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Talk:British Library Philatelic Collections/GA1

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GA Review

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Reviewer: Tim riley (talk) 21:26, 26 January 2011 (UTC) I owe GA a review, having just had one of my own efforts promoted. As the privileged holder of a British Library reader's ticket I have picked this one. More to come in the next 24 hours. Tim riley (talk) 21:26, 26 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This article is well laid-out, nicely illustrated, thoroughly referenced and – as far as a layman can judge – comprehensive. There are, however, quite a few minor problems with the prose, which I think need to be dealt with before I can complete the review:

  • General: capitalisation – the use of u.l.c. for titles of people and organisations is inconsistent and looks odd in places. "Philatelic Collections" appears with and without capitals; "assistant keeper of Printed Books" looks decidedly odd. (I have checked Garnett's Times obit, 14 April 1906, p. 4, and "Assistant" and "Keeper" are both capitalised there.) Moreover, this does not square with the use of the capital letter in "The Head of the…" later in the article. Also, "Government departments" looks odd with one of the two words capitalised.
 Done Philatelic Collections, Assistant Keeper, Tapling Collection and Government Departments all standardized to title case. Fæ (talk) 16:43, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "In 1900 the Crown Agents for the Colonies send three albums – past tense needed here, surely?
 Done Fæ (talk) 12:38, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • References 10 and 9 - I have been (rightly) pulled up at GA or FAC for having adjacent references out of numerical sequence as seen here; swopping them round would do the trick.
 Done Fæ (talk) 22:13, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "in 1946 this was proposed to be moved" – tortuous use of the passive. Something like "…there was a proposal to move it…" would be easier on the eye.
 Done Rephrased. Fæ (talk) 22:13, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "1961 Mr. James A. Mackay was" – why "Mr." here? Not usual Wikipedia practice.
 Done Fæ (talk) 12:16, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "progressive printings" – I think this needs to be explained for the lay reader
 Done A short explanation added but with a link to the related article which goes into the detail. Fæ (talk) 22:22, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "valued at £7,600, Mackay had exchanged these" – stronger stop than a comma needed here.
 Done Full stop added. Fæ (talk) 22:22, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "ize" -v- "ise" – consistency needed; the article contains examples of both.
 Done Only found one instance, harmonized to OED conventions. Fæ (talk) 12:20, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "horse licenses and the pilot's license" – the modern English spelling of the noun is "licence" ("license" as a noun is either archaic English or else American)
 Done Working on Commons tends to make you blind to the American spelling. :) Fæ (talk) 12:23, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The Head of the philatelic collections in 2011 is David Beech" – this construction is apt to get out of date, and is better phrased as "David Beech was appointed …. in 20XX". See Wikipedia:MOS#Precise language.
 Done Rephrased, this seemed misleading as my understanding is that Beech has been Keeper of the Collections for 30 years and there is no need to put in the current year just to say he is still there. I have removed "2011" and will try hunting around for information on when he was actually appointed.
I found a decent source (a published lecture he gave which includes a profile) and so the dates of his appointment are verifiable and clear. Fæ (talk) 22:54, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "which were the Crown Agents working records" – possessive apostrophe needed.
 Done Fæ (talk) 12:37, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "…such as postal stationary" – stationary post is no use to anyone; I think you mean "stationery".
 Done Fæ (talk) 12:26, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "23rd April, 1890" – see the Manual of Style: the correct form for dates is 23 April 1890 – no "rd" or comma.
 Done A regex search only found the one instance of cardinal dates. Fæ (talk) 12:30, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "British Library pocket guide Treasures in Focus; Stamps" – the BL website gives the title as Treasures in Focus – Stamps (i.e. a dash where you have a semi colon).
 Done I normally add book and article subtitles and by-lines using the semi-colon, however as the BL is the publisher (and this was also the format used in the citation), I'll go with their preference. Fæ (talk) 12:37, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "in tête beche pairs" – another technical term that should, I think, be explained (a footnote would do).
 Done Wiki-link to related article added and an in-article explanatory footnote. Fæ (talk) 13:25, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Finally, back on capitalisation, are you sure you have correctly reproduced the titles of your reference books, such as The care and preservation of philatelic materials? A quick google suggests that it is generally rendered as The Care and Preservation of Philatelic Materials. The same may apply to other books in your references.
 Done I tend to check with GBooks and WorldCat (and sometimes use a script to nab the text automatically), this example may have been taken from either the main GBooks or WorldCat entries where both match the case given, though I note that where cited in other works the mix-case form is used. I'm not sure there is a convention on using title case, but I'll double check the other titles before either making consistent with the Google Books catalogue or using title case throughout. Fæ (talk) 12:48, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have changed over to consistent (hopefully) use of conventional Title Case throughout rather than relying on the haphazardness of whatever Google Books does. Fæ (talk) 22:52, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

If you would like to consider the above points I can complete the GA review. Tim riley (talk) 11:35, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Overall summary

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GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria


  1. Is it reasonably well written?
    A. Prose quality:
    B. MoS compliance:
  2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?
    A. References to sources:
    Well referenced
    B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:
    Well referenced
    C. No original research:
  3. Is it broad in its coverage?
    A. Major aspects:
    B. Focused:
  4. Is it neutral?
    Fair representation without bias:
  5. Is it stable?
    No edit wars, etc:
  6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?
    A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:
    Well illustrated
    B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:
    Well illustrated
I don't know how the image of the book cover would fare at FAC, but your fair use rationale seems fair enough to me.
  1. Overall:
    Pass or Fail:

A good job, and a pleasure to review. Tim riley (talk) 09:40, 28 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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