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GA Cup - Round 3

WikiProject Good Articles's 2014-15 GA Cup - Round 3 Greetings, all! We hope that all of our American GA Cup competitors had an enjoyable Thanksgiving holiday. Friday saw the end of Round 2. Two from 7 pools, plus a tie score and one wildcard (16 in all) moved onto the next round. Some pools were more competitive than others. Round 2's highest scorer was 3family6, with an impressive 255 points. Good888, who came in second place overall with 202 points, reviewed the most articles (19). The wildcard slot for Round 2 went to Jaguar. Congrats to all! Round 3 will have 15 competitors in three pools. The key to moving forward in Round 2 seemed to be reviewing articles with the longest nomination dates; almost everyone who moved forward nominated at least one article from the pink nomination box (20 points) or reviewed articles that had languished in the queue for over 5 months (18 points). The GA Cup was also used to promote a group of articles about The Boat Race, a rowing race held annually since 1856 between Oxford University and Cambridge University, on the River Thames. 17 Boat Race articles were promoted to GA in November. In Round 2, 110 reviews were completed, as compared to 117 in Round 1. The GA Cup continues to be a success. This month, we got a report from User:AmericanLemming, who maintains the GA statistics, that in October, there was a net gain of 201 articles nominated for GA. He thought that more open GANs could mean that more editors are submitting more of their articles to the GAN process. In addition, having a high-throughput of GANs means that more articles get reviewed more quickly, which reduces the frustration of potentially waiting several months to get an article reviewed. The activity in Round 2 of the GA Cup seems to bear that out. It's our hope that the competitors' enthusiasm continues in Round 3, and we can continue to make a difference in helping more editors improve their articles. For Round 3, participants have been randomly put in 3 pools of 5 contestants each; the top two in each pool progressing, as well as the top 2 of all remaining users. Round 3 will start on December 1 at 0:00:01 UTC and end on December 29 at 23:59:59 UTC. Information about Round 3 and the pools can be found here. There have been a couple of rules clarifications to announce. We're slightly changing the wording to the second bullet in "General rules", which now reads: You may only score points in a round for reviews which have been completed in that round. We're also including this clarification: Only reviews started during the competition are eligible. We have also lost a judge, so there are now only three judges. Good luck and remember to have fun as we move into the holiday season. It is the judges' hope that every competitor in the GA Cup has a joyous holiday season and Happy New Year. Cheers from Dom497, TheQ Editor and Figureskatingfan. To subscribe or unsubscribe to future GA Cup newsletter, please add or remove your name to our mailing list. If you are a participant still competing, you will be on the mailing list no matter what as this is the easiest way to communicate between all participants.

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The Who

Were those 3 samples ok? I tried to follow the instructions you left at FAC. If there are any tweaks you would like, please suggest them. --John (talk) 22:02, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks John, they're exactly the samples I wanted! I was going to do them tomorrow, but as you've done them, that's great. I've added appropriate captions to them. I'm not really au fait with {{listen}} so it might be worth checking I've done the right thing, but I just wanted the description to relate the sample to the article, and explain its importance. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 22:08, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

I thought you might be about to, and I wanted to make sure I had not trodden on your toes by adding them myself. I tweaked the descriptions a little; I think we write in the present tense about works, though we write in the past tense about their creation. For example "Orwell's Animal Farm deals with dictatorship" (present tense) and "Orwell's Animal Farm was written in 1944" (past tense). Feel free to disagree of course. Thanks for all your work on the article, it is looking good. --John (talk) 22:45, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

That sounds okay to me. If in doubt, ask Eric ;-) The article is looking good (but since I took it to GA and beyond I would say that, wouldn't I). The trick now - and the sticking point I've always had with FAC, is getting a sufficiently large enough body of people to agree so that consensus goes with support. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 10:28, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Did you see that BBC documentary on Marshall Amplification last week? There are quite a few clips of Pete Townsend, and some of the very early Who also. The early development of the group was very closely intertwined with the history of the Marshall company. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:26, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Something's not right. Oh yes, I'm not loud enough - I can still hear Noel over there....

I wasn't aware that Pete Townsend had anything to do with that - he must have just been doing something cathartic to get over Princess Margaret. Or did you mean Pete Townshend? Yeah, he was very important in getting the company up and running, but ultimately decided that Sound City / Hiwatt was better, leaving Hendrix to fly the Marshall flag. As for the documentary, 'fraid not, all I tend to watch is old drama series with the other half, usually as a break from work and WP articles. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 12:17, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it all added to the early mystique of the band, apparently. It seems that Marshall was instrumental (geddit!?) in allowing gigs to be played after some of the early guitar-smashing episodes (with Townsend at one point hurredly dashing into the shop and grabbing a guitar off the wall). PT recalls being told by Marshall that the amps were not meant to be stacked one on top of another, but then gleefully recounts how a swipe from his guitar brought them easily crashing down on stage - although they carried on working. If you want to open a little i-Player window on your computer, and watch while you edit, I promise not to tell your better half. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:30, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Oh I know about that, there was a bit of a kerfuffle a while back with Dougal Butler's DYK, where his autobiography said he used to keep the car running while Townshend "stole" guitars from Marshall's shop. Except he didn't really steal them per se as Marshall knew exactly who he was, where he lived, and where to send the bill to (good ol' Uncle Kit made sure the bill got paid). And of course, there's that Russell Harty Plus clip starting with a 2 4x12" + amp stack falling over, only for Pete to say "that's alright", which it probably was given what it had to withstand. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 13:35, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Haha, yes. Townsend refers to them, I think, as "various hire purchase arrangements". Martinevans123 (talk) 13:44, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

We could try that around here, give people "opportunities to move greatly towards the readership end". Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 14:15, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm almost ready to support, come to the FAC :)! Snuggums (talk / edits) 02:03, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

@SNUGGUMS: - Just the 100 million record claims to go. Then I've got to sort out everyone else's comments. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:56, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Mersea Island

Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article Mersea Island you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Biblioworm -- Biblioworm (talk) 16:41, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Gardner Lake

I decided to go with your suggestion and merge (and redirect) Minnie Island to Gardner Lake. Same with Hopemead since a bunch of filled expansion and other proposals litter its history that failed to cause any development. So Gardner lake is a 3 in 1. Not exactly my style, but I put it up for GAN as this is the best overview I think can be done. Four separate pages just wouldn't make since when they are all on or within Gardner Lake. I nominated it for GAN. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 19:02, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

• Cool, I'll take a look when I get a chance. I've been busy on the "other side of the fence" improving articles to GA standard myself, but if I can get a free evening this week I ought to be able to review it. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 19:03, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Thank you!

Thanks for all your careful and detailed attention to the article Beer in San Diego County, California to enable it to become a Good Article. Here's a well deserved beer for you. If you ever come to San Diego I'll treat you to the real thing! --MelanieN (talk) 15:00, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Boosteels Kwak. Less a beer, more a science experiment.

Yum. Westmalle - my favourite (well, it was when I went to the Kattenstoet in 2012 at least). I'm still waiting for "Drmies and Hafspajen's Definitive Guide to the Best European Beers and Ales" to come out so I can actually make a definitive decision on what my favourite actually is. Mrs 333 lived in San Diego for about 20 years, and has suggested I spend time there in the future, so your offer might well be more seriously taken up than you realise! Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:08, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• Westmalle is indeed some kind of wonderful. I never appreciated the Kwak; I blame myself. But the Tripel Karmeliet is the uniquest of all the Belgian tripels--an acquired taste, but wonderful. Have you tried the St. Feuillien tripel? Very good for a very good price. And then there's Delirium Tremens and its varieties... And the Christmas ale from St. Bernardus Brewery, the best such ale I've ever had... Drmies (talk) 15:28, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• I told you that you should write a good beer guide! If I can get hold of St. Bernardus, I will. Because Mrs 333 is teetotal, I don't drink at home and generally only do so when I'm out and about - which fortunately being a travelling musician is all the time. I'm quite impartial to Whitstable Brewery's Raspberry Wheat beer myself, which is a little unusual, and then there's the usual fayre from Shepherd Neame who also do a rather nice Christmas ale over the festive season. I miss Gales HSB, one of my favourite British ales, very nutty, but alas since Fullers bought them out it just hasn't been the same (plus you can only get it around the Southampton / Portsmouth area anyway). British beers are quite different to their Belgian and Dutch counterparts, but you get used to them after a lifetime of drinking them ;-) Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:42, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• I'm totally not hip to British beers. I had a Samuel Smith one time, I think, and it was good; and I've had...what was it called...it's somewhere in the archive of Eric's or Sitush's talk page. We are getting a lot of good American beers these days, and they do interesting things that would never happen in Europe. But for me the biggest revelation was discovering Danish gypsies: see if you can get your hands on anything by Mikkeller or Evil Twin Brewing. Drmies (talk) 15:58, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• Samuel Smith is popular around North Yorkshire and County Durham and often the preferred ale for locals in the area. I tried it about 15 years ago on a visit to Durham. I wouldn't mention the word "gypsies" round here though, it's generally associated with Irish travellers and while I try to keep an open mind on things, I have heard otherwise rational small business owners and landowners refer to the group as a whole as "utter bastards". Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:07, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• It means something quite specific in this case. :) Drmies (talk) 16:25, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• Oh sure, my mind has a tendency to wander, which is actually great for WP as it means I just wander about editing bits and bobs when I remember ... anyway, it seems you can get Mikkeller over here which sounds good. Beer in British pubs is quite hit and miss unless you know the area well, Wetherspoons (popular for WP meetups) can do a nice varied selection, particularly in the larger ones around London and elsewhere. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:31, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Alternatively, discover some other Danish Gypsies! Martinevans123 (talk) 17:51, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

So, after all this, a. I went to the beer store and bought a four-pack of Matilda and a big bottle of thissss...; b. I dreamed I was at a beer store trying to explain the plot of a Hitchcock movie to the cashier while trying to find the beer I was drinking. Drmies (talk) 16:13, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Dearest Doctor, may I advise you that friends don't let friends edit Wikipedia while drunk. You may accidentally add a comment to a particularly juicy ANI thread - terrifying. Mind you, we've been doing the yard of ale for centuries around here. And all this talk of real ale has inspired me to knock up that Brentwood Festival (100 real ales and counting) article I keep forgetting to create. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:19, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

• Consider it a standing invitation. I can find something delicious for Mrs. 333 also. How does she feel about apple cider? --MelanieN (talk) 16:16, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

"And this one time .... at Wikimedia Camp ...."

• Nope, nothing alcoholic for her at all - though she's quite impartial to cranberry juice! Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:23, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• This is not "hard" cider, it's fresh squeezed apple juice. Ask her about Julian, I'm sure she'll remember it. Famous for cider, and for apple pies in season. --MelanieN (talk) 18:07, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• I've never felt the same about apple pie since watching American Pie but that sounds like an invitation too good to miss and it seems that Julian is a lovely place to go and visit. Let me scribble something in the diary. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 10:30, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Reference Errors on 12 December

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Discretionary sanctions notification - BLP

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Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 08:28, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

@Callanecc: - I understand where this is all coming from, but I'm concerned it might give administrators a bit too much latitude. On at least three occasions now I have seen John remove a source like The Daily Mail, and refer to the newspaper in disparaging terms (eg: "The Mail and the Sun are disgusting rags with a proven reputation for making up lies"), and take action against editors reverting the source back in, most memorably with Brad Pitt and John Barrowman (eg: User talk:Ritchie333/Archive 12#A few things). Now, for what it's worth my personal opinion of the Daily Mail is pretty much the same as John's, I look at a typical headline in my local newsagent and my stomach turns (apparently Facebook causes cancer). Yet I don't feel as strongly about its acceptance (or otherwise) as a source in limited circumstances, and until we have an actual policy or guideline that explicitly blacklists it, editors will continue to add it in good faith for BLPs and argue its suitability. I fear these arguments are going to turn up again and again. Perhaps the answer is for a special 1RR sanction on any newspaper sources in BLPs? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 09:36, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

It would be pretty much impossible to enforce unless each editor has been reminded and is still edit warring, in which case it would be just as easy to block (as they've got a recent warning for edit warring) or protect. If you have an issue with how admins are operating then WP:AN for long term or WP:ANI for one incident, however if you think that there is a misuse of discretionary sanctions then WP:A/R/C is the place to go. I'm not intending to comment on it. If you feel that there should be a discussion then please feel free to start a discussion at WT:BLP or WT:VERIFY. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 00:07, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

I am generally against starting threads on ANI because they have a tendency to create drama and WP:BOOMERANGs, making them more hassle than they're worth. Nevertheless, I fear (and "fear" really is the right word) that is not going to be the last time somebody gets into a quarrel with John about citing the Mail. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:10, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Just enforcing the policy as written should be fine. Word will get around that we can't use these poor sources on BLPs. The statement that editors could be arguing "in good faith" that the Daily Mail or The Sun are fine reliable sources for controversial material on living people is a bit of a stretch. --John (talk) 09:43, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't think Parrot of Doom or Andy Dingley were saying that all, and I would expect both of them to not recommend the Mail, let alone the Sun, for anything controversial or contentious. But in this case, I don't think the direct quotations from the two biggest-selling British newspapers was either of those, and it was fortunate we found secondary sources that gave us a consensus that everyone was happy with. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:12, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

GA Mentor request: Conflicting sources on GA review

Hello, Ritchie333

I was hoping you could help me to resolve an issue I have on my first GA review at Talk:Sig_Mejdal/GA1 (relevant links regarding my questions are on the GA review page). The problem is that I have sources conflicting on which degrees were earned for the subject of a BLP. Two sources say that Sig has 2 master's engineering degrees, but a Sports Illustrated article referenced for another fact says that he earned two non-engineering degrees instead (degrees which I've never heard of): Master's in Cognitive Psychology and Master's in Operation Research. I've read the policy on Wikipedia:Conflicting_sources and, all things being equal (including reliability), it recommends keeping both. This leads to a number of problems:

1. Should this conflict, if unresolved, fail GA critera?
2. For such a small, focused article, it seems silly to include "both sides of the controversy"
3. If both sides are included, does it fail GA criteria?
4. Both sources say he got his degrees at San Jose University. I've checked the SJU website and it does list the engineering degrees. It does not list the other degrees, however SJU does offer Master's in psychology that kind of fit the descriptions in the SI article.

a. Generally speaking, is my act of checking the SJU website Original Research or just verification?

b. Is it OK, for the purposes of the GA review, that I determine the SI article is unreliable for this fact only? (I would assume that the engineering degrees, I/S Engineering and Human Factors engineering, have been de-jargonized by the author of the SI article into Operation Research and Cognitive Psychology, respectively, leading to the conflict of information)

Thanks for any help. Vile-eight (talk) 01:20, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

@Vile-eight: I've had a look at the article. I would go with what the SJU website says. You have a valid point in looking at Wikipedia:Conflicting sources, but in this case I think we can conclude the reputation and importance for the university getting its graduate's degrees correct is much more important than Sports Illustrated. So in this case, SJU would be the more reliable source for that fact.

Elsewhere, I'm concerned that your review is quite short, though admittedly you haven't signed off anything other than prose and verification yet. While you shouldn't make a GA review longer than it needs to be, the article being a little over 3K of prose makes me wonder if there isn't more than can be added to meet the "broad in coverage" part of the GA criteria. Have a read through the article carefully, and if any part of it makes you stumble or stop for even a second, bring it up as a discussion point. For instance, the article links sabermetrics in the lead, but unless you're particularly knowledgeable about baseball, that won't mean anything, so a brief definition for the non-enthusiast would be worthwhile. His date of birth is not cited to an inline source anywhere in the article, and for me that is a major red flag. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:04, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Dates

Say kids, what date is it?

Hi Ritchie. No problem with this edit, but did you realise that that gives the ref a CS1 error? (Not my area of expertise, but that's why I'd tweaked it in the first place...) Cheers! — sparklism ^hey! 15:07, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

I've added a comma, that should sort it out. As far as I know the standards are [day] [month title] [year] for the UK, and [month title] [day], [year] for the US. I don't think the ref should give an error now, but the important thing is they need to all be consistent. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:11, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Ah, a comma was all it needed - that's what I should've done. That said, the date formats in the refs across that article are a bit inconsistent (e.g. #9 & #11 aren't formatted the same as #14 & #15). I'll not meddle with them myself but you might want to take a look. Cheers! — sparklism ^hey! 15:18, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Should be all done now. Usually with these things a bot comes along with a silly edit summary (see WP:HITANDRUN) and I scratch my head for a minute - so I usually don't do manual fixes! At least I'm not getting any red errors. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:28, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Yep, they look good now :) — sparklism ^hey! 15:58, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Oh good, I'm glad I can do some of these correctly without ballsing it up. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:15, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks to both of youse. Popcornduff (talk) 16:45, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Pete Townshend

Hey! Good work with the Who. I was wondering if you wanted to work with me on Turning Pete Townshend into a GA or maybe even FA. Cheers! ~EDDY ^{(talk/contribs)}~ 15:31, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Hooo boy. Well I've done all I can on The Who's main article for now, so maybe it's time to turn the attention to related articles. Of the four key members, Townshend's is going to be the most difficult - you will need at least his autobiography Who I Am, and probably some other book sources about his devotion to Meher Baba, solo activities, philosophies, and that BLP hornet's nest of the child porn arrest - all outside of the Who. I can have a go at sourcing from Dave Marsh's Before I Get Old, which documents Townshend's thoughts and ideas in far more depth than the others, but that will only get us part of the way. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:37, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

I have a copy of Who I Am. I am a bit reluctant toward using it as a source however, since it may be biased. I worked on the article a bit last year, so his life up to Tommy is essentially complete. It might need some copy editing, but the important events of his life up to that point are there. ~EDDY ^{(talk/contribs)}~ 15:48, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, using Townshend as a source generally is a minefield. As you are probably aware from reading his biography and numerous interviews in Rolling Stone as elsewhere, he tends to tell journalists what they want to hear and speaks whatever is on his mind at any point. You could use his biography to explain how he felt or what he wanted to do at a specific time in his life, but I would be extremely careful to go beyond that? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:57, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

GAR notification

2013–14 Michigan Wolverines men's basketball team, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for a community good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 04:55, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Songs from the Black Hole FA

Thank you again so much for your work getting the article to GA. Now I'm wondering: what do you think would need to be done to make it FA? I've never gone to that step before. Popcornduff (talk) 16:54, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Ack. I'm probably not the best person to ask. I've never had an article passed through FAC - I do about 1 nomination a year and every time I get fed up of the article and desperately want to do something else. That's not really a criticism of the FAC process, more a criticism of me in that I think WP:OWN can be a positive thing in that you're not actually obliged to edit anything here if you don't want to. In your shoes, I would look to get every Weezer album up to GA status, then every band member, then maybe go for a good topic nomination. I don't mind people taking articles to FAC and improving them, and fair play to those that do, but I personally believe the encyclopedia would be better with an overall improved quality on average rather than just a few diamonds in amongst a lot of charcoal.

However, to get to FA it has to use brilliant sources (ideally a commercially published biography with rave reviews, copies of Rolling Stone, Billboard and anything else that covers the topic) and you have to have the article copyedited to the standard that a professional journalist would accept, or you think somebody would pay money for. How you do that, I'm kind of unsure myself. I have always thought Eric Corbett to be a copyeditor par excellence but he's keeping a low profile for reasons I won't go into here, and GabeMc, a brilliant Beatles FA writer, has retired. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:00, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. Your point about getting other articles to GA is a sensible one; one has to question one's motivations on reflection - is going for FA just a pride thing, really, when I could be helping in bigger ways?

I actually consider copy-editing my number one skill (it's what I do for a job), but truth be told, I have seen a lot of dodgy writing in featured articles. Popcornduff (talk) 17:08, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Eric Corbett and GabeMc's FA work is, in my view, generally excellent, as is the work of SandyGeorgia, Giano, BrianBoulton and Ealdgyth. You're not the only one to criticise FA writing, I believe SandyGeorgia has given it strong criticism too, but I prefer to just keep out of the process and stick to article writing where I can. English wasn't my strong subject at school - I can remember getting in trouble for just messing about when I was supposed to be writing essays on Macbeth, which is a shame as I appreciate Shakespeare far more these days. So I'm more a research and sourcing person, leaving the top-notch copyediting to someone else, though I can do GA-quality prose (which I consider to be "enthusiastic amateur" level). Interestingly enough, when I recently created Brentwood Festival, my other half look at it and remarked how well I did making something she found interesting rather bland and dull (albeit factually correct and reliably sourced)! Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:20, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Will you review my review?

Hello again! I've just done my first ever GA review: Talk:Rounds_(album)/GA1

The Wiki guidelines recommend you ask a more experienced reviewer to check out your review and make sure you haven't gone mad. As we've been corresponding recently I thought I'd ask you first, but if you don't want to, that's totally fine, there are a billion others I can ask instead! Thanks. Popcornduff (talk) 22:17, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

I'll need to take a more thorough look later on, but it doesn't look particularly different to how I run GA reviews. Since you've passed a few of your own articles through GAN, you'll have a basic idea of what to expect anyway.

If you can, go and check every inline source and confirm that what is written is factually correct. Prose errors are easy to suggest alternatives for, but if an article says something it shouldn't, that's more of a stumbling block! Some people like to use templates like {{GAList}} that mark off the individual criteria, but I just prefer an open-ended dialogue. If I think something is some way off meeting the criteria, I'll mention it in a summary at the bottom before holding it. I try and avoid failing reviews wherever possible, and only do so if I can't see a way of resolving the issues myself.

Once all issues have been addressed, I go through and check that they're done. If there are one or two further things needed to meet the GA criteria, I tend to jump in and fix them myself (as you saw on Songs from the Black Hole). Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:07, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

All sound advice. Thanks so much, once again. Popcornduff (talk) 15:56, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Re: Drammen Spiral Challenge

Hi. I wasn't aware of this race, but I have looked at the homepage of the organizers. It's a so-called "Challenge Race" for (usually) veteran cars, with different stages, including transport stages, car orienteering stages, skill stages and reliability tests. I don't think it's directly related to the Drammen Spiral. Maybe it was at one time, and just kept the name. I've never heard of it, and I've lived in Drammen for 25 years in two periods. Cashewnøtt (talk) 13:07, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

It tickles my sense of humour that Google Translate from Norwegian to English on that page replaces "Hokksund" with "Dunstable". Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 13:14, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Seasonal Greets!

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2015 !!!

Hello Ritchie333, May you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you a heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New year 2015. Happy editing, NorthAmerica1000 14:55, 18 December 2014 (UTC) Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to user talk pages with a friendly message.

DYK for Richard Dawson (musician)

Harrias ^talk 00:02, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Hurrah! :) — sparklism ^hey! 07:19, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Merry Merry

To you and yours

FWiW Bzuk (talk) 21:42, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Nadolig hapus

Martinevans123^{Santas Grotto} ... wishes you and yours:

"Nadolig Llawen a Blwyddyn Newydd Dda"

---

May the true spirit of Christmas bless you with warmth and peace!

Diolch yn fawr, Martin. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:58, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

A Merry Christmas to all talk page stalkers

It's beginning to look a lot like ... oh you know

Since this is the season of peace on earth and goodwill to all Wikipedians etc etc, I don't suppose today everybody could refrain from all vandalism, reverting and blocking. Or is that just wishful thinking on my behalf? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 09:52, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Yuletide greetings

	Merry Christmas!
	I ran out of lumps of coal, so I'm distributing leftover children. Happy holidays! Curly Turkey ¡gobble! 00:34, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

Oh my word, not more children who insist that it's their go on the computer / tablet / Playstation right now. Still, coal will come in useful for Hogmany, particularly as we're better together. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 10:48, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for December 27

Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Genesis (band), you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Prep school. Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 09:39, 27 December 2014 (UTC)

To paraphrase Severus Snape, do you get your jollies from being an insufferable know-all, DPL bot? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:04, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

GA Bot

Look at these damn automated bots, always blowing their own trumpet. No wonder Mitch likes to block them.

Just noting, I have the bot intentionally avoiding my talk page for GANs. I don't like automated messages on my talk and try to block bots as needed. Mitch32^{(I have seen great intolerance shown in support of tolerance)} 17:58, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Ah okay. Normally I wouldn't have thought about it, but I've noticed the GA bot tripping up over things occasionally and not notifying people when it should. I get annoyed at automated messages (see above), but they happen for a good reason (likewise) so I just await in hope that Martinevans123 will come along and help me make light of them ;-) Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:03, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

As you know, I love bots. They talk more sense on my Talk Page than most editors, and give me such a laugh! "chortle, chortle" Martinevans123 (talk) 18:38, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

At least a bot's message will be predictable and not contain any hidden agenda like "you don't love me anymore, do you"? Although, with JavaScript, all things are possible. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:46, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Haha, yes. I do little to discourage these charming creatures (... although I do prefer her chatty friend). Martinevans123 (talk) 19:11, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

GA Cup - Round 4 (Semi-Finals)

WikiProject Good Articles's 2014-15 GA Cup - Round 4 Happy New Year! We hope that all of our GA Cup competitors had an enjoyable and safe holiday season. Monday saw the end of Round 3. Eight contestants moved forward to Round 4—the top two contestants from each of Round 3's three pools and the top two participants of all remaining users. It was an exciting competition, especially towards the end. Round 3's highest scorer was Jaguar, Round 2's wildcard, with an impressive 305 points, the highest score in the GA Cup thus far. Pool B was the closest race; J_Milburn and Cwmhiraeth switched places a few times in the final hours of the competition, although J Milburn edged out Cwmhiraeth by just 9 points. Pool A was, by far, the most competitive; four out of five moved onto Round 4, and its competitors earned a cumulative 935 points and reviewed 59 articles. Ritchie333, who came in second overall with 255 points, reviewed the most articles (17). Peacemaker67 and Wizardman earned the two wildcard slots, with 184 and 154 points, respectively. Congrats to all! 114 articles were reviewed this round, as compared to 110 in Round 2 and 117 in Round 1. The key to success in Round 3, like in Round 2, was reviewing articles with the longest nomination dates; everyone who moved forward reviewed articles from the pink nomination box (20 points) or reviewed articles that had languished in the queue for over 5 months (18 points). Many of these articles had languished because their nominators had left Wikipedia and had little chance of passing to GA, so our competitors provided a great service by helping remove them from the queue. Also as in Round 2, The Boat Race articles proved to be popular review choices, with 10% of all the articles reviewed in December. We appreciate the competitors' continued enthusiasm, even during the busy holiday season. At least one competitor even reviewed articles while preparing for a holiday meal! For Round 4, participants have been randomly put in 2 pools of 4 contestants each. The top two in each pool will progress to the finals, as well as the top participant (5th place) of all remaining users. The semi-finals will start on January 1 at 0:00:01 UTC and end on January 29 at 23:59:59 UTC. Information about Round 4 and the pools can be found here. We received some excellent feedback about how to improve the GA Cup in the future, including the definition of "quickfails" and the use of pools, which we'll seriously consider as we move forward. As a result of this feedback and the experience we've gained, there will be some changes to the rules come next years GA Cup. Good luck to all our semi-finalists! It is the judges' hope that every competitor in the GA Cup continue to have fun and be enthusiastic about reviewing and passing articles to GA! Cheers from Dom497, TheQ Editor and Figureskatingfan. To subscribe or unsubscribe to future GA Cup newsletter, please add or remove your name to our mailing list. If you are a participant still competing, you will be on the mailing list no matter what as this is the easiest way to communicate between all participants.

--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:09, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Ashford

Sorry, missed your earlier message. Sure, it's on my watchlist, why not let Drmies or another admin or somebody know though? He's proving disruptive now. List of schools in Ashford, Kent might be more appropriate if there is some sourced info summarising each one though but it's trivial by itself and clearly has no place in the article.♦ Dr. Blofeld 11:38, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

It's a tough one to deal with. Based on this edit I think we're just dealing with someone who's a parent or a teacher, who also deals with the local youth football team, and has simply thought it was acceptable to put the content on Wikipedia. It's easy to hit the "rv - unsourced" button in this and stay totally within policy (except perhaps the one on edit warring), but I don't really want somebody going away with the impression that we're all killjoy nazis who think all IP editors are scum. Anyway, I dropped a note on their talk page explaining basic policy and why you should be extra careful about editing a GA or FA, and there's been no further activity since. The schools can be verified by OFSTED reports and local news articles, but I think only the two grammar schools (Norton Knatchbull and Highworth) have any serious claim to notability. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 12:00, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Who's Next

The article Who's Next you nominated as a good article has been placed on hold . The article is close to meeting the good article criteria, but there are some minor changes or clarifications needing to be addressed. If these are fixed within 7 days, the article will pass; otherwise it may fail. See Talk:Who's Next for things which need to be addressed. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Ben MacDui -- Ben MacDui (talk) 11:40, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

@Ben MacDui: - I think you meant to put this "on review" rather than "on hold". I only use the latter case where I have read the entire article, listed all action points I can, and concluded the review will pass once those are resolved. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 12:03, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Fair comment and fixed. You can see my image comment at the review page and I have numerous small prose suggestions. I am taking a break right now (back later today at some point Insha'Allah) but if you are raring to go you can see a draft here. Ben MacDui 13:03, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm not in any particular rush, generally, so take your time and let me know when you're done. It's probably easiest to do all the prose stuff in one hit, and I've got some other GA reviews I need to close off. Regarding the existing comments, I did re-read the article this morning and thought the "we did a test run and it was fucking incredible" doesn't really work, so good call for spotting that. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 14:34, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

It's ready... Ben MacDui 16:11, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

@Ben MacDui: - okay, I think I've done what I can, have a look now. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 20:54, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Happy New Year Ritchie333!

Happy New Year!

Ritchie333,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia. Snuggums (talk / edits) 06:29, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year 2015}} to user talk pages.

Your GA nomination of Jaywick

Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article Jaywick you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Jaguar -- Jaguar (talk) 17:00, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Happy New Year!

Dear Ritchie333,
HAPPY NEW YEAR Hoping 2015 will be a great year for you! Thank you for your contributions!
From a fellow editor,
--FWiW Bzuk (talk)

This message promotes WikiLove. Originally created by Nahnah4 (see "invisible note").

ACR comment/Drammen Spiral

Hi Ritchie333 I saw your note on Drammen Spiral and the norwegian article was one I had my eye on to translate when time permits (haha). I am a moderately frequent traveller to Norway and can read Norwegian to a moderate standard, so I'm happy to collaborate with you on it but may not be able to assign a lot of time just now as I've only edited a handful of times since the summer. What do you have in mind with Norwegian sources, do you have some you want looked at for verification, or worked into some English content for the article, or did you need some finding? Baldy Bill (sharpen the razor|see my reflection) 22:22, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

@Baldy Bill: I remember visiting the Drammen Spiral in about 1980, and pulled what I can from book sources to make up the current stub. To improve it any further will require somebody with good Norwegian skills to read better local sources, and hopefully update foreign language Wikipedias too. Not sure what else I can do, but anything you can do to expand and improve it will be great! Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 22:28, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Made a start on it, will come back to it and find some more at a later stage. There are 1300chrs of readable prose now so removing the stub tag is probably justified if you like, there is after all only so much that can be said about a giant drinking straw... Baldy Bill (sharpen the razor|see my reflection) 01:57, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

DYK for Mersea Island

Harrias ^talk 00:02, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Mersea Island

The article Mersea Island you nominated as a good article has been placed on hold . The article is close to meeting the good article criteria, but there are some minor changes or clarifications needing to be addressed. If these are fixed within 7 days, the article will pass; otherwise it may fail. See Talk:Mersea Island for things which need to be addressed. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Biblioworm -- Biblioworm (talk) 19:01, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Mersea Island

The article Mersea Island you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:Mersea Island for comments about the article. Well done! If the article has not already been on the main page as an "In the news" or "Did you know" item, you can nominate it to appear in Did you know. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Biblioworm -- Biblioworm (talk) 03:02, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

If you will be so kind

I say, that's a jolly good GA that EEng chap has written there. Ding dong!

I hope this isn't asking too much, or a GA faux pas, but could you see your way clear to jumping the queue and taking up the GAR for Widener Library when you feel up to it? I have this idea (possibly hopeless) of bringing it to FA in time for it to run as TFA in June, which will be the library's 100 anniversary. There will be quite a celebration at that time, and a TFA would be a wonderful addition to that. I've never done an FA or even GA (and frankly what I've seen from afar is a little frightening) but I recognize that GA is a kind of proof-of-concept for FA, and I believe I can relay on you to be frank yet sensible. EEng (talk) 10:44, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Okay, I've started the review. I do try and work with people and give people a chance to improve things during the review so we have a GA at the other end. If you've done DYKs, you can probably do GAs. The full criteria is at WP:WIAGA but the important differences between a GA and an FA is that the sources can be a little more lax, only a small selection of the MOS needs to be followed (most of which is common sense) and the prose has to be readable but not pro-journalist standard. That said, the way I tend to work is suggest any improvements I can, and only fall back on the GA criteria if something is contentious or difficult (eg: "well we could make the citation formats consistent and find a better source than the Lymeswold Weekly News but it's not part of the GA criteria"). Anyway, I've started the review and I'll hopefully finish that in the next day or two - unless there any serious howlers it'll be put "on hold" and you'll get time to fix things - or, if you prefer, to argue why I was wrong and you were right. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 21:05, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Needless to say I'm amazed by the thoroughness of your very detailed review. I may or may not have time to attend to this today, but in the meantime... I futzed with the images overnight and I don't know whether your last comments were before or after I did that. Can you take a look and see if that affects any of your comments re images? And if the specific problem, at that specific screen size you mentioned, persists can you be clearer about what the situation is (zoom level, what browser) and exactly what happens? Thanks! EEng (talk) 15:31, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

The easiest way to describe the problem would be to do a screen grab, but since uploading images on Wikipedia is a minor PITA to confirm a free licence etc, for now I'll just say that on this laptop, which runs at 1900x1200 using Google Chrome, I can navigate to the "Renovation" and position the browser in such a way that no prose whatsoever appears on the screen. If you can't possibly bear the loss of these free images, we can create a gallery section at the bottom, which should alleviate things. If the images are still giving you grief, I will have a look and attempt to fix them up myself, though be warned this may involved commenting some out so they're invisible. In any case, once I have completed a GA review to "on hold", I will then help with the legwork to complete the issues if I can. The standard time for fixing an "on hold" is 7 days, but I have been known to wait longer (eg: South African general election, 2014 was started on 16 December and passed on 1 January). So there's no rush. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:52, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Instead of a cheque...

		The Running Man Barnstar
		Thank you for all you have done to help me with the Boat Race articles. Tonight we hit a landmark, over 50% of the race articles are now Good or Featured Articles, which is a monumental achievement considering that none of the articles even existed eight months ago. Thanks again. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:34, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

@The Rambling Man: Without wishing to massage your ego too much, it is such a joy to review a set of articles for GA that I can just read and absorb and not have to stop every two sentences and think "wouldn't it be easier to say 'y' instead of 'x'" or "is that really true" or "OMG, they've cited the Daily Mail". So thank you for creating them. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 21:38, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

"How very dare you!" Some of the best pictures going, I'll have you know! Martinevans123 (talk) 15:58, 4 January 2015 (UTC)