Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article/February 23, 2016

Revert[edit]

Dank, regarding this revert, you said my edits didn't "work for you." That doesn't tell me much. The reason why I changed "followed by internment for more than five years as a prisoner of war" to "followed by more than five years as a prisoner of war" is because the removed words were superfluous. The reason why I changed "McCain graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1958, where his rebellious attitude resulted in a low standing" to "McCain attended the U.S. Naval Academy, where his rebellious attitude resulted in a low standing, and he graduated in 1958" is because it is more chronological and doesn't suggest that he was rebellious at his graduation ceremony. The reason why I changed "he was shot down over Hanoi and badly injured before becoming a prisoner of war" to "he was shot down over Hanoi incurring severe injuries, and was taken prisoner" is because it makes more clear that the injuries he sustained before becoming a prisoner were due to the crash rather than due to combat (of course he also sustained injuries immediately after being taken prisoner such as being bayoneted and having his shoulder crushed). The revert doesn't make sense to me, but whatever. I made about 6% of the edits to this article, but I guess will make 0% of the edits to this blurb. Cheers.Anythingyouwant (talk) 17:19, 13 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I've asked a couple of copyeditors if there's any chance someone might read the Naval Academy sentence to mean that he acted up at his graduation; they said "good lord no". "internment" is a matter of style, although I get your point that tighter would be better if nothing is sacrificed. But something is sacrificed: "years" isn't strictly parallel to "missions". I'm generally not enthusiastic about random style edits at TFA, because we're working on a deadline and this isn't article space. (But feel free to correct any errors.) Your third edit stranded the "there" in the next sentence, leaving it without an antecedent. Also, "incurred" is too weak a verb for this context ... think of the sentence "she incurred a rape", which is so vapid that it's vaguely offensive. But you make a good point about clarity about where the injuries were sustained, I'll fix that. Don't take anything here as discouragement from making any edit in article space anytime, and thanks kindly for your hard work on this vital article. - Dank (push to talk) 18:02, 13 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

On second thought, that sentence with "there" is another editor's, and I don't like it much, I'll combine it with the previous sentence. - Dank (push to talk) 18:05, 13 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I approve the edits you've made since this talk page got started, and thanks for explaining.Anythingyouwant (talk) 19:32, 13 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Great. Again ... none of the things I'm mentioning are "rules" for article space. They're part of my eight-year attempt to make sense of the preferences of GAN and FAC reviewers and writers. - Dank (push to talk) 02:45, 14 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]