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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Archived nominations/June 2005

< Wikipedia:Featured article candidates‎ | Archived nominations

Stuyvesant High School edit

This is an exemplary school article which apparently has been nominated before as a FAC but I cannot find any record of prior discussion. In any case, I would like to resubmit this as a candidate to become a featured article on Wikipedia. (Support) Bahn Mi 07:11, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. No reference section. Also, convert those external links to footnotes; in the current form they are utterly useless if the document is printed, or if the linked documents are no longer available or moved to another URL. However, I have to say I am quite impressed with the article; it really establishes the school's notability, and is way above the average high school article. Phils 07:29, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I agree that this is a really good piece and am happy to support. Will need a few trivial rejigs of external links to references to satisfy the hoop-jump requirements but this is very nearly there. Pcb21| Pete 10:04, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. If this article gets references I'll support. It is the best high school article I have seen and better than most university articles. Falphin 16:35, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support this looks good, frankly the complaining about references is a weak objection since there are about 100 external links used to back up claims and 23 inline links to references.  ALKIVAR™  21:33, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • References need to be in a references section using proper formatting. - Mgm|(talk) 10:48, Jun 26, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, there are rarely articles this good on high schools. File:PhoenixSuns 100.pngPhoenix2File:Teamflag1.png 21:49, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. There are quite a few Stuy alumni on Wikipedia, and we try to keep these pages informative and relevant. If there are hoops to get through, we'll nurse it through them. RossPatterson, Stuyvesant '76
  • Object. Call me a killjoy, but I dislike the cosy touches: the nickname right in the first sentence, the humorous claim that the building is sinking, the old prank made obsolete by the swimming pool. The combined effect of them is of an angle, a "voice", behind the article, and a little nostalgia and self-satisfaction in the voice—probably very justified, but still not ideal here. The extremely detailed description in the "History" section of the new building and its present-day use adds to the impression: "large glass [yeah..?] windows", "computers for work or play", "a popular hangout", "hundreds of square feet of carpet for sitting and socializing", "being caught in the elevator without a pass guarantees one a trip to the dean", "when the escalators do break down, groans can be heard as Stuyvesant students grudgingly clamber up the steps". Such things sound a little too ordinary to mention, and too warm and proud and cosy. Cool down the style of the new building description and shorten it, please. Btw, there is an interesting critical perspective on the school demographics in the spin-off "main article" Stuyvesant High School student body. I think it's a pity that no suggestion of it has survived into the summary section "Student body"—I realize it's a short summary, but a sentence or two about the criticism would be great for perspective. Apart from these points, I agree that the article is very good, and I will support if they're addressed. Even if they're not, I'm prepared to withdraw my objection, since all the other voters seem to like the article's temperature, provided somebody puts up a good argument for why I'm wrong and sour. Bishonen | talk 03:54, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Pruned some of the nostalgic invisible voice from the history and added criticism on the student body User
  • Object: I must say that the tone of the writing, and the specific language of it, really does read like a tri-fold brochure that would be handed out by the admissions folks at Stuyvesant. Once upon a time, I wrote things like that for St. David's School, and sentences like "it became obvious that the building was too small" sound like the wording we use for parents and donors, not encyclopedia articles (as there is an implicit 1st person POV in there). There are grammatical errors as well: "there has been allegations" and "obsoleting" a joke. Stuyvesent is one of the great schools, but I do think that it's overlong for having no references (i.e. something this long really can't go without references) and it's promotional in its tone. If school-generated materials were used in the preparation of the article, they really should be cited. Geogre 13:10, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object: References are needed. The "Notable Alumni" section consists of just a link. "While Stuyvesant accepts students purely on their academic merit" puts a POV accross that the allegations that there's a bias are unfounded. -- Joolz 13:20, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object:Strange adjectives "accomplished alumni" in what way are these people accomplished do they play the piano, arrange flowers, and sing in French? In what way are the academics "rigorous"? Links within the text should be footnoted. The two lined paragraph "In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Stuyvesant was struck particularly hard by the AIDS epidemic, with at least four teachers dying from that disease." strikes me as odd. Why "particularly"? Are all American schools losing staff frequently in this way? What is the significance of the paragraph, were the parents concerned? Or was it just the staffing shortage that was the problem? I've no idea what a PSAL pool is, and the prank doe not seem that prankish to me. I think this needs a huge re-write, and of course some references. Giano | talk 14:46, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support- this article is an exemplary example of wikipedia's collaborative effort, it is concise, referenced, and very rich in information abulanov

Nix v. Hedden edit

Self-nomination: I'm interested in getting this United States Supreme Court case to FA status. I used the court case itself as the source, so only one reference is required. Not many people seem to have commented on this, can't find any other information. I think it's comprehensive now. - Ta bu shi da yu 05:08, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Oh, P.S.: I might also note that if this does get to FA status this would be resolution to next years April Fools day issue. The case and its decision appears so unlikely that it might be seen as an April Fool's day joke. The ultimate in trickery would be to put this on the front page (with an image of a tomato): all those botanists viewing our site will go: no it's not! It's a fruit! But this will be an accurate and factual encylopedic entry. Jimbo would be proud :-) Ta bu shi da yu 05:12, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. I'm not sure if I should support or object this one, but I'll make a comment about some things upon which others may base their objections. The subject matter is certainly intriguing, however I have a number of concerns. Firstly, I don't like how it is divided into "The case" and "The decision". Both consists mainly of quotations. Also, some of the wikilinks seem out of place—for example, there is a link to classify even though such an article does not exist (and if it did, would probably be better off in Wiktionary). While I don't think it is ready to be a featured article yet, with more work it will make a good one some day. Ben Babcock 05:44, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • There is a Wikiproject on this very issue: see WP:SCOTUS. Also, this is a reasonably standard structural division for U.S. Supreme Court cases. I'm not quite sure why the quotations are an issue, I am willing to work on this however. How should I rephrase them? As for wikilinks... I'm actually a bit suprised we don't have an article on classification systems! They are an article in their own right. - Ta bu shi da yu 05:51, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Have fixed the direct quoting: a minor copyedit should (hopefully) have done the trick. Have removed the classify wikilink (unless someone can point me to a classification article!). Kept the structure, as agree with WP:SCOTUS - our supreme court cases (no matter how obscure) need to be consistent to remain NPOV. - Ta bu shi da yu 06:10, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • I like the topic, but this may be a little short. I don't agree that one reference is all that's required, because ideally you shouldn't be writing just about the case, but about the various things directly associated with it, such as reactions, legal precedents, things like that, which you could only get from other sources. I'll grant this could be difficult if the case is obscure; I don't think I had ever heard of it before now. Everyking 05:46, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • The case is obscure, granted. The case itself, as far as I can see, did not become a major legal precedent on anything: the way courts deal with dictionaries appears to have been decided long before this. If other sources on this case can be found, please feel free to add them! However, due to its obscure nature, not many people have commented on it. We seem to be the ones who make the most comment — all without doing original research! With regards to writing only about the court case: I disagree, with respect, because the case itself should be the main focus of the article. If it had major repurcusions, they should be most definitely documented. This one didn't... It merely legally defined a tomato as a vegetable and not as a fruit. - Ta bu shi da yu 05:57, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • If it really did just drop like a stone into the water without any ripples, OK, using just the case is fine. And if this really is all there is to write, I suppose it might have FA potential, although I have little enthusiasm for one this short. Everyking 06:21, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        • Ya... I would be the first to add more info, had there been any :-) - Ta bu shi da yu 06:38, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. Concise article on an interesting court case. Is it possible to get the dictionary definitions which were used as evidence in the case, and maybe use them as external links? Also, the article could mention how legal maxims like "inclusio unius est exclusio alterius" were applied to this case. For the main page, how about a picture of tomato salad? That is certainly *not* a dessert. :) Graham 07:54, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • The legal maxim I actually wanted was "ejusdem generis", latin for of the same kind. [1]

However, I'd understand if it would be difficult to incorporate the use of legal maxims into the article, to comply with the policy of no original research. Graham 02:14, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • support. Well written, concise. There is nothing else to say in terms of consequences, implications, so it's complete. It's sourced and the intro is fine.--Fenice 20:32, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • I have an objection. The article is overly concise. It has no external links (at least give links to an online copy of the case and a case summary). There are a couple of long block quotes. It'd be best, especially for the first one, if the quotes content is also summarized in the article (to tell you the truth I can't tell what side those expert witnesses are on). More references would be nice- are those quotes in the decision? It also doesn't meet the wikiproject guidelines. It should have a breakdown as Roe v. Wade does for each justice and what side they were on. Also, there are a couple of cases which cited this one [2]. Don't worry there is plenty of time until April 1. This link is Broken 22:41, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
It appears that Everyking and BrokenSegue are correct: this may be a little premature for FAC. - Ta bu shi da yu 03:32, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object for now - a good start, but, as per the talk page, I think you need to identify the particular law in point in this case, discuss the previous cases cited in the judgement, and put it in its legal context (including the usual rules of legal construction). -- ALoan (Talk) 28 June 2005 14:51 (UTC)
  • Comment: Could you get a better picture of a tomato? The current one with someone's hand in the photo looks rather amateurish. Deus Ex 29 June 2005 09:17 (UTC)
  • Object. The case certainly did not decide that "legally, a tomato is a vegetable"; at most in decided that a tomato is a vegetable under US law, and I strongly suspect that it only decided that a tomato is a vegetable for the purposes of a specific subsection of a specific act. In FAC terms, the article is not comprehensive. Mark1 30 June 2005 01:57 (UTC)

History of Poland (1945-1989) edit

Partial self-nom. The title sais it all, I believe, at least as far as the content goes. I believe the article meets all of our standards (PR archived recently, comments adressed). For comparison to similar FA articles, see History of post-Soviet Russia, History of Russia or History of Scotland. Your constructive comments, as always, much awaited and appreciated. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:53, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object—needs major NPOVing. I was rubbing my eyes in disbelief after reading just the second sentence, which puts "liberated" in quotes when referring to the liberation of Poland by the Red Army in 1944-45. Seriously, this is loaded with right-wing POV. Everyking 22:05, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Removed quotes, although the word liberarated without quotes is also misleading (suggesting that Red Army brings liberty is an oxymoron :)) Any suggestions what term to use here instead? Please give specific examples of other "right-wing POV", I'll be happy to fix them, if you can't - this is, after all, the purpose of this review. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:07, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Update: changed to forces of Nazi Germany were driven from Poland by the advancing Red Army of the Soviet Union. This should contain no POVed terms, right, left or otherwise. Better? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:27, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        • Fine, that's NPOVed, but the rest of the article still needs heavy NPOVing. Everyking 23:39, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
          • I'd again ask you to be more specific. Have you even read the rest of the article? If so, please give me specific examples that you deem POVed. The article has passed the PR, and nobody has even once mentioned it is POVed on its talk page. Unless you become more specific, I am afraid you comment is not going to help to improve this article much. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 00:15, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, too many grammatical things; but of course these can be fixed. Phoenix2 01:33, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • As I am not a native speaker, I can do only that much with the language. I hope if you spot any language problems, you will fix them - I, unfortunately, can't help much in that regard - to me the article reads good already. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:08, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Let me look through this 7000+ word article. The third sentence is "With little opposition from the Western Allies, who had accepted the fait accompli at the Yalta Conference, Stalin's agents, the Polish Communists, soon forced the opposition (the delegates of the Polish government in exile, the members of the Armia Krajowa resistance movement and any non-communist political parties) to either join them or face being exiled, imprisoned or even murdered." Can you imagine if the post-war history of Italy was written in such a fashion, although it very well could be. It would never survive on Wikipedia, let alone be a featured article. Reading these comments, I see the POV used to start with the second sentence. Also, the English is horrible, with section heads like "The Stalin's era (1945–56)" Ruy Lopez 01:44, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I fail to see POV in this sentence. Please help me out. At Yalta, Western Allies accepted Stalin demand's regarding Polish borders and government - fact. Polish communists persecuted their oppositing, up to imprisonment and execution after staged trails - fact. Also, I don't see any 'strong, hotile words' in this sentence, but feel free to rewrite it so it is more NPOV to your liking. And by all means, list other sentences then this you are unhappy in the article.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:08, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • After reading 172 comments, I agree that 'Stalin agents' is somewhat POVed and incorrect, deleted this phrase. Hopefully, this will make the sentence NPOV enough? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:23, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Look at the History of Italy as a republic article. The involvement of the USA in Italy was equal to or greater than that of the USSR in Poland, yet you don't see the entire article revolve around this, how horrible Italy's leaders are and whatnot. How come the Italy article doesn't say "With little opposition from the USSR, who had accepted the fait accompli at the Yalta Conference, Roosevelt's agents, the Italian capitalists, soon forced the opposition (the newly formed Italian government, the members of the resistance movement and any non-capitalist political parties) to either join them or face being exiled, imprisoned or even murdered."? I am not interested in that article, I am just using it as a point of comparison to show how POV this article is. Everyking came in and saw super-POV on the second sentence, then I come in and see it on the next sentence. Polls show the vast majority Americans are unhappy with the way things are run in the US, but the USA article doesn't say Americans are wage slaves living under a tyrannical regime with bogus elections and whatnot. Ruy Lopez 13:04, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • I am afraid your criticism is not constructive. Comparison of Italy to Poland, or USA is almost pointless - the situation was very different, besides, you are yet again adressing some vague, general issues, not any specific points backed by facts or even POVed words! Your latest posts gives more details on the irrelevant history of Italy - and none about Poland. You write about the 'super POV' which you saw - and still fail to quote specifics of it: I don't even know if the POV you refer to is pro-Polish, anti-Western, pro-Soviet, anti-Communist, pro-aliens from Mars or something else :) I still don't know which part of the sentence that you quoted you consider POVed and why, as you have not responded to my correcred sentence posted above (based on specific and constructive comments by 172 on article's talk page - tnx). Have you even read the article after the second sentence of the lead, or considered that the lead, being a summary, may containt one or two phrases which may need tweaking for more NPOVed words? Please, point me to the exact POVed or erroneus phrases, like "liberation" or "Soviet agents", and I will gladly fix them. But triple please, be specific - or if you consider the article beyond hope, list it on VfD :> --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 14:34, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Trying to establish equivalency between USA involvement in Italy and Soviet involvement in Poland ignores some basic facts. The most fundamental fact of course was that Italy was a democracy, with the Italian Communist Party allowed to compete without much hindrance in free elections (it won 34,4% of the vote in 1976, for example). In Poland all opposition to the Polish United Workers Party was quashed, and certainly no "capitalist" parties were allowed even to exist, never mind compete in fair elections. Balcer 05:24, 27 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Poland was an ally of Great Britain and USA, while Italy was an enemy. That makes a sight difference ? Lysy 29 June 2005 15:03 (UTC)
  • 'Show's a great deal of promise. I'll try to help Piotrus resolve some of the objections. 172 03:53, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support - though some sections still need expansion. In particular the later years of the period (Solidarity, Martial Law, Jaruzelski regime etc) need some improvement. A concluding section would also be useful. Balcer 28 June 2005 21:12 (UTC)
    • History of... articles rarely have conclusions (or better said, I haven't seen any yet), but it's an interesting ideas. Still, it would logically have to be something like 'comments on history of...'. Feasible, but I'd like to see it in talk first.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 28 June 2005 21:25 (UTC)
  • Support - comprehensive, informative and well balanced. Lysy 29 June 2005 17:11 (UTC)
  • Support - I am fixing the article now for grammar, but as I looked at the article, it is pretty good explaining the socialist period that took place in Poland. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 30 June 2005 18:31 (UTC)

Krag-Petersson edit

Self-nomination. Having trouble finding any sort of information on the Krag-Petersson rifle, I did my best to pull all avilable information together in this article. I believe it is the most comprehensive article (in english) avilable on the 'net today. Hopefully, y'all will find it suitable for becoming a featured article (and if not, I'll do my best to make it suitable =) )WegianWarrior 09:13, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Being in an excelent position to do so (since I wrote most of that one too), I fail to see what you try to say... are you wanting this one to have as much / the same sort of information as the one on the K-J? Trouble is, since less than 1000 K-Ps was manufactured for use by the norwegian navy, there is neither much to be found in the way of interesting models, prototypes or usage by other nations. WegianWarrior 06:25, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I meant that it compares unfavourably with Krag-Jørgensen. If online sources are lacking, what about offline sources? Sorry, but I would not support the article in its present state. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:53, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
There is a print source - see the references section! - Ta bu shi da yu 06:15, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, this might just not be the most comprehensive article on 'net. Phoenix2 18:48, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
It is more comprehensive on this subject than any other online resource I've found. Off course, I would love if you could prove me wrong on this - since I could add more to the article. WegianWarrior 06:25, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Please provide a more comprehensive article so we can update this one. - Ta bu shi da yu 06:15, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Maybe it is the most "comprehensive" on this gun on the internet, but featured articles need to be a tad bit longer. File:PhoenixSuns 100.pngPhoenix2File:Teamflag1.png 02:15, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. This article seems a bit too short. I'm not a gun expert per se, but maybe you could add information like collector's information, influences on modern gun design, and maybe an expansion on the Usage section. --Omni gamer 06:59, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Too short of an article for FA. Craigy   (talk) 02:55, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)
    • No offense, but disagree. If this is the most information that can be found on the article, then it is the right size. I feel that this is not actually an actionable objection. - Ta bu shi da yu 06:15, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support seems pretty comprehensive to me, I know that WegianWarrior thoroughly researched it. Feel that it should be an FA. - Ta bu shi da yu 06:15, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment, isn't there some fire arms infobox to add? - Mgm|(talk) 10:52, Jun 26, 2005 (UTC)
I think I found the one you was refering too. WegianWarrior 28 June 2005 07:37 (UTC)
  • Comment; Since the main objection people have seems to be the lenght of the article, as opposed to the contents, I've rewritten the major parts of it... all while refering to the only good source avilable; Norske Militærgeværer etter 1867, ISBN 82-993143-1-3. Hopefully this will answer some of the objections. WegianWarrior 20:28, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Pathological science edit

I just stumbled on this article and was impressed at its comprehensiveness and neutrality, considering that the topic is potentially controvercial. Aside from the fact that it has no images, I think it's almost ready to be a Featured Article as-is. --Doradus 02:25, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)

  • nominate and support. --Doradus 02:30, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
    • Ok, I should have known that comprehensiveness and neutrality aren't enough per se.
  • Object, yes the article does not have an image among other problems. Phoenix2 03:06, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • A featured article doesn't need images, and "other problems" is not a specific rationale that can be addressed, so you risk having your objection ignored unless you can be more specific. --Doradus 06:02, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
      • Not having an image is a valid criticism, but it's not enough to stop a nomination; "Other problems" is so vague it's inherently inactionable. →Raul654 19:14, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Wish I could agree, because there ought to be a good article on the subject; but it's too much of a hodge-podge and seems to be doomed to stay that way. It argues with itself, and that shouldn't be featured. The cold fusion section, for instance, is an argument, not an illustration of the idea of pathological science. And the last paragraph and its list are hopeless. To be sure, these criticisms should be in the talk page (and are), but it suggests why I'm objecting. Maybe put it up for Peer Review and then try again? --Dandrake 07:05, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. How is "Pathological Science" different from "Pseudoscience" and "Junk Science"? The Pathological Science article seems to consist of two things: (1) Langmuir's definition of the term, and (2) examples of bad science. The examples of bad science seem like they should go in either Pseudoscience or Junk Science. (I also don't see why we need separate articles on Pseudoscience, Junk science, Bad science, Cargo cult science and others, but they're not FA nominees.) As for Langmuir's views, from what I can see, the term has had only limited impact. I think several articles, including this one, should be merged into say Pseudoscience, and Langmuir's views should be a paragraph (or maybe a section) in that article. I also agree with Dandrake above that this acticle is a hodge-podge. Zashaw 21:35, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Comment. As to the question of how it is different -- my understanding of Langmuir is that it is supposed to be limited to theories which enjoy support from reputable scientists which do not have evidence for them (or have much evidence against them). This would differ from pseudoscience, which is a term used usually to designate activities outside the realm of science masquerading as scientific, and junk science, which to my knowledge has no attempted philosophical definition (is used in a strict pejorative sense). These differences could be commented on in the article, of course.
  • Oppose. I don't think the article is very clear. I would appreciate more direct quotes from Langmuir, and any discussions of the term in the philosophy of science literature. I don't think more space should be devoted to Cold Fusion than is to N-Rays, Langmuir's initial example. I don't understand the section "Scientific theories which are not pathological science" -- clearly a whole lot of things could be listed under such a heading, and I'm not sure there's any reason to call Lysenkoism out from all of those possibilities specifically, for example (which is not to say I have any opinion over whether Lysenkoism would fit into the definition or not. If it was going to be mentioned at all, it would be most interesting if presented as a problematizing force -- what do national politics and incentives do to notions of pathological science? Is science transnational? etc.). I'm sure we could scrounge up some N-Rays pictures if we hunt around a bit.. --Fastfission 05:30, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Funeral of Pope John Paul II edit

I am renominating this article for featured status. Previously, this article had been nominated here and here, and turned down, mostly because the even was very recent, and too many fair use pictures were used. It was also peer reviewed. In my opinion, sufficient time has passed between the funeral and now. Also, I have tried to cut down on the number of fair use pictures, and changed them with ones in the public domain. Since I have worked on this article, this nomination is a partial self-nom. Bratschetalk 5 pillars 02:15, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

  • Roughly half of the images are still {{Vatican}} "fair use"; the others are {{PD-USGov}}. If this is acceptable, I would support. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:12, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, great article; very comprehensive. Phoenix2 18:40, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • I finally get some time to thoroughly review a FAC again. Unfortunately, I have to oppose this one. I agree with the above that this is a great article, but I believe it is not correctly, or sufficiently referenced. First of all the web-based references (the only references available) are not formatted according to the MoS page WP:CITE. There are no retrieval dates, and no information about the linked document aside from the title, making it difficult for readers to find essential information about the sources (authors, publication, date of publication) once the corresponding documents are no longer online or archived with a different URL. I also think the article does not cite its sources precisely enough (no footnotes). I could find a lot of examples of strong, precise, or even unusual statements that would need to have their source indicated in footnotes, to make it easier for intrigued readers to fact-check these statements. Comprehensiveness is pretty useless if readers can't make sure the details in the article come from reliable sources, especially for such a high-profile article. Consider the following sentences for examples of statements that I believe should have specific source information in footnotes: This tradition originates from ruthless cardinals looting the papal chambers upon the death of past popes., Pope John Paul II instead chose to be buried in his favorite pair of Polish-made brown leather shoes, an American size ten and a half, which he wore on his travels throughout the world. There are many more. The article also slips into conjecture (on rare occasions, but nevertheless): The funeral was perhaps the most-watched live event in the history of television., One of these would have required Cardinal Martínez Somalo to tap the head of the pope with the ceremonial silver hammer, a practice that is believed to have ended some time ago. My final criticism to this article of otherwise pleasing quality is the (also rare) use of "artsy" language in some places. Consider Centuries of sacred rituals are set in motion upon the death of a pope.; in my opinion, figures of speech like this do not have their place in an encyclopedia. Besides, such sentences are pretty useless: simply enumerating the rituals at hand is sufficient. The reader can then easily see that the funeral of a pope brings a lot of rituals with it, without being told so explicitly in a rather tourist-guidy style. We're close to FA quality here, but not quite there. Phils 20:05, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose Use of copyrighted images potentially not permitted by fair use. Images taken by wikipedians would be preferable even if they were of somewhat lower quality. On varrious photography forums around the net I saw dozens of teriffic pictures, is no one willing to go convince even one of them to come submit their work here? Gmaxwell 02:05, 27 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Eleanor Rigby (song) edit

This is a self-nom of an article that I wrote a while back. It's improved a lot since then, I think, and the big Beatles' songs seem to feature prominently as featured articles, so I figured it was worth a submit. Anyway, any suggestions are appreciated. Thanks! --The PNM 06:33, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • I see some areas that could be expanded - there is no mention that there is an instrumental version on Anthology 2. It could also mention covers - I know of one by Godhead (band), there have no doubt been others. Morwen - Talk 12:14, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I've added a section on covers and a little blurb about the strings only release on anthology 2. Any other suggestions? Thanks! --The PNM 14:03, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • mild object 1) In the section "The story behind the song", we read in McCartney's quote about the shop name, then we read further down that "Rigby" came from a shop name, and then we read again that "Rigby" came from a shop name. It's a little repetitive. 2) There is very little to inform the reader how this song fits in with the group's career, other than the fact that it was released along with "Yellow Submarine" on a single. Did this song demonstrate a shift in music style or some other turning point for the group? 3) My first thoughts when I hear the name of the song are of the smokestacks in the movie ("Yellow Submarine") all blasting at once as the cellos begin with that note, making it look like a whistle is blowing to signal the end of the work day. I think there is more that could be said about the symbolism that was used both in the lyrics and in the song's video presentation in the movie. 4) There are no samples from the song. A 10 second clip should be enough. slambo 13:14, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
    • Okay, I've tried to address some of these. I reread the repeition in the "Story Behind the Song" and almost cringed -- a healthy dose of deleting solved that, I hope. I tried adding a blurb in the introduction about "Eleanor Rigby" marking the continuing evolution of the Beatles started in Rubber Soul -- I mention that it's the first Beatles' song with no Beatles playing earlier -- but I'm not sure if I should add more context. Any ideas? I also added the audio clip at the end of the song. As for the Yellow Submarine movie, I need to rewatch in and do some research -- I'll hopefully do that shortly. Anyway, does it look any better? Any more suggestions? Thanks! --The PNM 14:55, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • For an analysis of the symbolism to be NPOV, it really needs to be presented in a "X states that Q symbolizes A, but Y disagrees stating that Q symbolizes Z instead". It's tricky, but with reputable sources, such a discussion can be done. I can add in my own interpretations, but that would fall into the original research realm. BTW, thanks for making the updates so far; I see steady improvement. slambo 14:57, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. I don't see anything remaining in the article that was objectionable. I know there was some other cover, by some jazz guitarist, Stanley Something, who was famous briefly for being the first new artist signed to Blue Note Records in yeasrs (this was the '80s) and he was famous for playing the guitar by just tapping the strings on the fretboard. He did it on his first album.

*Object, principally to the "Meaning" section. It's a summary of the lyrics (which don't really need to be summarized), plus an editor's interpreatation. I don't think this is consistent with guidelines re: NPOV and no original research. Monicasdude 19:28, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC) Fair enough. Move me to the agnostic category, mostly to do with my opinions about FAs in general rather than this piece in particularMonicasdude 15:04, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

    • Okay, removed the meaning section from the article -- other Beatles' featured articles have had sections like this but I guess "Eleanor Rigby" is so simple a song it's not really neccesary. --The PNM 19:56, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Megatokyo edit

I think that this is an excelent article on wikipedia that is both complete and infroming and would bring variety to the Featured articles of Wikipedia. It would also be helpful in the event of not being of the quality required for such an honor to be notified of what does need to be fixed so that it would be possible to fix the problems. user:Vcelloho 21:23 Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)

  • Object no references =Nichalp «Talk»= 09:20, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, the article deals more with criticism of the comic than with its style and content. Radiant_>|< 14:54, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support; well-written, and helpful. ChercherEccles 18:39, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support; well written --Kiba 12:16, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, good article. Phoenix2 18:47, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Nice article about an interesting and good webcomic.--Kross 19:09, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete POV essay on the comic - not encyclopedic. JamesBurns 02:41, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    Incorrect forum to place this. Please go to VfD. - Ta bu shi da yu 07:33, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose: would love to support, but cannot due to NPOV issues. For instance, the criticism section is full of weasel words. There are various assertions sprinkled through the article, for instance "Much of the early humor consists of video game culture jokes, as well as culture-clash issues—a testament to Caston's writing." Suggest that author (who, incidently, writes extremely well) reviews WP:NPOV. - Ta bu shi da yu 07:33, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Pope Benedict XVI edit

It has grown to a very impressive article. --83.109.174.227 (link to nominator's IP added by User:Phils).

Withdrawn, I agree with the concerns raised below. 83.109.148.242 21:53, 3 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Impressive indeed, but the lead section requires expansion. Phils 15:58, 1 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - Not stable, completely inadequate lead section, no organized references section. --mav 16:49, 1 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object It is still experiencing tons of edits and vandalism. See the talk page for all the issues that have yet to be resolved. Maybe in a couple of months. Bratschetalk random 18:05, May 1, 2005 (UTC)
  • Too soon. Let the news settle in first. Everyking 18:38, 1 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - I agree with Maveric and Bratsche, this article is still too much the subject of debate to be stable enough for a featured spot. Ben Babcock 20:34, 1 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - This is way too unstable, also I would suggest that it is too close to his election. I am not too keen on current, or very recent, news stories, or figures involved in them, being promoted to featured article status. Let's wait awhile. Rje 00:40, May 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - As mentioned above, the article is too unstable. We deal with vandalism and continious editing/sub-paging. There is still some information that is not clear yet, some of which includes his Coat of Arms, his Theology and early life. Though I do want to give thanks to those who edit and debate the article and it's contents, I do not think this is the right time for the article to be elevated to Featured Article. Zscout370 (talk) 01:38, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object- I do believe this is an excellent article, with a lot of information on the pope. Yet, I agree that there's going to be a ton of editing on the page. Every new appearence that the pope makes for the next couple of weeks will surely be added to the article. Let's wait a while, and see if the article stabilizes. <<Coburn_Pharr>> 01:56, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object - I think this article is quite impressive in its breadth and depth of coverage for having been worked on for such a short time. I think however that it is premature to feature it for a while, as substantial editing changes continue to be made, and the article which is featured might differ substantially from the article as it stands presently. Also, by the very act of featuring this article, it is likely that we would attract more vandals as were such an annoyance in the early days of this article's creation. Whig 03:05, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • neutral - I think this article is a credit to wikipedia. I doubt if there is a more thorough article on Ben anywhere at this stage in his papacy. But the article does need more work. It is possibly a bit premature to make it a featured article just yet. But it does deserve that acolade and will get it in the near future. Maybe we need another category - potential featured articles covering those that are nearly there but just not yet. FearÉIREANN 03:24, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object Good article, but still in the mold. Sjakkalle 07:50, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral - For those that object due to vandalism. Does that mean that you would propose a FA article be un-FA if people suddenly start vandalising it? Whether one support or object to FA should be based on whether the article is good in content and not whether people like vandalising the article. -- KTC 09:00, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment after the initial wave of vandalism I suspect this page is on rather a lot of people's watch lists so I doubt vandalism would be a problem.Geni 09:05, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • A FA will get vandalized no matter which way you slice it. Articles about netrual subjects, like the Medal of Honor and the Order of Bath, got vandalized a lot due to them being a FA. Reversions come quick in Wikipedia, but if you take the vandalism out, you still have problems with the stability. We are still talking about cutting the article down into managable pieces, and there is still more to be added. Zscout370 (talk) 11:29, 2 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object, agree with the above concerns. Neutralitytalk 04:26, May 3, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object very good article, but a "Sex abuse scandal" revels a tendency, offensive to the person, and a prejudice. It would be important to discuss why people didnt like him, rather than using that section, maybe with keeping some info (i'm not saying that is useless). But not an all section! I'm not seeing an encyclopedia, like wikipedia that uses writing to offend people. Would you like a sex scandal section in your biography? -Pedro 22:22, 3 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • It's an important, contentious subject, and to leave it out would be POV, not the other way around. I wouldn't want a section about a sex scandal in my biography, no, which is why I will endeavor in life not to do anything that would justify one. Benedict, however, even if by inaction, has done so and it should be noted. Kairos 12:16, 4 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • I said keep what's important and factual, If you use that and make a fire out of it (like in the article), it is surely POV. -Pedro 10:46, 5 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object to the article becoming featured, for the reasons given above. It's too new and unstable. Kairos 12:16, 4 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. The majority of the article is sourced from current events news articles. The footnote external links will be mostly DOA within a year as news sites remove article links, even if this made FAC, it would need a close review within a year or so as links expire. Most news sites dont keep links for long. Stbalbach 04:25, 6 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Burkhanism edit

This is a shameless self-nom. Burkhanism is an utterly obscure subject--of interest mainly to students of Altai history and/or Agni Yoga--for which few non-Russian-language sources exist.

For several years I have been hunting down information on Burkanism, and set this site up to make things easier for the next interested person who comes along. Everything I know is here, either in the article itself or in the linked citations at the end. One source (who wishes to remain anonymous) kindly agreed to let me use his photographs of several Burkhanist artifacts, which would otherwise not be seen by anyone outside of Siberia.

So, what do you think? Dawud 07:35, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object – poor presentation of the material, no categories, unclear if the links are external links or references. Paragraphs are too short. =Nichalp «Talk»= 10:49, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object 1) list your references as described on cite your sources. 2) The "Practices" section looks like little more than a list; tell us a little more about each of them, such as describing the symbolism and significance of the practices. 3) with only one person listed, the "Famous Burkhanists" should be combined into another section or expanded if possible. Since that one person is a red link, tell us more about him. slambo 13:25, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object: information is pretty limited to the early years, and doesn't seem to talk about post-1921 at all. Everyking 00:38, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, as several paragraphs are indeed too short. Phoenix2 18:37, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • This is too vague to be actionable. Can you be more specific? →Raul654 21:58, Jun 24, 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. I will see what I can do. --Dawud

Sydney Boys High School edit

This article is quite a thorough report about Sydney's premiere public boys school. It is neutral, detailled in content, accurate and well written and is not prone to any major changes. --Protarion 10:02, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)

The Times edit

Propose. This is an excellent article which is now NPOV owing to the efforts of many Wikipedians. I have had some involvement in its development, but this is really an article which many people have worked on. It has been commended by The Times newspaper (see Talk:The_Times) but is an objective article neither biased to or against the newspaper. An impressive piece. I hope you agree! --Mrclarke 16:01, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object- no references, only one "real" section (history). Maybe add a few sections on impact, current status, etc? Thanks. Flcelloguy | Give me a note! | Desk 16:06, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, for many reasons, mainly that it's nowhere near comprehensive: there's an unreferenced weasel term ("some claim") in the introduction; doesn't include cover price; there's little on the Times' and its readers' public image; the current circularion figures are burried in the history section; there's little on what supplements the paper runs (and comparisons of those with rival papers' supplements); has it won any notable awards? does it sponsor any notable events (e.g. the Guardian does Hay festival, the Mail does ideal homes etc)? History doesn't mention the launch of the website. Joe D (t) 16:40, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, for the same reasons as above... Maybe with the sections about the owners, editors, and columnists, you could say, if they had one, what impact they had on the newspaper... Yrjö 16:45, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object for the reasons mentioned above, especially because much of the article is a big list of names--Quadraxis 02:52, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Spice Girls edit

First, I am not going to type using big words and try to sound like a professor. I am merely going to state my reasons for why this article should be a featured article candidate.

One, this article has gone through many changes. In the beginning, it was small, and only gave a bit of information on the Spice Girls, but with time, it grew, and grew, through the good and bad times, to present day.

Image copyright violations occurred in the past due to a user who was unsure of how to post images under fair usage (whatever the template might be). However, that issue has now be resolved, and every picture displayed in this article contains fair use, and exhibits pieces of the Spice Girls career, from album covers, to their appearances in commercials, to scenes from music videos.

There were a few mistakes that were added to the article originally - one that was extremely incorrect but could not be detected until recently, but has now been cleared up.

Despite easy and hard times, the Spice Girls article is definitely an article that took time to be completed, illustrating that its editors took time to search thoroughly for information and facts - not just post assumptions and terribly incorrect data.

That is why I think the Spice Girls article should be the featured article. DrippingInk 19:12, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Support. Well-written, readable, accurate. 64.231.118.193 19:20, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Above vote appears to be a sockpuppet vote from the nominator. (evidence). slambo 14:37, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object 1) the lead section is too short and doesnt adequately summarize the entire article. 2) cite your sources. 3) It's an article about a music group, but there are no samples of the group's music. slambo 20:16, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
    • Never strike out someone else's comments. slambo 18:01, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, sufficient reason stated above. Phoenix2 00:13, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Mild object. What Phoenix2 said. Otherwise, it's a good article. --FuriousFreddy 01:10, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. No references. Deltabeignet 03:14, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. There's no requirement that references be provided in the text, especially in an article like this. Nor is there a requirement that the summary does more than this one does (how could one summarise this sort of information?). The demand for samples of the music is peculiar; is slambo asking editors to break copyright laws? Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 09:37, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • It's a current FA policy that all FAC articles must have sources as a primary prerequisite. Short (thirty second or less) .ogg clips of a handful of the group's most notable songs are fair use. As far as summarization, nixie seems to have described well what is needed below. --FuriousFreddy 17:07, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • No, I'm not asking anyone to break copyrights. 10 second clips as a demonstration of the music style is fair use. The same goes for quoting a couple sentences of text in an article. slambo 18:02, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
      • I'll grant you that ten seconds would probably be more than enough for anyone in this case, but it's surely simply not true that samples are necessary. Following your analogy, are you saying that articles on writers must contain quotations from their works? This seems excessively rigid, and isn't mentioned anywhere in the FAC guidelines so far as I remember. Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 18:59, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        • Making a handful of .ogg samples of "Do You Wanna Be My Lover" and a few other Spice Girls records isn't at all an arduous task. I was asked to do it when I nominated The Supremes; the idea makes sense. --FuriousFreddy 23:13, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
          • If I had suggested that it was arduous, this would have been an adequate response. Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 09:06, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
            • Please do not insult other Wikipedians. I only said that because, based upon responses such as "but it's surely simply not true that samples are necessary", it seems that you think making the samples would be too much trouble (that is, making editing the article, it would seem, in your eyes a more difficult or "arduous" task than previously planned.) If you didn't think it was too much trouble ot add the samples, I humbly apoligize, but that appears to be what you are saying. I like this article; there are just some criteria, both required for all FA nominees (references and citations) and unique to music related articles (song samples). --FuriousFreddy 14:16, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
              • Insult? Still, I accept your apology. Could you point me to the explanation of the criteria that you mention? I'm new to the FAC business, and though I never intend to nominate an article, I'd be interested to see the details. Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 14:49, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
                • It read like an insult, is all. As far as your request, see Wikipedia:What is a featured article. The music sample inclusion is a sort of unspoken rule, it seems, when it coems to music-related articles. I'd never thought of doing it myself until I was requested to. It does make sense, and soemtimes it can be fun. If you don't do it, I won't object to the FAC nomination (that is, after the lead is legnthened and the references added), but some other editors probably will. --FuriousFreddy 18:22, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        • It goes along the lines of comprehensiveness. We don't specifically state that biographies require birth/marriage/death info, but if it's not there, we cite it as an actionable objection. When the Timpani article came through, one of the objections stated was that there were no sound clips. When we write about authors, I see no reason not to include a quote quote or two to demonstrate the writier's style. When we write about painters, sculptors or architects, we need to include images of their works. Sure, it's not listed as a strict requirement, but an article about someone who produces artworks in any form should have samples of the artworks to show the artist's style. slambo 11:31, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
          • That undersuts my request to FuriousFreddy above. Wouldn't it be a good idea to explain this in the FAC criteria, rather than letting people nominate articles and only then be faced with objections? Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 14:49, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
            • Perhaps a better explanation of "comprehensive" would be useful on the criteria page. Did this article go through peer review? The objections that have come up so far are items that are often noticed and corrected there before the nomination here. slambo 15:15, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, the lead is missing several things, like the time period the band existed, how the band formed, number of albums, merchandising spin-offs like the movie, for a featured article the lead is supposed to summarise the entire article. All featured music artists have samples, they need to be .oog files, and if they are less than 30 seconds long then they are acceptable as fair use.--nixie 13:53, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Ahem, my reasons for this are that the lead section doesn't require the article itself. It is, after all, a summary, and tossing everything into it would be pointless. The rest of the article would only serve as a place to pick up the little nit-picks and what-nots. Secondly, no sample music is required. Just like DrippingInk said, Wikipedia is not an HMV store. Third, the information itself is extremely readable, is presented with images suited, and goes beyond what I even knew about the Spice Girls. The career records and achievements is a perfect addition, and with cites to the various sources, it is now obvious that this information is not made up. I am truly impressed with the editors of this section. All of them. This article is extremely well-done, and I give it ten out of ten stars. 64.231.161.245 21:41, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Above comment appears to be a sockpuppet vote from the nominator (evidence). slambo 14:39, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
    • (The above comment was made from an IP address that shows exactly seven edits, all on June 19; 64.231.118.193 has made exactly five edits, all on June 18) From the lead section page: "The lead should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it could stand on its own as a concise version of the article." I don't think the lead on this article meets this criteria. Compare the lead on this article with the leads on other recently featured articles such as Igor Stravinsky, The Temptations or The Supremes. The music samples are an actionable objection; an article about a music group isn't entirely comprehensive without samples of the group's music. As to the references, Wikipedia:What is a featured article states: "Includes references, arranged in a ==References== section and enhanced by the appropriate use of inline citations (see Wikipedia:Cite sources)." All of my objections still stand as there has been no change to the article. slambo 11:51, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Wow, you people here on Wikipedia truly are complete fools. I'm surprised someone hasn't slapped you straight across the face yet. DrippingInk 19:55, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Please avoid making comments such as this. Continued personal attacks can be considered grounds for blocking. I would much rather see that energy directed to ensuring that the objections listed above get addressed in the article. You know much more about the subject of this article than I do (I favor jazz from the 1920s and 1930s myself); this article is close to featured quality, and it would be nice to see the objections resolved. slambo 20:06, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object reluctantly for the reasons given by slambo - I have had my eye on this article for a while, but it needs a better lead, references and (subject to copyright concerns, particularly as this is a UK band) sound samples. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:24, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object for the reasons above stated (sound samples, references, lead), and some problems with neutrality. The sentence A cleverly constructed image combined sex appeal with post-feminist self-confidence ("Girl Power", as they labelled it) guaranteed them a large female fanbase, at least., for example, is hardly indisputable, and needs to sourced to whoever believes it. There's some other stuff that should be copyedited out, like giving the hook for "Wannabe", which isn't particularly useful here and seems out of place. Tuf-Kat 02:17, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
    • As stated before, and I don't care if you scream back at me, you're all complete idiots. The Spice Girls were obviously going to obtain a female fanbase in the least. This does not need to be sourced because it's damn well obvious. And the hook for "Wannabe" is certainly useful, and nowhere near out of place. To ALoan, your comments are much more respectable, except for the sound samples, which are not required to complete an article.
    • Hopefully most of you Wikipedians will learn something - because most of you aren't that wise at all. DrippingInk 19:33, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

John Wesley edit

I disagree with the praise for the first half of this article. It reads like it was written by someone out to debunk the importance of Wesley and undermine his influence. It is SERIOUSLY unbalanced with no mention of the Oxford years and over emphasis on the lawsuit in Georgia and the influence of the Moravians. What Wesley accomplished in Savannah is not mentioned, the link to later Methodism is ignored, and the Moravian section completely downplays the importance of the Altersgate experience on Wesley. It is not hagiography to insist that a proper proportion be shown. All that lawsuit detail goes in a book length study, not a relatively brief entry. The same applies to the Moriavian influence. I also think technical terms should be briefly explained, not just linked to another entry. Wis2fan (talk) 15:11, 16 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Nicely detailed capsule biography, well organized, lucid narrative and useful links. In its depth and engaging style, this article exemplifies Wikipedia's advantages over other online references. The article has been criticized on the talk page as being NPOV and a "hagiography". I disagree. Although there is little or no negative content in the article, I don't believe that lack of same means the article is innaccurate or misleading. In fact, I believe that in both its form and content, John Wesley represents the best of Wikipedia. — J M Rice 18:16, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object 1) The lead section is too short and doesn't adequately summarize the article's content. 2) cite your sources. slambo 20:19, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
  • Neutral at this point: I have listed a number of areas for potential expansion on the talk page. Wesley should be seen in less of a vaccuum, I think, and I don't think it would be extranneous to discuss what the Methodist Church under his direction did, nor the sorts of adherents that he attracted (blue stockings at first, then field believers, and the uneasy coalition between the upper class and "rocking" folks). Geogre 14:14, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    Object: Does not appear to be an active article. Perhaps some time on peer-review would help. Geogre 14:48, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object I'd like to see more from Heitzenrater's books, e.g. The Elusive Mr. Wesley: John Wesley his own Biographer. I just checked, and the book IS still in print. Also in full agreement with slambo's objections, above. (sorry, forgot to sign my comment!) --JohnDBuell | Talk 20:52, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Medieval hunting edit

Self-nom. I think it's a well-written article. Please make suggestions. 80.111.96.99 03:18, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. It is a well-written article, but it limits itself to Western Europe for no apparent reason. The name implies a broader scope. Remember that we're writing for a global audience. I might support if the title is brought in line with the contents or vice versa. — mark ✎ 13:41, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: the term medieval is in itself in most cases reserved for Western Europe. Other areas of the world operate with different categorisations. There could perhaps be a stronger emphasis on Eastern and Northern Europe, but for the most part the nobility of these regions emulated the court culture of Western Europe (the exception would have to be the Byzantine Empire). 80.203.101.24 14:22, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • The article name and scope are appropriate, the objection is without merit. Medieval means Europe, and hunting (along with most things related to nobility) meant doing it the French way. User:Stbalbach
  • Comment. The article is pretty good. I think it could be better with additional people. I would recommend it follow the path to Featured Article by first getting a Wikipedia:Peer review, then move to a vote once its had more attention. User:Stbalbach

W. Mark Felt aka Watergate's Deep Throat edit

Self-nom. Detailed, sourced account of Mark Felt's life with references. If someone wants to add specific footnotes--I don't understand how the footnote system works--see my list here. PedanticallySpeaking 14:44, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)

Footnoting is now (almost) done. There are a few footnotes to fill in. - Ta bu shi da yu 09:14, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Thorough and readable. --Ian Pitchford 15:11, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object Great work on getting it done so quickly, but I feel that this needs to mature a bit before I think it should be nominated, after all the article is only 18 days old. PPGMD 15:19, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
There are precedents for quicker elevations to Featured status. Today's featured article, the Warren County Canal, was started on April 15, 2005, and made featured status on May 2. PedanticallySpeaking 15:37, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
There may be precedents, that doesn't mean I agree with them. Particularly on articles that can get politically charged, I believe in a wait and see attitude. But hey you never know how these votes turn out. PPGMD 15:40, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Well constructed, impressive example of the ability of Wikipedia to put together an excellent article in a short amount of time --John Kenneth Fisher 15:55, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Though it may eventually get even better, this article appears to be thorough, accurate, neutral, and readable. Jon the Geek 16:00, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Some of the writing still needs some work, e.g. "Tolson submitted his resignation, dictated by Felt, and Gray accepted it, the acceptance also dictated by Felt." My reaction was, huh? A couple of the captions need a bit of polish as well, e.g. "Hoover made Felt the third ranking official in the Bureau in 1971." Has the article been through Peer Review? The Talk page does not indicate this. --JohnDBuell | Talk 16:29, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
The Tolson sentence has been altered. No, it hasn't gone through PR. PedanticallySpeaking 15:24, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
While I agree that the writing has been improved, some of the comments below do indicate more work to be done, and as such, I feel I cannot change my vote at this time. --JohnDBuell | Talk 05:50, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. I agree with the concerns about occasional awkward writing, and there's also no way something is ready to be featured when the comment "Citation needed" appears at several points in the text. I also suggest that the section about his pardon be trimmed down; its detail is out of proportion to the rest of the article and not particularly necessary for a topic that should really be handled as a relatively simple addendum to the account of his trial. --Michael Snow 18:53, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Have gone through and tried to tidy the prose. The citation needed have been fixed, though the final paragraphs (written by others) need source notes. PedanticallySpeaking 16:08, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, good article. Phoenix2 19:05, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, for an article made in less than a day, this is quite full. And if we can Spring Heeled Jack as a FA, he can be, too. As some of you may know, I was one of the people to vote to keep all Deep Throat info on the Deep Throat page, so my support is assured. --WizardOfTheCDrive 20:05, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Hi there. As a relatively new Wikipedia contributor, I had to look up featured article criteria to understand what is being proposed. I would have to say the Felt article in its current form does not quite meet criteria for a FA. A FA is supposed to be an example of Wiki's "very best work"; in particular, its prose must be "[c]ompelling, even "brilliant"." In this regard, the Felt article is very nearly there, if we confine our meaning of prose to the type of writing that is seen in non-fiction works like encyclopedias (which is what Wiki is). It needs a little more work but on the whole is very encouraging. However, a FA should also be stable. Here there are more problems. I note from the Edit page that the article is still being actively edited. Secondly, the Felt and DT articles may in the near future be merged, and I'm not sure what implications this holds for one of them being nominated for FA - what if its decided that Felt should be merged into DT, since it is arguable that Felt's entire significance from a historical point of view is really his involvement in the Watergate scandal as DT? Note, I'm not pushing that point, and in fact will oppose such a motion if only because this article is much better written than the DT article. I'm just pointing out possible hurdles toward FA status.~ Neuroscientist 05:37, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose - this is so close to being there. I have footnoted the entire article, and have noticed that the last few paragraphs are not sourced properly. This has let it down - right at the end we get some weasel words creeping in! Also, if you notice, there are several Fill in! bits in the "Notes" section. These obviously need to be filled in :-) Ta bu shi da yu 09:13, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Quotes in end paragraphs are someone else's doing, so I don't have information on their sourcing. PedanticallySpeaking 15:26, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, but this could use another pass or two from editors before it is featured. It's not as tight as it once was. Don't have time to work on it myself, but there was an article in The Nation showing Felt was in charge of finding out who Deep Throat was, and we should add stuff about the book deal. Jokestress 17:49, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object for now I still think its too early to give this a run for FAC, information is still being added to it, its still in the news. Although the article looks very very good, I still think its a bit too soon, maybe wait til the fall for another FAC run.  ALKIVAR™  22:38, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support A wonderful article and an important one. --jenlight 08:06, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object Whatever the quality of the article to date, it's got to be viewed as a work-in-progress right now. Monicasdude 19:18, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • support: The timeliness and significance of this article showcases the incredible collective effort, by an ensemble of talented Wiki editors, to preserve institutional memory. Making it a featured article would truly be in keeping with the Wiki's mission. Noting the vast contrast between Felt's invaluable disclosures and the destruction of files kept by J. Edgar Hoover during the Watergate era, and the similar contempt for public disclosure evidenced by latter day thought police (e.g. Executive Order 13233), the outcome of voting on this nomination will be a very telling indicator of which road Wikipedia is headed down. Ombudsman 18:51, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object: While the story of W. Mark Felt is an intriguing one, I don't feel that this topic should be a featured article. I feel the point of a featured article is to bring to the attention of the Wikipedia readership an often overlooked, but always very well done article. The W. Mark Felt article has seen plenty of publicity on the main page in the last month. Because he has been in the news so much, I think we would be wasting an opportunity to bring a different article some extra traffic. Badammcqueen 22:28, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, the whole article is filled with pictures of other people. This seems to be unique for an article about a specific person. -- Dissident (Talk) 29 June 2005 17:02 (UTC)

History of South Africa edit

Self-nom. This article failed the last time it was nominated due to concerns over its length and image copyright status. The length issue I believe is a non-starter, as while the article is around 60k, that is only 20k per millenium of South African history. The image copyright issue has been fixed by my creation of an image tag that describes the law under which the images have been used. Apart from that, I think this article is definitely one of the best we have here on Wikipedia, and incredibly thorough while being concisise for the amount of history it covers. The old discussion can be found here. Thanks! Páll 03:05, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Comment, the article is great, but the images a remain a problem since a non-commercial licence is not compatible with the GFDL. Also I think that the html links in test should be references clearly using a footnote template--nixie 11:32, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Yes, of course non-commerical licence immages are not compatible with GFDL, that's why they are seperate licenses. All of the text on wikipedia is released under GFDL, however the images may be released under different licenses. Páll 13:02, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Yes, but all images need to have a commercial license because non-commercial licenses are being disallowed as announced by Jimbo Wales. It was in the Signpost a few weeks back. - Mgm|(talk) 15:40, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - same reasons as before in the failed nom. No effort has been made to address those. Especially telling is that the ==Apartheid== section, instead of being a summary of the Apartheid article, is in fact almost exactly the same size. Also, as is, having almost half the article on that aspect of South Africa's history unbalances the whole article. In addition, there are overly romantic heading titles like ===Stalked by a shadow===, ===Winds of change===, and ===Into the future===. There are also no inline cites except in the last section of prose. --mav 17:38, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. My understanding is that the 32k length limit for articles is just a rough guideline, not a firm limit. The article is long because it's on a big, important subject, and and because people put a lot of work into it. I don't see anything in the article that looks like filler. The discussion of the Boer War, for example, is long because it tries to present an accurate NPOV picture of a controversial topic. I understand the concern over licensing for the photos, but this is for only a relatively small number of the photos covering recent times, and the plain truth is that they add immeasurably to the article. I find the subheadings like "Winds of change" to be refreshing. Too much of the writing on wikipedia is awkward, formal, and boring. This article is a nice change from that. --Bcrowell 20:00, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • All featured articles need to stay tightly on topic and not go into unnecessary detail on subtopics (leaving more detailed descriptions of sub-topics to other articles). The Apartheid section of this article does not follow that FA criteria and its length, relative to the length of the other parts of South Africa’s history, is more than is necessary to summarize that part of South Africa’s history. Nobody here has mentioned the 32KB limit and nobody is complaining about the length of the Boer War section. --mav 15:56, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • I see. So are you just complaining about the length of the apartheid section? I'd assumed we were talking about the total length of the article, and just using the apartheid and Boer War parts as specific examples. I disagree that the length of the apartheid section is longer than it should be in relation to the rest of the article; it's about 1/3 of the article (not half), and I think that's about right. It's true that it's comparable to the length of the apartheid article, and not only that but it's much better written, and includes a lot of excellent photos. To me, reading the apartheid article and reading the apartheid section of the history article is like night and day; the section in the history article is much better in every way, and I don't think the people who did such a good job on the history article should be penalized because the apartheid article has never been brought up to the same level of quality. --Bcrowell 17:35, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • The history of South Africa was not written down until the late 16th century, and even then was only written down to cover the small area that is now known as Cape Town, therefore the beginning of the article is short because the amount of known information about the subject is short. The apartheid section is detailed because it covers perhaps the most relevant subject to South African history as well as the current situation in the country. Why don't you mention which details and subjects you find to be extraneous and worth moving to the apartheid article, which has no real history of apartheid and instead focuses on the law (and is also at the moment in the middle of a huge edit war which would make "offshoring" imprudent as it could flare the edit war further). Remember one of the Wikipedia maxums, "If you feel a change is needed, feel free to make it yourself"! Páll 18:54, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • I'll make those changes this weekend. That means somebody else will need to work on adding those inline cites and verifying or removing the images listed below. The other things are not that important. --mav 02:10, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        • I've worked on the images, as described below in my reply to Carnildo.--Bcrowell 16:43, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object agree with mav. Why can't the history be summarised and chunks of detail moved to dedicated articles for each top level section? It would be easier to read just gist of South Africa's history if it is made shorter. I also don't see the significance of the map of SAF in the lead.  =Nichalp (Talk)= 18:04, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. A history of a country should be long. Appartheid section is long but then it should be - after all it is the most (in)famous part of the country's history. Of course I wouldn't object if other sections were expanded, but the current 63kb is impressive and tells me the article is fairly comprehensive, especially with that many subarticles. All considered, another great FA by our resident SA specialist, Páll. What's next on your list 'to FA'? :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:28, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • So size alone tells you this is comprehensive? That's absurd. --mav 02:05, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Where did I write that it's the only indicator I use? It's an important 'first impression' indicator, but of course one has to read the article to be more certain. Of course getting a PhD in the related area would help as well, but we have to draw a line somewhere...:p --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:06, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose. The copyright status of some images is unclear or unacceptable. In particular:
    • South African copyright reserves images for 50 years if taken by the government, and the Architects of Apartheid image was definitely taken before 1955, in fact it must have been taken sometime around 1945-46 by the people who are in the photo. I have seen the Sharpeville Massacre, Soweto Riots, and South African Miners images in so many places that I would have a hard time believeing they are anything but fair or free use. They are in EVERY text book on South African history in South Africa. Páll 20:13, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Copyright doesn't work that way. Just because everyone and their dog uses an image doesn't mean it's out of copyright, it could just mean that there's widespread copyright infringement going on. And fair use isn't a type of copyright license. It's a defense allowing use in what would otherwise be an infringing situation. Fair use must be considered on a case-by-case basis: there's no such thing as a blanket "fair use" decision.
      • If Image:Architects of apartheid.jpg is really more than 50 years old, and if South African law says that images that old are no longer copyrighted, and if the law applies, then the proper tag for it is {{PD}}
      • I've researched the copyright status of the Soweto riots photo, and added some notes to its description page, Image:Soweto_Riots.jpg. The copyright has now gone back to Sam Nzima, the photographer, and he has made efforts to collect royalties. I think it should be in the article because it's such an important, powerful, and well known image in the history of South Africa, but I'm afraid it can only be used under fair use.--Bcrowell 21:10, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Guns N' Roses edit

Self-nomination. Article has been heavily revised since it was last considered. 26 Dec 2005

Partial self-nom.This article was previously nominated and it failed because some people considered that the history section was too short. This has been fixed. More than five paragraphs of additional information has been added, as well as new photos. The article has all the qualities for being a featured article. References, lenght, pictures, point of view. If you compare any heavy metal band article in wikipedia with this one, you will see a great difference. This article looks extremely profesional. It should be a Featured Article. <<Coburn_Pharr>> 00:09, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Support, comprehensive well written article. Should be an interesting read. Marine 69-71 01:18, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. The article is way too fannish, especially the lead, which reads like liner notes or material from a fan's web page. There are no inline citations, which I think are pretty important when you're stating that people are heroin addicts, threatened to kill other people, etc. For instance, "Members of the crew at the time even stated that Slash had to be carried on to the stage by a group of people and that he often passed out after the concerts ended." Which members of the crew? Where can this statement be verified? Or this: "His excessive elusiveness has led to several stories that claim that he is suffering from serious bipolar disorder." Is there any way to verify this statement that he's mentally ill? Almost all the photos are claimed to have been used under fair use, and Rose.JPG has no legal information. The article has essentially no critical discussion of the band's music. Were there any themes that were important in their songwriting? How does their music compare stylistically with other heavy metal bands' music? --Bcrowell 01:59, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. What Bcrowell said was right: the article in general, but especially the lead, is on the "fannish" side. I am not one that complains about hidden citations, but I would like to see much more referencing. This article has a lot of potential, but I don't think it's there quite yet. My suggestion would be to get it copyedited by someone who is relentless at it (Bishonen might actually be willing to help if you ask her nicely), do a peer review, and go from there. It will get there; you just need to work a little more on it. Linuxbeak | Talk | Desk 04:57, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. I didn't even make it past the first sentence before POV became an issue. The rest of the article didn't improve upon that issue. I remember I objected to this article last time because there was no singles discography (a standard on even stubbed artist articles); there still isn't one here. --FuriousFreddy 06:55, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Ed Wood, Jr. edit

  • This is an excellently contructed article on a cult figure.
  • Doesn't seem to omit anything important.
  • Is concise and comprehensive.
  • Provides information researched from several non-internet sources.
  • Appropriate use of pictures.
  • Fleshy bibliography/filmography sections, which don't just consist of long lists of titles.
  • Plenty of links to other appropriate articles, which have also been written well.
  • Would make a refreshing change from having other more famous Hollywood personalities in the Featured Article slot.
  • Comment. Nominated by anon 130.209.6.40. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:01, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. No references. Article is fairly short and half of it is a giant list (Filmography and Bibliography) sections. This should go to PR first. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:01, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object--for now. Lack of references and detail in places. However, this article is well-written and looks to be well on its way to FA status. Edeans 02:55, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Kurt Cobain edit

Not a self-nom, I stumbled across this article a little while ago and thought it was pretty good except for the lead and the bit about the supposed murder. I cleaned both those up, added some inline citations and I now think its ready to be featured. Tuf-Kat 07:30, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

  • Support- Artical is well written. --ZeWrestler 12:01, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object given the number of really good biographies available like Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana and Cobains own journals I think alot biographical detail could be added to this article including the time before nirvana, his health problems, his influences and attitudes toward the changes in his life. Given all the press coverage of the murder theory this could potentially also be a seperate section. All the images have sketchy copyright information, for example I think the claim for fair use of Image:Kurt Cobain BW.jpg would be a lot stronger if it was the Rolling Stone cover rather than this verion which gives no credit to the artist or sign of the origin.--nixie 14:17, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Your suggestion has been taken and made. The image was replaced with Image:RollingstovecoverCobain.jpg.
      • The rest of the images have the same problem, also the image problem was not by only objection.--nixie 05:01, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. The situation on the talk page about Category:Murder victims was never resolved, and needs to be decided upon first. This is a serious problem with the NPOV status of the article and should be taken into consideration. -- LGagnon 19:42, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)
    • I've rebrought this up on the talk page. Anybody interested in the discussion, go there. Tuf-Kat 01:56, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Brilliant article though its grammar needs improvement. Cedars 01:05, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. WB 01:39, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - while a very good start, there is much more to be said. As nixie says, there are good biographies out there to be used and cited to fill the article out. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:37, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Multiple sclerosis edit

This appears to be a relatively comprehensive, well researched and referenced article exemplifying the best of Wikipedia. Whig 08:22, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Oppose. While being comprehensive, the article presently has a number of shortcomings that should be addressed before it is featured. (1) It has no references to recent & thorough scientific review articles, a bit of a "must" for a tricky disease like MS. (2) The section "Cause" completely bypasses significant recent evidence on EBV, Th1/Th2 imbalance etc that should be written here. (3) Charcot's clinical triad is missing, as well as a reference to his work on MS. (4) The section "emotional aspects" is unwikified. I'm quite willing to cooperate in raising the article's standard, but I'll need help. Sadly we have no wiki-neurologists who could review the article for us and offer input. JFW | T@lk 09:10, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    Not being a neurologist myself, I lack the knowledge of the up-to-the-moment research, and I think it would be a useful inclusion if someone can provide this with appropriate references. With that said, all encyclopedic content is likely to be a bit "dated" and it isn't really possible to incorporate every current strand of research in every medical article. If this is the principal blocking issue, I don't know what we can do except ask for help from someone with specific expertise in the field. As for the wikification of various sections, I'll be glad to help in any way you think needed. Whig 19:24, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    In regard to point (2) EBV and MS, this study has apparently been retracted. [3] Also in regard to point (2) Th1/Th2 imbalance, what I have been able to find is inconclusive at present. Do we really need to include withdrawn studies and inconclusive causal theories in order to make this article featurable? Whig 05:33, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    They messed up the data, but when it was corrected the hypothesis was still supported. There are numerous other studies that found EBV seroconversion associated with MS incidence.
    Presently the "Cause" paragraph treats the immune system like a black box. There must be data on HLA linkage and other predispositions (see Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM): 126200 for example - HLA-DRB1*1501-DQB1*0602 is associated). JFW | T@lk 07:08, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    I've added a Reference section with Readings including clinical reviews which can be moved up above Readings if used as references for this article. I can email some UpToDate articles if anyone wishes to help if you email me. Petersam 06:56, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose. The "treatment" section is not ideally structured as a long bullet point list; it makes it look messy and encourages unstructured editing (cf. "Trivia" sections in some articles). I think paragraphs with subsections would make more sense.--Eloquence* 15:49, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object- for the reasons stated above. However, it is a good article that with some improvement could become a FA- I'll see what I can work on! Flcelloguy   Give me a note!   Desk 02:19, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Lead is too short. Stub section: Signs and symptoms - expand. List secton: Treatment - transform into normal text. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:21, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Battle of the Coral Sea edit

Very well-written article; comprehensive without extraneous detail; excellent flow & style. NPOV throughout, appropriate supporting images and well-structured body. - Offtherails 01:48, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

  • Support. -- ALoan (Talk) 13:42, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support --Scimitar 22:17, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Minor Objection- First, the lead section is too short- maybe another paragraph? Second, there are too few inline cites (only one), and it is not formatted correctly- try getting more references and putting more in-text citations. Otherwise a well-written article; I will be happy to support in the future! Flcelloguy   Give me a note! 22:34, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Inadequate references. I haven't read A Record of Activities in Cooktown During World War II, but I don't believe it provided much of the material in the article. ;) We also need evaluations of the battle by historians in the field- names and quotes. Also, the tone is very narrative and not very encyclopedic: I'm thinking of phrases like "mindful that his primary role was to protect Port Moresby" and "Their fears were realised". Mark1 02:09, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. Quite short, one reference. At best, a bottom line of what passes for FAC in our current standards. And plese remove the external link from body and transform into a note. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:24, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Inadequate references and inline citation. - Taxman Talk 14:50, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

Pope John Paul II edit

An anon user nominated this article but neither created this page nor put the FAC tags correctly, so I went ahead and did it. Flcelloguy 22:08, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Two things to mention:
1) A user signed his (her?) four tildes ( ~~~~ ) before the title (===[[Pope John Paul II]]===) of this section. I'm not sure what he meant, but I went ahead and removed it.
2) Originally I was not planning on pushing for this article. I simply noticed that an anon user had attempted to put the article up for FAC but had done it incorrectly. However, after actually reading the article and reading the comments, I have decided to push for the article, since it seems like the anon user isn't coming back. Thanks for all the comments and suggestions, and I'll be getting to them over the next week or so. (I'm travelling over the next week and might have limited computer access, so bear with me please!) Thanks! Flcelloguy 02:58, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I have now added a few paragraphs for the "Health" section, though the sub-article ( {{main|Health of Pope John Paul II}} ) is kept. In addition, I have expanded the introduction (lead) section to make it more inclusive- it is now 3 paragraphs long. Thanks to everyone for their suggestions and comments, and I'll be working on the rest soon! Flcelloguy 02:36, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Due to above, my Support is now full. JDG 16:18, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

More Recent Update: Sorry it's been taking me so long, I've been busy cleaning up competition... Anyways, after re-reading the article for the umpteenth time, I would have to agree with some of them- the focus on death, too little focus on S. America, etc. These are major changes and will take some time to fix, depending on how busy I am (feel free to help!). Thus, I plan to take this article to peer review after I'm done fixing all the objections and then re-submitting it as a FAC. However, feel free (as always) to put more input here. Thanks everyone for your comments and suggestions! Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk 21:25, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Update: All minor objections (such as fixing confusing uses of John Paul to John Paul II and the "Health" section) have been taken care of. Thanks to everybody for their comments and suggestions. I will be taking a look at the rest of the comments/suggestions over the next few days, and will get to them soon! Thanks! Flcelloguy 02:52, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Support Comprehensive, NPOV. Could do a better job of using references to back up its statements, and may focus too much on his recent death and the possibility of beatification. --Bcrowell 22:22, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support, but I would suggest tightening up the intro a bit. Everyking 22:33, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Conditional Support (now Full Support, see Above. JDG). Bring the Health section back into this article and blow away the sub-article. Wikipedia is becoming a click fest. The current activism in favor of short core-topic articles with many sub-articles is very misguided. When you sit down to read a major topic article you don't want to be chasing down scores of sublinks and subsublinks-- you want all the relevant info in that article. This is what Enc. Brit and almost all serious ref. works do, and it's for a reason. You put all or most of the detailed stuff in far-flung sub-articles that far fewer readers visit and you've succeeded in what: reverse-dissemination of information. JDG 00:29, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Most Wikipedians support sub-articles, and the idea that we shouldn't shove a huge amount of text down the reader's throat at once, though. So I don't think that's a fair thing to ask. Everyking 04:07, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I'm only asking for the restoration of a single section. I'm not sure where you get "most Wikipedians". Has there been a vote? I'm not sure if Flcelloguy is actually pushing for this article such that he's making changes in line with comments here. If he is and he wants my particular support, he'll restore Health. I won't oppose if he fails to, though. JDG 05:21, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Please see above note. Thanks! Flcelloguy 02:58, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Abiding by Summary style is an FA requirement and bringing all the content at Health of Pope John Paul II would imbalance the article toward the later part of his life even more than the article already is. --mav
This is really a requirement for FA? The first sentence of the link you give says "In order to make Wikipedia maximally useful to a diverse readership some people believe that articles should be written in summary style." That certainly doesn't sound like something that has risen to policy status. I really think it's time for a major vote on article length. I think a 32kb limit would be extremely detrimental and I'm sure many agree. JDG
See item 6 at Wikipedia:What is a featured article. Summary style does not require articles to abide by the 32KB limit, it just says that once an article reaches that length of prose it may be getting too long. As is, this article has less than 34KB of prose and since it covers a very important topic it should be easy to justify even more prose than there is already. So long as it is written well and stays tightly on-topic. --mav 20:44, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I have now written a few paragraphs for the "Health" section, though it still links to the "Main" article on his health. Flcelloguy 02:34, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose Much of this article is excellent work. But its organization, and the lengthy treatment of the relevant sections, make it seem as though the most important aspects of his papacy were his death and its aftermath. I also think the discussion of his ecclesiastical career in Poland needs a bit more development (and context), that his positions on social and economic justice need more exposition, and that the discussion of his political influence needs a bit more development and structure. Monicasdude 03:46, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for the suggestions, Monicasdude! I just have two comments/questions: 1) When you say you think the emphasis is on his death and aftermath, are you proposing that we cut down on the death/funeral sections? Most of those are already two or three short paragraphs and have another "sub" article of their own. Second, could you please tell me which sections of the articles you feel need improvement? That would be a great help. Thanks very much! Flcelloguy   Give me a note!   Desk 02:28, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. I wouldn't agree with moving the whole health article back into the main piece, but a small summary would be better than a heading and a link. Other than that, a worthy FA page. Harro5 11:38, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. I agree with Harro5 regarding the health section. JYolkowski // talk 17:00, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - An article on such an important topic needs to really shine. So far, this article has several issues I think need to be addressed before that can be achieved:
    1. Lead section is too short for an article this size on such an important topic. Condensing the ==Overview== section (which is the purpose of a lead section, btw) and merging the current lead section will accomplish that.
Please see above- I've now expanded lead section, and I'll take a look at the "Overview" section soon. Thanks! Flcelloguy 02:39, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    1. TOC is overwhelming and there are way too few inline cites.
    2. Having a heading with the only content under it being a link is appalling. Add a paragraph or two about his declining health to the death subsection and rename that to reflect the change.Then make the link to Health of Pope John Paul II inline instead of it being a main article link.
Done. (Again, please see above) Flcelloguy 02:39, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    1. The ==Other== section is just a list of what looks like miscellaneous trivia. What is its purpose?
I'll be looking at the rest of the suggestions soon- thanks everyone! Flcelloguy 02:39, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I agree with you that the "Other" section is just trivia. The only one that looks like it could be incorporated into the article is the first one about "Totus Tuus". Would there be any problems if I incorporated that one and deleted the rest of the section? Thanks. Flcelloguy   Give me a note!   Desk 02:38, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    1. Confusing use of 'John Paul' instead of 'John Paul II' in some parts of the article.
    • Fixed- all "John Paul"s now say "John Paul II". Flcelloguy 02:48, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    1. Organization: Having ==Biography== and ==Life's work== are odd as the major level 2 sections. One's life work *is* a very large part of their biography. Nixing these level 2s and finding a better way to organize would help. As is, the article does not seem to have a cohesive structure (moving this material out of its current level 2 section would likely fix this).
    I hope you are not advocating abandoning of lv 2 sections? I added them to this article some time ago - although they have been much changed by later editors. I generally find 2nd level sectioning very helpful. Perhaps sth should be moved from one lv1 section to another, but leveling the sections would do more harm then good, I am afraid. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:32, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    1. Over-concentration on declining health, death and funeral in the ==Biography== section. As is, those aspects take up half of that section (this could be fixed by reorganization under a different level 2 heading or by condensing).
  • Aside: I was surprised to see that the further reading, notes, external links, references, and interwiki links have a very significant impact on the physical size of this article and that without them this article isn't nearly as large as it seems from the page size warning - 34KB (just a note for anybody who is thinking about objecting due to the article's apparent size). --mav
  • Support- The article is very informative, and extremely NPOV. --User:SVera1NY
    • The above vote is this user's only edit ever. --mav
  • Object Very little focus on Latin America, though this region is home to the world's largest Catholic population. (Maybe I went through this article way too fast, but is Liberation Theology even mentioned?) Also, the section on "criticism" should be woven in with the rest of his text. History actually contains far more many shades of grade than the picture presented by those who seem to imagine there to be only two perspectives on the past ("supporters" and "critics"). 172 06:14, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. The organization needs work. The contentless health subsection needs to be expanded or turned into a simple see also. The image gallery also looks as though it is missing two pictures. Good articles really shouldn't have an other section and the factoids listed there should be merged into the prose. - SimonP 18:21, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
Health section now done (see above). Thanks! Flcelloguy 02:41, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Hmm... I've tried fixing the gallery, but it's not working. I've posted a help comment on the help desk. Any ideas? Thanks! Flcelloguy | Give me a note! | Desk 16:33, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Agree with most of Mav and other users' objections. Several days ago I put this article in Polish Wikipedians Notice Board to do 'close to PR' section, just because I don't think it is FAC ready yet. Close, true, better then several of our current FAs, true, but not something I'd nominate just yet. Although it is close enough so that with one-two editors willing to put some time and address those objections we can make it a FA in that voting run yet :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:32, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support --Witkacy 22:28, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, I agree with the criticisms about the balance given to different portions of his life, too little in some aresa too much in others. Also, what is up with the 31 external links to obituaries?--nixie 06:44, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I, too, personally felt a bit overwhelmed at the large number of external links when I first read the article. However, should we delete some of those? I'm a bit hesistant because now that we have so many links, how do we choose which ones to keep and which ones to delete? Thanks, Flcelloguy   Give me a note!   Desk 02:31, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
All the links seem to link to a particular media organisations direcoty of links about PJPII, I'd delete them all except the criticisms and the ones specifically labelled as directories.--nixie 05:08, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Done. Flcelloguy | Give me a note! | Desk 16:16, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. The late Pope looks good but the lead is a bit long. Dralwik 17:02, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support Pope John Paul II was a great man.Yo Mama 5000
    • But this article is not. I would even go as far as to say that in it's present form it offendes the pope - he deserves so much better. Please, people, don't let your admiration for the men get in the way of this review. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:46, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Cleopatra VII of Egypt edit

I nominate this article because it is very well-written and informative. Matjlav 18:19, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. Cleopatra has had a huge impact on cluture, and the section in this article is simply too short at present. --Scimitar 18:58, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, there's more controversy surrounding her death than this article mentions. I saw a documentary on discovery which suggested she was murdered. This article doesn't mention this option as well as the fact there was no snake in the mausoleum and that she wasn't the type to commit suicide and so on. There's enough notable speculations to report in a section on her death. Mgm|(talk) 19:03, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review This could be an FA, but it doesn't seem comprehensive enough. As one of the most famous women in history, there should be more here. slambo 19:54, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object--no references. Meelar (talk) 20:39, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object For all of above reasons Giano | talk 21:45, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object- please use references and citations. Flcelloguy 15:05, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Agriculture edit

Good thorough treatment, but not overly detailed for such an umbrella topic. Very strong History section. Partial self-nom. JDG 00:07, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. It's a good summary for such a vast topic, but it needs a longer lead section and the environmental problems and policy sections should be turned into prose. - SimonP 16:52, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. I agree with Simon P here. Generally, it's an interesting read, but the Environmental Problems, Policy and Methods sections need expanding. They're basically just lists at the moment. Perhaps you could start off with including small summaries of each (e.g. "aeroponics is..."). Extraordinary Machine 18:19, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. As well as the objections listed above, I would like to see specific source citations inline. I have marked it up accordingly. --Theo (Talk) 19:55, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Overall, it's a good article, but I must object since I don't really see any mention of how the finished goods are transported; a major part of farming is getting the product to buyers since failure to do so means no income from the product that is created. In my eyes, Agriculture isn't just planting and growing, it's also selling and transporting the finished product. For example, the North American "wheat rush" every fall can generate revenues large enough to subsidize some small railroads for an entire year. Many farmers in America join together into co-ops to market and transport their crops to buyers. The Canadian Wheat Board was setup as an agency that would handle much of the marketing of various grains across Canada. There's more that could be said, and I think it needs a mention here. slambo 19:46, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object too many lists, stats are not up to date (and I'd prefer to see stats from the FAO than the USDA), the format is bad in places, the list of methods and see alsos needs pruning to only the immediately relevant links, there is very little information on livestock (should have a section similar to crops), there needs to be a decent discussion of pest and disease management and trade of agricultural goods and futures, environmental policy and problems need to be prose.--nixie 22:47, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: Far to broad a subject to be covered by one article. Each small diversity could be long article in itself e.g. "Wheat Production in East Anglia", or "Agriculture in Ancient Egypt". Not too mention the minefield of "Genetic crops" The word agriculture can only really be a vague dictionary definition. Agriculture should be a category not an article. Not voting on this as my comments are not really actionable. Giano | talk 12:30, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: Well, folks, you're right. I see now that as good as the existing text is, a number of other areas need to be fleshed out, foremost among them Livestock, as nixie says. But I disagree vehemently with Giano. When writing for WikiP I always keep kids in mind, your typical 12 or 14 year old who was just hit with a homework assignment. Poor kid needs to do a writeup on Agriculture, surfs optimistically over to the best new reference work in the world and is met with "Please use the Agriculture-related links below.", which links lead off to endlessly detailed, often obscure sub-aspects. No, we need strong entries for high--level topics like this. This movement to severely limit article size and throw everything relevant into sub-articles is downright poisonous. This is an encyclopedia, not a vast index-finger workout room. JDG 20:03, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Further comment Children today are not told "go find out what is agriculture" even at a young age thay are given a defined (excuse the pun) field to research, e.g what do cows eat to make milk, what are daddy cows called, why does mummy cow need a calf once a year, etc. etc. etc. That is the detail that needs to be covered on every aspect of agriculture if you are writing for children, or even adults who want to know more. Then one can cover more complex issues calving indexes, feed conversion rates. Yields per hectare. Fertiliser nitrogen rates per hectare to improve protein yields in milling wheat, the perceived detrimental effects of those rates on the environment, before one even approaches the history of the subject, the projected future of the subject, it's effects on the landscape. Agriculture in the political field of the 21st century (very relevant in Europe). The effects of irregation in agriculture on the economy of a country (think Egypt, Aswan damm) and so on. Giano | talk 20:57, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Actually, being a parent of a 10-year-old, I've heard and helped with many of the homework assignments that have been assigned this year. Sometimes the question is "What is TOPIC?" Other times, it's "Find 5 facts about TOPIC." For questions like these, I showed my son how to do a quick search on WP to find an answer. So, yes, we do need to think about children accessing the site for homework with broad questions. However, we do need to stick to certain conventions when nominating articles for featured status. I don't think these two goals are at odds with each other since brilliant prose can be, and often is, accessible to younger readers. slambo 17:28, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

Beowulf edit

  • Vote For. Nice Read. Very Interesting. 4.238.245.162 23:19, 23 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I think the storyline and translations sections need to be split, and we can probably do without an excerpt as well as long as the Project Gutenberg link is referred to. Mgm|(talk) 11:12, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Doesn't appear comprehensive. An article on this length might be sufficient for a more minor work, but Beowulf is important enough to warrant a more detailed review. Everyking 12:22, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. The article is in quite a good state, but it's nowhere near long enough to be featured. Much, much more could be written about such an important work, and this article is not yet comprehensive. — Trilobite (Talk) 15:18, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. I fixed 4.238.245.162's nomination of this article. As an inexperienced user, s/he did not know that it also had to be posted on Featured article candidates. I did not know whether to delete the nomination or to complete it, but I chose the latter, because the information is OK, and as far as the length and coverage are concerned the page has been quite static for a very long time (most contributions during the last months have been quite minor edits). Hopefully, this discussion can inspire further work on the article.--Wiglaf 15:34, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, not comprehensive. Neutralitytalk 19:45, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, not comprehensive. Lead is too short and fails to even summarize what the work is about. The excerpt from the work itself is basically filler to cover for the fact that this article doesn't have nearly enough depth on the subject. --Michael Snow 20:18, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Lead is too short, prose seems bad (lots of single-sentence paras). Article is rather short, so I doubht it is comprehensive enough for our standards. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:34, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object there seem to be few references, and I'm not sure what they cover, please consider more texts or explain which ones covered all the material. Also please condsider inline references such as footnotes. Mozzerati (signed 20:24, 2005 Jun 6 (UTC))
  • Object - can't say much about detail of the piece, but would strongly advise converting inline numbered external links to use Template:Note and Template:Ref. I also think that more notes need to added to source specific info, for instance to indicate the source of where J.R.R. Tolkien thought a particular translation was bad. - Ta bu shi da yu 02:34, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. It needs to be expanded, as I have seen more comprehensive summaries of Beowulf - as a poem, as a cultural archetype and as an example of Anglo-Saxon language - in GCSE (UK - aimed at 14-16 year olds) textbooks. It is just not yet good enough --Batmanand 15:49, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, I agree, It's not comprehensive.
  • Object. Not comprehensive, and relatively superficial. Monicasdude 01:12, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Half-Life 2 edit

Self-nom. Me and some editors have been fixing this article up and now I believe it is worthy for FA status. I tried to incorporate everything that was said while it was peer reviewed, and I think we did a good job. Thunderbrand 04:04, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

  • Comment: could you add something about how many copies of the game have been sold (preferably mentioned in the lead)? I thought I once heard this had been one of the fastest-selling games in PC history...Harro5 04:48, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)
I added it to the lead. The only thing I can find is how many were sold from Nov-Jan, and Valve hasn't said anything new lately. Thunderbrand 04:58, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Primarily because assertions are mostly unsourced. For example, what were the positive reviews mentioned in the Lead? Who "feel[s] that it is very frustrating to only learn the story in small bits and pieces throughout the game"? I also dislike the title of the ==Notes== section; conventionally, we use that heading for footnotes, but it also gives little clue as to what the section addresses. Is it about ==Player perspective==? --Theo (Talk) 23:43, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Well, I tried to fix it up as best I could by what you said. Thunderbrand 00:40, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. The changes address my concerns. --Theo (Talk) 01:39, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Contains empty and very short sections. The 1984 comparison is original essaying and speculation, as is the part about Half-Life 3. Many references are made to "some players" without specifying who they are and providing references. There is hardly any information about the gameplay, and particularly too little information about the Source engine and how its much-hyped physics powers were applied. The "controversies and criticisms" section should be prose, not a bullet list. There should also be more information about the game's development history and other things surrounding it besides controversy, such as marketing/hype and reception by reviewers. - Fredrik | talk 21:59, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Much of the infomation you mentioned was moved to new articles or already exist in other articles, such as Source engine, since the page was becoming way too long. Thunderbrand 22:15, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
There should be summaries to replace what was moved. Fredrik | talk 23:36, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I summarized the weapons section, and the other sections that were moved already have summaries. Thunderbrand 23:58, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. (sorry for the rather extreme delay in voting) A good start, but clearly not FA-quality yet. What bothers me most is the disorganized plot section; the plot summary itself should be more comprehensive, and there should be less room for speculative 1984 comparisons. Right now, the summary itself also lacks cohesion in my view (A few examples: i) does it make sense to mention the G-Man to people who know nothing about HL, just to say Freeman then finds himself in City 17, without explaining the G-Man's role at all, or reporting his words; ii) "it seems that the massive energy discharge caused by the "resonance cascade" " is ambiguous wording. What level is this written on: does "it seem" so to Freeman, the general population of the virtual world, or is it the article's authors' speculation?).
The Setting could easily be converted into flowing prose, and describe the actual setting as a whole, rather than simply compare it to 1984. The very choice of 1984 as only comparison strikes me as somewhat POV; I mean, why not compare it to Doom III, for instance (I'm not saying that's what should be done, I'm just giving an example of how arbitrary the choice is, as HL2's setting is reminiscent of many "post-apocalyptic/post-invasion" works. The 1984 speculation, if it has to stay, needs to be turned into prose and provide even more specific hints (The Civil Protection seem distinctly like the Thought Police, reinforced when Freeman witnesses the storming of a flat. doesn't say much). The best would be to quote authoritative reviewers mentionning the "Orwellian" atmosphere, or drawing comparisons to 1984 (I know there have been). What about the Eastern Europe reference, where does this come from?
I also feel there are too much reminiscences of the personal authors' views and comments (examples: which is, appropriately enough, referred to as the Seven Hours War). More of this: The general atmosphere of the game has a distinct totalitarian and authoritarian feel that makes it similar even without the specific details mentioned above and inferred from in-game., However, the Gravity Gun survives (probably due to its zero-point nature) and is made incredibly powerful - Sentences like this (which are equivalent to describing the highly subjective "look and feel" of the game) border on personal comment (even if the game developers' intent was clearly to produce the effect described) should be avoided if possible.
The "Notes on the narrative" section, while interesting should stay even more factual and present less conjecture, unless it can be shown by quotes that the questioning of the narrative technique of the game presented in taht section reflects what major reviewers thought. (consider: Although these are certainly intentional devices on the part of Valve Software, [...] It could be said in Half-Life that the player's bewilderment is meant to mirror Gordon's [...] . By the opening of Half-Life 2, however, Gordon has proven that he can survive in a strange and hostile environment, and should therefore be at least somewhat more level-headed and inquisitive., These complaints, of course, only prove that the game's designers have successfully [...].) The paragraph about the Gordon's not aging could be reduced to a single-sentence mention, as the rest is fan speculation; the stasis theory does not follow from the endings of the games.
Too many microsections; the "Weapons" and "Enemies" sections, for example, need serious help. Ask yourself if it is worth making an extra section just to say many of the weapons from the first game return, with some new ones. At best briefly mention both enemies and wepaons from Half Life make "comebacks" in HL2.
The "Multiplayer" section likewise needs some cleanup; the paragraph about fan disappointment needs to be reduced and stay factual (However, there are arguably just as many players for whom the novelty of annihilating enemies by blasting them with barrels, computer monitors and even cars will never be exhausted., It is common for a player to immediately blame some factor beyond his or her control for a defeat. — personal comments like this need to go).
The "Game engine" section does not seem satisfactory for a game so highly praised, specifically for its physics and game engine. The confusing mention of Steam being used to upgrade the engine, doesn't cut it. (Additionally, when coupled with Steam, the engine can be easily upgraded to include many new graphical technologies. One such example is high dynamic range imaging [...], if they used Steam to upgrade the engine to add HDRI, say it clearly, and say when they did it; from the wording right now, it is not unequivocal wether they did it, plan to, or just could possibly do it).
I only have one word for the section about Steam: quotes. Quote reviews, mention and source specific problems users have had with the system. Without sources, this section is useless. The "Controversies" and criticism quotes could also use some external links to media websites (specifically about the code leak, and legal battle with Vivendi). It would be nice if it were turned to prose too. The HL3 paragraph is pure speculation. I hope I wasn't too harsh, and my comments will be useful to help get this to FA level. Phils 19:25, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - The "note" template used in the "Notes" section is designed to be used in conjunction with the "ref" template, so that the "^" "symbols" in front of each note, links back to the noted text. Otherwise they don't work, this should be fixed. Paul August ☎ 20:18, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)

Hampshire edit

Partly a self-nomination, as myself and the UK geography WikiProject have masively expanded the article over the past couple of weeks. From the references I've run out of things to add, so I think the article is pretty comprehensive. Compare with Dorset, which is already featured. Joe D (t) 21:00, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Support. Very interesting to read. Meelar (talk) 21:07, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • Weak oppose. I don't have a strong opinion about this article, and that is probably because in general it is just flat to read. There isn't anything wrong with it as such, it's just that Hampshire isn't that interesting a place. Harro5 21:23, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object Nothing on sport. I think there should be a section on that. Southampton and Portsmouth have football clubs. Hambledon is important to the history of cricket. Hampshire County Cricket Club is at the Rose Bowl. There must be loads of sailing and yachting with the Solent nearby. Also, the picture of "Southampton from Netley Hospital" looks like a lot of grass and some trees - I thought Southampton was an urban area, jguk 22:15, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • OK, done (except the image caption, which is correct, though the foreground is dominated by the hospital grounds). Joe D (t) 23:21, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • You can't see Southampton in that picture (unless you expand its size greatly). It's a misleading caption that should be removed - or perhaps better the whole picci could be removed. It's still not in the same league as Mumbai yet, jguk 19:23, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object on several grounds:
    • Source citation is inadequate. For example, I recall that only the western half of the county was occupied by Jutes so I wish to check the assertion that the county was occupied by Jutish tribes. Theo (Talk)
  • Response: Reference and filmography added 6-6-05.
    I have split the endnotes from the references. It feel that more inline source citations would be better but insisting on rigourous citation seems inappropriate. --Theo (Talk) 07:12, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Significant omissions include:
      • Culture including sport (already noted by jguk above), educational institutions (e.g. University of Southampton, and Winchester College), theatres (e.g. the Nuffield Theatre company developed West End shows), and fine art (e.g. Millais was a native, and Lowry was a regular visitor and painted local scenes).
      • East Hampshire is an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB).
      • Famous residents including Gilbert White (Natural History of Selborne), Captain Oates, Benny Hill, and Craig David.
      • Historically, the Mayflower, the Titanic, and Supermarine (manufacturers of the Spitfire aircraft and flying boats).
      • The Boat Show.
      • Basingstoke as a financial centre, not just a traditional market town.
      • "Hampshire Hog" as the nickname for those born in the county.
Theo (Talk) 23:26, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • OK, added several of these and will look into adding theatres and people tommorow. I'm not sure whether the Titanic should go on the main article, but I'll certainly add that and other notable ships to History of Hampshire later. Can you clarify the Mayflower connection? I'd never heard of a connection and the Mayflower article doesn't mention Hampshire. Joe D (t) 23:58, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      The loss of the Titanic is a defining moment in Hampshire's history because it involved the loss of so many residents of Southampton (the county town). The Mayflower originally departed Southampton; this is stated in that article. --Theo (Talk) 07:12, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose for some quibbles. It seems odd for an English county's area and other measurements to be given in square miles first, then kilometers (the infobox only gives kilometers). Also, I assume the source for the demographics in the infobox is Office for National Statistics & Hampshire County Council, but that should be specifically cited in some way. The first sentence under "Physical geography" is odd -- is that a geological use of categories? (also why is that section "physical geography" but the main article "geology"? I suggest sticking with one or the other) And the second sentence refers to a "weak" variety of clay, which I guess uses some meaning of "weak" I'm not familiar with. There are an awful lot of statistics under "economy" that aren't cited, but should be (also under "transport"). Tuf-Kat 23:41, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
    • What's odd about miles? They're more commonly used than metric for measuring large distances. The sub-article of Physical geography is partly named such as a standardisation of the sub-article names across counties, and partly because the only other physical geography in the section is climate, for which there isn't enough to say for an extra article, or to split the section into geology and climate sections. The first sentence of geology is simply saying Hampshire can be divided in two by what its geology and landscape are like, I'll try and think of a less ambiguous way to phrase it though. I'll go and change "weak" to "non-resistant" and link to the sources now. Joe D (t) 23:58, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose I agree that a culture section should be added, universites should also be mentioned somewhere. The seascapes are lovely but don't really give an impression of the city areas or urban environment, the cathedral in that pic is compltetly obscured by a large tree, so you have one from a different angle. Also, what's the sifnificance of the yellow shaded regions on the district map?--nixie 04:50, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Weak support I'm sure the length can be expanded.Object Agree completely with nixie. Would also like to see average temperatures, rainfall; and the sports section expanded.  =Nichalp (Talk)= 11:58, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
  • Comments: I've added stats to the climate paragraph and changed some photos around to hopefully give a better idea of the towns and cities, but since I don't live in Hampshire and only rarely pass through it I don't have that many photos of my own to use, so am mainly relying on what other people have uploaded already. I've added a little culture, but haven't added Nuffield because I don't have and can't find a reference for its notability. The yellow areas are independent unitary authorities as it says in the list below the map. Update: I've also added a sentence linking to the universities in the settlements section, which I think is probably all that's needed on this topic for this page. Joe D (t) 16:19, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Joachim Gottschalk edit

A once-famous but now obscure German actor who defied the Nazis for love and family. - Wellreadone 23:33, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)

  • Object No references. Not comprehensive: the article is almost exclusively about the circumstances leading to his death, with almost nothing on his acting career, not even a list of the movies he was in. Phrases like "his devoted fans" sound fannish. There is no copyright information on the photo; from what I understand about Nazi-era copyrights, this is a big can of worms.--Bcrowell 00:49, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Response: Reference and filmography added 6-7-05.
  • German Copyright Law -- Article 72

(1) Photographs and products manufactured in a similar way to photographs shall be protected, mutatis mutandis, by the provisions of Part I applicable to photographic works.

(2) The right afforded by paragraph (1) shall belong to the photographer.

(3) The right afforded by paragraph (1) shall expire 50 years after publication of the photograph, or if its first permitted public communication took place earlier, after the latter, but 50 years after its manufacture where the photograph has not been published or legally communicated in public within such period. The period shall be calculated in accordance with Article 69.

The photograph of Gottschalk was an "autogramme" postcard, signed by Gottschalk and given to a fan. Therefore, it was published more than 50 years ago.

Can anyone refer us to more info on Nazi-era copyrights? There used to be some at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Image_copyright_tags#WWII_Nazi_pictures, but it looks like it's gone, now. From what I recall, it was very complicated, with, e.g., two different laws applying to two different types of photographs, and complications because it was an empire rather than a single nation. This seems to be a FAQ, since I remember it coming up more than once before this (e.g. for blitzkrieg). --Bcrowell 03:08, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
On German copyright, and the distinction between a "Lichtbild" (50y) and a "Lichtbildwerk" (life of author +70 or 80), see Template_talk:PD-Germany, that template's deletion discussion, and Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion#Holding_Cell. Lupo 10:17, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • This is far, far short of being comprehensive. Look at some featured articles to see the kind of standard that's expected. Everyking 04:07, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review --nixie 04:42, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Interesting and sad story, but it does not meet the FA criteria. Giano | talk 15:01, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

History of the Ryukyu Kingdom edit

This article should be nominated. Very little has been published elsewhere on the rich history of the Ryukyu Kingdom. As it kind of overlaps with another article on Ryukyuan history: Ryukyuan history and Ryukyuans, some attention is also needed to bring the two articles under the same heading.

  • Object:Needs a map. Needs images. Needs references. Needs 3000 words. It's terrible, what's the mater with this place today? Giano | talk 18:59, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support: 3000 words and references can be searched in libraries. We can all work on it. Map can be easily found on-line. Dunshi 19:07, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • strong object. Sorry, but there is a rather large amount of work needed before this article is FA-worthy. To start with: 1) there is no lead section. 2) there are no images. 3) cite your sources. 4) The The Origins of the Ryukyu Kingdom and its dynasties section is exactly one sentence and doesn't even list any of the dynasty names. 5) The External links section is longer than the rest of the article. Please review Wikipedia:What is a featured article before nominating articles in the future for FA status. slambo 19:19, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
Compare this article to the content in History of the Grand Canyon area to get an idea of the comprehensiveness that is needed for a History of REGION article. slambo 19:22, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
  • Please, do not nominate articles that do not meet basic FA criteria. Phils 19:42, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • refer to peer review for additional ideas. Not comprehensive enough to be a feature article. --Scimitar 20:17, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, refer to peer review or the article improvement drive.--nixie 00:22, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Are those Wikipedia mirror site links I see in the ext. links section? It looks like there's at least a few. Everyking 02:26, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object- Please write a more comprehensive article. Featured articles should offer an in-depth look at the topic and contain a lot more information and writing. Flcelloguy 03:03, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - Looks kind of sloppy, and needs a map.

Antarctic krill edit

The article is online since March 2002 and gives basic information about the ecology of the most successful animal species of the planet, backed with images, animations, and links to free reading material and high resolution images on Wikisource and an interactive virtual microscope and a webserver with in-depth information. The article is very often used by schools and universities all over the world, as we know from feedback - we use it as teaching material in our new proposals for a Virtual_University - I contributed much of the article - Uwe Kils 14:19, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)

  • Object--very short article, far too many pictures for that small amount of text. Where's the beef? Meelar (talk) 14:34, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object.Agree with above, plus links in the text should be footnoted. No references. Giano | talk 14:55, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
This is improving, and becoming very interesting, but it does need proper references, or is this own research? Giano | talk 21:59, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Could you make it clear, is the literature section in fact references for this work, if so, and they are then labeled as such, I will change to support. Giano | talk 12:37, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Hallo Giano - put links in the text to refs Uwe Kils 20:16, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
hallo Giano - thank you - most is own research but i will work on refs - take care Uwe Kils 22:41, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
there is a link to 43 references about krill in the article, some given in full, and for those who want to read more text there are 4 full works from 3 authors on Wikisource linked - we tried to get copyright permission from other authors for the project but they wouldn't / couldn't give it - we think that direct links in the text are much more practical for educational work than confusing footnotes, which make articles only longer - Uwe Kils 15:06, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
*Oh please! I would love to support this, BUT until it has a section titled references (from which the page is sourced) I cannot support. I am fascinated by the page, I love the animations - believe me - I am sure it is accurate and true, and indeed the last thing in Krills but this encyclopedia is written by unknowns. Hence, more than any other work it has to be reliably referenced otherwise it is unreliable. Please see this or else withdraw this excellent article. Just put in a reference section called "references" Giano | talk 20:43, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I put in "references" - did you see what Britannica and Encarta have about krill?

SUPPORT This is very different from the usual featured article format, but it is good. It explains in depth most of what (I would imagine) students of the subject need to know. I thought I was totally disinterested (still not riveted) by the subject, yet it held my attention to the end, and I have learned something. So in spite of being a little unconventional in its style and format, I have changed to support, now that it is reliably referenced. I would ask other objectors to give it a second read and see it accordingly for what it is, something well written and informative, on a subject little referred to elsewhere. Giano | talk 18:10, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. The article is certainly not comprehensive; it is too short to possibly incorporate material from the 43 works mentionned above as "references", and does not follow standard formatting and style guidelines. Phils 19:56, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Article isn't properly referenced. Contains too many pictures and too little text. You don't need copyright permission to retell information from any of these 43 sources and copying (for which you would need that) would make for a very dull article. Please expand and follow the FA criteria as they are. Mgm|(talk) 20:04, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
thank you for your responses and time. Sometimes the art is to make information short, with pointing to larger volumes. Where are the rules how much media should be used in a wikipedia article? Space is on the harddrives enough. "An image says more than a thousand words". The article was once longer - I could have easily dumped text from scripts I still have from the times I lectured at the universities about krill or pasted from the 150 pages from articles with my students given at wikisource, but we wanted to keep it here condensed. The images and animations are considered as additional already, nobody is forced to scroll down on the page - as far as we know, the upper part of the page is formatted ok - otherwise please help us - keep up with your fine work Uwe Kils 14:16, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Article is incomplete and poorly formatted. Morwen - Talk 16:20, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
hallo to England - hallo Abigail! formatting is a matter of style and personal taste - we used it the way it is many years in teaching, and we got much feedback, very positive, from all over the world - if today wikipedia articles need all to be very huge and thus confusing, all alike looking, thats a matter of another taste. We like big images and videos, as we have on our teaching servers since the haydays of the web, now giving away for the great ideas of wikis and joint creations - keep up with your fine work, we like your great images of England - Uwe Kils 17:50, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: So that's how you like it fair enough. But for an article to be featured here. It needs to be comprehensive and follow Wikipedia's criteria for featured articles. It's not a matter of personal opinion. Mgm|(talk) 21:16, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)
Guten Tag mgm! Danke für den Kommentar - in Allem ist persönlicher Geschmack - und wir können alles diskutieren, über alle Grenzen und Alter hinweg - ich werde Eure Hinweise hier besprechen. Ich hab schon etwas mehr Text hineingetan. Ist ja auch nur ein Versuch, und Diskussion ist immer gut - viele herzliche Grüsse über den Atlantik Uwe Kils 22:50, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)
Please note that most Dutchmen don't speak German particularly well. German and Dutch languages are related, but not enough for it to be mutually understandable. Mgm|(talk) 04:50, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
sorry - but you have on your user page a tab that you do speak German - was not so important anyway, I just tried to be friendly and cooperative - I contribute much more n the Englishserverside than on the German, but I note what you wrote Uwe Kils 12:06, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)

Dear review group, I addressed the objections that were raised, thank you very much for the advice - it would be nice if you would take another look at Antarctic krill - best greetings Uwe Kils 03:51, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)

  • Still object, although improving. Seems to use a lot of highly technical language that might confuse the reader; also has somewhat poor grammar that makes it tough to read. Much improved from its original state, though. Someone else should check on references, as I'm not sure exactly how they're supposed to be formatted. Meelar (talk) 14:56, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Despite the imporvements made recently - which were admirable - it is 'still' too much pretty pictures, too little useful content. Actionable stuff: make the captions longer with more explanation. And take out some of the photos. They just get in the way for some of the article, and (no offence but) more photos of krill is less useful to the typical user than more info. on krill diet, lifecycle, migration patterns, contribution to ecosystem etc. Hope this is not too harsh, cos the article has promise, but it needs work. Batmanand 20:58, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC) Most criticisms answered. More about migration, which I thought was a big part of the krill life (if its not tell me and I'll remove this criticism) is the only thing still remaining. Oh, and the compund eye bit: it says "electron microscope" a bit randomly. Do you mean the photo is an electronmicrograph? If so, change that. IF not, clear up what it does mean. But overall, my object is now very very weak. Batmanand 08:47, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC) All criticisms answered> good work. Now support (and will shut up about migration lol). Batmanand 13:24, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
changed electron microscope - The krill schools drift with these watermasses, and it is one stock all around Antarctica with gene exchange over the whole area. There is not much knowledge about migration patterns because it is not possible to put tags on krill yet.Uwe Kils 13:01, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)


hallo Batmanand - thank you for the comment - we submitted the article to hear critics - we are used to that in academia - will work on it, maybe take pictures to sub pages for the interested Uwe Kils 21:15, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
moved the images of the filtering basket to a sub page Uwe Kils 21:37, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)

Hard to understand

Really like what you have done with the article, i think it could be really good but i have difficulty understanding some of it. As a native English speaker i found some of the grammar quite poor which made some of the content unintelligable. Also the choice and the way you word the sentences has made it difficult for me to understand what is being conveyed. I have made some minor edits to some of the wording but i still think it needs a bit of work. Again i think this is a good article but with better elucidation and grammar it could be a fantastic article. Yakuzai 21:14, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

hallo Yakuzai! thank you for your comment. Please help us and change bad language. I am German and know my English is rotten - take care Uwe Kils 21:20, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)



Hi Kils. Have read through your article more thoroughly and have done some further editing. Will go through it systematically over the next week or two, really want this to be a featured article! Here are some initial thoughts on the introduction:

1. The bit about the step between prey and predator is hard to understand maybe you could write this up more thouroughly in the ecosystem section and erase it from introduction.

2. In the section Systematic are you trying to give an account of what distinguishes the Antartic Krill from others of the same order? If so i Think you need to state that and also have a link for the meaning of carapax and gnathapod. Peolple who don't have knowledge of technical terms like these will find it hard to understand this section. I made an edit of this section myself but i need to clarify whether you are trying to say that the visibility of the gills is due to the thoracomers on each side of the carapax being so short? Also whether the visibility of the gills is another distinguishing feature of this order? updated by 193.115.13.66 12:01, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)


Hopefully this is helpful for you. Yakuzai 22:45, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

thank you, Yakuzai, I will work on it Uwe Kils 23:27, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC) Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Antarctic_krill"

  • Object (see below for new vote; this has gotten too messy). You did a great job, Uwe, but here are a few more things to consider:
    • 2½ of the three paragraphs in the section of geographic distribution actually explain stuff about the Southern Ocean. Shouldn't most of that info go there?
    • The article needs better structure. For instance, I would group "Systematic", "Development", "Food", under a heading "Life cycle", and "Bioluminiscence", "Esacpe reaction", and "The compound eye" under another heading "Characteristics". Not sure where "Filter feeding" and "Ice algae raking" would go. The rest ("Biomass", "Position in the Antarctic ecosystem", "Decline with shrinking pack ice", "The Biolgical Pump and Carbon Sequestration") could go under "Ecology", and finally "Fisheries" and "Future visions and Ocean Engineering" could again be subsumed under their own section, for which I can't come up with a good name, though. Article structure is OK now.
    • Comment only, not an objection: Some of the current sections could probably be combined.
    • The article should be proofread by a native English speaker. Could probably still be improved, but is way better already.
    • "krill is substituted by salps" — by whom? :-) Seriously: why? and what happens to salps in years where the krill population is large? This interaction could use some more explanation.
    • Fisheries – who fishes krill? I suppose primarily the Japanese, but the article doesn't say so explicitly. Are there other nations?
    • Layout problems; it just doesn't look good yet. I guess this might vanish if some restructuring is done. mostly resolved.
    • Lupo 11:41, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thank you, and thank you for your edits - will work on it - salps live only one year - my English is rotten, I am from Germany (as you know) but I still contribute most on the English article so many in the world can utilize it - one of my students will later make German and Danish and Norwegian translations Uwe Kils 13:01, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
Some more:
  • Image:Filterkrillkils.gif is a movie (actually, an animated GIF) larger than 600kB! This increases load times tremenduously if you're on a slow line (56kbit modem). This should be de-inlined, like I did here (use [[:Image:...]] instead of [[Image:...]]). Replaced by still image + link to movie.
  • Some paragraphs just uses the term "krill" (e.g. the Fisheries section). What kind of krill is meant? Does this apply to krill in general? If so, the information should go to krill, shouldn't it?
  • The section on the biological pump could use a link to biological pump.
  • Lupo 13:11, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Hallo Lupo - thank you for the comments - we do not know any person still on a 56k modem, and in future the speeds on the internet will again go up - those who dial in get the space empty - maybe we make an extra page with small images and no motion on one of our other servers - will change krill to to antarctic krill - good point, i will link to Biological pump, just forgot (I started that article on 18:42, Jun 4, 2003, Paul Falkowski is a coworker of mine)
"we do not know any person still on a 56k modem" – yes you do: I am :-(. And a whole lot of people that are part of our target audience are likely to be in the same situation, just think of all the third-world countries! Page design should always be done with slow connections in mind. Lupo 15:49, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
The animation is compressed already. The wiki software is written in a way that everything loads and can be read, only then animations are loaded and will show up eventually - we ask you to please leave the animations in the article, that is more important for us (and many we asked) than getting the status "featured". We asure you we have the third world in our minds. We had the article evaluated by an academic group, forked that version off to other servers and will use that proofread stage for our third world teaching projects (and will update it again and again). Thank you all for your input and time - we will continue to make the article in Wikipedia better - one day Wikipedia (or sponsored/supplemented forks) will hold content proofread enough to become serious teaching resources even for science classes - we still dream of a Virtual University free for all and worked up by many cooperative all over the world - good luck to all of you who helped with comments and edits on this demonstration article about a remarkable organism Uwe Kils 17:24, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
Much better now. Thanks to all who helped. However, I still have some points:
  • Development: What was the "Discovery-expedition"? Was the ship called Discovery? Or was it sponsored/initiated by a magazine called Discovery?
  • Development: "The next two larval stages [...] do not eat but are nourished by the yolk." What does that mean? Do the first nauplius eat? And all this is after hatching. Where does the yolk come from? Do they carry it with them after having hatched, or how is this meant? And if they don't eat, how do they feed on the yolk? Or do they eat the yolk, but not yet phytoplankton?
  • Development: The text says "at a depth of 2000 m", the image caption claims 3000 m. Should probably be 2000 - 3000 m in both cases.
  • Fisheries: do the Japanese fish other krill besides Antarctic krill?
  • Fisheries: "The products are used largely in Japan for feeds."—do you mean "animal food"?
  • Fisheries: "great loss of the krill's moisture"—I can't quite make sense of that, though I think I understand what is meant. Maybe "great loss of the krill's internal fluids"?
  • Fisheries: "One aim, involves splitting the muscular hind part from the front part and separating the chitin armor, in order to produce frosted products and concentrate powders."—Sorry, I can't parse that sentence.
  • Not an objection, comment only: Future visions and Ocean Engineering: that is very interesting, but I perceive this paragraph as rather one-sided (maybe that's just me, though). I would worry about the long-term effects of such ecosystem tampering in search of a cheap way out of our non-sustainable lifestyle with its overproduction of Greenhouse gasses.
  • I'm sorry to say so, but that movie is a show-stopper for me. How about producing a still image from one frame of the movie and showing that, and linking the full movie in the image caption? Did this myself.
Lupo 11:45, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thank you, Lupo, for your extensive work. I changed most of your extra points. We have the environmental concerns a lot, thats why I wrote "no knowledge" - I would like to add more critics, but then it would be POV - the intelligent reader will do that on her own we trust - best greetings Uwe Kils 13:08, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • Neutral now. If the two points not yet resolved above (explanation of the Discovery-expedition and better explanation of this yolk business) are amended, I'll support. Lupo 14:43, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I changed the two points Uwe Kils 15:38, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support I've rewritten the difficult systematic section to be more intelligible to the non-specialist, and I would now support this interesting article - perhaps pleopod could be explained also. jimfbleak 05:39, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Minor Object- first, I agree with Lupo that those two points need to be clarified. Second, some of the in-text external references are formatted differently from others (i.e., some are superscripts, some not)- is that supposed to be like that? Third, I would like to see the section on the compound eye expanded a bit. Though it says we understand very little about it, another sentence or two explaining why it is fantastic,etc., wouldn't hurt. Otherwise, the article has improved immensely- everyone keep up the good work! Flcelloguy 15:05, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I changed the three points, I just do not know what more to write about the eye, nothing is known, I just thought it would be nice to share the beauty of the structure with others, just click on the eye three times Uwe Kils 15:38, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • Minor object, the large images create too much white space in the article, move some of the less important ones out of the articles or to the gallery at the bottom of the page. The graphs presented in the later part of the article need better captions. The reference section should be in a format more similar to David Helvarg for example.--nixie 15:57, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Ismail Raji al-Faruqi edit

I believe that this article should be nominated. Been working on it since Sept 2004, and I think its ready now. Menj 09:06, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object: This needs to be more in depth. It's more his CV than a biography. There is no objectivity here at all. The quote. " .....is widely recognized as an authority on Islam and comparative religion" - recognised by whom? The reference section is the wrong place, and the formatting seems generally to be erratic. This need to be expanded and then given another (it's already been there once) long period on peer review. Giano | talk 09:55, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Looks like a solid start, given the extensive biography and the fact the article is rather well-formatted (on this point I disagree with the above), but i) it has serious POV problems (see Giano's comments above) ii) it fails to explain al-Faruqi's significance as an author. What were his views, what were his actual achievements; currently the article does little but list the various positions and honors he held. The three sentences explaining the presumed "focus" of his work at the end of the second section are insufficient. Phils 20:07, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. the first line isn't even a complete sentence, and the discussion of his death in the introduction is much too speculative. RickK 06:17, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)

Éamon de Valera edit

One of the most important Irish politicians of all time, critical in the foundation of the Republic of Ireland. Talrias (t | e | c) 16:49, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • Refer to peer review. Structural problems, and lacks references. Phils 20:24, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Refer to peer review. Overwhelming TOC, bad section organization (find better ==Level 2== themes and organize the current sections under those), no references, lack of inline cites, and goes into more detail than needed (the more detailed text could be in daughter articles). --mav 17:15, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Refer to peer review. Gigantic structural problems. Move cabinets to sub-article. Neutralitytalk 19:56, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)
    It's actually been peer reviewed. Circeus 19:47, July 27, 2005 (UTC)
    It was peer reviewed after this FAC request - check the dates. Talrias (t | e | c) 20:38, 27 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]
      • My very bad, THe fact remains that the peer review has been archived in the meantime without providing much actual help, apparently. Circeus 22:29, July 29, 2005 (UTC)

But 'dev' was American and he was not in power when the Republic of Ireland was set-up.Fine Gael were.He also opposed the treaty see he wasnt critical in setting up the Irish Free State either,if that is what you meant.--Muc Fíníneach 15:49, 24 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Xanadu House edit

Self Re-Nomination for the Xanadu House article I have been writing and revising for the past few months. The article, since last time nominated now meets the criteria for nomination articles, and now includes several references, more pictures and a better quality of writing as well as many correct spelling and grammar mistakes. The article is neutral throughout, and gives consistent reading pleasure with lots of detailed information and links to external sources for even more information. I hope that this time the article will be accepted, however if there are any objecting comments and opinions I will continue to improve the article. Wackymacs 18:38, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object. Inappropriate structure and lead section. The lead section doesn't really summarize the article or even explain what the subject will be. The article is titled "Xanadu House", but the lead section doesn't say if it covers the last "House" still standing or the entire project. Also, the lead should mention the nature of the foam (insulation, "plastic foam", and finally polyurethane foam are mentionned later, why not be precise right at the beginning?). The Pre-History section, apart from being somewhat strangely named (shouldn't it be just a "Concept" subheading under the "History" section). The first sentence is already obscure: why is Rob Masters referred to as "Creator of Xanadu", in quotes. Is he the creator or not? Does someone dispute the creation? Moreover, the entire section does not flow logically; for example, the sentence he decided to take a slightly different approach by creating a series of show homes around the country, seems to imply that he was trying to promote his constructions before, but this is not made clear; it is only said that he was a pioneer "in building and living in them". There are countless such imprecisions ("Bob Master's partner Tom Gussel"). The origin of the name is further obscure, did Gussel choose it, or was it derived from Samuel Coleridge's poem "Xanadu"? Many people are introduced with very little context if any at all; who is Kubla Khan? Roy Mason? Jacques Beufs? Jacques Rougerie? If there are no Wikipedia articles on them, at the very least mention their professions and nationality, and perhaps when they lived. The next section, "History", seems to begin as if the rest of the article did not exist. The "Construction" subheading answers many of the question readers might have had while reading the previous sections (nature of the foam, etc) giving a strong that the article was written by different people who did not review each other's work. The following sections only strengthen the feeling that the article is disjointed: there is no longer any structure or logical order in the sequence of (relatively small) sections. The form of the "using computers in the house" (which is more of a description of the House's interior) is rather bad: the list summarizing the features of the House feels like it was taken straight from a promotional leaflet. It should be turned to prose, and the authors should focus on electronics related features, if the section is to keep the name it has now. (Outside pool and garden has nothing to do with using computers inside a house). The subheadings in that section contain more questionable prose. The "Kitchen" subheading for example, begins with The house itself grew some of that food. Xanadu had a built-in greenhouse. The first sentence of the Work at Home section exemplifies ambiguous and inconsistent use of the word Xanadu throughout the article. When the authors write Xanadu suggested a way to do business at home..., do they mean the creators of Xanadu, the Xanadu project, or should it be taken to mean The Xanadu House's design...? The last few sections should be merged with the History section, and de-POVed (The "Future" section contains wild speculation, and might be get rid of entirely). I am unsure what to do about the Xanadu Book section, perhaps move it to the end.
I hope I wasn't too harsh. In any case I invite the author to take this to Wikipedia:Peer Review. I might lend a hand in improving the article, too.Phils 21:01, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Wow thanks for the great feedback and constructive criticism.I took into account some of the issues you mentioned and have already addressed them (see updated article). Though the leading paragraph still needs work, and maybe the sections should be reorganized (mainly the "using computers in the home"). I've merged the other sections into the History section. I've removed the "Future" section, I agree that it wasn't very relevant to the subject that much and was pure speculation. If you want to make any changes feel free, because this article still needs a lot of work doing on it. Wackymacs 21:36, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
It's already somewhat better now; thank you for addressing my concerns. I'll see if can make some research so I can help improve the article. Phils 09:47, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks I like the improvements so far, the best source of research is in-fact the Xanadu book itself because the book includes pretty much everything about Xanadu - but sadly the book is limited in its explanatory of detail about the homes which is why the sections of the article about each room are quite short. I couldn't find much about the architects themselves, and what they went on to do after Xanadu which I'd like to find out.Wackymacs 10:42, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. Too informal. To choppy. Some images not captioned. Exploding Boy 18:38, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to Peer Review. There are problems here with style, sources and comprehensiveness. --Theo (Talk) 22:37, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Needs a thorough copyedit. Many examples of poor grammar, enough I'm not sure they could be quickly fixed. Needs more sources, and inline citations for important/contentious facts. - Taxman Talk 21:11, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)

Elasticsoul 21:38, 27 October 2005 (UTC) Made extensive edits to improve grammar, logical flow, and remove redundant information or information not directly related to Xanadu House. [Interesting article, btw!] The parts I cut out are mostly below, some with my comments:[reply]

History - Redundant; mentioned previously in the article Xanadu House was an architectural house project originating from the 1970s. Roy Mason, an architect, planned the Xanadu home by creating a clay concept. His vision of the future home of the 1990s was to use plastic foam for the building's main structure.

There were originally three Xanadu homes built, one in Kissimmee, Florida, one in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin, and the third in Gatlinburg, Tennessee.

Xanadu is owned by a vacation ownership property, Star Island Development Corporation, 5000 Avenue of the Stars, Kissimmee, FL 34746. It was purchased to be the sales office for this timeshare resort.

The polyurethane hardens in a couple of days, then paint can be applied and space cut out of the foam for windows and doors to be mounted in.

It was put on sale in 1997 and was re-sold in 2001.

The computers had a number of advantages and disadvantages;

Both ordering food from home and maintaining household calendars, records and home bookkeeping can today be done because of the Internet and Secure Online Credit Card Payments.

do a certain action when the computer can do it for you, while you're not even there. Shown in the picture to the right are two girls in the bedroom typing on a computer.

"In the home of the future, people may be able to control coffeepots and front door locks from their bedrooms."

Great Room: The form of entertainment where family members sit around a television set is passive with little or no interaction between the family members and the Television or with each other. A home computer, on the other hand, allows interactive entertainment.

Work at home: This concept has been adapted to today's homes because of the Internet, and Personal Computers, the majority of people working will work from home running a home business or either working for a company through email and websites. Having access to news services from home has become even easier with RSS newsfeeds. In the recent years, working at home has advanced to a new level that the creators of Xanadu did not even dream of having: Video & Audio conferencing over the Internet.

Spa: Sauna temperatures were controlled by computer, pre-set temperatures could also be used.

Security: - doesn't refer to Xanadu House (AKAIK) A computer can control the locking system of doors and windows in the home require a user to enter a password to enter their home, or either uses their thumbnail print as a key of identification that you own the home and has the privilege to enter. Today, this idea is seen as rather silly because computers can be used to do much more than speak to increase security levels in the home.

Disadvantages preventing picture hanging , or would take automated tasks for granted, resulting in you thinking you never have to do housework again.

Reaction unlike a good piece of architecture which would last a long time, Xanadu a bad piece of architecture After Xanadu House was built, there was not a sudden shock and crave from other designs which caused an outburst of futuristic looking homes,

Book was a hardcover, with contained 260 pages of material 

- and some too outdated to be considered any longer

Elasticsoul 21:38, 27 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Convention on Psychotropic Substances edit

Self-nom. Gives a detailed history of the Convention, explains its role in the global drug control regime, and even includes a few cases describing how Scheduling decisions were made. Lots of references, too. Pravoka 05:59, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. Looks good (only cursory read... sorry), can't support until I read more. However, could we convert those internal links to a form suggested in Wikipedia:Footnotes? - Ta bu shi da yu 08:07, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Minor Object. Stimulants such as Crystal Meth and the like seem to have received only brief coverage in this. There is also no illustration for a stimulant in the article. Yes its primarily centered on hallucinogens such as LSD/Peyote but the stimulants are still covered under this convention and deserve equal pictorial coverage. Mostly minor stuff... rework this a bit and i'll support.  ALKIVAR™  18:37, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. subject matter worthy of a place on the featured page. Tparker393 20:41, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • object there are many external links, however there is no meta information stored about them, so if one of the sources gets moved or changed it will be impossible to tell. Using footnotes for the links, as is done in many current featured articles, would enable storage of Author/title/date/summary information which would make this much easier in future. Mozzerati 20:01, 2005 Jun 2 (UTC)
  • Object. The link to the list of schedules (http://www.incb.org/e/conv/1971/cover.htm) referenced at the ==Schedules of Controlled Substances== section is broken. This shows the vulnerability of linking to essential information as an external link. Can a copy be posted to Wikisource so that a stable baseline exists for reference when the dynamic list is unavailable? --Theo (Talk) 13:28, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • Yeah, they moved the treaty text, which broke many links. I concur with the idea of posting it to wikisource. The treaty has never been amended, to my knowledge, and should be fairly stable. Remember me 13:58, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Kerney Thomas edit

great article...spent a lot of time on it...self-nomination...good info and tells as much as possible about his ministry.

  • Refer to peer review. 1) cite your sources 2) There is almost nothing about the man outside of his ministry work; tell us about his youth and family 3) It's bad form to show a screen shot without pixelizing out the phone number; it looks more like an advertisement than a featured article. slambo 01:13, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)
"He has been married to Debra L. Thomas for 27 years and has two children, Kerney Thomas III and Krystle." uh...thats family info right there...geez this guy is a 3:00 am tv preacher...not exactly a wealth of pics of info out there...
Exactly, only one sentence. It isn't nothing, it's almost nothing. A bit of judicious digging around should be able to find some more information. Who were his parents? Where was he born? Where (in what cities) has he lived? Where did he go to school? Does he hold any advanced degrees? Has he been honored by any notable groups? I can appreciate that the information may not be easy to find, but with it missing here, the article is not, IMHO, FA quality yet. slambo 20:31, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
I've pixellized the phone and url on the screenshot and uplaoded the image to a different filename, and formatted the image in a manner more consistent with other biography articles. The original image didn't have any copyright or fair use tag on it, so it may get deleted by one of the automatic image deletion processes (see Wikipedia:Untagged images). Since I'm guessing that the image was a screenshot of a TV broadcast, I've tagged the updated image with {{screenshot}}. So, there's one objection down, how about those references? slambo 20:44, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review. No references, details are quite sparse, odd unsubstantiated language ("humorously and incorrectly points out..."? What does that mean?), photograph's toll free number needs to be pixellated, blurred or cropped out, arguments ("appears to be unbiblical according to Scripture") skirting original research and or POV ("many find humourous" - how many? Is there a survey?). Needs a lot of cleaning up before it approaches consideration. No offense meant to the nominator, who has done substantial work on this, but more needs to be done. Nominating this for FA is very premature. --khaosworks 02:28, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. I'd like to encourage the submitter to flesh out this article, because it is interesting, and the general topic of TV preachers, and late-night ones specifically, has a certain fascination. But the article just isn't anywhere near as complete as, say, Eugene Scott or Tammy Faye. There are no references at all, except to Thomas's own web site, and that makes the whole article come off as something subjective, written by one person who thinks Thomas is amusing. For instance, there is no reference to back up the statement that "He leads a very controversial broadcast in Christian circles, as most of his teachings are considered false." There is an external link to a third-party web site about him, but all that site really does is list a bunch of his quotes. --Bcrowell 14:02, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, not comprehensive. Neutralitytalk 19:55, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)

Karla Homolka edit

Read the CNN.com article about this lady today, and thought it was interesting. Came to el pedia, expecting to find a couple of paragraphs; imagine my surprise when I found this massive treatment of the person, case, and common myths. --Golbez 00:27, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)

  • 'Object. Lead's too short. Dralwik 02:21, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object the misconceptions section in not really in an appropriate format and all those facts should be refferenced.--nixie 02:23, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Not sure this is comprehensive? Also, she's about to be released, so this may be a bad time to make this a FA (generally right in the midst of a current event is a bad time because we want the article to be relatively stable). Also the "misconception" section gives me a slight impression of a pro-Karla POV...those are just some thoughts, I'm not voting on it. Everyking 05:11, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object!. Incredibly POV and wishy washy. Consider sentences like: This was an utter failure if it is to be believed. Many of the myths floating about the internet were far more sickening than the actual details of the case (which were, indeed, very upsetting in their own right). Unfortunately, due to the very nature of the internet, many of these tall tales are still to be found, while the factual details -- protected by the publication ban -- are much more difficult to find.; Most of the ban breaking was done on the unfortunately named alt.fan.karla-homolka Usenet newsgroup.; The whole article is also written in a rather informal style, and the single reference (without any footnotes to acompany the external links are insufficient to make this article credible. The "Common misconceptions" section will also have to go (or be completely rewritten in another form) for me to support this FAC; right now, it feels like a sensational tabloid infobox. Phils 22:00, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, highly POV. Neutralitytalk 19:52, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to Peer Review. Even having just copy edited the article, I still feel that it is POV, light on sourcing and needs to have the sensational "misconceptions" section rewritten. This is too much to address here. --Theo (Talk) 21:58, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • object - seems like there is only one reference for quite a lot of material! - Ta bu shi da yu 03:24, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)


Let's start again I have taken on the reorganization, reediting and rewriting of the articles on both of these adorable killers. It is important that all relevant facts are put on the table so that people can understand what went on and make up their own minds. Because of certain obstacles I have to do this in sections. ALL references will be added after the articles are complete. IF the bot once more deletes my changes and accuses me of being an unidentified vandal, while I am signed in, I will leave if for someone else to pick up. Freiherrin (talk) 23:11, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

PS AGAIN - I am logged in yet am told "You are not currently logged in." Am sick of this. Any suggestions?Freiherrin (talk) 23:11, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Deaths in Ciudad Juárez edit

Very informative, well developed, with lots of photos, a list of the body findings and of the names of those women identified, well illustrated, neutral and it covers the subject in depth. Antonio Peace for Juarez Martin 05:55, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)

  • Needs formatting work, especially the lists of women (should use # lists) and the list of references. Morwen - Talk 11:15, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object for now. Needs a toc, the lists are confusing in that there is too little visual distinction to mark the top of each new one, the rest of the refs need bullet points. Filiocht | Blarneyman 11:23, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review 1) There is no lead section or any section headers until you get to the footnotes. 2) Image placement isn't as good as it can be; with three large pictures in one spot, the text is a little hard to follow. slambo 11:25, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object--needs a new title. These are obviously not the only deaths in Ciudad Juarez, and this title doesn't tell the reader what the article is about. Meelar (talk) 13:45, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
    • Actually, it does. That's the only way that the Spanish media has dubbed the cases, anyways. Antonio Juarez Angels Martin
      • I'm not sure – there's alot of gang/drug violence in Cd. Juárez, some of which might be related to the deaths of the women, but much of which involves men. The title as it stands now I think would work if all of that were included, though perhaps "Violence in Cd. Juárez" would be better. If it's going remain an article exclusively about the mysterious deaths of women, maybe "Deaths of Women in Cd. Juárez" would be better. But on the other hand, I (as someone fairly familiar with what's been going in the city) immediately knew what this article was about when I read the title. Regarding the article itself, it looks like there are some good resources out there that allow this article to get more detailed. Since it's in the news right now, it's especially difficult, but I'll object until this article is more in-depth. --Spangineer (háblame) 13:21, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)
        • I'll defer to your judgement on the title, then, but I wish there was somewhere more specific we could put this. Ah well. Meelar (talk) 19:12, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object: Quite interesting but too short and superficial to be a featured article. this reads more like a page filler in a Sunday newspaper. The links in the article need to be footnoted and annotated, then considerably expanded. Giano | talk 12:49, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. I would like to see sources cited for the many assertions within this. I also seek more depth. How do the victims break down by age? Are there statistics about their birthplaces? And so on. --Theo (Talk) 15:39, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Slasher film edit

The article is informative, covers all the major milestones of the genre, with dates, names, has a neutral stance on the subject, references serious academic discussion on the topic and popular criticism. It has working links and does not cover the same ground as other articles.

  • Object. No where near comprehensive enough. Evil Monkey∴Hello 00:20, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object As Evil Monkey says, this is barely an outline. Although it mentions academic works it has no references. It also screams for an image or two. Dsmdgold 02:43, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object Virtually none of the basic requirements are met; please read the requirements before nominating articles to FAC. Phils 06:22, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. This meets none of the FA criteria. On a side note to this article, we really need to rethink letting anons nominate articles for featured status - they end up adding poor candidates like this which doesn't help the process. Harro5 06:56, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object This should not be here! Giano | talk 12:51, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, not comprehensive. Neutralitytalk 19:49, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)

Leonid Brezhnev edit

I personally found this article a most helpful reference. JBurnham 14:41, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object I haven't read the entire article yet, but I must object on the lack of References. slambo 15:39, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)
    • I can add one (all of the content here is easily verifiable, bordering on general knowledge). In the meantime, are you having a tough time with any specific claims, which I can try to verify for you? JBurnham 16:50, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object for now. This statement suggests a need for references:
    • Brezhnev ruled the Soviet Union longer than any man except Stalin, but his posthumous reputation is very low, both in Russia and among historians.

It isn't so much that I doubt the claim as I think the article would stand a better chance as exemplifying the best of wikipedia with a reference section. --Scimitar 17:36, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. References are an absolute requirement for a FA. Claims like "his orders are dated June 22nd" (relating to his being drafted during WWII) must have precise source information, regardless of how well-known the facts are. Phils 18:26, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
It also occurs to me now that the three first paragraphs or "Crisis of the regime" are largely irrelevant to Brezhnev's biography and redundant with respect to other Soviet Union articles; the two first paragraphs basically detail generalities about the Stalin era and its economic consequences, and the third paragraph is a rather vague description of sociopolitical problems in the 1970s Soviet Union—Brezhnev is never mentionned, nor are any of his specific measures or policies that could have contributed to the situation; while it's good too provide some context, I feel three paragraphs is too much of a digression, and could be condensed. Phils 19:42, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • It could definitely use a mention of his (bumbling) role in the Yom Kippur War →Raul654 19:05, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)
    • Follow up - when I made that comment, since I made that comment, I have expanded the Yom Kippur War article considerably, so that now you can just merely copy/summarize what is written there. →Raul654 08:29, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object: Very informative. No doubt written by someone very knowledgable on the subject. I can see no gaping errors but without references it might as well be fiction. Cannot these frequent non referenced articles be sifted out and legitimately failed before time is wasted looking at them. Giano | talk 12:58, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, not comprehensive. Neutralitytalk 19:52, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. Lead is too short, no references. Comment: it looks like just a bio. Our standard is to have a discussion of influences, policies, and such, and I see few of that in the article as well, leading me to say it may not be comprehensive. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:36, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Starfleet ranks and insignia edit

THIS NOMINATION HAS BEEN CLOSED. For a debate on the validity of this article as a Featured Article Candidate, please see the FAC's talk page

This is a renomination of the article formerly named "Ranks and insignia of the Starfleet". Original nomination page was closed 20 May 05. The resubmission has been after addressing the following concers:

  1. Table of contents was considerably shortened
  2. References were updated and put ito proper Wikipedia format
  3. Conjectural rank information was purged leaving only ranks which have been mentioned in a live action or literature source
  4. Photos added extensively thoughout the article
  • Support: The nominator of this article gives full support as a featured article due to the extensive research and time that has gone into writing the material. -Husnock 05:00, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongest ever support --Cool Cat My Talk 23:11, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Is this article based on fictional material? Yes. --Cool Cat My Talk 23:32, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Is that against a "Featured article" requirements? No. --Cool Cat My Talk 23:32, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
If you are objecting this on the basis of it being "fictional" I personaly don't want to hear about it. --Cool Cat My Talk 23:32, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Too bad. Suggest if you don't want to hear objections, don't read fancruft FAC nominations. — Xiong熊talk* 17:15, 2005 May 30 (UTC)
Valid objections are one things. Calling an article names becuase you don't like is something completly different. I believe you also referred to this as a "petty collection of images" last time. Now its "dribbling bits of fanwisdom". Your comments are very clearly inactionable. -Husnock 19:57, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Image quality of rank insignias can be better but that would be pointless as we have to use small images so that people with slow connections can see the page without waiting a decade. Also insignia is notvisible on screen remotely close to current size unless you zoom on dvd, etc. --Cool Cat My Talk 23:32, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Star trek isn't a random tv show. It inspires us engineers to develop the technology. This show is one of the most known thing on planet earth. Every one knows "photon torpedo" "Mr. Spock", "beam me up scotty" even if they dont regularly watch the show. --Cool Cat My Talk 23:32, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, as before, excellent Everyking 05:24, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Very strong object ; my major previous objection, the lack of inline citied sources, is still valid. Things like " some publications " absolutely need an inline cite. With all the changes the TOC is again overwhelming, the lead section too long (3 paras max) and the article is now bloated with more detail than necessary (that is what daughter articles are for; see Wikipedia:Summary style), making the article a longer read than necessary (the 10KB lighter version I first read was much better). This nom is also very close to the previous failed nomination. --mav 11:48, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I will make the corrections you mention, but really don't know what to say to the statement that the article is now "bloated". Brekaing the article up would lose the very inforamtion that makes it worthy of being a featured article. In addition, there has been almost no change to the text since the last nomination. All was done was adding several pictures which is what featured articles should have. So, I see the "bloated article" objection as inactionable unless you can expand upon it. As of now, the following corrections have been made:
  1. Shortened opening paragraph
  2. Shortened table of contents
I will be adding the citations you ask for this weekend. Will this at last be acceptable? I hope so. -Husnock 14:50, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
TOC has now been reduced too much. Some subsectioning is needed. That is the trouble with longer than necessary articles; it is becomes increasingly difficult to have properly subsectioned sections without also having an overwhelming TOC. Oh and this version was much more tightly on topic and is the version that I gave high praise to in the previous nom. See your talk page for more. --mav 15:11, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The version you mention is nearly identical to the version we hav enow except that we added pictures. The pictures are important for an FAC. I feel it would only draw objects and complaints if we removed all of them. I feel they should stay. -Husnock 16:04, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I have "re-expanded" the Table of Contents. It is now halfway between what it was before the first edit and what it was after the major shortening. It is now only has two levels with no more than 3 sublevels for some portions. I feel this should be good enough. Inline citations will come this weekend. -Husnock 16:02, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Looks good. Thanks. :) --mav 16:56, 27 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I am also pleased to announce that in-line citations have now been added throughout the entire article. I hope this will change your objection to a support. -Husnock 05:10, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I believe this objection has been handled in that the table of contents has been shortened and inline citations have been added. The other point you made, about the article containing too much information, I do not know how to change that. if the last part is inactionable, can we assume your vote to object has been handled? -Husnock 08:09, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You can change that by summarizing the larger sections and moving the detail to daughter articles. Thus it is an actionable objection. Making sure articles do not go into unnecessary detail and that they cover subtopics in other articles is a specific FAC criteria (see #6 at Wikipedia:What is a featured article). You may have noticed a page size warning when viewing the edit page of the article. Our guideline on page size is linked from there. You should read it. I also noticed that a significant amount of prose was hidden in templates. This is non-standard. Also non-standard is the use of templates to hide tables, but I can let that slide. Search for 'some publications' - it still needs a cite. --mav 16:09, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Please look again and give a specific for any mateiral that is not cited. I went through the article line by line and added footnates everytime a publiction was mentioned. The rest of what you say...well, I'll see what I can do about breaking up the article without losing the content.-Husnock 19:57, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Third paragraph under the Lieutenant Junior Grade discussion. Taxman mentions that other parts need cites as well. --mav 21:43, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
All conjectural info has been removed and the term "some publications" has been purged from the article. even gave you the "daughter article" you were asking for! -Husnock 00:06, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Support: Looks good. Has a better title now, as several people had requested. CDThieme
  • Support: A great article, and a good example of what can be found here. The change since the prior FAC have really improved the article, and some sections have been vastly improved. --Wingsandsword 07:44, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. With the various changes I have contributed to the article, I have realized that an article of this caliaber can easily be used to show what Wikipedians can do with just a little tweeking and conversing. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:10, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - very informative, and I don't believe it to be fan-cruft. - Ta bu shi da yu 08:15, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose in every way possible -- and the repeated nomination is simply invalid. I'm sure I could nominate any page here a few dozen times, and eventually it would pass when nobody was looking, or after I'd rounded up a few of my buddies to plump for it. No intrinsic change has been made to this page, nor can it ever be improved to FA status without becoming something altogether different from what it is: fancruft, an elaboration of details from a fantasy universe. Every time I see this come up on FAC, I like it less. The addition of character headshots makes it much worse; they are irrelevant to the topic of the page, which is ranks and insignia. They tell you in the Army, You don't salute the man; you salute the rank. Dribbling little bits of fanwisdom in among the images does not an article make. Nothing about this page is notable. Nobody outside Trek fandom could care less about anything here; so far as I know, nothing about it has ever had any effect even on other fancruft, such as Empire ranks and insignia, let alone on anything in the Real World. There is not even a description of the Vietnamese sweatshop where they sew the things up. Everything about this page is hermetically sealed, contained within a fantasy universe. Move to Wikifan or, failing that, Delete. — Xiong熊talk* 17:15, 2005 May 30 (UTC)
  • I submit this entire vote is inactionable as it simply expresses a strong distaste for the article based on personal feeligs, offers no points to improve upon and it makes statements like "nothing about this page is notable", "dribbling little bits of fanwisdom", "everytime I see this page I like it less", "nor can it ever be improved to FA status". I have also just noted the racial comment that this article was put together in a "Vietnamese sweat shop". Clearly inappropriate thing to say, not valid reasons at all for oppoing an article. -Husnock 19:43, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Actually, there are a few actionable elements in there. 1) Not renominating without fixing issues brought up only a week ago has been mentioned by others including me, 2) He believes there is excessive minutae and the article cannot be featured without reducing that, 3) believes the character headshots make the article worse, 4) the real world aspects of the topic have been ignored. All of those save the first are currently actionable, because changes can be made to fix them. - Taxman Talk 14:16, May 31, 2005 (UTC)
  • I feel that any objection to an FAC which bashes the article and calls it nasty names should by its very nature be inactionable in accordence with Wikipedia:Civility. Xiong has atatcked this article both here, on the previous nomination, and on his user page. The most recent addition was a statement that "this article stinks" (see talk on his UP). But, this is a horse beat to death and sent to the glue factory. I reported this to admins, was (rightfully so) advised to calm down so I did. Xiong's opinion's, however, mean very little to me. He made up his mind about this article a long time ago and at the level of name calling and bashing there is nothing I could ever do that would put this article past him as a successful FA. I have actually withdrawn the nomination, but am leaving the page active to get constructive feedback upon the request of others. -Husnock 15:51, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. Much work still needed. The rank pip graphics (especially in the "Officer insignia" page) still wrap around for me (using the "Classic" Wikipedia skin); for example, the "Captain" pips appear as three dots over one dot. The images don't line up properly, especially under the "Captain" section, where the text and pictures are forced into one very narrow column with way too much whitespace at the left. I don't like that the insignia for the ranks are given all together in a table before they're discussed; I feel that the insignia for a rank should be immediately above the discussion of the rank. I don't understand why "conjectural and alternate insignia versions" are given from dubious sources ("Hollywood Pins"?), or a Mirror Universe episode (the "Lieutenant Commander" conjectured pips), or when they conflict with known canon (like the five-pips "Fleet Captain"). Some headings are pushed aside by pictures (Wesley forces the "Provisional Ranks" heading rightwards, and Tucker pushes "Lieutenant Commander" over) when a "br clear=all" should be used. It's not clear from the tables which insignia are badges and which are sleeve stripes. However, on the plus side, I do like the use of all the pictures; it helps convey the long and rich tradition of Star Trek by showing a sample of the sheer number of characters in it. - Brian Kendig 18:02, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Most of those issues have been handled, most important of which is the removal of conjectural and alterate ranks. Also, getting rid of the tables would be a very big deal and conflict with other opinions about the article. Are you still having format problems with the browser. -Husnock 22:41, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Sorry your browser is being such a bad boy! You make a valid point if there are such problems with the pictures. I'll see what I can do. as for as the conjectural sources, define "dubious sources"? I felt I cited where all those pictures came from. Hoolywood Pins, BTW, was a big company in the 1990s that supplied rank and insignia Star trek patches to major convetions and they were connected to the costume department of PAramount. Maybe a link to what they are on a separate article? Anyway, Ill work with your objections. -Husnock 19:55, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Husnock - change your screen resolution to 800x600 for a while. This is the resolution that most people on the Internet surf under. Then you will see that the insignia in the Officer insignia table are scrunched together and the screen shots in much of the article, especially in the Captain' part of the ==Officer rank information== section, squeeze the text in between them. The width of the Flag Officer insignia table also caused horizontal scroll. --mav 22:10, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
My browser is Safari on Mac OS X 10.4.1. It's not being a "bad boy", it's rendering the page as it is presented; nothing's telling it not to wrap the pips. I believe the solution is not to turn the "four pip graphics in a row" into "one single four-pip graphic" (this would mean that every insignia would require its own graphic, greatly increasing the image count on the page), but instead to force the table to a specific width, or else make the tables less wide. As for "dubious sources", I had no idea what "Hollywood Pins" is (it's not described in the article) and I don't feel that selling an insignia pin at a convention makes the insignia canon. Overall, between the layout problems (images making text and headings flow incorrectly) and the organizational problems (listing a bunch of ranks in a table apart from their descriptions, then listing a bunch more ranks in another table apart from their descriptions, etc.), this article does not yet represent Wikipedia's finest work. - Brian Kendig 22:39, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The Browser issues are, without a doubt, one of the most valid objections I have seen and that has pretty much convinced me to abandon this as an FAC. Others have asked to keep the nomination open, so I will. As far as Hollywood Pins goes, they were one of the primary costume providers for Star Trek VI. I actually knew a women who worked for them. It was a huge company in 1991 but went out of business (rather quickly) in 1995. I will link Hollywood Pins to its own article and describe this. Someone also questioned the validity of Star TRek Encyclopedia as a source. That books was published by Mike Okuda, who works directly for the Star Trek show, and his publications I would consider one of the most offical sources available. -Husnock 15:44, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. First and foremost, conjecural ranks (and massive, unsourced conjecture in general) do not have their place in the article, at least not in the form seen in the article; a short and concise mention of such ranks is enough. Presenting them as virtually equal with canon ranks is not acceptable in my eyes. My second concern is about images (I know I have on occasion said I don't normally consider images when voting on an FAC, but I feel the (over)use of (bad) images in this article inappropriate): The sheer amount of extremely low quality live action picture adds nothing and breaks formatting in all my browsers (Camino, Firefox, Safari), the most popular Mac browsers. This article's merit rests almost solely on the images of the insignia; just as we have objected articles in the past for their high list-to-prose ratio, I object this article in part because anyone who reads this without seeing the pictures for whatwill lose about 50% of the information provided by the article. Trust me, there is an increasing number of Internet users who don't have access to pictures, for whatever reasons. Anyone who's worked in the accessibility "business" will know what I'm talking about. Finally, I might be an idiot, but I still do not understand how images such as this are in the public domain? Do the Star Trek producers hold no rights whatsoever on all these designs? (Various sources) is also not a valid source information. At least provide the address of the mirror you found the image on, and show you have done a minimum of research to find the original source of the artwork. Phils 20:16, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You're not an idiot! The copyright status of the movie pins, as far as I know, is as follows. Thye have been recreated and recopied in dozens, if not hundreds, of books and manuals and, in the modern age, on the internet. Paramount does not, as far as I know, get a royalty on the use of rank pin images when theya re used. Also, in the copmputer age, some of them are pretty easy to create on a computer. A good example would be that the U.S. Army does not get a royalty for the use of Army Colonel insignia in films and TVs since the insignia itself, is immensly common. Also, movie pins were created in 1982, almost 25 years ago. I think the original copywrights dont apply anymore. This was actaully beat to death quite heavily in the nomination page|last nomination. I suggest you go there for more coverage on the topic. -Husnock 22:41, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Copyright doesn't work that way. Ease of reproduction does not invalidate copyright; neither does a lack of copyright prosecutions (although you might be able to claim doctrine of latches if they do come after you). Copyright on corporate works lasts (IIRC) 135 years these days, so the copyrights won't expire for quite some time -- and even under the original copyright law, they'd be protected for another five years. And the point about the US Army is a straw man argument: the Army (and the US government in general) is unable to create copyrighted works. --Carnildo 00:29, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I didn't call you names! -Husnock 00:35, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I see no name-calling there. I was characterizing your reference to US Army ranks as a "straw man argument", because US Army rank insignia are not copyrighted, and therefore referring to them in a copyright discussion is misleading. --Carnildo 01:46, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
To quote from the article you so thoughtfully linked: "the creator of a "straw man" argument does not accurately reflect the best arguments of his or her opponents, but instead sidesteps or mischaracterizes them so as to make the opposing view appear weak or ridiculous". Sidesteps? Misleads? Mischaracterizes? Sounds pretty insulting to me. I was answering your question to the best of my knowledge. I also dispute that Army insignia is not copyrighted. The copyright law is actually quite complex especially for unit patches, badges, and medals. The Medal of Honor is absolutely copyrighted. Rank insignia probably isnt copyrighted but I have read some documents through my work at the National Personnel Records Center which states before World War II they might have been. -Husnock 01:53, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
In your case, it probably wasn't intentional, but it's still sidestepping and misleading. And the Medal of Honor isn't covered by copyright. As the article indicates, it was originally covered by a design patent, and after that patent expired, it, and other military medals, are covered by a special non-copyright law: 18 USC 704, part of the criminal code. --Carnildo 02:11, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • I kinda like the screenshots. Would it be OK if just one example per rank were kept? Once this article is redone in summary style, that will probably be needed anyway. The images in the wider tables are also too wide. This results in the page looking nasty at anything below 1024x768 screen res. --mav 21:49, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. Resubmitting this 7 days after removing it from the FAC page is inconsiderate to the editors who have spent their time reviewing the article, especially when the past objections were not fixed. Specifically I commented the conjectured ranks are "original research and are given way too prominent of placement in the article." And you say you've fixed that, but the reality is far from it. There is still an entire section on conjectured admiral ranks with only two different fan websites of unkown quality supporting it. As I said before the sources used "would have to have some reasonable level of quality, such as a published fan magazine. A geocities (for ex) homepage listing a made up rank certainly doesn't qualify as something that Wikipedia should be covering, unless that website is demonstrably popular and widely recognized." Good job going through and providing citations, but there are still many comments that appear as author opinion, not collation of sources. I'd list them out, but I think there are enough other problems to work on first. After sifting through a lot of this I presume "conjectured" in the other tables means that rank never appears in official Star Trek sources. That is really unclear though. Much better would be to state or make clear somehow that it never appears in official sources. And is the Star Trek Encyclopedia an official source? If not, that should be made clear. The article still needs a much clearer separation of what are official ranks seen in official sources and what is not. That would help cut down on the bloating of the article, which is clearly too long, with too much minutae. The criteria do call for using summary style, and moving excessive detail off to daughter articles. As a side note, which has nothing to do with this article meeting the criteria, and would not lead me to continue to object to the article it if did meet them, it does sadden me some that so much effort is put into Wikipedia articles on pure fancruft with no redeeming social value. - Taxman Talk 20:20, May 30, 2005 (UTC)
Social value is entirely subjective. There are probably more people who care about Star Trek than category theory, a topic I am sure no one here would dare describe as "mathcruft" or "minutiae" (although only a fraction of the world's population knows about it). Phils 10:49, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely, which is why I separated my opinion on the topic from my take on whether this article is of featured quality or not. - Taxman Talk 14:09, May 31, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. This is an extremly thorough and interesting article complete with appropriate citation. It has my full support. I am, however, concerned about its quick renominiation, but that does not diminish my support. -SocratesJedi | Talk 21:17, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. I'm a lifelong Star Trek fan, and I've written my share of what people consider fancruft, but here's what I think needs to be looked at:
  • The headshots - way too many of them, and why are they there, exactly? Are they actually necessary?
  • Conjectural ranks - takes up much too much space for what is basically non-canon information. If they are adopted in a widespread manner by fandom and thus fanon, that needs to be mentioned.
  • Real world info - What impact has this topic had on Trek fandom or the real world in general? Are these ranks iconic? Have they passed into popular culture? Notability is a problem here, but I'm not sure what could be done to redress this.
  • The O'Brien mess - this is probably the most significant thing, in my view, about the ranks in Starfleet, since for years and years there was so much fan debate on O'Brien's rank pins and their implications before they settled it in Deep Space Nine. Basically, the production team were inconsistent and making it up as they went along, but right now the information is buried in a couple of paragraphs in the Enlisted Ranks section. It should be teased out and given a bit more prominence, perhaps.
The "O'Brien Mess" is actually pretty well explained in the "Enlisted rank Information" section and the aritcle links to the main article on Miles Edward O'Brien which is where the problem whould be brought out in more depth. Can I get you to pull back this objection? I see the intro as covered as to O'Brien with the article on the character covering this in detail. -Husnock 22:41, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Looking at Miles O'Brien, it actually covers the rank issue in less detail than this article. However, I will withdraw my objection on this point, although I still feel that the discussion could be organized better. --khaosworks 00:32, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)
The reason I'm registering this as an object and not a mild object is that I think that it needs reorganising and cleanup to make it read more coherently. Splitting it up into daughter articles, or splitting up the ranks themselves into smaller sets of images might be an idea, since at the moment there's a hell of a lot of images and adjoining text to plow through and refer to each other. The information is not cleanly presented, and thus it becomes a hard read, so in all good conscience I cannot support it as the "best" Wikipedia has to offer. --khaosworks 21:51, May 30, 2005 (UTC)
  • Object (withdrawn, see below). Where to start? Resubmitting this article doesn't change what it is and must always be. Some good work has gone into it, but it's still fancruft. I can tolerate it in the encyclopedia but I don't want it on the main page. — Trilobite (Talk) 23:24, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
"I don't want it on the main page" is purely inactionable. And thank you for "tolerating" it, but your personal views on articles are not a basis for denying one as a featured article. -Husnock 00:28, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Marking an FA so that it never is put on the Main Page is completely actionable. Wikipedia is thus marked and this article, if it passes, will almost certainly also be thus marked. --mav 14:44, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: But the fancruft objection is fundamental inactionable, no? Notwithstanding the issues involving resubmission, articles are supposed to be reviewed here for "style, prose, completeness, accuracy and neutrality." I think this article is outstanding in a large number of those categories, which is why I supported, even though it relates to a specific fictional universe. Will you reconsider your objection and present one that is more actionable? I would like to think that all articles in Wikipedia could be brought to FA status given enough investment in time and talent into them. Why exclude any given category of article if it is a well-done work? -SocratesJedi | Talk 23:31, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Probably it is inactionable, but what can I say? Those are the grounds on which I object. In the interests of civility and good relations, I could offer some more constructive criticism, but this would probably just be a rehash of what others have said: conjectural ranks, nothing much to connect the hermetically sealed fictional universe described with the real world, excessive distracting and irrelevant screenshots, etc. For the record, it doesn't seem to display properly in my browser either (Firefox, Windows XP, 1024x768). "Why exclude any given category of article if it is a well-done work?" Well, call me an elitist, but I don't subscribe to this view of the featured article system. For an article to "exemplify Wikipedia's very best work" I think it should be about a 'serious' topic. What constitutes a serious topic of course relies on subjective judgments, but in my opinion a collection of made-up details about what is already a fictional topic does not qualify. We have already had to endure Dawson's Creek on the main page today. I think we can tolerate the presence of fancruft (up to a point), but we shouldn't be showcasing it to the world as the best we have to offer. — Trilobite (Talk) 00:36, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
A direct quote for the criteria for Featured article candidates: "If nothing can be done in principle to "fix" the source of the objection, the objection may be ignored. This includes objections to an article's suitability for the Wikipedia Main Page". Why object when you know it is inactionable? -Husnock 01:08, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Calling an objection inactionable allows it to be thrown out on a technicality. You can go ahead and ignore my objection (although note that I did also make some actionable criticisms), but this just dodges the question of whether the article is really suitable for featured status. My objection stands, even if you choose to disregard it when tallying up the votes. — Trilobite (Talk) 01:20, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Zscout370 asked me on my talk page what I considered to be a serious topic. I think just about every article on Wikipedia:Today's featured article/May 2005 qualifies, with the possible exception of Dalek and Dawson's Creek, although both of those have a greater claim to eligibility than this one. If this article was about Star Trek as a whole I would probably consider it eligible, but it's actually about a minor aspect of Star Trek, padded out with fan conjecture. Which particular articles I consider featurable is my personal opinion and is not really relevant to the question of how Wikipedia should conduct its FAC process. I am more interested in establishing the convention that not every article is entitled to be featured, however well-written it might be. It seems a little odd to me that while we take into account an article's content and argue furiously over how best to format references etc., we're unable to question the subject matter because such complaints are not actionable. — Trilobite (Talk) 01:14, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Which particular articles I consider featurable is my personal opinion and is not really relevant to the question of how Wikipedia should conduct its FAC process. This makes no sense. It's akin to saying "Which particular people I consider eligible to vote is my personal opinion and is not really relevant to the laws applicable in my country". If you want to discuss fancruft on FAC in general, please join the discussion here, though. Phils 10:35, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. This article is thorough, well-researched, and extremely informative. In my opinion, it meets all the criteria at Wikipedia:What is a featured article. Featured article status should be based on the quality of the article, not one's opinion of the subject matter. I understand the concerns over triviality of this topic; however, I feel that a high-quality article merits feature status even if one does not find the topic interesting. There also seems to be some confusion between featured articles and those featured on the Main Page. While all articles featured on the Main Page must be featured articles, the converse is not true: not all featured articles will be featured on the Main Page. I agree that this article is probably not the best candidate for the Main Page, and I would support marking it not to appear on the Main Page, but dislike for the article's topic is clearly not an appropriate objection to featured status itself. — Knowledge Seeker দ 01:40, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object. I don't understand the relationship between the "conjectured" and "N/A" texts in the boxes. They both seem to go where insignia should, in which case I don't see what's being conjectured (or by whom). And Admiral Morrow is overlapping with text. Mark1 05:30, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • The first few tables show that the rank that was actually used or witnessed on various ST programs/movies. Conjectured ranks will be shown below, though I do wish if we provide a link to the bottom. The N/A shows that we do not have it, or it was not used. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 14:18, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • This has just been fixed. -Husnock 23:43, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. I believe this article to be in breach of criterion 6 on Wikipedia:What is a featured article; the headshots and lists of names of characters to hold certain ranks, as well of the inclusion of conjectural ranks that cannot be verified meet my definition of too much detail. Filiocht | Blarneyman 14:58, May 31, 2005 (UTC)
  • After discussion on Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates I withdraw my previous inactionable objection, offer my apologies if commenting on broader questions of the FAC process was inappropriate here, and object on the grounds that the article describes in more detail than is sensible the intricacies of a fantasy world constructed by some fans around a fairly two-dimensional work of fiction. It is not appropriate to go into vast amounts of detail on a topic like this, where fans have filled in the gaps, and the article spends its time talking about a conjectured system, much of which never existed in the original fictional work. Also, it doesn't render properly in my browser, and my set-up is in no way unsual. — Trilobite (Talk) 16:33, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Conditional object. Some of the headshots should not be included because they don't relate to the subject. For example, a picture of the first lieutenant commander to appear in Star Trek is appropriate, whereas a picture of an ordinary admiral is not. Other than that, while I personally find the topic dull and uninteresting, I think the article is written well enough to be included as an FA, and my personal tastes are irrelevant. --Scimitar 18:28, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. As it stands this article is too long and is over-illustrated (specifically, the number of headshots is too high). I have no problems with the topic, even though I do not find it particularly interesting. --Theo (Talk) 18:57, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose: Leaving aside the question of self-indulgence/hermetic isolation, and judging the article in its own terms (which is difficult) it appears to have areas for improvement, but no more than other featured article candidates, and these are being addressed by an activist editor. It is hard to avoid the impression that it is currently written under the assumption that the reader is already familiar with Startrek, and its terminology (compared with the British Army officer rank insignia article for example). A non-expert (like me) will probably be confused by the article because they lack the assumed knowledge; for instance, the "Officer rank information" section appears to be self-contradictory to the uninitiated: It says that "Other than Louvois... no other staff officers have ever appeared in Star Trek as Captains", but in the feature film section says: "Spock and Montgomery Scott who were both promoted from Commander to Captain" appeared (and functioned as staff officers). Does this mean that in Trek-lore "Star Trek" means only the TV-series? Or that Spock & Scott are only conjectured to be Captains? For this page to break out of its ghetto it must be written for non-experts (i.e. fans). I hope that if this is written for the general reader it will become a featured article, but presently it reads very much like an inter-fan discussion. One thing which isn't clear to the outsider is how the various types of source material stand in relation to each other: The page says that something is "pure theorizing", which presumably means it is unauthorized fan comment, but since the entire premise of Startrek is speculative, wouldn't this describe everything in the article? Wragge 19:19, 2005 Jun 1 (UTC)
  • Exactly. It is really hard for anyone with at least a passing familiarity with Star Trek to take a step back and judge this on its merits, but I bet if you showed it to someone who'd never seen or even heard of Star Trek before, they would be totally lost by it. — Trilobite (Talk) 19:23, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • I think this is my biggest problem with the article. Approaching it from the viewpoint of a fan, it is mildly interesting, but from the viewpoint of a non-fan, my eyes start to glaze over just from the introduction. There is just nothing here to clearly tell the reader why all this is significant. At least Dalek tried to relate to the real world - I would never nominate any of the companions-related articles for FAC, for example, precisely because while they provide information, they just aren't major enough (and probably will never be) to become an FA. --khaosworks 01:24, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support on the condition that it does not appear on the Main Page —thames 19:53, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Update: Major revisions to the article have included a massive cutback on pictures and the removal of all conjectural and alternate ranks to a separate article. Also, I have removed the phrase "some publications" from the entire article, replacing it with which specific book, mnual, or group of such manuals. I ask that objections based on these issues be reviewed by the posters and, if corrected, withdrawn. -Husnock 23:43, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Comment: I am concerned about the following paragraph in the introduction: Starfleet ranks and titles have evolved through both live action productions, official publications, and the fanon of the Star Trek Expanded Universe. The most official ranks established are those which appear in Star Trek films and television productions, with ranks appearing in publications from Star Trek producers considered “secondary”, but nevertheless still officially established Starfleet titles. The least official of all ranks are those which appear in Star Trek fan literature, such as magazines and websites published by private persons with little or no affiliation with the Star Trek series. Such ranks are considered conjecture, yet occasionally may find their way into semi-official Star Trek sources (an example being the rank of Branch Admiral).
Now, I know what you're trying to say, but I'm afraid that a non-fan may become quite confused. What does it mean to be "least official", "semi-official" and "most official"? What are "secondary" publications? Needs to be more clearly written, and licensed sources, on-screen sources, fan sources need to be distinguished and the hierarchy more laid out (or a reference to some other article that discusses "Star Trek canon"). This is not my only concern - just the one that leaped out at me the moment I started reading the article. By the way, I don't know if it's been mentioned, as this article gone through peer review? --khaosworks 00:39, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
The opening was much more detailed answering those very points but, in response to an objection above, was shortened to three paragraphs. The explanation of were the ranks are mentioned, sources, and the conjectural question is the body of the article. -Husnock 01:03, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Unfortunately, shortening it has not improved clarity. Perhaps you could break up the introduction by putting ina heading that does discuss sources. --khaosworks 01:14, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
It looks as though Husnock is working hard to improve the article, and respond to the critics here; I would have liked to withdraw my objection, but I find that the text has mostly been re-organized rather than completely clarified for the non-fan. Thereore, I have to reiterate my incomprehension: How many staff officers have appeared in "StarTrek" as captains? Is it one as the Captain section says, or three as given in the Commander section? Re-reading this, I think the confusion is partly my fault, as the first section probably means Captain in the sense of "ultimate onboard authority", and the second "holding the rank: Captain". To an outsider, the most interesting aspect of the article is the way Gene Roddenberry's originally egalitarian vision was compromised through the series into a very hierarchical command structure with visual differentiations in uniform, and the development of Enlisted ranks. That's sociologically quite interesting, and could be a way to develop the article into something even Xiong could approve of. However, my objection must stand for the time being, because I think the article still depends too heavily on an assumed level of fan knowledge. Wragge 17:40, 2005 Jun 2 (UTC)
The lack of a "real world" aspect to this is a very valid point and one of the legitimate reasons this isnt a Featured Article I am actually going to try and add some things about the real people who invented the insignia such as William Ware Thesis. -Husnock 01:55, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
That's good news - I was worred that you'd been discouraged by all of the negative feedback. That would be a shame as I think your perseverance is close to paying off. Wragge 02:17, 2005 Jun 3 (UTC)
  • Support. The latest changes address my objections. --Theo (Talk) 16:22, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment:Yes, I have to admit, I see improvement here. The article -- from a purely technical standpoint -- has reached an impressive level. Now, here is what might be done to pass for an encyclopedic article:
Reorganize the presentation around something real. The current structure is built around the ranks themselves; that is, fleet ranks, officer ranks, enlisted ranks. This is a castle built on sand, because the ranks themselves are not only fictitious, they have never been taken seriously by the producers. Each new film or show brought a new version of every rank, each version unrelated to earlier ones. It's important to remember that these insignia are simply costume accessories -- ways to dress up actors. It's much more important to producers that a new film looks new than that there be any self-consistent explanation for the look.
It's all superficial. There is nothing to stop a scriptwriter from creating a character for one show holding the rank of Biologist Major (acting), without making any real effort to tie this into any overall structure. Perhaps the effort that Trek producers have made to be consistent is laudable; other shows just don't bother -- but it's misleading. Trek producers, scriptwriters, and costume designers as a body doubtless have a less complete reference on this topic than this page. It's not that they couldn't assemble such; it's that they just don't care that much.
One route out of the ghetto for this article might be to reorganize it around Real World production dates. The show began in 1966, when America was embroiled in the Vietnam War. This polarized the nation (and the world) and Star Trek may be viewed as a reaction -- utopian, eglitarian, a military vessel on a scientific mission. ("Set phasers to stun.") In this context, the piano insignia appears to comment on the real war of the time.
Later on, note that Wrath of Khan appeared during the saber-rattling Reagan years -- and presto!, the uniforms were made much more bold and militaristic to appeal to contemporary viewers. Recent series have been produced against the backdrop of the endless war over oil; insignia have become weary-looking, as has public support for the war.
Tie Trek ranks and insignia to those of real military arms. To what extent have film and series designers drawn on US and European models? Why? Have producers and designers commented? Caution against original research, but I daresay with enough digging, primary research into the topic can be uncovered.
Minimize the compulsive need to display every insignia; this is a sure sign of cruft, the obsession with the complete set. But if you've seen one shoulder board with a couple of gold buttons on it, you've seen them all. A more interesting question is Why are the buttons gold today? Why were they square silver blocks yesterday? Who made the change? Can names and perhaps headshots not be shown of the real people who designed these insignia?
Caution against fictional-universe explanations. The 24th Century has not happened yet. All of these bits of cloth, metal, and plastic were sewn in a sweatshop or stamped out in a Third World factory right in our own time. Who makes these insignia? Do fans buy theirs from the same manufacturers as the official producers? I'd be very impressed with a photo of a dozen Malaysian teenagers sitting around a table banging out Trek insignia for affluent Westerners to wear to their next con. I'd be even more impressed with an interview with one of these workers. What do they think about this topic? What other insignia do they make in the same shop? What is the process?
Can Trek insignia be related to those of similar shows? Did George Lucas take them into account? What about derivative or parody appearances -- feature films, say, in which some character wears a Trek costume to a prom? Has an elected official ever been seen wearing Trek rank insignia? (It's not beyond possibility in the weird world of politics.) Many spoofs and send-ups of Trek and Star Wars have been produced -- to what extent were the insignia copied?
Star Trek was not the first space adventure series. Buck Rogers came out in 1929; I don't know if any rank insignia were ever worn by a character in the 1939 serial films. To what extent may this have influenced Trek producers?
My comments, relentless and unwelcome though they may be, all come back to the same point: Tie the topic to the Real World. Only then can the page become an encyclopedic article on a notable topic. Even I will grant it's only a short step from that to FA. — Xiong熊talk* 05:32, 2005 Jun 3 (UTC)
I am subdued by the very good points and civil nature with which this was presented. It seems that the potion wore off and Hyde Xiong has been replaced with Jeckell Xiong. Very, very valid points. The way the unforms changed for the feature films is a very interesting topic as yes, in was in 1982, when the military was on the rise as defenders in the Cold War.
I have limite dinfo on where these insignia come from except for knowledge of one company called Hollywood Pins which supplied some rank badges for Star Trek VI. The man who invented all Star trek rank, William War Thesis could almost deserve his own article. I will have the research it.
So, thanks for the very valid and noteworthy comments. They will be taken seriously and take away almost all the bad things I said about you behind your back! -Husnock 17:28, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

This article is exceptionally well-written, informative, and fascinating--top-shelf. It is also nice to look at, replete with diverse images. If an editor would go through it and remove redundant information, this would be a fine feature article--better than most, I believe.
--(nominated by 24.14.32.36)

Agreed. I went through and made some edits today, hopefully cleaning things up a bit.--AaronS 17:20, 29 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Object. While I don't have a problem with the contents & I feel its well rounded; some sections are too long. The history section is half the page length, and should be summarised into about six paragraphs. Climate can be merged with geography. A section shouldn't have a solitary paragraph. Similarly a heading shouldn't have a solitary sub heading.  =Nichalp (Talk)= 09:08, May 30, 2005 (UTC)

Boston has existed for 375 years. Wouldn't it follow that it have a long history? Moreover, the history section is perhaps the most interesting.--AaronS 16:41, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
If it is so interesting, then a History of Boston, Massachusetts article is in order. Then this article can have a more condensed treatment of the city's history. --mav 16:46, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Done and done. The history section has been much condensed.--AaronS 01:39, 31 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent history summary, but 1) I still would like to see climate merged with geography (unless you would like to add a new paragraph). 2) Sports, media and transportation should not have any sub headings. Rationale: Their content is too small. Instead, use this syntax for a heading: [ ;'''xyz''' ]; these do not appear in the ToC. (See the =media= section in Mumbai) 3) This article has very few references, this concerns me. You'd have to use inline references for all figures you'd used, be in the demographics, area etc. See the Mumbai page as to how facts are referenced through the Wikipedia: footnote3 style 4) I also feel that much of the geography should be under =demographics=. 5) elevation of Boston? If you can resolve the above, I'll lend my support.  =Nichalp (Talk)= 07:43, May 31, 2005 (UTC)
I eliminated the H3 in media, sports, and transportation; I also combined the climate and geography sections and moved the neighborhood passage from geography to demographics. However, a lot more work is needed before this article can be considered worthy of Featured Article (I should note that it has been barely more than a month ago that many of the sections were merely lists, especially sports, notable Bostonians, and sites of interest). Pentawing 20:57, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Object. the history section is now just a list of unrealted facts, I suggest you put together two or three coherent paragraphs describing the most important events in Bostons history. The media, transport, sports sections don't need those ===h3=== subheadings. Arts doens't mention anything about fine arts, I assume Boston has galleries etc, those big lists in the arts section don't do alot for the readability of the article. The Colleges and Universites section is also a pretty bland list. --nixie 02:36, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to Peer Review. There are too many issues with this article to address here. --Theo (Talk) 21:49, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Agreed. Pentawing 03:20, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Interlingua edit

Interlingua because is a notable constructed language in that it is one of the few international auxiliary languages (along with Esperanto and Ido) from the 'heydey' of IALs that is still alive today. It also has its Wikipedia with a bit over 1900 articles, making it the third largest Wikipedia in a conlang (behind Ido and Esperanto). (The next largest conlang Wikipedia, for Occidental/Interlingue, has just above 200 articles.)

I can't say it's a self-nomination since I've had a lot of criticism and support on the way to getting it here, but I did do a lot of research and a lot of writing to get it this far. Thus, I can't claim to be unbiased in this, so I won't be voting. Almafeta 22:19, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose Too many red links, no references. Denni☯ 23:25, 2005 May 28 (UTC)
I included three of my primary references, in one case moving them out of external links. I'll have to return to the library soon to get the publisher's info and ISBNs of the other two books. As to the red links? Well... it seems I've got some more writing to do. Almafeta 00:35, 29 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object agree with Deni, there is a red link to the color argument. What is this? Also, the section "Criticisms of Interlingua" uses weasel words, a pet hate of mine. - Ta bu shi da yu 06:27, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
"Weasel words" are required to remain NPOV. Almafeta 15:10, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to Peer Review. For starters: pronunciation should be 'Phonology' or 'Sounds' and should use IPA transcription instead of loose approximations. It would be nice to have phoneme inventories (vowels, consonants) instead of unhelpful clues like 'the vowels are like Spanish and the consonants are like English'. — mark ✎ 08:20, 30 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Star Wars edit

Self-nom. Definitely featured article status. A cultural icon that is one of the greatest motion picture series and is vastly acclaimed as such.- B-101 20:52, 28 May 2005 (UTC) Past FAC nomination here.[reply]

Please, do not nominate articles that do not meet basic requirements for FAs (References in this case). Sections like "Third Reich" are nothing but wild speculation and conjectures unless you provide authoritative sources to back your claim. This is an encyclopedia: we report and expose facts, we don't present original analysis and research. Phils 21:59, 28 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I would however like to note that much progress has been done since the last time this was submitted as an FA. Phils 15:45, 29 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Refer to peer review. Please note this nomination wasn't made on a subpage either. Mgm|(talk) 22:21, May 28, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review. Not ready to be a FA - there would be many people who would want to weigh in on a Star Wars article before it became featured. Harro5 22:34, May 28, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review. Please respect the criteria for FAC nominations and please be patient when requesting the peer review. If no comments come out of the PR, try advertising it a bit more. Peter Isotalo 12:22, May 29, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review and I will make it a point to review it myself. Linuxbeak | Talk | Desk 20:48, May 29, 2005 (UTC)
  • Refer to peer review serious concerns with structure of article. - Ta bu shi da yu 23:38, 29 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Internet Explorer

2004 Atlantic hurricane season edit

(Self-nom) I'm not trying to stuff the box with hurricane articles here, but this IS a good article, and I promise the last I will nominate for a while. The only thing I can really think it's lacking are references, but really, there are few things to reference. All roads lead back to the NHC, and NHC links are spread liberally throughout the article. I'll try to find a link for Gray's forecast, but beyond that, I think it's pretty good as-is. --Golbez 09:01, May 20, 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. No references. See Wikipedia:Cite sources. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:30, 21 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • Can you elaborate? Every storm has NHC links; Gray's forecast is linked at the bottom (and I may make a footnote); and the major storms have references in their own articles. What exactly is lacking a reference? --Golbez 21:50, May 21, 2005 (UTC)
  • It's mostly a formatting issue. You need to mention the NHC links in a seperate reference section. Mgm|(talk) 11:37, May 22, 2005 (UTC)
    • I disagree, that would create a huge Reference section that helps no one. External links has a link to the NHC and should (if it doesn't now it will soon) have a link to the NHC's 2004 page, and each storm has the proper links. How would moving all of the reference links to a single section be useful? --Golbez 22:35, May 22, 2005 (UTC)
      • Er, unless you mean simply mention them, which can be done. :) --Golbez 23:37, May 22, 2005 (UTC)
        • I've all the references I can think of; I'll concatenate them in an end section later today. Requesting more comments. --Golbez 17:55, May 23, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Neutralitytalk 06:45, May 24, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Although it still needs a reference section which simply describes the sources, this can be done with little problem. I've thought that this article was worthy of a nomination for a while, I just never got around to nominating it myself. bob rulz 01:08, May 25, 2005 (UTC)

Ismail al-Faruqi edit

I believe that this article deserves to be nominated due to its quality and research. Have been written and re-written since September 2004. Menj 09:02, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Object: Needs to be more in depth. This is more his CV than a biography. There is no objectivity here at all. The quote. " .....is widely recognized as an authority on Islam and comparative religion" - recognised by whom? The reference section is in the wrong place, and the formatting seems generally to be erratic. This need to be expanded and then given another (it's already been there once) very long period on peer review. Giano | talk 09:49, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
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