Talk:Furry fandom/GA1
GA Review
[edit]GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
I put this article On Hold since a lot of work is required during the next time to meet the Good article criteria, especially in the fields of "MoS compliance" and "References to sources". I was not sure where to place some issues in this template. If my main concerns are met, I will have a second look at the article to perhaps find some less noticeable problems. So please do not take the green plusses for set in stone. However, the quality of the article is decent in its current state and it can surely be improved to meet all criteria.
- Is it well written?
- A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:
- % "Fictional work celebrated" inapprobriate wording
- B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:
- % There are way too many very short paragraphs with only one, two or three sentences.
% The lead does not provide a comprehensive overview over the main aspects of the article and thus violates WP:LEAD. Short summaries of other important information regarding the furry fandom in the various chapters of the article should be added.
% "live shows such as Rapid T. Rabbit and Friends and" external link in the prose
% "For example, Further Confusion has raised more than $62,000 (USD) for various charitable beneficiaries throughout its nine-year history,[38] and Anthrocon has donated more than $66,000 (USD) to animal-related charities since 1997.[39] In September 2004, Mephit Furmeet raised more than $15,000 for an organization known as Tiger Haven.[40]" redundant information
% The use of italic in titles like Second Life and and Everquest II is inconsistent.
- % There are way too many very short paragraphs with only one, two or three sentences.
- A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:
- Is it verifiable with no original research, as shown by a source spot-check?
- A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:
- % The following links in the references do not work: http://ranea.org/falf/articles/fanzines.html [14], http://vcl.com/ [19], http://kdka.com/local/local_story_167193226.html [36], http://www.arclight.net/~yarf/YARF_Chronology.html [8] and http://www.thecornernews.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=AUC/MGArticle/AUC_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1137836454751 [55].
% There is a big number of links to external websites lacking at least a publisher and a retrieval date (if available, more information like author, date of creation, etc. would be even better of course).
% It should be always clear, if a source (like [4] Dagna, Justin (2005). Fera Vita: Pax Draconis. Technicraft.) is a book, a scientific paper or an article.
% There are two [citation needed] in the article.
% "The fandom contains a relatively large portion of people reporting homosexuality, bisexuality or other forms of alternative sexual relationships." There should be percent numbers to give more precise information.
% "Heterosexual furries may participate in mixed-gender social body language between members of the same sex without being confused in their sexual identity." This needs a reference directly after the sentence.
- % The following links in the references do not work: http://ranea.org/falf/articles/fanzines.html [14], http://vcl.com/ [19], http://kdka.com/local/local_story_167193226.html [36], http://www.arclight.net/~yarf/YARF_Chronology.html [8] and http://www.thecornernews.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=AUC/MGArticle/AUC_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1137836454751 [55].
- B. Reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose):
- C. It contains no original research:
- D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:
- A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:
- Is it broad in its coverage?
- A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:
- % The chapter about the history of the furry fandom does not cover more recent events, which is particularly interesting since the fandom has grown so much in recent years.
% There is no information about the worldwide situation of the furry fandom. I think that there are some interesting differences in the history and the social structure of the furry fandom in Europe.
% The following information does not belong in the chapter about "Art and literature": Although mammals are most commonly depicted, anthropomorphized reptiles, birds or aquatic animals may also be known as furries (or "scalies",[16] "avians",[17] or "aquatics" respectively).
% There should be some information about the communities on art archives and personal blogs which are an important aspect of the fandom.
- % The chapter about the history of the furry fandom does not cover more recent events, which is particularly interesting since the fandom has grown so much in recent years.
- B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):
- "The Milwaukee Brewers had a run-in" This anecdote is really not that important that a whole paragraph should be used for it. One sentence might be even enough. Why is Jim Powell's opinion relevant at all?
I pass this because this issue can be easily fixed.
- "The Milwaukee Brewers had a run-in" This anecdote is really not that important that a whole paragraph should be used for it. One sentence might be even enough. Why is Jim Powell's opinion relevant at all?
- A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:
- Is it neutral?
- It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
- The chapter "Media coverage" looks like it has been written by a furry fan who wanted to defend the fandom against accusations in the media trying the hardest to meet WP:NPOV by carefully selecting his sources.
- It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
- Is it stable?
- It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
- It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
- Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?
- A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:
- B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
- A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:
- Overall:
- Pass or Fail:
- Good luck with improving this article!
- Pass or Fail:
--Novil Ariandis (talk) 20:18, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
GA - Adjustment per review
[edit]First off, thank you for your efforts, Novil Ariandis. Further comments on your review would be appreciated.
Below will be the possible improvements or questions regarding the article improvement as outlined by GA review. --Draco 2k (talk) 21:47, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
Non-vital: wording in the lead. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
What do fans do with their subject of liking anyway?
|
- There are way too many very short paragraphs with only one, two or three sentences.
How can we avoid this without meshing together vastly different subject data in one paragraph?
- GR: Rather than doing that, expand each paragraph with relevant related information. The article can always get bigger. It will have to grow eventually, might as well get closer to "comprehensive" now.
- Well, that's the problem - we only have sources on so much things. Maybe I'm just not too good at finding them though. --Draco 2k (talk) 23:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
- Feedback: Sorry, but there does no acceptable excuse exist to not find a way to connect them better to create a better reading flow. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 15:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- Currently, small paragraphs are used to solve this problem - there's just too much data of vastly different quality in one place. Ideally, this is solved by extending the article like GreenReaper suggested.
- Anyone have ideas about what to do with this? --Draco 2k (talk) 17:57, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- The lead does not provide a comprehensive overview over the main aspects of the article and thus violates WP:LEAD.
Feedback needed: Do we need to present all six different aspects in the lead?
- No (see below) --Novil Ariandis (talk) 21:45, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
- GR: This is one area we can perhaps mishmash different areas in one paragraph, but if done it needs to be done so that the transition is reasonable. I've had practice at that; if people want to write it as big as they deem necessary to get everything in, I can trim it down. ;-)
- Short summaries of other important information regarding the furry fandom in the various chapters of the article should be added.
Feedback needed: What important information?
- Please have a look at Wikipedia:LEAD#Provide_an_accessible_overview. The lead should contain the most important aspects of the main body of the article. Information like "In the past, the media has often focused on the sexual component of the furry fandom. After claims that these portrayals are misconceptions by furry fans, a more balanced coverage has recently been established." I just came up with this and it is probably not a very good summary of the "Media" chapter (nor "good" prose), but it should indicate what sort of information the lead should contain. Writing a short lead which covers all important parts of the article is VERY difficult! However, nobody expects wonders in a "Good article". --Novil Ariandis (talk) 21:45, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
Adjusted: replaced link with internal one and italised titles. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Propose link removal.
|
Adjusted: removed trivia; reworded and done other minor edits. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Feedback needed: How is this redundant?
|
Adjusted: moved trivia to Furry convention. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Deleted excerpt above could be incorporated into the Furry convention article. This article could also make use of some stuff from it. I'm incredibly tempted to round down the "over 9,900" attendees to the fourth digit. --Draco 2k (talk) 01:34, 4 September 2008 (UTC) |
Adjusted: revised use of italics throughout the article. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Feedback needed: "Inconsistent" in what sense?
|
Adjusted: added archive.org mirrors to references as per citation templates; removed one reference due to unavailability. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Feedback needed: Certain websites cited are no longer available, but are still verifiable through archive.org.
Looks like some sites are still on-line. Thanks, Dajagr!
All links adjusted or appended with archive.org mirror as per template. Removed one reference due to unavailability. Removed reference below. --Draco 2k (talk) 19:54, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
|
- There is a big number of links to external websites lacking at least a publisher and a retrieval date (if available, more information like author, date of creation, etc. would be even better of course).
Easy adjustment.
- I have no idea what to do with this, or the one below. Barring any excuses I could come up with (screen resolution, plain-text mess, citation templates, etc.), is there a syntax highlighter or WYSIWYG editor for this sort of task? --Draco 2k (talk) 19:41, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
- It should be always clear, if a source (like [4] Dagna, Justin (2005). Fera Vita: Pax Draconis. Technicraft.) is a book, a scientific paper or an article.
Easy adjustment.
Non-vital: two unsourced statements. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Of little importance. |
Adjusted: "19-25% of the fandom members report homosexuality, 37-48% report bisexuality and 3-8% other forms of alternative sexual relationships." |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Easy adjustment.
|
Note: never round down statistics. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
|
Adjusted: duplicated reference provided after to follow the respective sentence. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
There are two references used to back up two sentences. Should be easy to verify and adjust.
|
Adjusted: removed trivia as per WP:NOTABILITY. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
|
- The chapter about the history of the furry fandom does not cover more recent events, which is particularly interesting since the fandom has grown so much in recent years.
Google or Wikifur should help out with this.
- GR: Agreed; this is really just a matter of updating the details, I'm not sure there's been that many major changes.
- Google and Wikifur did not help out with this. And no sources mean no coverage. Is it really needed? Could someone do a double-take on this? --Draco 2k (talk) 23:49, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
- Feedback: I think that it is quite important at least to mention stuff like conventions now being visited by thousands of people instead of several dozen. The source(s) do(es) not have to specifically deal with the "history of the furry fandom", just contain information related to it. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 15:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- This might help a bit. --Draco 2k (talk) 17:57, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- There is no information about the worldwide situation of the furry fandom. I think that there are some interesting differences in the history and the social structure of the furry fandom in Europe.
Feedback needed: Sources on this could be impossible to acquire. The media coverage of the furry fandom currently seems to be too scarce to provide such details.
- GR: We could ask the European furs to contribute but there's an issue of original research there. See WikiFur:Timeline of media coverage which includes some foreign media? There certainly are differences.
- Here's a fair bit of media coverage from the recent Eurofurence. GreenReaper (talk) 00:51, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- Good. Of course, we can't establish the differences as per WP:OR, and there's just not enough material either way. This sounds like it'd do nicely in Furry convention though. --Draco 2k (talk) 01:41, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- Feedback: I know that this is tricky and it is not a must. I will try to write two or three sentences about the situation in Germany, at least. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 15:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for your help! --Draco 2k (talk) 17:57, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Adjusted: removed claim as per WP:OR and WP:NOTABILITY. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
The following information does not belong in the chapter about "Art and literature": Although mammals are most commonly depicted, anthropomorphized reptiles, birds or aquatic animals may also be known as furries (or "scalies",[16] "avians",[17] or "aquatics" respectively). Feedback needed: Why doesn't it belong there?
|
- GR: It also appeared vague because "may also be known" applies to people too - mixing the concept of the identity of furs with the artistic depiction of them.
- We really have remarkably little sources on people's fursonas to begin with. --Draco 2k (talk) 23:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
- Feedback: It does not belong into the chapter about art, because it is, mainly, relevant as a form of identification. That fursonas are not just avatars like those of P&P-players should really be made more clear in the article. It is a very important part of the fandom. This information could be added in the "Roleplaying" chapter. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 15:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- Sadly, we don't have any reliable sources to claim that. Fact is, "fursona" doesn't really have a clear meaning even inside the fandom. --Draco 2k (talk) 17:57, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- Since there are now quite some articles in local newspapers and other media coverage, I find it hard to believe that there are no sources available for the claim that furries often identify strongly with their avatar. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 18:31, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
- This something noone will be able to prove off the bat. The only thing I can suggest is trying Googling this yourself, but, as a reviewer, you are not expected to, or should perform any contributions to the article. Besides, it'd be impolite, so there's just my word to it.
- I've been unsuccessful in this task so far, as seemingly were other editors that ever contributed to this article. In fact, I haven't even been able to find a concrete definition of the term even among the first-party sources.
- Best I can propose is inserting this as an OR and adding a [citation needed] template afterwards, since GA qualifications allow for one or two of these in the article. Failing that, no sources mean no mention, and no relevance. --Draco 2k (talk) 19:20, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
- About recent edit: does the article cited really reference definition of "fursona"?.. If so, thanks a bunch, and good job.
- If not, however, it'll have to go as per WP:OR. That, and current revision does not logically follow since there's no associative definition of "fursona" given previously (and on-line journals are not reliable sources when it comes to statistical claims, universal claims, or, indeed, definitions of words). --Draco 2k (talk) 20:02, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
- There should be some information about the communities on art archives and personal blogs which are an important aspect of the fandom.
Feedback needed: Reliable second- of third-party sources on this seem to be very hard to acquire. Can we cite first-party ones here?
- GR: Right. We've been dinged for bad sources before. Art archives have historically refused media comment; there's been the occasional interview, but not on very reliable websites. If primary sources are acceptable (the sort that would not be acceptable for establishing the notability of a separate article) then we can do this well. Other than that the closest we have as a reference are things like WikiFur, blog posts, or websites of questionable notability.
- Feedback: I think that this topic is so important to the understanding of the furry fandom, that first-party sources are okay if no halfway decent secondary sources can be found. Possible, not too obscure, sources are Alexa stats for art archives (to show how big they are), interviews with important members of the furry fandom (like the main staff of conventions) or articles by such furries in anthro magazines. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 15:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- This isn't good. VCL and Furaffinity don't actually seem to have a centralised reporting system - so the only "news" there is about them comes from Wikifur, and DeviantArt uses administrator's personal blogs as main sources for announcements on things, if at all. Same for any remotely published interviews, though I haven't found any remotely notable ones, personally.
- Alexa does monitor FA and VCL though, here and here. --Draco 2k (talk) 20:35, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Adjusted: replaced with "Milwaukee Brewers broadcaster Jim Powell was sharing a hotel with Anthrocon 2007 attendees a day before the convention and reported a negative opinion of the furries." |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Proposing removal.
|
Non-vital: POV in Media section. |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Feedback needed: We won't know what to fix if it's not named directly. Clarify?
|
Comment
[edit]Althoug some improvements have been made in the first days after my initial assessment (definitely a good thing), the article does not meet the Good article criteria at the moment. Except for ongoing content issues (Is the article broad enough? Are the sources reliable?), the two most obvious current problems are the lead (see above) and the references which lack necessary meta-information. If no substantial improvements are made in these two regards, I will fail the nomination in a few days. --Novil Ariandis (talk) 18:06, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
- ^ Anthropomorphic Arts and Education. "AAE, Inc. - What we do". Retrieved 2006-08-26.
- ^ Harris, Brian, Anthrocon Charity Auction Director. "Anthrocon Charity Auction FAQ". Retrieved 2006-08-26.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ "Mephit Furmeet website". Retrieved 2005-02-04.
- ^ Brandolph, Adam (June 28, 2008). "Furry convention a $3 million cash cow for city businesses". Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Retrieved 2008-07-04.
{{cite news}}
: Check date values in:|date=
(help) - ^ Carpenter, Mackenzie (July 7, 2007). "Anthrocons convention turns city into 'real zoo'". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Retrieved 2007-07-14.
{{cite news}}
: Check date values in:|date=
(help) - ^ Cite error: The named reference
TribReview
was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Cite error: The named reference
FirstSurvey
was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Al Kratina (2007-07-26). "Finally comfortable in their own fur". Montreal Gazette. Retrieved 2007-07-28.
- ^ "Avians.net". Retrieved 2007-08-28.