Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp./archive1

SG review

• "best known as" is an over-used cliche in leads. I suggest changing

  Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp. is a landmark 1948 New York Supreme Court decision that is best known as the first case in United States copyright law to recognize moral rights in authorship. ... to -->

  Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp. is a landmark 1948 New York Supreme Court decision that was the first case in United States copyright law to recognize moral rights in authorship. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:55, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  Done. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:35, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• You can install User:Trappist the monk/HarvErrors.js to find ref errors like these:
  • Lee, Mary A. (1950). "Moral Right Doctrine: Protection of the Artist's Interest in His Creation After Sale". Comments. Alabama Law Review. 2 (2): 267–281. ISSN 2162-6812 – via HeinOnline. Harv warning: There is no link pointing to this citation. The anchor is named CITEREFLee1950.
  • Zabatta, Patrick G. (1992). "Moral Rights and Musical Works: Are Composers Getting Berned". Syracuse Law Review. 43 (3): 1095–1136. ISSN 0039-7938 – via HeinOnline. Harv warning: There is no link pointing to this citation. The anchor is named CITEREFZabatta1992. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:55, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  The reason these ref errors are there is because those sources aren't currently cited in the article. Should they remain in the ref list? voorts (talk/contributions) 00:55, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

  OOps, sorry, responded below. They should be deleted then, unless you think them so valuable that they should be listed as Further reading. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:56, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• Considering the topic, I'd ask Elcobbola if he has time to look in. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:56, 9 November 2023 (UTC)
• A MOS tangle/nitpick – The French cour d’appel (lit. transl. court of appeal)

  This is showing on my iPad without a space between transl. and court of appeal, which is quite odd, yet when I edit copy-edit paste it to here, the space is there. Is there a space on your browser, or is this an iPad issue?

  Do we not have a link to this French court of appeal ? Even if that link uses an Interlanguage link to the French article? And if so, is it not a proper noun, or need to be in upper case? Because if so, per MOS:BADITALICS, proper nouns in non-English are not italicized. (Yep, that's a tangle :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:13, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  On a real computer now, and the space is showing; that's an iPad issue apparently. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:37, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

  I don't believe cour d'appel is a proper noun; not sure though. I changed it up a bit so that it says: "A French court of appeal (French: cour d’appel) reached the opposite conclusion of the New York Supreme Court in Shostakovich ...". The spacing error was not occurring on my laptop; perhaps something to report on the template talk page. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:45, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• The placement of the image of Charles Recht at the Case history section is causing formatting problems. See MOS:IMAGELOC, "Left-aligned images may disturb the layout of bulleted lists and similar structures that depend on visual uniformity, e.g. by pushing some items on such lists further inward. Hence, avoid left-aligned images near such structures." On my screen, the image placement is distorting the four-point list in the text; can the image be re-located elsewhere, or moved right? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:18, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  Moved to the right. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:46, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• Should there be an explanatory footnote after "in New York Supreme Court, the state's trial court" (or somewhere in the article) about how/why New York State is different than others vis-a-vis the Supreme Court being a trial court? Readers without a lawyer in their back pocket could stumble over that. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:29, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  The "why" is weird historical reasons. I don't think a footnote explaining that would make someone who is already confused after the in-text clarification any less confused. Additionally, New York Supreme Court is wikilinked in the article, so if someone wanted to learn more, they can click that. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:49, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

  Good enough (the lawyer in my back pocket said same :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:53, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• Is also redundant/necessary here? "Justice Koch also watched The Iron Curtain with counsel present." SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:39, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  Removed. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:49, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• [Not a lawyer alert]: "At oral argument and in their motion, the composers conceded that the compositions at issue" .. this makes it sound like the composers themselves attended the trial ... should it be "attorneys for the composers"? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:41, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  It could say "plaintiffs" instead. The party name is often used in legal writing to describe the party's decision. I'll change it if you think it's actually unclear / confusing and someone could think Shostakovich actually went down to 60 Centre Street in Manhattan to argue a case. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:51, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

  the party's position, not decision voorts (talk/contributions) 00:59, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

• Is there a way to vary the wording to avoid used ... use ... "the music was being used for a political use" SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:43, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

  I changed the second "use" to "purpose". voorts (talk/contributions) 00:52, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

That's all; very nice and clear work, well written. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:47, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

@SandyGeorgia: Nits have been picked. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:52, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

Did you want to delete those unused sources I identified above with HarvRef errors, or move them to Further reading ? Elcobbola is usually pretty responsive to my pings, so hopefully he will show by tomorrow, and may have something interesting to add, as this is his field. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:55, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

I've added them back in as cites. I hope Elcobbola can take a look. Thank you for taking the time to review the article. voorts (talk/contributions) 01:12, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm sure he will; I don't post at Elcobbola's talk page to ask him to, rather ping him, as he has a serious long-standing sockmaster who pesters his talk page as a result of Ec's adminning on Commons, and I wouldn't want that sock to be encouraged to also follow your fine work here! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 11:43, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

You'll have to forgive me--I'm traveling and will likely not be able to look into this for several days. Эlcobbola _talk 21:51, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Happy travels, Ec! It's possible the FAC will get promoted then before you get to it, but now I've introduced you and voorts, regardless ... in case you want to collaborate later. It would be grand to have your stamp of approval, so I can also support. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:55, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks again for connecting us, Sandy. @Elcobbola: do you regularly work on legal articles? I have some listed on my user page that I've been thinking about working on for a while if you're interested in collaborating. voorts (talk/contributions) 02:33, 15 November 2023 (UTC)