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Reviewer: SilkTork * YES! 23:09, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
I've long had an interest in Sutton Hoo - so it would be good to find out a bit more while doing a review. My views and general approach to Good Article reviews are
here. I welcome and value discussion. I've not yet read the article, but had a quick glance at it. It looks neat and tidy and fairly comprehensive. There's an impressive list of print sources at the end. I feel encouraged that it will be a scholarly and informative read. A quibble is that the lead looks rather short for such an important topic. It is helpful if the lead section is an independent summary of the topic rather than an introduction - see
WP:Lead for some guidance on that.
I'll take a look over the next few days and then start to give my initial comments. If there are no readily available sources online for Sutton Hoo, it may take a while to complete the review while I order material from my local library. The Bruce-Mitford guide looks to be the main source, and it would be interesting to delve into that. SilkTork * YES! 23:09, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
But I had better see if Dr Eehbahgum is willing to participate before making any changes. Johnbod ( talk) 01:02, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
An observation - it's not a GA requirement, but can be helpful for both the student and general reader - is that much material is available online these days - especially on Google Books, and can be linked to, so a reader can check a source at the click of a button, and read the information in context. Very few of the cites are linked - are none of the significant Sutton Hoo sources online? I also noticed that one source I looked at randomly, "Bruce-Mitford 1975, 488–577" did not easily relate to the texts listed in the bibliography - it took a few moments to decide that it probably referred to "R.L.S. Bruce-Mitford et al., The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial (3 Vols in 4) (British Museum, London 1975, 1978, 1983)." I think that is because there are three dates given, and a scan read just picks up the last date. These cite presentation comments are not going to impact on the review - they are just my individual comments on my initial experience. SilkTork * YES! 23:09, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
I just took a look at Google Books - there are a number of books on Sutton Hoo. This one - Sutton Hoo: the excavation of a royal ship-burial - looks useful, and is online. It does look like a boat was discovered in Barrow 2 in 1938. SilkTork * YES! 09:26, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
Initial impressions are that this is an informative and helpful article, rich in detail, with few problems. Some tightening of prose and presentation is probably all that it needs. I will read it more carefully and give more detailed comments later. SilkTork * YES! 10:44, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
There is much to like and admire about this article; however, the more I look at it the more difficulty I have with it. There is a fair amount of information and detail, though I find that the organisation and presentation of that information is not as clear and helpful as it could be. It is vague about the discovery and excavation of the ship burial; it doesn't give an appropriate and helpful history of excavations on the site; the prose style is not appropriate (or helpful) for the general reader of an encyclopedia; the presentation of the images makes the article look messy and cluttered; the sectioning also makes the article look cluttered, and doesn't aid flow and ease of reading; some of the detail in the Ship-burial section is too intricate - there is valuable information contained there, but it is not being brought forward. This on the purse, for example:
The purse, with ornamental lid covering a lost leather pouch, hung from the waist-belt. The lid consists of a kidney-shaped cellwork frame enclosing a sheet of horn, on which were mounted pairs of exquisite garnet cellwork plaques depicting predatory birds, wolves devouring men, geometric motifs, and a double panel showing horses or animals with interlaced extremities. The maker derived these images from the ornament of the Swedish-style helmets and shield-mounts. In his work they are transferred into the cellwork medium with dazzling technical and artistic virtuosity. These are therefore the work of a master-goldsmith of his age who had access to an East Anglian armoury containing the objects used as pattern sources. As an ensemble they enabled the patron to appear in an imperial persona, and expressed his authority and resources to do so.
Most of the important detail on the purse is already covered in Purse Cover from Sutton Hoo Burial, and so a very brief, clear summary is all that is needed.
As there is much reliance on a single source I feel it appropriate to check out that source, so I have ordered Bruce-Mitford's The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial, along with Green's book and John Preston's The Dig.
I am putting the review on hold until I have those books and done some background reading and checking of facts. This is likely to be at least two weeks. In the meantime things to consider and work on:
Please feel free to ping me on my talkpage or by email in regard to any of these issues, and also to nudge me if there have been developments, or it appears I am not paying attention. SilkTork * YES! 09:59, 12 August 2010 (UTC)
I'll start putting comments here. These may be random at first, and I'll organise them into sections later if needed. SilkTork * YES! 19:22, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
The first caption mentions the parallel between finds in Swedish barrows, particularly Vendel, and Sutton Hoo. The Bruce-Mitford handbook I have is the 1968 version which has no index so that will delay me in finding the right information, but luckily in this case there is a chapter devoted to the connection. There are also several mentions in the Charles Green book. This connection seems to be of some importance - indeed Bruce-Mitford says it has "special significance". Though there are other mentions of the Vendel connection in the article, I feel a section on the connection would be helpful, and that would also be the appropriate place to have an image with a caption pointing out the similarity of the goods found (perhaps with an example from Vendel if possible). The caption of the lead image might be more helpful in simply pointing out that the helmet was one of the objects found at Sutton Hoo - and to put it into perspective for the general reader it is appropriate to mention that it was restored, so the reader doesn't get the impression that the helmet was intact. If there is room, it might be appropriate to mention that it was restored by the metalwork expert Herbert Maryon (who should have a Wikipedia entry, if anyone is interested in creating one!). SilkTork * YES! 19:22, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
I'm becoming happier with the layout and related MoS issues. I'll leave the Lead to last, and will also then make a final check through of use of punctuation and bullet points, etc.
I have placed the second helmet in the Vendel section so a side by side comparison can be made, and also because when the contents list was hidden (and some people have it hidden as a default) the image would push down into the first section displacing the text and image there.
I have made a crude separation of Beowulf and the east Sweden graves - I will do some research on these matters so I can tidy, perhaps expand a bit more, and perhaps provide some accessible reliable sources. SilkTork * YES! 17:28, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
I am concerned at the size of the ship-burial section compared to the whole of the article. At this point the article contains 7806 words of readable prose (not Wiki code or refs), of which 2666 are the ship-burial section, which is just over 1/3 of the article. Wikipedia:Article size does recommend breaking out sections using WP:Summary style when readable prose starts getting more than 6,000 words, or the printable version is more than 10 pages (this is 17 pages). I think a Sutton Hoo ship-burial article containing all the ship-burial section here (leaving behind a useful summary), with a brief Lead putting it in context, could be useful - and items from the burial could be dealt with in greater detail. I would think that Purse Cover from Sutton Hoo Burial would be better off merged into such an article, as it contains only one paragraph of new material - the rest being lengthy context which is best dealt with in this article. SilkTork * YES! 18:12, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
Readers may tire of reading a page much longer than about 30 to 50 KB, which roughly corresponds to 6,000 to 10,000 words of readable prose. If an article is significantly longer than that, it may benefit the reader to move some sections to other articles and replace them with summaries (see Wikipedia:Summary style).
Readers may tire of reading a page much longer than about 30 to 50 KB, which roughly corresponds to 6,000 to 10,000 words of readable prose. If an article is significantly longer than that, it may benefit the reader to move some sections to other articles and replace them with summaries (see Wikipedia:Summary style).
You said: "... Wikipedia:Article size does recommend breaking out sections using WP:Summary style when readable prose starts getting more than 6,000 words, ...." - a very different thing. In fact I'm sure most FAs are longer than this. Taking in mind Hamiltonstone's comment just above, I don't think "Reducing the ship-burial to a 600 word summary" is an option. If anything has to be moved off it should probably be either the history of the 1939-40 excavation, or the later excavations. Perhaps one could do Achaeological investigations at Sutton Hoo? But since the article is still at an acceptable size it is better to keep it as it is. Once you break out a sub-article you can't in any way assume that "readers will be going there from this one" - most won't, especially as links will typically go to the most specific article. How many readers actually bother to follow through to "main article" links anyway? Johnbod ( talk) 13:26, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
Those who wish to read more detail. That's the idea, and it works. See Wikipedia:Summary style for a helpful overview - there are links there which point to other guidelines giving more information. It's your option if you wish to click on them to get more detail, and you may elect not to get more detail - though the links are there if you wish to follow them. As an example - the Kraków article has a number of sub-articles, and the number of hits each gets varies - Education in Kraków gets 200 hits a month, Local government gets 450, Culture in Kraków and Transport in Kraków both get around 1,000, while the Old Town gets 1,300. People decide for themselves what they want more information on. Bear in mind that people are coming to a general encyclopaedia for a general overview - if they wish for greater detail they will go to the main texts. We are not writing for experts, or for people who already know about the topic - we are writing for those who wish to get a reasonably quick general feel for the topic - though, of course, experts and those who already know they topic will read (and hopefully improve) the article. The lead will provide a very brief overview and the main body will provide more detail broken into sections, and for even greater detail we move to sub-articles. The system works well. (We don't have figures for how many people just read the lead, and it would be an interesting research topic, as there is a feeling that the majority of readers don't go beyond the lead - or will read the lead and selected sections.)
I will say that I am not 100% convinced that the Ship-burial needs a sub-article, but I am "concerned", and I feel the issue needs to be aired. Summary style is an integral way that Wikipedia works, and the general principle is that when an article is reaching a detail density (which will vary from article to article, with more technical articles requiring more frequent summary splits than easy to understand articles) we move some of the detail to a sub-article. The situation here is that I am concerned that the Ship-burial has reached a counter-productive detail density and so readers will skip over it and thus not get a general feel for the importance of the objects found there.
Please note that I am not just saying that this article is too long, but that the Ship-burial section is too detailed. Removing other material (though possibly quite valid in and of itself) does not address the issue of the detail density of the Ship-burial section. I am clearly not explaining myself well, and I apologise for that. Essentially I would rather we discussed the actual detail density of the Ship-burial section and the best way of dealing with it, rather than the general principle of summary style splitting. If I am still not clear, please let me know and I will spend a bit more time formulating an answer. SilkTork * YES! 15:18, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
The Raedwald section looks very short now, & I can't locate the history around him. Have you cut the three paragraphs beginning: "During the later 6th century when the various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms...", "In c 616 he was challenged by the Northumbrian ruler Æthelfrith,..." and "Rædwald did not establish unequivocal Christian rule,..."? I think you have, with the edit summary "(mostly layout - some MoS issues as well)"! [2]. Please do not do things like this! Being a GA reviewer is not a licence to make major changes to an article without consultation, or even leaving an adequate edit summary saying what you have done. You have never even mentioned this issue above. Johnbod ( talk) 00:51, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
I'm not clear on the relevance of Raedwald's history to the article. Information about why he is considered to be the probable king, and any scholarly speculation on other possible kings would be worthwhile (and more on that would be welcome), but the personal history appears to me to be colouring rather than encyclopaedic. A link to the article about Raedwald seems to me to be sufficient. I have concerns about focus in other areas of the article - the detail on the surroundings/location is questionable, as is the detail on the discovery and on the ship-burial itself. The selection of material can be difficult on some articles. The more important, complex and less clearly defined a topic, the more difficult it is to get the scope and focus right. For example, a standard album release of a band is easier to write a Good Article on than the band's most important and acclaimed album, which is in turn easier than an article on the band itself, which in turn is easier than the musical genre the band play. It is also more difficult when doing a GA review to look at cutting material than adding it. If we had arrived at this article without the detail that we already have, I doubt we would be feeling that it needed more personal detail on Raedwald, more personal detail on Basil Brown, such as that his "smallholding had failed four years earlier", etc. The temptation when editing an article is to put in little bits of information as discovered. My place when reviewing an article for GA is to look at those little bits and independently give a judgement as to if the bits are valuable encyclopaedic detail or local colouring that might be considered "unnecessary detail" as in 3 (a) of the GA criteria. WP:DETAIL gives a bit more background. On the whole people are more tolerant of extended detail when it is interesting and there are no sub or parent articles to which the detail can be moved. I am more tolerant of background detail on the location as I don't see a useful article which can be linked to which will provide the same detail, but I less tolerant of potential "unnecessary detail" when there is an article which can be (and is already) linked. I understand that you feel strongly about this. Would you be able to explain for me why you feel the background history is needed in this article, and why the link is not sufficient. SilkTork * YES! 12:47, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
The review has wandered on for a considerable time now. I think an update on the points, and a drawing of a line would be useful. So....
GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
SilkTork *
YES!
12:52, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
I think this is quite doable in seven days. I think we are close to completing this review! I'll check back in seven days and see how things are going, and as time allows will pitch in myself.
As always, the above recommendations are open to discussion. SilkTork * YES! 13:49, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
The review has to close today as it has gone on too long. I am hoping that any issues left can be sorted today, and I will feel comfortable passing it as meeting GA criteria. Even if I feel the article doesn't quite meet my interpretation of GA criteria the actual review process has been useful as I feel the attention the article has got has been of benefit. SilkTork * YES! 12:35, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
GA review – see
WP:WIAGA for criteria
Article (
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visual edit |
history) ·
Article talk (
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Watch
Reviewer: SilkTork * YES! 23:09, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
I've long had an interest in Sutton Hoo - so it would be good to find out a bit more while doing a review. My views and general approach to Good Article reviews are
here. I welcome and value discussion. I've not yet read the article, but had a quick glance at it. It looks neat and tidy and fairly comprehensive. There's an impressive list of print sources at the end. I feel encouraged that it will be a scholarly and informative read. A quibble is that the lead looks rather short for such an important topic. It is helpful if the lead section is an independent summary of the topic rather than an introduction - see
WP:Lead for some guidance on that.
I'll take a look over the next few days and then start to give my initial comments. If there are no readily available sources online for Sutton Hoo, it may take a while to complete the review while I order material from my local library. The Bruce-Mitford guide looks to be the main source, and it would be interesting to delve into that. SilkTork * YES! 23:09, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
But I had better see if Dr Eehbahgum is willing to participate before making any changes. Johnbod ( talk) 01:02, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
An observation - it's not a GA requirement, but can be helpful for both the student and general reader - is that much material is available online these days - especially on Google Books, and can be linked to, so a reader can check a source at the click of a button, and read the information in context. Very few of the cites are linked - are none of the significant Sutton Hoo sources online? I also noticed that one source I looked at randomly, "Bruce-Mitford 1975, 488–577" did not easily relate to the texts listed in the bibliography - it took a few moments to decide that it probably referred to "R.L.S. Bruce-Mitford et al., The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial (3 Vols in 4) (British Museum, London 1975, 1978, 1983)." I think that is because there are three dates given, and a scan read just picks up the last date. These cite presentation comments are not going to impact on the review - they are just my individual comments on my initial experience. SilkTork * YES! 23:09, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
I just took a look at Google Books - there are a number of books on Sutton Hoo. This one - Sutton Hoo: the excavation of a royal ship-burial - looks useful, and is online. It does look like a boat was discovered in Barrow 2 in 1938. SilkTork * YES! 09:26, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
Initial impressions are that this is an informative and helpful article, rich in detail, with few problems. Some tightening of prose and presentation is probably all that it needs. I will read it more carefully and give more detailed comments later. SilkTork * YES! 10:44, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
There is much to like and admire about this article; however, the more I look at it the more difficulty I have with it. There is a fair amount of information and detail, though I find that the organisation and presentation of that information is not as clear and helpful as it could be. It is vague about the discovery and excavation of the ship burial; it doesn't give an appropriate and helpful history of excavations on the site; the prose style is not appropriate (or helpful) for the general reader of an encyclopedia; the presentation of the images makes the article look messy and cluttered; the sectioning also makes the article look cluttered, and doesn't aid flow and ease of reading; some of the detail in the Ship-burial section is too intricate - there is valuable information contained there, but it is not being brought forward. This on the purse, for example:
The purse, with ornamental lid covering a lost leather pouch, hung from the waist-belt. The lid consists of a kidney-shaped cellwork frame enclosing a sheet of horn, on which were mounted pairs of exquisite garnet cellwork plaques depicting predatory birds, wolves devouring men, geometric motifs, and a double panel showing horses or animals with interlaced extremities. The maker derived these images from the ornament of the Swedish-style helmets and shield-mounts. In his work they are transferred into the cellwork medium with dazzling technical and artistic virtuosity. These are therefore the work of a master-goldsmith of his age who had access to an East Anglian armoury containing the objects used as pattern sources. As an ensemble they enabled the patron to appear in an imperial persona, and expressed his authority and resources to do so.
Most of the important detail on the purse is already covered in Purse Cover from Sutton Hoo Burial, and so a very brief, clear summary is all that is needed.
As there is much reliance on a single source I feel it appropriate to check out that source, so I have ordered Bruce-Mitford's The Sutton Hoo Ship-Burial, along with Green's book and John Preston's The Dig.
I am putting the review on hold until I have those books and done some background reading and checking of facts. This is likely to be at least two weeks. In the meantime things to consider and work on:
Please feel free to ping me on my talkpage or by email in regard to any of these issues, and also to nudge me if there have been developments, or it appears I am not paying attention. SilkTork * YES! 09:59, 12 August 2010 (UTC)
I'll start putting comments here. These may be random at first, and I'll organise them into sections later if needed. SilkTork * YES! 19:22, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
The first caption mentions the parallel between finds in Swedish barrows, particularly Vendel, and Sutton Hoo. The Bruce-Mitford handbook I have is the 1968 version which has no index so that will delay me in finding the right information, but luckily in this case there is a chapter devoted to the connection. There are also several mentions in the Charles Green book. This connection seems to be of some importance - indeed Bruce-Mitford says it has "special significance". Though there are other mentions of the Vendel connection in the article, I feel a section on the connection would be helpful, and that would also be the appropriate place to have an image with a caption pointing out the similarity of the goods found (perhaps with an example from Vendel if possible). The caption of the lead image might be more helpful in simply pointing out that the helmet was one of the objects found at Sutton Hoo - and to put it into perspective for the general reader it is appropriate to mention that it was restored, so the reader doesn't get the impression that the helmet was intact. If there is room, it might be appropriate to mention that it was restored by the metalwork expert Herbert Maryon (who should have a Wikipedia entry, if anyone is interested in creating one!). SilkTork * YES! 19:22, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
I'm becoming happier with the layout and related MoS issues. I'll leave the Lead to last, and will also then make a final check through of use of punctuation and bullet points, etc.
I have placed the second helmet in the Vendel section so a side by side comparison can be made, and also because when the contents list was hidden (and some people have it hidden as a default) the image would push down into the first section displacing the text and image there.
I have made a crude separation of Beowulf and the east Sweden graves - I will do some research on these matters so I can tidy, perhaps expand a bit more, and perhaps provide some accessible reliable sources. SilkTork * YES! 17:28, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
I am concerned at the size of the ship-burial section compared to the whole of the article. At this point the article contains 7806 words of readable prose (not Wiki code or refs), of which 2666 are the ship-burial section, which is just over 1/3 of the article. Wikipedia:Article size does recommend breaking out sections using WP:Summary style when readable prose starts getting more than 6,000 words, or the printable version is more than 10 pages (this is 17 pages). I think a Sutton Hoo ship-burial article containing all the ship-burial section here (leaving behind a useful summary), with a brief Lead putting it in context, could be useful - and items from the burial could be dealt with in greater detail. I would think that Purse Cover from Sutton Hoo Burial would be better off merged into such an article, as it contains only one paragraph of new material - the rest being lengthy context which is best dealt with in this article. SilkTork * YES! 18:12, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
Readers may tire of reading a page much longer than about 30 to 50 KB, which roughly corresponds to 6,000 to 10,000 words of readable prose. If an article is significantly longer than that, it may benefit the reader to move some sections to other articles and replace them with summaries (see Wikipedia:Summary style).
Readers may tire of reading a page much longer than about 30 to 50 KB, which roughly corresponds to 6,000 to 10,000 words of readable prose. If an article is significantly longer than that, it may benefit the reader to move some sections to other articles and replace them with summaries (see Wikipedia:Summary style).
You said: "... Wikipedia:Article size does recommend breaking out sections using WP:Summary style when readable prose starts getting more than 6,000 words, ...." - a very different thing. In fact I'm sure most FAs are longer than this. Taking in mind Hamiltonstone's comment just above, I don't think "Reducing the ship-burial to a 600 word summary" is an option. If anything has to be moved off it should probably be either the history of the 1939-40 excavation, or the later excavations. Perhaps one could do Achaeological investigations at Sutton Hoo? But since the article is still at an acceptable size it is better to keep it as it is. Once you break out a sub-article you can't in any way assume that "readers will be going there from this one" - most won't, especially as links will typically go to the most specific article. How many readers actually bother to follow through to "main article" links anyway? Johnbod ( talk) 13:26, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
Those who wish to read more detail. That's the idea, and it works. See Wikipedia:Summary style for a helpful overview - there are links there which point to other guidelines giving more information. It's your option if you wish to click on them to get more detail, and you may elect not to get more detail - though the links are there if you wish to follow them. As an example - the Kraków article has a number of sub-articles, and the number of hits each gets varies - Education in Kraków gets 200 hits a month, Local government gets 450, Culture in Kraków and Transport in Kraków both get around 1,000, while the Old Town gets 1,300. People decide for themselves what they want more information on. Bear in mind that people are coming to a general encyclopaedia for a general overview - if they wish for greater detail they will go to the main texts. We are not writing for experts, or for people who already know about the topic - we are writing for those who wish to get a reasonably quick general feel for the topic - though, of course, experts and those who already know they topic will read (and hopefully improve) the article. The lead will provide a very brief overview and the main body will provide more detail broken into sections, and for even greater detail we move to sub-articles. The system works well. (We don't have figures for how many people just read the lead, and it would be an interesting research topic, as there is a feeling that the majority of readers don't go beyond the lead - or will read the lead and selected sections.)
I will say that I am not 100% convinced that the Ship-burial needs a sub-article, but I am "concerned", and I feel the issue needs to be aired. Summary style is an integral way that Wikipedia works, and the general principle is that when an article is reaching a detail density (which will vary from article to article, with more technical articles requiring more frequent summary splits than easy to understand articles) we move some of the detail to a sub-article. The situation here is that I am concerned that the Ship-burial has reached a counter-productive detail density and so readers will skip over it and thus not get a general feel for the importance of the objects found there.
Please note that I am not just saying that this article is too long, but that the Ship-burial section is too detailed. Removing other material (though possibly quite valid in and of itself) does not address the issue of the detail density of the Ship-burial section. I am clearly not explaining myself well, and I apologise for that. Essentially I would rather we discussed the actual detail density of the Ship-burial section and the best way of dealing with it, rather than the general principle of summary style splitting. If I am still not clear, please let me know and I will spend a bit more time formulating an answer. SilkTork * YES! 15:18, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
The Raedwald section looks very short now, & I can't locate the history around him. Have you cut the three paragraphs beginning: "During the later 6th century when the various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms...", "In c 616 he was challenged by the Northumbrian ruler Æthelfrith,..." and "Rædwald did not establish unequivocal Christian rule,..."? I think you have, with the edit summary "(mostly layout - some MoS issues as well)"! [2]. Please do not do things like this! Being a GA reviewer is not a licence to make major changes to an article without consultation, or even leaving an adequate edit summary saying what you have done. You have never even mentioned this issue above. Johnbod ( talk) 00:51, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
I'm not clear on the relevance of Raedwald's history to the article. Information about why he is considered to be the probable king, and any scholarly speculation on other possible kings would be worthwhile (and more on that would be welcome), but the personal history appears to me to be colouring rather than encyclopaedic. A link to the article about Raedwald seems to me to be sufficient. I have concerns about focus in other areas of the article - the detail on the surroundings/location is questionable, as is the detail on the discovery and on the ship-burial itself. The selection of material can be difficult on some articles. The more important, complex and less clearly defined a topic, the more difficult it is to get the scope and focus right. For example, a standard album release of a band is easier to write a Good Article on than the band's most important and acclaimed album, which is in turn easier than an article on the band itself, which in turn is easier than the musical genre the band play. It is also more difficult when doing a GA review to look at cutting material than adding it. If we had arrived at this article without the detail that we already have, I doubt we would be feeling that it needed more personal detail on Raedwald, more personal detail on Basil Brown, such as that his "smallholding had failed four years earlier", etc. The temptation when editing an article is to put in little bits of information as discovered. My place when reviewing an article for GA is to look at those little bits and independently give a judgement as to if the bits are valuable encyclopaedic detail or local colouring that might be considered "unnecessary detail" as in 3 (a) of the GA criteria. WP:DETAIL gives a bit more background. On the whole people are more tolerant of extended detail when it is interesting and there are no sub or parent articles to which the detail can be moved. I am more tolerant of background detail on the location as I don't see a useful article which can be linked to which will provide the same detail, but I less tolerant of potential "unnecessary detail" when there is an article which can be (and is already) linked. I understand that you feel strongly about this. Would you be able to explain for me why you feel the background history is needed in this article, and why the link is not sufficient. SilkTork * YES! 12:47, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
The review has wandered on for a considerable time now. I think an update on the points, and a drawing of a line would be useful. So....
GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
SilkTork *
YES!
12:52, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
I think this is quite doable in seven days. I think we are close to completing this review! I'll check back in seven days and see how things are going, and as time allows will pitch in myself.
As always, the above recommendations are open to discussion. SilkTork * YES! 13:49, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
The review has to close today as it has gone on too long. I am hoping that any issues left can be sorted today, and I will feel comfortable passing it as meeting GA criteria. Even if I feel the article doesn't quite meet my interpretation of GA criteria the actual review process has been useful as I feel the attention the article has got has been of benefit. SilkTork * YES! 12:35, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
GA review – see
WP:WIAGA for criteria