Wikipedia:Featured article review/History of Poland (1945–1989)/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was kept 19:31, 8 April 2007.

History of Poland (1945–1989)

Review commentary

Original author aware. Message left at Poland. LuciferMorgan 21:17, 19 February 2007 (UTC) Message left at History. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:26, 26 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Promoted to FA status quite a long time ago. Has 4 decent references at the bottom, but could use some in-line citations. There are some citations of online sources in a few rare places, but they are not presented in the proper <ref> format either.--Konstable 05:23, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

On my to-update-list. Please notify WP:PWNB. We will see what can be do to bring it to modern standards.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 06:47, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Some random concerns:

The lead has a bunch of images that causes it to look extremely awkward on high res.
Misplaced formality throughout, such as "in order" to, "prior to" (instead of "before"), vauge terms of size ("a number of"); very minor stuff.
Five solid references, but only 2 footnotes.
The article is a bit on the long side, but it's already a subarticle. Perhaps a 10-20 percent trim, if possible?

On the whole, it could use inline citations and a copy-edit by a group of editors. It's a long article, so it's going to take some time. However, it is still a very good article, so elevating it to modern standards should not be a huge challenge. — Deckill er 10:45, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

- I will see what I can do about inline citations. Copyediting is not my forte (as I am not a native English speaker), and I strongly object to 'trimming' (Wikipedia is not paper). That said, splitting excessive details into subarticles is always a good idea (I just object to the suggestion that some info may be uncessary and can be deleted).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 22:16, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- Subarticles will be a great idea; sort of like what's going on with the B-movie article. I'll work on copy-editing with the other FAR people, but it looks like this article will get a lot of modernization, which is always great! — Deckill er 22:40, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - A hint for anybody willing to read a little: a more recent FA of mine, History of Solidarity, has a lot of great inline ctiations for much of the facts covered in part of that article (late 1970s-1990). So feel free to see which ones can be copied and added here.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 03:06, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    - I agree. HoS being a POV-fork of this has a lot of stuff that needs to be moved where it belongs. --Irpen 04:51, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      - Shame nobody supported your POV-fork claim during HoS FAC. Why don't you try FARC for that article, as long as you are here?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 05:16, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        Only because time constraints cannot allow me do all I want to do. --Irpen 06:05, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I have significantly improved inline references in the article. That said, there is still room for improvement - but I believe this FARC comments have been mostly addressed.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:56, 15 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

Suggested FA criteria concerns are citation format and sufficiency (1c) and prose (1a). Marskell 08:57, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Remove unless size is addressed; 66KB of readable prose significantly passes WP:LENGTH guidelines. Also, websources need last access date. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:25, 18 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I am removing my objection based on size; the article size is now within WP:LENGTH guidelines, and the article complies with WP:MOS issues. I am not supporting as I don't know enough about some of the references used to be certain that the article is free of POV. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:16, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Remove per Sandy's reasoning. LuciferMorgan 17:35, 18 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Remove, but really only because of the massive length. The citation concerns seem like fairly minor points. Peter ^Isotalo 09:28, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I can hardly believe size is an objection: at 66kb prose (91kb total) the guideline states only that 'Probably should be divided' - hardly a reason for FA delisting. Yes, the article has grown since it became a FA (69kb in July'05), and yes, some small parts can be split off per our summary size - but by becoming longer it has only become more comprehensive and even better then when consensus was to FA it. Again, while I support trimming the article, I cannot believe that becoming 'too good' can be a reason for FARCing it...--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 00:31, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Conditional keep — I'm turning away from the length issue, to be honest. It looks like most of the refs have accessdates, although you might want to double check to make sure. Also, the lead is somewhat cluttered — is it possible to reorganize that? — Deckill er 00:57, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I have trimmed the lead. Comments welcome on talk as to what and where to split to trim the article further.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:32, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - I was mostly talking about the amount of images in the lead. Honestly, I don't mind the length whatsoever. Perhaps you can move the Partia image down? — Deckill er 01:34, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    - Partia is actually the defining image for this article. But feel free to move the images for better layout - it looks fine on my comp, though.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 12:53, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      - Ok. It seems the major issue left is fixing those citationneeded tags. — Deckill er 19:15, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. There are 3 ^{[citation needed]} that should be fixed. Note 31 has no page. To be honest, I did not read into detail the article. 66 kb of prose is a bit more than the usual. Maybe sub-articles could be created.--Yannismarou 16:01, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- There are still numerous sections which are large enough to benefit from summary style to bring the article in line with WP:LENGTH. But length isn't the only problem; the citation needs extend well beyond the cite tags added. The article is replete with hard data that is uncited, as well as political statements that need attribution. I'm still a very strong remove unless the article is cited and summarized. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:26, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- The last section, added after FAC, that was poorly referenced and contained all of the three citation requests, has been split to Culture in modern Poland. Thus the article is both better referenced and leaner :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:48, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - I moved the section on minorities to Historical demographics of Poland (actually, it was a copy of that text anyway) and added a sentence with link to that article elsewhere in the article. Those two recent changed moved the article from 99kb to 81kb :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 19:41, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Piotrus has made good improvements on the article since the FAR. I am in the process of addressing the concern about too many photos. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 18:38, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Length (the only argument that's left) is not a reason to de-FA an article. Besides, my experience shows that FA articles divided onto several sub-articles are not the best option and most of the sub-articles are seldom (if ever) updated by the readers (check the Warsaw Uprising series to see what I mean). //Halibutt 22:20, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- Or Polish-Soviet War - while the main article has been improving steadily, Polish-Soviet War in 1919, Polish-Soviet War in 1920 are becoming more like obsolete ghosts of the past then anything else. Seriously, I find the 'lenght objections' and splitting useful stuff into forgotten subarticles actually damaging our project, not helping it.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 22:34, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Something about length: personally, I don't insist so much on it. Yes, 60 + kilobytes of prose is a bit more than the usual, but it is not for me that terrible (now it is even less I think). Recently promoted FAs were more than that. Anyway ... Something I want to say is that IMO some numbers and assessements should be better cited (e.g. "While their attempts to create a bridge between Poland's history and Soviet Marxist ideology were mildly successful, especially in comparison to similar efforts in most other countries of the Eastern Bloc, they were for the most part stifled due to the regime's unwillingness to risk the wrath of the Soviet Union for going too far from the Soviet party line.", "By 1950, 5 million Poles had been settled in what the government called the Regained Territories."). The prose looks to me fine. So, for the time being, I am a weak keep, hoping for further improvements but believing that the article is back to FA status--Yannismarou 18:47, 28 March 2007 (UTC)![reply]
Remove. Article lacks in line citations (for such article scale!), especially when from 32 in line citations article mostly relies on 2 sources. A lot of article's statements are unreferenced, for this reason article looks like speculative and with original research elements. For instance "Poland's postwar recovery was much harder than it could have been" it is pure speculation without proper refs, another one "Poland was forced by the Soviet Union to give up its",and there are many more. I also suggest to remove such wordings as "an immediate rise" , "enormous losses" etc. Article also lacks information about minorities, article do not mentions Germans position at all and it looks like they did not existed in Poland. Another unacceptable development - city names spelling such as "Wilno". In short article still needs major input. M.K. 11:49, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- The statements you mention have been removed or referenced. The article has 35 distinct refs now, and I can't help but note that the newest Lithuanian FA you recently worked on, Act of Independence of Lithuania, has only 37 refs. Minorities, including Germans, are mentioned and refer leader to more in-depth subarticle (please note several other reviewers asked for such info to be split of and summarized, we can't please everyone).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:32, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Status: Well, I guess this stays up a little longer. I know Piotrus is willing to work. Can referencing examples be provided (don't swamp the page, please). The article has moved from very, very long to merely very long, which is good. Marskell 20:32, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Remove. Some paragraphs have no citations (for example, lead, 3 first paras under "The Gomułka period", quick count - 16 paras in total). And writing is aweful (cherry-picking examples): to pay the crushing rates, albeit at great risk of punishment; which was greatly diminished by widescale bribery of police, political earthquake followed, catastrophic blow, two things saved Gomułka's regime at this point, turned into huge riots, welcomed Gomułka's return to power with relief, and even euphoria, etc. Fixing just these won't help: the text needs a very thorough and extensive copy-edit and NPOVing, probably re-write would be even better. And I lack words for this piece: The reforms were greeted with relief by a significant faction of the population. Tens of thousands of Poles who had joined the Communist Party and some Social Democratic, Communist and Trade Unionist Poles, celebrated the opportunity to create what they saw as the society of the future. Renata 17:39, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment The lead isn't supposed to have citations Renata, or at least it is not required. Search through the featured articles for examples. Quadzilla99 05:26, 5 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not great prose—Probably not bad enough by itself to warrant defrocking, the prose needs TLC throughout.
I find the opening para, which dives straight into shifting territory, inappropriate. What is required is a broad statement of the significance and location of Poland in the history of the continent.
Remove the subtitles in "Early history". Stubby paras under the last subtitle.
Why is title case used in the titles (against MoS)?
"powerful hatred"—unidiomatic.
Inconsistent use of en dashes/hyphens for ranges (should be the former). Tony 23:52, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Update. I am continuing to add refs (all specific examples above have been cited or removed) and move unnecessary details of the article. At latest count there are 8 unreferened paragraphs, judging by lack of citation requests they don't contain anything new, but they seem like good candidates for moving to a subarticle. Feel free to tag citation requests templats anywhere. As for language, please edit anything you dislike, I am not a native English speaker and the text looks good to me (it has not been significantly changed in that regard since FAC).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 03:56, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: It seems that a lot of references are added. This article came through some reviews unscathed. Sjones23 20:17, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comments I'm happy with length now; 8800 words is within guidelines, albeit long. I'm working on formatting and MOS issues, and reviewing references now.
- Why is this in External links? Toons and other children's programm from 70's and 80's (Polish) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:15, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- Please check this reference. I wikified the date, but don't know if 02-10-04 in Polish is February 10 or October 2nd. Rzeczpospolita (February 10, 2004) Nr 232, Wielkie polowanie: Prześladowania akowców w Polsce Ludowej (Great hunt: the persecutions of AK soldiers in the People's Republic of Poland). Retrieved on June 7, 2006 (Polish) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:43, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

- Update. Most unreferenced paras has been split, this brings the article to 75 kilobytes and maybe 1 or 2 unreferenced paras. This elink has been split. The date for that ref is 2 October.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:58, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - I'll fix that date. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:16, 7 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Very productive FAR. Quadzilla99 10:03, 8 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.