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==April 2012==
==April 2012==
{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Bastion (video game)/archive1}}
{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Elias Abraham Rosenberg/archive1}}
{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Wage reform in the Soviet Union, 1956–1962/archive2}}
{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Wage reform in the Soviet Union, 1956–1962/archive2}}
{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Murder of Joanna Yeates/archive2}}
{{Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Murder of Joanna Yeates/archive2}}

Revision as of 00:30, 5 April 2012

April 2012

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 by Ian Rose 00:30, 5 April 2012 [1].

Bastion (video game)

Nominator(s): PresN 19:37, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Back again, this time with the indie video game darling of 2011! Bastion is a GA, been copyedited by me several times over the past month, has its refs archived, has image rationales and alt text, and overall feels up to the level of my other video game FAs. Thanks for reviewing and showing me how wrong (or right) I am! --PresN 19:37, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comments: I read through the article a few weeks back and thought it was pretty complete/well written. I have a few comments and suggestions on the prose though:
  • There is a lot of "the game" in the first couple paragraphs, if you can think of a good way to cut a couple out that might be a good idea.
  • "a team of seven people split between a house in Los Angeles and New York." I'd suggest "split between houses in..." here.
  • In the Gameplay section you start two consecutive sentences with "Levels", I suggest rephrasing there.
  • "the shrine lets the player choose idols of the gods to mock, causing the enemies to become stronger while giving increased experience points and currency." Who receives the currency that is given here? (I assume the player, but it might be good to clarify.)
  • "destroying a certain number of objects with it within a given time" I'd suggest avoiding the "with it within" if you can think of a good way to avoid it. Mark Arsten (talk) 21:02, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Responses:
  • Wow, I really did, didn't I. Done.
  • Dropped the "house" bit from the lead- the idea was 5 in a house in LA, while Korb and Cunningham lived and worked in NYC. Spelled out in the dev section.
  • Done.
  • Done.
  • Done.

--PresN 22:09, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Alright, fixes look good. I made a few more copyedits. Here're a few more comments:
  • Do you think "courses designed to test the player's skills with the weapons" would be an improvement over "courses designed to test the player's abilities at using the weapons"?
  • "sets off for the titular Bastion, where everyone was supposed to go in troubled times." Should this be "was" or "is"?
  • "who had worked for the Caelondians in building a weapon intended to destroy the Ura completely to prevent another war." This feels a bit wordy to me, trying to think of a good way to tighten it.
  • "The original idea was based around the idea..." I suggest rephrasing to remove the "idea... idea" here.
  • "a way to provide background details and depth to the world without having the player read long strings of text" Maybe "requiring" or something more specific than "having" here.
  • "A playable version of the game was debuted at the" Do we need the "was" here? (I honestly don't know.)
  • " A playable version of the game was debuted at the September 2010 Penny Arcade Expo, where it was well received, and after a strong showing at the March 2011 Game Developers Conference, Warner Bros. signed on to publish and distribute the game." I suggest splitting this into two sentences. Mark Arsten (talk) 20:20, 22 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yes, done.
  • Is sounds wrong to my ear, possibly because the "everyone" in question is dead, and so are past tense.
  • Tried chopping the sentence in half.
  • Idea->premise
  • Used requiring
  • "debuted" makes the game the actor, while "was debuted" makes the dev team the implicit actor; I'd prefer to leave it as "was"
  • Done.

--PresN 20:34, 22 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Ok, these are the last of the notes I made about the article, made a few more copyedits:
  • ""Build" features the voice of Ashley Barrett, "Mother" that of Korb, and "Set Sail" of both." Is there a good way to rephrase the last part? It sounds a bit awkward, but it could just be me.
  • "The musical style of the soundtrack has been described by Korb as "acoustic frontier trip hop"." This may be an MOS linking violation.
  • Watch out for the overuse of "while". I just noticed it twice in this sentence: "Each structure serves a different purpose; for example, the distillery lets the player select upgrades, while the shrine lets the player choose idols of the gods to mock, causing the enemies to become stronger while giving the player increased experience points and currency."
  • "Bastion was released to a strong reception. The game sold over 500,000 copies during 2011, 200,000 of which were for the Xbox Live Arcade.[37][38] Bastion received generally strong reviews." It almost feels to me like you're trying to fit two different topic sentences in one paragraph here, maybe try to combine them? Maybe something like: "Bastion was released to strong sales and critical reviews."?
  • "The game has won several awards, beginning prior to publication." is "beginning" dangling here? I read it a couple times and I'm not sure.
  • Leaning to support, will probably read through the article again just to be sure I didn't miss anything. Mark Arsten (talk) 20:26, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rephrased.
  • It is, delinked.
  • Hmm, "highlight all" definitely shows a bunch of "while" clumps. Replaced about half of them- something for me to watch out for in the future.
  • Done.
  • Reworked to avoid the issue.

--PresN 21:00, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • I'm back again, a few more comments:
  • "and went on to win and be nominated for awards at the 2011 Independent Games Festival and Electronic Entertainment Expo prior to release." This sentence has been bothering me a bit. Could it be clarified here whether it was nominated and awards won at both or was nominated at one and won at the other?
  • Just noticed that in the first paragraph of Gameplay you start three sentences in a row with "The player". Also you use "the player" a lot in that section, though I guess it would be hard not to. Mark Arsten (talk) 21:58, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Levels contain many different environment types, including cities, forests, and bogs." Do you think bog is uncommon enough to be linked, or should that stay unlinked?
  • "At any point in the game, the player can choose between at most two regular levels." I'm not sure about the "at most two" phrase, perhaps "one or two" would be better?
  • "Rucks' narration while the Kid travels reveals that he had previously told Zia that the Bastion had the ability to somehow fix the Calamity" Who does "he" refer to here? Mark Arsten (talk) 00:22, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • "They also wanted to forgo a map system, and felt that having the ground come up to the player allowed them to easily see without a map where they had been or not been in a level." I'm having a bit of trouble understanding this, it might just be me though.
  • "To avoid slowing the pace of the action-oriented gameplay, they had the narrator mainly speak in short, evocative phrases, with long pauses between speaking parts." I'd avoid "they" here, probably better to state "the team" or something.
  • "An early version of the game was shown at the March 2010 Game Developers Conference, to little acclaim. A playable version of the game was debuted at the September 2010 Penny Arcade Expo, where it was well received." Maybe note that the first version was unplayable?
  • "Of the presentation elements, the story was the least praised; though several reviewers such as Noble enjoyed it, saying that it "just gets better the further you delve into it," Ryan Scott of GameSpy termed it a "just-sorta-there plot" and Greg Miller said that it "could have been better" and never "hooked" him." This is a sorta long sentence, I suggest breaking it up.
  • "and Scott called it enjoyable, though not challenging." Just checking, is this a paraphrase or did you forget to put quotation marks?
  • A few sentences in the last couple paragraphs are pretty long, but that may just be a preference issue on my part.
  • Alright, I think that's the last of my comments. I'm poised to support pending the resolution of these last few comments. Mark Arsten (talk) 18:15, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Done.
  • Removed the repetition; not much I can do about "the player" appearing all over.
  • I'd leave it unlinked.
  • Done.
  • Reworked.
  • The pronouns were a bit ambiguous, reworked.
  • Done.
  • Sure, done.
  • Broken up.
  • Quotes for two of the words; he used the words enjoyable and challenging in the review, but not that phrase.
  • There's nothing there I'm bothered about, but if anyone else also feels that they're too long I'll go ahead and rearrange things.
--PresN 23:41, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I think the resolution of File:Bastion screenshot.png is too high at 960x540, particularly in a lossless png format. And yet, the image size on the article is too small at default preferences (220px wide) and I can hardly make out any detail. I also think you can pick out a better screenshot, showing more enemies, action and colour. The narration was by far the most well received and original part of the game, it would be useful to have an audio snippet. I'm not sure how well this would work without the accompanying action, I'm not sure about whether our non-free guidelines rules out video, but even voice alone would convey the tone of the game and story. - hahnchen 23:45, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done. Nikkimaria (talk) 17:17, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved comments from Axem Titanium (talk) 23:01, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
*Comments: Overall a good read for a game I've never played (though I'd like to). Some thoughts:
    • "Bastions's" in the first paragraph of the lead
    • Lots of passive voice throughout, would prefer if at least some of it was converted to active, particularly in the lead
    • The gameplay section uses singular they. While this stylistic decision is up to the editor, I've found that an easy way to sidestep the whole issue is to refer to "players" instead of just one player.
    • "Bastion was created by a team of seven people, who composed the studio Supergiant Games." Did they compose the studio just to make Bastion? It sounds like it, based on this wording but it should be clearer either way.
    • The word "while" is used extensively in this article in an iffy way. See WP:1a#Achieving Flow for why it's not the best connector in the world.
    • Nice use of fair use and free images. Good job.
    • More passive voice in the Development section. Could use some touch-ups here.
    • The discussion about "debuted" vs. "was debuted" came up at my FAC, referencing this one. Merriam Webster seems to think "debuted" by itself is fine, but feel free to disagree.
    • A template for track listings exists, {{track listing}}, which has all the functionality you seem to be using in your custom table.
  • That's what I see right now. Might go through the article again soon. Axem Titanium (talk) 20:54, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Replying in a block
  • Done.
  • Tried to add some active voice.
  • I prefer the singular they and no one has complained here yet.
  • Clarified (not just for the game necessarily, but it's the only game they've made so far)
  • Yeah, I get that a lot- even if it was correct I overuse it, as per Arsten above. Fixed.
  • Thanks! GDC releases their photos for free, so that's helpful.
  • Activized
  • Made it debuted with Supergiant as the explicit subject, since, both you and Arsten commented on it.
  • Used, I had just left whatever was in the article before me.
  • Some more comments:
    • You mention awards on two separate occasions in the lead. Is it possible to combine them?
    • The screenshot claims it shows the Kid fighting, but I can barely the one enemy in the shot, since it's mostly covered by the cursor. Is there a better screenshot that shows the combat more clearly?
    • "The player additionally has the ability to perform a special attack; weapons and special attacks must be acquired before they can be used." Not really sure if a semicolon is appropriate here. I don't see the connection between the clauses. You can probably get away with completely removing the second part of the sentence. It's pretty obvious that you need to acquire a thing before you can use it. "Additionally" can be replaced with "also".
    • Feel free to use "the Kid" instead of "the player" where appropriate in the Gameplay section, so you're not repeating player all the time. E.g. "The Kid can only carry a certain number", "As the Kid progresses through the levels", etc. Of course, there are certain things the Kid isn't doing, like choosing between levels or upgrades, which are solely the provenance of the player.
    • Distinguish between level, as in character level, and level, as in stage. You use the same term for both and it might be confusing for non-gamers.
    • Link New Game+
    • "The narration while the Kid travels reveals that Rucks had previously told Zia that the Bastion had the ability to somehow fix the Calamity" Too many clauses! I don't think it's necessary to specify that the narrator says this.
    • "composed the studio" Do you mean "comprise"?
  • Thanks. Axem Titanium (talk) 20:19, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rather not, as there's a timeline going on - pre-release awards, release, reviews, post-release awards
  • I actually had a really hard time finding a screenshot that showed off the art style and had the ui up- looks like all the press package shots had the ui removed. If I can find a better one, I'll replace it.
  • Killed the semicolon in favor of a period, but left the second part- there's no reason that the player couldn't get all special attacks related to that weapon as soon as they get a weapon, or just get all special attacks/weapons at the start of the game.
  • Replaced a bunch with "the Kid", as it seemed to be a bit out of hand.
  • Good point, done.
  • Done.
  • Done.
  • Nope. wiktionary def. In NA english, the studio is comprised of the 7 people, but the 7 people compose the studio. I've gotten dinged on that before, and there's one guy on WP that spends half his time using AWB to fix all uses of comprise he can find. --PresN 22:06, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments from Noleander

  • Readers will want to know what the price was ... I don't see the price in the article. Even if the price varied, at least give a price range, for the US or UK markets.
  • More precise wording? - "At any point in the game, the player can choose between one or two regular levels. " - I presume that this choice is not made at any point in the game, but rather whenever a level is completed, the player has two choices of the next level? Probably should be reworded to be clearer.
  • Pronounciation: "Caelondia" - Readers may want to know if that is sounded K or S.
  • Wording: "The idea of a narrator was added early in the game's development ..." - Could delete the words "idea of a".
  • More on fan opinions? - This game was, apparently, a big hit. Yet the Reception section seems very sterile; certainly the official reviews deserve prominent discussion ... but can some other data be adde that gives the reader a feeling for the enthusiasm of the fan base? I know that WP:V limits what material can be added, but if there was a huge/faithful/loyal following, can that be indicated somehow? Perhaps calls for a sequel, etc.
  • Overall, a fine article, will support once the above are addressed.

End Noleander comments --Noleander (talk) 16:14, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Begin PresN responses:

  • Per WPVG guidelines, derived from Wikipedia is not a directory: Sales catalogs, prices should not be included for video games unless they were notable- in this case, $15 at launch, it was basically on par with other indie games of its caliber and reviewers didn't take note or exception to it.
  • Reworded, how's that?
  • Well, today I learned how to do the IPA template. Done- it's say-lon-dee-uh/seɪˈlɒndiə.
  • Done.
  • I'd love to, but there's not much I can do, I'm afraid- it's a perennial issue in VG article development. Fan opinions are inherently non-notable, unless a journalist comments on them- forum comments and Reddit threads can't really be cited, and things like user review scores tend to be based on a vocal minority, either up or down. In this particular case, it would be that most people liked the game, thought the narrator was a great idea and the music really good, but there's no RS supporting that. Review scores and awards are all we've got- sadly enough I'm lucky to even have some sales numbers for the game, as that's fairly uncommon.
  • Thanks for reviewing!

End PresN responses. --PresN 20:39, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Changed to Support, based on improvements. I don't agree with the "dont show price" guideline, but I'll defer to the project's judgement. --Noleander (talk) 21:18, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delegate notes

  • As the nominator had a spotcheck from Nikki in another FAC last year, I think we can forego one in this nom.
  • I notice some discussion on images but has anyone checked all media licensing (and is prepared to sign off on same)?
  • Best to end each paragraph with a citation; that's missing from the first paragraph in Gameplay -- pls action. Same for one paragraph in Plot -- although plots in novel and film articles are not usually cited, since you've done it in this article you might want to take care of that one too, for internal consistency. Cheers Ian Rose (talk) 22:56, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Images (although Axem Titanium already said a bit about them) The two non-free images are good, used correctly and described adequately on their file pages. The two CC BY 2.0 images are tagged correctly as such and are also used correctly in the article. ClayClayClay 19:06, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 by Ian Rose 00:30, 5 April 2012 [2].

Elias Abraham Rosenberg

Nominator(s): Mark Arsten (talk) & Livit⇑Eh?/What?

Since we recently brought the article about the first Catholic missionary to Hawaii here, I decided to nominate the article about the first Jewish "missionary" to Hawaii, as well. Elias Abraham Rosenberg went from a humble peddler to royal adviser in a very short time, using only his charming personality and ability to predict the future. Sourcing this article was pretty tricky, but with help from some of our expert researchers, enough sources were found to write the article. It's been peer reviewed by a few editors and thoroughly flogged by copyeditors, so we believe it now meets the featured article criteria. Mark Arsten (talk) 01:32, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Fuhghettaboutit I may add more but for the moment:

  • Lead
  • "While working as a peddler, he encountered legal problems selling lottery tickets." I don't think this quite captures the detail from the text that he was illegally selling lottery tickets.
  • This lead sentence, He traveled to Hawaii, where upon his arrival he claimed to be, and performed as, a fortune teller. reads awkwardly to me. "Upon his arrival" feels redundant when we were just told he traveled there. I think it's the proximity in the same sentence. Also, there's something abrupt about the shift from San Francisco to Hawaii with no lead in language to frame it, like a date of travel. Maybe add a bit more detail from the text and break into two sentences: "In 1886 Rosenberg embarked for Hawaii, possibly on a whaler, arriving in Oahu some time before December 1886. After his arrival he claimed to be, and began performing as, a fortune teller.
  • On the issue of adding more detail to the lead, I think you can summarize a bit more of the article and split into two paragraphs, which feels right for the size of the article.

San Francisco section

  • "He is believed to have been born in 1810 in Russia, and later may have lived in Australia and England." I think you should do away with "later". We know that if he lived in Australia and England, but was born in Russia, his birth preceded living in other places.
  • This incident may have led to his move to Hawaii" I'm not sure "this incident", which speaks of a single incident, works well to refer to his attracting attention from the police. Maybe start with "These problems..." (or something better!)

--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:30, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

    • Ok, I took care of the first two in the lead and the first in San Francisco. Do you think "These obstacles" would work in place of "This incident"? I guess the lead is fairly short, I'll try to add some to it tomorrow. Mark Arsten (talk) 04:48, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • Hmm, not really, though I haven't thought of a replacement. These obstacles doesn't work I don't think. It's so concrete, while attention from police is nebulous. Let me mull on it.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 05:16, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • I expanded the lead a bit, hopefully to your satisfaction. Mark Arsten (talk) 17:18, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
          • Great job on the lead expansion. I think it reads much better now and feels more balanced with the two paragraphs. I'm fine with "problems/troubles". I looked through the rest and found only a few minor things which I changed myself, hopefully not to your dissatisfaction. I wanted to ask one more thing: In the sentence ending "...the power of the Hawaiian monarch" Should this be monarchy? An interesting article and well done. I am now happy to support.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 22:30, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support - I had my say at the peer review. It's a well-written—albeit short—article about an interesting figure. Well done. Eisfbnore (下さいて話し) 06:25, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support with comments by Cassianto I agree. Lead maybe a bit short, but don't let that ruin a good article. Some small points...

  • Could we have a link to "peddler" in the lede?
  • There are a few meanings for "soothsayer". Which was is it? A blue link here might be good to determine which kind of soothsaying he was active in.
  • "In March, April, and May, Rosenberg was paid $100 each month..." Do we need to list the months? I think saying "Between March and May, Rosenberg was paid $300..." Also it maybe good to mention a year here too as the last time it is mentioned is at the start of the first paragraph. I found myself reading it and having to stop to remind myself of the year.
  • Stray period between refs midway through "Return to San Francisco and death"
  • Rosenberg left Hawaii on June 7...(year?)

No further points and an interesting little article to read. Congrats! -- Cassianto (talk) 11:22, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

    • Thanks for the support and comments, I think I've fixed the things you pointed out. Having to go back to figure out dates is one of my pet peeves, so I won't argue with you there. Mark Arsten (talk) 14:57, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support Just one issue: "ornate and well-crafted Torah[8] and yad" How is a Torah well-crafted? You might want to put (Torah pointer) after yad.--Wehwalt (talk) 21:22, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support. I was an interesting article to read. Ruslik_Zero 15:59, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support with nit-picks: I commented extensively in the first peer review and the article has improved enormously from an already very high standard since then. I have a few small issues but I am happy to support assuming there are no problems with images or sourcing. --Sarastro1 (talk) 21:40, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • "Rosenberg apparently encouraged the King to revive traditional Hawaiian religion": I think "apparently" is a little weak here.
  • Also, I'm not sure this idea of revival comes across sufficiently in the main body. Presumably it is the part referring to his use of prophets, but the lead suggests something stronger (maybe this is strong and I'm missing it!). Otherwise it gives the impression that Rosenberg was almost solely responsible for this change and by implication, the subsequent troubles he encountered.
  • Nit-picky and ignore me by all means, but I wonder if "He is the first known Jew to have visited Hawaii" may be better as "the first Jew known to have visited Hawaii"?
  • "Rosenberg was present at a birthday celebration for King Kalākaua at ʻIolani Palace in November 1886." While relevant, this fact appears to be slightly tacked onto the start of the paragraph. It may be better placed after mentioning the king's trust of Rosenberg in the same paragraph, or even after earlier mentioning his first audience.
  • "In late January, the King appointed Rosenberg as a customs appraiser in Honolulu,[9] however the appointment was controversial": However does not work here; better to start a new sentence after Honolulu, or replace "however" with "although" or similar.
  • Do we know why he was initially fired from his customs job?
  • "At this point, Rosenberg reported to Archibald Scott Cleghorn": Reported is ambiguous here. Does this mean that his "superior" was Cleghorn by this stage, bypassing the head of customs, or that following the resignation, Rosenberg went for a one-off meeting with Cleghorn (i.e. about the resignation)?
  • "The next week, the King made a payment of $100 to a local jeweler, but it is not known whether it was for the gifts given to Rosenberg." Apparently unsourced sentence at the end of a paragraph.
  • I'm not sure why note g is added on to information about a 2008 article. --Sarastro1 (talk) 21:40, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks for your support and comments, here and at the peer review. I think I took care of them all--it's not known for sure why he was fired from his customs job. There is speculation that the head of customs found Rosenberg to be too lazy, but I'm not sure there's enough sourcing to put that in the article. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:37, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments I commented on the article's peer review, and am happy to see that it's now been nominated for FA status. I think that the article is almost at FA class, but have the following suggestions:

  • "who became an adviser to King Kalākaua of Hawaii near the end of Kalākaua's reign" - is there a way to avoid repeating 'Kalākaua' twice in the one sentences (would "who became an adviser to King Kalākaua of Hawaii near the end of his reign" work? - no-one is going to get confused and think that Rosenberg was the king in this context)
  • "After his arrival he claimed to be, and began performing as, a fortune teller" - this is a bit awkward (especially the passive 'began performing as')
  • It would be helpful to explain what the King's authority was at the time Rosenberg was in Hawaii (eg, was he a powerful figure, or constrained by political factors?)
  • I'd suggest noting in the text that William DeWitt Alexander was writing in 1896, as this kind of view is rather jarring to modern sensibilities
  • As a cosmetic issue, the placement of the citations in the notes section at the end of the text in each section rather than as endnotes like the rest of the article is a bit unusual. I'm comfortable with this, but you may want to standarise on all-endnote citations. Nick-D (talk) 11:03, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks for the comments, I think I've taken care of all but the notes citations. Someone who was pretty experienced with templates told me to do it that way, I'm not sure what his reasoning was though. He's retired now, so I can't ask him. I'll ping someone about it and see what they think then get back to you and Brian about it. Mark Arsten (talk) 21:15, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, I talked to a smart guy and thought about it some. With the current system I'm using, you click on a letter to get to the explanatory note, then click the citation in the explanatory note and you go right to to the bibliography, if I change it, you'll have to click to get to the explanatory notes, click to get to the references, and then click to get to the bibliography. I think the way that I have it now is easier on the reader. Mark Arsten (talk) 00:56, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support My comments are now addressed. As I said above, the referencing style for the notes doesn't really bother me, though it is a bit unconventional. Nick-D (talk) 09:57, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Oppose: I am sorry if I appear negative, but as five supports have been registered, I fear my concerns may be overlooked unless I emphasise them in this way. While the article undoubtedly has merits (originality of topic not the least), there are at present significant problems to be addressed before it is ready for promotion:-

  • Probably the most important of these is the inadequacy of the lead. It lacks the essential declarative statement in the opening sentence, explaining why the subject is notable and defining his chief characteristics. Merely saying that he was "was a Russian Jew who became an adviser to King Kalākaua of Hawaii" is bland and uninteresting; what is significant is the unconventional nature of his advisory role and the hints of the charlatan in Rosenberg. Without such information highlighted, I can see no reason why I would wish to read the article. I suggest that the first paragraph is rewritten to capture at least the sleazy flavour of Rosenberg's role and thereby give readers the desire to read a little further.
  • Much of the prose is fractured by the close-knit citing of individual phrases, almost of individual words. Thus we have sentences like: "He began to teach the King basic Hebrew,[1][15] and gave him an ornate Torah[8] and yad[11][c] (Torah pointer) that Rosenberg had brought with him to Hawaii.[1]" That sort of thing is difficult and irritating to read. In this case, there is no need to cite [1] twice within the same sentence; is there really no single source that covers the gifts of both the Torah and the yad? Why is it necessary to double-cite the straightforward information that Rosenberg taught the king Hebrew? There are many other instances where some revision of the citations would make the article altogether easier to read.
  • There are several issues of style, grammar and clarity in the prose:-
  • Rosenberg is defined as a Russian Jew in the lead, but the text says merely that he "is believed to have been born in 1810 in Russia". This implies a degree of doubt about his birthplce and nationality.
  • "The advertisement has been speculated to be a hoax..." Adverisements are not "speculated"; there may be speculation about them. Thus: "There has been speculation that the advertisement was a hoax..."
  • "He also claimed to have found references to Hawaii in ancient Hebrew texts, a claim that encouraged..." Clunky repetition
  • "The King had previously sought instruction from several people he regarded as prophets and had established a society dedicated to this cause." Not clear what "cause" refers to.
  • "No-show job"; I have never seen this expression in a formal article - it reads like slang. The formal term is sinecure. The link to the rubbishy unreferenced No-show job stub needs to be replaced.
  • "Kalākaua's efforts to revive traditional Hawaiian religious beliefs may have helped convince foreign residents that action should be taken against the King, leading to the June 1887 Constitution, which forcibly stripped him of many of his autocratic powers." That makes very odd reading; it implies that "foreign residents", whoever they were, rather than the native population, had power to take action against the king. Was that the case? If so, at least a phrase or two of explanation should be added. Otherwise you need to rephrase to make the meaning clear. Also, the word "forcibly" is redundant; a Constitution is a matter of law.
  • Links to other web pages are normally placed within an External links section; I believe that MOS stipulates this, so the "external images" link probably needs repositioning.
  • Why are the citations within the "notes" in a different format from the in-line citations within the main text?

I will be happy to reconsider my oppose when these points have been addressed. Brianboulton (talk) 11:21, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In general you have answered my main concerns and I have struck the oppose. In particular I think the lead is much improved. A few minor quibbles:

  • (Not raised before) The capitalisation of "King" except as part of a formal naming is questionable. Thus "King Kalakuara" is OK, but otherwise it should be "the king" not "the King"
  • Perhaps refer to Rosenberg's religion before merely stating that he was the first Jew known to have visited Hawaii; a brief mention in the preceding section, maybe?
  • The citations within the notes are still formatted differently from those in the text - is there a reason? Brianboulton (talk) 10:20, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, king has been downcased and I mentioned that he was a Jew in the first section. With the current system I'm using, you click on a letter to get to the explanatory note, then click the citation in the explanatory note and you go right to to the bibliography, if I change it, you'll have to click to get to the explanatory notes, click to get to the references, and then click to get to the bibliography. Basically it's just a little easier this way, I think. Mark Arsten (talk) 19:46, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Comments from Crisco 1492
Resolved comments from Crisco 1492 moved to talk page

Note -- Aside from the matter of Brian's comments, looks like we still need an image check. I think we can waive the source spotcheck given Mark's second-most-recent nom had one. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 03:56, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, but for anonymous works the copyright term is 120 years from the date of creation, i.e. it expired in 2002 and 2005, respectively. Ruslik_Zero 09:43, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 by Ucucha 00:58, 4 April 2012 [3].

Wage reform in the Soviet Union, 1956–1962

Nominator(s): Coolug (talk) 13:01, 18 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about a series of reforms that took place in the Soviet Union after the death of Stalin. Being a ridiculously under-researched area of Soviet history, there isn't a massive amount of information out there in the world about this reform, however, what little that has been written is of very high quality, and has all been used to source this article. The article had a pop at FAC over the christmas/new year period, the result being four supports and one oppose, the oppose being about prose concerns. I stuck the article on the no-mans-land that is the copyeditors request page, but decided to have a go at rewriting bits myself when interest at GOCE was shown to be non-existent and I had a couple of days at work with nothing to do but mess around on wikipedia. I'll be the first to admit that I found the failure to be promoted last time a bit demoralising, but my previous experience on wikipedia with other FACs has taught me that resilience always pays off in the end. I would ask that anyone with any concerns that they think might be a quick easy fix consider making the changes which may often be a great deal quicker than writing an essay on my failings as a writer. I look foward to any constructive comments. Cya! Coolug (talk) 13:01, 18 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Seeing that I'm a GA and FL-man, and not a FA-man, I'm not the best of reviewers. Even so, here I go:

  • I'm guessing that the Sovnarkhoz reform of 1957 and the monetary reform of 1961 did effect the implementation of this reform in some way or another....
  • Shouldn't the Seven-Five Year Plan be mentioned? Considering that the Soviet economy was built on planning, the plan in which the reform was a part of should be mentioned.
  • I'm not sure, but should it be mentioned that the 1986 wage reform was very similar to to the 1956 reform?
  • The reform caused major disruptions in the machine-tool sector, for instance, the machine-tool sector reported a shortage of 600,000 in 1964 because of the reform. The Brezhnev–Kosygin leadership partially reversed the reform when they came to power. This is not mentioned...
  • A new reform came during the 1970s; did it replace this one, or was it only minor?
  • While the reform was planned to end in 1962, several features of the reform were delayed to 1964 and 1965; for instance, the reform was not introduced in the service sector before 1964/1965
  • The article could do with more pictures of something - maybe pictures of workers? This one maybe?
Probably more to say, but I can't seem to come up with any.... --TIAYN (talk) 16:35, 18 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
hello. Thanks for your comments. Unfortunately there isn't a huge amount of sources that specifically mention this wage reform, so to be perfectly honest I'm not massively knowledgable about a lot of the stuff you mention because I haven't read about it in the sources I've used. However, this machine-tool sector problem sounds very interesting, especially if the leadership specifically blamed the reform, could you point me in the direction of a reliable source I could use for this? I can access academic journals via a friend who works at a university. Anything you can suggest that cites this would be great. Thanks! Coolug (talk) 19:58, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry for the late response, here; Soviet Workers and De-Stalinization: The Consolidation of the Modern System of Soviet Production Relations 1953–1964 (this one contains much information which this article is missing) and The Dilemmas of de-Stalinization: Negotiating Cultural and Social Change in the Khrushchev Era mentions some of this... Do you need more? --TIAYN (talk) 07:29, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, sorry for my even later response :) I've got the "Soviet Workers..." book by Filtzer at home so I'll try and add some of this stuff, however, the index is not super comprehensive so it might take me a while to read through and find the things you suggest I add. Cya! Coolug (talk) 12:44, 2 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've thrown in a mention of the gorbachev thing, however, I really want to include this machine tool shortage thing but can't find the reference to this among the 300 pages of filtzers book, where is this? Have you got a page number? Coolug (talk) 19:47, 8 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I have found this blasted machine-tool reference in the book! At last! Coolug (talk) 21:30, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I supported this last time, and I've been through the edits since the previous nomination was archived. These include helpful copyedits from two other editors. The article prose is improved, and I can't see any new issues Jimfbleak - talk to me? 12:23, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment:

  • Shouldn't the headers "Positive results" and "Failures" be consistent? i.e., "Successes" and "Failures", or "Positive results" and "Negative results"? More of a query than a criticism. But "Conclusions" strikes me as somewhat wrongly worded; wouldn't "Legacy" be a better term? MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 18:14, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
hello. Thanks for this. I have made successes/failure more consistent. I'd rather keep 'conclusions' however, as the text is more about how the reforms told us something interesting about labour relations in the USSR than any lasting legacy of the reforms. That's not to say I'm against changing it, I just don't think legacy would be any more an accurate title. cya! Coolug (talk) 19:28, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: The opening paragraph remains problematic, as indicated by Tony during the last FAC. I wonder why you have not adopted his suggested rewording, which in my opinion is much more fluent and authoratitive than the present tentative beginning. His suggestion was:-

"During the Khrushchev era, from 1956 through 1962, the Soviet Union attempted to implement wage reforms intended to move industrial workers away from the mindset of overfulfilling quotas, which had characterised the Soviet economy during the Stalinist period."

As Tony suggests, this could be tweaked in a few ways without losing any force. I strongly recommend you make this change. Brianboulton (talk) 15:06, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I did do just that during the first FAC. I'm not going to not follow some advice due to some fear of losing face. Here's the page last week [4]. I changed the opening again because short of anyone telling me otherwise I was under the impression the opening was still regarded as falling short (tbh I forgot that the article opened that way because someone else suggested I do it that way).... Anyway, I'll change it back.
Other helpful comments, I shall respond shortly...... Coolug (talk) 18:44, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've just had another look at the first FAC and noted that I actually did make every change he suggested, except for the removing of the word 'incentive' as I felt (and other editors agreed) that it was an entirely appropriate word for an economics article and was also a the word used in the original source. I'm always happy to make a suggested change if it's a constructive one. Coolug (talk) 13:05, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support on (1bcde; 2abc; 3 (limited); 4): I've read it again, and it still meets: Content depth, breadth and correctness; source & cite quality; structure; neutrality & stability; media (appropriateness and captions only) Fifelfoo (talk) 01:12, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comments: not as tasty as your last featured article candidate, but I'll try to read this over and review the prose as best I can. A couple quick comments to start:
  • Try to be consistent with comma usage, for example, I see "In 1956..." (no comma) "In May 1955,..." (comma).
  • "Academic Donald Filtzer wrote that wider issues in Soviet industry..." What kind of Academic was Dr. Filtzer? An economic, a historian? Mark Arsten (talk) 20:01, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. Thanks for these comments, I have made a few changes. If there's anything I've missed please let me know. Cya! Coolug (talk) 12:10, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Alright, I'm back again with more:
  • Not a big deal, but I'm not sure wage reforms needs to be bold in the lead (WP:BOLDTITLE).
  • You start the first two paragraphs with "During...", is there a good way to avoid that?
  • In the image caption, I'd suggest "celebrates" rather than "is celebrating".
  • In the second caption, I'd suggest "was offered as a role model for workers by Soviet authorities." instead of "was used by Soviet authorities as a role model for other workers."
  • "This was usually because, due to supply problems, factories simply did not have the resources to complete production until the end of the month." This reads somewhat awkwardly to me. How about "This was usually due to supply problems that left factories without the resources to complete production until the end of the month."?
  • "Alec Nove wrote in 1966... that the lack of transparency surrounding average wages was in fact to prevent Soviet workers..." I'm not sure "in fact" is the best choice there, I'd suggest something like "was intended to prevent Soviet workers..."
  • I made a few copyedits, hopefully inoffensive ones. Mark Arsten (talk) 01:13, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'd prefer 30em over 20em here, but that is purely a matter of preference.
  • "Quotas had been lowered during the Second World War so that new inexperienced workers" Is "new inexperienced" redundant here? Mark Arsten (talk) 03:05, 1 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi there. Thanks for your excellent edits. I have now made changes for everything you suggest. Thanks! Coolug (talk) 12:41, 2 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • "First, basic wages were increased. This meant that there would be less pressure to overfulfill quotas, and therefore less pressure to manipulate or distort results." Maybe combine these two sentences?
  • Maybe think about combining some of the short paragraphs in the Provisions subsection.
  • "The number of different wage rates and wage scales was drastically reduced." Could we remove "different" here without changing the meaning?
  • "This allowed managers to better distribute labour and helped to reduce the frequency of bottlenecks occurring in production, as formerly less attractive tasks would now be carried out by workers who had seen their financial incentive to focus on higher paying tasks disappear." Is there a good way to tighten this sentence up a bit?
  • "with only 0.5 percent of workers continuing to receive them in 1962", "with piece-rate workers seeing", "with wages across the entire state (not only industrial wages) rising" Is there a good way to avoid the WP:PLUSING in some (or all) of these?
  • "The wage reform was linked to a program that reduced the length of the overall working week in the Soviet Union. From 1958 the working week was reduced from 48 hours to 41." Maybe try to combine these two sentences?
  • "Whilst the reform did remove some of the peculiarities of the Stalinist era, overall the reforms created more new problems for Soviet workers." See if you can avoid the repetition of "the reform... the reforms" here.
  • "A further problem with the centrally directed bonus system was that it would encourage factories to continue producing old, more familiar products where it was therefore easier to overfulfill targets than to start work on new products." This feels a bit wordy to me, is there a good way to tighten it up?
  • "in the same way that their counterparts in the west could" & "Some academics in the west believed" vs "the culture of consumerism that in the West" & "seen to such an extent in the West in industries" Not sure which version is correct here.
  • Made some more copyedits, feel free to revert if you think I put too many commas in. Mark Arsten (talk) 00:03, 6 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've made changes to everything you suggest. Thanks for your edits, plus thanks for the help Mathew! Coolug (talk) 12:57, 8 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Alright, fixes look good. I'm taking a second, and hopefully quicker, run through the article. I think the prose is in good shape at this point. Just a preference issue, but I'd suggest condensing the lead to two paragraphs. Mark Arsten (talk) 06:28, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • You have "The subsequent sixth Five-Year Plan for 1956 to 1960" and then "The Sixth Five Year Plan made several key changes" in the next paragraph. I think the first one is right?
  • Is there a good article to link to "corrective labour"?
  • Feel free to push back against my last round of copyediting if you think I got too ambitious.
  • Support -- Alright, I've gone over the article about as thoroughly as I can, and I am now more than willing to support its promotion to featured status. Mark Arsten (talk) 14:05, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, thanks for all your help with the article and your support. I piped 'corrective labour' to Gulag. But I've realised that the Gulag system was dissolved in 1960, so I've undone the edit. It would be good to have a link there though, I'll have a look around and see what I can find that might be suitable. cya! Coolug (talk) 16:40, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment:

  • This page lacks a discussion, or even a mention, of Marxism, Marxism-Leninism or socialism. These theoretical ideas lay behind much of what the Soviet Union was about, and the fact that they are not even mentioned in this article is a great omission. A section discussing these theoretical currents and their influence on the Soviet wage system should really be included in the background section to ensure proper coverage of this area. I personally believe that this is a major issue, but maybe others would disagree with me.
  • Another niggling point that is in the "Conclusions" section the term "West", referring to the western world, is referred to in both capitalised and de-capitalised forms; this should be standardised. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 22:20, 7 March 2012 (UTC))[reply]
The use of these theoretical constructs in the article is inappropriate, if only because the scholarly literature avoids these shibboleths. I don't think the first part of this comment is substantially actionable. In particular neither Marxism-Leninism, nor Marxism, nor Socialism actually lay behind PC policy decisions in the late 1950s and early 1960s. There was more Marxism in the PCI. Fifelfoo (talk) 23:04, 7 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the comments. I'm afraid I tend to I agree with Fidelfoo about the first part, unfortunately the sources I've used are all super scholarly so they don't go into the fact that the Soviet Union was a marxist-leninist state, and in fact I don't think having a centrally dictated wage system is an especially marxist idea anyway.
Fixed the West bit, thanks! cya Coolug (talk) 13:19, 8 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Communism is mentioned at the end of the "successes" section: "He had spoken previously of the reduction of working hours as a basic goal of a communist movement, and had hoped that communism would eventually achieve a working day of 3–4 hours." Not sure how much more you can fit in, but maybe a link in that section? Mark Arsten (talk) 14:05, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments from Noleander

  • I supported this at prior FAC, and I'm prepared to support it again.
  • The topic is very obscure, boring, and not heavily documented .. but that is no reason to refrain from FA consideration.
  • One improvement I see as necessary: The article does not mention, let alone explain "De-Stalinization". Yet that is the title of the primary source book for the article. The "khrus era" is a close synonym, but "De-Stalinization" also needs to be mentioned and elaborated upon.
  • Leaning towards support once the above is addressed.

End Noleander comments. --Noleander (talk) 23:18, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. Thanks for making a very good point. I agree that this article could do with a brief explanation of what this whole de-Stalinisation thing is all about. I'm at work at the moment but when I get home I'll add something. Cya! Coolug (talk) 09:23, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've thrown in a sentence about what de-Stalinization was with a wikilink to the appropriate article. I've kept it brief, so if you think it needs more let me know. Cya! Coolug (talk) 12:04, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Changing to Support based on recent change. Support based on prose & MOS only. I have not done spot checks or image checks. The topic of the article is very narrow and there is not a lot to say on it, so it does not leap out as one of WP's stellar articles. Yet, it does mee the FA criteria. --Noleander (talk) 22:21, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note -- Doesn't look to me that a spotcheck of sources for accuracy and avoidance of close paraphrasing has been carried out on this article as yet. If Fifelfoo is able to take care of that, well and good, otherwise one can be requested at WT:FAC. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 05:49, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Note -- Source check carried out for nominator's last FA: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/The Human Centipede (First Sequence)/archive3. Does that count? MathewTownsend (talk) 23:05, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Spotchecks — I did spotchecks on online sources (no books) using this revision. I think the accuracy and paraphrasing was mostly good, with a few (possibly nitpicky) exceptions. Here are the ones I looked at:
      • reference 3 is accurately quoted -- but should there be a subscription note if you want to read the entire article?
      • ref 5 accurate for the sentence cited. The source also mentioned supplementary pay after above the norm, but it gave an example of 50 and 100% increases, not 10% tiers that was written in this article.
      • ref 9, accurate, assuming it is OK Moscow is used to summarize a synonym for various governmental ministries
      • refs 11, 14, 15, 16, and 26 are good
      • ref 18a,b,c,d accurate, though "by...1961...40 million workers... nearly two-thirds" resembles the sentence structure fairly closely. I also think there is something wrong with "working to a" around one of those #18 references. I think I fixed it.
      • ref 30, OK, but both use "old, familiar"
      • ref 31, no page 80 in that article, couldn’t find what was cited on page 70, which seemed to be the most probably typo
      • ref 7, accurate, but "conceal" used in both
Strafpeloton2 (talk) 00:38, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, thanks for this spotcheck. Ref 31 was made in error on my part, I was supposed to cite page 80 on the Filtzer book, not the Grossman piece. It's lucky that you chose to pick that one out as it might have slipped through otherwise. Incidentally, I found a copy of the Filtzer book online here [5] in case anyone wants to have a look at it (I link goes straight to page 80 btw). cya! Coolug (talk) 07:42, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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 by GrahamColm 16:20, 1 April 2012 [6].

Murder of Joanna Yeates

Nominator(s): Paul MacDermott (talk) 12:14, 9 March 2012 (UTC),BabbaQ (talk) 15:59, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm bringing this back for a second nomination because I believe all issues raised in the previous discussion have been addressed now, and two weeks have lapsed since it was closed. To recap on my reason for nomination, I feel the article is close to meeting the standard required for featured article content, is comprehensive, well referenced and neutral, and has been surprisingly stable given the topic's blanket media coverage throughout 2011. Paul MacDermott (talk) 12:14, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Just a quick note. If you feel any graphical changes are necessary (e.g., maps, timelines, images, etc) I would appreciate some assistance with that as I use screen magnification which can make such things a tad difficult. Thanks in advance for your cooperation. Paul MacDermott (talk) 12:18, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Paul McDermott that the article is close to meeting the standard required for featured article content. And it's not much that is needed to be done before being ready for FA.--BabbaQ (talk) 16:01, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments I know nothing at all about this case, and found the article to be highly detailed and generally well written: nice work. I think that this is close to FA level, but I've taken a pedantic approach to commenting on it. I'm an Australian, so have also pointed out some UK-specific terms that might be unfamiliar to people from other countries. The following comments shouldn't be as scary as they look at first glance!

  • "She reportedly told friends" - why the 'reportedly'?
  • "Grief counselling was offered to Yeates' co-workers to help them cope with her death." - what's the relevance of this?
  • What position did Detective Chief Inspector Phil Jones hold?
    • Not sure what you're looking for here. Could you be a little more specific?
      • If possible (and it should be possible), could you specify what job he held? Was he the commander of the local police, a specialist investigator brought in to handle this case (for instance, from a homicide squad), or something else? Nick-D (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • "especially potential witnesses who were in the vicinity of Longwood Lane in Failand during Yeates' disappearance" - this reads a bit awkwardly. Could people who'd been in this area at the time not have been 'potential witnesses'? (I imagine that people who'd passed along the lane but not seen anything out of the ordinary would have been of assistance to the police). "Yeates' disappearance" is also unclear - why not "in the period before Yeates' body was discovered there"
  • "while The Sun offered £50,000" - happily, not everyone will know that The Sun is a newspaper, so this should be specified
  • "Authorities advised residents to take precautions" - were visitors given different advice? (OK, I'm being very pedantic here)
    • Definitely pedantic. :) I couldn't find anything to suggest they would have received specific advice.
      • I'd suggest changing to wording to something like "Authorities advised people in the area to take precautions" Nick-D (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • I hope you don't mind I changed this. The source says the advice was given to "householders to secure their homes" i.e. not to visitors, and I found "precautions" a bit unnecessarily vague as there was only that one bit of specific advice. --Pontificalibus (talk) 22:23, 12 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Avon and Somerset Constabulary is linked twice
    • Again can you be more specific, I couldn't find the second one.
      • It's linked in the first paragraph of the 'Investigation' section and the first para of the 'Post-mortem and initial enquiries' section. I should have been more specific. Nick-D (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Detectives from the Avon and Somerset Constabulary immediately treated Yeates' death as "suspicious"," - the previous section describes the very large investigation they launched, so this is unnecessary
  • "the unsolved cases of Glenis Carruthers, Melanie Hall and Claudia Lawrence." - when were these women killed?
  • "Senior officers from the investigation asked for assistance from the National Policing Improvement Agency, which provides expertise for difficult cases" - do we know when was this request made? To be pedantic again, did multiple "senior officers" really contact this agency? - surely only one of them would have lodged the request.
    • No detail on an exact date is given.
  • "Bristol East MP Kerry McCarthy offered to endorse the idea of a public DNA screening process if the police found it useful." - what's the relevance of this? Would she have needed to approve this process for it to take place? Did the police ever consider this option? The sentence is also a bit wordy.
    • Slightly modified this. She is offering her opinion, but has no authority over it.
  • "On 30 December 2010, Yeates' landlord, Christopher Jefferies, who lived in the same building, was arrested shortly after 7.00 am on suspicion of Yeates' murder and was taken to a local police station for questioning while forensic investigators inspected his flat" - this is a bit wordy and repetitive.
  • "Investigators were granted a 12-hour extension" - what was extended, and who granted this?
  • "On release he retained the legal services of Stokoe Partnership to assist in clearing his name." - who are 'Stokoe Partnership' (a legal firm, I assume)? Also did he really engage lawyers only after being arrested and questioned at length? (which means that he didn't have lawyers present during the interviews). 'clearing his name' is also a bit tabloid - why not 'act on his behalf' or similar (or did he engage them with an eye to going after the media for their coverage of the case after defending him in relation to the arrest?).
  • What's Crimewatch?
    • A programme that reconstructs crimes (usually murders or violent robberies) and appeals for witnesses to come forward. The UK press kind of assumes everybody knows what it is so I could find nothing offering an explanation of its role, so no reference to back up a description. Any thoughts on what to do here?
  • "who was detained at an undisclosed location" - undisclosed to whom? I don't see how this is relevant well after the event.
  • "The authorities declined to reveal additional details while the suspect was being interrogated due to concerns over controversial media coverage of Jefferies' arrest, which had breached the rules governing what can be reported when an individual is arrested." - this is the second time the controversy over this media coverage is mentioned in the article, and what it comprised still hasn't been explained. A brief summary in the section about his arrest would be very helpful.
  • "The Takak arrest reportedly followed an anonymous tip from a female caller, hours after a televised appeal by Yeates' parents on Crimewatch" - why 'reportedly'? Was this not confirmed in the trial?
  • The fact that Takak lived next door to Yeates should be noted the very first time that he's mentioned, as this is a key detail
  • "the UK's largest supplier of outsourced forensic science services" - what's the relevance of this?
    • To leave this out could invite one to ask why the firm was involved in the investigation. At least some (though I don't know how much) forensic work is conducted by private firms under contract. Any thoughts on how to approach this?
      • How about "DNA tests were carried out by LGC Forensics, a private company which undertakes forensic analysis for criminal investigations?"
  • "Though Joanna Yeates and her partner moved into the neighbouring flat in Canynge Road in the autumn of 2010, she and Tabak did not meet until the night he killed her." - this is very jarring as the article has, up to this point, been trickling out details and not coming to conclusions about when the murder occurred and who committed it. I'd suggest changing this to "did not meet prior to 17 December".
  • "Tabak had researched and contacted escort agencies" - did he just ring them up?
  • I'm really uncomfortable with Tabak's girlfriend being named per WP:BLP: it seems entirely unnecessary as there's no suggestion that she had anything to do with the murder.
    • You are right, although saying "he met his girlfriend, the daughter of..." seems a bit awkward when the word appears again shortly afterwards. Any suggestions here would be welcome.
      • What's the relevance of her dad's job? How about something like "While living in Bath he established a relationship with a woman he first met through The Guardian's online dating website Soulmates. She was later described by the newspaper as his first serious girlfriend". Nick-D (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Did the prosecutors suggest a motive for the killing? (possibly not, as this would have been difficult to prove and perhaps unnecessary)
    • My impression is they wanted to cite his taste in pornography as a possible motive, but the presiding judge would not allow that information to be included in his trial.
      • OK, but did they come up with anything else? At the moment the article doesn't explain why Ms Yeates might have been killed. That said, given the strength of the forensic evidence and the fact that Tabak had admitted to the killing, they might not have put forward an explanation as doing so was unnecessary. Nick-D (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • They didn't offer a motive in the actual trial, but have found and added more useful information.
  • What exactly did ITN do to be banned by the police? Was this over a series of reports, or just the one report?
  • The party affiliations of Anna Soubry and the government at the time should be noted
  • "Her boyfriend, Greg Reardon" - he was introduced much earlier in the article
  • I don't understand the purpose of the 'Coordinates' section. I'd suggest linking to the police 'The death of Joanna Yeates' Google map as an external link as it provides much more detail in a more user-friendly format. If the geographic details are important (and I'm not sure that they are), add a map from Open Street Map with the locations marked. Nick-D (talk) 07:18, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm happy for it to go, but unfortunately would not be able to add a street map myself.
      • Disagree. Current setup allows the locations - which were a key part of the story - to be viewed in a range of common mapping services. How is replacing this with a link to a single map better? --Tagishsimon (talk) 22:03, 12 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • ok, I've put it back because whatever I do somebody will object, and at the end of the day it does add a useful dimension to the article.

Most issues now dealt with. Have commented on those which need further clarification. Paul MacDermott (talk) 17:34, 11 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Everything now addressed. Have added a couple of other items I found, notably Tabak's confession to a prison chaplain while he was on remand, and a little more on the prosecution case. Paul MacDermott (talk) 21:55, 12 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support My comments are now largely addressed. I still think that the coordinates section is not at all useful and should be removed (Ms Yeates was killed in her home by her neighbor and her body was dumped nearby, and the locations of the last places she visited aren't very relevant so the locations aren't terribly significant, and there's a perfectly good map provided by the police which can be linked to). However, I don't want this nomination to turn into drama like that which affected Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Ontario Highway 401/archive2, so I'm going to support it as it stands. Nick-D (talk) 06:57, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:31, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • I found one skynews ref with incorrect capitalisation (if correct = as source) and fixed it ... indeed, the title had changed. I've also changed the publisher and work attributes of all skynews refs, to be consistent with other refs.
  • Oh, in checking refs, I discover that Ref 1 is kaput :( --Tagishsimon (talk) 16:23, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Cheers. Ref 1 only seems to be a source for her height so we can use one of the press reports for that. I know it was mentioned at the trial. Paul MacDermott (talk) 16:26, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Image review - File:Joanna_Yeates.jpg: licensing tag used requires that the image, as opposed to its subject, be the topic of significant commentary in the article. That doesn't seem to apply here. Nikkimaria (talk) 03:25, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Now you really have me snookered. Are you saying the rationale suggests the image should be part of an article discussing her graduation? If so what is the best solution? Paul MacDermott (talk) 11:19, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The solution - to the extent that it works - is to make the image itself the subject of commentary. That would suggest changing the caption to comment on the image, such as "Graduation photo of Joanna Yates released to the media by police investigating the disappearance of Yeates". Whether that's a sufficient comment on the image to qualify I leave for others to determine. The alternative, if we fail to make the image itself the subject, is that we must lose the image. --Tagishsimon (talk) 11:39, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for making that a bit clearer. I've updated the caption in the article and on the image page so hopefully it is ok now. I also notice the Avon and Somerset ref for that image is gone. Should I de-link the source, but keep it as an offline reference? Paul MacDermott (talk) 13:16, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I guess so, yes. --Tagishsimon (talk) 13:35, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks once again. I've changed it but please take a look to make sure it's ok, and adjust accordingly if necessary. Cheers Paul MacDermott (talk) 14:34, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support My comments from the previous FAC have been addressed. Having spent the last hour or so re-reading it, I think prose is sufficient and likewise comprehensiveness. Good work. -- Lemonade51 (talk) 13:09, 24 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • The case dominated news coverage around the Christmas period in the United Kingdom — is Christmas different elsewhere? Suggest The case dominated news coverage in the United Kingdom around the Christmas period
  • memorials were planned in her memory — in her memory is redundant, a memorial is something that's... in memory
  • Netherlands. — I don't think we link countries now, and certainly not twice
  • internet or Internet — cap and lc both appear
  • avant garde — I'd hyphenate and link
  • homophobic — link
  • Vicar — why cap? He's not the Pope


Delegate's comment – I would like to see a spotcheck of the sources for verification and close paraphrasing. Graham Colm (talk) 14:05, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note I've been mindful of pitfalls such as these while working on the article, but if a spotcheck does reveal any issues you'll need to be quite specific about where these are as it will assist me greatly in being able to locate and fix them. For example, information such as "paragraph 5 of Article X is similar to named sentence" or "Fact A is not mentioned in Article Y" would be very helpful. Cheers Paul MacDermott (talk) 14:58, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Spotchecks I have taken the liberty of spotchecking the sources, and I found no issues:

  • Source 6: In December 2008, Yeates met then-25-year-old fellow landscape architect Greg Reardon at the firm Hyland Edgar Driver in Winchester. The couple moved in together in 2009 and settled in Clifton, Bristol, when the company relocated to that area. (article)

The two met at Hyland Edgar Driver architects’ firm, where they both worked. They began living together last year and when the firm moved from Winchester to Bristol, they went with it. (source)

  • Source 16: On 21 December 2010, Yeates' parents and Reardon made a public appeal for her safe return at a police press conference. (article)

The parents of missing architect Jo Yeates issued a desperate plea to her abductor yesterday. (source)

  • Source 42: The footage was of poor quality, making it impossible to clearly distinguish individuals or car registration numbers. (article)

But it yesterday emerged pictures from Clifton Suspension Bridge’s CCTV – one of the best hopes of a breakthrough in Jo Yeates’ murder hunt – could be too dim to show her killer or their car registration. (source)

  • Source 81: Following Tabak's arrest, the BBC cancelled its plans to air the Yeates re-enactment on Crimewatch. (artcile)

The murder reconstruction of architect Jo Yeates has been pulled from BBC One show Crimewatch tomorrow, television bosses confirmed. (source)

  • Source 132: Prayers for her were also said at the church on 17 December 2011, the first anniversary of her death, while visitors left tributes and messages of condolence for her family. (article)

Prayers were said yesterday to remember tragic Joanna Yeates, a year after she was murdered by her neighbour Vincent Tabak. Visitors to her local church in Bristol also lit candles in her memory and left messages of condolence in a card for her family. (source)

  • All The Sun references, (10,11,8,73,134) are giving server errors at the moment (I think their server is down), but I happy to assume good faith on these based on my findings above. Graham Colm (talk) 15:31, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Cheers, looks like they've been moved to a different url as I entered ref 10 into their database and found this. I'll update as many as I can, although the date at the top of the page now appears to be different. Paul MacDermott (talk) 15:36, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Paul, I still think there are problems with their server; all the articles are showing in their search pages [7], I would leave them for now. I am happy for these to be fixed post FAC is necessary.


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