Wikipedia:Peer review/David Meerman Scott/archive1

David Meerman Scott

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I've listed this article for peer review because I'd like to get it into shape for a Featured Article nomination.

Thanks, Woz2 (talk) 12:27, 20 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, first of all, I'm sorry for not giving a more in-depth and specific review at the moment, but after a short checking of the article it appears that it needs quite a bit of work before an FAC is in oder. There is very little substantive material on Scott's life, whereas the book and product lists make up a majority of the article and the text reads more like a summary of things Scott said about himself (somewhat like a press release) than a biography that relies on high quality sources. Maybe those are not easily found with a salesman, but using primary sources like YouTube videos and his Twitter and Google profiles to source his activity on those pages in a list does not make for a good read and reminds me of an advertisement (in tone, too, especially in the lead). Also, the image is problematic as it lacks a proper author identification and was transferred by another user from the English Wikipedia to the Commons without good information - it looks like a promotional photo that lacks proper permission and should be sorted out in any case. It's always a good idea to be unafraid of adapting the style and structure of articles on similar subjects that are already featured to the article to be improved - I'm sure the article can greatly improve in quality with some work. Regards Hekerui (talk) 21:34, 20 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Hmmm... sorry you feel that way... I'm concerned you're using the pejorative epithet 'salesman' unfairly. I felt the cites to reliable sources like Wiley, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, The Wall Street Journal, Entrepreneur, The New York Times, and Advertizing Age Magazine made the article quite good... looks like there's more works to do... Woz2 (talk) 00:57, 21 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- I found a bunch more reliable sources. Would the citation of these help?

Woz2 (talk) 14:48, 21 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ruhrfisch comments I took a brief look at the article just now nad have some comments to add - agree that it is not ready for FAC.

A model article is useful for ideas and examples to follow. One possible FA model is Madman Muntz a bio on a business man - other FA biographies can be found at Category:FA-Class biography articles
I would include a hat note to David Scott (disambiguation) at the top of the article
One dead link - see here (Kadient board of directors)
The article depends rather heavily on sources from the subject (Mr Scott) - as much as possible it is best to use third-party reliable sources that are independent of the subject.
MOS says to avoid bullet point and other lists wherever possible - this article has several. I think most of them would be better off converted into straight prose
Looking at his books - there are 10 in the bullet point list, plus five he has written forwards for, plus and unspecified number of ebooks (which I suspect duplicates his bullet point 10 books, in part at least). Only two of these 15 or more books have any sort of crutucal commentary (i.e. anything other than the title and what Scott himself says about them). Of these critical comments, one is really about how the book came to be written Scott Kirsner, reviewing the book in the Boston Globe,[21] mentions that the authors say they were inspired in part by an article in the Atlantic by Joshua Green.[22] and only one is actually about the book itself (and that more about the format it is published in) Nick Morgan of Forbes notes that Scott and his publisher, Wiley, "point the way forward" by publishing this book only in electronic formats.[17] What do critics say about his books and his work and his ideas?
I doubt the covers of the books would pass as fair use for this article at FAC - how does seeing the covers increase the reader's understanding of Mr Scott? See WP:NFCC
References are a mess - per WP:CITE references come AFTER punctuation, and are usually at the end of a sentence or phrase
Article needs more references, for example some of the book material is uncited as is his serving on the board of NewsWatch (acquired by Yahoo! Japan).
My rule of thumb is that every quote, every statistic, every extraordinary claim and every paragraph needs a ref.
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
Add dates / years to put things in context - when did he get married? When was their daughter born? Or add a year to boards he serves on (as of 2012) as this kind of info can become out of date pretty quickly.
Please make sure that the existing text includes no copyright violations, plagiarism, or close paraphrasing. For more information on this please see Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-04-13/Dispatches. (This is a general warning given in all peer reviews, in view of previous problems that have risen over copyvios.)

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 _><>°^° 15:07, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]