Talk:Joseph Smith/GA4

GA Review

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Reviewer: Shii (talk · contribs) 07:15, 25 October 2012 (UTC) GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose quality:

   The article gives all the important details of Smith's story that are relevant to the general public-- in other words, what Wikipedia is supposed to do. In the previous GA review, in early 2011, the lede was questioned; this is now fixed.

   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:

   And obviously so.

   C. No original research:

   This has been rigorously checked over the years.

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

   This article does the impossible: it presents Smith's life and his doctrine, and his impact on American culture, in the space of less than 100,000 words. I say that its current form is very well done. The aspects of Smith's doctrine chosen -- theology, ritual, family and polygamy (mergable?), politics, and ethics -- are precisely those that a general reader would want to know about from a neutral perspective.

   B. Focused:

   I consider this article as focused as a GA ought to be. FA has stricter requirements with regards to making each section small enough to be digested but I understand those would be very hard decisions with this article. The previous reviewer said that the article is too focused on Mormonism. This may be true, but Joseph Smith is famous as the founder of Mormonism. People do not come to this article to learn pointless trivia about his life. For future improvement, I recommend that the tiny details about Charles Anthon, Parly Pratt's memories, etc., be better condensed, but at present it is doing the job it needs to do.

4. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

   Readers of this article will either be Mormon or non-Mormon, and Wikipedians cannot help that. The article should present clearly determined facts with their appropriate context so that both kinds of readers understand why the article was written this way. For Mormon critiques I consulted FAIRMormon.org and found that (1) they considered the article "significantly improved" since 2009, (2) their current complaints are minor, and (3) they note that the article cites a number of critical sources, but do not find issues with the facts that those sources discuss. I therefore find that this article is widely considered neutral, even by serious Mormon apologists, which is quite an accomplishment.

5. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   Images in the "Revelations" section seem merely illustrative but this is not part of the GA criteria. Please consider this for FA.

   B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

   The "good article" standard applies to any and all articles with a complete and well-formed summary that would belong in a good encyclopedia. The previous reviewer was looking at a worse article, over a year ago, but he still gave the editors a hard time in what is supposed to be an informal process. This article is certainly a good article. I say it is very close to achieving the "featured" status. Congratulations to all editors involved and keep pushing this towards FA. Shii (tock) 07:15, 25 October 2012 (UTC)