Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Maserati MC12

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 06:03, 17 February 2007.

[edit] Maserati MC12

(Self-nom) I found this article when it was in a bad way [1] and rewrote it. It has since had 2 peer reviews; 1 and 2, the second not providing much which I hope is good. The only criteria I'm hesitant about is 1a. Note: it's written with British spelling. James086^Talk 09:00, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

• You say that "the MC12 qualifies as a super car, meeting all criteria" - yet the Super car article says: "The proper application of this term is subjective and disputed, especially among enthusiasts. In addition, the use of the term is dependent on the era; a vehicle that is considered to be a supercar at one time may not retain its superiority in the future." I agree with what Super car says - there is no set of criteria you can apply to say that this car is or is not a supercar (note arguments about the Arial Atom for example - it equals or beats most supercars in most technical regards but isn't regarded as one because its styling isn't like other supercars and it doesn't cost millions of dollars). Personally, I believe that the term is inherently non-encyclopeadic and that we should delete all references to the term 'super car' in all of our articles (except the Super car article itself). But at the very least, you shouldn't say that the car meets criteria when there are no widely recognised criteria to meet. Aside from that this is a good article - I think the English majors here may have something to say about punctuation - but I'm not in a well-qualified position to complain about that! SteveBaker 17:31, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I will change it today, I'm in a bit of a hurry now so I won't be able to do it immediately (real-life beckons) but will come back later and alter it. Thanks for commenting. James086^Talk 23:06, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Very nice job with the re-write. I did a bit of cleanup today: I changed the ambiguous damper wikilink to point to the shock absorber article (but kept damper visible, since the article is written in British style.) There were redundant links to carbon fibre, radio, down force, and clutch that I took out. I also removed a wikilink to leather, which I found too generic word to merit a link from this particular article, and dropped a wikilink to power (physics) which is an extremely technical article, with formulas galore; it just didn't seem like a good fit for the general audience of the car article. I also added three race location links for Imola, Motopark Oschersleben and Dubai Autodrome.

My biggest complaint is the opening sentence:

The Maserati MC12 is a super car produced by Maserati as a road car (for homologation) from which they developed a FIA GT Championship racing variant.

I'm a 49 year old, reasonably well-read and educated American, and I've never heard the word homologation in my life. Maybe in Europe it's more familiar, or well-known among avid racing fans, but I don't think that a lead sentence should have a word that in all likelihood could be unfamiliar to many readers. The word is also wikilinked twice in the article, but I left the redundant link in because I figure readers like myself may need to re-check the word for its meaning. After looking it up, I guess a more-familiar (to me, anyway) term that is equivalent would be street legal, but I'm not sure I'm right about that! Feel free to leave the word in, but I felt I had to comment about it. - Itsfullofstars 18:14, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Should I rewoword it into something along the lines of

The Maserati MC12 is a sports car produced by Maserati as a road car to homologate (meet entry criteria) a FIA GT Championship racing variant.

Or leave out the homologation all together (explaining it). Bearing in mind it is the correct term. Anyway thanks for bringing it up and for the comments. James086^Talk 23:06, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Homologation doesn't mean anything like street legal. It means something like: When you want to race a really special hand-built kind of race car in certain race events, you are obliged to show that not only is this a 'street legal' car - but also that it's somewhat mass-produced and is sold as street car. So in order to get this car into the race events they wanted it to compete in, they had to make and sell enough of them to the general public. The rules for how many you have to sell - and how similar they are to the car you are planning to race are the homologation rules for that event. I very much doubt there is another word that means the same thing - I'm hard pressed to think of even a shortish phrase that means that. But street legal doesn't cut it. To give you a concrete example, the Mini Cooper'S that won the Monte Carlo rally in 1966 was definitely street legal - but because it had different headlamp dimming circuits from the version they sold to the general public, it failed the homologation test and was disqualified. I think the word has to stay - I don't approve to 'talking down' to our readership...but maybe I'd reorganise the introduction section to move that information down into the second or third paragraph so that the first paragraph is more approachable. SteveBaker 23:36, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

I moved the homologation info into the 3rd paragraph (I agree that it needs to be included, but the first sentence should be clearer) and changed "supercar" to "grand tourer" because that's what Maserati calls it officially. Heres the diff: [2]. James086^Talk 09:43, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I like the changes. After reading the further comments here, I can absolutely agree that homologation is the proper word and needed to be kept, but its new location outside the lead sentence is a big improvement. It's better not to have a possible 'huh?' factor in the lead paragraph. In retrospect, my mentioning of 'street legal' is embarrassing, but hey, at least I learned a new word. - Itsfullofstars 18:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

WHAT?! Someone learned something by reading Wikipedia? OMG - Quick...call the media! Short-sell your Encyclopedia Britannica stock!  :-) SteveBaker 23:11, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Support - With the changes so far, I support this article as FA. SteveBaker 23:11, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Support - What else can I say, very well written, support to keep the term homlogation in as people should know what this term means, if not get to know it, it could be useful for you! Willirennen 00:15, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Support - Well written, well researched. (Someday, I'm going to toss the word Homologation into a conversation to impress my friends, but I worry I may not pronounce it right.) Itsfullofstars 20:41, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

• Object Abstain - I do like the content and structure of the article, but I have to agree with the nominator: the prose is not up to par yet. There are many grammatical and punctuational errors present, which should be corrected first. Find a good copyeditor and thoroughly cleanse the article. Thanks. --Plek 20:57, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I have had a friend copyedit the article (mostly in my account, and they later through IP, see diff) and I have requested a copyedit with the League of Copyeditors. James086^Talk 09:43, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Sorry for being fashionably late. I intended to create a list of all the things I thought needed copyediting, but ended up making the edits myself. As I'm not a stellar copyeditor (I usually have no problem spotting the mishaps, but my corrections are not always the best possible), you might want to look through the diff to see if I messed things up somewhere. Changing vote to abstain. --Plek 00:01, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Only one minor wording change [3], saying that the figures are lower implies it accelerates faster. It is hard to describe in one sentence but I think it is important to keep in there. Thanks for copyediting and improving the article :) James086^Talk 08:55, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

• Support - I think it is a very good article. Karrmann 01:19, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
• Comment, the TOC is a bit bloated. Also is there any information on how commercially successful the car has been, I couldn't spot it.--Peta 00:48, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Firstly thanks for the comments, all suggestions are great. There were only 50 cars made, as it was produced to meet the entry criteria for the FIA GT. Also they probably limited the the number produced to make it seem prestigous. Maserati approached customers that they selected and offered it to them for €600 000. Commercial success isn't really something that applies to this car, especially since you couldn't request to buy it. You shrunk the TOC a bit, should it be reduced any more? I might be able to work some of the specification sections together if need be. James086^Talk 07:24, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.