Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (Atari 2600)/archive1

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[edit] E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (Atari 2600)

Self-nomination: I have really worked this article over in the past five days and I believe it is now ready for FA status. An extremely bad and extremely important video game, it holds a special place in video gaming history. There are a lot of mistruths surrounding this game, so I made sure to cite my sources extensively and made sure they were creditable. Additionally, despite being considered the worst game of all time, I think I managed to keep a pretty neutral POV for the article. The fact that the images need fair use rationals is probably going to be brought up, but I'm tired atm so I'll get around to putting in that jibber-jabber tomorrow. Otherwise, I find it as perfect as I can make it and I hope you guys agree ;) Happy 3rd of July everyone! --SeizureDog 05:58, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Support. My god, I take a break from Wikipedia for a couple months, and the whole E.T. page transforms! A most excellent job you've done. If it gains FA status, I would be overjoyed, if only for personal reasons. It was a rather crappy article before I stopped by, if I do say so myself...one picture, no Infobox, etc etc. What you've done, though, is double my work. From shit to shining! *high fives SeizureDog* Spamguy 06:15, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
Thank you very much Spamguy :) Also, I think it's safe for you to go ahead and support the nomination. Virtually the entire article was rewritten so I don't think your vote could be discounted from being a "significate contributor" of the current version.--SeizureDog 06:30, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment It's a good article. My major concern is the material about the user on a message board digging up all these photos. It seems a little original researchish, but it can probably be adjusted to focus more on that local newspaper. I also wonder about Production and sales being one section- they're not really related. I would give Production its own section and make Sales a subsection under the heading "Reception", which would include "Critical reaction". Perhaps a brief definition of the video game crash would also help to understand the article. Finally, with this stuff about it being one of Atari's best-selling games but also a failure, would it be fair to say Atari was aiming higher than their usual capabilities? CanadianCaesar Et tu, Brute? 07:42, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
Hmm. Well, I agree with shifting the focus to the newspaper. I kinda had a hard time mentioning the newspaper without bringing up the backstory though. As for it being original research, it's the best there is on the subject and backs itself up well. It's better researched there than the page at snopes.com in any case (a rare event). Plus, his actions were enough to get him an article in the Alamogordo Daily News, so that kinda makes it unoriginal research right? I mean, I would call being talked about in the town in which the event occured without having the information denied as falling under being "published by a reputable source". The subsections I had nothing to base myself on, so I just tried to split them up as best I could think of. Whatever naming feels most correct is fine with me. I don't think the video game crash of 1983 needs to be explained though. For one, it's wikilinked. And for two, it kinda explains itself doesn't it? In 1983, the video game market crashed. Explaining why it crashed really isn't in this article's scope. --SeizureDog 08:29, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
Oh yeah, I forgot to respond to "would it be fair to say Atari was aiming higher than their usual capabilities?" If by "capabilities" you're referring to their capabilites of getting away with putting shit in a pretty box and it selling well, then I'd say yes, yes they were. (The quote, "I could put shit in a box and it'd sell a million copies," is from the Video game crash of 1983 article. Sadly, there's no way I'm adding that to this article without a good source)--SeizureDog 08:43, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: Just two small things ..
  • Viewing at 1280x1024, the Reviews and scores table looks a bit weird .. it's cutting into a paragraph of text, actually, it's a bit hard to explain what is happening, so I took a screenshot. Maybe you can play with its positioning or something.
  • Aren't references and endnotes normally kept seperate? Cheers --darkliight[πalk] 12:24, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
  • I did some tweaking with positioning and it should look fine now. And the references section is user preference. The style for references wildly various from article to article. I know that this style isn't of my own creation, but I just can't seem to be able to find the article I picked it up on. For a close example though, Bulbasaur is an featured article with both endnotes and references kept together (slightly different style though).--SeizureDog 16:07, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
Table looks good. Regarding the references, Bulbasaur keeps its references and notes seperate too, just that they're contained within one section instead of two. The number of sections does not bother me, just that they're kept seperate in some way. Don't consider this to be an objection though, if it doesn't bother anyone else than I'm fine with it. Cheers --darkliight[πalk] 16:21, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
So is that a support then? --SeizureDog 18:38, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Support; well written, and manages to find NPOV even in article about such a dreadful game. Would like to see articles for Karate (Atari 2600) and Skeet Shoot though, two red links which are of medium importance to the article. smurrayinchester(User), (Talk) 16:25, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Funny, I was just working on that. Red links are gone :) --SeizureDog 16:38, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment A few things need work. There are some minor grammatical issues (like commas and periods should be enclosed by quotation marks, not outside) and some language that does not entirely seem encyclopedic ("chump-change" for example). Significant issues include
  • The use of quotation marks outside of periods and commas is a British style (even though I'm American, I perfer their way and it is acceptable in US use). Of course, I might have screwed it up even using the British style, quotation marks can get highly confusing. Point taken with "chump-change" though, need to replace that.
  • The section on the confirmed landfill story actually has no citations. I see a number of newspaper articles listed in the references section; they should be converted to cite.php refs and applied to the correct locations in the article as needed. "chump-change" was reworded.
  • I was actually just putting off adding citations for that section. I wanted someone such as yourself to speckle it with {{fact}} to avoid over-citing. All of your tags marked been sourced.
  • Inline cite #1 should be made into a regular ref giving the issue date and page number of the Alamgordo newspaper where the photos came from, not to the blogger who found them.
  • I agree this needs to be addressed
  • Inline cites 2 and 3 are dead links for me; unless the interview has been published somewhere other than a personal website, it would not be considered a reliable source in any case.
  • Works fine in Opera. It's a direct link to an MPG file so that might be the problem.
  • What is the source of information in ref 23?
  • Sourced.
  • A more NPOV way of saying "it wasn't the programmers fault" should be found, especially since you are relying heavily on an interview with the programmer, which could certainly be seen as potentially self-serving.
  • Agreed. Comment removed.
  • The online reproduction of the manual should be moved from references to an external link. Other things specifically used as references (like Seanbaby's ranking as #1 worst) should only be in refs and not also in external links.
  • I disagree here. I used the manual heavily as a source for the gameplay section. As an external link, it adds little that the article already has. Plus, it can be found via the AtariAge link already in the external links. As a final note, Pokemon articles such as Bulbasaur and Torchic have taken to listing the manual as a ref.--SeizureDog 20:45, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

It's certainly a good article and well on its way. Thatcher131 19:04, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

  • Object
  1. Inline citations are required now, and I think "Gameplay" needs them.
  2. "was largely due to the unreasonably short deadline to ship on September 1 in order to coincide with the 1982 Christmas shopping season." You'll need attribution for this, I think "Howard Scott Warshaw"?

Some other suggestions:

  1. "It is considered a paradigm of marketing greed: a poorly produced, rushed game that Atari thought would sell well based purely on brand loyalty to the names of Atari and E.T." - I'm not sure if the cited source here is enough for this blanket statement. Perhaps it is considered by "some"?
  2. "The problem of E.T.'s poor quality" phrasing seems awkward, suggest something like "The quality issues with E.T."
  3. "Thus, it was an amazing feat of programming that the game was even able to be completed at all." - a source for this might help

RN 10:03, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

GRAH! Stupid Wikipedia has to crash my internets after I'm done typing up replies D:< They'll be shorter this time out of frustration.
  1. This is just stupid. There's nothing in the Gameplay section even remotely worth giving a cite. Also, see The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, no cites for Story or Gameplay.
  2. I have no idea what you're talking about. The quote is plainly sourced to Warshaw.
  3. I have not seen a single person say that Atari was not being greedy or defend their actions. Find any (even minor) source saying otherwise and I'll see about changing the wording.
  4. Reworded.
  5. Removed.
--SeizureDog 10:56, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

As per (2) I mean you're taking an interview as fact - it would be better if you said something like "According to X, " in the article. As per the quality statement you're making a point-of-view judgement on it's quality by saying "E.T.'s poor quality" RN 13:17, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Be bold and word it how you like then. --SeizureDog 19:01, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Oppose Forums aren't and shouldn't be acceptable sources, even for pop culture articles. Also, I'm pretty sure the use of newspaper articles posted on the AtariAge forums doesn't count as using the newspaper article itself as your source, but using the forum. I know this is a pretty exceptional case, what with one of the articles being videotaped rather than scanned (!) but I think the policy would still apply. Perhaps the original article can still be found somewhere; we're only talking 25 years ago. Other points: The "Atari Landfill" section's organization -- divided into "the legend" and "the confirmed story", has a rather informal tone. They'd be better merged into one section, and dealing only with what's factual, unless the status of the story as an "urban legend" has been discussed significantly in other sources -- a cite would help. The "reasons for the destruction" section is also way too speculative; I'd prefer it if you just phrased the "reasons" in terms of "explanations" and refered directly in the text to which sources have offered these explanations. Overall, this is a very interesting topic, but I believe whole books have been written about the downfall of Atari -- pop culture articles are supposed to use the best sources available, and I think there's more to be discovered here, from better (off-line) sources. Sorry to be so picky :) -- Lee Bailey(talk) 21:27, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
The forum itself is never used as a source. I don't see what the difference is if I use newspaper articles that are scanned or view them IRL. If anything, the scanned articles are more reputable. I could have the paper right in front of me, but it would still be prudent to link to the scans so others can verify that the articles do in fact exist. Otherwise, I could just make up a bunch of BS that noone would able to fact-check because the articles require living in such a specific location to see. And perhaps we're only talking about a 25 year old article, but that's a 25 year old article from a small town paper. I don't see how taking a road trip to read them myself would help matters. As for merging, it is very important in this case to mention what is not factual as well as what is confirmed. Otherwise, we're going to be getting a lot of "helpful" edits that will comprimise the article. Its status as an urban legend is all over the place, I'm sure at least half of my references contain a section talking about it as an urban legend, so I'm not quite sure how to cite that. I'll admit to the "reasons for destruction" being a tensey bit of originial research. I know that tax write off thing is very likely though; I just can't figure out how to cite it as a law. The book you're thinking of would be Zap!. However, I have no access to the book. Perhaps in the future I can get my hands on it and use it as a source, but I'm not sure if it would help much (the reviews say it's pretty poorly written). That's the only book on the subject though; other VG history books may mention it in passing, but my experience with books on the subject of video games is that they end up being horrid for references. Too much focus on common knowledge, not enough depth. --SeizureDog 01:03, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually, I see several individual threads from the forum listed as in-line cites for the article -- that's the reason I said the forum is being used as a source. With regards to the newspaper, the issue isn't the scanning of the article persay(or retyping, or filming, or whatever). The issue is who did the scanning/retyping/filming. Naturally, the online edition of New York Times is as reliable as the paper edition, because it's still a part of the Times. But WP:CITE suggests that A common error is to copy citation information from an intermediate source without acknowledging it. For example, you might find some information on a web page which says it comes from a certain book. Unless you look at the book yourself to check that the information is there, your reference is really the web page and the web page must be mentioned. The web page itself must therefore be a reliable source.
As for books, I thought of the titled you mentioned yes, but there's also books like Supercade, The Ultimate History Of Video Games,Power-Up: How Japanese Video Games Gave the World an Extra Life, Joystick Nation, and others to explore. Granted, off the top of my head, I can only come up with one source specifically about Atari and Atari only, but my point was more that print examinations of this topic exist. Why cite a vaguely-independent-researchy article no-one can get their hands on when you could probably find an in-depth discussion of the same source in several books, which anyone can find at a local library? You might say that video game books make dreadful sources, but I still think they're inherently better than self-published online sources and reviews on forums like GameFAQs. Despite being a flop, this is probably one of the most noteble games in history. Don't get me wrong, this article has improved tremendously IMHO, but using the best available sources would really help to make it great. For a point of comparison, check out the number of offline sources that were employed in the Featured Article Donkey Kong (arcade game). -- Lee Bailey(talk) 01:55, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I meant that the forum is never used as a source for the Atari landfill section. The forum is only used as a source to show public opinions of E.T. not being the worst game ever. The only article that may be a minor problem is the one that was retyped (I couldn't find the images for that article), but for the scanned articles I hardly see how the information could be a mistake. Typing up that an that article says something but accidently misquoting it is one thing, but implying that scans of an article are somehow incorrect is entirely different. The other books you linked to are very unlikely to be of use: Supercade is a visual history book; Power-Up focuses on Japanese video games, hardly useful for researching an American made game; the other two might be of a little use, but usually those books tend to focus on the good games, not the duds. And how could any book (which could just base itself off the legend) be more reputable than newspaper articles from the town it occured in? , In all fairness, popular games always are going to have a lot more sources to draw from. People just naturally seem to perfer writing about good games. Not to mention that the Atari 2600 is pretty skimpy in terms of writing; most books on that era of gaming focus on the arcade games. I think that finding good off-line sources for even games such as Pitfall! and Adventure would be hard.
I should also mention that I'm only able to get online with a Mac now, which I'm not used to and thus have an extremely difficult time editing articles. I suggest being bold and editing the article yourself for any changes that wish to be addressed, as I'm not likely to be able to get around to it.--SeizureDog 20:32, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I suppose the scanned/taped articles work. It's sort of a weird case though, in terms of the sourcing: if I found a scanned image of a newpaper page in a book, my first instinct would be to cite the book instead of the newspaper for the information, which seems to more generally follow the guideline; but I could be wrong about this one, so I won't worry about it for now.
The one article that's retyped, however, shouldn't be used as a source, per the guideline I've cited. If the website it comes from is the only source you have from article, any information that comes from that article and that article only is unsourced, which is problematic for this article being featured.
As for the books, I refer to them because I believe this article has a lot of weak sources, when the reliable sources guideline stresses that pop culture articles should always use the best sources available. The AtariAge forums, GameFAQs, Snopes, an outline of an undergraduate lecture at Tufts, Stingray's Madness (personal site) and others all strike me as weak sources. One of your references even cites "Zap! The Rise and Fall of Atari" which you reject as a source on the grounds of reviews by Amazon readers. What video game books have lead you to believe that these books ignore Atari, and ignore unpopular but historically significant titles? Two more to try: "The First Quarter: A 25-Year History of Video Games" by Steven L. Kent, and "Phoenix: the Rise and Fall of Video games" by Leonard Herman. Trust me, tons has been said about this subject -- Lee Bailey(talk) 02:47, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
You're forgetting that the subject that "tons has been said about" is video game history in general. The most I could hope to get from those books is maybe a passing paragraph mentioning the game. Maybe if I'm really lucky, I'll get a page's worth, but I'll hardly find a "ton" of info on this game in perticular. I really don't think I'm missing out on too much by sticking to the net.--SeizureDog 04:16, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
My point here is that WP:Reliable Sources requires pop culture articles to use the best sources available. Even if you don't find anything that's not already in the article, a published book is still a better source for the same information than a forum, personal web site, etc. Pop culture articles get cut a lot of slack, because there often aren't sources even in existence for those topics that satisfy WP:V and WP:RS. In this case however, you are indeed talking about a topic which has been discussed in better sources, including some of the ones I've mentioned. Maybe we're differing on our definition of "a ton of information", but still, the ET game is probably one of the most talked-about Atari games, as it has hugely important place in video game history. I really don't mean to be hard on this article; it's got a lot of great information. I just don't think it's really met the sourcing requirements expected of the particular subject. -- Lee Bailey(talk) 07:14, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Ok, wish granted. Went to the library and checked out The Ultimate History of Video Games (only book to mention E.T. there). In total there were 3 pages that talked about it (the pages aren't very packed though, double spaced and liberal use of margins). About as much as I could hope for. Not much to add with it, can spice it up with a couple of new quotes and a few more accurate numbers though. Oh well, hard sourced now. Book supports the article on most all points. The two diviations were an error I had about who actually bought the rights (Steve Ross, not Ray Kassar) and an error on the book's part with a minor detail about the landfill (says that Atari "went back" to crush the cartridges when they were actually crushed on delivery). Happy?--SeizureDog 03:15, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment. The intro seems a bit opinionated to me. Modlin 08:38, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
It does make me happy that you used your public library to find a source for Wikipedia -- that always makes me happy. As stated above, though, I do still object to use of forums (atariage, gamefaqs) and self-published websites (stingray's madness, snopes) as inline cites. Information that is sourced exclusively by sources that WP:Verifiability and WP:Reliable Sources don't accept (even for pop culture articles) should be left out until an acceptable source is found. Same goes with the unsourced tax write-off explanation. I recommended looking into a few different books because I thought it might be helpful in finding an acceptable source for unsourced or poorly sourced info in the article -- I'm sorry if that didn't help. -- Lee Bailey(talk) 04:09, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, that's where we differ then. The thing about video games and other such nerd culture is that the most accurate information is often actually found on the internet. The internet is specialized towards this sort of thing and print is not. It's like when Time or (ugh) MTV tries to talk about what video games are "good" and makes some wildly awful picks. They aren't specialized towards video games and don't know much about them. From what I've looked into, there are pretty much only 3 good books for video game history: The Ultimate History of Video Games, Game Over, and Pheonix: The Rise and Fall of Video Games. Since Game Over is only about Nintendo, Pheonix is the only other print source to actually draw from.
One of the sections my sources seem to bother you on is the "Critical Responce" section, which, without internet sources, will completely be killed. Hate to say but print reviews for a game this old are going to be virtually non-existant. The only two reviews I could possibly have are semi-gimicky and play up its status of "worst game ever"; I'd have nothing nothing to show for it being otherwise without the net(even though there's a pretty good section of people that don't think it's the worst ever).
The landfill section is bit of a problem though. Since the newspapers have only recently been unearthed (2005), and no good VG history books have been written since that time (Utimate History was written in 2001), the next printed source to include this information is likely to be a ways in coming. I think killing the content of information just because its not written about much offline is not a good idea. I may not be able to directly source all of it to print, but it's all good, respectable information that's not likely to be very wrong. --SeizureDog 00:17, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm not saying everything needs to be sourced in print. I'm saying that not all online sources are created equal, and the ones that are explicitly referred to as unacceptable in w:v and w:rs -- like forums and personal webpages -- shouldn't be used. I'm fine with the use of your newspaper articles, just not the one that's retyped text. And in this instance, yes, I disagree with the assessment that the internet exclusively has the best information on the topic. Call me nuts, but I suspect that sources like Gamespy and 1-up are not relying on their stunningly accurate memory of 1982 when they recite the game's history or toss out statements about the game being widely panned -- I believe they're getting their information other things that have been written about it, mostly likely including Zap (referenced by snopes) and similiar books. Not that I have a problem with the use of Gamespy or 1-up, but I'm just saying -- the existance of those articles suggests there's still more to be found, which would most likely cover the gaps you'd create by leaving out forums and the like. Snopes also references The First Quarter by Stephen L. Kent. If you're dead convinced that the three books you mention are the only good books on the subject, you should not be using snopes, which obviously is dependent on books you believe are not up to standard.
As for the idea that the landfill story was an urban legend until 2005 when someone posted a newpaper article on a forum, I think you may be overestimating the importance of this. For one thing, I don't see a lot of sources actually calling it an urban legend. There was a New York Times article about it; also Game Over, which as you accurately state is a history of Nintendo and not Atari, nevertheless includes the dumping story, and retells it as fact without any reluctance. I can't say they've got much on it, but that is widely considered an exceptionally well-researched book. For sources, it generally uses academic papers and print media from the time these games were released, which is a perfectly legimate route to go; good libraries do usually have archives of major periodicals either in a digital format or on mircofilm, going back pretty far. So, if you're not interested in looking through the books that are relevant to the subject, you've got options. -- Lee Bailey(talk) 05:38, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
The Atari landfill didn't suddenly stop being an urban legend, I never said that. It still is an urban legend even with the evidence. It doesn't even have to be called an urban legend to be an urban legend. Basically, my understanding is that an urban legend is any story that the vast majority of people learn not from a reputable source, but from peers (who heard it from other peers). As I've said before, I'm open to someone editing that section to work out the forum reference, but personally I can't write about the legend without mentioning that as a backstory.
The First Quarter is what The Ultimate History of Video Games was originally published as, so that's already been covered. How do you know that Game Over talks about E.T.? Do you have it? If so, your own additions to the article would be welcome. And what the heck would be relevent for this game in academic papers? I don't think any gaming magazines existed in 1983, I don't know what I'd look for even if I had access to such an archive. Plus, the only good library I have near me is the Fayetteville, Arkansas library, which is very new (built one or two years ago), so it doesn't go back that far, especially not with this subject matter. Honestly, I'm really stuck with the references and can't go much further. If you could help there, that'd be great, but otherwise it'll be months before I have the spare cash to buy some of those other reference books. --SeizureDog 19:33, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Reworded the landfill section so that the forums weren't mentioned, better? --SeizureDog 06:37, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Also was able to find the scans for the article I had been using the typed text for. I think this takes care of all of the problems I can address, consider changing position to (weak) support? Or did I miss something?--SeizureDog 06:50, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Oppose, the "Explanations for Destruction" section is very poorly written:
  • In the third paragraph it's postulated that Atari's finances were "floundering" and that they could not afford to store the cartridges. The next paragraph, though, points out that Atari was an extremely successful business at the time!
  • "The second reason is that it was likely done..." Why is "likely done" placed here? Isn't this just a continuation of a theory w8hose description began in the previous paragraph?
  • "...By throwing all of their excess merchandise away, they were able to avoid paying taxes on them. If they had kept them in storage, they would have had to pay taxes on millions of useless games." This seems very odd; can we cite the tax code that says that disposing of the games instead of storing them allows them to write them off? Is this reasoning that somebody formed after reviewing the relevant tax code, or just a wild explanation some guy on a forum came up with?
  • "One of the most common arguments against the legend is..." Why are we even taking arguments "against the legend" into consideration, if it's been proven that the "legend" is in fact reality? What is being argued against?
  • "Additional considerations such as storage costs for keeping the dead weight also must be taken into consideration." The considerations must be taken into consideration? Huh?
  • were irrevocably written in non-rewriteable" Irrevocably non-rewritable. This sort of redundancy occurs throughout the article.
  • "more than couple of ten-thousand dollars" Is this standard English?
  • "and likely saved them even more." Again with "likely." How can we judge how "likely" this is? It seems like Atari had some difficulties with financial planning; maybe they lost money compared to their other options by doing this. We don't really know since we don't have their balance sheets.
  • "But it was still not enough to save them from their inevitable collapse during the following year." I don't like this sentence at all. "Inevitable" is a very strong word, especially when the article points out that the rushed release of the game was a (presumably avoidable) mistake. And does "during" need to be there? Andrew Levine 20:51, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
  • And I just noticed something quite important -- The sections which are drawn from the Almogordo Daily News do not make any mention of E.T. per se. They just say that a lot of 2600 cartridges were dumped, without specifying game titles. Did the source articles mention the E.T. game specifically? (EDIT: They do not, one of the headlines notwihstanding.) Do we really even know if a single E.T. game (much less hundreds of thousands, as the lead claims) was among those trucked out to the New Mexico desert, and that the E.T.s were not disposed of elsewhere? Andrew Levine 21:02, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Oh, and one more thing: All of the critical reviews seem to be recent, with not a single one drawn from the era when it was released. I know that back then, there existed magazines and newsletters reviewing new video games (as there still do today), and that while some of them were probably shills, there must have also been some independent publications able to objectively examine E.T. and praise it or pan it as appropriate. Exclusively using reviews from nostalgic "classing gaming" websites introduces a bias. What did contemporary video game critics think? Andrew Levine 21:19, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Andrew raises good points; there are still some significant issues with this article. It's certainly getting better, though. Objections I still have include the use of in-line cites 8 (personal website) 16, 20 & 21 (observation of reaction on a forum), and 32(private email exchange). I bring up the issue of "urban legend" status, partially because from what I can see you've not really cited sources that indicate the story was ever widely believed to be untrue. And I still think the section about "reasons for the destruction" is a bit too speculative. Where's the source for "one of the most common arguments... is that it would be too expensive and impractical for Atari to dump the cartridges...?" Who is claiming the process would take "couple of ten-thousand dollars"?
Here's the thing: I'm actually quite interested in this topic, and would be more than willing to work on some of these things in perhaps the next week or so. I do have "Game Over", which doesn't have much on the landfill story, but I can look into the references it cites in it's bibliography. I checked with my library, and "Zap!" and a few other probably-relevant books are in my local system -- which means I could have them on an interlibrary loan in 3-5 days. If you're willing to hold off on this nom for a bit, I'd be willing to try and dig up some information, and give the "Atari Landfill" section some copyediting attention, which I still think it needs. Fair? -- Lee Bailey(talk) 22:51, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
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