Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/The College of William & Mary/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 14:09, 26 September 2008 [1].

The College of William & Mary[edit]

Nominator(s): -Jrcla2 (talk)(contribs)


I'm nominating this article for featured article because The College of William & Mary, first and foremost, is one of the oldest (second only behind Harvard University) and most prestigious public institutions of higher learning in the United States. The College's article itself is concise, provides plenty of pertinent (and legal) images to support content, and qualifies under other criteria as well (such as a good lead paragraph followed by a chronological history). It also provides a myriad of references from third party sources, and it deserves recognition as a Featured Article. -Jrcla2 (talk)(contribs) 19:43, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Did you consult Vaoverland (talk · contribs) about this nomination, per WP:FAC instructions? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:49, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was unaware of the pending FA nomination before it was made. I live here in Williamsburg (though not affiliated with W&M). I watch and help maintain the article among others relating to Wikipedia: WikiProject Virginia. Seeing this article achieve FA status would please me. However, without taking away from the noteworthiness of the College as mentioned by the nominator, I think there is more work to be done on the article to achieve a successful FA vote. It surely would have benefited from a peer review. It is also significant to note that both WikiProjects including it currently only rate it as "B" class. One problem I perceive is that, not unlike many WP articles, a lot of the content was written in good faith before WP began to emphasize inclusion of in-line citations. I am unaware of anything inaccurate, but to my knowledge, no one has taken the time to comprehensively go through and obtain citations where there are none. My main area of contributions has been in the history portions, where I have cited sources for any additions/rewrites in past several years, but have not done that "retro-citation" thing across the board even in just the history sections. I am pretty busy with other WP projects, but will try to assist in any areas where I have something to contribute. It will take users who are ready to roll up their sleeves to bring this one up to FA level. That means WP:Collaboration, which may already be underway (good). I.E., I see someone is working on images, which is not an area of strength for me. Vaoverland (talk) 03:58, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments regarding criterion three:
    • Image:James Blair.jpg - needs a verifiable source per WP:IUP (links give only Blair's lifespan, not when the image was created)
    • Image:WytheGeorge.jpg - needs a verifiable source
    • Image:Wren3.jpg - sources to Wren1, which does not have a verifiable source (for self-made images, this means an explicit assertion of authorship)
    • Image:Thomas-Jefferson.jpg - needs a verifiable source (a hitherto deleted en.wiki page is not sufficient)
    • Image:WM Tribe logo.svg - needs a caption (per criterion 3), needs a source (why is the source different in every template; in the template for this article, "The College of William and Mary" is as unhelpful as "The New Yorker"), is not low resolution (NFCC#3B - SVG files are infinite resolution), and the purpose appears to be freely replaceable (NFCC#1 - if the purpose is "Used to illustrate the William & Mary Tribe athletics teams", why couldn't a picture of an athletic event accomplish this?)
    • Image:Margaret Thatcher 1983.jpg - why does this have two copyright tags simultaneously claiming to be the work of the US Government and user:Happyme22?
    • Image:David D. McKiernan.jpg - source is a deadlink; how can we verify federal authorship? Эlcobbola talk 20:26, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
McKiernan is here: http://www.1id.army.mil/bigredone/commandteam/former/ADC/McKiernan,%20David.htm The site itself is "© 1st Infantry Division, U.S. Army 2008". DrKiernan (talk) 08:39, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose A principle contributor thinks it is not ready, there is a dearth of references, should be withdrawn for more work jimfbleak (talk) 06:24, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Per lack and poor formatting of citations. –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 11:42, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Citations are a mess, EVERY website needs publisher and last access date at the very least. Some need formatting to include titles. If the rest of the article is like the references section, it needs serious work to reach GA or FA status. Ealdgyth - Talk 14:02, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Withdrawing, see WP:FAC instructions regarding prior discussion with the significant contributors. Citing the article and doing the significant citation cleanup and MoS will be better accomplished outside of FAC. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:06, 26 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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