Wikipedia:Peer review/Rare Books and Manuscript Section/archive1

Rare Books and Manuscript Section[edit]

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
This article was emailed to me by a Wikipedian who is a member of the said organization. He stated he is well-aware of the WP:COI policy and requested I (having listed my name at WP:HAU review it before it hits the Wikipedia. I have edited out quite a bit of information and links that were out of place for Wikipedia and have also cleaned up the references in regular {{reflist}} format. However, my areas of expertise do not include history, libraries, or organizations, so someone else is going to have to take it from here. Thanks! Bob the Wikipedian ^{(talk • contribs)} 03:03, 24 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's not clear that the subject is notable. Shii (tock) 10:18, 4 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As a friendly non-expert in that area, I did agree to wikify the article (and removed massive amounts which weren't encyclopedic) but told the editor I'd put it through peer review since I wasn't qualified to judge its notability or content at all. Bob the Wikipedian ^{(talk • contribs)} 03:18, 5 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ruhrfisch comments: Thanks for your help with this. I am not an expert in libraries or this topic, but I do have some comments that should help improve the article.

I agree that as written, it seems like the article may have notability concerns. However a quick search on Google Books finds a number of references to the Rare Books and Manuscript Section by reliable sources, so I think that it is notable. It would help very much to add these to the article.
My guess is that
The article needs more references, for example the first paragraphs of both the Governance and organization and Programs and activities sections have no references. My rule of thumb is that every quote, every statistic, every extraordinary claim and every paragraph needs a ref.
The refs that are in the article need more information (like the publisher). Internet refs need URL, title, author if known, publisher and date accessed. {{cite web}} and other cite templates may be helpful. See WP:CITE and WP:V
The lead should be an accessible and inviting overview of the whole article - the current lead needs to be expanded so as to be such an overview. As a summary, nothing important should be in the lead only - since it is a summary, it should all be repeated in the body of the article itself
My rule of thumb is to include every header in the lead in some way, but the History section does not seem to be in the leas (as one example). Please see WP:LEAD
Spell out abbreviations on first use, and lini on first use too. So, for example, American Library Association (ALA).
The {{quote}} template is generally for quotes of 4 lines or longer, per WP:MOSQUOTE
Writing is decent. I think obtaining outside views would also help to expand the article.
I would add brief mentions and links to some of the articles linked here, like Society of American Archivists and the Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of America
Any chance of a free image of the members at a convention? Or perhaps the non-free logo of the organization?
Any notable chairs or officers who have served on the board?
One dab link here that needs to be fixed
Not a lot more to say as the article is pretty short.

Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). I do not watch peer reviews, so if you have questions or comments, please contact me on my talk page. Yours, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 03:49, 6 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]