Wikipedia:Featured article review/Ann Arbor, Michigan/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was kept 11:27, 3 March 2007.

Ann Arbor, Michigan[edit]

Messages left at Pentawing, Michigan, and Cities. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:50, 12 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As part of a WikiProject Cities review, I have rated the article as A Class. It is a well written article, includes many beautiful pictures and reasonable amount of sources. However:

  1. Find a GFDL replacement for Image:Ann-Arbor-City-Seal.png.
  2. Implement Citation templates for all references.
  3. Remove wikilink tags from broken/red wikilinks.
  4. Review images for sizing, excessive text and placement. Advise rm px sizing and left placement to improve readability.
  5. Review external links and bring article in line with policy.
  6. Reduce usage of subsections in favor of comprehensive paragraphs.
  7. Apply WP:LEAD guideline.

Alan.ca 13:24, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Alan. Please do not remove comments from pages. Also, every page goes through two weeks of review before being moved to FARC. Your specifics above are a great help, so let's see what we can do. Marskell 13:29, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Reagarding points 2 and 3, cite templates are not required for FA status, nor is removal of redlinks. References need to be correctly formatted, but that need not be via usage of WP:CITET. There are also external jumps, and WP:EL—while important—is a guideline, not a policy. So, re-phrasing, the lead, inline citations, reference formatting, Fair Use images, stubby prose, external jumps, and External link farm need attention. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:38, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • In regards to issue 1, you will never find a GFDL replacement. It's the seal of the city, and either the city holds the copyright on it and all derivatives, or they release it to the public domain. The only part of the logo that isn't currently meeting the FUC is the lack of fair use rationale, which shouldn't be hard to write. Jay32183 21:09, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, there are GFDL seal images, see Image:Seal of Los Angeles, California.svg Alan.ca 23:41, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Drawing your own version of something doesn't actually remove the original copyright. The copyright is on the seal, not a particular representation of the seal. Jay32183 23:51, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I'm not an expert in copyright, do you have a link of some kind that discusses topic. Alan.ca 02:18, 12 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think the rules for seals are similar to those of logos. Jay32183 19:50, 12 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I reviewed the logo article, but it doesn't mention anything about a seal. I can see how you might make the connection, but I think some research will need to be done before we can use this criteria. My understanding has been that a logo must bear a TM or R mark indicating it has been registered as such for it to remain protected. Alan.ca 13:39, 13 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Look at other city seals. I'm not sure the template that is used, but is one psecifically for governmental seals like this. *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 14:20, 13 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • The images in the text no longer contain a fixed width, they are set to use user-preference settings. Jay32183 22:05, 13 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • As the original nominator of this article for FA, here are my thoughts on improvements for the article:
Find a GFDL replacement for Image:Ann-Arbor-City-Seal.png.
Unless someone is willing to create an image and post it as GFDL, I have no problems with it. However, I would prefer someone who is skilled with graphics editing software to create a quality image.
Implement Citation templates for all references.
This might work out, though I am not familiar with all cite templates. If I recall correctly, such templates are not required for an article to achieve/retain FA status. At the same time, utilizing such templates can help the article achieve a more unified formatting when it comes to citations. If you believe in such, can you point out the citation templates list (or implement the changes)?
Remove wikilink tags from broken/red wikilinks.
Done (for now).
Review images for sizing, excessive text and placement. Advise rm px sizing and left placement to improve readability.
Is there another means of resizing images rather than px? It should be noted that the original images have different size attributes, and removing a uniform size for all images would create a distorted article format with regards to the images. The use of left placement is to stagger the images with respect to images' using right placement (this is particularly helpful for readers with low monitor resolutions, which would create excessive blank spaces if all images have the same image placements).
Review external links and bring article in line with policy.
Done, though one might want to do a double-check to make sure.
Reduce usage of subsections in favor of comprehensive paragraphs.
I believe the current state of the article's subsections is adequate and in no need of further editing. I think the use of subsections in this article actually improves the article's overall readability.
Apply WP:LEAD guideline.
I believe the lead is the best that I can possibly get at. This also applies to the general prose of the article, though having another Wikipedian copyedit the article for prose can help immensely.
PentawingTalk 05:02, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The GFDL replacement cannot be made. Ann Arbor owns the seal, not that drawing of the seal. I've already removed the px from all of the images. The word "thumb" is controlling their sizes based on user preferences. Jay32183 05:11, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Jay, can you provide a reference clarifying this issue? Alan.ca 11:50, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I asked the people at WP:COPYRIGHT and this was the discussion: Wikipedia talk:Copyrights#Question about seals. Jay32183 22:06, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My current concerns:

  1. I still have concerns about the images. I prefer default placement of thumbnails which is on the right side. However, if you want to alternate left and right, I have seen some preference for this layout. Unfortunately, when you use the 1 left, 1 right system, future editors often break the system by inserting an image that doesn't follow the pattern. Presently, there is no pattern to the image layout which detracts from the professionalism of the excellent content.
  2. "Ann Arbor's crime rate... " this section has a fact tag for citation needed. Please remove the statement or cite the reference.
  3. "Greenhills School, which is one the premier private schools in the state of Michigan", please remove or cite the source of the fact.
  4. As for the subsection issue, consider condensing the sections that have these subsections into well written, complete paragraphs. Watch out for one sentence paragraphs!
  5. External links section contains a blog link? Please remove the links that do not meet WP:EL.

Alan.ca 11:44, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've corrected the crime rate paragraph, and cited my sources. I also removed "premier" from the paragraph mentioning Greenhills School. -- Avenue 00:34, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I staggered all images (they use the right-left pattern). I also commented out the blog links in the external links section (though during the article's peer review there were some who insisted that such links be present in the section. Hence, I don't know how long those blog links stay commented out until someone else comes along). As for the subsection, can you be specific as to which sections you are thinking about? I should note that two other featured city articles (Canberra and Boston) use the same subsection formatting. PentawingTalk 03:45, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • This article is looking great! My subsection issue relates to: Ann_Arbor#Geography_and_climate, Ann_Arbor#Culture and Ann_Arbor#Infrastructure. In all 3 of these sections, it seems they would be better served by 3 to 4 well written paragraphs. If there is too much content to condense, I suggest putting that information in a forked article. This would serve to shorten the TOC and balance the article. Remember, people reading this article want well balanced coverage of the topic. The details on every kind of transportation in the city may not be so important in a main article like this. Alan.ca 11:40, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'll look at the subsection issue, though at the moment I don't think there is enough material that would warrant placing the details into sub-articles for now. PentawingTalk 20:28, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • After looking through the materials in the three sections, I would prefer the present sub-section formatting unless someone can provide a very compelling reason why such formatting should not be used. Otherwise, I believe this article should continue to maintain featured status since the other issues have been addressed and corrected. PentawingTalk 03:43, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • The citation formatting issues have not been addressed. Jay32183 03:45, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Which citations in particular? PentawingTalk 03:50, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • All of the websites need access dates, and the dates should be wikilinked for user preferences to work. Using {{cite web}} rather than trying to type them out may make this easier. Jay32183 03:57, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
              • The access date may pose a problem (since others have placed them so I am not sure exactly when those sites were accessed). Any suggestions? PentawingTalk 04:00, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
                • Never mind. I have started to do checks on the citations. If they are valid, I am posting the access date as the time that I rechecked the citations. PentawingTalk 04:19, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I still believe the culture and infrastructure sections can be condensed to 4 paragraphs. It's not necessary to list every street festival, especially those of which there is no reliable source. Under culture, you have 14 paragraphs, but only 4 referenced sources. This suggests WP:NOR is not being applied. Further, a paragraph should be at least 3 sentences in length and that's without getting into the grammar of a using complete paragraphs. I know it may seem that I am being particularly nit picky about these points, but FA articles are supposed to serve as an example of what an ideal article looks like. Alan.ca 13:31, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Citation formatting and sub-sections have now been taken care of. Anything else? PentawingTalk 00:09, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Excellent work everyone! I will be proud to reference this article as an example when reviewing other city articles. All of my concerns have been addressed and I believe this FAR is ready to close. Alan.ca 23:09, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Status. Well done here. We'll wait another day and see if there are any other issues, and close if not. Marskell 22:24, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Excellent article. I know what article I'm going to use as a template for the Woonsocket, Rhode Island FA push :). A few minor concerns:
    • "Located" — based on what I've seen, this can be considered redundant in many situations. For instance: "More contemporary-style houses are located farther from the downtown district." This is a subjective and perhaps overanalysis, so I'll leave it up to you guys for feedback.
    • Vague terms of size — "A number of Other art galleries exist in the city, notably in the downtown area and around the University of Michigan campus." The problem with "a number of" is that it can mean zero, one, negative eight million, fifty, twenty eight billion. "Several" at least implies more than zero or one, and in many cases, a vague term of size isn't needed. Other times, use shorter terms, like "several" or "many".
    • Redundant prepositions — "blocked off", etc.
    • Other issues — "over the course of", "...and contains a wide variety ofmany restaurants and performance venues".

I'll take care of these minor issues now; it's a very nice article! — Deckiller 23:09, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • I looked through the article and copyedited the wording as much as possible. However, if there were still wording problems, could you explicitly point them out if not correct them personally (what one might think is incorrect wording might not be seen the same way as someone else)? PentawingTalk 02:59, 23 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Sure; you've done a great job by the way. This article's format and coverage has inspired me to get to work on the Woonsocket article :) — Deckiller 10:19, 23 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'll give it a final pass tonight after school. However, it would be nice if a third person can weed other issues out. I think it's getting close, though, and I highly doubt this will be going to FARC. — Deckiller 12:44, 23 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I went through the wording again and checked it out (so far I believe the wording has been cleaned up). Anything else? PentawingTalk 23:41, 24 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • All set — I believe everything is passable now; there is no reason to move this to FARC. — Deckiller 13:22, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Close As the nominator, I agree all issues have been resolved. Alan.ca 16:10, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move to FARC. There are numerous references that are not completely specified in a thorough bibliographical format. There's no reason not to accurately complete them, and two weeks is long enough. All footnotes should include publisher as well as author and date of publication when available; a blue link to a website name (not always a correct site name) isn't adequate. Please take remaining time to correctly reference this article. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:54, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • It sounds like only an hour of work; I think the article can be held another day until the reference format is fixed. — Deckiller 16:58, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Close FAR and retain featured status.I looked over and corrected the citation formatting. However, most of the sources are lifted from websites that do not publish their information in article format, such as those of the Visitor and Convention Bureau and government organizations such as the U.S. Census Bureau. Hence, it is impossible to ascertain the authors of the passages (usually in websites, unless it is a personal website or one that produces content in article format (e.g. a website associated with a newspaper or a forum), the author is normally not disclosed). The same applies to time and date, which in that case I am using the copyrighted date as stated on the websites unless there is an explicit modification date stated elsewhere. PentawingTalk 21:11, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I think this can avoid FARC. I wouldn't call prose compelling, but it is passable, and everything else looks OK. It's a pity that you removed the redlinks though, redlinks are good. Yomanganitalk 16:03, 26 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Why are redlinks good? Alan.ca 03:38, 27 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Redlinks versus no link inspires editors to create new pages. Many editors would also rather develop an article from scratch in a sandbox than expand an existing stub. Jay32183 03:42, 27 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Referencing work looks good now, but why is ref number fourteen bolded? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:53, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • I split the two citations and removed the bolded text. On a second read, I realized that they could/should be cited separately. PentawingTalk 23:47, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Glad to see another successful review; nice job everyone. — Deckiller 00:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.
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