Wikipedia:Peer review/Mark Satin/archive1

Mark Satin

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I am preparing it for FA candidacy. It covers unusual ground - its subject played major roles in three "alternative" political movements over five decades - and I would appreciate any comments you care to give, the more exacting the better.

The article began as a squib in 2004. I put it up for FA review almost two months ago and resisted the initial comments, but I have seen the error of my ways; most of the suggestions there and in a subsequent Military History A-Class review have now been integrated into the text. And they inspired more improvements on my part. I cannot improve it any more without your help.

Note on citation style. I have retained the style I used in a 2005 revision (the original stub contained no references). It is a composite with the following major features: (1) first name before surname, as in the Bluebook; (2) all commas until the period at the end, as in the Bluebook; (3) no parentheses around dates or publishers (except around years of journals), as in the MLA Handbook; and (4) "p." or "pp." before page numbers, as is the practice of some American publishers.

Note on links in the "References" section. I have linked authors and publishers here only if they are not linked anywhere in the text or in the "Publications" section; and I have only linked authors or publishers here on first mention.

Thanks so much! - Babel41 (talk) 02:53, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Comments from Ealdgyth (talk · contribs)

• You said you wanted to know what to work on before taking to FAC, so I reviewed the article as I would at FAC.

Thanks for these incredibly helpful comments! I have tried to take full advantage of them, as you will see; - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • You need to eliminate any references in the lead that aren't strictly speaking necessary - I'd probably keep the ones for any controversial labels. Per the MOS, we don't use references in the lead when the fact is sourced in the main body of the article.

 Done I eliminated about two-thirds of them, and the lead reads much more smoothly now.

• • A bit of overlinking going on - we don't need to link to words such as ideology, newsletter.

 Done Sorry, I had geared my links to the average U.S. public high school student. Of the 69 links to things other than people, texts, organizations, and movements, I have now eliminated 56 (over 80%). The 13 remaining seem to me to be essential to grasping the article, but please correct me if I'm wrong (draft dodger. draft resister, neopacifism, New Age, radical centrism, pacifists, radicals, Quaker, deliberative democracy, amnesty, macular edema, diabetic retinopathy, and "Fool," respectively). - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Overciting going on also ... Generally there should only be one citation for most sentences - two is pushing it and three for any fact starts screaming that something's wrong.

 Done I have eliminated all 10 instances of three or more citations (a couple of times by bundling them), and have eliminated some double cites as well. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Lead: "Despite its arguably off-putting.." you need to atttribute this to someone rather than imply that Wikipedia thinks its "off-putting"

 Done Rewrote to take Wikipedia off the hook. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Link to "Green political thought"?

 Done Eliminated it - seems out of place at the beginning of the "New Age" section. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • "It became one of the few non-academic books to win a "Best Book Award" from an organized section of the American Political Science Association." Huh? Totally do not understand what an "organized section" is here.

 Done Many U.S. professional groups (e.g., lawyers, political scientists) are built around the work of their organized sections, which typically require a minimum membership (e.g., 250). In the APSA, one thing these sections do is hand out book awards. Rather than explaining all this, I simply changed "organized section" to "section," which is hopefully more self-explanatory. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • "Bringing war resisters to Canada was opposed by many in the anti–Vietnam War movement." but we've never been told that he did so..

 Done I now make this explicit in the first sentence of the second paragraph of the lead. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Early years: Feels totally disjointed and strung together. The quotes from his mother aren't really placed in context here. Neither is the newspaper column thing.

 Done Great points. I have totally redone this section with your comments in mind. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Need to explain/link what battle stars are - are these just campaign ribbons or a Silver or Bronze Star?

 Done In context of this article, that might be a distraction. Also, I cannot find any other references to the father's battle stars. I now simply say Satin's dad served in combat in WWII. (The point is simply to contrast the father's service with the son's draft dodging.) - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Please give years for many of the episodes in his life. We aren't told when he enrolled in the U of I - that would help anchor the article.

 Done I have added more dates both in the new "Early years" section and in its spinoff, the "Later life" section. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • This source does not support the statements in the article that it is a citation for: "Six months later he discovered his only life partner, a poet and educator. In 2009 he retired from newsletter publishing. Although losing his eyesight as a result of severe macular edema and diabetic retinopathy, from 2009 to 2011 he presented occasional guest lectures on "life and political ideologies" for Americ Azevedo's".

 Done This whole passage has been rrewritten and moved to the "Later life" section. And it is better sourced. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • The organization of the article is somewhat disjointed. We have "early years" then a total overview of his career - complete until 2011, then a whole host of explanations of various behaviors/career twists that we haven't even been introduced to yet. I strongly strongly suggest integrating the factoids in "colleges and career" and "explanations offered" into the whole chronological framework that starts with neopacifism.

 Done It embarrasses me that I didn't recognize this earlier. I have done what you say, beginning with the new "Early life" section and moving certain biographical facts into the middle sections, and then ending with a new "Legacy" section that makes use of most of the material in the old "Explanatuions offered" sub-section. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Don't use "Main article" for draft dodger, etc, use "see also". Main article is for a sub-article that is summarized in this article, but you're not summarizing the whole draft dodger article here - just using the link to add extra information to a particular person's career. Same with "New Age Politics" section.

 Done Changed all four "Main article"s to "See also"s. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)s

• • "...as one journalist strained to objectively put it." Opinion, needs revising.

 Done Satin is now simply and unambiguously "fired." - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • I do not see the connection between these two sentences: "Others took issue with the section on emigration. According to journalist Lynn Coady, the FBI and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) attempted to wiretap Anansi's offices."

 Done Good point. I have created a much better transitional sentence. - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • "According to a study of the Manual in a literary journal, some editions experienced a falloff in quality." Name the journal and shouldn't that be "later editions"?

 Done And you're right about "later." - Babel41 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • In general, I feel there are too many "quotes" in the article, a lot of it feels like a string of quotes strung together into a narrative.

 Done In the article you reviewed on October 17, there were 81 direct quotes of three words or more (nested within approx. 7,200 words of text). I agree that that was too many. I am happy to report that I have now paraphrased or eliminated slightly more than half of them (8+9+15+9=41). Moreover, the vast majority of the quotes that remain are from the subject of the article (Satin), rather from secondary-source authors. - Babel41 (talk) 06:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• • Also, many of the quotes need attribution in the text, not just a citation at the end. Any time you have a significant amount of quoted material, it should be stated in the text who made the statement, not left up to the citation at the end.

 Done Every quoted sentence or lengthy phrase now has a speaker or author right there in the text. - Babel41 (talk) 06:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• • An example of information that is given as quotes that would be better summarized and not quoted: "One of the council's announced goals was "to break away from the old quarrels of 'left against right', and help create a new consensus". Another was "to serve as one of the organizational vehicles for transformation"."" This could more concisely be stated as "The councils goals were to avoid the old political dichotomy of left versus right as well as allow the transformation of politics." If you quote too much, people don't pay attention.

 Done I understand. And I have now paraphrased both of the examples you cite. - Babel41 (talk) 06:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• • Much of these points holds true for the entire article - too much quotation makes it hard to read, too many citations in a row makes it hard to read, and the organization is just plain odd.

 Done That is, I have now gone over my ENTIRE text using the criteria you set forth above. - Babel41 (talk) 06:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Hope this helps. Please note that I don't watchlist Peer Reviews I've done. If you have a question about something, you'll have to drop a note on my talk page to get my attention. (My watchlist is already WAY too long, adding peer reviews would make things much worse.) 15:01, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

You have helped tremendously! I'll let you know when I put this article up for FA candidacy. - Babel41 (talk) 06:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)