User talk:Gordon Laird/Sandbox

I would appreciate any responses to the proposed article on David Lochhead. --Gordon Laird (talk) 16:40, 27 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some tips from PeterSymonds (talk · contribs)

Great start! Just a few pointers:

Do not reference Wikipedia, as you do in the opening paragraphs. Because Wikipedia is a Wiki, and allows other editors to edit articles, it is considered unreliable for verifiability. Moreover, if you say that he's mentioned in a Wikipedia article, people will ask "so what?" because it's not a reliable source. Moreover again, you don't properly establish why his inclusion in that list of names is significant.
Bold "David Lochhead" for the first mention of him in the lead (opening sentence).
I would change "Brief biography of..." to simply "Biography" for the section header.
When you have time, add a bit more to the bio section. Plus "untimely" is a bit POV and thus should be removed.
You have a biography section, but under "Academic studies", you repeat his birth details. These only need to appear once in the bio section.
A couple more wikilinks would be more appropriate, on the first instances of certain words. I'll leave that to your judgement.
I know this is only a first draft, but you make some pretty bold statements that are currently unreferenced. If you know about in-line citations, and are going to put them in later, then fine; otherwise feel free to contact me about it.

Otherwise a great start. Well done. PeterSymonds | talk 23:32, 27 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

All points well taken and will be utilized. Since "Guy" has suggested a move of my article to User: Gordon Laird/David Lochead is it OK if we move further discussion to the discussion page for that new location? Thanks. --Gordon Laird (talk) 16:09, 28 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]