Wikipedia:Peer review/Community/archive1

Community

Hundereds of Wikipedia articles link to this article and it nearly always filters to the top of Google searches with the term "community" in them. In addition, "this article has been identified by the Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team as a Core Topic, one of the 150 most important articles for any encyclopedia to have." The text is awkward, there are very few authoritative sources and references cited, and the structure seems to be a bit unconventional in terms of Wikipedia style. Please lend a hand to help get this article at least up to GA status! Thanks in advance. CQ 19:52, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

• Please see automated peer review suggestions here. Thanks, AZ _t 00:36, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, thanks. We're hoping some Humans would take a look at it, too. • CQ 01:37, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I usually hope for that too. Still:

• Quite a few one sentence paragraphs, especially in the lead. If I remember correctly WP:MOS advises against this.
• The lead is probably a little short. It should give an overview of the article. And you probably shouldn't have a section called overview either. Sorry!
• You will get picked up for not having inline citations of your references. The practical consequence of having only very few is that I can't tell which references you have used to provide which facts, either to confirm that they are right or to find out more about that particular bit of the topic.
• I can't reference this (or at least I'm not going to, this is only a quick review!) but I think you'll find that the progression from hunter gatherer to city dweller was much less linear and inevitable than the article describes. In the Middle East there was a lengthy period in which communities drifted back and forth between the two lifestyles before agriculture really kicked off. Some hunter gatherer societies reached levels of complexity equivalent to less complex agrarian ones - in the American North West, for example. You might do better to reflect this.
• Under 'Types of community' Why does Community of place appear at the bottom under 'Other classifications' as well as apparently being the main article for 'Location'?
• 'Challenge of Community' doesn't sound very encyclopaedic. What is the point that the article is trying to make here?
• The automated suggestions are actually quite useful I find. Give them a go. If you want to return the favour, by the way, why not have a look at Brabham. I'm looking for views from non-motorsports fans and I've got a theory that if everyone who puts an article up for Peer Review reviews two other articles, we'd all get a lot more use out of this process! 4u1e 21:26, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments 4u1e. We're working on the issues you mentioned. The article has undergone a massive re-write since AndyZ's script was run and much has changed. Maybe I'll ask him to run it again. We concur that the 'Types of community' section is a bit cumbersome, and we'll be dealing with that. Also, we're looking for more sources and more international coverage of the topic. The topic has proven to be so broad and abstract, it has made sourcing and referencing quite a challenge. Please feel free to join the conversation at Talk:Community and we'll do the same at Talk:Brabham Racing Organisation. I certainaly agree with your theory about the peer review process! Thanks again! • CQ 12:28, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

The article has improved significantly since I last checked it few months ago, and it is certainly an extremly important subject. As such, it should have many more inline citations, preferably academic. Preferably every single fact should be referenced - and currently we have entire sections with no reference at all (for example, 'Significance of community'). Notes and references should be merged, and if something is not an inline citation it is more of a 'further reading' then any reference. It's great that it already cites an important work like Putnam's Bowling Alone, but it needs more important publications; there is not a single academic journal used in references as far as I can tell. Notable authors should be ilinked, like Ferdinand Tönnies or Robert Putnam, not only in text but in reference section, too (so should titles of notable publications). One of the key issues is definition: while there is no one definition of community, I think the article should cite several by most notable scholars. See also should be as short as possible, with its links incorporated into main article. Last but not least, I would suggest trying for an WP:ACPR and get this article reviewed by a scholar specializing in community (I may know a person like that, let me know when the article is ready for FAC and I will do this before FAC).-- _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus  talk}  15:57, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments and what I'm taking as a "vote of confidence", Piotrus. I think we've made the classic mistake of trying to source an article to what we've written rather than first gathering the sources, then writing the article. All of the issues you brought up are being dealt with and this article's ambition is to become FAC material, so jump on in if you have the time. We could use your expertice. Please also have a look at the List of community topics, where I've started a Sources and references section to do the "gathering" of such. I know you're busy but if you have the time, go for it. Thanks again • CQ 20:36, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

• Good article (I promoted it as such). My only suggestion is don't feel forced to discuss every aspect of community. Sometimes the best thing for articles on subjects as broad as this one is for them to leave a few points out so that they can really focus on their main points. Some sections such as Communitarianism might be worth reconsidering from this perspective. However there were no major problems and the only real concern I had was with the Community service sub-section that seemed tacked on and completely disconnected from the rest of the article. Cedars 10:31, 4 August 2006 (UTC)