Talk:Somerton Man/GA1

GA Review

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Criterion 1 - well-written

• "subject of intense speculation over the years" - given that you have few modern or even post-40s sources - see below - how can this be? Are sources missing? Ricardiana (talk) 04:05, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

There has certainly been enough written about the case over the years to qualify as intense speculation. In my pedantic opinion, the GA nomination was probably raised slightly too early (see my comments in above section) but hopefully we will be able to work through this to get it to GA status. I'll add some more references to support the intense speculation quote. --Roisterer (talk) 07:23, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

• As far as it being well-written, I must point out that the following sentence I'm quoting is a grammatical horror-show. I don't have time to reword it now, so I'm making note to remind myself to do it later, or to give someone else the opportunity if they should get to it before I can. (This is my first ever attempt to add, make note of, or edit anything here; it certainly isn't bold, but as a former English teacher this stopped me in my tracks.) I hope I'm doing this correctly! I'll also check on that when I return in a bit. Here's the sentence, copied from the section describing modern efforts to solve the case: "To this end copies of the Rubaiyat (also the Talmud and Bible) are being compared to the code using computers to get a statistical base for letter frequencies although the code being so short may require the exact edition of the book used. " --Rathyrye 15:30, 26 June 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rathyrye (talk • contribs)

Criterion 2 - sources

Most of your sources are from the 40s, which is a problem in terms of original research - see below also. An obvious example of original research: "Jestin is typically a boy's name of Welsh origin, with a common variants being Jesstin or Jeston."

Some statements are unsourced, e.g., "This led police to theorise that the man had committed suicide by poison, although there was no other evidence to back the theory."

Ricardiana (talk) 04:05, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

I have to agree that some of the points added sound like original research. I will work on these to lessen the ORness of them and find some sources for unsourced statements. --Roisterer (talk) 07:29, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Criterion 3 - broad in coverage

I see a suggestion on the talk page that this article is incomplete in terms of sources. That's a red flag - can someone who has worked on the article tell me more about this?

Hi, I'm the main author of this article (but not the GA nominator) so I can respond on this. There are still some references that certainly need to be gathered for this article (or regathered, as when I started researching this article I wasn't so methodical on referencing statements). I am going through the article trying to reference all statements. --Roisterer (talk) 07:12, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Also, I found an article (not the book) by Stephen Orr from the 11 January 2009 Sunday Mail. That should be included, especially as some of the details in the Orr's piece don't match details in the article. Ricardiana (talk) 04:05, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

The article by Stephen Orr "Riddle of the End", in The Sunday Mail, 11 January 2009, pp 71, 76, is currently referenced six times. One thing I have discovered in my research in this case is the amount of contradictory information given out on the case. Some of the information in Orr's is no doubt correct, while other information may not be. Such are the problems of articles on the case where writers rely on other more recent articles rather than contemporary press reports. --Roisterer (talk) 07:12, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Criterion 4 - neutral

Good here. Ricardiana (talk) 04:05, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Criterion 5 - stable

Also good here. Ricardiana (talk) 04:05, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Criterion 6 - images

Several of the images in the article are in the public domain by Australian law, but unfortunately Wikipedia has to abide by U.S. law. You can still use the images even if they aren't in the public domain in the U.S. - you just have to re-do the description on the image file page. Here are the images that need to be re-done:

File:SomertonMan2.jpg
File:SomertonManDeathSite.jpg
File:SomertonMan.jpg
File:SomertonManSuitcase.jpg
File:SomertonManCode.jpg

 Done

And here's an example of an image not in the public domain that's OK to use because of the file description:

Ricardiana (talk) 03:38, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Will redo these, thanks. --Roisterer (talk) 07:13, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your prompt replies, Roisterer, and my apologies for not spotting the Orr article. I'm putting the article on hold and will come back in a week to see the changes you (or others) have made. Feel free to contact me if you want to ask any questions. Best, Ricardiana (talk) 00:32, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Verdict

Hi, checking back in. I'm pleased to see work has been done, in particular on the images, but in comparing the current version of the article to the version I reviewed I don't think enough has changed to make this a Good Article at this point - Roisterer has added three new citations and updated others, and fixed the image descriptions, and kudos on all that. However, as Roisterer points out, the article is not complete yet. So for now it's not a Good Article, but it is a very interesting one, and I encourage you to re-submit it later. Ricardiana (talk) 05:43, 20 May 2009 (UTC)