Talk:Zodiac Killer/GA1

GA Reassessment

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I am starting a good article reassessment of this article because it has not kept up with GA standards since it was promoted, and has numerous tags that show this. Specifically:

• First, tags:
  • Seven references with dead link tags. There may be more that aren't tagged.
  • Over a dozen citation needed tags scattered through the article.
• In addition to the tagged areas, there are numerous spots, including entire sections, of unsourced material.
• The lead needs to be expanded. WP:LEAD recommends four paragraphs for an article of this length.
• The numerous short sections make the article really choppy to read. Many of these could easily be integrated with bridging material would make the prose flow more smoothly, rather than reading like a series of calendar entries.
• What makes zodiackiller.com (used for numerous references) a reliable source?
• Reference #26 (Rodelli, Mike) is an untagged dead link, and what makes it a reliable source?
• What makes ref #32 (about.com) a reliable source. The author is PI, but this does not make him an expert on serial killers.
• Reference #49 (L.A. Times 1971 Zodiac letter) is a dead link (tagged), and what makes it a reliable source?
• What makes ref #66 (Zodiac Killer's Daughter, Deborah Perez, Also JFK's Daughter) a reliable source?
• I would think that more of the books in the Further reading section would be integrated as references, rather than using unreliable and semi-reliable sources like the ones listed above and others.
• There are two books authored by Graysmith in the Further reading section, but I don't know which one of them is meant by all of the "Greysmith, p. xx" in-line references.
• Popular culture section - one (unsourced) sentence does not constitute a section. This should either be expanded with a cross-section of the most notable pop culture references, or should be merged with another section.

These are the big problems I'm seeing on a first run-through. Please let me know if there are any questions. Dana boomer (talk) 23:24, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

As nothing has been done to address the above concerns, I am now delisting the article from GA status. Dana boomer (talk) 16:58, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree with the delisting. You asked what makes zodiackiller.com a credible source? The website is a good source for documents about the case but not anything else because there's too much POV. For the first ten or so years of its existence, the website creator thought Arthur Leigh Allen was the Zodiac Killer and he disingenuously presented information to support that conclusion. He no longer believes Allen is the killer but he hasn't changed his previous distortions. The second book by Graysmith has been heavily discredited and I am removing it from the further reading section but his other book on Zodiac, the best seller, remains on the list.TL36 (talk) 03:44, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

I worked heavily on this entry years ago and was proud back then to see it receive the GA status. It's disheartening to see the state of entry deteriorate so badly it has to be delisted. Dana, regarding some of your points:

• zodiackiller.com is not entirely reliable, but when I used it for references, I tried to focus on links to first-hand and contemporaneous documentation, like police reports and news article clippings. I feel this documentation is the most reliable we have for this type of topic and zodiackiller.com is a major repository of it.
• You suggest using books in Further Reading, but unfortunately with this subject most books are less reliable than contemporaneous accounts (again, like police reports and newspaper articles).
• The Popular Culture split-out was as much a defense mechanism as anything. Years ago this entry was bombarded almost daily with people wanting to link their favorite heavy metal band, graphic novel, etc. as influenced by the Zodiac Killer, and many of the references were quite a stretch. In addition, at one point the list was nearly 50% of the article itself. Both points merited (in my mind) a separate page linked to from here. WP:IPCA seems to agree with my thinking, and although it cautions against splits, it seems to have worked well here, as doing so kept this (already lengthy) article focused and the IPCA has stayed relatively orderly as well. If the link to the IPCA article needs to be moved to merged somewhere, so be it, but I don't think anything is gained by attempting to merge some or all of the IPCA article into this one.
• This article is also constantly bombarded by people who are convinced that the latest person to come forward with their "solution" has nailed it, and that has caused the "Current status of investigations" section to balloon with a lot of disproven cruft. -- Jimbonator (talk) 08:00, 14 May 2014 (UTC)