Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Sheerness

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

The article was promoted 15:54, 26 July 2007.

[edit] Sheerness

I believe this article passes the FA criteria. Epbr123 08:25, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Support A good read that is well cited.--Analogue Kid 14:09, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Comment and Support: Would it be an idea to mention that the town is unparished at all? It wouldn't be necessary, as I think it reads well as it is.  DDStretch  (talk) 09:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose
  • Comprehensiveness: The Geography paragraph is dominated with the town's location relative to other places, but does little to explain its geographic features or its layout, also, the History section alluded to the town's built environment but the Geography section falls silent on this. The Demographics section is limited to 2001 stats and silent on any demographic shifts (eg. growth, aging, etc.) in history, since the last census, or since 2001. The Government section says it's within the Swale local government district but does not say what that means (give example of what Swale does for Sheerness). Is there no information on crime statistics (that's always interesting).
  • Prose: The Demographics section has 4 one-sentence paragraphs and is dominated with lists of data.
  • Units switch between metric|imperial and imperial|metric. --maclean 21:43, 30 June 2007 (UTC)
    • I think I've addressed your concerns. Thanks. Epbr123 23:50, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose—Poorly written. Is there some push to ram through England-related articles? There are so many, and most suffer from poor writing. You need to assemble a small team of copy-editors first, and have more pride in your products. Fed up.

Let's look at the first para in History.

• • Building, building, built, built, built, built.
  • "paint they used to paint"
  • "At the dockyard naval ships would be built,..." Hate this 'conditional-as-past-in-future' thing ("would").
  • "led to the area becoming known as"—ungrammatical, strictly speaking (loosely speaking, it's just awkward).
  • "In 1666, building commenced to replace it with a modern fort, however, this fort was destroyed a year later during ...". "Commenced" is rather too formal (reminds me of ballet school); try "started" or "began". So it started in 1666 and was destroyed a year later: when was it completed? Something stronger than a comma—such as a semicolon—is required before "however" (or change it to "but").
  • "The poor housing and water supply near the dockyard caused delays in its construction due to a lack of workers, and it took until 1708 for the first dry-dock to be built". Why not just "delayed its construction"? The causal connections are mangled: poor housing --> lack of workers --> delays in construction --> 1708. See if you can make it nice and easy to read this chain of cause and effect. "to finish the first" would allow you to get rid of one of the "builts". See how easy it is? Tony 11:44, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
    • "You need to assemble a small team of copy-editors first" - that is more difficult than it sounds. There are very few users who can copy-edit to your standard. "and have more pride in your products" - I had no idea there was anything wrong with the grammar. You can't expect each user to have as much grammar knowledge as you. Epbr123 17:06, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
      • I am working on it. I agree that this article needs copy editing, but the criticism is unnecessarily snippy. Jehochman ^Talk 19:33, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

• Support The article is comprehensive and of appropriate length for the topic, thoroughly referenced and reasonably well-written. Jehochman ^Talk 20:53, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

• "Reasonably" well written fails to satisfy Criterion 1a, so the previous reviewer's support is illogical. I can't see how the prose is yet "engaging, even brilliant, and of a professional standard" as required. Take the opening:

"Sheerness is a town on the Isle of Sheppey, in north Kent, England. It is in the northwest corner of the island, beside the mouth of the River Medway. It has a population of 12,000 and is the largest town on the island."

• • is, in, of, is in, of, is, on. Isle, island, island. "Medway" is unnecessarily repeated in the subsequent sentence. This repetitive wording is a bad start. Why the commas after "Sheppey" and "island"?

"After a Dutch attack in the 17th century, Samuel Pepys established a Royal Navy dockyard there, and the building and repair of warships took place at the yard until 1960."

• • Does "there" mean at the river or in Sheerness? Clumsy wording in the last clause. --> "After a Dutch attack in 1692, Samuel Pepys, the Secretary to the Admiralty, established a Royal Navy dockyard in the town, where warships were built and repaired until its closure in 1960." I've guessed some of the details. Now it's more precise and informative and better written, don't you agree? It contains details that our readers will want to know to get the picture. That's what 1a means by "professional". You want a gold star, yes?

So I can't endorse this until the fine-tuning is done. I think it has the makings of a really good FA that we can be proud of, but significantly more work is required to achieve that. PS It's not just grammar, but a whole bunch of aspects of the language that will make it good. Do you know where to find copy-editors? Research the edit-history pages of related FAs. Tony 15:14, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Your concerns have been addresseed. The article has been reviewed by six copy-editors. Epbr123 10:16, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: Several members of the League of Copyeditors, myself included, have been working on this article. Reviewers who have objected to featured status due to 1a concerns may want to take another look at the article. szyslak 07:38, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support Um after a quick look, I feel that it meets fa criteria ~ peaceful dreams 23:40, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support I've been inactive for a few days and came back to see a request on my talk page for a copyedit; I could find absolutely nothing to correct. The article in itself is well written and presented very well. SMC 13:54, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose. The "Government", "Demographics", "Economy", "Culture", "Transport", and "Education" sections should give a historical background on their respective topics. Take the "Government" section for example: Has the town always been a part of that parliamentary constituency? Does Sheerness traditionally vote Labour, or is this new? What I want to say is that the way the town was in the past is just as important as the way it is now. The article should therefore mention whether things have always been like this. Also:
  • The 18th century is not covered in the article. Even if nothing interested happened in this period, it would probably be worth noting if the town grew during this period, for example.
  • "The dockyard closure led to thousands of job losses, and most of the nearby houses and shops in the Bluetown area eventually disappeared." I doubt the houses disappeared, maybe they were abandoned or they might even have been torn down, but they hardly disappeared.
  • "The coast of the island has been designated a Site of Special Scientific Interest." Might be worth mentioning why.
  • The two paragraphs discussing the climate in Sheerness are written in the past. I think using the present would sound better. I realize that you're trying to take the fact that the numbers are all based on measurements in 70's, 80's, and 90's, but the climate generally does not change very much, so it's safe to say that this is just the way the climate is in Sheerness.--Carabinieri 18:11, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
    • I have added all you've suggested, except I don't think I'll be able to add anything to the education section and I think the history of the economy and transport have already been mentioned in the history section. Epbr123 22:10, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
      • Thanks for your quick response and all the fixes. I can now support this FAC.--Carabinieri 23:05, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

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