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Only Fools and Horses

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Came across this as a GA. Have made a few changes to try and get it to FA standard.Buc 22:40, 25 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support This article has been dramatically improved since it became a good article, as have the articles in it's category. I feel it fits the FA criterea.Caissa's DeathAngel 19:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment News sources aren't correctly referenced - they should include author name and publication date when available. Using cite news instead of cite web for news sources will allow for input of the necessary parameters. Please reference the article correctly, and I'll have another look. Sandy (Talk) 01:38, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Added dates and changed news sources to cite news as well as adding author names where I could find them.Buc 11:55, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I fixed the remainder for you - pls check. I found one with an uncertain date - you will need to verify vs. other sources whether 05-03 meant March 5 or May 3 - see note in diff. I ran out of time. Sandy (Talk) 14:21, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Date fixed. The Telegraph uses the British date format of day first. See here, here and here, for instance SteveO 15:27, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Looks like refs are in order now - I'll read later as I have time. Sandy (Talk) 19:58, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - Too much uncited text (I flagged a small part of it only), and copyedit needs (Del Boy came 4th in a Channel 4 list of Britain's best-loved television characters[29] and 1st in another survey by Open...[30]) Sandy (Talk) 02:22, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak Support with a few minor qualms:
  • One reference in the lead -- this should be moved to the body.
  • Italicization of titles isn't consistent -- the ones that currently aren't (eg. "The Green Green Grass" in the lead) should be fixed.
  • "...but the show came to develop a story arc and a "soap opera" dimension. -- this doesn't flow smoothly in its sentence or paragraph, and the portion I've italicized is probably the worst bit.
  • A couple of unnecessary words like "often" scattered throughout. Also a couple of archaicisms like "whilst."
  • Quite a few parentheticals; perhaps some of these could be eliminated.
  • "The show was aired in seven series'" -- extraneous apostrophe
  • "Several non-regular one-off specials" -- redundant
  • The paragraph about the directors and producers isn't grammatically correct. Punctuation's a bit off. Splitting the first long sentence into two shorter ones would help. Shimeru 04:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Addition... it's overlinked. No reason to wikilink "September 8," for instance, or "lisp." Or a couple of others. Shimeru 05:14, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Correction - WP:DATE says "If a date includes both a month and a day, then the date should almost always be linked to allow readers’ date preferences to work, displaying the reader’s chosen format." Sandy (Talk) 10:21, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I stand corrected. There were still instances of overlinking, though. It looks to be in better shape following SteveO's edits. Shimeru 20:00, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The Green Green Grass has been italicized and the episode titles are now just in quotation marks. I've edited out many of the parentheses (I'll try and do the rest later), the erroneous apostrophe has been removed and "Several non-regular one-off specials" has been re-written. SteveO 15:54, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
All of Shimeru's objections have now been rectified. SteveO 14:43, 31 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Latter Days

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Article has been peer reviewed here, and I think it's worthy of FA now. If there are any small prose problems you can see however, I ask that you correct them yourself, as, although it has already been copyedited, my prose writing is not brilliant and I find I am unable to spot minor problems myself. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 20:02, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object. Conditional Support. You have a good start to a Featured Article, but this is not there yet. As it is, I think it could be considered GA class. I know this film quite well and the article adequately covers the basics, but I think there is still much more that could be said. Here are some areas that could use work:
    • I'm not a big fan of long plot sections and I think the plot section is a bit too long, it is almost as long as the rest of the article. I would try reducing it to 2 or 3 paragraphs. If you hit the basic plot points, I think that will work. Cut out much of the detail.
    • A background section is needed. This isn't the first film to discuss religion and homosexuality (you mention Trembling Before G-D), but what are some of its predecessors? Have other fictional films portrayed the subject with the seriousness as it is portrayed here? Did any other films influence the making of this one? You might also discuss Cox's scriptwriting here.
    • Part of the development section can be included in the background section. Development should include some information on the artistic decisions made during the filming, but also the development of the script. I know that certain scenes were deleted (Aaron's sister finding him after the suicide attempt), why? Look at the "Development" and "Initial stages" stages sections of Gremlins for some ideas.
    • The characters section can be written in prose. Take a look at the Casting sections for FA's such as Sunset Boulevard (1950 film) and Gremlins. Both sections are in prose with explanations of why certain actors were cast and information on the actors.
    • The critical reception section should be expanded. You used a few reviews in the article, but they all appear to come from internet sources. What about highly respected sources such as The New York Times, The L.A. Times, Washington Post, Rolling Stone or even Roger Ebert? IMDB may have links to some of these and others. If you run into problems getting any of these, let me know and I'll see what I can do to help you. There could also be expansion on the controversy in Utah. Was there controversy anywhere else? Additionally, the themes section could be expanded using these reviews and relevant film criticism if available.
    • I know this film is quite recent, but has it influenced any other films?
Again, this is a great article, but I think it could be much better. Take a look at the plethora of film articles that are Featured and compare this to them. Please let me know if you need help on this, I'll be more than willing to help as I am familiar with this film, though film, as a subject, is not a strong point of mine. Cheers! *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 15:24, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, much of the stuff you've mentioned, such as turning the cast list into prose, is purely personal preference. I based mine on V for Vendetta (film), you like Gremlins, and there's yet another variation at Dog Day Afternoon. Personally, I prefer the vendetta version, so I won't change that. I've checked the plot against those of other FA films, and it is of an appropriate size and detail, so I don't think I should do anything to that. I've gone through a good 80% of the FA films now and I cannot find a previous similar films section like you want - as I have my own doubts about the appropriateness of such a section (it seems kinda sidetracky from the film itself), I'm reluctant to put one in. So far as I know, Latter Days has yet to influence another film, no LGBT film in recent years has had a similar plotline that I know of - however, you're absolutely right about my lack of "hard sources", and while I'm looking out for some of them to replace the others with, I'll see if any similar films are out. So basically, I'll go and see what I can find, but I think many of your objections are purely based on personal preferences and not because the sections as they stand need to be improved (I'll see if I can expand the themes section), but I'll definitely get on with the rest of them. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:23, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just an observation. Sunset Boulevard (1950 film) and Gremlins both use "Casting" as the section header, and "casting" is a process, so therefore writing in prose to describe the process, is acceptable. You've used "Cast" as the header (same as the examples you gave) and so the way you've done it is fine, IMO. Rossrs 20:49, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I added reviews from Roger Ebert and the Los Angeles Times, but I didn't find any film influences. I tapped a rich seam of information at affirmation.org, the gay Mormon website, so I added everything I found there. The Utah controversy has been expanded and cited, the rique French release has been added, and a little has been added to the Development section. I'll see if I can find any more interviews with c. Jay Cox. That OK? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:39, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
On the other films thing, Cox says in this interview that he can't think of any similar film - and if he can't, there probably isnt one. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:45, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The criticism section looks much better! One thing I do think should be included: why did the movie make so little money at the box office? I would presume that it had a fairly limited release, but I'm just assuming. As for the Background section, I think you really still need one. Imagine if this article is read by someone fifty years from now who is not familiar with the controversy over homosexuality and religion, there should be something said about the Mormon approach to homosexuality and the controversy in general. In this you might include Cox's own experience and how the movie come from that. Cheers! *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 19:57, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Box office stuff has been added and Ganymead has agreed to write the background section himself, as he knows what should be in one. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 20:57, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, the lead says the film "was popular with ordinary fans", which is a problem for many reasons. First, it is at odds with the low box office take. Second, it's unsupported by any citations or by any later (cited) statements in the article. Third, what are "ordinary fans"? Fans of what? Ordinary, how? Andrew Levine 11:23, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It was popular with ordinary fans because the Rotten Tomatoes user rating is 75%, as opposed to the critics' 42%. It won several Audience Best Film Awards (which are listed in the article) when it played at sold out film festivals, and the cast were given standing ovations by the audience at several other screenings (not just as film festivals). This is all in the article. What I mean by ordinary is just that: people who aren't critics, who don't specialise in reviewing. The low box office is partly explained by the fact that it was never given a full release, and at its peak was only screened on 19 screens at any one time. I will see if I can find an average take per showing - this might resolve the issue. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 13:02, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I found statistical data at http://the-numbers.com but I'm finding it hard to interpret at the moment. However, thsi article implies that per theatre, it didn't do badly - http://www.the-numbers.com/interactive/newsStory.php?newsID=600 Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 13:12, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have reviewed the article and the entire first paragraph of the reception section is devoted to discussing the ordinary fan reception, in addition to the awards section (all of which are audience awards). I think this objection has been addressed, but Andrew Levine is not responding to his messages from both me and another user asking him to review his objections on our respective FACs. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 13:53, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It still reads "popular with fans." Obviously any movie is popular with its fans. This is still not good, and it gives no idea of the scope of its popularity. How about "popular with film-festival attendees" or soemthing? Andrew Levine 04:14, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Have replaced with more accurate "most of those who saw the film". Because it is. That Ok? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:30, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly Support. This was indeed a wonderful film, and you've written a beautiful article about it, quite comprehensive and detailed. I've just taken the liberty of copyediting it for you again--I have some expertise in that--but feel free to revert anything you don't like. I can't see how the article could be improved much, but I will throw out just a couple of small points for you to consider:
1. At the end of the opening paragraph, perhaps add something like ". . . with strong supporting performances by Jacqueline Bisset and Mary Kay Place"--? Their appearance in this low-budget indie was an unexpected pleasure for many viewers, I suspect.
2. I like the way you list the performers/characters; to do that in prose would make it nearly unreadable for me. But the description of Mary Kay's character might be expanded just a tiny wee bit: perhaps "strictly religious, controlling" would be appropriate? (That's the nicest way I can put it. Ha.)
3. One more tiny point: you do say that Aaron's mom is the one who tells him about the $50 bet, but could you add in a couple of words or so how she knew about the bet? (Heard it from his missionary buddies, I think I remember). But this may not be important enough to worry about.
But these are just minor quibbles from a big fan of the film. Overall, I think you did a fantastic job! Hope you get FA status! Textorus 06:55, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! I changed one bit of your copyedit, and put in the stuff you recommended (though I didn't say "strong" supporting roles, or call Aaron's mother controlling - potentially on the wrong side of POV, I thought). There's only one person I know of who has seen this film and disliked it, and she's doesn't know what she's talking about. Everyone else just falls in love with it. :) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 07:13, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. 1a. Here are examples of what you find throughout. Please don't just fix these.
    • Is it US spelling? Seems to be a mixture.
    • "Some while later" ... What does this add, exactly?
    • "Christian admits that he initially just wanted to win a bet, but "it's not about that" anymore." Direct quote not well integrated.
    • "Ryder relents enough to tell him"—"Relent" is binary, isn't it? Either you relent or you don't.
    • A few stubby paragraphs.

The film looks like right trash. For this reason, it's hard (although not impossible) for the writing to be "compelling", as required. I just wonder why an increasing proportion of our FAs is taken up with storylines. If not engagingly written and more interesting than monotonous suburbia, they reduce the object they describe. Can someone tell me why such a story is worth telling in dissociation from the film itself? Is this "among our best"?

For example:

"Christian confesses his love, and despite his profound misgivings, Aaron admits his own feelings of love. With all flights cancelled due to a snowstorm, Christian and Aaron are able to spend a loving and intimate night together in a nearby motel. However, when Christian awakes in the morning, he finds Aaron has gone. Sadly, he is forced to return to his former life in Los Angeles."

Fascinating. Tony 14:53, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's supposed to be US spelling, because it's an American film. However, I am English, so it's possible there are American spellings I am unaware of. "Some while later" is supposed to indicate that there is another ten minutes of the film between scenes that is not mentioned because it isn't vital to the plot. I've added to the quote and changed my choice of verbs. Why you don't want me to fix these I don't know. Your objection to this FA on the grounds that you think the film is crap is silly. If you're reading an article on a film, do you not want to know what the film is about? Is it not part of our mission to be comprehensive to explain what the content of the film/book/album is , not just how it was conceived and received? Just because you personally do not find an article interesting doesn't mean that it's not FA standard. If every Article on Wikipedia should have the potential to reach FA, that should include every notable film, whether rubbish to watch or not. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:30, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've reviewed the article and reduced three stubby paragraghs. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:46, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If it's supposed to be US spelling, then make it US spelling throughout. Your comments aren't a fix for the poor writing. Tony 15:43, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'll take a look. If I can't convert it though, would it be OK to convert it all to british spelling? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:46, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I can't find any British spellings, so I don't know what you mean there. However, it would seem I trusted my copyeditors too much - some bits of this article are badly written, you're absolutely right there. I'm going to quickly go through it on paper and tidy it - I'll be done in about an hour, so check back then. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:56, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done. What's it like now? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:40, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - 1a. References don't use a consistent style (some have website before, others after, the title) - please use a consistent bibliographic style in the refs. The prose is tortured. The paragraph I glanced at towards the bottom of the article is a sample of the extensive problems throughout:
    • In 2004, the Latter Days screenplay was adapted into a novel, written by T. Fabris, and published by Alyson Publications. The book was mainly faithful to the film, but added several extra scenes that explained confusing aspects of the film and gave more about the characters' backgrounds. For example, the reason Ryder tells Christian where to find Aaron is as a result of his own broken heart over a girl he fell in love with at his mission training. It also added dialogue that had been cut out of the film: finishing, for example Christian's cry of "That's the hand I use to..." in the film with "masturbate with".
  • Needs a thorough copy edit by an uninvolved editor, and the prose needs something to make it compelling and interesting. Sandy (Talk) 16:15, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've copyedited it, you might liek to comment again. The references issue you mention is where I have added the website first in the reference, I cannot find an author - I read it in one of the referencing guidelines, though I cannot find where at the moment. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:40, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
As explained on her talkpage, Sandy is having trouble editing Wikipedia. Request FAC not closed until she has a chance to respond to my improvements to the article. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:40, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry for the delay - still have problems. I've converted all of your references to a standard style - Author last name, author first name. Title. Source, (publication date). Last access date. Please go through and doublecheck my work, and wikilink all full dates.
Real problem with the term "ordinary fans": I changed it.
I made some changes so you can see the need to fix the tense and choppy sentences: I changed an it's to its, which shows the copy edit needs are still there. I eliminated a redundancy "all funding" equals "funding", linked to subsequent sentence about funding. These are examples of the work you still need to do throughout - the prose still needs work. Since the article is well referenced, you should be able to make FA if someone will run through the prose Sandy (Talk) 23:58, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've wikilinked the dates, someonelse has copyedited it but I have fixed the comments they had, and I've dropped a line to another editor to take a look at the article. Does it look OK now? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:30, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's getting better, but the prose is still not compelling. Here are some random examples:

  • Nevertheless, a major theme of Latter Days is that there is an underlying spirituality in the world that goes beyond the rituals and dogmas of religion.[15] This can be particularly seen in the scene where, after a day of making phone calls, Christian finally traces Aaron, writes down his phone number, and then discovers he has already idly drawn it on the previous page. (I can't see the connection between the first sentence and the second - and since it's not sourced, it sounds like OR.)
You can't see the connection between an underlying spirituality in the world and Christian mysteriously coincidentally doodling the very phone number he's been searching eight hours for? You haven't seen the scene, so you're going to have to trust me on this, but the message is so unsubtle Cox may as well have hit you with a two by four inscribed with "There's an underlying spirituality in the world". You don't need to reference the blatently obvious, I recall.
  • A total of three songs were written by C. Jay Cox for Julie to sing: "Another beautiful day," "More," and "Tuesday 3 AM." Allaman was very impressed with C. Jay Cox's musical ability, and both men composed more songs as background music. (I'm not sure what this means - other songs? Songs that were or weren't used? Are songs usually in quotes or italics? What impressed Allaman about Cox's ability?)
I don't know, it's on the featurette, which is referenced. No other explanation was given, and to speculate would be OR on my part.
  • For contractual reasons, Rebekah Johnson did not appear on the album, and her character's songs were performed by Nita Whitaker instead. (What contractual reasons? Why was Whitaker chosen? Who is she?)
I don't know, it's on the featurette, which is referenced. No other explanation was given, and to speculate would be OR on my part.
  • (This is unreferenced). In 2004, the Latter Days screenplay was adapted into a novel by T. Fabris and published by Alyson Publications. The book was faithful to the film, but added several extra scenes that explained confusing aspects of the film and gave more about the characters' backgrounds. For example, the reason Ryder tells Christian where to find Aaron is his own broken heart over a girl he fell in love with while on his mission training. The novel also added dialogue that had been cut out of the film: finishing, for example Christian's cry of "That's the hand I use to..." in the film with "masturbate with".
What, you want page numbers?
Ok, I've added page numbers. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:49, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • (Aggressive attitude to the script?) Gordon-Levitt originally auditioned to play Aaron, but his aggressive attitude to the script but good sense of humor made the producers decide he was a perfect Ryder.
I don't know, it's on the featurette, which is referenced. No other explanation was given, and to speculate would be OR on my part.
  • Full dates in refs are not yet completely wikilinked.
Yes, they are. I am not going to wikilink 2006, it bears no relevance at all to the article, and the only reason I'm wikilinking the dates in my references at all is because you want me to, there's absolutely no reason to otherwise do so.
Ok, I looked up WP:DATES, and get why wikilinking is needed. But years, according to the policy are only to be dated according to personal preference, and I prefer as few blue links as possible, especially in the footnotes. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:49, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sandy (Talk) 23:31, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I will dig up a Amazon link for the novel, but the rest is unnecessary. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:46, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've dug up the relevant part about tracking down Aaron on YouTube here. The bit where Christian says "That's the hand I use to..." is around the one minute mark, but the scene where Christian is tracking Aaron is 6:18 onwards. You should see what I mean. And obviously, if you have the time, I recommend watching the entire film, which has been uploaded in twelve parts. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 00:08, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've added page numbers, and explained everything above. Is that all OK now? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:49, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Striking my object - everything looks in order now, and Dev920 has been persistent in improving the article - I think s/he's done the best that can be done with a really sappy, cliché storyline. Sandy (Talk) 21:35, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You just need to watch it Sandy... :) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 14:01, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've run this article through three US English spellcheckers, and they changed two spellings, one of which was in the footnotes. What on Earth are you seeing that I, two copyeditors and three spellcheckers are not? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 12:23, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Bless your heart, Dev, all these sugggestions and counter-suggestions to deal with. That's why I will never propose an FAC myself!  :-) Hang in there, you'll make it. Textorus 20:16, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. The nominator has worked with commendable vigour to make this FA-worthy. To a certain extent the article is never going to be stellar because the plot is so tired, cliched and frankly dull but on its own terms this is FA quality. Moreschi Deletion! 15:59, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Disclosure: I've completely skipped the synopsis in order not to be coloured by any weakness of the plot. The article seems fairly complete and readable, and I note fair use rationales have been written for the three images. Seems like a fair candidate for the main page some day, so I'm not objecting. Gimmetrow 05:18, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • "This can be particulary seen..." Apparently he unknowingly wrote a number which is coincidentally the number he's trying to get. Perhaps add another sentence explaining how this relates to an "underlying spirituality in the world", or at least making it sound more dramatic? (I'm guessing this is a key dramatic moment in the film, but it's not obvious to someone who has not seen it.)
    • I don't really understand the 42% and 75% ratings with rottentomatoes. I thought all rottentomatoes raters were "critics". If "critics" means a distinct type of rottentomatoes user, perhaps that can be explained slightly better.
    • The partial wikilinking of the "retrieved" dates looks a little unorthodox. WP:DATES says that "The day and the month should be linked together, and the year should be linked separately if present."

El Greco

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I started the rewriting of this article about two months ago. The article has already gone through three peer-reviews: 2 thorough peer-reviews (here and here), and 1 peer-review by the WikiProject Biography (here). Users Yomangani and Eusebeus had the kindness to offer their own independent reviews in the talk page of the article (here and here). I'm most grateful to the following users who who were eager to copy-edit the text (or some of the sections): Plange, Celithemis, Ganymead, Yomangani, Gzkn, and Tom (who had initiated the previous withdrawn FAC of the article). I thought it was the right time for this nomination.--Yannismarou 21:57, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object I think it's a good article, but I think it fails to place El Greco in context. The introductory paragraph of the introductory section is boring and says essentially nothing (this is not a fault of the rest of the article, though). I don't get any idea from the introduction (section) to this article that El Greco is a great or extraordinary painter. Is he? Should anyone be left asking this? There are, imo, a lot of details in the writing overall that need work. It's awkward, doesn't flow, and sometimes contradictory or missing facts. I think footnotes are not in its favor. In spite of my objections, I think the level of research done in this article, and the overall approach to the topic are excellent, and way above the norm. I do believe this could be a superb article, not simply a FA. Outside of the sciences Wikipedia does not have a lot of truly superb articles, for this reason alone, I hope the editors of this article attempt to take it all the way--I didn't realize that art was one of the contendor areas for excellence. This article needs to flow. It doesn't. Mostly I object because I see much greater potential in this than in most of Wikipedia. KP Botany 01:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • The lead is a summary of the article. In the lead I will tell you that "El Greco has been characterized by modern scholars as an artist so individual that he belongs to no conventional school." But I won't tell you yet why. I will also tell you that "El Greco's dramatic and expressionistic style was met with puzzlement by his contemporaries but found appreciation in the 20th century", but I won't go into details. And I will tell you that "He is best known for tortuously elongated figures and often fantastic or phantasmagorical pigmentation, marrying Byzantine traditions with those of Western civilization", but I'll later analyze his style. I think that when I say that: 1) El Greco has an individual style and belongs to no conventional school (one of the very few artists in the history of mankind!), 2) he puzzled his contemporaries but impressed our contemporaries, 3)he married the Byzantine and the Western traditions, 4) he is a "prominent" painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance, I do give the idea that El Greco is a great and extraordinary painter. I could have explicitely said that "El Greco is an extraordinary painter bla bla bla" or that "the X scholar says that El Greco is a unique genius (Wethey actually said that)", but this is not my purpose. My purpose is to let the reader realize that he is great by reading the whole article. The lead gives him a general idea; by reading the whole article he will understand all the details of El Greco's greatness. I thank you very much for praising the level of the research and for saying that you "see much greater potential in this than in most of Wikipedia". But I do not want you to judge this article as superb or not; I want you to judge it as FA or not. In any case, I will check the lead, and see what additions are needed.--Yannismarou 12:15, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The lead section serves a purpose, it should provide a context for the article, and be able to stand on its own. Your lead section, as you freely admit, does not and is not even intended to stand on its own. See Wikipedia:Lead section. I'm going to go ahead and judge each article on its own merits within the criteria of a FA. Wikipedia can and will, eventually, attain something greater than what it is now. When I see the potential for excellence, I am going to ask for more. It's not that I'm asking for something extra from this article, it's that I personally think I have to lower my standards for excellence in Wikipedia articles in other articles. Your 4 points say better what you are trying to say than the prose in the article does. The introduction is flat, lifeless. KP Botany 20:13, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Nope! It stands on its own per WP:LEAD, but it is not supposed to offer all the details. Anyway, I did some tweaks there. But I'll check it again for further improvements.--Yannismarou 21:28, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Lead expanded a bit and re-worked.--Yannismarou 23:06, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "When El Greco arrived in Rome, Michelangelo and Raphael had been dead, but their example continued to be overwhelming and left little room for different approaches.[16]"
So what? This just sounds awkward, what are you saying?
I'm saying that El Greco felt pressed by the artistic heritage these great masters and desperately wanted to make his own mark with his own style in Italy. And this has a lot to do with the rest of the paragraph. I will try to make that clear in the text.--Yannismarou 12:23, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
You say it much better here than in the sentence quoted from the article. You don't say, in the article, what about their example was overwhelming, their work ethic? the quantity of their work? the quality? Why not use these words in the article, richer, more specific?
Is it any better now?--Yannismarou 12:48, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No. Your above text is better, "When El Greco arrived in Rome, although Michelangelo and Raphael were dead, he felt pressed by the artistic heritage of these great masters and wanted to make his own mark with his own style in Italy." I think it can be said better than this. It's simply not clear the amount of pressure an artist would be under arriving in Italy in the aftermath of Michelangelo and Raphael, making this clear will eventually put El Greco in the proper historical context.
I rephrased. This is the new phrasing of the first half of the paragraph:"When El Greco arrived in Rome, Michelangelo and Raphael had been dead, but their example continued to be paramount and left little room for different approaches. The artistic heritage of these great masters was overwhelming for young painters, but El Greco was determined to make his own mark in Rome defending his personal artistic views, ideas and style.[7] He singled out Correggio and Parmigianino for particular praise,[8] but he did not hesitate to dismiss Michelangelo's Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel". How is it now?--Yannismarou 21:20, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Although El Greco singled out Correggio and Parmigianino for particular praise,[17] he dismissed Michelangelo's Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel;[f] he wished to mirror the Incarnation by spiritualizing nature and in accord with the new and stricter Catholic thinking.[18]"
Lost me. Who wished to mirror the the Incarnation? Why? This might be a non sequitor if I could follow it.
El Greco wished. The subject in all these three sentences is the same: El Greco (El Greco - he - he). Syntactically I don't see anything wrong and any reason of confusion. Why he wished to mirror the Incarnation in a different way? But it is answered: 1) He wished to mirror the Incarnation by spiritualizing nature, 2) He wished to mirror the Incarnation in accord with the new and stricter Catholic thinking.--Yannismarou 10:37, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not really following this. What exactly did he intend to do to mirror the Incarnation? He intended to sell himself as Christ? He wanted to make nature come to life in the flesh of painting? This is really unclear, maybe someone else can explain to me what you mean. To me, reflecting the Incarnation of Christ implies something beyond painting, and seems to have no meaning in this context. Without using Incarnation, or mirror, can you explain this? Can you quote the entire passage?
Bfffff... You are right afterall! This Incarnation thing is indeed confusing. I rephrased focusing on the Last Judgment: "He singled out Correggio and Parmigianino for particular praise,[8] but he did not hesitate to dismiss Michelangelo's Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel;[f] he extended an offer to Pope Pius V to paint over the whole work in accord with the new and stricter Catholic thinking.[9]"--Yannismarou 21:52, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "And thus we are confronted by a paradox: El Greco is said to have condemned Michelangelo, but he was also influenced by him.[20]"
I don't know if this just needs developed more, it seems less sophisticated than the rest of the writing, what's the point?
I honestly don't think it is less sophisticated. The whole paragraphs treats this issue (and there is also a related note). I believe that further analysis in this article is against the encyclopedic principles of Wikipedia - in a sub-article (like Art of El Greco), yes. After all, I think that the point is clear here. From one side El Greco critisizes and even rejects Michelangelo's technique, but, on the other side, he shows huge respect in his writings for him, and integrates him in his paintings in order to honor him. The main points of this paradox are covered for me. And don't wait for a clear answer to this problem; not even the most prominent scholars can give it, because they are confused with El Greco's attitude towards Michelangelo!--Yannismarou 11:04, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Again, you say it much clearer here than in the article: " From one side El Greco critisizes and even rejects Michelangelo's technique, but, on the other side, he shows huge respect in his writings for him, and integrates him in his paintings in order to honor him." I don't get this sense at all from the cryptic quote.
I rrephrased the "cryptic quote": "And thus we are confronted by a paradox: El Greco is said to have reacted most strongly or even condemned Michelangelo, but he had found it impossible to withstand his influence." Is it clearer? I believe that the next sentences elaborate its meaning.--Yannismarou 22:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "By integrating Michelangelo, Titian, Clovio and, presumably, Raphael in one of his paintings (The Purification of the Temple), El Greco not only expressed his gratitude but advanced the claim to rival these masters."
Integrated them or their techniques?
Them, of course! If I wanted to speak about their techniques I would have said ""By integrating Michelangelo's, Titian's, Clovio's and, presumably, Raphael's techniques" or something like that. Let's not doubt about what is clear in the text. I am open to prose improvements, but not where the prose is crystall clear!--Yannismarou 11:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but he didn't exactly make them part of the whole, he just added their portraits to one corner of the picture. It sounds awkward in English, it implies something different from "he painted portraits of Michelangelo, Titian and Clovio in The Purification of the Temple."
I rephrased: "By painting portraits of Michelangelo, Titian, Clovio and, presumably, Raphael in one of his works (The Purification of the Temple), El Greco not only expressed his gratitude but advanced the claim to rival these masters." Is this clear now to close this bullet?--Yannismarou 20:36, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "As his own commentaries indicate, El Greco viewed Titian, Michalengelo and Raphael as models to emulate.[22]"
Why? Contradicts above.
I know it contradicts above! This is the problem here! And I present it! When all the scholars of the world cannot give an answer to this contradiction, how do you expect me to do it? El Greco's personality was contradictory, and, yes, he presents in his own writings Michelangelo as a model to emulate. ANd, yes, he integrates him in one of his paintings in order to honor him. And, yes, he had rejected his work, when he was in Rome. And, yes, he had said that Michelangelo is "a good man but not a good painter". But I cannot give an answer to these contradictions. Nobody has managed to! I can make assuptions, but is this the prpose of an encyclopedic article? I do not think so.--Yannismarou 11:14, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
You can point out, in the text, that this contradiction is a matter of scholarly debate. Again, you added information here that you don't include in the article.
Nope, this is not what I said! And I do not add here information not mentioned in the article. It is not a matter of scholarly debate. Most scholars agree on what I said: El Greco criticizes and even rejects Michelangelo, but, at the same time, he is influenced by him and presents him as a model to emulate. Most scholars (at least those I read) agree on this assessment and try to figure out an explanation (without much success). So, if I say that there is a scholarly debate I won't be accurate.--Yannismarou 20:36, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Because of his artistic beliefs and personality, El Greco soon acquired enemies in Rome. Architect and writer Pirro Ligorio called him a "foolish foreigner", and newly discovered archival material reveals a skirmish with Farnese, who obliged the young artist to leave his palace.[23]"
What beliefs and personality acquired his enemies?
The criticism of Michelangelo mainly. The fact that he wanted to promote his own unique style, giving the impression that he scorns the great masters of the past. His (Greek!) temperament which made his quarrel with Farnese; but this is described in the text. I did some rephrasing. I think it is better now.--Yannismarou 12:55, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that works.
  • "Lacking the favor of the king, El Greco was obliged to remain in Toledo where he had received, from the very day of his arrival in 1577, the consecration of a great painter.[33]"
Huh? Which great painter consecrated him?
You are probably right. "Consecration" seems the wrong word, although it is used in my English-written source. I rephrased.--Yannismarou 13:39, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, it's a good word, but better without, not left hanging.
  • "El Greco in his lifetime was highly esteemed as an architect and sculptor.[62]"
But he wasn't esteemed in his life? This is kinda a throw-away comment, need to be put in introduction.
Yes, he was esteemed in his lifetime, but not after his death and for many centuries. That is why, I felt the need to emphasize on this here. And I felt the need to emphasize on this issue for one even more important reason: because nowadays almost no sculptures of El Greco survive (with one-two disputed exceptions); so nowadays we know him just as a paintor, and not as a sculptor or an architect. Most people ignore even the fact that he was also sculptor and architect. Therefore, I do not think this is a "throw-away comment". It introduces the reader in a proper way to a part of the artistic work of El Greco he, most probably, ignores. In the lead I say he was a prominent architect and sculptor. Per WP:LEAD, I think this is OK.--Yannismarou 11:14, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I don't remember you mentioning, thought, that almost none of his sculptures survive. I believe there is contemporaneous evidence of his sculptures, though. This should probably be detailed in the article.
It is in both this section and in "Debates on Attribution".--Yannismarou 08:47, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "To French writer Theophile Gautier, El Greco was the precursor of the European Romantic movement in all its craving for the strange and the exteme.[70]"
Elaborate, seems out of context.
It is not out of context, because the context is Romanticism. And Romanticism was in search for the "strange" and the "extreme". And El Greco was regarded as a "strange", "extreme" and "mad" painter. I did elaborated per your suggestion, but do not forget that note j offers further analysis on Gautier's views.--Yannismarou 11:58, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Better.
  • "The critic Zacharie Astruc and the scholar Paul Lefort helped to promote a widespread revival of interest in his painting."
Art critic? French? Century? What type of scholar? Nationality?
When was Romanticism? Do I have to say all the time "art critic", "art critic", "art critic"? I rewrote the paragraph per your suggestion: "With the arrival of Romantic sentiments in late 18th century, El Greco's works were examined anew ... The French art critics Zacharie Astruc and Paul Lefort helped to promote a widespread revival of interest in his painting. In the 1890s, Spanish painters living in Paris adopted him as their guide and mentor."--Yannismarou 11:42, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it's clearer. A reader should be able to read without footnotes, without clicking on links. And Romanticism isn't confined to one 10 year blip on the map, early, late, anything that further places it may help the reader see the development of the appreciation of El Greco through the Romantic movement, and a scholar who was not an art critic could very well have contributed to part of the dicussion of the greatness of an earlier painter--this was part of the times, part of Romanticism.
  • "In the 1890s, Spanish painters living in Paris adopted him as their guide and mentor."
I think his Spanish legacy is greatly understated in this article. Isn't he rather important?
Understated? Let's see:
  • "Late 17th and early 18th century Spanish commentators praised his skill but criticized his antinaturalistic style and his complex iconography. Some of these commentators, such as Acislo Antonio Palomino de Castro y Velasco and Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez described his mature work as "contemptible", "ridiculous" and "worthy of scorn".[68] The views of Palomino and Bermúdez were frequently repeated in Spanish historiography, adorned with terms such as "strange", "queer", "original", "eccentric" and "odd".[69] The phrase "sunk in eccentricity", often encountered in such texts, in time developed into "madness"." Almost a whole paragraph analysis here.
  • "In 1908, Spanish art historian Manuel Bartolomé Cossío published the first comprehensive catalogue of El Greco's works; in this book El Greco was presented as the founder of the Spanish School." Sentence rewritten by me in order to emphasize on the role of El Greco for the Spanish art. This book of Cossio is even nowadays regarded as monumental for the history of the Spanish art and the re-evaluation of El Greco.
  • "In the 1890s, Spanish painters living in Paris adopted him as their guide and mentor." The sentence you mentioned.
  • "Michael Kimmelman, a reviewer for The New York Times, stated that "to Greeks [El Greco] became the quintessential Greek painter; to the Spanish, the quintessential Spaniard".
  • The symbolists, and Pablo Picasso during his blue period, drew on the cold tonality of El Greco, utilizing the anatomy of his ascetic figures. While Picasso was working on Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, he visited his friend Ignacio Zuloaga in his studio in Paris and studied El Greco's Opening of the Fifth Seal (owned by Zuloaga since 1897).[82] The relation between Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and the Opening of the Fifth Seal was pinpointed in the early 1980s, when the stylistic similarities and the relationship between the motifs of both works were analysed.[83]
  • "In any case, only the execution counts. From this point of view, it is correct to say that Cubism has a Spanish origin and that I invented Cubism. We must look for the Spanish influence in Cézanne. Things themselves necessitate it, the influence of El Greco, a Venetian painter, on him. But his structure is Cubist."
  • Picasso speaking of "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon" to Dor de la Souchère in Antibes.[84]
  • The early cubist explorations of Picasso were to uncover other aspects in the work of El Greco: structural analysis of his compositions, multi-faced refraction of form, interweaving of form and space, and special effects of highlights. Several traits of cubism, such as distortions and the materialistic rendering of time, have their analogies in El Greco's work. According to Picasso, El Greco's structure is cubist.[85] On February 22, 1950, Picasso began his series of "paraphrases" of other painters' works with The Portrait of a Painter after El Greco.[86] Foundoulaki asserts that Picasso "completed ... the process for the activation of the painterly values of El Greco which had been started by Manet and carried on by Cézanne". Picasso and Zuloaga were Spanish.
I think this analysis is more than enough, and his Spanish legacy is clear to the reader. But don't imagine that all the Spanish artists after him were influenced by El Greco. No! Velasquez's legacy was more important for the Spanish art of the next centuries. El Greco was presented by the Spanish art historians as a "starting point", a "landmark" for the beginning of the "Spanish School". The major influences to Spanish artists (Picasso and Zuloaga who owned works of El Greco) are mentioned. Further analysis is offeres in the sub-article Posthumous fame of El Greco. But I think that the analysis of the main article covers the main issues.--Yannismarou 11:33, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It's not really clear at all from the article, it is just a list of minor points about the painter. I realize I am not expressing myself clearly in this, but I think the biggest thing lacking in this article is a grand feel for the overwhelming legacy of El Greco in Western art.
In "Legacy" I treat his influence on Delacroix, Impressionists, the Blaue Riter Group, Pollock, Picasso, Cezanne, Manet, post-modern painters etc. Isn't this "grand feel" obvious by all the analysis?--Yannismarou 22:02, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
See also the lead as it stands now.--Yannismarou 08:27, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for all your comments. I hope I gave you (at least some!) satisfactory answers!--Yannismarou 11:58, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support The minor objections above may be valid, but compared to all the other featured articles we have, the 'El Greco' article would largely deserve its status as a featured article. --Donar Reiskoffer 06:57, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Looks like a very good article - good job! I just wanted to ask if it would be possible to cite a bit more accessible Internet sources.. There are a lot of accessible books on google, but I don't know if the books in question are in there. There are a few parts that might need a look for simple syntax, however the article is good. I suppose the above comments are valid, but they are no biggie. They could be fixed as the FA is progressing... Baristarim 09:28, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Many books are indeed accessible in Google Book and almost all the articles in Google Scholar. For those not accessible there I offer ISBNs. The catalogues are usually easily accessible. There is indeed a problem of accessibility with some more "ancient" books. This is true. But in most case I provide in parallel another online or accessible source.--Yannismarou 13:04, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support El Greco is a very important topic, and that makes attaining featured status harder. There is a large body of scholarship to review, and the task of situating El Greco within the world of sixteenth century art and politics is by no means insubstantial. I had numerous reservations when this first came up which I articulated; these have now been largely addressed. While there may be a few details here and there that could still be tidied up, the article considered as a whole now easily meets, in my view, the criteria established by FAC. In many ways, such as its thematic outline, the overview it offers of a wide variety of scholarship, and the accompanying illustrations, this is examplar of what a featured article should be. Congratulations to all the contributing editors and especially to Yannis, whose efforts have been especially rigorous. Eusebeus 14:27, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. A very thorough treatment of the subject. Images of key works are represented, and El Greco's unique style is discussed in a sophisticated manner. The artist's life is related in copious detail. Although there are some sentences that could benefit from minor revision, I believe this article merits FA status. (On a tangential note, why is "posthumous fame of El Greco" a separate article? It seems to me that most of the key points are, or should be, noted in this article, and the separate article deleted.) Excellent work, a very interesting article on one of the world's most creative and unique artists. Venicemenace 17:53, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Very nice, Yannismarou - congratulations on your persistence and hard work. Sandy (Talk) 21:42, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Serial Experiments Lain

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I believe all the points asked in the previous nom have been adressed. Specifically, print sources have been added, several experienced editors copyedited the article, character design has been expanded, and the video game has been cut off to its own article. IMO, this is a thorough, well written article on a particularly difficult subject. Even thought wikipedia is not censored, an effort has been made to keep the article relatively spoiler-free and out of universe. Reception section could be expanded as more sources are available, but I'm afraid this would set the article off-balance. Thanks for your interest.--SidiLemine 13:55, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment The Wiktionary links are informative. The link to artifact clears up any confusion on meaning and its alternative spelling and the link to blasé explains what it means concisely. The link to charm on Wict. is better than a link to amulet which is where you end up after the disambiguation page for charm. --Squilibob 06:14, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Too much white space in the characters section. Avoiding being overly detailed, but give enough text to line up with the images provided at least. This pretty much means a little less than doubling each characters' blurb.--SeizureDog 12:09, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That's what was originally done, but a user chenged it to this to align with other articles of the same kind. I'll change it back to see if it solves the problem.--SidiLemine 13:06, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I did this, but they don't overlap like they should. Anyone can advise what to do to get rid of that white space?--SidiLemine 13:15, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I had a try at fixing it. Less whitespace, but it's still there. --Squilibob 14:12, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
yup, definitely gonna have to add to eiri, alice and taro.--SidiLemine 14:41, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done! Ibelive this issue adressed.--SidiLemine 17:00, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Effects of Hurricane Isabel in North Carolina

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I published this article a few weeks ago, and I believe it adheres to the FA criteria. Comments? Hurricanehink (talk) 17:46, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Scouting

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Overview of the worldwide Scout movement. Rlevse 01:15, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just added 5 refs (making 50 different ones, some used more than once). Will keep working on it. Let me know if there's a specifc ref you feel is needed. Rlevse 03:29, 7 December 2006 (UTC)...added 3 more, total 53. Rlevse 11:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)...added 6 more, total 59 now. Rlevse 14:28, 7 December 2006 (UTC)....3 more, 62 different refs now.Rlevse 03:06, 8 December 2006 (UTC)...See "Announcement" below. Rlevse 14:32, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Is it really possible to judge the quality of an article by the sheer quantity of its references? --jergen 09:11, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Every section has at least one-two, often several. They are not a judging of the text, but an indicator of the level of referencing.Rlevse 16:37, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No, these are notes, which refer to Wikipedia articles as a "see also". Although you should seperate these into a different section. Michaelas10 (Talk) 14:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Michaelas10 is correct, those are explanatory notes made when questions arose in the past; I've seen this done in other FACs/FAs. If the consensus is to separate them, we can, but I've generally seen these left in the regular notes section. Rlevse 14:32, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
As far as I know, it is technically impossible to separate proper references from "see also" references if you use the <ref> scheme.--GunnarRene 16:04, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If I may clarify my comment: I knew that they were notes as opposed to references, and I knew that they can't be separated. My comment was really that the "includes ###" notes made me think that this information was simply taken from other articles, and it was not sourced in those articles (as I checked a few of them). -- Kicking222 16:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, these numbers were just taken from the mentioned articles. I think I could source most of the numbers, but this would take some days. And it is (nearly) impossible to get complete informations for the countries with fragmented Scout movements because nobody has a complete list of the existing associations. But this concerns mostly small local organizations with only a few members. --jergen 18:13, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
We've fixed Germany and France, are working on the others.Rlevse 01:40, 8 December 2006 (UTC)...fixed Italy now tooRlevse 03:06, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
See El Greco as an example of how to separate notes and refs. Gzkn 06:49, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Announcement a separate Notes section has been created for those five items, the standard footnotes are now in Citations. There are 5 notes and 55 footnotes now. Rlevse 14:32, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Can you please convert these to Roman numerals? Michaelas10 (Talk) 20:26, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done, I'd just followed the article that showed me how to do it. Rlevse 22:21, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I think it's well written and well sourced. --evrik (talk) 14:32, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per Evrik. It has 59 refs now, plenty enough and every section has at least 1-2, if not several. I think the notes are okay where they are. Sumoeagle179 16:05, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment the "In film and the arts" section is awfully short, especially considering that what's there says that Scouting is "prevalent", and used by "numerous films and artwork". Also, though it may be most prevalent in American popular culture, there should be some mention of elsewhere, if possible. Tuf-Kat 16:31, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've made what was a regular wikilink a "main" link, there's a whole article on this. I'll work on this more later. Rlevse 16:39, 8 December 2006 (UTC)...Added a Scottish bit too.Rlevse 22:21, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object—1a. Let's look at the opening para.
Scouting, or the Scout movement, is a worldwide youth movement of multiple organizations for both boys and girls whose aim is to develop young people physically, spiritually and mentally so that youth may take a constructive place in society. The movement employs a program of non-formal education with emphasis on practical activities in the outdoors, using the Scout method with programs targeted for up to five age groups, as defined by the founders of Scouting in the early 20th century. Most countries have Scouting programs for children and young adults from ages 6 to their early 20s.

This is a very bad start, and indicates that the whole text needs major surgery. Tony 02:03, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • I'll do what I can on the rest, but since I, like most of us, aren't as good at it as you and we're not mind readers, it'd help if you could be specific on the rest. Rlevse 02:29, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Try to find someone who's distant from the topic. Fresh eyes. Tony 03:38, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That'd be you.Rlevse 04:06, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed both issues. Thanks for the help.Rlevse 17:05, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Gosh, I'm just finding time to read this. A lot of respected editors have copyedited here, but I found a sentence fragment in the second sentence of the body of the article ... disappointed :-(
    • Robert Baden-Powell founded the Scouting movement in England in 1907 based on his experience, in and outside the army. First only for boys as Boy Scouts, but in 1910, with help from his sister Agnes Baden-Powell, for girls too as Girl Guides or Girl Scouts. Later it spread all over the world to young people of all ages.
  • Sandy (Talk) 21:19, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment that para was cut and merged earlier today, but someone else modified it and stuck it back in. I've rm'd it again.Sumoeagle179 22:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Not much of a difference to me.Sumoeagle179 13:42, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I objected above, and have returned to check progress. Take this bit of the lead:
    • "By 1909, girls wanted to join the Scout Movement and they are called either Girl Guides or Girl Scouts. In 2006, Scouting and Guiding have over 38 million members in 216 countries and territories represented through different Scouting associations at the international level. The works of Ernest Thompson Seton and Daniel Carter Beard influenced the early development of Scouting. Internationally, Scouting has become a significant part of popular culture." Sentence 1 has tension between past and present tenses. Two statements are uncomfortably jammed together with "and", which should be used to join very close ideas. Sentence 2: Are the last four words necessary? Sentence 3: we zig-zag back to the early days, followed by the international theme again in Sentence 4. This is very poorly organised.
    • The third para in the lead is: "The movement has experienced controversy. International Scouting associations have formed outside of the mainstream. Policies on membership regarding sexual orientation, religion and co-education differ between Scouting associations." Sentence 1: stubby and unexplained. Sentence 2: "outside OF"? Remove the second word, and explain what, exactly, the sentence means. Then this bit about sex and religion ... needs to be smoothly summarised, not poked at for the sake of it.

I'm sorry, I can't change my object, yet I wanted to. Tony 09:36, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the input. I've worked all the above. Since you left no specific points for the rest of the article, we can only assume you support the rest of it.Sumoeagle179 21:05, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment one reason of my reticence in supporting this nomination has among others been that the lead text was not in line with the fairly well organized body of the article. There even was information in the lead text, that was not mentioned in the body. I have given the lead text a major edit now, and kindly invite native English speaking editors to give it a further copy-edit for its English. Wim van Dorst (Talk) 22:27, 29 December 2006 (UTC).[reply]

The Simpsons

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This is the third nomination of The Simpsons. Since the last FAC I've been fixing the critique and sent the article through a peer review. The current semi-protection is not a result of an edit war, but instead teens and pre-teens finding it funny to vandalize the article. I will try and fix any complaints people might have. --Maitch 15:25, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Adding archives, Sandy (Talk) 16:19, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support, Very informative, well referenced and clear. Gran2 19:35, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support as per nom. Blackjack48 02:29, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, as a long-time Simpson's fan, I was glad to learn a few new things. Very comprehensive and informative article. —ExplorerCDT 05:05, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Object - there are extensive referencing problems, to the point that I wonder if it's vandalism or just a lack of concern for WP:V. So much of the article is cited to non-reliable sources that it certainly fails 1c.
    • The article extensively cites The Simpsons archive, which is an outgrowth of a Usenet newsgroup, not a reliable source.
      • I have heard this before and I still don't buy it. In my experience The Simpsons Archive is more reliable than anything else I can dig up. The producers on the show have admitted that they use the website for fact checking what they'd already done. Most of the refs from The Simpsons Archive consist of copies of real newspaper articles. If it were any other article a real newspaper source would be of value and not considered unreliable. --Maitch 11:42, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • You can read more about The Simpsons Archive in its own article. --Maitch 12:15, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • Not only does this source not appear to satisfy WP:V or WP:RS; from the example given below (The New Yorker), it also appears that they may be violating a lot of publishers' copyrights, which means we shouldn't link to them anywhere, and perhaps their article should be AfD'd because of copyright violations. Sandy (Talk) 15:10, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • But if that is the case I can always reference the news article directly and skip the copy on the web. Would that satisfy you? --Maitch 15:28, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
            • Yes, for example, a case like The New Yorker doesn't need to point to a URL which may be violating copyright. But, the bigger problem is that most of your article is sourced to the Simpson Archive, and I'm not going to support that. I don't consider it a reliable source, and it definitely seems to violate copyright. You can fix all of the news sources, but the extensive sourcing to that archive is the bigger problem. Sandy (Talk) 17:55, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • (This URL doesn't point to the indicated source.) Owen, David (2000-03-13). Taking Humor Seriously. The New Yorker. Retrieved on 2006-07-03.
      • The link is dead and I can't find the article anywhere else. Even the internet archive doesn't have it. I will try to find a replacement. --Maitch 11:42, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • The Simpsons Archive had a copy of the article on their webpage. The dead link is now fixed --Maitch 12:02, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • Raises the issue of copyright violations on the Simpson's archive - see WP:EL, "Sites that violate the copyrights of others per contributors' rights and obligations should not be linked. Linking to websites that display copyrighted works is acceptable as long as the website has licensed the work. Knowingly directing others to a site that violates copyright may be considered contributory infringement. " Sandy (Talk) 15:10, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • (This reference has the wrong date, and is in a different ref style than the other news sources - please use a consistent style.) Scooby-Doo breaks cartoon record. BBC (2004-09-25). Retrieved on 2006-08-21.
      • Date now fixed. Vandalism. The reason why the ref doesn't follow the same style as the others is that the article doesn't have the name for the author. What do you propose I do? Write "unnamed BBC writer" or something like that.--Maitch 11:42, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • The difference in style I mentioned is in how you show the publication date, not the author. Sandy (Talk) 15:10, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • All the references uses {{cite web}}. The differences comes when some parameters are lacking. --Maitch 15:28, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
            • The parameters are lacking because you're using the wrong templates - news sources need cite news rather than cite web. (But, the cite templates are pretty stinky anyway - they use inconsistent parameters, and give inconsistent results, so I sympathize with the problem - that's why I don't use them.) Sandy (Talk) 17:55, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • (This link is dead.) ^ Longest Running Animated TV Series. Guinness World Records. Retrieved on 2006-08-21.
      • Guiness has deleted it from their webpage. I found the article in the way back machine, so it should work again. --Maitch 11:42, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • The problem is not whether or not you find a link: you're not required to provide links. The problem is that the article came to FAC without attention to making sure it was ready - given the density of problems I found, *all* of the references need to be checked - these were only samples. Sandy (Talk) 15:10, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • (This reference also has the wrong date.) Remington, Bob (1990-09-26). It's The Simpsons, Man. The Simpsons Archive / TV Times (The Calgary Herald). Retrieved on 2006-07-03.
      • Date now fixed. Vandalism --Maitch 11:42, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • You mentioned vandalism twice in the random sample of errors I found. The fact that the article is being vandalized is not an issue at FA (reverts of vandalism don't apply to stability criteria): the fact that editors aren't catching and reverting the vandalism, and making sure the article is accurate before coming to FA, may indicate a problem with the accuracy of the article, and its readiness for FAC. Sandy (Talk) 15:10, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • I'm only human. I can't sit at home all day waiting for the ten vandals who comes ny on a regular basis. It is way better now when the page is semi-protected. I have read the article many times before nominating it and I don't think there should be more problems. And as you say vandalism is not an issue at FA. --Maitch 15:28, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
            • No, you can't babysit the article every minute, but you do need to check it thoroughly before bringing it to FAC, and it appears that the article is going to need to be tended if it is to maintain accuracy. Sandy (Talk) 17:55, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
              • So you have found two instances of people changing a 09 to 10, which I've missed, good for you and good for the article, but you don't have to be a jerk about it. I could have read the article a thousand times and still have missed it. --Maitch 23:31, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
                • You're missing the point: on a random check, I found more than two errors - you mentioned two were vandalism. The question is if you've checked *all* of your sources, since a random sample proved mostly inaccurate? I'm sorry you think I'm being a jerk about it, but WP:V is important on featured articles. Sandy (Talk) 19:13, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Some of the templates are placed at the bottom of sections (see also, further details, etc.), some at the top.
    • The prose is not compelling - here's a sample: "Talk about a possible feature-length Simpsons movie has been going on since the early days of the series. " Here's another: "Scooby-Doo has been renewed again under a new name, airing on Kids WB in 2006, giving it another chance to catch up to The Simpsons. It must be noted that Scooby-Doo has experienced several incarnations, while The Simpsons' record comes as a continuous production."
    • There is uncited text - example: "While critical and public reaction has been mixed, several of the Simpsons games did very well commercially." Another example: " It is the longest-running series to have never experienced either a major change in cast members or the addition/removal of major characters (Gunsmoke, by comparison, underwent several such changes during its run)."
  • Improved over previous versions, lots of work done, but not ready for FA - please get the sourcing of the article in order. Sandy (Talk) 05:45, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, I will try and fix these objections. It will take some time so I can't respond to everything right now. If you will be kind to reply to some of my questions I will appreciate it. --Maitch 11:42, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object Some initial comments to add to Sandy's.
    • The Storylines section appears to be a bunch of paragraphs stuck together without structure or logical flow.
    • The Impact on Language section has a number of unsupported assertions which come across as inflated/exaggerated:
"Many of the characters, concepts and catchphrases from The Simpsons have become common knowledge in modern society. A number of neologisms originated on The Simpsons have become a part of the universal lexicon, the most famous of which is Homer's saying: "D'oh!," which is referred to in scripts, as well as four episode names, as "annoyed grunt". So ubiquitous is the catchphrase that it is now listed in the Oxford English Dictionary, but without the apostrophe... The show's creators take pride in having passed on schoolyard rhymes to a new generation of children who otherwise may not have heard them.
    • Other examples of unreferenced statements coming across as boosterish/inflated:
With the popularity of The Simpsons, especially among children, it was only natural for the video game industry to turn to the characters and world of Springfield, with the early games starring Bart Simpson. While critical and public reaction has been mixed, several of the Simpsons games did very well commercially. As a gamer and past games industry analyst, I personally have never heard or read of a Simpsons game being a notable hit, nor I have heard or read of the Simpsons license as being particularly attractive for game companies
also this:The title family as well as other characters apears on everything from t-shirts, action figures to posters.

**Also unreferenced: Music is prominently featured in The Simpsons, with virtually all members of the cast breaking into song at least once during the course of the series. (does this mean the human cast or the cartoon cast?)

      • The sentence is changed to "Music is featured in The Simpsons, with many characters breaking into song during the course of the series." I really don't think we have to find a source that says that sometimes characters break into song on The Simpsons. --Maitch 14:34, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, but its not as common or significant a feature as in, say, Family Guy Bwithh 16:53, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

**This is unreferenced and may be self-contradictory: ::It is the longest-running series to have never experienced either a major change in cast members or the addition/removal of major characters... While The Simpsons has a record number of episodes for an American animated show, some foreign animated shows, especially Japanese anime series like Doraemon, Dragon Ball, and Pokémon, have more episodes than The Simpsons

** The line about religion in the middle of the characters section is rather jarring - its not such a major theme on the show to warrant inclusion here, I think.

Bwithh 06:03, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support: Very good article, while looking through it I stopped to read some and learnt a lot about it, deserves to be featured. But i do think that the opening section should get cut a bit. It's four or five paragraphs, but it is meant to be just one with a brief overview.--ANDY+MCI=Andy Mci 17:03, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Edit: After looking at it again, i feel that all we need to keep there is the first paragraph. The second could be merged into origins, and one could be merged into awards, etc.etc.--ANDY+MCI=Andy Mci 17:06, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • As the guy who put the lead together, I should say that a lead should be a basic overview of the article and I based on the lead of Arrested Development, a Featured Article. A one paragraph lead isn't very good for an FA anyway. -- Scorpion 18:45, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Simpsons name / snpp reliability concerns I attempted to add information from the Matt Groening article about the origins of the "Simpsons" name. This was sourced to a Season 2 DVD commentary but I added a citation needed tag as the claim about "Son of a Simpleton" sounds dubious. This addition was immediately removed[3] by Scorpion who said it was unsourced speculation and that the name origins was not vital to the article. However, the claim about "brat"/"Bart" in the article has exactly the same kind of sourcing (purportedly comes from a DVD commentary). The claim about "Simpson" being a literal translation of "Son of a Simpleton" is repeated by snpp.com[4] in their main Creation of The Simpsons FAQ. I'm having trouble finding an authoritative source to back up this claim. Is this a case (which I've seen before) of people hearing laid-back semi-jokey DVD commentary and taking it as the gospel truth? Is snpp.com really a reliable source? Bwithh 19:23, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I just saw the documentary which only lasts five minutes and it features an interview with Matt Groening where you hear it from his own mouth. It is included on the season one DVD. Is this now considered unreliable information. Because then I give up. --Maitch 19:55, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object—1a. It's good, but needs a clean-up throughout. Here are examples at random.
    • "Since it's 17 December 1989 debut," Ouch.
    • "20th century" (numeral), but "eighteenth"? Usually spell out single-digit, write others as numerals.
    • "chosen as it is an anagram of "brat."[7]"—Remove "It is".
    • We have "half-hour series", but "three season run" (and there's a second one in the lead).
    • "true hit TV series"—What's "true"?
    • Suddenly UK spelling: "programme".
    • "viewed by over 20 million people, and one occasion by over 30 million people."—ON one occasion?
    • "spokespersons"—"spokepeople" a little less ungainly.
    • Do we really need to link "United States", and common words such as "strike" and "saxophone"—it's already densely linked with useful ones. I'd go through and minimise. Tony 00:50, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. Lack of references. The article needs a lot more inline citations/footnotes and probably also some global refs (of which it has none). There are over two dozen paragraphs with no citations, so without any article ref, these are effectively unsourced. For example, the middle two paragraphs of the Voice actors section contains dozens of unsourced facts. Similarly for both paragraphs in the Animation section. The IMDB and SNPP refs aren't acceptable per Sandy. Ref 1 is a DVD doesn't need an IMDB link anyway. And, yes, the English isn't FA quality: "One of the most unique aspects of the opening is that…" ugh! Colin°Talk 17:19, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object It is a good article, but I believe the show is too controversial to be an FA on Wikipedia. Mbralchenko 23:29, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I think the above obection should not be counted unless the poster adds a more relevant reason. Many of the FAs on the main page have been more controversial than The Simpsons, and that should not factor into the deciding of the article.
Yes, Controversy isn't taken into account for FA status. So its irrelevant that Simpsons is actually pretty tame, even by Fox standards (i.e. Family Guy) - never mind the animated stuff on cable (Drawn Together, Moral Orel etc) Bwithh 00:34, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support - well-written, well-referenced, important subject matter. Nice job. (Ibaranoff24 09:00, 22 December 2006 (UTC))[reply]
  • Support, good article, inline citations all intact. Informative as well. Terence Ong 09:01, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Support this article is the best source of information that one can get from a single source and we can either try to haggle out irrelevant flaws or accept it for the good article it is.
Actually, it seems like a bit of a waste to give away the article's only shot at FA when it's not super-perfect, but I don't see it getting any better. Atlantis Hawk 09:58, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I forgot: I'd like to see more critical reaction as well. Right now, there's only criticism dealing with the show's declining quality. What did critics think when the show first premiered, and as it progressed?--Dark Kubrick 01:39, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

    • Thanks for the copyedit. There is some mention of the initial response in the "Origins" section. I think that covers it pretty well. I would like to note that Buffy the Vampire Slayer (a recently promoted FA) offers no critical reactions at all. It is very hard to find reliable sources for critical reactions from 1990. Basically, I would have to go through all of the newspapers in hope of finding a review. I do have some sources, but who is going to say that this one review would be typical of the general opinion in the year it was released. --Maitch 16:48, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Good job. Comprehensive and sourced article. I was not able to read the proofread the whole article from top to bottom, but if there are a few typos here and there, they can be fixed over time. Baristarim 00:17, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Update. I finally managed to replace all of the sources deemed unreliable such as fansites, The Simpsons Archieve and IMDb with other sources. I wonder why The Simpsons is not allowed to use IMDb, when Buffy the Vampire Slayer is. I have also added quite a few more references. I would very much like people to specifically cite which sentences they think needs referencing. --Maitch 16:37, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Flag of Lithuania

[edit]

Another FAC hot and fresh out of my oven, ready for comments and criticism as normal. I decided to write an article on a subject that I know well, flags, but on a country that doesn't receive much love from Wikipedians, Lithuania. Also, out of full disclosure, this article is part of a bounty on Lithuanian articles, listed on the Article Rewards page. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 02:28, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Conditional support. There are still some paras without a reference, I am afraid I cannot support until they have their inline citations. I'd also suggest moving 'Design and symbolism' after 'History'. Also, consider a section similar to Flag_of_Poland#Shade_of_red about shade of colors - was there ever any controversy as to what exactly shade the green, red and yellow colors should be? The html table may be a useful additon as well. That said, it is a very good article; I remember a time not so long ago when we though Zscout would be leaving this project - and the above article is a great proof of why we are all glad he didn't.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  13:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Alright, I will move the sections. As for the controversey over the shade of colors, I have not heard of one for the Lithuanian flag. The only thing I have seen is a conflict of flag ratios, but that was set in 2004. The history section was split up, but they all still use the same source (reference 2). Everything in the flag protocol section is listed at the Reference one, but I can add more notices of it. I have a table for the colors already, but I am not sure what you wish for me to do with the HTML table. Thanks again for your comments. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 19:31, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Great work, in my opinion. (As usual. ;)) —Nightstallion (?) 15:28, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question? On the English-language Wikipedia, why are you using the English-language icon in the References? Sandy (Talk) 15:46, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Because I am using a mixture of English and Lithuanian references and I want to denote what is in English and what is in Lithuanian. I started adding the English tags after Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/National emblem of Belarus. During that peer review, I had used several English language sources but users had a hard time finding out which ones were English (the unmarked ones) and the Russian/Belarusian links (which were marked). Since then, I have marked the English sources if I am using a mixture of different languages for my sources, which also include a Czech website. I hope this answers your question, but if you want me to remove the English tags, then I can go ahead. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 19:27, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Support Very well written. Honestly, Wikipedia needs so much of articles like this one.Mbralchenko 13:50, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Good article. Hmains 21:29, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Great article, but just one question. the term "State flag" is sometimes used in the article to refer to the tricolor, and other times to refer to the government flag (the one with the knight). Could you clarify this? Thank you. CG 20:45, 25 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have fixed the ones that I saw. I am going to look at it more and see if I missed any. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 20:53, 25 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tropical Storm Edouard (2002)

[edit]

After I first wrote this article, a reviewer said he had never seen an article start out this good, and that it could be FA worthy. I think it adheres to the FA criteria, and I'm happy to address any comments or concerns. Hurricanehink (talk) 16:41, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Áedán mac Gabráin

[edit]

This is a self-nomination. The article has not previously been nominated. Since the GA-review earlier in the year the changes have been to add references, correct spelling and grammar errors, and add detail. The article has been read by volunteers who didn't find (or were too kind to remark upon) any major blunders. It may be that more context would be useful for general readers, and this can easily be added if desired. The automated peer review suggestions have been addressed to the best of my ability. I have a rather miserable stub written in a sandbox which could remove the one remaining red link, if that needs to be resolved. Angus McLellan (Talk) 16:20, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

and so on. Circeus 22:54, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the comments. I have changed the hatnote (Aedan redirects here ...) to {{redirectpeople}}. For the story of Áedán and Brandub, I've slightly reworded it, and changed it to the present tense since it's treated here as a work of fiction. There was a link to Dál Riata in the lead image caption, but as you rightly say, that's not very helpful. Cuiviénen had already updated it as you suggested.
I've linked Gabrán mac Domangairt in the lead, otherwise the son of Echu mac Muiredaig version is likely to be confusing, just as you say. Since there's no specific article on early Irish kin groups, I've added a link to apical ancestor before naming the kin groups. It may be that eponym(ous) would be better. The contradiction should be resolved by the sentence added to the lead section.
The MacQuarrie citation is for the sentence as it stands. MacQuarrie doesn't (as I recall) say where the list is found. Fortunately, http://volny.cz/enelen/sc.htm supplies the missing information which I have added to the footnote. If there is anything else that you see, however minor, please let me know! Thanks very much, Angus McLellan (Talk) 12:18, 26 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
After rereading, I'll throw in some extra prose concerns:
  • Title of works should all be in italics: "The Senchus fer n-Alban records [...]" isn't (MoS:T)
    • It also lacks a free translation (which should be stated, unless they are official translations; if they aren't published English titles, then quotes are needed)
  • "Áedán is a son of Echu mac Muiredaig of the Uí Cheinnselaig of Leinster". That's three combined "of"! Rewording would help.
  • "the unidentified Delgu or Teloch" Are these place names? "unidentified city/hill/plain", "an uncertain location named" are allfar better options.
  • A comma is missing before "which they had captured in Báetán's time" (it's a side comment to the main prose)
  • Maybe a few "in about" could be replaced with (and the first instance linked) circa? "Around" is also an option. "in about" is... unwieldy
Circeus 17:14, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you very much for the comments. I've made a first pass at incorporating them, although I haven't added any translations as yet. I'll need to check my references for those. Thanks again, Angus McLellan (Talk) 19:56, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral for the moment. This is certainly a very impressive piece of work, insofar as I can tell knowing as I do little or nothing about this historical period. A couple of issues seem not quite clear as currently phrased, though:
    1. the first sentence states that Áedán "was king of Dál Riata, ruler of modern Argyll, Scotland, and County Antrim, Ireland, from about 574 onwards". I take it you don't mean that he was the ruler of modern Argyll! But are these two modern regions meant as an explanation of the extent of Dál Riata or are they an area that he ruled directly while being one of several kings in Dál Riata? This should be rephrased.
    2. The article states that "Áedán was one among several kings in Dál Riata and many in northern Britain and Ireland. Dál Riata was later divided into three sub-kingdoms, although these divisions may post-date Áedán". There doesn't seem to be any information about who the other kings were, and the second sentence is confusing. Was Áedán only king of the area controlled by Cenel nGabráin? This seems to be the implication, but it isn't spelled out. Later on we read that "Báetán is said to have forced the king of Dál Riata to pay homage to him at Rosnaree"; again, is this known to be a reference to Áedán (and if so, the choice of language - "the king of Dál Riata" seems to imply that he was the only king of Dál Riata), or is it unclear in the sources?
I am sorry for all these quibbles, and I am well aware of how difficult it must be to write a comprehensive article on topics such as this that is accessible to the general reader. As I said, it's an excellent piece of work. Palmiro | Talk 14:40, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I've tweaked the intro (getting king of Dál Riata and Dál Riata in the lead) to explain where it was. The sub-divisions bit has been redone somewhat; I hope it is clearer. I've modified the section on Áedán, Áed, and, Báetán, so that it should be less cryptic. Please let me know if these improvements aren't, or if there's anything else that seems like it needs work. Thanks for the comments! Angus McLellan (Talk) 16:05, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that addresses all my issues. Palmiro | Talk 18:51, 1 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Tiridates I of Armenia

[edit]

Self-nomination. This is the article's first nomination and the article is very stable. It achieved a GA status in April. It is illustrated and has a good number of notes and references with page numbers etc. A peer review request didn't bring up anything other than automated suggestions (which have been taken care of). There are only two red links which can be removed as they are not that important anyway. Also, there is hardly any other information available that can be included in the article. I researched the topic quite thoroughly.--Eupator 19:41, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. First off, it looks very well-written and well-cited, so good job on that. Just a few issues: —Cuiviénen 20:36, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • The lead seems a bit short, though somewhat understandably so given the brevity of the article. Maybe just a couple more sentences would be a good addition.
    • This sentence: Tiridates was one of the principle characters in George Frideric Handel's Radamisto and Reinhard Keiser's Octavia operas seems tacked on to the end. Are there any other mentions of him in culture? You could create a separate section for that.
    • A map of Armenia and its geographical relation to Rome and Parthia during his reign would add greatly to the article.
Thank you. I know the lead is short, that was one of the suggestions the automatic peer review brought up. I will try to extend it. Added a map. The borders of Armenia were essentially the same from the end of the 1st century BC until the early 4th century when Armenia was partitioned between Rome and Sassanid Persia. Regarding cultural references, those are the only two I know of. There is a statue of Tiridates at the palace of Versailles made by André. I'll try to find some more. Thanks again.--Eupator 21:04, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Could you clarify the copyright status of Image:ArshakuniArmenia150.gif, which you uploaded? (Provide a source and a reason the copyright was released, in this case.) Thanks. —Cuiviénen 22:43, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well the applicable license is Template:PD-AM-exempt since it's a work of the Foreign Ministry of Armenia [5] but the image was taken to Commons and that template doesn't exist there. Should I reupload it to Wikipedia with a different name?--Eupator 23:26, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That would be the best solution, I think. —Cuiviénen 00:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done.--Eupator 04:31, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That would be nice but he has two potential successors, there is no article on his predecessor and his dates of birth and death are unknown. I'll try and add it, see what it looks like with some missing info.--Eupator 23:26, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I don't understand the footnotes - they don't use a consistent style, some refs need to be expanded, and it's not clear if all are reliable sources:
    • Iranica needs to be expanded to include full info, including author and last access date. What is this site? Is it a reliable source?
    • Mithraism by Roger Beck needs full info including last access date and webhost, is this a reliable source?
    • The Jewish Roman World of Jesus by Dr. James D. Tabor needs expansion.
    • Champlin, Edward (2003). Nero. Belknap Press. ISBN 0674011929. Here the footnote style switches to a conventional last name, first name, while other entries don't follow that style.
    • There are a number of References listed that are never cited - were those sources used in the article? Sandy (Talk) 23:48, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hello done, except the last two. Tacitus, Cassius, Pliny are not cited with templates because there just isn't any publisher, isbn etc. As for your last point, I assume you're talking about material taken from Vahan Kurkjian history of Armenia. That's at various places in the article. Under references it says:This article incorporates text from History of Armenia by Vahan M. Kurkjian, a publication in the public domain. With a link.--Eupator 00:10, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Can someone help in eliminating run-ons and other grammatical problems. I'm afraid i'm not proficient in that department. Also, all red links have now been eliminated.--Eupator 18:22, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why the marked additive? "an event of far-reaching importance not only for Armenia, but for most of the lands in the Roman East". Better as "an event of far-reaching importance for Armenia and for most of the lands in the Roman East." Tony 15:14, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Changed.--Eupator 19:25, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. On a cursory glance, I found two direct quotes with no citations, and a punctuation error in the first paragraph of the body of the article (Vologases considered the throne of Armenia to have been: "once the property of his ancestors, now usurped by a foreign monarch in virtue of a crime,".[9]), suggesting a thorough runthrough is needed. Sandy (Talk)
Done.--Eupator 01:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I'm afraid the article has certain prose deficiencies. Let's pick a phrase in random:

In the summer, Corbulo began moving towards Tigranocerta, through rough terrain, passing through the Taronitida (Taron), where several of his commanders died in an ambush by the Armenian resistance

  • Two "through" almost one after the other.
  • I count 4 commas. I'm not the best in syntax, but they seem too many to me. And, in general, I think that in the article there is a confusion about the use of , and ;.

I think that this article needs a slight copy-editing by a native Engish speaker. And I think this is its only problem, because it is well-structured and well-researched.--Yannismarou 19:50, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment: Did his reign begin in 53 AD (main text) or 63 AD (Infobox)? Also, there's only one good depiction of him in the article - the photograph, as opposed to the sketch of the statue - but since it has so much empty space around it, details can't be made out. I'd suggest cropping and enlarging. Adam Cuerden talk 15:46, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    There is a footnote next to 63 AD in the infobox that states Beginning of reign without interruption. In the article, it states that he became a king in 53 AD, but his reign was interrupted a couple of times.--Crzycheetah 00:40, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment In my opinion, the references should be written more explicitly. It seems like a well-written compilation from Tacitus - Annals and Dio Cassius. In addition, i find it very concise. Better to enlarge and provide more material. E104421 19:11, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Added a bunch new secondary sources.--Eupator 22:59, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Just a few notes. I've noted that some paragraphs conclude without inline citations; at least some of these are probably from Tacitus or Dio Cassius, but it's always better to make it clear:
    • "In 53 the Roman governor of Cappadocia, Julius Paelignus, invaded Armenia and ravaged the country, then under an Iberian usurper King Rhadamistus."
    • "Rhadamistus himself returned to Iberia and was soon put to death by his father Parasmanes I of Iberia for having plotted against the royal power."
    • "Tiridates then mounted the steps of the platform and knelt, while Nero placed the royal diadem on his head. As the young king was about to kneel a second time, Nero lifted him by his right hand and after kissing him, made him sit at his side on a chair a little lower than his own. Meanwhile, the populace gave tumultuous ovations to both rulers. A Praetor, speaking to the audience, interpreted and explained the words of Tiridates, who spoke in Greek." Is also this covered by the inline citation by Pliny?
    • "In memory of these events, the Senate honored Nero with the laurel wreath and the title of Imperator, or commander-in-chief of the armies. No reception comparable to this in magnitude and splendor is recorded in the history of Rome. Besides the enormous sum spent in festivities, the Roman Government bore the entire cost of the journey of Tiridates and his retinue, both from and to their homeland. Nero also made a gift to Tiridates of fifty million sesterces."

A different question that may be posed is if the quote from Champlin isn't a bit too long - but regarding this I may be wrong, only I find it a bit too big for the section in which it is.--Aldux 00:55, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'll add inline citations for the lines you mentioned using secondary sources, since primary ones seem to be disliked by some. I'll replace the Champlin quote with an explanation of Tiridates' speech, citing both Champlin and a few others.--Eupator 01:11, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Finished adding the references. I'm not sure what exactly to do regarding the Champlin quote now though. I would like more feedback.--Eupator 20:27, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, the quote has now been moved.--Eupator 22:24, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hoysala Empire

[edit]

This article has been through a peer review. It has been reviewed for balance in content, facts, citations and has been copy edited by multiple reviewers. Please provide further recommendations if any and I shall gladly comply.Dineshkannambadi 00:23, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply Per WP:DATE, "There is consensus among editors that bare month and day names should not be linked unless there is a specific reason that the link will help the reader to understand the article. There is less agreement about links to years. Some editors believe that links to years are generally useful to establish context for the article. Others believe that links to years are rarely useful to the reader and reduce the readability of the text."
So, a copyedit has been done per WP:CONTEXT, and most of the solo years have been de-wikilinked. However, some important years, like the start year or end year of the empire, start date of family record of the empire etc. and reigning years of Kings in Template:Hoysala Kings Infobox have been kept as wikilinked. Please see and comment. Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 04:06, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply--> I have provided the requested citations in "Women" section.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 13:51, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support : The article probably needs a couple of rounds of cpedit to tighten prose. That apart, a very useful, important and informative article. I wholeheartedly 'support'. Sarvagnya 22:56, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object—(1) I'm not agreeing to a promotion until the trivial chronological links are delinked. Why on earth do we need the page to be scattered with blue? And why do you want your high-value links (there are a lot) to be diluted in this way with irrelevant links? Aside from the obvious disadvantages, this aspect is inconsistent. (2) Needs a copy-edit. Here are examples:
    • "Literature in Kannada language, in the Vaishnava, Shaiva and Jain traditions flourished." THE Kannada language.
    • "Sanskrit works spanning Advaita, Vishishtadvaita and Dvaita philosophy were written". Awkward expression.
    • "Poetesses"—please use "poets". "Such as" is more elegant in formal prose than "like". "Gained fame"—bit of a jingle. ay ay. And the grammar suggests that poetesses were an age for emancipation.
    • "Administrative responsibilities were no longer the monopoly of men. Performances in music and dance by women became popular." Stubby sentences that continue similar grammatical constructions to those we've just read. Needs to be varied. But more seriously, these sweeping statements seem to be a little dangerous. I hope that they'll be referenced copiously and authoritatively further down. Do they belong in the lead? Can you have a performance "in" dance, or a performance "in" music?

Don't just correct these examples. The whole text is at issue in this respect. Tony 01:39, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply-->Thank you for your candid critisism. I am starting with removing all Chronological links (years and centuries) and repeat linking in many places. I am also simplyfying the LEAD.

I shall then look closely at the rest of the article for sweeping statements and replace them with more sobre statements.Thank you.Dineshkannambadi 03:04, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Copy edits--> I have taken out many repeat links, date links and sobered adjectives through out the articles. The LEAD has been trimmed. I have replaced "like" with "such as" and "poetess" with "poet". Please take a look and give me your opinion.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 17:41, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object -- choppy prose. =Nichalp «Talk»= 15:41, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Please reply on this page, not user talk pages.
    1. Kannada and Sanskrit literature were prolific during the Hoysala rule. The 12th century saw the Champu style of works go out of vogue, while new metres like Sangatya in compositions (meant to be sung to the accompaniment of a musical instrument), Shatpadi and Tripadi in verses (seven and three line) and Ragale (lyrical poems with refrain) rose in popularity The first is too short, and second sentence is long and windy. 2. Cattle farming was attractive in the highlands (malnad regions) from where diary products, fruits and spices came -- awkard sentence 3. They came to be treated with deference. Their accomplishments gave them more freedom in that they could distance themselves from social conventions to a greater degree.
    2. The sections need a rework. The sections need an overhaul with many of them combined under a single heading. =Nichalp «Talk»= 16:32, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    3. Only Hinduism is mentioned. What about other religions such as Jainism and Buddhism?

=Nichalp «Talk»= 16:33, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply--> As far as I have read, Buddhism had made its exit from India, becoming more rooted in SriLanka and the Southeast Asia. There may have been a few monasteries though. Jainism itself was on the wane. I shall write briefly about these topics also. Please give me a day. I shall also correct the sentenses you mention above as choppy, lengthy etc.thanksDineshkannambadi 16:54, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I propose the following sectioning:

  • History (no subsections) - summarise
  • Economy (no subsections) - summarise
  • Governance
  • Culture
    • Religion
    • Society
    • Literature
    • Architecture
    • Language

The map should be added to the infobox =Nichalp «Talk»= 17:35, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply-->DoneDineshkannambadi 12:52, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply--> I have no problem with reorganization of the article. Do other reviewers have their own suggestions?thanks.Dineshkannambadi 18:36, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I have added a few lines about the decline of Jainsim and exit of Buddhism in the 11th century-14th century time.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 19:41, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thought Since the major developments of this time were art, architecture and Religion, should'nt these topics be ahead of economy and governance.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 20:09, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reorg--> I have reorganised the sections per Nichalp's proposal. I will embark on the summarising aspect tommorow. Just two questions, 1) Do I keep the "impact" section as seperate from Religion or merge it and 2) Do I keep the subsections under "Society" or merge it.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 03:17, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to reorg IMO, Religion and its impact must be merged. subsections of society should also be merged. Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 14:14, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply DoneDineshkannambadi 03:37, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply on REORG->Thanks. That gives me the direction I needed. This job can be done within a couple of days.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 15:46, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Administration-->I will summarise tonight.thanksDineshkannambadi 16:10, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've made some more changes to the structure. This leads to a slightly larger section which should be summarised.

Some additional points:

  1. Use the Template:Infobox Former Country, the closest infobox we have for such kind of articles.-->Done by Dwaipayan/Dinesh
  2. More problems with the grammar: The Hoysala society was comparatively liberal. Woman enjoyed administrative powers. Queen Umadevi administered Halebidu in the absence of Veera Ballala II.[40] Women made progress in the realms of music, dance, literature, poetry, politics and administration. Queen Shantaladevi was a noted dancer. -- very choppy, appear to be just statements instead of flowing text.

Reply modifiedDineshkannambadi 02:22, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  1. The Hoysalas followed the Western Chalukya and Western Ganga Dynasty (Gangas) method of governance -- not very useful bit of information for those reading it for the first time.

Relpy modifiedDineshkannambadi 02:22, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  1. See alsos should be placed at the end of the section.

Reply doneDineshkannambadi 02:22, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  1. The images should be reduced, as far as possible, keep only images relevent to the section placed in.

=Nichalp «Talk»= 16:27, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply Will do this once the text editrs are complete.Dineshkannambadi 02:22, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

SOCIETY--> I have created a subarticle for this also and will compress the content on the main page.Dineshkannambadi 12:54, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Compressed SOCIETY secton.

TBD-->1) compress RELIGION section without loosing context-->Done by DwaipayanDineshkannambadi 17:06, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

2) Learn to use the Template:Infobox Former Country

3) Get the IPA for the article

Please tell me if there are other things to be done.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 16:05, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • I'm happy with the current structure and content per section
  • The text still choppy, so request you get a third person to copyedit it.
  • Phrases not common to standard English should be modified with context. eg. He relied more on the Puranas -- most people outside India would not know what the Puranas are. How about ...literary works of the Puranas?--->Done.Dineshkannambadi 19:08, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Use British English spellings (eg favorable --> favourable)
  • Remove the script from the infobox. For those without the correct fonts, it would be badly rendered at large sizes.-->DoneDineshkannambadi 19:08, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • change 1/4 to 'a fourth'-->Done

=Nichalp «Talk»= 17:57, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox: Template:Infobox Former Country. Is there an example of this in use somewhere?. That would make it easier for me to correctly use it.thanksDineshkannambadi 12:40, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for putting in the box. The big ? is where the emblem goes right?thanksDineshkannambadi 15:23, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I will add symbols for previous and sucessor kingdoms today.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 16:06, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I dont have pictures of the emblem of the preceding kingdom. So that portion will have to wait for a future trip of mine. I may have the "Varaha" emblem of Vijayanagar Empire.Dineshkannambadi 16:13, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply-->All the items in "See also" are included as wikilinks and appear at various points on the main article.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 19:44, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Per MOS, if a link is in the article, it should not be in see also - removal of the section seems to be in order.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  01:58, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, I removed the See Also section. It is funny because I was thinking of same thing and then I came here and saw your comment and went ahead with the removal. --Blacksun 10:11, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Minor contributor to the article (copyedits etc). The article now has a size that is not intimidating! It's well-referenced. Has appropriate links to daughter articles. WP:MOS has been followed. Just one issue: images and the Hoysala kings infobox may not appear properly placed in all browsers/resolutions. Please attend. Assuming this actionable point would be taken care of, I support this artcle to be given featured article status. Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 08:47, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply-->Done. I have anchored all images and kings infobox to the right so they wont appear misplaced in other browsers.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 13:49, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, this Hoysala kings infobox is still creating problem. I am using 1200 by 800 pixels, usiig Mozilla firefox, in a wide screen laptop. The infobox is not exactly fitting. The infobox appears to hover around in the right-ish middle zone of the section "History", with a lot of white space to its right. Probably there is a problem of space between the former country infobox and this infobox. I tried to left allign the infobox, with unsatisfactory result (sentences almost crammed into the infobox). Is anyone else facing such problem?--Dwaipayan (talk) 14:38, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No problem on my screen.The kings infobox is snuggly aligned to the right side, just as the country infobox.ThanksDineshkannambadi 16:18, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Requirements, =Nichalp are there any other requirements for this article. Dwaipayan and myself have done one more copyedit for choppy sentences per your advice.Thanks.129.42.208.182 19:28, 14 December 2006 (UTC).Sorry, last edit was mine.Forgot to log in.Dineshkannambadi 19:29, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nope, still not up to the mark I'm afraid. A cursory glance: 1. It must be noted -- Essay type phrase. 2. Inscriptions were of three kinds — Kannada, Sanskrit and bilingual -- redundant words present: --> Inscriptions were in Kannada, Sanskrit, or bilingual. 3.Queen Umadevi governed Halebidu in the absence of Veera Ballala II and is known to have fought wars against antagonistic feudatories.[35] Women participated in music, dance, literature and poetry as well. Queen Shantala Devi was well versed in dance and music and performed publicly -- choppy =Nichalp «Talk»= 18:31, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

ReplyTook care of these choppy sentences.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 19:56, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Copy edit-->Another user, Mattisse is helping me with copy edits.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 01:13, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Let me know when done =Nichalp «Talk»= 19:13, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Conditional Strong Support - I read through just a bit over half of the article and have added few inotes and citation tags. I will read through rest of the article later and add additional inotes if neccessary. Mark me as support once these are addressed. Pretty good article so far and should be easy to make it FA.--Blacksun 10:31, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply I have addressed the concerns. Please take a look.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 18:18, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The Hoysala map I have (ref:A Concise History of Karnataka, Dr. Kamath, page 328) covers the entire northern Tamil Nadu connecting Kanchi down to Srirangam excluding a narrow strip of Coastal Tamil Nadu. The territory also covers Karnataka coast parallel to Shimoga going down to Kerela's northern tip. More than one reviewer has come up with his question. Can this be corrected.?ThanksDineshkannambadi 18:25, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In addition, I suggest that the core empire be in dark color while the rest of south India south of Krishna river be in a lighter colour indicating Hoysala dominaton there. This way we make sure no questons are raised about Hoysala control over southern deccan.Dineshkannambadi 20:34, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if you cannot find a better map then the present one will do. Atleast you have a date now to give it context. I added couple of more inotes in the second half of the article. Please respond to that and then mark me as support. I am very pleased with the attention to details in the article. --Blacksun 10:13, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Replies to questions raised by User:Blacksun

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all citations requested have been provided.

Innotes on Hoysala page

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1. The legend may have gained popularity after King Vishnuvardhana's victory over the Cholas at Talakad as the Hoysala emblem depicts the fight between Sala and a tiger, the emblem of the Cholas.

Reply-->Historians are not sure who Sala was though they have tried to associate the early kings Nripa Kama I or II, but this has not gained popular support. The legend of Sala bacame more popular from around 1117 CE after Vishnuvardhanas victroy over the Cholas after which sculptural and inscriptional depictions started to appear. The emblem rather than focussing on Sala focusses on Salas (Hoysalas) victory over the Cholas, the tiger being the Chola emblem.Dineshkannambadi 16:02, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, thanks for your reply. However, my question was did this incident make the legend more popular (as stated) or is it arguably the source of the legend? In case of latter then the sentence can be phrased in a better way. Otherwise, it is fine in its present form. --Blacksun 10:09, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

2.Reply-->added dates for inscriptions implying Yadava lineage.

3.QuestionBy the 13th century, they governed most of present-day Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and western Andhra Pradesh in Deccan India.

Reply-->The map shows the core Hoysala areas and excludes loyal feudatories from coastal Karnataka. The Pandyas who payed tribute for some time from Southern Tamil Nadu. I have a map here that is more precise and will request user Nichalp to correct it. The map shows the entire northern Tamil Nadu under Hoysala occupation (the Cholas had been reduced to their feudatories at this time, though their control over Pandyas was periodic 1220-1250, 1290-1313 when the muslim invasion started)Dineshkannambadi 16:11, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

4.The kingdom was divided into four provinces named Nadu, Vishaya, Kampana and Desha, possibly in decending order of geographical size.

Reply-->The kingdom was divided into these four categories and there may have been several Nadus (and Vishayas) under which were several Kampans and under that, several Deshas etc, Just like we have a state under which there are several districts and under them Taluks in present day India (just a crude comparison).Dineshkannambadi 16:14, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

5.Question Under them were the local officials called Heggaddes and Gavundas who dealt with local farmers and labourers hired to till the land.

Reply I will clean this up. They took care of hiring/paying farmers and labourers.Dineshkannambadi 16:19, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

6.Question There were other coins called Bele and Kani as well.

Reply No more info on these units are available. However from the way it is just mentioned by the author suggests very low denominations.Dineshkannambadi 16:23, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

    • Question of Sala Legend by user:Blacksun

Hello, thanks for your reply. However, my question was did this incident make the legend more popular (as stated) or is it arguably the source of the legend? In case of latter then the sentence can be phrased in a better way. Otherwise, it is fine in its present form.

    • Reply

If the incident you mention is " Vishnuvardhana's victory over Cholas" then from what I read (source-->Dr. S.U.Kamath) the legend appeared for the first time in the Belur inscription of 1117 after his victory, but he also says it may be a symbolic represention the wars between the Cholas and early hoysala chieftains (no clarity what early means). However a twist to this is the presence of the emblem in a 1060 Chalukya-Hoysala transitional style temple in Balligavi (which I have visited and photographed), which researcher U.B. Githa claims was added by Vinayaditya, Vishnuvardhana's grandfather. So one can specualte when the legend came into existance. The victroy at Talakad may be the source of the legends "popularity", but Prof. Settar says it is Vishnuvardhanas creation. At present, the earliest inscription with the mention of Sala is 1117, but that does not mean the legend did not exist earlier. So there is no consensus. hope this helps. thanks.Dineshkannambadi 00:56, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Further to my object, I have problems with 1a. Here are random examples.
    • "He wrested Gangavadi from the Cholas in 1116 and shifted the capital from Belur to Halebidu." No, "moved" in this register. "Shifted" is too loose/informal.
    • "four way struggle"—Hyphen required. Please audit similar constructions. I see "high ranking positions".

But the more serious problem concerns the referencing.

    • The list of references at the bottom (under "Notes") is very sloppy. I'd like not to have to sift back to the earliest mention of Kamath's Concise History to find the publication details, including the year; these should appear in every note. lease remove the copyright character from the reference list. In Note 1, "1998-00" will not do for "1998–2000". "OurKarnataka.Com, Inc." is unclear—is it some hybrid web address/company name? Why is there a book title AND a web address/retrieval date? "pp" means "pages" (plural), and should not be applied to a single page. Remove "Dr." from authors' names, and professional words such as "Historian". Is "Joshi surmise that ..." your speculation, or the title of a book chapter, or what? Fix spacing/lack of spacing throughout. Total consistency in formatting is required. Why just two texts referred to so much; it makes me suspicious of the veracity of the article. How reliable are these texts? Without a great spread of sources, there's a huge risk. And the site http://www.ourkarnataka.com is not itself referenced. Is it just opinion?

Unacceptable, I'm afraid. Tony 13:42, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Replies to Tony's questions

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I will certianly clean up some of the things you pointed out. Regarding your more serious concerns, (I hope I have understood your questions correctly) 1."OurKarnataka.Com, Inc." is unclear—is it some hybrid web address/company name?

Ans. OurKarnataka.com is on line website (not a blog site) that comprahensively covers many topics about Karnataka state and Kannada language. Under this web page are listed various topics including history.

2.Why is there a book title AND a web address/retrieval date?

Ans Here is an example-->Historian C. Hayavadhana Rao, J. D. M. Derrett, B. R Joshi surmise that Sala was a mythical founder of the empire, A Concise history of Karnataka pp 123, Dr. S.U. Kamath, Arthikaje, Mangalore. History of Karnataka-Hoysalas and their contributions. © 1998-00 OurKarnataka.Com, Inc. Retrieved on November 17, 2006.

In a citation like the one shown above, I have referenced multiple sources, one is a book and another the web page. Both of them give the same information, one of them may have had the name of an additional scholar which I though should be accounted for. So there are two citations clubbed as one.

4. Is "Joshi surmise that ..." your speculation

Ans-->Not my speculation. The reference book/web may say "In the opinion of Joshi" or "Joshi feels that". Surmise is just used as another word meaning the same thing. If there are specific wordings you dont like, I can refer back and change the word.

5.Why just two texts referred to so much

Ans I have refered to 7 books all of which are listed. One book focuses entirely on Architecture and another on literature. Four of the books referred to provide the same consistant infomation on the birth/growth/decline of the empire, though two are more detailed (Dr Kamath, Prof. Sastri, the less detailed ones being John Keay and Dr. Thapar) I could refer any number of books but the infomation at some point becomes repetitive. For instance in citation #48 thru 54, I may have as well cited R. Narasimhacharya, History of Kannada Literature, 1988 as he also provides the same information. Prof. K.A.N. Sastri dwells slghtly more in detail, so I used his book as reference and used the former book as additional reference in places. If you want both cited, I have no problems with it. The history of the Hoysalas is one of the most understood because it was not too far back in history (speaking relatively) and the empire has left behind a large number of inscriptions, next only to the Vijayanagar empire. In addition, literary sources from that time abound.

Number of references--> Dr. S.U.Kamath (32), Prof. K.A.N. Sastri (11), Dr. Thapar (12) John keay (2), Web based (19). Please remember that in many a case, I have cited both Dr. Kamath and Dr. Sastri OR Dr. Kamath and Dr. Thapar OR web reference and one of the books mentioned, and so on, indicating the scholars and sources concur. Sometimes I have clubbed citations to cover some extra info in one reference not found in the other for completeness.

6.It makes me suspicious of the veracity of the article. How reliable are these texts?

AnsThe authors of all seven books are renouned scholars and historians. This can be verified online. There is a wiki page also for Dr. Romila Thapar, Prof. Sastri is Prof. of history at Univ of Madras[6][7], South India, Dr. Suryanath Kamat is winner of the prestigious Sahitya Academy award 1973, from Government of Karnataka. He is the Director of Karnataka State Gazetteer and Director of Raja Ram Mohan Roy Historical Library in Calcutta. R. Narasimhacharya is a renouned authority on Kannada language and I can quote you other books he has authored as well. His books and historical lectures are available from Vedams books in New Delhi ([8] akin to Amazon.com except they deal mostly with India related books). John Keay, John M. Fritz and George Michell dont need an introducton. The authority of these scholars is beyond doubt. Some of there books are avaliable even in book stores in the USA, others have to be ordered for from publishers.

7.And the site http://www.ourkarnataka.com is not itself referenced. Is it just opinion?

AnsThe info to this page comes for historians themselves or info collected from historians. The fact that it is copyrigthed and deals with so many subjects makes it a valuable site to source from or verify from. So far I have not seen any inconsistancy between the contents of this web page and the books written by the scholars I have referenced. When I find something interesting worth mentioning from the web page, I reference it.

The copyright is irrelevant, and should be removed (there are so many of them in the list). My problem is that the web site is not itself explicitly referenced. That's all that counts. Our readers shouldn't have to wonder. I don't mind a few references to web sites that are themselves unreferenced, but not a lot, as here. I can only discount the info on the web site in terms of research veracity, because of this shortcoming. The information about the author(s) that you provide here is, I regret, irrelevant. Point 4: my point was that it's unclear what the function of that clause is.

1c is a serious issue for this nomination. Tony 03:03, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Umm, I would help but I do not really follow what Tony is talking about. Anyways their are only nine citations that include the website in question out of sixty-seven? I do not think their is a reason to not use available information just because it is from a website and the article has a lot of good references besides the website too. Maybe the issue is the way it is formatted? Also, I do not agree that simply using three-four books is not enough. It matters on the quality of those books and the subject matter. I cannot imagine finding dozens of books or needing to find dozens of books or someone actually having the time to read dozens of books for this article. --Blacksun 09:11, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I think I see some formatting issues. For instance, I do not think that you need to cite the ebook store where you retrieved the book from. You should just cite the book as citing the site is akin to citing the library where you borrowed the book - bit silly. I can see the reason to cite it if the book is accessible for everyone on a website but needless to cite a place where you have to purchase it. --Blacksun 09:31, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply-->are you saying I have too many web references from www.ourkarnataka.com (8 of them actually) and that should be removed?thanks.Dineshkannambadi 03:21, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I did not understand this comment."1c is a serious issue for this nomination". What is 1c? thanks.Dineshkannambadi 03:23, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It basically implies that you require citations or that your citations are not good enough. I strongly disagree with the assessment. --Blacksun 09:42, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I was typing this in when you replied. I counted the number of citations just in case you wanted the info. Number of references--> Dr. S.U.Kamath (32), Prof. K.A.N. Sastri (11), Dr. Thapar (12) John keay (2), Web based (19, of which 8 are from www.karnataka.com). Please remember that in many a case, I have cited both Dr. Kamath and Dr. Sastri OR Dr. Kamath and Dr. Thapar OR web reference and one of the books mentioned, and so on, indicating the scholars and sources concur. Sometimes I have clubbed citations to cover some extra info in one reference not found in the other for completeness.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 03:25, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dinesh, do not club sources. Simply make another citation and put two cites next to each other in the text. "For example, this could be a sentence with two difference sources saying the same thing [14][15]".--Blacksun 09:33, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, make separate notes for different sources. And "1c" means WP:WIAFA criterion 1c. Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 16:19, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Objection to candidature of this article

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* Object - I object to this article's nomination for FA. This article is not neutral, nor is it well-sourced. It's sources are mainly pro-Kannada and it quite easily hides the Telugu and Tamil connection of Hoysalas. It seems to me like an advertisement of Kannada and Karnataka state. The user who has authored this article, User:Dineshkannambadi is well-known for his POV-pushing as I read from some talkpages of other articles. See Vijayanagara article's talkpage, or see Talk:Rashtrakuta or further see it's archives and see talkpages of Seuna as well. He has been regularly accused of pushing pro-Kannada POV in his articles. He has sone the same here. The article is full of Kannada-POV and I wonder how the administrators and other regular editors are missing the advertisement-style tone of the article. I vehemently oppose this nomination. We cannot let political propaganda run its course in Wikipedia. S Shri Venkata 11:34, 22 December 2006 (UTC))— Possible single purpose account: S Shri Venkata (S Shri Venkata • contribs) has made few or no other contributions outside this topic.[reply]

Comment - I have blocked the above user as a disruptive sockpuppet of a blocked user. Please ignore his comments as the user has been known to have disrupted articles edited by Dineshkannambadi- Aksi_great (talk) 19:30, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Mmm, can you be more specific? I have read the article thoroughly and have not noticed anything that seemed like PoV pushing. But I am not well-versed in South Indian history so can't be sure if I missed anything subtle. Can you provide sources and examples? Also, lets try to stick to the article instead of getting into personal conflicts. --Blacksun 12:30, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The above account S Shri Venkata was created on 11:25, December 22, 2006 I believe with the sole purpose of rising an objection.If the user has any real objections he should bring verifyable sources to prove the Telugu/Tamil origin of the Hoysalas and I will be happy to include it. The sources should be accompanied with author, publication year, page number etc to validate the POV claim. If the conflicting source is in another language it has to be accompanied with preferably third party translation.Dineshkannambadi 12:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Your objection is invalid without providing a citation for your claims to POV. Secondly comment on the article not a user's history in FAC. =Nichalp «Talk»= 04:36, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Language can always be improved, but it is easily among Wikipedia's best as it is now. Nice work. The references look solid and it seems comprehensive. I'd like to know a little more about daily life during the empire's rule, such as food, lifestyle, etc, but that may be more appropriate for other articles. - Taxman Talk 16:28, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

update (12/22/06)

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1.Removed city of publication from citations based on advice by User:Blacksun
2.Split combined citations into individual citations per User:Blacksun and User:Dwaipayan

If the 8 citations from www.OurKarnataka.com (pointed out by User:Tony1) is a concern, I can quite easily replace some of it with citations from other "referenced" web sites from well known Karnatakan scholar Dr. K.L. Kamat (not to be confused with Dr. Suryanath Kamath whose book I have used as reference) or may be from my own books. Please tell if that is required.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 18:44, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Done I have reduced this web site usage anyway by giving a few citations from other sources.

Also, As far as some of the citations, especially in the literature and architecture sections, I can provide more from R.Narasimhacharya and Gerard Foekema whose books I own and use as additional sources (Foekema ofcourse has been used extensivly on the Hoysala architecture page). I just did not want to overwhelm the article with repeatitive citations.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 18:50, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Done I have used History of Kannada Literature - R. Narasimhacharya and A Complete Guide to Hoysala Temples - Gerard Foekema

These above changes were made without altering the content of the article itself. As I had mentioned earlier, after reading a few books, much of the infomation becomes repeatitive and hence easy to find similar sentences and content while providing citations.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 23:02, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Object I too object this article as given the 'background' of Mr.Kannambadi,he is an 'dubious' editor, extremely ill-mannered and indecent who manipulates the history to suit his own 'loyalties'. Historical articles need neutral and 'detached' editors. IMO, Hoysalas were not an 'empire' it was a kingdom. Peace. Mrtag 03:40, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply-->There are small empires, there are large empires (please look at article Empire). One has to focus on the contributions also, not just size. One of the main requirements for any rule to become an Empire is imperialism, meaning one culture occupying the land of another culture and influencing the occupied territories by way of culture, architecture etc. This is what the Hoysalas did when they occupied neighbouring Tamil Nadu and parts of Andhra Pradesh. Also if you do a google search for "Hoysala Empire", you will see many more listings (twice as many) than for Hoysala Kingdom.thanks.Dineshkannambadi 05:19, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

MrTag, please comment on the article not the editor in question. If you feel it to be a POV, please cite sources to suppliment your claim. Else this vote is invalid. =Nichalp «Talk»= 05:59, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have little knowledge of Hoysalas hence cant comment on it. Probably this article is fine. My allegations about Mr.Kannambadi are justified, but seems it is not a place to say this. I take back my vote. Mrtag 06:40, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to thank Mrtag for taking back his vote. Would he be kind enough to "scratch" it out because it spoils the otherwise positive mood on this page. Can I do this myself?.Thanks.Dineshkannambadi 12:02, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Umm I did it. *shrugs* --Blacksun 14:13, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Please note that User:Mrtag has now been indef-blocked as a disruptive troll run by User:Sarvabhaum. - Aksi_great (talk) 19:39, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sei Whale

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(self-nom) This article has undergone an overhaul and peer review. It is currently a Good Article and I believe that after implementing the suggestions brought up in the peer review, the article meets the standards expected of Featured Articles.

For comparison, other featured articles about whales include Fin Whale (most recent, link to FAC discussion), Blue Whale (link to FAC discussion), Humpback Whale (link to FAC discussion), Right whale (link to FAC discussion), Sperm Whale (can't find FAC discussion), and Orca (can't find FAC discussion). Neil916 (Talk) 20:33, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support, but with a few nits — A very good article that appears reasonably comprehensive, well-referenced, and an interesting read. I just had a few nits that I thought needed addressing:
    • In the early part of the introduction, the sentence that begins, "Other related whales...," is a bit diverting from the main topic. Since it is covered in the taxonomy section, I wonder if you would consider removing it (or moving it further down)?
    • The second rather than the first occurance of kilograms (and lb) is wiki-linked. Also I believe a period is appropriate following an abbreviated ft., lb., mi., mm., in. and hr.
    • mi/hr is not wiki-linked, &c.
    • The taxonomy section doesn't cover the meaning of the name "borealis".
    • Please use a &mdash; in: "...identified - the..."
    • The single paragraphs in the "North Atlantic", "North Pacific", "International protection" and "Current whaling" sections are quite long. I believe that splitting them up appropriately will make for an easier and more enjoyable read.
Finally, is there any information on this whale's vocalizations? Do they vocalize at all? Thanks. — RJH (talk) 16:14, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response: Addressing your points in order:
      • I agree, and I have removed that sentence
      • Fixed the wikilink problem. As for the period after the abbreviations, I was under the impression that it should be there as well, but WP:MOSNUM#Units_of_measurement clearly shows dropping the period after all of its examples, even though it is not explicitly stated that the period should be dropped. Any suggestions?
        • According to the abbreviations page, SI does not require a period within or after a unit. So km and mm are correct. Heh, learn something new every day. I'm not sure about the old English units, however: I've always included a period. — RJH (talk)
      • Fixed the wikilink of mi/hr.
      • Added the meaning of the latin word borealis, meaning northern.
      • Added the &mdash; in the appropriate section.
      • Revised and reorganized the paragraphs to make them flow better.
      • Not much is known about the Sei Whale's vocalizations, but I added a section describing what little is known.
    • Thanks for the feedback. Neil916 (Talk) 18:15, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Mild Oppose for now. I think it still needs a lot of little detail work. However, as it now stands, with attention to a lot of details, and clearing up some prose it has what it takes to be a FA. The biggest thing I don't like about it is the redundancy of text, when you repeat something, make the sentence more detailed the second time, as with the lead sentences for sections taken from the lead paragraph. I added comments to the talk page and will post more soon. KP Botany 23:29, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response: I've cleaned up the redundancies between the lead section of the article and the main body. I've been trying to balance requests to expand the lead section with the need to not repeat the entire article in the lead section. See if you like that better. I have addressed the other concerns over on the article's talk page. Feel free to review the article again and raise additional issues as you discover them. Neil916 (Talk) 16:44, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • No, I don't think the lead section should be expanded at all, sorry for the confusion. I think that when you repeat a sentence from the lead section as an introductory point to another section in the article, the lead sentence from the lead section should be expanded a bit. The lead section for this article is superb, content wise--please don't change it!!! Sorry to mess you up on this. KP Botany 18:13, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • No, it wasn't you who suggested expanding the lead section, it was one of the issues that had come up in the peer review, and the result was the version that you saw. I interpreted your comment to mean that you felt that the lead section had become too repetetive, where there was a sentence in the lead section that was just an exact replica of the sentence in the main body (which was the case, in fact, because in some cases I just cut-and-pasted it when I was expanding the lead). So what I've done in response to your concern is to verify that in every case where a fact is mentioned in the lead, the fact is mentioned in more detail in the actual body of the article. The only minor exception to this that I can see is the comment about the whale's swimming speed, because I don't know how much that statement can be elaborated upon, but I did move the article around and made that statement part of a larger paragraph on the whale's swimming habits in general, including diving, which wasn't mentioned in the lead. So when I mentioned the balancing act, I was basically referring to work that I'd done in the past expanding the lead, not plans to expand it further in response to your concern. Neil916 (Talk) 18:24, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - the article is comprehensive, good pictures (I like the whale diagram picture), well-written and it is easy to follow, well-referenced but only one reference to an external wiki page. As soon as the external wiki reference is replaced, I will change my vote into full support. — Indon (reply) — 09:29, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. The prose needs cleaning up, and the lead is poor (1a and 2a). Here are random examples that indicate that the whole text needs considerable work.
    • "The whale reaches lengths of 20 metres"—Plural "lengths" and "weights" are unidiomatic. In any case, the largest ever recorded specimen was this long, but much heavier. Conflicting information with the details below.
    • "an average of about 900 kilograms"—Remove "about" (see MoS).
    • "Its name comes from the Norwegian word for pollock, a fish that appears off the coast of Norway at the same time as the Sei Whale.[3]"—Why highlight this in the lead when the info is repeated just below? Big picture first, please. Tony 12:55, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response: Addressing your points in order:
      • Fixed the wording and corrected information; I had copied the wrong stats when writing the lead, thanks for pointing that out.
      • Fixed that.
      • I disagree with this point. Per the Manual of Style (Lead Section), "The lead should be capable of standing alone as a concise overview of the article, establishing context, explaining why the subject is interesting or notable, and describing its notable controversies, if there are any". By that definition, the lead section is going to repeat information contained in the rest of the article. The lead section is organized from the standpoint that it should address questions that a reader would have if the intro is the only thing they read (or can read, It has been suggested that the CD version of WP only contain the lead sections of articles). It is my opinion that a typical reader would have questions about why the whale has a common name "Sei" and that the question is important enough to raise in the lead section. The fact that it is addressed in the following section shouldn't be a reason to not include it in the lead, and additional information is provided in that section. If your objection is due to the fact that the wording is similar, suggest an alternative for the wording.
    • Please let me know if there are additional issues that you spot. Neil916 (Talk) 17:09, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rejoinder—My point about allowing etymological niceties intrude into the second sentence of the lead is that it's just too detailed compared with the rest of the info in the lead, which should summarise the topic. It's a nice point to make, but do it just once, after you've provided the big picture in the lead. Like, tell us where the species lives/migrates instead. Lower down, you mention the migration without giving an idea as to whether it roams the whole of the North Atlantic or specific areas off Norway, Siberia, Greenland, etc. THAT is the summary stuff we need in the lead, not etymology that's repeated below.

Now, more problems:

    • "The whale reaches a length of up to 20 metres (66 ft) long and reaches a weight of up to 45 tonnes (50 tons).[4]" Try: "The whales reach lengths of up to 20 metres (66 ft) and weigh up to 45 tonnes (50 tons).[4]" Ah, much better ....
    • "although it continues to be hunted to a limited extent"—awkward passive construction and inefficient wording: "although limited hunting still occurs ..."
    • "approximately one-fifth"—a plea for plain English: "about a fifth". It's what our wide range of native and non-native readers want. We're vying for their reading time, too. People are busy, and using short, simple language adds up to a satisfying reading experience.
    • "(up to 180 tonnes, 200 tons) and the Fin Whale (up to 70 tonnes, 70 tons)". Um ... get that calculator out.
    • Can you make the expression of ranges consistent? We have "4–5 metres (13–16 ft)", which I like, but more elaborate wording elsewhere—e.g., between 12.2 and 15.2 metres (40–50 ft)".
    • Love your en dashes, but use them consistently (32-60 looks so squidgy), and then "to" below.
    • It's turning into a wiktionary with the linking of common words such as "scar" and "skin". Please delink these throughout.
    • "Very little is known about their actual social structure." As opposed to their fanciful social structure?
    • "The Sei Whale is notable for its speed, being among the fastest of all cetaceans." Why not remove the bloat: "The Sei Whale is among the fastest of all cetaceans."?

I won't read on. Someone with strategic distance is required, to copy-edit it throughout. Tony 03:06, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • I have addressed these points, but I don't know what "32-60 looks so squidgy" means. KP Botany has been providing copyediting assistance on the talk page of the article, addressing his objections raised on this FAC page. Your participation in that discussion would be welcome. Neil916 (Talk) 18:42, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Because a hyphen is used. Try the trusted en dash for ranges: 32–60, not 32-60; it's standard usage. Tony 07:24, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The Boondock Saints

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This is a self nomination of the article. I've been working on the article for about two weeks. I think the article meets all the featured article criteria. It's comprehensive, factually accurate, neutral, and without edit wars or disputes. The lead section is concise and gives a broad summary of the entire article. I feel it is an overall interesting read, that is ready to be a featured article. KOS | talk 17:27, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment -Footnotes come after punctuation, not in the middle of a sentence (at least 2 are). The footnote about the DVD should have info on the DVD, title, publisher, date, etc as this info can change over time.Rlevse 19:10, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • A comprehensive and interesting article, well-referenced and neutral. Now that the images have FURs, I have no hesitation in supporting (though please fix the placing of the footnotes). Regards, —Celestianpower háblame 19:17, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • After a breeze through the article, I found a lot of run-on sentences, small typos, and other style and grammar related issues - perhaps a thorough copy edit by users who have not been involved in the article's development would be a good idea?--Dmz5 05:08, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've attempted to resolve the issues you have pointed out, I believe the issues have been resolved, though an other copy edit by users who have not had a hand in the development of the article, might be a good idea. KOS | talk 11:52, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I have been overlooking this article for about the 2 weeks that it has been worked on. Over this time, the changes that have been made have enhanced the article in several ways. The article captures a wide audience, and interest in the subject is not necessarily needed to make for an enjoyable read. The article edit history does not include any edit wars, the whole article is written in a comprehensive manner, the number of sources provided is sufficient and the article is not bias in any way. In my opinion, this article should become a featured article. Support --Ali K 11:36, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - I'd like to see the refs have a bit more information than a url and retrieval date, but that's my only issue. pschemp | talk 16:36, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Charles Darwin

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Old FACs
Archive 1
Archive 2

This has been a Good Article for some time, with very good prose. Dave Souza has put a lot of effort into it, and we have now very thoroughly referenced it, which was the main remaining criterion to be satisfied. Please help us address any issues that arise, as this is a very important historical figure to have a featured article on. Thank you. Samsara (talk • contribs) 15:10, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. I would change the Greek endnotes to common Latin. --Brand спойт 15:28, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, though partially a self-support as I helped with the citations. Adam Cuerden talk 15:39, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, essentially a self-support, many thanks to all who have contributed to transforming this article. .. dave souza, talk 17:05, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support- Its all Greek to me. Seriously though, this is well written and has more references than you can shake a stick at. It is an excellent article about a very important topic and considering how much this man's life has been studied, a very nice summary. Good work. pschemp | talk 17:15, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object, overall, excellent, but....a)solo years should not normally be wikilinked. You have some linked and some aren't. b) at least note a (check for others) is in the middle of a sentence. notes/citations go after punctuation. c) your web reference format isn't consistent. most don't have a retrieval date, so do but in the format "downloaded on", and some do but in the format "retrieved on"--be consistent, suggest using the "retrieved" format.Rlevse 20:18, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • On b), the guideline, WP:FN, states Place a ref tag at the end of the term, phrase, sentence, or paragraph to which the note refers. The ref tag should be placed directly after most punctuation marks, which is what we have done. Years have been delinked. Samsara (talk • contribs) 20:37, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Great article, well done! --WS 20:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: The "children" section needs to be expanded. On the other hand, the list of publications could be split off to a separate article in order to shorten the overall article, which is pretty long. Also it's a long list of references. Has any attempt been made to make sure that these are the most reputable sources? Good luck! -- Ssilvers 21:33, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • As all of the sections have been kept concise, the brief summary about Darwin's relationship with his children with dates and links to individual articles seemed appropriate. Having a list of books on the same page is useful for readers who want to refer to what came when, but don't want to go to another page: a link is given to the very full bibliography which the University of Cambridge provide at Darwin Online. Many of the references are to primary sources, the original books made available at that site. A lot of use has been made of the very reputable biographies by Browne and Desmond & Moore, which as it happens have recently been recommended by the Darwin Online founder and director Dr John van Wyhe on this page. Other sources have been checked against these main and primary sources for accuracy. .. dave souza, talk 22:48, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Please note that the "children" section has been expanded: any comments? .. dave souza, talk 19:12, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The section entitled "Illness, natural selection, and marriage" needs to be renamed, since it isn't clear if all these things could happen to one person! TimVickers 22:08, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • The original heading for that section was "palpitations of the heart", a somewhat ambiguous quotation that Dave liked because it could be seen to refer both to his chest pains and his romantic involvement with Emma. Would you and others prefer this original heading? Samsara (talk • contribs) 22:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • If you can accept "natural selection" as being an idea rather than a process in this case, they all happened to Darwin in less than eighteen months! :) .. dave souza, talk 22:56, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support I'm happy with the revision and I also changed the Section called "Descent of Man, sexual selection, botany and old age." since this had a similar problem, with three of Darwin's areas of study mixed into one thing that happened in his life. TimVickers 17:23, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Thinking about it, perhaps "Descent of Man, sexual selection and botany" would work better – the fact that it's the last "Life" section covers the old age point. .. dave souza, talk 19:12, 15 December 2006 (UTC) Implemented dave souza, talk 08:36, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • In the lead - 'wrote a series of books on plants, then one on earthworms' - 'followed by', maybe, or 'in addition to'?
  • 'Illness and marriage' section - the prose here is a bit disjointed due to covering both his relationship and his scientific interests during the same period in his life. There's a bit of a jump from his invalid aunt being cared for by Emma, to his studying earthworms - could use some sort of transition. (Also, 'intelligent but unmarried?)
  • Same section, second-to-last paragraph - in one sentence Emma is worrying about the afterlife, and in the next Charles is house-hunting in London. As apt as that may be, there could be a better transition here, if the house-hunting process is really important enough to include.
  • Not terribly relevant to this FAC, but this is as good a place as any - some of the daughter articles, eg Darwin from Insectivorous plants to Worms, are rather awkwardly named. Opabinia regalis 04:18, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for these pointers, I've tackled the prose issues and tried to make the "illness and marriage" section more informative, as well as adding "Overwork" to the title in case anyone got the impression that Darwin was idling in his sickbed ;) The daughter articles were named at a time when it seemed good to allow the name to be used in a sentence without a piped link, this could certainly be reconsidered but I'm not sure if the effort would be worthwhile: better suggestions welcome. .. dave souza, talk 06:52, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I'm not weighing in with a support because I've edited to article quite a bit, but I did do a very thorough informal review of the article (here) and, amongst other things, can attest (1) everything is accurate & NPOV and (2) all of the online refs support the claims made. Mikker (...) 05:08, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Just gone through it, and found a few minor things which I have fixed. Very comprehensive and good article. Just one thing, you may want to mention that Darwin's Sound is a glacier. I had to enter the article to find that out. Great work. --liquidGhoul 10:49, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Moderate Support - I'd rather have all the References gathered into inline citations as well as Darwin's iconic bearded picture in the infobox, but overall very worthy. Wiki-newbie 15:36, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The references are now all linked from the inline citation footnotes, using the newish Harvnb template system. There was a lot of discussion earlier resulting in the decision that the image from around the time of publication of The Origin is preferable to the iconic image of Darwin's beard which he grew seven years after publication. .. dave souza, talk 10:16, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm not convinced that this is yet "compelling, even brilliant" prose, as required. Here are examples just from the top.
  • "by convincing the scientific community of the occurrence of evolution and proposing that this could be explained"—"Occurrence" is definitely the wrong word here. "notion"?
    • "could"—use present-tense "can".
    • "His theories are now considered the foundation stone of biology"—Remove "now", and possibly "stone".
    • "The wildlife distribution he saw on the voyage"—The first item (three words) is awkward.
    • Unsure that "heretical" requires linking. Tony 06:07, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for these examples: it's prodded me to rethink what we're trying to say in the introduction and rephrase it accordingly. Nuances I've tried to incorporate include the point that he was already eminent before publishing his theory, evolution is a phenomenon which he demonstrated convincingly to the community of his day and, citing the linked biography, is "now the unifying theory of the life sciences". Life sciences redirects to biology, though I'd have thought it covered other disciplines. Geographical distribution of species set him thinking, and it seemed desirable to me to link "heretical" since it was literally heresy to the established church. However the linked article probably confuses rather than helps that point, so I've delinked it. I've previously checked over the prose of the rest of the article, will now try to re-examine it with fresh eyes. Thanks for that insight, .. dave souza, talk 09:51, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

hey guys great article, i did't even have to read it to know how good it was. All these other comments just sums up how excellent this truly is :)

Cell nucleus

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This A-class article was the subject of the molecular and cellular biology collaboration in September, and was barely more than a stub before we started work. Much of the credit for the work and collaboration coordination goes to ShaiM, who is currently on a break, with contributions from myself and many members of the MCB project. The article had a brief peer review in October, archived here. Comments on this critical article in cell biology would be appreciated. Thanks. Opabinia regalis 03:49, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The subnuclear bodies sections could be a bulleted list, I suppose. I liked having them clearly demarcated in some way that makes it obvious how the descriptions relate to the table. Opabinia regalis 01:33, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments
  • In the introduction, its not clear what this means "It was later popularized by Scottish botanist Robert Brown in 1831." When was the cell nucleus ever popular? :)
What, you mean it's unpopular? Well, I like my nuclei, anyway... :) Reworded.
*Units of measurement should be spelled out on first use Style guide (such as μM)
Fixed the ones I found.
  • Are all Karyopherins really transcription factors? "Most proteins, ribosomal subunits, and some RNAs are transported through the pore complexes in a process mediated by a family of transcription factors known as karyopherins."
Err, that should say "transport factors". Fixed, good catch.
*Need to stick to either US or real English. I caught a few British spellings and changed them to US English, since this seems to predominate.
Fixed the ones I found (two uses of 'organised'). So what, the US uses fake English now? ;)
*The changes in sub-cellular localisation of Hexokinase seems to have more to do with transcriptional control than direct control of enzyme activity, see review in PMID 12007644 "The hexokinase 2-dependent glucose signal transduction pathway of Saccharomyces cerevisiae." Moreno F, Herrero P. After all, phosphorylated hexoses will diffuse freely in and out of the nucleus.
Caused by my ham-handed attempt to fix the flow of the writing and not be too wordy, I think. This has been clarified.
*I can't find any references in PubMed to nuclear laminins regulating apoptosis. "The progressive organisation of the nuclear lamina throughout apoptosis is used to initiate and regulate the various phases of apoptosis." TimVickers 17:56, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Bad writing; see the revision. Lamina don't 'initiate apoptosis', but they do initiate some of the apoptotic processes within the nucleus after being cleaved by caspases, and lamin assembly failure induces apoptosis. (Not sure by which pathway this induction occurs, but that's a bit too specific here; more a matter for nuclear lamina.) Opabinia regalis 01:33, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Comprehensive, well-illustrated and clear. TimVickers 17:16, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments. Quite comprehensive and well referenced. However,
  • Lead needs quite a bit of reworking. What is the paragraph on gene expression doing in the lead?
I believe the original point was to emphasize that only transcription occurred in the nucleus, but I think you're right that it's unnecessary; paragraph removed.
Added short descriptions of these two to the appropriate structure discussion. I don't think it's feasible to include much more than a short mention of individual disease states, as this invites indefinite expansion of an already somewhat lengthy article. Opabinia regalis 01:07, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Wonderfully organized and magisterial in scope and treatment. It's written at a fittingly high level and should definitely not be simplified further; but I would include a higher density of wiki-links for the less well-read readers, e.g., phosphorylation and other freshman biochemistry concepts. Willow 12:04, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Few more wikilinks added - phosphorylation, snRNP, etc., especially at the beginning. Opabinia regalis 01:07, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
PMIDs added. TimVickers 17:57, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Tim! You beat me by a mile. Opabinia regalis 01:37, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hurricane Erika (2003)

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After working on this for, yada-yada-ya, I think this complies to FA criteria. Comments? Hurricanehink (talk) 04:31, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support Well written and well sourced. Great work. Jay32183 05:07, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Great work as always Mercenary2k 20:38, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. When is David Roth gonna make a rainfall graphic?!?! Other than that, supertastic! íslenskur fellibylur #12 (samtal) 21:26, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment since the event has now passed, did the Bahamas get rain or not? "The precursor disturbance was expected to bring heavy, yet needed rainfall to the Bahamas" Hmains 23:33, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per above. CrazyC83 05:12, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. The article is well sourced, well written, and overall informitive. The only things I have wrong with it is that its a tad short, and the first portion doesn't have any refrences. However, how much is there to say about a Hurricane which did not last very long and was just barley a Hurricane and the rest of the article's citing makes up for the lack of it at the top, but some would be appruciated. Overall, though, I don't see why not. Jerichi 21:49, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Just to let you know, the WPTC prefers not to use references for the lede if the information is sourced further down in the article. We like having our ledes look nice and neat, though having unneeded sources for all of that (when it's further down) just clutters things. Hurricanehink (talk) 21:55, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Article guidelines say that the lead should summarize the later text of the article rather than contain its own information. To this end, any facts in the lead are elaborated upon later in the article and cited there. That has become TC Wikiproject policy. (This was an edit conflict with Hink above, but I thought my clarification was useful.) —Cuiviénen 21:56, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • (double edit conflict) Well, if you mean the lead section, it is supposed to be a summary of the rest of the article; so, everything in the lead should be covered with more detail on the other sections in the page, and that's where the references are. If something that is described in the lead is not described with more detail on the rest of the article, it should a) be referenced, or b) ideally not be there. Other FACs have been opposed due to that, such as Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/National Anthem of Russia. Titoxd(?!?) 21:57, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, no problem with that then. Again, its a tad short, but it seems to be as long as it can get, so I have no objection whatsoever. Jeri-kun 23:08, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Good work, well sourced. --SunStar Nettalk 21:50, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Writing could use some work. Look at the second sentence for example. Derex 06:07, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support.--Dwaipayan (talk) 20:57, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Terrific article, well-sourced and organized. Hello32020 21:13, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support As usual, the Tropical Cyclone project sends another excellent article to FAC! Some quibbles:
    • I'm not sure what the "however, operationally" is doing in the second sentence. Why is "however" needed? To what is "operationally" referring?
    • Some repetitions in the lead: "quickly westward and strengthened under favorable conditions and made landfall as a hurricane on northeastern Mexico on August 16, but quickly dissipated inland." and "along with light rain, causing light"
    • "it passed beneath a cold-core upper-level low" Wikilinks for the last part?
    • "10,000 were evacuated from northeastern Mexico" Is there a way to avoid starting that sentence with a number? Perhaps "About 10,000"?
    • According to the guide to layout, the See also section in this article isn't needed, since the terms are already linked in the article. Gzkn 02:28, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Thanks, got all of that. Hurricanehink (talk) 02:51, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • I still don't know what role the "however" plays; how would the meaning change if that word were omitted? Is 70mph below hurricane speed or something? Derex 23:26, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • Yes; minimum hurricane speed is 74 mph. Titoxd(?!?) 23:30, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
            • Ok then, the sentence is as clear as mud. Since it's one of the first, that's important. It ought to say something like the NHS classified it as an X (tropical storm?) at the time based on 70mph winds, but later (a week?) revised it upward to hurricane force with peak winds of X. The sentence saying it was the xth cyclone, yth tropical storm, and zth hurricane is really confusing to someone who doesn't know the distinctions. particularly since the cyclone article starts off by saying that "hurricane redirects here". The lede is also a chronological oddity, as it first tells me that Erika moved west into Mexico and rapidly dissipated. then, it tells me that it caused issues in Florida and Texas. I understand that's probably b/c it treats the "hurricane" impacts first, but it's still a bit confusing. FA should be clearly written, and _certainly_ so in the first paragraph. This is still not. Derex 19:56, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
              • Ok, I had a hack at it. The first paragraph is supposed to be a summary of the meteorological history of the storm, and the second paragraph summarizes the impact the storm caused, in chronological order. Titoxd(?!?) 20:20, 19 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
                • I revised your revision a bit :). Hope I didn't render it unintelligible. I'm still not clear what purpose "operationally" serves in the sentence though. Gzkn 00:54, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
                • It's a term meaning that as the storm was still "alive", the National Hurricane Center's regular tracking operations defined it as a tropical storm, not a hurricane. Titoxd(?!?) 01:04, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Brabham

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Self nomination Current Good Article on a former Formula One team and racing car manufacturer with an interesting history. I've been working this one up over the last 6 months or so, on and off. It is comprehensive - more so that most webpages on the topic, which tend only to cover the team's F1 involvement. It's also pretty thoroughly referenced mainly from hardcopy sources (although no doubt someone will immediately spot something I've missed :)). It was peer reviewed here - all the issues raised were dealt with to the satisfaction of the peer reviewers. Finally, I think I've pegged all the relevant bits from WP:MoS. I believe it is now up to FA standard, but await your views. Thanks in advance. <ducks and hides under desk> 4u1e 00:40, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support Don't be like that 4u1e, Brabham is a great article and it's rating as a GA, in my opinion, is an understatement. Great job!. --Skully Collins Edits 07:20, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Oh, I'm not that worried! In fact, since my concern for the article is that I'm too close to it, I'll be quite happy if/when someone points out a problem with it. Thanks for the support :D 4u1e 08:09, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral Very close, just one thing that concerns me, the image used in the infobox is also used later on in the article (with the caption "The Brabham BT52 was the first turbocharged car to win the F1 drivers' championship"). Also the copyright notice of the image seems a bit dodgy to me, and I couldn't find anything on the source website to confirm it. Suggest that a logo be used in the infobox and if possible proof of the the BT52's copyright status be found (or the image replaced). I will support when this is done. Alexj2002 09:24, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'll check out the BT52 picture copyright notice, it's not one of the ones I loaded (there's a pic of a BT49 around somewhere if this one's not OK). Regarding logos, I agree, but have a small concern. I originally had the BRO logo at the top of the page. Because BRO only represents a small part of the team's history, I was going to go with the team's most recent logo (the scorpion/snake thing). I have a gif of this one, but didn't record the site I got it from and cannot now find it on the web anywhere. This means I can't fulfil the requirement to give the source of the image. Any advice? 4u1e 09:56, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
You're right. Very dodgy licensing, and the pic has gone from that website as far as I can see. I've replaced it with a cc-by licensed image of a BT49 from flickr.com in the text and the BRO logo at the top of the page. 4u1e 10:18, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Try [9] for the snake/scorpion logo. Alexj2002 10:20, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's the one. Apparently it's referred to as Hissing Sid. Don't know why it didn't come up on search. I'll fix that one tonight. Cheers. 4u1e 10:23, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done. Thanks for finding that. I'd be grateful if you could check I've gotten the fair use rationale right. 4u1e 20:49, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support Objections resolved. Alexj2002 21:08, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comments.
    • Please remove Amazon.com links from references.
      • First of all - many thanks for such a comprehensive assessment of the structure. Happy to remove the Amazon links, although I find them more useful than the ISBN ones for the kind of sources we're talking about here. Out of curiosity, is there a specific policy on this, or is it a preference?
    • I fixed one of your references to include the webpage title: in the event links go dead, future readers need to know the exact bibliographic info in order to attempt to re-locate the info. Please doublecheck all your web links, and make sure last access dates are provided. When a page links to static results, consider linking to the internet archive for a stable version.
      • What I really wanted was a link to a general 'results archive' page. Unfortunately the F1 site isn't structured like that, you have to link to a specific year. I didn't want the reference to look like it was just to a single year's results, so left that part of the title out. However, you're probably right, it's misleading to do so. Excellent point re archived versions of the page. I will investigate.
        • Sadly, I don't think the internet archive will work here. The way the f1 site is structured, each year's results have a different page. Each year has 16 or so races, again each with a separate page, and the results can be viewed by driver, team or season summary. If I understand correctly, the links from each archived page go to the current version of the linked page, not the archived version. Without giving individual links to archived versions of each of the relevant pages (perhaps 30 x 16 = 318 pages!) I can't see how this can be made to work.4u1e 22:26, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Is there an ISBN for Pinder?
      • No, and I think I may drop him as a source. I hadn't noticed at first, but the coincidence of his name and the publisher's indicate that it is probably a vanity book. While I think it remains a useful and reliable source on Repco, and there is nothing in the book which contradicts other sources, it's probably cleaner just to use Henry instead.
        • Pinder removed, substituted Lawrence, which gives more info than Henry on Brabham's technical involvement in the project, if anyone ever actually reads the reference text! 4u1e 19:05, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Wiki is a dynamic environment, and future editors could insert new text - I can't support an article carrying this statement: "Facts which are not otherwise footnoted have been taken from the following sources:" Facts which need to be footnoted, should be footnoted.
      • Again, your point is fair. I suggest that the article's readability will suffer if I footnote all race results, so how about I remove the general reference to Alan Henry's 1999 Motorsport article and leave the race results under the heading 'All race and championship results taken from'?
    • Why do you include page numbers in References? The point of References is to list sources, with specific page numbers provided in the Footnotes.
      • The ones with page numbers are articles in newspapers or magazines, so the referenced source is a particular article, not to the magazine in general. In newspapers, which are not generally indexed, the articles will be harder to find without a page number. The page number is given in the footnote, though, so I can live with losing them from the references.
    • Some bluelinks in some footnotes need to be expanded to include full bibliographic info - if the sources go dead, future readers need to be able to find the article, example, www.sfo.gov.uk is not sufficient info.
      • Good point. Will fix.
        • I've made some tentative changes, but haven't finalised an approach yet. Can I confirm that www.sfo.gov.uk wasn't actually a problem? It has the website, the name of the document the info came from and the title of the case study within that document. I've added the 'click path' to the title as well, but don't see what else can be done with this one. I assume www.f3history.co.uk, www.grandprix.com and www.indy500.com/stats are the issue? I've tried something with the first two (see references section). Better? 4u1e 07:13, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • Have added more detail on each ref, and re-written some of the article to use hardcopy references instead of on-line (Online now in 'External links' section). 4u1e 22:45, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Why are these bolded ? devised a hydropneumatic suspension system, Murray started using lightweight carbon fibre composite panels, The Brabham BT46B of 1978, also known as the Fan car, to introduce full width rear wings for downforce and increased grip, etc ?
    • Why is this italicized? downforce created by aerodynamic ground effect.
      • It wasn't me that did it, but I believe the intent was to highlight technical terms, an approach I've seen recommended somewhere in one of the style guides (I'll check that out in more detail). I'm happy for it to go if it's distracting.
        • OK. The guidance I was thinking of is Technical terms and definitions. Having read that again, I've settled for italics for technical terms which I believe many people won't have encountered before. Thus I have italicised monocoque, but not wind tunnel because I think most people will have a vague idea of what it is. I've italicised at the first appearance, and at the first appearance in the 'Technical innovation' section, since this is where most of the description is done. Better? 4u1e 18:57, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Re-arranging images in Racing history - other formulae will help avoid chunks of white space - images don't *have* to be right next to the text they refer to, when doing so results in chunky white space.
      • Will give that a go, on a variety of screen settings. It looks OK on the three different set ups that I normally use, but I guess that's not really representative of the world at large.
        • I've tried a couple of different screen resolutions, a load of different window sizes and IE as well as Firefox (Netscape now uses the IE and Mozilla rendering engines, so I haven't bothered with that). I can't see any 'chunky white space' on any window or screen sizes, other than right at the top of the article on my maximum resolution settings. I have re-arranged the pictures anyway to make the page less uniform. Any better? If not, could you be more specific about what the problem looks like, perhaps with screen resolution settings and browser details? A screen cap would be good, if you can do it. 4u1e 18:00, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't read the text yet; I'll do that after structural things are addressed. Sandy (Talk) 17:22, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Response to comment: I think I have addressed all of the points raised above. Do you agree? 4u1e 22:45, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Responded on talk. Sandy (Talk) 01:47, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Kitsune

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Self-nomination. I've been working extensively on this article over the last two months. It's now thoroughly referenced, comprehensive, and, I hope, covers the topic in depth but not excessively so. I like to think it's also well-written. It's recently received a peer review and passed a Good Article nomination, and I've further improved it based on suggestions made by reviewers in both cases. Shimeru 08:32, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose – 1. needs a thorough copyedit. 2. Kitsune is the Japanese word for fox – Am not sure about the scope of this article. It seems to be how foxes are perceived to be in Japanese culture. Could the scope be made clearer in the lead? It seems to be an article on a humble fox called a kitsune. =Nichalp «Talk»= 09:06, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Could you be any more specific on either point? I'd be glad to try, but this does not give me anything to work with. Shimeru 10:10, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • :Ok here goes: 1. Kitsune is the Japanese word for fox. (the first statement is choppy. Is it a direct translation of the word fox? If so, why a translation into Japanese? What's special about it? The first sentence has to define the scope of the article. (eg Dürer's Rhinoceros is the name commonly given to a woodcut created by German painter and printmaker Albrecht Dürer in 1515). 2. In folklore, kitsune are a type of yōkai -- No I have no idea what yokai means, so I have to click the link. Instead giver the reader some context --> In folklore, kitsune are a type of yōkai or spirits. This should be done throughout the article where words not native to English have some context. The same applies to Lafcadio Hearn. Who is he? Add his occupation (author) 3. Are these foxes unique to Japan? 4. Kitsune are commonly portrayed as lovers. These love stories usually involve a young human male and a kitsune who takes the form of a woman. -- choppy text, could be merged. 4. ==Origins of fox myths== needs to come much higher in the article. 5. Eastern sense? 6. For more details on kitsune appearances in specific contemporary works, see Kitsune in popular culture. -- duplicate link in section. Hope that was enough to start you off. =Nichalp «Talk»= 12:37, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • ::I think so, thank you. I've made an attempt to address the lead and explain more context for the Japanese words and for individuals in general. Also moved the origins and etymology to immediately follow the lead, which I'd been considering in any case. I haven't yet dont a full pass over all sections; I want to see first whether the new lead is the sort of thing you had in mind, rather than risk making the entire thing much worse. Shimeru 21:43, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • :::Yeah, that's exactly what I was looking for. I'll link my vote to BrianSmithson's, and as soon as he changes it, mine will too. Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 16:49, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I think the title needs changed or the opening needs changed as I was confused as to whether this article is to be about the Fox in Japanese Folklore (or Kitsune in Japanese Folklore), or a biological article on the Kitsune. Rlevse 15:29, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've only read the opening so far, and I agree. I thought I was going to get an article on Japanese foxes. When the folklore started, I asumed this was just an aside. Then I realised this whole article was going to be about folklore. That needs to be made clear in the first sentence by removing the scientific names. What about a sentence along the lines of that which begins Reynard: "Reynard the fox, also known as Renard, Renart, Reinard, Reinecke, Reinhardus, Reynardt, and by many other spelling variations, is a trickster figure whose tale is told in a number of anthropomorphic fables from medieval Europe". qp10qp 17:39, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Now I've come to:

In folklore, kitsune are a type of yōkai. In this context, the word kitsune is often translated as "fox spirit." However, this does not mean that a kitsune is not a living creature, nor that a kitsune is a creature different from a fox. Because the word spirit is used in its Eastern sense, reflecting a state of knowledge or enlightenment, any fox who lives for a sufficiently long time may gain the supernatural power of the kitsune.[1]

The second sentence depends on the first, and so I don't understand. What context? Then it says that this doesn't mean that a kitsune is a creature different from a fox. But having been told that a kitsune may have up to nine tails, I'm afraid I already assumed that a kitsune in folklore is a different creature to a fox, even if the name is the same. The word "supernatural" here surely means that the kitsune of folklore is a different creature from the natural fox. It is normal in all cultures to make folkloric creatures out of animals.
qp10qp 17:55, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Rewrote some of the text, including the above-quoted section, to try to make the intent clearer: within the context of folklore, there is no difference between an "ordinary" fox and a kitsune. All foxes have the potential for supernatural power. May need to revise further for the sake of clarity; will think about how that might best be done. Shimeru 21:54, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Needs better linking. For example, "Print by Kuniyoshi Ichiyusai." is not linked, nor is "Blacksmith Munechika (end of the 10th century), helped by Inari and her fox spirits, forging the blade ko-kitsune-maru ("Little fox"). This legend is the subject of a noh drama." (The blacksmith is not linked nor is the play itself). On a more general note, I'd like to see more quoting from source texts: the Hearn quote is good, but more would be better, particularly illustrative instances from folk tales or religious texts. --Gwern (contribs) 18:12 10 December 2006 (GMT)
    • Well, the reason for at least part of that was that some of those articles don't exist yet (Munechika, the play). I redlinked them, though, since that's preferred, and also linked a few other things (including Kuniyoshi). Added a couple more direct quotes, too; I was thinking about doing more, but I don't want to tilt the other way and duplicate too much from the sources. Is there anything in particular you'd like to see a folktale quote illustrating? Shimeru 21:58, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • I may be too demanding, but I see a FA as the centerpiece of an ecology or network of articles in the particular subject area, so it bothers me if articles that should be linked are not linked just because people are afraid of the red links or don't want to start stubs on them. As for quotes, I'd like to see more about the discovery of the fox ("And then he noticed a tail sticking out of the woman's robe...") and their powers.
      • In general, I'd like more pictures - for example, one of the most famous woodprints in Hiroshige's 100 Famous Views of Edo was an illustration of a legend that all the foxes in a particular province would rendezvous one night a year to receive their orders - and more contemporary mentions; Neil Gaiman's Sandman: The Dream Hunters is an interesting contemporary use of Kitsune, even if you don't want to use any of Yoshitaka Amano's artwork. --Gwern (contribs) 17:32 13 December 2006 (GMT)
        • I wouldn't call it "too demanding." The only problem I'm running into regarding it is that there's now a separate objection on the grounds of having too many wikilinks. I suppose it's a case of competing philosophies, but it does make it difficult to address. Anyway, the quotes should be quite easy; I'll get those into place by tomorrow. More images would be easy enough, though I want to stay away from anything copyrighted; I'll see whether I can find Hiroshige's print, since I think I know the one you mean. Contemporary mentions are in the daughter article, Kitsune in popular culture, although there are no images there yet and it's essentially an annotated list. Shimeru 23:44, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • Ok then. If you can't find Hiroshige's print, tell me - I can interlibrary loan it (my copy of 100 Famous Places is currently inaccessible, so it'd take a while for me to get it and scan it). I didn't notice the Kitsune in popular culture article; but the description isn't totally accurate - it's not just fantasy authors who use them. Even excluding Jade Empire for example, I remember seeing examples in regular non-fantasy fiction. (Don't ask me which works specifically though!) Also, Nihon Ryakki is both important and in the introduction and should definitely have at least a stub. --Gwern (contribs) 03:30 14 December 2006 (GMT)
            • Found and incorporated an image of the print. Agree about Nihon Ryakki, but I know literally nothing about it aside from that it's one of the oldest Japanese books of records -- I'll need to find more sources on that. (There are none online, aside from a JSTOR article, which I can't access from home.) Could possibly take a while, but it shouldn't be hard, since I'm looking for sources for the various noh and kabuki plays' articles anyway. You've seen kitsune referenced outside of fantasy? That's surprising. Perhaps "Western authors of fiction," then. Shimeru 08:00, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
              • I've started a stub on the Nihon Ryakki - it's actually not that old. I managed to find one footnote in a JSTOR article which dated it to 1596, but I couldn't copy over the kanji. If you could...? --Gwern (contribs) 23:49 14 December 2006 (GMT)
                • Perhaps I misconstrued from my source (Nozaki, which does have poor translation in areas). The records in the Nihon Ryakki, though, go back far further than that date; Nozaki quotes entries from as early as 803. Possibly what was meant wasn't "one of the oldest books of records" (as written), but "one of the books of the oldest records"? Entirely speculation on my part, though; I'll continue searching for sources. Will see whether I can copy the kanji over.Fg2 already has. Shimeru 01:00, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
                  • The latter was my interpretation - I don't know what Ryakki translates to, but Nihon is apparently 'Records' or 'Chronicles', and those are not necessarily (in fact, you would expect them not to be) even relatively contemporary with the recorded events. Which is not to say that a Chronicle written or compiled 700 years after the putative event is likely to be accurate or very truthful... --Gwern (contribs) 03:52 15 December 2006 (GMT)
  • Support: Now that the opening is clear and the premise framing the article is established, I see no reason why this shouldn't be a featured article. What more does one need to know about this subject? Encyclopedically, nothing, I suspect. Congratulations to Shimeru and the article's editors for a cleanly written, well-organised introduction to the subject. (A small point: I would like to see the fox photo removed or shifted down the page because the information that real foxes live in Japan isn't particularly arresting, to be replaced by a mythological depiction, for example the Prince Hanzoku one; the article could do with a couple more such, I think, if any are to be had.) qp10qp 00:07, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Good point. I've brought in a few more images from the Commons, and rearranged the ones that were already there. Fairly certain I could find another few if necessary, since creatures of folklore were a common subject of woodblock prints. Shimeru 00:51, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. My objections have been addressed. A couple of further comments: Perhaps move some of the images to the left for some visual variety. I think the lead could be beefed up a bit, but it's not too important. I still advocate a move to a different title. But good work. --- BrianSmithson 02:53, 15 December 2006 (UTC) Oppose for now. I think this is a good piece, and it will probably make it through to featured on this nomination if the author continues to respond to comments here. Still, here are my concerns:[reply]
    • The structure is a bit disorganized. For example, the ability to assume human form is covered under both "Yokai" and "Physical characteristics". Likewise, several sections are quite stubby and should probably be merged. I'd suggest the following restructure: "Origins and etymology" (merge two sections), "Characteristics" (to include "Yokai", "Physical characteristics", "Powers", "'Star Balls'", and "Kitsunetsuki"), and "Portrayal" (which should merge in the information from "In fiction").
      • I think this has mostly be cleared up, however there are still a few issues. First, the "Origins of fox myths" section is a bit all over the place. We're told about China, Japan, China, Korea, India, all three, China, Korea, all three again, Japan . . . . Some rewriting is necessary, I think, to present the conflicting opinions. It seems these are that kitsune ultimately derive from Indian sources but spread to Japan; that they are native to Japan; and that they are native to Japan, but that they were influenced by Chinese and Korean stories that ultimately derive from India. Is this right?
        • Somewhat. There are really only two sides: one says that the concept is entirely imported, though it may have later developed in separate directions; the other says that the concept existed within Japan, and the myths that were imported modified and were modified by the purported original Japanese tales. It's agreed that, to some extent, there was importation. I've done a quick rewrite on that section to try to make that more clear and avoid the interruption in flow. Shimeru 06:43, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I agree that the article needs a good copy edit; there's a lot of confusing and redundant language. I'll try to help out in this area, but I'd like to wait until the structure issues are addressed.
      • I've got the marked up printout. I'll try to do the revisions tonight.
    • Watch the scare quotes and be careful that when using words as words to use italics rather than quotation marks per WP:MOS.
    • The article currently mixes BC/AD and BCE/CE date terminology. This should be changed to consistently reflect the earliest style used on the article.
    • There's currently a mixture of past and present tense when describing kitsune beliefs, and this is quite confusing in places. For example, under "Kitsunetsuki", we're told that "Exorcism, often performed at an Inari shrine, induced a fox to leave its possessed host." However, we're later told that "Stories of fox possession are still known to appear . . . ." So do people no longer believe this or do they?
    • The "Other meanings" section seems to be simple trivia. The first two items should be merged into the body of the article, and the last four removed entirely (or placed at a disambiguation page if necessary). The fact that someone who looks like a fox is called kitsune or that there's a game called kitsune-ken in Japanese has nothing to do with fox spirits in Japanese folklore.
    • The "Etymology" section talks about fox-wives, but this is well before the concept of kitsune being able to assume human form has been introduced. Either clarify or move the example.
    • Watch the RPG/anime-speak. I have no idea if the author is an roleplayer or likes anime and manga, but words like "powers" read strangely to me in this context. Perhaps "magical abilities" or something would work better? This is mostly just a minor quibble though.
  • Like I said, it's good work. It just needs some reorganization and copy editing and it will be good to go. — BrianSmithson 10:04, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Shuffled the text and categories around a bit to try to produce something more organized. Most of those sections were originally subsections; I'm not quite sure how that changed. I've eliminated a few of them, and changed others back to subsections. I think some of these are helpful ("Characteristics" is a wall of text without at least "Kitsunetsuki" in there). Dates are straightened out, and I've basically eliminated the word "powers." I'm not sure where to merge the information from "other meanings" -- there doesn't seem to be a good place to digress to discuss udon and soba. I could probably work up a short section on the weddings, but I'm not sure how much more there is to say. Will think about that a bit more. Article should be ready for copyediting, though, if you like. Shimeru 21:25, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Looking good. I've struck through some objections and elaborated on others. I have a couple of new concerns, though, from my second read-through:
        • Should the Chinese picture be moved to the origins section, since it is not an actual Japanese example?
        • There's quite a bit of weasely language. "It is a matter of debate", "Some scholars have suggested", "some sources say", etc. Can these be replaced with names of specific people? "Scholars such as So-and-So have suggested . . . ."
        • The web references need information about when the URL was last accessed. I think this applies to the Gutenberg text, since those are still being checked for transciption errors in some cases.
        • Regarding the "Other uses", I think I can spot main-article homes for three of the items, and I will attempt to move them there when I do the copy edit. Recommend deletion of the band and record label though, or if they're notable, a disambiguation page. As for the facial type, is it thought that such people have kitsune blood or are more likely targets for kitsune possession? If so, the section can be merged in with "Kitsunetsuki". If no, I recommend deletion, as it's simple trivia.
      • Sorry for being long-winded. -- 210.239.12.84 02:14, 13 December 2006 (UTC) (User:BrianSmithson, who was involuntarily logged out somehow)[reply]
          • Got the dates in there (rechecked most of them, but left the date on the Project Gutenberg text, since I don't see any way of being sure that it hasn't changed, and I used it fairly extensively). No idea whether the band and record label are notable; searching doesn't turn up much, so I removed them. The facial type... well, I know of at least one folktale offhand that states that a transformed fox had this facial structure; it's in either Hearn or Nozaki, I don't remember offhand. Doesn't seem terribly important, but it's an interesting side note. Finally, I moved the image as you suggested and added a few specifics about the scholars. Shimeru 06:43, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I don't agree that "it is a matter of debate" is weasely language in this context; quite the contrary: it is an unequivocal statement of fact. By all means ask for examples from the debate, but it will still be a debate. It is good article-writing to note matters of debate, and, in my opinion, it is often better to reference secondary sources that say something is a matter of debate than to try to recreate the debate by quoting the various scholars, since Wikipedia is a tertiary medium.
It is perfectly good practice to use terms such as "it is a matter for debate" or "some scholars say" if you follow those points with references to books or articles which summarise or quote the debate and the scholars, as this section of the article impeccably does. In fact, one scholar's summary of the debate is used to end the section — rather elegantly, in my opinion: "Inari scholar Karen Smyers has noted that the idea of the fox as seductress and the connection of the fox myths to Buddhism were introduced into Japanese folklore through similar Chinese stories, but she also maintains that some fox stories contain elements unique to Japan." qp10qp 02:46, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I see what you mean on the phrase "It is a matter of debate", but disagree with the eloquence. The whole section is confusing and needs to better identify and present the two or three conflicting schools of thought. -- BrianSmithson 04:35, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Okay, my remaining objections remain un-struck through above. In addition, some more weaselly language that should be cleaned up:
        • "another classifies kitsune according to their supernatural powers." Is it possible to elaborate on this? It's pretty vague.
        • "some sources say that a fox will only grow . . . . " Can we say which sources? Or provide an example? (If these sources are folk tales, I remove the objection.)
        • "In the late 19th century, one doctor noted . . . . " Do we have a name for him?
        • "There is speculation as to whether. . . . " Who speculates about this?
        • Currently, we have two cites in the lead that give information not repeated in the body. This information should be repeated in the body somewhere, and the cites should be migrated to these mentions.
      • I think we're getting very close now. — BrianSmithson 10:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC) (Added another item at 13:08, 14 December 2006 (UTC))[reply]
I think I've addressed all of the above. In most cases, it only took the addition of a word or two, or changing one word to another. (The sources of your second point, for instance, were folktales, and I changed the word accordingly.) Also added a brief explanation of the marriage in the etymology section; I don't believe moving the example would be a good solution, since it's there to illustrate the folk etymology. If it's still too confusing, though, it could fit beneath 'Wives and Lovers' -- in fact, that's where it used to be, before the restructuring. That layout, though, doesn't make as much sense with 'Etymology' at the top of the article instead of following 'Portrayal.' Shimeru 01:00, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object — Needs a copy-edit throughout. Here are examples of why.
    • Tell me, why are simple chronological items linked? For example, 4th century is really useful: it talks of Armenia, Constantine I, Saint Augustine of Hippo, in fact, a whole host of early Christian characters .... And why are dictionary terms linked, such as "skull", "magical", "shadow" and "dogs"?
    • "This etymology is acknowledged as false, but it remains widely known.7" — Odd.
    • "all foxes who live for a sufficiently long time may gain supernatural abilities" — "All" and "may"?
    • "Supernatural abilities commonly attributed to the kitsune include, in addition to shapeshifting, possession, the generation of fire or lightning from their tails or the ability to breathe fire (known as kitsune-bi, literally fox-fire), manifestation in dreams, flight, the ability to become invisible, and the creation illusions so elaborate as to be almost indistinguishable from reality." What's supernatural about appearing in dreams? "Flight" looks stubby in this list. Isn't it an ability too? "Creation illusions"?

Tony 15:05, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

    • Reply Well, taking these in order:
      • Context for further reading. Go ahead and unlink them if you feel they shouldn't be linked, but considering a previous objection was that there weren't enough wikilinks, this seems like a no-win situation.
No thanks, you delink them. Wikilink only where the reader is led to focused, useful information. Avoid linking common words.
But you're the one saying some of these links are not focused or useful. Personally, I would consider "magic" relevant to a discussion of magical creatures. I've unlinked the ones I feel aren't relevant, as well as the dates.
      • Odd? Maybe, but it's a perfectly true statement. It's a folk etymology: it's false, it's known to be false, and it's a widespread story anyway. I cited the source, so you can double-check it if you like.
No, I'm only concerned with the language. I think a stronger contrastive than "but" is requred here. Perhaps ", despite its being widely known"; but there's tension between "acknowledged" and "known". See if you can reword to avoid that.
Done.
      • Yes, that is correct. I assume you're objecting to the word "may." Its omission changes the meaning of the full sentence, but I'm reasonably certain, based on the folklore, that it would remain true, so I've made the change.
No, remove "all" and retain "may". Tony 07:16, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Will sleep on it. I think that might make it less clear, since the point of the paragraph is that all foxes are believed to have this potential. They have only to live long enough. (This is a common theme in Japanese folklore.) Shimeru 08:20, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Was more worried about over-repetition of "the ability to," but I moved flight toward the front so it won't look so out of place. I honestly don't know what to say about "What's supernatural about appearing in dreams?" -- I've never gone visiting other people's dreams, have you? And I added the missing "of," thanks.
    • I understand BrianSmithson has a copyedit in progress. Hopefully that will help; I think I might be too close to the prose to see some of the issues that are being mentioned. Shimeru 23:24, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. The lead starts confusing: 'kistune, or foxes' - so are they real foxes or is the same word used for both foxes and those spirtis? A read can easily be confused. The article also seem list heavy near the end, and there are tiny paragraps which is not a good style.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:32, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm pretty sure it's the latter - Kitsune in one context can refer to real foxes, an in others it can refer to the mythological ones. Raul654 20:46, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • True. Had changed the opening statement because it was felt that stating "Kitsune is the Japanese word for fox" was misleading. Have made the definition a parenthetical instead of comma-offset in an attempt to address. In Japanese the word is used for both real and folkloric foxes; in English, it refers to the folklore. Will attempt to clarify further tomorrow, when I have more time. Shimeru 00:25, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Yes, kitsune has both those meanings. The primary meaning of kitsune is simply "fox" (the mammals) and the other meanings discussed in the article are all secondary. This article does not include the primary meaning in its contents; it only contains secondary meanings. It should be retitled to match its contents. An article with the title "Kitsune" that's about foxes in Japanese culture is like an article with the title "moon" that's about a display of bare buttocks. Or an article named "Star" that's about the typographical symbol.
      • During Peer Review, I suggested the title "Foxes in Japanese folklore." I avoided the word kitsune because I advocate choosing English titles. In fact, that's the only suggestion I made during Peer Review, because I think it's a great article! With an appropriate title, it'll have my support. Fg2 02:24, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • The difference between this article and your examples is that, in this case, the secondary meaning is not divorced from the primary meaning. (In fact, when the word is used in English, the "secondary" meaning is the primary meaning.) It's more akin to an article like Cygnus, which discusses the secondary meaning -- the constellation -- along with the primary. But in this case, there's no need to discuss the primary Japanese meaning, since we have Fox. If there's concensus for a move, I suppose that's fine, but I do think kitsune is both the more appropriate and the more consistent (relative to other Japan-related articles) title. Shimeru 08:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • Now I'm confused. In English, the only meaning of Cygnus listed in m-w.com is the constellation. It's not in OED. So of course the Wikipedia article with that title is on the constellation; there's no other meaning. By contrast, "kitsune" is not an English word, even though it has been used in some works translated into English. It's not in m-w.com or OED. The only citation in Britannica Online is Kitsune, with a capital K, used as a proper name (like Reynard). It doesn't have an article of its own; it's in a single article on a related topic. Maybe some day it will become English, and maybe even soon, but it isn't now. So I remain convinced that the article title "Kitsune" does not indicate the contents. Fg2 01:13, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
            • Of course there's another meaning. The constellations (in Western tradition, at least) are derived from Greek mythology. I am also not convinced by the proposition that the title, simply by virtue of being non-English, does not indicate the contents. It's a particularly interesting case in that what you cite as the secondary definition was the primary definition of the word -- although the modern usage should take precedence over the archaic. In any case... as I said, I won't contest if there's consensus for a move, although I don't favor one. (And, I admit, I don't look forward to the prospect of moving all those other articles.) Shimeru 01:48, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Rus' Khaganate

[edit]

Self-nom as the creator of this article, though User:Ghirlandajo and User:Beit Or contributed as much or more than I did. I think this is a very comprehensive coverage of a little-known period in Russian history. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 16:12, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree about the necessity to use Latin and not Cyrillic (or Greek for instance) script in the references. Since this is an English encyclopedia, this is the only choice.--Yannismarou 20:05, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Latin letters are preferable, but if the latinised name is a transliteration where there might be several ways to do so (Peking/Beijing) it can be appropriate to include the original name in (parentheses). Also see WP:MOS - Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) for reference. --Oden 23:07, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In parenthesis, yes, but not only the original name.--Yannismarou 09:43, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Oppose.
    • This very interesting article is written so well and convincingly that a casual reader may take it for a solid, well-established state. In fact this is nothing but a reconstruction from scarse historical references, and pretty much recent one. This must be said more prominently in the introduction. In particular, is this theory taught in Russian school? So the remarks kinda "I never even knew of the existence of this state" are pretty much normal reaction.
    • Second, The article is not about some obscure lost island in New Guinea, it is part of the history of big chunk of land:
      • What was written about these lands/times in other history books?
      • What is the genesis of this theory?
Concluding, in the current state the article is rather misleading IMO. `'mikkanarxi 00:05, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I believe the sources speak for themselves, and all prominent scholars in the field agree that this polity existed. To the extent there are disagreements about temporal or geographic scope, or about the nature of its government, religion etc., these disagreements are extensively (even, thanks to Ghirla and Beit Or, painstakingly) set forth in the the article. The fact that this period is or is not taught in Russian schools is irrelevant. Very few (if any) American students learn about the Adena culture, either; that doesn't mean that they didn't exist or that they weren't a part of the history of North America. I have no idea why your second point militates against FA status; it would seem quite the opposite. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 03:26, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • You don't have to tell me once again that american schools suck. anyway, I probably had to be more specific: Do they teach this in historical depts of Russian universities? Also about "all prominent scholars", I am not an expert, so I even did not raise this concern (namely, if there is any disagreement), alsthough I have my doubts as to total unanimousity with respect to these scarsely documented times. The second point subbranches into two items about an isolated stand of the text. `'mikkanarxi 23:18, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • By a sheer occasion, just now I stumbled upon the statement "there is no commonly accepted understanding of Rus khaganate", reaffirming my major objection: the article is misleading in presenting (possibly inadvertently) this theory as a well-established, consolidated piece of knowledge. `'mikkanarxi 23:27, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • A case to demonstrate my claim: The authors so unconditionally assume their POV that unwittingly (I don't assume they intended to cheat) write false statements: "The earliest European reference to the khaganate comes from the Annals of St. Bertin." There is no mention of "khaganate" In Bertinian Annals. This style of writing is good for pop-science, but not for encyclopedia, despite multiple inline references. And once again, paradoxically, the problem is aggravated by the fact that the text is very well written, so that ony such hardened nasty people like me may stop and wonder whether all this is bullhit or not. `'mikkanarxi 23:37, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Mikka, if you feel that the article is a bunch of fantasies by Briangotts and me, you should apply to AfD. You may consider deleting its ru.wiki predecessor as well. To be sure, you won't find anything about the khaganate in Karamzin, Solovyov, or Klyuchevsky because, as the former has observed, в 1850 г., по высочайшему повелению Николая I запрещено было подвергать критике вопрос о годе основания русского государства, ибо-де 862-й год назначен преподобным Нестором. In the Soviet period, anti-Semitism was still rampant, so the "khagans" and Khazarian influences were seldom mentioned. I can't imagine any modern historian who can overlook evidence, however. Even Rybakov, the pundit of Soviet historiography, did not dare to deny these stubborn facts. --Ghirla -трёп- 17:25, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Don't overreact. What you've just wrote is a valid addition to the article, as an explanation of the obscurity of the topic. I am surprized you don't find this oblivion/obscurity to be a notable issue. `'mikkanarxi 19:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    I indeed treated the obscure issue with scepticism and, when Brian started the article, went offline for evidence to debunk it as a fringe theory. I checked my books... and returned to expand the article. --Ghirla -трёп- 19:55, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    That's exactly my point. The theory is relatively novel, and this deserves explanation. Please notice I am not questioning its validity. I am questioning its presentation. `'mikkanarxi 23:43, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • It seems to me that the purpose of this reader is to derail this FAC nomination. It's his right to oppose, yet he makes several gross mistatements of fact that must not go unanswered:
Bertin does not use the word "Khaganate" but he does refer to a Rus' ruler whose title was "Khagan". a land ruled by a khagan is a "khaganate." To deny that Bertin refers to the Rus' Khaganate is an exercise in verbal trickery.
On the contrary, it is a verbal trickery to put your words into Bertin's mouth. He could have used the word "khagan" for countles reasons. the title of the ruler does not always correspond to the name of the polity, take Golden Horde for an example. `'mikkanarxi 19:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I think the main question remain unanswered and obscure here. Is Khaganate mentioned in Bertin or not? Those supporting "yes" can they give a clear and undisputable argumentation, so that everybody is convinced here?--Yannismarou 20:11, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The polity is known as "Rus' Khaganate" to modern academics. It is a descriptive, not intended to be a recreation of what the people themselves called their polity (like calling someone "Byzantine Emperor" instead of "Baseleius ton Rhomahoi". We know that the ruler of the Rus' in this period was called khagan. Therefore his kingdom was khaganate.
If Bertin referred to a "King of x", we would say that that is a reference to the "x kingdom". This is no different. Mikka is nitpicking here, and not in any particularly relevant manner. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 20:23, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you.--Yannismarou 20:26, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
With regard to the denial that this is taught in Russian universities- what Russian universities do or do not teach is their own affair, and something over which I have no control (and little concrete knowledge). But I will point out that numerous Russian professors, who did teach at various universities, have acknowledged this period of history and written extensively about it: Svetlana Pletnyeva, Machinsky, and Novoseltsev to name just three off the top of my head. Numerous Western academics of Russian or Ukrainian origin (Omeljan Pritsak, Vernadsky, etc.) have also written copious works on this topic. This is to say nothing, of course, of the vast number of scholars who have discussed the Rus' Khaganate who were not Russian or Ukrainian. To ask that everyone ignore all of these sources based on Mikka's feeling that this is all "bullhit" doesn't seem to me to comport with what Wikipedia is all about. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 18:45, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I was asking. You answered. Or not? Teaching in universities is an important criterion, meaning that a theory is widely accepted. Professors write millions of articles. Not all of them are mainstream. Are there any books that have a title or a chapter title with words "Rus Khaganate"? () `'mikkanarxi 19:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Example. --Ghirla -трёп- 19:55, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Moreover, to refer to this article as a "theory" is ridiculous. The Rus' Khaganate existed, the fact that we don't know much about the structure of its government etc. is immaterial to its place in this encyclopedia. The disagreements and multiple theories extant are all given and discussed. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 18:47, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
There are many things that "exist". To see that you perceive the term "theory" as a slur or insult is very funny. The article itself says that facts are scarse, hence the rest is a theory derived from scarse literary mentionings and excavations. And the introduction to this article cannot sound in the same declarative, doubtless way as, say, for Ancient Rome. `'mikkanarxi 19:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I am no longer certain what you are objecting to. Your statements don't appear to be part of a coherent argument. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 03:59, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It smells like there are some strained interpretations in the article. However prostitution in the People's Republic of China isn't taught at schools either, but the article is featured, Mikka. :P --Brand спойт 20:35, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object—1a. Here are random examples of why the whole text needs copy-editing.
    • "poorly-documented"—NO hyphen after "-ly'. Why start with a negative?
    • "According to contemporary sources"—Does contemporary refer to the ninth century or now?
Oh, dear... "Contemporary" refers to the era of Rus' Khaganate; otherwise, it would be "modern". Beit Or 19:20, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
You' re right on that one; the rest stands, though. Tony 07:06, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • "its successors would ultimately found Kievan Rus' and its successors, the states from which modern Russia would evolve."—why this back-slung conditional? What's wrong with the plain "its successors ultimately founded"? And "modern Russia evolved".
What's wrong with the use of the conditional? I can fix that anyway. --Grimhelm 14:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it is true that these two conditionals in a row do not sound very nice, but again grammatically they are not wrong. In this case, the truth is somewhere between your opinion and Tony's!--Yannismarou 20:30, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • "he was aware only about the Avar khagans, but never heard about the khagans of the Khazars and Normanns"—aware about? Insert "had" before "never". There's a false contrast here: "but" should be "and".
    • We have "11th" and "12th", but "tenth".
That was also easily fixed. --Grimhelm 14:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Why are some of the years linked? 889 tells me about Strathclyde, the Khmer empire, Bulgaria and Scotland. That's helpful.
You forgot to mention the Magyars, and both the Magyars and the Bulgars are mentioned in this article: just look at Template:Gardariki! --Grimhelm 14:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
This is way below the required "professional" standard. Tony 14:29, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I am not a native speaker of English, therefore I can't assess if there is any merit in what Tony says above. I urge native speakers to examine his arguments which appear like his personal preferences rather than a definitely fixed standard. --Ghirla -трёп- 17:28, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
"Had" before "never" is indeed a personal preference. My personal preference is tha same, but a preference it is. Beit Or 21:34, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have gone through this and copyedited it. I made a number of smallish corrections, but I found the writing to be quite good on the whole. One sentence did stump me--see the article's talk page. Once that is resolved, however, I feel that the prose will be a very solid standard. --RobthTalk 15:48, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Quite interesting, well written, well referenced, well illustrated, good length. Kudos to its creators! Jayjg (talk) 20:51, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Minor object. This is a very interesting article, but there are several issues that need to be resolved first (I fully expect them to be, and thus it is a minor object which I expect to change to support shortly). 1) there are a few places where inline citations are needed, I added a few fact templates 2) government section has some inline comments raising important questions, they should be addressed, preferably at talk 3) there are some other inline comments throughout the article; discuss them at talk and remove them from article 4) lead could use a picture.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:59, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    <ad hominem removed into section "Freedom of expression"> `'mikkanarxi 19:58, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Conditional support if the last citation requested tag I added and is now removed would be replaced by a footnote explaining that the sources discussed in this sentence are discussed in more details in the following paras.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  00:24, 16 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. ←Humus sapiens ну? 23:30, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Without revoking my support, I would like to make a few additional remarks (after reading the article line by line), in order to underscore some minor problems IMO that should be settled, before the article acquires the FA status (I must say I was influenced by Grimhelm's remarks):
  • Is there a reference of Rus' Khaganate in the the Annals of St. Bertin as the article claims or not as mikka asserts? Such things are of major importance, if we want to guarantee that the article is accurate, and we should clarify them.
The Annals of St. Bertin article has been created by Berig - I copied his citation from it into this article. --Grimhelm 14:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
My mistake. I meant mikka; not you! Sorry!--Yannismarou 20:08, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, so I wasn't confused for no reason… No need to apologise though - the article got improved in the process. :-) --Grimhelm 20:42, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • What is the Salerno Chronicle? There is no wikilink and no explanation. Will the editors of the article create a stub for this Chronicle? Shall they offer a brief explanation in the article we review (which according to my IMO would be necessary, even if a wiki-article existed)? This is not a major issue, but I think that some kind of explanation should be offered.
I believe that would be the Chronicon Salernitanum, which has had an article for some time; I have provided a link to it. --Grimhelm 14:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • About the fate of Rus' Khaganate there is only a short uncited paragraph at the end of the article. And, although prominent scholars are mentioned throughout the article, there is nothing there! Just the assertion that "The fate of the Rus' Khaganate, and the process by which it either evolved into or was consumed by the Rurikid Kievan Rus', is uncleal." Yes, but, when we have this detailed analysis in all the previous sections, the level of analysis in this final issue of huge importance can be caracterized as lower and maybe inadequate. What are the conclusions of the recent scholarly research? Slavonic and other sources may not be helpful, but what are the most popular scholarly theories right now? My impression is that the article closes leaving a sense of "incompleteness" to the reader, who wants something more in this particular issue, when he is already so well-informed for the previous open questions.
  • And, of course, before the article gets FA status, the [citation needed] added should be fixed. Otherwise, this is a reason for objections. A FA can't be in the category "Articles with unsourced statements".--Yannismarou 11:59, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support the points raised earlier seem to have been largely addressed. The word "behooves" should be replaced by an alternative construction, and I would be happier if the last paragraph contained a citation. Other than these, I am content with the development of the article this week. I believe it meets the FA requirements. Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:59, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Second attempt It seems that the authors took this thing too personally and started bickering with me instead of anwering my major objection. I admit my guilt of not being very clear and probably too offensive. Let me restate it once more. The theory and the term Russian Khaganate are relatively novel in modern historiography (forgetting about ancient sources), and many of us of various levels of knowledge in rusian history admitted never heard before.
    • Therefore this article requires a full separate section about the genesis of this theory. At present the text is written in the matter-of-fact way (although with NPOV defense: "there was a state or not state", "it was located here or there", etc. (which is good)).
    • What missing is who of historians was first to use the term "Russky Kaganat" or synonym.
    • Were there any sporadic references during previous centuries?
    • Are there any notable opponents? (I dont believe there are none. I know quite a few guys who are sure that Russians are Finns or Huns. But I may be wrong; the latter guys may be simply ignorant of RusKha).
    • What are the reasons under the intro phrase: "Rus' Khaganate, sometimes called Volkhov Rus, Ilmen Rus, or Novgorod Rus"? Who identified them as the one?
      • Comment: Just noticed that I was not the first one who questioned this phrase, but was reverted under false edit summary "These are not statements that require citations. They are discussed extensively in the text": None of "Volkhov Rus", "Ilmen Rus", "Novgorod Rus" are mentioned anywhere in the article. `'mikkanarxi 00:57, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • The intro should state clearly that Rus' Khaganate is a modern term and most probably was not used at these times.
    • Any hypotheses about absence of the mentioning in Primary Chronicle besides a vague phrase that slavs and finns first kicked varangian's ass and then invited them back.
`'mikkanarxi 00:05, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Encyclopedia articles are not supposed to answer every question one can conceivably invent. Beit Or 11:03, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Excuse me, I did not "conceivably invent" these question. This is plain common sense. A new theory out of the blue. If is does not raise suspicious, it means that our brains are ready for indoctrination by next best smooth-talking kook. I was not nitpicking, kinda "what was the name of at least one Rus Khagan?" (a good one by the way) or "you misssed a comma in line 37 from below" or something else. I posed one HUGE question (a bit itemized): what is the place of this theory within Russian historiography? `'mikkanarxi 16:43, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
With all due respect Mikkalai, but I don't think it is a valid criterion for opposing the nomination that the theory is new to you. The many references show clearly that it is not a new theory, and your concerns about indoctrination make me wonder if you are opposing the nomination because you simply don't like the idea of a Rus' Khaganate.--Berig 16:55, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Conditional support. I am not sufficiently familiar with the subject matter to evaluate the validity of the commented-out objections in the "government" section, but those need to be resolved--either by clarification or by reevaluating the content of that section. Other than that, however, I found this to highly informative and a very good read. --RobthTalk 15:54, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Freedom of expression" (Personal bickering removed out of discussion of the article)

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  • Why was Ghirla's comment removed?! I may not agree with his opinion, but I think this removal does not serve the freedom of expression here. I actually intended to post an answer to his opinion ("No, it is not. This is an established practice in FAC, FAR and FARC. I have initiated it, but I have also suffered it").--Yannismarou 20:06, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    There is no "freedom of expression" in wikipedia. See WP:CIVIL and WP:ATTACK. `'mikkanarxi 00:23, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    If there is no freedom of expression here, let's close the store and let's all go home!!! I've suffered similar attacks by Ghirla, but I never reverted his edits. I repeat again that I'm per Piotrus in this particular case, and I really feel disappointed his citations requests and copy-edit were removed. I agree that this is not constructive attitude by the editors of the article, and that such actions do not help at all their FA aspirations. But, at the same time, I do not accept the deletion of Ghirla's comments. He was wrong and unfair, but he was civil. He did not insult and he did not use "bad words". So, I still regard the removal of his comment as arbitrary. The best response towards such comments is a strong argumentation; not deletions!--Yannismarou 08:28, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    The behaviour of Piotrus has indeed been less than graceful. He was previously warned to avoid citation template spamming. Not only does he disregard the arbitrator's advice, but he also today accused his opponents in vandalism and "hundreds much more incivil comments". All this against the background of Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Piotrus, where the question of his desysopping is being discussed at the moment. There is enough stuff for arbitration, I think. --Ghirla -трёп- 08:38, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Yannismarou - check this for an interesting twist...-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  08:36, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree with you! And I say once again that I'm against any reverts of this kind. Your wording had obviously nothing to do with a personal attack. This is something I detest whoever initiates it!--Yannismarou 10:48, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Oh! And I also believe that this is definitely not a case (this particular case - I do not know the background of the desysopping request, but I will read the relevant page) for arbitration or for desysopping! Let's not exaggerate things here!! Instead of removing the [citation needed] (the addition of which I repeat is a common practice in FAC, FAR and FARC), Ghirla or any other editor could just add the requested citations. Piotrus, me and any other reviewers dedicate time reading and trying to improve the article. The reviewers are not enemies of the article. This is a wrong philosophy. And if the editors of the article had understood that from the first momment, this would have been an easy (almost boring!) FAC. Instead, we have unfortunate reverts, warning for arbitration and desysopping! I'm really overwhelmed with all this unnecessary fuss.--Yannismarou 10:54, 15 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

1995 Pacific hurricane season

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I finished redoing this article a few weeks, and I believe it adheres the FA criteria. Comments? Hurricanehink (talk) 00:34, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment I believe that some sources are lacking. For instance in the season summary paragraph, no source is given for "Lastly, Ismael struck the state of Sinaloa as a minimal hurricane. Offshore, fishermen were caught off guard by the hurricane, and 57 drowned. On land, Ismael destroyed thousands of houses, leaving 30,000 homeless and killing 59. Both Hurricanes Flossie and Ismael also produced moisture and localized damage in southwestern United States." TSO1D 01:59, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. The Season summary section is a bit bare. Since I can't think of an image that would fit within the section, would it be ok to have a short table (similar to the ACE table in size) listing the number of deaths each storm caused? Titoxd(?!?) 03:54, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Kinetoscope

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Self-nomination. Stable article on the world's first commercial motion picture exhibition system. Judged A-class by WikiProject Filmmaking. The advice and encouragement of project leadership has been crucial in getting the article to this stage.—DCGeist 17:21, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support - read it yesterday. Excellent article. (Minor aside: I still think the use of "Kinetoscope project" to refer to the people working on it rather than the project itself makes for confusing phrasing, especially as it isn't referred to earlier) Yomanganitalk 17:28, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Good point. Sentence edited so both clearer and shorter.—DCGeist 18:03, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Were all of those "Sources" used as References for the article, or should they be divided into References and Further reading? Sandy (Talk) 21:49, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: All the Sources are cited in the Notes.—DCGeist 05:12, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hero of Belarus

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This article was FA before, but was farc'ed because of lack of maintainence on my part. After I got some of my other projects out of the way, I started to bring this article back to shape and see now if it is FA worthy, again.

The first problems people had was the citations. When I wrote this in May of 2005, I did not know about the (ref) tags, either because I was still too new or that wasn't started yet. Regardless, I used that system in this cleanup and used 16 references (with some of them repeating). Second, people are having problem with some of the grammar. I have tried to fix that as the best as I could, but grammar has been an issue haunting me a lot on Wikipedia. Any help on that is welcome. Third, at the time when I wrote this, I had some illustrations and I was a noob to copyright law. Now, I know a lot about it and many of the former illustrations have been nuked. Some other concerns, about missing sections, I have included some more information and added a new section dealing with misc. topics.

My main goal for this FAC is not much, except for getting that shiny brown star again on it's talk page. It has been on the main page before, so don't worry about that. However, if there is anything I missed, let me know and I will try and make sure it gets added/subtracted from the article. Thanks again. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 21:57, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Bodyline

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Former FA, (very) recently defeatured because of lack of inline citations, now fixed. Outstanding prose of a quality rarely encountered in WP, useful and enlightening illustrations and a sound retelling of the complex story of one of those exceptionally rare occasions where sporting controversy leads to serious political ramifications - in this case, just about averted. --Dweller 09:52, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object—Needs a copy-edit throughout. Here are examples from the top.
    • "several of the Laws of Cricket were changed to prevent this kind of tactic being used again"—The last three words are redundant: beautiful example.
Thanks. Fixed (although I don't think it was dreadful as it was) --Dweller 23:38, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • "that could be caught by one of several fielders located in the quadrant of the field behind square leg." Remove "located". Why is the "square leg" link piped to "Fielding" when there's a WP article on square leg? And if you're going to pipe it to "Fielding", why not to the specific section where s l is mentioned? I had to use my finder to locate it in that linked article.
Square Leg has nothing to do with cricket. Personally, I don't think that the fielding article is very good and there's no specific reference to square leg worth the mention. The best is the diagram. Anyone unfamiliar with the concept of fielding positions probably only needs to know that it is a fielding position... which the current link does admirably. --Dweller 23:38, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • "and make the ball come up into the body of the batsman"—not well expressed: "into"? Sounds like a penetration. "Make" is a little awkward; what about "so that the ball would strike the batsman's body"?
    • "to fend the ball away"—fend away? Try "deflect". Tony 03:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Caspian expeditions of the Rus

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This is a good article now, and several editors on its talk page have suggested nominating it for FA. It had a peer review by the WikiProject Military history, which is available here. The article is comprehensive, fully referenced, and well-illustrated, so it should be up to the FA standard. User:Ghirlandajo and User:Briangotts have greatly contributed to improving the article, special thanks to Briangotts for drawing two highly informative maps. Beit Or 11:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Object—1a. Here are examples that indicate that the whole text needs serious copy-editing.

    • "On their way back home, the raiders from the north were attacked and defeated by Khazar Muslims in the Volga Delta, and those who escaped were finished off by the local tribes on the middle Volga." Slightly informal for this register: "back home"? Better as "On their return". "Finished off"? Very loose—what does it mean: killed? Routed? Beaten in battle?
    • "Afterwards, several more raids occurred; the last Scandinavian attempt to reestablish the route ..." Like "eventually", "afterwards" does not belong in an encyclopedic register: it's just too vague. "Further" might be better than "more". Hyphen within "reestablish".

And further down from the lead, at random:

    • "No later than in the early 9th century, the Norsemen settled in Northwestern Russia, where about six miles south of the Volkhov River entry into Lake Ladoga, they established a settlement called Aldeigja (Slavic: Ladoga)." Quirky construction at the start. Make it "By the early 9th century, the Norsemen had settled ...". Why the N for northwestern? Metric equivalent ...? Relocate the "they established" clause to straight after "where".

Not good. Tony 01:50, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Made changes suggested by Tony.--Riurik (discuss) 05:46, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
But what about the rest of the article? Mine were just examples. Tony 05:38, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The response from Ghirlandajo (see below) is that an expectation of brilliance is subjective and arbitrary and hence non-actionable. Yet, if not brilliant, is the prose compelling as stated by Wikipedia:What is a featured article? #1(a). I think Tony's objection and my comment on the issue are valid and "actionable".--Riurik (discuss) 21:19, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe you could pinpoint some passages that you find to be less than well-written? Otherwise, this comment is difficult to address. Beit Or 21:53, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No, I cannot do the the actual copy-editing. I do have two items that may be answered...Under the Destruction of Khazaria section, it is stated that several possibilities have been suggested explaining the roots of the conflict. Maybe this can be made more clear and organized. I counted three possibilities. If that's the case, a possible revision may be: "There are three explanations for x, y, z. etc, etc..."

Also, the first sentence: The Caspian expeditions of the Rus were military raids undertaken by the Rus between 864 and 1041 on the Caspian Sea shores. Is there another way to say the same thing without using the Rus twice? I made one alternative change, but was accused of being an anti-Normanist. I was not even aware of either position (Normanist and anti-) until then. Are the Rus not the East Slavic people?--Riurik (discuss) 23:26, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • The "See also" section has only two links. I think you could easily get rid of this section by incorporating the two links into the body of the text.
  • Is it ibn Khordadbeh or Ibn Khordadbeh, because the title of his article is Ibn Khordadbeh?
  • There is an inconsistency concerning the books mentioned in references. Some of them published after 1990 have ISBNs, while others also published after 1990 do not have.
  • Persons and terms come and go without any information about them. Who is ibn Khordadbeh and who al-Masudi? Yes, you link them, but I think that you shhould clarify in this article that they are prominent Muslim historians of the X or Z century. Again what is the Primary Chronicle? I want an explanation in this article!
  • For me the writing is OK. But I'm not a native English speaker, while Tony is one, and I take seriously into consideration his remarks (and Riurik's as well). Maybe a slight copy-editing by an external native English editor would be helpful for the article. I'm sure the article's prose is "good", but I'm not sure it is "brillant".--Yannismarou 09:45, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    I have been reviewing the evolution of Yannis' FA standards for quite some time and I advise everyone to take them cum grano salis. Per WP:POINT, Wikipedia is not consistent and it should not be. Any attempt to force consistence on Wikipedia articles is ill-advised. Our articles are not expected to repeat general information on every ABC term that is mentioned in the text. If you want to know what Primary Chronicle is, it's enough to click the link to this article. That's how online encyclopaedia works, as opposed to a paper encyclopaedia. The concept of "brilliance" of prose-writing is inherently subjective and arbitrary, hence non-actionable. Furthermore, following Yannis' self-imposed standards makes the article overlong and basically unreadable as his own articles are. I believe this is the issue for Wikipedia:WikiProject Extra-Long Article Committee. I am surprized that they have not split Demosthenes or El Greco into three nice 32K articles as yet. --Ghirla -трёп- 11:12, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Huh? Not sure why you're lashing out at Yannismarou here...I particularly don't see where Wikipedia:WikiProject Extra-Long Article Committee comes into play...I don't think Yannis suggested any expansion of this article... Gzkn 11:18, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    What is this if not a request for expansion where it is not needed: "Persons and terms come and go without any information about them. Who is ibn Khordadbeh and who al-Masudi? Yes, you link them, but I think that you shhould clarify in this article that they are prominent Muslim historians of the X or Z century. Again what is the Primary Chronicle? I want an explanation in this article!" Yannis' premise that every article mentioning Leo Tolstoy (or al-Masudi) should introduce him as "the Russian novelist of the nineteenth century" (or "the Arab historian of the tenth century") is fundamentally wrong. --Ghirla -трёп- 11:22, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Oh...thought you meant Yannis wanted new sections in the article or something. Anyway, I don't see what the big fuss is all about...I'm sure Yannis means well...he is a very friendly editor, and he did preface his comments with "the article is informative, well-structured, well-researched and well-referenced". :) Gzkn 11:34, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    My remarks have nothing to do with expanding the article. I speak about a few more words, not even adding 1 kb to the article. And I proposed these minor explanations (which is a minor issue anyway), because here we do not have to do with Tolstoi, but with some historians, institutions etc., which are not known to the majority of the readers. Who has a clue about the "Primary Chronicle" outside Russia? Not me and I think not many other readers. I must say I'm surprised by the personal attacks against me; taking into consideration the fact that I did not comment negatively on anybody here, but I made some (mostly minor) remarks about the article. If Ghirla thinks that by insulting others and attacking their contributions in Wikipedia, serves this FAC he is wrong. I'm even more surprised, because I did not object, but, on the other side, I lauded the high quality of the article. Nevertheless, I'm happy, because the nominator does not follow the same tactics with the above mentioned user; this is something very positive and I have to stress it. I also thank Briangotts and Beith for their swift and accurate responses on their remarks. At least, they know which is the right attitude towards a FAC reviewer.--Yannismarou 14:33, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Yannis, where do you see an insult or a personal attack? I often call into question your nebulous standards of what FA should look like and I don't believe my criticism of your approach qualifies as a personal attack. Also, there is no insult in pointing out that many of your articles are extremely long. Please cool off and don't resort to ad hominem arguments and comparisons. Best, Ghirla -трёп- 15:14, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for your interest in me cooling off. Whatever you may say about my "nebulous FAC standards", I feel vindicated, when, for instance, I see the level of referencing of this article (where you are an editor, if I'm not wrong). You were saying in the past that inline citations are not necessary, while this article (whose you are an editor) has citations in almost every phrase. According to your previous arguments, this shouldn't happen, and this article should be regarded as "extremely referenced". Anyway, I'm happy, because your actions negate your words and vindicate my positions. I'll be always here, in order to offer you guidance that you will first ridicule and then implement. Best, --Yannismarou 07:35, 12 December 2006 (UTC)--[reply]
I have done so. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 21:34, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Megadeth

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Self-nomination. This article was put up for FA before I got a hold of it, but has been completely rewritten, formatted, cited, and peer reviewed. It may be a little long in kilobytes, but nearly half of that is inline citations, and seems comparable to other music FA's such as The KLF, Rush (band), and Pink Floyd. -- Skeletor2112 06:39, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support This is a remarkable improvement over the previous version. Well cited, very detailed while staying on topic, and well-written. Great work. Jay32183 23:48, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, so long as you fix the categories. Why is it in Category:American heavy metal groups and Category:Heavy metal groups? Country specific categories are already subcategories of the main category, so putting the article in both is wrong. They should only be in the American one, the general one should only contains band that don't yet have a specific heavy metal category for their country. Also, why are they in the speed metal, thrash metal and heavy metal categories? Pick just one - the article describes them as a heavy metal band, so I would go with that. Otherwise, article is fine. Proto::► 13:30, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I also removed the speed metal category, even though they were commonly referred to as a speed metal band, the term has fallen out of favor, and is somewhat contested these days. But the band is widley considered both "thrash metal" (early albums) and "heavy metal" (later albums), since their sound has changed greatly in the past 20 years. Skeletor2112 05:39, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed all of the extra samples, leaving only Grammy nominated songs, and "hits" like "Symphony" and "Trust", ect. Skeletor2112 07:52, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed all cites from the lead paragraph. Skeletor2112 07:52, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The above user seems to speedily tagging some of the articles on FAC with {{LEAD}} without bothering to actually read them...:-/ (see Special:Contributions/FrummerThanThou). Gzkn 04:52, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The KLF has a lead roughly the same size, and won a Wikimania 2006 Award, so I don't feel the objection is actionable. LuciferMorgan 20:09, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
FrummerThanThou, can you explain what "not universally rocking" means? The lead has been combined into four paragraphs, as per WP:LEAD, and is roughly the same size as the Battle of Dien Bien Phu page, which you voted to support today. Skeletor2112 06:15, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object Image problems. Image:Megadeth-Band-2006.jpg fails WP:FUC #1 and needs deleting. Five other images are sourced to some fansite, with no indication of copyright holder (failing WP:FUC #10) and need deleting -- they should have been tagged as "found on an unconfirmed website", not as "promotional". One of them is apparantly the back of an album cover, so that one at least could probably be properly sourced -- look in the liner notes for the photographer and copyright info. Jkelly 19:56, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Gigantour is the official tour website of Megadeth's latest tour and is a confirmed website. Image:Megadeth-Band-2006.jpg meets WP:FUC, as the picture is promotional and is intended for use by third parties. LuciferMorgan 20:07, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
You need to actually read my comment. Image:Megadeth-Band-2006.jpg fails WP:FUC #1 (and is now so tagged -- incidentally, it also fails #10). The rest of the images are from fansite with a Polish extension, except for the one that is a back of an album cover, which is nevertheless credited to the same Polish fansite. Jkelly 21:36, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Since you seem so certain it fails #1, what free equivalent is available then?— Preceding unsigned comment added by LuciferMorgan (talk • contribs)
Image:Megadeth at Sauna.jpeg is a recent photo of the band. In case it is helpful, I've cropped it -- Image:Megadeth at Sauna crop.jpg -- to remove the extraneous overhead space. In any case, we don't need to already possess a freely licensed image to know that something is replaceable. Many editors spend significant time asking people to donate their photography under a free license. You can find some examples of polite letters to use at Wikipedia:Boilerplate requests for permission. Jkelly 23:25, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
So we should remove Image:Megadeth at Sauna.jpeg and make Image:Megadeth at Sauna crop.jpg the lead image, and then just remove all the images marked as unsourced? I want to make sure I understand your suggestion. Jay32183 23:30, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
More or less, except that I really have no opinion on whether the cropped version should be used or not... that's an aesthetic decision, and you should feel free to use whichever version of the freely-licensed photograph that the local editors prefer. Jkelly 00:30, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If you've tagged the images as having no source won't a bot remove them from the article and in a few days it won't be an issue? Jay32183 21:14, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Right, most of the images need to be deleted, and when they are my objection has been dealt with, but that means the article will look quite different once the problem images are gone. Jkelly 21:36, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well when the images are gone, it's obvious someone will moan about lack of images, which may I add isn't a valid reason for objection.— Preceding unsigned comment added by LuciferMorgan (talk • contribs)

Support, Well written and well referenced article. Acs4b 16:03, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support Well written with plenty of pictures, music samples, etc... It's a lot better than most featured articles Freezing the mainstream

California Gold Rush

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I am nominating California Gold Rush, which had an extensive peer review and has been rated a Good article. It is very well-referenced, and meets all of the FA criteria: well-written, comprehensive, factually accurate, neutral and stable. While I did not create the article, I did contribute significant portions. This is the first nomination of this article. NorCalHistory 19:38, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

*Object, mildly. On the whole it's a good article, but it lacks any direct mention of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company (that article also needs some work, by the way), which played an important role in the development of California during the gold rush era, and which was itself greatly affected by the gold discovery. Whyaduck 01:39, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

    • Fixed Information was in article; added specific name Pacific Mail Steamship Company (PS: I agree that PMSC article could use some work - sounds like a fascinating topic!).NorCalHistory 03:03, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • OK. I might make a couple of small, clarifying additions to the Pacific Mail article myself (there's a lot of information about the company available online), but haven't the time to do the full expansion the subject deserves.
  • comment I would certainly want to support this, but I see that another editor who is trying to edit war is following me along to articles I work on and inserting links to stand alone years. Your article now contains these unnecesary links--links which I did not and have not touched in any way, but this other editor in his zeal failed to notice this. Sorry this is involved now. No need to say anything in return. I will view any result.
  • Support. Since it is a good article, it should be a featured article. Chris 02:52, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. It looks very good for the most part, and is certainly well-referenced. I feel that it is very, very close to FA quality. The parts I'm most concerned about are the lead, and a few other short sections of the text that have the feel of a popular book, rather than an encyclopedia. As noted above, the Geology section is mostly background information, and should probably be moved to its own article with only a brief summary left in the Gold Rush article itself. One addition to the article might be a little on the mythology of the Gold Rush (see, for example, the Levi Strauss & Co. article). BlankVerse 08:13, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. I offered some guidance when this article was in peer review. Since then it has improved to become impressively referenced and comprehensive. Its only shortcoming is the need for a copyedit to eliminate a few civic-boosterism phrases. I may provide that copyedit if my time allows. Those turns of phrase are not entirely unmerited: prior to this era California had been an isolated region of little importance; if it were an independent country today it would have the world's sixth largest economy. I don't think a few minor inconsistencies in tone constitute reason to oppose. All of the underlying FA requirements have been satisfied. DurovaCharge! 17:27, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment This article needs a good map of the Gold Rush area during the Gold Rush era; I added one citation needed tag to the article (on 300,000 arrivals); all wikilinks need be checked to see they are pointing to the desired article; Placerville points to a disambiguation page, for example. Hmains 18:28, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I contributed to the peer review, and have followed the article and made minor tweaks and suggestions since then. While some improvements can still be made per suggestions above, I believe the fundamentals are in place. Over time, I'd like to see the article grow in the areas of history, immigrants such as the Chinese, and effects, and a daughter article on Forty-Niners created and correctly disambiguated. I agree that a map is a much-needed addition, and it should highlight the site of original gold discovery, as well as Route 49. Sandy (Talk) 18:59, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. We don't blithely write "in 1848, retrieved 273 pounds (124 kg) of gold in a few months"; we aren't Encyclopedia Britannica. What in the world is the italics supposed to signify, anyway? Why are these 273 pounds equal to 124 kilograms, rather than 102 kilograms? Don't use any pounds at all without explicitly identifying them, after you have made damn sure you know what they are. Does the original source of this statement identify its pounds, either in the place this came from or generally in the introduction? Does that source include the kilograms, or did some Wikipedia editor add that? Does it indicate its source for the numbr, so you can track that down? Is the specific number "273" in that source? Gene Nygaard 09:18, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
. on Page 230: "... in gold; others from a nearby tributary, $12,000 ON THE FEATHER RIVER six miners with fifty Indian workers took out 273 pounds of gold AT SINCLAIR's RANCH Sutter's neighbor, ..."--Paul 16:02, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Response: Gene - I hope the following answers your concerns;
(a) Yes, the figure of 273 pounds is given in the source cited.
(b) When I use any of the standard conversion websites (like this one), they confirm that the metric equivalent of 273 pounds is 124 kilograms.
(c) Italics are used for the word pounds here because all prior references to gold are in ounces. The italics assist the reader to see that a different unit of measurement is being used here.
Do these respond to your concerns? NorCalHistory 18:01, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: 1 kg = 2.2 lbs; Ergo, 273 lbs * (1 kg/2.2 lbs) = 124 kg. --DaveOinSF 19:58, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Your conversion is incorrect because you are converting from avoirdupois pounds to kilograms, rather than from troy pounds. The correct figure in kilograms is 102. Andrew Levine 19:59, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Response Judging that the secondary sources cited are ambiguous whether it is avoirdupois pounds or troy pounds, perhaps the best thing would be not to include a metric equivalent in the main text, but to footnote the metric equivalent of both troy and avoirdupois pounds, with an explanation.NorCalHistory 00:31, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Response There's no possibility of ambiguity because gold is always measured in troy pounds and never avoirdupois. Andrew Levine 00:52, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Always? Get real, Andrew. Troy pounds are only rarely used any more. Why in the world do you suppose I mentioned Encyclopædia Britannica? Every time they mention pounds with respect to gold, they are avoirdupois pounds, though usually not identified as such. Gene Nygaard 05:46, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
"Rarely used anymore?" Is that why the New York Mercantile Exchange still denominates gold and silver prices in troy ounces? Andrew Levine 07:09, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Response to NorCalHistory (and DaveOinSF). Respond to my concerns? Most definitely not--it amplifies my concerns. You even seem oblivious to the fact that the troy ounces used for gold are different from avoirdupois ounces, in addition to being unaware of the fact that there are twelve of those troy ounces in a troy pound of gold. That is different from the 16 of the smaller avoirdupois ounces that make up an avoirdupois pound, the one you converted it as. That makes the use of italics in the text doubly confusing.
Do you know how many of those troy ounces it takes to make up one avoirdupois pound, the type of pound for which 273 of them is 124 kg?
Answer: 147⁄12 ounces to the pound. Weirdness we ought to avoid at all costs. Like I said, we aren't Encyclopædia Britannica.
One of the biggest problems, of course, is that troy pounds were more commonly used back in 1848, the time for which this number is quoted. But on the other hand, the number comes from a book written in the 1990s, a time when a whole lot of people are so innumerate as to be totally oblivious to the fact that troy pounds exist, and very often happy to use the comfortable-sounding old word ounces without even having an inkling that the ounces still used in much of the world's gold, platinum, and silver trade are different than the ounces some of us still use for meat or sugar or a baby's birth weight, and different yet again from the ounces we use for beer or soft drinks.
Back in 1848, it was still 30 years before the British would outlaw the troy pound, in the Weights and Measures Act of 1848. Yet, in one of the ultimate illogicalities and weirdnesses in the world of measurement, the UK today, 128 years later in the 21st century, has a specific exemption written into its metrication laws for continued use of troy ounces, even though the pound from which it was derived (and its pennyweight subdivision) were thrown out back in the 19th century.
Of course, in 1948 the troy pound (373.24 grams) remained the primary standard for United States weights. A specific artifact known as the "Troy Pound of the Mint" was the primary standards for all U.S. weights; even the best quality avoirdupois pound standards maintained by the government were secondary standards. That is a situation which had prevailed in England as well since back in the time of Henry VIII, when the independent standards for an avoirdupois ounce, whose independent standard before then had been measured to be about 7002 troy grains, was redefined as exactly 7000 troy grains.
It was 45 years after 1848 that the United States abandoned all independent primary standards for pounds, and redefined the avoirdupois pound as 0.4535924277 kilogram, and another 66 years after that before current world-wide definition of the avoirdupois pound as a slightly different value of 0.45359237 kg was adopted. That value was adopted in part because it is divisible by 7, making the troy grain's representation in metric units a terminating fraction, exactly 64.79891 mg. A troy pound is 480 of those grains, compared to only 437½ of those troy grains in an avoirdupois ounce. Gene Nygaard 06:12, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The United States never did outlaw the troy pound. But it isn't used much any more, rather people usually use thousands and millions of troy ounces. Once in a while you see troy pounds used, as in some documentary last year about salvage operations on some old Spanish shipwreck in the Carribean. Gene Nygaard 06:27, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
NYMEX still denominates gold and silver futures in troy pounds and ounces (and not in avoirdupois). The USGS says that "The basic unit of weight used in dealing with gold is the troy ounce." [10] I have never seen avoirdupois as the basic unit for gold (though I often see a measure of gold listed primarily by its troy weight, followed by what its equivalent in avoirdupois would be). Show me some of these places where gold in the present day is primarily measured in avoirdupois. Andrew Levine 07:17, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
What's the point? The ounces in this article aren't what's being questioned, and there are quite a few of them. Remember, the Brits—and much of the Commonwealth, not sure whether Canada and Australia, big players in the metals field outlawed the pound, but I know that Australia also has a specific exemption to its metrication laws for the troy ounce, and Canada's metrication laws may be weak enough that no exemption for the troy ounce is necessary, but it is still used there—only outlawed the troy pound, not its ounce subdivision. Whenever Britannica (which isn't British and hasn't been for nearly a century) gives gold weights in ounces, they are troy ounces, too. Goo look for the weight of the sarcaphagus lid on King Tut's tomb. If you find it listed as 243 pounds (give or take a couple), those are avoirdupois pounds. You only very rarely see it as 290-odd pounds. Gene Nygaard 10:33, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Response Thanks to everyone who offered very useful information on this topic. I see that the article has been updated. Thanks again! NorCalHistory 12:13, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Continuing objection. Stating worth $x at a specific price is just like stating a mass, because ($y/oz troy)(z oz t) = $x, or z oz troy = $x/($y/oz troy). But stating "worth $x at 2006 prices" is even worse, because of the ambiguity of the price ranges over the year 2006, and we cannot even use a yearly average at some commodities market for that value because the year isn't done. Gene Nygaard 15:01, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Figuring out what 273 troy pounds of gold in 1850 would be worth today is an imprecise exercise, but it isn't going to be off by much. In 1850 a troy oz. of gold was worth $20 (c.f. the $20 "double eagle" gold piece which contained 1.125 troy oz. of 22k gold). So 273 troy lbs. * 12 troy oz. per lb. = 3,276 oz. or $65,520 in 1850 $. Various long-term inflation calculators are available and they indicate that this would currently be worth about $1.5 million. If you had 3,276 oz. of gold today, you could sell it on the London Exchange for about $1.8 million. So a conservative estimate of the value is "in excess of $1.5 million in 2006 dollars.--Paul 21:07, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The thing is, we don't know that it was 3276 troy ounces. It might well have been in the neighborhood of 3980 troy ounces (273 avoirdupois pounds). And there is another possibility not yet mentioned here that is probably just as likely—that the reason the pounds were not identified in that book is that some author or editor was oblivious to the distinctions, and that some number originally 4368 troy ounces (or somewhere between 4360 and 4376) was divided by 16 to get these "pounds", of the fictional 16-troy-ounce variety. So that is quite a variation, with the larger amounts 34% higher than the smaller ones. Gene Nygaard 12:24, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In any event, the current wording "in excess of $1.5 million in 2005 dollars" is correct under any scenario that has been discussed.--Paul 02:37, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal Gene - given that the only information we have is that "273 pounds" of gold were removed in the early Gold Rush by this one party of miners from this one location, would you be kind enough to give us an approximate modern-day dollar valuation of that amount, as you see best? Understanding that we need only an approximation to give modern readers a sense of scale (and do not need precision), you can describe your methodology and include whatever caveats you think are appropriate in a footnote (for example, "worth approximately $1.5 - $2 million in Dec. 2006 values"). Your educated assistance on this point would be appreciated! NorCalHistory 17:16, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This particular detail seems unecessary to the quality of the article. I have further rewritten to make it even more non-specific. If there are other instances where precision seems to be detracting from the sense of scale, it might be best to just rewrite them; you can also bring them to my attention and I will rewrite them.--DaveOinSF 20:24, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose: The lead really needs to be fixed. The lead is more of a history than a brief summary. When this is fixed, I will give it my support.-Hairchrm 03:48, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment Thank you for your observation, I did make a change in the lead. I am trying to understand your observation a little more clearly. Wikipedia:Lead section suggests that the lead should "stand on its own as a concise version of the article." This article describes a historical event. A "concise version" of a description of a historical event may very well read like a history - it's not clear to me that result is to be avoided. In general, major points in the article should be summarized in the lead. As I read the article and the lead, major points in the article appear to be summarized in the lead. I would be interested if you would be kind enough to provide a bit more information; for example, is there is a major item in the article that you feel is not adequately summarized in the lead? If so, please suggest that missing information, and perhaps an editor will be able to include it. Thank you again, and I look forward to hearing more information. NorCalHistory 12:41, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Battle of Dien Bien Phu

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This is a second nomination (Old nom). The previous comments were mostly minor, and I think they've been addressed now. Raul654 21:44, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose This article is pretty good, but it needs some work to reach FA status. Some suggestions:
    • The first half is very lightly cited.
    • Some of the claims in the article are contridictory. For instance it is stated that VM AAA batteries "made it prohibitively costly for the French to bring in reinforcements", yet the French did manage to bring considerable reinforcements into DBP, including several complete battalions (albeit at a serious cost on transport aircraft). Similarly it is stated that "The Viet Minh elite 148th Independent Infantry Regiment, headquartered at Dien Bien Phu, reacted "instantly and effectively"; however, three of their four battalions were absent that day". If the 148th Regt was so weak at DBP how could it be effective?
      • The 'instantly and effectively' is quoted verbatim from Davidson. I don't believe it's contradictory - they were understrength, but the people who were there fought effectively. As to the comments regarding the airdrops, I agree that may need clarification. Raul654 04:59, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Support after copyediting the article on the previous nomination and helping Raul refernece on this one, I'm safe to say this article is yet another one of Wikipedia's outstanding History selections. — Deckiller 00:19, 9 December 2006 (UTC) (Sorry, I forgot that I didn't get around to copyediting this in the old nomination; I just added sources)[reply]
  • Oppose. Please clean up the references section. Books should have a publication date, web references should be expanded to include the name of the site and the last access date. There are many one and two-sentence paragraphs, resulting in choppy prose. There are also statements that should be cited (for example, "The garrison constituted roughly a tenth of the total French manpower in Indochina.") Sandy (Talk) 00:45, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't think the paragraphs are an issue, but then again, I've always stongly disagreed with the "stubby paragraph" arguement. I cited what I could from the one book I had, so Raul might be on his own for the rest. As for the reference issues, again, I couldn't help there, since all I know is the Bernard Fall book. — Deckiller 00:51, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • I've added dates for all the books and switched the website references over to the cite web template with the access date. The smaller paragraphs, located primarily towards the beginning of the article, have been merged together by Deckiller and myself. I've added a reference for the 'tenth of manpower' statement, but I don't see anything else that should be cited that isn't. I think that addresses Sandy's concerns. Raul654 01:44, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, providing Sandy's points are addressed, and the issues below are fixed. (These are only writing glitches that I found on a quick read-through; there may be more.) Generally, it's well written.
  • "a colleague whom he trusted"—better "a trusted colleague".
  • To be picky, this is ungrammatical: "would require operating his army far from its home base". Better: "would require his army to operate far from its home base".
  • "launched a massive artillery barrage against the surprised French"—better as "a massive surprise artillery barrage".
  • "unbeknowenst" (like "whilst" and "amongst"), should go into the bin of forced formality. Just remove the last two characters.
  • "and had practiced assaulting it used models." ??
  • "However, the Viet Minh ..." Stubby para.
  • "While the fighting was going on ..." Too informal. "During the fighting".
  • "on the night of the 14-15 and the 16-17"—Are these dates? Format correctly, with en dashes and "th"; remove the two "the"s.
  • "4 155mm howitzers and mortars"—Confusing and unacceptable. Spell out "4". Tony 01:12, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment article has a redlink to an ethnic group in Vietnam: T'ais: "Anne-Marie was defended by T'ais". This group is not listed in the article List of ethnic groups in Vietnam. Perhaps someone could reconcile these facts. Thanks Hmains 01:35, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • support a good useful article. Hmains 03:08, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment overall a very good article but some issues could be adressed Mieciu K 16:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • how did the French forces took care of their wounded, and how many of them were evacuated?
    • did the French use helicopters or attempted night-time ressuply (to avoid Vietnamese AA fire)?
    • how well were the Vietnamese units armed in small arms like submachine guns and machine guns compared to the French forces, and how well were they supplid in ammunition?
    • did the Vietnamese use human wave tactics?
      • The answer to most of your questions is no. The French doctors and surgeons tried very hard to treat the wounded (Roy 138 describes Dr. Grauwin, the French surgeon, as a man of "considerable virtuosity") but the field hospital they used wasn't much more than a hole in the ground - one which the Moroccan workers had to dig the walls out of every night in order to expand it, to accommodate the ever increasing numbers of wounded. As far as evacuation - the airfield became unusable not too long after the battle began. After that, as the article says, supplies and reinforcements had to be parachuted in (a one-way trip to be sure). A helicopter rescue - especially in the extremely primitive 1950s helicopters - would have been a suicide operation. Helicopters tend to be large, slow-moving , and easy to knock out. A night time resupply would only have made the problem of inaccurate supply drops far worse.
      • Most of the ammunition used by the Vietnamese came from China. Given the logistics involved in transporting it through untamed jungle from China, the Viet Minh operations at Dien Bien Phu consumed virtually their entire supply capability. As far as their armament, I'm not entirely sure - none of the sources I've read explicitely state it (and it's somewhat beyond the scope of this article. It would more properly belong in an article about the Viet Minh). If I had to guess, they were probably using Chinese knockoff AK47s, although at the time there was a *LOT* of surplus WWII equipment from the British, Japanese, Chinese, and French in the area, so it wouldn't surprise me if the logistics were very diverse. Raul654 03:35, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • As far as human wave attacks - no. The fighting was reminiscent of the trench warfare of WWI, but I wouldn't go so far as to describe it as having human waves. Raul654 03:50, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

White Deer Hole Creek

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White Deer Hole Creek has had a peer review (which is here). The peer review found no major problems and the suggestions for improvement have all been addressed. The article follows most of the recommendations of WikiProject Rivers (although there is no list of tributaries, as the creek has only one named tributary). This article also follows the model of Larrys Creek, which is a similar stream and a featured article.

This is a self-nomination in that I have made most of the edits to the article, but I have sought feedback from many and have received positive comments. White Deer Hole Creek is a relatively small, but quite interesting stream and I believe the article does it justice. Thanks for any feedback, Ruhrfisch 15:09, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support - A marvelous article! My only complaint would be the over-linking of unnecessary terms. Please look closely at each term linked and see if it adds anything to the understanding of the text. There are many common words linked that should be unlinked. In addition, some terms are linked a number of times in the text, they should only be linked once. Otherwise, congratulations on a great article! *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 19:42, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Terrific article, many details. I also agree with these things that could be fixed, but the article seems good enough to be featured. Hello32020 20:18, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I haven't had time to read it all yet, but can you shorten the very long caption on the introductory image? It makes a very busy visual presentation. Also, quotes don't need to be in italics (see WP:QUOTE), and can you fix your second footnote - There's an extra bracket, and an overly long linked article title. Sandy (Talk) 21:43, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response Thanks very much. I have shortened the caption and fixed the italicized quotations. I will fix the extra bracket in the second footnote. The full title of the book in print really is that long (it was published in 1892 - the web version does not give the full title). I really like using the full title, but will shorten it if that is what is required. I have started to remove duplicate wikilinks already, but to carefully do all of these things will take me a few hours at least. Ruhrfisch 22:47, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support The article is terrific! It seems to cover all the bases and tell you everything there is know about White Deer Hole Creek. I grew up on the other side of the mountain from the creek and never even knew its name. This just goes to show you what can happen when someone takes in interest in a creek. Articles like this should go a long way to helping preserve the wild streams of Pennsylvania. Dincher 23:06, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, excellent. Everyking 01:35, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response Thanks for all the support and praise. I believe I have now addressed all the issues raised above. I removed 51 duplicate or non-essential wikilinks from the article and fixed a couple of disambiguation links that had snuck in there along the way. I also fixed the extra bracket in the second footnote, but left my beloved very long title (for now at least). Ruhrfisch 02:43, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Its very comprehensive, I'm in favor. I like to see some of the more obscure articles being featured. RideABicycle 03:35, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Excellent work.--Dwaipayan (talk) 15:03, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support As a member of the rivers project myself (I think I am, anyway), this is everything we want our articles to be. Shame we're better at doing it with a very minor tributary of a major river than the major rivers themselves (Then again, geographically this was within the scope of what one editor could research and accomplish. Extraordinary work).

    I do have some suggestions — minor copy errors, some image suggestions, but IMO they are not and should not be fatal to featured status, which this article has achieved. I will instead share them on the talk page later. Daniel Case 18:33, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

    • Response Thanks again for the support and praise, it is always nice to have one's work appreciated. I had a useful question on my talk page about the Name section which I copied to the the article's talk page. I would be glad to try and respond to other questions or suggestions here or there. FYI, my eventual plan is to get all six major creeks in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania (plus one or two of Pine Creek's tributaries) up to FA status, then work on the West Branch Susquehanna River. I started with Larrys Creek because it is small and all in one county, then moved to White Deer Hole Creek as it is also small. Thanks again, Ruhrfisch 18:58, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Beautifully written article. I'm amazed that there is so much interesting to write on a previously unknown to me tributary. Sjakkalle (Check!) 07:50, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. But I would still like to see the word 'watershed' linked to whatever is its proper use from the watershed disambiguation page. - Mgm|(talk) 10:39, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Response Thanks for the support and praise. I have re-linked the first "watershed" to drainage basin. There is also a link to this in the infobox (from "basin"), so I had removed the duplicate link earlier in this FAC, as requested above. Ruhrfisch 12:29, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Object—1a. Here are examples from the lead that indicate that the whole article needs surgery.

    • Remove "located" from the opening sentence: it's redundant. People do this all the time, and I'm unsure why.
    • Why are "forest" and "agriculture" blued out? We do speak English. But wait, there are more. This is turning into a dictionary. Please delink these nuisance blueings.
    • The western part of the creek is in the Tiadaghton State Forest and has very high water quality." Two ideas that sit uncomfortably in the same sentence. Try a semicolon with some kind of causal factor? Or recast.
    • "The watershed has opportunities for canoeing"—The watershed goes canoeing?
    • "small scale lumbering"—What's "scale lumbering"? Hyphenate "small-scale".
    • "In the Second World War a TNT plant was built in the watershed, which later became a federal prison." Why be vague when you could easily google for the year it became a prison ...?
    • "In the 21st century, most development is in the eastern end,"—"has been"? Are you referring to development since 2000? Can a more precise time span be used than a whole century? Why not just remove the opening phrase? Recast to get rid of the hated "located"? "Most development has been in the eastern end [?particularly since ???], comprising two unincorporated villages, a hamlet, and most of the farms (primarily Amish)." Tony 02:14, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Response Thanks for your constructive criticisms. I will do my best to clean things up, but it will take me some time (I need to get some sleep soon). I will print it out again and get a fresh red pen. Ruhrfisch 04:58, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

        I have now edited just the lead to hopefully address the points you raised. The starting date for the prison was given in the article. I have reread your suggestions for meeting 1a and the criterion itself. Neither mentions the number of blue links (that I could see) - could you please direct me to the policy on this? I will work on the rest of the article, but hope the lead is now satisfactory. Thanks again and good night, Ruhrfisch 05:50, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think that Tony's concerns are more about wikilinking common terms like pond, right bank and left bank, paths, bunkers, etc. See Wikipedia:Only make links relevant to the context Gzkn 10:59, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks very much - I had thought right and left bank OK to link to in an article on a stream, but will work on this and Tony's other points. I appreciate all the feedback and help, Ruhrfisch 15:00, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Update and Questions I have removed all wikilinks to common words except for the names of plants, animals, fish, and birds. If you think I should delink these I will, but at least some are useful links i.e. hemlock in PA is really tsuga. Please let me know what to do. There are a few duplicate wikilinks left, all in the infobox first then put back in by other editors at their first occurrence in the text (Clinton and Union Counties, Pennsylvania, perhaps some townships). If you want, I will remove them from the infobox and leave them in the text. Again please tell me what to do. Finally, I have removed 1 kb from the article in redundancies and have hopefully cleared up any remaining trouble spots. I will ask some other editors to look this over for copyediting, but please, if you are better at this than I, let me know of problems and I will do my best to resolve them. Thanks and I look forward to any feedback on these edits, Ruhrfisch 19:42, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I think you overdid the delinking a bit. If we insist on referencing even the most innocuous assertions of fact (and I remember Uncle G pointing out somewhere that even things like, say, a well-known foreign capital cannot be presumed to be commonly known, we ought to allow more linking than WP:CONTEXT (a page which admits it's in constant conflict with WP:BTW) would seem to suggest, at least as interpreted by Tony. "Unincorporated" should definitely be linked in this context IMO.

And I would add, too, that he should have been more civil in his phrasing. If you're going to brashly assert "the whole article needs surgery", cite examples from the whole article, not just the intro. When I object to an FAC without reading the whole thing through, I usually try to say as much (nor do I consider mildly troublesome prose in the intro to merit a blunt "Object". Better to just say you have concerns you want to address. Daniel Case 02:43, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

To elaborate on this a bit, why delink all the outdoor sports in the intro? They're certainly context-relevant.

Also consider that people (wikipedians or not) don't always click on links because they don't understand something and need further explanation. They might have an interest in the subject and want to see what the actual article looks like. Maybe, just maybe, that will convince them to become active editors. Especially if this article makes it to the main page, as I expect it to someday. Daniel Case 02:56, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Response Thanks very much, I will add back in the sports and unincorporated wikilinks. If other editors want them out, please say so. I have used wikilinks as a way of explaining more if a reader is interested. I know a lot about Ohio, where villages are incorporated municipalities (population under 5000), and Pennsylvania, where they are unincorporated and part of townships (which are municipalities), so I always try to make it clear what the PA situation is and think the wikilinks help clarify this. I similarly had "white" (for the deer) in the Farley quote linked to albino. I just want to have the best article possible and help make Wikipedia better and appreciate all help in reaching this goal. Ruhrfisch 03:38, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly. I used to live in Ohio, too, and like NY where I live now, there are just three types of municipalities: cities, villages and towns (townships in Ohio). But when I saw "Village", I thought, aren't small communities in PA called boroughs? The link does help. Daniel Case 05:20, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Villages in PA are marked with a sign by the Pennsylvania Dept of Transportation (i.e. "Village of Elimsport"), but even smaller communities (i.e. Spring Garden) are not, so I called Spring Garden a hamlet. Ruhrfisch 13:12, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Response Your points about the wikilinks are very valid in my opinion. It doesn't hurt to wikilink turkey (just as an example) even though most people reading the article probably already know what a turkey is. It seems to me that at least part of the purpose for wikilinks is to provide more information, not just a definition. Tony's comments seemed to be pretty harsh and would have set me off.Dincher 04:15, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Aldol reaction

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I came across this article during random travels through the encyclopedia. The importance of this carbon-carbon bond formation reaction can hardly be overstated. All the important mechanisms and stereochemical models are mentioned; it had an external peer review a while back (see Talk:Aldol_reaction#Nature_errors_to_correct for that), and it is adequately referenced. Everybody please weigh in! Dr Zak 19:02, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment and minor object (as of now): more minor issues first: Preferably, the footnotes can be converted to the cite.php method described on WP:WIAFA and WP:FN. Also, the See also comes before References (WP:LAYOUT). Also note that there should be no spaces between punctuation marks and footnotes (ex. :[1] instead of : [1]).
  • It would be very helpful to add a section which explains the entire topic in laymen's terms. Honestly, I can barely follow the first paragraph in the WP:LEAD (which, by the way, is too long according to WP:LEAD)
Not sure if anything can be done about that at all. This reaction is bread-and-butter for any chemist, but how do you begin to explain what carbonyl compound means to a layman? Dr Zak 04:08, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Also suggest a copyedit. I'm not too familiar with the terminology, so I'm not absolutively positive that the following are wrong:
    • If strong bases such as LDA are used, the enolate may be produced separately before the reaction, then an aldehyde slowly added at low temperature to produce the aldol product. Just read it out loud. Try rephrasing the last part of the sentence.
    • or ketones can also be deprotonate to deprotonated.
Done. Dr Zak 03:43, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Not about copyediting, but I picked this up while reading: why is another molecule italicized? At first glance it looks like terminology.
This is because acid has a dual function: to catalyze enol formation, and to activate the carbonyl group of an aldehyde towards attack by the enol present in the equilibrium. Dr Zak 03:43, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Can you explain how? I really like the layout of this - but then I drew it! I put in a lot of thought planning the layout to make it as clear as is possible. Did you want color added to the structures? If not, can you suggest a specific change to make it better? Walkerma 05:21, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Not the image itself, I meant the layout of the image in the article (for example, see [11]). AZ t 01:20, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Still looks fine to me! Maybe it's different browsers. If it's just a layout issue - so can you fix it so it looks OK to you? Would centering it solve the problem? Walkerma 03:30, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Otherwise, the mechanism can be regarded as the same. I plodded through the paragraph with this sentence, and I can't seem to understand what it is saying.
This is about different bases (hydroxide ion vs stronger bases). Agreed, that sentence is superfluous. Dr Zak
    • Enolization may be effected using a strong base ("hard conditions") or using a Lewis acid and a weak base ("soft conditions"): affected, right?
We are discussing what causes enolate formation, not what influences it, so "effected" is the right word. Dr Zak 15:07, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
"Effected" means to "bring about". It means, literally, "to have that effect". It is not the same as "affected". The word is being used in a precise and scientific manner. --Amandajm 22:15, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Extensive studies have been performed on the formation of enolates under many different conditions. See Tony1's guide- here, we can eliminate many as redundant since we already know that extensive research was performed.
    • Despite the cost and being limited to syn adducts Un-parallel.
Reworded. Dr Zak 15:07, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • stereoarrays: syn selective: [30] and anti selective: Three colons in a row? 2 can go.
    • The methods described allow the synthesis of extensive polyketide stereoarrays to be assembled. Allow the synthesis to be assembled? AZ t 01:08, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Re-worded. Dr Zak 15:07, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
This has now been fixed. Dr Zak 21:57, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I rarely do this, but I've decided to change my vote to an object. Features articles on complicated science topics do indeed need a simpler section for those who have had less experience w/ science. Ex. see Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Photosynthetic reaction centre/archive1 (note that I was involved w/ the FAC, but I'm not trying to make a point). What would happen if this page went onto the Main page? I doubt that most people will be able to understand any part of it. At least, note where this reaction occurs (why is this reaction important to a layman?) and its significance.
Also, nice job rewriting the lead, but there are a whole bunch of typos in there; also, there are some references from the first couple of sections to the lead which no longer are applicable (ex: acidic or basic conditions, as shown above). AZ t 01:20, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I think the lead section is as uncomplicated as possible already. Any simpler, and it will have to say "the aldol reaction is important in chemistry". Frankly, I'm not sure the reaction *is* important to a layman, despite its role in biochemistry, or industry, or whatever. Does the layman care about the Battle of Austerlitz? Probably most people don't. I don't think it's the purpose of featured articles to incite the interest of the general public. Presumably the people who are interested will at least have a little background, and will understand some of what's written. From reading the criteria, it seems like you need it to be "well written, comprehensive, factually accurate, neutral and stable", with a good lead section, hierarchical setup, table of contents, images, and references. Now, I certainly think there's some copyediting that could be done, but it seems like the rest is there. I do take the point that the lead section may well be incomprehensible to a layman, but I can't see anything that could, in principle, be done about that. Maybe you could suggest some specific stuff which you feel could be done. I would add more about how it's used in industry or biochemistry, but frankly, I have no expertise in that area, so I really can't. Eugene Kwan 03:53, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
This article isn't about an object or concept that one might encounter in everyday life. Looking through the list at WP:FA if this were promoted it would qualify as the article most remote from everyday experience. I would go so far to say that it is impossible for a layman to understand the article; one would need to know about carbonyl compounds and their reactivity first, something not encountered at all in daily life. However, the sheer bulk of literature on the subject testifies to its significance, and as far as I am qualified to judge it is comprehensive and well written - in fact it is more complete than the textbooks on the market. As Eugene said, if there are any specific low points we can address them, but your main complaint seems to be that only chemists would be expected to have an idea what this is about. That's the nature of the subject. Dr Zak 04:30, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that it would be impossible for a layman to understand the article. However, there has to be some use for the reaction- it would hardly be comprehensive for an article on a reaction to only discuss the steps involved in the reaction. Perhaps add a paragraph somewhere about when this reaction is used. It is noted how certain methods are more industrially useful; we don't need to go in-depth about exactly how the reaction is specifically incorporated in industries, but we do need some examples of when this reaction is required. AZ t 23:29, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the important feature of the aldol addition is that two stereocenters are set up in just one reaction step, and that the organic chemist's toolkit contains has means to set them up almost in any way that is called in the course of a multistep synthesis. You are right, this must go into the introduction, and perhaps we also need a landmark synthesis where aldol chemistry was used in the crucial steps. (I don't have time to hit the library before Monday, though!) Industrial applications - not sure that they are important - pentaerythritol and a couple of related compounds are so prepared, but the wide scope offered for synthesis of stereogenic centers is what gives this reaction its importance in today's chemistry. Dr Zak 03:47, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I suppose when one asks "why is such and such a topic important?", one should also be asking "important to whom?". Now perhaps if you're an industrial magnate, the most interesting part of the aldol reaction is its use in industry, but if you're a chemist, it's cool because it's such a powerful reaction. Evans and many others have studied this chemistry in so much detail that polyketide synthesis has moved from "impossible" to "challenging", and now, "routine". Certainly, the cutting edge polyketides people are working on now aren't exactly "routine", but the point is that our understanding of this reaction is a big advance. Now, if I see an alkyl center next to an oxygenated center, chances are excellent that there's already methodology to make that stereoarray. If you were a chemist 50 years ago, it would have been a lot more difficult, if not impossible. Eugene Kwan 04:04, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've changed the lead a bit, per the suggestions above. Also, are the "C-alpha" and "C-beta" markings necessary? Sorry, Dr. Zak, I was editing at the same time you were, and I felt your statement was best included where I had it...I'm open to suggestions. Eugene Kwan 05:38, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In the scheme you mean? Not sure, the idea was to make the nomenclature immediately obvious to the lay reader without anyone having to go to alpha carbon. I'd leave the stars in, though, to point out the stereocenters. As for the lead I would put the definition in the first paragraph, reaction partners in the second, and importance and synthetic applications in the third paragraph. There's some redundancy there right now. Dr Zak 05:50, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Er...I'm not sure that's the best way to do it. But I'm leaving in the redundancy for now, and maybe others can take a look, and sort it out. — Preceding unsigned comment added by E kwan (talk • contribs)
I've rearranged the introduction a bit. Dr Zak 20:45, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi everyone...I contributed the majority of the material on the page, and I've just added some new stuff. What is the current feeling about the article? Eugene Kwan 05:32, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support with comments.

  • Line diagrams are best displayed in SVG format, you have a mix of PNGs and GIFs.

*You need to explain the Ireland model in text.

    • Has been addressed

*All the references past the Crimmins thiazoldinethione reference need formatting to the same reference format as the earlier references.

I'm afraid I don't know anything about these graphics format. I drew everything in Chemdraw...perhaps I could re-export them? I agree with the next two points. The fourth point: as a graduate student in the Evans group, I'm afraid I don't know much about industrial uses...perhaps someone else can add something. Eugene Kwan 00:20, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support, the chemistry is very advanced and insofar as I am qualified to judge very accurate, the references have been updates nicely to wiki standards, the intro is aimed for non-technical readers as it should be. My only concern is the size (already 35KB): some segments could possibly be spinned of to separate articles for example two named reactions Mukaiyama aldol addition and the Hajos-Parrish-Eder-Sauer-Wiechert reaction and the Evans ligand. What remains unclear is the use of syn and anti in the text, it is used in a different way than syn addition would expect. Regarding the images: I prefer to have the images in png (rescalable!) and not gif, I do not see any advantages to svg though V8rik 17:39, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • As for the nomenclature to describe the relative stereochemistry at α- and β-carbons, Evans uses syn and anti in his papers. This isn't the same as a syn- or anti-addition, of course, and in older papers one sees erythro and threo from carbohydrate chemistry. Since the main author is from the Evans group I'd say to let him use what he's familiar with. Dr Zak 23:57, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey guys, thanks for the support. I think I've done as much as I can. On my computer, the graphics look nice, and it would take a lot of effort to convert everything to something else, which, IMO, would look the same. I'll leave it in your hands. Eugene Kwan 20:00, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The image policy is explained here. Wikipedia:Preparing images for upload PNG would probably be easy enough, since that doesn't require a program that can rasterise the images. TimVickers 20:19, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. I agree with two points that V8rik has made above. The article is long and segments can be put in different articles. Additionally, the images as PNGs are just fine. There is no advantage to using SVG for chemical schemes. In fact, I would say there are plenty of problems. But I digress... The article should be a featured article. ~K 05:07, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: (Disclaimer: I was a significant contributor to this article). I've given several talks on Wikipedia and I've always used Eugene's section on the Evans aldol as an example of what I think is excellent quality material on Wikipedia. The more advanced material is better and more up to date than you will find in many textbooks! It's about time this page got the star it deserves - I think the recent editing/peer review has tweaked the article enough to bring it up to FA standards. I don't think you could rewrite the intro in more basic language. Regarding SVG, we have had problems with SVG files in organic chemistry articles, they have usually given lower image quality than PNG or GIF. Walkerma 05:21, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, that's great. I don't mind at all if you guys think it'd be better to cut it up into smaller articles. I'm not very adept at Wikipedia, though, so perhaps I can leave that to you? Also, is it worth my time to convert the many chemdraw files I have to PNG instead of gif? That'd take quite a while, but I'll do it if it's necessary. Eugene Kwan 06:20, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object with regrets. An article about the aldol reaqction should explain why β-protons are (relatively) acidic: without this information, a student chemist cannot understand the excellant chemistry which is described in the article. I would favour a split, taking some of the more intricate applications into seperaqte articles: this should be fairly easy, given the depth of coverage which this aritcle already gives them. There is obviously an FA in here, but it is not there yet. Physchim62 (talk) 15:59, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]


    • (rare edit conflict!) Valid points: I volunteer to do two tasks: reinforce the carbon acid article: why hydrocarbons can be acidic etc. and a table with pKa values and make sure the Aldol article links to this page in a prominent way. Also I will float the Mukaiyama aldol addition as a separate page. I will also try to update the DOI's in the references. I think the image issue is solved, no advantages for SVG. Only change gif to png when you have the time (not a must-be for FA status). Thanks Eugene for providing the explanation for syn/anti in the text, this issue is solved! a great help. V8rik 16:13, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, I don't think a detailed discussion of acidity belongs in this article, any more than a detailed discussion of how artists use paint belongs in an article about Monet. Eugene Kwan 16:34, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry Physchim62, but I agree with Dr. Zak here, this is an article about a reaction that uses enolates. A detailed description of C-H acidity belongs in enolate, which should probably be split off from enol. Admittedly we have a little on the stereo/regio chemistry of enolate formation in this aldol article, but that is because it has great relevance in determining which aldol product is formed. If v8rik strengthens the carbon acid article, that should suffice. Walkerma 21:20, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • improved carbon acid article, added DOI's, Mukaiyama aldol addition now a separate header ready to float and explained a bit on dibutylboron triflate. Some bits in the enolate section should belong in enolates because enolates are used in more reactions than just Aldol. Even Evans' oxazolidinone chemistry is not unique to Aldol as it has other uses. Comment to AZ: FA perhaps too technical for main page (it should go for main page) but science portal also has FA V8rik 23:20, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments. In the lead, can we have just a tiny glimmer of information for non- and semi-experts as to the significance of the topic in the wider world? It's about catering for WP's wider readership at least a little, and more importantly, selling science to the policy makers. Minus sign should not be a hyphen (–78 occurs twice). An en dash is OK (–). An en dash is required for "carbon–carbon", so you could pipe the link to the wrongly named article. "The Evans' acyl oxazolidinone method." Why the apostrophe? It probably needs a careful copy-edit to weed out little glitches, although it's not too badly written. Tony 12:35, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    To answer that question, the apostrophe is used for that sentence because the last name of David A. Evans ends with an S. The -78 thing seems to have been fixed already. How about the little mentioning of pharmaceuticals in the beginning, the stuff about polyketides? --HappyCamper 14:20, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Eugene had had a go at the introduction the other day, and he improved it much.[12] The article is very clear about the relevance of the reaction (emphasis mine): "Structural motifs derived from aldols are especially common in … natural products from which many pharmaceuticals are derived … . Extensive research on the aldol reaction has produced highly efficient methods … . The synthesis of many polyketides, once considered nearly impossible, can now be performed routinely on the laboratory scale, and is approaching economic viability on a larger scale in some cases … . In the aldol reaction two stereogenic centers … are set up in one single reaction step, making this reaction an attractive choice for the synthesis of complex molecules with many stereocenters. … Stereoselective synthesis is of considerable interest to the pharmaceutical industry, since the stereochemical configuration of drugs can greatly impact their biological activity." A large amount of effort has been devoted to this reaction by organic chemists and the methods that are now available are incredibly powerful. Of course reading Wikipedia isn't the same as taking two or three years of chemistry at uni level, but all the relevant keywords are linked within Wikipedia, and the articles linked are of good quality. Dr Zak 15:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Is there supposed to be a red link for Mukaiyama? So what are our outstanding issues? Eugene Kwan 02:51, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Summary?

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  • As far as I am concerned all of the above reservations have been discussed and where appropiate taken care of, so our slate is clean. If somebody's considerations have been neglected please restate them here, this will help to keep the discussion focussed, thanks in advance V8rik 21:16, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Russian Ground Forces

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This article has been much improved and brought to A-class status, and is now ready for FAC consideration with numerous cites and photos. Self-nomination. Buckshot06 08:46, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support This is an excellent article and would form a good model for all other articles on national militaries. In addition to describing the capabilities and roles of the Russian Ground Forces, this article also discusses the RGF's future and the cultural/structural issues which are impacting on it in a concise yet well referenced and powerful way. My only concerns are that the Ranks and insignia section should be either fleshed out or removed and the prose in the 'Mission' paragraph could be tightened a little bit (it reads like a translation, which I guess is what it is). --Nick Dowling 23:26, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Nick Says it all

Flubeca 01:58, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support & Comment. Great Job. There is some missing information like who are the top Echelon Commanders of the Russian Army and some Information about Women and Ethnic Minorities in the Army. Just a suggestion. Mercenary2k 05:52, 4 December 2006 (UTC) Thanks for adding the stuff about women and the Top commanders in the Army. Dont worry if you didnt find any info on ethnic minorities in the army. I am pretty sure that Russian Army doesnt release these statistics because of the on going wars in Chechenya. My concerns have been addressed, so I fully support.[reply]
  • Support The article is terrific with many various details and history of the Russian Ground Forces. I do agree it could be better, if some of the above suggestions were fulfilled, but it looks good enough to me. Hello32020 22:17, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nominator's Comment I've made a few notes, as requested, on ranks, and tried to improve the Mission section, though further wordsmithing assistance would be welcome. Am in process of adding the Military district commanders to the table, and I've added a note on what little info there is on women in the Ground Forces. There is virtually no information available on ethnic minorities within the Ground Forces as far as I can see, but I'll keep looking. Thanks for your comments. Buckshot06 05:53, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon

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The old nom was very long and virtually unreadable. I'm starting this one over. Raul654 22:45, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tropical Storm Henri (2003)

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As author of the article, I feel it complies to the featured article criteria, and would like to nominate it for featured article. Hurricanehink (talk) 23:22, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Invasion of Tulagi (May 1942)

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Respectfully submit this article on a World War II battle for FA consideration. Self-nomination with helpful polishing from other editors. Cla68 08:35, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support, another excellent article from Cla68; all the issues raised in the peer review have been resolved. Kirill Lokshin 12:50, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Rather very well-done, although I want to pick, after I go over the Sei Whale article once more. I would like a map of the Solomon Islands that pings its location on the scale of the eventual war in the Pacific, a map that just shows the islands and their relationship to Japan, Australia, Midway Atoll (ask User:Reisio, or User:Geo Swan, imo, if you don't do your own) early on in the article. First, or probably second, occurence of name "Solomon Islands" should be formal name at time (British Solomon Islands Protectorate?), "initiating in the critical" might be "initiating the critical" (or is that dialect), US battleship fleet" --> "Pacific Fleet" first time. KP Botany 17:26, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done. Cla68 23:42, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Kyriakos 23:57, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral: A quick comment, why are there three campaign boxes on the article? The invasion itself isn't on the last two. If we're going to start listing the grandfather campaigns, I can see a slippery slope developing (Telugi --> Solomon Islands --> Pacific 1942 --> Pacific War --> World War II). In my opinion, only direct parents and children should be used as campaign boxes. Oberiko 17:56, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Actually, both of the latter two are parent boxes of the campaign (that is, the Solomon Islands campaign is linked to on them); I think it's become pretty conventional now to include, where available, up to three levels of campaignboxes.
      • Sub-engagements of the article topic (e.g. a campaignbox for a war on the war's article)
      • "Sibling" engagements of the article topic (e.g. a campaignbox listing a battle on the battle's article)
      • "Sibling" engagements of the broader campaign (e.g. a campaignbox listing a campaign on an article about a battle in that campaign, as here)
    • In other words, the campaignboxes place the battle within the immediate campaign as well as placing the immediate campaign within whatever broader sequence of events is present. (I doubt this will lead up to the slippery slope idea, actually; certainly, nobody's tried it so far. WWII battles are somewhat unusual in having a campaignbox scheme that's not purely a tree; for almost everything else, the current guideline and the available selection of campaignboxes would only allow a maximum of two campaignboxes on a single article.) Kirill Lokshin 21:15, 5 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • The Pacific War was, obviously, a large and complex conflict. That's one of the reasons why there are three campaignboxes in this particular article instead of just two. This battle was the first battle in the Solomon Islands campaign, which is why that campaign box is there. The second campaignbox, "Pacific campaigns 1941-42" exists to show the series of Japanese advances in the first year of the Pacific War, because the involved battles crossed several separate campaigns, but were part of Japan's single campaign to acquire and secure territory and resources to support and secure its empire, and this battle was one of those. The third box is the "parent" box for the Solomon Islands campaign. Sure, the campaignbox system for this particular conflict is somewhat messy, but so far it's the best attempt at organizing the complicated history of the war in the Pacific. Cla68 23:46, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • The article has a fine linking mechanism: one back jump to Pacific War on the top of the conflict box and two back jumps to Pacific Ocean theater and South West Pacific theatre. So in my opinion there is no need to repeat, the parent box could be moved lower, to the reference section at least. --Brand спойт 03:05, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment very interesting article but the lead paragraph is way to long and detailed. Please see WP:LEAD. FrummerThanThou 03:56, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Well documented and written. Hmains 03:08, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Well written. Acs4b 15:59, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Clement of Dunblane

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Self-nom. I have confidence that the article is factual, neutral and concise, and that it is of FA quality. I have been urged, despite the article's young age, to put it up for nomination by another wiki user. I have given it several productive proof-reads. If there are still any issues with it, I believe they are only minor and can be (perhaps only) resolved here fairly quickly; it is for this reason that I am moving the article past the peer review stage, and nominating for Featured Article. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 08:27, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object Improved; can you ensure that the page ranges end with at least two digits—some do, some don't (e.g., 116–9 shoud be 116–19). It's not usual to double up and "support" your own nomination.—Needs a copy-edit.
    • Opening sentence: "Clement was one of the first of the new Dominican Order to enter Scotland, and was the first member of the Dominican Order in the British Isles to become a bishop, being chosen by 1233 to become bishop of the ailing diocese of Dunblane." Rather long and complex, and needs splitting in two, perhaps with a semicolon; two instances of "become" and of "bishop"; "being chosen" is grammatically awkward in this construction.
    • "Clement managed to obtained some grants for the bishopric." What does "some" add?
    • "He was present with the king during his campaign in Argyll in 1249 and was at the king's side when he died during this campaign." "His" campaign refers to the king's, right? So use "his side".
    • "In this period too Clement helped to"—I think commas on both sides of "too" are mandatory.
    • "The latter source, however, is often highly unreliable, and cannot be fully trusted.[2] Therefore, Clement's Scottish birth and entry into the Order in 1221 cannot be entirely relied upon." It's the account of his birth and entry that is unreliable, surely. It's all too hedged this way and that, and repetitive, right through that para. Your historian "wrote", not "writes", if we know about it.
    • "In the three or four years after his visit to the papacy, agreements were made with the various institutions who were drawing income from Clement's diocese; namely Coupar Angus Abbey, Lindores Abbey, Cambuskenneth Abbey, Arbroath Abbey, the nunnery of North Berwick and the Hospital of Brackley, Northamptonshire"—I think an em dash would be far better than a semicolon to precede this list.
      replaced with a dash for you. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 12:56, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

As you predicted above, there are minor problems: the whole text is peppered with them. Please don't just treat the examples I've cited here—find someone different to sift through the article carefully. A couple of hours' work, at least. Tony 11:59, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much for your comments. I implemented the things you suggested. I've given it another copyedit too. Since my brain doesn't have any problems with most of the things you listed, I think I'll have to request that someone else copyedit it too. If you could give it a once over yourself, I'd be most grateful. Medieval bishops are not exactly the kind of topic most people are falling over themselves to read about. :) But I will put in a request with User:Angusmclellan. Regards, Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 12:56, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Although Angus may look over it again in the next 12 hours, the article has now been looked over by others and has had several more copyedits by myself, as you will see by this diff. I hope this has gone further to addressing the problems you raised. Regards, Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 22:22, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
can you ensure that the page ranges end with at least two digits
Did it. Thanks for your help. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 02:09, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Take the objection of the above user with a grain of salt, as he/she tagged Clement of Dunblane with {{LEAD}} 20 seconds after he/she finished commenting on another FAC. Leads me to believe the user didn't even read the article at all. Gzkn 04:47, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Don't worry, I'm not going to. The lead blatantly isn't too long, and if she doesn't support religious figures, there's nothing I can do about it. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 07:49, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

For previous nomination see here.

History of Solidarity second nomination

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I am resubmitting this article to FAC after addressing concerns (layout, copyedit - thank you, User:Logologist!) raised during the past nomination. I have also asked for an External peer review to assess the concerns raised by some editors (propaganda, unnecessary POV fork). While I have not received a permission to post the information on who has reviewed the article (I am still waiting for reply on that, for now I can say that he is a professor at a US university and has published a major book on this subject), I believe I am allowed to post an opening sentence from his review emailed to me: "Overall: exhaustively reserarched, thorough in coverage." I have of course addressed all issues from that review as well. Therefore I sincerly believe the article is now FA-level.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  01:08, 5 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. I suggest a rephrasing with the transferring of what Solidarity is closer to the article name. --Brand спойт 18:20, 5 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Full. I am particularly glad to note that the external (and professional) peer review encourages me to quote my previous rationale (since the article was yet improved I deleted a part of it). Well done. Essentiallly, it wins when compared to many other texts on the subject, encyclopedic ones included. References for any crucial statement. I think we could wish the article gets into a next encyclopedia contest --Beaumont (@) 18:27, 5 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - per technical issues: → Support.
    • There are a lot of redlinks. It is useless in FA level to introduce a link that does not exist. Remove redlinks or create a stub article for them.
    • Too many unrelated (blue) wikilinks cluttered in the article. Read again WP:CONTEXT. You don't need to link plain English words, such as (picked randomly) morale, dissident, nation, religion, media, etc. You don't have to link multiple times to the same page, such as social movement, People's Republic of Poland, etc. that only makes reader jump to the same page all over again. If you need to point so many times to the same article that contains more details, then consider to use Template:see also or other similar forms.
    • I'm a bit concern of using images in the article. Some of the images do not have any relation to the current section. For example, the 25th anniversary of Solidarnosc image and the US president Ronald Reagen visit to Pope. I know there is one sentence about Reagen's visit, but it is unecessary to be illustrated with one image. The article itself has already more than enough images. I'm baffled also with images of more recent politicians at the end of the article, that has small relationship with the subject of the article. It seems to me when I reached at the end that this article looks like an electorate campaign poster.
I only found those above items at the moment. Further comments will be given later. — Indon (reply) — 03:23, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have to disagree with the first two points. Red links are important to show what we are missing, although I will see if I can create few more stubs. As for blue links, they are important concepts and should be ilinked either on their first use (if general), or more often if they are relativly rare - although I will look through WP:CONTEXT and see what it suggest we can do differently. As for images, I think they are all relevant; feel free to remove any you think are not.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  03:45, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
As I think the red links in references and further reading should be checked for notability and unlinked if they don't meet the criteria. --Brand спойт 04:07, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. As for technicalities, I'd suggest that plain English words could be disconnected (not too many instances; I'll try to do this immediately; double links too, if any). However, please note that Wikipedia is not meant for native English speakers only. Some more complicated expressions with a deeper meaning, as e.g. social movement should be kept! Links like this are desirable and make Wikipedia better than other encyclopedias. As for red links, I think we should keep the balance between a positive new article demand and, on the other hand, the red color in a FA text. I suggets that red links (13) can be revised, and we can stub a half of them. I can not see not notable ones. Maybe a few of them could be integrated in the Structure of historical Solidarity or something like this (not so sure), but this does not concern the present nomination anymore. --Beaumont (@) 08:07, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. It's better to make a little stub (1-2 paragraphs) if editors think that a certain terms should be wikilinked but do not exist yet. As for not notable ones, please see the References section and you can see the "ocean of red links" there. Should all of the authors be wikilinked? And as for the blue wikilink, I agree for social movement link, but not to link it twice. Well, it might be not a good example. Take a look at the lead section, there are 2 (if I didn't mistakenly calculate it) links to People's of Republic of Poland. One is enough. — Indon (reply) — 09:48, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Good article on interesting and important topic. I think implementation of Brandmeister's and Indon's suggestions would make the article even better. Alex Bakharev 04:37, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Well-researched, readable article on an important subject. logologist|Talk 07:50, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - it's much better than during the last voting (yet probably worse than it could be during the next one... err... only joking) //Halibutt 09:24, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Further comments
    • A good encyclopaedic article should be accurate whenever it is read, either now or 20 years later. I found some terms point to an inexact time, which makes this article will be obsolete in the future. Avoid words, such as currently, the present, etc.
    • Section Solidarity underground (1982-88) is still listy. Unlike previous sections which give a nice flow of historical description, this section contains one or two-sentences paragraphs, that looks like bulleted historical timeline items.
I think these are all my last comments. I'll see responses from the editors before I change my vote. Overall, it's a good article, although at the end it's a bit detoured to the general current Poland's political situation. — Indon (reply) — 10:17, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I believe I now addressed those two issues. The word present is left in acceptable context (as in history of Poland (1989-present).-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:35, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I would not agree to the History of Poland (1989-present), either. When is present? Today when we are writing it? Or tomorrow? Or 10 years later when we read that? — Indon (reply) — 16:10, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the nature of Wikipedia makes it relativly safe to assume that present means 'up to any major event which happened few hours ago'. Polish historiography splits history of Poland into several chapters, with period after 1989 being the last one; once that changes we will likely see a new article on Wikipedia. There seem to be no rule against unsing present, and similar format is followed in many articles. History_of_Italy_as_a_Republic last section is entitled 'The "Second Republic" (1992-present)'. History_of_France last section is 'France in Modern Times II (1914-today)'; French Fifth Republic in the French history tempalte is entitled 'Fifth Republic (1958–present)'. Germany's latest history is found in History of Germany since 1945, Australia in History of Australia since 1945. Open-ended titles like this seem to be a rule in articles about events which are still ongoing - and history, certainly, has not ended yet.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  18:37, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In that case, I concur. — Indon (reply) — 08:56, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I think we all have concerns about the redlinks in the article. I have made similar comments above. — Indon (reply) — 08:55, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. The problems are still here: short passages, piles of ill-digested (and unnecessary) images, red links for non-notable authors (have no idea why Piotrus thinks every author he cites is notable), WP:CONTEXT... Seriously, we need to set a limit on the number of nominations of the same article within one month, especially as concerns about partisan voting on Piotr's articles have not been addressed as yet. --Ghirla -трёп- 09:03, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I believe the technical concerns expressed above have been addressed. In particular,
  1. no more redlinks
  2. plain English words delinked, no more double links
  3. two images have been deleted (actually, I do agree that all of them were relevant; but to respond to a few independent and coherent remarks, and to reach a consensus, I've tried to select the images that would cause the less quality loss. It turns out that my choice coincides with that of Indon.) --Beaumont (@) 12:25, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Citations have been greatly improved. Mkdwtalk 23:37, 16 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. All concerns have been addressed. This one is ready to go. I congratulate Piotrus for not getting discouraged after the first failed FA nomination and instead working to turn this into a truly outstanding article. Balcer 00:45, 9 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Indeed, all issues addressed, very nice. A grand piece of work from Logologist correcting, and from Piotrus well... he knows why. --Ouro 07:27, 10 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose:
    • Images: Image:Lech Walesa Solidarity Time.jpg → no rationale. Image:Solidarnosc.png → no rationale, no source. Image:WieczorWroclawia20marca1981.jpg → it is not a free image. Just because I scanned/photographed an album cover I cannot claim copyright in it. Image:Jaruzelski przemowienie.jpg → not a photo. Image:Dewiza-SW.jpg → not a free image. Permission is needed from Solidarity and not some website. Image:High noon 4 6 89-Tomasz Sarnecki.jpg → no rationale. Image:Okragly Stol 1989.jpg → no source, how do you know it was a Polish photographer? Image:Lechwalesa.jpg → no copyright tag. Image:Tadeusz Mazowiecki1.jpg → no rationale. Most of the other images are climed under disputed {{Polishpd}} (nevermind legal arguments, how do you know if it was a Polish photographer and it was published without a (c) sign? How do you know (c) was not in the image caption?)
    • Some examples of "heroic" writing:
      • Solidarity's survival meant a break in the hard-line stance of the communist Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR), and was an unprecedented event not only for the People's Republic of Poland ... but for the whole of the Eastern bloc. → survival? unprecedented?
      • Solidarity's influence led to the Revolutions of 1989 ... and to the spread of anti-communist ideas and movements throughout the countries of the Eastern Bloc... → the only cause was Solidarity?
      • he was a bellwether of change, and became an important symbol—and supporter—of changes to come
      • ...characterized by long queues and empty shelves.
      • ...Wałęsa scored a public-relations victory.
      • ...the talks would radically alter the shape of the Polish government and society.
      • Its activists were dogged by the Security Service (SB), but managed to strike back
      • By December 28, 1981, strikes had ceased, and Solidarity appeared crippled. → crippled?
    • Writing: Way too many one-two-three line pragraphs (especially at the end). Very choppy style, sometimes hard to follow what's happening because sentences are packed with facts, dates, names. For example, "In September 1990, Wałęsa declared that Gazeta Wyborcza had no right to use the Solidarity logo." - how is this relevant, notable, important?
    • References: Most of the controversial facts are from an article written by a Marxist writer... Also, can you put all the cite templates in one line and not make every parameter start on a new line?
      • The aricle passed academic peer review, I believe the above references are acceptable. 'Most controversial facts' is POV. While I am not fan of marxism, being a historian with a marxist views does not make one unreliable - marxism (or socialism), are not automatically disqualifying like let's say stalinism, nazism or extreme nationalism. Colin Barker was an academic, sociologist and historian, working at a Western university for 35 years - I believe his publications are quite reliable.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  18:17, 11 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment. While being a marxist is not a sin, especially in the academic community, it should be stressed that, actually, Renata's argument supports NPOV nature of the article and encourages the promotion. If the most controversial facts in the article on an anti-communist movement are supported by a marxist, it certainly implies that it is not written in favor of the movement. On the other hand, I believe that we do not depreciate it either (no one was concerned about it). --Beaumont (@) 23:49, 11 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • General: most attention is devoted to 1 year period - 1980-81. While strikes are fun, I don't think Solidarity is remembered because of them....Renata 15:52, 11 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I am disturbed by Piotr's insertion of his comments between Renata's arguments, so that it's difficult to distinguish who speaks what. As a result, much of Renata's argument is lost to new readers of this page. --Ghirla -трёп- 10:56, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Julo 18:27, 11 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    substantiation: Good research, comprehensive citations. According illustrations, in spite of some other comments here, I accept them. Julo 19:33, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Much work and improvement has occurred. I now support. Rlevse 23:50, 11 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per reasons stated at previous nomination as the problems raised there were not addressed, and per Renata's reasons (except for the copyright ones. We have enough wannabe copyright experts and I do not want to join their chorus which I find quite annoying). The article still looks like an eulogy and, most importantly, a POV fork of the entire History of Poland for the period of early-70s to end-80s. Take for instance the Popieluszko incident: his photo and two paragraphs around it seem like belong to the History of Poland general article rather than an article about one of Polish trade unions. There is nothing Solidarity specific in Popieluszko's murder, in the outcry it caused. There is nothing Solidarity specific in authors' lengthy paragraph about Gorby reforms and their effect. And the article is full of such examples. Solidarity specific stuff belongs to the Solidarity article which is in a pity shape. Polish general history stuff belongs to the History of Poland article or one of its subarticles. I see no rationale in the article in its current form and I think having lots of inline refs and grammar cleaned up is no substitute for the encyclopedicity and NPOV. --Irpen 02:17, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Because of the reasons you raised in the previous nomination I asked for the academic external peer review. The academic in question did not share your comments (and I particulary asked him to consider the points you raised than). Popiełuszko is relevant to the article, as explained, he was considered one of the 'Solidarity's priests'; his masses were were people voiced support for the organizations; his death made him a matryr of the organization. Gorby's reforms significantly undermined Polish governement and were an important factor in forcing it to negotiate with the opposition. Your claims about this article being a POV fork are unsupported by anybody - which of course does not make them invalid, but majority of the reviewrs, but I really think you should reconsider your POV here.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  04:29, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Please reconsider that the alleged "eulogy" of an anti-communist movement that eventually led to the fall of the Party (and the socialist system in Poland) is supported by 22 references to a Marxist-Socialist). To some extent this is a nice illustration of WP:NPOV policy (Writing for the "enemy"). As for me, not a surprise that the peer review supports the text. Actually, I do not know of reliable sources that would question what is written in the article. --Beaumont (@) 10:53, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • May I suggest discussing the question of whether the article is good enough for FA rather than Colin Barker's political stance and the number of academics who like the article. There is no list of political ideologies, whose adherents aren't reliable, as far as I know. If the NPOV-rule were to be interpreted in the sense that the authors of any sources are not allowed to have a POV, then only works by completely apathetic people would be allowed. That is complete nonsense. Further, if Marxists aren't allowed to be cited, then capitalist democrats, e.g., should not be be considered reliable either IMHO. If you are going to object based on NPOV violations please state in which way you feel the article is POV mentioning examples for this POV. McCarthyanist purges are surely not in line with Wikipedia policy. On the other hand an academic peer review does not mean that an article is at FA level and cannot be criticized. Why don't you answer people when they find faults in the article, rather than continouisly repeating the fact that some academic liked it, Piotrus? I hope this discussion will get back on topic.--Carabinieri 00:29, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I believe I have addressed all objections - do correct me if there is something I missed.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  06:04, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • No you did not. The article lacks encyclopedicity and neutrality as explained in my vote. Your keeping telling me that you addressed them or that my objections are of no merit or perpetual calls to restate them cannot help addressing the article's problems. --Irpen 18:49, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • Well, I addressed your objections by going over the article, trying to eliminate the problems you indicated. 14 support votes plus an academic reviewer agree that there are no longer viable concerns; you are of course free to disagree but I am afraid there is only so much that we could do other than delete the article to satisfy you, and that is not a community apparently wants to do. Feel free to take the article to WP:AfD at any time.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:08, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
          • This isn't a vote. Comments including nothing more than the the words support or oppose should be politely ignore. If someone finds that part of the article does not conform with the FA guidelines than that makes a difference even if it's only one person.--Carabinieri 21:14, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
            • When a user objects, s/he is expected to provide specific reasons why. For support, while it is nice, it is not obligatory - it is assummed that a user have read the article and found it confirming to the FA stadnard. See also 'Supporting and objecting'. As I wrote above, I believe we have addressed all objections, safe for Irpen's single claim that the article 'lacks encyclopedicity (sic!) and neutrality'. We have been discussing this since last round of voting, I have yet to find an editor that will agree with his reasoning - and we have found plenty who apparently disagree.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:21, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. As per Piotrus and Logologist. Visor 17:58, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. This nomination is a wonderful example of how voting along national lines may promote any POV mess to featured status. I see unsubstantiated votes in such borderline cases as abuse of WP:FAC for tendentious purposes. This problem needs to be fixed as soon and as promptly as possible. --Ghirla -трёп- 09:45, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I also find it a wonderful example of how the article is opposed solely by (some, not all) editors from a particular country (or to be more specific, with connection to a particular country, i.e. that used to live or still live in Russia (Soviet Union in the past)). On the other hand, the article is supported by many editors who are not Polish, and others from that region. Case rested.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  18:38, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Empires: Dawn of the Modern World

[edit]

Old Archive
This is my second Self Nomination of this article (and needless to say support), and I think it is finally ready. The only problem in it's previous FAC was that it needed to be well written, which thanks to Deckiller and TKD, it is. It's a good article, and is a great example of this encyclopedia's best work, and deserves featured status.--Clyde Miller 15:31, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The game isn't really well known or well recognized, so there just isn't that much information on it. I'm sorry there isn't a better answer than that.--Clyde Miller 19:31, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per above. Most possible copyedits are just a matter of taste. Could use some more reference parameters, such as author and date. Michaelas10 (Talk) 18:24, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I know that subject matter is not relevant to an FA - that any article can be an FA - but frankly, the material here seems really, really thin. This is a personal reaction, I acknowledge fully, but as I was reading "A unit can be ordered to scout, guard, act defensively, or act aggressively. Resources — food, wood, gold, and stone — are required in different combinations to build structures and armies. Throughout the game, citizens gather resources and deposit them in Town Center structures" I was going, uh-huh, ok so what. It may, perhaps, be possible to include content that rises above this kind of prosaic, dull walk-through of a humdrum video game, but this ain't it. Eusebeus 19:34, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose is invalid; "It must not be about a 'humdrum' video game" is not in the criteria. — Deckiller 19:43, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Glad to see we have such a diligent guardian of the validity of FA considerations. Many thanks for that nuanced reading of my objection. I never said "It must not be about a 'humdrum' video game"; what I said is that It may, perhaps, be possible to include content that rises above this kind of prosaic, dull walk-through of a humdrum video game, but this ain't it; to paraphrase: the content is slight as it is; this does not mean that better content cannot be derived, and content is the core part of FA. Eusebeus 19:57, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • Actually, the entire article as it currently is not just a "dull walkthrough of a humdrum video game"; that is merely one section. The article covers all aspects, including development, gameplay, story/background, reception, and so on. I'm sorry if the gameplay section appears dull to you, but it's important for a FA to be comprehensive. You can't really insert entertaining prose into a gameplay section without introducing redundancies and whatnot. In short, the article covers all aspects of the game based on what general information is available. — Deckiller 20:08, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Game articles have to be written in order to be accessible to a non-gamer audience. Nearly every Good class or above RPG article has the same "characters move around on a field map with an overworld map too" and stuff about attacking, and it can sound a little dull. But it's part of fulfilling comprehensiveness and making it accessible. --Zeality 01:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Do simple years really need to be wikilinked? Gzkn 02:36, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Further Comments
    • The Japanese are opponents in the game's campaign mode, but they are not playable in the game. and Although the Japanese are opponents in the game's campaign mode, they are never playable. Kind of repetitive, no?
      • Removed. Done
    • Kim Shi-min, Kwak Chae-u -> Wikilinks (caption and prose)?
      • Fixed the prose and I hope that red links are okay. Done
    • In an interview, Rick Goodman stated If the reader didn't read the infobox, they might not know who Rick Goodman is. Also the quote is pretty general and readers aren't told how his quote relates to the development of the game.
      • fixed up. Is this better? Done
    • Might want to link "PC Game World" and "Worthplaying" .
      • Hope red links are okay. Done
    • For criticism, GameSpot Not really a big fan of that transition...
      •  Done Better?
    • The magazine found that the pathfinding algorithm often causes units to travel together in a disorganized mass and sometimes take more dangerous routes than necessary to reach locations, although explicitly constructed unit formations eliminated crowding and lessen friendly fire and interference with the routes of other units. Could this be broken up somehow? Or trimmed? Also, there's a weird change of tense ("eliminated").
      •  Done
    • "... dumb man's Rise of Nations." ellipsis is probably unnecessary there. Gzkn 02:59, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      •  Done
    • The article mentions Rise of Nations several times; I think a link should be added to the "See Also" section.
      •  Done I added it to the see also, but I thought you don't add something to the see also if it is wikilinked. If someone can back me up on this, it should be removed.

Reply: I (and Deckiller) took care of the problems. Anything I did wrong or anything that still needs work?--Clyde Miller 03:29, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good. Those {{done}} templates are neat...I need to start using them. Regarding the red links: I assumed that they would have articles...darn :( Since they don't at the moment, perhaps an explanatory word/clause of what they are might be better instead of red links (are they web-only game reviewers, magazines?). Gzkn 03:37, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I also changed the transition to "In a negative review". Is that OK (I'm assuming it was a negative review)? Gzkn 03:41, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that transition works better. — Deckiller 18:42, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah I found the {{done}} template on some peer review and I liked it. As to the red links, I could start a stub or add a segment to explain them once I get a chance.--Clyde Miller 23:23, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
 Done I added a segment about the red links instead of making articles, because I don't feel like have an FAC and AFD at the same time. Anything else I missed or need to work on?--Clyde Miller 00:11, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Replied. see above.--Clyde Miller 19:30, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure (I'm new around here). I just thought that you had compared it several times to Rise of Nations, so it should have a link for being a "comparably similar" game. AndonicO Talk | Sign Here 01:05, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well good enough for me. Stays unless someone finds some policy that says otherwise.--Clyde Miller 02:20, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
"See also"s are actually discouraged in featured articles, because links should already have appeared in a relevant context elsewhere in the article (as you had originally thought). If the links can't reasonably be integrated into the rest of the text, then it raises the question of whether they're really all that relevant. Remember, FAs are about brilliant prose, so lists should be minimized. I'm also not sure why Age of Empires is in the See also section. If a source compared the two, then that should be mentioned in the article proper. Otherwise, it's not really clear to the reader why the comparison was made between these two games in particular. If the comparison were in the "Reception" section, it'd probably be tagged with {{fact}}, so a link in "See also" is a bad idea unless it's sourced. I'm being bold and removing the "See also" section. — TKD::Talk 02:25, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I learned something today. :-) | AndonicO Talk | Sign Here 12:40, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
:: shrug :: Alright, I really never thought it was needed anyway.--Clyde Miller 00:10, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Gamerankings is citied in the article, and most of the reviews compilied in it are in the article also. Sales figures are impossible to come by with a game that is as little known as this. However, I will keep looking, and will try to find a place to add the compiled scores. I think this is the final response, since Empires has been promoted. --Clyde Miller 01:15, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ian Thorpe

[edit]

Self-nomination'. This is my first attempt at the FA process. I feel that this article which I wrote is a comprehensive account of Thorpe, and well sourced (166) and is NPOV. Thanks, Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:43, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment - I think the lead should be 2-3 paras - possibly a bit long for the article. The language is concise and the article looks comprehensive. Certainly topical. cheers Cas Liber 09:06, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
After looking again, I should add that paras 2 and 3 of the intro sould be shorter and more summary-like. Also, I am not sure para 4 should be there. Cas Liber 09:08, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

::*Need a better picture of Ian Thorpe as his face is covered with water. ::*Lots of results of his performances are written in text instead of organized into a table. This makes it hard to visualize.I suggest you create a small table to show his performances. ::*There is only one picture of him. This article is quite wordy which is ok but it needs pictures to add a visual aesthetic element to it. ::*Ian Thorpe Also appeared on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno. I think it should be mentioned, and if possible get a picture of that. ::Other than that, this article is wonderfully cited and deserves to be FA if these things are addressed. Mercenary2k 16:59, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ok Changes have been made so I support Mercenary2k 19:23, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • It needs more pictures to break up the monotony
  • This article still needs a good copyedit for tone. Some of the sentences may be improved. For e.g.
Theoretically competing for a position on the Australian team for the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, he finished 23rd in the 400 m freestyle and 36th in the 200 m backstroke. Theoretically???
In June, two months before the Pan Pacific Championships, Thorpe required an appendix operation, causing him to miss two weeks of training. Which year?
horpe was began 2002 with the Australian Championships in Brisbane in March syntax.
He also competed in the 100 m backstroke, an experimental event, coming second in a time of 55.74 s to earn himself a Commonwealth spot in the event - experimantal??
  • The lead is good. What is in the article should be mentioned in lead and vice versa, which it does. However, IMO there is no need to provide inline citations in the lead. They can be given in the body of the article where appropriate.
  • All red links should be either removed or stubs created for them.
  • At 92kb, I think the article is a bit too long for a bio. Can it be trimmed?
Good luck - Parthi talk/contribs 21:41, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry, that is not correct on the redlinks. Redlinks are there to encourage article creation, but a FA stands on it's own. Now there shouldn't be a redlinked topic that doesn't deserve to be an article, but it's not the burden of a FA author to create stubs for every potential article it links to. - Taxman Talk 22:06, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nice work, much improved from when you first asked me to look at it. Last thing is to improve the flow of the prose partly through eliminating the one and two sentence paragraphs. Either expand them into a full idea, merge them with related material or remove them. Also, in general The rest of the prose is choppy in places, work on improving the flow by adding and improving transitions. I do agree the citations in the lead aren't needed if it properly summarized cited information in the rest of the article. But to me it's not a problem to leave it cited. - Taxman Talk 22:06, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object—1a. Here are random examples of why the whole text needs thorough copy-editing.
    • "an Australian former freestyle swimmer"—Awkward syntax; reverse the second and third words. And "the youngest male to ever represent Australia"—Reverse "to ever".
    • " He has won five Olympic Games gold medals, the most of any Australian and is the only person to have won win six gold medals in one world championships at the 2001 World Championships,[1] and has won eleven World Championship golds in total, the most won by any swimmer.[2]" This winding snake needs chopping up. So does this one: "However, he was struck down by glandular fever, forcing him to withdraw. Subsequent training camps in the United States were similarly hampered, and he announced his retirement from competition on 21 November 2006 at the age of 24, indicating that he was moving into the next phase of his life, citing waning motivation.[10]"
    • "Aside from 13 individual long-course world records,[9] Thorpe has also"—You can't have both "aside from" and "also". Second para, last two sentences each have a redundant "also". Every sentence in the text is an also, so it's much smoother not to use the word.
    • MoS is silent on this matter, but I think most house styles demand spaces either side of the times symbol: " 4×100".

The first thing to do is to chop up the huge sentences throughout. Then find fresh eyes to audit the prose. Tony 09:40, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've made further attempts to fix up the prose by dividing sentences and removing some redundancies. I will change the x spacing soon. Is it an improvement? Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object per Tony. Also, please don't use ibid in the dynamic environment that is Wiki, as future editors could insert new references, messing up the ibid. The lead includes a lot of detail, rather than a compelling summary: once you've had a thorough copyedit, the lead may need particular attention. Images need attention: looks like a lot of Fair Use images. Sandy (Talk) 16:29, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I have fixed the ibid thing. I have tweaked the lead somewhat. As for the fair use images, I feel that they convey important historic events in Thorpe's career and cannot be replaced by re-enactments and such. Is there a limit to FU images used in the prose? Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Further comments. It's better, but there are still problems in the prose, and there must be no shortage of fresh eyes to look at this one from a copy-editing viewpoint. There are issues concerning the smooth integration of ideas into sentences, such as:
    • "Thorpe was a large baby, weighing 4.1 kg and measuring 57.5 cm in length at birth and grew up in a family of sporting pedigree in the working-class Sydney suburb of Milperra." (and ... and; the two statements aren't closely enough connected to be joined by the second "and", which, in any case, needs to be separated from the first "and" by a comma). Try a semicolon: "at birth; he grew up ...", or just two separate sentences. Or—
    • "Thorpe was initially sidelined as a young child due to a chlorine allergy,[7] and swam in his first race at a school carnival aged seven with his head out of the water." OK, you have to think for a half a second to put together that the head out of the water was to avoid the chlorine; this should be neatly spelt out. "Thorpe was initially sidelined as a young child due to a chlorine allergy.[7] Because of this allergy, he swam his first race at a school carnival aged seven with his head out of the water." See how much easier it is to read?
    • There are awkward wordings, such as: "Thorpe did not seem to inherit the ball his parent's ball skills, instead following his elder sister Christina into swimming lessons at Padstow swimming pool when he was 5 [five] years old. This came through [opportunity arose by] chance after Christina was given medical advice that swimming would strengthen a broken wrist attained in [from] a backyard accident." And:
    • "He managed to win despite the ungainly technique, primarily due to his significant size advantage." By juxtaposing "the ungainly technique" and "primarily due", the reader will momentarily wonder whether it was the ungainly technique that was caused by his size. Makes the reader work harder to make sense of it, which should not be the case in good writing.

I took these examples from one small window in the article that I selected at random. This suggests that the whole text requires careful work. Do you know how to locate one or more good copy-editors? Research the edit histories of Australian- and sports-related articles (perhaps FAs), and identify those who performed linguistic, as opposed to procedural edits. Ask them nicely. Tony 11:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, they have been fized along with the spacing after the times. Thanks, Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:13, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • More problems in the prose, selected at random from a single paragraph:
    • "His winning times were on average two seconds per hundred metres faster than the silver medalist"—False contrast: insert "those of" before "the silver".
    • "Frost knew that Thorpe had no realistic chance of gaining Olympic selection at only 13 years and 6 months, but sent him to Sydney in order to gain racing experience at senior national level."—Add "of age", remove "in order", add "the" before "senior".
    • "but swam slower in the final to miss selection"—Nope, "more slowly". But shouldn't it be "too slowly ... to be selected"? That's a blooper. Tony 01:39, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Yes, by now it appears that I am either simply not skillful enough or simply not in a relaxed enough state to pick up these subtleties. I have fixed them and asked ALoan, who is active in sports to have a look at them, but he appears to be busy. You are an Australian Tony, perhaps you may help me please, so that I could pick up more examples for future use. Kind regards, Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:13, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

2005 United States Grand Prix

[edit]

I have renominated this article because the article has had a major re-write since it last failed and meets all the criteria in my opinion. Kingjamie 19:38, 29 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

First FAC.
  • Comment That would take it out of sync with the majority - but not all - of the other Formula One articles. UK English is the usual concensus. We should also note that although the race took place in the US, of the significant individuals concerned only Tony George is American. I'm excluding sports broadcasters from that assessment. None of the teams and only one race driver (Jacques Villeneuve) is North American. (Scott Speed was only involved as a third driver). Neither of the tyre companies is American. Formula One itself is largely based in Europe and is owned by a UK company.
From WP:MoS: For example, with respect to British spelling as opposed to American spelling, it would only be acceptable to change from American spelling to British spelling if the article concerned a British topic.
Reversing that test case, we should only change this one if it concerns an American topic. While I agree that it can be seen as an American topic, it is not unequivocally so. At least as strong a case can be made for UK English (stronger in my view). Recommended procedure in that case is to leave the article as it is.
A final point - what we're really talking about here is the word 'tyre/tire'. If we swap to 'tire' throughout, we will have to change the spelling used in two direct quotes from the International Sporting Regulations (see FIA's reaction), or quote them accurately from the source text and have them inconsistent with the rest of the document. Cheers. 4u1e 14:03, 31 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Good argument. I'll defer, but my preference remains.
While the event was in the US, the issue is international and so therefore is the article. The key players in the affair are British (Mosley & Ecclestone), French (Michellin) and Australian (Stoddard).Damiancorrigan 00:34, 9 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

--Spangineerws (háblame) 00:40, 1 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose Comment- This bit makes no sense: "Out of all of the Television channels who broadcasted the grand prix, only ITV decided to screen the race and at the end of broadcast, the channel's anchorman Jim Rosenthal apologised for what viewers saw. Italian channel Rai 1 aired the race too, with comentators Gianfranco Mazzoni and Ivan Capelli trying to understand what led to the withdrawal and to explain it to the public. Austrian channel Orf 1 broadcasted the entire race as well, citing contractual obligations to do so...". How if ITV were the only one out of all the TV broadcasters to show the race did RAI 1 and ORF 1 air the race as well. I'm not happy with "their witty exchange of jokes made the race coverage actually rather entertaining at times.". It sounds like an opinion to me. The entire Team principals' plan section contains one source. More sources are needed. Also "At the 2005 Champ Car World Series Grand Prix of Cleveland, held one week after the US Grand Prix, free admission was granted to all bearers of ticket stubs of the US Grand Prix." could do with a source.Alexj2002 12:54, 1 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done the champ car source Kingjamie 22:18, 2 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have added one ref for the "Team principals' plan" section please can somebody else help me in finding some more. Kingjamie 22:35, 2 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have done these tasks now Kingjamie 18:21, 3 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
To make the 'entertaining' comment less POV, someone could add the award ITV won for 'best sporting coverage' for that race. I'd add it myself, but I can't remember what exactly they won.Damiancorrigan 00:24, 9 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Refusal of coverage still needs a copyedit. Also it mentions several stations refused coverage but only names TSN. Did any other stations refuse coverage? What did Speed do? Alexj2002 19:09, 3 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know about Speed or any other TV stations coverage, I have also done a minor copy edit don't know if it is enough. Kingjamie 20:30, 3 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
SPEED aired the complete race. As host broadcaster, they were required to do so. The race was already going against a NASCAR race on FOX, which owns SPEED, so it had no hope in terms of TV viewership whether all the teams started or not. Adamtw (talk) 06:00, 18 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]


Speed aired the entire thing, FYI. The359 05:30, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done Kingjamie 23:21, 3 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done Kingjamie 20:26, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
There are still a few places that would be served by a citation (last two sentences of "Toyota tyre failures" and all of "Race report"). There's even a quote from Bob Varsha that's not cited. --Spangineerws (háblame) 23:11, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done, deleted Varsha quote but last two sentences of "Toyota tyre failures" are already cited Kingjamie 17:50, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I meant the last two sentences of the first paragraph. --Spangineerws (háblame) 23:58, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done Kingjamie 17:58, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent. Support. --Spangineerws (háblame) 07:53, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question Why is an article on the United States Grand Prix using "tyres" instead of "tires"? Doesn't this fall into the category of distinctly American and should therefore use US English. Jay32183 20:52, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
While the event was in the US, the issue is international and so therefore is the article. The key players in the affair are British (Mosley & Ecclestone), French (Michellin) and Australian (Stoddard). Kingjamie 20:56, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That makes sense. Jay32183 21:05, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Jocelin

[edit]

Self-nom. I'm confident the article is factual, neutral and concise, and that it is now of FA quality. Besides my experience with FA articles, two other wiki users have already expressed the same opinion. If there are any issues with it, I believe they are only minor and can be resolved here fairly quickly; hence I'm moving the article on beyond peer review stage and nominating for Featured Article. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 05:55, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Why is the word Scottish in quotes in some of the text? This is neither consistent nor explained.
  • Similarly, why is the word promoted in quotes in the bishop of Glasgow section?
  • The sentence It is certainly obvious that Jocelin was one of the most respected figures in the kingdom. is poorly-expressed, since this statement comes before the evidence supporting it. Overall very good, well referenced and clearly-written. TimVickers 23:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks for your comments, Tim. The first paragraph of "Early life" should explain why "Scottish" is in inverted commas; "promoted" is in inverted commas because, while many may regard it as a promotion, it was not a promotion in any formal sense. As for the sentence, I guess that's there as one of the many sentences introducing the paragraph's content in the paragraph's first line. I don't know if you'll find these answers satisfactory; if you don't, lemme know and I'll make the necessary changes. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 06:19, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thylacine

[edit]

Self nom. I've rewritten this article over the past couple of weeks - there's a little of the original left but it's mostly new material. It's had a peer review and several other people have looked it over to help me clear up any problems before bringing it here. I think it's ready now. Yomanganitalk 00:20, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment - I thought the general feeling was that citations be kept out of the lead (as it is a summary of the artcle body anyway) and linked through the article proper. Cas Liber 02:07, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not really. To quote Giano: "Redlinks are one of the benefits of a wiki - they encourage others to contribute material to make the redlink turn blue. Many people think it is more helpful to leave a link red than to create a bunch of one-line stubs which provide a misleading impression of Wikipedia's (lack of) comprehensiveness." I have actually filled or redirected or eliminated a few of the redlinks already, (Henry Burrell for example), and have some of the others on my list to do at some point, but I'm not going to create a one liner that doesn't add anything to the encyclopaedia just so the link is different colour. Yomanganitalk 09:59, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Good update and good to see more images added. I have made some minor edits and added the quote from "The ancestors tale" please amend it if you think it is appropriate to. Maybe the lead should say that it is "the largest known Carnivorous Marsupial in modern times" --Mutley 11:32, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Kind of in a hurry so these are my comments for the first two sections. Will continue my review later. Joelito (talk) 18:59, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • "The modern Thylacine first appeared about 4 million years ago, but closely related species date back to the beginning of the Miocene." The second part of the sentence does not contradict the first, hence "but" should not be used. Use a semicolon or separate into two sentences. Also, what does closely related species refer to? I presume it is of the same family so why not state it clearly. e.g. (Some) Species belonging to the Thylacinidae family date back to the beggining of the Miocene
      Fixed
    • "...is the oldest of the seven discovered fossil Thylacine species" This is confusing since Thylacine is the common name for T. cynocephalus and by refering to Thylacine species one may think you are talking about 7 fossil individuals. I believe you wished to refer to members of the Thylacinidae family. Re-write as "is the oldest of the seven discovered fossil Thylacinidae species".
      Just dropped the "Thylacine"
    • "the Powerful Thylacine,Thylacinus potens,". "the Powerful Thylacine (Thylacinus potens)" for consistency.
      Fixed
    • "The animal was rare even in Tasmania by the time the first explorers arrived." European explorers? Weren't the aborigines explorers also? Why "even in Tasmania"? We have not established (aside from the lead) that the animal was extirpated from mainland Australia.
      Well, "indigenous peoples" suggests they weren't explorers and European is mentioned in the next sentence. Since we have established in the lead that it is extinct I don't think the "even in Tasmania" is too much of a leap, but maybe I'm missing your point.
    • "However, it was not until 1805..." Again this sentence does not contradict the preceeding one. Just eliminate "However"
      "However" doesn't imply a contradiction. It emphasises that nine years passed between it being reported and the first description being sent.
    • "Recognition that the Australian marsupials were fundamentally different from the known mammal genera led to the establishment of the modern classification scheme, and in 1796 Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire created the genus Dasyurus where he placed the Thylacine in 1810, and to resolve the mixture of Greek and Latin nomenclature the species name was altered to cynocephalus." Damn. This is what Tony calls a snake. Chop the snake!!! (e.g. Divide into two sentences around "scheme, and in")
      Snake arose from a poor bit of cutting and pasting, but the action in the second clause is a result of the action in the first, so breaking where you suggested isn't really a good idea. I cut off the Greek/Latin section instead, but other suggestions for a prettier rendition of the first section would be good.
      Thanks for the comments so far. Yomanganitalk 19:37, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support. Excellent!--Yannismarou 10:05, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Overall, it's very good; I'll support it when the writing has been polished. Here are examples of the need for this.
    • "The Thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) is a large carnivorous marsupial native to Australia which is thought to have become extinct in the 20th century." Since Australia didn't become extinct in the 20th century, why not make it smoother: "The Thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) is a large carnivorous marsupial that was native to Australia and is thought to have become extinct during the 20th century."
      First couple of sentences have been rewritten.
    • "Heavy hunting"—Should be "Intensive hunting".
      Fixed.
    • "Widespread throughout"—better "in".
      "throughout" was used to indicate that it was widespread in the whole of Australia rather than in certain areas. It did have "in mainland Australia" but it was pointed out that this could suggest it was not in Tasmania.
    • "The animal was rare even in Tasmania by the time the first explorers arrived."—Reverse the clauses and separate with a comma? "By the time ..."
      Fixed.
    • "The animal was first definitively encountered by"—awkward wording.
      Fixed(ish - struggling to find an alternative that conveys the same meaning).
    • "Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne, arriving with the Mascarin in 1772, reported meeting with a "tiger cat"." So it was a chat with a cat, was it?
      Fixed (although I think "meeting" is an acceptable synonym for "encountering". It didn't say "arranging a meeting" after all).
    • Can you transliterate the Greek term in parentheses?
      Done.
    • "100 to 180 cm (39–71 in) long, including a tail of around 50 to 65 cm (19.6–25.5 in)"—En dashes for all?
      I used a mixture to break it up a bit, but I'll change it if there is a general objection to that style.

Plus more. Tony 15:07, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the pointers. Yomanganitalk 14:40, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Weymouth

[edit]

This article was nominated by me 3 weeks ago, and failed to recieve FA status, for a number of reasons. The opponents described what needed to be changed to the article, and with excellent help and long dialogues with User:Tutmosis, a long series of improvements have been made to the article. Hence Tutmosis has now confirmed his support for this article to become featured, and I believe that the dozens of improvements I and a few others have made have brought the article upto featured quality. I have checked the article for common mistakes and things which people may object to, and made sure that it conforms to WP:MOS and Featured article criteria. Rossenglish 13:29, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

First FAC

  • SupportObject You don't wikilink solo years, refs come after punctuation and with no space between it and the punctuation--not in the middle of a sentence, dates shouldn't have "th" after them, suggest review the article for more wikilinking.Rlevse 14:16, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
OK thanks for the input, wikilinking has been reviewed  Done Rossenglish 14:25, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Final items: Your see also links should be in alphabetical order and your dates in the refs should be wikilinked. The best thing to do for the refs is put them in citephp/web format. I've done one for you to show you how. Rlevse 15:04, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ive done the see also bit, but the citephp/web formatting of the refs will take a while ;) Its alot of fiddly work to change all those refs, I'll do them slowly one section at a time =)Rossenglish 15:29, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Rlevse, when I have finished changing these refs, would you support the nomination, or do you have any other improvements? Rossenglish 18:19, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That's be all. That's what I meant by "Final items". Rlevse 19:21, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well thankyou! Just to let you know, all the references are in the new format now. Thanks for the suggestions Rlevse. Rossenglish 19:55, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Cyclol

[edit]

Self-nomination. The cyclol model was a historically important early model of protein structure. Although ultimately proven incorrect by experiment, several elements were eventually verified; most importantly, cyclol reactions are a key element of several types of alkaloids, such as the ergopeptides (which happen to be related to LSD). The cyclol model is also an excellent illustration of the scientific method. The references are thorough and I hope that you'll find the text interesting and well-written. Thanks for your comments and suggestions for improving the article! Willow 17:59, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Hi, I wondered about that as well; but I eventually chose the more general name, cyclol, which refers to a historical protein model, a chemical reaction and a class of chemical compounds such as ergotamine. Given how interrelated they are, it didn't seem helpful to make separate articles for those topics, so I put them together under a common title. Hoping that this answers your question, Willow 18:28, 13 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support excellent article - even more so given that it didn't exist at all until a couple of months ago and was almost nope, actually the occasional others were just bots, sorry :) entirely written by Willow. I think I already got all the nitpicks out my system - except the minor comment that "excellent illustration of the scientific method" might be a bit editorializing. Opabinia regalis 02:41, 14 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks very much, Opabinia! The article is really the child of several editors, whose thoughtful suggestions and contributions have helped her grow up: you of course, the kind folks at the Chemistry WikiProject such as Wim van Dorst and Physchim62, and our own FA Zen master Tim Vickers. Thanks, all!
I know what you mean about flirting with editorializing adjectives like "excellent". However, I do think it's verifiable that the history of the cyclol model illustrates how the scientific method works, and does so in an unusually clear way on a fundamental topic (protein structure). So it doesn't seem a stretch to describe it as "excellent". Willow 10:20, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object with regret, as it is mostly an excellent article. However I feel that the section on the "scientific method" is Popperian PoV-pushing... It needs to be rewritten, with reference not only to the view of Karl Popper but also to those of other philosophers of science such as (my fave') Imre Lakatos. I will, of course, try to help out here, as I entirely sympathize with Willow when he/she says that it isn't an easy topic! Physchim62 15:30, 10:20, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've tried re-writing this to make it an example of falsifiability, rather than the scientific method in general. By being more specific here it removes the implication that falsifiability is the only part of the scientific method (which I see as probably true, but is my own POV). See what you think. TimVickers 17:28, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't feel regret, Physchim62, about expressing your true opinion, since no doubt others will think likewise; whatever may happen in science, Wikipedia articles certainly improve from harmonizing different perspectives and reaching consensus. I can honestly say, though, that I'm not consciously pushing a Popperian PoV since I've never read even one word of his work, nor any of Imre Lakatos. The method of considering multiple theories and eliminating the false ones seems much older than the 20th century, wouldn't you agree? I seem to recall reading it in works by Rene Descartes, Galileo Galilei and Isaac Newton; even Aristotle begins many of his works by incinerating earlier theories and sifting the diamonds from the ashes (right after he defines his terminology!). With all due respect to Popper and Lakatos, I think that this article — which is fundamentally about the history of biochemistry — wouldn't be improved by a discussion of the philosophy of the scientific method. Perhaps we can find a compromise? Willow 19:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I re-wrote it a bit Willow, and this may have addressed the concern, but I'm not sure. TimVickers 19:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have placed a half-finished proposal on the talk page for illustration purposes. All comments welcome. Physchim62 (talk) 14:42, 17 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support. Clearly-written, illuminating and well-referenced. Excellent work. TimVickers 23:40, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Joseph W. Tkach

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This article has achieved GA, has gone through general Peer Review, and has achieved A-class in the Biography wikiproject. The comments from all three review boards have been implemented and additional improvements have been made by two anonymous editors. I submit it now as a FAC and I welcome your comments. RelHistBuff 10:59, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comments Overall, well written and well cited.
    • An incident changed him. Very short sentence that chops up the flow of that paragraph. Is there a better way to transition?
    • and he found himself miraculously cured. I'm not sure if I'm entirely comfortable with "miraculously" there...some readers might be led to think the article is stating that his cure was indeed a religious miracle. But that's just me.
    • Commas are a bit inconsistent: "In 1966 Tkach moved..." and "In March 1981, Armstrong appointed him". I'm a fan of commas, so I'd suggest putting them in like the latter example whenever you have a similar construct, but that's a stylistic preference.
    • In the late 1970s a period of disputes occurred... Disputes over what?
    • Since he was an American, I would suggest using American spellings. I saw "characterised", "baptised", "recognised", and "authorised". There may be others.
    • he was to eventually have split infinitive
    • wikilink "disfellowshipped", "Mosaic Law", "dietary laws"
    • the acceptance of the validity of other Christian denominations;[20] etc.. "etc." usually means the reader can infer what the rest of the list looks like. Not the case here though.
    • current Pastor General of the WCG Be careful when using "current". "Pastor General of the WCG as of 2006" may be better.

Gzkn 13:02, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your comments. I agreed with and implemented almost all of them. The prose comments were very helpful and I believe it flows better now. I clarified the type of disputes (leadership and financial), but I didn't add the details. I assume the reader can read more on that in the Stanley Rader article. I removed the whole clause current Pastor General of the WCG as the reader has already been introduced to Tkach Jr. and there is already an article on him. The footnote gives the source which is Tkach Jr.'s book. The only comment I hesitated on was the implemention of commas on introductory elements such as In 1966,. For some reason, it looked a little strange to me. I checked on some other manuals of style and it seems that for short elements that are non-ambiguous, the comma is optional. If the element tends to be long (one manual said more than five words), then a comma should be used. So what I did was to remove commas after short introductory elements, i.e., the ones with years and dates. However, I kept the commas for longer introductory elements such as In assessing the work of Tkach,. RelHistBuff 14:40, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Looks good. You have my support. Gzkn 00:42, 8 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Per my comments in the Bio peer-review.--Yannismarou 08:30, 9 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I saw this article in Peer Review and I appreciate the NPOV tone of this controversial figure and like the way the article strings together a broad portrait of the subject. Agne 23:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I've seen the article grow and omprove over the last few weeks/months. I added a few categories. There may be additional ones available. On a side note, about 2-3 years ago someone I knew had mentioned the WCG and wondered "where did it go"? If this article were available then it would have been easy to tell him. Mfields1 00:02, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Scottish Parliament

[edit]

Self nomination. I believe it is as comprehensive as it can be, well referenced and stable. Has been through peer review with no major problems. Thanks Globaltraveller 15:40, 14 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support Object - Insufficient inline citations. There are huge large swaths of text here without a single reference. Think of the poor reasearcher... he can't reference wikipedia itself, so he needs to reference what we reference. But if we don't specify where we got the information, he can't do that at all, and wikipedia becomes far less useful. Fieari 17:47, 14 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Text is great. Large number of publicity photos are probably fine, status of Image:GeorgeReidSNP.jpeg needs to be resolved. Image:Edinburgh Scottish Parliament01 2006-04-29.jpg needs to be rotated to remove tilt (hint: the buildings have no tilt in reality), or replaced with one of the many images in commons:Category:Scottish Parliament. If a temperature and brightness increase were applied to Image:Scottish Parliament.jpg, it might be suitable. - Samsara (talk ·  contribs) 01:36, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Getting images for this article has been very difficult. There are plenty of building photographs on Wikicommons but either way they belong on the Scottish Parliament Building article rather than repeated here, ad nauseum. I'm not sure there is a great deal I can do about the status of the George Reid photograph. As I'm sure you'll appreciate there are no free use images of him. The only way to rectify this situation is to obtain a fair use image (probably from the parliament website), which I will try - and I'll see what I can do about the photograph of the building - even if it is just a photograph of a part of the building. Thanks for your comments Globaltraveller 11:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments Some weird wikilink issues among other things:
    • Members are elected for 4 year terms... -> "four year terms"
    • 'Scotland during the late 1960's[8] fueled demands Ugly placement of that citation...can it go at the end?
    • Does "oil" really need a wikilink?
    • ...the resulting It's Scotland's oil campaign of the Scottish National Party (SNP) resulted in..
    • in part because the government of the United Kingdom was controlled Why is "United Kingdom" wikilinked here when it was already wikilinked two paragraphs above?
    • a referendum of the Scottish electorate Again, "referendum" is already wilinked two paragraphs before.
    • A few full dates are not wikilinked.
    • which is made from silver and inlaid with gold panned Why are silver and gold wikilinked?
    • including £100 million spent on bronze cladding Why is bronze wikilinked here?
  • A scan of the blue wikilinks of the entire article might be helpful. Just look for odd links that are not relevant to the context of the article. Gzkn 02:31, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Indian Standard Time

[edit]

I had submitted this article in August for FAC (nom) but it failed as it did not get any support to be promoted (+1/-1). I have reviewed the objection carefully since then and don't think it is paramount to add it in the article. Any suggestions welcome (if I can find credible sources). It is currently rated as a Good article. Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 01:16, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

1) With an east-west distance of over 2,000 km (1,200 mi), the sun rises and sets an hour earlier in eastern India than in the west.
2) Begin with an introductory sentence that describes the problems with the ist. (Wikimachine 12:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
Reply. Both problems addressed. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 16:49, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Addendum. Being "too short" isn't an actionable concern unless what is missing is pointed out. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:02, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In comparative sense, many other standard time articles should also be featured articles if this should one also, for example Time in Australia. This should apply for good article, if it wants to try. Additional topics that could expand this article are broadcasting concerns, list of metropolitan areas/states within the zone, inaccuracy & standards (in relation to Earth's orbit & rotation & axis), & anomalies. I didn't think of these out of blue, they are in other time zone articles such as Central European Time, etc. (Wikimachine 03:36, 22 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
Time in Australia is hardly referenced (no inline refs), and what is more important, I don't even see it going to FAC, so there is no question of it being rejected on grounds that it is short. If the referencing concerns are addressed, I am sure that TiA can also be a featured article. For comparison, Crushing by elephant is nearly the same size as this one, and it is a featured article. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 05:23, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
But we're not talking about referencing, I think this article's fine in that. & as I've mentioned in the section below, justification is not necessary. This is probably the first time when a standard time article becomes a featured article (if it does). So it needs different standards. And I think that this article needs to be really good to make a worthy precedent for other standard time articles to follow. And I personally don't think that those other articles about exploding whale, Crushing by elephant, Japanese toilets, etc. should be featured articles. (Wikimachine 17:24, 23 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
Can you elucidate what you mean by "broadcasting concerns". The list of metropolitan areas in the zone would be useless as it has been mentioned in the first sentence of the lead that IST is followed throughout India, without any exceptions. Inaccuracies & standards WRT Earth's orbit are better discussed in a dedicated article like Equation of time, and the same info need not be repeated in all the time zone articles as it is beyond their scope. Anyway, thanks for pointing out this relevant topic and I have added it to the "See also" section. Anomalies usually occur when there is different standard prevailing for places that should have a common standard. Since IST is applied everywhere, there are no anomalies. Of course, a single standard comes with its own set of problems, which have been discussed in the "Problems" section. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 05:35, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Inaccuracies & standards are specific to this article because they vary among different time zones. I don't expect readers to be able to go to Indian Standard Time Zone, go to Equation of Time, calculate the differences & anomalies & the say "aha!".
You could add something about the time zone's uniformity. Another user could never know what's missing & what's not. About broadcasting concern, I don't think that this zone has one because as you said it is standard throughout all of India. (Wikimachine 17:24, 23 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
Given that it was used as a wartime measure, it could also have been used in order to deter night lights serving as a beacon for enemy planes if they attacked cities late in the evening or at the crack of dawn. That's a possibility, that's why a source stating the reason would be better. Many war time memories state that vehicles were asked to switch off lights for this purpose as few military planes had night vision. Idleguy 18:24, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
True, but that's technically called a blackout, not a DST. The source clearly mentions DST, not blackout. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 19:07, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Such a possibility might have used it as a deterrance measure, but it would be more suited to the border areas rather than changing the timezone of the entire country. Again this would be speculative. =Nichalp «Talk»= 00:23, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The article's history says vipala is the smallest unit of measuring time based on hindu traditions. But according to Hindu astronomy, half a nimesa (ardha nimesa) is the smallest one. After doing some math I found that vipala works out to 1/216,000th of a day while half a nimesa is 1/405000 day according to that article. One of these must be wrong, or maybe I'm confused. Idleguy 11:55, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Oppose. There are still a couple of issues including the citation not matching what is written. For instance, note #2 points to a BBC article that only says that the issue was being investigated and doesn't say anything about it was not recommended, or the reasons why it was not adopted. I found that an earlier mention to the hindu article was wrongly pointed to some other website, but I corrected it myself. The article has to say why it was not adopted with proper cite. Also, the article should mention the official internet page where the time can be checked. AIR and Doordarshan are mentioned, but I'm assuming that an official website exists somewhere. Idleguy 14:50, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    I'll be overseeing it over the weekend. Thanks! =Nichalp «Talk»= 07:46, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I've checked all the references and it seems to be ok. Also updated the dates accessed.
    • As for DST, the article on it Daylight Savings Time does not list any other reasons why it may be used other than energy savings.
    • Added reason why timezones were rejected by Govt of India. Real coup as I got it from a Rajya Sabha transcript.
    • Added more text to the article.
    • Added a link where the IST can be checked.
    =Nichalp «Talk»= 17:44, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Other reasons for DST from the article says it reduces crime and traffic accidents and encouraging outdoor activities. -Idleguy 14:48, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Good compact article. Meets FA criteria. --Dwaipayan (talk) 16:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - Is licensing Image:IST-CIA-TZ.png as {{pd-self}} acceptable, considering it is a derived work?--thunderboltz(Deepu) 17:09, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Reply. I am sure it is. The original work is licensed as a {{PD-self}}, which means that the author doesn't claim any right on the image any more. This means that there is no authorship claim on the image and the image is truly free. This allows anyone to pass on the image under any license, even as a self-created work. However, to make things clear that the image has been sourced from such a work, a link to the original image has been provided. Even this, I believe, is courtesy, not a requirement considering the waiver of all rights over the image by the original author. Note that even the original work is derived from PD work, i.e. CIA World Factbook, and claimed as PD-self. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:27, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support A nice article with a length that does not intimidate. We need more of these. --Blacksun 19:17, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: A great article with detailed information ("Indian Standard Time (IST) is the time observed throughout India, with a time offset of UTC+5:30. India does not observe daylight saving time (DST) or other seasonal adjustments, although DST was used briefly during the Sino–Indian War of 1962, and the Indo–Pakistani Wars of 1965 and 1971") that covers the history as well as problems of Indian Standard Time. (User • Talk) 00:29, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support This article is well written and well referenced with appropriate use of inline citations. Jay32183 18:09, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Conspiracy Here & Absolute Oppose

[edit]
  • I checked national identity of the 7 Wikipedians (besides me) who participate in this featured article promotion.
  • 6/7 Wikipedians are Indians.
  • 3/7 Wikipedians here edited the article.
  • Absolutely Oppose.
  • Conspiracy.
  • Unless you bring in more third party voters, I'm reporting this to a higher branch in Wikipedia, such as the Arbitration Committee. (Wikimachine 03:42, 22 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
    • Hmmm...if this indeed were a conspiracy, you would have already seen my support on the article. I supported the article in the last FAC, but since I now consider it a semi co-nom as I have edited the article a lot, I haven't shown my "Support" for the article. Also, if you were regular at FAC, you would have seen Spangineer as a neutral and (ahem....) ruthless participator in FAC debates. Also, it is a good thing if the reviewers make a good faith effort in improving the article. If you see my edit history, you would have seen that I edit almost 80~90% of the articles I see during FAC. Again, you need not worry about these things as FAC is not even a !vote, and a single valid objection is enough to sink the article. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 05:13, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • If there were conspiracies, Idleguy and Deepujoseph would have registered support, rather than raising concerns that could sink the FAC. I see 3 Indians who have supported this, and 2 Indians who have raised concerns. (Me and Nichalp have not !voted as this is a co-nom). So it is anybody's guess if this is conspiracy to promote or reject. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 05:49, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • \FAC is not a vote. No one is obliged to bring in third party votes. If you have some objections regarding the content of the article, then it would be useful to all if you could list them. If you can't find any points to object, then your conspiracy theory is moot as according to you the article is already FA standards. Please note that Raul does not just count the number of votes while promoting articles, but also checks if all the concerns by other editors have been addressed. And then there is also AGF. Regards, - Aksi_great (talk) 06:00, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I also want to add that Wikimachine's opposition due to what he/she perceives as an "Indian conspiracy" is quite offensive and has nothing to do with the content of the article. Gzkn 07:09, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I find it really funny that Wikimachine wants to push it to arbitration. If he so wishes he may do so, but please do remember what the Arbcom is meant for before you submit your case. Don't say we didn't warn you if your case is unanimously thrown out. Next, five of the people who have commented/supported the article have at least one featured article to their name. So your case of a people blindly voting based on their nationality seems to be a matter of making wild accusations which I consider offensive as you haven't researched on who is reviewing the article. If the article is as bad as you say, why don't you help us by telling us what criteria of WP:WIAFA it does not meet? =Nichalp «Talk»= 15:11, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I never meant it as Indian conspiracy. But this is what I consider internal systemic bias. I can imagine a group of foreigners who only participate in articles regarding topics pertaining to their own culture/history & since they are the only ones participating in it, they could be the only ones participating in the featured article candidate discussion & thus making featured article status inevitable.
    • Foreigners? I'm not sure which country you're from, so I'm not sure which nationalities you would consider foreigners. Would an article on an American topic that was passed by mostly American editors qualify for similar suspicion? What about Canada? The UK? MLilburne 18:38, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I am interested in what group did you classify me? I hold an American Passport but live and work in Netherlands while also having Indian ancestry. Please note, my utter disgust and strong offense at your attempt to classify me and other wikipedians on racial or ethnic groups and implying that our input/vote is based on anything but the quality of the article. --Blacksun 12:14, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Foreigners as people who aren't English-speaking Europeans.
    • In my invitation for various WikiProjects, I've posted this: "I want to note that Indians are a special exception from other nationalities in Wikipedia because most of them can speak and write fluent English & thus can participate more in English Wikipedia while other foreigners can't & thus limit their participation in fields related to their nationality/culture & making participation of other third parties more likely.", thus clarifying my cooperative stance with Indians yet focusing on the internal systemic bias.
    • As for Americans/British/etc. editing English leading to POVness/systemic bias, see Wikipedia:WikiProject countering systemic bias. Furthermore, I think that users of other nationalities have different incentives from those of Americans/British/Canadians/Australians/etc. in editing the English Wikipedia. The first being the expansion & promotion of articles related to their culture/history/country, as a means of resisting the systemic bias of the majority, not only in Wikipedia but also in society. And English Wikipedia, written under the international language, is the best and most productive means of achieving this goal. The majority in the English Wikipedia are mostly English-speaking people, and therefore do not have any incentive to do so.
    • Blacksun, I'm sorry that you were offended (and others too), but I did not do the classification myself. I looked at user pages of each of the voters in the fac earlier.
  • Nej - you indeed classified me based on false assumptions. No where in my userpage I mention anything about my nationality. You made a false assumption based on couple of barnster awards or user activity. --Blacksun 22:31, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
One exception was you. (Wikimachine 22:40, 26 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
  • I'm disregarding the fact that some of you "commented" instead of "voting" & I'm not going to check editing history of every one of you b/c (1) I don't think I can (2) Too many (3) Simpler option: bring in third party.
  • I'd say third party is absolutely needed, regardless of whether something is a vote or not. Community consensus means not only opinions from one type of nationality/culture, but a mix.
  • It fails to comply with 1 (b): "Comprehensive" means that the article does not neglect major facts and details. I've listed additional topics that the article could cover (since other standard time articles cover them) & there is no reason why if this should be a featured article, others should be also.
  • "Well written" means that the prose is compelling, even brilliant. I've noted few format/style problems, and I can note much more brilliant quality in other featured articles. There's no reason why because some featured articles were nominated in shorter form than this one this one should be. Maybe, we need to correct our previous mistakes. This type of justification is unnecessary.
  • This is a vote, that's why voting's taking place (?). The paragraph in the very top part of this page says that consensus must be reached. Quotation from the article Wikipedia:Consensus:
Precise numbers for "supermajority" are hard to establish, and Wikipedia is not a majoritarian democracy, so simple vote-counting should never be the key part of the interpretation of a debate. However, when supermajority voting is used, it should be seen as a process of 'testing' for consensus, rather than reaching consensus.
(Wikimachine 16:50, 23 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
You are free to bring in more editors to weigh on this article and we would appreciate any additional feedback on the article. But as mentioned earlier, I would repeat that unlike the processes like RfA where numbers can't be disregarded, FACs depend totally on merit and even a single valid opposition is good enough to stop the article from being a featured article. If you don't believe me, ask Raul, who handles FAC promotions. Also, there are reasons why some people restrict themselves to a category of articles. One of them is that they are confident in their knowledge in that particular field only, and are in better position to comment on comprehensiveness. For example, if I ask you to review Chalukya Dynasty, you would hadly be in a position to comment anything other than spelling and grammer. So I see it a positive sign that people only pass their judgment on what they are confident about. Secondly, the Indian Wikiproject is a very active workgroup with lot of closely working people so that whenever any help is needed, there are always a big group of people to refer to. This has helped us in our previous endevours to get FAs as even before the articles are submitted for FA, there is very rigourous review of the article by the workgroup itself. I wouldn't be wrong to say that selection into the Indian portal is one of the biggest challenge that could be faced by an article after FAC. You won't see that in case of this article, as Nichalp already has 10 FA under his belt so he knows what are the common mistakes and objections. For example see the recently concluded discussion on Culture of Thiruvananthapuram article to get selected into the Indian Portal. Would you say that there is conspiracy for selection to even Indian Portal? Coming back to the issues of merits of the article (which probably should be our primary concern). I have addressed all concerns raised by you except for the "broadcasting concerns" which I am unable to comprehend. If you can clarify what you want, even that can be addressed. As regards to quality of prose, please point out where the article lacks, as it is very difficult for us if you don't even point out where the article lacks. With regards to the size of the article, even I don't want that to be a part of the debate, but I remember that you first brought that into picture and I had to address that. Personally speaking, I feel that we should talk about this specific article, rather than any general article. Finally, I again repeat that FAC is not a !vote. Hope this clears the doubts in your mind. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:20, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I am changing my stance. I've looked at all other standard time articles in process of searching for what this article might lack.... But most other time zone articles have one word/sentence & then list of metropolitan areas. So I am willing to support if you would add something about the anomalies in rotation, etc. in the Problem sections. But let users that I've invited comment also as due process of reaching consensus. (Wikimachine 17:27, 23 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
Thank you for your change in stance. Do you suggest we duplicate information from Equation of time to all time articles in this list? — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:32, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Kind of, but aren't there anomalies specific to the time zone? (Wikimachine 21:32, 23 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]
  • Support The the expansion of the Problems section to include the anomalies specific to the time zone has been done. All grammar and prose problems that I have identified were fixed. This is the best time zone article available & will set good standards for later time zone featured articles. (Wikimachine 03:12, 25 November 2006 (UTC))[reply]

Support It support the article. Amartyabag 12:18, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Further comment. While I don't want to get heavily involved in this discussion, I did click on the featured article at Chalukya Dynasty. I was impressed by the detail and breadth and sourcing. However, I came across phrasing like "It brought about some remarkable achievements in the myriad realms of culture, particularly in the evolution and proliferation of their unique style of architecture known as Vesara, a combination of the South Indian and the North Indian building styles. Chalukyas have left behind their legacy of some of the most beautiful monuments." There are prose and NPOV problems there. While not the result of intentional bias on the part of the editors, these statements do not belong in a featured article in this form, and perhaps it is the very way that the article topic is opaque to most foreigners that causes that type of thing to be missed. Of course it's not a conspiracy, but I can understand objections to the tone. The featured articles on British topics, say, have been read and seen and edited by more editors before being promoted. This has probably resulted in more ironing-out of problems with the articles. That is not to fault the nominator here or of any other article on an Indian topic, as we all work with whoever we can draw to our projects; no one mentioned this problem in a peer review that happened only last month. However, prose style is a big issue when the overall goal is to make Wikipedia articles unbiased and verifiable. The phrases "remarkable achievements" and "some of the most beautiful monuments" can never be verified because they are subjective. They may very well be beautiful and remarkable, but to say so isn't encyclopedic. ...And I know we are not here to talk about the Chalukya Dynasty, so I will turn off the objections now. Dekimasu 01:03, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Nick,
Thanks for taking time to review the article. I have fixed the hyphens used incorrectly for endashes, but couldn't find any occurance that would need an emdash. As I told to Wikimachine before, can you please point out the places you feel the article lacks, because if we could see any better, we would have already fixed it. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 13:29, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have given another copyedit to the article. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 13:51, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I came over from WikiProject: Countering systemic bias. Foreigners? What does that mean anyway? Is this a country? I guess I am a foreigner (as defined by Wikimachine) as I am not an English-speaking European (although I am an American). It is not unusual (as pointed by Angr) for people interested in an article to work on it and vote it to FA. That has always gone on. Usually, they are not seen as "foreigners", so I can only hazard a guess that is what brought this on. I don't think we should discourage what is going on here, and especially not under the guise of countering systemic bias. There is no conspiracy here. Just hard-working editors seeking to bring information that is usually not added, from a background quite different than many on English Wikipedia. We should encourage this, as that is why the countering systemic bias project was formed in the first place. --C S (Talk) 00:16, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment I think the problems section should be expanded. For eg: I had read in a newspaper a few years back that assam and the north eastern states wanted to change the IST because the local time is 1 hour forward than IST. I'll try to add that infoin the article.--Agεθ020 (ΔT • ФC) 21:41, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Reply. This infor is already present. The following sentence summarizes it: "Inhabitants of the north–eastern states have long demanded a separate time zone to advance their clocks with the early sunrise and avoid the extra consumption of energy after daylight hours." Reference is also provided for the same. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 05:22, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - referred from WikiProject Germany. I have two suggestions for improvement, both minor. I agree that the article is comprehensive and well sourced, but would love to see some references from printed, not online sources. Also, the first sentence of the "History" section, specifically the phrase "...which according to them", strikes me as clumsy. However, these concerns are nowhere near big enough to prevent it from reaching featured status, IMO. Badbilltucker 23:01, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support; informative, well-writen prose, good images and generally worthy of FA. Laïka 11:57, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments:
    • I was wondering about daylight saving time that was used in two wars. This should be an important fact, because it is re-iterated in the lead section. However, the main article only explains it in a single sentence and it is an orphan paragraph. I'd like to learn more about this fact. Could editors expand that stubby paragraph?
    • Another important fact in the lead is the contradiction clauses of this sentence: "Local time is calculated from a clock tower at the Allahabad Observatory (25.15° N 82.5° E) though the official time servers are located in New Delhi." Why can't I find it in the main article? I want to know why there are two different time calculations?
— Indon (reply) — 13:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object per my unanswered comments above and the following other comments, as of the time of my review [15]:
    • Comprehensiveness. The article is too short to be featured. Many portions of the article is about the history of time zones in India, so I would suggest to rename the title into "Time Zones in India" or something like that.
    • Unreliable sources:
— Indon (reply) — 15:21, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Replying:
  1. Sources: 1. http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/ authors are known: (credits), and see the [http://wwp.greenwich2000.ltd.uk/legal.htm legal notice too about accuracy. Ads does not mean that the site is necessarily uncredible. 2. Ifrca is a very credible site contrary to what is says about it being just a mailing list (those were it's origins). Infact most of Indian Railways and Rail transport in India have been sourced from the site. And their content is internally peer reviewed before publishing, and many newpapers do source their content from this site. 3. I don't know about the third reference, I can't find a better one, so would remove it perhaps?
  2. Length: there are many short featured articles, (see WP:WIAFA) where short articles are also included. This is unactionable unless you tell us what content it lacks. You said something about DST, what sort of content are you looking for?
  3. Title: No, the article is about the development of the IST. How different timezones were merged into one and what the country used before that. It won't be a good idea to change the title just based on the content of one section. It was used for not more than 10 days. =Nichalp «Talk»= 17:22, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Mirzapur and Delhi. At Mirzapur, IST is the local time. The acutal mechanisms which are calibrated +5:30 UTC are not on that longitude, but further westward, in New Delhi. That is what the meaning implies.

Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 17:22, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

    • Response:
      1. Yes, the authors are known in source (1), but the website is not preferred. It looks like spam links, although I know editors of this article don't have anything to do with ads in those website. If there is other preferred, possibly academic, sources, then please replace those sources.
      2. I am not questioning the credibility of IRFCA as an organization, but taking maling list discussion from individuals as source here, for me, is not a good practice. It would be reliable if the source (2) is a press release documents or reports from IRFCA, but not FAQ. If other WP articles use that kind of source, then it does not mean that the source is reliable.
      3. If you can't find a better reference for the source (3), then please remove it and also the fact that comes from it.
      4. Yes, length is not a WIAFA criterion, but I'm still feeling that the article is not comprehensive enough. Unless if the subject is "History of Time Zones in India", for example.
      5. I was asking DST that is said to be used only for the two wars. It is written in the lead, but there is only a single sentence in the main article, which is just a copy-pasted from [16]. In the lead, it is written:
        India does not observe daylight saving time (DST) or other seasonal adjustments, although DST was used briefly during the Sino–Indian War of 1962, and the Indo–Pakistani Wars of 1965 and 1971.
      For me, it is an interesting thing, but there is only this stubby orphaned paragraph in the main article:
      During the Sino–Indian War of 1962, and the Indo–Pakistani Wars of 1965 and 1971, daylight saving was briefly used to reduce civilian energy consumption.
      I want to know why if DST could reduce civilian energy consumption during the war, but it is not used in other time? Why was it said that only civilian energy consumption were reduced in the war? Were there any specific advantages to the army by using DST? Oh, and please don't answer these questions here, but in the article.
    — Indon (reply) — 09:13, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Replies:

  1. other preferred, possibly academic, sources, then please replace those sources – If I could get my hands on such, I certainly wouln't hesitate to update the references. As mentioned in the nom, I can add new text subject to the availability of references. An article as obscure as this, does not have too much dedicated material on it. To illustrate this point, see this this
  2. I've removed the text on the trial
  3. Online or print references for using DST are not available at the moment, so can't add.

Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 09:04, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply:
  • Nichalp wrote: "An article as obscure as this, does not have too much dedicated material on it. To illustrate this point, see this this" → that is why I cannot support this article to be featured. Sources used in this article are not yet reliable.
  • To add of what I have said that this article is not comprehensive enough, and Nichalp said "This is unactionable unless you tell us what content it lacks.", actually, you pointed to me one of them from the Google Books' search result that you gave. One of the book has an interesting and important aspect of IST that affect ordinary life in India. Please see this: [17], where labour time in a factory has been affected by the IST. This is still missing in the article and I guess a lot more aspects beside labour time.
  • Ah, thank you for pointing me that search. I found one more. Chapter 8 of this book: "What's This India Bussiness?" (ISBN 1904838006) has title: IST - Indian S t r e t c h a b l e Time, which describes the difficulty in India to have IST for arranging meeting, bussiness, etc. I would like to see that more in this article.
— Indon (reply) — 09:35, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply:

  • Answering 2: I can't find a specific instance to the string "labour time". The link does not mention anything about it I'm afraid.
  • Answering 3: Indian Strechable Time was added for a short time as a trivia, but Gzkn recommended we not add this (see above). As such, mentioning the habits of people in an article in an encouraging or disparaging way is considered to be a POV on wikipedia despite references on the same.

=Nichalp «Talk»= 06:52, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Response:
  • Response (2): It doesn't necessarily to be strictly an exact phrase. The book contains information about the influence of IST for labour time in Indian factories. To give an outlook of what this book is about, I typed one paragraph from it.

As the home of the clock, however, the factory comes to mark the temporal parameters of the day, housing as it does the omnipresent siren. The siren, which used to be a loud hand-beaten "gong", sounds eight times during the day, beginning at six in the morning. Most symbolically, residues of colonial time schedules remain within workers' perceptions of the siren's call. During the colonial period, the siren's clock was advanced by half an hour, creating a temporal schism: Garden Time and Indian Standard Time. Thus when it was actually 5:30 in the morning by Indian Standard Time, the siren would sound the beginning of the 6:00 factory shift. Prior to labor legislation, planters manipulated daylight hours to stretch the working span of the day. With postcolonial legal stipulations of six- and eight- hour days, Garden Time is strictly obsolete and its earlier extractive objectives cannot be met; even if the clock was to advance by half an hour, only the stipulated legal hours of work are permitted. At Sarah's Hope, the siren sounds Indian Standard Time. Workers, nonetheless, continue to perceive this artifact of colonial scheduling as somehow present within the logics of the contemporary regimes of work.

  • Response (3): I didn't ask editors to put Indian Stretcheable Time, but in that book there are information about Indian Standard Time that creates difficulty for bussiness. Is it trivia? No. It is different aspect of the subject of this article, as to get more comprenhensive.
  • One more source: http://cires.colorado.edu/~bilham/Oldham1881account.htm is broken in the following citation:

"Note on the earthquake of 31 December 1881, Records of the Geological Survey of India,, XVII(2), 47–53, 1884". Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES). Retrieved 2006-11-25.

According to the last web archive on 5 Januari 2006 (not 25 November 2006!!), the webpage is a reprint from Proc. Asiatic Society of Bengal, March 1883. p.60. Somebody should take a look at this article to verify that factual data that is written in this article are correct.
  • For me, sources of the article currently for this FAC nomination are still vague: Google-ads websites, FAQ of mailing list discussions, an email (was removed) and now a dead link.
— Indon (reply) —
  1. On Tea Plantations: To answer #1, from the example you cited, A Time for Tea actually talks about exploitation, that phrase has little to do with problems associated with the time-zone. Now as mentioned in the article, there is a legislation that allows factories in a local area to change the local time. If it is exploitation, it does not imply that IST is affected, or refer a generalised statement that this is what happens because of the time shift for factor/plantation time.
  2. On stretchable time: I'm still not convinced. Quoting from the book: Indian Stretchable Time, the usual version of what IST stands for, is a brilliant excapsulation of so many attitudes and perspectives. However, it isn't mystical. – The term is coined on the for the fact that many in India have the tendancy to arrive late. This may be a problem for businesses etc, but th core concept relates to the personal habits of people in India, and not the time zone, or a problem with it. None of the above two examples can really add to the "comprehensiveness" of the article.
  3. On the CIRES link : I can hit the link, not sure what the problem was there: Here is the extract if you're interested:

At Calcutta the time of arrival of the earthquake was noted by Mr. James Murray, who writes, in reply to my inquiries, that he was reading in an upstairs room when feeling the shock he immediately ran downstairs and marked on the glass of his standard regulating clock, the exact position of the second's hand and then waited to note the time of cessation of motion; afterwards he carefully took with a second's watch the time that occupied to do all he done between the moment he first felt the shock and when he made the first mark on the clock, adding this and the error of the clock on that morning, he obtained the times of commencement and cessation as 7:37:45 and 7:42:00 Calcutta Mean time, or 7:55:02 and 7:59:17 Port Blair mean time, respectively. This, I may add, is the only observation of real value made at the time and not automatically recorded that I know of in connection with this shock.

At Madras a clock in the office of the Master Attendant, electronically controlled from the astronomical observatory, was stopped at 07:05:45 local time or 07:55:36 Port Blair mean time.

=Nichalp «Talk»= 04:42, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support Looks good; I have touched up the language in a few places, I hope without altering meaning. I thought there were a lot of hyphenated phrases (I've left): "four-member", "time-zone" & others, that maybe could go.
  • Comments 1) Bhutan & BD are presumably on +6 hours, but the map with the zones doesn't say so. I would make the map bigger- or maybe you can't make it big enough to read off the page.
  • 2) I didn't really understand the bit about the terrorist's lawyer in Mumbai. It says he "argued" by "stalling" - they don't work together. What were his motives?
  • 3) I was curious in reading it - how many "prativa pala"s to a solar day? Too lazy to use my calculator, & maybe too big a number for the first para.

I'd better add, for Wikimachine's statistics: white, male, lives in Uk, hetrosexual, Catholic, visited India (inc Jaipur & Dehli Jantar Mantars) and Bhutan. Probably I'm a foreigner - not sure. Any other info you need, just let me know! Johnbod 02:33, 28 November 2006 (UTC) Johnbod 02:33, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

1. The map does show the timezone as +6. (The text is at the bottom). I'm working on an SVG version which will replace this rather silly looking one. 2. Um... Tilak wasn't a terrorist. He was arrested to having alleged links to a bomb blast. I think the stalling motives are clear... he kinda stalled proceedings in the assembly against a switch. Since the issue was minor and public sentiment was against the British, they shelved it as it was deadlocked. Was this clearer? Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 16:54, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • ok - I can see both points now, but did not before, which may tell you something. It sounded like the objection to the time zone was a tactic in the trial defence. If the barrister was not involved in the actual trial, you might drop the word barrister (confusing to non-foreigners anyway). I would go with "further antagonising" rather than antagonization.

Johnbod 17:12, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

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This is a self-nomination. I am renominating this article after it previously failed. The reasons given, were that it needed a good copyedit and more references. All of the problems were noted and addressed (thanks to a wonderful copyedit by Deckiller) and I now believe it to be among Wikipedia's best work. It has had a peer review and has been rated as A-class by WikiProject Films. It is not only a good article, but also a part of the newly formed featured topic. The Filmaker 04:08, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Co-nom/Support — a solid article all around; the prose should qualify enough, but I'll definitely be around if anyone believes that further copyediting is needed. — Deckiller 04:47, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'd add a sentence or two mentioning Star Wars' inspirations and impact in the lead.
    • I'm not saying include the actual names of all the inspirations and such in the lead; I'd just like the lead to mention that Star Wars drew inspiration from a number of sources, and that it has influenced just as many others. Then the lead would give a nice overview of the entire article.--Dark Kubrick 13:32, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • The ninth paragraph down in Production History jumps around a bit too much, with a misleading opening sentence.
  • From the Releases section: "He was later told that silence was the Japanese's greatest honor to a film." Japanese's? Is that really correct?
  • The paragraph that talks about Kurosawa's influence in Cinematic + Literary Allusions has a couple mistakes.
Here's the first few sentences of that paragraph: "1958 Kurosawa film The Hidden Fortress was also an influence, with the two bickering peasants (who evolved into C-3PO and R2-D2), elements of the Obi-Wan/Luke relationship and the Darth Vader-like evil General wears a kamon, and a Japanese family crest seen in the film is similar to the Imperial Crest. Star Wars borrows heavily from another Kurosawa film, Yojimbo. In both films, several men threaten the hero, bragging how wanted they are by authorities." "The" should be inserted in the first sentence, although I think it reads better like Akira Kurosawa's 1958 film The Hidden Fortress was also...". "elements of the Obi-Wan/Luke relationship and the Darth Vader-like evil General wears a kamon" is not a sentence, there should be a comma in place of the "and", and probably a "who" after General. I don't think the comparison between Darth Vader and the General is made very clear also. Also, the last sentence could be (but this one I'm not too sure, so it could be dead wrong)"...several men threaten the hero, bragging how they are wanted by the authorities".

Excellent job. I look forward to Episodes V and VI soon.--Dark Kubrick 17:09, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. I just copyedited some of the later sections and left a SGML comment query about the last part of the first paragraph of the Novelization section, which somewhat confuses me. I haven't had time yet to scan the upper parts of the article, but will do so later. — TKD::Talk 18:18, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Terrific article, well written and referenced. Hello32020 21:29, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. -- Wikipedical 21:52, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Overall, this is a good article and well cited as well as a good read. The only thing I can see that might need looked at is there are a few citations that are in the middle of sentences not following punctuation in the first half of the article. Other than that it's well written. Darthgriz98 22:15, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Anyone have issues with the prose? — Deckiller 23:22, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I like the article a lot; it seems very well done (and I'm of course a fan of the movie as well). Nicholasink 02:51, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. It's looking good. I hope reviewers will give it the fine-toothed comb it deserves, as one of the most important movies ever. At the moment the second paragraph in "Production" concerns me, because it seems to be expecting "in-knowledge" of the movie and to some extent reads like trivia. "Luke Skywalker's character changed from a 60-year-old General to a member of a family of midgets." OK, but he didn't end up as a midget, and I'm not told that. Same goes for some of the other sentences in that para. Other possibilities include repositioning this information to later in the article, as it's very early. Also, I'm not sure why the characters, and The Force (Star Wars), aren't wikilinked here. –Outriggr § 06:45, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Yeah; it might be excessive information. I believe The Force is linked in the article, as are the characters (most likely above the section, as usual policy is to link it the first time it appears). — Deckiller 07:18, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments Concerned about the prose among other things...specifically:
    • Why not link 1977 to 1977 in film instead of the year?
    • Moreover, Lucas disliked the studio system... I'm not entirely sure why "moreover" is used there...I don't see the continuity from the previous sentences.
    • Agree with Outriggr's comments about the assumption of prior knowledge in "Production". The Force was initially conceived as the Kyber crystal <-- wikilink the Force here (first appearance). Han Solo needs one as well.
    • ...the left leg shattered down into the plastic of the left foot, stabbing him in the foot. Hmmm...I think I know what's trying to be said here, but how about "the left leg piece shattered down through the plastic that was covering his left foot, stabbing him."? Also, C3PO isn't wikilinked here when it probably should.
    • After Tunisia, production moved... --> "After finishing filming in Tunisia, production moved..."
    • Para that begins with Lucas clashed on the set... includes quite a few unsourced statements.
    • ...playing scenes out in master shots, then flowing into close-up coverage. Might want to wikilink the terms on film technique.
    • Hirsch and Chew "leap-frogged" by one grabbing reel one and the other grabbing reel two; whoever finished their reel first would grab reel three. When the Tusken Raider (played by stuntman Peter Diamond) attacks Luke, the editors ran the reel back and forth, causing the Raider to raise his weapon several times.[2] Huh? Confusing (even more so if the reader is unfamiliar with Tusken Raiders).
    • During production, the cast attempted to make Lucas laugh or smile as he often appeared depressed. No transition? Perhaps a new para would be better here.
    • Mark Hamill's face was injured in a car accident, which made reshoots impossible. Here's where a "moreover" would be helpful in connecting this to the previous thoughts.
    • four shots that Lucas declined --> "four shots that Lucas ultimately declined to use"
    • The dogfights provided a pacing that the script, storyboards, and Lucas could not describe. Huh? Could not describe?
    • these early animatics were later created with CGI effects in the production of the prequel films "created" gives the wrong impression there. This clause is also unneccessary IMO.
    • The voice of R2-D2 was said to be the most difficult sound to develop "said to be" is pretty weaselly.
    • was achieved by placing a miniature microphone into the regulator of a scuba tank, followed by Burtt breathing through the mask itself. "followed by" and "itself" make the sentence quite awkward.
    • He originally wanted Orson Welles to speak for Darth Vader. Darth should be linked earlier than this.
    • It had been suggested that C-3PO... Suggested by whom?
    • I stopped here, but I have a feeling the entire article may need a thorough copy-edit, preferably by someone not familiar with the films. Gzkn 12:41, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • I agree with most of your suggestions (a couple invite redundancies). Nobody should've had to go through this if I had spent more time on the article or asked for someone else to double team the article. I'm embarrassed that I let The Filmmaker nominate this article without giving it a more detailed treatment. — Deckiller 18:02, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • Ah yes, I took a look at your corrections and your edit of "four shots that Lucas declined" is definitely much better than the clumsiness that I had suggested. :) I knew something was wrong with ending just with "declined" but I didn't know how exactly to fix it... Gzkn 13:43, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • The main sections to worry about now are the reaction and allusion sections, which I have barely touched. I'd rather have someone else work on those sections at least at first, since I've clearly lost my edge on this article. — Deckiller 18:37, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I agree with the sentiments above; some Eyeballs with Freshness™ need to review the whole article for copy. I have contributed some, and don't mind continuing, if the dynamics of the process stay collaborative. –Outriggr § 02:56, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • You did not cross off some other items that were addresed (actually, all have either been addressed or done in a manner that improved the points made). — Deckiller 03:40, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments. First, there's a blatant breaching of the rules in the failure by at least two supporters (Outriggr, The Filmaker and are there more?) to declare that they are significant contributors to the article, i.e., before its nomination. I must ask that their text here be disregarded until they insert such a declaration.
  • Second, although the copy-editing of Deckiller et al is in evidence, more polishing is required. Here are random examples.
    • "nineteen" but then "14". The usual way is to spell out single-digit numbers, and numericalise all others.
    • At the opening, "is" vs "was" conflict.
    • "a genre that drew relatively low numbers at the box office"—Remove "relatively".
    • "Lucas would later propose that"—Can we go easy on the journalistic backslung conditional? "Lucas later proposed that" is perfectly good.
    • "(ILM). ILM"—close repetition.
    • "Eventually, 20th Century Fox approved a budget of $8,250,000. Furthermore,..."—"eventually" is not encyclopedic: it's just too vague, and begs for precise chronological information. "Furthermore", like "in addition" and "also", is usually an unnecessary back-link. Just remove it.
    • "were constructed based on"—"on the basis of" would be more idiomatic.
    • "Special Edition"—no title case for WP titles. Tony 04:30, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm...I think the Filmaker stated above that it was a self-nom. Outriggr has yet to support the nomination and he did say he contributed to the article... Gzkn 04:34, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks Tony; I'm always afraid to remove passive "would" wording, but at least you laid down the law here (reminds me of the Shadow of the Colossus FA in a way). What do you mean by the is vs was and the no title case points? — Deckiller 04:53, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm reminded yet again why I stay away from FAC. I contributed to the article only after it came to FAC, as a result of the article coming to FAC. Tony, I know you prefer armchair commentary, but I tried to help, and I thought that was within my right without having to disclaim it. It's a goddamn wiki. Is this an article improvement and featuring process, or is it some kind of absurd game? I'm not saying another bloody word in FAC again. Bye. –Outriggr § 05:11, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Did I miss something? — Deckiller 05:17, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • No, I think you probably read, above, Tony's accusing me of a "blatant breaching of the rules" (as you Gkzn noted, which I saw later, I have not "supported" the article). Regardless of his being incorrect on a number of counts, the result is the same—"no good deed goes unpunished". What's the point of pitching in to improve articles in the face of an environment like this? The pedantry around here leaves me cold. –Outriggr § 05:31, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, very sorry if I made a mistake. I just looked down the edit history and thought I'd seen you before the nomination date. My fault. Tony 08:26, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. –Outriggr § 02:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'll just add, Tony, that I wouldn't have gotten quite as excited if Joe Blow had said something like this to/about me. As you're a FAC regular, and people seem to listen to what you have to say, it is quite different to have you accuse me of a blatant breach of the rules. It is especially ironic that I specifically wrote above, "I don't mind continuing, if the dynamics of the process stay collaborative." Next thing I know, I'm hit with this. Anyway, it's apparent who carries the weight around here—thank you Gzdn for being objective enough to note the facts—as the silence in the face of such assertions is rather deafening. On to other things, indeed. –Outriggr § 02:57, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, but these wonderful editors above have been nice enough to address so many comments that I've become lost to what has been done and what has not. I'm going to state now, for the Wikipedia record that all of the above comments have been addressed. However, should any user be able to point out a particular comment that has not been addressed. Please do so. Thanks guys. :) The Filmaker 03:40, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Bacteria

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Self-nomination. Bacteria are a core topic in biology, medicine, biochemistry and biotechnology. The article is intended to be a wide introduction to a general audience, but still contain sufficient detail to be comprehensive. TimVickers 04:40, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Strong Support:Bacteria are central to all of life. This article does a good job of getting across all the important information about bacteria, while not inundating us all with useless academic specifics. This article was also fully peer-reviewed. There are too few featured articles that cover important, core topics; this is should be one of the few. Adenosine | Talk 05:44, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral Some of your footnotes end with a few spaces and then a period and/or a comma. These need to be cleaned up. This is in excellent article, but it's probably too technical for the average reader. Rlevse 11:04, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I find the people with the technical knowledge often just read over the difficult phrases without realizing it: please point to some phrases and then we could fix them; I find this very important for FA.--Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 16:50, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done. TimVickers 17:11, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support This is a great article, you've done a really good job. ← ANAS Talk? 12:40, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, nice work again. I don't know the territory, but I know Tim will speedily fix anything that comes up. Tim, can you add ISBNs to the books in Further reading? Also, those darn cite templates are giving you double punctuation after the article names - can you remove the extra (I hate the cite templates :-) ? Sandy (Talk) 15:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Double punctuation fixed throughout. Hope Tim doesn't mind... Fvasconcellos 16:09, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Of course I don't mind! Thank you very much. ISBNs added. TimVickers 16:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. — RJH (talk) 23:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Problem sentences re-worded for clarity. TimVickers 00:13, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. — RJH (talk) 16:58, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Some of the earlier captions could use some wikilinks. Also Anton van Leeuwenhoek could be expanded and some context provided for the users who inevitably look at pictures first :) Gzkn 00:53, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Captions expanded and linked. TimVickers 02:16, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support another excellent article, Tim! If the 'average reader' can't understand this, the average reader is in trouble. The only substantive suggestions I have are to add a bit more on bacteriophage, as they're only mentioned as a means of mutation at the moment (come to think of it, I'm not actually sure how big a role they play in nature) and to add at least a mention of chemosynthesis. Also a couple of prose comments:
  • In the lead: "pathogenic bacteria cause infectious diseases. These diseases include..." - why two sentences? Most of the text is very well-written, but these two sentences have a very simplistic/'written for children' tone.
Rewritten. TimVickers 03:37, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • "prokaryotic life consists of two very different groups of organisms that evolved independently" - a casual/clueless reader could get the impression that they're two totally unrelated lineages with no common ancestor. Also, the 'origin' section could use a mention of the approximate time of divergence between bacteria and archaea - this estimate must exist, even if the error bars are enormous.
Added time of divergence and reference (error is 700 million years!). TimVickers 03:37, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Expanded caption. TimVickers 03:37, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Replaced with link to Myxobacteria. TimVickers 03:38, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Additional references added for last section, now we have 120 sources! TimVickers 20:23, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Great, full support, then. Hurricanehink (talk) 00:25, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: Tim has done an excellent job addressing all concerns with this article. I see no reason it wouldn't qualify. Josh 19:43, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support A strong article on a broad subject.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 21:10, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support, a very well-written and comprehensive article. Nice work. --Coredesat 05:10, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Wow!! I have been working on this article for a while and I click in and find there is suddenly a lot of action. I have noted here some points from my to do list for the article:
  • The referencing was severely lacking and that is now comprehensively resolved. There are so many now I wonder if they could go right down the bottom and then move the further reading and links up so they can be seen? Perhaps the Further reading should also contain "Brock Biology of Microorganisms" a text that most microbiologists think of as standard issue and most likely the first port of call for someone wanting to read more about bacteria. I can do this.
Excellent point a major omission! I added Brock, but we should keep the order of sections as this is standard format for Wikipedia articles and conforms to the manual of style. TimVickers 17:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I added Brock... you corrected my formatting. Thanks. --Azaroonus 19:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think that the "groups and identification" section could be turned on its head and focus on the current methods first and the history can take a back seat (or my preference - be deleted). The discussion page and other places focus on the taxonomy issue with much debate and it would be nice to have a clear section here.
Please don't delete all the history, but condensing it a little could be useful. TimVickers 17:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have rewritten this section now and I think that it covers the topic more comprehensively. Thanks for your editing, Tim. I still want to add a sentence on environmental DNA sequencing for identifying the "uncultured majority". BTW: Do you think that there is overlap in the identification section with the Growth section? I have never been --Azaroonus 06:38, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No problem, thanks for your additions. There is some overlap certainly, since the two areas do overlap. However the growth section concentrates on the process of bacterial growth, while the identification section concentrates on the use of selective growth in identification. TimVickers 15:36, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • In my suggestions for the article outline on the discussion page I suggested there should be three sections that deal with the topics more of less covered in the current "Interaction with other organisms" and "Bacteria in Industry" sections. I suggest: Bacteria and Human health, Bacteria and the environment and Bacteria and industry/science. I think that it is important to add a section that addresses bacteria in the environment, especially with respect to their role in global nutrient cycling. The importance of this issue is outlined in the introduction but the text does not really follow through. I do not know what the time scale is on these reviews (it seems to be going quickly) but I can put something together on the weekend.
Some more material on nutrient cycling to the "Mutualists" section would be good, it would be great if you could add that to the article. However, section headings should not repeat the title of the article and I'm afraid I don't see why re-arrangeing these sections would be an improvement. Could you explain why this would be better? TimVickers 17:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The article already details the structure and function of bacteria but to humanity the significance of bacteria relates to their role in the global ecosystem and their occasional tendency to cause disease. I think that that warrants treatment that is not covered by the scope of the "mutualists" section. If using the word bacteria in a sub-heading is against Wiki conventions what about Ecological significance. I will write something anyway and let's see how it looks.--Azaroonus 19:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. TimVickers 17:17, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • The FAC notice would be better at the top of the discussion page. I've made a significant change in the lead, so that the bigger, less technical picture appears first. There's a troublesome statement in the lead: "However, most of these bacteria have not been characterised, since only about half of the phyla of bacteria have species that can be cultured in the laboratory." Are you sure that the inability to culture in the lab is the only reason? (Tension between "most" vs "only about half", plus I balked at it from common knowledge, anyway.) It's looking excellent, but I've only looked at the lead thus far. Tony 15:34, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
A great improvement to the lead, thank you Tony. If you can't culture a microorganism in the lab that is a huge impediment to characterisation. The only other information you can get is distribution in the environment from sequencing its nucleic acid from environmental samples. There is no contradiction since even if a phyla has representatives that can be cultured, this may still leave the majority of bacteria in this phyla uncharacterised. I've changed this from "since" to "and" which removes implication of one being a consequence of the other. TimVickers 17:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral, tilting towards support. Great overall (excellent referencing), but some minor problems. There is a bit of inconsistency with the serial comma, but that can be easily fixed. Also, there are occasional grammatical mistakes and a few punctuation errors (double check the usage of colons and semicolons in the article). Occasional run-ons (ex: These differences in structure can produce differences in antibiotic susceptibility, for instance vancomycin can only kill Gram positive bacteria and is ineffective against pathogens such as Haemophilus influenzae or Pseudomonas aeruginosa.[48] | These structures can … such as macrophages,[54] they can act as … in cell recognition, as well as aiding … formation.[55] | Many types of bacteriophage exist, some simply infect... | Bacteriophages can contain genes that contribute to its host's phenotype, for example...). AZ t 00:12, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed the errors you listed and any others I saw. I standardised to a restrictive usage of commas - if I missed anything please point the remaining errors out. TimVickers 05:20, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Looks good now, if there is any other problems I find they'll probably be minor and I'll address them myself. Great job! AZ t 22:47, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I know some don't see it as important, but I do feel it important to put the dates each web based article was last accessed. If they're there it increases the likelihood of finding them through the Wayback Machine should they become dead - if a link becomes dead and cannot be found, it would have to be removed. LuciferMorgan 14:52, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
This is because the publication date provides this information for all of the modern articles. However, this isn't applicable for the historical papers with no PMID, so I've added the access date for these. TimVickers 16:31, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, I'm not sure I understand your comment. Do you think there is too much overlap between this article and another article? TimVickers 18:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If you mean that you think that the history section in Bacteria should be merged with the history section in microbiology then I agree. I like the origin and evolution section but I think that the "history of bacteriology" has a more fitting home in bacteriology or in microbiology. Comment added 15:31, 2 December 2006 by Azaroonus

Announcement and request for feedback

An editor has made some major changes in the structure of the section of the article dealing with interactions with other organisms. As stability is a criterion in FAC, I wish to proceed by consensus. Which do people think is the better version? Version 1 or Version 2 TimVickers 21:09, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • I prefer version 1; comparing mutual to pathogenic bacteria seems better than "significance to the environment" and "to human health"; this could be seen as almost arbitrary; bacteria behave exactly the same in wild animals to in humans; virtually everything under "to human health" could apply equally to a dog or a cow or a snake. Also, the stubby, one sentance paragraph "Bacterial diseases are important in agriculture, with bacteria causing leaf spot, fireblight and wilts in plants, as well as Johne's disease, mastitis, salmonella and anthrax in farm animals." has been added since then. I personally do not like this paragraph at all as it is short, and the phrasing ("are important") implies that farmers want their plants to succumb to fireblight and wilt! Laïka 21:22, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Version 1 seems clearly better than the present Version 2, both in writing and logic. For example, the triple repetition of "Significance of..." in the section titles seems — uninspired, while the facts of the new sections are chosen and laid out haphazardly, with poor integration with (and development from) the rest of the article. Nevertheless, I think I might appreciate Azaroonus' intentions, e.g., targeting the text more precisely at what an average lay-reader might want to glean from the article. I also feel that a slightly longer article might be OK, provided that it were written and organized with utter clarity and inexorable flow. Unfortunately, version 2 is not that article, as Azaroonus himself would likely admit. Moreover, this doesn't seem like a good time to be making rash major re-writes. I suggest that we discuss our long-term goals and concerns for the article over at Talk:Bacteria over the next few weeks and consider what changes we might make to reach them. Eile mit Weile and all that, Willow 22:49, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • With respect to Azaroonus, strong preference for version 1. Version 2's edited sections are redundant (both with each other and with the rest of the text) and have a distinctly human-centric perspective that is not entirely encyclopedic in an article about bacteria as a general subject. I could be persuaded that there's a use for a specific subarticle on bacteria in human health that would be even more layman-oriented (if there already is one I don't know about, can it be more prominently linked in the interactions section?), but that's largely immaterial to this FAC nomination. Opabinia regalis 00:07, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Good points Opabinia and Willow. I tried to deal with this by choosing Version 1, but adding the material in version 2 to a new article called bacteria and human health. I put a link to this new daughter article at the top of the Pathogens section. The current article is now not substantially different to the original, but of course incorporating the edits and suggestions from the reviewers here. TimVickers 00:26, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I also prefer Version 1. As much as I like "larger picture" enviromental information, I really hate the overt focus on human health. Would a section on vetrinary health be significatly different? Wikpedia generally is biased towards a focus on humans (look up any organ or general bodily process), can we please avoid continuing this trend in a major topic on non-human lifeforms? --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 05:22, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Minnesota

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When I started working on Minnesota a year ago it was completely unreferenced and in pretty bad shape.[18] Since then a small team of dedicated users and I have gotten the article to GA status and we now believe the article is at or above the standards needed for FA. It has also undergone a successful peer review. I have also run the auto peer review script and completed any items that needed addressing. No other US states are good article or featured status, in fact most are in pretty bad off, so considering adopting your own state. I appreciate your feedback, I am more than willing to quickly address any concerns you may have that can prevent this from becoming a FA. Others that can address concerns: User:Appraiser, User:Kablammo, User:Gopher backer, User:Jonathunder. Self nomination. -Ravedave (help name my baby) 06:41, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support Good job. My only suggestion would be to try and get rid of a couple images. In certain places (between "Climate" and "Protected lands" as well as "Economy" and "Industry and commerce" and to a lesser extent in "Transportation") images are literally stacked on top of one another, and this at my modest screen resolution (1024x768). I think you can easily take out two or three pictures with no detriment to the article, since many of them are more "scenic" than necessary to illustrate a particular topic. Anyway, I wouldn't oppose on this qualm alone, I'll just ask that you give it some consideration. -- mattb @ 2006-11-28T17:38Z
Thanks! I have started a section on the balance of images on the Minnesota talk page and I will try and weed out any unnecessary images. -Ravedave (help name my baby) 19:09, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tropical Storm Bonnie (2004)

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Next nomination from Wikipedia:WikiProject Tropical cyclones. We're fairly confident that this article passes WP:WIAFA, and we're putting it under consideration now. Titoxd(?!?) 06:24, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. I fixed a redlink to Aroostook, Maine that should have been to Aroostook County, Maine. Not sure if this was a typo or if someone thought Aroostook was actually a town, but I only caught it because I used to live near there and knew that it was a county. Someone may want to go through the article and check the other redlinks just to make sure that something similar isn't happening there. MLilburne 09:38, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  1. ^ Smyers, Karen Ann. The Fox and the Jewel: Shared and Private Meanings in Contemporary Japanese Inari Worship. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1999. 127-128
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