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Kept status

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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 18:57, 22 May 2008.

Wayne Gretzky

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Review commentary

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Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography, Wikipedia:WikiProject Ice Hockey, Wikipedia:Canadian Wikipedians' notice board, Wikipedia:WikiProject Arizona, Wikipedia:WikiProject Canadian football, Wikipedia:WikiProject Indianapolis, Wikipedia:WikiProject Canadian sport notified.

I believe that this does not currently meet the following Featured Article criteria:

1) Well-written: It's not bad, but it could be improved. For example, the first paragraph of the "Edmonton Oilers" section end with: "The rule was later changed." No explanation is given as to what change was made. Hyphens are used incorrectly throughout the article, and there are several noticeable punctuation problems.
2) Factually accurate: Lack of citations is a huge problem throughout the article. Notably, the "Edmonton Oilers" section has no references. Likewise, most of "Los Angeles Kings" is unreferenced and "St. Louis Blues" has no references. "New York Rangers" has only one reference. Five citations isn't enough for a career like Gretzky's (not to mention the biography of a living person). In addition, all of the other sections except "Off the ice" need more citations.
3) Proper referencing: Inconsistent formatting and lacking important information. In addition, several citations are placed incorrectly in the text.
4) Neutrality is a problem. For example: "No less an expert than Bobby Orr said..." GaryColemanFan (talk) 02:33, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

re 1- only a start, but the incorrect hyphens have been replaced by en dashes. Beyond that, your concerns are basically valid. Alaney2k (talk) 21:39, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Gretzky detractors have often claimed that Gretz wasn't allowed to be hit during his NHL career (due to his marketing value); if there's any sources for such critisims, they should be added to the article. Also, where's the mentioning of the Bill McCreary hit? Which many claimed was a major no-no. GoodDay (talk) 22:06, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I looked that up. That is old, the McCreary hit. I don't have a 'primary reference' for that, it was either in 1980 or 1981, and is mentioned later in newspaper articles. The topic of his protection might pass scrutiny. He had Sememko, McSorley. Who did the Rangers have to protect him? And what happened on the night of McCreary hitting Gretzky? That will take some digging to see if it is notable enough. Alaney2k (talk) 21:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I wonder what has changed in the article since it was given FA status to warrant another look. -- JTHolla! 00:18, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure what you're getting at. GaryColemanFan (talk) 00:27, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My point is, the article has been granted FA status. What has changed to make someone think that it is no longer FA worthy? -- JTHolla! 03:54, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
According to Featured Article criteria, "FAs are held to the current standards regardless of when they were promoted." The article clearly doesn't meet the criteria, so it needs to be looked at. Any FA can be examined and discussed at any time. Featured Article represent the best of Wikipedia, so while this may have been good enough in 2006, it needs a lot of work to maintain its status. Are you claiming that "the best of Wikipedia" should be exempt from upkeep? Is it okay to have poorly referenced Featured Articles? GaryColemanFan (talk) 04:23, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Of course not. But at one point it met the FA criteria. What about the article has changed to make it not fit FA criteria? -- JTHolla! 15:43, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What changed was the rules on what is a FA. Personally, I couldn't stand Gretzky as a player, and I'm not all that fond of him as a coach, so I'm not the best person to look at bringing it back up to standards. Hopefully one of our other hockey project members is up to the challenge. Resolute 05:26, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments- I started cleaning up the refs, and must agree with GaryColemanFan that there are several major issues, listed below:

1) The biggest problem is inconsistent formatting. Templates are used in fewer than half of the cites, but there are still a good number of them. A decision should be made on whether to use them or not, and some must be changed to be consistent.

2) Many dead links. All Canoe.ca or Slam.canoe.ca links (I counted five) are dead. Also dead are current refs 46 (Newark Star-Ledger), 48 (Yahoo) and 49 (The Arizona Republic). I didn't look at every link, so there could still be more.

I replaced all Canoe links with Internet Archive versions. Still need replacements for the other three. Giants2008 (talk) 23:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I converted two dead links into offline news citations. The other one was removed as the part of the section it was in was deemed unnecessary. There are still two dead links in Off the ice, which I'll take care of tomorrow. Giants2008 (talk) 19:03, 16 April 2008 (UTC) Done. Giants2008 (talk) 02:44, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

3) Several sources on his endorsements look questionable at first glance, although I haven't looked at them closely. Replaced with reliable sources. Giants2008 (talk) 02:44, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

4) Current refs 10 and 33 (ESPN SportsCentury) are identical and can be combined.

Update: I did this myself. Giants2008 (talk) 19:17, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This isn't including the aforementioned lack of references in the NHL career section. Gretzky is a major figure in sports history, and deserves the best referencing possible. Giants2008 (talk) 17:29, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I will be able to help on the look up of references. I am sure his whole career can be well referenced from the Canadian Newsstand database. Alaney2k (talk) 17:43, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I just performed some cleanup work on the article. Punctuation was poor for an FA; hopefully I got most of the problems fixed. I changed the POV statement mentioned to: "Hall of Fame defenceman Bobby Orr said...". I'm no prose or style expert, so more improvements are surely needed. Giants2008 (talk) 22:57, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

All citations now after punctuation. Giants2008 (talk) 23:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I would like to suggest adding a 'To-do list' on the talk page of the article? Would it be a good or bad idea, though? I would want to limit it to the terms of the FA review. Alaney2k (talk) 21:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's a good idea, as long as nobody here has any objections, of course. Giants2008 (talk) 00:39, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Progress report Since being placed on review, the number of references has nearly doubled, from 48 to 93 as I write. I also listed the article at WP:LoCE, where someone will hopefully take an interest in it. There's still more work to do, but good progress is definitely being made here. Giants2008 (talk) 22:15, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've just taken out all citation templates in the article, since most of the references didn't use them. I normally like templates, but thought they were not used effectively in this case. Giants2008 (talk) 19:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your good work. A lot of the citations may have pre-dated some of today's templates. The main thing is to be consistent, that's why I always use them. That said, there is a diverse selection. Alaney2k (talk) 19:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Do you think templates of some form should be put back in? I ask because you used them in your latest batch of references after I took the existing ones out. If you believe they should be used, I have no problem with that, other than the annoyance of having to change 100+ citations. You also used two different kinds of templates, which I believe is frowned upon. Let me know what you want to do. Giants2008 (talk) 00:12, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Long-term, it probably makes more sense to use the templates, if the template format ever changes then you don't have to rewrite, but not now. I used Citation for the References section, the cite can't handle books with editors as well. I will rewrite the cites in the text to not use templates. I did that just to see how it is written, and also did the save immediately in case you were working at the same time. I will basically paste what the cite puts out. But in the References section, we should stay with the templates. I think that the format output is the correct one according to the MOS. Alaney2k (talk) 00:21, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I am trying to find a cite for the "Skalbania knew that the WHA was fading ..." sentence. That may have to be rewritten. After that, I think we have the article thoroughly cited. Alaney2k (talk) 23:38, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also see what you can find for the Skills section, particularly the first paragraph. That may also need adjusting. Giants2008 (talk) 00:12, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, will do. Alaney2k (talk) 00:21, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Rebel League would be the best place for such a citation, I would think. I just returned that book to the library, otherwise I'd check for the citation for you. At any rate, excellent job on citing and fixing the article, guys. Resolute 15:53, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Gretzky book has a good explanation. I've used Gretzky's version of events. It's more interesting this way, too. Alaney2k (talk) 18:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lots of fixes needed: I haven't looked at content or citations much, but from a MOS point of view, this article is going to need a lot of work. Incorrect WP:DASHes of all types everywhere, lack of conversions on units (see WP:UNITS), WP:MOSNUM, WP:HYPHEN and ce issues (look here: At age 6 he was skating with 10-year-olds.[16] At age six, his first coach Dick Martin remarked that he handled the puck better than the ten year-olds.), MOS:CAPS#All caps, no consistency in the citations in pg. pp. p. pp etc., missing spaces in the citations (sample: Gretzky(1990), pp. 34–35), incorrect spaces on WP:MOS#Ellipses, WP:MOSNUM issues everywhere (sample: They have 4 other children: ), and much more. The article needs a serious copyedit, and when nearly finished with that, perhaps editors can go hat in hand to User:Epbr123 and ask him to help with the sigificant MoS issues. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:07, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This sort of stuff has occurred only because many editors have edited the article. I would not characterize this as serious, only that we have another area to cover. This will get covered. I will add this to the To do list. Alaney2k (talk) 14:26, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

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Suggested FA criteria concerns are prose (1a), factual accuracy (1c), and POV (1d). Marskell (talk) 11:59, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

:: Sometimes the above types of comments are completely non-useful. Are you repeating what we started with? Or have you some examples to point out? Alaney2k (talk) 14:27, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I started to copyedit, fix for MOS, and clean up reference formatting this morning. I have been working on it for four hours (it's a very long article), during much of which I had to deal with edit conflicts despite the big old {{under construction}} tag I added before I began working. I'm glad other people are working on the article, but it's extremely frustrating to have to duplicate my own work. Please respect under construction tags; with the exception of my second to last edit (which had a larger time gap from my previous one), the briefest glance at the edit history should have confirmed that I was still working on it. I have removed the under construction tag I placed; time for a break. Maralia (talk) 17:10, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I may have been one of those who interrupted. Sorry about that -- the notice actually welcomes other edits. You should have used {{inuse}} Alaney2k (talk) 17:23, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I performed a couple cleanup edits as well. Sorry if I got in the way, and thanks for the much-needed copyedit. Giants2008 (talk) 23:14, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sigh. I've used {{inuse}} I don't know how many times, but it didn't occur to me that I used the wrong template until hours after my message above. I really should not attempt anything brain-intensive before noon and at least two cups of coffee. Sorry for getting so cranky about it. I'll try to get back to this tonight. Maralia (talk) 23:25, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've not forgotten about this - just got distracted with rl and other wiki work. Will try to get back to copyediting today/tomorrow. Maralia (talk) 15:26, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Are we there yet? :-) Seriously, the only part of the article I think that needs some added detail is the time period in L.A. I will focus on getting some details about that time period into the article. It is a bit under-represented considering his play in L.A. was important in later getting several NHL franchises into the area. But as for citations, we must have everything covered, no? (I have one citation to fix up, that said.) I have looked at all I could look at and I think the factual accuracy of the article is covered.Alaney2k (talk) 01:05, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I can see Maralia's on the job; when she says it's a keep, count me in. But, what is the source for all of the career stats at the bottom of the article, in many different sections? Those all need sources. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:39, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've completed a copyedit, although the article is so bloody long that I wasn't as thorough as usual. I also did some work on the 'Statistics' section: moved 'International play' into the same section; refactored 'International play' from two tables to one; and put 'Coaching career' last for chrono order. Some remaining issues:
  • I am not comfortable with this uncited sentence in the lead: "Gretzky regularly played at a level far above his peers."
  • The enormous table in the 'Playing career' section is virtually impossible to edit. Would be good if someone would edit it to reduce it to one row of edit box text per year, or consider dumping it in a template or something.
  • I was bothered by the preponderance of hyphenated words, so I removed a slew of hyphens. I realize this could be a stylistic/EngVar issue, but (1) he's Canadian, not British; and (2) the article is so full of necessary hyphens ("17-year-old Gretzky", "All-Star") that unnecessary hyphens are unwise.
  • I find the list of endorsements in 'Business ventures' to be rather ludicrously exhaustive, and would really like to see it narrowed down and most of those links removed.
  • There appears to be no rhyme or reason to the order of the items in the succession box.
  • I notice half the navigational footers are currently nominated for deletion. Frankly I don't think any of them add anything, except perhaps the current coaches one. The '1998 SI Swimsuit Issue' one is incredibly worthless.
Maralia (talk) 07:32, 6 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The uncited sentence is repeated later with a cite. I'll fix that. About the playing career table, it's not clear what your goal or plan for that table is, to be able to suggest something. The succession boxes and templates are an on-going issue. Since it is a sports article, people seem to think that people want these templates and go out and edit them. There is some effort going into the creation of these templates that could be better used on editing content. It's not the ice hockey project members who are creating these, it seems to be sports fans who don't crack open books for a citation, or apply references to text, etc. ... I noticed you thought it was odd to mention that they are still married. Celebrity marriages not lasting, encyclopedic point of view, that's why that was noted. Is it inherent nowadays to assume people are still married? Maybe I'm just a bit cynical. :-) Alaney2k (talk) 14:07, 6 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks for adding that cite; I'm not fond of citations in the lead, but that statement is such a strong one that I feel it needs a cite there.
  • I went ahead and made the changes I wanted to see on the Playing career table. The appearance of the table is the same (with the exception of the last row, which I changed to what I think is a more logical title), and it reduced the editbox length of the table from 33 screens to 6. This should make it much easier to correct any data or manually fix vandalism - before, you couldn't even fit all the fields for a single year's data onto one edit screen.
  • I get what you mean about celebrity marriages, but it's a bit POV to say 'still married': it implies there may be reason to think otherwise.
  • Regarding nav footers: I'm not quite clear which are supported by the ice hockey project. I would be happy to see all of the nav footers go, with the possible exception of the Current NHL coaches one.
  • As to the succession boxes, I would think overall chrono order makes the most sense, although I could see an argument for subsets by award with chrono order within each subset. Additionally, I'd like to see the language cleaned up, so we don't have "Winner of the NHL Plus/Minus Award" but "Lou Marsh Trophy winner".
Maralia (talk) 16:08, 6 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would get rid of the list of endorsements altogether. Having a list of 30 companies adds nothing to the article, not to mention the difficulty of citing all these endorsements. The succession boxes and footers are ridiculous for major athletes like Gretzky. It's just box after box, none of which are important. Since they seem to be standard, however, I'd be cautious about removing them. As for the other header, don't guys like me always get the Swimsuit Issue to see The Great One? :) Seriously, this was probably created for models, and the athletes who have appeared in it are supposed to get it as well. It has absolutely no relevance, and doesn't seem to be a standard yet (Anna Kournikova has the template, but Maria Sharapova doesn't). I wouldn't be sad to see this go. Giants2008 (talk) 18:40, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The endorsements may date from the time that the article was smaller. Would it be worth keeping as a split? Probably not. Let's prune the navboxes. Alaney2k (talk) 02:44, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I cut that list of companies—just free advertising.
Does anyone want to do the exceptionally boring work of ref consistency? I don't see huge issues with this article beyond that—except that Bobby Orr is the Best Ever—and would like to keep it. Marskell (talk) 21:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
They look pretty good except for the few that say "accessed" instead of "Retrieved on". Once that's finished, how do we go about wrapping this review up? I think it has improved considerably and should be kept as a Featured Article (perhaps even nominated for Today's Featured Article to celebrate its improvement). GaryColemanFan (talk) 04:00, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure how they end, but I have made that fix. -Djsasso (talk) 04:07, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep as FA. The concerns I brought up when initiating this FAR have been addressed. The prose and MoS compliance are good, everything now appears to be referenced, references are properly formatted, and neutrality does not seem to be an issue. This diff shows the article's improvement during this process, which has been substantial. I believe it now meets the Featured Article criteria GaryColemanFan (talk) 14:35, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've done more reference formatting cleanup. Some remaining issues:

  • The various Gretzky book citations need work. Some Gretzky cites have no year. Other cites have a year (1994) for which no Gretzky-authored book is listed; this may mean they're actually Taylor cites.
  • This cite needs a pub date: Gallagher, Tony. "Great One saves hockey in Phoenix", The Province, p. A81.
  • This cite needs a publication name: Morrissey, Bob. "Gretzky brings Kings to Hull", September 12, 1989, p. F1.

Maralia (talk) 17:38, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I did the Morrissey cite. The newspaper name was there, but it was incorrectly formatted. Giants2008 (talk) 18:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 20:43, 18 May 2008.

Monty Hall problem

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Review commentary

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Previous FAR

Notified Wikipedia:WikiProject Mathematics, User:Rick Block, User:Antaeus Feldspar, User:Glopk, User:Father Goose

Concerns:

1(c), factual accuracy/verifiability. Huge sections of unsourced content, including lengthy mathematical proofs. Without being cited to a reliable source, it's difficult to think that they're anything but OR.
2(c), inline citations. See also above. If these proofs are not original research, they should be directly sourced with inline citations, rather than requiring the user to hunt through the lengthy external links section to find the relevant proofs. Furthermore, the number of references in this article seems disproportionately low, given its length.
4, length. The article is extremely long, preferring apparently to offer every possible explanation of the correctness of the solution rather than picking one or two choice ones. (The objective of Wikipedia is to present verifiable facts, not to convince people of the truth where the truth may be counterintuitive.)

- Chardish (talk) 06:09, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Judging by the previous FAR, it's probably worth spending the effort up front to present a more detailed list of the problems alluded to as 1(c) and 2(c), as many sections have already had inline citations added, and the remaining spots will be more actionable if identified as such. For example, the "Decision tree" section is currently unreferenced, but this could be fixed almost trivially. Melchoir (talk) 06:52, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
...or even better. Melchoir (talk) 06:54, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes a detailed list would be good. Note that Harvard referencing is used. -- Rick Block (talk) 13:26, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Per the above, sections that appear to lack sources:
These sections comprise 12.5 kB of text, or approximately 2,280 words. (This isn't terribly pertinent, but personally I'm not much of a fan of Harvard referencing, especially on Wikipedia, since footnotes are quickly becoming the de facto standard here, if they haven't already.) - Chardish (talk) 15:04, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Unsourced content including mathematical proofs", creating a "verifiability" problem?? Mathematical proofs can be verified by reading them and checking them. Sources won't help with verifying them. That's just not how proofs work. Michael Hardy (talk) 15:52, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On the contrary; please read the policy on original research. Who is to verify that the proofs contained in the article are correct, free of errors, etc? This is why all information - including mathematical proofs - must be attributed to reliable secondary sources. Wikipedia is not a mathematical journal and must not publish original proofs. - Chardish (talk) 17:01, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On the contrary, these statements, which are too trivial to be publishable in a mathematical journal, are as self-verifying as a plot summary (for which see WP:WHEN. We are permitted to do our own arithmetic; this is the same thing. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:13, 30 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, you are incorrect. While the information may be too trivial to be published by a journal of advanced mathematics, certainly there are books, lesser journals, magazines, etc. with the same information. Wikipedia is not a place to publish information that is not already published elsewhere, plain and simple. That is what no original research means in a nutshell. You will also note on the talk page of the essay you linked to a significant amount of disagreement with the claims made by the essay. Cheers. - Chardish (talk) 18:44, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
But it is exactly correct. I recommend that this disruptive abuse of WP:OR be ignored, and this review speedy closed, as nominated in bad faith, and in disregard of Wikipedia policy. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:01, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, how is this a bad faith nomination? Simply because we disagree does not mean that one of us must have sinister motives. - Chardish (talk) 21:24, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
When Infinite monkey theorem went on FAR, I found and fixed an incorrect proof that had been allowed to lie for some time. I detected the error because I was looking for sources. Monty Hall problem is a somewhat different beast, since it is already undergoing active revision on its talk page. What that implies for the FAR I can't say. But I can say that sources do help verify proofs. Melchoir (talk) 17:17, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No, close reading verifies proofs, here and elsewhere. Close reading should be encouraged, and should not be distracted by superscript numbers, or we will wind up citing the significant number of invalid proofs in the published literature. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:13, 30 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Close reading should be encouraged as well. It would be naive to think that an article can be maintained at a high quality merely by enforcing a certain density of citations. But it would also be naive to think that readers can be trusted to maintain quality on their own, without citations.
There is a theoretical danger that providing citations for proofs will result in some incorrect proofs gaining a veneer of acceptability. But there is a proven danger that writing proofs without citations results in some incorrect proofs never getting fixed, since they are equally well-cited as their neighbors. Infinite monkey theorem had a proof that started out correct but was complex and little-understood. It wasn't cited. An editor attempted to simplify it and broke it in the process. No one noticed. Untold numbers of people read this proof inside a Featured article and did not correct it. One editor commented on the talk page that the proof smelled, and the talk page regulars actually insisted that it was correct.
The above failure points out several intrinsic challenges for mathematical proofs on Wikipedia, which I won't get into here. The point is that citations could have prevented the problem, and citations fixed it. Melchoir (talk) 21:24, 30 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The lesson I draw from that is "use citations, where possible". If a given piece of information improves an article and is verifiable one way or another, I am prepared to not excise it. I've seen a lot of people on the talk page of the article independently derive "combining doors"-type solutions, so it must have use as a way of explaining the problem, and I consider it an alternative way of describing the basic (unconditional) solution.--Father Goose (talk) 02:45, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
See, in that case, the "combining doors" solution could simply be a popular fallacy that happens to reach the correct answer by accident. It is not obvious to me how the solution can avoid being used for different host behaviors with different probabilities -- where it is wrong. The article does say "if and only if the game host is required..." but at what point is this assumption applied?
On the talk page, Rick Block indicates that there may be sources that describe the theory behind such a solution. I for one am curious about what they have to say! Melchoir (talk) 06:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm given to believe (as I stated above) that it's merely a way of visualizing the basic, unconditional solution, so it is neither a popular fallacy or an accident. As for your question about "at what point is this assumption applied", is there more than one point at which it could meaningfully be applied?--Father Goose (talk) 06:50, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm saying that I don't see any place where it is applied. Here's the same section with the host behavior changed in bold:
Instead of one door being opened and shown to be a losing door, an equivalent action is to combine the two unchosen doors into one since the player cannot, and will not, choose the opened door. The player therefore has the choice of either sticking with the original choice of door with a 1/3 chance of winning the car, or choosing the sum of the contents of the two other doors with a 2/3 chance. The game assumptions play a role here — switching is equivalent to taking the combined contents if and only if the game host is required to open a door with a goat and chooses between two losing doors randomly with equal probabilities. Assume that the game host is required to open the rightmost unchosen door with a goat.

In this case, what should be ignored is the opening of the door. The player actually chooses between the originally picked door and the other two — opening one is simply a distraction. There is only one car and it does not move. The original choice divides the possible locations of the car between the one door the player picks with a 1/3 chance and the other two with a 2/3 chance. It is already known that at least one of the two unpicked doors contains a goat. Revealing the goat therefore gives the player no additional information about the originally chosen door; it does not change the 2/3 probability that the car is still in the block of two doors.

This time the conclusion is wrong. But what has changed about the argument that makes it more wrong than the version in the article?
Personally I suspect that there is a symmetry principle at work that salvages the argument and explains when it can and cannot be used. The problem is that this principle is not in evidence. The following section titled "Bayes' theorem" goes step-by-step through the derivation that P(C_1|H_13) = 1/3, and this 1/3 appears to depend on every input to the problem. It is far from obvious that P(C_1) has simply been conserved, and if so, why. Melchoir (talk) 07:49, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ah. That change you made to the text changes the problem from unconditional to conditional (and very specific conditions, to boot), so that indeed the "combining doors" or even the basic explanation given in the "Solution" section can no longer be used. How to address the differences between unconditional and conditional solutions has been the subject of many weary months of discussion on the article's talk page.
You could also change the statement of the problem in the section by changing the game to the "host doesn't know" variation. Not surprisingly, the "combining doors" explanation would be invalid for that as well.--Father Goose (talk) 08:19, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Unconditional"? I don't know what that word means in this context. Melchoir (talk) 08:26, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is the topic of a long discussion on the talk page. As generally presented the problem asks about a situation given that the host has opened a door (conditional), not an overall average. Note that the argument above is still correct if the question is "what is the overall chance of winning by switching" (as opposed to "after the host has opened a door, what is the player's chance of winning"). The overall chance of winning by switching is 2/3 regardless of how the host selects between two goat doors, but if the host selects unevenly between goat doors the chances are not split evenly based on which door the host opens. I'd suggest not continuing this thread here. -- Rick Block (talk) 13:51, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the explanation. I think I understand the relationship between the two versions, and I can see how it's a tough editorial call on how to present them. Back to Combining doors, then: it's currently worded to suggest the conditional problem, i.e. "...opening one is simply a distraction. There is only one car and it does not move. ...Revealing the goat therefore gives the player no additional information...". This is all post-door-opening, and why the player hasn't gained additional information about the chosen door isn't explained. Do any of the sources help? Melchoir (talk) 17:22, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I haven't found anything yet that is entirely satisfactory. Until recently, the entire article other than the Bayes' theorem section has presented an unconditional analysis which comes up with 2/3 as the answer (which is the same numerical answer as the conditional answer given the "equal goat" constraint on the host). Whether there's even a need to distinguish between the unconditional 2/3 and the conditional 2/3 and, if so, how has been a topic of heated discussion on the talk page. -- Rick Block (talk) 18:35, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

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Suggested FA criteria concerns are referencing (1c) and focus (4). Marskell (talk) 03:25, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I've strengthened the referencing and made the article at least somewhat shorter (meant to be responsive to the identified concerns). If folks could take a look at the current state of the article and make specific suggestions for what else may need improving that would be helpful. -- Rick Block (talk) 23:42, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I made some edits, mostly to avoid repetition, but they were reverted, without discussion, and I'm not entirely sure why. The lead doesn't require inline references. And it seems important to separate out a simple statement of the problem with an account of its history (which has its own section). It's true that that history section should probably be moved up; but that's better than duplicating it. Or perhaps those elements should go in the lead, so (again) the lead complies better with WP:LEAD. --05:15, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
    The problem statement in the lead is a quote, and as such must be referenced (per WP:MOSQUOTE and WP:CITE#When quoting someone), as mentioned in the summary for this edit. Do you seriously have a problem with including three sentences about the origin of the problem and its relationship to an earlier (mathematically equivalent) problem in the "Problem" section? The problem statement that you have now duplicated in both the lead and this section (which are contiguous!) is as long. We can certainly discuss this on the talk page if you'd like. -- Rick Block (talk) 05:37, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    It's not a question of length, but of logic and structure, and I think I've explained it clearly enough: there is already a section on the history of the problem; it's probably misplaced, but so be it. The section on "The problem" should best be kept for outlining the problem. Previously, it didn't even do that very gracefully, as it referred readers back to the lead. See, again, problems as per WP:LEAD. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 05:42, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The lead was indeed rewritten a few months back to serve as an overview of the problem, to better conform to WP:LEAD. What do you feel is missing from the lead, or erroneously included in it?--Father Goose (talk) 22:05, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The lead is to be an overview of the article, not of the problem, right? As such, for instance, I'd have thought there should be at least some reference to the "History of the problem" section and the Bayesian analysis (though to be fair this latter may be too technical). Also something on the reasons why the solution is counter-intuitive, as per the discussion in the section on "Sources of confusion." --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 22:11, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The last paragraph of the lead is a reference to the "History" section. The Bayesian analysis is too technical to summarize in the lead, but is implicitly referred to in the last sentence ("formal mathematical proofs"). The sentence starting with "Because ..." in the paragraph immediately below the problem statement is meant to be a concise version of the "Sources of confusion" section (and the recent change from "nearly all" to "most" in this sentence considerably weakens the point - in most studies the number is 90% or more). -- Rick Block (talk) 16:38, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Closing: The article, if anything, is improved since the last FAR. Rick has worked to deal with the comments on the review. We don't have explicit comments, so this is a default keep. Marskell (talk) 20:25, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 18:36, 9 May 2008.

Exploding whale

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Notified User:SandyGeorgia and Wikipedia:WikiProject Cetaceans.
previous FAR

The lack of sources seems to be the main concern — 18 sources seems kind of thin for an FA. Overall, I see more unsourced sentences than sourced, especially in the Taiwan section. I see a couple weasel words here and there ("fairly rare"). Furthermore, there are no sources in the "fiction and poetry" list at the end. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Broken clamshells•Otter chirps) 17:38, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What statements specifically do you feel require sources? Christopher Parham (talk) 03:13, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The sources are given in-text rather than in the notes section, aren't they? If that's inappropriate, I suppose this review is accurate, but otherwise I don't really see that this article requires demotion. Teh Rote (talk) 17:48, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Some sentences that require sources:
  • "Today, beach managers tow dead beached whales to the open sea. This is done mainly for safety reasons, as the rotting carcasses have been known to attract sharks and so become a danger to beach users."
  • "For several years, the story of the exploding whale was commonly disbelieved and thought to be an urban legend. However, it was brought to widespread public attention by popular writer Dave Barry in his Miami Herald column of May 20, 1990... Some time later the Oregon State Highway division started to receive calls from the media after a shortened version of the article was distributed on bulletin boards under the title "The Farside Comes To Life In Oregon"."

Note also that the above sentence uses vague terms like "several" and "some time". Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Broken clamshells•Otter chirps) 17:35, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • The prose could use some cleanup in places and the "In fiction and poetry" seems trivia-ish. "Overall, I see more unsourced sentences than sourced..." <- Not sure I understand this argument. Sure, there are a few statements here and there where I feel a source may be useful, but the overall level of referencing isn't bad. Other than the "In fiction..." section, little has changed in the article since the last FAR. BuddingJournalist 22:42, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

TenPoundHammer, please complete the nominating instructions at the top of WP:FAR by notifying relevant WikiProjects and significant article contributors, and posting notifications back to the top of this FAR. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:24, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Lovely :-) I guess I'm a top editor because of cleanup work on the last FAR :-)) I don't know anything about exploding whales. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:28, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment 18 sources seems kind of thin for an FA - References are not a matter of quantity, and I think this article is adequately sourced. Its a short article on a very narrow topic; frankly I was unaware that whales could explode. I cut the "references in popular culture" section, otherwise I don't really have a problem with the page. Ceoil (talk) 14:00, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It's not a counting contest and given how short this article is the level of referencing is comparable to other FAs. After the cut of trivia, this practically identical to the kept version of last year. Keeping again. Marskell (talk) 18:34, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 18:36, 9 May 2008.

MTR

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previous FAR

The English version of the article MTR refers to the whole MTR network after the merger with KCR network (while Chinese version have both former MTR network before merger and current MTR network). However, some of the information of KCR network was failed to be presented in the article. For example, the history of British Section of the Kowloon-Canton Railway, which is now part of MTR network, is missing. (The history of the whole MTR network should start from 1900s instead of 1960s.) -- MTRKCR (talk) 11:34, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In my opinion, pre-merger KCR history do not belong to the MTR and so just a mentioning in the article with the main page template linked to the KCR article would be adequate. If your opinion prevails as the consensus, we could add in content from the KCR article and find references for it. --:Raphaelmak: [talk] [contribs] 12:03, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I suppose pre-merger KCR history may not belong to the MTR Corporation, but it does belong to part of MTR network's history, as KCR network is part of MTR network now. -- MTRKCR (talk) 12:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that it is obvious that the pre-merger KCR network now belongs to the MTR network, and of course the history section of the MTR article must deal with the history of the MTR network. But in my opinion, since there was no such thing as MTR when the present-day East Rail Line came into operation (1911), it would be somehow illogical to include such early histories of the KCR-BS in the MTR history section. Nor was the KCR-BS (or today's ERL) part of the MTR network until 2007. The history section of the MTR, at a given point within the section, should deal with the situation, or what had happened, to the MTR network at the time described by that point, not dealing with what had happened to the present complete MTR network at that time described. So KCR network history might not be worthy of a detailed inclusion in the MTR article (though there is no problem in merely mentioning it). Any history section of articles here on Wikipedia, in my opinion, should talk about the history of the subject in relation to the definition of the subject at the time the section has progressed to. --:Raphaelmak: [talk] [contribs] 12:57, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
KCR lines are on lease, ownership not transferred. If we merge everything now, are we going to split up the article if the lease terminates tomorrow? Pre-merger history should go to KCR article up to the point of merger, perhaps just brief facts (say ERL was the oldest railway line) for the MTR article. And why is this issue on FARC rather than the talkpages? - Mailer Diablo 17:57, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think there is sufficient material to retain a separate article on the pre-merger KCR and only a brief mention is necessary in this article, which should concentrate on the history of the network since its inception in the 1960s. DrKiernan (talk) 10:13, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Given that none of the criteria are found not met by the article (the nominator has the responsibility to cite and justify the points not met), and per the above arguments, I think that FAR is not the place for such a discussion and therefore the nomination should be closed. --:Raphaelmak: [talk] [contribs] 11:33, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(Nevertheless!) Please complete the nomination by following the instructions at the top of WP:FAR to notify significant contributors and relevant WikiProjects, and post the notifications back to the top of this FAR. Thanks!--RegentsPark (talk) 17:28, 6 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Somewhat belatedly, I am going to follow Raphael and DrK and keep this one. This is essentially a split/merge debate that can be taken care of on article talk. The balance of comments seem to suggest that the separate KCR article can handle the material in question. No other criteria concerns were raised. Marskell (talk) 18:27, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.

Removed status

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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 removed 18:57, 22 May 2008.

Rajshahi University

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Review commentary

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Wikipedia:WikiProject Universities, User:Shmitra, Wikipedia:WikiProject Bengal, Wikipedia:Notice board for Bangladesh-related topics, Wikipedia:WikiProject Bangladeshi Universities notified.

I'm nominating this article for review as it has several inherent drawbacks. Consider this caption for one of the images:"A list of the martyrs of Rajshahi University during the Liberation war." The usage of the word "martyr" is a clear violation of NPOV. Besides there are so many citation-needed tags-RavichandarMy coffee shop 10:51, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Without commenting on the article itself, I don't see much problem with the usage of the term 'martyr' in the context of the 1971 Bangladesh War. Martyr is often used to describe soldiers who die in a war. --RegentsPark (talk) 21:20, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Typical POV. The term "martyr" is serious POV. A martyr is "someone who dies fighting for a good cause". Terming the war as a battle of "liberation" or the soldiers as "martyrs" would be a violation of POV-RavichandarMy coffee shop 04:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Everything is POV. The acceptable POVs are those that are supported by reliable sources. No body is a "terrorist" unless labeled so by an authority, and cited as such (see Martyrs' Cemetery or Martyrs Monument in Midway). If there is a contesting view then there would be a need for consensus or a presentation of both views. That too would have to be appropriately weighted, to prevent fringe views getting equal importance.
If you are interested to take things to that extreme "independence" is a POV, and so is "war". There has been debates going on to define these words for way too long, involving not just morons, but great philosophers as well (ooops, POV there). How do you propose to establish that "liberation" is more POV than "independence" or "revolution" (see American Revolutionary War or Irish War of Independence)? This particular stand on POVs is granted by consensus, and if you really want to change the convention I would suggest that you go for the Village Pump. Aditya(talk • contribs) 06:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia:WTA#Extremist.2C_terrorist_and_freedom_fighter - That's not correct. We say things like "Hamas has been designated a terrorist group by the US" and so forth. If a professor writes a book saying that someone is a war criminal/freedom fighter/terrorist, then the POV is attributed to someone. The rules say that you can't state terrorist/marytr/FF/liberation as "Wikipedia POV", ie, without qualification. A lot of articles about 1971 Bangladeshis use "is a freedom-fighter" - That's not allowed just because Bangladeshi professors or Banglapedia regard it as such. A Pakistani could also use the word "reactionary" or some other perjorative term, we can't use that in WP as WP's POV. In the case of "Martyr's Cemetery" and "Patriot's Cemetary" etc, that is there because it is the official title. That doesn't mean that if we write a bio on a guy who is buried there that we use "..is a martyr/patriotic militant". Blnguyen (bananabucket) 06:13, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Stuff like Munshi Abdur Rouf, Abul_Monjur and Noakhali District use disallowed nationalist POV like martyrs and freedom fighters as a statement of fact. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 06:20, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed, but only in part. As you see yourself, it is not to be used indiscriminately. When a particular installation is designated as "martyr's cemetery" by the builders, it's fine to say so. When a particular war has been accepted as a "war of revolution" by reliable sources, better if by accepted authorities, it is fine to call it so, with appropriate citations, of course. I have real discomfort with the Bangladesh articles using POV terms in abundance, much like I dislike those elsewhere. But, that doesn't mean that I'm ready to agree to unnecessary absolutions. Not yet.
Anyways, coming back to real issue at hand, the article itself. I have a feeling that the entire "Criticism and controversy" sections needs to rewritten. No use writing something first and then finding sources to back whatever I want to put in there. I believe the contrverssy section is not addng up due to a simple reason - it is trying to be too soft and too neutral. That attempt is hardly supported by sources. The "Activities" section is even worse. Much of it is original research, which is very regrettable. Wikipedia is not a compendium of truth, it is rather a place for verifiable facts. The spirit is pretty missing here.
But, I also believe these problems are not big enough to be addressed. Let's put some work into it, and it will be fine. In the worst case scenario, it may have to go through a FARC before tidying up. Say what? Aditya(talk • contribs) 06:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
BTW, we are not discussing other crap here, are we? Lt's keep the flaws of the rest of Bangladesh-related articles out of this discussion. Aditya(talk • contribs) 07:20, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment on the word Martyr: I checked dictionary and couldn't verify the definition of the word martyr that Ravichandar has provided. The appropriate definitions that I could find from Dictionary.com are: A person who is put to death or endures great suffering on behalf of any belief, principle, or cause. or A person who suffers death or hardship for what he or she believes etc. As such I fail to understand exactly what is inherently POV about this word. Arman (Talk) 10:33, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In most cases, you will only see one side calling a person a martyr, never the other. Why is this so? Because it's all a matter of opinion. We're building a neutral encyclopedia here, not some tribute pieces to Bangladeshi heroes. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not love) 00:28, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
All that is nice and true. The only problem is that the list is described as such by the builders, and it is clearly written on the top of the list. In fact, the caption is only a literal translation of the description on the list. How do you people propose to make it NPOV? When descrbing the "United States of America" do we use a footnote that says - "United is the descriptor used by the writers of the Declaration of Independence, in which case "Independence" was another epithet used by the same group of people", and then put a couple of in-line citations to support the explanation? I am sure we don't do that. Let me see if I can make this NPOV enough for everyone. Aditya(talk • contribs) 04:22, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"From the Binodpur gate, the residential halls named after Nawab Abdul Latif, Shamsuzzoha and Madarbux are located to the north, while Sher-e-Bangla hall[citation needed] and the oldest dorm Motihar Hall[9] lie to the west.[citation needed]" has been tagged twice for citation. An, I have no clue why. When it was first tagged, I understood that it was for the claim of "oldest dorm" and that has been cited. If someone really wants to be silly enough to ask citations for geographic locations of the dorms per cardinal directions, Wikipedia may be in dire problem. This trigger happiness with tags doesn't seem to apply to any other featured articles here, and I believe all of them passed through community consensus. Are we sure that we need a cite to tell Belgium lies to the north of France and Spain to the south? Aditya(talk • contribs) 04:55, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was just commenting on the word "martyr" in a general context. I don't have a problem if you have a quote that includes the word "martyr". It's clearly being attributed to someone or something. However, the article does have other issues: it is poorly referenced (some sections do not even contain any refs), the lead is underdeveloped and there are MoS issues (discrepancies with spelling out numbers). Nishkid64 (Make articles, not love) 04:57, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I personally have no inclination towards using high-sounding epithets, unless it comes from a source. And, my entire argument was that since it was called so by the builders, it is perfectly alright to say so. I have tweaked the copy of the caption to that end. But, now I am faced with a new problem - this geographic location thing. Any idea about what to do about this? I have also noticed that there are problems in the article, and I am getting around to them. Pressed with time it's not happening too fast. But, its happening alright. A few more hands there would have been appreciable. But, well... Aditya(talk • contribs) 05:14, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"In the 2005–06 fiscal year, the UGC granted 59 crore taka (around US$10 million) to the university; the university was expected to raise another 3 crore taka from its internal resources." I have removed this part from Organisation and administration section. It looked trivial, wasn't cited and didn't sit well with the rest of section. Aditya(talk • contribs) 05:37, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Largeness of Shabash Bangladesh looks mighty suspect. Can someone provide cite? I couldn't find any. The bit on largeness may have to if there's no source supporting the fact. Aditya(talk • contribs) 13:27, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Missing info - History from 1964 to present is very short. There is only one line on it. In 1964 there were hardly any students, now there are 25,000 but the growth is not documented. There appears to be an undue weight on political issues, unless it recognised that the uni is more of a political org than a uni. Also, there is no hard data on funding, commercial sponsorships, rankings etc, unlike other FAs on unis, since Unis' performances are usually compared to their competitors. Compared to other university articles, there is a lot missing. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:05, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, there may be some necessary information missing. But, there is no need to continuously compare to other universities, unless that is an ironclad law. Most of these other universities seem to have their social, cultural and political impact missing from their articles. An university doesn't have to become a political organization to have a social impact. There is certainly a reason why many people refer to grad-schools instead of universities. It is a pity to find universities to play smaller social roles than Hollywood starlets, it is a bigger pity to find that endorsed as an encyclopedic standard. For now let's stick to facts, and not a comparative bias. Aditya(talk • contribs) 04:07, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well there is no ironclad law, but even without a law it's pretty obvious that for any organisation, it is normal to discuss who funds it, how heavily funded it is. And for any organisation, it is normal to measure its results and if it has succeeded, so academic indicators are usually provided. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:08, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That part has already been agreed to. Aditya(talk • contribs) 04:44, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

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Suggested FA criteria concerns are POV (1d), referencing (1c), and comprehensiveness (1b). Marskell (talk) 18:14, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delist - The issue of "Martyr" seems only one of the many things needing fixing. The suggested concerns seem fair and the article indeed needs quite a bit of work in almost every section. I also note that there has also not been a real concerted effort to improve the article since it was FARed.. which is not reassuring. As it stands, the article certainly is not FA-grade. Sarvagnya 01:26, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There may be other issues with the article but I don't see why you object to the way martyr is used in the caption. If the encryption translates to martyr, then what's wrong with that? --Regents Park (Feed my swans) 02:01, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm.. if "Martyrs' monument" is what it is called.. well that is what it is called. But using "martyr" in the text as an adjective or a verb is not encyclopedic. Anyway, imo, the "martyr" issue is the least of the article's concerns. That is what I intended to suggest in my delist comment above. Sarvagnya 01:07, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delist - Still has missing sections on history/growth, performance indicators and budget, unsourced sections, and once the info is down pat it still has (1a) and MOS to fix. But nothing new has happened since Apr 30. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 04:49, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Is it possible to expound a little on 1d, like Blnguyen has done for 1c and 1b? BTW, some of the "citation needed" tags may need a bit of explanation, like there's a tag for the Rokeya Hall while a source for all hostels been provided (yep, a hall is a hostel there). Aditya(talk • contribs) 05:07, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And, I wouldn't mind a delisting as well. The prose isn't too good (probably that's generating this amazing hoo-haa over POVs), there's this problem with MOS (too short intro and all), not laid out well enough, not too many support (like when you say a Faculty of Biology, there's no chance of learning about that, a ring of tiny articles can solve that easily). I'd say, let this article lie low for sometime, and when the problems are fixed take it back to FAC. Say what? Aditya(talk • contribs) 06:42, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 18:57, 22 May 2008.

De Lorean DMC-12

[edit]

Review commentary

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User:Jwplumley, Wikipedia:WikiProject Automobiles notified.

I worked on this a lot quite some time ago, but it has not been maintained. There are short sections, sections without citations, and personally I now feel it no longer fits the FA criteria. — Wackymacs (talk) 06:24, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

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Suggested FA criteria concerns are stub sections (4) and citations (1c). Marskell (talk) 19:14, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delist lacks citations, half the citations are from a site where the author has a dislaimer saying that he is an amateur enthusiast. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:42, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 18:57, 22 May 2008.

Windows 2000

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Review commentary

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Notified: User:Warren, User:Jdlowery, User:AlistairMcMillan, Wikipedia:WikiProject Microsoft Windows

I am nominating this article for FAR because it no longer meets the Featured Article criteria, particularly:

  • 1c - quite a bit of the article is now completely unsourced, including some direct quotes, almost all of the Architecture section, several chunks of the Common functionality and Server family functionality Section, almost all of the Deployment section, the entire Editions section, all of Total cost of ownership, etc.
  • 1b and 1d - while a huge amount of the article discusses features, there is almost no information on how well received the software was, sales numbers, etc. The only reception type information is security criticisms, which seems imbalanced and lacking in neutrality to be a top level section without other reception information.
  • 1a - could use a new copy edit as it is no longer well-written, with several grammar and spelling mistakes.
  • 2b - seems several later sections could easily be combined into a single one. The menu was also set only show 1st headers, but I've already fixed that.
  • 3 - excessive images, including the logo being included twice; four images of the software box, one for addition, which are completely unnecessary and seem more like decoration than anything else.
  • 4 - 60k in length, likely because it goes into far too much detail on the software features and usage, which seems to go against the idea that Wikipedia is not a software manual and not an advertisement. The technical aspects easily take up over half the article, and could be greatly reduced for brevity. I think the blow by blow should be left to tech articles and manuals.

AnmaFinotera (talk) 03:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

God forbid an article on a technical subject contain technical details! Windows 2000 is an enormous topic; Wikipedia has hundreds of articles that discuss components included with it. Because of the sheer size of the subject being discussed, each successive Windows operating system article focuses on what's new to that release, and in the case of Windows 2000, it turns out that there's quite a lot to talk about. We had the same problem with Windows Vista, whose "new features" section had to be split into seven sub-articles.
Most of the text in the Windows 2000 article is actually sourced from the book references (esp. Inside Windows 2000), but Harvard-style referencing needs to be applied to it. -/- Warren 17:46, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I really don't know why this is still featured. A lot of work has gone into it, but...
  • Why are there so many lists everywhere? Prose is always better. Long lists should be moved out into their own articles.
  • I can even see internal URLs instead of proper citation formatting (see Language and locale support sub-section, at the end of the paragraph).
  • Too many images - do we really need to see the boxes for every edition?
  • Why is there random bolding in places? Doesn't seem to comply with WP:MOS
  • The article is rather technical, for someone who doesn't have a clue about computers. The meaning of kernel is not explained.
  • Maybe I'm blind, but I don't see any mention of sales figures, and no 'reception' section?
  • Looks like this one needs to go back to square one to get sorted out.

— Wackymacs (talk) 06:30, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the article is good, but may be too long for the average person to read. I suggest splitting it up into multiple sections just like what has been done with the Windows XP and Windows Vista articles. What if we made a section for features, editions, and support. I think this would be a great way to clean up the article a bit. We also should try and find some citations for un-cited sources. I will try to start on this soon. Jdlowery (talk) 02:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Like many articles in WP, it suffers from corporatese. I've started to hack away at such grotesque stuff as "While all editions of Windows 2000 are targeted to different markets, they each share a core set of common functionality" (Whatever "functionality" may means, can't even slow readers figure that what's shared is common?); "Windows 2000 can be installed and deployed to corporate desktops" (What's the distinction between installation and deployment, how does it matter whether the 'puter is on a desk or on the floor, and what's distinctively corporate about this?); and "The public received the full version of Windows 2000 on February 17 2000" ("Received"? 17 February was a day that this member of the public spent not buying Win2k, let alone shoplifting or downloading it). However, this is going to take some time, and this rather mystical treatment of the products of large US corporations is so common across Wikipedia that I start to think that its perps aren't just forgetting they're not writing corporate image copy but instead actually like this stuff. Morenoodles (talk) 07:07, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I find that faintly insulting - I wrote most of this and I run Ubuntu at home, have been a fan of Linux for a long time. Please, by all means criticise but for goodness sake - refrain from making personal comments! - Tbsdy lives (talk) 16:01, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry if you feel insulted but I wrote what I thought and rather than merely criticizing have been sporadically working on the prose. Morenoodles (talk) 07:24, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate that you are doing this :-) I did say "faintly", I suppose more to point out that the following sentence is fairly personal "this rather mystical treatment of the products of large US corporations is so common across Wikipedia that I start to think that its perps aren't just forgetting they're not writing corporate image copy but instead actually like this stuff". This implies that the main author of the article is a Microsoft fan-boy! And given that I was the main author... well, you see where I'm going. The lesson to be learned here is that you can never be sure who writes an article. It's best to be specific when giving criticism and not make generalised statements like the one above. However, that said I'm sure that you didn't mean ill by it, and I'm positive it wasn't specifically directed at me. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 10:04, 21 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: This article seems to me to have a fairly high percentage of "sourcing" that's satisfyingly explicit. What alarms me is the percentage of this that was written by Microsoft. Great swathes of the article are in effect what Microsoft said about its own product. Much of this is very dry and I am not making accusations of advertising or similar. Still, it seems odd to me that screenfuls go by with Win2k compared to its predecessors and successors as if in a world where no non-Microsoft product is worthy of any note. True, Microsoft then had (and still has) a lock on the OS market and one shouldn't pretend otherwise (the great majority of potential customers wouldn't have looked at a non-Microsoft alternative even if it were given to them free). But I'd guess that somebody somewhere would have compared Win2k with Mac OS or even Linux or BSD, yet Linux goes unmentioned other than for price and Mac OS is not mentioned at all. Morenoodles (talk) 12:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't think this is particularly valid. Windows 2000 was an operating system created by... Microsoft. We rely on their documentation to understand the technical aspects of the OS. I'm interested, however, in who else you suggest we should be citing? - Tbsdy lives (talk) 16:03, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • I really don't know, as I don't claim to be an expert on OSes. Back when I was using Windows, I wasn't using books published by or with the cooperation of Microsoft, and those books (long since thrown away) were sometimes a little skeptical of the claims that MS made. Morenoodles (talk) 07:24, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • I'm not trying to be difficult here, but this is all a little too vague for my liking. If you could give me specific examples where there is a pro-Microsoft bias in the article then I will try to address your concerns. However, speaking of long-forgotten books being sceptical of unspecified Microsoft claims isn't really an actionable objection. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 10:04, 21 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are referencing (1c), comprehensiveness (1b), POV (1d), images (3), and length (4). Marskell (talk) 16:45, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Diff since nomination, appears nothing is happening here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:08, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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The article was removed 20:43, 18 May 2008.

Acorn Computers

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Review commentary

[edit]
User:Lmno‎, User:TreveX‎ notified.

This article is far from FA standard:

  • Referencing is not even GA standard. "Prehistory" section has 0 references. "CPU Ltd (1978–83)" section has only 2 references. "Acorn Computer Group plc (1983–85)" has only 1 reference. No references in "BBC Master and Archimedes" section and paragraph before it. No references in first 2 paragraphs of "Break up of Acorn (1998–2000) and on-going developments of their technology" section.
  • References 5, 7, 13 and 16 have formatting problems.
  • The article is not comprehensive. It only talks about the history of Acorn. I know the company no longer exists, but what is it's impact on computers nowadays? What was the corporate culture of Acorn like when it was still around? Also, the "Revival of the Acorn trademark" section is only two sentences and needs to be expanded.
  • The article has a lot of POV words and sentences:
    • "it left an impressive legacy"
    • "It was a very influential documentary"
    • "The BBC Micro sold spectacularly well"
    • "a successful advertising campaign"
    • "The apparently strong demand for Electrons proved to be illusory"
    • "Acorn was in real trouble"
    • "ultimately proved to be something of a flop"
    • "proved to a drawn-out and expensive process that proved futile"
    • "The dire financial situation was brought to a head in February 1985"
    • "met with great success"
    • "was considerably more powerful and advanced than most offerings of the day"
    • "Acorn's last real hopes of becoming a major player in the computer industry had fizzled out: set-top boxes were not taking off as expected, and the Network Computer, too, had been a bit of a flop"
  • There are also many sentences written in a way which is not formal or encyclopediac:
    • "With the Atom on the market, Acorn could begin to think about its replacement."
    • "should they move in that direction?"
    • "In later years the Tube would play an important role in the development of Acorn's own processor."
    • "this was not going to be easy with a 2–4 MHz 6502-based system doing the graphics. Acorn would need a new architecture."
    • "if a class of graduate students could create a competitive 32-bit processor, then Acorn would have no problem"
    • "It was hoped that the Network Computer would create a significant new sector in which Acorn Network Computing would be a major player"
    • "Acorn's watershed year was 1984 – it had gone public just as the home computer market collapsed. It was the year when Atari was sold, Apple nearly went bust, and Acorn had solved the one problem it had had throughout its history: production volumes."

--Kaypoh (talk) 06:05, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]


I agree about the referencing, there isn't nearly enough. This is also the problem with POV sentences, they are pretty uncontentious statements but need to be referenced, especially when words such as "spectacular" are used. As for the unencyclopedic sentences, some of them, I agree, are written in a more informal 'magazine' stlye (e.g. the rhetorical "should they move in that direction?" or "if a class of graduate students could create a competitive 32-bit processor, then Acorn would have no problem". However I think a few comments are just nit-picking: how is "With the Atom on the market, Acorn could begin to think about its replacement" or "It was hoped that the Network Computer would create a significant new sector in which Acorn Network Computing would be a major player" unencyclopedic or set in an innapropriate tone?
Kaypoh asks "The article is not comprehensive. It only talks about the history of Acorn. I know the company no longer exists, but what is it's impact on computers nowadays?" Try reading the initroduction! "Though the company was broken up into several independent operations in 1998, it leaves an impressive legacy, particularly in the development of RISC personal computers. A number of Acorn's former subsidiaries live on today - notably ARM Holdings who are globally dominant in the mobile phone and PDA microprocessor market."
The section on the new company was (wrongly IMHO) split off.
To be honest, I don't have the time to fix all this. The FA may well lapse now but I just thought I'd respond to these comments. TreveXtalk 15:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I see the lead section talks about the legacy, but there should also be a "Legacy" section with more info. Also, I only gave a few examples of POV and unencyclopediac statements, there are more. If you don't have the time, you can let the article lose FA status and later work on it so it can become a GA. --Kaypoh (talk) 06:48, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't need a legacy section - as this is dealt with in the general prose. Any number of subjects relating to and aspects of an article can be important but don't necessarily 'need' a section of their own if they're dealt with properly. The legacy is discussed (RiscOS, ARM etc) at various points. TreveXtalk 21:36, 20 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns referencing (1c), prose (1a), and POV (1d). Marskell (talk) 16:47, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We only have one definite comment in FARC but there is absolutely nothing happening here. Removing. Marskell (talk) 20:34, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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The article was removed 20:43, 18 May 2008.

AIDS

[edit]

Review commentary

[edit]
Notified: User:Grcampbell, User:JoeSmack,‎ User:Coppertwig, User:Eubulides, Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine, User:Nunh-huh, User:MastCell, User:SandyGeorgia

This FA article has been undergoing clean-up recently by several editors that focus on medical articles. There are several concerns:

Comment -If the wikiproject was cleaning the article, why was it brought here? Those who will most actively address the articles improvement should work on it first, so if they are in the middle of that, putting the article here is not very helpful. Also, please notify all users and :wikiprojects that you have put this article up for review. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Judgesurreal777 (talk • contribs) March 20, 2008
The WP isn't adequately cleaning up the article, and issues were raised on the talk page a while ago. Notifications were done; Orangemarlin just failed to post them here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:25, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I haven't read the article for some time and I need to study it once more but on a quick read through this jumped out at me:
Commercially available tests to detect other HIV antigens, HIV-RNA, and HIV-DNA in order to detect HIV infection before the development of detectable antibodies are available. For the diagnosis of HIV infection these assays are not specifically approved, but are nonetheless routinely used in developed countries.
The first sentence is very poorly written and the second sentence is not true. Modern screening tests for HIV infection detect antibodies and p24 antigen simultaneously. PCR for HIV RNA is used all the time and is the basis of the viral load assay and genotyping for drug resistence. PCR for HIV proviral-DNA is approved and is central to the diagnosis of HIV infection in babies born to infected mothers. (Unfortunately, they are not routinely used in developing countries because they are expensive). To find errors such as these in a featured article is appalling.--GrahamColmTalk 21:31, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment-I just plowed through the External Links section. Many of the links overlapped each other, some were just a link to a bunch more links. I cleaned it up. I also added an external reading section that links to pdf files of key resources. I'm going to find some more external links that are useful, but to be honest, most were giant advertising for something or another. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 20:30, 21 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Here are some comments from a first quick read of the article.

  • The lead gives too-short shrift (in many case, no coverage) to symptoms, pathophysiology, diagnosis, treatment, prognosis, and history—entire sections of the article are not mentioned in the lead.
  • The last paragraph in the lead (on stigma) is not sourced, and makes claims that are not a summary of the text.
  • WP:MEDMOS suggests a Classification section, and that's a good idea here.
  • WP:MEDMOS suggests that AIDS#Transmission and prevention's material should be split into two parts. The transmission part should be moved to AIDS#Cause and the prevention part kept (so that the section is renamed to Prevention). This sounds like a good idea too.
  • AIDS#Symptoms contains extended coverage of survival time, material that belongs in AIDS#Prognosis.
  • AIDS#Symptoms does not mention the symptoms of acute HIV syndrome. Admittedly this is not AIDS, but it is relevant (perhaps should be in a new Classification section).
  • There's no mention of AIDS-related lung illnesses such as lymphoid interstitial pneumonia (pediatric AIDS) or pulmonary lymphoid hyperplasia.
  • Come to think of it, there's no mention of the symptoms of pediatric AIDS, e.g., ear infections, tonsillitis, delayed development.
  • There are several dead links.
  • Much of the material under AIDS#Cause belongs in AIDS#Pathophysiology.
  • AIDS#Pathophysiology is just a stub sketchy; it is more of an outline of what a pathophysiology section might be, than a high-quality section.
  • AIDS#Diagnosis uses the term "staging system" without defining it.
  • AIDS#Sexual contact is way too long. Subarticle, please.
  • AIDS#Treatment is also too long. It should be cut by a factor of four. It should just summarize its subarticle.
  • AIDS#CDC classification system for HIV infection and other subsections of AIDS#Diagnosis contain considerable historical material that should be in AIDS#History.
  • AIDS#Epidemiology does not cover crucial topics like comorbid conditions, changes with time, and risk factors.
  • AIDS#Prognosis is missing some basic answers about prognosis. (Orangemarlin mentioned this too.)
  • AIDS#Economic impact is too long. A subarticle would fix this.
  • AIDS#History spends some time talking about HIV species. That's not a question of history; that material belongs elsewhere.
  • The sources are getting dated. Only one high-quality source from 2008, and maybe five from 2007, among 103 citations? Sounds like the article hasn't been kept up-to-date. I suggest that someone start with Kallings 2008 (PMID 18205765) and read it and follow its citations, to see how to bring AIDS up to date.

There are more problems, I suspect, but this should be enough for starters. Eubulides (talk) 08:12, 22 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wow. This is going to take almost as much work as an FAC. I started working on the sexual contact section, and I got a migraine trying to figure out what was being said. So, I went to something I thought would be easy, the links, and I wanted to throw my laptop out the window. I know, these comments are useful, but it's 1:30 in the morning, and I've been reading for 4 hours. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 08:26, 22 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've noticed a lot of copyediting and MoS items, but my comments would probably be more effective if I wait until more of the basic work is done. And again, there is still an external jump to an external website in the text. I've raised this multiple times on the talk page; it keeps coming back. See WP:EL. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:45, 22 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are referencing (1c), formatting (2), prose (1a), and focus (4). Marskell (talk) 19:00, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No feedback since two days after the FAR was initiated, diff during FAR (69 edits, mostly vandal reverts). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:45, 26 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Remove per prose (1a), referencing (1c), lead section (2a), and focus (4). I hate to vote "remove" as it's clearly a high-quality article on an important topic. But only a few of the abovementioned problems have been addressed. A non-stub AIDS#Pathophysiology section has been added during the past 24 hours, but it's mostly just an outline. The whole article still needs attention from a good copyeditor. Eubulides (talk) 06:35, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Demote until the Pathophysiology section is greatly improved. There is no mention of the importance of apoptosis, co-receptor switching and progression to AIDS. This article is about a disease and it is important to get the pathology right. The quality of the rest of the article is good but some sections, economic impact for example, ramble on a bit. Yes, it could do with some CE attention, but not that much. --GrahamColmTalk 12:19, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Further update Tim Vickers and I have tried to make changes. I've done a lot of cleaning per the recommendations here, but the article just doesn't flow well. The prose needs serious copyediting, which is not one of my skillsets. Two sections, mentioned above, Pathophysiology and Prognosis are in bad shape. Causes reads like several different editors, all of different writing skills, contributed to the writing, yet there is no coherence. Treatment section needs to be reviewed by an expert. Tim Vickers has improved the lead a lot. The external links have been cleaned up (wow, was there cruft accumulated there). We really need some copyediting before we can do the next phase of cleaning. I think. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 21:20, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've moved that. Tim Vickers (talk) 16:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Update after a week, no progress whatsoever on Pathophysiology, which needs a complete rewrite. Unless someone is able to take this on, this one isn't likely to make it. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:08, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The section is way outside of my skill set. I pulled out a paper on it, but because I don't know much about it, I can't write it. I've tried to ask Tim Vickers, who is a virologist, to help out, but I don't think it's in his skill area either (but I'm not sure, maybe he just doesn't have time). This is sad for such an important article. I wish someone could help out. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 06:15, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I just realized the "Diagnosis" section needs work, too. It starts with a throwaway sentence ("The diagnosis of AIDS in a person infected with HIV is based on the presence of certain signs or symptoms.") and moves on to talking about Staging, without every clearly discussing how the condition is diagnosed. More than six weeks into FAR, I don't see any indication that the broad effort needed to restore this article is underway. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:49, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Work and comments have both dropped off, so removing. I think this has seen improvement but it's been open an awful long time. Marskell (talk) 20:22, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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The article was removed 14:13, 14 May 2008.

Senate of Canada

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Review commentary

[edit]
Wikipedia:WikiProject Governments of Canada notified.

This artcle's FTC failed because it no longer met FA standards. It was promoted at the same time as the now demoted Canadian House of Commons and likely suffers from the same kind of problems. I would like to know what it needs to get up to today's FA standard. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 02:29, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  1. Lead needs expanding.
  2. Section tagged with "requires update" should be updated.
  3. Please cite "The Senate was ... meant to represent the social and economic élite." I know about the property qualification, but what if I was to argue that the qualification was designed to prevent corruption by ensuring that senators could not be bought or pressured by financial interests?
  4. Please cite the quotes.
  5. In the "Senators" section, it is unclear whether the original formula was proportional to population, and it has only become disproportionate due to population changes, or whether it has always been disproportionate. Needs better explanation or phrasing.
  6. "The Speaker may settle disputes over which senator rose first, but his or her decision may be altered by the Senate." How does the Senate alter the Speaker's decision?
  7. "the Speaker holds a vote (which is not usually exercised) and votes first when a recorded division is called;" this is unclear. Do they vote or not? Needs further explanation or different phrasing.
  8. "In the 1960s, the Senate authored the first Canadian reports on media concentration with the Special Senate Subcommittee on Mass Media or the Davey Commission,[5] since "appointed senators would be better insulated from editorial pressure brought by publishers"; this triggered the formation of press councils." Confusing use of a semi-colon. I can't tell which clause of the sentence relates to which other clause.
  9. The "Provincial positions" sections needs expansion to include the names of the other three provincial premiers. DrKiernan (talk) 09:41, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are referencing (1c), lead (2a), and prose (1a). Marskell (talk) 16:39, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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The article was removed 14:11, 14 May 2008.

Sassanid Empire

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Review commentary

[edit]
Notified author and all WikiProjects listed on the talk page. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:06, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This article is substantially undersourced. Many paragraphs have no citations at all. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 04:59, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, there are some uncited paragraphs and sections, but, in general, it is a comprehensive and well-written article. I think it can be easily saved; it would be a pity to lose the star. In the legacy section there is an external jump ("Today there are around 70,000 Parsis in India. [4]") needing fixing.--Yannismarou (talk) 17:06, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. As an overview article most of the uncited material is no doubt very basic to the study of the period & not likely to be challenged, but someone with a good book should sprinkle page refs around. At least in the later sections, some obvious links are missing, which in an article like this is on the whole more serious. I will try to add some myself. Johnbod (talk) 19:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Refmongering may help assuage editors who simply look for more little numbers to help them believe stuff is not made up, but more important is the quality of references. I am disturbed that some standard works are missing, not least the important of which is the Cambridge History of Iran (cited indifferently inlined), while other fluffy and non-scholarly works are included. I like this article: well-written, well-organised and accurate to the best of my knowledge. I am largely serene about the current footnoting; there is no need to footnote closely basic facts in a narrative structure. However, the References section does need to be improved in order to provide a better basis for credibility. Eusebeus (talk) 13:26, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concern is referencing (1c). Marskell (talk) 11:57, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delist per 1c. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:37, 6 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove Would benefit from further inline citations, particularly where potentially contentious claims are made (e.g. "probably copied", "died in (sic) grief", "too much of a melancholy character to achieve anything", etc.), or where sources are referred to without exact details (e.g. "It is said that...", "...is often compared to...", "the most well-known", etc.) There are some discrepancies in the prose, e.g. "Shapur II pursued a harsh religious policy...Shapur II was amicable towards Jews", which should be ironed out. "See also" and "External links" could be shortened easily as some links are repeated. DrKiernan (talk) 10:23, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delist. I've just added some fact tags. A quick look at the history shows that exactly zero references or citations have been added in that time, and indeed that any change has been minimal in the extreme. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 00:53, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And I've just spent some more time with the article: even where there are sources, they are pretty poor. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 01:20, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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The article was removed 11:47, 10 May 2008.

ASCII

[edit]

Review commentary

[edit]
Notifications at Chris Chittleborough, WP Writing systems and WP Computing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:22, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A brilliant prose promotion, this article is due for a tuneup. It has taken on cruftiness (External link farm, See also farm, lots of external jumps in the text) and is largely uncited. Several one- and two-sentence sections, and listiness. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:15, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This was on my plate for a rewrite in the next few months, including a nav template for character encodings. "RFC" is a special wiki code like PMID. Gimmetrow 04:08, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, the article has accumulated some cruft over the years (but it would be much, much worse without Gimmetrow's great work). Gimmetrow, I'm delighted to hear you're planning a rewrite, and I'd love to help in any way I can. Cheers, CWC 09:46, 23 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are formatting (2) and referencing (1c). Marskell (talk) 19:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see this is now closed as remove, despite ongoing work to the article. Thank you so much. Gimmetrow 18:08, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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The article was removed 17:40, 9 May 2008.

Cheese

[edit]

Review commentary

[edit]
Notified Wikipedia:WikiProject Food and Drink, Wikipedia:WikiProject Agriculture

This is a featured article, and I wish to nominate it for delisting, for the following reason: lack of sufficient references. A section in the article is actually tagged as not having sufficient references. diego_pmc (talk) 18:05, 7 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns is referencing (1c). Marskell (talk) 10:43, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 17:40, 9 May 2008.

TGV

[edit]

Review commentary

[edit]
Notified: Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains, Wikipedia:WikiProject France, User:Schutz‎ , User:Slambo‎ , User:Willkm‎

Just a quick skim over the article shows that there are very, very few references for an article of this size, and that many statements are unreferenced (criteria 1c). I don't think an article like this should be an FA. Noble Story (talk) 02:20, 7 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Acknowledging that I have at least received the notice (thanks for the notice). I was involved in the original push to move this up to FA level; I haven't looked very closely at the text of this article since it was promoted. I will try to find time to return and fill it in with some more refs and clean it up as needed, but with school this week, I don't think I will have as much time as I would like. Slambo (Speak) 17:21, 7 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Large sections of this article read like trivia collections. For example, look at the last several "paragraphs" in the History section.WVhybrid (talk) 01:15, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are referencing (1c) and trivia (4). Marskell (talk) 10:42, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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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 removed 17:40, 9 May 2008.

Ku Klux Klan

[edit]

Review commentary

[edit]
Notified: User:Bcrowell, User:GordonUS, User:Shanes, User:Parkwells, User:Darwinek, User:Luna Santin, Wikipedia:WikiProject African diaspora, Wikipedia:WikiProject Jewish history, Wikipedia:WikiProject Alabama, Wikipedia:WikiProject Discrimination, Wikipedia:WikiProject Secret Societies, Wikipedia:WikiProject Tennessee

Nominating this article for review for several reasons. First, the factual accuracy has been harmed by various POV commentary and original research placed within the text. More editors need to be involved with the article. Second, the article is moving away from neutral, and in several instances, has eliminated some KKK wrongdoing. The article is not stable any longer, and is subject to various edit wars. It is a solid FA but it has grown some POV statements that would prevent it from being a FA if done now. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 23:06, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A quick look at the history section shows the disruption seems to be caused by one editor. It would be better just to revert this user or blcok him, rather than terminate the entire article status as a FA if that is the case. Yahel Guhan 06:30, 1 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Suggest resubmit later for FA, not now Article has lock on it saying there is dispute. So solve dispute then reapply for FA. I must say that I am not neutral about KKK. I do not like KKK. But if disputes fixed then it could be a FA because you can hate KKK and still think article is written very good (I mean good prose, not make them look good). 219.240.73.145 (talk) 06:21, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are factual accuracy (1c), neutrality (1d), and stability (1e). Marskell (talk) 12:43, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lots of work needed, a quick glance shows a proliferation of MoS errors; if anyone is actually working on the article I can list them. See also needs attention, per WP:GTL. There are also citation tags and uncited text. Unless someone is actually working to salvage this article, I don't have a big interest in reading. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:46, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove Citation needed markers need clearing, and the uncited paragraphs would benefit from references as this is a contentious topic. The "Popular culture" section is not comprehensive and off-focus. It lists trivial instances of no lasting impact whatever and jumps from 1891 to 2000, missing all references to the cultural impact of the Klan in the intervening years. The important cultural legacy of Griffith's film and Klan iconography is in a preceding section, which may indicate structural problems as the details of the Klan's cultural impact are split across sections. "See also" and "External links" sections are too long. Citations could be better formatted, in particular by removing redundancy and duplication of details also given in the "References" section. I think it would be better to standardise the image sizes, at present it looks untidy with images of different sizes adjacent to each other. I recommend using the default, as that will also reduce length marginally. DrKiernan (talk) 10:02, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 17:40, 9 May 2008.

Tom Brinkman

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Review commentary

[edit]
Notified User:PedanticallySpeaking, User:Spencer, User:Stepshep, Wikipedia:WikiProject Ohio, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography

The article was promoted to FA almost three years ago and I believe that it no longer meets the criteria as a Featured Article. It fails 2(c) but also it requires of cleanup in several areas. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 13:03, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • The references need to be completely redone, the main image features a banner reading "McEwen" when the article is about Brinkman, and it's very short. Another thing that bothers me is the slightest of details like this sentence:"Will, Stephen, Daniel, Kelley, Kevin, Michael." which really isn't even a sentence. From my understandings the quotes and other things are formatted incorrectly. At this time from the article's current condition I vote in favor of a delisting. §tepshep • ¡Talk to me! 19:58, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concern is referencing (1c). Marskell (talk) 12:41, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 17:40, 9 May 2008.

James K. Polk

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Review commentary

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Notified WikiProject Biography, U.S. Presidents, U.S. Congress, North Carolina, Tennessee, United States presidential elections

I'll see if I can come up with some citations, both for sentences with fact tags and paragraphs without. Is this the only issue with the article? Also, are there any specific sentences you want sourced that are not already labeled? Thanks. Rufous-crowned Sparrow (talk) 18:37, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concern is referencing (1c). Marskell (talk) 16:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove 1c Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:53, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • This might perhaps become a useful process, if reviewers would actually read the article and see what claims were indeed controversial or difficult to find, thus answering Rufus' question above (as nobody has bothered to do). Since, by my count, it cites five standard lives of Polk, these should not be difficult to check. Some of the existing {{cn}} tags are frivolous (I've dealt with one); it would be laborious but not really difficult to find, from our own articles, which presidents were survived by their mothers. Ignore as not actionable. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:09, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I am not familiar with Polk and his life, and thus the potential controversies there might be. I would assume that someone who is familiar with Polk would reference the salient points and thus help keep its status, as has been done with Emsworths articles in the past. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 19:37, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still planning on working on this article; however, I agreed to before checking my school's library, which does not have a bio on him, making this somewhat problematic. Do online databases which require passwords to get into count as Wiki-able sources? Thanks. Rufous-crowned Sparrow (talk) 22:26, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
JSTOR? Yes, certainly (include the citation to printed form of the article, please); the books cited in our article, some of which must be dead-tree only, also count. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:42, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Judge: you have an exaggerated idea of the virtue of footnotes; we could note every comma, and that still would indicate nothing about where the controversies on Polk lay. Fortunately the major one is "Was Polk a great President?", which is not our business; the article has one sentence on it, which should probably be removed. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:38, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No. I hold this article to the standard that all Featured articles are currently held to, and it is expected to be very well referenced, which means lots of inline citations. I am not mistaken about this. If you don't like the criteria, perhaps you should discuss it with the appropriate talk page, because this argument against the citations hasn't worked before and won't work this time either. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 05:48, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This comment is inconsistent with
  • The instructions at the top of this page. Nominators must specify the featured article criteria that are at issue and should propose remedies. Judge has failed to do this. Participants may declare "keep" or "remove", supported by substantive comments, and further time is provided to overcome deficiencies. I have asked for substantive comments and recieved none.
  • WP:V:All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation. That qualification is bolded in the policy itself; it is intended to limit what needs inline citation.
  • WP:FAC: Each objection must provide a specific rationale that can be addressed. Again, emphasis in the original.
  • WP:WHEN: Not every statement in an article needs a citation.
  • This FAC, which was denied chiefly because the article in question had "lots of footnotes" (a meaningless demand: How many is "a lot"?)
But Judge could indeed be very useful if he would list additional statements which fulfill the criteria carefully listed at WP:WHEN - for which an eye which knows nothing about Polk would be a distinct advantage. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is not a forum to attack me for nominating FA's for review, and I will not engage in a fight about it. I have nominated dozens of articles here with the same rationale "insufficient inline citations", and it has been acceptable to the FAR directors, and until they say otherwise, what I stated is sufficient. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 04:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No, there are other fora for dealing with disruptive edits. We can get to them if necessary. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:10, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Retain and hold: I believe I have dealt with all the specified substantive complaints to the article except the total cost of the Mexican War. I will continue; but that should be soluble, but if anyone else can find it, so much the better. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:28, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove I think there are other issues, regardless of the citations debate. I have concerns over the prose (e.g. choppy sentences, short and/or listy sections, repetitiveness and confusing grammar in the "Investment in slaveholding" section) and comprehensiveness and focus (e.g. his term as Speaker is covered in two sentences, but the election of 1844—which has its own article anyway—is given seven paragraphs and two images). DrKiernan (talk) 11:40, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks for the changes I have a few other queries/requests:
  1. I've only checked one printed source on Polk (an encyclopedia), but it says his operation was for gallstones rather than urinary stones. Though urinary stones seems more likely given the medicine of the time, this point is important as the suggestion of impotence only makes sense if it was urinary. If there's a dispute in the literature about what the operation was for or whether it was capable of causing impotence, then this should be pointed out.
  2. Wasn't he a student at the University of North Carolina, where he graduated in 1818 at the head of his class? There's no mention of this in the article.
  3. For the brief period he was in the Tennessee legislature, should we mention William Carroll?
  4. Wasn't there tension between Polk and his generals, Taylor and Scott?
  5. I recommend merging the earlier slavery section into the later one.
  6. "Department of the Interior", "States admitted to the Union", "Supreme Court appointments", and "Congress" are short, listy sections which I would prefer to see as tables, infoboxes or merged into other sections or each other or expanded. The problem with these sections is that they break up the flow of the narrative and serve to distract from reading the actual article.
  7. Please update the image pages, some of them are missing sources or use deprecated tags. DrKiernan (talk) 07:19, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I got as far as two paragraphs into the lead, and the following already sprung out at me:
    • "mostly lived in and represented the state of Tennessee." Mostly lived in and mostly represented Tennessee?
    • "the last 'strong' pre-American Civil War president." What's meant by this?
    • "his foreign policy successes." Is threatening war with Britain, and then backing away, a foreign policy success? Is it useful to call the Mexican-American war a "foreign policy success"? Presumably, not as far as the Mexicans are concerned...
    • "he was the first president who retired." The first president to retire, surely?
  • My (soon to be) patented jbmurray rule of thumb would suggest that so many problems in the lead are already a bad sign for the article FAR prospects. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 00:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My comments are given below:

  • His wife's influence as noted in the sentence "Sarah was said…" should have a cite. The cite in the sentence that follows is to a Biography website with no author indicated. Instead one should use a solid, reliable, peer reviewed source. The same with Polk's final words to his wife which gives another website with no author as a source.
  • Controversial statement "He even proposed, unsuccessfully, that the Electoral College be abolished" should be cited.
  • "although he maintained the facade of traditional bipartisanship" sounds like something from a historian's analysis. Should be cited. Same with "Clay seemed more equivocal and vacillating".
  • The quote by Polk "It has been well observed…" should have a cite.
  • Why is "Incumbent Whig President John Tyler…" a parenthetical element? Same with the Fifty-Four Forty slogan.
  • "According to a story told decades later by George Bancroft…" declares that Polk had pre-defined goals that he eventually fulfilled. I would like to see the source for this, in particular his desire for expansionism. Did he give these in a public speech or did he write these down? As this lead to the Mexican-American War, questions can be raised concerning his motives.
  • His views on slavery should be expanded. It just says that he was unpopular about it. What did he specifically say or promote other than the territorial boundaries of slavery? On his diary, the article says "most historians accept it". Who said that?
  • "Democrats believed that opening up more farms…" refers to the Manifest Destiny article, but we should not use Wikipedia itself as a source.
  • On the Texas section, this is mostly about Tyler and almost nothing on Polk. Why is this here?
  • The War with Mexico section is basically a recounting of the War and the treaty results and not about Polk's views, motivations, etc. There are very few specifics about Polk's role other than his statement to Congress.
  • He was exhausted by years of public service, but the article does not really tell the story of what happened in the White House that caused him to suffer.

This article is really not comprehensive enough on Polk, the man himself. With the exception of his early life and post-presidency, it is more like a general US history article with some bits thrown in from his presidential record. --RelHistBuff (talk) 09:28, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Following on my comments above, I vote to remove based on non-compliance to the Comprehensive criterion (1b). --RelHistBuff (talk) 17:05, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I appreciate that PMA did try to work on this one but a week to ten days is generally the waiting time for work. Nothing doing since Apr. 30 so removing. Marskell (talk) 17:36, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 12:43, 6 May 2008.

Scooby-Doo

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Review commentary

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Notified:WikiProject Television

Concerns:

  • Eight fair use images is too much per {{non-free}}.
  • Red links in lists.
Red links don't matter. I cut two of the images, the rest are necessary and explanatory. I also cut the two IMDB references, so the last thing you mentioned was more references, which I will work on, but others feel free to help :) Judgesurreal777 (talk) 17:06, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Film posters are also not needed. They are like advertisements if used out of the film article. Ultra! 14:10, 30 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps, but we should demonstrate the cast of the live action version, as that is a notable shift in the franchise. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 17:15, 30 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Read WP:NFCC again. Fair use is meant for improving reader's understanding only. 2 posters don't, and 2 screenshots of all characters are not needed. Ultra! 15:18, 1 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
So remove animated poster & keep the other. Ultra! 15:21, 1 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Remove US flag. Why does infobox say "See voices below"? Ultra! 15:21, 1 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Because for some reason the voice actors are listed at the bottom of the article, perhaps because whoever did it thought there were too many for the infobox. Aslo I removed the flag and the tv movie poster.Judgesurreal777 (talk) 15:39, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are referencing (1c) and images (3). Marskell (talk) 03:28, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually we fixed the images issue, now it just needs a lot more references. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 14:52, 22 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 19:35, 4 May 2008.

Final Fantasy VII

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Review commentary

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Wikipedia:WikiProject Final Fantasy, Wikipedia:WikiProject Video games, Wikipedia:WikiProject Square Enix, User talk:Arrowned, User talk:Sjones23, User talk:Axem Titanium, User talk:Deckiller‎ notified.

The article was featured two years ago, and I think it doesn't meet the criteria anymore. The article fails the following FA criteria:

  • 1.(a) and 4. The article is too long, especially due to the Story section and the Development section. The information should either be split into subarticles or re-written in a more concise, more efficient style. When something new is added to the article, it is often added hastily without regards to the article's prose and coherence: in fact, hardly any copyediting has been done since the article's initial FA nomination two years ago.
  • 1.(b) The Development section and the Merchandise section have been tagged with Update templates since apparently half a year. They are incomplete as pointed out in the article's talk page and todolist.
  • 1.(c) There is a [citation needed] tag in the Development section and the following sources don't qualify as reliable sources: [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]. However, while these sources are not considered "reliable" by Wikipedia policies, most of them are actually fansites hosting transcripts of interviews from official sources, so efforts should be done to locate these official sources and cite them directly instead of citing the fansites.
  • 2.(c) Several sources are not properly written, and some are dead links.
  • 3 Image:FF7 Pic 3.jpg and Image:FF7 Pic 4.jpg don't seem to be absolutely necessary in the article; ordinary sentences would be enough to convey their information. FightingStreet (talk) 13:34, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
[4] could be replaced with a reference to "PlayStation Underground #2 demo CD". If you do find the right issue [7] was taken from, I think it would still be best to link to that website for the transcript. It's a lot easier to check an already translated interview than having to hunt down the specific issue and then finding someone to translate for you (if you don't know Japanese that is). Davhorn (talk) 16:34, 19 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I will get to work on this when I get the chance :) Greg Jones II 16:59, 21 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are prose (1a), comprehensiveness (1b), referencing (1c), and images (3). Marskell (talk) 10:09, 6 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - This article was authored by those in WP:VG of the school of thought that role-playing games deserve comprehensive plot sections to satisfy 1b, and often have detailed, complex plots. If an up to date standard of comparison is needed, Chrono Trigger hit the main page yesterday. ZeaLitY [ DREAM - REFLECT ] 01:11, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - It seems most of the actionable advice here is generally superficial upkeep; if someone has the time to give the article a facelift, then I don't see why it shouldn't be kept. — Deckiller 23:01, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove - There seems to be quite a bit of sourced material in the lead when the lead should be summarizing the article. Why are those items there and not in the article proper? Or if in the article proper, why the sourcing in the lead? There also seem to be some unreferenced statements peppered throughout the article. Setting seems lengthy when it already has an entire article. The article section arrangements seem to need work. Why two sections named plot? The plot section itself (#2) is way too long and needs some serious trimming. I love the game as much as anyone, but that's too much plot and really unnecessary. It should be a summary, not a nearly scene-by-scene. The article also has several maintenance tags that have been in place far too long for a featured article. And as none fo the issues from the first part appear to have been addressed, with the same non-RS sources still in the article. Collectonian (talk) 20:10, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - This article needs to be fixed up as soon as possible. If FFVII's FA status is removed, we can renominate it at any time when its ready. Greg Jones II 21:22, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Closing. The needed facelift doesn't seem to have arrived. Removing. Marskell (talk) 19:17, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 removed 19:35, 4 May 2008.

The Office (U.S. TV series)

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Review commentary

[edit]
Notified User:Jersyko‎, User:Raymondc0‎, Wikipedia:WikiProject Comedy‎, Wikipedia:WikiProject Television‎, Wikipedia:WikiProject The Office (US)

Promoted to FA status in early 2006. Since then, the article has been inundated with a large amount of trivia that has hampered the article itself. The season synopses are particularly problematic, both ineffective and awkward in their writing styles and putting an undue amount of focus on the romantic plot arcs at the expense of describing the episodic workplace happenings on the show. Rather than effectively summarizing details about the show, the article relies too heavily on quotations, featuring literally dozens of quotations for ideas that could instead be reworded and summarized. Furthermore, the images in the article are problematic: we have one image from the actual show (featuring only two of the five main characters and taking place outside the typical office setting), two promotional images (the cast shot, which is now outdated, and the DVD cover), and four photographs taken of the city where the show takes places (but is not filmed.) This does a poor job of illustrating the topic in general. Large amounts of unsourced content, including the entire list of awards and much of the show plot synopses. Numerous dead external links and reference issues are also a problem.

It's a shame, because I really enjoy this TV series, but this article just isn't FA-status anymore, and might not even make the cut as a GA. - Chardish (talk) 04:10, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Agree that it hasn't maintained featured quality since it obtained FA status. I also wanted to note that while I was notified of the FAR, I really have done little editing other than vandalism reversion. I am uncertain who the primary authors were at the time it became featured. · jersyko talk 16:01, 21 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FARC commentary

[edit]
Suggested FA criteria concerns are focus (4), images (3), prose (1a), and referencing (1c). Marskell (talk) 18:34, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
OK, we can hold.' But keep us informed. Marskell (talk) 09:22, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I just left a note on the talk page about the issues I found going through a hard copy with a red pen (lots). I will be spending this weekend implementing the results of a copy edit. Daniel Case (talk) 04:31, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have reconsidered whether an April 10 main page date is the best, per continuing discussion on talk page. I now prefer to go for the season finale date in late May as it would give us more time to fix some of the unsourced facts. However, this does not mean I won't be continuing my efforts to preserve the FA standing. Daniel Case (talk) 17:11, 30 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Status. I spent enough time in there just to get some basic article organization and to see how much needs to be done. There is so much basic MoS cleanup needed that I'd rather just do it myself than have to type it all out, assuming editors are still working and aware of how much work remains to be done here; otherwise, I'm a Remove. I saw non-reliable sources while I was working, citation needed tags, poor image layout, the prose needs attention, I think the article is better organized now but there's a lot of cruft and borderline trivia that probably needs to be removed, there are too many stubby sections even after I reorganized, almost none of the citations are correctly or completely formatted; in short, there's work to be done, and it's time to get on with it or defeature the article. Are editors actively working on this? If so, I'll help; if not, I'm a remove. There are many problems. Also an image check is going to be needed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:16, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, we're still working on it. Thank you for your many minor edits yesterday; I'd appreciate it if you'd list your concerns more specifically on the talk page, as I did, so that other editors can discuss and implement them. I'm a Keep at this point, but then I did a lot on this after my earlier comments, got rid of a lot of trivia and tried to consolidate sections, and added more relevant info.

As for images, we have at least four free ones in the article (the sign, the tower, the mall atrium and the writing staff). I added a few screenshots that, per the above commentary, depict the show's major characters in its main setting (and one which illustrates a scene described in adjacent text). I will be reuploading an image of the show's title later today. So we do have more than one free image in the article. Daniel Case (talk) 19:06, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm chipping away at this as I find time, but it needs a lot of work. It can be saved if the regular editors can replace all the dead links and missing sources. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:45, 12 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm about halfway through cleanup, but the article has a lot of issues that need to be addressed. There are numerous dead links and non-reliable sources (I'm tagging as I go), there are some fragmented and disorganized sections (likely because content was added over time by different editors, I left inline notes), uncited text, I still have MoS cleanup to finish, there is a substantial amount of trivia, and there was an entire WP:UNDUE, WP:SOAPBOX section dedicated to one editorial opinion that claimed a comparison of the show's characters to Bush and Cheney. I'll keep chipping away as I have time, but this is a lot of work and the article was not in featured shape; unless the regular editors can quickly begin updating sources and removing trivia, this might not be a save. Also, the "Characters" section is deficient (only a list, no analysis or description); strangley, the featured version did contain a Character section.[13] There's also a lot of original research: the further I get into this, the worse it looks. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:03, 12 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I was going to remove this but Daniel's been working today. So, sigh, we wait some more. Marskell (talk) 11:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: As my first foray into FAR, I’ll enter my thoughts as comments. At FAC, I typically enter an oppose when three or more images have concerns, so take that as you will.
    • The stated purpose of Image:TheOffice(US)1-02.jpg is “[to] depict typical scene from show, with two main characters in regular setting”. Three other images currently in the article display (at least) two characters in a regular setting. WP:NFCC#3A requires "As few non-free content uses as possible are included in each article" and "Multiple items are not used if one will suffice". Image, additionally, is not low resolution (NFCC#3B).
    • Image:TheMerger.jpg purportedly depicts a “key scene”, yet the adjacent prose makes no mention of the reunion. The implication seems to be that either this is not actually a key scene, or that the prose is not providing adequate summary. Image, additionally, is not low resolution (NFCC#3B).
    • Image:Dunder mifflin banner scranton.jpg is actually licensed as Attribution 2.0 Generic, not Attribution 3.0 Unported.
    • NFCC#3A purists could even argue - successfully, I think - that Image:The Office US title.jpg is unnecessary, as it's only real purpose is to identify the topic (to use the common boilerplate: to confirm to the reader that they have reached the "correct" article). It's stated purpose ("Depict title of series") is at best inadequte; why is this necessary (NFCC#3A) and important for our understanding (NFCC#8)? Would not either Image:GayWitchHunt.jpg or Image:TheMerger.jpg satisfy the need to identify the program? One has to have some familiarity with the program for the images to work as identifiers, so it seems a scene would function as well, if not better, than a placard flashed briefly at the beginning of the show. Again, per minimal usage, we want to endeavor to find images that serve multiple functions (i.e. two birds, one stone).
    • Ultimately, I think Image:TheOffice(US)1-02.jpg and Image:Office us cast.jpg need to go, as they appear to fail minimal usage (NFCC#3A) and significant contribution (NFCC#8). Remaining images provide sufficient context (setting, costume, cinematography, expressions, etc) and depiction of key characters (Michael, Jim, Pam) – a free use of Wilson would suffice if Dwight needs representation (given office attire and no unique makeup, etc, real life Wilson looks identical to Dwight in ways meaningful and substantive to our understanding). I'm not sure how I feel about Image:The Office US title.jpg, thoughts? ЭLСОВВОLД talk 14:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was responding to the comment above that, as of when I started working on it, there was only one screenshot in the whole article, depicting Pam and Jim, that it showed only two major characters and then not in the office. I can certainly rewrite the accompanying text. I have advocated for removing that cast photo anyway for a variety of reasons above and beyond questionable fair use (outdated, difficult to identify cast members at that size) and lately it's become difficult to place in the layout. I had included the title card shot because every other TV show has one ... I see we'll be on firmer ground if we have less screenshots and use the free image of Wilson where we currently have the "Diversity Day" shot. That's fine; that works. Back at it tonight; I have to go now. Daniel Case (talk) 21:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Some variation of Image:TheOffice(US)1-02.jpg would probably be most useful in the article - scenes of Michael addressing his employees in the conference room are common, and it would be a great way to fit multiple main cast members into a single shot. Image:Office us cast.jpg does not appear to be of significant quality to really identify any of the characters, and the cast shot is outdated. Image:GayWitchHunt.jpg and Image:TheMerger.jpg don't really depict anything of great importance to the show. I'm fine with the use of Image:The Office US title.jpg, it seems to satisfy fair use guidelines (and displaying the opening credits' title card appears to be common practice on Wikipedia articles.) - Chardish (talk) 22:11, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was trying to work with images we already had rather than upload a new one. But yes, I'll go look through the NBC website to see if I can find a shot of Michael addressing everyone in the conference room. Or somewhere else. Daniel Case (talk) 17:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have access to every episode through season three. If there's a particular scene wanted, just let me know. ЭLСОВВОLД talk 17:48, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
IOW, you have the DVD collection. The best I had found on the NBC site was one from "Grief Counseling" in which they have the funeral for the bird ... but in the parking lot. But Michael, Dwight and most of the other characters are in it.

I'd shoot for any group shot in the conference room. The later sections of "Diversity Day", the ones where Michael does his "Diversity Tomorrow" thing, should have a lot of opportunities. "Grief Counseling" has conference room scenes as well and has the benefit of being more recent. Try "The Merger" as well. Daniel Case (talk) 17:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You know, you don't really realize it until you're looking for a group shot, but these folks are only really "together" outside of the office. In the office, they're segmented into departments or Michael is up in front of the troops in meetings (i.e. someone's back is always to the camera, as they're facing each other instead of us). My search continues... ЭLСОВВОLД talk 01:42, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps there's a quick shot at the end of "Conflict Resolution", where Michael attempted to get a group picture. Ill check later today. Mastrchf (t/c) 11:57, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Two sections still need writing/re-writing: International broadcasts (which is a mish-mash), and Characters (which is just a list). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:04, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My plan right now is to bring back the old characters section and bring it up to snuff. Will do same with int'l broadcasts (could that maybe be tableized?) Daniel Case (talk) 03:06, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I should be able to get more work on the article done this weekend. I've been busy in the past week working with season articles and the main episode list. Mastrchf91 (t/c) 03:31, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Good, because I'll be away. Daniel Case (talk) 06:48, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Looking much better ! A final push to clean up the remaining citation needed tags, and smooth out International broadcasts, and it should be there. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:53, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Prose problems—1a.

  • Not pleased with some of the prose. I took a small sample at the top of "Production" and was disappointed to find issues such as:
    • "elements of episodes in the British series turned up in plots" --> "elements of the British series turned up in plots".
    • No big deal, but nicer if the clauses reversed: "The show does not use a laugh track, in keeping with the mockumentary format."
    • "was filmed in an actual office space"—Spot the redundant word.
    • No reason provided as to why they moved into a replicated set in a studio.
    • "sung or performed"—singing is performance. Tony (talk) 06:17, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is just inches away. Can those last cite tags be taken care? Marskell (talk) 09:54, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Still not pleased with the prose, layout, and form. Where is the brilliant prose that gives us an idea of what the show is typically about? Where is the "executive summary", so to speak? It feels like the article gives a cursory dictionary definition of what the show is in the first (very brief) paragraph, and then immediately dives into minutiae and production details, spending lengthy sections talking about how the show is made before even addressing what it's like. The plot synopsis section is still very poorly written and heavily favors the romantic plot arcs - they're a notable part of the show, for sure, but the synopsis makes the show sound like a soap opera. Still needs lots of work. - Chardish (talk) 17:39, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Later this weekend (not that there's much of that), I will be rewriting the intro to more comprehensively summarize the entire article (always the last aspect of any writing or rewriting I do). Sorry ... I've been away on a short vacation, then started to work on some other articles related to that vacation. This needs so little to finally keep the star. Daniel Case (talk) 18:33, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove in the current state. It has quite a bit of referencing issues, with several statements having no source and a few nearly whole sections as well. Some of the existing references are in need of formatting fixing. The entire Season synopses section seems excessive, particularly when there is already an episode list with individual season lists branching off that. The whole section really needs to go, with the episode formats worked into the production section, and a general plot summary put in its place with the link off to the episode list. The webisode stuff can go down in the main section on those. "Cast blogs" what does that have to do with the show at all? And that first sentence just reads badly, almost sarcastically. Awards belongs under Reception/Response, and the season ratings table should be prosed worked into the rest of the ratings section (or better yet, left to the season lists). Seems to have an awful lot of decorative images, even if some are free. It needs to be compared to the TV MoS to make sure its still following it, as it has changed since this article was first promoted. Collectonian (talk) 19:56, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Collectonian, can you provide some specifics? Elcobbola has been through the images, and I trust him as well as anyone. I've been through the citation formatting: has something changed since I was in there a week or so ago? What are the citation formatting issues? Examples please. There is very little unreferenced text. Can you provide examples? There seem to be enough people willing to work on this. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:23, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ref 25 is badly formatted. Ref 95 has multiple links in one source. Ref 90 isn't a ref at all, just an extraneous note. For specific unreferenced statements:
  • Writers - entire section but a single mid-sentence citation
  • Production - entire paragraph is not supported by ref 8. Use of ref 8 starts at "Featured music tends to be well known..."
  • Directors - entire section
  • Casting - "Schur has also made occasional appearances as Dwight's cousin Mose, and consulting producer Wilmore has played diversity trainer Mr. Brown."
  • Deleted scenes - entire section (source is non-existant)
  • Product placement - "In the Season two episode "The Secret" Michael takes Jim to Hooters to discuss Jim's feelings for Pam. In another episode: "The Merger" Angela refers to Hooters as a strip club causing Michael to defend Hooters as a family place, and informs the camera of how many chains there are worldwide."
  • Local color - Source does not full support the section, as "Poor Richard's bar" is unmentioned in source
  • Characters - includes unsourced interpretive statements
  • Season synopses - various sections missing sources on airdates and "The Accountants" has no refs at all for non-plot summary statements
  • Critical reviews and commentary - "The show was also on Time Magazine's "The 100 Best TV Shows of All-TIME" list."
  • Seasonal ratings - entire table example last three columns (and does not make clear that all three columns are sourced from same source).
  • International broadcast - several sentences already marked for needing citations
  • Online releases - already tagged
  • DVD releases - entire table
  • Promotional - "Dunder Mifflin has two websites,[95] and the cast members maintain blogs both as themselves and in character." - only first half is sourced
  • Cast blogs - "Since actors must sit at their desks even when not actively participating in a scene, they have ample opportunities to use the functional, Internet-connected computers to browse the Internet, play games, and blog."
  • Awards - entire table
I think that's all of them Collectonian (talk) 01:48, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Partial reply Ref 25 is formatted that way because WP blacklists blog.myspace.com links (see the inline comment). I do not understand why notes 95 and 90 are a problem. Footnotes can be used for giving extra information (although in this case, I'd suggest renaming the section Notes and References or just Notes). BuddingJournalist 03:53, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If its blacklisted, why is it being used as a source at all? Collectonian (talk) 00:49, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. OK, this is probably a pet peeve of mine, and it's a problem endemic to Wikipedia, but here it's more apparent than elsewhere... The article's first line has "American" piped to United States. Why can't is be "U.S." as per the article title itself? There are, after all, many millions of people who live in hemisphere who consider themselves American without being part of the USA. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 00:43, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • "Although fictional and scripted, the mockumentary takes the form of a documentary." Isn't this redundant? The whole point of a mockumentary is that it is, um, a mock documentary. Already the article's looking bad under the patented jbmurray first-couple-of-paragraphs test. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 00:46, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • "Based on the British series of the same name, it was adapted." Dependent clause problem. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 00:47, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove. I was going to dive in and copy-edit this, as is my wont, but wasn't even sure where to start. The article's a mess, IMO: the organization and structure are all over the place, with short, stubby sections that focus on trivia. It needs a complete overhaul. And I see it's been up on FAR for a couple of months now, so doubt it's going to improve much more any time soon. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 01:01, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Closing. Somehow this managed to become one of the longest reviews ever. At one point, I actually had it archived as remove and reverted myself to give it more time. But eventually we have to end things. I have two non-trivial removes two-and-a-half months in and it's time. I said it was inches looking at the ref formatting, but more closely examining the organization and prose I think the remove camp takes the argument. No article should contain a Miscellaneous section, for instance. Or how about the second sentence: "Although fictional and scripted, the mockumentary takes the form of a documentary, with the presence of the camera openly acknowledged." That's not a logical construction. In terms of surgery, the stub sections are the biggest issue. So I'm removing. Daniel and others, there has been improvement and hopefully you can build on it further and perhaps take it back to FAC. Marskell (talk) 19:31, 4 May 2008 (UTC) (Oh goodness, Jb had already noted the second sentence. I guess that's the spot to start.) Marskell (talk) 19:33, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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