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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 22:18, 21 September 2012 [1].

Dodo

[edit]

Dodo (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Toolbox
Nominator(s): FunkMonk (talk) 08:41, 28 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured article because I have expanded it to many times the size of the GA version[2], which was not very comprehensive, and was badly structured and sourced (and one third pop culture trivia). Having read a lot of literature about the bird, I can not think of any major issues having been missed (some of the included info is even quite obscure). Both sides of controversial issues have been presented. The most important contemporary images and descriptions have been added, which mirrors most of the comprehensive secondary sources (comparable to Rodrigues Solitaire, but has a better text to quote ratio). I have searched far and wide for rare paintings and photos, and I'm pretty happy that I could find images of all surviving non-fossil specimens (one I had to photograph myself). The article is pretty long, but shorter than for example Tyrannosaurus. FunkMonk (talk) 08:41, 28 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done

  • Foreign-language sources should be identified as such

How is this done?

Done, thanks. FunkMonk (talk) 13:14, 5 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Books need page numbers

Done.

  • Be consistent in whether you include locations for books

I will add locations to all.

  • FN20: formatting

I removed "/ by Richard Lydekker" from the title, if that's what you meant.

You mean the cite DOI template? They are bot generated, and have not been a problem in other articles.

  • FN33: need full citation

Done.

  • FN68: italicization

The title?

What do you mean? Page numbers? Should be there, if you're referring to Rothschild 1919. FunkMonk (talk) 01:35, 29 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment
All those Quote Boxes are out of place. The quotations are longish, but they should be indented quotes, because in almost every case they follow directly from the context of the article itself.
The quote boxes have the effect of breaking the article into bits, and disrupting, rather than flowing.
The purpose of quote boxes it to set aside a quotation that is relevant to the subject in some way, but is not itself expounding upon that subject. For example, in an article about a writer, one might place a particularly pithy paragraph that the subject had written, with a quote box, so that it is separated from the text. But a quote analysing the author's work, or commenting on him or relating an incident would simple be indented and within quotation marks.
So every quote box needs to go, except the one with the poem.

Amandajm (talk) 13:17, 1 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree. The 350 year old accounts of sailors to far flung lands are so open to interpretation that it is most prudent to let the reader see them for themselves to interpret. They also add alot of colour to the prose. I like them all but I suppose could lose the second one if any needed to be lost....Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:20, 1 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The quotation issue was discussed at length during the Rodrigues Solitaire FAC, which passed, see the discussion there[3]. As for this article, I have removed several quotes before, and I could sure remove a few more, perhaps one of those in the white Dodo section (not so relevant to this particular bird), as well as something else, the quote explaining how Dodo fossils were excavated can be paraphrased, since there isn't anything about Dodo behaviour or appearance which is up for interpretation. The quote about Dodos taken aboard a ship for food could also be paraphrased. But I disagree that most of the quotes should be removed, per my comments at the other FAC. The contemporary accounts are sometimes so inconsistent that paraphrasing them or interpreting would do more harm than good. FunkMonk (talk) 03:19, 2 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I have now paraphrased the Clark quote, as well as added some more relevant information I overlooked and left out before. FunkMonk (talk) 04:55, 2 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
After reading Amandajm's comment again, it seems that her issue is not the quotes themselves, but the boxes they're placed in. I have no opinion on that, but I originally used the block quote template, which does not create boxes. This was later changed by other users, so I assumed it was preferred. In any case, I actually think the sub fossil section is better off without the quote. It can now be found in the newly created Mare aux Songes article anyway. FunkMonk (talk) 05:08, 2 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Any more opinions on which quote template should be used? I like the current one, as it clearly separates the quotes from the main text. FunkMonk (talk) 04:12, 3 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'm with you and Cas, for what it's worth. The quotes are very much something that should be in the article, and this box is an excellent way to show them. J Milburn (talk) 22:21, 5 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I recall somewhere an MOS ruling that we should not use boxes around them, but I think the boxes are better visually for marking the text as separate from the prose as such, so I like them. Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:06, 5 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I agree, the presentation is better with the boxes, and Funkmonk's rationale makes sense to me too Jimfbleak - talk to me? 05:43, 6 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • The duplicate detector found the following overlinked in the body of the article (I.e. excluding infoboxes and the lead section): clade, ostrich, travel journal, terrestrial, clutch, Broad-billed Parrot, Mascarene, Dutch East India Company, Thirioux's Grey Parrot, Peter Mundy, London, Amsterdam, Surat, Red Rail, British Museum, Denmark/Danish, Richard Owen, skeleton, Roelant Savery.
  • Genetically nested within pigeons and doves — I don't like the use of nested here and later, it invites confusion in an article about a bird.
  • seasonal, however, and that individuals were fat during cool seasons, but slim during hot seasons — overuse of "seasons", also check for overuse of "bird" in this section"
  • encounters with Dodos made between the Dodo's discovery and its extinction — clunky, perhaps encounters with the Dodo between its discovery and its extinction?
  • Work the Maure aux Songes swamp has shown — missing word?
I'll fix those things. But to be honest, the article could use a copyedit, two different users already volunteered to copyedit it at different times, yet both simply vanished from Wikipedia before finishing half of it, so I just gave up and nominated it anyway... FunkMonk (talk) 18:04, 4 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Issues should be fixed now, is "grouped" better than nested? FunkMonk (talk) 18:21, 4 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I prefer it in this context. I've been fortunate in that my current nature reserve-type FAC and the previous two had enough military history in the dunes to persuade the Milhist project to copyedit, but I know that otherwise it can be tricky. I picked up the duplicate detector from them too, makes it easy to pick up overlinking in one's own articles as well as persecuting FAC candidates {: Jimfbleak - talk to me? 06:27, 5 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Where is the detector? And some kind of poem tags were wrapped around the Belloc quote in the culture section, but it hasn't done anything but break the reference template. Not sure what the goal was. FunkMonk (talk) 06:55, 5 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
That was me, and the issue with the ref is fixed. The point is to clean-up the markup of embedded break tags and leverage a CSS class. It also has the visible effect of a proper sized break between paragraphs. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 21:14, 7 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose on prose quality. Quite a lot of issues with the writing. A sample;

Done. I have also removed many other links that seemed redundant. Please elaborate on "etc".

    • " males being the largest" should be "larger"

Done.

    • lots of "actually"s and "however"s; benchmarks of poor writing. Also "In fact" and "notable"; these terms should not be used much if at all in an article

Done. Removed two "actuallys" (which were added during copy edit) and the "howevers". "In fact" was also added by a copy editor.

    • "the bird itself"; why "itself"?

Removed.

    • "26 museums worldwide"; don't start a sentence with a number

Reworded.

    • "Why is the bird's name capitalised? It looks especially awkward alongside mention of non-capitalised animals like cats and dogs.

See below.

"below" seems to be missing, but the reason for the caps is at WP:BIRDS#Bird names and article titles. --Stfg (talk) 20:47, 15 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • "the mid 19th century", "an island of 1,860 km2" and "up to 23-centimetres (9-inch) long"

Reworded.

I'll go along and fix those issues. Please list whatever other issues you have so I can fix them, as most of the problems mentioned appear to be very trivial and easily corrected. In fact, the first half of the article (where most of the problems mentioned are found) has already been copy edited twice by different editors ("overlinking" was done during copy edits), so I'm surprised there are still so many problems there. I find it almost comical that a new copy edit is needed to correct two previous copy edits. As for the name, bird names are always capitalised in Wikipedia articles, I think it's a policy of the bird wikiproject. FunkMonk (talk) 15:36, 8 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The issues have now been addressed, please express if the changes are satisfactory or not, and elaborate on whatever else you don't like, so the article can be improved. I have brought up the issue of the missing copy editors here.[4] I hope someone will have pity and come save the damn Dodo, if not from extinction, then from rejection. FunkMonk (talk) 16:02, 8 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The article is now being copy edited anew, and many of the suggestions above that I implemented have now been changed back to the former state (wording, wikilinks). I hope this goes to show that much of this is subjective, and should not have an impact on whether the article passes or not. FunkMonk (talk) 07:15, 9 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I now tentatively support following the major copyediting that has taken place. The writing still isn't perfect but I am confident it will be further improved in the normal editing process. --John (talk) 16:54, 9 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Stfg is now kindly giving it one more thorough copyedit, I hope it will address remaining concerns. FunkMonk (talk) 18:29, 16 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delegate's comments: I'd like to see some spotchecks for verification and to check for close-paraphrasing please. Graham Colm (talk) 18:49, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Spotchecks done I checked six of the references to sources that have on-line text, all looked OK to me Jimfbleak - talk to me? 07:42, 21 September 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.
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