Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Featured log/April 2005

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Contents 1 Canadian Senate 2 Warren County Canal 3 Dorset 4 Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 5 Canadian House of Commons 6 Louis Riel 7 Kalimpong 8 Geology of the Grand Canyon area 9 Eldfell 10 Francis Petre 11 Diamond 12 Dream Theater 13 Palace of Westminster 14 Samantha Smith 15 Sly & the Family Stone 16 Diego Velázquez 17 Polish-Soviet War 18 Order of St. Patrick 19 Moorgate 20 Speaker of the British House of Commons 21 Bath 22 United Kingdom corporation tax 23 Stuttering 24 Ta-Yuan 25 Goa 26 Automatic number plate recognition 27 Hydrochloric acid 28 1755 Lisbon earthquake 29 Swastika 30 Apollo 8

[edit] Canadian Senate

-- Emsworth 19:09, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support, although could use one or two more pictures. (Getting pretty cocky, eh Emsworth? Not even bothering to explain your case in the description and marking it as a minor edit? Haha!) plattopus^talk 19:16, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)
  • Actually, I have very rarely made comments when nominating, aside from "self nomination" or some such phrase. -- Emsworth 20:09, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Phils 21:42, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support because what is there is very good. Observations for improvement: 1) I'd really like to see some inline citations, using whatever format you like, Wikipedia:Footnote3, and Template talk:Inote (invisible notes) are good ones. 2) There is still room for significant wikification it seems. 3) The power of the Governor General to "stack the deck" with eight extra Senators seems important enough to note in the lead as an example of the Senate's lack of power, but I'd leave that to your discretion. - Taxman 21:50, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)
  • I chose not to include that power in the lead, since it is so rarely used, and is rather obscure. (It has only been used once in the past 140+ years.) -- Emsworth 22:30, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment I think the article should include something about the Senate's role in the dispute over the 1989 Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. Mwalcoff 07:37, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support Lorddude 04:37, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC) This looks pretty good.

[edit] Warren County Canal

Self-nom. The story of a short branch of the Miami and Erie Canal in southwest Ohio. I started this on April 15, 2005, and it was today featured on the main page's Did you know? feature. It won't break the record for speediest time from creation to featured status (see Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2005-04-11/Speed feature) but I hope it is ready. It has a bibliography, much of it linked to transcriptions available on line. It is a thorough account of its short existance. Before anyone asks, no, I don't have any photographs or any way to post them if I did. Finally, I'd like to thank User:Bobblewik who kindly metrified my measurements. PedanticallySpeaking 15:52, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

• This article is pretty good, but would it be at all possible to get a picture? It would really help the reader get a sense of the place. This is not an objection. Meelar (talk) 18:25, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Support The content and presentation are nicely balanced, references excellent. Maybe one of our WP map and diagram makers could help, as it is hard to picture it. Time period was before photography was very widepread. Vaoverland 19:26, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • I was thinking a photo of the area today, but a diagram and map would also be very helpful. Meelar (talk) 19:29, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Pretty much bullet-proof by my standards. I concur with User:Meelar that a diagram or a map of the canal itself would be helpful. Phils 19:46, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• object a) you state that it consumed water at [..] 1800 cubic feet per minute (850 L/s) [..]. Bogen says it was 2000 cubic feet[..] which kind of implies Bogen was clearly wrong. Could you give the source of the other claim and the reason why it's more certain. Possibly you could just say "between 1800^[1] and 2000^[2] cubic feet per minute." and give the source of each claim in a footnote. This continues through the article (forty-acre (162,000 m²) reservoir vs. forty-five acre (182,000 m²) lake) In any case, it would be best to try to clear this up. b) it would be helpful to be able to relate which reference relates to which section of text. You could use "invisible references" or footnotes to help with this. Mozzerati 19:48, 2005 Apr 19 (UTC)

• I would always support greater referencing, but 2000 is well within the range of simple rounding of a more accurate figure. Considering significant figures, variability, and measurement error, asking for more precision where it might not be available is asking for false information. - Taxman 20:28, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

• Okay, I cited the differing opinions. I listed Josiah Morrow's figures first, because he was closer to the scene than the other sources. However, when he wrote his book, the canal had been out of business for three decades so exact figures probably aren't obtainable without looking through the official papers of the Canal Commissioners and the Board of Public Works, assuming they still exist. PedanticallySpeaking 15:14, Apr 20, 2005 (UTC)

• I'll try to make a map, if I can figure out the route. --SPUI (talk) 20:10, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • I'm having some trouble with the map. Can someone provide some information, namely:
    1. Which parts of the canal were later used for railroads?
    2. For the parts that weren't used for railroads, exactly where did it cross other features like roads?
  • --SPUI (talk) 21:48, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Neutral Object – no map, no photo.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 20:40, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

• Map has been added; I got lucky and found a map in the Library of Congress American Memory Collection that shows it. --SPUI (talk) 05:18, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Will support fully if a photo is added. I have decided to cast a neutral vote, as an image is not absolutely necessary for a FA.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 16:46, Apr 21, 2005 (UTC)
    • Does an aerial photo count? Not that it will actually show anything... --SPUI (talk) 15:38, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• After adding a map and dealing with Mozzeratti's objections, you've got my support. Meelar (talk) 01:04, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dorset

Mostly self-nom, and I've run out of changes to make (except the politics section which will change after the election in two weeks)! Buckinghamshire is an existing featured English county article, and I recon this one's reached that standard and more. Joe D (t) 21:20, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• (Well, Buckinghamshire is on WP:FARC and seems likely to be removed unless it improves sharpish...)

Object for now (I am having a bad hair day :) Dorset is quite nice, with some good images and references, but the lead is quite short: could you add some more flavour of the county (Jurassic coast, Chesil Beach, Portland, Isle of Purbeck; seaside resorts - Bournemouth, Poole, Weymouth, etc; Dorchester; Thomas Hardy). Also, does it need the list of places at the end? Many are already mentioned, and there is a separate main article list. There are some nit-picky details like links (Maiden Castle is not linked in history, for example) - and are you sure it is pronounced Dorsit - but I won't go on. -- ALoan (Talk) 22:27, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

OK, I've added another paragraph to the introduction summarising some of the most notable points about the county, I'm not entirely sure which things are considered the most famous by non-residents though, so there might be other points to add to that.

I'm really not sure about the list of places at the end, it's a standard feature of English county articles so it was there before I arrived. I've moved the complete list to the sub-page and cut this list down to what I consider to be the most notable, and I've been considering turning it into a short piece of prose summarising notable places, similar to how the settlements section is summarised. If people think that would work better than a list I'll get on to it.

Dor+sit or Dawh+sit looks like how most people pronounce it to me. It should probably be converted to a phonetic alphabet, but I don't think I'm up to that. Joe D (t) 22:46, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support - thanks, I think that is good enough. I've copyedited slightly. My only small caveat is that list at the end, but other this is good stuff, how Buckinghamshire and all the other counties should be. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:22, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Comment - I have added more links to other Wikipedias with the aid of this excellent tool. I reckon that wherever appropriate - it really only works on proper names - that should be good practice for FACs (though not an actionable objection if it's not done). --194.73.130.132 13:52, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The only one missing is fr:Dorset, which I will add. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:22, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I took out fr:Dorset - it's only a disambiguation page, and is correctly linked from Dorset (disambiguation). The French Wikipedia has no page on the county itself. The global search tool is smart (notice how it marks :fr as a disambiguation page), but not infallible. 194.73.130.132 16:18, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support – good article but it would be better if you start with the ==History== or =Geography== sections first, to give the reader an idea of the place rather than its population statistics.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 17:49, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

'tis done. -- ALoan (Talk) 19:34, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support but agree with ALoan comments. --Briangotts 20:28, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Comment: I've removed the places of interest section in favour of a link to the full list in the see also section. If some of them are considered notable enough it might be possible to mention them somewhere in the main article. Joe D (t) 20:55, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support, this is a good article. Rje 01:48, Apr 23, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. The politics section could do with a full list of parliamentary constituencies (and possibly a fuller discussion on its own page), but I dont think this counts against the nomination Andreww 06:56, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC).

[edit] Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9

The collision of SL9 with Jupiter in 1994 was one of the most significant events ever seen in the solar system. I've spent the last couple of days expanding the article a lot and hopefully making it worthy of consideration for featured status.

As an aside, I will be proud if this nomination succeeds because it will be the 10th article I've worked up to feature-worthy (10 could be expressed as 0.2M here, because an M's worth is 50). Worldtraveller 10:27, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object - threatens my comfortable lead of FAs. :) Just kidding - Support, great work. --mav 13:13, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the support! What does your lead currently stand at? Need to know what target I'm aiming for :) Worldtraveller 14:56, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • There are 13 FAs that I am the primary author of and two others that I greatly helped toward FA status. --mav 15:23, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • Nice, I have only 8 myself :> --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:05, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
        • So the three of us put together still have less than Emsworth. I'd like to know what he's sprinkling on his cornflakes in the morning. Worldtraveller 22:21, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Great stuff. Just one sentence that needs some restructuring: "Brian Marsden of the Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams noted that the comet lay only about 4 arcminutes from Jupiter, and that its apparent motion indicated that it could be close to the giant planet". Unless that is just entirely redundant, is that trying to say something else? And one more, the inner solar system is not clear of debris, Jupiter just clears a lot of it out. I tried to edit that but Aloan's edit put it back. - Taxman 14:20, Apr 20, 2005 (UTC)
  • Worldtraveller will correct me if am wrong, but two objects being close together on the plane of the sky (i.e. a few arcseconds apart) does not necessarily mean that they are close together in three dimensions: the apparent closeness could be a projection effect. To tell whether objects actually are physically close together, you have to look for clues that they are interacting (generally their gravitational influence on each other, which produces kinematic effects, noticeable as proper motion and red shift or blue shift). The problem is that you have to try to create a three dimensional picture from measurements of only two dimensions, right ascension and declination, plus two velocities, proper motion and red/blue shift.

Indeed, apparent closeness doesn't necessarily imply physical closeness - I've reworded that section to try and make the point clearer.Worldtraveller 14:56, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

On the "debris" point, Jupiter keeps the inner solar system largely clear of debris, not totally clear. I'll amend it again. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:36, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I didn't know that bit about apparent closeness (makes sense now though), but now both bits are quite clear, thanks. - Taxman 16:46, Apr 20, 2005 (UTC)

• Support, of course - Worldtraveller and I have been discussing it on our talk pages, and I have done some light copyediting. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:36, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment. I was going to whole-heartedly support this until I read the Jupiter's "role as a vaccum cleaner". With formulations like "Studies have shown..." and "Some astronomers have speculated [...]", and the fact that, unlike other parts of the article, this section is not directly backed by one of the references via a footnote, this section is a somewhat disappointing end for an otherwise article. Reading any average article, I probably wouldn't even have noticed this, but this one is so excellent that even this small detail bothered me :D. Support. Good work. Phils 15:14, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Very true, that section was a bit vague. I had written it from what I recalled of the situation because I was having difficulty tracking down the relevant sources, but I've found them and cited them now. Worldtraveller 22:21, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment: it would be really nice if some more images could be added, either directly to the article (though there's not really room for that) or on a Commons page. Fredrik | talk 21:00, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Looks good. Reads good. What's more to ask? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:05, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Canadian House of Commons

Self-nom. -- Emsworth 20:50, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support, looks good. JYolkowski // talk 23:47, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Well the middle of some of those paragraphs could contain secrets from the Kama Sutra, but I was unable to force myself to read all of it to find out. :) What I did read was very good, and I support as much as my limited knowledge of the subject allows. - Taxman 20:36, Apr 21, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Nice and smooth as usual, Emsworth. You could add the date you accessed the website in the references section. Phils 05:33, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, maybe I'm just a biased Canadian but it looks like featured article material. Benw 11:52, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, that is a good article says I. Rje 01:32, Apr 23, 2005 (UTC)
• object would it be possible, please, to do the same work here as you did to Westminster palace to make the references easier for us to check. For each part of the text say where it came from (invisible is okay) and for each reference give a brief comment what it's useful for. Not that we don't trust you :-) , but verifiability is a great goal. Mozzerati 13:27, 2005 Apr 23 (UTC)
  • Addressed. -- Emsworth 14:39, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Louis Riel

An interesting and comprehensive article on one of Canada's most enigmatic historical figures. Denni☯ 01:09, 2005 Apr 16 (UTC)

• Support. Great. Phils 12:50, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Excellent work; among the best Wikipedia articles on historical figures. (Disclaimer: I know little about Riel from other sources besides the Chester Brown comic, so I'm not the best judge of comprehensiveness or slant, but this looks really good to me.) I wish the article on John Brown were this good! -- Rbellin|Talk 16:45, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: A prior featured article nomination result for this article is here. -- Rbellin|Talk 16:51, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Just to clarify, it was not defeated in the previous FAC cycle, rather withdrawn to Peer Review. It has in fact undergone almost a complete rewrite in PR. Fawcett5 18:19, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Reviewers might choose to take this with a grain of salt&nbsp— I here disclose that I did much of the rewrite after it went back to peer review following the last FAC attempt (with able assistance from JamesTeterenko and CWood among others). Fawcett5 18:19, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• seems like a great article, but object that the references section is short and it isn't at all obvious which parts of the text to look up in which reference. Also, I notice that some phrases "Riel was the eldest of eleven children in a tight-knit, highly religious and well respected French Canadian-Métis family." are remarkably similar to the dictionary of Canada article[3] "Riel was the eldest of 11 children in a close-knit, devoutly religious, and affectionate family" this seems too close to a copyright violation for a featured article. Mozzerati 20:38, 2005 Apr 16 (UTC)

My response:

1. Number of References - the reference section includes 5 of the most important standard works on Riel, including Riel's own writings, Boulton's first person account from 1886, Stanley's 1963 classic, Siggin's respected 1994 update, and Flanagan's 1992 work suggesting the parallels between Riel's following and Millenarianism. For those less academically inclined, there is even a graphic novel. The bases are covered. The external links also have two more quality biographies.

   almost withdrawn - I've copied your descriptions into the article, can you just verify, and as needed correct or expand my text as needed.Mozzerati

   OK, I've made slight copyedits on your changes, and added the ref for the Flanagan bio (hadn't noticed before that the extant ref was just for his pamphlet, not his book). Note also that I didn't mean to imply that Sliggins text was based on Stanley's, just that it was a more modern treatment.Fawcett5 14:16, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

2. Finding what you want - The account sticks closely to a consensus version of Riel's activities - for 99% of the material you can refer to any of the standard texts. Footnotes or inline citations are therefore an unneccesary distraction for the vast majority of the article. There are two exceptions:
   1. Direct quotations from Boulton's account, which are attributed to him in the text where they occur.
   2. The "Reconsidering Riel" section is where non-consensus theories or interpretations are dealt with. In this section, the relevant historians are mentioned by name.

   thanks for that answer; I would still prefer if individual quotes had page numbers etc. The reason for this is that people who are once considered good historians can later be re-evaluated (see David Irving who was discovered to be a liar) and any material based on their work has to be carefully checked. If you give detailed sources then it easier for checking later. Even so, with the addition of the comments you gave earlier, your article will not nearly be worst within the FAC category, so once you've verified my edit, I withdraw this objection. Mozzerati 06:41, 2005 Apr 17 (UTC)

3. Copyright violation - The DCBO biography (actually by Stanley, Riel's best-known biographer) was obviously important source material for both myself and other editors. While the sentence you point out does have similarity, it most assuredly does not rise to the standard of a copyright violation. Nevertheless, I will change this, and any other instances that you can point out - I believe that very few such problems survived the rewrite. Fawcett5 21:24, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

   I will try to check this further; in the case where the sentence actually was derived from an original source we would have to claim fair use. That would be okay only for a very limited amount of the article. Mozzerati 06:41, 2005 Apr 17 (UTC)

   I have checked this as far as I could (which wasn't much). That sentence was added in a small edit along with other material which appears to be original. Since that time the article has been almost entirely changed. I guess it's okay, probably the original contributor was trying to do their best and isn't fully copyright aware. I can say that this is a perfect example of where a full system of inline notes would allow much easier checking since we could see exactly which bit to lookup where. Please everybody be more careful in future. I consider this last objection answered and am striking out my object. Mozzerati 06:38, 2005 Apr 18 (UTC)

• Support - Covers all of his life in a well-balanced way and fits it all into the surrounding history. Great work! Radagast 02:03, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Just so everyone knows my bias, I have contributed a bit to the article. I also voted against it becoming a featured article a month ago. Fawcett5 has done an amazing job rewriting the article, and a few of us tried to help when we can. -- JamesTeterenko 07:39, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I also was a contributor to the article, so again, a bit of bias. This article has had an amazing transformation thanks to Fawcett5 and others. Riel was a complex figure in Canadian history and I think that this article does him justice. CWood 14:57, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I too contributed a bit, and my opinion is much like CWood's. The article now treats Riel as a historical figure; I think that was the intention of the article from the beginning, but when I first ran across it it tended towards hagiography. Riel is, despite what many prefer to think, one of the most important figures in Canadian history, and this article gives you a good idea why he is. John FitzGerald 19:48, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - an engrossing story of an interesting character - excellently written. Worldtraveller 21:57, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment - This couple of sentences from the intro reads just very slightly oddly to me:

In 1884, he returned to what is now the province of Saskatchewan in order to represent Métis grievances to the Canadian government. But this resistance, known as the North-West Rebellion of 1885, escalated into a military confrontation.

"Representing grievances", which to me suggests a non-confrontational process of consultation, has become "resistance" in the next sentence. It's a very, very minor point, but pedantry is my stock-in-trade. --194.73.130.132 08:54, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well, thats not a bad way to describe what actually happened. Took a few months in real life, rather than one sentence though... Fawcett5 11:22, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Weak Object - The execution of Scott, if I remember my history correctly, hardened the public attitude in Canada against him. Yet I see no mention in that section, only of legal troubles. Can you clarify further? Burgundavia 21:40, Apr 21, 2005 (UTC)

Burgundavia, this is comprehensively dealt with in the main article on this period of Riel's life. See Red River Rebellion. Much of the material there now was previously at Louis Riel, but was moved to conform with summary style and article length considerations. Fawcett5 23:35, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Kalimpong

A self nomination, I have added most of the matter on this small town in the Himalayan foothills. Kaal and IMpbt copyedited most of the text. All MoS are adhered to. (PS: Some of the references (books) were already mentioned before I added info to the page). Was in Peer Review for a while: Wikipedia:Peer review/Kalimpong/archive1, but did not receive any suggestions. Suggestions welcome. :)  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 20:37, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)

• Support ; Very nice work! Has everything I'd expect a small city article to have, and more. --mav 23:08, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, looks pretty good. Are you from this place, or have you been there? Did you take those nice pictures? Everyking 02:26, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I was there last December for a fortnight. Some of the pics are mine, the rest belong to Anujkp and were uploaded by Eloquence. :)  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:01, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Good job, Nichalp (I could say "as usual"). The photos are great. Phils 08:38, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, never knew so much could be said of such a small place. Mgm|^(talk) 09:53, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)
• Support looks good Mozzerati 10:45, 2005 Apr 17 (UTC)
• Support. Excellent work, a paragon. To be pedantic, a prettier map won't go amiss. —Oldak Quill 14:22, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I know the map looks a little odd. Once we get a detailed West Bengal state map, I'll replace this map.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:01, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

• Support. A very good article and effort --IMpbt 23:46, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - really, Kalimgpong is a 'work of art by the God', and this article by User:Nichalp reflects the beauty of the place - as a featured article, a wider section of wikipedians will be able to enjoy this beauty of nature. Congrats.--Bhadani 03:36, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. --DanielNuyu 03:42, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Yet another model article from Nichalp; thanks to the other contributors too. -- Sundar (talk · contribs) 04:47, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Geology of the Grand Canyon area

Self nom. This article has been on peer review for a while now and I've fixed most of the issues brought up there. So what else needs to be done? Note: I already plan to take close up photos of each formation during my trip to the Grand Canyon this summer and later add those photos to this article. --mav 22:43, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Looks pretty fantastic to me. A few really great illustrations, especially the cross-section. BLANKFAZE | (что??) 22:58, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. A short introductory paragraph for section 1 would be nice. It might be useful to make the relation between the subsections and the figure clear in the text (not only in the caption). Also, I'm not sure every reader will understand that "group" has a special meaning in geology. If so, a short intro would be the place to define it. Finally, is there any reason the cross section picture is not under section 1. From what I can see using "Preview", putting it under that section would not break layout, and it would probably make sense. Phils 10:16, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the comments! An intro para for section 1 is a good idea. Concepts like groups, supergroups, formations, members, and the various kinds of unconformities are all already parenthetically explained inline the first time each of those concepts are introduced in the article. But putting those in a quick intro is a better idea - and I’ll do that later. I’m not exactly sure how I could make the connection between the figure and the text clearer than having the current inline refs to the figure such as (see 3b in figure 1), but a mention in the section 1 intro may help. Hm, inline links such as (see 3b in figure 1) may make it clearer still (that image description page could then have further explanation). The cross section picture is where it is in order to give room for photos and/or other illustrations that would be specific to the sub-section (such as having a close-up photo of the rock unit being talked about and, if room, an illustration of what the continent looked like and where it was on the globe when that sediment was deposited). --mav 13:46, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Intro created as well as other fixes per above. --mav 00:13, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Excellent overall, keep them coming. The beginning of the intro is a little tough though, esepcially for someone that doesn't know geology. What is a column? I guess the first sentence tells what the subject is, but world renowned seems like gratuitous peacock language, and makes the real meaning of the sentence less accessible. I think if you add some context for column, and time progession, and NPOV that a bit, or at least rework the structure of the first sentence it would be much stronger. - Taxman 14:43, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)
  • Lead section expanded a tiny bit to be less dense and hopefully more accessible. Got rid of 'geologic column' and 'world renowned'. --mav 00:13, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Yes, excellent, though if geographic column is more accurate or useful in some way, it could be put back in with some careful context. Either way, how it is now is good. - Taxman 19:51, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. My god, those pictures! I really have to get back there... Meelar (talk) 02:10, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Extraordinary. I strongly support. Hydriotaphia 03:57, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Question/Object looks like a great article, but, a) I see the diagram comes from a display the visitor's center. I think that it qualifies as their copyright and would question whether it is covered under fair use: does it come under US.Govt PD or is it from a non-governmental s ource? b) could you please make it easy to work out which bit of the text is covered by which reference, using, for example "invisible references" or footnotes to aid in verification. Mozzerati 07:03, 2005 Apr 19 (UTC)
  • a) Even if the display were not a work commissioned by the United States government and therefore eligible for copyright protection, under what provision of U.S. copyright law would a two-dimensional representation of a three dimensional object be a derivative work that would be hindered by the 3D object's original copyright? Such a hindered derivative work would certainly be created if a three-dimensional work were copied from a copyright-protected three-dimensional work, but that is not the case here. I know for a fact that photographs of buildings are not hindered by architectural copyrights but I'm not aware of similar provisions one way or the other for statues and other three-dimensional works of art. b) I'm not going to use any hacked template-based reference system (I tried this at helium with very bad results due to the fact that I have so many references and so many of those refer to the same reference and same page). The HTML commented out citations are just a temporary solution until a real referencing system is in place. For now I’ve mentioned that the source text has these citations. --mav 16:42, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • a) there are differences from a building due to the function of a display; I'd like to discuss further... Do you know of any previous policy discussion on this. b) apologies; I really did go into edit mode and look for the refs but didn't see them. Your solution, whilst not so good for the normal user, is acceptable to me. BTW, there is a manually numbered footnote system (mn/mnb templates) but it doesn't seem to work right now (probably a wikimedia bug?), When that is fixed, doing something like helium should be no problem. b2) I like your idea for making commented out notes visible by mentioning them in the references section. Mozzerati 19:05, 2005 Apr 19 (UTC)
• Support. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:45, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Eldfell

This has been on peer review for several days with no comment. So, it's either just not very interesting, or there's not much that can be done to improve it. I'm hoping it's the latter, so I thought I'd give it a run past FAC. I think the eruption of Eldfell is a very interesting story, which I hope I've done justice. Worldtraveller 10:00, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support: I think it's interesting and has some brilliant photograph too. Giano | Talk 11:07, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• It does have some nice pictures. And it is rather crufty. Should perhaps be more crufty, though. Lukewarm support. Everyking 11:17, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • What could be changed to make your support more enthusiastic? Worldtraveller 13:20, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Interesting subject, and nice pictures. — mark ✎ 12:58, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Very intersting, sorry I missed it on peer review. Sometimes it takes a couple weeks there. But this is great. - Taxman 14:52, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Great article, breath-taking photography. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 15:03, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Lovely article. One major and a few minor nitpicks though:
  • Text says the lava flows added land to the west of the island, but the map shows lava flows on the east of the island. One or the other is wrong. I suspect from other context that the "North" arrow on the map is actually a "South" arrow.
  • On the map, I assume the white section is the town -- it should be labeled as such.
  • A couple non-SI units slipped in (I recall seeing "mile" somewhere); these should be fixed.
  • Coverage of submarine effects is spotty. Is there any more info available?
  • I'd love to see more info on national and international reaction. Was this a local disaster or was the whole of Iceland gripped by it? What about internationally -- was this the top of international newscasts for weeks like the tsunami, for a few days, or mostly ignored?
  • Recovery: Was there government assistance in rebuilding homes and businesses? Insurance?
  • Looking ahead: how long do they expect the geothermal plants to continue to produce electricity and heat water? What are the expectations of future eruptions? Has anything else changed (i.e. planning, evac procedures, etc.)?

- Bryan is Bantman 17:15, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks very much for those comments - my inability to tell east from west has been cruelly exposed! Always get those two confused. The map is right, the text was wrong. Town is now labelled, miles converted to kilometres, and a bit about funding of the recovery added. It was certainly a major Icelandic news event and I'm pretty sure it was reported around the world as well, but would need to do a bit more research on that. Likewise with the geothermal power. I've mentioned that there's speculation that volcanic activity in the archipelago is increasing, can also give that a mention nearer the end. I think I've covered pretty much all that's known about the submarine activity, all I can find in my sources anyway. Worldtraveller 21:43, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Comment: Bantman, the media reaction where I live (Sweden) was very intense, with the slow-moving lava threat against the Heimaey harbor being top of the news day by day. I'd say it would have been like the tsunami coverage, if it hadn't had so much competition from breakthroughs being made in the Vietnam peace talks in Paris at the exact same time. I have some strong visual memories of newspaper front pages divided exactly in half between Heimaey and the peace talks, with world war typography used for both. Worldtraveller, possibly this media schizophrenia would even rate a mention in the article? (OK, now y'all know I'm really old, see if I care.)--Bishonen | talk 19:22, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object. Multiple untagged images which would appear to be copyright violations unless permission has been granted. 119 04:40, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • The two untagged ones might have qualified as some sort of fair use, but to be on the safe side I've swapped them for two fully legit ones. Worldtraveller 11:06, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, but image copyright status does need to be established for the untagged images. I also think Bantmans commnents about media coverage of the event should be covered--nixie 04:59, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • I've added a bit about the media coverage now. Worldtraveller 11:06, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Awesome. jengod 00:46, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. What Jengod said. Filiocht | Blarneyman 11:13, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Support, wonderful volcanocruft.--Bishonen | talk 19:22, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I have one minor suggestion: the article could include Imperial equivalents for the metric units, as suggested by the Manual of Style. As the subject is scientific, however, this is by no means necessary. Nevertheless, an excellent article. If Worldtraveller keeps up this rate of FA creation, I shall have quite some competition :) -- Emsworth 01:35, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the support and suggestion, I've added imperial equivalents for most things now (wasn't sure about giving gallons for litres as litres are pretty much universally understood I think). I think if you stop writing articles now, and I manage to keep on working at the rate I have been, I'll be catching up your FA total by about early 2007 :) Worldtraveller 10:37, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Francis Petre

One of New Zealand's greatest architects sadly little known outside Australasia. This is mostly a self-nom (I want him to be better known). The page has had fantastic support, courtesy Wikipedia:New Zealand Wikipedians' notice board which resulted in help and great photographs specially taken and supplied by Grutness and one by Silenceisfoo, without which it would be pretty dull. I think I've (or to be exact Bishonen has) sorted my English grammar. New Zealand has some great unappreciated (outside NZ) architecture, I'd like to see something about it on the front page. Giano | Talk 10:54, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. I can't say anything about the material, but the writing looks good, has good pictures and structure, and has references. I made a few copyedits, again hopefully all good. - Taxman 14:45, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I had never heard of Petre before, and found the article an entertaining introduction. I would recommend removing or sourcing some of the rather peacockish language, though: "successful" and "skillful" are particularly overused, and some of the article's praise of Petre seems a bit fulsome. Perhaps find some sources to cite others' assessments of Petre? Surely his skill is adequately demonstrated by simple description of his work, in any case. -- Rbellin|Talk 18:44, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the support, I've attempted to remove some excess adjectives etc.Giano | Talk 19:30, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support, but it needs propper footnotes where webpages are referenced in text see:Wikipedia:Footnotes--nixie 04:54, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Thanks! I've added the footnotes, that's great I didn't know you could do that! Giano | Talk 08:42, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Yeah, I know, I was one of the lesser collaborators on this page, but even if I hadn't been I would see this as a potential candidate. Grutness|^hello? 06:45, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Neat! jengod 00:45, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Yes, I've done a little copyediting (Giano is modest about his "grammar" as always). I think this is a very enjoyable, vivid article, it would be a treat to see it on the Main Page. Bishonen|talk 08:45, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I've watched this one grow, and it really is a fine article on a subject who is little-known in the wider world; just what Wikipedia should be doing. Filiocht | Blarneyman 09:48, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Comment surely his exact birth-death dates must be known? Fawcett5 16:11, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Dates now given Giano | talk 18:48, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diamond

Partial self-nomination. This article spectacularly failed an earlier nomination (archived) about six weeks ago. Since then, I and others (notably User:Hadal and User:Jasper) have tirelessly whipped this article and its sub-articles into shape. This includes a massive, total rewrite of the article as well as the creation of eight sub-articles, two sub-lists, and filling in of numerous red links on everything from Gemological Institute of America to Argyle diamond mine. In my truly humble opinion, this article is a great overview of the topic, discusses all important topics while leaving details and minutiae to the sub-articles, and is interesting, well written and well organized. In short, I believe this article does its topic justice. I'm quite proud of it. Thank you in advance for your comments. - Bryan is Bantman 01:33, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

• Definite support. I've been watching this one improve and waiting for its nomination here. Great work. - Taxman 02:22, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
• Comment: Shouldn't the sections on "Diamond cut" and "Diamond cutting" be merged or at least be placed closer together? Also, isn't there some sort of standard infobox for gemstones? Mgm|^(talk) 07:42, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

"Diamond cutting" is a subsection (TOC 2.4.3) of the "Diamond cut" section (TOC 2.4). The infobox is not exactly standard (only on about 10% of the articles in the gemstones category [4]), but is located in the subarticle material properties of diamond. - Bryan is Bantman 16:24, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Comments: it seems the intro is a bit over-long and could use some clipping; at least two users (including me) had a difficult time finding the properties - the subpage link is there but easy to miss - maybe somehow make that more prominent. I've tweaked the Natural history section a bit and will probably do a bit more - see some possible fixes that need checking (nothing glaringly major - my interests are from the mineralogy/geology end). Over all a very good article and obviously the result of a lot of work. -Vsmith 04:18, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Some fool (OK, I'm pretty sure it was me) forgot to indent the Main article: material properties of diamond line; I've fixed it so it should be easier to see now. (I should point out that that article, along with three other sub-articles - diamond cut, diamond simulants, and diamond enhancement, are perhaps FA quality themselves.) Re: the intro, it was certainly a struggle to get it as short as it is now; what do you think we can trim out of it? I tried to touch on each of the most major points, and I don't think it's overly long given the length of the article. Any help on the natural history section would be great; thanks for the changes you've made already. - Bryan is Bantman 17:13, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

• Comment: It would be nice with an image of an uncut diamond. Thue | talk 10:40, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ask and you shall receive. :) Granted, it's not the best image, but it's the only sizable PD example I could find. (It's incredibly difficult to procure a rough diamond that's above a few millimetres in size.) -- Hadal 13:46, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Great picture - and a great addition to the article! Vsmith 15:38, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Nice image; thanks :). Thue | talk 16:25, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support Holy cow. I would recommend though moving the natural history section to after the material propeties but before all the gemological/industry stuff. Fawcett5 13:33, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree w/ Fawcett5. It would make the article flow better. Although I prefer my cows w/out holes :-) Vsmith 15:38, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Done. (No cows were harmed in the editing of this article.) - Bryan is Bantman 17:18, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)

You didn't even have one tasty burger or steak in the whole time you've been working on this article? - Taxman 14:52, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)

• Support The article is comprehensive and well-organized and has spawned many high-quality subarticles as it has avoided becoming too long. Vengeful Cynic 20:52, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Surport tooto 00:11, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Object until inline external links are removed or cited at bottom, rather than in the text. Neutrality^talk 18:49, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

Done: inline external links are now also cited at bottom. - Bryan is Bantman 21:08, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dream Theater

Self-nomation. Spent over a week in peer review and only received one set of comments, all of which have been addressed. IMO one of the more complete and informative band-related articles on the 'pedia, but that's for YOU to decide! (I don't know if this affects anyone's voting, but all related articles [albums, members, etc] have also been completed.) plattopus^{is this thing on?} 14:50, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

• Object for now - Nice - but the TOC is a bit overwhelming. Consider combining smaller sections (esp for lists - the ; character can also be used in lists). History seems a bit long - consider summarizing it and creating a separate 'history of ..' article. --mav 16:36, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • History has been abridged and moved to History of Dream Theater. Not sure what you mean about the TOC, though. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 21:04, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
    • I don't understand. All you did was copy the text and create a new article. The history section that was left is not an abridged summary, it is a complete fork. --mav 21:21, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • I moved the previous history section to its own article, then cut-down any unnecessary content to create a shorter history section for the Dream Theater article. People wanting to view an in-depth history can click on the main article. Or have I missed the point completely? plattopus^{is this thing on?} 21:25, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
      • OK, I see what happened. In one of the subsequent edits I must have been using an out-dated window, so the full version was restored. Fixed. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 21:29, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
        • Much better. Support. --mav 21:07, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I disagree with the above objection about the TOC, although I agree about the length of the history. Good to see some people still believe in subheadings. It would be good to add a reference section, too. The Notes section already contains many references, but it's practical to have all references summarized in a separate section. Phils 20:03, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • See above for History; external links contains every website I referenced, and as far as I know there are no books on Dream Theater, so would renaming external links to "external links and references" be suitable? plattopus^{is this thing on?} 21:04, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
    • Follow the policy on Wikipedia:Cite sources. Object until thats completed, support after.  ALKIVAR™ 05:53, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • I have cited specific sources (see Footnotes), do you mean I should compile a list of external references? If so, the external links is just that. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 06:33, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)
        • If thats what they are, label them as such. External Links is for sites that represent the content but are not used as references.  ALKIVAR™ 06:37, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
          • Thanks, I've added a references section. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 12:42, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I've been watching this article and making minor edits for a couple of months now, and it's amazing to see how far it has come in that time. I've been a fan of Dream Theater for over 10 years, and even I was able to learn new things from this article. Well-written and very comprehensive - well done! --Durga2112 20:10, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Oppose. No bibliography. PedanticallySpeaking 16:54, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • There are footnotes, references and external links. I don't see how that doesn't cover it. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 17:23, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

• Considering the frequency that weblinks go dead, there should be citations to print sources that will still be available in the future. PedanticallySpeaking 17:27, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

• Like I mentioned above, I am unaware of any books about Dream Theater, so there aren't any to reference. Although you have alerted me to the fact that I should have referenced my DTIFC magazines. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 17:33, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

• All you can do is note the date you viewed the references. See Helium#References for an example. This is both standard and acceptable. If and/when these links go dead, then just find new links that confirm the info in this article. No big deal. :) --mav 02:50, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• OK, I see what you mean now. I've given general retrieval dates from when I wrote the article, but can't give specific dates (see below). plattopus^{is this thing on?} 06:49, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

• WP:Cite sources says "Since you're referring to a general website, and not any particular content on it, you do not need to give a retrieval date". I will add retrieval dates for the magazines. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 05:49, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)

• Whoa! You're quoting the WP:Cite sources comment on the example reference "Slashdot is a popular web site at http://slashdot.org/ ". For that, it would be plain silly to give a retrieval date, and for your "External links" it's hardly necessary, either; but your reference websites are another matter. If you haven't used "any particular content" on these sites for the article, I'm sorry to say that would make them kind of lousy references. I would really recommend you to provide retrieval dates for those. And the magazine articles need to be linked, or those retrieval dates aren't much use. (I know the examples at WP:Cite sources are a little confusing, but note the common-sense recommendation: "for online articles, make the article title a link to the URL.")--Bishonen | talk 00:28, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Yeah, but they aren't online articles. I can't link to a URL that doesn't exist. I've just followed what it says on Cite Sources, so if something is wrong then it's a policy problem. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 17:53, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)

• What? I'm mystified, sorry. I was talking about the magazines in the References section. You have added retrieval dates for them. They're not online? Uh, then what do you mean by "retrieval"? As for following what it says on Cite Sources, no, it actually isn't a policy problem. Maybe it's my explanatory skills that are the problem, or maybe I have annoyed you, but could you please just read my post above again while strenuously assuming good faith? I am trying to help, however unskilfully. You've used a fragment from Cite Sources for a context it doesn't apply to. Bishonen | talk 18:47, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• You seem to be turning this into an argument... all I'm doing is taking peoples' suggestions and enacting them in the hopes of getting the Dream Theater article up to scratch. So I should remove retrieval dates for non-online references? Done. I should add retrieval dates for the websites? I'd love to, but I didn't look up specific pages when writing the article... those sites (especially the FAQ) are repositories of information about the band, which I have read thouroughly. I originally had them as external links, because that's what they are, but I was told to put them in the references. I'm just doing what people are telling me to do, and unfortunately for me, I'm getting conflicting suggestions. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 06:44, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

(Outdenting.) I'm sorry you've felt buffeted by conflicting advice. I do understand that these things can be confusing, to the point where you'd start putting sources that weren't used as references into a references section, or adding retrieval dates to sources that were never retrieved. I have to say that nobody "told you" to do these things, though. (Example: saying "If that's what they are, label them as [references]" (Alkivar) is not synonymous with saying "Label them as references!") All the advice people have written you on the subject is good, you know, excepting the statement that you must have printed sources (which Mav immediately picked up on and contradicted). We're all trying to help. I will not strike out my own tips, but I do withdraw them as an objection, since their importance for sure doesn't warrant any more arguing. The particular issues I raised aren't so central that they ought to stand in the way of an article becoming featured. --Bishonen | talk 09:03, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

So I will take your comments as a non-vote (personally I believe they should be striked out because you have withdrawn them, but obviously it's up to you), but PedanticallySpeaking you have left your objection in place and I assume you are not aware of the changes I have made to the references. Do you still take issue with the formatting of the references? plattopus^{is this thing on?} 18:55, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)

I have not withdrawn my comments, only (and with some hesitation) my objection. I'm beginning to wonder if that thing is on.--Bishonen | talk 20:05, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It's hard to take your comments seriously when you're so obviously looking to turn this into a petty argument. I have been open to all suggestions from reviewers (including you) and have been doing my best to accomodate what people suggest I do with the article, but all you're doing is "defending" what you presumably perceive to be your ignored opinion. I originally confused two sections of WP:Cite Sources, and instead of constructively suggesting how to fix my mistakes, you started insulting my intelligence and assuming I was ignorant of peoples' suggestions. I have stated numerous times that I am only attempting to fix what people believe is wrong with the article, there is no need to insinuate that I am mentally inferior to you or anyone else (and I assure you, it most certainly is on). I said that I consider your comments to be a non-vote (which you in fact agree with) and said that in my opinion they should be struck out (and, you'll notice, I mentioned that it's obviously not up to me to make that decision). Maybe you should start taking your own advice and assume a little good faith of your own? (Specifically the following warning of what might occur if you fail to assume good faith: "You might make a personal attack. Once you've made a personal attack on someone, they are likely to stop assuming good faith in you.") plattopus^{is this thing on?} 20:35, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)

I absolutely did not mean to insinuate any derogatory opinion of your intelligence! Sheesh. I absolutely don't have a derogatory opinion of it. I'm very sorry you feel insulted. Your sig is a little elliptical, so I ought not to have jestingly quoted it, but made sure of being understood instead. "Is your readiness to listen switched on?" was what I meant.--Bishonen | talk 21:31, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Comment (Fully outdented, new train of conversation.) OK, instead of bickering, I think we should get back to the original point of this vote and try to make the Dream Theater article as good as it can be. I admit that I confused when one is or is not to use retrieval dates in references, and as a result of the helpful suggestions of others the online references are now dated and the offline ones are not. I understand that you believe I should give direct links to exactly the pages I have used as references, but to do that I would practically need to link every single page under the sites I listed. I think links to the DTFAQ and Tourography main pages are sufficient, because those sites are direct portals (front pages, if you will) to hundreds of individual pages of information, most of which have been used as references in the article. The pages I have used from the official Dream Theater website are all directly linked as notes, so should I remove that reference or leave it as a general website link? -- plattopus^{is this thing on?} 17:45, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

• Support Great article, NPOV, references, all top drawer, strong support --PopUpPirate 16:43, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. One of the best band-related articles in Wikipedia. --Jannex 09:09, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
• Support Damn close to the best and most interesting Dream Theater read on the internet. - user:defunkt 00:10, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Palace of Westminster

I would like to say (perhaps at the risk of being accused of immodesty) that I am proud that if the nomination passes, this will be my 50th featured article. -- Emsworth 10:51, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. I may copyedit later, to reduce the German Capital Letters and make the prose somewhat less artful, but an excellent summary. How does he do it? He must have too much time on his hands... I suppose the moral is to concentrate on one article at a time, rather than scattering your favours around willy-nilly, like certain others...-- ALoan (Talk) 13:10, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Congratulations. Phils 13:41, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Hallmark of quality. JuntungWu 14:26, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment. First let me offer my congratulations to Lord Emsworth on another outstanding piece of work. For producing fifty featured articles he ought really to be given a peerage! (Oh, wait a minute...!) After reading through this article an area in which I feel it may be slightly lacking is the historical and architectural context in which the palace was rebuilt after the fire of 1834. There is some good description of the what the building is like, but not so much explanation of why it is so. I quote from Simon Schama's History of Britain (he talks before this passage about Pugin's role in the Gothic revival, which I note is linked from the article, but perhaps we need a bit more about how it applies specifically to the Palace of Westminster):

Just such an occassion delivered itself in 1834 when parliament burned down and a debate ensued about whether it should be rebuilt in the Gothic or neo-classical styles. The winner of the competition, Sir Charles Barry, had made drawings that amounted to an almost fantastic vision of a Gothic medieval palace; not, in truth, a structure that owed its precedent to anything truly medieval, but a decorated 'module' of pointed Gothic, extended indefinitely along the Thames as far as money and the needs of government dictated. It was a far cry, in fact, from Pugin's beautifully crafted fit between form and function. But the arguments rehearsed to justify a Gothic Revival parliament must undoubtedly have appealed to the romantic historian in Pugin. For they were all about acknowledging that the distinctive characteristic of the 'ancient' British constitution—its liberty and the rule of common law—was a medieval inheritance. The pediments and columns, the dominant squatness of classicism, were thus made to seem, somehow, not only 'foreign' but also the expression of authority, in a way which the pinnacles and pointed arches of Gothic building were not. Classicism was top down; Gothic was bottom up. Classical architecture was the visible declaration of hierarchy, built by slaves, in Ruskin's view; Gothic was about the community of craft, designed by free men. Inside a classical legislature, rulers would lay down the law; inside a Gothic parliament, they would make it accountable to the people. Such a building would not only be a dignified convenience to the law-makers; it would, by connecting them intuitively with the world that had produced Magna Carta, also ensure that they would legislate in a spirit of freedom, justice and virtue.

I apologise for making these comments without first working to incorporate something like this into the article itself, but I'd be interested to hear others' comments before proceeding. I am in no way, shape or form an expert on architecture, but I'd be happy to help add something to the article about this. — Trilobite (Talk) 19:33, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• • I have added information on why many individuals seemed to prefer Gothic architecture. -- Emsworth 21:10, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment I agree with the above. It needs more about the building's position in architectural history. It is one of the most important buildings of the gothic revival. And it took so long to build that by the time it was finished, the gothic revival had moved on somewhat. Barry and Pugin had something of a tempestuous relationships, and Pugin was not at all pleased with it in the end. In an edit I did a long time ago, I included the famous Pugin quote, "All Grecian, Sir; Tudor details on a classic body", which I think deserves a place back in the article. It seems to have been lost over the edits recently. Maccoinnich 20:28, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • The quotation has been added back. -- Emsworth 21:10, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• I would like more about the pre-1834 Palace. But I am probably the only wikipedian who has the information and the inclination to add it. Dbiv 11:52, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Great article, but a quickly fixable objections; a) please can you mark which information comes from which of the references. b) Also, in the security article it would be good to see some comment about limitations of accessibility caused by security c) something about the big ugly concrete blocks might be worth mentioning d) the public galleries shouldn't just be a matter of "tourism", but also mentioned in terms of general public accessiblity and openness e) could we please have a daytime photograph of the outside? Mozzerati 21:05, 2005 Apr 16 (UTC)
  • I must object to objection (a), because the FA criteria only require that there be references, not that the article include paranthetical citations or footnotes. I feel that such citations only serve to clutter the article, and prefer not to use them. (b) Addressed. (c) I am not familiar with the blocks of which you speak; perhaps you would be kind enough to clarify? (d) I think that the Culture & Tourism section addresses public accessibility: it states that there is no casual access, that tickets are normally required, and that access is generally limited. (e) Addressed. -- Emsworth 21:48, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • a) I object^3, there is no request for footnotes, just for verifiability. There are many other suggestions, ranging from decent descriptions of the references (see Louis Riel) through invisible footnotes (facts from the article are listed at the bottom with page number and name of reference, references in as separate section) through HTML comments visible only to editors, name/test/page references as suggested in Wikipedia:Cite your sources and only finally ending at footnotes. Whilst I certainly encourage footnotes, I have no objection to any other method which allows verifiability which is a criteria directly referenced from the FAC criteria (point 1). Please note that i) the style guides about references encourage adding descriptions and ii) there is no exaclusive list of FAC criteria which are the only ones upon which to object, they should be "the best" work on Wikipedia, (point 3) and the best nowadays is quite seriously verifiable.

    b) thanks c) at the front (road side) of the palace are a layer of concrete blocks for crowd and car bomb control they are a big, ugly and very visible; see this BBC article for example. I was there recently, but I didn't think to take a photo of this. If you won't be able to go there soon, I can try again in May/June and promise to take a photo if you'd like one. e) great. Mozzerati 10:10, 2005 Apr 17 (UTC)

    • • a) If footnotes are not necessary, then I have no problem with the objection. I have added a section in HTML at the bottom of the article describing the sources used for each section. Generally, one source supplied all the info. for a particular section; specific exceptions are noted. c) Dbiv has been kind enough to add a description of the blocks. b, d, and e were previously addressed. -- Emsworth 12:59, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
        • Great, almost everything is fixed, only one comment on d, I was trying to say it would be worth covering positive / open democracy / public access aspects of the public galleries, not just tourism. Whilst nowadays access via television and radio is available, previously the public gallery was the only way, and even now, most debates are not covered by most channels. One last comment, there was no coverage of the gardens. I've added something, but it's really just a list of names with some red links right now Mozzerati 16:28, 2005 Apr 17 (UTC)
• support most objections covered. Excellent article. Mozzerati 16:28, 2005 Apr 17 (UTC)

[edit] Samantha Smith

Fits the criteria in my opinion - deserves a nod. PMA 04:29, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• It needs work. The introduction needs a brief description of her and why she became famous, sans the letter itself. I tried fixing this but couldn't make it work. It also needs better sectioning (the TOC is halfway down the article). →Raul654 04:47, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

I think, these were reasonable concerns. I've just made some mostly cosmetic changes proposed by you.We dealt with these issues. Cmapm 15:03, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object, at least for now. The current sectioning is rather poor, with an immense lead that contains the full transcription of the letters and nearly the whole story. The texts of the letters are almost all that the article contains; it's not comprehensive enough, missing many details of the social repercussions of her story in the US and the USSR, while mentioning trivial information. External references should be put under External Links, not in the article's text itself. Dubious copyright status of the sole picture included. While not a bad article, it's not near FA status. -- Shauri 05:26, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've just included some info on social repercussions into the section Worldwide success. Cmapm 11:01, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The article has improved, and I withdraw some objections, but I also must add now a minor objection regarding the presence of some POV, like Wordtraveller says ("tragic death", "famous letters"). That's easy to solve, tho. -- Shauri 19:30, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

All my objections have been taken care of. Now Support. -- Shauri 20:21, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Her letter to the Soviet leader and Andropov's reply to it is the first and the main thing, which made her famous. Therefore, I see it pretty natural for it to be included into the leading section or at least to be contained in the first section of the TOC. As concerns "external links", there are many featured articles, which even were on the Main Page already, with many references to external sources inside the article (e.g. Isaac Asimov, Laika etc.). In my opinion the "social repercussions" were trivial (general love in both USSR and USA and negative reaction of the lesser part of people, mostly Soviet emigrants and dissidents), however, details on this can easily be found through external links. All details of the image copyright status are clear from the {{Fair use}} template, article's and image's talk pages: Patrick Carkin is the copyright holder, whose image was placed "for educational purpose" on (now not-functioning) PD website Proactivist.com and was taken from there under Fair use to at least two websites before it has been uploaded into Wiki. While some places of it may seem infantile and too simple for some people, I believe, that considering that the article is about a child, this does not make it less encyclopaedic. I think, after some recent edits by other people and many my ones the article became much less simple and lost much of its "infantile" details. I personally think, that "complicated" and "adult" style is inacceptable for articles about such young persons, but I still support it as FA candidate, mostly because it became very informative. However, I give up all my possible edits of this article at least until its status (whether FA or non-FA) becomes clear, because firstly, I don't want to be its constant "English grammar worsener" and secondly, I don't want to completely destroy myself my ideal of the article about a child. Cmapm 15:29, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object for the moment - I had never heard of Smith until I read it and found it a very interesting article. But I think that although it's an excellent short summary of the story, I'm not sure it's comprehensive. What did she do in the Soviet Union? Was she accompanied? So she 'became a social activist' - how so? How did the meeting with the Prime Minister of Japan come about and what did they say? I see that her book was co-written with her father - how much did he write? Did her parents push her into all this at all? Were they politically active at all? How come her plane crashed?
  More minor points: some of the writing is not very clear, eg Nearly the same situation was in the USA, although certain part of its population, mostly 1950s emigrants from the Soviet Union, called Samantha Pawn in Propaganda War. Also, there's a lot of very short sentences which don't really flow very well. Some POV as well, for example I don't think you need to title the section 'tragic death' - it's evidently tragic without the need to explicitly say it. Worldtraveller 19:09, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I expanded some sections, including info, directly related with some of your questions. However, I believe, that for a complete answer on all of them a separate solid research should be carried out with the free access to all possible sources and with the ability to browse a lot of them in other languages (e.g. Japanese one to browse sources on all Japanese Prime Minister's meetings). I seriously doubt, if some info requested by you can be retrieved at all, but well, once again, it's my POV. However, I did all I was able to do to the moment, maybe someone else will be a more lucky searcher. Cmapm 00:55, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I'll just summarize, what your questions I've answered. Was she accompanied? What did she do in the Soviet Union? Did her parents push her into all this at all? How come her plane crashed?So she 'became a social activist' - how so? Minor points you mentioned, that short sentences and POV issues have been also dealt with.The remaining your points: 1. How did the meeting with the Prime Minister of Japan come about and what did they say? (some info on her visit to Japan added, but concerning details on meeting Prime Minister seems unbelievable to answer at the moment). 2. I see that her book was co-written with her father - how much did he write? (I cannot get the book, in any sources I found so far no details on this) 3. Were they politically active at all? (I added info on where they worked, I didn't find any info on whether they took part in elections or were some pol. party members). Cmapm 15:03, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Great work on the article, I think almost all of my original points have been answered, and the article is much improved. But I think there are two points that need more expansion. When you say she became a social activist, I think that needs more explanation. Did she give up normal activities like school? What exactly was her social activism? I think it might actually be easier just to omit that sentence - I don't think it harms the sense and flow of the article to omit it. Also, the fact that there were no US government representatives at her funeral is attributed to many in Reagan's administration regarding her as a Soviet dupe. That definitely needs some kind of attribution or reference, otherwise it looks like speculation or weasel words. Worldtraveller 16:39, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Comment: Should the letters not be at wikisource or somewhere else and be summarised here instead? violet/riga (t) 14:25, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • I personally think, the long reply from Andropov may well be e.g. in wikisource (although this seems minor for myself as the article itself is not very long at the present), but a short Samantha's letter should be here. The problem is that it will be pretty difficult for myself to summarize Andropov's letter, if someone can, you are welcome. Cmapm 14:48, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Wikisource is for something along the lines of the US constitution. Using it for a 20-odd sentence letter is definitely overkill, particularly when it's intimately relavant to this article. →Raul654 14:57, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support this then - I agree with the replies above. violet/riga (t) 15:03, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Object - While I can tell that a lot of hard work went into this article, I still find the way that it is written to be too infantile and simple, and includes a lot of irrelevant information that makes it less encyclopaedic. The lead section also needs to be much longer, and which airport did her plane crash in? What were the rumours around her death over? Why would the CIA or the KGB want to kill her? And the section about the memorials is blatantly POV, and again poorly written. Páll 00:25, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The leading section made longer, e.g. it is now longer, than that of "Main Paged" FA Suzanne Lenglen. We've also dealt with other issues you mentioned. Cmapm 19:35, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• • There were a lot of good edits to this article, but I maintain my objection. The writing is better, but still very immature sounding. What does "loved" mean? American people cannot just "love" someone they see on TV. Páll 16:02, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Object - I think a lot of the style is very (as stated above) "infantile and simple". Examples - the reader does not need to know her dog's name, or that she was "having a problem" with mathematics - that's trivia, and simply not encyclopedic. In the section about her death "she was only 13 years old" - is it necessary to tug at the heartstings? Reading it, I can almost feel a solemn pause hanging in the air at that point, and it should not be there. The article says she was born in 1972 and died in 1985 - and yes, that's very sad, but it's enough information to calculate her age at death and that should suffice. There is a fair degree of POV, example - the seeming indignation that her "anniversaries" are not "even" recognised. How about her popularity in the US? ("she was generally loved"). I'm not doubting she was popular, I remember her popularity very well, but how is public adulation quantified? Was it genuine adulation or was it just whipped up by the media. Also wouldn't it be equally true to say that a lot of cynical Americans may well have had opinions about her other than "love". Couldn't they have also believed she was being used by the media, or was this clearly only the opinion of Russian Americans? Once again, how can such a statement be quantified, let alone verified? Finally, it is conventional to consistantly refer to a person by their surname in the body of a biographical article, or their full name if considered necessary, but never by the given name alone. ie "Samantha Smith" and "Smith" are both fine. "Samantha" is not. It changes the tone of the article considerably. Having said all that, I think the article is one that could be easily elevated as most of the hard work has been done and I'm hoping that I'll eventually be able to support it. Rossrs 13:21, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

We've just dealt with some of these issues. Cmapm 14:15, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Greatly improved. A couple more suggestions : do you think it may flow better if the "death" and "funeral" sections are combined into one section, and also the three individual "tribute" sections combined into one? Also in the funeral section, I think the representative of Gorbechev should be mentioned first ahead of Robert Wagner, whose presence at the funeral is less noteworthy. I like the article - I'm glad people have taken the time to develop it. Rossrs 14:26, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I love Samantha, my contributions to this article, including some POV, corrected by guys here is a consequence. As concerns merges, partially agree (article corrected). But I think, if we combine Russian and Soviet tributes, USA tributes will seem poor. And if we combine all three in one, it'll be completely unclear,what and when. Cmapm 15:24, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

More copyedit done to correct the English, and some additional background added. Denni☯ 23:12, 2005 Apr 7 (UTC)

Thanks. I added Soviet contribution to the international tension - war in Afghanistan since 1978 - for NPOV-ing.Cmapm 23:59, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've made a few edits, which I think are fairly minor - removed a few superfluous phrases/words and changed others.

Support now. Rossrs 06:29, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object interesting story, but seems to lack comprehensiveness. More about her social activism is probably called for. And it still needs a good copyedit. See for example this train-wreck sentence: No representative of the American government was present, certain part of them, probably, due to the fact, that many people within administration circles saw her as a Soviet dupe. Fawcett5 15:05, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The problem is that both Samantha and Arthur's 1985 book and the 1987 biography of her are out of print and trying to locate copies of them has proved difficult. PMA 15:24, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support There is more that could be added to this story, but then there always is. It no longer suffers from English-as-a-second-language problems, and I can no longer find evidence of POV issues. I'm at a loss as to why you see the need for a "good" copyedit. Not only can I find no evidence of the sentence you quote, but I have worked through the article almost word by word, correcting bad grammar and irregular constructions. Denni☯ 21:30, 2005 Apr 8 (UTC)

Are you suggesting I made it up? It seems unreasonable to expect to find evidence of a particular flawed sentence 6.5 hours and several edits after I pointed it out to the world on FAC. And as you said yourself, you went through word-by word fixing things. So it sounds like YOU might have been the one that gave it the "good copyedit" I requested. Anyway, I will give it another read through when I get the chance, and will reconsider then. By the way, Denni, I'm going to make a final push on Louis Riel and Red River Rebellion this weekend to get them ready for resubmission.. I'll drop you a note sometime soon. Fawcett5 21:57, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

No way I'm suggesting you made it up, Fawcett5. Your good work precedes you, and I'm sure it existed there in some incarnation. Looking forward to seeing your finished version of Riel. Denni☯ 00:24, 2005 Apr 13 (UTC)

[edit] Sly & the Family Stone

Self nomination. When I first came to Wikipedia, I was shocked and appalled that one of the most important bands in American music history did not have an article (Sly Stone had an article, and the band information was tucked into it). --FuriousFreddy 22:57 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Question: the band was certainly multiethnic, but in what sense were they (as the lead paragaph calls them) "multicultural"? -- Jmabel | Talk
  • There's at least three distinct cultures in the band (African-American, Italian-American, and Caucasian American). All of the members are American, but they still came from three different cultural backgrounds (even if all the members were the same ethnicity, they could still come from differnet cultures; i.e. Southern U.S. blacks and West Indians. In addition, the band's sound is a blending of differnt forms of musical expression (rock music, soul music, gospel music), which are each distinct to seperate cultures. An example of the usage of "multicultural" to describe them is scene in this professional review here ([5]). Also, "multicultural" helps summarize the fact that the band was both multiethnic and co-ed as well. I'm not married to the term, though; if there is consensus it should be changed, it will be. --FuriousFreddy 03:07, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Though there are some colloqial expressions which I think will be difficult for many readers, and should if possible be replaced. Also, perhaps clarify "falltein' me be mice elf agin." It could also use a copyedit, as there is some minor bias from an informal tone or approach, e.g., "managed to be pop-friendly enough to be released as singles" (was) and "was still unable to return" (still did not). And clarify opinion holders on "The album was underwhelming both critically and commercially." Overall very nice though, I think. 119 06:53, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Will take care of it. Which colloquial expressions did you mean though (the rest, I understand)? I know I referred to Sly Stone as "Sly" and not "Stone"; but that was because I have four persons with that last name to discuss in this article.--FuriousFreddy 15:56, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Done. --FuriousFreddy 03:59, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment - haven't yet read it fully but it looks to be an interesting read about a great band. One thing I think could be mentioned in the influences section is the influence on jazz - in particular, in the sleevenotes to 'Headhunters', Herbie Hancock describes having a vision of himself playing with Sly, which inspired him to move to an electronic funk sound. Headhunters ended up being the biggest selling jazz album of all time, and Hancock is renowned as one of the great innovators. Worldtraveller 16:30, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Adding it now. Thanks. --FuriousFreddy 17:06, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • I've read it properly now and I think it's a fine article. I'd like to support but a couple of things may need fixing - first, the intro is a bit long, perhaps, and second, there are two sections which discuss the band's influence on later music. It might make more sense to combine these sections. Worldtraveller 18:36, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • I can shorten the intro. As for the seperate influences sections, that was done on purpose because the Family Stone had two completely different styles of music (the psycyhedelic rock/pop of the 1960s and the more sedate, drug-laced funk of the 1970s), each of those eras had a completely different influence on the music industry. The 1960s era Family Stone introduced psychedelic rock to soul music, leading to the psychedelic soul era of the late-1960s. The 1970s group, in many ways a completely different band even though 5/7 of the lineup was the same, was one of the first major funk music acts. In addition, those two sections are seperated so that they read chronologically (meaning, when the article discusses Dance to the Music, for the sake of readibility, it should discuss the impact of that album and era (psychedelic soul). Then, when it discusses There's a Riot Goin' On and Fresh, it should discuss the impact of the early funk music output of the band at that time. --FuriousFreddy 21:06, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
        • Intro looks excellent now. I'm very close to supporting this article. Small questions though, shouldn't it read 'Sly & the Family Stone were...' rather than was? Regarding the two influence sections, I think their purpose and the band's changing sound could be made clearer to the reader by changing the section headings, perhaps to 'Philosophies and influence of the early years' and 'Internal problems and a change of direction'. Also I think 'later' could replace 'latter-day', and I think the 'Dissolution' section could come before the second influences section. Worldtraveller 16:46, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
          • Will do it right now. --FuriousFreddy 17:57, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
            • Done. --FuriousFreddy 18:25, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
              • Good work - I'll support now. Worldtraveller 11:07, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Strong support! I haven't read it since my initial glance, when I saw a few strictly copy editing issues, but it's a thorough and engrossing piece with great photos (and I'm diggin' the psychedelic band logo). I agree with Worldtraveller about S&TFS's influence on jazz (back and the day when Herbie was tryin' to be more "relevant" and briefly called himself "Mwandishi" :p), so I'm glad Furious is taking care of that. Well done. deeceevoice 14:46, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Object I think we may be pushing the edge of legality with that many 30 second audio samples. If someone authoritatively can state thats not an issue this is a support.  ALKIVAR™ 19:56, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • How many should there be? I will remove the excess numbers and leave only the most important ones. --FuriousFreddy 20:56, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • I dont know what the limit to a fair use claim would be, nor do I know the length limitations. I do know however samples of as short as 1 second have been cause of lawsuits. Hence why I said authoritatively, it would require someone with legal expertice to clarify. I've already faced a P2P lawsuit from the RIAA (it got thrown out), so perhaps i'm just a bit jumpy.  ALKIVAR™ 21:17, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • Well, I removed everything except the major hits, which left eight songs. How is that? I really couldn't fathom deleting any of the ones that are left. When I did the article on The Supremes, moderator TUF-KAT had me put the samples at thirty seconds each. I was just doing the same here. --FuriousFreddy 21:36, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
        • Well if thats what the "standard" is theres probably a reason for it.  ALKIVAR™ 22:10, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support this comprehensive and well-structured article. Jgm 12:41, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diego Velázquez

A self-nomination. Your comments are appreciated. --DanielNuyu 04:40, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. A quick POV-check might be good, because the prose tends to be slightly passionate at times. Otherwise, good job. Phils 16:46, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Object. Generally a good article, well-written if perhaps a trifle hagiographic. My main issue, however, is with the lead section. Its first paragraph really only mentions him as a portraitist; while this is important to mention, it neglects his work in other forms of painting. The second paragraph is just poorly written. Read literally, it would have you believe that later artists tried to learn from Velázquez's fame and importance, rather than from his artistic style. --Michael Snow 17:55, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Michael: A good point. See the lead as edited now. --DanielNuyu 21:08, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Reasonable, objection withdrawn. --Michael Snow 21:25, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. \m/ --Protokurios 21:29, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Nice work. Want to do El Greco and Goya next? I can't really see any overly positive POV comments that aren't supported by his reputation and the views of him by others. Is there an image of the portrait of Phillip IV (not on horseback) available? Seems like that is needed for the 'Madrid and Philip IV' section. - Taxman 14:01, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • Taxman: There are several such portraits, and I happened upon one already uploaded being used in the Habsburg Spain article. I will integrate it here. --DanielNuyu 19:13, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Yep, that's the one I was thinking of, thanks. Now what about the other Spanish painters? :) - Taxman 20:41, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)
• Comment: It is my understanding that all substantially unaltered digital copies of all of Velazquez's works are in the Public Domain. Given that, shouldn't we have a pretty complete collection of his (and other pre-modern artists') works somewhere on WP? I think the amount of pictures in the article is appropriate, but I would like to see pictures of all of his works collected in one place. Something like a Gallery of Velázquez paintings article, which mainly just has pictures (analogous to the current ubiquitous "list of..." articles). This would be fantastic, and in my opinion would be a great asset to WP as well as a differentiator from other encyclopedias (especially paper ones). - Bryan is Bantman 16:51, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • That does sound like an interesting idea, Bryan. The only concern I would have is, given the fact that Velázquez has been attributed some 274 pieces of art, this page would certainly require more server space than others. I'm not saying it's out of the question; I'd just like to see some kind of administrative comment/consensus before going with it. --DanielNuyu 19:10, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Galleries belong on Wikimedia Commons, and if one is created it could be linked from the article. --Michael Snow 23:42, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • Apparently one already exists, which now has been linked. --DanielNuyu 00:46, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support: Wikipedia need more authoritative articles just like this. One minor quibble I personally don't like the heading : To the King's court (early period), and would prefer to see Philip IV's name or just Madrid or whatever. A brilliant page. Giano | Talk 09:07, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Appears now as "To Madrid (early period)". --DanielNuyu 20:26, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Much better thank you Giano | Talk 20:51, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Polish-Soviet War

Resubmitting. I believe all objections have been adressed (see former failed nomination discussion). By use of subarticles the size have decreased from over 80kb to 45kb. Also, new maps have been added for your viewing pleasure - and expect to see some more over the coming days :) Again, I welcome any comments. Oh, and I see that the old archived discussion has already more supports then opposes - a good sign, I believe. Note: down to 29 paras in 1920 section :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:21, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• support This article is very well done. If Featured Articles are to be comprehensive then objections about length are uncalled for.Dinopup 03:35, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - all previous objections were answered (although I can't say I like the splitted article more than I liked the entire article in one chunk). Halibutt 06:36, Apr 10, 2005 (UTC)
• Support - I thought this was already featured. The 1920 section still has too much detail for my taste, but that can be condensed some more later. --mav 14:20, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Strong object - no Russian sources used, making an article Polish-American POV. Example: "Polish win" is doubtful.Poland got its border 50-100 to the west from the one suggested by the Soviet Russia on Spring 1920 without the war. No mention of the fact, that mostly due to above reason Soviets, recognising their defeat in the battle of Warsaw, hold entire campaign as their victory. 213.115.184.126 13:16, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Okay, I think that is handled well. He's got a point there. How can you even come close to NPOV without consulting the sources from both sides? - Taxman 20:43, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)
    • Neither are any Polish sources used. This is an English Wiki, and we tried to keep to the sources available to an English speaker. Although at least one Russian source was used to prepeare/check some portions of the materials (Директивы командования фронтов Кр. Армии (1917-22) by Mikkalai, see Talk:Target Vistula for details). The article was read by at least two Russian Wikipedians I know of - Mikkalai and 172, both of whom had made significant contributions to it, and made no objections since it was nominated here. Some of the English sources for the article are in fact given by them, IIRC. Finally and perhaps most importantly, the Polish-Soviet war was a subject not covered in official communist history. As the biggest defeat of the Red Army, it was deemed a dangerous exception to the communist dialectic and such, and thus it was striken out from all Polish history books during the times of People's Republic of Poland (communists had their own 'better' version of history...*shivers*). It is quite possible that as anon writes (if I understand his English correctly) in some Soviet publications the war was portrayed as a Soviet victory. I doubt however that any of publications made in the Soviet Union are of any value except for the article on the communist version of real history (publications such as mentioned collected orders from 1917-22 are an exception only becaues they were written by soldiers on the field of battle without much thought to the political correctnes. For that very reason many useful Soviet documents were on the prohibited reading list, and declassified ony after 1991.). For similar reason we don't see - or demand - German Nazi references for the Second World War articles. I don't know of any post-91 publications in Russian on that subject, and as I can't read Russian I can't look for them on the net. I seriously doubt they would contain any major revalation, although perhaps the anon who objected (do we have any rules on anon objections to FA btw?) would like to prove me wrong by quoting the publication title, date, author, ISBN and the factual revelations that would force me to rewrite the article? Or at the very least a link to an English speaking site with such information? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 00:11, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Ok that sounds pretty reasonable. I guess I would like 172 to weigh in on the issue, but I think he isn't around anymore. Maybe Mikkalai can add his opinion. Well I'm not a history person and I suppose it is common knowledge the Soviets re-wrote their version of history, but maybe even that is worth noting? I could be wrong. As to anon objections, my understanding is they are treated just like any other. Many articles are promoted with one or even a few objections, Raul654 just judges them a bit based on their validity and weighs the support votes. Many support votes can outweigh a minor objection or one a number of people disagree with. And besides if that Russian source was used and is of high quality for the reasons you stated, then I am satisfied. This was just my first thought on the issue I'll have to read the article before I can give my support. - Taxman 01:10, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

It is worth noting and already noted in the aftermath section: Until 1989, while communists held power in a People's Republic of Poland, the Polish-Bolshevik War was either omitted or minimized in Polish and other Soviet block countries history books, or was presented so as to fit with the "truths" of communist propaganda. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 11:18, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The source mentioned (Direktivy Komandirovanya...) is simply a collection of all battle orders, orders of battle and reports issued during the war. As such, it is one of the two basic sources used by more or less all historians of that conflict (the other being a similar publication containing all Polish orders and reports). I can't say if it's 100% credible (which source is...), but it's definitely the best source out there, at least for the Red side. Halibutt 01:27, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

I continue to strongly object, I removed one more strong POV, that Soviet Union allied itself with Hitler by the means of MR Pact, see talk page. Polish sources used indirectly: along with getting facts from Western books, Piotrus introduced his own opinion, which pretty well fits to the latest campaign of Hitler-whitewash-Soviet-blackwash in Eastern European countries, including Poland. I look at the article itself, not at "Russian" wikipedians, who "signed" it. Soviet propaganda was not much different from anti-Soviet propaganda in Western countries during the existence of the Soviet Union and also was not much different from nowadays propaganda in Eastern European countries. 213.115.184.126 15:23, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It would be much better if instead of attempting an edit war on the article and deleting whole paragraph without even being close to any consensus you'd try to advocate you POV on the talk page before :-( Lysy 13:40, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Well summarized, organized, written, and researched. I can't comment in the slightest on the material, but it sounds like you guys have researched it well and done a good job there. Good work. - Taxman 03:01, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)
• Support now that the accusation of POV has been addressed. KingTT 15:55, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - well structured, NPOV and well balanced. 213.115.184.126, if you think it's POV, try to express the alternative POV instead of forcibly deleting whole paragraphs Lysy 13:32, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support V1^t 03:39, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Order of St. Patrick

An article I wrote long ago, but neglected to nominate. -- Emsworth 21:50, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Yet another to add to your œuvre. James F. (talk) 21:59, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• There seems to be some unresolved suggestion that the article should perhaps be at Order of St. Patrick - perhaps it should be at Order of Saint Patrick, instead? Otherwise, support. john k 22:49, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. --DanielNuyu 00:50, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - I can't not support an article with one of my photographs in it. :-) re the Saint/St question. I thought we wrote saint for people, and st/st. for buildings named after saints. I've never seen the Order written as saint, always st or rather st.. Without a dot it looks rather, um, naked and unfinished or something. Everyone I know in Ireland and Britain uses the period. The only people I know who don't are Americans!FearÉIREANN 01:50, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment: Can't we have a picture more near the top of the article? I think it should be moved to Order of St. Patrick (with the dot) with redirects at the other locations. Mgm|^(talk) 16:28, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)
• Support, although I agree that a photo nearer the top of the article, perhaps a color close-up of the star or badge, would be an improvement. Edeans 16:39, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• minor object needs a good leading image, once thats taken care of support.  ALKIVAR™ 20:02, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Hmm. The orphan couple sentence paragraphs make the lead read choppily. Can you integrate them together to flow better? There's one later on too. I agree, could really use a lead image too. - Taxman 22:42, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • I addressed the issue of the short paragraphs. -- Emsworth 22:45, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Moorgate

It's me again. Self-nomination; the article spent a week on WP:PR with two comments. JuntungWu 12:01, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support now jguk 16:45, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)Object for now. It's a nice short article - but I can't help thinking more could be said. I'm not saying all the following need to be dealt with to get my support (they don't), but here are some ideas for development:
  • (1)There are 2 key events mentioned (the hot air balloon flight and the Moorgate tube disaster) - more could be said about these.
  • (2)Were there any other interesting events that happened there?
  • (3)Any cultural references - what are the bars like?, has it ever been mentioned in literature?, any famous residents?
  • (4)The articles on Moorgate station and Moorfields are pretty small anyway - and much of the text on them is already in the Moorgate article. Could the articles be merged in to one?
  • (5)On my IE browser, the map of the London Wall, etc. covers up the end of the second line of text under "Moorfields". This should be fixed.
• Let me know on my talk page after you've tweaked the article some more, and I'll see if I can change my vote to support, jguk 18:05, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • I am looking at it now. JuntungWu 14:27, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Okay, I've expanded the balloon flight and Moorgate crash sections considerably. There are lots of events but I think the problem is defining whether something is better covered in articles about neighbouring areas, eg., Barbican and Guildhall or areas in the rest of the City. I've stuck to covering only about areas directly connected to the present street, which I think is a fair definition. --JuntungWu 09:52, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - It looks like a excellent article. I'm a bit confused as to why the various sections are present, I missed the mention of "Moorgate (street) and the neighborhood section heading the first time through. JesseW 18:25, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support Love it. --PopUpPirate 00:06, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)
• Support the article is good, although there are few minor typographical quirkafleegs (such as floating square brackets) for someone to pick up. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:58, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Speaker of the British House of Commons

Self-nomination. -- Emsworth 23:58, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support--very well done. Just a few quick requests: I gather that there's no way to remove a Speaker unless he/she chooses to go; is this true, and could it be clarified? Secondly, a picture of a Speaker in action (e.g. calling on somebody in the chamber) would be nice. Meelar (talk) 00:10, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • The first request has been addressed. -- Emsworth 00:58, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment - shouldn't this article be something along the lines of "Speaker of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom" due to (what seems to me to be) Wikipedia's convention preference for nouns? --JuntungWu 12:16, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • After a rather lengthy dispute, it was decided that the article on the House itself should be at British House of Commons, rather than House of Commons of the United Kingdom, or United Kingdom House of Commons, or some other form. The article on the Speaker is named in a parallel fashion. -- Emsworth 19:03, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support but I have two requests. The salary is in the British pound and it would be helpful to have that figure in United States dollar or euro which more people would be familiar with. Second request is that with this much history behind it, some may have done stupid things, and really bad one might be worth mentioning. Revth 13:35, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • The first request has been addressed. -- Emsworth 00:58, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. James F. (talk)
• Support. --Travisyoung 10:28, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Object. This is a good article about the formal duties and ceremony around the speaker, but is not a useful article about UK politics. For example, there had been a long time of alternating Labour and Tory speakers - Michael Martin's election broke this, no mention of this that I can see. Also there is no real discussion of how independently the Speaker really behaves, or examples of the Speaker defying the government. Also: the article says "the claim was wrong" about the SNP contesting the speakers seat. This seems POV. Morwen - Talk 13:03, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • The issue of alternating Labour and Tory speakers is mentioned on the talk page. It was determined that there is really no "convention" under which the speakership alternates. -- Emsworth 13:16, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Then this deserves to be mentioned! Certainly various people complained about it at the time. This article could do with a great deal of expansion. What sort of people are speakers (I understand senior MPs who've never held ministerial office)? Countless other things need to be added for this article to be balanced. Morwen - Talk 19:47, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • I have addressed the NPOV issue, the issue of Speakers normally being MPs from the government party, and the issue of Speakers sometimes being past ministers. I would submit that the Speaker does not behave in any particular fashion, as he or she is entirely impartial and non-partisan (as is covered by a separate section of the article). -- Emsworth 20:22, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
        • You would suggest taking such a claim on face value? We can say that the Speaker is supposed to remain impartial, but outright saying he is is a value judgement. For the impartiality to mean anything the Speaker must occasionally do things that the Government would prefer him not to. One notable instance recently (quite unprecedent) was where the current speaker told off Tony Blair for not answer a question. Are there instances where the government has tried improperly to lean on speakers? Morwen - Talk 18:34, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
          • Some source material here [6], [7], [8] about the meaning of impartiality. The current speaker has faced criticism on this issue, although the rebuke of the Prime Minister rather balances that out. Also [9] claims that the election procedure is regarded as a bit of embarrasment in certain quarters - I remember reading a lot about that in the press at the time. That also claims that candidates were openly campaigning this time. Morwen - Talk 18:51, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, a very informative article as to the history and current role of the office. Edeans 17:01, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - I have done some copyediting. I think the objection above has been dealt with. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:38, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - Much improved now. Morwen - Talk 12:36, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Bath

Self-nomination - I think it is comprehensive and interesting, it fulfils all of the FA criteria. It has passed through Peer Review and I have personally dealt with all failings listed there. Please provide constructive criticism if you decide to object. —Oldak Quill 07:50, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Support. A few comments: while you have a reference, obviously more than just that one went into writing this article. Maybe a slightly more representative set? Also, this city is most familiar to me as related to one of the Canterbury Tales ("The Wife of Bath's Tale," I believe). I would at least mention that in the arts section. On the whole, this is a well-written and well-organized piece. --DanielNuyu 08:04, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Well-written and comprehensive. The pictures are nice, although a couple more wouldn't hurt. A few more references would also raise the already high-quality of the article. Good job. -- Shauri 23:59, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support jguk 17:38, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC) Object A good article and nearly there - and will support once the following points are addressed:
  • (1)FAs should be WP's best, and good practice for an international encyclopaedia would be to show distances, areas, etc. both in metric and imperial measurements, and temperatures in Celsius and Fahrenheit.
  • (2)Also, in "Geography" the areas of Greater London and Paris seem suspiciously the same! as well as suspiciously different from the Greater London and Paris articles!
  • (3)The text suggests there are 6 notes, but only 2 notes appear.
  • (4) References are missing - as DanielNuyu notes, you have one, but others surely must have been used, jguk 18:21, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • I have corrected points 1, 2 and 3. 4 is more tricky, much of the references used were the websites listed in "external links". In any case, the references are there, how do you suggest I deal with this? --Oldak Quill 00:43, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
      • Thanks for the changes. I'd suggest moving those external links that were references from "external links" to "references". I think this does need tweaking for me to support as references are important - ideally we should list them all. Once you have tweaked this (I can't do it myself, as I don't know which ones you have used - if I could I would have done) - my vote will be to support, jguk 06:00, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
        • Done. --Oldak Quill 11:09, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support: (Although I did write the architecture section) the article covers all salient points, and is well illustrated. Giano | Talk 06:12, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support, nicely done. The points I raised on peer review have been well taken care of. Bishonen|Talk 11:42, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Conditional Support - Nice, but a few oddities to be dealt with - the reported population varies widely in the lead and under demographics. Also, using the word "comply" in the context of ethnic makeup is unintentionally sinister. Southeast instead of south east, etc. Fawcett5 15:26, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • I have clarified the differences in population: one is for the immediate city, "Greater Bath", for which the government do not have statistics this year. The other is for Bath as a whole, including the more accurate city borders which the government provide statistics for. The word "comply" refer to the religious makeup, but I have changed this to "compare". I have also made all references to "south west", "south-east", etc. "southwest" and "southeast". --Oldak Quill 17:58, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • Umm. I was the one to change them from "southeast" to "south-east", as per normal useage in English. IME "southeast" is wrong; is this incorrect? James F. (talk) 22:06, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. James F. (talk) 22:06, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] United Kingdom corporation tax

Self-nom. An article on a serious topic where Wikipedia currently has no FAs. I've reworked it extensively since its earlier nomination. I think it's now at FA status, jguk 18:09, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support -- my concerns are taken care of. Comment -- 1) The first sentence is too long and should be simplified. Its winding for those like me not used to such jargon and should be split into two sentences. 2) mention something about how the tax is levied as opposed to VAT in the lead-in. This would help people like me (I know, you already told me :)) understand how this is applied. 3) I suggest that the history section be demoted so that I get to read more about the article instead of scrolling through the history.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 18:40, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

• 1) Now split into two. 2) I've added a bit under "assessment". Would it just be better to define "profits" though? 3) Demoted, jguk 18:56, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• 2) You could mention something like: "Unlike the VAT, which is levied on the sale of goods, the Corporate Tax is levied on the net profits of the company. (Stupid readers like me would understand what sort of tax this is all about.)  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:52, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

• 2) I've amended the text along the lines you suggest in the "assessment" section, jguk 20:02, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Supported it last time and it's better since then. Dbiv 23:29, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support - excellent bit of work. violet/riga (t) 14:28, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object. Needs some minor copyediting (garbled text in "Relief for expenses" section, split of opening sentence mentioned above has left the "either" without an "or"). British English is of course correct, but I would recommend appropriate wikification when introducing British terms that are unfamiliar for US readers (e.g., accountancy, life assurance). A fair amount of specialized terminology may be comprehensible to an accountant, but this cannot be assumed for the general reader. Wikification would also help with this, and I took a brief stab at some of it. I recognize that the field overall is not covered in great detail, so I don't care if the links are red or blue. --Michael Snow 18:07, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Thank you for your comments. I've altered the "relief for expenses" section and amended the first two sentences. I've wikified "life assurance" and "accountancy", both of which already have their own articles. I'm happy to wikify more words, but as I'm only familiar with UK English, you'll have to forgive me in that I do not know where US English uses different words. If you let me know, I'll happily wikify/explain them. The same goes for specialist terminology - it's more a case that I don't know what you don't know - but if you let me know, I'll tweak the article as appropriate. You are right, this is a poorly developed area of Wikipedia - it'd be good to get it represented by at least one featured article, and hopefully it will expand in due course, jguk 19:50, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• • That's all the specific British English I noticed. On specialist terminology, I've added a few links where I could find an article and recognize that it was generally on topic. Some examples of cases where I was hesitant, not knowing how best to go about it, mostly from the History section:
    • The introduction talks about capital gains, chargeable gains, capital profits, and capital receipts all so closely together that I wasn't sure what the respective significance of each term is, or how they are to be distinguished. "Capital gains tax" is already wikified, so I thought wikifying "capital gains" might be overkill, but the other terms are not necessarily transparent to the reader and the possible links don't elaborate adequately.
    • Toward the end of the section there's a reference to mark-to-market basis and realisation basis where I just have no idea what is meant, beyond my general understanding of the concept of basis.
  • I'd still encourage more wikification, even for financial terminology that may seem pretty basic, but if these specific points can be addressed I'm willing to support. --Michael Snow 20:34, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• I've added a brief explanation of what "capital" is and removed some of the terms you refer to (which are more peripheral to the subject in hand).
• I've explained what "mark-to-market" and "realisation" basis mean.
• I've wikified more words. Many of these are to red links (however, that's more a testimony to this area of Wikipedia needing expansion rather than anything else), jguk 21:33, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Nice work, support. --Michael Snow 21:40, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Weak object. I find the tax avoidance part a little bit light; the intro part talks about "tax avoidance schemes marketed by the big accountancy and law firms and by banks" but this is not elaborated inside the article. Also, whether some of the schemes are "tax avoidance" or legitimate tax planning is debatable. Also, certain professions are not allowed to "market" schemes so the use of the term is not watertight. JuntungWu 12:07, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Thank you for your comments. I've added to the section on "Avoidance" to explain what it is and who does it. Avoidance, by definition (and I have now added a definition to the article), is legitimate tax planning - so there is no debate on what is "avoidance" and what is legitimate tax planning: they are synonymous. I'm not aware of any professions who are not allowed to market tax avoidance schemes - if you have information to the contrary, please let me know, or, of course, feel free to be bold and add it to the article yourself:) jguk 17:35, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

My comment was to do with prohibitions against "marketing" in general by certain professions. That's hair splitting so don't worry about it. Object withdrawn. JuntungWu 13:58, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support, nicely-written article. Sunny Jim's owl eyebrows scared me, though, when I first clicked on ;) Mike H 13:38, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Stuttering

Self-nomination. I'm not entirely certain if it's FA-worthy, but I put a good deal of work into it and submitted it to peer review in hopes that this could become a featured article. Regardless, Featured article or not, I am very interested in bringing this page up to a high standard, so I encourage you to be cruel-but-fair on anything you think should be changed, improved, fixed, or whatever. --Clngre 16:57, Mar 30, 2005 (UTC)

• Conditional Support Lovely article, but still a few things that need to be changed. Pictures are traditionally placed in left-right alternating order, so the larynx picture should be moved to the left. The beginning of the prose in Onset and development seems to have been chopped off, and starts in mid sentence. Just checking, but if those video clips are copyrighted, have they given us permission to have them here? Again, in Types of disfluency the prose seems to start mid sentence. Formatting error, possibly? Finally, the three Famous Blank sections either need to be turned into narrative, or moved somewhere else. I would rather see them moved some place else. Good job, I like the article! --Taitcha 04:21, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree about the seemingly truncated openings and I've patched them up now. You're also right about the videos and getting appropriate permission, I'll get on that right away and move the table to the talk page for the time being. I don't really agree about the image placement though. While I understand that tradition might dictate a L-R-L-R pattern or whatever, I think that kind of becomes arbitrary when you get down to each individual article. As a rule of thumb L-R looks better, yes, but I dont think it would look very good in this particular situation. Also the famous x lists I really don't care that much about one way or the other. I had little or no hand in any of them, but just as a reader I think a list format would be more effective. I definitely open to hear some more opinions or arguments on these matters --Clngre 06:08, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)

• • Thanks for fixing the clipped sentences. The picture, though I disagree, I'm willing to let slide as a difference of opinion. But I'm afraid I have to object unless the lists are put somewhere else. I agree that a list is effective for what they are, but what they are is trivia. Interesting, perhaps, but not important to the article. Let's get them on another page, appropriately titled, and simply link to that page from this article. I think a real problem with lists in these Featured Articles is that they tend to get corrupted very quickly, and also seem to just beg to be expanded to ridiculous lengths. Anyway, once the lists are taken off I'll happily support. --Taitcha 02:27, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ok I see what you mean know, especially about how they usually invite gross expansion, I totally agree with that. I made a seperate page for the lists --Clngre 03:19, Apr 1, 2005 (UTC)

My objections have been taken care of. I now Support --Taitcha 05:35, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object, many of the references in the text are given as direct numbered links. These are specifically recommended against in Wikipedia:Cite sources and may cause problems in future if the contents of those links change, for example a domain disappears and is replaced by a pornography/link farm. Please consider using a footnoting system such as Wikipedia:Footnote3 or another similar one.

Ok, you're right about that. I just converted them to the correct footnote format, check it out now to see if theres anything else you object to --Clngre 15:06, Apr 2, 2005 (UTC)

No specific other objections, more notes through the text would be nice, but since it is now in the top 1% I will instead support Mozzerati 16:50, 2005 Apr 3 (UTC)

• Comments: In no particular order, and hopefully fair and not-quite cruel. 1. The developmental table is of a troublesome width that causes the adjacent text to limit itself to a very narrow column on both browsers I've looked at with fairly typical text settings (ie. medium text size in IE); the text of the table itself is also small and hard to read. 2. The statement about "stuttering awareness day" just kind of sits there - should it really be before the TOC? 3. The lead starts excellently but would flow better if the paragraphs were shortened; in particular I'd prefer to see the stuff after "for example" below the TOC and in the section detailing characteristics of the disorder. 4. In general, I'd like to see the article go beyond the medical/technical focus that it currently has. Specifically, I'd like to see a section on societal and mass culture reaction to stuttering. How were/are stutterers viewed/responded to in different times and cultures? There are lots of examples of stuttering characters used as humor, for example, even after making fun of other types of disabilities became taboo. There are also examples of stuttering used to indicate some underlying issue (ie. "My Generation". 5. Have there been any notable people who were also stutterers? Such a list or link to a list would be a useful addition. Jgm 18:27, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree with everything you've brought up.I changed the table now, so tell me if it looks better or worse.It's hard to be specific when sizing a table or image or whatever because you can never really know how it'll be presented across different browsers or font or screen sizes. I just tried to reach a happy balance between too wide and too thin but I cant really tell if its alright or not. If you'd like to fiddle with it, be my guest; I'm somewhat blind to how it looks or might look. I also smoothed out the lead, so that answers 3.. There is already link at the bottom to "list of famous stutterers" which kind of answers 5. I'll get on 4 soon. Thats a pretty big topic, but youre right in thinking that it really should be included. --Clngre 17:13, Apr 3, 2005 (UTC)

Ok I added a new section, you can check it out now to see if it's sufficient. The biggest problem I had was figuring out a succinct and accurate name for the section. I just settled on "reactions to stuttering" but if you have a better idea I encourage you to rename it. --Clngre 20:20, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

Wow, I am quite impressed. Nice job, I support this as a FA. Jgm 21:36, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Comment It's a cool article, but I wish some of the claims in it had sources attributed to them. It should be easy with the new footnote system to say "with 5% of all children at some point having displaying stuttering behavior and with most outgrowing it before adolescence" and then add a footnote, for example. Or "with 70% of individuals with developmental stuttering benefiting" and then a footnote. I hope you can fix this, because I'd really like to see it featured. Dave (talk) 01:16, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

Ok I fixed those up now. Let me know if they're alright --Clngre 20:20, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

• Comment I read today that Albert II, Prince of Monaco stutters when he speaks French (his father's first language), but not when he speaks English (his mother's). How come someone can stutter in one language but not another? jguk 18:26, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I don't know why with any certainty. It's one of the most interesting things about stuttering -- that people can speak 100% fluently under certain conditions. I have a stutter and I'm tremendously articulate when talking to myself, but when I step outside to door and start talking to a friend, I stutter. Same thing for adopting "voices" or "characters." Stutterers can usually increase fluency immensely by acting or speaking with a fake accent. I've read about some stutterers who don't stutter when speaking in languages of a foreign tongue, not necessarily because the language has qualities that are inherently easier for a stutterer to speak, but because theres something profoundly different going on psychologically. I read somewhere before that it's simply a matter of accessing the physical mechanisms of speech in an unfamiliar, backdoor kind of way, a way that doest already have years of negative or destructive associations leeching it. That seems like a reasonable theory, but I dont know for sure. If I knew what it was exactly, how it truly worked, I'd cure my stutter instantly and be a very happy man. --Clngre 18:56, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. Some of this should go into the article! jguk 17:45, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Being the son of Grace Kelly, English is not totally foreign to Albert of Monaco. Also, I read that in the past he had a speech coach (or something) for English, since most of what he did was represent Monaco outside the country. Luis rib 22:06, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ta-Yuan

Came across this randomly - I've not edited the article at all. Well-written, comprehensive, has images with good captions, headings and references. (Note - this nomination should not count as a vote in favour as I'm an anon editor). --194.73.130.132 11:40, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Object. Not nearly adequate in comprehensiveness. Hydriotaphia 13:54, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)

• It would be helpful to have some notion of what's missing. 194.73.130.132 14:16, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • The anon is correct - as it is, this objection is so vague as to render it inactionable and therefore invalid. →Raul654 08:19, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

I have no idea what I was thinking; maybe I meant to comment on a different article (or was on crack). Sorry: it's a great article, and I gladly support. Hydriotaphia 06:00, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

Actually, I have two small suggestions--on whose acceptance my support is not, by the way, contingent. (1) Better link and synethesize the sections. Right now they read as disjointed from each other. (2) Modify the system of citation so that it's easier on the eyes. Put the page citations in parentheses with periods. Perhaps I'll do (2) myself when I have time. Hydriotaphia 06:07, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

Support A fascinating article about a group I'd never heard off. Great images, referenced and well-written. It's a great story as well, a group of presumably Greek colonists cut off from the Mediterranean world as described by their Chinese contemporaries. Lisiate 01:39, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support Like what Lisiate mentioned, very fascinating, unique and well referenced. Minor grammar and spelling mistakes, but once corrected, definitely a FA material. Travisyoung 06:18, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support General support. Nice article. Although, some controversy in its name exists and should be clarified (however, if no one will do this, I'll continue to support it, because these changes seem minor for myself). See talk page. Cmapm 13:24, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Corrected the ideograms. PHG 12:51, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Support PHG 04:08, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Goa

A self nomination. Goa is one of India's most well known states. It was on peer review last week. Taxman and Jguk helped critique and copyedit the article; and Mozzerati verified my references. I hope I have fulfilled all the criteria for the FA status.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:04, Apr 3, 2005 (UTC)

• Object for now, not even a single reference to "Goa" psychedelic trance music, which is what Goa is predominantly known for by most of North America. Infobox wraps wrong, none of the sections are what i'd consider comprehensive, sport and media are both sparse paragraphs. It needs to go back to peer review IMO. I now Support  ALKIVAR™ 20:30, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Goa trance music is mentioned in the second paragraph of the culture section. About the infobox: I can't replicate the problem on my PC, so I don't know how to take care of it since I can't see what you are seeing. You'd have to mention what you hope to see in the sports and media sections so that I can append the said information.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 20:41, Apr 3, 2005 (UTC)

Fixed the infobox myself, I guess I missed the mention in culture. As for Sports and Media, if you can make it a section you can write more than 6 sentances in Media and 11 in Sports. I still say its not long enough there.  ALKIVAR™ 22:20, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I disagree, just because you'd like to see more there doesn't mean that's the best for the article. An overview article like this can't include full information on every single topic, it instead must summarize many. Specifically I think the sport should be summarized and fit within culture, because it is really just a lifestyle activity. Media could be fit in somewhere else too. -Taxman 14:10, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)

Alkivar, the sections do look small, but I have no ideas as to what more to to add in the two sections. I would like to expand the sections, perhaps you could give me ideas as to what I can add there? Taxman: I wouldn't want to merge culture with sports as it would make the culture section too long. While the media section can be merged, none of the current sections seem suitable for a merger.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 18:45, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)

I've merged sections to address your nomination.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:48, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

• Support. I think it's a splendid, well-rounded article – it's even got information about climate, and a really lovely map – and the many colourful images make it a pleasure to look at. (And believe it or not, the article is not about North America.) Image:Blkred flag.png QuartierLatin¹⁹⁶⁸ 14 Germinal CCXIII

• Support. -Taxman 14:10, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)

• Support. -Vsmith 02:20, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Object. How different are sports, education, transport and transport in Goa from other cities in India or around the world? Unless it is unique, the justification for adding them is weak. For example, the trams in Melbourne are unique because they are the only city in Australia to have them. Why would I be interested in a what kind of buses run in Goa (unless of course, if they are unique). --Travisyoung 06:16, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

On what basis is the justification for adding the sports and transport weak? Wikipedia:What is a featured article mentions no such criteria for mentioning "unique" topics. Thus, this cannot be construed as a valid objection. The article should be comprehensive, adding the said topics certainly lends support to the goal of having a comprehensive allround topic. You may not want to know about buses, but can you say the same for for others who may want to know something on transport?  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 18:31, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

I agree the article should be comprehensive. However you failed to mentioned the second half of the sentence in Wikipedia:What is a featured article - "does not omit any major facts or details". Are are the sports and transport sections a major part of Goa? Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not clearly states that "current consensus is that Wikipedia articles are not travel guides." For someone who is interested in transport/information on how to get around in Goa, then a link to the relevant article at Wikitravel would be more appropriate. Unless hypothetically, Goa has hydrogen buses or ships which run on solar cells (something which is unique or different. Then the interested reader might want to refer to an article on environmentally-friendly transport. --Travisyoung 05:30, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

You've missed the point completely. The transport section lists the various modes of transport in Goa. It certainally is not a travel guide, and includes information on the national highways and length of major roads. And yes, sports is an important section. Just because the transport section lists the main highways and rail lines, list necessarily mean it is a travel guide. I'm tired of this petty quibbling which is just your Point of View. Please object on something constructive instead of frivolous points that cannot be addressed.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 18:44, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

I've removed the paragraph on the beach volleyball and reworded the transport section. However no guidelines say it has to be "unique", so I'm not removing the text.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:48, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

• Support, but agree with Alkivar that this should give more than a one-liner mention of the electronic music genre that many people tend to associate with the name. —RaD Man (talk) 08:57, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Support. The planet earth has several wonderful places and regions – Goa is one of them. Few interesting notes about Goa:

Rocks older than the oldest fossils are found in Goa. Geologically classified as Trondjemitic Gneiss, these rocks are 3600 million years old, and are found along the higway linking Panaji to Belgaum. These rocks belonged to the Supercontinet Panggea which broke apart during the process of continental drift.

Goa has also many interesting but lesser known geological features. Then,there are more than 40 estuarine, 8 marine and about 90 riverine islands - even the revenue department has no record of the smaller islands. A number of these islands are very scenic and beautiful; virgin and uninhabited, and some are recently forming like the one in front of Penha da Franca church in Mandovi estuary, close to Chorao-Ribandar ferry-route.

The Portuguese had recorded and classified more than 100 medicinal springs in Goa. Goa has more than 300 ancient tanks, many of which are more than 1000 years old. For a small state like Goa, it works out to be, 1 tank for every block of land measuring 3 kms x 4 kms.

Apart form special geological and geographical features, Goa is unique in cultural history, ecology, anthropology. Goa has a long historical heritage, from the vedic period till the modern time, when Portuguese influence gave a new dimension to the Goan Identity.

Goa is a living testimony of delicate synthesis of various cultures. We, the Wikipedians should come closer to highlight the natural and social masterpiece of our human heritage to a wider audience by according Goa the featured article candidate.

PS: and, with an open heart and without any “motive” and “malice”, I would like to interject on earlier discussion. Yes, trams in Melbourne are unique, because that is the only city to have them. “Motorcycle taxi”, the system of carrying pillion rider (against payment) is something unique not only in Goa, but in India, and may be in the World. I entreat that any information about public transport, in a proper and relevant context, does not tantamount to be qualified as a travel guide. --220.226.36.7 09:30, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)Hey as usual, I had forgotten to sign --Bhadani 09:34, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Then why are these not in the Goa article? I appreciate your comments, which are definitely provide much more insight than comments by Nichalp, which appear to me combative and self-defensive at times. I do understand that there are cultural/national sensitivities, but I firmly believe that a FA must demonstrate one of Wikipedia's best work. Once again, thank you Bhadani for your insight. --Travisyoung 05:43, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I'll include the matter now that I've got the reference link from Bhadani.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)=

Travis, there's no policy that all sections should be unique or exotic to be featured, but at the same time there is a lot of interesting matter about the state, particularly in the history and culture of sections. 2) The pillion bikes were already included. Please mention the room for improvement instead of why "buses should be mentioned" and "solar vehicles". Simply put, in many Indian places buses are run by the govt only, and this matter would be useful if someone has to make a comparison on transport in different parts of India. But I reiterate once again, I wouldn't remove the whole section as has useful information for many, but I've edited the text so that it is no longer the travel guide as you put in.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:23, Apr 8, 2005 (UTC)

• Support. A very well written and arguably the most colourful article. I've some doubts about the correctness of punctuation (usage of ;) in the last paragraph of the History section, though. --Sundar (talk · contribs) 09:31, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

• Object. I agree with the comments about the tourist guide feel. If you look at any place in the world, there will be certain things there no matter what. Is it important to say that people in Goa pay attention to the EuroCup? What is different about that from other places? Or that some people in some parts of Goa play beach volleyball? Stick with what makes Goa different. Páll 00:35, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Probably, it wasn't obvious. But, I think it is there because the rest of India is more obsessed with the unofficial national game of Cricket. --Sundar (talk · contribs) 04:32, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. I've reworded the transport section so make it a "less" of a travel guide. The sports I've pruned and added it to culture. Since there are no guidelines that topics should be unique to wikipedia I wont remove the sentences. Instead I've rewritten the some sport sentences so that they have some more information.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 19:48, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

• Comments. Much work has been done to address the concerns listed here. However, not all of the concerns listed here are fully address and IMHO I feel that this article needs to spend more time in peer review. Referring to Wikipedia:What is a featured article, below are some of the areas that need to be looked into:

• Exemplify Wikipedia's very best work. Represent what Wikipedia offers that is unique on the Internet. (point 3 of Wikipedia:What is a featured article) - My earlier objection was misconstrued by Nichalp. I did not mentioned that "topics should be unique to wikipedia" or "all sections should be unique or exotic to be featured" (please see above comments by Nichalp). To quote point 3 so that I will not be misunderstood again - "Represent what Wikipedia offers that is unique on the Internet". The insightful comments by Bhadani do indeed potray a very interesting and unique perspective which I feel would make this article a comprehensive and unique article on the internet. I appreciate efforts to add his comments in the article. This is what Wikipedia is about after all, a collaboration of ideas, not a one man show. That said, if this article spends some time at peer review, all these very unique perspectives could be added and enhance the Goa article.

• Comply with the standards set by any relevant WikiProjects, as well as those in the style manual. (point 8 of Wikipedia:What is a featured article) - IMHO I feel that Alkivar's concerns were not fully addressed (As for Sports and Media, if you can make it a section you can write more than 6 sentances in Media and 11 in Sports. I still say its not long enough there.) Perhaps an ideal solution would be to comply with the standards set with the consensus of the community at Wikipedia:WikiProject Cities#Structure. After all, Wikipedia:What is a featured article does say that a featured article should comply with the relevant standards. Divisions could go under Government & Politics, Flora & Fauna could go under Geography and Climate etc. If the sections article become too long, then these could be referred to main articles for each section. I am confident that Nichalp can put his excellent summary skills to good use here.

That said, I would like to applaud the excellent efforts of the various contributors to this articles. Some time spent in peer review and this article would be excellent for FA status the next time round.

--Travisyoung 02:03, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for replying again and letting me know some of your comments.

1. As per Wikipedia:What is a featured article, I have complied with points 1,2,4,5,6,7&8. Points 3 and 1d are subjective statements, and to ratify them, we use this page to vote. I have also complied with all Wikipedia:Manual of Styles, ranging from geographical cordinates, units, Main articles, footnotes, dashes, headings and references (and having it verified) [I've got used to this stuff now].
2. I have included Bhadani's comments into the text along with its references.
3. As of now there's no "ideal solution" to the sections. The Wikipedia:WikiProject Cities as you mention, mentions this clearly: "These are only suggestions, things to give you focus and to get you going, and you shouldn't feel obligated in the least to follow them.". Besides, the project is for US cities, and the same metric cannot apply for each and every country, (though it can follow many topics). Since there are no guidelines for states, I believe that I should be given the "creative licence" to include suitable and relavent headings? I have though, modelled many of my my headings on countries, but again, the same metric cannot be clamped down on a state. [If there was one I would have followed it.] Divisions are akin to a country's state and would not be suitable under government as they are two disparate topics. See Taxman's comments above on the inclusion of content under a heading.
4. "collaboration of ideas, not a one man show". This is what the page looked like before I worked on it. Its not a one man show as you have said, as sufficient matter was already present on the page. I did list it in Peer Review:- See: Wikipedia:Peer review/Goa/archive1. Besides the PR, I had also listed in Wikipedia:Notice board for India-related topics (now archived) so that Indian editors could have a look. Indian reviewers: Bhadani, Sundar and Brhaspati had a look at it, and if you look at the page history, significant edits have taken place after my version. Besides, I've even asked two Goan permanent residents to help out. (They are occasional contributors, but alas, they haven't responded.)
5. I listed the page for a week in Peer Review. I'm unlikely to get any help on PR if I list it again. (My next article is Kalimpong, currently in PR, with no suggestions yet.)
6. PS. I do not summarise unless the page size exceeds 30kb.
7. Since you have objected in two places, I've removed the word Object from above.

I've done all I can in my capacity to address Alkivar's, Pall's (he hasn't responded) and yours. You may choose to continue your objection, but some of your comments are subjective and I have no way of knowing as to how to address it.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 20:39, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

• Comments. If you look at the featured article about my home city of Seattle, you'll see that much information is included there about things that do not make Seattle unique. I do not mean to be rude, but I think that your comments, Travisyoung, reflect the view that featured articles about the third world must include "exotic" or "unique" information in order to fit FA standards. This reflects two mental pathologies: first, the notion that the third world just is exotic and strange and other, and second, the notion that no one could possibly be interesting in the third world unless it was exotic and strange and other. I apologize if these comments seem inflammatory. I do not mean to be trollish. I mean merely to point out something has bothered me greatly about this conversation. Respectfully, Hydriotaphia 05:41, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

Hi Hydriotaphia. Please see my last comments - I did not mention or suggest that "all sections should be unique or exotic to be featured". To quote point 3 of Wikipedia:What is a featured article so that I will not be misunderstood again - "Represent what Wikipedia offers that is unique on the Internet". I am truly sorry if my comments have caused any confusion. In any case, I disagree with the usage of the words "first world" and "third world". I am not from a "first world" country myself, have been to Mumbai on a work-related trip and I tend to believe that your "exotic third world" misconception stems from the US-centric view of the world that a lot of people here in Asia believe the majority of Americans have. But, this is not the forum to discuss is it? :) --Travisyoung 09:49, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Automatic number plate recognition

The article covers virtually all aspects of ANPR, giving examples of the main uses. Was on peer review which gave some ideas for expansion, all of which have now been implemented. Self-nomination. violet/riga (t) 18:30, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• comment I'd like to see more in-line references. There were only three until I just added one. They help the reader verify facts without having to search the bibliography to figure out which source supports your point. Dave 18:56, Apr 3, 2005 (UTC)
  • Done this as much as possible - hope you think that's an improvement. violet/riga (t) 19:30, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support: my above concerns have been addressed. Dave (talk) 02:17, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)
• Object: Reference section needs to be more like Wikipedia:Cite sources. - 203.35.154.254 02:54, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Sorry but could you please explain how the references section isn't like that? violet/riga (t) 08:24, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
    • I tried to fix it myself, but when I sent in the edit, Wikipedia didn't accept it (the server went down or something). I think he/she is referring to the order of the contents. It's usually author/group, then title, then date. If he/she is saying you should use footnotes instead of numbered in-line links, I can't help you because I don't understand it. I'd talk to User:Mozzerati if that becomes an issue. (signed retroactively. I'm discussed as "anon" below) Dave (talk)
• comment the point I can see is that you've used bare numbered links (like this [10]) which are very bad style. The reasons why are covered in most detail in Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links). Moving to a footnote system would be my preferred solution. Autonumbered footnotes are easy; put {{ref|NAME}} in the text and # {{note|NAME}} at the start of the line with the note in a special <nowiki>==Notes== section. See Wikipedia:Footnote3 for full details and ask on my talk page or on the project talk page if the slightest detail seems unclear. The other thing the anon could be referring to is use of citation templates, which give nicer formatting. They're a bit harder, but ask me or someone else at WikiProject Fact and Reference Check if you want help with those Mozzerati 19:45, 2005 Apr 4 (UTC)
  • Thanks for that, though I am aware of all these things. Footnotes are not a necessity (see the FAC talk page) and I think the current references system works well enough to pass through to a FA. violet/riga (t) 19:50, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• object in support of the anon, to this using numbered external references which are recommeneded against both in Cite your sources and in the Manual of Style.
  • Object to objection. Cite your sources doesn't state this and the article is referenced to the degree required. Policies you seem to be referring to are not yet official or agreed. violet/riga (t) 21:33, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. This is an excellent article, very well written and informative, and it held my interest all the way through. It's also well-referenced, and so far as I'm aware, this is the standard way of doing it. If the MoS says something else, perhaps it ought not to, but in any event the MoS is just a guideline, not policy, and Cite sources when I last checked argued against the use of footnotes, and is also not policy. Many editors use inline links to external websites: they're easy for the reader to click on, and there are articles that already have FA status that have used them too. The important thing is whether the article is well-referenced, not the style of citation, and this is well-referenced. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 07:18, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)
• comment - I didn't see any mention of drivers or passengers who will do dangerous things to try to obscure the plate so the reader can't decipher it. There was a note about obscured plates (the reader is left to guess how the plates are obscured), but there are some really stupid people out there. I read a couple of articles about the Toronto system that mentioned passengers in vans opening the rear doors and then hanging out the door so they can close them again after they pass the cameras, and motorcycle riders doing some wild acrobatics so their feet obscure the plate (and this at nearly 70mph!). On sedans it's a little easier for someone to ride in the trunk and then stick their arm out to cover the plate with their hands. It's amazing what people will go through to try to save a dollar or two on a toll. slambo 11:21, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)
  • I've not heard of people doing that but will look into it. Thanks for the comments and typo copyedit. violet/riga (t) 11:29, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • I've worked on this a bit, adding a new subsection, but not been able to find anything about the more extreme ones you mentioned. It's an improvement anyway. violet/riga (t) 12:58, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. A very nicely put together article, with lots of cited sources and illustrations. -Willmcw 16:31, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Great article all-round. plattopus^{is this thing on?} 14:38, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)
• Support for reasons listed above. Thelb4! | Talk to me 18:16, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hydrochloric acid

This wikipage has been on the Peer Review for nearly two months, with active contributions of many people. Please read on the review page all discussions. Now, after all open issues have been finalized, and the new page is stable, I humbly propose it for Featured article status, where I hope it will be an asset to the Science section. Please support, everybody. Wim van Dorst 21:04, 2005 Apr 3 (UTC)

• comment I really like this article. I just did some copyediting. I'll support it if someone puts in in-line references (like footnotes) and adds a bit more to the "living organisms" section (I'm a bio geek). Dave 23:51, Apr 3, 2005 (UTC)

I can expand the "living organisms" section slightly. H Padleckas 01:36, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Finished expanding "Hydrochloric acid and living organisms" section slightly as mentioned above.,H Padleckas 23:15, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Very cool. Support

• Support. Very well-written article. --Carnildo 01:13, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Conditional support. I'd still like to fact-check this article, but I'm happy to support if everything checks out. Mgm|^(talk) 07:36, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)
• Support well-written with extensive coverage of the subject JoJan 07:46, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. And great effort during the peer review process. Your effort to implement good suggestions and discuss others really made the commenting worthwhile which is why you got so many. - Taxman 14:04, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)
• Support - I made some comments early on in peer review, and have been very impressed at the subsequent expansion and improvements. Great work everyone, a very interesting read. Worldtraveller 17:17, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support -- informative  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 18:39, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I added links to gastric acid. JFW | T@lk 19:34, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support. JYolkowski 21:56, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - An outstanding article covering both technical and applications aspects of a fundamental chemical used extensively in our society. It has been peer-reviewed in detail by a number of Wikipedia's best chemistry experts. History, chemistry and properties, production, applications, biological aspects, and hazards/safety are all covered for a well-rounded approach. It has good length for a Wikipedia feature article, long enough to cover virtually all significant aspects of this subject without becoming excessively technical or dwelling excessively on any minor sub-topic. However, it is not so long that it reaches 30 kB, an apparent Wikipedia article length warning limit. The article is well-referenced, has good internal and external links, has well-formatted finished tables of properties, and enough images to make the article picturesque, without jamming an excessive number of pictures in. H Padleckas 23:15, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Support - Vsmith 02:21, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Gladly support --jag123 05:05, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Comment: could the comment about HCl being used in titrations and the picture about it be moved closer together? Maybe a duplicate mention of titration in the section about neutralization of bases? Mgm|^(talk) 09:20, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

The image hasn't been moved yet, but it can be done by moving the image "text" to just before the paragraph starting with "Monoprotic acids have one ........" in the Chemistry section. If the pic is moved, I would recommend keeping the image on the left side of the page. Maybe then the removed gelatin pic can take its old place. H Padleckas 11:57, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC). Agree. Done. Wim van Dorst 19:57, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC).

Sofar the hydrochloric acid page has been given a dozen of Supports in merely two days! May I pass on this best and greatest thanks to all the other people who have contributed to our wikipage. Wim van Dorst 20:07, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)

• Support. The article would benefit from one or two photos truely related to hydrochloric acid (and from removing images of shoes and desserts...). Maybe an image of HCl production or its use in industry. Wim? Cacycle 21:39, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, Cacycle, I only have highly copyrighted material there: not for public use. I recommended my successor to be strict on my/his scant photo material, and he has learned well :-). I even asked, nonetheless, but got what I expected. But perhaps others? Please? Wim van Dorst 21:57, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)

Perhaps a picture relating to ion exchangers, steel pickling or industry, or wastewater treatment, even an ion exchanger diagram might be available in Wikipedia or somewhere? Just suggestions. H Padleckas 04:53, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC) I looked in Wikipedia for these kind of pictures, but I didn't find any.
H Padleckas 10:00, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Good picture for Production section is up now. I'm still looking for the Application section. Wim van Dorst 23:53, 2005 Apr 7 (UTC).

Moved proposal to schedule the by now Featured Article on the wikipedia:Main Page to the proper discussion page for it. Wim van Dorst 19:46, 2005 Apr 8 (UTC).

[edit] 1755 Lisbon earthquake

Having looked at it after the earthquake was mentioned twice in two days (in a book I am reading, Rumours Of War by Allan Mallinson, and The Long View on BBC Radio 4 this morning, currently available to hear here), I think this deserves another go. Other than adding remembered snippets from the radio, this is nothing to do with me.

Previous FAC nomination here. I think previous objections are addressed. -- ALoan (Talk) 21:06, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Support. The current article is very, very good. All the objections, including mine, have been addressed as far as I can tell. I've been reading through Harald Weinrich's article on the earthquake's philosophical impact (listed in the article's References section) and actually can't find anything more in it to add. -- Rbellin|Talk 23:57, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I'm happy with the article (at last). It really does have a philosophical section, one that is rather well-balanced. And with deftness, the entry sidesteps the great controversies swirling around and about the legacy of Marquis de Pombal (swirled, I'm told, mainly by European historians). Pombal is 18th Century Europe's equivalent of the man who made the trains run on time. Pombal rebuilt the city and Portuguese society along fluid new lines, but he antagonized a lot of people in the process (not least the Church and the old gentry) and hasn't quite been forgiven for it. I think the entry makes clear that he took the reins after the quake and seized a personal opportunity, and maybe that's all that needs to be said in it.

But if I could ask for one further refinement: could someone please find a picture of Pombal to include? It would be good to have him, as well as something to represent the philosophical contingent (an image of Voltaire and/or Kant?..or even a philosophy book?)

Remember that November 1, 2005 is the 250th anniversary, so we would do well to polish this to WP:FAC level sooner rather than later. Sandover 00:12, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Support: Well written and well covered. "Comprehensive" is all but impossible, as this was one of those events that had effects far away from the epicenter and in forms other than physical. Samuel Johnson was affected. For that matter, so, sort-of, was Laurence Sterne. As the article says, pretty much everyone had cause to think. My only quibble is that the philosophical development of the sublime as a theory is not the same thing as the development of the aesthetic of the sublime. It's true that the Romantics went nuts with their version of the sublime, but the aesthetic was at work in poetry and exploration prior to the earthquake, and definitely prior to Kant's treatises. (E.g. the Churchyard Poets had developed an idea of the sublime in desolation at just the same time as the quake.) My quibble is only that Kant can't really be the father of the sublime, and therefore I think, rather than stating that the quake made Kant create the sublime, it would be better that it made him consider the sublime and attempt to formulate a philosophy of it. That's not an objection, though. Geogre 00:48, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • I've had a go at rewording this, though I don't think it ever quite suggested that Kant invented the sublime; see what you think now, or please make it better if you can. -- Rbellin|Talk 01:48, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Brilliant and beautiful, and now I can't even quibble. (Must..find..article...to.grumble.about Must..go...to.VfD.) Geogre 05:31, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Support, perhaps one of the best writeup of a historical geologic event i've read on WP. FA this and schedule it for mainpage in November!  ALKIVAR™ 03:41, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• I'm disappointed. I don't think it's very good. It's too short, far too short. It feels like nothing more than a summary. I guess I can't specifically object about anything, though. Everyking 11:20, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Well, we are supposed to write in summary style while remaining comprehensive. Please let us know if you find any omissions. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:29, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • I don't see any subarticles. I just see one article of moderate length. Not bad but not great, either, especially as our standards for FAs seem to steadily increase. Everyking 11:32, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • Since when size is directly proportional to quality? What kind of an objection is that? Do you suggest a specific topic to expand? muriel@pt 11:57, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
        • I think my complaint was too broad to be a formal objection. So it's just a complaint. On the other hand, it is actionable; just research and write more. Everyking 12:38, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
          • Oh dear - I hope we are not going to fall out about this. Summary style is not just about how articles and sub-articles should relate, but also how stand-alone articles should be written. Unless you can identify specific shortcomings, I think you are making more of a comment than an actionable objection: what is not very good; what should be researched and written about? -- ALoan (Talk) 13:22, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
            • I don't think the article is comprehensive. That may or may not be counted as an objection; it doesn't matter to me. But I do think it should be addressed. Everyking 13:30, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
              • Other than a general sense of disappointment, can you point out anything that should be covered but isn't? -- ALoan (Talk) 13:39, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
                • No, I don't know enough about it to do that. Everyking 13:49, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
                  • Without taking any position on this article itself, I will say that Summary style is a method of writing articles that is by no means endorsed by a consensus among Wikipedians, let alone an official criterion for featured article status. For more information on this, please see this discussion. Hydriotaphia 18:03, Mar 30, 2005 (UTC)
  • Small size alone is not by itself evidence of not being comprehensive. Sure it is harder to be comprehensive with less text than more (that is why good lead sections are so hard to write), but it is still possible to have a comprehensive treatment if done by skillful writers. In fact the most prized skill an author can have is the ability to get across a message in as few words as needed (try summarizing a 600 page report into a 16 page executive summary - not easy but I’ve done it). One reason why I support summary style is that it encourages the development of this skill. Another is that the shorter an article is the more people will read it in the first place and the more people that will actually finish reading it. This statement is general - I’ll take a look at the article later and compare it to other sources to see if it has missed anything important. --mav 14:06, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • The brevity of this article is a virtue. There's a lot on Wikipedia that's bloated beyond all need or reason. Sandover 16:39, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support — but that part of "what did animals think" is a bit strange and should mellowed down instead of a trivia as it currently appears to be.  =Nichalp (talk · contribs)= 20:00, Mar 30, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. A very well-written article. --Carnildo 01:04, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support. A well-constructed and interesting article. Sarge Baldy 06:15, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I must say this article looks much better than it did a month or so ago. The philosophical parts are quite good now, and I can no longer object that this part has been treated in a shallow manner. I never even realized Kant wrote about the earthquake until now, so good work! WhiteC 08:35, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support as usual. This article shows how an article can be excellent and not boring, by contrast an example is Shroud of Turin and its extreme comprehensiveness. muriel@pt 09:26, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Shroud of Turin looks great. The readers are not seven year olds with seven minute attention spans; don't insult them by making them settle for mere summaries. Featured articles are supposed to be comprehensive. Everyking 14:08, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • As I've already said, summaries can be comprehensive. It just takes a bit of writing skill and knowledge of what is most important to include. --mav 15:14, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • If this linked off a couple subarticles, that would be different. Then people would say it doesn't directly pertain to this article, I suppose. But this isn't comprehensive enough in itself, all other things aside. I've written articles more detailed than this that I wouldn't even consider nominating for FAC at this point. Everyking 15:25, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
        • Thanks, Muriel, for pointing out Shroud of Turin, which I looked over. One hilarious bit of Wikipedese jumped out from it: "Those supporting image formation by miraculous means point out that a singular resurrection event could have skewed the proportion of Carbon 14 in the cloth in singular ways." Only Wikipedia, and the custom of NPOV, could have given rise to such a beautifully contorted sentence.
        • But seriously, User:Everyking feels that 1755 Lisbon earthquake reads like a summary. By comparison to many other FA, it may feel that way. Yet I still think it's a stronger article for never getting prolix, for never offering competing theories and interpretations, for not basking in trivia, etc. Instead, the article is up front, and contains all the essentials from (at least) four different points of view -- historical, philosophical, cultural, scientific. Best of all, it reads like a thriller. You watch, someone in Hollywood will make a movie from this! Sandover 17:59, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
          • The Shroud of Turin, in the attempt of referring *everything* is a serious mess of fact and interpretation. I know because i read it carefully when i was writing the portuguese article. I dont want this one to be a mess like that! muriel@pt 12:27, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The lead of the article says the earthquake "inspired the concept of the sublime." I click on the link for sublime, and learn that the concept of the sublime was being written about by a 1st century Roman! How is that acceptable? The article doesn't even bother to explain this bizarre claim. 68.118.61.219 00:30, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

See my exchange with User:Geogre above: the section on the quake's philosophical impact does, in fact, give a considerably more detailed version of this claim. The history of ideas of the sublime is really a very complicated question; without wishing to get too deeply into it, the current article on the sublime in philosophy leaves a lot to be desired, so don't just base your response on it. And Kant's development of the sublime in philosophy (and hence also aesthetics), which was to some extent certainly prompted by the quake, was unquestionably seminal. What would you like to see changed here? Perhaps the lead section puts its case for the quake's influence too baldly, but I think in the interest of brevity its claim seems eminently reasonable. -- Rbellin|Talk 06:25, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps "inspired the concept of" is the wrong phrasing. Maybe 'caused re-evaluation of' or something that doesn't suggest creating the concept at this time. But other than that, I agree with Rbellin. WhiteC 02:27, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've revised this phrasing slightly to tone down its suggestion about the sublime. -- Rbellin|Talk 02:44, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing up (and fixing!) the problems in the lede—they were left over from edits a couple months ago, before all the Wikipedian philosophers were recruited (and who deserve credit, ultimately, for making this article feature-worthy). I've made a couple minor changes in the lede and last grafs, for the sake of clarity, readability, and (why not admit it) style. I love how the article reads now, tight, taut, like a thriller. Sandover 05:46, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Swastika

I just ran across this article on S:RC. On reading it, I found it comprehensive and good quality, as well as very informative. There is supposedly a failed previous nomination, but I can't find it anywhere. Excellent images, in particular. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 18:51, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC) p

Previous discussion was here; I made a copy at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Swastika/archive1. Gdr 22:02, 2005 Mar 23 (UTC)

• Support, very appropriate. --GRider\^talk 19:01, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support, ex-o-rilliant. Even includes the bit about the Finnish air force using it as their emblem, and it has Johnny Rotten in it! But is that image - which looks to have been scanned from a magazine - really in the public domain? And come to think of it, the text to the right seems imperfect. In its current form it goes "Punk rockers like Siouxsie Sioux, Sid Vicious and John Lydon used the Nazi version of the swastika for its shock value. (Its red and black coloring fitted with the punk aesthetic, too.) This is all the more shocking as Siouxsie Sioux and Malcolm McLaren, the Sex Pistols' manager, were both Jewish. They may also have used it as a way of criticising the previous generation's supposed fixation with World War II". My worries are (a) the line about the 'punk aesthetic' seems like nonsense, (b) "this is all the more shocking" is an opinion, and it's written in an editorial voice, and (c) "they may also have used it" is just floundering. Apart from that, however. great.-Ashley Pomeroy 19:34, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Comment I will support when the 'Taboo in North America and Europe' section is brought up to par with the rest of the article. Currently it is comprised of a heterogeneous series of example, with little cohesion and some dubious claims (including the one mentioned by Ashley Pomeroy). Phils 21:04, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Make that a conditional support. Based on how swiftly concerns about the Taboo sections were addressed, I have faith the lead section will be "brought up to standard" before long. Phils 11:02, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • Support Phils 09:34, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support Very nice article. Though I do see one thing that could be improved: the pic of the 1917 1,000 ruble note isn't clear enough to be able to see the swatika. Maybe I'm just blind, but I did go to the larger version of the pic (which isn't much bigger) and still couldn't see it. Ganymead 21:12, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• • Right, I have been through these concerns, and:
    1. I have highlighted the appropriate section of the 1000 ruble note.
    2. I have removed two of the comments Ashley Pomeroy mentions, and improved the third.
    3. I think I have improved that section. Have a look. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 22:15, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Object - the introduction in downright bad. It consists mostly of word etymology and doesn't actually give any useful information - it doesn't even mention the nazi connotatations associated with symbol, which is what the vast majority of westerners immidiately think of when they see a swatstika. →Raul654 23:20, Mar 23, 2005 (UTC) - Introduction has significantly improved. →Raul654 18:01, Mar 25, 2005 (UTC)
• Support if lead is brought up to standard. Denni☯ 00:27, 2005 Mar 26 (UTC)

• Conditional Support. Lead text is too short and it's usage as a nazi symbol and a summary of the perception of the image around the world has to be there(in the lead).
  • This by Pamri (talk · contributions) Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 16:36, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Lead rewritten. I think this is a distinct improvement. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 17:52, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Support Significantly improved. pamri 02:48, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)
• ObjectSupport. External links should not be placed in the article body, they should go to the external link sections and be linked through maind body by notes (preferably using the following syntax: ^{[#Notes/external links etc.|1,2,3...etc.]}. Lead can use some expantion as well. After this is adressed I'll support. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:02, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Progress. There are still few elinks in text (see first para), but the work done is impressive. the lead is ok now. I will support when all elinks are removed from the main text. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 14:21, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)The notes are excellent, I think I will adapt this to my own articles in the future. Good job. I support now. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:28, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Object. Numerous {{unverified}} images (i.e. images lacking source information). —Steven G. Johnson 20:11, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)
  • Few images remaining shown that are not verified (two have been temporarily commented out). I have added a little more to the lead, which is now 183 words. This is not huge, but I think it is long enough. Footnotes added. Whaddya think? Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 23:40, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Object. (1) History and Origins should be one section, or at least History should follow Origins.

(2) It is stated that the swastika was used freely by Sumerians, Hittites but this is not backed up in the article, nor do the articles on these two civilizations include mention of the swastika. Remove if can't substantiate claims.

(3) Most of the Origins section astonishingly, IMO, devotes three paragraphs to what it admits are unsubstantiated guesses about comets and one sentence to the theory of universal spontaneous development.

(4) The article obfuscates the continuities of the swastika symbol, e.g. Hinduism split into Buddhism and Jainism, Buddhism spread to East Asia and influenced the religious symbolism there. The different interpretations propounded by subsequent religions should not be confused with separate development. I'm not sure that the reader of this article would be able to tell that there is a direct line of causation from, for example, Hinduism in northern Indian several millenia ago to the swastika on Pokemon cards through the spread of Mahayana Buddhism to Japan.

(5)Going back further, I was also under the impression that the symbols found in Greece and among the Celts may all be traced to the Proto-Indo-Europeans. (The Hindu vajra and Zeus' lightning bolts have been traced to a common Proto-Indo-European origin after all.) I think the phrase "a religious symbol for the native religions of Northern Europe" is thus on shaky ground indeed.

(6) I assume that the phrase common as a design motif in current Hindu architecture and Indian artwork as well as in ancient architecture, which is followed only by European examples, should be ancient Western architecture. The implication that non-Western architectures cannot be ancient is very offputting.

(7) The Sauwastika section should be a more general discussion of the use and frequency of left-facing swastikas, with a clear link to the Sauwastika article. In particular, the correlation between swastika direction and religious circumambulation direction compared between Buddhism and Bön is noteworthy.

The movement of the Sauwastika section basically nullifies this objection. - BanyanTree 21:01, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

(8) In general, the article does not show the depth I would hope for with a topic as fundamental as the swastika. The brief mention of the Navajo didn't sound right so I found this, which seems to contradict it. While the article touches on how the swastika's meaning in various regions, it does not focus on the commonalities of it as a cosmological symbol representing movement and stability, impermanence and eternity, destruction and creation, and contraction and expansion. I simply do not find this article comprehensive on the origins and early spread of the swastika.

BanyanTree 02:36, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Point by point

1. This reordered and improved (I think)
2. Cited one, removed the other
3. Corrected, with a note about Jung
4. I have added a couple of notes to this effect. If you consider this a major problem (and you do seem to be knowledgeable on the subject) please give me a citation or (better yet) work this into the article.
5. What's the problem? I don't think the common root makes the statement "shaky", because of the shared Indo-European origins. If you can clarify, do.
6. I didn't find it offputting. It's changed, if it makes a difference to you.
7. I have cut the section down, so that the entire discussion of the sauwastika is on a separate page. I don't think that alters the quality of the article, as the sauwastika seems to be far less important.
8. {{sofixit}} You appear to be the expert here. I have found no cites for these ideas. I cannot understand how the link does contradict this. It doesn't really seem to say anything about the swastika.

How is it coming? Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 17:54, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The article is much better in Eurasian development and diffusion, and I never had any objections to the descriptions of more recent events. However, I would like to see more on the origins, development, and use of the swastika in the Americas. An analysis of the commonalities and differences with the Indo-European version would be extremely interesting. Also, I am not aware of any other swastikas drawn at a 45 degree angle besides the Nazi one. (It destroys the correlation to the cardinal directions.) Is it unique to the Nazis and, if so, why did they change it? I withdraw my objection and change to abstain. - BanyanTree 21:01, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hmmm... So the etymology with a reference link has been replaced with the previous version, without a reference... I'm not going argue evidence over exact origins because I don't have a stack of books next to me. The point is that nobody editing this article appears to be consulting a stack of credible sources. In the course of checking my fuzzy memories of a long-ago course on religious symbolism, I found the sources for half the "Religion and mythology" sections on various webpages. (BTW, I find it really amazing that people seem willing to accept a general assertion that the swastika is a symbol of "luck" or the sun, without any sort of in-depth explanation of how and why.) Do you notice that the only reference listed for origins of the swastika is from 1896, precisely the period when nobody had the slightest idea? I've come the conclusion, unfortunately, that the Religion and Origins sections need to be thoroughly referenced to recent academic sources. In a first for me, I'm moving back to object. (I'll leave the creation of a cross (symbolism) article to someone who still has the textbooks from their college classes.)- BanyanTree 12:56, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'm not surprised, BanyanTree. I don't blame you in the slightest. I'm beginning to think it is not exactly ready for FA status, with this ongoing dispute. If it makes a difference to anybody, the support inherent in my nomination is now an abstain. Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 13:01, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Support An amazing demonstration of a totally NPOV and factually complete article on a controversial subject. -Lommer | ^talk 22:49, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Oppose I really like this article a lot, but it is too disorganized and it has too many unsubstantiated assertions. Wile E. Heresiarch 05:56, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• I support this time. It was substantially changed during the previous nomination, but now it seems fairly stable. The minor objections can be accounted for fairly quickly. But what are the unsubstantiated assertions? We'll have to hunt those down first, of course. dab (ᛏ) 08:21, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• omfg, I thought I was watching this article! It has deteriorated badly, since the last nomination. I did some rough cleanup, but it's really terrible. The concise etymology section was butchered by a "sanskritist" with little etymological or grammatical knowledge, of course without noting the change on talk. This is a sad demonstration, of how articles on WP are raised to a certain (mediocre) level automaticall, but also levelled to the same level, if not carefully watched. change my vote to abstain.

  Here are some assertions that seem pretty shaky to me. (1) It has been suggested that it is part of what Carl Jung termed the collective unconscious ... -- maybe so, but says who? (2) The most widely accepted explanation is of a single origin ... the most likely candidate is the "Kurgan" group ... This is presumably due to the fact ... -- I'd like to know who is accepting this theory, who thinks the Kurgan group has something to do with it, and who presumes something about religious customs. (3) Like all religious symbols, it was created as a simplified representation of the cosmos, as understood by the makers. -- wow, an assertion about the swastika, and all religious symbols too. (4) The swastika may be seen in two ways: as a cross or as a square. ... -- this entire paragraph reads like BS. (5) A more recently proposed correspondence is gendered. ... -- this paragraph reads like BS too. These paragraphs are in serious need of mainstream references (I'm not interested if somebody made these assertions on their Geocities web site or something). (6) The "hooks" at the end of the bars of a swastika might thus be seen as an alteration in the path from the world center. -- I wonder who saw the hooks like that. (7) It is considered to be the second most sacred symbol in Hinduism ... -- not surprising, but in need of substantiation. (8) However, a proposed direct link between and a swastika floor mosaic ... is considered unlikely -- agreed; I wonder if this theory is actually taken seriously by anyone. (9) The swastika, known as the fylfot in northwestern Europe ... -- it is certainly true that "fylfot" is understood today as a synonym for swastika. However, it is quite unclear whether "fylfot" was ever actually used in premodern times. (10) The swastika is the sign of the god Zeus/Jupiter, ... -- interesting, would be nice to substantiate that. -- The long and the short of it is that there is a great deal of misinformation surrounding the swastika, so, considering the importance of this topic, it would be best to be very careful about what kinds of claims are presented in this article. For what it's worth, Wile E. Heresiarch 05:18, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

whoa, thanks for pointing these out. valid objections indeed, it seems a lot of BS was snuck in since I last read the entire article. Especially the rambling paragraph about single origin / Indo-European should be cut mercilessly (it's not like there is a single swastika symbol associated with the Kurgan culture). dab (ᛏ) 07:17, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

So, now that all this has been deleted (to BanyanTree's chagrin, I shouldn't doubt), have you objections? Smoddy (_t^g_e^c_k) 10:47, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I don't know, my deletions may have left some jarring edges. somebody should look it over and turn it into more coherent and fluent prose (without adding new unreferenced claims!). I'm not positively objecting, though dab (ᛏ) 13:43, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Should mention recent efforts to outlaw the display of swastika[11]. Leonardo 06:04, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

---

featured on 2 April 2005, in this version.

[edit] Apollo 8

This is a self-nom, that has been through peer review. Basically I think this a comprehensive look at one of the most important spaceflights ever undertaken. Evil Monkey∴Hello 02:41, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

• Neutral - I'd like to see the images right-justified and made larger, the article is quite long so there is no reason not to make them bigger, like 225-240px for the vertical images, and 300px for the horizontal images. Apart from that, great article and will support as soon as that's done. Páll 02:56, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Done. Though I have had some comments from IE users that if images overlap they end up with large white spaces. Doesn't affect me in Firefox though. Evil Monkey∴Hello 03:37, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)
    • Okay they have been moved. I'm not to worried about alignment - this is more a personal preference issue as to the placement of images. I don't see the white spaces so it doesn't bother me. Evil Monkey∴Hello 03:52, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

OK, I attempted to clean up the images myself after you re-sized them. I placed all the images at the start of each section so that they won't overlap. I think it looks much better this way! Now support Páll 04:18, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Object I don't think my Peer Review comments have been adressed. The lead is too short and few more ilinks wouldn't hurt. Better mow. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 11:25, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

FWIW, I believe these issues have been addressed--Intro is longer than when this comment was made, and the article has many more internal links since then, as well. Niteowlneils 20:25, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Support Comment. Seems quite detailed and well illustrated and referenced. I have issues with all distances/weights/speeds (with one exception) given only in metric units in a decidely US topic, as well as the occasional British English ("manoeuvre" and, oh, I can't find it now, but there's an "-ised" instead of "-ized"). Early on it mentions limiting the lunar orbit to 10 hours, but later says it lasted 20--the discrepancy should be explained or corrected or something. Some initialisms aren't explained at all (eg TLI, IVB, LTA, and I think one other I can't find now--maybe RCS), and others are only indirectly defined after their first appearance (eg LM, CSM, VAB)--similar issues with no definition of "capcom", especially since three different individuals are described that way. The article mentions a desire to measure radiation exposure, but I don't see results of the measurements. The Crew section lists a 'support crew', but the article doesn't discuss their role in the mission. I don't have a problem with the intro length, but if you want to expand it, I think a brief summary of how the mission's goals evolved would be useful. One final nit--was the 'thank you' telegram from some average citizen, or someone or something notable?Niteowlneils 20:30, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks for those specific issues. My source for a lot of the information was The Apollo 8 Flight Journal which uses metric units for all of its comments. I've gone through and changed them all to mi, ft/s etc then in parantheses have the metric conversion. I tried to use American spelling but some mistakes may have got through. The issue with 20 versus 10 is me getting confused with orbits and hours. It is definitely ten orbits taking twenty hours. As for the telegram, I don't know. It is mentioned a couple of times in passing in literature and was on From the Earth to the Moon (HBO) where they give the person a name. My guess is just an ordinary person. Evil Monkey∴Hello 21:31, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)
  • I guess since I added a section, it's now a partial self-nom. All my previous issues have been addressed, and then some. Definately support altho' I have two more nits/suggestions: A picture or diagram or two of the control panel or cockpit (something more specific and easier to make out than the only current interior pic), or a cutaway of the CSM, like on p50 of Zimmerman's book, would add a lot, assuming they are available. It seems like the first paragraph of the 'Planning' section and/or the prose added to the 'Backup crew' section need to be clarified a bit, as they currently seem a bit contradictory. Niteowlneils 05:16, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • You mean this pic - Image:Apollo-linedrawing.png? :-) . I removed the bit about the Apollo 13 backup crew - they were the only one that was really notable as it happened about three days before the launch. Evil Monkey∴Hello 05:49, Mar 19, 2005 (UTC)
      • That looks like the one. Niteowlneils 04:41, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • FWIW, I've now made it thru the Zimmerman book on the flight, cover-to-cover, and believe nothing else is missing, unless you want to get into trivia like how many children each astronaut had. Niteowlneils 14:12, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Ancheta Wis 12:08, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• This excelent article has waited for too long... you got my support, Evil Monkey :) -- Shauri 13:12, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support. This article is a pleasure to read as well as being informative and credible. --Theo (Talk) 21:28, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Really nicely done, and seems comprehensive. The graphics are exceptional for the typical FA candidate. Vaoverland 01:33, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)
• Certainly support. I've just gone to poke the article and add a couple more details; this is an excellent piece of work! Congratulations to Evil Monkey et. al. Shimgray 20:54, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)