Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/testing

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Here, we determine which articles are featured on Wikipedia:Featured articles. A featured article should exemplify Wikipedia's very best work by meeting the featured article criteria. Before nominating an article, you may wish to receive feedback by listing it at Wikipedia:Peer review. Nominators are expected to make an effort to address objections. If you have worked on the article you nominate, note it as a "self-nomination". Please do not post more than one nomination at a time, as this may make it difficult to do justice to each. Please respond positively to criticism and avoid discouraging reviewers. For a nomination to be promoted to FA status, consensus must be reached that it meets the criteria. Consensus is built among the reviewers and nominators, and the Featured Article Director (currently Raul654) determines whether there is consensus. If, after sufficient time, objections considered actionable by the Featured Article Director have not been resolved or consensus for promotion has not been reached, a nomination will be removed from the list and archived. The FA Director determines the timing of the process for each nomination. Purge page cache	Shortcut: WP:FAC Featured content: Featured articles ← Featured pictures Featured lists Featured portals Featured topics Featured article tools: What is a featured article? Featured article candidates Featured article review "Today's featured article" This month's queue Featured article log Featured article statistics Former featured articles
Nomination procedure Check the featured article criteria and ensure that the article meets all of them before nominating. Place {{fac}} on the talk page of the nominated article. From there, click on the "leave comments" link. If the article you are submitting has had a previous FAC nomination, use the Move button to archive the previous FAC discussion. For example, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Television → Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Television/archive1. Remember to change the old {{facfailed}} template on the talk page to {{facfailed|Television/archive1}}. Place ===[[name of nominated article]]=== at the top. Below this title, write your reason for nominating the article and sign with ~~~~. Copy this text:{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/name of nominated article}}, then edit this page (i.e. the page you are reading at the moment), pasting the template at the top of the list of candidates. Replace "name of..." with the name of your nomination. Supporting and objecting Please read a nominated article fully before deciding to support or oppose a nomination. To respond to a nomination, click the "Edit" link to the right of the article nomination (not the "Edit this page" link for the whole FAC page). If you support a nomination, write *'''Support''' followed by your reason(s). If you have been a significant contributor to the article, please indicate this. If you oppose a nomination, write *'''Object''' or *'''Oppose''' followed by the reason(s). Each objection must provide a specific rationale that can be addressed. If nothing can be done in principle to address the objection, the FA Director may ignore it. Be aware that references on style and grammar do not always agree; if a contributor cites support for a certain style in a standard reference work or other authoritative source, consider accepting it. Reviewers who object are strongly encouraged to return after a few days to check whether their objection has been addressed. To withdraw the objection, strike it out (with <del>...</del>) rather than removing it. Contributors should allow reviewers the opportunity to do this themselves. If you feel that the matter has been addressed, say so rather than striking out the reviewer's text. To provide constructive input on a nomination without explicitly supporting or objecting, write *'''Comment''' followed by your advice.

Contents 1 Nominations 1.1 History of Puerto Rico 1.2 Queen (band) 1.3 Ayn Rand 1.4 I Believe in You 1.5 AIDS 1.6 Bush v. Gore 1.7 Battle of Cannae 1.8 Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom 1.9 Black Sabbath 1.10 Charles Dickens 1.11 S. A. Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition of 1897 1.12 Cædmon 1.13 Hurricane Iniki 1.14 Illmatic 1.15 William Tecumseh Sherman 1.16 Keratoconus 1.17 Julian Eltinge 1.18 Rush (band) 1.19 Frank Zappa 1.20 Ford Taurus 1.21 P. K. van der Byl 1.22 Final Fantasy IV 1.23 First French Empire 1.24 Blue Man Group 1.25 Philosophy of mind 1.26 Pakistan 1.27 Mexicanos, al grito de guerra 1.28 Military history of France 1.29 History of Michigan State University 1.30 United States Bill of Rights 1.31 Ran (film) 1.32 First Council of Nicaea 1.33 F-4 Phantom II

[edit] Nominations

[edit] History of Puerto Rico

This article has had a recent peer review which has improved the article significantly. I now believe it is a comprehensive and well-written article that covers Puerto Rico's history, which spans more than 500 years. I also think it's well referenced and stable. Joelito 22:40, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. The article is comprehensive, well written, and full of references. In fact, the only problem I had with the article was one sentence in the History_of_Puerto_Rico#Establishment_of_the_Commonwealth section. This sentence reads "This actions by both Muñoz and the United States' Government would later be determined as infringing on constitutional rights." Determined by whom? Is this the historic consensus? I think this sentence needs a reference. Otherwise, I think the article is ready to go to FA status.--Alabamaboy 02:00, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• I have added two references regarding this. One is a news article in which the FBI admits rights violations. The other is a reference to declassified documents by the FBI on Freedom of Information and Privacy Acts. Joelito 04:20, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Conditional Support. There are a couple of sections (namely "The struggle for autonomy" and "Military rule") that are missing citations at key locations. Other than that, it looks really great. —Cuiviénen, Thursday, 23 March 2006 @ 02:03 (UTC)

• If you could please specify the exact locations I would gladly submit the corresponding reference. Joelito 02:59, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• I have added references in both sections. Joelito 04:41, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment At a quick glance, the images need better captions... almost all are just 2-3 words directly identifying the subject... leaves a bit to be desired. See most other FAs for good examples of captioning. Also the article is a bit overlong... but I can understand if that's a bit more difficult to address. --W.marsh 04:10, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

• I have added better picture captions. The length of the article is unavoidable since it covers 500 years of history. Joelito 04:47, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

• Thanks, it's a big improvement already. Article needs a little copy editting I think, I've done some... but that's not a huge deal. References look to be excellent, prose is good. Pretty impressive, really. Support. --W.marsh 05:00, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Brisvegas 09:51, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object the article needs to be written in sumary style by moving detail into daughter articles. The current article has too much detailed information. =Nichalp «Talk»= 10:05, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

• Can you provide specific instances of too much information?. Joelito 13:41, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
• Sure: Two years later, in 1511; Under the encomienda, settlers enslaved Tainos a... ; Not wishing to serve under the new governor, The first paragraph of the =Spanish rule= section easily be summarised into:

On November 19, 1493, explorer Christopher Columbus landed on the island christening it San Juan Bautista in honor of Saint John the Baptist. Juan Ponce de León, a lieutenant under Columbus, founded Caparra, the first Spanish settlement in 1511. Two years later, another settlement, San Germán, was established to the southwest. By the 1520s, the island took the name of Puerto Rico while the port became San Juan. =Nichalp «Talk»= 14:43, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the example however I find unacceptable to remove the Taíno revolt of 1511 and the explanation of how colonization began (encomienda and repartimiento systems). Maybe copyediting the paragraphs to eliminate the detail but maintaining all information would be a good compromise. Joelito 15:05, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

You need not omit it, just remove details of the event. A single sentence describing each event should be ok. =Nichalp «Talk»= 16:10, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Queen (band)

• Lengthy article that, following a massive cleanup, is now very concise and has much improved writing. Very comprehensive and well cited.TheImpossibleMan 13:12, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. Still has issues.The first few sentences of the lead are quite POV, and the tone of the article is at many times unencyclopedic and chatty in nature. Seems to have good content, however, it is close but needs a careful comb-over to remove POVa nd install a more formal tone. RyanGerbil10 13:39, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. No references whatsoever, so it fails the basic requirements for FAC. Also agree with Ryan about the overall tone. I would suggest a rewrite and full references, and then a trip to Peer Review. Kafziel 14:04, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. The lead itself is witness to several Weasel word phrases such as "they have generally become recognized" and "considered by many to be the first true music video". The member section is only a bullet list telling songs they wrote. There are many opinions in the article, such as "In hindsight, it's considered to be a strong first album." The fan fiction bit about "Journey of the Dead" should be deleted. As you admit on the Queen talk page [1], the page still needs a clean-up. I would suggest that instead of continuing through FAC, which is designed for articles which are already clean and referenced, that you refer to both Peer review and, specifically, to add the suggestions of the Featured Music Project.--Ataricodfish 16:13, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. The article is over-sectioned to death. All the year-by-year subheaders need to be consolidated such that the TOC is not bloated beyond usability. Try to name to sections such that the the reader can scan the TOC to pick out a distinct era, rather than relying on the reader to know the exact year of the Queen history they're searching for.—thames 16:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Move to Peer Review. Please move this article to WP:PR so that suggestions and recommendations made during that process can be incorporated into the article. AreJay 19:06, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object per reasons above; see my comments on peer review. AndyZ 21:21, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment The nominator has opened a peer review for this article. As such, I believe that the FAC nomination can be closed.--Ataricodfish 21:24, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ayn Rand

I would like to move to re-nominate the Ayn Rand Article for a Wiki Featured Article due to the fact that all of the problems have been cleared up and the new version is both informative and well-written. The Fading Light 5:59, 2 May 2006 Previous nomination.

• Images do not meet licencing requirments, all fair use images need fair use rationales.--nixie 00:06, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose per nixie. - FrancisTyers 00:49, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
• Oh Good God! Why on earth do some of you people have to be so nit-picky and kill off any enjoyment you might find in working on Wiki? The Fading Light 10:10, 2 May 2006
  • Settle down. Personal attacks are against the rules of Wikipedia. -- LGagnon 02:16, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose. The cult section is still not fully explored. Several other arguments, including more in the cited sources alone, have not been added. Also, I made a recommendation for a separate article for this section (as the Rand article is getting quite big, and it would help for consistency's sake to have a central article on the subject) which has not yet been addressed. -- LGagnon 02:16, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm changing my vote to Strong Oppose. As the "Ayn Rand cult" article, which supplimented this article, was deleted (same old Objectivist bias on Wikipedia), the section on the cult claims is even weaker. There's a lot of work to be done to recover all the information deleted by so-called "unbiased" editors and a lack of safeguards against a tyranny of the majority. -- LGagnon 23:53, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
• Comment. It looks like a good article, but I have a few nitpicks. The 'Is Objectivism a cult?' section has several quotes, one of them is very large: consider reducing the quote overload (move the to Wikiquote). Some tiny sections are but a stub sections and should be expanded: 'Ayn Rand Institute' and 'Popular interest' are currently stub sections.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 02:22, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
• Support. The cult section is not good, but it is not a widely discussed aspect of Ayn Rand's life and is not essential to the article. I'm more bothered that almost all the references are to web pages; one of them is just a google search. It would be more credible to cite stable and edited paper sources, such as the ones in the "Further Reading" section. But even though it's not perfect, this article seems to meet the FA criteria. Our remaining concerns can be addressed later.--Yannick 01:51, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
  • The cult section is, in fact, essential. How can the article be NPOV if we remove the most important criticism of Rand? -- LGagnon 12:52, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting removing that section by any means. I just don't think it is essential for that section to be polished in order to deem the article comprehensive. This is the harshest criticism Rand, but it is not widespread and only has peripheral importance.--Yannick 04:21, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

• Support. This looks to be a well-written and extensively footnoted article about a person in whom many people are interested.--Coemgenus 20:59, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I Believe in You

Note: The article in question has been moved to I Believe in You (Kylie Minogue song) to create a disambiguation page.

I believe that this article is worthy of being a featured article: it is well written, comprehensive, referenced, neutral and stable, and complies with the WP:MOS. It uses three images: two of single covers and one of the music video, and they have "acceptable copyright status". I really believe that this article meets the FA criteria -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 00:41, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

(this is a self-nomination) -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 00:46, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Nom and support! -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 00:46, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• tentative support this is a pretty short but nice article about a single... I'm not sure I can say more than that but it appears to meet the FA criteria besides a couple unreferenced things which the submitter appears to be working on. Just another star in the night ^{T | @ | C}

01:13, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Conditional Support. Like other FAs about songs, this article needs a section detailing the release of the songs, versions, etc. RyanGerbil10 02:03, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support I think the article it is well written and comprehensive. I'll try to help expand certain sections, but as of right now I think the article is very informative. — Underneath-it-All 02:58, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object I think the article needs work. There is a great deal of passive voice, especially in the short lead, as "is" or "was" is the verb in every sentence (In particular, the phrase "The song was ..." is used often). There are weasel word phrases and opinions, such as;

"The song takes its inspiration from 70s disco and 80s electro-pop music, and has been descibed as a nod to 80s band New Order." -- i.e., who described it as 80's New Order?

"The chorus is recognized as the highlight of the song..." is also an opinion -- who recognizes it as a highlight?

"The collaboration with Shears and Babbydaddy was seen as an unlikely collaboration." -- Seen by who?

"The music video has been compared to Dannii Minogue's music video for "I Begin To Wonder"." -- Who has compared it?, and so on.

The article is much too short, with paragraphs of only one or two sentences. There is also nothing which shows why this song is notable -- how did the recording process go? Why was it a "unlikely collaboration"? How has this song advanced / declined her career? After these additions and a peer review, I'll be glad to evaluate the article again, but as it stands, it needs considerable work. --Ataricodfish 06:17, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I've sourced/removed your four weasel word points and added a bit about how the song returned Minogue to popularity in the American dance market. The song is notable because it is a charting single release from Kylie Minogue -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 23:06, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but the article is still very much incomplete and needs tremendous work. Take a look at something like Real Love (song) or Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me) for examples of more complete Featured Articles on songs. The articles tell the motivation for writing the song, how the songs were recorded, why, and how they were influental to the performer's career. After reading the article, I fail to see how the song is important besides it being just another song Kylie recorded. Also, there should probably be some book sources, or at least something besides Internet links. My objection remains, and I would recommend that you place the article in Peer Review first as, despite your good intentions and admiration of Kylie, it's not ready for FA yet. --Ataricodfish 03:19, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Object The article is far too short and lacking in detail to be a featured article. In fact, without the charts and track listings the article would be almost laughingly short. In addition, was there any cultural impact from the song? The article also lacks bio info on the singer and lots more.--Alabamaboy 19:57, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean by "the article lacks bio info on the singer"? Kylie Minogue is covered in the main Kylie Minogue article. I am not sure if you want me to bring some of that information into this article? -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 23:06, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

The article should still have some bio info about Minogue, along with a Main article link to the main article on her. If needed, bring a bit (not all) of the main article stuff into this article. Please note, though, that this is a minor issue with the article. The other issues I raised are more substantial.--Alabamaboy 00:42, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that the article is too short.. I have expanded the "Composition" and the "Chart performance" sections. And I do not believe that the single has impacted any cultures (it only reached the top five in most european countries) -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 00:58, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Object. An overall short and choppy article. The prose is uncompelling: there is no flow or variance of sentence structure. Almost every sentence (especially in the lead) begins with "The song...". Secondly, the article fails the comprehensive section of the FA criteria. Not once does it discuss the history behind the music: the studio sessions, etc. Moreover, while it does talk of the "music", there is still a lot to discuss: the theme of the lyrics, the key in which the song is set (major or minor), the melody, time signature, the song structure (does it follow the verse-chorus form, AABA? etc) The writers quoted lyrics, but why? They have not discussed it indepth, nor have they commented on its strenght/weakness. It seems to be there to take up space. Thirdly, the article is poorly sourced. Just 6 sources are included, most of which are critical appreciation. The rest of the article that discusses "song composition" is not sourced (except for a quote), and if left this way, could be construed as original research. Fourth, there is a picture at music video, but how does it contribute significantly to the article? The caption reads something like "a scene from the video"(not a direct quote). However, you need to use that pic to help show something notable about the video. In its current state, it's there just for decoration. Good attempt, but this article needs much —and I do mean "much"— more work to be considered ready. I suggest peer review. I really hope the writers dont get discouraged; it has potential. Orane (t) (c) (e) 22:01, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I have changed up the intro and there are now eleven sources, and I have changed the caption of the picture. I fully understand your second point and I will try and improve on that when I'm not busy. -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 23:06, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I've attempted to improve on the discussion of the "music" (composition section). I hope I've done it right, I don't have much experience in that area. -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 01:16, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

CommentI'm sorry, but no, you certainly have not. What you did was a direct cut and paste of the "music and structure" section of "We Belong Together", slightly altering text to "fit" your article, and I must say, I'm a bit disappointed: 1) its like reading a mirror article/total rip-off of "We Belong together", which is really weird, since the content in that article was written by yours truly, and 2) the text does not fit in another article, especially this one. You could have atleast altered the words just to make it less obvious. Moreover, unlike WBT, none of the new info in your article sourced, which brings us right back to original research. Changed vote to "strong object." Orane (t) (c) (e) 02:56, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I used that format because I knew that WBT's article had a good "music/structure" section... I will alter the text further and find some more sources -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 03:02, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

You could have used the same format without a direct copy and paste. Orane (t) (c) (e) 03:10, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Also, I know FACs can be brutal, and the objectors can be a real pain in the ass, but please just hang in there ok? Orane (t) (c) (e) 03:12, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment→ I have realized that with the addition to the music section comes a deterioration of prose and coherence. Examples:
• ""I Believe in You" includes three sections of melodies, each with Minogue in slightly different emotions" — I just don't get what this sentence is saying. "Three sections of melodies"? Also, what are the different emotions?
• "This melody is maintained throughout the song, except for occasional pauses for Minogue's verses" —poor musical explanation.
• "Written and recorded for Ultimate Kylie during the summer of 2004 in London, the song takes its inspiration from disco and 80s new wave electro-pop music and has been descibed as similar to 80s band New Order. This is evident in the rhythm of the song: the song opens with a keyboard playing the choral melody in a 4/4 time signature." —Does the fact that the song opens with a keyboard in a 4/4 time signature means that it is inspired by 80s disco? How come?
• "During the second section, she lowers her tone and sings in a sweet voice" — are you implying that she was singing in a higher pitch in the first verse? Also, who said her voice was "sweet", you or a critic?
• ""Nothing lasts for ever, but together til the end, I'll give you everything I have again and again," Minogue sings during the bridge of the song." — what is notable about this section that merits a quote/special mention? I would really advise that you do some research. Orane (t) (c) (e) 19:41, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Conditional Support -I'm a firm believer in article length not always having anything to do with quality, and on quality grounds it's there. However, I DO have a problem with 3 fair use images. The cover should stay, the music video, noted for it's effect, is beautifully illustrated. The alternate cover, however, adds precisely nothing to the article and stretches fair use. It needs to be dumped. -M^ask 02:38, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I guess you're right. I've removed the alternate cover image -- getcrunkjuice^contribs 02:45, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

And now you get full support -M^ask 05:35, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object please have the article peer reviewed first. Zzzzz 09:52, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object Reads like a well-written fan piece rather than the 1-in-1100 that is a Featured Article. There's even typos (which I'm fixing as I find them). Should be peer reviewed first. --kingboyk 13:35, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. There are multiple typos throughout the article and the subject ("I Believe in You") is incorrectly spelling in several places, where "in" appears capitalized. The chart trajectories need to be removed and replaced with a graph similar to those included in We Belong Together and Cool (song). In addition, where is the information on the music? What chord is it in? What is the time signature? Are there any bass guitars, a piano, or even a clarinet? Refer the article to peer review. —Eternal Equinox | talk 23:10, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment- I would advise any author to ditch the graph style. It takes up more memory and is less exact then a chart. Considering We Belong Together did not make it, I'd also advise any author to take ideas from that article with a grain of salt. -M^ask 20:50, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment— Just because an article did not make it, that does not mean that it cannot be used as a model. Most of the objections were on image copyright and a few instances of poor prose, not comprehensiveness nor content. i.e. it can be used. Orane (t) (c) (e) 00:49, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment - should be very careful about quoting lyrics. They are copyright and governed by the same fair use rules as images and sound samples. If lyrics are to be quoted there must be a reason and they must be discussed in sufficient depth, that the inclusion of an extract from the lyrics is necessary. This is not the case here. Two sizeable chunks of lyrics are reproduced and I can't see any reason for it. One section is just there - no explanation - is it just for decoration? What is the point you are trying to make with these lyrics? The other bit is where Kylie sings "in a sweet voice" (whatever that means) and in this context whatever lyrics she is singing is irrelevant as the point seems to be about her "sweet voice". Please remove these. Rossrs 00:04, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] AIDS

This article has been listed at the Good articles for some time now. It was also a Medicine Collaboration of the Week where it underwent a lot of improvements and it has also been through a Peer review. It is well-referenced, current, comprehensive, and, I will let you tell us if it is well-written. It has remianed stable for a long period of time, except from the obvious vandalism which a page like this does suffer from. This is a semi-self-nomination as I have worked a lot on this, but this should not detract from the nomination. --Bob 22:52, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

NOTE about page size. Since all the references are inline to this article, the page size warning gives a page size that is twice as large as the readable prose of the actual article. Thus, as I write this, the readable prose of this article is just a bit above 40KB ; about right for the topic, IMO. --mav 16:10, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Object - Everybody should look at the wikitext for this article - what a HUGE mess. It is practically unreadable due to the fact that full reference information is hidden in in it. That is very bad style - the full alphabetically sorted by name reference information should be in a ===Works cited=== subsection under ==References== with <references/> under ===Notes==. The ONLY thing that should be inline is things like <ref>Smith et al, 1995, page 56</ref> or better yet in this case (Smith et al, 1995, page 56). Be brief and to the point so as not to make editing the article more difficult than necessary. Here is an example of what I'm talking about:

Most researchers believe that HIV originated in [[sub-Saharan Africa]] <ref name=Gao>{{ cite journal | author=Gao, F., Bailes, E., Robertson, D. L., Chen, Y., Rodenburg, C. M., Michael, S. F., Cummins, L. B., Arthur, L. O., Peeters, M., Shaw, G. M., Sharp, P. M. and Hahn, B. H. | title=Origin of HIV-1 in the Chimpanzee Pan troglodytes troglodytes | journal=Nature | year=1999 | pages=436-441 | volume=397 | issue=6718 | id={{PMID |9989410}} {{doi|10.1038/17130}} }}</ref> during the twentieth century; it is now a [[pandemic]]. As of January 2006, [[UNAIDS]] and the [[World Health Organization]] (WHO) estimate that AIDS has killed more than 25 million people since it was first recognized on [[December 1]], [[1981]], making it one of the most destructive [[pandemics]] in recorded history. In 2005 alone, AIDS claimed between an estimated 2.8 and 3.6 million, of which more than 570,000 were children <ref name=UNAIDS>{{ cite web | author=[[UNAIDS]] | publisher= | year= 2005 | url=http://www.unaids.org/Epi2005/doc/EPIupdate2005_pdf_en/epi-update2005_en.pdf | title=AIDS epidemic update, 2005 | accessdate=2006-01-17 }}</ref>. In countries where there is access to [[antiretroviral drug|antiretroviral]] treatment, both [[mortality]] and [[morbidity]] of HIV infection have been reduced <ref name=Palella>{{ cite journal | author=Palella, F. J. Jr, Delaney, K. M., Moorman, A. C., Loveless, M. O., Fuhrer, J., Satten, G. A., Aschman and D. J., Holmberg, S. D. | title=Declining morbidity and mortality among patients with advanced human immunodeficiency virus infection. HIV Outpatient Study Investigators | journal=N. Engl. J. Med | year=1998 | pages=853-860 | volume=338 | issue=13 | id={{PMID |9516219}} }}</ref>.

That is horrid. The whole purpose of wikisyntax is to avoid unreadable source text like that. Featured articles are supposed to serve as examples of best practice - the above is certainly not best practice. --mav 23:40, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment The article uses the templates {{cite journal}}, {{cite book}} and {{cite web}}. There are also other FA's with such templates in use, such as Pneumonia. Harvard citations were removed because they made the text unreadable. The wikitext has been formatted in such a way in that it is NOT displayed as portrayed above.--Bob 00:42, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

The above formating is the result of the way the nowiki tag works, but still shows the effect of breaking up sentences. And Pneumonia does not use the CITE templates at all, let alone inline. Sorry, but doing so is ugly and makes the wikitext unreadable. MUCH more consensed use of citing is needed inline with the detail in a ===Works cited=== subsection under ==References==. --mav 01:24, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

So, you feel that this is better?: Bacteria were first seen in the airways of individuals who died from pneumonia by [[Edwin Klebs]] in [[1875]].<ref name=klebs>Klebs E. Beiträge zur Kenntniss der pathogenen Schistomyceten. VII Die Monadinen. ''Arch. exptl. Pathol. Parmakol.'' 1875 Dec 10;4(5/6):40-488.</ref> Initial work identifying the two common bacterial causes ''Streptococcus pneumoniae'' and ''Klebsiella pneumoniae'' was performed by [[Carl Friedländer]]<ref name=fried>Friedländer C. Über die Schizomyceten bei der acuten fibrösen Pneumonie.'' Virchow's Arch pathol. Anat. u. Physiol.'' 1882 Feb 4;87(2):319-324.</ref> and [[Albert Fraenkel]]<ref name=fraenkel>Fraenkel A. Über die genuine Pneumonie, Verhandlungen des Congres für innere Medicin. ''Dritter Congress''. 1884 April 21;3:17-31.</ref> in [[1882]] and [[1884]], respectively..

Just because it uses a non-standard template, it is just as difficult to read for the editor, and is not formatted in such a way as to make it easier to read. As stated below and previously, the citation method used in the AIDS article is seen to be best practice at the moment. And the way you would have us reference it would mean two sets of reference tables for the same set of references, either that or Harvard references which makes it hard to read, or incomplete references which cannot be verified. If you read the Talk:AIDS page you would have seen discussion on this point. --Bob 17:54, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, that is best practise at the moment. It's the fault of the >ref< system for needing inline citations. The article uses nicely standardised citation templates and formatting, and uses auto-numbered and linked references to make maintenance that much easier. Your proposed solution would not work properly since you have to have cited the reference once before >ref< will pick it up and display it. (And I don't think an alpahabetically sorted list of citations is amongst the currently used referencing systems anywhere on Wikipedia, but I could be wrong.) -Splash^talk 01:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

What? How is that the fault of the ref system? All one needs is to have the detailed information about each reference in the references section and for the refs to be used to refer to that while using the minimal amount of text '<ref>{Smith et al, 2004, page 56)</ref>' <-- THAT is all you need inline. That is best practice. The detail should NOT be inline. --mav 01:24, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

But then how would you construct the templated links in such a way that they get autonumbered when you rearrange the text? -Splash^talk 01:31, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

As I understand mav's suggestion, there would be one section of footnotes, produced by ref tags and autonumbered, but without detailed citations. The detail would go in a separate section which would be arranged alphabetically, not by the order they are referred to in the article (Smith et al would be filed under s, and would tell you where to find Smith's article). Mark^{your words} 17:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Agree with the suggestion; for the inline citations, put a simple thing within each <ref> tag (see J. R. R. Tolkien#Notes as an example), and move the bulk of the referencing into a separate "References" section. However, despite being actionable, I don't think this goes again any of the WP:WIAFA requirements and don't feel as if it is a valid reason for objection. AndyZ 21:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Tolkien article uses the {{cite web}} within the text exactly like the AIDS article does, yet there is no objection to that. Your suggestion would be fine if there was under 10 references, but since there are a lot more, it is not practical to repeat references like that, especially when many references are referred to just once. What the suggestion asks for is a repitition of the reference section, ie, two sections for the same thing. The current method employs a way to automatically numerate the list with backlinks to every citation within the article, making it extremely reader-friendly.--Bob 22:03, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

The Tolkien article also has {{cite book}} within the text, and for the journal references, big chunks of hidden data as well with no standard format, which the {{cite journal}} would bring. Really, if both Tolkien and Pneumonia can be FA with hidden inline data to make up the the reference sections, then what is the problem with the AIDS article?--Bob 22:08, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Strong Support - I've been looking at the AIDS article for quite a while now. I was a heavy contributor last summer, and it was a mess; been checking in on it regularly ever since. Right now, it's lookin' really awesome, well referenced and well written. Great job to all involved, lets make this a featured article! JoeSmack ^Talk 01:07, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Support. This article is excellently written. I went back to read WP:What is a Featured Article?, and found no mention of readability of wikitext as a criterion for featured status. Considering that, I am inclined to say mav's objection is not valid. I think it is simply silly to reject such a complete, well-written article that also happens to be NPOV on what could be a controversial topic, on such grounds. It is akin to judging the quality of a car on whether or not the factory that made it washes their floors every night. RyanGerbil10 01:58, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose -- the article is in a huge mess. There are too many subsections and lists giving rise to a bloated ToC. Some sections serve as trivia while others are too short. Make sure you use minimal subsection (if possible avoid them). Secondly, much of the text is heavily US oriented: In the USA, the definition of AIDS is...; The majority of new AIDS cases in the United States; However, these assays are not specifically approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration etc. AIDS is a global phenomena and US specifics should not dominate the article. =Nichalp «Talk»= 10:31, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment --Subsections have been removed, ToC has been reduced in size and is not disimilar to other FA's. The text has been modified so it is not heavily US orientated. --Bob 19:00, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

The ToC is dissimilar to most other FAs I know of. The article also cries out for a summary. 76kb is a very long article. =Nichalp «Talk»= 14:55, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Maybe you should read other FAs on scientific subjects then. Please see DNA_repair, Antarctic krill, Pneumonia and Action potential. All have similar ToCs. Other FAs are longer than this, and remember, about a third of the length is made up of references, external links and interwiki links. --Bob 17:21, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I would have objected to those articles too. I ignore references etc while estimating the page size. Taking 20 kb off would still result in a raw size of about 55kb. Summarise content here, move details to dedicated daughter articles. =Nichalp «Talk»= 17:47, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the cite.php also increases page size. If you take out refs and cite.php and external links to other wikipedias, the size of the article is only 39kb, 40kb needs to be taken off to correctly estimate the size of the page... --Bob 18:16, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Presentation is one of the key points in a featured article. If it is not neatly presented and needless detail added to the page, it does not deserve the Featured tag. =Nichalp «Talk»= 12:46, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

What, exactly, do you oppose to? Please make a point by point list detailing exactly what parts you object to and why. Please include subsections you object to and why, and what you think could be done to improve the article's presentation. Also, I have tried removing the subsections in the symptoms section, and it looked much worse. Without the point by point objection list, I would have to deem your objection unfounded. --Bob 17:51, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support.Oppose - not comprehensive: no section on social consequences of AIDS. It should discuss both the micro consequences (ostracism of carriers, etc.) and macro (threat to African economy, etc.).I'd exepct that those matters are important enough to deserve their own subarticle.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 03:34, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Done --Bob 17:21, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

That's a good start on the stigma section, although 1) bullet points are not the best style 2) I am sure it can be expanded 3) see also to external links is definetly not recommended. But there is still little on macro-level impact of AIDS - although quite a lot of relevant info is mixed into the 'Epidemiology' section. I think the economic impact of AIDS deserves its own section.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 03:46, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

- Will somehow make more... --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Good job. While I think those sections can be expanded even further, this can be done in their subarticles - they should be comprehensive enough for the current 'overview of AIDS' article. One last thing to be done is to go over those new sections and ilink some important concepts like 'economic growth, 'human capital', 'death rate', 'labor force' and such.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 22:40, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Minor Oppose - Not for the reasons above, but rather, I'm a stickler for WP:LEAD sections to be of the appropriate size. In this case, it should be three paragraphs. I'd support otherwise. Fieari 21:21, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Three paragraphs is what it now is. --Bob 22:01, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Support now. Fieari 22:33, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Note that as I write this it's back up to six. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 04:15, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

I really am a stickler for this. Removing my support until the lead is properly sized. It's "only" 4, but not only is it 4 paragraphs, those are also dense, long paragraphs. It's too much for a lead. Fieari 05:47, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

It has been condensed and reduced to three --Bob 16:01, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Flip-flop, flip-flop... back to support. Good condensing! Fieari 19:04, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support Interesting and comprehensive. Brisvegas 10:01, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Thethinredline 08:06, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Tentative Oppose Abstain A lot of work has gone into this, but I don't feel that it's suitable for FA:
  • Parts of the article read like an instruction manual, which wikipedia is WP:NOT. In particular the areas on the use of condoms, eg "They must be used during all penetrative sexual intercourse ..." and "It is essential to check the expiration date ..."

- rewording --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• • Weasel words are sometimes used. For example, "Other religious groups have argued that preventing HIV infection is a moral task in itself ..." - which religious groups?

- stated the Episcopalians --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• • The section about Uganda sounds like an argument in progress.

-The whole situation of the CNN and ABC is an argument in progress. Just listen to politicians and right wing nutbars on this subject --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but the wikipedia article text could do with some cleaning up. Anything that uses "It must be noted that" is a red flag to me. Andjam 03:48, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Noted.--Bob 17:52, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

• • The table of risk of infection sounds like original research - it gathers the risk on different infection routes from different sources, and comes up with a conclusion as to which routes are most dangerous. If there is a "league table" out there, wikipedia should cite it instead, and if there isn't, is there a good reason for wikipedia to create one? As a side note, in the table, does oral sex refer to sex involving male or female genitalia?

- stated the CDC source --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• • Maybe fewer research papers should be used, with more secondary sources instead, so that the number of references are reduced. The article ought to read like an encyclopedia article, not like a scientific paper. Also, scientific papers tend to be designed for scientists (and are often unavailable for non-scientists).

- most papers are available to the general public through open access or through their local college library --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• • The paragraph starting with "The definition of "alternative therapies" in AIDS has changed since that time ..." seems a bit flowery. It also lacks references.

- You want us to use less references, but you request some more here? ;-). I will see what I can dig up, but the whole alternative therapies section is flowery IMHO, and decent reliable references not using commercial sources is difficult at best. However... --Bob 18:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I guess most sources promoting alternative therapies would be commercial in nature, but what about sources keeping track of them? Wouldn't mainstream health researchers be interested in tracking the use in alternative therapies as they'd view it as a source of concern? Andjam 03:48, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

• I hope I'm not being too harsh. Thanks, Andjam 12:37, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, comprehensive, and as it is a high-importance article, it has to be a bit long. Using too many daughter articles kills the prose, so I wouldn't recommend splitting it any more. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 23:43, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment - can we please remove the reference citations from the lead and shift them into the main article body? I say this because the lead is only a very general summary of the most salient main points of the article — as no info should be in the lead that isn't dealt with further in the main article there is no need for references. The point of the lead is not to introduce specific facts: it is to be almost like an executive summary of the main article. - Ta bu shi da yu 14:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Reply- the references were added to this section after the statements were frequently removed precisely because they were not backed up with references --Bob 17:57, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Well, you can still move them into the main body of the text. If people complain, point them to the body. - Ta bu shi da yu 22:39, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

• Reluctant support. There are a few places with unusual writing quality. —Eternal Equinox | talk 15:51, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
• Object; excessively long lead (6 paragraphs!) and furthermore, "For more details on this topic" stuck in the middle of the lead. Incidentally, what's the difference between "For more details" and "main article"? Why have both? Why put some of them at the beginning of a section and some at the end? Too much bold used throughout article (just the title please), and inconsistent inline citation positioning throughout (citations should follow punctuation with no space in between to prevent line breaking, which is happening here and looks terrible). Also, the punctuation is sometimes used both before the citation and after. And still, too many subsections. Gigantic low resolution screen eating table in the "Transmission" section, with text jammed up against it (do something to add some space there). Numerous very short paragraphs. What's the copyright status of Image:ThreeColoredRolledUpCondoms.jpg? This is a good article, but as Nichalp said, it's a mess. This breaks so many basic formatting rules that it is almost deserving of a cleanup tag. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 04:02, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Reply

The Image:ThreeColoredRolledUpCondoms.jpg is Copyrighted Free Use as per the owner of the photograph. The name of the image has been changed to reflect the one that the person taking the photograph uploaded.

The lead was extended to six paragraphs because a section title was deleted. This has been rectified.

Regarding "For more details" and "main article"', main details links to the main article on that subject, further reading is just that, further reading. The formats are standard for every section.

Inline citation is now standardised.

There are now only 11 subsections listed.

Bolding has been reduced throughout.

The table has been reduced in size and formatted so a margin of 15px is found around it.

Are there any other specific points that one would have to address? --Bob 20:47, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Good work. I've been bold and made it so that there is only one extra link per section, and incorporated the rest into the prose itself. In my experience, that's the more typical formatting. My complaint about subsections wasn't related to the ToC, but to the size of some of them. The ones in the diagnosis section are pretty short, but that's not a big deal. Thanks for taking care of the rest of it. Reading through it, I still feel like the prose can use some improvement (some passive voice and somewhat choppy in places), so I'll go with a weak support. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 03:04, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Not well enough written for 2a. Here are some examples.

"It is a late stage of advanced HIV infection which leaves individuals prone to opportunistic infections and tumors." Starting this second sentence at the top with a thematic equative is laboured; there's a particular meaning here that is redundant (the late stage is the only thing that leaves individuals prone ...).

"world-wide"—no hyphen, one word.

"access to health care, age and other coexisting infections"—ambiguous.

"many different definitions"—middle word is redundant.

"peculiarities of the viral strain"—do you mean just "the viral strain"?

progression to death normally occurs within a year"—why not remove the first two words?

India based infections"—clumsy, and hyphen missing in any case.

Most instances of "also" need to be weeded out. A few of the monster sentences need to be chopped up.

A few stray upper-case letters in titles and subtitles.

Please get someone else to go through the text to polish it, and I'll change my object. Tony 16:30, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Reply I had a friend look over it and copyedit it, I applied these copedits today. Your objections noted above have been addressed, though I don't know which monster sentences you were referring to. If there are any specific points that we may have overlooked, please feel free to help out, as help from a pro would be appreciated in getting this article up to FA status. --Bob 22:11, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support In light of the prograss that has been made during this FAC. Vulcanstar6 01:09, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bush v. Gore

This is not really a self-nomination as the article differs significantly from my first draft and is very complete and well researched. I feel its coverage of the case is uncommmonly good, the endnotes really clarify things and its well cited.

—This unsigned comment was added by Reboot (talk • contribs) . RyanGerbil10 02:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Lacks proper footnoting. RyanGerbil10 02:11, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object This article fails FA requirements on many counts:
  • Please use either {{ref}}/{{note}} or <ref> to cite your sources.
  • Also, the Relevent Law section needs to be expanded so that it makes sense to readers that don't have a legal background. All I see now are exerpts from clauses in the constitution.
  • The verbiage of the three bullets in The issues is non encyclopedic. Rephrase.
  • The article discusses the merits of Bush's claims while not touching upon Gore's claims.
    • Comment. This objection is completely wrong. The merits both parties' cases are discussed in the "issues" section, which (in the interest of full disclosure) I wrote. You will be hard pressed to find a more neutral presentation of each side's case anywhere. However, I agree that this article needs substantial work, but mainly in the "decision" section. Kronius 00:45, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
  • In-line citation is very limited in this article. This was a fairly important ruling in what was a controversial election. Appropriate citations are required to justify that the article complies with NPOV requirements.
  • Please move this article to WP:PR and incorporate any suggestions you receive there. AreJay 22:21, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object, no peer review done before FAC, lacks footnoting does not meet FA standards. I suggest withdrawal of this nomination. --Terence Ong 11:37, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment A peer review is not necessary before an article comes to FAC. A very good idea, but not necessary - The Catfish 03:36, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Cannae

I believe that this is a highly informative page that provides a comprehensive view of the Battle, as well as quotes, tactical dispostions, and its effects. Furthermore, I believe that this article fully meets the given WP:WIAFA for a featured article......--chub 23:16, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Two comments: One, per WP:LEAD, the lead should be expanded, and two, the external links in the text should also be converted to WP:FOOTNOTEs and have citation information. Thanks, AndyZ 20:41, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Approve: But other than the few minor errors mentioned above (which can be easily corrected), I see no other reason why this article shouldn't be accepted--199.232.104.30 21:07, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• You have a lot of inline citations refering to the samefootnotes. Unfortunately, the baclinks will only ever link to the first citation. You might want to convert the article to the <ref> system. I'll help if you wantCirceus 22:09, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support, looks very well-written and well-cited. It would be nice if the citations were converted to <ref> format and if the lead was lengthened, both points already brought up, but those alone are not sufficient to stop me from supporting. —Cuiviénen, Thursday, 23 March 2006 @ 02:20 (UTC)

• Comment. Battles articles have usually a picture or a painting of the scene as a lead image. The map is really bad, I took a while before finding the Cannae town. I suggest you improve it by showing only the Italian peninsula. CG 16:59, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Adressing and acting upon comments: I appreciate the advice. I have expanded the lead. I am not aware of the </ref/> system, so I may need help with improving the citations. --chub 23:17, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Citations I converted the article to Cite.php <ref>s,but there were a couple issues:
    • I found 3 refs without equivalent notes, 2 were labelled "sealy" and one "gowen". They are still in the source, but commented out.
    • If a references does not have footnotes attaches, do not put {{note}} before it. These refs are in the "References" section instead of "Footnotes"
    • There are still 2 external links that should be converted to footnotes (The Cannae book link and the Titus livius citation), you might want to look into {{Cite web}}
    • I could not properly reference the PDF because I could not access it (A failure I blame on a problem with the PDFdownload extension of Firefox), someone else should fix it.
  • Circeus 15:47, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support: The article appears to be extremely well-written with numerous citations that are now properly formatted (for the most part). --24.91.242.154 23:46, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Minor Comments: As far as details and content goes, this article is indeed FA-worthy. Inline citations are properly formatted and the lead has been expanded as requested. However, there is still room for improvement. I recommend that this article undergo minor grammatical revision if (or before) it is to be saved as a featured article (fragments in the lead need to be eliminated. Furthermore, I suggest that (1) The lead include more details about the aftermath of the Battle (it provides a summary of the battle itself but devotes only two lines of info on its effects) (2) and The "United States Military Academy" text on the images be removed (I think they are, for all purposes, unecessary). But other than that, the article seems to be considerably well-written and EXTREMELY informative. --24.91.242.154 02:20, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

The United States Military Academy text is not unecessary - but is part of the conditions of use of the copyrighted images. - Vedexent 16:31, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Another Comment: Someone also needs to check the numbers of casualties, since battle casualties (in all military history articles in general) often have a tendency to contradict each other.--24.91.242.154 05:41, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Lead of Article: I've made some minor adjustments to the lead. Unfortunately, I know very little about this topic, so I could not add any further details.--24.91.242.154 05:41, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

The lead is long enough in my opinion. It should not go in-dept and should only contain the most significant details. According to WP:LEAD: "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.". The fact that Cannae was not a decisive battle (meaning it did not determine the outcome of the Second Punic War) means that its strategic effects were limited. The defection of Capua and other Italian city states was perhaps the only significant strategic effect from the battle, and it is already mentioned in the lead.--Chubdub 19:06, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Strong Support + Comment: Looking over these commments and the recent adjustments made, I think the format of this article has been greatly improved. Together with the content (which features highly detailed descriptions about the tactical dispositions and an abundance of additional facts), I would say that this article is certainly FA-worthy. Alhtough I would like to see more pictures of the battle itself rather than just diagrams. I know this is ancient history, and no photos were in existence back then. So I found this "virtual reenactment" from the TV series of Decisive Battles (TV series)

http://home20.inet.tele.dk/creativ/Cannae1.jpg --P.O.N.Y. 19:21, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunatly such images cannot be used due to copyright restrictions. Images in an article have to be in the public domain, or have permission granted by the copyright holder. - Vedexent 20:46, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

*Weak oppose

• • I'd like to see my earlier comments on citations acted on,especially about making the PDF cited properly.
  • I don't think the big "trivia" section belong there. After all, if it is "trivia", then isn't it by definition unencyclopedic? If the material in there is really pertinent, then it should be possible to work it in the rest of the article. Circeus 19:52, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Article looks great and ready for featuring. Circeus 00:19, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Weak oppose with hopes the objections can be cleared up so the article gets the FAC it clearly deserves: - This is a well written article, with a balanced approach of Carthaginian and Roman perspectives, it describes the larger background of the war, the rationale of the commanders in their deployment, clearly lays out the stategies of the two forces, what happened as opposed to what was supposed to happen (at least for the Romans), and goes on to explore the results an significance of the battle. I think a lot of praise is deserved by the nominating author who has obviously put a great deal of time, research, and effort into this article.

However, there are large blocks of facts that are mentioned, without citation. The makeup of the forces is in question, but by who - what sources are being accepted by the author? There are claims for the strategy and viewpoint of Varro and Hannibal; facinating and informative, but where do they come from?

I'm of the opinion that there should be a 1:1 ratio of claim (or group of related claims) and referance: "X was the case _[1]. This caused Y _[2]. There is evidence that Q,W, and W were probably in place, and this most likely would have lead to M_[3], although it has been said by others that they would have resulted in P instead _[4]." My example is pretty citation heavy (really, citations shouldn't be inside a sentance), but you get the idea.

Unfortunatly there are large blocks of claims that read like they do come out of the volumes in the bilbiography, so I don't think they are spurious, but they are not referenced, so I cannot find them.

This is well written and informative article. I just think it needs to be a little more informative about where it gets the information from. - Vedexent 19:44, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

• Slight retraction - some of the views attributed to Varro and Hannibal are cited. Plus, the ones that are not could be due to recent re-organization of some of the paragraphs by ... ahem... me.... (mea culpa) - and the citing author may want to examine the "tactical deployment" section to see if the citations need to be moved around. There are other areas that still do have the problem I outlined, however. - 19:51, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support' with Minor niggling complaint - The author did a boatload of footnoting since my comment. We also discussed the footnoting style, and while I personally would like to see page numbers in the references, they don't seem to be needed for the Wikipedia style :) The only slight complaint I might still have re inline references is that there seem to be two diffrerent styles of footnotes being used - and because of this the numbering sequence seems to jump around out of sequence. Other than that, looks good to go :) - Vedexent 01:03, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

I feel that since this article is both well-written and informative on the reign of Queen Elizabeth II that it should be our next featured article.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by The Fading Light (talk • contribs) 01:24, March 20, 2006 (UTC).

• Oppose - There are a number of reasons to oppose this article, but the most notable are (a) insufficient referencing and (b) because she is still Queen. As long as she is Queen, the article is not stable enough to become an FA; this was also an argument used in opposition to other FAs for current politicians or world leaders. Citations, preferably footnotes, are also needed so that the article is verifiable. —Cuiviénen, Monday, 20 March 2006 @ 03:14 (UTC)

Tony Blair is a featured article even though he is the incumbent Prime Minister. --Terence Ong 11:33, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree on this point. I've always assumed that the 'stability' requirement meant that there isn't still huge debate and revert-warring going on over the article (which would obviously mean that a featured article might rapidly change to junk) - but I don't imagine it means that subjects where real-world facts are still being accumulated can't be FA's - that would exclude a large number of important topics from ever being featured. (However, there are sufficient other reasons to Oppose - so this is a moot point) SteveBaker 15:32, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I concur with Steve and Terence. Saying we can't have FAs on living politicans or heads of state is like insisting we should only have FAs on extinct languages. And Elizabeth II isn't really all that controversial to begin with.

Peter ^Isotalo 15:47, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose - (a) Four of the images have unacceptable copyright status - all of the others are listed as 'fair use'. (b) Definitely insufficient references. There must be a bazillion books written on this subject - there is no excuse for not using them to back up the facts in this lengthy article. SteveBaker 03:20, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose. The above reasons other users stated concern me. The article has lack of sources and references and is not very well written after all. This article definitely needs more improvement, and sources must be verifiable. --Terence Ong 11:33, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Black Sabbath

This is a very influential band and I beleive it should be nominated because it meets all the standards for a Featured Article. --GorillazFanAdam 01:31, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object Unfortunately there are no references at all leading to weasel words issues and possible POV issues. Bwithh 01:25, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object, and would recommend a referral to Peer Review The article needs a complete copyedit for grammar, opinions, and the aforementioned weasel words. An example in the intro, "Even though Judas Priest, Cream, and Deep Purple may have had a profound influence on the emergence of hard rock and heavy metal music, Black Sabbath is generally considered, along with Led Zeppelin, one of the primary forces of the genre. And the founding fathers of heavy metal." The first sentence is a run-on filled with opinions, the second sentence needs a verb. References are needed, and sources should be placed for all the POV statements ("This later became known as a hoax, possibly due to the fact that it was the April issue of the magazine and during the shifting lineups of the 1980s, the Kerrang! staff seemed to enjoy poking fun at Black Sabbath as it then existed.") and references to what the band said ("The eventual fate of the set is not clear, although Iommi has said it was probably abandoned on a loading dock somewhere."). --Ataricodfish 02:10, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object This is a comprehensive article well formatted and obviously reflects a lot of effort. Continue with that effort: you're 90% of the way to FA. Ataricodfish states things quite well. This article needs line citations and a copyedit. Opinion statements in particular need to be sourced. Bring in some music critics, interviews, and news articles. I'm making this an object instead of an oppose, but I know how much time it takes to track down adequate sources so my hunch is this article will get to FA on its second try. Run it through a peer review first to be sure it's ready and keep up the good work. Durova 06:49, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object, (1) No sources. Example: the first paragraph says "They are cited by many as the very first true heavy metal band." There need to be some citations to verify this. (2) Needs a general copyedit. I found a lot of run-ons and other details that need fixing, ie "They were ranked number 2 in VH1's '100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock' (Led Zeppelin was number 1)." should be "VH1's '100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock' ranked them second, behind Led Zeppelin." (3) Needs some cleanup. There are a lot of weasel words (see WP:AWW). There are also some trivial statements. The first sentence reads "Black Sabbath (sometimes called Sabbath by fans)..." Is knowing that they are sometimes called 'Sabbath' really noteworthy? I also noticed that Ozzy Osbourne is referred to as "Ozzy" throughout the article (references should be by surname, not first name).--Fallout boy 07:54, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object per above, and I second the idea to submit it to Peer Review. -M^ask 18:03, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object due to lack of sources and factual errors. For example, LSD has no effect when taken daily.

[edit] Charles Dickens

I think that I should nominate this article, because it seems someone must have forgot this great page existed. Malomeat 05:04, 19 March 2006 (UTC)Malomeat

Slight Object until the following concerns are addressed:

• The lead and sections are well written, but the lead should be split into 2-3 paragraphs and the body sections should be split into subsections where possible.
• More references should be cited.
• There seems to be disagreement about a Shakespeare reference on the talk page. If indeed there is any conflict, it needs to be resolved.
  • [Nope, conflict long dead - newbie upset about his edit being changed, but I'm the other "party" and am not that bothered, so newbie's edit stands. JackyR 16:38, 29 March 2006 (UTC)]
• The article could use a few more images to break up the text. Perhaps one of Dickens as a child? The guidelines say that images are not a prerequisite for FA status, but if it is possible, we should do it.

These are my most immediate concerns, and some of them I can begin working on myself. If they can be resolved, you have my support. --Danaman5 06:19, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object; no inline citations. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 16:49, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object; as above. Also, the (two, which is insufficient anyway) references don't use any real referencing format, not MLA, not APA, not Harvard, not... anything, so far as I can see. It just has a link with a brief discription of what the link is, no author or date or publisher or anything. Please include more information with the references as well. Fieari 22:24, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] S. A. Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition of 1897

Self-nomination, with many thanks to Johan Elisson who made the map. An unlikely tale from the heroic age of polar exploration, involving blinkered patriotism, chicanery, crazy technological optimism, the spirit of Jules Verne, and suffering. The peer review is here. Bishonen | ノート 00:28, 19 March 2006 (UTC).

• Most emphatically support for FA. A shining example of a Wikipedia article; very interesting, and indeed a poignant reminder of how idealist optimism can lead to such disastrous consequences. The prose is nicely set out, the article is clearly structured and defined, is well referenced, and presents an excellent summary of the subject in general. It's about the right length, too; it's got enough detail to make it a good read without it being too heavy. Indeed, it is perhaps one of the very best articles I have so far come across on Wikipedia - of course, I would have expected nothing less from Bishonen. :) --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 01:07, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Support. Everything from references to the wacky ttile is unimaginably good. RyanGerbil10 01:34, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Well, support. Extensive peer review. Great prose. Fantastic article. – Elisson • Talk 01:56, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Well-written; a fascinating story that I had never heard of before Bishonen started working on it; the 1897 photos are an amazing, haunting time-capsule. Structure is very nice, references are plentiful and solid (if somewhat, what's the word? Swědïsh), and the length is quite appropriate to the topic. Wish-list item: a screenshot from Ingenjör Andrée's Luftfärd (Flight of the Eagle). —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 03:24, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Pretty good all around. Good prose, everything is referenced, I have read the article and looked at the references and can find nothing substantially wrong. A few minor gripes, it is perhaps ever-so-slightly overlong, but that can be addressed with pruning of minor redundancies (as I've already done on a small scale) rather than taking out any content. There are also some parts that could read a bit more clearly, for example the first part of the last paragraph of the "Promotion and fundraising" section. But overall it's quite nice already. --W.marsh 03:29, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
  • That paragraph you mention was a mess, I hadn't noticed how tortured it was. Please see if it works for you now. Bishonen | ノート 16:00, 19 March 2006 (UTC).
    • Yes, it looks better, thanks for checking it out. --W.marsh 00:26, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support: One of the strongest FA's in a long time. The narrative itself is interesting, and the writing moves well, so the native interest of the events combines with a clear telling and appropriate amount of context. There are many ways to add, but each of these represents a sub-topic. The article is nearly a perfect example of how to tell the essentials, spare the extranneous, and yet achieve comprehensiveness. Geogre 04:14, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Well, you know, I like this article until I read this comment. Is this article in fact lacking detail, as Geogre suggests? Everyking 10:34, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
    • I could snow you, James, since nobody around here except me has read the sources, but I won't. There's an inordinate amount of detail in the diaries, and certainly I've selected, yes. There are high-colored anecdotes, mainly from Andrée, a practised diary-writer since childhood. "I was mending my underwear and the boys were cooking dinner when suddenly I noticed a polar bear staring into my eyes from a few inches away, through the slit in the tent. I never stopped sewing but merely said: 'Look, lads, dinner'. Frænkel grabbed his gun..." and so forth. Or: "Frænkel has invented an excellent new recipe for pancakes, using seals' blood as a coagulant. It's really good, much less nauseating than seal meat." :-) I could have filled a couple of screens with such illustrations of Andrée's rather determined cheerfulness and non-complainingness, even in a diary. Of course he had reason to believe posterity would read it and judge him by it, so it's a kind of interesting reflection of the stiff-upper-lip when-men-were-men culture of the time. But the page is on the outside of long enough for the subject as it is, and I'm dead against spinning off subarticles from such a very narrative article. I don't think readers would come trooping to say "fascinating" ever again if it was re-cast like that. :-( And now you're gonna oppose, aren't you? How about a deal: I'll add a paragraph about Strindberg's fiancée and Andrée's mistress, which I wrote earlier but removed for considerations of length. They're quite interesting, and relevant to the expedition. Any good? Bishonen | ノート 11:37, 23 March 2006 (UTC).
      • I don't want you to include great quantities of non-notable detail, I just want the topic to be covered thoroughly. I know that I tend to disagree with Geogre about what's significant, and so I get nervous when I read praise from him like above. And notice that I did in fact vote to support, and I read the article all the way through and liked it very much. Everyking 11:58, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
        • Sure. Thanks. I didn't mean to suggest you'd oppose unreasonably, just that I know how you feel about comprehensiveness, and there are a few things I would have liked to include. Also, it's a bit of a problem that few people here can review the sources, as pretty much all the good ones are in Swedish. Bishonen | ノート 12:15, 23 March 2006 (UTC).
  • I should clarify. I am the great expander. I usually think everything lacks context, and I see connections between things that other people think are irrelevant. I was praising Bishonen's article for not falling into the traps that I often fall into. For example, you could say, "Tell me more about nationalism," or "Tell me more about the Swedish Church's role," or "Tell me more about the newspapers," but all of that would be interesting and unnecessary. I thought Bishonene showed us all exactly the right line to walk between comprehensive and rambling, the necessary and the extranneous. Geogre 13:10, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support of course. Great work. Looks like a speedy FA candidate to me. - Taxman ^Talk 04:51, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support - I don't normally take the time to read through an entire FAC, but that was a very well written and interesting article. Has some excellent photographs in too. Could we get a photo of Ekholm? The sane one? - Hahnchen 05:22, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I do have a good pic of Ekholm in a book, but when I let slip he didn't actually go on the expedition, the family tech was reluctant to break out the scanner. I'll try again, I can totally understand the story makes you want to look at a sane man. Bishonen | ノート 06:46, 19 March 2006 (UTC).
    • There is one at the SMHI website here. As he died in 1923, I assume it is old enough to be {{PD-Sweden}}-eligible. Tupsharru 07:47, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
      • Mmm, thanks, Tups, but that portly white-haired gentleman looks an awfully incongruous candidate for Andrée's triple sleeping-bag anyway. I should get my photo scanned, it's from 1896 and has a more explorer-like look.
• Support. Excellent article. Tupsharru 07:47, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Great article, minor suggestions I will make on the talk page. - FrancisTyers 09:57, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, Interesting and aesthetically pleasing. -Obli (Talk)^? 10:14, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Per Taxman. Giano | talk 11:18, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, for all the reasons above and then some. Great tale, well told. KillerChihuahua^?!? 11:46, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Excellent article on a fascinating topic Bwithh 16:49, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, however, I have one concern: would it be possible to decrease the size of the lead image? At least on this monitor, it is very large and shoves the text toward the left side of the screen. —Eternal Equinox | talk 17:56, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
  • It's unusually wide, I know, but I'm a little reluctant to change it, as the image is IMO very effective and striking, and emsmallening it will have bad consequences for the way most users see it, which are to do with its shape and composition. But if you mean there's text there that you actually can't see, I must of course do something. The image has been at original size so far—not thumbed—which means 439 px wide. I've now changed it to 380. I hope that'll work for you and everybody else. Unless you're viewing it on a mobile phone screen... anyway. Anybody who now finds it entirely too small or too big, please let me know. Bishonen | ノート 22:02, 19 March 2006 (UTC).
    • It's better, thanks. —Eternal Equinox | talk 00:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support thoroughly encyclopedic in presentation and a good tale well told. Durova 06:37, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. No really major quibbles, but still worthy of attention:
  • The lead is too long and detailed. It introduces very specific details which I don't find appropriate for any lead, even if they belong in the main body of the article.
  • The image syntax is slightly awkward in places. I suggest removing a pic or two where they're bunched together and I recommend presenting the pictures of all three members of the expedition next to one another.
  • My favorite; footnotes. They're somewhat gratituitous to me. Note 7 establishes that the entire section is based on Lundström pg. 19-44, but the section contains an additional 5 notes, three of which refer to the pages alrady specified in 7. Pretty much the same goes for note 17-21. 17 states that all info is from Lundström pg. 73-114 "unless stated otherwise" and then goes on to repeat itself. Also consider whether it's really necessary to apply footnotes to statements like the number of holes in the balloons (15) or that Strindberg was good with cameras (13); they don't strike me as being either controversial or easily contested. (Disregard this particular critique if the footnotes are meant to cover entire paragraphs.) I'm also somewhat skeptical to leads containing any footnotes, since they're supposed to be summaries.

Otherwise a very good article. Well-balanced in the amount of detail and very well-written.

Peter ^Isotalo 17:21, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Responses:

1. The Lead: You may well be right. I've removed a few specifics. I think beyond that is really a matter of taste, though. For myself I like it the way it is now, on the principle that "some consideration should be given to creating interest in reading the whole article" (WP:LEAD). If all colorful or ambience-generating details are removed from the Lead, it's my feeling that it won't create any interest. But that's certainly a subjective opinion. I expect equally or more compelling arguments could be made for a more austere intro.
2. Images bunched together? Probably it looks different on different screens, it usually does. I don't have the expertise to fix image issues for any other screen than mine, where it looks good.
3. I agree about footnotes in Leads, I'm against them. But there was rioting in the streets the last time I tried to get out of having them on a FAC— The Country Wife, I think it was. I can't take on the footnote moguls singlehandedly on this issue, and altogether I don't want to get sucked into the mathmos ("a seething lake of evil slime beneath the city Sogo") of MOS debates. I might never write an article again.
4. Your other footnote remarks are, I don't know how to put this—they're wrong. See, the "covering" notes at the beginning of paragraphs—you mention 7 and 17—will necessarily be to a rather long page range, and therefore it sometimes needs complementing. For instance, the statement in note 17 that "The information in the 1897 section comes from Lundström, pp. 73–114, unless otherwise indicated" isn't specific enough for all the claims in the text that need referencing. Thus, Lundström says on p. 81 that the balloon careened wildly between sailing high and nearly crashing. Rather than sending the reader chasing this down somewhere on pp. 73—114, I give him/her the page reference "P. 81" in a separate note. All the examples you mention are of this kind. It's just not the case that they merely "repeat themselves". Where they're to the source that's already been mentioned, they add specificity, and where they're not, of course they're all the more needed. Or was your point that it's my covering notes that are redundant? They are the reason I have far fewer notes than the usual "well-referenced" FA of comparable length, you know: they save the need for many a specific note, which I'm as keen to do as you. Perhaps you might feel differently about this if you looked up my references in Lundström's book. The information that I use isn't at all easy to locate without my notes (all of them). There's no index. I've in fact spent some time trying (in vain) to convince Taxman that we don't need page references at all to sources that possess good indexes, so I feel rather miscast as a devotee of redundant apparatus and decorative footnotes.

I don't quite know what to say about the things you think don't need references. No, it's not widely known that Strindberg constructed his own cameras, and I haven't seen the 8 million holes mentioned anywhere else. Bishonen | ノート 18:23, 21 March 2006 (UTC).

My emphasis was on the level of footnote detail, not the obscurity of the individual details. They just strike me as things that couldn't be fought over by any reasonable editor. Or at least not by anyone who would ever bother to acquire the book.

Comments stricken.

Peter ^Isotalo 20:57, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support well written, Scoo 19:14, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment- two issues about dates. (1), some dates like "In 1893 he" lack a comma, while in others like "On July 11, in a steady wind" there is a comma. They all should be changed to having a comma or not. (2), per WP:CONTEXT, years with full dates should be linked. Thanks, AndyZ 20:45, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh, c'mon! "In 1893 he bought his own balloon" and "On July 11, in a steady wind from the south-west, the top of the plank hangar was dismantled" are utterly different cases. I will not chop them to fit on the bed of Procrustes, sorry. Bishonen | ノート 22:28, 20 March 2006 (UTC).

WP:CONTEXT makes it clear that full-date linking is optional: many don't care for the way Wikimedia has implemented date preferences, since turning them into links has the unfortunate side-effect of... turning them into links. As for the commas, well, look: it's written without commas after short introductory date clauses; the comma after July 11 isn't a comma after July 11: it's one of a pair of commas delineating a subordinate clause that follows. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 22:54, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

A comma offsets an introductory or initial adverbial phrase. This rule, however, is optional in the US and fading in the UK. (E.g. American grammars are beginning to teach it as an option.) The question is whether the phrase is an introductory adverbial or an adverbial that is part of the verb clause (in other words, how much is it functioning as optional information of context and how much is it a part of the verb that follows). Bishonen's non-offset adverbials are not introductory. Still, it is good that people know this rule -- it's just that it's a bit complex in practice. Geogre 15:22, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I find historical articles in which every other sentence starts "In xxxx, ..." a little turgid; rather than prolonging this fascinating grammatical debate, my recent copyedit has rephrased some of them (including this one). -- ALoan (Talk) 15:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support what is so great about this page? it exists! Malomeat 05:15, 21 March 2006 (UTC)Malomeat

What do you mean? —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 05:20, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I think this was praise (this page is great because it exists). -- ALoan (Talk) 15:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support - Interesting read, very well sourced and referenced, no POV-ness; I really enjoyed the article. TheImpossibleMan 06:40, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Excellent article, great pics, comprehensive notes. Kafziel 14:09, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Excellent. (Disclosure: I have done a light copyedit which may have fixed AndyZ's comment.) I think the lead is entirely commensurate with the article: it sets the scene for a relatively obscure footnote of history. The "image syntax" and footnotes look fine to me. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:18, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Thank you. I have to say I was sad to see the images now so small. :-( Especially the (formerly) haunting Lead image. Did it look bad on your screen the way it was, at 380 px, or take up too much space? For images with somewhat long captions, the captions are now bigger than the images, IMO an uncomely sight. :-( Cui bono? Does the cool North Pole boardgame on your screen look better shrunken and illegible, or where's the advantage? Bishonen | ノート 17:37, 21 March 2006 (UTC).
    • Did I make any images much smaller? I think I made some bigger too. Most of my image tweaks were just to bring in some consistency - I could see no reason why the images were getting bigger and smaller all the time: it just looked messy to me. YMMV. I think made the lead image a bit smaller (380px to 350px). The issue with large images is that the lead image can blot out the text for people with narrow screens, particularly 800x600 (given sidebars, etc). AFAIK, the featured article with the largest lead image is National parks of England and Wales, which is 400px, which is a little hard to justify, but the image is 'lovely. :) -- ALoan (Talk) 22:20, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object until this thumbnail-fetish is cured. The images are the most striking and incredible part of the article, they should be allowed to shine. Since they are black-and-white it's especially important to have them a decent size. Everything else is excellent. Haukur 09:37, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  • You think all the images are too small? Or are there some in particular? Image:Andree.Svea.jpg is the only one on my monitor that seems like it should reasonably be bigger, but then I run at a fairly-low 1024x768 resolution. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 16:21, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
    • All right, I enlarged that one. Personally I like large images. To be entirely honest I was trying to provide some counterweight to the small-image fans above :). Support. Haukur 16:38, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
      • Please, not that one! It's the only single low-quality image in the article (but I think it's funny, so I like having it in there). That's the reason I had it small. Don't you think it becomes less, rather than more, clear when embiggened? Thank you for wanting to allow this amazing pictorial material to shine. I've made the rest a bit bigger. :-) And Nils Gustaf Ekholm can now be seen looking sane in a great (IMO) studio portrait of the whole 1896 balloon crew, do take a look. :-) Bishonen | ノート 23:54, 22 March 2006 (UTC).
• Support, well done for the hard work put in. --Terence Ong 11:39, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support This article is top-notch. I have watched the diligent effort by the major contributors to this article and am impressed with their drive to do the best job they could. I can't think of any thing it may need to make it better.--MONGO 13:07, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. You have written one of my favorite articles. Seriously awesome!— L1AM (talk) 00:08, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Support Never heard of the event, but after reading that article I feel enlightened. Sean WI 04:29, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support; this is very good. Everyking 10:32, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Could more on their deaths be added? I was looking over this again, and noticed that's one of the most important and interesting parts of the story, but there's only one paragraph on the cause(s) of death. The question that springs to my mind is, if it was trichinosis, it wouldn't be likely to kill them all within the same short span of time, would it? It sounds like a lot of theories have been put forward about the cause, so it seems like it deserves to be discussed at greater length. Everyking 07:27, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
    • I've added a bit more. Several problems with the trichinosis theory have been raised since it was proposed in the 1950s, even though it's still the favored explanation. The cause of death is the only aspect of the expedition that people have found to disagree about, since everything else is so amply documented, so I guess it deserves more discussion for that reason alone. I hope I haven't given Kjellström's common-sense theory (=that they just died already, and wouldn't you have?) too much prominence. I admit I like it. Bishonen | ノート 08:23, 25 March 2006 (UTC).
• Support. Brilliant! Kosebamse 09:21, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment - There are a LOT of pictures in that article. You may want to cut a few out. TheImpossibleMan 04:49, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

  Please not. The historical pictures are an i ntegral part of the article and should not be reduced in number. Kosebamse 06:47, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

  I see that image galleries in articles are so very deprecated that it won't be of any use my suggesting a gallery to resolve the viewpoints above, either. Oh, well. I do think there should be as many of the most relevant 1890s photos as possible (and I'm heart-broken that I can't have a few of the presumably copyright ones from 1930 too, as those are also time-capsules, notably the state funeral procession in Stockholm), but if the images are starting to make the text irritatingly snaking to read at some resolutions, that of course won't do, either. Is that the problem, TheImpossibleMan, or is your objection aesthetic? Bishonen talk 09:38, 26 March 2006 (UTC).

  No, don't remove any images. But I think galleries are getting reprecated (if there is a word like that) so an additional gallery could be a fine addition eventually. In any case, according to the {{PD-Sweden}} template, photos published in Sweden before July 1, 1944 are in the PD, but I don't know what that is based on exactly. Tupsharru 09:48, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

  "... according to the copyright law of July 1, 1994, of Sweden, all photographs of Swedish origin published prior to July 1, 1944 are assumed public domain. This applies worldwide." Great Scott! Where's that scanner?? Bishonen talk 09:58, 26 March 2006 (UTC).

  The law is here, but I can't tell why it is supposed to be 1944. It talks about "Rätten enligt första stycket gäller till dess femtio år har förflutit efter det år då bilden framställdes", which would appear to be 50 years from the present time, which would now put photos from as late as 1956 in in the public domain. But perhaps it depends on the artistic value of the image, however that is judged? I'm sure there is something written about this somewhere in normal Human Swedish. Tupsharru 10:31, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

  P.S. I guess it can be deduced from the "Övergångsbestämmelser" listed under "Ändring 1994:190" here. Tupsharru 10:37, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

• Minor object. Impressive work, but the article needs more ilinks. For example, lead should ilink words like Sweden, Russia, race to reach the North Pole, drag-rope steering technique, Paris, optimism - that's just after a cursory glance of the first two paras.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 00:43, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I disagree. Sweden, Russia, and Paris: maybe. It's a matter of style preference, I think. (But everybody probably does know what Sweden, Russia, and Paris are, and linking to their main articles is unlikely to actually serve a useful purpose from an article like this one.) Drag-rope steering technique is likely to be a red link... forever? Linking optimism would just be to provide a dictionary definition of a word... exactly what links shouldn't be for. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 01:13, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

  [edit conflict; thanks, Bunchofgrapes.] I expect I can link a few more (in the whole article), but on the whole I just don't agree, either. Paris and optimism? I've followed the Make only links relevant to the context principle, and I can't believe anybody will want to go off to look at a half full/half empty glass in order to better understand S. A. Andrée's optimistic mindset, or to look even cursorily at the vast Paris article merely because his balloon was made there. These would be distracting low-value links IMO. Sweden is linked in the first sentence, from the form Swedish. But your suggestion of linking drag-rope steering technique raises an interesting matter of principle that's probably relevant to other concepts in the article as well. See, I would have to write a stub for it, which would not conceivably, ever, be relevant to anything except this article, because drag ropes were a wrong-headed invention by Andrée that no one else ever used. They're an obscure dead end in the history of ballooning, and unique to this story. Therefore I think they need to be fully defined in this article (which they are, below), rather than linked to. I mean, "drag-rope steering technique" is a whole long phrase (which I made up), can you see anybody typing it into the Search field? They wouldn't, they would only reach it via this article, and find that it only contained duplicated information from this article. So, well, I know the article is lightly wikilinked, but there are reasons for it. I don't want to link just to make it more blue. (Or more red.) Bishonen talk 01:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC).

  I agree that some of those are dispuateble. But there are also those that definetly should be linked, like race to the North Pole or polar expedition (and those definetly deserve a stubs and would be linked from quite a few articles, I believe). One more issue: shouldn't there be a section on discovery of the expedition remains?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 04:03, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

  I added a few links (Russia, Paris, etc) in my light copyedit by later editors removed them again. I would link them, but I agree that it is a matter of style. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:50, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

  I think it is. Thanks, ALoan. The article got Featured a few hours ago, so this is now an archive, I guess; I've replied to Piotrus on his own page. Bishonen talk 12:41, 27 March 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Cædmon

I am resubmitting this article for review, as I think most of the objections that can be answered have been. The main outstanding one is the request that no references be made in the article lead. I've played around with it, but not found a solution. I'm wondering if it maybe isn't that severe a problem. Here's a link to the previous discussion page: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Cædmon/FACarchive1 - Daniel.odonnell 16:09, April 19, 2006

• Don't forget to add the 4 tildes (~~~~) :-) The notes aren't that important, though if we could incorporate the facts into the article it would be great. Lead looks fine - good summary (helps with working towards 1.0). I can't agree with bunchofgrapes objection, the method of layout for this person is necessary because, from what I read in the text, their isn't that much non-legendary and undisputed material about his life. The most significant thing about Caedmon is really what he wrote, not so much his life itself. I think we need to take into account that this is not a modern day notable person we are documenting here. Maru's comments are also interesting, but I think somewhat misplaced. I have modidifed the text that deals with "most beautiful verse" to note that it was really Bede who said this. I hope I didn't alter your meaning! If this is wrong, feel free to revert. The ironic comment is not that bad, but if we could rephrase I would appreciate it (call me difficult). Other than that, I Support - fantastic work! - Ta bu shi da yu 16:31, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Response (green="accepted and fixed"; red="rejected")

• The ironic comment is not that bad, but if we could rephrase I would appreciate it (call me difficult): I've removed the "perhaps ironically". Not a hill to die on.
• The notes aren't that important, though if we could incorporate the facts into the article it would be great: To be honest the notes in the lead are there to answer a couple of peripheral questions that readers might have but are outside the scope of the article--e.g. the number of named poets, etc. Adding them to the main body would drive the article out off the road, IMO. But not mentioning them would be a shame. In the case of footnote 2 and 3, they are an artefact of the referencing system. I've rewritten the relevant section of the lead and the main body to get rid of notes 2 and 3. dpod 22:41, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support Nice work. --Osbus 00:22, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
• Object. 2-sentence pgraphs are too short. expand them or merge them or rewrite them or restructure. dont have any sections with only one subsection (ie "other medieval sources"). non-standard heading sizes. shorten title of "source and analogues to the caedmon story" as it stretches TOC too much. "heliand", "general corpus" and "manuscript evidence" pgraphs too long. this reference makes no sense: "——————————. 2005. Cædmon’s Hymn, A multimedia study, edition, and witness archive. SEENET A. 7. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer. ". "notes" should be before "works cited", which should be renamed "references". recheck formatting of note 25 and 28. lead should better summarize the content of the whole article. Zzzzz 23:08, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Response (green="accepted and fixed"; red="rejected")

• 2-sentence pgraphs are too short. expand them or merge them or rewrite them or restructure.: There is one two sentence paragraph in the piece (the first paragraph in Sources and analogues), and one one sentence paragraph (the last paragraph in Bede's account). If one were to combine the two sentence paragraph with the paragraph that follows it, one would have a paragraph that is 15 lines line--three lines longer than the Heliand paragraph you think is too long. Perhaps more importantly, the one sentence and the two sentence paragraphs are conclusions and introductions respectively. These a rhetorically distinct from the evidence that follows. Finally, paragraph is a logical/rhetorical unit rather than a visual one. While it is true that newspapers split paragraphs visually, most other genres don't except in extreme cases--which these are not.
• dont have any sections with only one subsection (ie "other medieval sources"): This seems to me a request to sacrifice clarity to the Balaal of style. I tried it [2], but it produced a wall o' prose. The Heliand is widely recognised as a potentially special case among analogues to the Caedmon story. It seems not unreasonable to name it in the TOC and outline. Especially given your comment on the length of the paragraph it seemed unwise to make it worse.
• non-standard heading sizes: how? The heading size is controlled by the CSS. The heading structure is sensible, so I don't know what you mean.
• source and analogues to the caedmon story: I've renamed the section "sources and analogues" albeit with trepidation: in Caedmon's case there are two distinct scholarly discussions about sources and analogues: one about Bede's account, and another about the hymn. However, the outline should suggest at this point that we are talking about the biography, not the poem. As long as we realise that we are introducing ambiguity in our content in order not to stretch the TOC box too much visually, I'm reluctantly ok with this. Seems a bit of an odd choice to priviledge form over content, I must say, though.
• this reference makes no sense: This reference is absolutely standard Chicago style... a recognised Wikipedia style guide. Are you really saying that you've never seen an author name replaced by a bar? If this is so, it makes one wonder about the range of genres behind your other style pronouncements. As a professional humanist and the son of a physicist married to a social scientist, I can assure you it's standard across the disciplines!

See also: WP:CITE#How_to_cite_sources. The style in this article is quite standard for the discipline.

While the use of the bar is certainly appropriate in printed works, it is not a good idea in wikipedia articles because if another editor comes along and inserts a reference between the two existing references (i.e., between the one with the name of the author and the one with the bar), the false impression will be created that the bar indicates the name of the author of the newly inserted work, rather than the name of the real author. Because of this, I have replaced both occurrences of the bar in the "References" section with the names of the respective authors. Polaris999 01:40, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

*"notes" should be before "works cited": this is something to take up with the template authors: as per wikipedia style (which I hate) references have been tagged using <ref</ref> rather than the simpler and cross-disciplinary inline style prefered by pretty much all professional style guides. The location of "notes" is automatically determined by the template: the template places them last. Thanks to Polaris99 who fixed this.

• "works cited", which should be renamed "references": the current section title is standard bibliographic practice--in fact straight Chicago. While I don't care myself what they are called (as long as they are not called bibliography), style guides exist to regularise choices; given the problems you have with a bar replacing an author name, I'm not sure I should take this as an authoritative pronouncement on style.

See also: WP:CITE#How_to_cite_sources. The style in this article is quite standard for the discipline.

I also have no personal preference as to whether the section in question should be called "works cited" or "references", but it is rather established wikipedia style for it to be called "references". (I just did a random check of 20 Featured Articles and observed that all 20 of them use the term "references" ...) Polaris999 05:53, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I just looked at Wikipedia:Citing sources and noticed that the section in question is labelled "References" there. This persuades me that wikipedia style prefers "References" and I am therefore going to make this change in the Cædmon article, which may, of course, be reversed if others disagree ... Polaris999 00:46, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

• recheck formatting of note 25 and 28.: Thanks.
• lead should better summarize the content of the whole article: de gustibus non est disputandum: I tried changing it even though I don't think it is a problem and had the changes rolled back. Some people at least seem to think it isn't a bad summary of the important points.

dpod 02:16, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

• Strongly Support All of my reservations have been addressed, so I now give this outstanding article my wholehearted support. -- Polaris999 05:42, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure where the appropriate place to put this note would be, so am inserting it here. I had been expecting dpod to come onto this page and comment on the fact that I have resolved two of the concerns listed above by Zzzzz, and either approve or disapprove the changes I made. But, since dpod doesn't seem to be around at present, I think that I should mention that the concerns this reference makes no sense and "works cited", which should be renamed "references" have been addressed – satisfactorily, I hope. I also made an effort to address another concern mentioned by Zzzzz, i.e.: lead should better summarize the content of the whole article, but do not know to what extent I may have succeeded ... Polaris999 02:26, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support. --Stbalbach 14:26, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Good work.--Bkwillwm 21:59, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support; looks great to me—well referenced, good formatting overall, and well-written. Nice job! --Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 00:24, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hurricane Iniki

Self-nom. I feel this is ready. It is a bit biased, I guess, because I worked greatly on this article, but I think it adheres to the qualifications for FA. Hurricanehink 19:57, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Weak support. Short, but concise. I feel the aftermath section could be expanded and explained better, and referenced more thoroughly. RyanGerbil10 21:32, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Because it is a little short, there aren't as many references, so I'm not sure how to reference more thoroughly. Is the aftermath section better? Hurricanehink 01:36, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
    • Full Support. I guess I was just a little taken back by the content of the section, Hurricane Katrina is still fresh in my mind. I think I've actually grown used to the death and destruction, and when I failed to find any in the aftermath section here, I guess I was a bit incredulous. Oh well, that's just how it goes sometimes. RyanGerbil10 22:12, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. It's a little short, but gives plenty of information. Well written article. WotGoPlunk 17:14, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Yes, it is short, but it is also well-written and stable. Remember, length is not a part of the criteria! :) —Eternal Equinox | talk 17:59, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. It is short, but it is concise, informative, stable, accurate, neutral, and comprehensive up to where it can be done. It also has gone under a significant amount of scrutiny, and it conforms to the standards set by the relevant WikiProjects. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 22:38, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, per above. -- §HurricaneERIC§^Damagesarchive 22:55, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, per all. It's long enough to cover the subject in detail; any longer and it would feel padded. —Cuiviénen, Sunday, 19 March 2006 @ 23:38 (UTC)
• Support, covers its subject well. Good referencing and images too. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 23:42, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, per above. — jdorje (talk) 08:41, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support don't know if it was changed from the earlier votes, but as of this writing, I'm actually amazed by the number of ref's for an article of this length... it's incredible. -M^ask 18:01, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Strong support. Very detailed for a 14-year-old storm, and no real disputes or speculation - very informative. CrazyC83 01:14, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Definitely yes for another great piece of work. NSLE _(T+C) at 00:56 UTC (2006-03-23)
• Support for the same reasons as everyone else. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 23:18, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Illmatic

This article covers the topic completely. The hiphopwikiproject has worked extremely hard to bring it up to FA-status. Not only is it already a GA article, it is well written, accurate, and sourced as well --Chubdub 20:05, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support - it looks great. --HasNoClue 21:47, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support - as per nom. -- Tutmosis 23:15, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
• Comment - I don't like the excessive block quoting, but don't know enough about the subject matter to object. Is there any other way to cover this information? savidan^{(talk) (e@)} 01:39, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Even as someone partial to pretty extensive quoting, the large, repeated block quotes here also make me a little nervous. I do wish it could be handled a little more elegantly, but it's not something I'd object over. Everyking 10:23, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

do you have any suggestions to improve the article's visual appeal. If I were to remove the block quotes, what would I replace them with? Chubdub 14:18, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support, per nom.--Fallout boy 07:51, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support, per nom. Crumbsucker 09:25, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
• Comment - Could you merge singles history with chart positions? Maybe just call it "singles", then?--Urthogie 10:00, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that I simply merge the two sections with both charts displayed? Or combine them into one chart?--Chubdub 14:25, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Combine.--Urthogie 19:04, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Okay. I see what you mean. But how do you suggest I include information regarding the singles (i.e. Label #, Music Video directors, etc.) into the chart as well. Chubdub 19:26, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

I think the label # and music video director for each one is really not necessary, because label # is kind of a factoid (an external link to the record label at the bottom would be enough) and music video director is already listed once on the personell heading. Also, now that I think about it, the combined heading should be something like "Chart history".--Urthogie 19:44, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

No problem Chubdub 01:33, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support, finally reached its destination. MOD 19:54, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support, per nom. P.O.N.Y. 02:34, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support - on the condition that: Reference is provided for the working cover art (headlock) and the Bow Wow quote. Also, is there any way there could be less quotes and the content could integrated in some other way - though this is not a condition of my support, just a comment. But yeah, try and find those two references. Great work! Cvene64 15:37, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
• Object, the lead is too long and covers material that is not mentioed in the body of the article (like the album cover) - the longish quote in the lead is not really necessary either. The text could also use a copyedit to make the tone more encyclopedic (Despite, In fact etc.). On a minor point, refs go after punctuation, there is a mix of before and after throughtout.--nixie 05:51, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

According to WP:Lead, a lead should be no less than three paragraphs. P.O.N.Y. 15:19, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't say that.—jiy (talk) 17:11, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Articles that contain 30,000 or more characters require three or four paragraphs P.O.N.Y. 19:20, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't say that either. It says "The following specific suggestions have been proposed..." As with any guideline, WP:LEAD contains suggestions, not requirements. Furthermore, this article is medium in size, containing roughly 22,000 characters worth of prose, for which the guideline suggests 2-3 paragraphs. I agree with nixie that the lead needs to be trimmed of its superfluities and unique information (i.e. Jesus in a headlock, remastered edition).—jiy (talk) 20:18, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

How about now????--P.O.N.Y. 20:42, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Now I think its too short. Seeing as the article is undergoing a major edit, I will not make any additions to the lead as of this momemnt. But more content and details needs to be added before admission. Chubdub 00:42, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Support- thanks for addressing my concerns, the adjustments you have made improve the flow of the text and have made the lead more direct and informative, the release addition is also a good improvement. On my last point, notes should follow punctuation, they all seem to do so following your adjustments to the article. Great work.--nixie 01:35, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

• Support - never seen a hip hop article that detailed Mike 14:02, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
• Support - per Yungmike513. Very nice work hiphopwikiproject.--Jonthecheet 16:46, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
• Support, but two comments:
  • Could you make the Personnel section a table?
  • Try splitting the lead into two paragraphs, without removing any content from it. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 21:15, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Comment #2 is adressed. I'm sort of reluctant to make a Personnel tabel that has such limited information. But should we decide to make one, what should a Personnel tabel include? And how should it look like Chubdub 00:37, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] William Tecumseh Sherman

This article was originally nominated by Kross in January. It had already had a positive peer review, but its nomination failed largely because on insufficient references (see archived discussion). I think that all of the issues raised then have now been addressed. The article as it stands is scrupulously referenced. It offers a balanced and very readable account of the life and work of a major historical figure. The images complement the text of the article nicely. I think this is the best source of general information on Sherman that is currently available on the web to the general public.

This is a self-nomination in that the bulk of the edits after the first featured article nomination failed are by me, though John Flaherty and Hal Jespersen also contributed significantly. -- Eb.hoop 18:07, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support, but I would like to see more footnotes -- one per paragraph would be nice. Ideally the new format (see WP:FN) should be used. Johnleemk | Talk 18:23, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Well done. RyanGerbil10 21:35, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. Definitely a Good Article, but not quite featured quality yet, I think.
  • According to WP:LEAD, the lead section should be three paragraphs long for this article.
  • Most of the sections are stubby, consisting of only one or two paragraphs. Consolidate sections, or, if there is enough to write about, expand them (preferred). If this makes the article too large, use summary style and split the article up.
  • Each section should have at -least- one inline citation. It would be nice to have at least one per paragraph.
• I didn't have time for a more thorough review of content and writting style, but I'll get back to that later (hopefully later tonight). But the above issues are obvious and need to be fixed. Fieari 22:40, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the lead was too short, and have now expanded it to three paragraphs. I also have added a few extra references, and expanded some sections. The footnotes are now in the new format. Please take a look! -- Eb.hoop 00:22, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. This is a well organized, well referenced, well written, and well balanced article. Introduction, layout, and image use are all appropriate. FA material by all standards. Durova 15:31, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Clear, well-referenced, NPOV. One to be proud of. Hydriotaphia 04:48, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Keratoconus

(Self-nom). This article has expanded substantially over the last few months, and I believe offers a comprehensive overview of a little-known, yet significant ophthalmic disease. A peer review was requested some weeks ago and comments raised there addressed. --BillC 10:39, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. Would have expected it to be one after finding it by chance. —Nightstallion (?) 11:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Very good and detailed article. Tarret 17:00, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Some comments:

• The lead should give "why" it's important. How many people are affected each year, prevalence (sp), what age group. Also, should mention something about etiology.
• I would drop the inline citation in the lead, it's distracting and inconsistent, as multiple claims are given in the lead, while only one is given a citation. (similary, in medical or science journals, rarely is the abstract given a citation, and the lead is the abstract here).
• History part is a bit insufficient. In addition to naming the people involved in studying the disease, should contain information about what did they "know" at the time and what "remained" to be known. Even though more about description of disorder can be added, history part now looks very good and put into context
• Diagnosis is hard to follow. Should contain a mini-intro about "rationale" for the methods. Ex. First Snellen test, since it's what every opthalamologist do first. Then physical examination of cornea such as curvature, features, colors, because keratoconus has the following features. Then go into specific methods. The current form goes to the methods first without providing a rationale first, and I think it's unclear. Diagnosis section now is clearer and easy to read.

The sentence "opthal tend not to ask what patients see," what's the rationale? Is it relevant?

• Cause, minor rephrase "the disease sometimes running within families" to "the disease running in certain families." Rephrase "cornea by proteases (a class of enzymes), which break some of the collagen" to "cornea by proteases, enzymes that break some of collagen." By the way, what kind of protease, any proteases? Are they overexpressed or just overactive?
• Genetic background should be expanded to more than just one sentence. Most people don't bother to read the journal, so should summarize about what loci is the putative gene involved, presumably the mutation runs in the family, and what the the suspected gene (cornea specific enhancer element, protease...?)
• The treatment sections are better than other IMO. But various mentions of company names, is it proper? I am not for either side.
• Other diseases: don't put the author who wrote a review in this section. Instead, link to that section as inline citation or as reference.

• Summary Overall the article has it's potentials. Grammer and others are fine, the main things are the lead should bring relevance, history should be expanded, and the diagnosis part should first give rationale for methods, then describe the methods themselves. I think this article is a good example of what wikipedia should have more as its FA, so I won't oppose here. These comments (objections) are easily actionable, when they are fixed, I'll give my strong support. Temporary account 22:20, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• update Very good edits by the nominator, I haven't comprehensively re-read the article, but right now looks a lot better. I'll come back in a few days to see if any changes are made and give my support then. Nice job. Temporary account 19:15, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the comprehensive response above. Have made the following changes so far:

• Strengthen lead section to indicate prevalence, age groups affected, and some introduction to etiology.
• Remove single citation from lead section.
• Removed reviewing authors' names from the final section. --BillC 19:46, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Rephrased 'Cause'. More work on enzyme action required.
• Expanded history slightly, but a visit to Moorfields Eye Hospital library in the next few days is required, I think.
• Removed corporate names from Intrastromal Rings section, though I think the device names ought to remain, as to many these are the names by which they are known. "Intacs" is turning up in PubMed searches paper titles, for example. --BillC 21:20, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Added more to History.
• Rewrote diagnosis to explain clinical methodology better.
• Expanded on a couple of short paragraphs, and combined another two. --BillC 07:37, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• The latest changes:

• Removed redundant term from first para.
• Expanded history
• Added to genetics section
• Added handheld keratoscope and retinoscopy
• Gel injection as a intrastromal ring modality
• Combined some of the shorter paras.
• Added incidence rate--BillC 19:03, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Good information, it seems very well researched. The biggest problem lies in the short paragraphs that make for choppy prose. Combine or expand any under 3 sentences to make for fuller ideas and smoother prose. 2) I'm a bit concerned about the note at the end on Posterior keratoconus. That suggests this article should be at 'anterior keratoconus', and a more general article or a disambiguation at Keratoconus. Otherwise the other condition is buried in a spot few would find if they only see this article. - Taxman ^Talk 18:40, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

'Ordinary' keratoconus is almost never called 'anterior keratoconus', but simply as keratoconus. (A google for "anterior keratoconus" produced 182 hits; one for "keratoconus -anterior" produced 376,000). I used the qualifier there to distinguish from posterior keratoconus, which is a different disease, as did my source for that section. I will reword that para to remove the word anterior. If anything, posterior keratoconus could have its own article under that name, though it is a rare condition. I will also review the text to try to combine some of the shorter paragraphs. --BillC 19:54, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

That's fine to justify the naming. Once the rest of the items that have been brought up here have been addressed, I would certainly support. - Taxman ^Talk 22:30, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Call me conservative (and consider that I am not a native speaker), but constructions like can affect the person's ability to, for example, legally drive a car or are effective enough to allow the patient to still drive a car make me feel slightly nauseated. Split infinitives are ugly, and split infitives with inserted clauses are unspeakably ugly, IMHO. Kosebamse 10:32, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I am of course biased, having written those sentences, but as a native speaker didn't see anything drastically wrong with them. I have however reworded them to remove the split infinitives. They were the only such examples I could find in the article. --BillC 21:00, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Support. Well referenced and comprehensive, a fine article. Kosebamse 04:28, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Julian Eltinge

Very well-written article about theater in the early 20th century and about one particular man who was so good at cross-dressing that he made a business out of selling beauty products to women. It's a comprehensive look at his career and gets deep into Eltinge's apparent need to prove his machoness. Great work all around. --Idols of Mud 01:07, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object, no inline citations, too many redlinks. Has potential if the issues are addressed, however. It could also stand to be a bit longer, but that did not factor into my objection. —

BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 01:44, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Thanks -- I fixed some of the links, though I guess I'll just have to hope the authors can do the citation.--Idols of Mud 13:00, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rush (band)

After a few months of preparation, including a bunch of work and a peer review, I think it's time to see Rush (band) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) on the list of featured articles. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 00:38, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support/co-nom Strong Support I think this article will be 100 percent, once another reference or two is given to balance things out. Even then, that's just a bonus. Deckiller 01:12, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment- Could the external links under the references section be cited according to WP:CITE? Perhaps Template:Cite web might be useful here. AndyZ 01:46, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Done. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 03:28, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support/Self-nomination Strong Support. The article has responded to all of the suggestions contained in this FAC forum. I feel there is little more that needs to be done. Wisdom89 18:41, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object;this looks pretty good, but the history section is really long—31 kb. Create a subpage History of Rush (band), copy the section there, and then cut half the history out of this article. Move the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame thing above the trivia/popular culture, and add some citations there. Incidentally, I'm not sure that the trivia and pop culture stuff is really necessary for this article, and I don't really like it being in a list... maybe a couple paragraphs mentioning the most important things would be in order? Citations are crucial in the reputation and musical style sections (think billboard magazine, rolling stone, arts reviewers in major newspapers, etc.) All complete dates need to be linked (I've done a few). Note that this does not include things like "xyz happened in August 2004" or "xyz happened in 2004", only "xyz happened on August 4, 2004". —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 03:22, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Okay, I've created that article (the section still needs summarization) and added three cites to the style section. Still need to work on some more cites, and that pesky trivia section still needs work. The wikilinking of dates is a trivial thing that I'll probably do last if no one beats me to it. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 03:50, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• The History section is much shorter now, and I simply removed the trivia and pop culture sections, which might merit a separate article but aren't really notable enough for the main one. I don't see any dates that need to be linked. The one thing remaining from your checklist seems to be those cites. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 04:29, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• I trimmed the history section a bit more. Deckiller 16:18, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• I don't think that the Allmusic guide is a particularly good source. I'd prefer to see citations from music magazines and newspapers. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 02:21, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• It meets WP:RS just fine... —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 02:35, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• I see nothing on WP:RS that gives me reason to think AllMusicGuide is a very reliable source. Andrew Levine 18:55, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Then what bias or other inaccuracies can you identify that make AMG unreliable? Do you have original evidence, articles written by others claiming AMG is not a reliable source? Can you provide us with these? From what I've seen, AMG is fairly respected in the music field. Moreover, they're only used in a handful of references on the article. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 23:18, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Just to throw my two cents in on this one, AMG has some reputable and well-known experts on popular music, such as Stephen Thomas Erlewine and Blue Gene Tyranny, who offer some excellent criticism. I'd definitely consider it to be a reliable source. Alexthe5th 04:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• AMG should stay, in my opinion. — Deckiller 02:56, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Wait, huh? I was under the impression that consensus is what determines such issues. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 03:14, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• I rephrased my comments, I'm stressed out over vandal catching, so I might be a little snappy. Sorry for being a little punk, it won't happen again. If it does, I block myself for a day. — Deckiller 03:17, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Anyway, my childish incident aside, AMG does interest me in the fact that it has professional, well-written reviews, though it is also nice to use another review source just for diversity. In that sense, I recommend not removing AMG sources, but including others to balance them out more. — Deckiller 03:28, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Reducing to weak object due to the addition of several print sources and overall diversification of the sources. I'll see what I can do about getting newspaper refs later, but for now, the referencing isn't too bad for a popular culture article. Other than that, it looks great. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 00:43, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

• Object, the reputation section has a lot of "Rush were criticized for X, they were also praised for X; they were criticized for Y and also praised for Y" without any citation. Find some credible sources for these statements. I will read through the rest of the article later. Andrew Levine 17:30, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• I believe the history section has been curtailed sufficiently for now. I will work on citations for the reputation section abit later, or if someone wants to beat me to the punch that's fine. Those claims should be easily verified as they are quite common. Wisdom89 18:20, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Citations have been added to the reputation section Wisdom89 02:37, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• "Much of the censure evaporated as time wore on, and as the lyrics became increasingly more introspective, humanitarian, and thoughtful" ...? No citation there. Also, I'm sketchy about the amateur reviews posted on Amazon and AllMusicGuide. What about professional statements from well-known music magazines or record guides? There are no shortage of well-regarded publications related to rock music (or to prog-rock in particular). Andrew Levine 18:55, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• When making statements or claims about the general public/fan's reactions to lyrics and the band's heavy usage of synthesizers, I feel that "amateur" critic analyses and reader opinions make complete sense as a reference... However, I agree that the comment you quoted needs a citation. Wisdom89 20:44, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Maybe sporadically, but professional reviews are more reliable and authoratative. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 23:16, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• AMG is not amateur... —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 02:50, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• AMG should stay. However, I think we do need to work on some of the claims. — Deckiller 02:57, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I have confidence in every claim currently in the article. However, more "reputable" sources may need to be sought after in certain cases. Wisdom89 04:09, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. I think the Rock and Roll hall of fame debate could be merged with the reception/criticism section. Deckiller 03:17, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Agreed. Also, I believe the reputation section needs to be expanded. Wisdom89 03:31, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object - Am I the only one who thinks it's very bizarre that there is a separate article for the history of Rush, and yet the info on their history, on Rush's main page, is still extremely long? Support - All my problems with this article have been solved, I'm all for making it Featured. TheImpossibleMan 06:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• The length of the current history is just fine considering the band's active tenure spans well over 30 years. Just examine any other band/artist featured article and compare. Dream Theater and Iron Maiden for instance. Wisdom89 18:36, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• ?!??!?!? This very FAC page suggested that separate article! Egad, I just can't win. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 02:47, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• The satellite article should stay, because MANY FAs have one. — Deckiller 02:52, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• See Wikipedia:Summary style. Good articles often have links to more details. The history section is now around 18kb, which is a pretty significant improvement from 31kb, and the article isn't too far over the ~30kb guideline (it's at 41kb at the moment). A little shorter might be nice, but that 41kb also includes citations and a big table and other stuff. So, I'm not inclined to argue over this more. I've struck out the relevant parts of my objection, but I'm still objecting on the basis of the references. I see 6 AMG, 1 Amazon (even worse than AMG in my mind), 1 About.com, some fansites, some reputable websites, and 1 book reference. I'd probably be ok with a few wisely chosen AMG/fansite references, but for a band with 30+ years of performing and lots of fame, there should be plenty of print devoted to them too. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 03:45, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. Extensive and sourced article. Gflores ^Talk 20:30, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support--This is a great article...we need more music-related FAs on Wikipedia. Osbus 23:33, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. This article is very well written, very informative, contains appropriate pictures and captions, and is well referenced. --NEMT 14:16, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Good article, very informative, well referenced, good layout, relevant pictures and usefull supporting tables --KaptKos 14:31, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Well written, good balance in reference material, very informative. A great article! Anger22 01:36, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
• Neutral Support. A very well-written and referenced article, but I'm not entirely comfortable with the only audio samples available being from an outside source. Get some fair-use OGG audio samples directly into the Wikipedia and added to the article, preferably integrating them directly into the main text (using the appropriate {{audio}} and {{listen}} or {{multi-listen}} templates) instead of just providing a selection at the end, and you'll have my support. - dharmabum 08:21, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

  I'll fire up Audacity and get right on that. Probably will have it done sometime tonight. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 18:16, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

  It is now done. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 21:42, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support. I'm not a fan of popular music FAs in general, but Rush has always been extremely influential among young musicians, and the article is goodness. JeffBurdges 20:25, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

• Support Great stuff --PopUpPirate 21:35, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

• Object As I already pointed out in the article's peer review, all images lack fair use rationales, and most of them are uploaded too large to qualify as fair use. The audio samples should be better incorporated into the article and the sections Videos and Audio samples at the end should be removed or merged into External links. Also, the labels in the discography table are overlinked and(done) "years in x" links should not be piped. I also think the History section should be the first after the lead. --Fritz Saalfeld (Talk) 14:40, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Most of these are opinion-based, except for the fair-use issue. — Deckiller 19:34, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. Perhaps the reputation section can be moved to follow the history, but band members and music style will remain where they are as they are logically placed Wisdom89 19:36, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

When Raul promotes this article, he'll only look for objections that address points that go against the criteria, not user opinions. The fair use is the only issue remaining from this objection. — Deckiller 19:38, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. The objections seem to be style-based, but they're not objections that relate specifically to the MoS. Thus, opinion. Hell, I prefer the way the song samples are linked...one song per "era". Fritz, if you want to try your hand at improving what you suggested, go ahead...but I think it looks fine now. As for the fair use images, I asked the dude who owns the copyright to one of those photos to release it to the GFDL, and I'm still awaiting a response. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 19:38, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I don't really mind the order. However, according to the fair use tag for audio clips "The sample is being used for commentary on the music recording in question" which is clearly not the case here (the songs aren't even mentioned in two of the sections). And they all lack fair use rationales. Also, the guide for piped links can be found at WP:PIPE. Plus I don't see any reason to keep the Videos and Audio samples section outside of External links.--Fritz Saalfeld (Talk) 19:54, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

The commentary is really that I was trying to provide an example of a song from each "era." Thus, the commentary is the entire section. As for the fair use rationale, it's that I'm using it in an encyclopedia article about the artist, duh. :-P —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 20:02, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Well, there needs to be a detailed fair use rationale on the image discription page, even for audio. (See Fair use rationale) --Fritz Saalfeld (Talk) 09:48, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Have added some minor fair use rational to all images, please add to, but am confused as to what to to bout audio, User talk:Fritz Saalfeld, as you highlight your contrib to New Radicals to FA on your user page, yet audio clips on that page have no fair use rational which you insist for this article. How do we square this circle? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by KaptKos (talk • contribs) .

That's a little off topic here, but thanks for letting me know, I'll fix that. --Fritz Saalfeld (Talk) 09:18, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Frank Zappa

Well written, comprehensive and informative article. The concerns about adequite citations from the previous FAC seem to have been addressed as there is a very large section of works cited included. Hamster Sandwich 21:22, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• First FAC: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Frank Zappa/Archive 1
• Object for now. Article has a "further reading" section - are these supposed to be the references? Were they actually used as references, or are they just sources that probably back up the claims of the article? There is a difference. I'd prefer an actual references section. Inline citations would be good too eventually. Also the above archive link above doesn't seem to be working. --W.marsh 21:36, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  This has been somewhat addressed, but Allen3's second comment below summarizes the still remaing problems quite well. If the references were cleaned up as described there it would do a whole lot. As I mentioned elsewhere, there are some POV claims in the article that are totally uncited. I just don't think a featured article should, say, proclaim their subjects "legendary" or "gifted" - though citing someone notable who says that is fine. Hence, reference problems. --W.marsh 00:46, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. As per Wikipedia:Citing sources#Further reading/external links, references are kept seperate from the further reading and external links sections because they serve different purposes. The long list of intermingled citations needs to be seperated and some form of inline citation added to allow a fact checker to double check the article's sources without undue effort. --Allen3 ^talk 22:32, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  The referencing still needs a fair amount of work. The quick split helped, but the majority of the article lacks any form of inline citation. The embedded HTML links (the only form of inline citation I was able to find) need to be converted into proper citations. In addition, there appears to be two or more different citation styles used in the further reading and references sections. The article needs to be standardized on a single style of citation. If you are not sure which citation style you wish to use, I suggest looking at the current citation templates. Please see WP:CITE for more information on what is expected. --Allen3 ^talk 00:09, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I couldn't help but notice the lack of reference to 'Guitar Johnny'. I am not expert enough to add the necesary lines but he was a major influence on Frank's guitar style & a lifelong friend. On a tv documentary I have he is one of the guests at a party for Zappa to comiserate with his impending death.

I think this is one of the best written articles on Wikipedia. It should be featured. Overdubbed 02:19, 12 May 2006 (UTC) Please get this article featured soon!

[edit] Ford Taurus

I'm nominating this artlcle again. The first time around, it got shot down. it has been vastly improved since then, and now I feel that it is ready for feature-hood. --Karrmann

• Support. --Gmaxwell 15:56, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. I agree with Karrman, this is a great article. --Chaos Reaver 17:44, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. The prose is a bit rough in spots, but overall, a very good article. RyanGerbil10 19:46, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Good work. —Eternal Equinox | talk 23:15, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment. Lots and lots of infoboxes. Are they really all necessary? They make the article look very cluttered and unclean. Would it be possible to turn all but the main infobox into text? —Cuiviénen, Saturday, 18 March 2006 @ 00:13 (UTC)
  • I wouldn't think so, all models seem to have differing specs. What is the general guideline overit for these kind of articles? Circeus 00:47, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose. This article needs a massive copyedit for glaring Capitalization, speeling, and, grammar, errors. — Scm83x ^{hook 'em} 01:05, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Been copyedited. --Karrmann
• strong oppose + commment. I don't think the article meets current FA standards (the ideal one), and here are some thoughts:

A. The prose is choppy and atrocious at times, and the article contains numerous spelling and grammar errors. In the design section, the word "they" refers to both the designers and other things, such as import models (the second sentence is especially terrible). There're ways to make this clear. Examples just in the first section:

1. Ford is a company, but is referred to as "they" many times. Bad grammar.

2. What are the "minor touch" here and there. This doesn't read professional at all.

3. Capitalization of adjective inside parantheses, wrong grammar. ex. "A"lmost.

4. Don't describe a build of car as "atrocious." It's not proper language for an article. Give specific reasons and description of the car to show your point would be better.

5. Why British spelling on American car language (ex. realising)? Not consistent with rest of articles at all.

6. This article needs heavy grammar checks, as there are too many puntuation, spelling, and syntax errors. Sentences don't follow a logic order thoughout the article. An FA should have none of those as a prerequisite.

B. Insufficient emphasis on design and production of the vehicle.

1. Lack of any significant engineering information regarding the article. They were more aerodynamic, or aesthetic purposes only?

2. After oil crisis, the American manufacturers sought "technologies." This is one of the worst sentences in the article. What technologies, oil crisis and aerodynamics, do what? To reduce drag? No explanations offered, and the sentence is totally out of place.

3. It's a car, where's information about gas mileage ratio?

4. Why is torque a welcoming addition for heavier wagons? We know torque in physics or in propeller crafts, but what's torque in a car?

5. Why is cooling problem thought to be at fault in 3.8?

C. The article is more or less a product or consumer guide.

1. Besides first section, all other sections are product description, and read alike, with the only difference being model make. What's the point, you could have just provided a link to other websites. And one of the website is a Taurus "Encyclopedia."

2. These sections read amateurish: Wow, this car has airconditioning, X model engine, blah blah blah. It takes lots of space to add these to the article, and are not put into context.

3. Why are some features in some model but not in others? Ford must have made some rationale to divide Taurus into many sub-classes, but the article does not provide reasons behind these decisions.

4. Overall these sections are like direct copy from consumer brochures, and it's not good when an article under consideration for FA has ONLY those facts.

5. Export model section is pretty insufficient, only cursory mentions of some weightless facts. Inability to expand Taurus to outside must be displeasing to Ford, any information?

Overall I don't think this article is ready. You can argue about the content, but at least the grammar of the article is very sub-par. The article contains more insufficiencies than the ones I listed, but those should give you some idea about the quality of the article. Anyways, feel free to bloviate. Temporary account 01:11, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Indeed, it had some pretty glaring errors, like spelling "Ford" as "for" a few times leading to very confusing sentences, and pretty much a grammar or spelling error error in every sentence on average. I'm hardly a great copy editor but I've made a ton of fixes in the first section so far... I'm sure there are a lot left. --W.marsh 01:19, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose. Writing not good enough; there's even a prominent typo at the top of the first section. POV as currently worded in a few places (e.g., 'atrocious'); that's not encyclopedic language. Tony 01:26, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Fixed (for the most part, I hope). —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 02:16, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose I noticed the same issues as others have pointed out. Also has some issues with weasel words (like "many people argue"), and several unreferenced POV claims (I added a citation request to one of them). A good article certainly, but still needs some work... I've done a bit myself at least. --W.marsh 01:49, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object for now, per W.marsh and Temporary account. —BorgHunter ^ubx (talk) 02:16, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose As far as "brilliant prose" goes, it's lacking. As far as an interesting read, it's lacking. What's the impact of the Ford Taurus on the world? There's so much more the article could tell us. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 03:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

comment : for such a common object,there must be better pictures than some of those.--Technosphere83 11:16, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object The article is more narrative than encyclopedic. An example; the first paragraph of "Introduction and competition" needs a complete copyedit. "Ford was in a free fall tailspin. Their build quality was atrocious, and their sales were plummeting" feels opinionated. "Ford needed something, and they needed something fast" is POV and narrative. "They called in Tempo designer Jack Telnak, to create a car that would one-up Chrysler and General Motors while allowing the United States to finally be able to keep up with the imports from Japan and Europe" is very wordy. Similar opinions and wordiness appear in most of the later paragraphs. --Ataricodfish 21:16, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] P. K. van der Byl

This article is modest in size and scope. But it offers a subtle insight into a significant issue in history - namely the decolonisation process in Africa. Bob BScar23625 14:26, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Not a work of academic distinction. But it is simple, readable, and makes a historical point. Bob BScar23625 14:46, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Refer to WP:PR - this is fine, as far as it goes, but I doubt it is comprehensive, and there are no references. See the criteria for featured articles. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:47, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  "comprehensive" means that an article covers the topic in its entirety, and does not neglect any major facts or details; note that "comprehensive" does not imply a minimum word count. I think the article is comprehensive, although concise. Bob BScar23625 16:00, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  Thank you, but I do know what "comprehensive" means (as defined in WIAFA). For example, who were his parents; where did he go to school; where did he serve in WWII; what did he do from 1945 to 1950 and from 1950 to 1962; what were his terms of office in the various ministries and what policy initiatives did he pursue; what did he do between 1982 and his death. Finally, you must add some references. If I was being picky, I would add that there are no inline citations, as far as I can see, even for the direct quotations. -- ALoan (Talk) 16:44, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  Thanks for your comments. As I am sure you are aware, his school, parents and war service details are given in the links in the article. But are you sure those are "major facts or details"?. Is the name of the school he went to fundamental to an understanding of the man and his career?. Bob BScar23625 16:58, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  I didn't know the man from Adam before having read the article, but it seems to me that his school could be important. He seems to been well known for having given the impression of being an upper-class Englishman, so it would be interesting to know whether he went to, say, Eton; equally, it would be interesting if he was educated somewhere less prestigious. I was not aware that details of his school, parents and war service details are given as links in the article - I have only read the article, not the links. If the details are so easily available, perhaps you would like to add them with a reference. -- ALoan (Talk) 18:54, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  The rewrite seems to have addressed my objection; however, as most of the text is so new, I still think it could do with a period of maturation on WP:PR. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:03, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Generally only one external link and pic and no references. Brandmeister 17:44, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. Criterion 2a. BScar, I don't know what you mean by 'academic'; what we want here is good writing. I can see at least eight changes that need to be made in the first few sentences. Let me know if you want examples. Tony 01:20, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• In fairness to everyone I should say that last night I rewrote the article almost from scratch and it is now much longer than it was. I have not finished and will go back to add direct references. I would refer this article to peer review once this process is completed. To Tony, I would say that criterion 2a (beautiful prose) is a very difficult one to judge. One man's beautiful prose is another's nest of clichés. David | Talk 13:39, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

It's not 'beautiful' prose that is required, but 'compelling, even brilliant' prose. This matter is not nearly as subjective as you're making out. The article should be 'stable' (Criterion 2e), and is clearly not. And it should go to PR before this room, not after. Tony 14:02, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support - even more so Sorry chaps - I am the guilty party on submitting the article prematurely. David has done an excellent job on rewriting this since yesterday and I have added a point or two. PK is a key character in the history of the twentieth century, although few people have heard of him. Perhaps you would all be kind enough to take another look at it?. Bob BScar23625 14:55, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support - I love this guy. Nice work Bob! michael ^talk 02:41, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Michael. Yes, I don't think even Wilbur Smith could make up a guy like PK. Bob BScar23625 08:15, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object lead section needs to be at least two paragraphs - see WP:LEAD WhiteNight ^{T | @ | C} 06:52, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Fixed. David | Talk 22:57, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Further comments just in case this academic vs. good writing thing has made Criterion 2a fuzzy. The writing is OK for a high-school essay, but not as a FA on WP. It's generally understandable, but more is required: plain, clear, correct English without redundancy. I've taken one whole section as an example, displayed below sentence by sentence. (BTW, the structure is a little choppy—too many stubby paragraphs and sections.)

"Van der Byl came to Rhodesia in 1950 in order to manage some of his family's tobacco farming interests, and to make his fortune." And remove the comma.

"He welcomed the move as it allowed him to indulge his hobby of big game hunting: in that year in Angola he set a world record for the biggest elephant shot; the, a record thatstood for many years." If you know that it was many years, why not tell us exactly how many?

The source did not specify. David | Talk 10:28, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

"He entered politics via the Rhodesian Tobacco Association (of which he became a leading spokesman) and the Rhodesian Front." "Via" might be OK as a technical word in chemistry or engineering, but here, "through" or "through his association with" is required. Replace parentheses with commas, or better still: ""He entered politics by being a leading spokesman of the Rhodesian Tobacco Association and through his membership of the Rhodesian Front."

"PK was always elegantly dressed and coiffured. He spoke in with an upper-class English accent that was not his native way of speaking." The last eight words raise thorny issues; you could remove this and write simply: "... coiffured, and adopted an upper-class English accent." If "PK" was his nickname, quotes are required on its first appearance here.

"At the 1962 general election, van der Byl was elected comfortably to the Rhodesia House of Assembly for the Hartley constituency, a rural area to the south-west of Salisbury." Perfect.

The whole text needs surgery like this to satisfy 2a, I'm afraid. Tony 07:31, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid you're talking rubbish here. Your quibbles are just your personal prejudices for the type of English you prefer, not some objective assessment. David | Talk 10:28, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• I'm afraid that rudeness to reveiwers is not what gets a FAC through. I won't say any more at this point. Tony 11:39, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• • I speak as I find, and this FAC is going to go to Peer Review anyway. I might object to lots of FAC nominations because they mis-spell words like "colour" and refer to people walking on something called the "sidewalk". David | Talk 11:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

The objections seem somewhat petty and an insult to those who put effort into this article. michael ^talk 13:18, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Let me be 'petty' a little more, and 'insult' the contributors with objections to writing that is frankly far from 'compelling, even brilliant' (Criterion 2a). Far from indulging in 'personal prejudices', I'm concerned about precision, consistency, and standard practice, which all add up to ease of reading.

"PK" or 'PK'—consistency required.

"who strongly believed in an international communist conspiracy which was plotting to overthrow white rule"—fuzzy; try "... believed that an international communist conspiracy was ...". Can a conspiracy plot to do something?

"He inherited from his mother in 1983 a property described as 'the magnificent estate he had inherited"—clumsy repetition.

"The two were both members of White's Club"—hello?

The reference to his attractive young wife might make some readers (like ... 50% of them) gag with the typecasting of women. It's not encyclopedic language. (See Criterion 2d.)

I won't go on; the article has some good points, but it definitely does not "exemplify WP's very best work". I note that little attempt has been made to improve the prose since my first objection and that, instead, the contributors' response to my suggestions was belligerent. Tony 09:03, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

• • We have guidelines about civility but not belligerence, so it's not a case of breaking any rules. You've still to substantiate your objection to the writing, which is just your personal prejudice about the style of English and really isn't something that can be taken into account. Yes, a conspiracy can plot to do something - that's the whole point of a conspiracy. What on earth do you mean by "—hello?" Is this supposed to be some form of objection? The point about van der Byl's wife is significant: after a lifetime of womanising he eventually marries a European Royal 30 years younger than him, which is highly relevant to his position. I don't know what your real objection is here because you bring up these nonsense points again. David | Talk 20:55, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

You still have to substantiate your contention that my objections are 'personal prejudice about the style of English'. No, a conspiracy doesn't plot, people plot. "Hello" means that you shouldn't have to be told that 'The two were both' is tautological. Attractiveness is subjective, and in this context is inappropriate POV. My examples, here and above, amply exemplify poor writing, specifically, redundancy, repetition, and jumbled logic. It is significantly below FA standards. Tony 01:05, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. I like the article, and it's been substantially improved since its nomination. But I agree with Tony; it wastes words throughout. Try following the six rules in Orwell's Politics and the English Language. Also, the preamble seems to stop partway; it doesn't cover Van der Byl's reaction to internal settlement or the aftermath. -- Avenue 09:54, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Very good article! 217.209.93.205 23:35, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Final Fantasy IV

Was nominated and failed in March, but was fixed up a lot by a collaborative effort of people who worked on the other Final Fantasy FAs and the Chrono ones.

Here's the failed nomination: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Final Fantasy IV/Archive 1

• Co-nom and support. This article's references have gone up to seventy six and the prose was fixed. I was also asked to tell you that if you have an objection, the problems will be corrected swiftly and zealously. Sir Crazyswordsman 19:50, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

• Co-nom/support; solid article, generally on par with the others; prose is a little "meh" in a couple paragraphs, but it's nitpicking. I believe it passes FAC quite well. — Deckiller 22:31, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

• Very Strong Support - I am so proud to see this article, which I worked on to get it to GA and sponsored the first FA nomination, finally ready for FA. Thanks guys for your hard work in giving the big push that made this possible. Judgesurreal777 01:30, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Thank you for your support. Sir Crazyswordsman 02:58, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
• Support and comment: Nice work, but Image:FF4 WSC boxart.jpg and Image:Ffcbox.jpg do not have any sources. Thunderbrand 03:55, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Fixed Judgesurreal777 04:31, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, again. Sir Crazyswordsman 06:24, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Also, Image:Ff4jbox.gif is missing a source. Thunderbrand 15:24, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Also fixed :) Judgesurreal777 17:03, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose Support - needs a good copyediting. Grammatical errors are rampant. I corrected 3 grammatical errors in the Versions and rereleases section that I ran across by accident while editing content. Kaldari 16:32, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Please elaborate. I can't seem to find any. Sir Crazyswordsman 16:58, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • The user has a point; I don't even think I touched the versions section. — Deckiller 17:04, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
    • I took a look at it. It looks okay to me. There were a few problems in the GBA section which I fixed. Sir Crazyswordsman 17:08, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
      • It seems that the article doesn't really need a copyedit any further, as those were isolated issues in a section that was not copyedited previously. — Deckiller 17:48, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Here are a few problems I noticed with a casual proofreading of a few sections:

Copyediting:

• "Characters move and interact with people and enemies on a field map, which usually depicts a single area——such as a tower or forest."
• "The ESRB rated it (Everyone 10 and older) and the CERO designated it for all ages." (should say the ESRB rated it "E" (Everyone 10 and older)...)

Awkward sentences:

• Magic is divided into "White" (healing and support) magic; "Black" (offensive) magic; and "Summon" (or "call") magic, used to summon monsters for offensive or specialized applications. (sentence is overly complex and doesn't flow well. overuse of parenthetical phrases makes a sentence hard to read.)
• An early Super Nintendo game, Final Fantasy IV contained graphics improved over past Final Fantasy titles and concurrent Super Nintendo games. (use of conjunction is ambiguous: did FF4 contain other Super Nintendo games? sentence should probably be divided into two sentences or reworded.)
• They meet Tellah along the way, who shares their destination in search of his daughter Anna. (prepositional phrase fits direct object, but not the verb, i.e. it sounds like they are also in search of his daughter. should be rewritten, possibly as two sentences.)

Need to use "logical quoting" per the Manual of Style:

• Most of Final Fantasy IV takes place on Earth, also known as the "Blue Planet."
• The world contains both an "Upper World" and an "Underground."

Redundantcy:

• "an elite air force unit of airships" (wouldn't "elite unit of airships" be adequate?)

Awkward wording:

• "Cecil awakes to find Kain absent" (more typical wording would be "wakes" or "awakens")
• "they must surmount Mt. Hobs" (more typical wording would be "ascend" or "climb", especially before the word Mt.)

Grammar:

• "Yang charters a ship to take him, Cecil, Edward, and Rydia to Baron" (should be "himself")
• "Entitled Final Fantasy IV Advance, the Game Boy Advance port was released in North America by Nintendo of America on December 12, 2005, in Japan by Square Enix on December 15, 2005, and in Europe on June 2, 2006." (needs semicolons)
• "released in Japan on March 27 2002" (missing a comma)

Hope that helps. I only looked through a few random sections to find those, so there are probably more problems that a thorough proofreading would reveal. Kaldari 18:04, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I went in and fixed the vast majority of your edits, and looked through the rest of the article, and I would agree with you in some places (which I fixed earlier). However, I need some help with the WP:MOS concerns you brought up. How exactly should I treat in-game definitions (which have been explained and, of course, referenced). Sir Crazyswordsman 18:30, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

The Manual of Style recommends "logical" quoting: "When punctuating quoted passages, include the punctuation mark inside the quotation marks only if the sense of the punctuation mark is part of the quotation ("logical" quotations)." What this means is that if the puctuation mark is part of what is being quoted, include it inside the quotation marks, otherwise put it outside the quoation marks. Kaldari 23:22, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

All problems solved. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:48, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

• Neutral - The story section is far too long. Three paragraphs should be more than enough to summarize the plot. If you want to keep the current description, then please move it to another article, and use summary style here. This isn't an issue of article length, but of relevance. An encyclopedia article's job is not to give excessive detail on a video game plot. Thanks. --Taitcha 17:02, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Please see the pop culture FACs promoted over the last 2-3 months. Also, I noticed you just recently restarted editing; there has been a general shift in what is necessary for comprehensiveness. An encyclopedia's job is to be comprehensive; the story section leaves out many of the minor details as it is. — Deckiller 17:04, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • All our other FAs have similar length story. Sir Crazyswordsman 17:10, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I can understand your worries about people wanting longer/shorter plot details. However, it seems a simple solution to me to have a sub-article with the full plot version, and a summary here. Can't everyone be happy that way? --Taitcha 17:13, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
    • We didn't start the trend; we followed it. Sir Crazyswordsman 17:21, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
      • The problem with subarticles is that they will cause another camp of users to state that there should not be story-exclusive articles. — Deckiller 17:28, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
      • Is that a problem you've experienced, or is it just something you're anticipating? Personally, I don't imagine anyone would complain about such a sub-article, and I think it would be a positive new trend. --Taitcha 17:36, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
        • We've had some problems with it in the past. Most of the subarticles that HAVE gotten praise are usually term lists. The thing is also that FFIV's story is one of the most in-depth in the series as far as progression, as there are many minor details (which we left out, for the record) which have SEVERE impact on the story. Look at some of the FFIV character articles on the Final Fantasy Wiki compared to the FFVI or FFVII ones there, and you'll see that their stories have much more importance to the overall plot. It's something I think that's beyond my control. It's for this reason that the story sections are now overloaded with references to the game itself. I should probably say this as the writer and primary referencer of the story section, which has actually been trimmed down (to my greatest impression) after I wrote it. Sir Crazyswordsman 17:49, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
        • Well, I'm not too happy about the state of things, but out of respect for your efforts, I'll change my vote to Neutral. --Taitcha 17:54, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
          • That's fine. I understand the merits of and respect your opinion. I just want all our FAs to be consistent. Sir Crazyswordsman 18:14, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
• Support: This being the English Wikipedia, why is the lone battle sequence screen taken from the Japanese version of the game? I think it's much more accessible if readers see "Fight," and "Item" in the command list rather than Japanese characters. EDIT: On second glance, I see that Cecil is in the middle of using an item. Showing the command list at all would be more illustrative of the game's style of combat. --Tristam 20:37, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

But the original game is japanese... Judgesurreal777 23:01, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Your point? We don't want a Japanese screenshot on an English Wikipedia. --TheEmulatorGuy 23:44, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Says who? We are not pushing some kind of English-only Wikipedia since this game is JAPANESE, and my point is that there is nothing wrong with including screenshots from the original game, regardless of its language. Judgesurreal777 23:56, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I'll have an English one up in ten minutes. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:47, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

It now has an English screen. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:53, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, CSM. Judge, I think the argument of originality versus accessibility is pretty weak. Final recommendation for CSM: I do like the separate infoboxes for the different versions of the game, but that section always has looked ugly. I think you can remove the FFChronicles infobox; after all, the game does have its own article. I think with that infobox out of the way and the text to help break apart the other infoboxes, it should be easier to move around the infoboxes in a more aesthetically pleasing fashion. --Tristam 00:03, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I just dont appreciate the terse and seemingly rude response from emulator guy when I was initially requesting clarification. Judgesurreal777 00:11, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I apologize. Remember, the image is being used to describe the game mechanics. Since this is an English Wikipedia, the game mechanics cannot be fully described without an English screenshot, therefore bringing it out of fair use. --TheEmulatorGuy 00:21, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Emulator Guy and Tristam, I very much appreciate your civility :) And I do see your point, I suppose it is better for comprehension. Judgesurreal777 00:43, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Fixed. Sir Crazyswordsman 00:06, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Voted to support after complaints were addressed. Judge, I apologize for all the hoopla then. Great article though, guys. --Tristam 00:20, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Tristam. Sir Crazyswordsman 00:22, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

• Support - Once again, a fine, fine article. Here's to yet another Final Fantasy FA! --PresN 01:15, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
  • As always, glad to have you aboard. Sir Crazyswordsman 02:51, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose There is still a bit of easy to fix items that Auto-peer review found such as lengthinging the intro, removing redunant words like 'some', and making the image captions more consise. The APR can be found on the articles talk page. -Ravedave ^{(help name my baby)} 02:35, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

• Support I don't like the short intro but other than that it's good. -Ravedave ^{(help name my baby)} 04:30, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

• Thank you very much. Sir Crazyswordsman 04:46, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

• • There is only one usage of the word "some" in the article (I believe I zapped most of the significant redundancies on the first and second passes; I'm a stiffler when it comes to redundancies). The intro seems to be on par with most of the pop culture FAs as of late, especially the final fantasies. Caption succinctness is one thing that I agree with. — Deckiller 02:34, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
    • I took care of a few size terms, but I'm not big on removing those, as they often provide a compromise between listing every example and providing misinformation. — Deckiller 02:48, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
      • Thanks for being here, Deck, and for your concerns, Ravedave. I've tried experimenting with caption succinctness, and was able to reduce their size a bit, but I don't know how to go any further without losing meaning. And as for the auto-Peer Review stuff, a lot of it is either stuff I can't really find (the date stuff, mainly) and the interlinking alphabetizing (can't find that stuff either). I may take another look later. Sir Crazyswordsman 02:50, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
        • On second thought, I took another look and fixed most of these little things. Sir Crazyswordsman 03:34, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
          • ALL image captions are now concise, and subtrivia has been removed. Sir Crazyswordsman 03:50, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose, for now. This is my favorite RPG ever, so I'd love to see this featured. I copy edited the article, but this allowed me to notice other, more fundamental problems:
  • First off, holy moly, the plot synopsis is long! The level of detail given simply isn't necessary; you don't need to mention every boss monster fight and every minor plot twist. I'd cut this section by 1/3 to 1/2.
  • Second, the sources used concern me. We've got the various versions of the game itself, the manuals, and some game magazines (all good), but then the rest of the sources are fan sites (rpgamer.com, allrpg.com, gamesarefun.com, the-magicbox.com, 1up.com, lostlevels.org, mobygames.com, ffcompendium.com, b-rock.netfirms.com, geocities.com/arcanelore2001/, and finalfantasy.neoseeker.com). Per WP:RS, these just don't cut it, especially for a featured article ("self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources").
  • Either incorporate the direct quotes from the game into the main text, or axe them. There's no need for direct quotations unless you want to add color to the article, and that should be done in the main body. — BrianSmithson 10:48, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

There may be some issues with precedent here. Perhaps the plot can be cut by a third, but lately the trend has been to satisfy the comprehensiveness requirement of featured articles before worrying about length, which isn't a requirement. Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross are examples. Nearly all the featured CVG RPG articles do source quotes from the text in references, too, though I'm not sure if that's an official policy or what.

As for the sources, several of those are review sites that have been accepted with other articles. RPGamer, AllRPG, and GaF are credible reviewers supported by gamerankings.org. I think 1up.com is supposed to be a respected blog, but I don't know too much about it. The b-rock thing is a fan translation reference, so it's normal to have a fansite for that (like the Compendium and RPGOne at Chrono Trigger). Fan translations have also been decided to be notable on WP:CVG's talk page. The real use of the other sources listed is documenting the translation differences. No "real source" breaks down the details, yet this is still relevant information for readers. Unless someone can get IGN to run a special feature on the version changes, there's just no source for this unless we cite these. So not sure what to do about that.

I'm back from an unexpected break, so I'll be able to help with anything. --Zeality 12:57, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, bad precedent shouldn't change the way we review articles now. I didn't participate in the FACs for Chrono Cross and the others, but had I done so, I would have raised the same conerns. — BrianSmithson 22:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

If you read some of the other comments above, and I've said this many times, you'll understand that a lot of your complaints are really just based on what the trends are. First of all, a lot of the sites you have problems with are actually well-respected sites within the community (and Zeality, 1UP.com is similar to IGN). Direct quotes from the game itself are required. It says somewhere that "in the story section, there should be a reference every two sentences from the story itself." Sir Crazyswordsman 15:30, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that's a policy anywhere. Every two sentences seems like a rather arbitrary rule at any rate. — BrianSmithson 22:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

As I've been very busy lately and haven't really had time to check in, I can neither fairly support nor object at this time simply because I don't have time to read the entire article and give it due analysis, but I would like to comment on the matter of sources. RPGamer is a well known site that has been covering RPG news and reviews for 8 years, and was exclusively covering Square Co. (now Square Enix) games as Square Net for three years before that (some have said that it was even hosted on Square's own server when it was Square Net). In terms of notability, it's in one of the highest tiers.

As for 1UP.com, I can't imagine how that wouldn't qualify. The 1UP network is owned and operated by Ziff Davis Media, and is comprised of several publications, including — but not limited to — Electronic Gaming Monthly and Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. If this doesn't qualify, nothing would. In fact, the 1UP article being used as a source was written by Jeremy Parish, a contributor to OPM and EGM.

For one of the others, as Zeality has mentioned, the b-rock reference is pretty much necessary given the nature of the information and the citation. I would also contest the notion that Neoseeker isn't a notable source. It's been around for 7 years and is quite well known. I don't really have time to look into or comment on the others, but any of them that are or are affiliated with RPGamer, CNET, Ziff Davis Media or IGN are definitely notable enough.

By the way, as for including quotes from the game itself, that's part of the manual of style, and is a practice not followed as religiously as it should be:

"Of course, out-of-universe information needs context; details of creation, development, etc. are more helpful if the reader understands a fictional element's role in its own milieu. This often involves using the fiction to give plot summaries, character descriptions or biographies, or direct quotations. This is not inherently bad, provided that the fictional passages are short, are given the proper context, and do not constitute the main portion of the article. If such passages stray into the realm of interpretation, secondary sources must be provided to avoid original research. Note that when using the fictional work itself to write these descriptions the work of fiction must be cited as a source. For instance, a video game article should cite the game text, but it should also cite a reliable secondary source when necessary."

That's the most I have to offer for the moment, I'm afraid. Good luck with the FAC. I hope I'll get time to come back by and offer some comments about the article itself. Ryu Kaze 15:45, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm on the fence about RPGamer.com. It does have a large "staff", but there's no evidence that it's subject to any editorial oversight and thus that it is not self-published. I can't find anything to reassure me about neoseeker; it looks like it's open to contributions from anyone (or at least from registered users).

The direct quotation thing (from WP:WAF) was never intended to be interpreted like this (and I should know; I wrote it, though not the addendum about video games, which I hadn't noticed until now). Rather, it was meant to sort out things like detailed backstories of characters taken from 20 different sources and weaved together into one whole. That way people can tell what comic book it was where Darth Vader got his new respirator or what cartoon shows that Speed Racer is afraid of heights. Here, the source is the same throughout. One source cite is enough for the whole plot, just to tell us what translation you're using. The direct quotes as they are being used do nothing but bloat the article and make it appear better referenced than it actually is. — BrianSmithson 22:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

As with the other gaming FAs/FACs, we struck a balance between the two factions (although like FF7, I wasn't a major contributor to this one), so it's highly unlikely that the synopsis will be cut down or expanded unless the featured article criteria can be interpreted correctly and in such a manner that discourages lengthy or short synopsis. As for the sources, a general term for "reliable sources" is misleading and perhaps ignorant on the part of certain aspects of the community (like certain parts of WP:NOT used to be). Reliable sources are different for each article; what's reliable for this would not be reliable for, say, a movie, or a war article. Reliable sources should be reworded to state that "Articles should have the highest level of reliable sources available for the topic". This article has some of the best sources it can get, so I see no problem with any of the sourcing. Final Fantasy IV doesn't have its own series of documentaries on A and E, or five analysis books published. As for the quotations, they have been included for numerous FAs, and they are perfectly fine according to most camps - they have never posed a problem in the past, and removing them would severely weaken the state of the article, as then we'd have people complaining that it's OR. With all of our FAs, we attempt to strike a balance between all factions, as this is the only true way to forge Wikipedia's best. — Deckiller 17:37, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I would disagree with any such rewording of WP:RS. Self-published is self-published, and such sources are largely unacceptible for encyclopedia sources. If these sources are affiliated with academic institutions or the well-known and respected gaming sites mentioned above, I would have no problem. But a Geocities page? That just isn't good enough for the FA level. — BrianSmithson 22:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Frankly, a source should not be treated as lesser just because it is web-based. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:02, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I will agree that the geocities reference (singular) should be removed and replaced by a better source (it's indeed possible; why in the world is a geocities reference in here anyway?!). However, let's keep things in perspective here; most encyclopedias write about major academic issues; stuff that has plenty of the most "reliable sources". However, on Wikipedia, we cover numerous topics very well (and just as factually accurate) with the best sources possible for that topic - and in many cases, they are web sources. Mario, Star Wars, and Donkey Kong would have many more books (or, rather, book sections) than an RPG. I stand by my comments above. — Deckiller 03:17, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

The issue isn't web-based vs. print, Crazyswordsman. Rather, it's self-published vs. not self-published. The various fan sites used to source some of this article are self-published, which, per, WP:RS, means they are not acceptable. I understand the frustration in trying to find good sources for pop culture articles such as this one, but it's a slippery slope if we lower our standards for some subjects and not others. I've been in (am in?) a pretty heated argument at Talk:Mami Wata that should illustrate why self-published sources are rightfully warned against in our policies. I stand by my comments, as well. — BrianSmithson 07:35, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

The Geocities thing is used because it's the only site, to my knowledge, that correctly notes that the Japanese Easytype was built from the US version, not the other way around. Ask a casual fan and he or she will say that the US version is a port of the Easytype, which is erroneous. This is unlucky, because it's a very important source. --Zeality 12:49, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

• Co-nom and Support. I'm a little late to the party due to unexpected events. --Zeality 21:34, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Finally you made it! At least now I know I'll have some help taking the heat here. Sir Crazyswordsman 21:38, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
• Support and Comment, I'm a little concerned about the actual number of story quotations referenced in the article. It's looking like almost 50% of the references section. Story references are good and all but that may be a bit excessive. Looking at some of the other Final Fantasy FAs, I see around 20 story references for some of the more controversial or obscure story points. Axem Titanium 22:21, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Thank you. Regarding the story references, it's 33 out of 76 references, which is less than half. We originally had sixty of them. FFIV is has such a deep and complex story compared to FFVI and even FFVII that it needs this. Almost EVERYTHING in the game has story value and isn't "Just there." Sir Crazyswordsman 22:27, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
    • I'd agree that IV is on the higher end of the spectrum when it comes to having a story where almost everything presented is actually relevant, but I'd still argue that VII has one of the more complex stories. At least in terms of how it's presented. Which is ironic considering how much of the story isn't even relevant to that core complex plot arc. IV is definitely consistent in its developments bearing relevance. By the way, still haven't gotten time to review the whole article, I'm afraid, but I'm liking of what I've seen so far. Ryu Kaze 23:28, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
      • You're a good man, Ryu, and I really appreaciate all you've done for us. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:44, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
        • Well, thank you for saying so, CS. You guys are most welcome, and it's been my pleasure. I just wish I had more time to lend a helping hand these days. By the way, I've had more time to look over the article and now throw in... (continued just below) Ryu Kaze 02:29, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
• ... (continued from above) Support for the reasons others have mentioned (particularly the reasons given in Deckiller's vote of confidence) and the touch-ups that have been made since the FAC began. Good work. Ryu Kaze 02:29, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
  • • • • • Thanks again Ryu. Sir Crazyswordsman 03:14, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose - The reception section is lacking. I'm not going to move on this until some relevent contemporary sources are quoted. Although we know that it polled very highly in the Famitsu 2006 readers poll, we don't have any review sources from when the game was actually released. I mean, what did Famitsu actually have to say about this? I've not really commented on that many FACs, but from now on, if there's no contemporary sources I'm going to oppose. - Hahnchen 00:01, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree that a review from the time of the game's release would be an extremely valuable piece of information. If anyone's interested in knowing where to get that review, it's issue 30 of Nintendo Power. You can get it on eBay right now (particularly check this) if you're willing to spend a little money for it (I know that might be out of the question, though, since it's basically spending money for volunteer work). Good luck. Ryu Kaze 00:25, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
    • P.S. I couldn't find the review on FindArticles.com. Better luck to you guys if you try. Ryu Kaze 00:36, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
      • We have a reference to Nintendo Power issue 30 already. Sir Crazyswordsman 00:46, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
        • • Ah, so you do. Well nevermind then. XD The section's just fine. Ryu Kaze 01:26, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
        • I'd much rather have Famitsu's take on things. Get that, and I'd support.- Hahnchen 00:58, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
          • When you say Famitsu do you mean from then or from now? Because honestly I think Nintendo Power is probably better for then, as NP is better known throughout the English speaking community than Famitsu, but if you want Famitsu I'll try to find its review for you. Sir Crazyswordsman 01:21, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
            • I found something! Sir Crazyswordsman 01:28, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
            • I mean from when the game was released. My own problem with Nintendo Power, and other such "official" magazines, is that they have to toe the party line. This is an issue which does not affect third party publications such as Famitsu. (after edit conflict) It would be nice to have the Famitsu score, and the score from Nintendo Power as well. - Hahnchen 01:30, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
              • I honestly don't know that what I have will satisfy you, but you may want to take a look. Sir Crazyswordsman 01:46, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Gamerankings should give you the rating. But to find the commentary, you're going to have to find someone in Japan who can scour markets for the relevant issue and then translate it. --Zeality 02:45, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

No Famitsu there, but I did find GamePro. Sir Crazyswordsman 02:52, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

It's all good. But note how the reception and critical reaction section for this is the shorter than the sections for other Final Fantasy FAs. If the only reason is that it's older and you don't have access to the print sources which obviously exist, then I'm not going to move, as I don't think it's as good as the others. - Hahnchen 03:20, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment Just as an update to the objections, we're looking for print sources by way of WP:CVG Magazine Projects and other avenues. We can also remove the Geocities reference, though I'd rather ensure we have some print before doing so (it's a really important reference, and we're plain unlucky that it's only available on a self-published webpage). We have no estimate on how long it will take to find print sources, so it's up to Raul on whether to remove this for the time being, pass personal judgment on the article's reception section, or leave it on the FAC page while we search. If it is removed, we'll renominate as soon as we can get some material. --Zeality 22:52, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Well I've done about five web searches and I can't find much. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:43, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose - This is almost there, I just have some qualms.
  • The biggest issue is that the plot summary needs less blow-by-blow and a bit more summary. Picking a paragraph at random...

    Cecil awakens on a beach near Mysidia, where he is met with contempt by the town's wizards for stealing the Water Crystal earlier.[23] However, the Mysidian elder allows Cecil to hold audience with him.[24] The elder notes that to defeat Golbez, Cecil must surrender his dark sword and become a Paladin. Cecil agrees and is asked to climb Mt. Ordeals to complete a trial.[25] He is assisted by twin wizards Palom and Porom, who are secretly ordered by the elder to spy on Cecil to learn if his intentions are pure.[26] While traveling, they encounter and defeat Scarmiglione, Golbez's Fiend of Earth. They also stumble upon Tellah, who is searching for the legendary spell of Meteo to defeat Golbez.[27] Cecil completes the trials, becomes a Paladin, and returns to Mysidia. The four warriors take the Serpent Road from Mysidia to Baron. Cecil learns that the engineer Cid was arrested for hiding his airship from the king. At the Baron inn, Cecil finds Yang brainwashed by Baronian solders. Cecil helps Yang recover, and together the five infiltrate the castle. Cecil discovers that the king is actually Caignazzo, Golbez's Fiend of Water.[28] Freed by Cecil, Cid takes the paladin to the Enterprise, his newest airship. Before dying, Caignazzo causes the walls of the castle to move with the intent of crushing Cecil. Palom and Porom petrify themselves to halt the trap.[29]

    With five minutes rewrite, I soaked that down to...

    Cecil awakens on a beach near Mysidia, where he is met with suspicion and derision. In Mysidia, the elder advises Cecil that he must surrender his dark sword and become a Paladin, and to do so he must complete a trial at Mt. Ordeals. The Elder sends twin wizards Palom and Porom along with Cecil, both to help and spy on Cecil. At Mt. Ordeals, the confront and defeat Scarmiglione, Golbez's Fiend of Earth, and encounter Tellah, who is searching for the legendary spell Meteo to defeat Golbez. Cecil completes the trials, becomes a Paladin, and returns to Mysidia.

    From there, the four travel to Baron, where they discover that the engineer Cid has been arrested and Yang brainwashed. After rescuing Yang and helping him recover, the five infiltrate the castle, where they discover that the king has been replaced with Caignazzo, Golbez's Fiend of Water, in disguise. The five of them defeat Caignazzo, but before dying, Caignazzo causes the walls of the castle to move with the intent of crushing the party. Palom and Porom petrify themselves to halt the trap, and Cid leads the survivors to the Enterprise, his newest airship.

    And that's without omitting any trivial points, like why Tellah was at Mt. Ordeals or every single boss battle. I realize the goal is comprehensiveness, but given that the rest of the article makes little reference to the plot (unlike with Final Fantasy VII), there's little need to sustain this level of detail. The rest of the article would still make sense even if the plot summary was reduced to...

    "Final Fantasy IV is the story of Cecil, a dark knight of Baron who is betrayed by his nation and eventually leads an ever-changing party of heroes in their effort to defeat the dark lord Golbez, who has co-opted Baron in an effort to collect the elemental crystals."

    Bear in mind I'm not suggesting that, but the rest of the article would still make sense.

  • The bloc of infoboxes below is ugly and unnecessary. The info those infoboxes have is the platform (which is already covered in the prose) and the release date (which can easily be covered in the text; Metal Gear Solid#Release information isn't perfect, but is an example of how this could be done without the need for obtrusive tables.
  • There's no need for a separate image for FFIV Easytype; it's the same cover with different trade dress. I'm also somewhat unhappy with having an image of the Wonderswan image; why do we need to illustrate a version of the game so minor that it only has three sentences in the article?
  • We have two images of interior overhead view, but no image of the overworld. It might be a good idea to replace the Golbez/Kain/Rosa image (which seems kind of unnecessary) with an overworld image.

  This is close, but it's just not quite FA-class yet. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:33, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  I should probably get around to doing this this weekend. There has been infobox controversey before, and some have already been removed. I'll get rid of all infoboxes and pictures except for the SNES and GBA ones. Sir Crazyswordsman 15:50, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  I took the infoboxes away. Sir Crazyswordsman 16:06, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  I've noted the progress, above. Most of the issues are superficial, but I do strongly feel that the plot summary fails to summarize. This article is 54K, and much of this is plot recap. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 16:33, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  Let's compromise. I don't want to get rid of important plot points, but I am finding a way to get rid of subtrivia (for example, I got rid of the Octomam reference). Sir Crazyswordsman 16:45, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  (reindent) I'm not toeing a hard line here, I just want to see a bit more effort put into summarizing. Some examples of superfluous details:

  • The mist dragon fight.
  • The fact that Rydia summons Titan, and how exactly it destroys the village.
  • Cecil's and Rydia's exact situation after they wake up. (There's a lot of this; it suffices to just say "...knocked the three unconscious. Once Cecil wakes up he discovers that Kain is missing and the girl is injured, so he takes her to a nearby town, Kaipo."
  • Exact dungeon names. There's a lot of "They travel to the Watery Pass," "They travel to Mt. Ordeals," and so on.
  • Exact modes of travel. "They take a hovercraft," "They take the Serpent Road," etc.

  I could do more, but it really feels like the main threads of the story are being lost in a flurry of detail. Take some time and consider whether a given detail is important to the story as a whole, or at least a particularly memorable moment. Examples like the fact that Rydia was laying on grass, driving a hovercraft around a desert, the entire bit with the Dark Elf's cave (why is that not one sentence?), fighting Dr. Lugae (bosses don't get any more throwaway), most of the Fiend battles, and many other details (I'm listing things again, *sigh*) are just overwhelming the main thread of the plot. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 17:15, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  Well the Mist Dragon IS an important boss to the storyline because without it, we would have no Rydia. I guess you could take some of it out. But some of it needs to stay. Sir Crazyswordsman 22:50, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  I took out the references to Titan and town descriptions. "Watery Pass," "Mt. Hobs," "Serpent Road," "Sealed Cave," and the fact that the Dark Elf is protected by a magnetic field are a few of the things I took out. Also, note that minor terms like "Misty Cave" "Baigan," "Old Water Way," "Mom Bomb," and "Twin Harp" are never mentioned. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:04, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  Mt. Ordeals WILL be kept though, as that is where a major plot point occurrs. I have a question: have you ever played the game? If you have, you should know what's important and what's not. Important locations should stay, and Mt. Ordeals is probably the most important location in the entire game other than Baron. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:06, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  I did the image replacement you want, and now you should know that now even important figures such as Dr. Lugae and Rubicante are taken out. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:18, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  Familiar enough such that I could write a plot summary from memory. Mt. Ordeals is a good example where details overwhelm the thread of the story; we're futzing around with the suspicions of the Mysidian townsfolk, the fact that Cecil gets an audience, traveling to Mt. Ordeals, the fact that he meets Scarmiglione, and even why Tellah is at Mt. Ordeals, but the trial itself (the first hint to the events of the third act) is glossed over as "Cecil completes the trials, becomes a Paladin, and returns to Mysidia"?

  I'm finding that the problem is too much "They went here. They did this. Foo joined them. Bar left. Then they went here." This isn't brilliant prose, and it's not useful or particularly interesting summary. The problem seems to be style as much as length and level of detail. I know there's an effort to stay away from getting too interpretive here, but this isn't FA class writing yet. Maybe it might be a good idea to talk to Deckiller and Ryu Kaze about refining the plot summary? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 23:30, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

  I'll ask. Sir Crazyswordsman 00:03, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

  Deck reworked the paragraphs, and I blended a few sentences together, using different styles of sentence construction here and there while minimizing the use of the passive voice. Sir Crazyswordsman 04:48, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

  My objections are sufficiently dealt with, and I've struck my oppose above. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 16:28, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

  You still haven't actually votes support on it. Sir Crazyswordsman 23:00, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

• Support: An overall excellent article.GrimRepr39 00:00, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
• Support: Excellent prose, good choice of images and a solid amount of references. Fulfills what's expected from a featured article, and is similar to other featured Final Fantasy articles. --TheEmulatorGuy 03:54, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
• Comment: Summary to date, as this nom is getting pretty lengthy: 3 co-nominating supports, 10 supports, 2 oposes, and 1 neutral. The current tally is therefore 13/2/1. --PresN 20:11, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Thanks to all! Sir Crazyswordsman 20:38, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] First French Empire

Partly self-nom, as I've done various bits of work on this, over time. — OwenBlacker 02:34, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Lacks inline citations and references. I would not register the writing as "brilliant prose" and it could be referred to peer review as well. Remember to check the what is a featured article guidelines before submitting an article to FAC. —Eternal Equinox | talk 02:46, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strongly object, as the current article has massive POV and stylistic issues (stemming, I suspect, from the almost unaltered sections of text from the 1911). A selection of some of the more flagrant examples:
  • "But Napoleon little knew the flame he was kindling. No more far-seeing than the Directory or the men of the year III, he thought that, with energy and execution, he might succeed in the Peninsula as he had succeeded in Italy in 1796 and 1797, in Egypt and in Hesse, and that he might cut into Spanish granite as into Italian mosaic or 'that big cake, Germany'."
  • "Napoleon's formidable material power could not stand against the moral force of the pope, now a prisoner at Fontainebleau; and this he did not realise."
  • "Napoleon himself was no longer the 'General Bonaparte' of his campaign in Italy. He was already showing signs of physical decay; the Roman medallion profile had coarsened, the obese body was often lymphatic. Mental degeneration, too, betrayed itself in an unwonted irresolution."
  • "At Eylau, at Wagram, and later at Waterloo, his method of acting by enormous masses of infantry, artillery and cavalry, in a mad passion for conquest, and his misuse of his military resources, were all signs of his moral and technical decline"
  • "Napoleon had hardly succeeded in putting down the revolt in Germany when the tsar of Russia himself headed a European insurrection against the ruinous tyranny of the continental blockade"
  • "Napoleon made a desperate effort in 1812 against a country as invincible as Russia"

Frankly, this article needs to be completely rewritten, using somewhat more varied and modern sources. —Kirill Lokshin 02:48, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Blue Man Group

Informative article about a group that not many people know about. Most remember them from the Intel commercials, and people need to be informed.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tripod2282 (talk • contribs).

• Object: The lead isn't an overview. References. Would refer to WP:PR. Kaisershatner 15:11, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object: The main image has no copyright tag (image now tagged to indicate this fact); no references given. Schutz 15:15, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object, not enough referencing.--Fallout boy 00:22, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object: "A total ripoff of the Smurfs if you ask me" – Homer Simpson. OK, back to serious mode. All above objections, plus the whole thing is rather uneven. Has too much of that "indiscriminate collection of facts" feel to it that we should absolutely avoid putting the gold star on. As I say elsewhere, this is a beginning, not an end. Daniel Case 04:14, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object, as above. Specifically the "indiscriminate list of facts" thing. "Appearances and other work" is particularly a bad offender here, and really needs to be rewritten as flowing prose. Fieari 05:23, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Philosophy of mind

I think this article is the most comprehesive, factually accurate, throughly documented, non-technically written overview of the philosophy of mind that you will find anywhere. Now go ahead and rip it to shreds!!--Lacatosias 11:00, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

comment wow a slug fest this should be interesting to watch, seriously its a good article obvious potential for FAC, first read is a little difficult(heavy) yet I understood whats was being said. I do question as to why Duelism has such a large section when it refers to a main article. Plently of referrences though their frequency increases towards the end of the article. I'll be back for another read before I climb off the fence Gnangarra 11:45, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

: Short and honest answer about dualism: I was trying to keep the structure of the article as faithful as possible to the German featured article version. Since I have no previous experience with Featured Articles on Wikipedia (have only been doing this for three months or so), I looked over the German version and decided there must have been something right about this particular organization or it would not have been accepted as an FA (which is something that only .001% of articles acheive??). In any case, this was my basic reasoning. Later on, someone added the main article links (this is not included in the German version) and I didn't want to offend by taking them out. Originally, there were just links in the body of the text to dualism or other technical terms and concepts.--Lacatosias 11:56, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Support Back I had time to read again and digest definately worthy of FA. Removing the main article link and placing a link within, the text flows and doesnt detract from the article.Gnangarra 16:52, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Hi, this is a very interesting article, and obviously a highly abstract and technical one. That presents some reviewing challenges. To start with, I think the WP:LEAD runs long and is not truly an overview of the article. I think I would amend this by removing the third para ("within dualism itself...") which may be more detail than is necessary, and replace with details of the first paras about "Dualist solutions" and "Monist solutions." This will give the general reader some overview - (1) what philosophy of mind is, (2) what types of answers there are to it, (3) what the history of these views is. Kaisershatner 15:08, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

This was one of the key areas that I tried to address in Peer Review. To start out with I had only one paragraph there, stating the nature of the questions (or something like that). It's not easy to summarize philosphy of mind in three paragraphs!! I will try to address your suggestion. Also note that in PR, I was advised that the artcile was too "popular" in style and read too much like a magazine article.--Lacatosias 15:22, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I qualified that by saying the Mind-body problem was to 'popular' - I changed my mind about the rest of the article.Sabine's Sunbird talk 15:33, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Need some clarification on this question of technicality. I've even added some illustrative diagrams to clarify several important concepts now. What specifically is still too technical about this article, in your opinion??--Lacatosias 08:52, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, no piling on. One thing at a time here. I've changed the third paragraph in the lead. Is this more along the lines of what Kaisershatner is suggesting? --Lacatosias 15:48, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, better. See my further changes, but it's getting there. I will have further comments when I get a sec. Kaisershatner 16:55, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I'm basically happy with the intro, and I hope I haven't messed up the definitions. And my head hurts, or at least I think my head hurts. My brain hurts? Kaisershatner 17:23, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I just needed to clarify again that while Spinoza was the first monist, his position was the very odd one called neutral monism. It is the latter that Bretrnd Russel breifly adopted and is not not very popular in modern times. Monism (physicalistic monism) is the dominant position. I just cut out the reference to Russell and left is as something like "monism originated with Spinoza". So as long as its clear to readers that Spinoza was a NEUTRAL monist, as is indicated later in the article, I think it works alright.--Lacatosias 17:58, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

BTW.. the answer to your question, as any neurologist will tell you, is that since the brain doesn't have pain receptors, it's the nerves in your skull, skin or other tissues that hurt!! (;--Lacatosias 17:58, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. I read this entire article, and all I can say is "wow." It is extremely well written, and even though the tone wanders in some places, especially towards the beginning, this article is excellent. Once a reader is familiar with the terminology used in this article, I think they would find it most enlightening. RyanGerbil10 21:44, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• comment. Haven 't finished reading yet, but looks good. I am not that familiar with the subject matter, but does this article cover all aspects of philosophy, are there any other schools of though that we missed? BTW, the lead mentions categories of thought, but I think it should be rephrased to "schools" of thought. Temporary account 23:49, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

**Response: All aspects of philosophy? Of course not. Perhaps you meant all the schools and traditions in the philosophy of mind? If so, the response is that it is undountedly very close. I could perhaps add mention of phenomenalism (a version of idealism sustained by the Bertrand Russel and some positivists at the beginning of the 20th century) and panpsychism. The first is not really a thesis about the philosophy of mind in particular though and the second is just another, more modern word for idealism (the idea that all that really exists is the mental and everything else is illusion). Those are the only things that I can think of that may be missed by some nitpicking terminologist. I agree with your second point and will change it to traditions. This is somewhere beteen schools (too narrow) and categores (perhaps too vague). --Lacatosias 08:35, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Done.--Lacatosias 08:48, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. The writing could be improved in sections, however, I am impressed. Good job. —Eternal Equinox | talk 02:51, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. This is indeed a great article, bound to be one of the very best and most comprehensive articles on philosophy here at Wikipedia. I think it deserves to be featured, although it can be further expanded, especially the Philosophy of mind in the continental tradition section. I also think that there should be something there about Indian philosophy of mind, Akan philosophical psychology, and mentions to other traditions. Nevertheless, superb work!
• Support.Abstain. Will support if more inline citations are added. Currently there are entire sections without one, starting with the lead and going through 'Arguments for dualism', 'Behaviorism', 'Psychology' (shouldn't this link to main?) and 'The self'.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 01:29, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • **Ok. Good observation. I think that can be addressed easily enough.--Lacatosias 08:32, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
    • Done. --Lacatosias 10:11, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
      • Great job, the inline cits have doubled since the beginning. I still see a few places they can be added, but even so the article is much better referenced than most of our current FA.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 16:41, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. Unfortuately, there are a large number of poorly written philosophy articles in WP. This rises quite highly above the mediocrity. Excellent. --DanielNuyu 03:46, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support - excellent article. Gandalf61 15:09, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support-This is a very well-written and informative article that as far as I can tell meets all requirements. --Kahlfin 20:27, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pakistan

This article has gone through an extensive makeover in the past 5-6 weeks and I believe that it currently meets the featured article criteria. Pepsidrinka 06:49, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Weak Oppose Almost there though: Some issues:

1. Following independence... twenty-fifth largest economy in terms of purchasing power parity. -- split and cpedit.
2. border dispute Kashmmir is not a border dispute. It's also territorial. I've fixed it
3. The tourism part in the economy sections reads like a brochure. plz tone it down. See Nepal and Bhutan.

   Please refer to [3] to populate the economy section. The tourism part needs to go. =Nichalp «Talk»= 06:59, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

4. The image gallery in the =Society and culture= section needs to go.

=Nichalp «Talk»= 09:18, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• I think three of the four items you mentioned have been looked at and edited as such. However, I'm not sure I understand your objection about the Kashmir border/territorial dispute. Footnote 2 explains that China, India, and Pakistan all administer parts of Kashmiri region. Footnote 23, which was added after your comment, explains that India does not recognize Azad Kashmir nor the Northern Areas. IMO this sufficently explains that there is a territorial dispute. Your thoughts? Pepsidrinka 05:06, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Support -- A light copyedit by someone not associated with the nom would improve the text significantly. =Nichalp «Talk»= 15:23, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• weak oppose also, the images need to have their copyright clarified. The image of Muhammad Ali Jinnah claims expired copyright and refers to a website. I checked that site out and cant find the image. Given that he died in 1948 (most photos would be this) if the photo was taken and published in India before 1946 then this image needs to have that confirmed and stated in its description. Images from world66 are creative commons with the requirement of acknowledging the author, i have fixed one but other images need to have this fixed. There is also an image with a template requesting the uploader to confirm copyright status. On the dates BCE and CE have been used, a wikilink to an article explaining what BCE and CE are would be helpful . Aside from these small fixes well done its an interesting article that kept my attention and deserves to achieve FAC Gnangarra 11:28, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

i found an article and linked BCE Gnangarra

• Is it safe to assume that since the uploader himself added the picture to an article here that he meant for it to be released into the public domain? Pepsidrinka 19:58, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• I have added the original author's name in the other picture (i.e., the King Faisal Mosque picture). Pepsidrinka 20:06, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment: It might be easier to just pick another image of the mosque from a PD or a creative commons work. Try these [4]. These images are CC-Attrib 2.0 images. You may want to search for additional images here too that might help satisfy any copyright concerns of other images currently used in your article. AreJay 15:52, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

I found a similar picture of the same mosque and a similar vantage point by the same author on commons. I have since substituted it into the article. Also, the Muhammad Ali Jinnah picture has been removed and replaced with another picture, one whose status is confirmed to be within the public domain. Pepsidrinka 16:30, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Good job in promptly addressing concerns Gnangarra 14:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
• Conditional Support Apart from the valid objections raised by Nichalp and Gnangarra, please address the following as well:. Good job addressing editors' concerns. AreJay 18:48, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

1. 1. Pakistan has the largest expatriate community of any Muslim country with large numbers living in Australia, Europe, the Middle East and North America. Citation required.
   2. Pakistani emigrants and their children influence Pakistan culturally and economically by regularly returning to and investing in Pakistan. That's a blanket statement, considering the assertion above that the country has the largest Muslim expatriate community. Please delete this sentence.
   3. The climate varies as much as the scenery.. theme repeated from the first sentence of the second paragraph on Geography. AreJay 18:01, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• The last two issues you addressed have been looked at and have been edited per your recommendations. A {{fact}} tag has been added and the editors of this article are looking for an appropriate citation. Pepsidrinka 05:06, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• The expatriates statistics have since been updated and cited properly. Pepsidrinka 17:11, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Conditional support once Nichalp, Gnangarra and AreJay's concerns are addressed, I'll give full support. Rama's Arrow 18:04, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Conditional support also. I liked the effort in article standarization. CG 20:54, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Conditional support as per others. I've added comments on Pakistan occupied Kashmir in the pertinent portions of Pakistan, according to the statements in Azad Kashmir and Northern States. I feel I may have acted under the influence of my bias towards India to do so! Please discuss if needed.--Dwaipayanc 21:29, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I think the Pakistan Occupied Kashmir article is fairly balanced. --digitalSurgeon 10:37, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose Don't think its quality is good enough. --GorillazFanAdam 01:36, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment - Could you elaborate on how the quality of the article is not good enough? Green Giant 01:54, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment That's not very helpful. GorillazFanAdam, please be specific as to what your objections are, so that the editors can then appropriately address any actionable objections. AreJay 04:03, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• WeakStrong support While I acknowledge the tremendous effort that has gone into this article, I'm unable to offer a strong support before the following issues are fixed.
  1. The lead could do well with a little copyediting. Not a major issue though.
  2. Needs a reference for the assertion "imprudent policies led to a slowdown in the late 1990s."
  3. "Recent decades have seen the emergence of a middle class in cities like Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi, Hyderabad, Faisalabad, Sukkur and Peshawar but the northwestern regions bordering Afghanistan, remain highly conservative and dominated by centuries-old regional tribal customs." - The link between "middle class" and "liberalism" is not explicit. Definitely it's not obvious.
  4. The mountaineering mention in "Society and culture" needs to be reworded.
  5. The article as a whole could benefit from a copyedit by someone who hasn't actively edited this article. Perhaps Tom can help. -- Sundar ^{\talk \contribs} 04:55, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• A citation has been added for the economic slowdown of the '90s and the mountaineering sentence has been tweaked. The article has been copyedited again (though by an active editor of the article). The other issue will shortly be addressed. Pepsidrinka 06:44, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• A citation has been added in regards to the liberalist/middle class. The sentence has been reworded to make itmore explicit that the middle class is of a more secular/liberal nature as compared to the northwester conservatists. Pepsidrinka 20:45, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• That citation is really weak. It does not give any information and when I clicked on it you get a subscriber site. You should provide the title and author, assuming it is some kind of an opinion piece. Furthermore, recent riots over the cartoons in urban areas seem to indicate that it is not something confined to frontier areas.(Blacksun 22:04, 22 March 2006 (UTC))

• I could not find a link so I rewrote the citation in a more appropriate format, which includes the author and the title. Pepsidrinka 22:47, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Thanks. I trongly support now. -- Sundar ^{\talk \contribs} 07:08, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

• Weak support: Really nice article. However, their is one thing that I found to be in gray area and bit misleading: "In the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2005, Pakistan's GDP growth rate was 8.4%, the second-highest after China, among the ten most populous countries in the world." I do not disagree with the figure. However, that growth rate was from an extraordinary weak base of previous few years. Considering the context, I find the statement to be bit misleading but it is not enough to oppose an otherwise fairly good article. Just my two cents. Good job. --Blacksun 01:01, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• The 8.4% figure was the number released by the PM, Shaukat Aziz. Please by all means, discuss it on the article talk page if you would like to encourage other editors of the page to chime in. Pepsidrinka 01:12, 22 March 2006 (UTC) Incidently, that figure is also used by the CIA World Factbook. Pepsidrinka 01:14, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support: I have been watching this article for a while and indeed it has gone under major changes and corrections that I feel it should be selected as a feature article. Fast track 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. We have references in the reference section that we don't know what they are there to support. Should be called a further reading section, not a reference section. Also, there is no decent map of Pakistan in this article. On another note, the map pertaining to the ethnic groups shows the Soviet Union! Do we have nothing more recent? --Bob 19:53, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

As explained already on the talk page of the article (though I'll explain for others who haven't read the dialogue on the talk page), the References were there prior to the current group of editors editing the page, and prior to this current trend where inline citations is the standard. If you take a look at older FAs, many do not have inline citations, as they weren't apart of the standard. Things have changed now. However, when the current group of editors started pushing for a FA, they added inline citations for those facts that needed it. As far as I know, it is not necessary for every fact to have a corresponding inline citation (this is explained further on the talk page). So the References section are references used by editors in the past, and assuming good faith that they are actually used in the article, it is my opinion that they should stay in the article, and be appropriately named References. However, I'm not going to get into an edit war over something like this. Pepsidrinka 23:06, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment: I'm with Pepsidrinka on this. I feel there's a distinction between the Notes and References sections. Notes contains specific in-line citations while References contains material that was used to gain a general understanding of the subject. As Pepsidrinka pointed out, the article lacked in-line citations before he and Green Giant and the new team of editors came on board. However, portions of the article existed in some state prior to their edits and the past editors had, it appears, referenced the material contained in the References section. I don't think the articles in the References section need to tie in directly and specifically to sentences in the article. I don't see how this particular objection can be satisfied short of tracking down this article's many previous editors and having them identify what they specifically referenced from each of those links. AreJay 02:23, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support -- Saravask 02:32, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support -- It is well written. --Spasage 05:31, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mexicanos, al grito de guerra

Another FAC attempt by me, second on a Mexican article and on a national anthem. The only thing I am concerned about during this FAC is the posibility that the media files I have might not be able to be used on here, so any comments about that, or anything else, is welcome. Also, if y'all think me moving this article a while back was wrong too, let me know. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 04:47, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment: some of the sources are just placed as bare links, without them being treated as footnotes. That glanced at me as soon as I gave the article a full read. Some of them are in Cite.php format too, so it should be better to just standarize them under one format, preferably {{cite web}}/<ref>/<references/>. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 04:53, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Now better. Support. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 04:25, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
• Cautious Hold. There don't seem to be many references or footnotes... RyanGerbil10 05:00, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comments: Are there more details on the copyright situation? I found that Mexican copyright law (article 156) seems to suggest that the government thinks they own the rights to the song. I'd prefer a more weighty citation than LA Weekly for backing this section up. Also, where did the translation come from? A few of the lines are rather shaky, but if it's something official I suppose I can live with it. I don't like the explanation of "Patria" right beforehand; it seems unnecessary. A little more discussion of current events related to the anthem might be interesting (maybe [5] and some citations of the cultural importance of the anthem?) Other than that though, this is looking good. I don't mind the fact that there aren't a lot of citations; this is a short article and each citation covers alot of material. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 06:29, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Hold. The translation is completely unofficial and has been discussed in the talk page. This should be emphasized in the article IMO. The copyright section should be clarified based on solid evidence, because otherwise it sounds like an urban legend. Itub 16:30, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I put an invisible note about the translation. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 21:24, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Itub, I found out that the copyright mess, while it did happen, is mostly an urban myth. Only one recording was determined to be copyrighted by a US Company, the lyrics and music are in the PD. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 21:33, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, is everything alright now? User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 22:56, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, all right. I withdraw my hold. Itub 03:55, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

One more thing, I got rid of all fair use photos from the article. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 06:34, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

• Adding my support; this is looking good. If anything, a little more copyright info would be nice, but I have a feeling that there isn't much more to say. —Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 04:15, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  • The only other thing I found was in Article 188 of the MX copyright law is that the rights cannot be reserved on "reproduce or imitate coats of arms, flags, emblems or signs of any country, State, municipality or equivalent political subdivision without the due authorization; " So, if I am reading this right, any unauthorized recordings of the anthem should be public domain. But, since that is probably OR, that will not be included. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 04:44, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose, not comprehensive. Everyking 08:53, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Can you tellign me what;s missing? User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 09:00, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
    • I'd like to know also! - Ta bu shi da yu 12:20, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support - Ta bu shi da yu 12:20, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Military history of France

Self-Nomination This article was checked by the Military History Peer Review and the regular peer review, although it has received no replies at all on the latter (but many on the military history one), so I decided to place it here on FAC.

I decided to expand and improve this article because I’m interested in the subject and I felt it was very under-covered in its initial version. Pictures were added, information referenced, sources increased, categorization improved, grammatical and spelling errors fixed, the number of battles and wars greatly expanded, visual quality got better, and descriptions also became more detailed. I greatly appreciate any and all input. I also just want to clarify a few things (these will become clearer after you’ve read/reviewed the article, so please do that first):

1. The article is somewhat long, but this is out of necessity, not oversight. I can’t change the fact that French military history was long, but I did try to be as economical as I could.

2. On the other hand, someone could claim that the article is short. For example, one could object to the fact that some wars (Revolutionary and Napoleonic) are covered as separate categories while whole periods of centuries received a category. This is because some periods, like the ones mentioned, witnessed profound change in warfare, and the literature also reflects this division. One of the books I used (it was on general world military history), for example, devotes one chapter of about 20 pages on 1,000 years of Medieval warfare while giving one chapter of the same length to 23 years of Revolutionary and Napoleonic warfare.

3. Because the article may be judged as (probably) long, I have included many pictures for variety and “visual entertainment,” but I would more than concur should anyone suggest some need to be taken away. However, the very reason why I put so many up was to provide some balance.

4. Below the descriptions for each era of warfare are the major conflicts (organized into wars and battles) that occurred in that era. But you’ll notice that for most categories, not every war or battle featured in the tables at the end is included in the descriptions; this is because those descriptions are meant to give a feel for what happened and why it happened. They are not meant to regurgitate every war or battle that French military history covers (that in itself is impossible, anyway). In the military history peer review, there was an objection that the tables at the end of the descriptions should perhaps be removed. This is very sensible indeed, as it would save a lot of space, but on the other hand, it would take away a unique experience for those readers who want to delve further into the topic and check out a battle in 1799, let’s say, that wasn’t covered in the description. The battle and war selection is also arbitrary and selective, but this is mostly due to the fact that wikipedia has limited resources on the respective topics, not because I forgot a certain important war or decided not to include this or that battle because I didn’t feel like it. Furthermore, there is much analysis of society and politics and how they shaped particular eras. This just follows from modern military theory that war has many different aspects besides what happens on the battlefield.

5. There are some online footnotes (six), which I more than realize is a weakness. However, they do not in themselves represent important claims, and because of that I thought it would be more convenient if I used online sources. One was a copy of part of the Versailles Treaty (primary source). One is a Britannica article on the “Grand Empire,” which does little more than give a casual description of that term (and I wanted nothing but that, so I thought it would suffice). One is a link to another wiki page on the Demographics of France, and if I must find another source for that then I will. One is a site on French colonization that I used for the size of the French colonial empire; a book might have been more reliable here, but I went back myself and added the number of squared miles of France at the time in question and found the number to be correct. The last is a site that talks about the controversy regarding the date of a battle, and the issue at stake is between several different historical authorities claiming different things (you’ll see in the site).

6. Articles in wikipedia look different depending on the text size or screen size in which you are viewing them. The way in which I expanded this article means that for optimal visual quality you should use the “Larger” text size. To do this (in Internet Explorer), go to “View,” then “Text Size,” and select “Larger.” If you don’t do this, the spatial relation between the words and the pictures will look disjointed. This can sometimes be a big problem in wikipedia, and someone needs to find a way to fix it. Also, a desktop would be ideal because of the large screen size.

7. An earlier judge objected to pictures being right underneath headers. Fortunately, the article’s creator pointed out that several other articles have this. In fact, many others do (including some very recent ones), and this article is definitely among them. It makes stylistic sense to do that; putting pictures at the top, right besides the text, is a way to lure in readers and keep them interested.

8. Almost at the very end of the article, there are three lists of military institutions, alliances, and leaders. Some of these have been mentioned during the regular parts of the article, and others haven’t. Still, they are there to provide outlets for others wishing to learn more about different aspects of French military history.

That’s it. Thank you in advance for all comments and suggestions.UberCryxic 03:18, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. I think that the "French Colonial Empire" section should be immediately before "Modern Period" and not after. My understanding of French military history is far from thorough, but what I saw here I liked. Andrew Levine 03:30, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. This is a good article, and I think it does a satisfactory job of meeting the required standards. It is well-written and looks superb. On the other hand, even though I support, I think a few things could be revamped. For example, the lists at the end of the article are complete unnecessary and should be taken off. There's no real sense that they "provide outlets." It's just basically lists, without explanations of the alliances or leaders, that take up space. The "French Expeditionary Corps" redlink should probably be removed, leaving just the "Russian Civil War" (this was done with other wars where no battles were listed). The intro could also use a bit more work (in being shorter). But overall, I think the standards have been met, and we have an article worthy of fa here.Prometheus123 03:46, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. Great, relevant images and prose that is very easy to read. Does a great job in avoiding bias, and even treats all periods of French history equally instead of favoring the more recent like some editors (i.e. me) would've done. Definite FA material. Juppiter 03:55, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your help guys. Ok, the French Colonial Empire has been placed before the Modern Period and I've removed the redlink to the Expeditonary Corps. But Prometheus, I'd like to see what the opinions of others on the lists are. I think some people may support them.UberCryxic 04:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

I think those lists are very helpful. If they were removed from the article I'd put them back in. Andrew Levine 04:07, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose -- 1) The article is long, but you can definately author it in summary style. Move unnecessary detail to daughter articles, and summarise the same here. 2) Those bulleted text at the end of each section look downright ugly. 3. There are issues with all browsers and resolutions but 800x600, the standard web resolution is regarded as the default. 4. A copyedit is needed. =Nichalp «Talk»= 05:32, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

  I'm still not happy with a lot of the issues.

1. =Themes in French military history= reads like an overview (which is the function of the lead). Military history of Canada for example is chronological and starts off immediately with "European colonization".
2. Important milestones in Caesar's conquest: is a list and be prosified.
3. Immediately prior to Charlemagne, the Franks were preoccupied with.. why is the article not written chronologically? Why not merge the two sections?
4. Lots of essay type phrases: It could be said that French military history; the zenith of their power; afford a better understanding; By the time of the Crusades; Indeed, given the successes of Henry V,; It could be claimed
5. France had a particularly favorable climate ... sophisticated and increasingly more expensive and more impenetrable armor. How does one the link climate with armor? Why is France singled out?
6. more impenetrable???

I'd have to stop here. There's also simply too much detail (specific instances, figures etc.) in the article. A summary is definately needed. =Nichalp «Talk»= 09:05, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok Nichalp, I've made the following changes: the Gauls section is now completely in prose, the Franks and Carolingian sections have been merged (so have the wars and battles in the list at the French wars and battles category), and I cleared out many of those annoying phrases (also, Wayward already performed a wonderful copyedit). I deleted the parts about the armor. A note on the themes section: it is not like the lead because it is not chronological. It merely informs people of important characteristics of the topic without many references to events (a fundamental difference with the lead). I believe it is a very important and crucial section in the article since it gives beginners a good starting point; something to keep in the back of their mind as they actually are reading the chronological accounts. Let me know if you have any more requests. Thanks very much.UberCryxic 17:18, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

1. It still needs a copyedit. I've still found two "Indeed"s and wesel terms such as "Some have aruged"; "Perhaps some of the most celebrated military rivalries". 2. I'm not convinced with the argument that the themes need to exist. Such a section conflicts with the goal of having a smooth and logical flow of the matter at hand. See Wikipedia:Lead section. The lead section needs to be trimmed down by omitting names of people, specific wars and dates. The =themes= section can be heavily condensed into three sentences and included right in the beginning of the lead section. 3. =Napoleonic France= needs to be cut down. The section is too long. Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 15:47, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

The indeeds have been removed and the "Some have argued" now reads "Some historians have argued" (I have to phrase it like this because it's not an undisputed fact). The Napoleonic section has been considerable shortened and looks visually better; I think it's now in line with the others. I based much of this article on the Military history of Canada, and the lead there mentions both specific years and wars. Also, for a 53 kb article, a 3-paragraph lead with that size seems appropriate. The themes section does many good things that just simply aren't covered in other areas (and that would be better if they were covered in a section like this). If you would like to give people a stronger sense of chronology, then what do you think about moving it all the way to the end, so the article starts with "Gauls" right away? I'm just hesitating to remove it because I think it serves some very useful functions; things that the lead can't do (the lead is expected to give the chronological account of French military history, and it does that, but it is not expected to provide information on motifs or themes; neither the lead in the Military history of Canada or the Military history of the Soviet Union does that). Thanks again!UberCryxic 17:56, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think some historians have argued is any better or needed. What historians argue that? It's partially covered in that the refutation of the theory at least tangentially covers the existance of the argument, but that's not ideal. It's a pretty good article, but I'd like to see that last few short paragraphs expanded or merged to eliminate choppy prose. - Taxman ^Talk 18:50, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

=Themes in French military history= Is it original research? these rivalries and objectives give a better understanding of French military history than a mere chronological listing. ..for whom? I'm still not convinced why we can't use a summary the themes section in the lead. I usually never copyedit, but I can summarise over the weekend if needed. Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 12:00, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Nichalp, it is my opinion that readers unaccustomed to the topic will benefit from that section by learning why some of these wars occurred rather than "here are the wars; have fun." For that reason, I am strongly disinclined to remove this category. Including the themes in the introduction would make it embarrasingly long as the lead is unequivocally the place for the chronological account of French military history. But, if you do want it removed, then I guess I'll have no choice but to comply. Before I do that, however, I want you to tell me whether you have any other requests so I can take care of those first. Thank you.UberCryxic 18:57, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not asking you to excide the =themes=, but weave it within the lead section instead. I'll support the article once this is done. (I have a small minor request. That roundel image can be converted into an .svg image. Not essential though.). Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 08:43, 23 March 2006 (UTC)r

Done and done Nichalp. After careful consideration though, I decided to just delete the themes section and not include any of its information in the lead as I didn't think it was essential enough to merit being placed there. I know it's not exactly what you wanted, but now the lead remains of appropriate length and the structure of the article follows that of its Canadian counterpart more closely. Tell me what you think; thanks!UberCryxic 14:56, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Yep I agree with you. I've removed the "Some have argued part" and it now just says "One of the driving.." and so on. French air force, navy, and linguistic influence have all been merged under the section "Topical subjects" (someone welcome to suggest a better name for it).UberCryxic 19:43, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

About the copyedit, would you mind if you did it? My worry is that because I wrote most of this article, I'll be hesitating about taking things away. I've already done several copyedits and we've still been having problems. Thank you.UberCryxic 18:23, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

All-right, I did another copyedit.UberCryxic 15:17, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

I've noticed some .gif images in the article. They need to be converted to png. GIFs are only meant for animated images. Secondly, please try and fix a standard width to the images (this applies to images where width>height). I've done the svg roundel image for you. =Nichalp «Talk»= 15:24, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I've made the png versions. Support' now. =Nichalp «Talk»= 06:24, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. Per Nichalp on the copyediting, but the article is very well written, so in no way would I use that to oppose. Also, the bulleted texts aren't ugly at all. They're very well-placed and fit in well with the rest of the text. I agree with Andrew on the lists at the end; keep them. Only thing I would suggest is to make the Franks category larger; as it is, a bit too small. In the end, great article and deserves FA.ThePro2 05:56, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support An interesting subject complex due to the length of time the article covers. I particularly like the list battles at the end of each section, very useful further reading. The only minor issue i have is in formatting around those list. Suggest a repositioning of Images to fill the large white areas as has occured in French Colonial Empire, this being a minor issue that its not sufficient to object. Suggest you consider an image of the periods major weapon(s) to fill the space as opposed to reformatting the current document. Gnangarra 10:17, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

comment continued support even with the loss of the list. Gnangarra 04:45, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Article very reader-friendly for the layperson. -- Sinatra 12:56, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose per Nichalp. Those lists are really unsightly, and 60+ KB is too much for one article. — BrianSmithson 13:07, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Further comment: In addition to my aversion to the aesthetics of the lists, they also bother me the same way all "See also" sections bother me. If something is a pertinent associated article, it should be linked in the main text of the article. Can you imagine if every article followed this one's example by appending lengthy "see also" lists at the end of each section? It's not a style I'd like to see mimicked by other pieces. If the lists are kept, they should be broken out into secondary articles, such as List of French wars and battles of the Middle Ages or some better name. The same goes for the long lists at the end of the article ("List of famous French military leaders" etc.) These lists are a large part of the reason this article is so large (66 KB!), and this is precisely because this is the type of stuff that should be broken out per summary style guideliness. Make these sepearate list articles, provide your links, and the main article will look and read better. The people who have supported the lists above will still have the information available, and I can forgive any excess of length at that point. — BrianSmithson 13:47, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Changing to Support. Bon travail! — BrianSmithson 12:47, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

All-right, I've made the following changes and the article has now shrunk to 57kb: I deleted the Medieval, Ancien Regime, French Revolutionary Wars, Napoleonic Wars, and Modern Period war and battle lists. I also deleted French military alliances. A lot more material has been taken to the "See also" around the bottom of the article. As of yet, those lists have not been made into their own articles to link off from "See Also," (so far I've only done this for the famous French military leaders and the naval battles at the end of the navy cateogry) but if there's support for this, then I'll go ahead and create those. However, I left out the lists in the first few categories and the lists in the French Colonial Empire, Air Force, and Navy since there's not much white space in those categories. But if you want them taken away Brian, I'll do it. Just tell me how you think it looks now. Thanks for your comments.UberCryxic 15:39, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

It looks better. One thing you might consider (in order to get rid of all the lists but not lose any content) is to start List of French battles or List of battles in France (or some better title) where you could list as many battles as will fit (including all of those you have listed now, as well as red-linked ones that will hopefully spur further efforts from other editors). Best of all, you could add a piped link to this article after each section, thus clearing away all the boxes. For example, [[List of French battles#Frankish_period|List of Frankish battles]] would bring the reader to a list virtually identical to the one under "The Franks" now while keeping the article sleek-looking and smaller KB-wise. — BrianSmithson 16:44, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

One more thing: I noticed somebody changed a particularly important part in the very first paragraph. What used to read as "peoples of France" now reads "the French." This makes it easier to read, but I'm afraid it's somewhat historically incorrect (which is why I used the phrase I did). The Franks, which made many of those important military developments, were Germanic and inter-mixed with the indigineous Gallo-Roman population, so Germany and France have just as much a right to claim them as "theirs." The reason why I wrote "peoples of France" is to avoid conflict like this. I don't think most laypeople would care, but a military "hardass" like myself would be skeptical about that comment. But I won't press it anymore. Overall, I liked the copyediting very much (thanks Wayward). UberCryxic 15:57, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd say change it back. You researched this topic, so you know what you're talking about and what the best wording should be. — BrianSmithson 16:44, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I did change it back, and I'm in the process of implementing your suggestions. When I'm done, there should be no more boxes (*tears*).UberCryxic 16:54, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok I created a List of French wars and battles article, so the remaining Gallic, Frankish, Carolingian, and French Colonial Empire battles/wars have been moved there. I deleted the five articles on the French Navy since they describe the current navy. But there is a link to the French Navy in the summary, and those five articles are linked in that article for anyone who wants to check them out. Also, the Zouaves picture had to go since when I took out the lists it was intruding on the space of the Modern Period. However, there is still one more box left, and that's under the Air Force. This last remaining box holds the three historical articles on the French Air Force, and because it doesn't hurt visual quality and doesn't repeat anything mentioned in the summary, I'd like to keep it there. But once again, check it out and let me know how you think it looks.UberCryxic 17:17, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Don't forget my suggestion to pipe a link to the appropriate section of List of French wars and battles at the end of each section. I prefer it the way it is now, but I'm anticipating that some who liked the boxes above may object to their removal. Linking as I described would be a good compromise, in my opinion. But back to the article: Bravo! It looks much cleaner. I still n'aime pas the long list of see alsos, but I won't object based on that alone. However, regarding the French air force box: Have you tried to move that information up to the top of the section with the {{main|Armée de l'Air (Part I: From birth to "Torch", 1909-1942)}} then the other and the other? That's the standard way to do this kind of thing. Finally, I'm fairly certain that there shouldn't be any wikilinks in the title of the ariticle. Unfortunately, I can't find the relevant policy page at the moment! — BrianSmithson 21:55, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Ooops forgot about the pipelinks, but they're in there now. I also put the main articles at the top for the air force. On the wikilinks, I got that idea from the Military history of Canada, which is a featured article, so I think I'm with "legal" bounds for that one lol.UberCryxic 22:55, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Got rid of the many see alsos at the end too; the list looks more palatable now.UberCryxic 23:56, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Support. Needs a copyedit, I'm sure, but all long articles could benefit from some good proofreading. I don't believe in length as an actionable FA requirement, so I'm going to go ahaead and say that the length is appropriate. I personally don't like the lists that aren't converted into prose, but if that's just me, I suppose I can let it go. RyanGerbil10 04:39, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• Abstain.Object. Complety forgets about the interwar period - engagement in the Polish-Soviet War (French Military Mission to Poland) and later the Franco-Polish Military Alliance (and the Franco-Czech Alliance), which were very significant to the interwar European politics and to the eventual outbreak of the IIWW. If such issues are skipped, it makes me wonder what other periods are not covered.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 05:22, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Piotr, I share and sympathize with your concerns. However, due to space restrictions and the gargantuan, event-filled military history of France, it would be difficult for me to focus on almost every single alliance or minor engagement. Your opposition is sensible, of course, but carried to its logical conclusion, you must also object to the fact that I didn't include French military missions to Japan in the 19th century, or French military missions to the Ottoman Empire in the 1730s, or the dozens of other French military missions with advisory roles to various areas and nation-states throughout history that have been just as significant, no? Furthermore, the mission to Poland is listed in the List of French wars and battles (so is the French Expeditionary Corps to Russia, thought it's currently redlinked); that category is incomplete, but you'll find wars and battles aplenty there nonetheless. I sincerely hope you will reconsider your opposition. I tried to be as thorough as I could with the length I am reasonably allowed to have. If you would like, maybe I could search for some online sources dealing with the topics you've raised. Please let me know if I can do anything more to help. Thank you.UberCryxic 06:13, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment : If the lenght requirement becomes a restriction to how complete an article can be,than IMO the requirement is the thing that fails.--Technosphere83 11:42, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I definetly agree with Technosphere83. The article should be comprehensive first, summary-style second. Of course we should not aim for gargantuan 1mb articles - this is what subarticles are for. Nonetheless I think that few mor kb could be spared to include more info, and that you can reduce some sections from several paragraps by one paragraph to include info on other events. One can make a good case that Napoleonic times deserve more coverage than Franco-Polish alliance, but not that Napoleonic ones deserve 5 paragraphs and FPa (or FJapanese or FOttoman relations) does not need to be mentioned at all.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 18:09, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I should emphasize that it's not the only problem preventing me from significantly expanding this article. I could go on with this in summary style for such a long time that 100 kb would seem short. It's just in the nature of the topic. Because it's so vared and complex, there are bound to be things left out. My objective is to cover the main periods, and the main struggles that covered those periods. The pictures also provide good, additional information and links where users can explore the subject further. Moreover, French alliances with other superpowers or alliances that produced decisive results on the battlefield are included; Franco-Ottoman partnership in the 16th century, Franco-Swedish cooperation in the 17th century, and the Entente Cordiale (mentioned in the article as something like "France, with British aid..."). But the Franco-Polish alliance didn't produce any decisive military result; in the Polish-Soviet War, the Poles were actually lucky to ignore the advice given by the French mission, or there would've gone one of the greatest victories of the 20th century, the Battle of Warsaw. In World War II, the French pulled off a measly Saar offensive to distract Germany from Poland, but it did nothing. In a strictly militaristic realm, this alliance was not as great as some other ones that France has had (which, again, have been mentioned). Thank you.UberCryxic 15:42, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comments (haven't read through the entire thing yet)
  • Squeezing text between pics is poor layout. Either remove or redistribute them. Readers should never have to change their settings for an article to look right. Basic principle of webdesign.
  • It'd be nice to see a conversion to the Cite.php (i.e. the <ref> format). I can do it myself if you don't have objections.
  • I think Piotr does make a valid point, although I won't be objecting over it, lacking the knowledge to do so, but a shorter section covering this period could be reasonably made. After all, if it is suposed to cover the entire Military history of France, then shouldn't it cover the Interwar period just as well?
• Circeus 15:43, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments Circeus. I wholeheartedly agree that it is a good principle of design; however, it looks weird through no fault of mine. For example, I am now watching the Palazzo Pitti (current FAC) on the "Larger" text. Looks fine. Then I switch to "Medium," and an ugly gap emerges between the "Palatine Gallery" and the paragraph beneath it. This gap did not exist in the "Larger" style. This is the stuff I'm talking about. It's not just this article; every wikipedia article seems to look better on the larger setting. Yes, go ahead and make the conversion (thank you so much for that btw). Piotr does make a good point; let there be no mistake about that. However, the amount of detail and analysis that would need to be added if I were to keep this article fair (presumably I shouldn't just add a section or paragraph on the inter-war period, but also on obscure subjects like the Saintonge War, which in its time used to be important) would positively drive every single wikipedia reader crazy (including me, having to bear such a promethean task), even the fans of military history. I also just want to mention that it does talk about France in the inter-war period; there's a paragraph that mentions Charles de Gaulle's ideas on armored warfare and France's population problems leading to longer conscription terms, making military life increasingly unpopular. On top of that, I want people to read Military history of Canada and compare it with this. You should be noting major differences; notice how wars set the tempo and categorization in that article. Well, that's because whoever wrote it could afford to do that with Canadian military history, which is immensely shorter (in terms of events) than what we have here. I can't do that with French military history because the article would never end. That's why this article is organized into important military "themes" in French history; so it says "Modern Period" instead of "World War I" or "Inter-war period." For those who want to find out more, there are the lists at the end of each category. Finally, it is my opinion that whoever reads this will come away with a very good understanding of the developments, as seen in wars and battles, and the general themes in French military history.UberCryxic 19:26, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't see the gap you describe, but then, that is probably because I use Firefox, not Internet Explorer (Firefox has Wiki-related issues of his note, though). Also, I'm afraid this article cannot have Cite.php refs until the bug that prevents them being used in Picture captions is solved. Circeus 20:06, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Piotr, I am pleading with you to revoke your wish, not because it’s not a good one, but because if I were to comply, this article would turn into a fortress of useless information and unnecessary details that would completely turn off laypeople. If that were to happen, I would also be greatly disappointed. It’s not just about Franco-Polish, Ottoman, or Japanese relations; there are many other things that you did not mention. I would have to include those too. I am not opposing you because I don’t want more work for myself; I love this topic. I’ve studied French military history (and particularly Napoleonic warfare) for years, which is why I sincerely hope people listen to my warnings. If I do this, I want to add my own big, bold-face “OPPOSE” to this article for FA. It would ruin it; it would be flooding with redlinks. This article is based on the premise that French military history should be covered in themes, not wars, battles, or alliances. To that end, I’ve included what I thought was the best information that would allow people to understand the general nature of French warfare in a particular theme or era. If, however, you want an exclusive and explicit mention of Franco-Polish cooperation during the inter-war period, then I’d be more than happy to do it. However, that would make it very arbitrary, so also keep that in mind. But if you want it done, I'll do it.UberCryxic 19:51, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Also, I just thought of this: I could take the Louis Fary picture from the French military mission to Poland and use it on my article, then explain some basic things about the Franco-Polish alliance in the caption. Tell me what you think.UberCryxic 20:00, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I do agree it is a relatively minor issue (for the same reason I don't think that Polish Legions in Italy need to be linked. Nonetheless I think that eventually all those things should be included in the subarticle, and I'd gladly see such subarticles created now - even if filled mostly with copied content from the main sections - so I (and you, and others) can then start adding such links (red or not) and related info to them, without overbloating the current article. When I see those subarticles, I'll support this one.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 03:55, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Piotr, I'm trying to better understand what you want me to put in these subarticles. Do you want me to include summary content in the sections about what we've been discussing? So, for example, in the Modern Period, do you want me to include something like the "Inter-war period" and then there mention the Franco-Polish alliance and other relevant matter? If so, how many subarticles do you want for each main article (or do you just want this subarticle on the Modern Period)? One, two, as necessity dictates?UberCryxic 04:10, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll leave it up to you - do what you think is best. Eventually I'd expect to see a subarticle for every section.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 04:18, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank God those horrible lists have been removed! Look, I don't know much about French military history (at least I didn't before I read this article), but I completely agree with Uber. This article is very comprehensive. Like Juppiter said up top, it covers all the major time periods, and does so in an effective fashion. I wouldn't change the summary content. If people have questions or desires about other material, just see the lists. And if your particular concern isn't there, then be proactive and put it in those lists. But the main article shouldn't be covered with litter because this or that was left out.Prometheus123 22:14, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Circeus, another problem for me could be that I'm using a laptop with a much-smaller screen than my normal home desktop (I'm in college now). And yeah, I've got IE.UberCryxic 23:39, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support, very good article; provides a comprehensive overview of the material without getting bogged down in endless trivia. I might add that the alliance with Poland, while undobtedly significant in regard to the start of World War II, is a miniscule part of France's military history overall; if we are to significantly expand the article (which I don't really recommend), we should concentrate on things like the Italian Wars and the French Wars of Religion, which involve decades of bitter warfare, rather than on advisory missions to other countries. —Kirill Lokshin 02:07, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support, well done for the effort put in to write this article. --Terence Ong 05:05, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Great article, great lack of bias, despite obvious pride. Very, very good indeed. --PopUpPirate 00:04, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Support. You've won me over. An article of this scope presents a great challenge. The piece is well organized and generally encyclopedic in tone. When editors take on this type of subject there's always a risk that someone who knows one part of the material well will come along and pick things apart. For this nomination, I'm that person. I'm very uncomfortable with the amount of unsourced POV on the topics I understand best. Details follow. Durova 21:09, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• "In approximately the 10th century, iron armor started to replace the use of other materials like leather or bronze." unsourced France remained in the bronze age until the tenth century? This would place the country well behind its neighbors in Europe where iron helmets and weapons predate that by centuries.

• In reference to the fifteenth century: "France could easily field over 10,000 knights in full plate mail, with a large number of those on heavy warhorses with their own armor. A knight on horseback would most likely have felt invincible except to another knight on horseback." unsourced Even before Agincourt, the English longbow had proven itself at the Battle of Crécy and the Battle of Poitiers and Swiss pikemen had earned their reputation in other engagements. Pope Innocent II had tried to ban the use of arbalests and bows because of their effectiveness in killing cavalry. Moreover, where does that enormous number come from? The most generous estimates of the 1429 campaign place the entire French army at 10,000, a figure which is probably exaggerated and certainly includes a preponderance of infantry, artillery, and noncombatants.

• "However, by the late 14th century and the early 15th, French military power declined because of the sudden obsolescence of men in armor." unsourced English technology and tactics barely changed between Poitiers and Agincourt. Armor didn't become obsolete until the seventeenth century. What did happen during the reign of Charles VI was a king who suffered from psychotic fits and a cousin of his who started a civil war. Before the middle of the century French men in armor humiliated the English at the very important Battle of Patay.

• "Given the successes of Henry V, the French could consider themselves fortunate that they recovered virtually all their territory by the end of the Hundred Years War." unsourced That makes adaptive tactics seem like luck. The French learned to ambush the English in open fields rather than charge against fully prepared longbowmen, and they learned to make greater use of bombardments and frontal assaults in siege operations.

• "Popular conceptions of the victory in the final stages of the Hundred Years War are often dominated by Joan of Arc, but there were far deeper reasons for the French triumph. The main step was taken by King Charles VII, who, with the Compagnies d'Ordonnance, 20 companies of 600 men each, created the first standing army in the Western world since Roman times, giving the French a considerable edge in professionalism and discipline. Additionally, developments in artillery made it the finest arm of the French army..." unsourced Arguably the English longbow corps was the first standing army since Roman times and the French reacted rather belatedly. The historians I've read give primary credit to diplomatic realignment at the Treaty of Arras and the weak leadership of Henry VI for the outcome of the war. This also implies that Joan of Arc was wholly uninvolved in artillery. Actually the men who fought alongside her considered her a tactical genius with artillery placement as her particular strength.

• Jumping ahead in time, but back to the article's introduction, we also find this: "In the 18th century, global competition with Britain led to defeat in the French and Indian War, where France lost its North American holdings..." unsourced Nothing in the body of the article clarifies or corrects this. In fact France retained large claims in North America which Napoleon sold in the Louisiana purchase. The transaction roughly doubled the land area of the United States.

Ok let me just chop off one thing first and then later on I'll address other more substantial claims. First of all, France did lose nearly all of its North American possessions following the Seven Years War. You forgot the Treaty of San Ildefonso in 1800, when Spain ceded Louisiana to France and Napoleon sold it three years later to America. The statement in the introduction is therefore correct (and it doesn't need to be sourced; it's a general historical fact). Also, I am 1000% sure that the Compagnies were the first standing army since Roman times (will be sourced). What I'm going to do about the Medieval category is use a site which up until now was listed as an "External Link." That site has terrific information on French medieval warfare and it's written by military historians. I'll notify you when I'm done with the changes (because essentially I agree with you; there's some things there that need to be referenced).UberCryxic 22:28, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, New Orleans was nominally Spanish - their lasting influence is demonstrated by the famous Spanish Quarter. ;) Durova 01:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

K the information about the Compagnies d'Ordonnance has now been fully referenced from credible sources. In the process of addressing other concerns....(will keep you updated moment by moment)...UberCryxic 22:45, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

From the Atlas of World Military History (editor Richard Brooks): "Much has been made of the success of the English longbow. However, it was not a war-winning weapon. Reliance on this defensive weapon on the battlefield gave the initiative to the French; its victories also depended on the French bungling their attack. The English were fortunate that their opponent failed to get it right three times in a 70-year period." My own research confirms the essence of this statement; the French would've crushed (excuse the wording but it's true) the English even with their longbows; they failed because terrain prevented the full maturation of an attack (Agincourt) or whatever attacks they did launch were poorly coordinated. The French tactical plan for Agincourt was superb, but the terrain prevented its implementation. The Henry comment is now cited, though quite unnecessarily. Every other book ....nvm, EVERY book on the Hundred Years War has the comment: "French got lucky when Henry died." Pejorative? You bet. But it seems to be a standard thing, and this is an encyclopedia, so standardization counts. Also, the article's comments don't in anyway belittle Joan of Arc's achievements; all the article says is that other, more substantial reasons than Joan of Arc can explain why the French won (which is true). Keep in mind that in this particular part I have to explain why the French won with little recourse to specifics (otherwise I'd break the structure of the article, which is not to get heavily involved in anyone part unless it's necessary....saying Joan of Arc spotted the artillery correctly at this or that battle is a bit irrelevant when I can talk about general trends).UberCryxic 23:17, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

You're absolutely right that the French got lucky when Henry V died. No quarrel there. The war continued more than 30 years after his death, though. Joan of Arc didn't end it either. However, DeVries (Joan of Arc: A Military Leader ISBN 0750918055) and Richey (Joan of Arc: The Warrior Saint ISBN 0275981037) cite the testimony of the French commanders who fought alongside her. They consistently single out her artillery tactics for special praise. Obviously you can only give this a cursory mention in such a general article. My point is that it misleads the reader to juxtapose artillery and Joan of Arc. I'd still like to know your source for the "10,000 knights in full plate mail." Durova 01:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh on the possibility that the English 'longbow corps' was the first-standing since Roman times, Andrew Ayton and J.L. Price in the Military Revolution from a Medieval Perspective (1998): "How far should the development of standing armies be regarded as a distinctive characteristic of the last century of the Middle Ages? Some states, like England, resisted the transition from contract armies to a standing army..."UberCryxic 23:12, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

I won't dispute a citation. My point is that, during an era when armies disbanded in the autumn and peasant soldiers brought in the harvest, the English maintained a corps of longbowmen who practiced their weapon throughout the year. Obviously that wasn't organized in the comprehensive capacity that Charles VII established. Durova 01:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

The comments about the artillery and their significance have been cited.UberCryxic 23:28, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

The comments in the first paragraph about the 10th century have been reorganized and extensively cited; review them now and tell me what you think.UberCryxic 23:49, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

I like the changes. I've been expanding Category:Medieval armor. You might want to Wikilink to a couple of items. Overall, thanks for responding quickly both here and at the article. Your subject deserves to be featured. You're very close to converting my vote into a support. Cheers, Durova 01:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Also, I strongly disagree with your comments about 10,000 being the number of French troops at Agincourt. The truth is that there is much controversy surrounding those figures. For example (I'm getting this off the wikipedia article on Agincourt), Juliet Barker's Agincourt: The King, the Campaign, the Battle says 6,000 English and Welsh fought against 36,000 French troops. I'll get rid of that number though.UberCryxic 00:17, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

You might want to read my comment again. I referred the drive to Rheims in 1429. BTW regarding your Agincourt numbers, each knight needed at least one squire in order to dress for battle. So if the French fielded 10,000 knights in full armor at Agincourt out of a force of 36,000, more than half their army is already accounted for. Durova 01:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok Durova, I believe I've addressed all of your concerns, both through writings here and the changes I've made on the main page. I'd like you to have a second look and tell me what you think. Thank you very much!UberCryxic 01:05, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Strong Support This is a terrific article. Good information, well-researched, and very well-written.MichaelBr 03:54, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strong support - very well written, though I have two items I have added to the talk page that need to be addressed. They are relatively minor, however. - Ta bu shi da yu 12:11, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] History of Michigan State University

This is the first nomination for an article prepared in conjunction with Wikipedia:WikiProject Michigan. This article has had a peer review. Project members are on stand-by to respond to any objections or address comments. Jtmichcock 01:06, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support [btw, this is Pulley, again, it's not registering at the end]. To whip this article into shape, I tidied a few things up, such as, w/ the 1st inset photo of campus, I reordered the list of building names to match those in the photograph, which wasn't done, originally. Also, there were other things: stylistically I changed: the possessive Holmes's to Holmes', which is not only the modern possessive form of 's'-ending names, it is consistent w/ other citations, like: Williams'. I changed (Williams) from "school president" to "college" president. Also, in the section where it was noted Abbot reverted the curriculum, I substituted "liberal" instead of "general" (in the phrase liberal/practical) because, in the academic context, the term "liberal" is more the yin to practical's yang than is "general". There were other spots that, while grammatically correct, needed tightening, like the section where we discuss the 1885 opening of the Mechanics program (eliminated: Michigan State University; added "which became its first full-fledged, degree-granting engineering program." Also, I bold-ed the name changes "Michigan Agricultural College" and "Michigan State College of Agriculture and Applied Sciences" since, not only were these names (and corresponding dates) neatly referenced in an inset box near the article's beginning, it was consistent with other text, reference name changes. I doubt anyone should have any problems with these changes (if so, please say so).151.197.170.126 04:48, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
• Support Object - Two items that jump out at me. First, the lead is too short for the article size. Second, some more facts need citation. One specific example: "Despite these innovations, Williams ran into conflict with the managing State Board of Education. The Board saw the College as being elitist and extravagant, despite William's eloquent defense of higher education for the masses. Indeed, many farmers began protesting against the College's curriculum and called for its abolition." Fieari 02:36, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• 1) I have enhanced the lede by three sentences, providing more detail as to the content of the article. 2) I have reinserted additional page citations to the text. I am also looking to see if we need to get more cites to the latter part and I would appreciate any input. Thanks. Jtmichcock 03:08, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• The lead is still insufficient for the size of the article, according to WP:LEAD. It should be three paragraphs. This is a sticking point for me, I'm afraid. I feel that the best wikipedia has to offer should follow standards like this. The "Co-ed College" section could use a few more citations in the first and second paragraphs. Other than these two points, the article looks good. Fix them, and you have my support. Fieari 21:01, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Fixed! Jtmichcock 23:07, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Agreed. Good work! Support now. Fieari 18:53, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support Thethinredline 09:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object Too short, not comprehensive. --*Kat* 23:45, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• That's not really helpful unless you can tell what it is missing. The article is about the right length for it's topic. - Taxman ^Talk 00:05, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support nice job. The article size is right for the subject, and it is well referenced. PDXblazers 04:03, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Very well done. I still think the riots issue is a little whitewashed. I mean there were police cars flipped over and burned, and I saw coverage of one of them on the news in California. I don't remember the estimates of cars burned and total damage, but some of them were fairly significant. And if I recall more than just the 2005 issue came after sports wins or losses so saying they were due to tensions over student drinking isn't very accurate. But that's a reasonably small issue, not too hard to fix, and ideally shouldn't take any more or even as much space as it does now. - Taxman ^Talk 17:12, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• I have revised the paragraph at issue so it is more even-handed. One problem is that local paper is probably not unbiased in its own coverage. The News and Free Press accounts were more balanced, but are inaccessible absent a large subscription fee. Jtmichcock 18:01, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• That is much better and simple enough. You should be able to get the News and Free Press at the library on microfiche if nothing else. If you had a source you could also note some (large?) proportion of those involved in the riots had no affiliation with the university and some of the events simply happened near campus. Interestingly enough, I happen to know the person that started the couch on fire in the Gunsen St riot and he wasn't a student and didn't live near campus. - Taxman ^Talk 19:43, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support I created this article a while back and put a lot of work into it back in January, but since moving I've been too busy to work on it. Thanks to Jtmitchcock for fixing it up and nominating it. It looks good so far, I'll try to help out when I can. Lovelac7 20:25, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
• Question Michigan State University has already been a featured article and fairly recently (I think... I may be confusing it with University of Michigan which was also a FA) as well, and as well as linking to this history article, also has a key section from the history article on its page. Wouldn't featuring the History of Michigan State University article essentially repeat this subject matter? Does this point disqualify this article? Bwithh 00:29, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

This article is a daughter article of the Michigan State University and was started because its parent was getting too large. There are a number of similar articles throughout Wikipedia, particularly as it relates to institutions and places (History of Miami, Florida, which was made a feature article just recently, comes to mind). While there is a brief summary of MSU's history in the parent article, it is just that: brief. Same goes for the Miami, Florida article. Having information related to another article has never disqualified any article I have seen. Jtmichcock 01:40, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

There's in fact precedent for all the daughter articles being featured. See: Saffron, History of saffron, and Trade and usage of saffron. Fieari 21:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

In that case, Support Bwithh 21:39, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Support One of the reason's for the daughter article is b/c of the history portions I wrote and expanded got to long for the mother article. However, in revising the intro paragraph, we need to be careful of our grammar as well as facts. Example "The school admitted its first African American student in 1899 and, shortly thereafter, the college began offering degrees in engineering and other applied sciences to students." This article is both facutally inaccurate (engineering degrees were offered immediately after mechanical engineering was offered in 1885) and grammatically awkward (the same subject listed twice with different names: "school", "college"). Therefore, if there are no objections, I plan to delete the latter portion of this sentence (leaving the African American 1st part) for it adds little and detracts a lot. Pulley14 03:03, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] United States Bill of Rights

This article was nominated by someone else in February, and met basically none of the criteria. After voting against it, I made a few hundred edits and submitted it to WP:PR (where it received no comments after > 1 wk). I then solicited comments from contributors to the FA "First Amendment to the United States Constitution." I didn't get any. Nonetheless, I think it might be time, or close to it. Fire when ready... Kaisershatner 19:58, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object Former nomination here. Wow! This has come a long way since the last time this had been nominated. Let me do a more thorough reading and get back to you in a moment... Fieari 20:58, 13 March 2006 (UTC) Okay, I've looked it over, and I'm objecting on the following points:
  • The lead section is both technically too long, containing four paragraphs, and also feels too long, as some of those paragraphs are themselves very wordy. See if you can't try to pare it down a little. It should be an introduction to the topic, allowing the article itself to elaborate.
    • Revised and truncated. Kaisershatner 16:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • There is information in the lead that is not explained further, or even mentioned, in the main body of the article. This includes mention of the English Bill of Rights, which was a previous point of objection to the older nomination.
    • Added "antecedents" section in "Drafting" section, with expanded discussion of the documents noted in the intro.Kaisershatner 16:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I like to see at least one inline citation per section, and preferably per paragraph. In particular, while the "Background" information is not exactly disputed, one citation for where one (say, a forigner who doesn't know our history) could verify or learn more, would be appreciated. The "Drafting" section, before the subsections, could use a citation.
    • Will work on more refs, but I think the "see also/main" links in the "Background" section fulfill this need.
  • Wordyness: Some of the paragraphs I found a little hard to read because they were so dense. While simply adding whitespace wouldn't be grammatical (even if it would help readability), I believe the information could be reworded so as to be able to be split up into more paragrahs, simply for legibility. This is not a sticking point for me, however, and I would not vote oppose on this point alone. Almost the entire article suffers from this issue.
    • It all suffers because I wrote this, and that's my style - dense, long sentences. I was repeatedly unsuccessful at attracting collaborators/commenters on this article, so I appreciate your understanding.Kaisershatner 16:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm not sure how to fix this one. In my browser, Firefox, and 1024x768 resolution, in the "Madison's preemptive proposal" section, the first line of the quote is overlapped by the image to the right, so that the text is somehow beneath the image. I'm not sure what causes this or how to fix it. The line is ""For while we feel all these inducements to go into a revisal of the constitution, we must feel for the" and the words "must feel for the" are overlapped.
    • No idea, but I think it's fixed. Call Jimbo?  :) Kaisershatner 16:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
      • Yep, fixed for me. Fieari 21:47, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
  • On my first read through, it wasn't clear to me that "Congressional Appointment" and "Congressional Compensation" were the two failed amendments, because I was skimming... something you can expect readers of an encyclopedia article to do. Could you make this clearer please? Preferably by including mention of these amendments' names in the "Twelve Amendments proposed" lead section.
    • Done.Kaisershatner 16:09, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • "Display and honoring of the Bill of Rights"... could we have statistics on how many visitors it gets per <arbitrary unit of time>?
  • Looking good other than these points, I think. As I said... impressive work since the last time this showed up around here. Fieari 21:24, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support - The issues I have not crossed out above still stand, but I believe they are not enough to object anymore, so I have changed my vote to support. Fieari 21:47, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
• Conditional support the intro really needs to be slimmed. Computerjoe's talk 18:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Much better. Support Computerjoe's talk 16:53, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• • The first sentence of the second para ends with "threatened the Constitution's ratification" which is confusing re the rest of the sentence and looks like it was left over from somewhere else. I can't tell what it's trying to say. I mostly agree with Fieari too. Rlevse 21:43, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

:Here is the sentence: "Initially drafted by James Madison in 1789, the Bill of Rights was written as ideological conflict between Federalists and anti-Federalists dating from the Philadelphia Convention in 1787 threatened the Constitution's ratification." It might need commas before "dating" and after "1787" but otherwise I don't see the problem...?Kaisershatner 16:02, 14 March 2006 (UTC) Anyway, I revised this again. Kaisershatner 17:22, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support looks good to me now. Rlevse 13:06, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Neutral Cut down thetop and my vote's yours! American Patriot 1776 17:24, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Support Wonderful, pure and simple. American Patriot 1776 17:41, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support The 2nd paragraph of the introduction could be almost completely removed. It can be pared down to a one- or two-sentence summary of the section that deals with that information further down in the article. Looks like that will solve objections from other editors as well. Otherwise, it looks good. Changing my vote to full support after revision of introduction. Kafziel 14:53, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Although a little more information on the display is nice. You could mention the display's heavy use in the film National Treasure, explain some of the security, there's GOT to be an easy PD/GFDL photo of it on display out there somewhere, etc. However, the important part is certainly FA quality now. Staxringold 17:41, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Added some more details about the display. I would think the NARA photos are PD as US Govt. work but couldn't find that info at their site (yet). I didn't see that film so can't be of too much use on that point. Kaisershatner 21:00, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

National Treasure was about the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. I don't see why any mention of it whatsoever should be in this article; maybe on the National Archives article, maybe on the Declaration of Independence article (but probably not), but definitely not here. Kafziel 21:05, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment Thanks for all the feedback. About the introduction: I cut it down, again. Note that WP:LEAD suggests a three paragraph introduction for articles over 30,000 characters. Without counting spaces and also w/o "See also" and everything after it, this article is 31,500 characters, but beyond that I think the introduction should include more than just "what is the Bill of Rights." I think it should also cover "who wrote it, when, how, and why." I'm advocating the three paragraph intro as it stands, for now, with all due respect, unless it is really a deal-breaker. Kaisershatner 18:33, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Great work --PopUpPirate 22:19, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Good article. --Myles Long 17:42, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object - the original text should be in Wikisource - it should not be in the article. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:51, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  Huh? This article is about the Bill of Rights. You object because it has the Bill of Rights in the article? What could possibly be more relevant than that? Kafziel 14:26, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

  And would you add the text of War and Peace to War and Peace? Wikipedia is not ... "a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files ... such as original historical documents ... laws ... and other source material ... Complete copies of primary sources ... should go into Wikisource". That is what Wikisource is for. This is an encyclopedia. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:39, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Comment The Bill of Rights is so short that it's ridiculous to put it in WikiSource and have to go look at it there. Coffeeboy 18:54, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree. No point in putting it elsewhere. Fieari 19:58, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

It is already in Wikisource, starting with http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Constitution_of_the_United_States_of_America#Amendment_I I and ending with http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Constitution_of_the_United_States_of_America#Amendment_X I can see no problems with small parts of it being quoted, but I don't think the article needs to have a whole section which just sets out the whole text of the subject of the article. -- ALoan (Talk) 22:31, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't see the problem, although it should probably be at the end of the article to avoid disrupting the flow of the text. Lots of constitutional articles have the full text of their subject in the article. Johnleemk | Talk 18:25, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Could you point me to which ones, please. Are any of them featured? -- ALoan (Talk) 12:04, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, several, including all of the following. Article 153 of the Constitution of Malaysia, First Amendment to the United States Constitution, and Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution all include the full text in one section. Article One of the United States Constitution spreads it out across each section of the article. Johnleemk | Talk 12:31, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. The "full text" included in First Amendment to the United States Constitution and Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution is so short in each case as to be a trivial addition (compare this article, which is about the first 10 amendments). There is much more original text in Article One of the United States Constitution, but at least it is disguised a little by being spread out. However, I would still say that it is too much. Similarly, I would say that the quotation of the full text in Article 153 of the Constitution of Malaysia is unnecessary; as some of the comments at the end of the FAC say, firstly it is in Wikisource already (the right place, IMHO) and secondly where to draw the line? (The series on the USA PATRIOT Act, such as USA PATRIOT Act, Title II, is a case in point - it is important legislation, but including the original text would be daft. Should we add the original text to Magna Carta or Parliament Acts or Bill of Rights 1689?) The "full text" in the Malaysian article takes up about 1.5 screens; the main body of the article is only about 7 screens (ignoring the references, which add another 1.5 screens), so around a quarter is taken up by the original text rather than prose about the original text. -- ALoan (Talk) 17:57, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

This is ridiculous. This isn't my article, and I objected to its first FAC, but why is this such a sticking point for you? Nobody else has had any problem with including the text, and four other editors have actively voiced their opinion that it belongs here, . First of all, it's not simply a word-for-word inclusion of the text; each amendment is separated and briefly summarized. Secondly, the Bill of Rights is very short; it's beyond absurd to compare it with the PATRIOT act. The article isn't overly long, nothing is hurt by its inclusion here, you're not backed by precedent or by the manual of style, and you're going against consensus by maintaining this objection. You've been shown examples of this same thing in other articles, but you still won't let it go, preferring instead to find excuses (like "at least it is disguised a little" - I must have missed the "disguise" section in the MoS). If your opinion actually is "humble", as you claim, then why do you absolutely refuse to compromise with anyone? Kafziel 19:46, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Sheesh. Each editor gets to object as he or she wishes. If the objection is actionable, it's actionable. In this case, I think ALoan's point is valid. In the case of the Malaysian article, I felt that an .en readership might well need the text. For one thing, the article was about very subtle disagreements and interpretations of words, so the text needed to be iterated. Secondly, it's an obscure thing. Neither of those cases applies here, and neither should apply here. Only because the Bill of Rights is exceptionally famous can there be an article like this, and any detailed analysis of the individual interpretations and political struggles over each phrase would be out of place in an all-ten article. Finally, the objection is entirely actionable. Since the Bill of Rights exists at Wikisource, the authors need merely to link to the Wikisource and then present a table of what each right covers (rather than original language). Finally, it is now MoS, since we're going to mention that, that FA's use "summary style" and transclude where possible. Linking to Wikisource is in keeping with this, and it is against our general article principles to allow duplication of material anyway. Truly finally, trying to argue someone out of an objection is absurd at best, counter-productive generally, and, honestly, bad form at all times. Geogre 21:10, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

As a reader, I don't want to have to go to wikisource just to be able to read the (very short) document this article is about. The Bill of Rights is quite succinct; most of the amendments are one sentence each. Any attempt to further summarize them would simply mean replacing one sentence with a different sentence, which would then be criticized for inaccuracies. But without some kind of context, the article is meaningless. I would object if this didn't include that section. Kafziel 03:00, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

As you wish. For my part, I can understand cutting down the 18th century wording where possible, and there is a difference between "The rights are: freedom of speech (1), freedom to carry weapons (2), freedom of a fair trial..." and "I: The right of the people to assemble, speak...." If nothing else, one is lawyer-talk. You feel that the primary material has to be present. ALoan feels that it shouldn't. Now the authors will either address the objection or not, and Raul will either promote the article or not. No calling names, badgering, or assessing the nature of another person's objections. If an objector is being a serious troll, I can understand, but when a person's objection is reasonable, I can't. Geogre 11:48, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Come on now. You're a smart guy. You know "freedom to carry weapons" is childishly simplistic, and you wouldn't want to see that in an article any more than I would. I certainly wish things were that simple, but they aren't, and they shouldn't be portrayed as such in a featured article. You know as well as I do that the history buffs and legal folks would have a shit fit over language like that. The original wording is only ten senteces long. Ten sentences. Any article about a legal document can handle ten sentences of exceprts from that document. That's nothing.

If I came on too strong before, it was only because one of my pet peeves is people who throw around "in my humble opinion" when, in fact, they're not humble at all; they think they're right no matter what and plan to throw a tantrum until they get their way, no matter how many others disagree with them. Happens on here all the time. Just throw a little "IMHO" in there and you can be as unreasonable and uncompromising as you want.

How about the guy above who thought there should be more information about the movie "National Treasure" in this article? It was an actionable request. But National Treasure isn't even about the Constitution, let alone the Bill of Rights. Should he still get his way, just because it's actionable? No. Not even if he had said, "IMHO". Kafziel 14:05, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. Criterion 2a. There's much that is worthy in this article, but it needs a thorough run-through to fix unwieldy sentences and odd expressions. Take, for example, the four sentences that lead into 'Background'.

"The Philadelphia Convention that convened in 1787 set out to correct weaknesses inherent in the Articles of Confederation that had been apparent ..." "before the American Revolution had been successfully concluded"—to conclude a revolution is unidiomatic "a revenue amendment"—needs to be reworded "requirements of large majorities to enact major legislation"—I think I know what it means, but it needs to be clarified and reworded "The need for a stronger central government with a unified currency and the ability to conduct affairs of state such as foreign policy (and that could bind all the states under negotiated treaties and agreements rather than be undermined by a single state's refusal to comply with an international treaty) led to the stronger Federal government adopted by compromise at the Convention."—this snake needs to be chopped up/simplified" All of those amended. Kaisershatner 15:01, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

"The newly designed Federal government"—designing a government?

In answer to your question, yes. See Philadelphia Convention. They were...desigining a government. Kaisershatner 15:01, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

"However, ardent debate between political factions known as the Federalists and anti-Federalists ensued over the balance between strengthening the nation's government and weakening the rights of the people who ten years earlier had explicitly rebelled against the perceived tyranny of George III of England."—another snake. I made your other suggested changes, but I like this sentence. Kaisershatner 15:01, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

The whole article needs scrutiny. Tony 06:51, 18 March 2006 (UTC) See either peer review archive for a history of the scrutiny, or please feel free to help edit the prose in a way that you find more appealing! Kaisershatner 15:01, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• Kaisershatner, you may have 'amended' my examples, but I haven't checked what you've done, and they may still be unsatisfactory; therefore, I've removed your striking out of my text here. With respect to your comment just above concerning peer review, I don't see the relevance. The fact that the article has already been scrutinised is irrelevant to whether it still needs scrutiny. Tony

Tony, thanks for your comments. Kaisershatner 13:00, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object - concerned about the large quote in the section "Ratification and the Massachusetts Compromise". Why are we doing this? I say, find seperate sources for this and the rephrase it into the main text of the section. Anything else is, to be frank, lazy. - Ta bu shi da yu 12:21, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

• This was already accepted as a featured article. Why is this still on the nomination page? Pointlessness 20:21, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ran (film)

Ran is a film by famed Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa. It follows the fall of an aging warlord who decides to abdicate as ruler in favor of his three sons. His kingdom slowly disintegrates, as each son jockies for power, murdering their rivals and laying waste to the land. The film is one of my favorites and the article has received a major face-lift over the last two months. In addition, it has had a Peer Review and been listed as a Good Article. I hope you will see fit to give this article FA status, and if not please give us some constructive feedback so we can keep improving it.

• Nominate and Support. Palm_Dogg 19:16, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. I've looked over your article, and it is both well written and comprehensive. I'll admit I skipped reading the plot summary, since I still plan on seeing it soon (I'm working my way through Kurasawa's work), but all that I read was written quite well, with "brilliant prose". I checked some of the references, and they fit, and there are plenty of those references. I checked the fair use on the images, and they are all propperly declared and explained. Comprehensivly, it not only discusses the movie, but influences, themes, and other such things... and it's not original research, since this analysis gathers together quotes from the director himself. All in all, a featured quality article. Fieari 20:16, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Very good. Not much more could be asked. RyanGerbil10 22:27, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Good work. —Eternal Equinox | talk 01:15, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. This is a wonderful article and very comprehensive. I hope to see this on the main page soon. Alexthe5th 14:39, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Not only is the article very well written and very thorough, it cuts to the story behind the story. Too often artistic directors like Kurosawa never get to achieve financial success and thus end up sitting on an opus. Here, Kurosawa gets what he wants at a time in his life where it was time to put a dramatic punctuation on the rest of his career. This article does justice to what is really the culmination of one of the world's best directors. --BridgeBurner 19:19, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support, very good article, no doubts. --Terence Ong 08:52, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support for a great and worthy film. I've viewed this page a few times before, and it is very good. We should propose this as the template for all movie articles. My only concern is in the "Background" section. Does there really need to be such lengthy exposition about Kurosawa and his lengthy hisotry? It mentions his suicide attempt, and for the life of me i don't see how that's germane. Perhaps it would be better to remove the exposîtion and reference the reader to the Kurosawa article. Thethinredline 09:04, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I think there does. Ran is Kurosawa's bleakest film and he made it during the lowest point in his life. Because many people (including Kurosawa) have said that Ran is partly autobiographical, I thought it would be useful to include some background on him as well. His failed suicide is incredibly relevant, because Hidetora has a similar incident that is a major plot device. I've tried to rewrite the background section to make that clearer. Hope this helps. Palm_Dogg 18:14, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
    • Well, i tend to disagree. The section contains over 500 words from looking at it, and mentions his getting fired from the set of Tora Tora Tora due to creative differences. That information (perfectly valid, of that I am sure) is not entirely relevant, and although it does give a sense of Kurosawa's state, the section could be easily compressed. However, consider this the advice of one man (and noone else has mentioned it, in fact one person even praised you for it), and noone else has mentioned it. And you can be sure I will not take the section to the abbatoir myself. Don't worry. I have a few labours of love of my own on this site, and i know how it is. But don't worry, my concerns wont prevent me at all from seeing this

Thethinredline 07:46, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support This article is a good example of what wikipedia can accomplish as a community. I hope that as a feature article that it may send people who have not previously seen the film out to discover this underappreciated masterpiece. My only proviso is that I would recommend that someone take a look at the cast and character section. It seems slightly clunky. Two of the actors listed as Kurosawa veterans were only in films that came after Ran making them AK rookies, neophytes or freshman. I had a go at it but only seemed to make it worse which is why I didn't save my attempt. I also want to let you know Palm dogg re Thethinredline's concern - Kurosawa's suicide attempt is not even mentioned in his article so I am glad that you have discussed it here.User:MarnetteD | Talk 20:52, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
• Strong support. Great article with detail and insightful analysis, excellent choice of images. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 21:29, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object - good article, very well written, but a couple of big problems.

1. there are too many screenshot images, and I'm not convinced they constitute fair use. Most don't particularly relate to the text and seem to be more for decorative purposes. Glaring example : Image:Warriors Ran.jpg has absolutely nothing to do with "Reception". Some comment needs to be made in the text and also in the image captions that makes it clear that the use of the image is important, rather than incidental, to the discussion. Fair use rationales should be specific to each image and it seems that the rationale has been copied and pasted for each one. The storyboard image rationale contains "Ran has been released for public purposes. Therefore, this screenshot is intended for wide distribution." copy and paste? - rationales need to be thoughtful and well considered. The storyboard image is not from the film and therefore this part of the fair use claim is false. "Courtesy of Palm dogg" is only relevant if Palm dogg owns the copyright. All images should show source and copyright holder. Stating just the source is not good enough, and determining who owns the copyright for the film, and stating it on the image description page, should not be difficult. I also think there are far too many fair use images, and each fair use image weakens the potential fair use case of every other image. Wikipedia's policies state that they should be used sparingly and only where necessary.

(have deleted those aspects of my objection that Palm dogg has addressed) Rossrs 00:27, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

2. Lead paragraph mentions that an Oscar was won for costume design, and it is also highly regarded for its screenplay, musical score, cinematography etc. These are very important aspects in the overall quality/look/feel etc of the film but are barely (if at all) discussed. For the article to be comprehensive, aspects such as these need to be briefly discussed rather than briefly mentioned. Rossrs 09:39, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

• • Just to throw in my two cents on this one, I think that the images are vital to conveying the true beauty of this film (and Kurosawa's masterful direction) to the readers of the article. I'd really like to see the first issue resolved in a way that would not involve the removal of the pictures from the article. Alexthe5th 03:56, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I also think the images are vital, but you are correct about the Copyright info. I believe I have added the revelvant copyright info everywhere and have indicated who produced the image and who uploaded it. I have also tried to update the Fair Use tags so that viewers can understand why I put them where I did (although I don't think we're anywhere near finished with this issue). Finally, there are a number of publicity photographs for Ran. Would you still object if we used these instead of stills from the movie? Palm_Dogg 07:38, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Don't get me wrong - I think the images are absolutely beautiful and certainly a good selection of images is vital, but as I said, the more images used, the weaker the fair use case is for each one. The work you've done on the tags is in the right direction, though it doesn't solve the problem of the sheer number of images. Replacing them with stills is just subsituting one type of fair use for another. I don't think it would make much difference. Some specific points - Image:Warriors Ran.jpg is a great shot but it does not in any way relate to the "Reception" section and I suspect it's there because it couldn't fit anywhere else, and I see that as more evidence that there are simply too many images. Also the fair use rationales make a statement "Ran has been released for public purposes. Therefore, this screenshot is intended for wide distribution. " - this is not a valid statement. The film is intended for wide distribution, but individual screenshots are not, and DVDs have all sorts of copyright disclaimers on them and in them. It's not suitable as a rationale. Have a look at Sunset Boulevard (film) and specifically the images. I think this film features some of the most beautiful black-and-white cinematography I've ever seen, superb direction, brilliant use of light and shade and camera angles. I would have loved to have used about 50 images, but I used 4. I think my point was made with 4 images, and I think you can make your point with a reduction of images. If you have a look at the fair use rationales I've tried to address why each individual image was required. Perhaps if you frame your rationales similarly and drop the "screenshot is intended for wide distribution" you may have a stronger case. Still too many images, but at least the fair use claim may be a bit stronger. Rossrs 11:49, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Removed Image:Warriors Ran.jpg and eliminated "film is intended for wide distribution" tags. BTW, FANTASTIC work on Sunset Boulevard (film)! Palm_Dogg 14:43, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, Palm dogg. The image description pages look good now. I think you've fixed them very well. I still have to say I think there are too many images, but I certainly feel that you are acting in the best of good faith. We'll have to disagree on how many is too many, unfortunately. Rossrs 00:25, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Object. I am currently beginning a copyedit, but if the intro is any indication there will be a lot of work to do on the prose. We don't want an article to greet people with such classic dangling participles as "Hailed for its powerful images and use of color, costume designer Emi Wada won an Academy Award for Costume Design for his work on Ran." Its? Was Wada the one hailed? It seems like someone inadvertently combined fragments of two other sentences to make that one. Also the language is, so far, a bit too hypey. I'll do what I can but I don't know how much work it would really need.

Oh, another example to avoid: "The story is based on the historical story of ..." Daniel Case 04:20, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

OK, I just got done going through the whole article and making what fixes I could. I am not ready to support it. The prose is still not anywhere near brilliant; I feel the most I could do was make an adequate eighth-grade paper into an adequate ninth-grade one. There is far too much in the way of repeated information (Do we need to tell the story of how Mrs. Kurosawa died during production twice? Once is enough. On the second reference we just need to say "Kurosawa halted production for a day to mourn his wife's death") and overall wordiness. One gets the feeling that different writers worked on different sections and didn't step back to look at the overall picture.

Far too many paragraphs lack organization, seeming as though information was just thrown in haphazardly, like socks in the hamper. They feel like lists. This sometimes results in overkill ... do we need to have every potential King Lear parallel explored in such great detail. It's important to the film (and the "themes" at the end could do with a great deal more of the Lear comparison, since many of the things said there could just as easily be said of the play as well.

Within sentences, there is far too much circumlocution, too much use of indirect language in the hope of sounding scholarly. Nouns are repeated too often where pronouns would do. It almost feels translated from some other language.

Beyond that, some more substantive issues:

• I am a bit troubled by the use of section epigraphs. They don't seem terribly encyclopedic to me and I don't know of any other FA (post-mid 2005, anyway) that uses them.

• There should be just one {{Endspoiler}}. I appreciate the authors' awareness of the reader, but there are more or less spoilers everywhere in the body of the article.

• I see how "the absence of God" is supported by Kurosawa's quote, but it comes not soon enough to shake the confusion caused by saying it and then immediately talking about Buddha.

• Likewise the images are nice, but I agree about the screenshots ... is it necessary to use so many of them? Similar issues were recently raised with Triumph of the Will, after all. Fair use only goes so far. Daniel Case 05:04, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

• • First of all, good job on the copyediting. I freely admit it's not my strong point and when you edit an article day after day it just sort of flows together. I removed the {{Endspoiler}}, since the whole article is a series of spoilers. Regarding the epigraphs, I've used them on both Triumph of the Will and Battle of Badr without any complaints. I think they lend credibility to the article, by showing what the director was thinking of. Regarding God/Buddah, I believe they're supposed to be one and the same. I can't think of any clear way to discuss this without going off on a major tangent, so I'm open to suggestions. Regarding "Fair Use", see comments above. Palm_Dogg 07:52, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

A few points I came across after taking another look at the article:

• You mention costume designer Emi Wada as "he", but she is actually female (she has an article in the Japanese wikipedia here: [6] where she's credited with being the first Japanese woman to win an Academy award).
• The Japanese meaning of the kanji 乱 has multiple meanings, most commonly "riot", "war", "disorder" and "disturbance"; since translations of these kanji are ambiguous at times (especially in titles, where the author is attempting to be intentionally vague, letting the reader decide for themselves which meaning to consider), "chaos" is not unappropriate. However, do you think it might be a good idea to list all the meanings? Alexthe5th 01:52, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

• Support. This article is well written and is very informative without suffocating the reader with too much information.

The Fading Light 11:29, 20 March 2006

• Object:

In Ran, the Battle of Hachiman Field is a perfect illustration of this new kind of warfare. Saburo's arquebusers annihilate Jiro's cavalry by engaging them from the woods, where the cavalry are unable to venture. Similarly, Saburo's assassination by a sniper also shows how individual heroes have no place on a modern battlefield. Kurosawa also illustrates this new warfare with his camera. Instead of focusing on the warring armies, he frequently set the focal plain beyond the action, so that in the film they appear as abstract entities.

First, it's plane, not plain. That should be easy enough to fix, but the rest of the article probably could use a check. Second, this analysis is a little too insightful for wikipedia. We're not here to make insights, we're here to cite experts and critics and summarize what others have concluded. This is the kind of analysis that belongs in an essay, not here, where it's considered original research. This article either needs more sources cited or conclusions cut. Night Gyr 17:43, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• • I actually forgot to add a reference for this. I got it off the audio commentary for the Criterion Collection's "Ran" DVD. I have just added a citation and fixed the spelling error. Palm_Dogg 21:42, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. The article is well written and very comprehensive. Great work! — Underneath-it-All 20:48, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

• Comment The styling of Japanese names is a fruit salad, with Sue (no accent), Sué (avec accent Pokémon), Yôko (circumflex), Hidetora Ichimonji (given name first, despite being a character in pre-Meiji Japan), Mori Motonari (surname first, according to the convention for pre-Meiji Japanese people), a red link to Shinnosuke "Peter" Ikehata (it seems prudent to create an article with one of his names or the other, rather than have the nickname in quotes in the article title) etc. Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Japan-related articles) has suggestions. There are similar inconsistencies in things like "Best Picture" in quotation marks, but other awards in the same paragraph not similarly marked. Additionally, links should be made direct, e.g. Buddhist should link directly to Buddhism. These finishing touches can be the very last things that turn a good article into a featured article. Fg2 02:32, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object. Too many fair use images. I know why you want to use them, and I sympathize with that, but it doesn't matter. No reasoning can support fair use on that many. No matter how much you want to use them, we have to respect copyright. More than 3 or 4 is really stretching it. - Taxman ^Talk 14:15, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment I have to politely ask if someone has some sort of agenda against this article. It's been up here for two weeks now, despite consistently having at least 3:1 support. If it's regarding the images, just order me to take them down and I'll do it, although I don't think there are too many. If it's about the copyediting, I've done what I can but it's not my strongest point -- I'm a researcher first and foremost. Anyways, I'd hoped to have this article promoted before I shipped out today, but it doesn't look like that will happen. Palm_Dogg 20:23, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• Agenda against the article? Remember - There Is No Cabal. ;) In all seriousness, though, I think this is a great article, and a lot better than many other FA's out there. Hopefully someone with enough knowledge of this film can get the issues ironed out and we'll have it up on the main page. 203.179.21.193 05:55, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
• That's not how it works. FAC isn't a vote it's a consensus that all major objections have been dealt with. It's not a rough consensus like (2/3, 3/4, whatever) like other Wikipedia processes. Even one major objection will keep an article from getting promoted. And I'm not just saying this because I've objected. You can check the talk page archives for backing. And if you disagree with our stance, find some evidence to back your position. I've just been around long enough that I doubt you'll find it. Try asking Carnildo, an editor with a lot of image experience, or get some legal backing for your position. I may be radical with 4, but certainly 11 is unnacceptable. - Taxman ^Talk 21:05, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• Now you tell me! :) OK, I've slashed and burned and cut it down to what I consider a bare bones 5. I'm sure that's still one too many, but I think all these images are necessary. I also have to formally state that I can't work on this article anymore. In two hours I leave for military training and won't be posting again until July. I'd really appreciate it if someone could take over for me and push this baby the last few inches to FA status. Palm_Dogg 00:53, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

• Sorry you had to go before it was done. I hope someone can finish it up as it's pretty close, but not there. - Taxman ^Talk 14:08, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

• CommentKurosawa also illustrates this new warfare with his camera. Instead of focusing on the warring armies, he frequently set the focal plain beyond the action, so that in the film they appear as abstract entities. Different tenses, I corrected it. But I didn't have time to read through the whole article, so there might be other grammatical errors...great articleOsbus 23:00, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Object its good but missing something: what was its long-term influence? have any directors been directly influenced by ran in the past 20 years? what do directors, producers, actors have to say about ran today? what other films borrow from ran? didnt peter jackson say the two towers battle was inspired by a kurosawa battle - was it from this film? also i dont think encyclopedia articles should have "intro quotes" like at the beginning of the king lear section, they should be incorporated into the body of the text. Zzzzz 18:04, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Fantastic article, only a few minor corrections left, after several major overhauls, including the one that has taken place on this page. Judgesurreal777 01:55, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support for this comprehensive article. Tankred 16:52, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support Wikipedia can be proud of this article! Fg2 01:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support. I've been indecisive on this issue for a couple of weeks, because although this is a fantastic article (and I listed it as Good a while back, and it's improved since then) I can see that it could be refined still further. But I've come to realise that I'm questing for perfection, but perfection is not the standard for FA status. It is a model article in terms of many of the Wikipedia criteria and a fascinating read. I feel that it could still do with more copy-editing but I don't think that holds it back from FA status - no article is perfect, after all, they can all be improved. The abuse of "fair use" on the images was really the last stumbling block for me. It's a great article, I would be proud to see it on the front page or in a printed encyclopedia, let's please feature it. --Estarriol 11:14, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
• Comment - I dislike the Amerocentrism of the value judgements and critical commentary presented in the article. I appreciate it's harder to work with sources not in English, but it just seems wrong that so much of the article is based on US media, critics and websites. --zippedmartin 23:25, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
• Support - Good enough for FA status. Cvene64 06:26, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support. Well cited, good language, gives good cultural, literary and historical perspective on the role of the great film. Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters 07:35, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
• Support. This is an excellent article. It's been here long enough—let's get it out of here and onto the main page. --DanielNuyu 02:13, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] First Council of Nicaea

Since the last time this article was nominated, it has been improved and cleaned-up (I've done much of the recent work myself). There is now more information and it complies with the featured article crieria. --Coemgenus 14:27, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

• Comment- a few simple minor issues: first, external links located in the References section should be cited according to WP:CITE (see also WP:CITE/ES) - {{Cite web}} may come in useful here. Additionally, headings generally do not start with the word "The" whenever possible. Thanks, AndyZ _t 22:22, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Fixed the subject headings. I left "The Nicene Creed," since that's how everyone refers to it, but I changed the other ones. I'll work on those cites next. --Coemgenus 14:26, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
  • The web cites are now fixed, using {{Cite web}}. Handy tool, that thing. --Coemgenus 01:21, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. As AndyZ indicated, some cleanup of citations is needed in the references section. In addition, the citations from Schaff (i.e. the links to ccel.org in the body) should be converted into proper references, in general leaving out the title of the work, unless it is of particular relevance (this is why one has citations after all). Finally, the text could use some superficial clean-up. ^iggy_talk 19:42, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

• Eh? Anyone? Coemgenus 23:02, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

• Comment See also section contain items already linked-to in text. Jkelly 04:07, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
  • You're right - they were all linked above, except for the one about the Da Vinci Code, with is just irrelevant. I erased 'em all. Coemgenus 13:55, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
• Weak Support I like the level of focus and comprehensiveness, and the summary of the Arianism page, for example, is quiet strong. However, there is a general lack of in-line citation in many sections. Generally reads well, except for some places where there are lengthy lists of names.

• My comments in red--Nino Gonzales 21:44, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

From WP:WIAFA:

1. It exemplifies our very best work.
2. It is well written, comprehensive, factually accurate, neutral, and stable. Read Great writing and The perfect article to see how high the standards are set. In this respect:
   • (a) "well written" means that the prose is compelling, even brilliant; I don't think it is compelling yet
   • (b) "comprehensive" means that an article covers the topic in its entirety, and does not neglect any major facts or details; OK
   • (c) "factually accurate" includes supporting of facts with specific evidence and external citations (see Wikipedia:Verifiability); these include a "References" section where the references are set out, complemented where appropriate by inline citations (see Wikipedia:Citing sources). For articles with footnotes or endnotes, the meta:cite format is strongly encouraged; Needs to be standardized (perhaps we could choose to not include the full title in the citation. The full details should perhaps be in the Reference section?)
   • (d) "neutral" means that an article is uncontroversial in its neutrality and factual accuracy (see Wikipedia:Neutral point of view); and OK
   • (e) "stable" means that an article does not change significantly from day to day and is not the subject of ongoing edit wars. OK. No edit war as far as I know.
3. It complies with the standards set out in the style manual and relevant WikiProjects. These include having:
   • (a) a concise lead section that summarizes the entire topic and prepares the reader for the higher level of detail in the subsequent sections; Could be improved
   • (b) a proper system of hierarchical headings; and OK
   • (c) a substantial but not overwhelming table of contents (see Wikipedia:Section). OK
4. It has images where appropriate, with succinct captions and acceptable copyright status; however, including images is not a prerequisite for a featured article. OK. All of them are ancient works of art.
5. It is of appropriate length, staying tightly focused on the main topic without going into unnecessary detail; it uses summary style to cover sub-topics that are treated in greater detail in any 'daughter' articles. OK

• Object; this is a good article, but are there citations for the sections called "Arian controversy" and "The Nicene Creed"? Also, I'm not a fan of using quotes to tell the story—better to summarize their content and cite the source, unless for some reason the quote itself is particularly significant (like something actually said at the council, not something a researcher has written). --Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 23:18, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] F-4 Phantom II

Considerably rewritten and expanded, addressing all concerns raised in the Peer Review and previous FAC attempt and more. A detailed overview of history and service of this Cold War icon. This is a self-nom of sorts as I am the primary contributor to the current revision. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 06:03, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Support, a great article on great fighter. Just two points from me:

• Is it possible to have a table of contents please? Those list-like entries are kinda creepy :)
• I would appreciate a section/paragraph/whatever on the Wild Weasel variant. If memory serves, these aircraft were completely "undressed" and modified in order to be converted. Plus, it is a role which is slightly different.
• I'm not convinced by "comparable aircraft"... Mig-21 is 2 times lighter and much smaller than the F-4, so while they may fulfill similar roles (just as all fighters do, they're not really in the same category). Just a thought, maybe I'm wrong so I don't insist :)

Overall, a great article worthy of FA! -- Grafikm ^(AutoGRAF) 10:11, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! I went to the list-like entries because the TOC was gigantic. I think this is much tidier. The Wild Weasel is discussed briefly in the Gulf War section and I made it a separate bullet in the variants summary. All variants are covered in more detail in F-4 Phantom II variants. In truth, there was nothing directly comparable to the Phantom when it came out. MiG-21 and EE Lightning were the closest in mission and performance. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 15:41, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Minor object:

• The "Operators" section is redundant with the entire "Phantom in foreign service" section, no? I can't see any reason to give the same list of countries twice.
• Footnote 6 seems misplaced. I'm assuming it's meant to apply to the entire section; but footnotes are usually placed after the relevant material.

Other than that, great article! Kirill Lokshin 12:50, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I have corrected both issues. Thanks! - Emt147 ^Burninate! 15:41, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Great, support from me now! Kirill Lokshin 16:52, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

• Support Fine article. Rlevse 15:52, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

• Support, having corrected a typo. DCB4W 00:51, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

• Nice article, but I object until formatting and a few other issues are fixed. This should use subsections, but not as many subsections as you have bold headers. In the first level 2 section, use perhaps "Origins", "Testing and production", and "Records". Also, no bold outside of the first sentence of the lead please. Citations follow punctuation,^[1] like this.^[2] As for units, I've fixed the lead to comply with WP:MoS, try to make the rest similar (abbreviate only the conversion, and use &nbsp; between the number and the abbreviation). "Contemporary United States dollars" needs to be defined (what year was the book published that says those numbers?). Also, the F-4 in fiction section is lackluster; anything to add there or can it just be removed? --Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 12:42, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. I will work on making those improvements. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 05:45, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I have implemented all of your recommendations. Please re-evaluate and comment. Thanks! - Emt147 ^Burninate! 00:08, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Nice job, but I think there are now too many subsections (the table of contents is quite long considering the size of the article). Perhaps the subsections for each individual country could be changed to subsections for each region (Europe, Asia, Middle East, Australia), and a few of the subsections in the development section should be combined. Is there a way to combine Nicknames and The Spook? They're both short and somewhat related, but I can't think of a good section name that would cover both of them at the moment. Also, there is still alot of bold within the prose; that needs to be removed. If something needs emphasis, use italics, but it's almost always unnecessary. --Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 12:47, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Also, "Related content" should be renamed "See also" and moved above the references as per WP:MOSHEAD. Its subsections should be eliminated as well. --Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 12:52, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

This is the reason why I was using bold words rather than == tags which produced a very compact TOC. Then you came in and expanded it back. Now you don't like it. Please make up your mind. The TOC is an optional element and can be turned off if users don't like it, so I would prefer to stop messing with the headings altogether. Check the box in your Preferences if it bothers you. Combining sections and compromising clarity and organization for the sake of shrinking the TOC is an absolute no go. The Spook, the nicknames, and all the separate countries are distinct elements and should not be clumped together because Wiki TOCs suck. I'll work on the bold text. The Related content section is per WP:Air MOS, template-encoded, and will stay. Thanks! - Emt147 ^Burninate! 14:55, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

On further review, I think the use of bold is appropriate to highlight the first mention of a new variant or a special project. It improves legibility and makes it easy to find the appropriate text segment by quickly scanning the page. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 18:13, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

I've been perfectly consistent. I said "This should use subsections, but not as many subsections as you have bold headers." You turned all your bold headers into subsections, and now complain that I'm having difficulty making up my mind. Did I miss something? The TOC is visible to virtually all users, and must concisely note the key components of the article. Level three sections that are only several lines long are not key components. Everything I have suggested is in line with WP:MOS and is identical to what I suggest on all articles that look like this. And please take a look at WP:CON; terms like "absolute" and "will stay" have no place around here, especially when the things they refer to are not commonly accepted practice. Since my opinions are apparently not of any more use to you, I'll quit commenting unless you ask on my talk page for more input. --Spangineer^[es] (háblame) 18:36, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

I'll shrink the TOC again. Your other recommendations contradict the consensus-derived WP:Air MoS, which differs from the general WP:MoS in order to provide better subject-specific coverage. As for "absolutely," I stand by my words -- it makes no sense to collapse distinct sections of text into a run-on heap for the sake of a shorter TOC. Sorry I upset you and thanks for your feedback -- it is sincerely appreciated even if not followed to the T. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 21:13, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Support Overall a very well done article. Coffeeboy 14:44, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Support My only suggestion for improvement to this excellent article is that the 'Phantom in foreign service' section be re-named 'Phantom in non-US service' to remove a minor US bias (though the F-4 is, of course, an American designed and built aircraft which was used in the largest numbers by the US military) --Nick Dowling 10:51, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Good suggestion, I'll implement it. Thanks! - Emt147 ^Burninate! 16:36, 1 June 2006 (UTC)