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Talk:Whitby/GA1

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GA Review

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Reviewer: SilkTork (talk · contribs) 16:49, 29 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'll take a look and start to leave some comments within the next few days. I am taking on board a batch of reviews, so it may be some time before I start to comment. I am also by nature a fairly slow and thorough reviewer who likes to check out sources, so this is unlikely to be quick. However, I am always willing to help out on the editing, and will make direct minor adjustments myself rather than list them. I always welcome discussion, and see the review process as entirely collaborative. SilkTork ✔Tea time 16:49, 29 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I shall be away from my computer until Sunday 2nd October so no rush.--Harkey (talk) 17:40, 29 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Tick list

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GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

  1. Is it reasonably well written?
    A. Prose quality:
    B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:
  2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?
    A. References to sources:
    B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:
    C. No original research:
  3. Is it broad in its coverage?
    A. Major aspects:
    B. Focused:
  4. Is it neutral?
    Fair representation without bias:
  5. Is it stable?
    No edit wars, etc:
  6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?
    A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:
    B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:
  7. Overall:
    Pass or Fail:

Comments

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  • Not a GA issue, but the lead image is quite poor - it is dark and poorly framed, with a lot of car park in the foreground,; considering how many more meaningful and attractive images there are of Whitby, why is it being used? SilkTork ✔Tea time 18:54, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • The captions are acceptable, but not very interesting. Rather than just "Old Town Hall", how about something a little more informative - "The Old Town Hall was built in 1788 by Jonathan Pickernell", for example. SilkTork ✔Tea time 18:54, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • The lead needs building up per WP:Lead. The lead should be an overview of the whole article - in general, get a summary of each section into the lead. Generally it's good to get the main points about the topic into the first paragraph. The distance of Whitby from York is not as notable a piece of information as the town's connection with Dracula, for example. SilkTork ✔Tea time 19:01, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • The prose is clear and readable and conveys the information. It meets the GA criteria. However, as part of the ongoing development of the article the prose could be made to engage the reader's attention and flow more smoothly. This is helped by making decisions on how much information to give - sometimes it is better to flesh out a detail before moving on to the next piece of information, and perhaps to drop minor pieces of information in order to expand on more important pieces. Sometimes it helps to link sentences so that they flow together more. Constructing sentences so that the active parts are on the main topic also helps. For example, in the sentence: "In 867, Vikings from Denmark landed 2 miles (3.2 km) west of Whitby ...." the active elements are the Vikings, and that they landed. However, the key information is the sacking of the Abbey. The following sentence appears disjointed as it begins: "After the Norman Conquest of 1066 the land was granted to William de Percy ....". The key element is the refounding of the monastery, but that comes later in the sentence. By bringing the key elements to the fore, and making them the active parts of the sentence the reader is more engaged, and understanding is assisted. The monastery was destroyed between 867 and 870 by a series of Viking raids under Ingwar and Ubba. It remained desolate until 1078 when William de Percy enabled it to be refounded as a Benedictine house dedicated to St Peter and St Hilda by giving the monks the land around the abbey that had been granted to him after the Norman Conquest in 1066. While rewriting that, I looked at the inline sources for extra information. I found that the information in the sentences was mostly not supported by the sources. Sometimes inline sources are moved around during successive re-writings. I'm unclear how this supports that William de Percy gave land so that the monastery could be refounded as a Benedictine house dedicated to St Peter and St Hilda, and I assume an inline source has been moved around. Also, this does not appear to support a landing 2 miles west of Whitby at Raven's Hill. SilkTork ✔Tea time 21:50, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • There are a number of short paragraphs, and at times the detail seems to wander into the trivial: "A foghorn situated on the end of the west pier extension sounds a blast every 30 seconds during fog"; and "The harbour is sheltered by the east and west piers on which there are lighthouses and beacons at the entrance, all with fixed lights, the east beacon shows red and the west shows green". A bit of tightening up would benefit the article. It might be worth asking the folks at Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors if they'd have a quick look. SilkTork ✔Tea time 22:20, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]


On hold

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I haven't checked sources yet for accuracy and appropriate coverage, but I'll put this on hold now for an initial seven days to allow contributors time to work on the lead. Any questions or queries, please give me a ping. SilkTork ✔Tea time 22:22, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you.--Harkey (talk) 07:57, 11 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Per WP:Lead, "the notability of the article's subject is usually established in the first few sentences", that is the essential facts that every reader should know about Whitby. Can you put into a couple of sentences the most important facts about Whitby? Possibilities include Dracula, Whitby Abbey, fossils, jet, maritime heritage, tourism and fishing, Captain Cook, Caedmon. Some things go together well - fossils and jet as local minerals?, Whitby Abbey and Caedmon, maritime heritage and Captain Cook, and the tourism would link the Victorian seaside resort aspects with the North York Moors national park and the heritage coastline, and perhaps Dracula? SilkTork ✔Tea time 06:55, 15 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm looking to close this today. Areas I'm focusing on are the lead, the early history - including prehistory, and the amount of detail in various sections to ensure that it is not excessive or disproportionate. SilkTork ✔Tea time 11:37, 20 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The sentences following on from the above are a virtual copy-paste from YHPlan - this indicates that it is possible that close paraphrasing from sources has been employed in other areas of the article. The main contributors will hopefully be able to remember which sources they followed too closely and be able to go through the article and make the appropriate adjustments without too much trouble. It would take longer if I checked every single source - there are 151 cites! SilkTork ✔Tea time 15:22, 20 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hold

The article is almost there. The lead still needs some work, and the article could do with a bit of a tighten and tidy; but nothing really major, and I'll be OK with either passing as it, or doing the minor work that needs doing when I next read through. The hold is to address the good faith copyvio issues mentioned above. The idea when consulting sources is to take the information and write it up in your own words. If there are opinions being given, then these are best put into quotes and the author named in the article. This avoids giving the impression that Wikipedia is passing off someone else's considered opinions as general knowledge. SilkTork ✔Tea time 15:22, 20 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Some more good work has been done since I last looked. Well done! However, I am still concerned at some copyvio incidents. I've just checked and found another copy and paste - page 23: "The catch consists mainly of cod, plaice, whiting, haddock, lemon sole, dogfish and skate, generally caught within 12 miles of the coast." Wikipedia article: "The commercial catch consists mainly of cod, plaice, whiting, haddock, lemon sole, dogfish and skate, generally caught within 12 miles (19 km) of the coast." Such copying has no doubt been done in good faith, however it is against policy and has recently been added as part of GA criteria. This article now satisfies all the GA criteria, apart from that one. It would be helpful for someone to take responsibility to check the sources to ensure there are no more examples of copyright violations. I'll put on hold again for another seven days. SilkTork ✔Tea time 14:17, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've had a go at that one but to be 100% honest I'm not too sure about how to check for more. I'll make a start reading the refs but can't guarantee the results.--J3Mrs (talk) 16:46, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks J3Mrs. Yes, it can be time-consuming to check for copying. During the discussion on including a check for copyvio during a GA review, some tools were mentioned - there is a link to this, though I haven't followed up on that myself. What I do is look at a statement within an article, then read the source to make sure that what is said in the article is suppported by the source - while reading the source it generally stands out if the language is the same. It helps if the citation gives the exact page number, though you can usually get to the right section by looking at content pages, and/or by scanning the text for keywords. With this article there are a lot of cites, so it may take a while. It might help to work out something with the other main contributors - so each person becomes responsible for just one or two sections. SilkTork ✔Tea time 09:01, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, thanks for that, it looks like Harkey has homed in on some. I've looked at quite a few refs now and copyedited a bit (though not necessarily copyvios). I'll keep doing a bit.--J3Mrs (talk) 09:08, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Cool. SilkTork ✔Tea time 09:10, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have gone through the refs and have finished, just before I lost the will to live. Hope it's ok now.--J3Mrs (talk) 10:56, 27 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
How do you know I drink tea? I do, but not sweet. I usually celebrate with a glass of wine & a piece of cake but it's too early :-) Thanks for the green dot for a truly collaborative effort. Whitby is one of my favourite places.--J3Mrs (talk) 08:15, 29 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Never too early for cake! I've visited Whitby twice, and it made a deep impression on me both times. SilkTork ✔Tea time 09:13, 29 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bothams of Whitby do a really good cake (by post). But that could be POV or OR. J3Mrs deserves one (at least!) for Christmas. Thanks.--Harkey (talk) 11:50, 29 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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