a set of short paragraphs about random topics. I'm sure they're essential to the article, but man is this not a cohesive structure.
- Why does "Tourism" gets its own section independent of history, yet info on the health care system, military equipment, and a history of native citizens are placed clunkily in a non-cohesive history section.
- There's a fricking citation needed tag in "Other Islands."
- "Declining population" Oh man, the problems with... a- ju- just the problems, I mean, gosh, this hurts
- "In 1764 (according to the Census),[86] there were 90 St Kindans, 105 in 1841, and 112 in 1851." The problem with this sentence is so obvious. There's no consistent flow to this. In fact, I'll fix it right now: "According to Census reports, there were 90 St. Kindans in 1764, 105 in 1841, and 112 in 1851."
- This is just an indiscriminate list of numbers per year with no analysis to make it interesting or engaging
- I think there are other parts of this article where this short-ass section could be merged, such during the history section there are reasons attributed to the declining population of the island
- To put it simply, another outdated promotion from more than 10 years ago that doesn't deserve its FA status, kind of like two other articles I've nominated for review a film with the "THIS! IS! SPARTA!" meme and lots of blood and gore, and a game starring a thicc Mario where, if you're an alpha speedrunner, you could BLJ up the stairs. The original FA nominator still seems to be active, so I'm interested to hear from him. HumanxAnthro (talk) 01:04, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- This is an inappropriate tone for FAR. Please dial it back, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:51, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- If it came off that way, I apologize, but what part of the tone was inappropriate? Looks like a typical FAR to me. HumanxAnthro (talk) 14:06, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- I will summarize later on your talk, but in short, there is nothing typical about your tone on these FARs, and it is unacceptable; I hope it stops. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:12, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- If it came off that way, I apologize, but what part of the tone was inappropriate? Looks like a typical FAR to me. HumanxAnthro (talk) 14:06, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- This is an inappropriate tone for FAR. Please dial it back, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:51, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC The last edit to the article was March 28. After reviewing the article, I have some concerns including a bloated History section, no information about the history of the island from 1957-2009, many small paragraphs throughout the article that need to be merged or deleted, and a large "Further reading" section that should be evaluated for their inclusion as sources in the article. Z1720 (talk) 23:03, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
- Ben MacDui, could we get a status update? Nikkimaria (talk) 01:26, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Chetwynd, British Columbia
- Notified: KenWalker, Maclean25, WP Cities, WP British Columbia, WP Canada, WP Canadian communities, 2020-10-25 When closing, note for recordkeeping purposes, this is a re-promoted WP:FFA.
This is a 2007 promotion that has not been maintained to standard. There is uncited text, MOS:CURRENT issues, and portions that need to be updated-- a couple of samples only:
- It has recently been renovated and now contains a rock climbing wall, indoor walking track and fitness center.[citation needed] Smart Growth BC ranked the town as one of BC's most livable municipalities in 2004, due mainly to its large park spaces.
- The current mayor, Allen Courtoreille, was first elected in 2018. He was preceded by Merlin Nichol (2011-2018) and Evan Saugstad (2003-2011). The city funds a volunteer fire department, which services the town and nearby rural communities. It also maintains the sewer, water, local road, sidewalk, street lighting, animal control, building inspection, park, and recreation services.
Citations need to be cleaned up and standardized for missing information and date consistency. If someone will take on improvements, this should not be hard to restore, but the deficiencies have stood in spite of a notice last October. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:48, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
- As the principal author, I will strive to make worthwhile edits but I am not seeking to retain FA-status. Thanks. maclean (talk) 16:56, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Maclean25 and Mattximus: thanks for the considerable work. [11] Is this ready for a fresh look, or is there more to come? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:48, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think the demographics section is not comprehensive enough to be at featured article standard. There should be a few sentences on language/ethnic groups, basic demographic things. Also I checked the first source but it failed to provide the number quoted in the sentence. The second sentence is unsourced and I cannot find that reference using google. It's certainly not horrible but that section does need a bit of work. Mattximus (talk) 19:23, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- OK I rewrote the second paragraph and added information which I now think is comprehensive enough for a featured article (I hope the wording is correct). I still have the two outstanding sourcing issues from the first paragraph that I cannot solve, but now the content of that section is essentially complete. Mattximus (talk) 20:01, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think the demographics section is not comprehensive enough to be at featured article standard. There should be a few sentences on language/ethnic groups, basic demographic things. Also I checked the first source but it failed to provide the number quoted in the sentence. The second sentence is unsourced and I cannot find that reference using google. It's certainly not horrible but that section does need a bit of work. Mattximus (talk) 19:23, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Maclean25 and Mattximus: thanks for the considerable work. [11] Is this ready for a fresh look, or is there more to come? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:48, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comments for HumanxAnthro
- Honestly, while I will take Sandy's word that this article may need improvements, I don't it's quite in the red zone and I think it's held up extremely well for a 2007 FA. There are issues to make about the cite formatting (inconsistent date formats and whether sources like Statistics Canada have their names italicized or not), but it mostly looks put-together, plus I only noticed one uncited statement: "The area's native tree species include deciduous balsam poplar and coniferous spruce and pine. Many fur-bearing animals—deer, moose, elk, beaver, and bear—comprise the region's mammalian wildlife. Three creeks run south through town. Windrem Creek—which flows down from Ol' Baldy Mountain—and Widmark Creek both flow into Centurion Creek, which itself drains south into the Pine River." Plus, all the sources used appear to be reliable, with government census data and newspaper articles and the like. The prose also looks well-organized and easy to understand, so if the MOS:CURRENT issues and sourcing is fixed, I think it's got a strong chance of being an FA. 👨x🐱 (talk) 14:43, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- This article was compiled in a time when FAC's expectations for citations were more closely aligned with Wikipedia:When to cite so everything should be in the references section but only cited when necessary. To HumanxAnthro's question, the list of animals all comes from the biogeoclimatic references earlier in the paragraph (except for the names of the watercourses which can be easily found on maps). I have made some edits to update and replace some refs, use cites to better explain where content is coming from, and generally provide some content updates. City articles tend to suffer from demands for recentism (understandable for an FA) so I have also tried to future-proof it better. For future editors, to improve this article better use of its local newspaper, the Chetwynd Echo, should be made but its articles are not currently in a searchable database. Similarly, I understand its history book, History Book Saga of Little Prairie-Chetwynd, was updated in 2012. I am okay with it moving to FARC and being de-listed. It was among WP's best city-articles during its day but there are better ones now and I am only going to update it less frequently as the years go by. Thanks. maclean (talk) 16:56, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- What to do? The article has been cleaned up, but Maclean25 indicates they don't plan to keep up going forward. We can't delist an article because of what might happen going forward :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:15, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
Military history of Puerto Rico
- Notified: Marine 69-71, WikiProject Military history, WikiProject Puerto Rico, WikiProject Caribbean, diff for talk page notification
I am nominating this featured article for review because as stated on talk, the article has multiple issues:
- At 17,511 words the article is too long and it needs to be cut almost in half to reach the recommended length, perhaps by using summary style and shifting material to sub-articles.
- The article cites questionable sources such as http://mayaguezsabeamango.com/images/documentos/capital.pdf .
- Some sources don't have page numbers, and a consistent citation format is not used.
- The lead doesn't meet MOS:LEAD.
- There's considerable unsourced content.
The response to these concerns was to state that there's nothing wrong with the article.[12] Article was last reviewed in 2006; at the time, it was only 7992 words long, so the greater part of the article has never been reviewed at all. (t · c) buidhe 04:05, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Skimming the page, because its too long, I agree that its too long, many sources don't have page numbers, there's a lot of unsourced content and also there's content that just doesn't need to be there like the list of units at Ramey Air Force Base and tables of medals awarded to the 65th Infantry Regiment in WWII and the Korean War. So clear fails on 1c. and 4 of the FAC Mztourist (talk) 04:29, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Extended commentary moved to talk. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:58, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- This is what our well respected editors and Wikipedia Foundation had to say about the article. Tony the Marine (talk) 04:45, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
Comments by Nick-D I've long considered this article problematic, and agree that a FAR is in order. I'd like to offer the following comments:
- The article is clearly too long, and includes obviously bloated material.
- Some structural examples of bloat are:
- The 'Puerto Rican commander in the Philippines' section, which seems to cover only a single Puerto Rican
- The 'Second Nicaraguan Campaign (1926–33)' section, which has multiple paras on a handful of Puerto Ricans performing routine-looking duties
- Listing every(?) unit assigned an airfield in World War II (without supporting references as well)
- The entire 'The USS Cochino incident' section
- The 'Operation El Dorado Canyon' section (two paras covering one Puerto Rican)
- The 'Puerto Rican women with the rank of general' section (and why focus only on two generals rather than provide a history of Puerto Rican women in the era since women were integrated into the military?)
- The 'Congressional Gold Medal' section - this should be a para at most somewhere
- However, most of the bloat is overly-detailed descriptions of a huge number of topics. Medal citations, one-para bios of large numbers of people (including people who seem barely notable), lists of people who are barely notable, etc, etc. All this stuff needs to be condensed.
- A lot of material, including entire paras, lacks references.
- There's an emphasis throughout the article on Puerto Ricans who distinguished themselves, and the general tone leans towards boosterism. For instance, while I presume that Puerto Ricans were subject to systematic racism (and this may still be the case), the topic isn't mentioned - a focus on 'distinguished service' obscures this important point. The fact that people are being highlighted for being promoted or filling prestigious/highly skilled roles for the first time indicates that this is unusual, yet the article never discusses this thematically.
- I was surprised there was no mention over the dispute concerning the United States Navy in Vieques, Puerto Rico
- The article's focus is also much too narrow, being limited mainly to the military (and especially wartime) service of Puerto Ricans. Topics such as anti-war movements (which I presume may have had a distinctive edge given the island's colonial history and current status) and military production aren't covered at all. There also isn't much on the military history of the island outside of wartime.
- The article is too long and, to be frank, too exhausting to read due to the bloat, for me to provide a detailed review of its text. The following comments are based on a light skim:
- It's not clear to me why the pre-colonisation military history of the island is presented in the context of colonisation. The statement that "The Tainos were known as a peaceful people, however they were also warriors and often fought against the Caribs" is poorly written, and risks repeating a 'noble savage' myth
- What's the relevance of the para starting with 'According to the "500th Florida Discovery Council Round Table"'?
- " In November 1917, the first military draft (conscription) lottery in Puerto Rico was held in the island's capital, San Juan. The first draft number was picked by Diana Yaeger, the daughter of the U.S. appointed governor of Puerto Rico Arthur Yager. The number she picked was 1435 and it belonged to San Juan native Eustaquio Correa. Thus, Correa became the first Puerto Rican to be "drafted" into the Armed Forces of the United States." - delete everything after the first sentence.
- "However, with the defeat of Germany in 1945, the United States concentrated all of their efforts to the war in the Pacific. " - the USN was focused on the Pacific for most of the war
- The 'Cuban Missile Crisis' section notes only the role played by a single Puerto Rican. Surely the bases on the island were used in this action?
- "Two Puerto Ricans who served in Vietnam held positions in the Administration of President George W. Bush...." - relevance?
- "He was ambushed in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, by Somali warlords" - sloppy writing: presumably the 'warlords' didn't personally ambush him. Nick-D (talk) 09:08, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- G'day, I had a go at fixing some of the issues, but probably can't rectify the major concerns listed above. I will try to help a bit more over the next week or so if I get a chance, but would need someone else to do the heavy lifting, sorry. These are my edits so far: [13] Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 09:20, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Prose size = > 17,000 words (8,000 words when last reviewed). I don't support FACs that exceed 10,000.
- The areas for cutting excess detail are easily found, sample Puerto Ricans in sensitive positions, undue and if people have their own articles anyway ...
- WP:CITATIONOVERKILL, why all these citations for an uncontroversial fact? On June 10, 2014, President Barack Obama, signed the legislation known as "The Borinqueneers CGM Bill" at an official ceremony. The Bill honors the 65th Infantry Regiment with the Congressional Gold Medal.[3][197][198][199]
- There is uncited text.
- Another section that presents obvious opportunities to trim excess detail is Post World War II; any where one looks, it is easy to see that this article can be cut to half the current size. One route might be a notable Puerto Ricans in the military section, cutting everything down to just the basics, since they have their own articles if they are notable.
SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:12, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
Comment
I agree with the nominator and other commenters here that this article has major issues and is not up to current FA standards. It is actually really hard to read and its coverage of the topic is very uneven. As an example, I don't understand why, in the Korean War section, there is so much focus on the 65th Regiment, when the preamble to the section mentions 61,000 Puerto Ricans served in the war. Presumably they didn't all serve in the 65th regiment. The heading for the section containing the awards the regiment earned during the war is misplaced. The amount of awards earned in WWII seem trivial and hardly worth mentioning given the scope of the article. I am not hopeful that the remedial work will be completed as the primary editor best placed to do this seems to think nothing is wrong with the article. As an aside, I am also concerned that the primary editor is mentioned in the article in the Vietnam War section and a picture of himself illustrates the section. That seems to be a COI if the primary editor added them. Zawed (talk) 09:14, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
- I agree, I have deleted the Vietnam War COI sentence and images. Mztourist (talk) 05:12, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
Comment by TJMSmith: I am a bit confused on the scope of the article. I think it obfuscates the military history of Puerto Rico (the island) and the history of Puerto Rican military people. For example, this article mentions Maritza Sáenz Ryan, Marc H. Sasseville and Hilda Clayton who were all born in the states and did not serve their career in PR. Are they relevant to this article? Additionally, Hector E. Pagan, Irene M. Zoppi, Noel Zamot, María Inés Ortiz have served the majority of their careers off the island on missions not tied to PR. Heather Penney is mentioned but is not Puerto Rican. TJMSmith (talk) 23:24, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
Comment by AustralianRupert: G'day, I have done what I can to add some more citations to areas that were missing them, but I am probably at the limit of what I can do. There are a few issues in the Korean War section that I think need clarification as a couple of points don't quite seem to make sense (I have marked these with clarification tags) -- can anyone assist with rectifying these? I have also tried to reduce image sandwiching and in the process have reorganised the article a little, including merging a couple of sections: [14]. Potentially this merge wasn't the best idea on my part -- I would appreciate others taking a look and if need be, I am happy for it to be reverted. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 10:54, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
- Agree the Korean War section is a mess. I've been doing too much citation clarification on this and related articles to really dive into it (plus Korea isn't my area of focus), but it feels very boosterish to me. Intothatdarkness 01:46, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- G'day, given that no one seemed to step forward to rectify my clarification tags, I had a go myself. These are my changes: [15]. If anyone with more knowledge feels keen to adjust, please do. I'd be happy to keep trying to help save this one, but I really need some assistance from someone with access to a broader range of sources (potentially someone in PR or the wider US). Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 06:36, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- I may be able to help, but one thing to be aware of is the need to check almost every cite (when possible) to make sure what's being quoted is actually IN the listed source. I've run into this problem with many of these articles (including individuals linked out of this article...which is where the issue seems especially frequent), and wanted to make sure people were aware. In some cases it's been misquoting, but in others what's attributed isn't even in the source. Intothatdarkness 13:34, 2 April 2021 (UTC) This may be of help with the Korea section: https://history.army.mil/html/books/korea/65Inf_Korea/65Inf_KW.pdf. Intothatdarkness 17:16, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- G'day, given that no one seemed to step forward to rectify my clarification tags, I had a go myself. These are my changes: [15]. If anyone with more knowledge feels keen to adjust, please do. I'd be happy to keep trying to help save this one, but I really need some assistance from someone with access to a broader range of sources (potentially someone in PR or the wider US). Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 06:36, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
Comment by Intothatdarkness: I took a whack at some of the stuff in Vietnam and WW2. Having done cleanup in some of the other linked articles I've found misquoting or misparaphrasing sources to be issues worth checking, and corrected some examples in the sections I worked on. Not much, but it's a start. Intothatdarkness 16:14, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- Ack, understood - I will try to help out here if possible, but I don't really have the time or knowledge to check all 190 refs and replace if needed, I'm sorry. If possible, I would like to see some of these sorts of refs replaced: [16]. What are the credentials of this site? (There are a few other sources like this used in the article, which potentially also need to be replaced, I'm sorry to say as they probably wouldn't meet the current FAC requirements). I wonder if the information could instead be sourced to the source provided above: [17]? That would seem to be a better source, IMO. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 09:15, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- From the quick comparison I made, I believe almost all the Korea sources could be replaced by the book I linked, AustralianRupert. I can take a stab at some of them, and already corrected a couple. I can prioritize replacing the web page with the book. Intothatdarkness 22:18, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks, I had a go at one of the paragraphs: [18]. I wasn't really sure what ref style to use, though, sorry as the article uses a mixture. Sorry if I mucked this up. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:13, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- That looks good...better than it was. As for the items you couldn't find...one thing I have noticed with this and related articles is items being cited that don't actually exist in the cited source. Given the depth of the book, I'd consider it more authoritative than the website, keeping in mind that the website may never have mentioned those locations in the first place (this being a recent example). Intothatdarkness 14:08, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks, I had a go at one of the paragraphs: [18]. I wasn't really sure what ref style to use, though, sorry as the article uses a mixture. Sorry if I mucked this up. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:13, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- From the quick comparison I made, I believe almost all the Korea sources could be replaced by the book I linked, AustralianRupert. I can take a stab at some of them, and already corrected a couple. I can prioritize replacing the web page with the book. Intothatdarkness 22:18, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FAR some improvements have been done, but the article still needs drastic whacking to meet the length requirement, among other outstanding issues. (t · c) buidhe 04:56, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
Mount St. Helens
- Notified: Mav, Astro-Tom-ical, User talk:Hike395, Hydrogen Iodide, dscos WP Geology, WP Mountains, WP NRHP, WP United States, WP Volcanoes, Climbing, 2021-01-03
This FA, last reviewed in 2006, has both a good bit of uncited text, and does not seem to be complete. The article does not discuss plant/animal life on the mountain, which seems relevant, and does not state if any further geological activity from the volcano is expected. Also, at least on my system, there is massive MOS:SANDWICH issues with images thrown in there haphazardly. Hog Farm Talk 04:00, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
Comments from Graeme - some easy to fix things:
- Some images have no alt= text
- inconsistent use of nbsp; between St. and Helens.
- inappropriate capitalisation in heading "Importance to Indigenous Tribes"
- Fixed
- External links may need to be converted to references that support extra text.
- The science external link has a DOI 10.1126/science.aad7392 and author Eric Hand
- The link for "Mount St. Helens photographs and current conditions" does not appear to go that that topic, instead redirects to Cascades Volcano Observatory.
Graeme Bartlett (talk) 06:31, 13 March 2021 (UT Thanks for quick response
- reference 9 "Mount St. Helens at 35". has author Kathryn Hansen, but what is on that page now claims to be Aug 7, 2017 (after retrieval, so does it still confirm?)
- Reference 21 has author Donal R. Mullineaux; DOI 10.3133/pp1563 and year 1996
- reference 31 "Rock Slab Growing at Mt. St. Helens Volcano". has "others" cs1 maint error
Graeme Bartlett (talk) 06:56, 13 March 2021 (UTC) Missing topics due to see also
- visitor center for the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument is not mentioned here. This bit could include the link for Silver Lake (Washington)
- Helenite should be mentioned inline and not just in a see also.
- Geology of the Pacific Northwest should be able to have a link in the main text.
Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:18, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
As much as I like these old featured articles, this article feels more like a GA than an FA to me. I will do some fixing:
- Images trimmed and sent to Commons gallery. MOS:SANDWICH problem fixed.
- Alt text added for remaining images
- nbsp; added for all uses of St. and Helens
- @Ceranthor: we could use some of your FA magic here, if you're free to help out! — hike395 (talk) 17:45, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- Hike395 please remove the done templates and properly thread your responses without templates; templates are not used at FAC and FAR as they cause template limit problems, and responses should always be threaded. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:34, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
Started section on ecology, including disturbance ecology and biological legacies. Started section on future hazards. Both of these sections can be fleshed out further (either by me or other authors). — hike395 (talk) 13:14, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, there has been some engagement since the nomination, but the issues are extensive and are largely unaddressed. Moving to FARC does not preclude that improvements may happen, but it's not looking promising. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:44, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
@SandyGeorgia: --- could you kindly list more of the extensive issues? I addressed all of the comments from Graeme, and added (some) material re ecology and future hazards, which Hog Farm thought was lacking. I can certainly do more research and add more material on ecology, but if you think there are other large problems, I'd rather spend my limited WP time addressing those. — hike395 (talk) 19:19, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
- Will do (not quite yet, busy), but as this FAR is getting lengthy, I will probably start a section on article talk. Lengthy back and forth on FAR just makes a mess for the Coords to read, when all they really need is a summary of where things stand. If you want something to work on while you wait for me,
- huge portions of the article remain uncited, and
- anytime you see a US government website as a source, that citation should include a date. They are frequently updated, and our articles need to reflect those updates. There are considerable dated sources used here (and the dates of the versions used aren't even given)
- make sure ALL information is current.
- These three alone will keep an editor quite busy for quite a while. If these are completed, pls ping me to the article talk, where I will continue. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:37, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
War of the Fifth Coalition
I am nominating this featured article for review because there is unreferenced information, an unaddressed Austro-centric concern raised on the talk page in May 2020, and a need for a copyedit. Z1720 (talk) 16:41, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
- Original concerns
For reference, I've pasted Z1720's concerns on the talk page below - Dumelow (talk) 10:19, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
Many paragraphs and sections do not have citations.The lede needs to be reformatted to remove the short paragraphs and ensure it summarizes the major parts of the article.There are concerns above about the POV being Austro-centric. Has this been resolved?There jargon in this image caption: "to throw off the yoke of Napoleon's Bavarian allies"- The article could use a copy-edit. I recommend this happens after all the information has been verified (as this process might cause the prose to change or new information be added)
Ref 15 cites 23 pages. Is there a way to narrow this down?
- Background section and infobox
My feeling is that the background section is overly long and could do with trimming down to the key points - Dumelow (talk) 10:34, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think we should merge the background of Austria into single one, and add up some other countries' background such as UK, Sardinia and others. And, I think Third Coalition is not necessary here, because this war is after fourth coalition. Also, as you said, this article is mainly about battle between Austria and France, which is not containing all the battles. What about course of Peninsular War or Wars in Poland, or the rebellion in Tyrol? That should not be described as other theatres, because it is interwined with Austro-France battles. -- Wendylove (talk) 11:49, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I agree with you on the background, please feel free to have a go at reducing it or I may do later on. With regards the main content, we'll have to check consensus in the sources but I'd consider the War of the Fifth Coalition to be largely a Franco-Austrian matter, with the exception of the Walcheren Expedition and the Tyrol revolt. I'd also consider the Peninsular War to sit outside the coalition wars (starting before and continuing after) and indeed our article on the Napoleonic Wars treats it as such. We should mention it but not focus on it, I think. I'm also not clear on the involvement of Sardinia and Sicily in the Fifth Coalition, they are mentioned in the infobox but not the article? - Dumelow (talk) 13:21, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've found a passage in Mikaberidze (2020) which discusses the formal coalition members (Austria, Britain, Spain, Sicily and Sardinia) but notes the last four played a "rather nominal" role. I've tried to elaborate on this in footnotes in the article - Dumelow (talk) 08:33, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think we should retain something about the war of the third coalition. The fifth was fought primarily between France and Austria, and the last time those two had come to blows was the third - Austria having not taken part in the fourth coalition. Part of their motivation for waging war in 1809 was to avenge the beating they had in 1805. Chuntuk (talk) 16:18, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- Okay, that is quite pinch to my opinion, and I think you're right! -- Wendylove (talk) 17:20, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- By the way, about Sicily and Sardinia, they are not belligerents of 1809 war. If you take a look at Coalition Wars#Coalition parties and Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies#Third Coalition, they are not main parties. I think we should change Coalition Wars#Coalition parties too. And in other languages' article, such as French and Italian, they put Sardinia and Sicily as well, but there is no references for it. (Italian article has references, which says 'Solo formalmente parte dell'alleanza, in realtà non coinvolto nelle operazioni militari') .-- Wendylove (talk) 17:20, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've trimmed Portugal, Spain, Sicily and Sardinia from the infobox and cut back the result to "French Victory Treaty of Schönbrunn" per the guidance - Dumelow (talk) 18:37, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I started on hacking back the background, only got down to the 4th coalition so far. Will continue, but probably tomorrow. If anyone else wants to continue, please feel free - Dumelow (talk) 19:19, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've cut some more back. This will also need a judicious ce to get rid of editorializing --phrasing like "the French mauled their Russian opponents" is rife. Eddie891 Talk Work 02:12, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- ... or not Eddie891 Talk Work 02:48, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- I merged backgrounds of Austria by now, and I put Spain and Portugal again, but I mentioned Peninsular War, making Spanish war and Austrian War separate. Also, I will add up some Spainsh and Potugal generals. --- 03:28, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- I started on hacking back the background, only got down to the 4th coalition so far. Will continue, but probably tomorrow. If anyone else wants to continue, please feel free - Dumelow (talk) 19:19, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've trimmed Portugal, Spain, Sicily and Sardinia from the infobox and cut back the result to "French Victory Treaty of Schönbrunn" per the guidance - Dumelow (talk) 18:37, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think we should retain something about the war of the third coalition. The fifth was fought primarily between France and Austria, and the last time those two had come to blows was the third - Austria having not taken part in the fourth coalition. Part of their motivation for waging war in 1809 was to avenge the beating they had in 1805. Chuntuk (talk) 16:18, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I'm not seeing how the Congress of Erfurt merits such a long mention in the background... Eddie891 Talk Work 14:10, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- I also get the general impression from my source that the article underplays the extent of Britains involvement. How would people feel about a paragraph or so on background about them? Eddie891 Talk Work 15:44, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- Also: How sure are we that all sources agree portugal was not a member of the coalition? this says they are Eddie891 Talk Work 15:46, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- I see Chandler (1994) has Spain and Portugal as "associated" with the coalition (whose members he gives as only Britain and Austria). Lachouque (1961) lists Austria, England, Spain and Portugal as members. I'll add them back as members with a citation to Lachouque - Dumelow (talk) 19:51, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think substantial sections on the background and the lead up to the war are important things to keep in the article - because they won't appear anything else. The actual events of the war - the big battles - have substantial articles of their own so don't need too much text here. The causes and consequences are only going to be dealt with here. I'm about to go away for the weekend, so can't do anything, but I thought I'd share that perspective. I'm also doing some digging on the "fifth coalition:" whether that term was actually used at the time, or applied in retrospect by later historians. Could help us nail down the membership! Chuntuk (talk) 15:56, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
Added: Maybe an approach to consider would be to show the pre-war positions of each of the great powers - Austria, Britain, France, Prussia, Russia (one paragraph each) - followed by one or two paragraphs on the rest: Spain, Portugal, Confederation of the Rhine. One of the themes we ought to be developing is the increased role for Napoleon's allies in this war, because a lot of his French troops were committed in Spain. That's one of the factors that encouraged the Austrians to make war in the first place. Chuntuk (talk) 16:04, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- What does Gill say about Francis's decision for war? (our article has " Stadion remained hopeful of Prussian support and on 8 February 1809 persuaded Emperor Francis I") Esdaile says "on 23 December [1808] the increasingly desperate Francis resolved on war." Eddie891 Talk Work 01:31, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Gill has "It was in this charged atmosphere that the monarchy's principal leaders gathered on 8 February to deliberate once more the question of war. Stadion apparently dominated this conference, painting Austria's situation in brightly optimistic colours and again persuading the Kaiser and Charles that Napoleon's preoccupation with Spain presented a brilliant but fleeting opportunity for success". He goes on to reference Francis' earlier December decision, but the Google preview doesn't have that page for me. I'll see if I can find anything about December elsewhere - Dumelow (talk) 07:34, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- I don't get why we need a whole section here on the Peninsular war. I think a sentence or two in background is enough... Eddie891 Talk Work 01:45, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- I agree, the Peninsular War is a separate conflict that started before and ended after this war. Beyond a basic description of its impact on this war anything on the Iberian peninsula belongs in that article, not this one - Dumelow (talk) 07:34, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Now I think the Austrian section (while all relevant background) might benefit from splitting into a sub section or two. Eddie891 Talk Work 23:00, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
- Sourcing
- I have ISBN 9780203209745 and can see if there's anything worth adding shortly. It looks as though someone may need to track down sources like ISBN 1446448762 though not sure. Eddie891 Talk Work 15:21, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've been through and tidied up all the existing references to use sfn or harvnb templates, it's not my preferred method but the least disruptive to what was already there. It seems to me we might be leaning rather heavily on Chandler, which is over 50 years old now, but is probably OK for this kind of overview. I've added Gill's more recent three volumes on the 1809 campaign to the list of sources (they're probably the definitive work on the subject) - I'll see if I can tick off some of those "citations needed" with it. Chuntuk (talk) 22:08, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
- Found a bit of time to get stuck into the sourcing. Everything's now sourced down to Wagram and I'll try to keep going with the remainder. I've struck out some of the original items raised as concerns as they have been addressed. Once we've added in a bit more about the German rebellions and naval actions I think the Austro-centrism will be dealt with also - Dumelow (talk) 07:45, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- About other participants .
By my view, it is very odd to divide participants by major and other, because none of the other articles of Coalition wars (First to Seventh) divide countries. I think it is better to put countries all together, and we should avoid verifying each country to participate or not. By the way, there is an effort to delete Portugal from main participants, but this is quite controversial. If we are going to cover Peninsular War in this article, then we should put Portugal as one of the main participants, because it was one of the major participants in Peninsular War. The Peninsular War 1807 – 1814, A Concise Military History by Michael Glover or The Peninsular War by Charles Esdaile can be a good resources for that. While Sicily and Sardinia didn't have any battles with French at that time (which should be reviewed with other materials as well), Portugal saw combats during 1809. -- Wendylove (talk) 19:39, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- course of war (Austro-centric)
Although it is a war between mainly Austria and French, I think we can rearrange Austrian section into one, and make "Other theatres" into appropriate poisition. After all, I think Holland, Poland, and Italy and Dalmatia section can be put into Austrian section, and I think we can cover up Peninsular War and Andreas Hofer's rebellion into one independent paragraph. I'll try it first, and if there is any problem, pls remind me. --- 15:30, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- Rebellion among Germans
Can we find some resources about Tyrol Rebellion, 1809 Gotscheer Rebellion, or Andrea's Rebellion? If we find resources, we can expand article. -- Wendylove (talk) 06:19, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Update, work ongoing as of March 25. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:46, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- Everything is now cited. Next job is to expand the non-Austrian sections a little (Germany and the naval battles), sort out the lead and then a copyedit and it will hopefully be passable - Dumelow (talk) 18:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thank you everyone who has been improving this article. Please ping me when the edits are complete and I will reassess the article. Z1720 (talk) 21:12, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think I've finished expanding everything non-Austrian now. I've also rewritten the lead (though this may be a bit long now). Would someone mind copyediting the article? - Dumelow (talk) 12:47, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- It's not a copyedit from me, but I do have a comment. The section Peninsular War opens up rather abruptly with "Unhappy after Portugal reopened trade with Britain" (we do not discuss the Continental System anywhere before and the link to Peninsular War#1809 does not explain it further). Is it possible to expand a bit to explain that Britain was under a comercial embargo at the time? (if sources mention it?) RetiredDuke (talk) 15:28, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks RetiredDuke, I've rewritten these sentences, hopefully it is better now - Dumelow (talk) 15:56, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Yes, thanks for the context. RetiredDuke (talk) 16:13, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks RetiredDuke, I've rewritten these sentences, hopefully it is better now - Dumelow (talk) 15:56, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- It's not a copyedit from me, but I do have a comment. The section Peninsular War opens up rather abruptly with "Unhappy after Portugal reopened trade with Britain" (we do not discuss the Continental System anywhere before and the link to Peninsular War#1809 does not explain it further). Is it possible to expand a bit to explain that Britain was under a comercial embargo at the time? (if sources mention it?) RetiredDuke (talk) 15:28, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think I've finished expanding everything non-Austrian now. I've also rewritten the lead (though this may be a bit long now). Would someone mind copyediting the article? - Dumelow (talk) 12:47, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thank you everyone who has been improving this article. Please ping me when the edits are complete and I will reassess the article. Z1720 (talk) 21:12, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- Everything is now cited. Next job is to expand the non-Austrian sections a little (Germany and the naval battles), sort out the lead and then a copyedit and it will hopefully be passable - Dumelow (talk) 18:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
@Dumelow: I am a non-expert in this subject. Do you want me to complete the copyedit or are you looking for someone with more topic-knowledge? Z1720 (talk) 02:03, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- There's definitely a need for copy editing - the very first sentence I glanced at in the article was "Massena launched a costly frontal attack that captured the position on 3 May; Hiller withdrawing along the Danube" which changes tense at the semicolon. I would be willing to do one except that I'm a horrible copyeditor, as anyone who's ever reviewed my GAN or ACR noms can probably attest to. Hog Farm Talk 02:20, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- Hi Z1720, a copyedit from yourself would be most welcome. In a way it may even be better that somebody without knowledge of the topic goes through the article. I've been editing it very piecemeal and much is unchanged from the original (particularly in the "Austria-Bavaria front" and "Aftermath" sections). I'll try to have a read through today to check for any obvious errors but if you pick anything up please note it here so it can be addressed. Cheers - Dumelow (talk) 06:02, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- I did a copyedit of the article, but I want to do another one at a later date. Please review and revert any changes that are unhelpful. I posted questions on the article's talk page that I hope others can clarify there and fix in the article. Could someone review the sources to make sure they are high-quality and correctly formatted? Please ping me if you have any questions. Z1720 (talk) 01:44, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Hi Z1720, a copyedit from yourself would be most welcome. In a way it may even be better that somebody without knowledge of the topic goes through the article. I've been editing it very piecemeal and much is unchanged from the original (particularly in the "Austria-Bavaria front" and "Aftermath" sections). I'll try to have a read through today to check for any obvious errors but if you pick anything up please note it here so it can be addressed. Cheers - Dumelow (talk) 06:02, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- There's definitely a need for copy editing - the very first sentence I glanced at in the article was "Massena launched a costly frontal attack that captured the position on 3 May; Hiller withdrawing along the Danube" which changes tense at the semicolon. I would be willing to do one except that I'm a horrible copyeditor, as anyone who's ever reviewed my GAN or ACR noms can probably attest to. Hog Farm Talk 02:20, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comment
I think previous edition look better because this edit looks similar to the original one, which looked so disperse. What I mention is not about cite or references, but order of paragraphs. Is there any reason for putting order of paragraph back to the original one? -- Wendylove (talk) 02:50, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Source formatting comments
- Don't think Bruce needs an accessdate; they generally aren't given for books as far as I know
- Henderson needs a location
- Johnson needs a location
- Does Lachouque have an OCLC?
- We have a ref to Gardiner p. 75, but no source by a Gardiner
Sources look fine otherwise aside from this and the question about Burnham above, no spot checks done. Hog Farm Talk 02:58, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks Hog Farm, I've replaced Burnham with a citation to Mikaberidze. Added locations for Henderson and Johnson and an OCLC for Lachouque. Wendylove, you added the reference to Gardiner here, could you add the source to the bibliography? - Dumelow (talk) 08:34, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
I have conducted a second and third copyedit to the article. There are two concerns I hope other editors can help me address: 1) There's some dup linking in the article, but I think some of it is justified because of the amount of text between the links. Can a more experienced reviewer look at the dup links and remove the ones that are not necessary. 2) There's a Further Reading section. I think the article is well researched but some editors on FACs have opposed FAs due to this list. Should we keep this list? Z1720 (talk) 16:51, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
- Further reading is generally only an issue if there is so much further reading that it indicates that the article does not comprehensively use sources. This doesn't seem to be the case here, and two of the further reading sources are by Gill, multiple of whose works are already cited. So I think the further reading is fine. I did remove one web source that doesn't really add anything. Hog Farm Talk 16:56, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
- I removed one duplink, but I think the others are spread out enough it's not horrible. Will do a complete read-through later; I anticipate that this can be closed without FARC. The no target ref to Gardiner is the only main issue I'm aware of, and it's not that major. Hog Farm Talk 17:22, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
- You can install User:Ohconfucius/script/MOSNUM dates to keep your dashes in order (done).
- Missing author: The British Expeditionary Force to Walcheren: 1809 The Napoleon Series, Retrieved 5 September 2006.
SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:12, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
Globular cluster
I am nominating this featured article for review because more than a month ago, Hog Farm stated on talk, "We've got lots of uncited text here, as well as many of the sources being from before 2005. This needs additional citations and an update with newer sources." There have not been any edits to the article since. I did not notify the FAC nominator as they have retired and not edited since 2014. (t · c) buidhe 17:54, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- Comment: can you explain why you arbitrarily picked the year 2005 as a cut-off criteria? Data collected from before that time should still be relevant. Praemonitus (talk) 18:24, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- Praemonitus I don't know how quickly research becomes outdated in this field but ideally one should only cite current/up-to-date research. The 2005 suggestion is from Hog Farm. (t · c) buidhe 18:29, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- I would have to say it depends on the subject. Some topics get researched more frequently, and others are more or less settled and rarely get an update. Praemonitus (talk) 18:32, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Praemonitus and Buidhe: - 2005 wasn't suppose to have any innate meaning, rather just more of a rough estimate of when most of the sources seem to predate. I lack the knowledge about the topic to deem the pace of research in this subject, but for an article about an active science, there are quite likely new discoveries and theories over the last 15 years. Although astronomy editors may have a better idea of the extent of that. Hog Farm Talk 19:18, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- I would have to say it depends on the subject. Some topics get researched more frequently, and others are more or less settled and rarely get an update. Praemonitus (talk) 18:32, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- Praemonitus I don't know how quickly research becomes outdated in this field but ideally one should only cite current/up-to-date research. The 2005 suggestion is from Hog Farm. (t · c) buidhe 18:29, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- References older than 2005 shouldn't automatically, or even generally, be considered inappropriate. Plenty of information isn't going to change, historical stuff most obviously, but also general background astronomy and physics. Obviously, any theories which have changed significantly in recent decades or are still in flux should have up-to-date references. Lithopsian (talk) 16:57, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Fully agreed (@Lithopsian:). However, one thing that has changed since 2005 is the view that most globular clusters are simple stellar populations, which is now dead (but still canonical, so still worth mentioning). I've updated that with a 2018 review article. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 06:41, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- References older than 2005 shouldn't automatically, or even generally, be considered inappropriate. Plenty of information isn't going to change, historical stuff most obviously, but also general background astronomy and physics. Obviously, any theories which have changed significantly in recent decades or are still in flux should have up-to-date references. Lithopsian (talk) 16:57, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Ashill recently saved Star pre-FAR. Does your interest extend to globular clusters? FemkeMilene (talk) 18:44, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- I took a quick look through. My impression is that the article is mostly pretty good. The statements that don’t have inline references are mostly what I would fit in the subject-specific common knowledge area of WP:WTC (things that are in any introductory astronomy textbook), so I wouldn’t challenge their verifiability. I tagged a couple things that could use improvement and can return when I have the time. Also, many of the older references are totally fine. Globular clusters are slightly odd in that they serve as a lingua franca of “standard” knowledge in astronomy, and Wikipedia should (and does) present that encyclopedic standard knowledge. That’s what older references in the research literature will state; newer ones don’t bother, not because the old references are outdated but because they’re common knowledge in the field. There are plenty of newer results that tweak that common knowledge with exceptions; this article does a good job, I think, of avoiding going down those rabbit holes citing new results. So I actually think it’s a good thing that this article avoids being based too much on new results. That philosophical comment aside, there are clearly some things that could be improved; I’ll try to work on it but may not have time for a while. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 15:39, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- I've added references everywhere that was tagged. No attempt to address older references yet. Lithopsian (talk) 20:57, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Comments from Graeme Bartlett
- Images need to have alt= text to improve accessibility.
- Done. A little repetitive, I'm afraid, but then one glibular cluster looks a lot like another to the average reader. Maybe someone with more imagination could take a look. Lithopsian (talk) 17:18, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Non-standard punctuation in use: “”
- Done. Wretchskull (talk) 16:44, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Awkward wording: "contains an unusual number of a type of star" (unusual number could be 0, 999, 1234, large - be specific)
- I was expecting to see a diagram of where globular clusters are in a galaxy, but there is none there. This could be in #Orbits section
- That's a good suggestion, although easier said than done. This one is OK (and public domain), although I'm not wild about the fact that they're not very clear to what extent it's an artist's conception and to what extent it is true positions of known globular clusters. There's a good one in Figure 1 of this paper, but we can't use it due to copyright. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 06:02, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- If we add a diagram like one of these, it should go next to the fifth paragraph in the observation history section, which describes the distribution of globular clusters in the Milky Way and its historical importance in demonstrating that the Sun is not in the middle of the Milky Way. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 06:11, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- This one? Artist's conception and it says so, labels the Sun and M4, but also has some other text that is a little dated. Lithopsian (talk) 15:50, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- If we could get the underlying image, that would be great. It's definitely an artist's conception of the Milky Way (can't have a real outside image that includes the Sun!) but may be real (modulo distance uncertainties) positions of globular clusters; the caption isn't clear about that. (That's my issue with the other one too.) —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 17:33, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- That's a good suggestion, although easier said than done. This one is OK (and public domain), although I'm not wild about the fact that they're not very clear to what extent it's an artist's conception and to what extent it is true positions of known globular clusters. There's a good one in Figure 1 of this paper, but we can't use it due to copyright. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 06:02, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- One reference (94) uses authors list with non-standard affilliations.
- Fixed. Lithopsian (talk) 17:21, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- None of the authors appear to be linked in references. I know at least one of these is famous enough, and I expect several have articles. Some journals should also be linked in references. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:29, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
Comments from Femke
I've looked through the article in search of sentences I believe need updating, and found a few.
- A total of 152 globular clusters have now been discovered in the Milky Way galaxy, out of an estimated total of 180 ± 20 (source 1992)
- Blue stragglers are mentioned in two different locations. Is there a problem with structure?
- This seems to be ok. Both locations, plus the image caption, appear to be sensible to mention this type of star. 2A02:C7F:7428:D200:9958:D746:E82D:FAD5 (talk) 16:15, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- However, a possible exception is when strong tidal interactions with other large masses result in the dispersal of the stars.
- However about 20% of the globular clusters have undergone a process termed "core collapse". In this type of cluster, the luminosity continues to increase steadily all the way to the core region
- A 2008 study by John Fregeau. Is this now common knowledge? If so, modren source + rephrase in wikivoice?
- I deleted that paragraph. The paper hasn't been widely cited in the 13 years since, and it doesn't seem to be a significant change in our understanding of clusters (despite a somewhat overhyped press release resulting in some media coverage -- not uncommon), so I don't think this is really worthy of a mention, and certainly not a full paragraph. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 18:58, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
- potential computing requirements to accurately simulate such a cluster can be enormous -> next paragraph indicated it was done in 2010, so not that enormous after all?
- I clarified that that comment refers to a low-density cluster. I also added a ref from a few weeks ago showing that we're still very much pushing compute power -- saying it was "done" is relative, since there are still lots of approximations, and we need to make fewer as time goes on. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 00:14, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
- How these clusters are formed is not yet known (2005 source)
- How they form is still uncertain, but some progress has been made. See Forbes at el. (2018) for a decent overview, plus perhaps some of the modelling results since then. 2A02:C7F:7428:D200:9958:D746:E82D:FAD5 (talk) 16:20, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- The Forbes et al reference is more about generic GCs; I added it in that context. (It is indeed a good overview; there's more from there that could be incorporated.) I added a more recent ref from the same team that originally discovered the unusual clusters with a bit more of an idea about how they form (accretion from satellites). —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 23:56, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- How they form is still uncertain, but some progress has been made. See Forbes at el. (2018) for a decent overview, plus perhaps some of the modelling results since then. 2A02:C7F:7428:D200:9958:D746:E82D:FAD5 (talk) 16:20, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- In spite of the lower likelihood of giant planet formation, just such an object has been found in the globular cluster Messier 4. (2008 source). With most exoplanets being discovered in the last 10 years(?), I suspect more have been found in globular clusters. FemkeMilene (talk) 15:40, 7 March 2021 (UTC)
- I found a 2020 source confirming this is still the case. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:32, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- Update zero edits to the FAR since Mar 13, and zero edits to the article since Mar 18. @Buidhe and Femkemilene: for status check. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:50, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think it's worth waiting for Ashill, I think only two more things need to be done: 1) integrate the Forbes et al article the IP mentioned, and 2) check whether "However about 20% of the globular clusters have undergone a process termed "core collapse"." is still up to date (1986 source). FemkeMilene (talk) 19:11, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- Update all the above are addressed, but more cn tags appeared, of which one still needs to be found. FemkeMilene (talk) 20:26, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- I think it's worth waiting for Ashill, I think only two more things need to be done: 1) integrate the Forbes et al article the IP mentioned, and 2) check whether "However about 20% of the globular clusters have undergone a process termed "core collapse"." is still up to date (1986 source). FemkeMilene (talk) 19:11, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- No joke, I think I've adequately addressed that last tag. Lithopsian (talk) 20:40, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- I went over the article once more, and put another set of cn tags in (sorry I didn't check thoroughly before). Six to go. FemkeMilene (talk) 15:46, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- No joke, I think I've adequately addressed that last tag. Lithopsian (talk) 20:40, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- SandyGeorgia comments
- Please install User:Evad37/duplinks-alt to review WP:OVERLINKing; perhaps many of them can be justified, but they need to be reviewed.
- MOS:CAPTIONS, full sentences should end in puncutation, sentence fragments should not.
- Done. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:44, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- MOS:BADITALICS, why is this italicized ? The difference between the relative and absolute magnitude, the distance modulus,
- Done. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:44, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Also—almost never needed and almost always redundant. See overuse of however and User:John/however. User:Tony1/How to improve your writing has good information on these plagues of Wikipedia. Considerable instances of both however and also, which don't seem to be needed.
- Reduced a lot. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:44, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Why are these in External links? The first seems to contain info that should be in a comprehensive article, and the second is a general blog.
- Key stars have different birthdays The article describes how stars in globular clusters are born in several bursts, rather than all at once.
- Globular Clusters Blog News, papers and preprints on Galactic Globular Clusters
This is going to need a lot of citation cleanup before further prose evaluation can begin.
- Why are these listed as "General sources", yet not formatted as the rest of the sources? They appear here as if they want to be External links rather than sources.
- NASA Astrophysics Data System has a collection of past articles, from all major astrophysics journals and many conference proceedings. And "a collection of past articles" is non-specific; which articles are we looking at for sources? (We can't just tell our readers, well, somewhere in this collection of past articles you can find what you need to verify content in this article.)
- "Review articles", not used as citations, should be alphabetical.
- "Books", Binnie and Spitzer each used only once, so why do they require a separate section, and Heggie is not used.
- Spitzer isn't used either (a conference proceeding from the previous year is cited). I don't know this specific Spitzer book and don't have immediate access to it, but everything he wrote is brilliant, so it's easy for me to imagine that this book is worth including as a classic reference. Binney & Tremaine is a very widely-used dynamics book that is very relevant to this topic. I don't know the Heggie book, but it too looks relevant. To me, that looks like a decently-curated list of more-in-depth books for further reading, so my vote is to keep it as is. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 20:30, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Footnote a seems to need a citation: Omega Centauri was known in antiquity, but Halley discovered its nature as a nebula.
- That's stated in reference 10, which is right next to the footnote. (It refers to the object as having been named by Ptolemy, which is pretty direct evidence that it was known in antiquity, although in different words.) Should the reference move into the footnote? —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 20:56, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- I eventually figured out that ESO = European Southern Observatory, which is neither linked nor clarified in any citation that used the abbreviation.
- Example, this is an incomplete citation: "Ashes from the Elder Brethren". ESO. 0107. Missing date, missing access date, and tell us somewhere what ESO is. (There are others similar.)
- Similar problem here with SEDS ... what is that ?
- I have expanded the European Southern Observatory and Students for the Exploration and Development of Space acronyms in the references, used the press release templates, updated URLs and access dates where needed, and added ID numbers to releases for additional permanence. —Alex (Ashill | talk | contribs) 05:37, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
- Frommert, Hartmut (August 2007). "Milky Way Globular Clusters". SEDS. Retrieved February 26, 2008. I can't get the site to load and can't even tell what it is, or whether it is reliable.
- Patrick Moore (2005). Firefly Atlas of the Universe. Firefly Books. ISBN 978-1-55407-071-8. This is a book, requires a page number.
- This is missing author ... "Messier 13 (M13) - The Great Hercules Cluster - Universe Today". Universe Today. May 9, 2016. Retrieved April 23, 2018.
I will stop there for now; this is only a brief sampling, and the sourcing and citations here need to be cleaned up before further evaluation of the content. Please review all sources and citations for completeness. I am very skeptical that this article can retain status, and filling in the missing citations is not the same as making sure the older content is verifiable to reliable sources. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:14, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
Extratropical cyclone
I am nominating this featured article for review because the article has numerous issues I outlined on the talk page, including a lede that needs expansion, missing citations marked with citation needed templates, and concerns that the latest "Historical storms" listed is Hurricane Sandy in 2012, making me believe that this needs an update. Z1720 (talk) 22:48, 24 February 2021 (UTC)
- I will see what I can do about updating it, as I update tropical cyclone which is also at FAR.Jason Rees (talk) 23:08, 24 February 2021 (UTC)
- Should this one be placed on hold? I think it's undesirable for somebody to "have to" rescue two articles at FAR simultaneously, and putting it on hold makes that burden less. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:01, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- I support putting this article on hold. If I knew Jason Rees would work on it, I wouldn't have put it up for FAR. [[User:|Z1720]] (talk) 19:13, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- To be honest @Z1720: I think I missed your talk page message at the time. Anyway while I support putting extratropical cyclone on hold, I have a rough idea to tweak tropical, subtropical and extratropical cyclone at the same time as they are similar.Jason Rees (talk) 23:30, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- Happy to leave this in the FAR section for longer to allow time for improvements. Nikkimaria (talk) 21:36, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- To be honest @Z1720: I think I missed your talk page message at the time. Anyway while I support putting extratropical cyclone on hold, I have a rough idea to tweak tropical, subtropical and extratropical cyclone at the same time as they are similar.Jason Rees (talk) 23:30, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- I support putting this article on hold. If I knew Jason Rees would work on it, I wouldn't have put it up for FAR. [[User:|Z1720]] (talk) 19:13, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- Should this one be placed on hold? I think it's undesirable for somebody to "have to" rescue two articles at FAR simultaneously, and putting it on hold makes that burden less. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:01, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
Menstrual cycle
- Notified: EMsmile, WikiProject Sanitation, WP Medicine, WP Anatomy, WP Biology, WP Women’s Health, 2021-01-24
- FAR commentary found at Talk:Menstrual cycle/Archive 3. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:53, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
This is a 2004 promotion from the “Refreshing Brilliant Prose” phase that was last reviewed in 2008 and has never been at current FA standards. There is considerable uncited text, UNDUE text, and most of the sources are not up to snuff per WP:MEDRS or WP:MEDDATE; additional detail on talk. The article does not stay tightly focused on the topic, and also omits coverage of closely related areas (eg In other animals). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:11, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
- One thing that I noticed about this article a little while ago when I first looked at it, is that there was some overlap with the article on menstruation. So I think both articles should be looked at hand in hand as they need to fit together snugly and not have too much overlap. The article on menstruation used to have lower view rates than the article on menstrual cycle but has caught up recently, see here. Could the reason be that the quality of the article "menstruation" has improved relative to "menstrual cycle" or that it is linked more from other articles? Anyway, I just wanted to flag that the two articles should be looked at together. EMsmile (talk) 01:30, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
There is considerable discussion on talk of other problems, including structure of the article which treats menstruation basically like a disease state. Many of the sources used are extremely dated (see WP:MEDDATE) or are not WP:RS, much less WP:MEDRS, much less high quality MEDRS. Prose is rough; redundancies like “however”, “subsequently” abound. There are numerous short stubby paragraphs. The article looks like some student editors got hold of it an chunked in their favorite theories based on primary studies. Additional issues at the article, where sources are misrepresented, may be a result of WP:ADVOCACY related to menstrual leave, which is biasing the article towards a disease state rather than a normal biological process. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:23, 25 February 2021 (UTC)
Remove featured article status(edit on 8 March 2021: when I wrote this, I didn't understand how the process worked and that there was plenty of time to improve things before deciding). EMsmile (talk) 00:22, 8 March 2021 (UTC) Based on the discussions we are having on the talk page of menstrual cycle, it is very far from featured article status at this stage. We could bring it back up to featured article status eventually but it would take time. Does the process allow for such time? Probably not. Thus, bring it back down to "B" for now (?). Is that how the process works? EMsmile (talk) 10:21, 25 February 2021 (UTC)
- EMsmile please have a look at the instructions at the WP:FAR page; Delist and Keep are not declared during the FAR phase. It is premature yet to say if Graham Beards or others (like Tom (LT)) might be able to salvage the article, and FAR is a deliberative process by design; the process allows as much time as needed, and sometimes it takes months to restore an article, but should Graham choose to work on the topic, he is more than capable of FA-level content. Also, to answer your other question, FAR does not re-assess the quality of articles (to B, C, GA, etc) if a Featured article is delisted— that is a separate process. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:11, 25 February 2021 (UTC)
Graham Beards is making considerable and steady progress here; it remains to be seen if he will be permitted to work at FA standard. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:08, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
- Update, very good progress, but Graham needs at least another week to get hold of more sources. In the interim, some other editors (yep, buck up everyone!) might read through for jargon checking. Y’all know who I’m looking at! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:11, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
- Happy to review and be pinged when Graham's ready. Kudos to Graham for improving the article. At this current point the 'other animals' and 'society and culture' sections remain quite short. --Tom (LT) (talk) 03:39, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Tom (LT) the section "society and culture" is short on purpose because we want readers to know that they can click through to other existing articles which cover that in great depth. And by the way, I don't think we should say there "further" but "main" and link them to menstruation#Society and culture. We certainly don't need detailed information here when the detailed information exists in a related Wikipedia article. Just key terms so that people get a rough idea. EMsmile (talk) 12:32, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- That is not how articles, or FAs, are written, nor is that how the article has been edited. The Society and culture section is short because there is nothing else to say, so far. Please review WP:SS for how to use hatnotes. This article cannot be a main summary of content at menstruation because this article is about the reproductive cycle; there need not be a hatnote at all (just a link), since most of the content in the sub-articles is unrelated to the topic of this article, upon which we should stay tightly focused. The criteria for featured articles are outlined at WP:WIAFA; we don’t decide what to include or not in an article based on what we hope or think readers will click on, and the article is not being edited “to give people a rough idea”; if there is anything else to say about a biological process that is covered in high quality sources, it hasn’t been produced yet. The section is short because high quality sources offer little. A good deal of UNDUE and poorly sourced content was removed, but remains in the sub-articles. If readers are clicking through to poorly sourced sub-articles, that is outside of the remit of *this* Featured article, which so far summarizes only information that is well sourced, on topic, not UNDUE, and not published in predatory journals (such content was removed). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:45, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Tom (LT): A number of editors are confused between a subset of the entire reproductive cycle (menses or menstruation) and what this article is about which is the overall reproductive cycle in females. Your assistance in sorting out the issues from an anatomy standpoint would be helpful; some editors want this article to be about menstruation rather than the entire cycle, of which menses is one small part, and if we have to merge in the poorly written, poorly organized and poorly sourced content from menstruation, we have a C-class article. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:01, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- I don't think that the menstruation article should be seen as a "subset" of menstrual cycle at all! You are looking at it purely from a biological standpoint. I look at it from a woman's life & society standpoint. In my view the article menstruation should be broad and overarching, it covers a range of topics, and looks at menstruation from different angles, including how women feel, how they deal with it, how society looks on it etc. For me the menstrual cycle article is a "smaller" more narrow article that is purely focused on what exactly which hormone does at which point of the cycle, so purely medical/biological/anatomical - whichever you want to call it. Therefore, it does NOT need a section on "society and culture". That belongs to menstruation (I would still argue to link the two articles clearly together; to me they belong together like a jigsaw puzzle; but I guess this whole notion that one will be FA quality whereas the other will be C quality gets in the way). - I still think merging them together might solve some of the problems. EMsmile (talk) 13:13, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Menstrual cycle uses summary style correctly to cover multiple phases of the reproductive cycle; these include the follicular phase, ovulation, ovarian cycle, the luteal phase and many others. Menstruation is one part, among those many others, all of which are summarized. Whatever the quality assessment of any of those other articles is, *this* article has to meet WP:WIAFA, which so far it is. What the menstruation article should be (or any of the many sub-topics) is not in the remit of this review; it is one of many sub-articles. In terms of which hatnote to use, when an article is not using WP:SS to summarize the entire contents of another article, further is more appropriate than main. The approach to this article is not “purely” anatomical, biological or medical; it is, as it should be, based on sources. The entire reproductive cycle is not menstruation, and menstruation, like every subset of the entire topic, has its own article. Some of the desires expressed on talk to bring in off-topic material from menstruation (but not from follicular phase, luteal phase, ovulation, or anything else) appear to be driven by issues beyond this article. Menstrual cycle is the broad topic, not the narrower one; it encompasses the entire reproductive cycle, of which menstruation (as all the other sub-articles) are subsets. The purpose for and work on this page is about menstrual cycle, not the sub-articles, and whether this article meets WP:WIAFA, which it will and does as long as Graham is permitted to finish. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:42, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Yikes, I can see I have stirred up a hornet's nest here. I wasn't aware of mensturation but I did find the (now absent) two sentence society and culture section jarring (my opinion is either include as a summary style paragraph or not at all, but that the very brief sentences were quite jarring). Please ping me when Graham's done and I will have a look. As he's still editing I think it may be somewhat annoying for me to review as he goes things that he may already plan to edit. --Tom (LT) (talk) 07:44, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- Hi @Tom (LT): There is another book on its way to me by snail mail, but I doubt if I will need it. So, when you have time could you comment? Perhaps the article Talk Page would be the best venue as that's where most of the discussions are underway. Thank.Graham Beards (talk) 21:26, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- Yikes, I can see I have stirred up a hornet's nest here. I wasn't aware of mensturation but I did find the (now absent) two sentence society and culture section jarring (my opinion is either include as a summary style paragraph or not at all, but that the very brief sentences were quite jarring). Please ping me when Graham's done and I will have a look. As he's still editing I think it may be somewhat annoying for me to review as he goes things that he may already plan to edit. --Tom (LT) (talk) 07:44, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- Menstrual cycle uses summary style correctly to cover multiple phases of the reproductive cycle; these include the follicular phase, ovulation, ovarian cycle, the luteal phase and many others. Menstruation is one part, among those many others, all of which are summarized. Whatever the quality assessment of any of those other articles is, *this* article has to meet WP:WIAFA, which so far it is. What the menstruation article should be (or any of the many sub-topics) is not in the remit of this review; it is one of many sub-articles. In terms of which hatnote to use, when an article is not using WP:SS to summarize the entire contents of another article, further is more appropriate than main. The approach to this article is not “purely” anatomical, biological or medical; it is, as it should be, based on sources. The entire reproductive cycle is not menstruation, and menstruation, like every subset of the entire topic, has its own article. Some of the desires expressed on talk to bring in off-topic material from menstruation (but not from follicular phase, luteal phase, ovulation, or anything else) appear to be driven by issues beyond this article. Menstrual cycle is the broad topic, not the narrower one; it encompasses the entire reproductive cycle, of which menstruation (as all the other sub-articles) are subsets. The purpose for and work on this page is about menstrual cycle, not the sub-articles, and whether this article meets WP:WIAFA, which it will and does as long as Graham is permitted to finish. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:42, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- I don't think that the menstruation article should be seen as a "subset" of menstrual cycle at all! You are looking at it purely from a biological standpoint. I look at it from a woman's life & society standpoint. In my view the article menstruation should be broad and overarching, it covers a range of topics, and looks at menstruation from different angles, including how women feel, how they deal with it, how society looks on it etc. For me the menstrual cycle article is a "smaller" more narrow article that is purely focused on what exactly which hormone does at which point of the cycle, so purely medical/biological/anatomical - whichever you want to call it. Therefore, it does NOT need a section on "society and culture". That belongs to menstruation (I would still argue to link the two articles clearly together; to me they belong together like a jigsaw puzzle; but I guess this whole notion that one will be FA quality whereas the other will be C quality gets in the way). - I still think merging them together might solve some of the problems. EMsmile (talk) 13:13, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Tom (LT) the section "society and culture" is short on purpose because we want readers to know that they can click through to other existing articles which cover that in great depth. And by the way, I don't think we should say there "further" but "main" and link them to menstruation#Society and culture. We certainly don't need detailed information here when the detailed information exists in a related Wikipedia article. Just key terms so that people get a rough idea. EMsmile (talk) 12:32, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Happy to review and be pinged when Graham's ready. Kudos to Graham for improving the article. At this current point the 'other animals' and 'society and culture' sections remain quite short. --Tom (LT) (talk) 03:39, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
- Update, jargon review time:. The article has been considerably reworked (heavy lifting by Graham); see the article talk page. [20]. It would be very helpful to get layperson feedback on the prose at this stage. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:30, 4 March 2021 (UTC)
- It's very bare-bones, but maybe that's ideal for keeping the cruft out. Seems reasonably understandable to this fairly educated but non-expert reader. (t · c) buidhe 19:33, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- It covers everything you would expert to see in a standard (expensive) textbook.Graham Beards (talk) 19:43, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- Progress ongoing, with numerous editors engaged on the article talk page; Tom (LT) is helping fine tune the anatomy, prose checking continues. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:10, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
- Looking good, but waiting for feedback from an endocrinology professor, see work on article talk. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:19, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
- Another week is needed for feedback from external expert review. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:05, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
- And maybe a couple of days to correct the article and find WP:MEDRS sources. Graham Beards (talk) 20:52, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
- Progress is slow but steady, still waiting for external expert review to wrap up (which has been very helpful), and need at least another few weeks, probably two or three. This has been a fortuitous two-fer: a Featured article review and an external expert peer review combined, thanks to Clayoquot. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:37, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
Tropical cyclone
- Notified: Titoxd, Thegreatdr, Jason Rees, Hurricane Noah, Hurricanehink, WikiProject Tropical cyclone, WikiProject Physics, WikiProject Meteorology, diff 03-09-2020
I am nominating this featured article for review because the article contains a few uncited paragraphs, and the long-term trends section is outdated and poorly structured. Additional minor comments on talk. Some issues have been tackled since the talk page notice, but further progress is needed.
This should be a saver, considering how many TC enthusiasts we have. Femke Nijsse (talk) 16:08, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
- My personal feeling with this one is that while it probably is a saver, its probably better to get some thoughts from the FAC community on the article as a whole.Jason Rees (talk) 16:30, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
- The lengthiest unsourced passage appears to be the "Derivation" sub-sub-section, which has a textbook-like feel and might originally have been based on a single source. That's probably not too hard to fix. XOR'easter (talk) 16:18, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
- Realistically speaking, the entire section about Maximum Potential Intensity was copied onto the article as a merge from Maximum potential intensity, and I'm not sure the tropical cyclone article needs that much detail about MPI. I'm tempted to split it back out. Titoxd(?!?) 23:15, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
- I would agree with that. Britannica's article (which seems quite decent) doesn't even seem to mention it.. Femke Nijsse (talk) 22:07, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
- FYI, a discussion is taking place on my talk page about the restructuring of the long-term trend section Femke Nijsse (talk) 09:20, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
- The uncited MPI derivation has been split back now. Could any of the experts look at the remaining info? Is that appropriate? FemkeMilene (talk) 20:32, 18 February 2021 (UTC)
- I am starting to look through the more technical bits and I'm not 100% happy with it, I'm trying to go through it as time allows.Jason Rees (talk) 21:45, 18 February 2021 (UTC)
- @Jason Rees and @Titoxd: could we have an update? FemkeMilene (talk) 19:02, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- I feel that with respect to @Titoxd and ThegreatDR: this articles needs a bit of weeding to make it more accessible. I am trying to do this as time allows and have a rough plan in the back of my head which I will write up on the talk page.Jason Rees (talk) 00:01, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Jason Rees and @Titoxd: could we have an update? FemkeMilene (talk) 19:02, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- I am starting to look through the more technical bits and I'm not 100% happy with it, I'm trying to go through it as time allows.Jason Rees (talk) 21:45, 18 February 2021 (UTC)
- The uncited MPI derivation has been split back now. Could any of the experts look at the remaining info? Is that appropriate? FemkeMilene (talk) 20:32, 18 February 2021 (UTC)
- FYI, a discussion is taking place on my talk page about the restructuring of the long-term trend section Femke Nijsse (talk) 09:20, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
- I would agree with that. Britannica's article (which seems quite decent) doesn't even seem to mention it.. Femke Nijsse (talk) 22:07, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
- Realistically speaking, the entire section about Maximum Potential Intensity was copied onto the article as a merge from Maximum potential intensity, and I'm not sure the tropical cyclone article needs that much detail about MPI. I'm tempted to split it back out. Titoxd(?!?) 23:15, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
- The lengthiest unsourced passage appears to be the "Derivation" sub-sub-section, which has a textbook-like feel and might originally have been based on a single source. That's probably not too hard to fix. XOR'easter (talk) 16:18, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
- Update the plan is there, and I'm updating the impacts of climate variability part as a whole now. Not yet familiar with this, so currently printing some review chapters / papers. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:20, 8 March 2021 (UTC)
- Femkemilene you may find some of the sources on paleotempestology useful. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:46, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
- Wow, it's difficult to get a good short narrative out of that and the review papers. I'll see whether I can find some books about the tropical cyclones in general to figure out how much attention is really due.. Paleotempoestology seems to be a collection of puzzle pieces that need to be assembled still. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:48, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- To say nothing of biased. Like, one would think that tropical cyclones only exist in Belize, the eastern USA, China and Australia if one went by the paleotempestology research papers. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 19:30, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- Have a look at the Climatology section I started to write the other day. It might be better/easier to expand that with a few bits of information and indirectly talk about paleotempestology in it.Jason Rees (talk) 01:50, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- Talking indirectly about paleotempestology is a good idea. This 2010 book talks about it only in its chapter on climate change; and dedicates only 1/9th of that chapter to it. If I can find a more modern book about it with an equal small part dedicated to paleotempestology, I'm very happy to see it integrated into another section instead of being a stand-alone subsection. I could weave it into the subsection on climatic variability in a similar fashion as that book.
- About climatology; I wonder if we could rename it into 'seasons', to make clear the distinction between that section and a) observations and b) climatic variations. Some of that first paragraph is more logically placed under observations. I further think that our section observations should be moved upwards, before climatology. FemkeMilene (talk) 17:09, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- This 2016 book also talks about paleotempestology only in the context of current climate change. This seems to be the most logical place to put it. A shame the IPCC report has been postponed until August.. FemkeMilene (talk) 17:16, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Jason Rees: can we have an update? It seems that quite a bit of work is still needed. Do we need to try and involve others? FemkeMilene (talk) 19:24, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- @Femkemilene: I have been a bit busy in real life over the last few weeks and havent been able to edit much. Yeah a lot of work is still needed and help from others would be appreciated.Jason Rees (talk) 22:39, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- @Jason Rees: can we have an update? It seems that quite a bit of work is still needed. Do we need to try and involve others? FemkeMilene (talk) 19:24, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Have a look at the Climatology section I started to write the other day. It might be better/easier to expand that with a few bits of information and indirectly talk about paleotempestology in it.Jason Rees (talk) 01:50, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- To say nothing of biased. Like, one would think that tropical cyclones only exist in Belize, the eastern USA, China and Australia if one went by the paleotempestology research papers. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 19:30, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- Wow, it's difficult to get a good short narrative out of that and the review papers. I'll see whether I can find some books about the tropical cyclones in general to figure out how much attention is really due.. Paleotempoestology seems to be a collection of puzzle pieces that need to be assembled still. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:48, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- Femkemilene you may find some of the sources on paleotempestology useful. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:46, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
- Note: I have patched up the citation needed tags outside of the §Climatology section. For the most part the preexisting uncited information was factually correct but I've added some additional clarifications/details where needed. —TheAustinMan(Talk ⬩ Edits) 15:00, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
- Great to have you on board. Of my initial comments, 2, 5, 9, 11, 12 and 13 have not yet been addressed. Would you be able to help there as well? FemkeMilene (talk) 16:10, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
Spiderland
- Notified: Brandt Luke Zorn, WikiProject Music diff
- Issues in the lead were mentioned back in July on the talk page and seem to have gone unfixed.
- I posted the following concerns on the talk page and none were addressed. Also pinged FA editor User:Brandt Luke Zorn who did not respond despite still being active.
- Among the concerns:
- [citation needed] tag in "Background"
- [When] and [citation needed] tags in "Production".
- "Music" section is very choppy and has a lot of one- and two-sentence paragraphs. Also the last paragraph is uncited.
- "Don't Look Back Concerts" (citation 27) redirects to a hotel website.
- Genius.com (citation 91) does not appear to be reliable.
Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 21:48, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
- Let me see what I can do. I'm cleaning up a little bit of trivial info on the background section and replacing some possibly unreliable sources with AllMusic, which is definitely a reliable source. It's slow going, especially since I don't have access to the 33 1/3 book outside of the limited preview in Google Books. Famous Hobo (talk) 02:15, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
- These pointers have been handy for a general clean up, though overall the article remains in very good condition.
- Have removed Genious.com, and replaced Don't Look Back Concerts with a ref from Pitchfork.
- Issue in background removed.
- Looking for a source for the 1st two sentences in "Production"...the [when] is gone...its obvious that it was in 1990
- Dont agree re the "Music" section being choppy...the short paras are because each discusses an individual song. Having them like this makes it easier for readers to find what they are looking for on a quick scroll through scan.
- will update when the Production bit is reffed Ceoil (talk) 21:17, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
- oh and the issues with the lead were addressed during last summer. Ceoil (talk) 21:45, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
- Ceoil is this ready yet for others to look in? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:12, 19 February 2021 (UTC)
- Yes, except the statements within "McMahan and Walford began writing together for the band's next record, creating six new songs which the band practiced throughout the summer of 1990. Slint entered River North Records in August 1990 to record Spiderland. At that time there were no vocals or lyrics prepared for the album, so the band wrote them while in the studio" are as yet uncited - cough User:Brandt Luke Zorn. There is no question that they are not true, but text shift has made them out of sorts....hold on. Ceoil (talk) 01:46, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
(Redacted)
There is still a citation needed tag, there is an awful lot of quoting, and it might be worth looking at a better application of WP:RECEPTION to avoid a lot of Reviewer A said B, Reviewer C said D. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:14, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
Move to FARC, which does not preclude further improvements. There is still a cn tag, a lot of quoting, and prose difficulties, sample: Spiderland has also been said by Michael Alan Goldberg to have been a considerable influence on post-rock bands Mogwai, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Isis and Explosions in the Sky. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:12, 5 March 2021 (UTC)- Work on going. Working from top to bottom, so havnt gotten to the specific issues mentioned above, but am formulating an approach to dealing with music critic's opinion not mired in wiki clicche. Ceoil (talk) 05:43, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- OK struck, no move, thx Ceoil! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:04, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- I see Ceoil is still at it, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:12, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
- OK struck, no move, thx Ceoil! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:04, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- Work on going. Working from top to bottom, so havnt gotten to the specific issues mentioned above, but am formulating an approach to dealing with music critic's opinion not mired in wiki clicche. Ceoil (talk) 05:43, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
- Glaring issues that pop up to me right away.
- There's a formatting screw-up in the first sentence of "Background."
- There's a student newspaper citation for a long quote. I don't think writers of student newspapers are reliable.
- "The album was virtually unnoticed by the American music press or zines.[28][28]" Why are there duplicate citations?
- Many "dafuq" moments in the prose: "It's black-and-white cover photograph" "which as taken by Noel Saltzman," "but said mitted the band was" "The UK press music press were among the first to notice praise the album." A random "Ho" at the end of the first sentence of the reunion paragraph.
- Many non-objective statements, each with only one citation, that are presented as fact but would be more accurate to be attributed: "Spiderland has sold in numbers exceptional for an obscure, defunct band who rarely performed live" and "Compared to record sales by contemporaneous alternative rock bands on major labels, sales of Spiderland would be considered modest or underwhelming."
- "Today, the album is widely considered a landmark indie rock album" "Widely"? There's only two effin citations. How is that considered widely?!
- "Spiderland has been cited as an major influence on post-rock bands Mogwai, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Isis and Explosions in the Sky.[64]" Nonsensical. It's only one article of a random alternative weekly newspaper assuming those bands may have been influenced by the record. Too obscure and abstract to include this.
- Most of the legacy section is a quotefarm of only a few retrospective reviews.
- Why does ref 69 have no timestamp?
- Futhormore, why are some single-page sources citation the Harvard way and others as full cites within footnotes? Inconsistent.
- "| Features | Pitchfork" are not part of the titles of those Pitchfork features. I think that should be obvious.
- Many work field names are improperly presented as URLs instead of their actual work names? For example, thelist.co.uk" instead of The List.
- Another promotion from more than a decade ago that hasn't kept its FA status. The prose is broken and filled with grammar problems, the article is disorganized in some places, and the cite formatting is problematic. I'm also sensing this article is incomplete and has garnered many more retrospective perspectives not cited here. HumanxAnthro (talk) 01:29, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- HumanxAnthro please see the WP:FAR instructions; Keep or Delist are not declared during the FAR phase, which is for listing items that need to be addressed and hopefully seeing that happen. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:32, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- To note, tomorrow is the 30th anniversary of the album, so expecting a lot heavy duty sources to publish lengthy overviews of its legacy and [v. important] placement in alt music history. Rolling Stone' for example, yesterday published a comprehensive overview of the contemporary music scene, the album's genesis and recording, and its enduring legacy. Ceoil (talk) 21:30, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
Featured article removal candidates
- Place the most recent review at the top. If the nomination is just beginning, place under Featured Article Review, not here.
United Kingdom corporation tax
- Notified: WikiProject Politics of the United Kingdom, Business, diff
Review section
I am nominating this featured article for review because the article is far from meeting the FA criteria. Not less than 40 cn tags, text only cited in the 6-paragraph long lede, not updated much since 2007 (including entire 'recent developements heading detailing 2004 changes). Two largest contributors not edited since 2007. I propose an accelerated process. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:14, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- I concur with the call for accelerated process. (t · c) buidhe 19:17, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to accelerated FARC Support an accelerated process. The "Interaction with European law" section needs a major post-Brexit revamp and there are too many cn tags. Z1720 (talk) 19:29, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, accelerated, complete rewrite needed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:05, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- FARC, accelerated process - This needs a top-to-bottom rewrite. Hog Farm Talk 03:15, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and currency. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:27, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Charles Edward Magoon
- Notified: Jrp, WikiProject Cuba, WikiProject Politics, WikiProject Biography/Politics and government, 2020-12-05 diff
Review section
I'm nominating this Featured Article for review because I believe it fails criteria 1. c), "a thorough and representative survey of the relevant literature". The subject of this article was, among other things, the governor of Cuba during the Second Occupation of Cuba by the US. Currently, the bulk of the sources in this article are contemporary newspaper articles dated between 1900 and 1909. This does not allow for a retrospective look into this politician's career by historians, especially when there is so much academic material out there (I've listed a few sources in talk, and a brief search in JSTOR shows many more). RetiredDuke (talk) 13:37, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- This may be an accelerate candidate - it's just so far from WP:FACR #1c. There is a decent corpus of scholarly literature about this figure, yet the article is almost entirely sourced to contemporary newspapers reports. The lack of use of non-contemporary scholarly sources also limits the amount of legacy material that can be had, which suggests #1b issues, as well. Hog Farm Talk 05:13, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC accelerated - Needs a significant rewrite with modern sources, also some missing cites in general. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:37, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC Accelerated (official declaration). This is just so far from 1c. Almost none of the sizable scholarly literature on this topic is being used. Hog Farm Talk 20:07, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC accelerated Except for one 1971 source (footnoted twice), the rest of the sources are from 100+ years ago. This article will need a complete rewrite using current academic scholarship, which is difficult for FAR/FARC to accomplish. Z1720 (talk) 23:19, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:29, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Battlefield Earth (film)
- Notified: Prioryman, WikiProject Film, WikiProject Science Fiction, 2021-03-17
Review section
While you were still learning how to SPELL YOUR NAME, I was being trained.... to review featured articles!
— Terl from Battlefield Earth
Another FA promotion from more than 10 years ago, a time of lower standards for the FA criteria. The article, mainly, is way too incomplete to meet the criteria; its production section has little-to-none about the actual production, just the Scientology relations in its development, when the making of its special effects, design, filming, scoring and so on has garnered features in science fiction magazines, special features in home media releases, and several retrospective sources in Newsweek, Vice, The Independent, and more not cited here (the DVD commentary is only cited one). Additionally, the film has not kept up with retrospective opinion and analysis, the reception section is a quotefarm with little attempt at opinion consolidation, and citations are incomplete in at least one field or another, with its two prominent book sources cited with too broad page ranges and no specific page numbers. Also, we have a random Youtuber's account as a source for Ref 66. The article needs significant improvement to deserve its golden star. 👨x🐱 (talk) 12:51, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
several retrospective sources in Newsweek, Vice, The Independent, and more not cited here
-- any chance of links? I might be interested in taking a crack at this, but no guarantees, and some jumping-off points would be good. I've read more than a bit on this film in my day. Vaticidalprophet 02:31, 3 April 2021 (UTC)- I've linked these in the talk page of Battlefield Earth's article. 👨x🐱 (talk) 14:23, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Actually, screw it, here are the links of unused sources
- There are five interviews in the Blu-Ray showcasing separately its directing, music composition, set and costume designs, script writing, and miniatures.
- Cinefantastique
- Starlog
- Starlog again
- Starlog
- The costume designer's involvement is discussed in an Starlog interview with him
- Science Fiction Age
- Vice
- The Independent
- Newsweek
- Film Courage
👨x🐱 (talk) 15:13, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks, I'll go through them sometime. I might also be able to think of more not listed here. Unsure whether these will all be usable at the FA level (I'm just dipping a toe into it, and FAC source reviews look terrifying), but will see what's good. Vaticidalprophet 21:31, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Chuckled at this line out of the Independent:
Battlefield Earth is currently unavailable to stream anywhere in the UK
. Aside from that amusingly reversed boilerplate, the Independent retrospective looks just a rehash of the Vice one. The Vice one is excellent, but I've seen Vice be criticised at the FA level -- thoughts? Vaticidalprophet 07:48, 4 April 2021 (UTC)- I see zero reason for Vice to be questioned 👨x🐱 (talk) 12:08, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Hmm. I've seen FAC source reviewers dislike it. Hopefully @Nikkimaria and @Ealdgyth won't be offended by a ping -- is this something that you-as-source-reviewers would accept in getting a FAR back to standard? Vaticidalprophet 03:19, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- Because it is listed as no-consensus at WP:RSP, there would need to be a rationale as to how it would meet the higher bar of high-quality for FA. Nikkimaria (talk) 11:43, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- Hmm. I've seen FAC source reviewers dislike it. Hopefully @Nikkimaria and @Ealdgyth won't be offended by a ping -- is this something that you-as-source-reviewers would accept in getting a FAR back to standard? Vaticidalprophet 03:19, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- I see zero reason for Vice to be questioned 👨x🐱 (talk) 12:08, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Chuckled at this line out of the Independent:
- Thanks, I'll go through them sometime. I might also be able to think of more not listed here. Unsure whether these will all be usable at the FA level (I'm just dipping a toe into it, and FAC source reviews look terrifying), but will see what's good. Vaticidalprophet 21:31, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, extremely limited engagement/progress, moving to FARC does not preclude further work. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:04, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, not a whole lot done, a lot more to do. Hog Farm Talk 13:39, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC no major edits since notice was placed on talk page, and there's lots to improve. Z1720 (talk) 23:15, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:30, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Bricker Amendment
- Notified: PedanticallySpeaking, WikiProject Law, WikiProject Politics, WikiProject U.S. Congress, WikiProject Conservatism, WikiProject United States Government, talk page 2021-03-11
Review section
I am nominating this featured article (2006 promotion) for review because its sources are not adequate under 1c. The main issue is an overdependence on primary sources. Primary sources are not "high-quality", and WP:PRIMARY restricts their usage to clear and incontrovertible statements of fact. That's not happening here. Much of the "legal background" section consists only of citations to court cases and statutes, meaning that statements of analysis (e.g. The precedent most often cited by critics of "treaty law" was Missouri v. Holland
) are effectively uncited. This happens throughout the article: citations to laws, treaties, legal disputes, and contemporaneous writings are all too common. In addition, there are about half a dozen citation needed tags. While I'd ordinarily be inclined to just fix it myself, I fear the pervasive use of primary sources could only be remedied by a substantial reworking of the article. Since the article hasn't been edited once since I gave notice, I don't think that there's a community of editors prepared to do that. (This is my first FAR, so kindly excuse any procedural errors on my part.) Cheers, Extraordinary Writ (talk) 18:13, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comments from HumanxAnthro
- While I see zero reason for the overwhelming bigotry against primary sources that are in FA discussions ("Primary sources are not "high-quality"" is a loaded statement. I know the internet has allowed a lot of self-written blogs that's made us have to determine what's what, but just because a source is primary doesn't mean it's unreliable or not high-quality. In fact, in some cases I would fail an article for comprehensiveness if it didn't include certain details from primary sources), but there is analysis not in those primary sources, I agree secondary sources are required for those. 👨x🐱 (talk) 23:11, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've stricken the "not high-quality" line - it was an overgeneralization. I don't object to the use of primary sources if it is compliant with WP:PRIMARY. In this case, as you note, the use of primary sources goes far beyond "straightforward, descriptive statements of facts", and so all sorts of sourcing and OR issues arise. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 23:39, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - the article hasn't been edited a single time since this FAR was initiated. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 03:50, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - missing citations and possible OR issues with use of primary sources. Hog Farm Talk 05:19, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - No edits since notice was placed on talk page in early March. Z1720 (talk) 23:12, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section largely concerned sourcing. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:31, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Fauna of Puerto Rico
- Notified: Joelr31, WP Puerto Rico, WP Caribbean, WP Animals, 2021-02-25 notification
Review section
This FA, which has not been reviewed since late 2006, contains large quantities of uncited text as well as a large number of 10-year-old statistics that need checked for currency. Currently does not meet WP:WIAFA. Hog Farm Talk 03:44, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - no engagement. Hog Farm Talk 20:09, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - still no engagement. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:34, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - seriously undercited; no substantial edits in months. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 18:33, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - No major edits since notice was placed in Feb. Z1720 (talk) 23:09, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and currency. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:31, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Grunge
- Notified: OnBeyondZebrax, WikiProject Music, WP Alternative music, diff
Review section
I am nominating this featured article for review because the quotes disrupt nice flow of prose, inconsistent referencing (including bare urls), and lacking page numbers, as laid out by RetiredDuke. I really hope that this important article is saved :). Not notifying editor without edits after 2013. FemkeMilene (talk) 17:50, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Comments from RD
Oh God, I was hoping this wouldn't come here, but seems like nobody picked it up. I think that the article has become bloated due to the number of quotes, particularly on the "Clothing and fashion", "Alcohol and drugs" and "Legacy" sections. Just as an example, House stated that there was "... no more (heroin) here [in Seattle] than anyplace else"; he stated that the "heroin is not a big part of the [Seattle music] culture", and that "marijuana and alcohol ... are far more prevalent"
- 3 quotes in a single sentence, and most of it can be paraphrased since it's nothing groundbreaking anyway. I think this article needs a significant trim by someone knowledgeable, but I'd like to hear other opinions. RetiredDuke (talk) 18:25, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Comments from HumanxAnthro
So many blatant issues, including those mentioned above.
- Original FA nomination was from 2007, so it's another article promoted to FA when standards were far lower and there was much less access to print sources on the subject.
- The 2007 FA nominator has not been active since 2012, only having one edit in 2013.
- The lead is missing summary of some key factors of this genre, particularly the clothing and fashion and use of alcohol and drugs associated with it as while as the overwhelming involvement of women, unusual in comparison to other rock genres.
- The History section needs to be split into its own article, and there needs to be more subsections within History to divide already insanely-long subsections
- "Grunge appeared as a trend again in 2008, and for Fall/Winter 2013,"
- (1) Citation for grunge being a fashion trend in 2008? Found it nowhere in any of the citations in this subsection?
- (2) Why are we so extensively talking about fashion collections Courtney Love encountered?
- "With Courtney Love as his muse for the collection, she reportedly loved the collection." Repetitive prose.
- Why is "bass guitar" section just a few disparate instances of how bass was incorporated? There doesn't seem to be a consistent grunge-style bass here, which doesn't justify the section.
- Why aren't the album names of the Neil Young img caption italicized?
- Several citations are incorrectly formatted and incomplete.
- Bare URLs are unacceptable even for good articles.
- Inconsistent cite formatting, as some book cites are fully presented in the footnotes are others are cited the Harvard way where you only give the last name and page number and have to go to a separate "works cited" list to see the full source.
- Our first cite (which is for one of the genre origins of Grunge) cites an autobio that isn't mainly about grunge. Shouldn't we have professional music journalists' pieces primarily about Grunge cite origins?
- Ref 21. Incomplete citation, and are we sure WatchMojo owns the TV interview cited? If not, we have a mighty WP:COPYLINK problem on our hands.
- Ref 110 is a WP:COPYLINK-violating Dailymotion source.
- Ref 140 is a Blogspot source.
- Ref 178. (1) AllMusic is not a work. (2) I don't think that's how you format titles of AllMusic source
- So many more cite formatting problems I could bring up, but I'd say to look at it yourself. You'll find more of them in a flash.
This is in severe need of cleanup. 👨x🐱 (talk) 16:28, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, no engagement, no improvement. [21] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:07, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - Not much happening, much needs to happen. Hog Farm Talk 03:17, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC Lots of work needed to be FA quality. Unfortuantely there's been limited engagement. Z1720 (talk) 23:08, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include citations, organization and coverage. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:38, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Rhodes blood libel
- Notified: Beit Or, WikiProject Jewish history, WikiProject Greece, WikiProject Ottoman Empire, WikiProject Turkey, WikiProject History, WikiProject Religion, diff for talk page notification
Review section
I am nominating this featured article for review because, as stated on the talk page, the article mostly cites just one source, while there are several other scholarly sources that cover the incident. Thus, it cannot be considered well-researched or comprehensive according to the FA criteria. (t · c) buidhe 12:07, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comments from HumanxAnthro
- I will say, in looking on the bright side, that the prose does establish all necessary concepts in a way the reader could understand and in proper order, although there are oddly-formatted sentences, and those that could be formatted better, here and there. "After an epidemic of plague in 1498–1500," "expelled those of the remaining Jews who would not be baptized." "deeply ingrained in the consciousness of some local Christian communities by the early 20th century while the blood libel likely came there in the early 19th century ." It definitely shows the writers of the article did keep in mind how a new reader would understand it, and with more sources represented and some more prose copyedits, this has got a chance of being FA. Plus, I think it's essential to get it to that quality given how under-represented the history of marginalization and oppression of Jews are in history classes. It didn't start with Nazi Germany, and it would be great for articles like this to become high-quality so more readers know that. 👨x🐱 (talk) 14:32, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, no engagement, heavy reliance on one source, others neglected. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:09, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC No major edits since notice was placed on talk page in Feb. Z1720 (talk) 23:05, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Sourcing. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:38, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Talbot Tagora
- Notified: no editors even remotely active here to notify, WP Autos, WP Brands, talk page notice 2013-05-16
Review section
This is a 2006 FA last reviewed in 2009 whose main contributor has not edited since 2006. The article is listy; there is uncited text, including direct quotes, throughout; there are incomplete citations and bare URLs; there are sources of dubious reliability, and it appears the article has not been maintained since its last review. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:10, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Support accelerated process Only 22 sources, not all reliable. Seems underlinked. FemkeMilene (talk) 21:27, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Support accelerated process per Femke, Hog Farm and sources not incorporated per RetiredDuke (unlikely that anyone will take this on, and if they do, moving to FARC does not preclude further improvements). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:34, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comments from HumanxAnthro
The FA nominator of this article responded to the previous time this was nominated for FA review, stating this is the most comprehensive article that could be written and that those were the best-quality sources available. Here's a quote of his response.
- "I admit to have written a good chunk of this article as it stands, and I am absolutely positive those were and are the "best quality" sources we can get on this obscure subject. Other possible sources are either inaccurate or incomprehensive, so even if they might look nicer by means of being print or more "high-quality" websites, they wouldn't consitute better-quality SOURCES for me. This is a rather special case in that there was minimal coverage of the subject by any form of lasting media, and I understand it is raising considerable doubts, but I hope this meets with understanding. Please do point me towards better sources if I missed some by any chance. As concerns comprehensiveness, this article really says all there was to say about the subject, and then some. I was actually getting anxious there was too much of trivial and unencyclopedic material put in there, so I am quite surprised the article is getting doubts on the other front. OTOH, similar concerns were raised during the original FA candidacy, and proved mostly to stem out of reviewer's cursory look at the article as "too short". Such concerns usually fade away on more thorough reading - there really isn't much, or actually anything, left to say."
Anybody believe them? 👨x🐱 (talk) 17:55, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- This quote is from PrinceGloria, who seems to be active here and there. I'd notify them about this review. 👨x🐱 (talk) 17:57, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Can't say I'm seeing any Bare URL cites, but if "Missing or empty" errors are popping up, that's a sign something needs to be fixed. 👨x🐱 (talk) 18:00, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
Personally, I think this appears to be one of those subjects that will just be very difficult to bring to FAC, due to the obscurity of most of the sources. A Google Books search suggests that this car has been written about, but just in primarily offline or otherwise not easily accessible sources. Snippet views for Google books suggest that [22], [23], [24], [25], etc. With the snippet view, I can see very little about these sources, so it is hard to truly judge. I just think that this is one of those subjects where there is RS coverage available, but it is just all stuff that is very difficult to access. Hog Farm Talk 19:30, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've had a bit more luck in finding sources, in some motor magazines:
- Motor Sport - April 1981; October 1981 (this one is in the article, but w/ no link to source)
- Classic & Sports Car - January 2020; a paragraph here; pages numbers 17, 18 & 19 in that slideshow; number 5 in that slideshow
- Road & Track - Chrysler Europe's $1 Sales Price Was a Terrible Deal
- Autocar - 40 years on: The notable new cars of 1980
- I keep finding quotes to old publications of Car, What Car? and Automotive News, for instance in this post or this one, but they are not available online.
- I don't know much about cars though, so I can't be of much help here. (I also found out that there is/was a band with that name, which I found funny.) RetiredDuke (talk) 21:51, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comment - For what it's worth this article still appears to be of a far better quality than most car articles on Wikipedia; which is to say that it's not a WP:JARGON filled mess. Perhaps the Pitchfork article mentioned prior could be used as a reference somewhere in this article to talk about the car's cultural impact? There certainly seem to be sources available that could help get this article up to the highest standards it could be at. HumanBodyPiloter5 (talk) 04:30, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comment this article is nicely written, but its sources are underwhelming and it lacks a description of the car – how would I know whether the car's design was good/average/bad if the tiny description pieces just tell me that is has a MacPherson front suspension and came with three engine options? A featured article on a car (or other vehicle) must include a decent description of how the car works. Best regards, --Johannes (Talk) (Contribs) (Articles) 09:11, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comment: "how a car works" is very subjective; such editorializing is commonly removed from automobile articles. One reviewer loves the handling and another one hates it. Someone finds the seats comfortable and another one thinks they are just okay. Also, is it not possible to have an FA with mainly older, off-line references? Seems very limiting. Anyhow, FA or not is not super important to me. Mr.choppers | ✎ 16:44, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
- Support accelerated process unless somebody steps up soon. This one is far from complete per Johannes above, and the sourcing is deficient, as noted above with the list of sources. This would likely need a top-to-bottom rewrite to get back up to the criteria. Hog Farm Talk 16:39, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:31, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist - Far to go, no engagement. FemkeMilene (talk) 15:48, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist (accelerated) - A long ways from this, as it is far from complete or a good sweep of the RS. Hog Farm Talk 03:49, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
300 (film)
- Notified: Mercenary2k, WikiProject Film, WikiProject Comics, WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome, 2020-12-15
Review section
Fun fact: every section in the article's source starts with a hidden warning: "ATTENTION! PLEASE READ BEFORE EDITING! Please present potential changes to this section in the Discussion area prior to making them, as consensus has been reached on a number of issues that tend to be repeated here." Apparently there hasn't been consensus on how to keep its featured article quality more than 10 years after it was promoted.
The not-retired RetiredDuke brought up many problems with this article on its talk page three months ago, and although many edits have been made since then, none of them addressed the problems. No representation from academic literature, statements un-cited or using questionable sources, the prose of the "Iranian criticism" section is not organized well, the plot section is 12 words too long, and the reception section is a quote-farm of 1% of all critical reviews of this movie. Also, I think it's fair to assume some sections of an article about such a big production (reception, production for example) are incomplete. I wouldn't even promote this article to "This is Sparta" status due to its many issues... That joke should tell you the current quality of this article. HumanxAnthro (talk) 11:39, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
Comments
- This article was promoted 8 months after the movie was released for the first time (at a film marathon), and just 5 months after it hit the theaters in March 2007. I don't think anyone at the time was anticipating what a behemoth it would become in popular culture, and I'm of the opinion that the article does not reflect the continued coverage the movie got in academic sources, for instance. The Iranian criticism subsection could be cut in half, and I've highlighted some unreliable sources in Talk. RetiredDuke (talk) 14:54, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
- If this article does happen to be delisted, I'd be happy to read the academic literature online and find more via Google Scholar. I'm really interested in doing it cause it's got feminine men and meme-worthy material aplenty ;) I'm working on a themes section (or article if there's enough info) for the Paranormal Activity film series, which will probably train me in doing the same for 300 and its lesser known 2014 sequel. As it stands, though, RetirdDuke is right. HumanxAnthro (talk) 15:51, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
Sourcing comments
I have doubts about the reliability of the following sources:
- About.com
- Comics2Film.com
- Broken Frontier
- Avatar Movie Zone
- SuperHeroHype.com
- What is Movie Wave?
- What is Music on Film?
- 300onDVD.com
- I think we can find a better source for the description of the real battle of Thermopylae than unsupported referencing to Herodotus
- Axccess News
- What in the world is the reference that is just "300 wows Sparta home crowd despite some critics' complaints"."
- Comingsoon.net
- CanMag
- What is AfterElton.com
- What is How to Split an Atom
- What is backwardfive.com
- What is moviepilot.com
Some of these could well be reliable (I'm not familiar with most of them), but these generally look like non-ideal sources. I get the strong impression from looking at the sourcing of this article that it relies on dodgy web sources way too much when there is academic literature about this topic. Hog Farm Talk 22:21, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
Move to FARC - Only real work that has occurred is some referencing formatting fixes, which doesn't solve the very significant sourcing issues. Hog Farm Talk 21:07, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and coverage. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:32, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist. Concerns over criterion 1c: high-quality reliable sources. DrKay (talk) 15:17, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
Privilege of peerage
- Notified: DrKay, WikiProject Peerage and Baronetage, WikiProject United Kingdom, WikiProject Politics, 2020-10-25
Review section
I am nominating this featured article for review because the article has been tagged as non-comprehensive since 2017, missing information about historical privileges. One of the sections consists mostly of overly long quotes, as detailed by buidhe. Original nominator/(?)writer not active since 2006. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:34, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
- Comment. I thought it was only fair to notify WikiProject Politics of the United Kingdom since they will likely have more interest in this article than WikiProject Politics –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 20:09, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC. I did as much as I could do last time around. Original nominator is long gone and no-one else is likely to engage. DrKay (talk) 09:41, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - Not much happening, not up to standards. Hog Farm Talk 21:06, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include comprehensiveness and organization. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:33, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist necessary improvements not happening. (t · c) buidhe 20:46, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist. Tagged for unsourced statements since January 2021 and as needing expansion for over 4 years. DrKay (talk) 13:38, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist - Nothing happening. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:27, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist - Nothing happening, lots of work needed. Hog Farm Talk 13:48, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
War against Nabis
- Notified: Kyriakos, Wandalstouring, Robth, WP Classical Greece and Rome, WP Greece, WP MILHIST, WP Rome, 2021-02-22
Review section
While this one looks fine on the surface, it relies very heavily on largely unsupported referencing to two problematic sources. Livy is an ancient primary source who is used often alone without anything to support it, and Smith 1873 is also used heavily and mainly unsupported and is a pretty dated source. With such a heavy reliance on Livy and Smith, this one doesn't meet WP:FACR 1c. Hog Farm Talk 00:29, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - no engagement beyond a handful of copy edits. Hog Farm Talk 03:36, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - still no engagement. FemkeMilene (talk) 16:57, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - nothing's happening here. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 03:32, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Delist - I don't think that an FA should rely this much on an ancient source, uncritically. Livy is a primary source and the use of his works should be put in context, with the use of modern, secondary sources. RetiredDuke (talk) 15:20, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist - uncritical reliance on Greco-Roman-period sources raises substantial sourcing issues. Citations to modern scholarly perspectives are a must when one is dealing with Polybius, Livy, etc. Otherwise, problems with OR and due weight inevitably result, as they have here. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 23:34, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
Chinua Achebe
- Notified: Scartol, WikiProject Biography/Arts and entertainment, WikiProject Nigeria, WikiProject Children's literature, WikiProject Disability, WikiProject Igbo, 2021-02-16
Review section
I am nominating this featured article for review because there are citation concerns from May 2020, an overreliance of the Ezenwa-Ohaeto source and bloated sections like "Influence and legacy" and "Masculinity and femininity". Z1720 (talk) 21:05, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC No engagement, 23 cn tags. FemkeMilene (talk) 12:36, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - No significant engagement, significant work needed. Hog Farm Talk 21:03, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Delist - lots of work needed, no engagement. Hog Farm Talk 03:50, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist - per above -Indy beetle (talk) 18:53, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
Super Mario 64
- Notified: Guyinblack25, WikiProject video games (plus the project's Nintendo task force), 2021-03-03
Review section
Super Mario 64 is an article that was promoted to FA status in 2008.... and man did it not maintain that status. The 2008 FA nominator hasn't made a single edit to the article since nearly ten years ago, and although other users have added info and content, it's not enough to keep this article FA quality. I brought up the many, many issues with this article on the talk page, with a couple of users initially considering interest in moving it back to FA quality. However, they lost interest days later due to a lack of time, so I'm taking this to featured article review.
You can go to the article's talk page for more specific details on its problems, but to put it simply, it is horribly incomplete (there's nothing about its f---ing E3 coverage, for crying out loud), disorganized and hard to navigate (at least its Reception section is), not representative of academic and scholarly literature and many contemporaneous publication opinions (even IGN's 1996 review is only mentioned for its score), has parts with a majority of their citations being unverifiable, and has so many quibbles with prose I couldn't summarize all of them simply.
If the discussion ends with the article being delisted, I'll be happy to look up the print reviews, do a lot of copyediting and (as a frequent player of Super Mario 64 and a fan of various Youtube videos about the topic) fix its gameplay section so that a lot of the most known parts of the gameplay are incorporated. As it stands, however, the article is in the red zone. HumanxAnthro (talk) 18:26, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- HumanxAnthro did you read the WP:FAR instructions? Was there notice of a FAR needed more than one week ago? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:31, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- I've added the diff; notice was given 10 days ago. FemkeMilene (talk) 19:49, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- Considering SM64's notoriety as a speed-game how much coverage can be added of that? This article became a featured article in the mid-2000s so there's presumably been a lot of recent developments in that area. HumanBodyPiloter5 (talk) 11:49, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
- Sourcing comments
- N-Sider is unreliable
- I can't imagine that the YouTube channel of "Thomas Game Docs" is RS.
- Destructoid is rather situational, is the author of that piece have good credentials?
- Author of that piece is Jim Sterling, who was found to be reliable in the Wii FAR. Devonian Wombat (talk) 10:06, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
- Can concur that Sterling is reliable. HumanBodyPiloter5 (talk) 11:47, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
- Author of that piece is Jim Sterling, who was found to be reliable in the Wii FAR. Devonian Wombat (talk) 10:06, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
There's got to be a better source than Dylan Cuthbert's tweet- Nominator for review here. Just so editors know their guidelines, I'm responding to this. I agree the article has several questionable sources, but this isn't one of them. WP:RSPTWITTER considers tweets reliable sources "if they are verified accounts or if the user's identity is confirmed in some way." The account is definitely verified and is of "lead developer on four Star Fox titles," which Star Fox is by the same company as Nintendo. HumanxAnthro (talk) 23:22, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- Struck. It's fine as a primary source. I wouldn't use it, but that's just a personal preference, not policy. Hog Farm Talk 04:08, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- It may be an official account, but it’s still a marginal source for that kind of statement (we are taking the word of one individual who says they were an engineer on the project?). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:53, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Struck. It's fine as a primary source. I wouldn't use it, but that's just a personal preference, not policy. Hog Farm Talk 04:08, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
- Nominator for review here. Just so editors know their guidelines, I'm responding to this. I agree the article has several questionable sources, but this isn't one of them. WP:RSPTWITTER considers tweets reliable sources "if they are verified accounts or if the user's identity is confirmed in some way." The account is definitely verified and is of "lead developer on four Star Fox titles," which Star Fox is by the same company as Nintendo. HumanxAnthro (talk) 23:22, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- The "Silicon Investor" source is a forum message board
- What is Ownt and what makes it high-quality RS?
- While comicbook.com is listed as "other reliable" at WP:VGRS, the linked discussion actually calls that source to be on the fringe of reliability, which means that it ain't gonna be high-quality RS
- What is sourcegaming.com and is it high-quality RS
- The source "Nintendo SpaceWorld '96: Miyamoto Interview + Super Mario 64 on 64DD + Rumble Pak Unveiled." likely fails WP:COPYLINK.
- Sources 99 through 103 are all random YouTube videos that probably fail COPYLINK and wouldn't be usable as sources anyway.
- What makes ETeknix.com reliable?
- We cite Nintendo Life several times; VGRS says for editorial content, author reliability is needed. So this needs watched out for, and is this even really a high-quality RS at all if the editorial content can be dodgy?
There seems to be a lot of issues with bad sources. Hog Farm Talk 20:22, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- Found a source that shows a live demo of SM64 during E3 1996. (https://www.destructoid.com/stories/this-live-demo-of-super-mario-64-is-an-amazing-retro-e3-moment-511570.phtml) Maybe we could use it? Blue Jay (talk) 02:47, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Destructoid is a little marginal if it qualifies as a reliable source, so we'll need to know if the author has good credentials. I'm not familiar enough with video games journalism to make that call here. Hog Farm Talk 02:54, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Alright, I'll go find other sources. Blue Jay (talk) 02:56, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Right, "Jordan is a founding member of Destructoid and poster of seemingly random pictures. They are anything but random." That's it. [26] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:57, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Destructoid is a little marginal if it qualifies as a reliable source, so we'll need to know if the author has good credentials. I'm not familiar enough with video games journalism to make that call here. Hog Farm Talk 02:54, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
Update on progress? Blue Jay (talk) 02:12, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
- We don't really need an update on progress, when the article is unchanged. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:09, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC, no sustained engagement and negligible editing towards improvement since nomination. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC no significant edits since notice placed on talk page. Z1720 (talk) 17:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - significant work needed and not happening. Hog Farm Talk 17:56, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 16:31, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- When closing, for recordkeeping, this is a re-promoted FFA.
- Improvements since nomination. @Popcornfud and SNUGGUMS:; I am heading towards Delist unless you can convince me otherwise. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:00, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Not sure why you're asking me, but I support delist. Popcornfud (talk) 17:06, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- My guess is because we tried to improve the article during its FAR. In either case, as much as I hate to do this to a fun game I very much enjoy playing, I reluctantly say delist when it isn't comprehensive enough given the above comments. Sourcing doesn't seem as problematic at the moment. Hopefully someone can later get it back up to par after the review concludes. SNUGGUMS (talk / edits) 17:26, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Oh right. From my perspective I was just doing standard editing work at random, heh. Popcornfud (talk) 17:45, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Yep, I saw you had worked on it. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:15, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Oh right. From my perspective I was just doing standard editing work at random, heh. Popcornfud (talk) 17:45, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- My guess is because we tried to improve the article during its FAR. In either case, as much as I hate to do this to a fun game I very much enjoy playing, I reluctantly say delist when it isn't comprehensive enough given the above comments. Sourcing doesn't seem as problematic at the moment. Hopefully someone can later get it back up to par after the review concludes. SNUGGUMS (talk / edits) 17:26, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Not sure why you're asking me, but I support delist. Popcornfud (talk) 17:06, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist, some work by Popcornfud and SNUGGUMS, but problems persist. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:15, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
- Delist Improvements made, but problems still persist per above, as well as scattered things such as N-Sider still being used. Hog Farm Talk 21:35, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
Geology of the Death Valley area
- Notified: Mav, WikiProject California, WikiProject Geology, 2020-11-23
Review section
I am nominating this featured article for review because there are significant unsourced parts in the article. The parts that are sourced rely mostly on pre-2000 books, including for statements such as Debate still surrounds the cause of (Collier, 1990). FemkeMilene (talk) 08:09, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
- A major omission is any mention of the Walker Lane, which it is part of, and any discussion of a change from dominant extension to left lateral strike-slip combined with extension over the last few million years as part of this proposed incipient plate boundary. It's in Death Valley#Geology, but not in this longer article. Mikenorton (talk) 13:24, 7 March 2021 (UTC)
- Move to FARC - Additional issues brought up during FAR stage, and no work done yet. Hog Farm Talk 04:11, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
- I will attempt to update at least part of the article when I get sufficient time to do the rewrite justice - I'm quite busy right now. Mikenorton (talk) 15:36, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
- Update, zero edits so far, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:48, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 16:32, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- Delist, perhaps can be brought back to FAC when re-written. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:02, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
Seabird
- Notified: Sabine's Sunbird, WikiProject Birds, 30 Jan
Review section
I am nominating this featured article, promoted in 2006, for review because it has some issues with verifiability (more than 20 cn tags) as well as lacking info on global warming impacts, as pointed out by Z1720 and Femke Nijsse on the talk page 2 weeks ago. (t · c) buidhe 01:26, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
- So..... (does some quick math) its been nearly 15 years since this was promoted? Thanks, I don't feel remotely old now. Well, I suppose its about time for a tidy. I can start going through, but as I am lacking the textbook I used heavily back then I may need some help. Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:20, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
- Great! This would be an important article to save. Maybe you can get specific pages of the book from Wikipedia:WikiProject_Resource_Exchange/Resource_Request. If you need any scientific papers, you can always ask me as well. FemkeMilene (talk) 08:54, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
- I'm hoping my local university still has it. I would need to browse it a bit to find all the generic statements that I was a touch sloppy in citing back in 2006, so I can't ask for specific pages without the index/table of contents. But anyway I've started adding missing citations. Sabine's Sunbird talk 20:36, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
- This article does not mention anything about climate change. Simply writing "Seabird" on Google Scholar will list a reservoir of sources about their decline due to a number of reasons, and many of whom are recent. This one is useful for example. Wretchskull (talk) 09:49, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Sabine's Sunbird: Could we get an update on progress here? Nikkimaria (talk) 21:37, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
FARC section
- Issues raised in the review section include sourcing and coverage. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:48, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
I've added a small paragraph on climate change, and slightly expanded the lede. Still hoping for Sabine's Seabird to come back. FemkeMilene (talk) 18:56, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
- I can also help with adding citations. ApproximateLand (talk) 00:10, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- Femkemilene, what is the specific ref style being used? I've looked at WP:Citing sources. ApproximateLand (talk) 10:25, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- The style of the references is quite straightforward: it includes everything in inline notes. Just make sure to include page numbers if you use longer documents (books or reports). FemkeMilene (talk) 18:25, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks. I looked at the style and I see what to do. I asked about it because I've seen that one of the concerns about citations for featured articles is to make sure the citation style is consistent. ApproximateLand (talk) 01:22, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
- The style of the references is quite straightforward: it includes everything in inline notes. Just make sure to include page numbers if you use longer documents (books or reports). FemkeMilene (talk) 18:25, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
Crap I have some stuff to add too. (knew I'd forgotten something...) Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:08, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
Update: Pomatostomus, a new user, has addressed almost half of the citation needed tags by adding high-quality sources. Pinging them here, in case they weren't aware they're helping save the star. FemkeMilene (talk) 10:24, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
- I added three refs.[27]. I'm going to ask at Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource Exchange/Resource Request for the page number for this one.[28] I couldn't find anything on "especially during the breeding season when hungry chicks need regular feeding." I looked for more recent refs for the older two citations I used, but I didn't find any, or, if I did, they were about one area, one type of gull, or very old. For "opportunistic feeders", I saw some that would say "like most gulls." I think the page should should say most gulls are opportunistic feeders, but the ref I used says "many." Finding a ref that talked about gulls having bills for opportunistic feeding was tough. I stuck to "are opportunistic feeders." ApproximateLand (talk) 07:53, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- I also saw this ref,[29] (Marine Biology: An Ecological Approach) but it plagiarizes this page word for word. Here's its publisher page.[30]ApproximateLand (talk) 08:00, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
- I have added some classificatory material. Musing on any more needed. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:50, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Question about page number resolved.[31]. ApproximateLand (talk) 07:16, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- At present,[32] only three pieces are left tagged as needing refs. Last time I was on, I looked for refs for "Seabird colonies occur exclusively for the purpose of breeding; non-breeding birds will only collect together outside the breeding season in areas where prey species are densely aggregated." and "Other species, such as some of the storm petrels, diving petrels and cormorants, never disperse at all, staying near their breeding colonies year round.", but came up empty. Since website refs are being used,[33][34][35][36] maybe I should give websites a try. Are we sourcing the seabird families section too? ApproximateLand (talk) 07:36, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
- @ApproximateLand: At page 43 in this book, the quote "Other species, such as some of the storm petrels, diving petrels and cormorants, never disperse at all, staying near their breeding colonies year round." exists and someone has copied it to the article. I could rewrite the sentence and add the reference, what do you think? Wretchskull (talk) 10:53, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Update: wait, I'm confused. Did the book copy from Wikipedia or vice versa? Because the book states exactly what the article has. Wretchskull (talk) 10:56, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Looking at the book, I am suspicious it copied from wikipedia really. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:38, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
- Wretchskull, I think, in all likelihood, the book plagiarized the page. Swaths are copied word for word. We can look in the page history and see when what's on the page was added vs. when the book published its information. Books are always plagiarizing Wikipedia. See my section "Springer Nature copying Wikipedia".[37] ApproximateLand (talk) 22:46, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
British Empire
Coordinator comments
Commentary here seems to have reached an impasse and there have been few recent substantive edits to the article. Summarizing where things are at with regards to the FA criteria:
- Well-written.
- Sandy raised some examples of prose tightening; have these all been addressed?
- Femke Nijsse raised concerns around reading level and comprehensibility; where are we at with that?
- Comprehensiveness, research, neutrality. Obviously these are the point of greatest contention in this review.
- Some editors have concerns that the article neglects areas other than history and military - eg economics. What is the relative weighting of these issues in reliable sources on the topic? What approach is being used here to summarize subtopics?
- Femke raised a concern with regards to source datedness. What more recent sources have been consulted, or considered and discounted?
- NickD proposed a number of additional sources that could be included (reposted by SandyGeorgia on 21 Nov). Have these been evaluated?
- Some editors have raised concerns regarding how the article depicts or does not depict impact of the Empire on Indigenous peoples (including the question of genocide but also including other impacts). What is the relative weighting of these issues in reliable sources on the topic?
- Style. Have all of Sandy's MOS points been addressed?
- Lead. CMD noted the use of sources only in the lead - has this been looked at?
- Structure. Femke raised concerns around how the article is organized - has this been looked at?
- Citation formatting. This needs standardization.
- Images. Other than sandwiching, has anyone looked at this? Are there issues in this area?
- Length. The article is currently slightly over the recommended prose maximum. Where are there opportunities to condense, keeping in mind the comprehensiveness criterion?
(I know the numbering doesn't line up with WIAFA, but if you could cite specific numbers in responses that would be very helpful). Nikkimaria (talk) 16:50, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
- 1.1 Has been addressed
- 1.2 Seems to be stalled, I for one am not sure how to proceed on this one.
- 2.1 Has been addressed in discussion, general consensus was nothing further was required and the topic seemed a bit specialised.
- 2.2 Source datedness - missed that one in discussion - what is required?
- 2.3 Nick D was invited to propose some text - the issue I see here is that the topics are in the main covered albeit briefly. I don't think a clear proposal has been forthcoming from Nick.
- 2.4 Has been addressed in discussion, general consensus is the proposer was giving undue weight to fringe views.
- 3. Has been addressed.
- 4. I would propose removing sources from the lede but this is a perennial issue. The article attracts drive by tagging and the motivation is not always for improvement.
- 5. Structure I think is fine.
- 6. Citation formatting still needs work.
- 7. Images have been sorted.
- 8. Length - seems to be stalled whilst we have some suggesting additional content, until that is resolved, it's difficult to see how to move forward on this.
- Overall, to summarise, some minor fixes in formatting are still required but we still haven't addressed the conflict between additional content and reducing size. Is that a reasonable summary? WCMemail 19:02, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
- On 2.1 and 2.4, I don't see consensus on these points, and would like answers to the specific questions above. Also looking for an answer on 2.2 with regards to recent scholarship, since this was part of Nick-D's points as well. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:34, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
- WCM, just making sure you've seen this ↑. Nikkimaria (talk) 22:15, 16 January 2021 (UTC)
- I hadn't seen it. I do think 2.1 and 2.4 have been discussed above - the topic of economics wasn't raised really in regards to economics but rather one posters obsession with fringe views. In general works on the British Empire do tend to focus on the military aspects and as for governance it would be quite difficult to weave that in. The British Empire didn't have the rigid control structure characteristic of the Spanish Empire for example, rather it was a looser set of controls with almost each individual colony having its own, in many cases unique, form of government. As regards 2.2 I did ask what people thought were required, it still isn't clear to me? WCMemail 17:58, 17 January 2021 (UTC)
- On 2.2, what more recent sources have been consulted, or considered and discounted? On 2.1 and 2.4, yes they have been discussed, but I don't see a strong consensus on these issues, which is why I'm hoping you (or other respondents) will have specific answers to my questions to help sort out what's a fringe view and what is not. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:38, 18 January 2021 (UTC)
- I hadn't seen it. I do think 2.1 and 2.4 have been discussed above - the topic of economics wasn't raised really in regards to economics but rather one posters obsession with fringe views. In general works on the British Empire do tend to focus on the military aspects and as for governance it would be quite difficult to weave that in. The British Empire didn't have the rigid control structure characteristic of the Spanish Empire for example, rather it was a looser set of controls with almost each individual colony having its own, in many cases unique, form of government. As regards 2.2 I did ask what people thought were required, it still isn't clear to me? WCMemail 17:58, 17 January 2021 (UTC)
- WCM, just making sure you've seen this ↑. Nikkimaria (talk) 22:15, 16 January 2021 (UTC)
- On 2.1 and 2.4, I don't see consensus on these points, and would like answers to the specific questions above. Also looking for an answer on 2.2 with regards to recent scholarship, since this was part of Nick-D's points as well. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:34, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
- 1.2. Shorter sentences, easier words. We have some prose geniuses running around on WP. Can we ask them?
- 2.2. This was a side comment in the discussion about neutrality; I'll leave that to the experts.
- 5: it was specifically about the structure of legacy; has been addressed. Femke Nijsse (talk) 19:25, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
- While there have been improvements along the lines I've suggested, I'm a very firm delist due to the inadequate response to my comments - especially the utter failure of the article to cover the impact of empire on Indigenous Australians despite this being a central issue (arguably 'the' central issue) in the literature on the British Empire in Australia since the 1990s. The request that I provide text is insulting given the dismissive response I received to my comments above. Nick-D (talk) 00:11, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
- Nick, see WCM's point re 2.3 above - was that something you were planning to work on, or no? Nikkimaria (talk) 00:34, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
- I have tried to reach out to Nick on his talk page but he blanked my message. I've known Nick for a number of years and he has been my mentor for some time over difficult issues. Hence, I am somewhat perplexed by his response.
- To answer the question on content, the article is supposed to be an overview on the British Empire, as such is covers topics at a fairly shallow level. As such coverage of a fairly specialised topic such as the impact of colonisation on aboriginal australia is difficult to cover appropriately. I have tried to do some searching on google and google scholar but I found that many of the top items are advocacy websites and it is difficult to find neutral academic texts. I then looked at wikipedia [38] as a guide. As such I could propose:
- Nick, see WCM's point re 2.3 above - was that something you were planning to work on, or no? Nikkimaria (talk) 00:34, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
"Colonisation had a disastrous impact on indigenous Australia, the introduction of diseases such as smallpox to which the indigenous people had no immunity combined with conflict over land, led to a massive reduction in the population."
- Thoughts, criticism, suggestions? WCMemail 18:22, 3 January 2021 (UTC)
- I had a brief look at this last year but didn't find sourcing and wording match I liked. I think it should lean more towards the conflict than the disease, and be worded to fit in between the Joseph Banks sentence (which should be trimmed) and the end of convict transport sentence, to place it within the chronology of settlement rather than as an outside issue. CMD (talk) 03:08, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
- A suggestion: "Unusually, Australia was claimed through proclamation. Indigenous Australians were considered too uncivilised to require treaties,[1][2] and colonisation brought disease and violence that together with the deliberate dispossession of land and culture were devastating to these peoples.[3][4]" CMD (talk) 13:09, 9 January 2021 (UTC)
- I'm ok with that, with one exception, was it unusual? WCMemail 00:07, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
- The sources contrasted Australia to other areas with existing populations, such as North America, where sovereignty was established through treaties with the natives, so I added unusually to reflect that point, and with regard to the importance the Terra nullius claim had on the the topic. In our text the next paragraph on New Zealand includes a treaty for contrast. CMD (talk) 00:31, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
- I'm ok with that, with one exception, was it unusual? WCMemail 00:07, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
- Thoughts, criticism, suggestions? WCMemail 18:22, 3 January 2021 (UTC)
- I am not weighing in, per perception of conflict that could arise when there is controversy on an article I promoted. Although we are fast approaching a time where what FAC used to be versus what it is now is no longer relevant, and I may decide to no longer worry about that. For now, I am abstaining. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:28, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
- Delist – I'm not convinced this article is the appropriate format for an "empire". Look at other empire FAs for example, the Han dynasty, has sizable sections on Culture and society, Government and politics, Economy, Science and technology; and similar formats appear in the Parthian Empire or Byzantine Empire. These are all concerns that have been brought up by multiple editors. As unfortunate as it is, this article is a "history of British Empire" or a really well made timeline. Aza24 (talk) 23:31, 16 January 2021 (UTC)
- The "appropriate format for an empire"? Could you point us to the FA criteria setting out the mandated structure of an article on an empire? We seem to have missed it. And so have all the sources: they don't talk about a consistent empire-wide culture, society, government, or economy (etc) - because there wasn't one - but they do focus on the history. Wiki-Ed (talk) 21:33, 21 January 2021 (UTC)
- Hi Wiki-Ed, I am referring to criteria 1b and 1c of the FAC criteria. When a host of other empire/major civilization FAs (Vijayanagara Empire, Chalukya dynasty, Maya civilization, Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Norte Chico civilization, Parthian Empire, Ancient Egypt, Tang dynasty, Han dynasty, Song dynasty, Ming dynasty as just a start) have far more than just a history section, one begins to think that perhaps the fault lies with the odd one out. No section on how the largest empire in history governed itself? Oxford bibliographies, with just a small 100 years of the empire already has significantly more topics referred to than here. And where is the section on decolialization? The most consequential part of the empire effecting out modern world is barely explored. The word "imperialism" or "nationalism" are absent from the article — Oxford bibliographies:
The massive literature on the British Empire breaks down roughly into three groupings, dealing first with general overviews of the empires growth or its role in the international system over time, thereafter with British imperialism in regional context, in which British India and British colonialism in Africa account for much of the literature
— not a single reference they recommend is included; and I haven't even look at their sections for British India/Africa. Another; what about Demographics of the British Empire, Economy of the British Empire or Historiography of the British Empire? Aza24 (talk) 18:49, 23 January 2021 (UTC)- Aza24, without wishing to sound rude, we have discussed a fair bit of this already (above). That said, discussion is not the same as agreement and so I think the onus is on FAR administrators to reconcile some of the inconsistencies between FA criteria and WP Core Policies (particularly weighting) and MOS guidelines (particularly article length). I'll break down what I think you're arguing:
- (1) Comparators: You're pointing to FAs for countries, dynasties and civilisations. For ancient examples (of the sort you've cited) 'empire' and 'civilisation' might be one and the same, but that does not hold true for modern empires (British, French, Spanish, Dutch, Portugese etc) which did not (horribly generalising here) have uniform social/economic/cultural (etc) characteristics across their entire territory or entire lifespan. For example, I cannot think of any way to summarise the 'government' or 'military' of the British Empire in a few short parapraphs in the same way as the Parthian Empire. Summarising such things in an overview article would almost certainly be misleading (and even authors with hundreds of pages to play with eschew this). The comparator articles for this topic are modern Empires, most of which adopt a similar 'timeline' overview approach.
- (2) Other sources: You're cited Oxford Bibliographies. I don't have access to that so I can't see what you're referring to. However, I think the point you're making is that a tertiary source has organised its information differently to Wikipedia. We are not using that model - perhaps for good reason if the section you've quoted is representative of the quality overall - we are using a style adopted by a large number of secondary sources - your source refers to them as "general overviews of the empires (sic) growth".
- (3) Content balance: You've suggested there isn't enough material on certain topics (incidentally, you'll find decolonisation in the section entitled "Decolonisation and decline"). Other contributors have also said similar, but about different issues. This article cannot cover every single thing that happened in every single country that formed part of the British Empire: "regional context" (your source's point) is too complex to summarise in an overview: there are separate (lengthy) articles on topics like the British Raj and colonialism in Africa; historiographical concepts live in the historiography article. You've spotted a few others. I would note that many of those articles are quite poor - weak sourcing, undue weighting, partial coverage - perhaps reflecting the argument I made above that it is very difficult to summarise these topics in a full-size book, let alone an article, let alone a paragraph within an article.
- (4)FAC vs article length: Finally, you refer to the FA Criteria. Being "comprehensive" seems to be at odds with the MOS article length guidelines. None of the contributors to this discussion seem to be able to resolve their demands for content on topic XYZ with the fact we cannot (a) cover everything and (b) reliable sources do not consistently weight some of those topics them as importantly as those WP editors, so the topics shouldn't be taking up space. Wiki-Ed (talk) 14:16, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
- OK, you do have access to Oxford bibliographies in the WP library. I don't know how having discussed this earlier means anything other than validating my concerns—the fact that I came here noticing the same things that other editors have brought up only reinforces the issues(s) (unless of course, you were just telling me to "go away"). When I'm talking about a section on decolonisation, I'm talking about the aftermath, i.e. the unstable countries that the British Empire left; the absence of this, and the extreme lack of information of imperialism or nationalism makes me think this article is seriously POV pushing. I look up in the FAR and see that users have been complaining about the lack of information on Indigenous Australians, the POV pushing is evident on three fronts now. I mean come on, slavery/imperialism/genocide aren't even mentioned in the lead? I've given you two/three links to a professionally curated website which discusses literature pertaining to imperialism. All of this said, I'm still blown away that there is no economy section.
- In general, I'm not convinced this article is one of the "best articles Wikipedia has to offer"—I look at the past FAR and see extremely divided editors, bringing up similar ones as here. If 10 years apart an article is still receiving the same criticism, there is something wrong with the article, not the editors commenting on it. I am not a hard editor to "please"—but I don't know if there is much hope here, defenders of the article seem too occupied on defending the article's current state, then considering what it would look like were other editors complaints explored. Aza24 (talk) 21:16, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
- Re Oxford Bibliographies: maybe you've forgotten (?) you had to go through a process to acquire access. It is not automatic so no, I don't have access.
- Re earlier discussions, both here and in previous FARs: Small numbers of persistent editors do not decide content. That's why we have core policies and they (particularly WP:NPOV) state that content is determined by the relative weighting of coverage in reliable sources. We're using a structure based on sources providing a general overview of the British Empire - not those examining niche issues, modern historiographical terminology or specific countries (etc). If they do not choose to focus their coverage on imperialism, or nationalism, or Australia, or famine, or the history of all the countries in the world since the British left... then we don't either. That's not to say those topics don't deserve their own article. It's not to say issues don't get a name drop here. But if editors cannot prove it is a primary focus in the sources then we don't make a big deal of it in this article: The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content. So on that note, since you're "blown away" by its omission, perhaps you could try to write a short (1-2 para), verifiable, comprehensive, and neutral summary on the economy of the British Empire? There seem to be a lot of critics here, but it's difficult to explore complaints - as you put it - if it's not clear (to either side) what new content might look like. Wiki-Ed (talk) 22:15, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
- I'm fairly certain the library now has an instant access program for 25 specific sites, Nikkimaria please correct me if I'm wrong or it's more intricate than that. Wiki-Ed, I sympathize with the predicament at hand, and regrettably, I'm too entrenched in other articles right now to write something for this one. If more editors share opinions on the matter contrary to mine, please let me know and I will see if that makes me revise my impressions. Best - Aza24 (talk) 23:39, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
- Correct, it's available to everyone who meets basic experience requirements automatically, which I expect would include most if not all editors here. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:13, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
- I'm fairly certain the library now has an instant access program for 25 specific sites, Nikkimaria please correct me if I'm wrong or it's more intricate than that. Wiki-Ed, I sympathize with the predicament at hand, and regrettably, I'm too entrenched in other articles right now to write something for this one. If more editors share opinions on the matter contrary to mine, please let me know and I will see if that makes me revise my impressions. Best - Aza24 (talk) 23:39, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
- Hi Wiki-Ed, I am referring to criteria 1b and 1c of the FAC criteria. When a host of other empire/major civilization FAs (Vijayanagara Empire, Chalukya dynasty, Maya civilization, Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Norte Chico civilization, Parthian Empire, Ancient Egypt, Tang dynasty, Han dynasty, Song dynasty, Ming dynasty as just a start) have far more than just a history section, one begins to think that perhaps the fault lies with the odd one out. No section on how the largest empire in history governed itself? Oxford bibliographies, with just a small 100 years of the empire already has significantly more topics referred to than here. And where is the section on decolialization? The most consequential part of the empire effecting out modern world is barely explored. The word "imperialism" or "nationalism" are absent from the article — Oxford bibliographies:
- The "appropriate format for an empire"? Could you point us to the FA criteria setting out the mandated structure of an article on an empire? We seem to have missed it. And so have all the sources: they don't talk about a consistent empire-wide culture, society, government, or economy (etc) - because there wasn't one - but they do focus on the history. Wiki-Ed (talk) 21:33, 21 January 2021 (UTC)
Comments I am not convinced by the arguments that the article lacks comprehensiveness or neutrality. The argument on comprehensiveness seems to be an argument for a page move rather than a delist and is countered by the argument that the article does contain the major facts and places the subject in context. The economy and demographics are covered in the lead, so it's an argument over structure not content. The argument on neutrality is countered by arguments of length and representative literature.
On prose, though, I think improvements are possible. Considering the lead:
- 1. First paragraph: redundancy, At the peak of its power, the phrase "the empire on which the sun never sets" was often used to describe the British Empire as the Sun was always shining on at least one of its territories. Change it to the simpler: At the peak of its power, it was described as "the empire on which the sun never sets" as the Sun was always shining on at least one of its territories.
- 2. Second paragraph: overly-complex prose, A series of wars in the 17th and 18th centuries with the Netherlands and France left England and then, following the union between England and Scotland in 1707, Great Britain, the dominant colonial power in North America. [note also raised above by Femke] Change it to the simpler: A series of wars in the 17th and 18th centuries with the Netherlands and France left England (and Britain after the Union of England and Scotland in 1707) the dominant colonial power in North America.
- 3. Third paragraph: redundancy, The independence of the Thirteen Colonies in North America in 1783 after the American War of Independence resulted in Britain losing some of its oldest and most populous colonies. [repetition of independence, repetition of colonies, repetition of America] Change it to the simpler: The American War of Independence resulted in Britain losing some of its oldest and most populous colonies in North America by 1783. Remove redundant soon, remove redundant and unidiomatic across the globe, remove redundant in Europe and the world
- 4. Fourth paragraph: redundancy and repetition: During the 19th century [already covered by of the 19th century in the preceding paragraph] Remove the opening clause and join the third and fourth paragraphs together as one paragraph. Lead should not be more than 4 paragraphs anyway per WP:LEAD
- 5. Fifth paragraph: redundancy, the military, financial, and manpower resources of Britain simpler as its military, financial, and manpower resources; Although the British Empire simpler as Although the empire.
6. Final sentence, strays off-topic into relatively minor point. Hardly anyone knows about the realms and most histories don't use the term. Either cut the final sentence completely or merge the final and penultimate sentences into the easier: After independence, many former British colonies joined the Commonwealth of Nations, a free association of over 50 independent states, 16 of which retain a common monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II.DrKay (talk) 22:35, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
References
- ^ Macintyre, Stuart (2009). A Concise History of Australia]. Cambridge University Press. pp. 33–34. ISBN 9780521516082.
- ^ Broome, Richard (2010). Aboriginal Australians: A history since 1788. Allen & Unwin. p. 18. ISBN 9781741765540.
- ^ Pascoe, Bruce (2018). Dark Emu: Aboriginal Australia and the Birth of Agriculture. Magabala Books. ISBN 9781925768954.
- ^ McKenna, Mark (2002). Looking for Blackfellas' Point: An Australian History of Place. UNSW Press. pp. 28–29. ISBN 9780868406442.
- "the article does contain the major facts and places the subject in context". A number of reviewers have argued otherwise. Even if the article were moved to History of the British Empire, it would also have to be delisted. This is because the article never mentions Aborigines, Native Americans, or the word genocide, despite these three terms being the heavy focuses of literature on the British Empire in Australia and North America. The article's coverage of the Indian Famines is also simply inaccurate.--Quality posts here (talk) 10:16, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
- Coverage is based on reliable source, not on a small number of Wikipedia editors' personal views. Those topics are not a major focus of general histories of the British Empire and sometimes don't even get mentioned. You have had multiple opportunities to prove otherwise. Your failure to do so speaks volumes. Wiki-Ed (talk) 21:39, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
- Nick-D has shown Aborigines are a huge focus of works on the British Empire in Australia, above. Also, if those books don't touch on the fields of anthropology, economics, etc. then they are simple historical narratives rather than comprehensive summaries of the British Empire.--Quality posts here (talk) 23:08, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
- Coverage is based on reliable source, not on a small number of Wikipedia editors' personal views. Those topics are not a major focus of general histories of the British Empire and sometimes don't even get mentioned. You have had multiple opportunities to prove otherwise. Your failure to do so speaks volumes. Wiki-Ed (talk) 21:39, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
- @Wiki-Ed and Wee Curry Monster: Could you please identify specific general histories of the British Empire and outline their relative weighting? At the moment I do not see consensus on the issues I identified under point 2 above. Also Wiki-Ed, I wanted to make sure you saw that you do in fact have access to the site cited by Aza24 above; if you disagree with that source, could you please provide specific sources that conflict with it and a rationale as to why they are preferable? Overall, I'm seeing several commenters advocating delisting identifying specific sources to support their views, and commenters advocating keeping referring to "general histories of the British Empire" but not specific works to counter. Also, some of the other issues raised above remain unaddressed, such as citation formatting which is still a bit of a hodgepodge. Nikkimaria (talk) 15:21, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
- CMD, with your comment above, are you now of the opinion that the article should be kept, or do you believe delisting is warranted? Nikkimaria (talk) 15:21, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
- With the caveat that I am still gaining experience at FAC/FAR, at the moment I lean towards keep. I feel tensions between the inclusion of information and article size will exist even in Featured Articles. The debate about article format, whether more a country-style page or more a History page, are interesting, but I feel that is potentially more of a title issue than a content issue, if that makes sense. Reformatting it to a more country-style format would be a massive undertaking and would create a completely different article to the one currently under discussion. Inputting on the Wiki-Ed library access point, I also do not have access to the OAuth service, as clicking that link brings me to a page asking me to provide access to my account. It is possible Wiki-Ed has not given permission either. On citations I have fixed some, and have the others on my to do list. CMD (talk) 16:29, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
- I've looked at the Oxford Bibliographies and the first general work I would have cited is listed:
- Louis, William Roger, ed. The Oxford History of the British Empire. 8 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998–1999.
- I think you'll find this was a significant source used when the article first achieved FA status. The other I would have listed would have been:
- James, Lawrence The Rise and Fall of the British Empire. Abacus. 2001
- One of the reviews of "The Rise and Fall of the British Empire" is helpful here:
- "Great Britain's geopolitical role in the global scheme of things has undergone many radical changes over the last four centuries. Once a maritime superpower and ruler of half the world, Britain's current position as an isolated, economically fragile island squabbling with her European neighbors often seems difficult to accept, if not comprehend. Although still afforded nominal status through membership of groups such as G7 and the retention of a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, the simple truth is that Britain has been resting on her laurels since 1945, if not before. The British Empire is both cause and effect of this spectacular transformation. At first an exercise in straightforward profit-making, foreign exploration and colonization by British settlers, traders, and entrepreneurs soon gave rise to serious moral misgivings about the exploitation of native peoples and resources. But the riches to be gained from empire-building were always a powerful argument in its favor, although changes in the domestic social and political climate made benevolent imperialism a more desired objective. The lure of profit was tempered by an urge to uplift and civilize. Those responsible for the glories of empire were also driven by questionable motives. Personal fame and fortune formed an inevitable and attractive by-product of the conquest of new territories, and many empire-builders felt an unimpeachable sense of destiny. The achievements, however, cannot be denied, and during its heyday the British Empire was the envy of the world. Revisionist historians make much of the stunted potential of the former colonies, but as always, the truth lies somewhere between the two extremes."
- The above isn't listed but I note that other works are e.g. James, Lawrence. Raj: The Making and Unmaking of British India. London: Little, Brown, 1997
- In terms of weighting, if you do a comparison, then the article as it stands compares favourably. I also checked the sources used in the article, they do reflect the Oxford bibliographies rather well. e.g. examples I gave above are represented. So I would venture to suggest that criticism is unfounded.
- I note one of the criticism of the article is the claim that imperialism isn't mentioned. I just checked, it is mentioned 31 times. Again I'd venture to suggest that criticism is unfounded.
- I note also the claim that nationalism isn't mentioned, again referring to the article it is, 25 times. A pattern is emerging here, I'd venture to suggest that criticism is unfounded.
- Next turning to the comparison with other "Empires", a criticism I would say is largely comparing apples with oranges. The suggestions of various editors are for sections on Government, law, Culture, Demographics. Such suggestions seem to me to be rather naive.
- Lets us for starters, consider Government. Generalising somewhat, Empires, such as the Spanish Empire. had rigid social structures and were centrally controlled. The British Empire is the odd one out here, it didn't ever have an easily defined form of government and perhaps the best generalised description is a loose federation of a diverse and disparate state entities whose relationship with the mother country varied considerably over the span of the empire. For example Canada started out as a series of colonies, that gradually transitioned to a self-governing Commonwealth and ultimately independence. India started out as a series of nation states, each came under control of the British East India Company, was gradually amalgamated into a single entity and after the Indian mutiny came under direct a Viceroy and was managed via the Indian Civil Service and became independent after a nationalist movement that ultimately split the Raj along religious divides. Others were protectorates and then there is the League of Nation mandates, which it is debatable whether they were part of the British Empire. Each colony was almost unique and was governed in a different manner. The description we give to the British Empire is "The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states." Any reasonable summary on government of the Empire would end up larger than the current article. If anything it's something for a specialised article..
- Next law. Every element of the British Empire had it's own laws and judiciary. About the only example I can think off, where the UK itself imposed law on it's Empire was the abolition of the slave trade.
- Culture and demographics, the British Empire was so unbelievably diverse I can't even begin to comprehend how you would cover such a broad topic.
- If you look at books on the British Empire, they don't try and tackle these, rather where it is tackled, it is a specific topic that is captured eg Economics of the Raj.
- So what is being suggested is pretty impractical for any summary article on the British Empire and I would venture to suggest that perhaps such suggestions hadn't been fully thought through. People really are not thinking practically about the tension between article size and the inclusion of more information.
- Finally, tackling the elephant in the room. Some elements of the criticism of this article are concerned with what the editor considers the WP:GREATWRONGS of the British Empire. They're not writing from a neutral perspective and are quoting from revisionist historical works. Their criticism that such material isn't included is unfounded, in all cases the material that they suggest is already covered. The difference is that the article doesn't use the loaded words they wish to see. As such I firmly believe their comments to be irrelevant for a FAR. WCMemail 18:53, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
- You claim the government, economy and society of the British Empire can't be summarized, then immediately summarize them.--Quality posts here (talk) 06:46, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
- Nikkimaria We’ve discussed this before and I’ve already provided a list of general histories (see late Nov above). The onus is on those advocating undue emphasis to explain why they think some exception should be made to Wikipedia’s core policies on balancing, not on the rest of us to defend that position.
- Regarding the Oxford Bibliographies: as I said previously and User:CMD has confirmed, would-be visitors have to provide access to account details. I had wanted to avoid this, but equally I don’t like arguing in the dark. So, having now had a poke around, I would make three observations about using it:
- (1) Searching the corpus for “British Empire” returned 2,182 separate bibliographies. I’m assuming that User:Aza24 clicked on a single bibliography - selectively quoted above - that most closely conformed to his or her conception of what the subject should be about. However, the reality is that while all 2,182 entries are legitimate perspectives, (a) we cannot cover them all in one article and (b) those perspectives are often far too narrow to be relevant for an overview article which is already too long by MOS standards.
- (2) Following on from that, none of the top entries are covering the same scope as this article (different date range or geography; or narrow focus on one theme) so they are not a reliable indication of weighting (which is the only reason we should be using a tertiary source anyway).
- (3) And, as User:WCM has already pointed out, despite taking a partial view of the topic the bibliographies I’ve skimmed all seem to revert to citing the same sources that we do here (as per my Nov comments: Canny, Ferguson, James, Lloyd, Marshall, Smith etc) in order to provide the general background. Wiki-Ed (talk) 22:24, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
- You claim the government, economy and society of the British Empire can't be summarized, then immediately summarize them.--Quality posts here (talk) 06:46, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
- I've looked at the Oxford Bibliographies and the first general work I would have cited is listed:
- Citation formatting (summary point 6: Citation formatting still needs work): All book and journal sources have been edited to fit the standard formatting, and the others have been made more consistent. Hopefully if there is anything left for this it is minor. CMD (talk) 13:47, 8 February 2021 (UTC)
- I've withdrawn my delist. The prose quality of the lede has improved after DrKay's comments in terms of understandability. My concerns about the structure and neutrality of the legacy section had been addressed before. I will not declare a keep because my knowledge of the topic is limited. Femke Nijsse (talk) 13:21, 10 February 2021 (UTC)
- Strong keep. The article explicitly addresses the colonization of Australia and Indian famines. The arguments of the demoters appear flawed. Increasing the coverage of specific aspects further would imbalance the article by stressing one part of the empire above all the others. That is inappropriate. The claim that the article does not cover specific topics and is therefore not comprehensive is not borne out. DrKay (talk) 23:04, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- The article still doesn't mention Aborigines, despite the lengthy discussion on this topic, above, and the British Empire being accused of genocide against them by some notable historians and international legal scholars. Can you please explain why you think this is acceptable? Additionally, I showed that many views about the exploitative nature of the Empire are not included in the article despite being held by "prominent adherents", the only test outlined by WP:DUE for whether a view should be on Wikipedia. Can you please address them specifically?--Quality posts here (talk) 23:37, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
- Queston: How will this FAR be closed?--Quality posts here (talk) 23:39, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
Anything else to be done
As far as I can tell all the points raised have been addressed, the one remaining is that the article is rather long. Should we be thinking about trimming the article? WCMemail 17:21, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
- The article is currently 64 kB (10445 words) "readable prose size" - generally the upper limit of article size is 50kb. The issue would be whether any segment of article could be relegated to a daughter article and trimmed/summarised without losing article integrity. If someone can find a section, maybe raise it here. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:53, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
- I think we're probably in the right place because we're midway between groups of critics. On one hand we have editors saying it's too long (at 10445 words). On the other we have some contributors to this discussion suggesting we copy the structure of the Roman Empire article (26,000 words). We're never going to keep everyone happy and I don't think it would be worth the effort of trying. Wiki-Ed (talk) 23:12, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
Five months in, and a quick glance reveals that basics have yet to be addressed.
- The sea of blue and serious WP:OVERLINKing that I raised eons ago has not been addressed, as evidence by a quick glance at the lead, where we have global power linked twice, to two different parts of an article (neither of which define "global power"), and unnecessary links to continents and geographical places like the Americas, Asia, Africa and the Pacific Ocean. (No, these are not Easter egg links to sub-articles about the British Empire in those places, and they are not needed; neither is World War II needed as a link.) User:Evad37/duplinks-alt reveals more. The sea of blue needs to be addressed throughout.
- A glance at the lead reveals that a copyedit has not been performed. A sentence in the lead starts with a number, and there is still overuse of the almost always redundant word also throughout the article. Please see User:Tony1's writing exercises and get someone to go through the entire article.
I am not impressed that this FAR was brought forward by an SPA, but nonetheless, all issues should be addressed while we are here. I raised these, and other issues, four months ago. By now, someone should have read through the article to correct the basics. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:50, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- I would suggest you do a compare between the article as was and is now.
- A copyright of the lead has been done, you said you'd had a quick look, would you like to look again and comment.
- We've also reduced a lot of the links but I'll take a look at what you've found. WCMemail 17:04, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Did you run the dup links script? I am not saying *all* duplicates must be removed because, in a long article, repeating links deep into the article can be helpful. Judgment calls are needed, just want to make sure you did run the tool to evaluate all of them before I spend time re-evaluating. I see you fixed the sentence starting with a number, and de-alsofied. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:15, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- I did run the script, thanks for the tip. I've also removed a lot of link clutter as well. WCMemail 19:09, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks for addressing all of that, Regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:23, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
- I did run the script, thanks for the tip. I've also removed a lot of link clutter as well. WCMemail 19:09, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
- Can we like, give credit to the painters and artists (and the year when the work was made) when their works are used? Aza24 (talk) 01:06, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
@SandyGeorgia:, @Nikkimaria: In previous FAR I've been involved in, we've created lists of tasks to do to finalise the FAR. Unfortunately this FAR has not really followed that constructive format and an awful lot of effort has been spent addressing what in many cases is well meaning but impractical suggestions. Can we pull a list of remaining things to do and start a push to finish this please. WCMemail 12:51, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
- The process has stagnated because multiple editors have presented a neutrality issue and rather than trying to address it by altering the article, you and others have flat out-denied its existence. It seems that this FARC is destined for delisting, unless editors actually try to work on the problem, rather than avoiding it. However, editors recognizing the issue at hand have been deterred away after having received uncolloborative responses, so good luck with that. Aza24 (talk) 02:52, 7 April 2021 (UTC)