Talk:Ken Barlow

Peer Review

Ken Barlow

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because we want to nominate it for FA status. I guess it needs an eager eye and someone familiar with FA requirements.

Thanks, RaintheOne ^BAM 22:29, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Ruhrfisch comments: Thanks for your work on this interesting article. I have never seen Coronation Street, so not sure if that makes me the ideal reviewer or not. Here are some suggestions for improvement with an eye to FAC.

• A model article is useful for ideas and examples to follow - there are several FAs on fictional characters at Wikipedia:Featured_articles#Media - for example Bart Simpson, Bernard Quatermass, Homer Simpson, Jabba the Hutt, Jack Sparrow, and Jason Voorhees are all FAs and may be useful models.
• There is a toolbox on this PR page which finds 4 dead external links here - note that newspaper and print media refs do not have to have a link as the print version is accessible in theory (at a library or archive)

Added Archive URL's to these four refs.RaintheOne ^BAM 19:01, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

• Tool also finds that there is one link in the article that is a redirect that points back to the same article (circular link) - see here
• Since he has been on the show for over 50 years, I would give the year of the image in the infobox.

Year and caption included GunGagdin^Moan 17:12, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

*I am not sure the lead follows WP:LEAD. The lead should be an accessible and inviting overview of the whole article. As such, nothing important should be in the lead only - since it is a summary, it should all be repeated in the body of the article itself. My rule of thumb is to include every header in the lead in some way, but there is no mention of Mike Baldwin in the lead, for example.

• His various wives and the women in his life that each get their own section may be covered by the blanket statement that he has been married several times and had many lovers. However, I think some sort of more detailed summary statement (he has been married five times to four women, has fathered X children, and has Y grandchildren) would help. Not sure if each wife should be named in the lead - probably.
• Biggest concern for an article of this kind is to avoid writing from an in-universe perspective. See WP:IN-U
• I thought the article did a good job of referring to the character as Ken, and the actor as Roache. About the only place I noticed that did not do this was In early 2009 the character was reported to media regulator Ofcom after a series of derogatory comments about Christianity, which also sparked a number of complaints to broadcaster ITV.

I have reworded this to make it more Out of universe.GunGagdin^Moan 17:30, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

• FAC is about making sure every i is dotted and every t is crossed. One little thing is that refs should be in numerical order, so fix things like Roache was initially offered the role of Ken on a thirteen-episode, six-week contract.[9][6]

I've put the refs in the correct order.RaintheOne ^BAM 18:14, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

• Quotations need to follow WP:LQ - basically punctuation goes outside the quotation marks unless a (nearly) complete sentence is being quoted. So quotes like this will need to be fixed The Guardian columnist Nancy Banks-Smith spoke highly of Ken's affair with Martha Fraser in 2009, calling it "a muted, ingenious storyline."[134]
• Another thing when writing about fiction is to make sure and provide context to the reader. I have never seen the show, and was not sure where it was set (Manchester). Although there is an early reference to Ken attending Manchester University, the fact that Coronation Street is set in Manchester is not explictly stated until the reception section. *Similarly, the Old Trafford scoreboard story makes more sense if it is somehow made clear that this is also in Manchester.
• Avoid needless repetition - the Old Trafford story in in the article three times (in the text of the section on Deirdre, in a photo caption in the feud with Mike, and in the In popular culture section). I think the first two are fine, although the caption is detailed enough to need a ref. The last mention is not needed.

Last mention removed GunGagdin^Moan 17:12, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

• The whole "In popular culture" section needs to go. Such sections are not popular with FAC reviewers and given the subject matter, isn't the whole article "In popular culture"? I would remove the duplicate Old Trafford item, and move the rest to elsewhere in the article. Most of it could probably go to Reception. Perhaps the gift wrap and cards could go to appearances in other media?

Pop culture removed, info merged into other sections GunGagdin^Moan 17:12, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

• As someone who has never seen the show, I was confused in the Storylines section as to what his profession(s) are - these are mentioned in passing in the article, but should probably be made clearer here.
• Similarly for a man who has had 4 wives, a sentence like Ken had a slight antagonistic relationship with his "acid-tongued" mother-in-law Blanche. leaves me more confused than enlightened.
• Is there ever any mention made of his age in the show? Some television shows have the characters age more slowly than real life, others are more realistic. Within the context of the show is he in his 70s now (as the actor who protrays him is)?
• Language is the most difficult FA criterion for most articles to meet. The prose is decent, but could use a copy edit to smooth out some rough spots.
• Might want to read User:Tony1/Noun plus -ing and look for examples
• There are a few short (one or two sentence) paragraphs, which interrupt the narrative flow. Where possible, these should be combined with others or perhaps expanded.
• Probably good to get someone familair with the show / character to read this - they would catch any omissions or WP:WEIGHT issues.
• Refs look OK.
• Images are OK- fair use rationales seem reasonable. Not sure if the infobox image needs the exact episode it is taken from or not.
• Please make sure that the existing text includes no copyright violations, plagiarism, or close paraphrasing. For more information on this please see Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-04-13/Dispatches. (This is a general warning given in all peer reviews, in view of previous problems that have risen over copyvios.)

Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). I do not watch peer reviews, so if you have questions or comments, please contact me on my talk page. Yours, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 12:13, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Ken Barlow/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: RAP (talk · contribs) 15:40, 1 May 2012 (UTC) I think the only thing i see that needs changing is the lengthy amount that is in his occupations list. I'll check back soon.

Eh, i guess it's just a small inquiry. Pass.

He's had a lot of occupations. Ergo, either the list contains a "lengthy amount" or it's an inaccurate list!Misha An interested observer of this and that 16:53, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 19 December 2017

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (non-admin closure) Steel1943 (talk) 19:59, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

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Ken Barlow → Ken Barlow (Coronation Street) – Given the three other Ken Barlows in the disambiguation hatnotes, a revisiting of the 2010 move request that made the Coronation Street character the primary topic is deserved.

After the recent successful Norris Cole move request, I am skeptical if a fictional character in a British TV show, even one who's been around for 55+ years, deserves to be the primary topic over three real people. Considering that Wikipedia should take a worldwide view, I think the Ken Barlow namespace should be converted to a disambiguation page.

Ken Barlow the TV character is well known mainly in the UK and other British Commonwealth countries where Coronation Street is broadcast - but not in the US. In contrast, Ken Barlow (basketball) had a notable college basketball career in the US and had a distinguished pro career in Italy and Greece. The US also has two notable Ken Barlows: the horse racer and TV weather reporter in Minnesota.

Furthermore, my Google search (from the US) of "Ken Barlow" has a mix of results about Coronation Street and the TV weather reporter in the Top Ten. Arbor to SJ (talk) 18:54, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose per this In ictu oculi (talk) 19:12, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - The presence of more than one hatnote is no indication that the other Ken Barlows enjoy equal notability and the nominator's point that Wikipedia should take a worldwide view is undermined by the following assertion that a minor American athlete is more famous than a leading character from an extremely succesful British soap opera. Wikipedia should indeed take a worldwide view and that includes not granting exorbitant attention to American culture at the expense of everything else. 79.65.126.84 (talk) 13:46, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Then it could also be argued that having the Corrie character as the primary topic is "granting exorbitant attention to British culture", to use your words. Arbor to SJ (talk) 16:42, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

No, that would be a very transparent and foolish attempt to use someone's words against them without addressing the points they raised. Thankfully nobody involved in this discussion is likely to do that. 79.65.126.84 (talk) 22:38, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. I think this is one of those rare instances where a fictional person is primary over real people. They're rare, but they do happen. And this is one of the best-known characters in the longest-running soap opera in history and a major part of British culture. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:11, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Yet Coronation Street is very obscure in the U.S. and non-English speaking world. Wikipedia can't be centric to a single country/region - it has to reflect the entire world. Arbor to SJ (talk) 16:42, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
    • I think you'll find there are many American topics that are obscure outside America that have been given primary status too! I'll give you an example: look down the List of current United States governors and see how many of them are primary. Yet we outside America have generally never heard of any of them! Well, it can happen the other way around too! -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:47, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

As Necrothesp says, and in this case 328 presumably British readers viewing one page daily vs 18 American readers viewing another page daily, with the much larger population of US means that Ken Barlow (basketball) isn't that well known in US. In ictu oculi (talk) 13:41, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose - Clear PRIMARYTOPIC here, It being british is irrlevent, As Necrothesp says hundreds of American people are PRIMARY even tho us British folk have never heard of them, The fictional character is clearly PT. –Davey2010 ^{Merry Xmas / Happy New Year} 17:52, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

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Active years as a character played by William Roache

Re this edit: the HTML note says "Essentially he did not leave, just took a break. He was not 'reintroduced' in 2014, just returned to normal after his real-life court case." This is correct as he never left the show formally. Please don't edit war on this.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:20, 28 October 2019 (UTC)