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Attribute
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Review Comment
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| 1. Well-written:
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1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.
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- Made a few tweaks, but on the whole very well-written, no major issues. Pass.
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1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.
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- Extensive notes, but not actually an issue. External links are typical and appropriate. Lead is a good length, Discography & Membership are typical for band articles. Pass.
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| 2. Verifiable with no original research:
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2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.
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- No unreferenced passages. Pass.
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2b. 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).
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- What's the case for PleaseKillMe.com being a reliable source?
- WP:BLOGS writes: "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications." In this case, Richie Unterberger has written two books on the history of the genre of folk rock (Turn! Turn! Turn! (2002) and Eight Miles High (2003), both of which were published by Backbeat Books. That publisher was owned by UBM Technology Group until Hal Leonard bought it in 2006, then Rowman & Littlefield acquired it in 2018. I do not think it is an overstatement to say that Unterberger has written more about the Lovin' Spoonful and folk rock more broadly than any other reliable source. Now, the other part of WP:BLOGS is that one should be cautious about using the source since "if the information in question is suitable for inclusion, someone else will probably have published it in independent, reliable sources". I have used that citation in three places. In the case of the first, Boone's autobiography already covers it, so the citation is not needed there. The next instance is for the quote box; I originally tried using quotations from Boone's autobiography there, but his writing there is quite dull. I have not found another source where he lays out the situation so clearly, which is why I used that quotation in particular, and why I think it warrants inclusion. If I had a better quotation from another source, I would have used it there. Finally, in the third case, it is used in note 5 to talk about the potential release of a Live at the Night Owl album; Boone never discusses this possibility in his book, and this interview is the only time I have seen it mentioned anywhere, which is why I think it again warrants inclusion.
- What's the case for the Fiction Liberation Front being a reliable source?
- This is the blog of an author, Lewis Shiner, who has been regularly published by independent publishing houses. Applying the same standard as above, I have only used this citation in five places for quotations from John Sebastian where I had no better examples.
- Why does cite #3 have the phrase "met the night the Beatles debuted on Ed Sullivan" - seems oddly placed.
- It indicates which parts of the citation apply to each part of the sentence. In this case, Unterberger and Courrier specify that Sebastian and Yanovsky met on the night the Beatles debuted on Ed Sullivan, and Miles specifies that that night was February 9, 1964. I like this style of citation because it makes it exactly clear where all the information is coming from, rather than just listing three books at the end of the sentence and letting the reader figure out which part is from which book. This style is used at the FA for Sgt. Pepper and I have used it at several of my own FAs (e.g. The Kinks' 1965 US tour, "Village Green" and "I've Just Seen a Face").
- Flanagan / Wilentz seems like it should be in the 'Liner notes' subsection
- Cite #61 (Boone & Moss) - same as #3, what's with the parenthetical "(waiting, Cafe Bizarre)" - this may be a citation style I'm simply unfamiliar with, just let me know.
- Ditto for #242, Barone 2022, "diminished preorders" etc
- The link for 'Picador' in the Paul Howard source goes to the bullfighting term, not a publisher.
- Issues addressed/discussed, pass. The Shiner source still doesn't thrill me since it is not an area where he has any notable expertise or publishing history, but for the information used, reasonable enough. —Ganesha811 (talk) 15:01, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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2c. it contains no original research.
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2d. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism.
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- Earwig picks up some box quotes and song/album titles, but no actual issues.
- Hold for manual spot check.
- Checked 6 randomly chosen cites where I can get access - no issues apparent.
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| 3. Broad in its coverage:
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3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.
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- Not able to find anything else of significance.
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3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).
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- No major trims found during prose review - provides a good summary of the band's whole career. Pass.
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4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.
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- A number of citations to autobiographies and memoirs from people directly involved - worth double-checking to make sure their opinions are separated from factual content and/or are backed up by more independent sources. I will spot check a few where I can but I presume you have more ready access to some of these sources.
- This proved particularly challenging in the writing of this article. In that PleaseKillMe interview, Unterberger mentions that, other than Boone's autobiography, there is no single book dedicated to the group. He adds: "I don't think it was [Boone's] intention, but I think it might serve as the best source for information about the group." Unterberger's books are useful, but they cover the history of folk rock in general, so that means only the major beats of the band's history are covered. Boone's book was useful in filling in the gaps. With that said, Boone often clouds some things with his own ideas. While using him as a source, I exercised my best judgment to include only statements of fact in the article while omitting what seemed more like opinion; Boone hated the name the Lovin' Spoonful, the song "Daydream" and he thought Butler was a better singer than Sebastian, but none of that made it into this article. Perhaps the biggest example of this is that Boone attributes much of the bands personal squabbles to Sebastian's girlfriend and later wife, Loretta "Lorey" Kaye. Boone paints her as the band's Yoko and the source of disagreements between Sebastian and the rest of the group, but I have not seen this mentioned anywhere else. Other reliable sources instead point to creative differences between Sebastian and Yanovsky and the band's drug bust as the source of many of the issues. That is what you will read in this article instead. I could go on, but I hope you get my point. If you find any examples where you think I have relied on Boone improperly, please let me know.
- Thanks for the response - I appreciate your awareness of the issue and efforts to avoid it. I'll check a few things, but hopefully nothing untoward will turn up given your work to mitigate the issue already. —Ganesha811 (talk) 15:01, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
- Checked a few sources while checking prose - no issues found on this front. Pass.
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5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.
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- No outstanding issues on talk page (Butler information is sourced and in text), no edit warring, no major changes since February. Pass.
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| 6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
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6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.
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- For File:The Lovin' Spoonful, 1965 (2).png, isn't there a copyright symbol for Clumbia in the bottom right of the first page? It's tiny, but appears to be visible. The pdf is also watermarked 'Copyrighted material' in the lower right of each page.
- That is for a different ad, advertising Bob Dylan, Paul Revere & the Raiders and Andy Williams, all of whom were signed to Columbia. The Spoonful's deal was with Kama Sutra Records/MGM Records, and they neglected to put a copyright on their ad. Also, in the same way that faithful reproductions of PD art cannot be considered under copyright, I do not think a "Copyrighted material" watermark makes PD elements of the magazine no longer PD; rather, its status is only a result of the conditions laid out at Commons:Template:PD-US-no notice advertisement.
- Given that Erik Jacobsen is in the photo (File:Erik-studio-spoonful.jpg), it's likely not actually his own work as the description states. Are we to assume that Jacobsen bought the copyright from the anonymous photographer at some point?
- That is a good point and I really have no way to confirm it. It seems Erik Jacobsen created a Commons account in 2017 so he could upload these pictures from his personal collection, but all he wrote was that he was the copyright holder. I will try to reach out, but I doubt I will hear back. It is probably best to remove his two images from the article (even if it means I'll have to cry ...)
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6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.
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- No issues, well-illustrated. Pass.
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7. Overall assessment.
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