Wikipedia:Featured article review/Cambodia/archive1

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[edit] Cambodia

[edit] Review commentary

Message left at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countries. Sandy 16:16, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

I got interested into the history of Cambodia in 20th century today and found out his article is FA... and that it's "History" and "Politics" sections are, in my opinion, far from FA status. This is not so suprising if we take in accout that this article was promoted more than year and a half ago. My specific complaints are:

• WP:V: the article has a {{fact}} tag in its History section, and then another one in the "Politics" section
• comprehensiveness: the history section is, I'd say, far from comprehensive. It lacks a time frame. When did Cambodia become independent? When did it became a kingdom, when did the civil war start, when did Khmer Rouge take power, and when did it fall... I mean, I'd say this section lacks basic information.

Apart from these two, the article would benefit from migrating to Cite.php... --Dijxtra 15:00, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• Comment - I tend to agree with the analysis above. The article has undergone substantial change in the last year-and-a-half. However, instead of everybody spending valuable time analyzing the article's current faults, how about spending a fraction of that time improving the article and bringing back up to Featured Article caliber. The article has the content, it just lacks some sources for the "newly"-introduced material and is in need of some basic copy-editing -- simple stuff that does not require one to be an expert in all things Cambodian to get accomplished.--WilliamThweatt 20:29, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• I have done some work on the history section trying to clarify the time frame. Still more to do there, though. Give me a couple days and I will work on the references (I have access to many sources) and copyediting.--WilliamThweatt 21:40, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
• Point taken, it's just that I had my own to-do list to finish before going to vacation and just can't spare time on Cambodia now... and the article really needs help ASAP. --Dijxtra 21:41, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• Perfectly understandable. I Just re-read my comment above and realized it could be interpreted to be more sarcastic than helpful. That was not my intent. Enjoy your vacation (I know I could use one, it's 116 degrees here today!)--WilliamThweatt 22:40, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• Well, I have wasted the better part of Sunday fixing reference formatting, researching to replace the {{fact}} tags, copyediting, removing excessive red links and doing various other tasks to (hopefully) improve the article. Could still use some more references and some further copyediting, though. Further comments/help are welcomed/encouraged.--WilliamThweatt 01:52, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

• The prose needs a good run-through by one or more copy-editors, preferably WPians who are not familiar with the text. Here are examples of what needs fixing.
  • "The Khmer Empire dominated the region until the 15th century, it's most important capital being Angkor. Angkor Wat, the empire's main religious site, is a symbolic reminder of Cambodia's past as a major regional power, and is now the country's top tourist attraction." "It's" is ungrammatical; as well, it's vague—when was Angkor the capital? Is this to do with the 15th century? Better to leave the reference to tourism to another section? (It jars a little here when the reader is primed for historical information.)
  • "Estimates vary as to how many people were killed by the Khmer Rouge regime. Depending on whether or not one includes deaths from starvation and subsequent deaths in refugee camps, estimates range anywhere from 1.7 million [2] to 3 million Cambodians." This is repetitive ("estimates"), and contains redundancies ("Cambodians") and confused ideas (so the deaths in camps weren't from starvation?).

The whole text needs attention—probably several hours' work by a skilled WPian. Tony 12:06, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Good work yesterday, William. I just did some things myself, including rationalizing the TOC a bit, ce'ing the intro, and slightly expanding the politics. Please check that I've got the facts straight in politics; previously it seemed to conflate the definiton of the executive branch with the definition of government itself, which didn't read right. Beyond that:

• Yes, more in-line sourcing please.
• I'm concerned about throwaway lines.
  • "Cambodia has diplomatic relations with most countries and is a member of most major international organizations..." Most countries have diplomatic relations with most countries. Are there any countries it doesn't have relations with?
  • "Sports in Cambodia are not as big as in western countries due to the economic conditions." Not as well-organized OK, but not as "big" in the sense of people not being "into" sports? That doesn't seem right—sports are "big" just about everywhere there's people. Marskell 16:07, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the compliments! I also noticed the problematic prose that you and Tony mention but I didn't have the wherewithal to continue yesterday. Today, I have made a few minor fixes and added two paragraphs to fill the four-century gap in the history section. Next, I will concentrate on in-line sourcing (probably tonight or tomorrow). I usually save the copyediting for prose/style for last, hoping that somebody more artistically inclined will come along and do it first (my own skills in that area being admittedly adequate, at best). I am more of a "facts and format" (the "science of writing") type. I prefer the prose to be copyedited by somebody who is a "style" (the "art of writing") type. I'll recruit a few if nobody here takes it on.--WilliamThweatt 22:52, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like a great idea, William. Let us know if you have serious difficulty in locating the right people. Tony 07:09, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

• It doesn't look too bad. There are some broken refs and some text in the economy section that looks like a blatant IMF/State dept assessment, It could also use some info on education (demographics) and media (culture).--Peta 13:38, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
  • I fixed the broken refs, and tried to do a bit of ref cleanup (the entire refs were linked), but I found some NPOV needs while I was in there. I added a couple of "The BBC reports", but there may be more needed. Sandy 14:16, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

• Status. This is another I think that has seen some good work and may not need to go to FARC. Any thoughts? Marskell 16:03, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

It's not thoroughly referenced yet: do we know if WilliamThweatt is still working on that ? Sandy 22:13, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello, all. I'm just returning from a wikibreak (vacation, kids back in school, etc). It will be a few more days until I'm back up at full speed here on Wikipedia, but I've been "checking in" from time to time and keeping up on the article. I will give the article a close read and see what jumps out at me as needing to be sourced. Sandy, do you have in mind any specific sentences that may need references? --WilliamThweatt 15:30, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

No specific sentences, but lots of entire paragraphs :-) For example, at the top of Economy, we find:

The per capita income is rapidly increasing, but is low compared with other countries in the region. Most rural households depend on agriculture and its related sub-sectors. Rice, fish, timber, garments and rubber are Cambodia's major exports, and the United States, Singapore, Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong, Indonesia and Malaysia are its major export partners. The recovery of Cambodia's economy slowed dramatically in 1997-1998 due to the regional economic crisis, civil violence, and political infighting. Foreign investment and tourism also fell off drastically. Since then however, growth has been steady.

Sandy 22:26, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

• I think it needs some structural work. Specifically
  1. The opening paragraph should be a brief definition of Cambodia along with a short summary of the most important facts about Cambodia. Its demographic makeup and what countries it borders are nowhere near as important as characterising it as a culturally rich but financial poor country recovering from famine, civil war and a brutal totalitarian regime.
  2. The "Naming" section is given too much space and prominence.
  3. Regarding Cambodia's natural history, this article gives a good deal on geography and a single paragraph on climate, but nothing on geology, flora or fauna.
  4. There should be a "Government" section; the Politics section covers who elects who how and for how long, but there's no information on what the government's roles and responsibilities are. e.g. Is the government responsible for health? education? law and order? How does it tax? How big is the public sector?
  5. The "Demographics" section should state the population. Yes I know it's in the infobox, but some of us look for these details in the text.
  6. The "Culture and Sport" should be a subsection of a larger section on "Social Conditions" including information on health, education, law and order, industrial conditions such as employment and wages, and social welfare.
  7. Similarly, transportation is just one kind of infrastructure; I also want to know what Cambodia offers in terms of communications, electricity, gas, water supply, sewerage, waste disposal, etc.

Snottygobble 05:01, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] FARC commentary

Main FA criteria concerns are comprehensiveness (2b), and format and number of citations (2c). Marskell 06:17, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. William, one place that could use a source or two is the transport section, where you have length of railway, navigable rivers etc. listed. "Always cite a number" is a good rule of thumb. Marskell 13:08, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• Status? A week has elapsed, no more references. William indicated he was very busy: perhaps he'll give us an update? Sandy 11:33, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

• Just got started back into my regular schedule yesterday. As far as the Cambodia article, I didn't write either "transportation" section or the "economy" section so it may take me a couple days to properly source both the specific numbers regarding transport and the description of the economy. Frankly, I'm a little surprised that nobody else has worked on the article. I did a little research this morning and it appears that the entire transportation section was copied-and-pasted almost verbatim from the CIA Factbook (more specificly, from country-data.com). I referenced the page for now, but will probably rewrite the section later.--WilliamThweatt 15:26, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

  The CIA thing is common: {{CIA}}. At least when you sit down to rewrite you know the initial source is reliable. Marskell 07:18, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

  Yes, it is pretty common, I've seen it a lot on various country articles. In fact the whole sub-article, Transport in Cambodia, was lifted entirely from the CIA Factbook webpage; they didn't even bother to reformat. To their credit, though, they did use the template. It probably shouldn't bother me so much, I realize it's important to get the facts up...I guess it's just the lack of originality in presentation. If the article's just going to be a mirror of the CIA Factbook page, a simple external link would suffice so the reader can go there and read it directly. Anyway, kinda busy this morning hope to dedicate some serious time to the Cambodia article this evening.--WilliamThweatt 17:05, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

• Quite a lot of activity since listing. I'm unsure that all aspects of the topic are treated with the right level of detail (2b). Asking Peta's advice. Tony 04:24, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
• Still doesn't have thorough inline citations. Sandy 05:43, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
• Remove - comprehensivness is an issue, although it's important that a country article is written in summary style, this article dones't go into much depth for history, demographics, politics and culture. Much is copied from the CIA, which I think is sloppy, and leads to bias in sections like economy.--Peta 22:52, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

• • Of the four sections you mention I think culture could probably due with expansion. However, I disagree that on the whole it is shallow. I think the history, for instance, has a nice flow, covering things but not pausing too long and allowing the blue links to do their work. Marskell 23:06, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

• I am a tentative keep here. I think this article is a good example of summary style and shows that 30 odd K of text, rather then 50 or 60, is enough to cover a broad topic. I'm also convinced it has a thorough page-watcher in William. There are a few things I would still like changed.
  • The clause "Cambodia has diplomatic relations with most countries and is a member of most major international organizations," which I started my commenting with, remains in the article and remains completely throw-away.
  • The foreign relations section in general could use another cite or two.
  • Also I wonder if in the administrative divisions section, a paragraph could be added after the list mentioning notable facts about particularly areas (largest province by pop, area, etc.). Marskell 22:58, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
    • I have taken care of my issues. I'm fairly comfortable with this one now. I'll contact William about Tony's two issues below. Marskell 08:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

• Further comment. When I see all-encompassing statements such as "The locals normally use automobiles, motorbikes and buses" ("the locals" are apparently all Cambodians), I shrink. And "Angkor Wat (Angkor means "city" and Wat "temple") is the best preserved example of Khmer architecture from the Angkorian era, although hundreds of other temples have been discovered in and around the region."—Although? Surely "and". "Other important historic sties"—pigs, were they? An hour's copy-editing throughout and the fixing of the reference problem are required. Tony 02:24, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

• Comment I'd like to echo Tony's concerns, as I have the same issues with the article. Having said this, my skills are unfortunately unsuited to the vast task, but I hope the two issues are addressed. LuciferMorgan 10:03, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

• Actually, these two specific concerns have been addressed. Marskell 11:10, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I've had a bit of a run-through bits of it. I suppose I reluctantly declare "keep", but would be happier with the quality of the prose at 97%+, not 92%. Tony 13:14, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment Although the article now has more inline citations, I still think it needs more - the opening paragraph of the "Economy" section is an example. We all know that Cambodia suffers from corruption and so on, but it'd be more professional to cite news sources that highlight this fact, and other unreferenced facts within the article. LuciferMorgan 16:22, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

• Remove. I mentioned a month ago that economy wasn't cited: it's still not cited, and there are still prose concerns as raised by Tony. Enough time has elapsed for the citation and prose issues to have been addressed. Sandy 17:55, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Because I have limited internet access right now, and might not be able to get back to the article for several days, I'll go ahead and strike my remove, trusting that Marskell will add any refs needed. Keep. 05:40, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

It looks like a state dep't fact sheet was the main ref there. I sourced the paragraph to it. I'll probably continue to poke away at this one, as I've already put in some work. Marskell 13:54, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

• I am a keep. Again, Tony's specific concerns were addressed. I just did a bit more CE'ing and I believe this meets 1c (let's split the difference and say 94.5% ;). I took care of the fact request in economy, for a total of seven in the section. Note Sandy, there's a Harvard style ref in there. Between the new ref (a fact sheet from Asian Development Bank) and CIA factbook, there are sufficient links to verify info there. I'll try to place one in the first paragraph to confirm main exports. Marskell 19:45, 9 September 2006 (UTC)