A fact from 2008 Universal Studios fire appeared on Wikipedia's
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check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
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The article links to Patti Smyth but there is no artist by that name. I can see the error comes from the NYT article. Is it Patty Smyth or Patti Smith? - Lopifalko ( talk) 06:33, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
I was curious if anyone had noticed if there were artists on Rosen's list that did not have Wikipedia articles. Chubbles ( talk) 14:26, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
Per FoxyGrandpa75 (h/t), here are the remaining artists without articles:
I may try to write one or more of these if I can find enough. Chubbles ( talk) 01:56, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
I'm not sure if any of the artists without articles need one or not, just listing for completion's sake. Doc Strange Mailbox Logbook 14:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
I guess the recently assessed Low importance ratings for the WikiProjects this article is currently a part of make sense, but shouldn't this article now be added to the appropriate music project as well? I would expect it to rate at least Mid importance in that context, if not High, given how much musical history was lost in this fire. -- Dan Harkless ( talk) 01:48, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
The list of artists affected in this article is now over 500; there are some 700 named in Rosen's full list. Is there any reason not to fill this out with the full list? Chubbles ( talk) 02:45, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
Shouldn't this be "2008 Universal Studios fire"? I mean, maybe LA locals call it "Universal" for short, but to the rest of the world - and I stress there is a rest of the world - the word "universal" means: pertaining to the universe. -- Jack of Oz [pleasantries] 18:49, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
The rationale is rather obnoxiously presumptuous about why the article was named as it was; the rest of the world does not capitalize Universal in colloquial usage. But I nevertheless support the renaming, as it more closely mirrors the name of the corporation. Chubbles ( talk) 02:00, 15 July 2019 (UTC)
Why do we need the year? Have there been other Universal Studios fires? The current title suggests so. Surtsicna ( talk) 09:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
I also commend to your attention the logic that carried the day in a discussion which did end with the contrary result over at Talk:Schoharie limousine crash (scroll down to where it starts). The argument for including the year in that article's title was that, for transportation disasters where the vehicle or trip being taken does not have some sort of unique identifier like a name or flight number, a year helps readers remember what the article is about even if it is not necessary for disambiguation. However, for that article those of us who opposed the year in the title carried the day since limousine crashes with two-digit death tolls are rather unusual and don't require a year to jog the memory (bus crashes, on the other hand, did).
Here, since fires at warehouses are actually rather common, I can support using the year. Daniel Case ( talk) 17:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
Re the recent edits to the list included in the intro and discussion about whether we should have it: I think summary style here dictates that we not name any artists, perhaps instead just giving a rough count. I could see naming a specific artist if, say, all or nearly all of their masters were found to have been lost Hah! Love that twist of phrasing! , but as noted, as is, it is an open invite to add everybody's favorite affected band. Daniel Case ( talk) 17:27, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
As of 6:14pm EST Sept 15, 2019 the article contains this sentence: QUOTE: On August 28, 2019, Universal ordered Soundgarden to back out of the lawsuit, but the surviving band members declined. UNQUOTE I mean, Wikipedia, who in God's name do you have reviewing your stuff before it goes live? I'm NOT an attorney. I have NO specialized knowledge. I just read a newspaper or watch a YouTube from CNN or NBCNews every now and then. But even someone who is as ignorant as I am knows that Defendant does not get to order a Plaintiff to back out of a lawsuit. A JUDGE might "order" it (i.e. dismiss), but when YOU get sued YOU are not in a position to order Plaintiff to so much as blink. How does someone NOT know that? Why does Wikipedia let this drivel get into print? And the source cited doesn't back up the contention that Universal had binding authority under law to issue such an order. 74.64.104.99 ( talk) 22:18, 15 September 2019 (UTC)Christopher L. Simpson
You are correct that defendants can't exactly "order" this; this is yet another demonstration of the pitfalls of letting people who don't totally understand how court proceedings work write about court proceedings. Or at least the late Frank Zappa's observation that rock journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk for people who can't read .
It would be nice if we could find another source on this, and indeed Rolling Stone reports it more plausibly, first referring us to Variety's story that broke this, which reports that Universal claims it has documentary proof that Soundgarden and the other bands were notified about the lost masters within days of the fire, instead of letting the band learn about it through the Times Magazine article as the band claimed. It quotes the studio's attorney at some length:
In a declaration, Scott Edelman, an attorney for UMG, wrote: "I informed Plaintiffs' counsel that UMG had discovered written correspondence with Soundgarden belying Plaintiffs' allegation that to this day, UMG has failed to inform Plaintiffs whether any of their Master Recordings had been destroyed in the fire. Specifically, I noted that UMG expressly told Soundgarden over four years ago that UMG had lost in the fire two compiled album master 1⁄2 analog reels of one Soundgarden album 'Badmotorfinger' but that UMG was still able to issue a remastered release of this album with Soundgarden's knowledge and participation, using a digital audio tape safety copy." The letter continues, "I further explained to Pla UMG currently has 1301 assets in its vault related to Soundgarden and that only 21 assets were impacted by the fire, none of which were multitrack masters.
"I have previously written you as to why you should immediately drop the other plaintiffs besides Soundgarden," he concludes, "because UMG's investigation has confirmed that no original master recordings embodying their performances were lost in the fire. You should immediately drop Soundgarden as a plaintiff as well. As shown in the attached emails, they and their representatives have known since May 2015, at the latest, that UMG lost Soundgarden-related assets in the fire. That you would accuse UMG of fraud for failing to inform Soundgarden of loss from the fire shines a bright light on your failure to conduct pre-suit diligence in your rush to be the first to file."
" Gibson Dunn may be the biggest law firm in the world, but they are not the judge," he tells Rolling Stone. "Their arbitrary deadlines have zero force or effect. Until UMG reveals what it collected for their litigation claims to extensive damage to master recordings, we cannot accept their belated claim that no damages were actually suffered."
Anyhow, I suggest that at the very least we amend this sentence to substitute "demanded" for "ordered" and replace the Spin article with the Rolling Stone and Variety articles as cited sources.
Thank you, Mr. Simpson, for bringing this to our attention. Daniel Case ( talk) 19:57, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
What about Nat King Cole?
Nat King Cole recorded for Decca for a short time as a member of "Eddie Cole's Solid Swingers". In 1973, there was a two record album released by MCA Records called "Nat King Cole: From The Very Beginning". Can it be that Universal Music doesn't know anything about these particular recordings if they were lost in the 2008 fire? Eddie Cole also happens to be Nat's brother. Does anyone even know about these particular recordings if they were destroyed in the 2008 fire? Thanks in advance for any answers. Frschoonover ( talk) 23:02, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
Greetings, Wikipedia User:Daniel Case!
Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 ( talk) 23:08, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article ... Consideration should be given to creating interest in the article, but do not hint at startling facts without describing them.
What you would have us lead with:
Universal Studios Hollywood, a film studio and theme park in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles County, California, suffered major damage in a three-alarm fire which broke out on June 1, 2008. The extent of the damage has been the subject of conflicting reports.
is a little vague and short, no?
The nut of this story is the potential loss of so many master tapes, some of which may have had considerable historic value. You'd never get that from your version—there's not even the hint at startling facts. Your intro reads, frankly, more like a writing-class exercise in trying to fit the article into as few words as possible, which has its uses in developing concision but is not what most other article leads read like, not when they've been developed to the extent this one has.
Consider also what MOS:LEAD does say: "The lead is the first thing most people will read upon arriving at an article, and may be the only portion of the article that they read." For that reason I have always described the lead as "the executive summary of the article". Since the writer is generally limited to four grafs, I think we can err in that direction here. Certainly an abstract would also have more information than your intro does. Daniel Case ( talk) 05:44, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
I think we should remove single-sentence mentions in articles about musicians and other performers who were listed by Jody Rosen in the 2019 piece published by The New York Times Magazine. An example may be seen at the Jimmy Dorsey biography.
The problem with these single-sentence entries is that the list of artists published over two weeks by Jody Rosen was shown to be exaggerated. As an example, Joe Jackson was listed as having lost tapes but this was later contradicted by a UMG confirmation that his tapes were not destroyed. [9] Nirvana, Smash Mouth, the Tragically Hip and Sheryl Crow stated that the listing was in error—they had not lost any tapes. Beck said some of his session tapes were lost but no master tapes.
The lawsuit by Steve Earle, Tupac Shakur, Tom Petty, Hole and Soundgarden was dismissed after most of the artists' master tapes were shown to exist. The huge list by Jody Rosen was proved to be an exaggeration.
We should continue to discuss the fire and tape damage for artists that responded to the issue, describing for the reader how they responded, citing later sources. We should always mention the fire in cases where multiple sources confirm that a recording was lost. Binksternet ( talk) 16:06, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
Two weeks later, Rosen wrote a follow-up article, listing at least 700 additional artists named in internal UMG documents as possibly affected. Determining which recordings had been destroyed, or how much of an artist's discography had been affected, was impossible, he wrote. For example, Rosen said it was difficult to confirm whether the Neil Young recordings listed in the documents were the original master tapes of the albums he recorded for Geffen Records in the 1980s, or session outtakes from those records.
Recently, we got another studio fire is Warner Bros. Studios. I know it had nothing to do with Universal, but it's other news. Stephenfisher2001 ( talk) 15:10, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
A fact from 2008 Universal Studios fire appeared on Wikipedia's
Main Page in the
Did you know column on 31 July 2019 (
check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
|
This article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
The article links to Patti Smyth but there is no artist by that name. I can see the error comes from the NYT article. Is it Patty Smyth or Patti Smith? - Lopifalko ( talk) 06:33, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
I was curious if anyone had noticed if there were artists on Rosen's list that did not have Wikipedia articles. Chubbles ( talk) 14:26, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
Per FoxyGrandpa75 (h/t), here are the remaining artists without articles:
I may try to write one or more of these if I can find enough. Chubbles ( talk) 01:56, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
I'm not sure if any of the artists without articles need one or not, just listing for completion's sake. Doc Strange Mailbox Logbook 14:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
I guess the recently assessed Low importance ratings for the WikiProjects this article is currently a part of make sense, but shouldn't this article now be added to the appropriate music project as well? I would expect it to rate at least Mid importance in that context, if not High, given how much musical history was lost in this fire. -- Dan Harkless ( talk) 01:48, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
The list of artists affected in this article is now over 500; there are some 700 named in Rosen's full list. Is there any reason not to fill this out with the full list? Chubbles ( talk) 02:45, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
Shouldn't this be "2008 Universal Studios fire"? I mean, maybe LA locals call it "Universal" for short, but to the rest of the world - and I stress there is a rest of the world - the word "universal" means: pertaining to the universe. -- Jack of Oz [pleasantries] 18:49, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
The rationale is rather obnoxiously presumptuous about why the article was named as it was; the rest of the world does not capitalize Universal in colloquial usage. But I nevertheless support the renaming, as it more closely mirrors the name of the corporation. Chubbles ( talk) 02:00, 15 July 2019 (UTC)
Why do we need the year? Have there been other Universal Studios fires? The current title suggests so. Surtsicna ( talk) 09:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
I also commend to your attention the logic that carried the day in a discussion which did end with the contrary result over at Talk:Schoharie limousine crash (scroll down to where it starts). The argument for including the year in that article's title was that, for transportation disasters where the vehicle or trip being taken does not have some sort of unique identifier like a name or flight number, a year helps readers remember what the article is about even if it is not necessary for disambiguation. However, for that article those of us who opposed the year in the title carried the day since limousine crashes with two-digit death tolls are rather unusual and don't require a year to jog the memory (bus crashes, on the other hand, did).
Here, since fires at warehouses are actually rather common, I can support using the year. Daniel Case ( talk) 17:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
Re the recent edits to the list included in the intro and discussion about whether we should have it: I think summary style here dictates that we not name any artists, perhaps instead just giving a rough count. I could see naming a specific artist if, say, all or nearly all of their masters were found to have been lost Hah! Love that twist of phrasing! , but as noted, as is, it is an open invite to add everybody's favorite affected band. Daniel Case ( talk) 17:27, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
As of 6:14pm EST Sept 15, 2019 the article contains this sentence: QUOTE: On August 28, 2019, Universal ordered Soundgarden to back out of the lawsuit, but the surviving band members declined. UNQUOTE I mean, Wikipedia, who in God's name do you have reviewing your stuff before it goes live? I'm NOT an attorney. I have NO specialized knowledge. I just read a newspaper or watch a YouTube from CNN or NBCNews every now and then. But even someone who is as ignorant as I am knows that Defendant does not get to order a Plaintiff to back out of a lawsuit. A JUDGE might "order" it (i.e. dismiss), but when YOU get sued YOU are not in a position to order Plaintiff to so much as blink. How does someone NOT know that? Why does Wikipedia let this drivel get into print? And the source cited doesn't back up the contention that Universal had binding authority under law to issue such an order. 74.64.104.99 ( talk) 22:18, 15 September 2019 (UTC)Christopher L. Simpson
You are correct that defendants can't exactly "order" this; this is yet another demonstration of the pitfalls of letting people who don't totally understand how court proceedings work write about court proceedings. Or at least the late Frank Zappa's observation that rock journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk for people who can't read .
It would be nice if we could find another source on this, and indeed Rolling Stone reports it more plausibly, first referring us to Variety's story that broke this, which reports that Universal claims it has documentary proof that Soundgarden and the other bands were notified about the lost masters within days of the fire, instead of letting the band learn about it through the Times Magazine article as the band claimed. It quotes the studio's attorney at some length:
In a declaration, Scott Edelman, an attorney for UMG, wrote: "I informed Plaintiffs' counsel that UMG had discovered written correspondence with Soundgarden belying Plaintiffs' allegation that to this day, UMG has failed to inform Plaintiffs whether any of their Master Recordings had been destroyed in the fire. Specifically, I noted that UMG expressly told Soundgarden over four years ago that UMG had lost in the fire two compiled album master 1⁄2 analog reels of one Soundgarden album 'Badmotorfinger' but that UMG was still able to issue a remastered release of this album with Soundgarden's knowledge and participation, using a digital audio tape safety copy." The letter continues, "I further explained to Pla UMG currently has 1301 assets in its vault related to Soundgarden and that only 21 assets were impacted by the fire, none of which were multitrack masters.
"I have previously written you as to why you should immediately drop the other plaintiffs besides Soundgarden," he concludes, "because UMG's investigation has confirmed that no original master recordings embodying their performances were lost in the fire. You should immediately drop Soundgarden as a plaintiff as well. As shown in the attached emails, they and their representatives have known since May 2015, at the latest, that UMG lost Soundgarden-related assets in the fire. That you would accuse UMG of fraud for failing to inform Soundgarden of loss from the fire shines a bright light on your failure to conduct pre-suit diligence in your rush to be the first to file."
" Gibson Dunn may be the biggest law firm in the world, but they are not the judge," he tells Rolling Stone. "Their arbitrary deadlines have zero force or effect. Until UMG reveals what it collected for their litigation claims to extensive damage to master recordings, we cannot accept their belated claim that no damages were actually suffered."
Anyhow, I suggest that at the very least we amend this sentence to substitute "demanded" for "ordered" and replace the Spin article with the Rolling Stone and Variety articles as cited sources.
Thank you, Mr. Simpson, for bringing this to our attention. Daniel Case ( talk) 19:57, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
What about Nat King Cole?
Nat King Cole recorded for Decca for a short time as a member of "Eddie Cole's Solid Swingers". In 1973, there was a two record album released by MCA Records called "Nat King Cole: From The Very Beginning". Can it be that Universal Music doesn't know anything about these particular recordings if they were lost in the 2008 fire? Eddie Cole also happens to be Nat's brother. Does anyone even know about these particular recordings if they were destroyed in the 2008 fire? Thanks in advance for any answers. Frschoonover ( talk) 23:02, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
Greetings, Wikipedia User:Daniel Case!
Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 ( talk) 23:08, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article ... Consideration should be given to creating interest in the article, but do not hint at startling facts without describing them.
What you would have us lead with:
Universal Studios Hollywood, a film studio and theme park in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles County, California, suffered major damage in a three-alarm fire which broke out on June 1, 2008. The extent of the damage has been the subject of conflicting reports.
is a little vague and short, no?
The nut of this story is the potential loss of so many master tapes, some of which may have had considerable historic value. You'd never get that from your version—there's not even the hint at startling facts. Your intro reads, frankly, more like a writing-class exercise in trying to fit the article into as few words as possible, which has its uses in developing concision but is not what most other article leads read like, not when they've been developed to the extent this one has.
Consider also what MOS:LEAD does say: "The lead is the first thing most people will read upon arriving at an article, and may be the only portion of the article that they read." For that reason I have always described the lead as "the executive summary of the article". Since the writer is generally limited to four grafs, I think we can err in that direction here. Certainly an abstract would also have more information than your intro does. Daniel Case ( talk) 05:44, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
I think we should remove single-sentence mentions in articles about musicians and other performers who were listed by Jody Rosen in the 2019 piece published by The New York Times Magazine. An example may be seen at the Jimmy Dorsey biography.
The problem with these single-sentence entries is that the list of artists published over two weeks by Jody Rosen was shown to be exaggerated. As an example, Joe Jackson was listed as having lost tapes but this was later contradicted by a UMG confirmation that his tapes were not destroyed. [9] Nirvana, Smash Mouth, the Tragically Hip and Sheryl Crow stated that the listing was in error—they had not lost any tapes. Beck said some of his session tapes were lost but no master tapes.
The lawsuit by Steve Earle, Tupac Shakur, Tom Petty, Hole and Soundgarden was dismissed after most of the artists' master tapes were shown to exist. The huge list by Jody Rosen was proved to be an exaggeration.
We should continue to discuss the fire and tape damage for artists that responded to the issue, describing for the reader how they responded, citing later sources. We should always mention the fire in cases where multiple sources confirm that a recording was lost. Binksternet ( talk) 16:06, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
Two weeks later, Rosen wrote a follow-up article, listing at least 700 additional artists named in internal UMG documents as possibly affected. Determining which recordings had been destroyed, or how much of an artist's discography had been affected, was impossible, he wrote. For example, Rosen said it was difficult to confirm whether the Neil Young recordings listed in the documents were the original master tapes of the albums he recorded for Geffen Records in the 1980s, or session outtakes from those records.
Recently, we got another studio fire is Warner Bros. Studios. I know it had nothing to do with Universal, but it's other news. Stephenfisher2001 ( talk) 15:10, 2 July 2023 (UTC)