Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/USA PATRIOT Act/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by User:SandyGeorgia 15:20, 8 September 2008 [1].

USA PATRIOT Act[edit]

Nominator(s): Tbsdy lives (talk)


I'm nominating this article for featured article because I feel that it's probably ready (or fairly close to ready) to FA status.. I wrote it some time ago, back when I was Ta bu shi da yu. As an aside, it actually took me two years to research and write up the article - not that this should influence the FAC nomination :-) Anyway, quite willing to hear the brickbats/bouquets, will try to address problems. However, it's fully cited, as neutral as I could make it, and as useful as possible. I do hope the writing is OK. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 12:46, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. this edit was the original content switch, obviously I made quite a few more revisions till I got to this revision. Then others did more cleanup. I think it's helpful to compare this against the previous version, which was pretty shocking. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 12:58, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • If the nominator, as appears from the above, is uncertain as to whether the article is of FA quality, should it not first have been taken to peer review?
  • Length: the article is an intimidating 12,000+ words of imageless text, with an even more scary infobox. OK, the topic is important, and complex, but does the article really have to be so protracted? If, as should be the case, it is aimed at the general reader, it may miss its target on the grounds of sheer user-unfriendliness.
  • I've picked up a few minor points in the lead - haven't time to press on further at the moment, but perhaps these could be looked at:
    • "e-mail" and "email" used. The latter is preferred, but consistency necessary
    • I find this clause awkward: "searches through which law enforcement officers search a home or business...." I think it's the "search" repetition that jars.
    • "sunset" as a verb? I know what sunset provision means (and you have provided a helpful link), but the use of the verb is ugly and jargonistic, as against a slightly longer: "Many of the Act's provisions were to termnate, under sunset provision, from 31 December 2005"
    • 4 years should be four years
    • Is there a reason for the date links? My understanding is that these are generaly deprecated unless there is a specific reason.

I'll try to read more and come up with more comments, even some positive ones, but time prevents at the moment. Brianboulton (talk) 17:24, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Will definitely take on board your feedback. I am unsure of myself at FAC now due to general nervousness. In relation to taking to peer review, would it not be a good idea to check whether I have done this? Sorry, but a simple look at Wikipedia:Peer review/USA PATRIOT Act would show you this has been done already. Don't get me wrong though, I appreciate the criticism.- Tbsdy lives (talk) 02:00, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the brief review to which you refer was a year ago nearly, and has two comments: one asking that the article be rewritten in a summary style, and another, generally complimentary, asking that the article be broken up into sub-articles. In the intervening period the article has been reduced from a mind-boggling 19,000 words to its current length, so I would have thought that that factor alone might call for a further review. My reason for suggesting it, however, was your own apparent doubts - or perhaps this was just modesty? - when nominating. I think the amount of work that has been done here is awesome, in the true meaning of that word, but the issues of length and readability remain overwhelming, and need to be addressed. Brianboulton (talk) 10:06, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
OK, will do... wasn't modesty that made me feel trepidation but sheer nervousness of submitting to FAC. The peer review didn't really get much feedback to be honest, but it did happen. I will do my very best to fix readibility and length. I actually did a huge amount to get it down - the article was originally I think about 150-200K. It's quite possible readibility was affected because I actually read the entirety of the Act to understand it... and IANAL. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 11:46, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose for now My first time trying to read it, I felt the same way I did when attempting to do my taxes. Is there anyway we can break up some of these huge chunks of text? Also, the page is way too large and needs to have some more splits. It takes forever to load on dialup, which didn't help the reading process. According to this statistic readout, your article is about 12,000 words, which is way over the limit. Note, this page also froze my comp for 10 minutes while trying to load the tool server because of how much text there is. This is a serious problem. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:53, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Other problems - Your external links has far more than external links and this needs to be cleaned up. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:55, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Is it just me or are people getting pretty personal on FAC now? They aren't "my" external links. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 02:10, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Cool, so basically I'll need to break up the text. Originally this was about 150-200KB, so I actually did my best to get the article size down. The problem is with the explanation of the titles, which a fairly complex and I was trying to make it as clear as possible but have evidently failed. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 12:34, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose the text is thick, with long paragraphs, and almost incomprehensible, even to me as a lawyer. It jumps back and forth between the legislative history, the act itself, and the aftereffects and amendments. Many of the sections (see especially Title III) are mere catalogues of act provisions. I'd like to see the proposer consider a major rewrite, and it may not be necessary to list every provision (enhancement of penalties for impersonating a Red Cross worker?) to meet the comprehensiveness requirement, especially in view of the individual articles on several of the titles. I'd also prefer to see the background section exclusively deal with what happened pre-enactment.--Wehwalt (talk) 17:54, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Hmmm... the background section needs improving. I'm a bit uncerain why penalties for impersonating a Red Cross worker is actually unimportant though... But I definitely need to work on getting the sections on titles in a better state. Btw, IANAL myself. I guess you need to use the acronym IAAL? :-) - Tbsdy lives (talk) 12:34, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Agreed that the text is incomprehensible for me, who knows nothing about law, and the prose is thick and poor. The sections really need to be broken up. I see some contractions, which need to be expanded. There are some run-on sentences, as well. Additionally, there are MOS breaches such as spaced em dashes. –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 20:58, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I'm sad to have to oppose the FA candidature of this important article. My reasons are that it is not written in summary style and it is not encyclopaedic in tone. There is too much esoteric detail and the prose is not engaging. I think readers who find this page by a search on Google's server, or other search engines, will be disappointed with Wikipedia and click on their return icons in the hope of finding something more digestible. So, it does not represent our best work. This is a pity, an editor who is good a precis could have turned this article into a treasure. Graham Colm Talk 21:16, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Wow, harsh! Ain't nothing compared to what it was like before. But I'll try better. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 02:00, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • I don't think we're being harsh. It is what it is. No one said getting an article to FA was easy.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:07, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • Look, I'm OK with constructive criticism, but when you say that someone who reads this article will be disappointed with the entirety of Wikipedia then I think that's a little harsh! The article might need improvement, but I don't think the article I largely wrote will cause people to stop visiting the site. Perhaps that's not what you meant to say... Tbsdy lives (talk) 09:45, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
          • I meant that they would be disappointed on that one occasion. The Wikipedia community has won a lot of respect and that's why we have to maintain our high standards. Please don't shoot the messengers and please don't take any of this personally; we are just being professional. Graham Colm Talk 10:26, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
            • Sorry if I sound a might defensive, I guess that I was a bit concerned that a few of the comments weren't being constructive and a little over the top. The main issues here are length and readibility, so that's what I'm going to work on. I really do appreciate constructive criticism, though it might not look like it. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 11:48, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • P.S. forgot to note: I'm going to ask Sandy to withdraw the FAC as I take on board your feedback about summary style, though if you look at what I did to condense my existing material, I thought I was doing OK. Clearly needs more improvement. - Tbsdy lives (talk) 09:47, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
          • Respectfully, please be careful in throwing the word "you" around. I do not think my comments were anything other than respectful and constructive. Actually, I think everyone's were. This article has issues, you ran it up the flagpole to see who saluted, and rather got a piano dropped on you. That doesn't mean that people were uncivil. I suggest licking your wounds, getting a solid peer review, and bringing it back at some future date. There is much of merit in the article.--Wehwalt (talk) 11:57, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
            • I used the word "you" once, when responding to the direct comments of someone who seemed to be saying to me that I'm stopping people watching the site. Someone oddly, you are now criticising me that I "ran it up the flagpole to see who saluted" but I'm taking it all a little personally. I really feel I need to defend myself a bit here - I worked on this article for 2 years for goodness sake! Please, follow your own advise and assume good faith here. I have already said that I'm withdrawing the FAC because I see the validity of the criticisms. The inference that I seem to have just plonked the article on FAC is somewhat insulting given that this isn't the case. Perhaps if you could please provide some constructive criticism though it would be much appreciated! - Tbsdy lives (talk) 12:06, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't criticism. I already said in response to your inquiry on my talk page that the article had much a lot of work in it. It wasn't like the Music of Chicago article that had no place on FAC. I think you would have been better advised to see if it qualified as a GA first, but I don't think you were completely out of line by asking for a FAC. As suggested in your discussion on Sandy's talk page, see if you can get people here to contribute to a peer review, and go forward from there.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:51, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Tbsdy, I'll withdraw the FAC now. Many of the issues should be solvable with more aggressive application of Summary style. Please see WP:FAC/ar and leave the {{fac}} template in place until the bot goes through. I hope to see you back soon ! Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:18, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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