Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Burger King legal issues/archive2

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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 not promoted by User:SandyGeorgia 19:58, 8 November 2008 [1].

Burger King legal issues[edit]

Nominator: Jerem43 (talk)

This is a renomination of the article. I have addressed the issues that were raised in the previous FAC and the subsequent Peer Review and now believe that is of sufficient quality to become a FA. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 02:42, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I don't think starting off with "As with other multi-national corporations," adds value. This article is about Burger King's legal issues, not about those of other corps. Giggy (talk) 03:27, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Images

Other than that images check out fine (though they don't look too healthy). Giggy (talk) 03:33, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I removed the as with... statement, the link worked OK for me. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 04:37, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • How do the three cases commented out above See also impact 1b, comprehensive? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:11, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
They are three major cases that affect the governance of franchise relations, all of which have set major, national precedents in the United States; one reached the US Supreme Court. I am working it on my talk pages at User:Jerem43/BKli. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 23:22, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
They're still commented out of the article. Is the article comprehensive without them? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:40, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments -

Otherwise sources look okay, links checked out withe link checker tool. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:42, 21 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Replies to your concerns:
  • Hoovers is an investment research company, please see the AllBusiness reference below for a fuller explanation.
  • I have no idea as that is not a citation I added, and it is actually part of the info box and not the article itself. However the site says that all information was provided by Morningstar, Inc., a respect investing information company and publisher. I have updated the citation to reflect the actual source of the data as opposed to the reprinted form found at zenobank. This will affect all pages with the {{Infobox Burger King}} template on them.
  • AllBusiness, and its commercial sibling Hoovers, is an online business informational publisher owned and operated by Dun & Bradstreet, one of the largest and most respected financial information clearing houses in the world.
  • Outside the Beltway is an example of how critics responded to the Islamic uproar over the ice cream label, it is an op-ed piece that confirms the existence of negative criticism.
  • ZESB is a major, international law firm based in Florida; this is a reprint of an article published in the Miami Daily Business Review. I tweaked the citation to include the original publisher to clarify it a little.
  • Allens Arthur Robinson is a major, international law firm based in Australia; this is a professional analysis of the case detailing how the decision may affect contract law in that country.
  • I will have to research and recreate the link. The page moved, I recreated the link.
I will notify you once I have corrected the last point. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 05:06, 22 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'll leave these out for other reviewers to decide for themselves. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:40, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments on lead -

  • Shouldn't Burger King or something in the first sentence be bolded per WP:MOS#First sentences?
  • The second paragraph in the lead is two really long sentences. Would it be possible/practical to split them up? Just a suggestion...
  • In the third paragraph of the lead, can "Occupied Territories" be wikilinked? I don't know where that is or I'd do it for you. :)
  • Third sentence, third paragraph of the lead: which countries does "the revocation of Burger King's business licenses in these Islamic countries" refer to?
  • Fourth sentence, third paragraph of lead: I don't think "whose" can be used to refer to the results of a lawsuit...

I'll get to the rest ASAP. Here's a copyedit I did. :) Intothewoods29 (talk) 01:07, 22 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Replies to you concerns:
  • I had it bolded it, but another contributor took it out; I reinstated it.
  • It is pair of very complex sentences, I will look into copy editing them a little. I copy edited the second paragraph so that it is not a pair of huge run-on sentences.
  • Wikilink goodness added...
  • Those countries listed in the linked article, Arab League, in the first half of the sentence. I reworded it to make the subject a bit clearer.
  • I changed out the whose, it really only applies to sentient beings.
Thanks for the catches. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 05:06, 22 October 2008 (UTC), updated 04:45, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The style of this article is quite turgid, and the article provides little insight. Take for instance this sentence from the lead: "Controversies and disputes with groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) over the welfare of animals, governmental and social agencies over health issues and compliance with nutritional labeling laws, and unions and trade groups over labor relations and laws, have touched on concepts of animal rights, corporate responsibility and ethics, as well as social justice." It mixes a bunch of issues in an unintelligible statement. The article is also full of peacock terms, e.g. "The opening of a Burger King location in the Israeli-occupied territories lead to a breach of contract dispute between Burger King and its Israeli franchise; the dispute eventually erupted into a geopolitical conflagration involving Muslim and Jewish groups on multiple continents over the application of and adherence to international law." Geopolitical conflagration? Really? What international law is this referring to? VG ☎ 11:13, 22 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To respond to your comments, I believe that there are no peacock statements in this article; the use of complex wording does not equate to peacock statements. Just as you state turgid instead of stiff in your criticism, my use of the term geopolitical conflagration just means that the was an international political dispute in which tempers flared and heated words were exchanged and is no different. Also, you are confusing the lead with the article as a whole, if you read the section the lead refers to you will discover the full history behind the dispute and what I am referring to. The article does not need to go into the specifics about the history of the Israeli-occupied territories, the six day war, the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict, or the list of United Nations resolutions concerning Israel; that is covered and explained through the Wikilinks that are in both the lead and body of the article.
As I stated previously, I will look into editing down the second paragraph so that it is a structured little less complexly. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 14:49, 22 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments on Nutrition section -

  • The first sentence of 2nd paragraph of Animal welfare: What is Burger King Holding, from "PETA went before Burger King Holding's board"??
  • Second sentence, same paragraph: What is tack? Is it a form of "tactic" that I'm unfamiliar with?
  • Third sentence, same paragraph: you say PETA presented its case in 2006, then you say that the protest was in 2007. Was there a separate protest, or is it supposed to mean that BK responded in 2007? Intothewoods29 (talk) 21:33, 22 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to your comments
  • That is a typo, the parent company of BK is Burger King Holdings and the apostrophe should be after the 's', not before it. I corrected it.
  • Tack is a synonym for tactic, the definition is An approach, especially one of a series of changing approaches.
  • The sentence is unclear, I reworded it so that it says BK responded in 2007 to the protest.
Good catch, thanks... --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 01:03, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I'd really like this article to moved from such an informal title. Perhaps something like "Legal issues involving Burger King". --Golbez (talk) 07:03, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Reply -
I believe that the current naming is in line with the WP:Naming policy, however it consensus prefers your proposal over the current name I would have no issue with the change. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 16:49, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • About Rudzewicz, I'm not sure what the appropriate depth of coverage is. This doesn't seem like a very important lawsuit for a major company, except for the fact that it reached the US Supreme Court and then became an important precedent. Why not just limit this article to that point?--chaser - t 08:19, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Reply - I do not quite understand the point you are making, so I will respond to what I believe you are asking; If I am wrong please feel free to correct me.
The three included cases are all precedent setting in their nature, the two in the US and the one in Australia. SCOTUS cases are important because of their impact on the US legal system as a whole. The MacShara decision established legal precedents for franchise contracts that all US-based franchisors and franchisees must adhere to, regardless of industry. I personally believe this major case does merit inclusion because of that, that is why I included it in the article. The Hoots decision is equally important because it prevents major companies from harassing smaller or independent operators with an established business. In my hometown there is a sub shop called the Subway that has been in business since 1963; the Hoots decision prevents Doctor's Associates from suing the owners of this small sub shack for trademark infringement over the name Subway. The Hungry Jacks decision is important because it introduced a foreign legal concept to the Australian legal system where it did not exist before, basically a game changer for the Aussie law system. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 16:49, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"game changer" I believe that we call the concept and actualisation of the precedent set by a Court (overseas or otherwise) case law in Australian Courts. But, the point is not lost. Petedavo talk contributions 16:07, 1 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment, section "Labor", paragraph five: "Besides the trolling incident, several terse, stridently worded e-mails were sent from a possibly fictitious employee at the BK global headquarters in Miami to supporters and media groups". Should readers be expected to be familiar with Internet terms such as "trolling"? --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 15:40, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to your concerns -
I Wikilinked the term earlier in the paragraph, I believe that is all that is required to help inform readers of the term. If I am incorrect please feel free to correct the passage or tell me what needs to be done to correct the issue. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 16:49, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I actually didn't notice that you had wikilinked it earlier. I slightly dislike having to read a seperate article to understand a concept which is pivotal to understand in order to get any sense out of a section of text. However, it should be sufficient. --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 18:45, 27 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I fixed the broken link, thanks for pointing it out. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 16:54, 2 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for fixing the broken link! —Mattisse (Talk) 02:48, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I don't understand why the section on animal welfare is in an article on legal issues. It reports embarrassments and board meetings and agreements. These don't seem to be legal issues. If there have been any, they need more visibility. In the section on nutrition, paragraphs discuss arguments, scorn and agreements; these again are not themselves legal issues. If the focus of the article is to be clearly on legal issues (the subject announced by the title), the material should be removed or its relevance clarified.
    • Separately, the section on nutrition has a sentence "Since its purchase in 2002, the company has . . ." However, it's not clear what the company purchased in 2002 that's relevant to this paragraph. Fg2 (talk) 10:49, 2 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Replies to your concerns -
The subject of this article is about legal issues that the company has come up against over the course of its history. Now, legal issues are not just lawsuits, they cover a gamut of legal topics including:
  • Contracts - a legally binding agreement between parties
  • Animal rights - the legal standing of animals in our society and what rights they have as living creatures
  • How the company complies with laws in the various regions it does business
Each of the points you raised concerns one or more of the three areas I just listed, which are all legal issues; this is stated in the lead of the article.
The Animal welfare section is about PETA and its quest to broaden animal rights and address animal cruelty in the livestock industry by targeting the companies who purchase products from the livestock producers. The PETA tactics include protests as well as going before the companies board as a stock holder and requesting changes to company policies. It also involves contract law because BK changed entered into a signed, binding agreement with PETA to address the issue. The agreement had the company change the wording and requirements of the contracts it enters into with the livestock dealers and producers.
The nutrition section deals with legal compliance to nutrition laws, as well as the law suits against the company over the health issues concerning its products. The section includes coverage of the CSPI lawsuit against the company over trans-fats, how the company worked in partnership with the mayor's office to create compliance laws in New York City over the publication of nutritional information, and how the company came into conflict with the government of Spain over portion sizes and nutritional content and the possible legal implications and sanctions that the Spaniards threatened the company with.
Regarding the Since its purchase... comment, that was a left over from when the article was split off from the main Burger King article. It referred to a section in the original article's history section covering the sale of the company in 2002, I clarified the sentence to show who was the purchaser and who was the seller. Than you for pointing that out.
--Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 16:42, 2 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dead link, it was unnecessary and I deleted it; the ISBN link works. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 05:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. This article seems to focus on a lot of controversy unrelated to legal issues. This could be a simple matter of poor article naming, but it appears as though two distinct topics are merged in a single article. Controversies with little to no relation to legal issues are present in the article. Similarly, though not of a concern in relation to the article topic, legal issues with little to no relation to controversies are present in the article. A featured article should focus nigh exclusively on the article topic. Controversial issues should only be raised in an article about "legal issues" when reliable sources clearly and explicitly relate to the matters to that topic. Similarly, an article about "controversies" should only raise legal issues when reliable sources clearly and explicitly relate the matter as a controversy or directly linked to recognized controversies. As it stands, this is an article about two distinct topics that lacks focus as an article about either one. Vassyana (talk) 09:05, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - I found the article very interesting and clearly written, but I see Vassyana's point and have been thinking about naming alternatives. Burger King disputes? According to one dictionary, a "controversy" is "a prolonged public dispute, debate, or contention; disputation concerning a matter of opinion". Perhaps changing the term "controversies" in the article to something else like "Legal compliance issues"? The article is not that long, but I suppose it could be divided into a separate "Burger King legal issues" and "Burger King controversies". —Mattisse (Talk) 20:46, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. The prose in this article does not meet the FA criteria. I have left a few examples below, but this needs a full copyedit to tighten the prose as much as possible.

  • The prose is unnecessarily wordy- "Situations involving these many legal topics have affected almost every aspect of the company's operations. " could be "These legal issues have affected almost every aspect of the compan'y operations". Example 2: " Using a different tactic, one that went beyond stating that the procedure is more humane," could be "Rather than employ their usual tactic of emphasizing humane treatment, PETA..."
    • Make sure that every word is actually needed in the sentence. The entire article is just way too wordy, which makes it harder to read and makes it not flow very well.
  • The lead seems too long. You could probably trim the wording without losing any of the facts that are being presented.
  • "On June 28, 2001, Burger King agreed with the group and" - is that factually true? Did they actually "agree" with the group or did they just give in to the group's demands - those are two very different concepts
  • "that its suppliers were conforming to agreed-upon standards of animal welfare" - who were the parties to the "Agreed-upon" standard setting? Just PETA and BK?
  • This sentence is either too long, too detailed, or worded in a bad way (I haven't been able to make up my mind): "In 2006, PETA went before corporate parent Burger King Holdings' board during its annual board meeting to request that the company ensured its suppliers switched to a more humane method of slaughter, called controlled atmosphere killing (CAK), in the preparation of its poultry products. "
  • "Responding in March 2007 to this new protest - was that actually a protest? I question the word choice
  • There are misspellings in the article (verb tenses, it rather than its, etc) - those are harder to catch, I know
  • I echo the concerns above that the article content is not focused towards its title. Either the title needs to be changed, or some of the content needs to go in a different article.
  • Watch for pronoun agreement- "A 1985 agreement with the New York city public health commissioner's office, over publication of nutritional data regarding the food it sells" - the logical antecedent of "it" is "the New York city public health commissioner's office)
  • The nutrition section needs a little better organization. It discusses Spanish concerns of the BK XXL, then it goes back to 1985 agreement about how to display nutritional information, then it returns to the BK XXL in Spain.
  • "the Spanish Health Ministry publicly claimed that the company had violated a voluntary agreement between the company and the Spanish Federation of Hoteliers and Restaurateurs, a group to which Burger King belongs' - I'm totally confused to who were the parties to the agreement....this is an awkward sentence
  • "The Minister of Health, Elena Salgado, claimed that the new promotion" - this is the first time the promotion is mentioned - perhaps it should be introduced at some point earlier? (introduction of sandwich != promotion of sandwich)
  • need a quote directly at end of sentence with quotes (like "illegally failing to comply with a contract") even if that means duplicating a cite in subsequent sentences
  • TwoThree different parent companies are named - Burger King Holdins and Burger King Brands and Burger King Corporation. If the name is changing, perhaps it would be best to just refer to "the parent company" rather than a specific name?
  • "As of August 1, 2008, Burger King has introduced the product line in the United States, but not the broiled Chicken Tenders product available in the United Kingdom and Ireland" - this is awkwardly worded. The assumption from the previous text in this paragraph was that the broiled chicken tenders were part of the product line.
  • There is little to no cohesion between sections in this article. Each section seems very self-contained and there is nothing to bring it together with the other sections.
  • The first dispute in the Islam section is part of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, it not about Islam per se. I would split that out into a different section, and name the rest "religious issues/religion" so that the article is not singling out a particular religion.
  • "and its relevance to Shariah" - what relevance to Shariah?
  • This sentence is so complicated I had to read it multiple times to figure out what it was trying to say "This event, Akhtar's reaction and other similar issues with companies such as Nike and Unilever have been used by conservative political critics, such as James Joyner, claiming that western nations and organizations are kowtowing too easily to Muslims' claims or threats and by commentators, including author Daniel C. Dennett, highlighting how factions of the Islamic faith gravitate towards iconoclasm.["
  • I am concerned that three particular legal cases are covered (as "cases of note"). Why pick these three out of all the cases they've probably been involved in? Instead of highlighting just a few, why not provide a broader view of the types of cases they've been involved in and how that has, as a whole, impacted the company?
  • "As a result, Burger King provided the Australian franchisee, Jack Cowin, with a list of possible alternative names " - this seems awfully arbitrary and makes it sound like they just ordered the guy to change his company's name. Perhaps that could be better worded?
  • I am confused as to whether the Australian stores were opened under the Burger King or Hungry Jack's name. Could that be made more clear?
  • Way too much detail in some sections: as an example: "After MacShara attended four months of training courses at the regional Burger King training facilities in Michigan and in the Florida headquarters on how to operate and administer a Burger King franchise" - that whole clause could go away and the reader would have the same understanding of what was happening.

Karanacs (talk) 18:52, 7 November 2008 (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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