Talk:Pornography/GA1

GA Review
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.''

Reviewer: Z1720 (talk · contribs) 14:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

(Criteria marked are unassessed)
 * 1) It is reasonably well written.
 * a. (prose, spelling, and grammar):
 * b. (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):
 * 1) It is factually accurate and verifiable.
 * a. (reference section):
 * b. (citations to reliable sources):
 * c. (OR):
 * d. (copyvio and plagiarism):
 * 1) It is broad in its coverage.
 * a. (major aspects):
 * b. (focused):
 * 1) It follows the neutral point of view policy.
 * Fair representation without bias:
 * 1) It is stable.
 * No edit wars, etc.:
 * 1) It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
 * a. (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales):
 * b. (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/fail:
 * 1) It is broad in its coverage.
 * a. (major aspects):
 * b. (focused):
 * 1) It follows the neutral point of view policy.
 * Fair representation without bias:
 * 1) It is stable.
 * No edit wars, etc.:
 * 1) It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
 * a. (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales):
 * b. (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/fail:
 * No edit wars, etc.:
 * 1) It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
 * a. (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales):
 * b. (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/fail:
 * b. (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/fail:
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/fail:
 * Pass/fail:

Hi, before going into an in-depth review of the article (it's very long, so it would take a long time) I am going to give general comments on things I found in a skim. When these are addressed, I'll go more indepth into various sections:


 * The lede is too long. While this is an extensive topic that has many facets, the lede should be shortened to provide an overview that does not overwhelm the reader. I think four paragraphs is appropriate, but the length of the paragraphs should be shortended.
 * There are many one-sentence paragraphs, which are not recommended per MOS:PARA. I suggest merging these paragraphs, expanding upon them, or removing them.
 * There is some major MOS:SANDWICH happening in the "Pornography throughout history" section with the quote and the top of "Legality and regulations".
 * Ref 28, 42 57, do not point to a citation.
 * Sutherland, John (1983) and Klein, Marty (30 October 2016) are not used as inline citations and should probably be removed.
 * "Further reading" should not be divided by position as it might be against WP:NPOV and WP:OR. Even better, these sources should be placed in the article as inline citations or removed.
 * The "External links" section looks like it should be in Further Reading, or removed per WP:ELNO
 * History.com is not a reliable source on Wikipedia and should be removed from External links.
 * Gover, Dominic (13 August 2013), Buchholz, Katharina (11 February 2019)., Richter, Felix (21 August 2013, Steinbuch, Yaron (2 December 2022)., News.com.au. and imdb are not considered reliable sources as should be removed.

Please ping me when the above are addressed and I will give more comments. Z1720 (talk) 14:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)


 * all the concerned issues have been addressed. Rim sim (talk) 07:39, 2 May 2023 (UTC)
 * , any updates? (t &#183; c)  buidhe  17:45, 22 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I got busy in real life and haven't had a chance to pick this up again. I am hoping to take a look at it by later this week. Z1720 (talk) 20:54, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Sorry about the delays. I am returning to this review, and I'm going to start by looking at the sources and what they verify. This is not a spot check yet, but I will bring up concerns below:


 * Source review: Books and News sections:


 * "Gupta, Mahendranath (1942)." This is only used once, to verify a fact about Hindusim, but the publisher is a sect of Hinduism and might not be representative of the whole religion. I suggest replacing this with a peer-reviewed academic source.
 * "Leahy, Michael (2009)." This is used to verify "Pornographic websites are often visited during office hours." There's another source that also verifies this, and this book has a bias towards stopping people from engaging in pornography so I think this can be removed.
 * "Monaco, James (1999)." I think this is James Monaco. It is only used once in the article, and there's a CBS source that is also used to verify this. I am dubious about the reliability of this source so I think it should be removed.
 * "The Hindu Kama Shastra Society (1925)." Considering the age of this source, and the bias that this group has towards this information, I think better, more recent sources can be found to verify this.
 * "Stone, Lyman (26 June 2019)." This is used to verify "The vast majority of US men use porn." Since this is a Christian magazine, I do not think it is the best source to use to verify this information. I suggest replacing it with a better, academic source.
 * "Weiss, Daniel (November 2022)" This is used once to verify "Some Christian denominations consider pornography use among Christian men and women as engaging in "digital adultery." I am not sure this information is necessary in the article, but if digital adultery is going to be introduced in this article I would expect an explanation in the article and information from other sources.
 * Some of the journals are wikilinked in sources, and some are not. I suggest picking one format and standardising it.
 * The page numbers for the "Sources used" section are not necessary as they are cited in the inline citations. Examples include "Black, Jeremy; Green, Anthony (1992). " and "Browne, Pat (2001)." These page numbers should be deleted. An exception to this is in edited works like "MacKinnon, Catharine A. (1989a)."
 * "Pornography: A Secret History of Civilisation"." There is no inline citation pointing to this, so this can be deleted.
 * The Further reading section does not need level 3 headings, per MOS:OVERSECTION, and most or all of these can either be incorporated as inline citations or deleted.
 * "Susannah Breslin (20 December 2013)." This is written by a Forbes contributor and is therefore considered unreliable. It should be removed.


 * General comments from skims:
 * There should be an inline citation at the end of every paragraph, minimum. Exceptions include the lede. Examples of where a citation is missing include:
 * "The Meese Report in 1986, argued against loosening restrictions on pornography in the US. The report was criticized as biased, inaccurate, and not credible."
 * "Some people, including pornography producer Larry Flynt and the writer Salman Rushdie,[h] have argued that pornography is vital to freedom and that a free and civilized society should be judged by its willingness to accept pornography." And this note h is not necessary and can be removed. (this whole paragraph can probably be removed as a topic as broad as this probably doesn't need individual opinions.)
 * "The UK government has criminalized possession of what it terms "extreme pornography," following the highly publicized murder of Jane Longhurst."
 * The Economics section seems to just be a listing of estimates of the total monetary worth of the industry. I think this section should instead focus on how the industry is monetised and generates revenue, with the total worth of the industry today included in that paragraph.

I am going to review the News and Websites section after the above are addressed, but in general please ensure that all websites have an access date. Ping me when the above are addressed. Z1720 (talk) 18:01, 27 May 2023 (UTC)


 * Hi there, have made changes as per all the recommendations listed, you may continue the review process now. Rim sim (talk) 11:36, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
 * pinging you, the review can be continued now. Rim sim (talk) 14:00, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Continuing review:


 * I do not think that we need a list of the net worth of pornography in the Economics section for specific years. Instead, this section should focus on how the economics of pornography has grown, with specific mentions of years where there were major changes.
 * "Bhasin, Puneet (29 November 2014)" What is the editorial policy of this source? Are articles reviewed before it is published?
 * "Comenas, Gary (2002)." Same as above.
 * "Dave, Hiren (2 July 2020)." This source is not necessary and the editorial policy is dubious, so I recommend removing it.
 * "Kernes, Mark (24 June 2014c)." Title has all-caps, which should be removed.
 * "Lipton, Josh (28 January 2010)." I could not find the editorial policy of Minyanville so I suggest removing this.
 * "Layne, Ken." I think this is just a general opinion site and should be removed.
 * "Masnick, Mike (4 November 2011)" I can't find this site's editorial policy and I think it can be removed.
 * "Maxwell, Andy (6 February 2012)." Wikipedia's website identifies this as a blog, and Maxwell is the site's creator. Thus, I do not think this should be used.
 * "O'Connor, David (September–October 2001)." I do not know what this website is, and I think it can be removed.
 * "Rodley, Chris;" This is not used as a source and should be deleted.
 * "Spencer, William David (2010)." This is a conference paper: should it be in this section?
 * "Salter, Michael (2013)." Same as above.
 * "SPINA, J. (9 July 2014)." This should be cited to the supreme court's website, not another outlet.
 * "Williams, Mitchell (21 November 2012)." This was written by a contributor and not considered reliable per WP:HUFFPOST
 * ""AMERICAN PORN". " The all-caps from this reference should be removed.
 * ""Bhagavad Gita: Chapter 7, Verse 11"." This should be cited to the actual book, not an external site.
 * ""Bulk Alexa rank checker"." Why is this reliable?
 * ""Denmark - the first country to legalize pornography". " This reference needs to be cleaned up: the author and other information is given in the archived site.
 * ""pornography – podictionary 943"" Why is this reliable?
 * ""pornography". Online Etymology Dictionary." Why is the online etymology dictionary reliable?
 * ""STI Testing in the Adult Industry: Exposing the Truth"." Why is this a reliable source?
 * ""πόρνος". " Why is this a reliable source?
 * """πορνογραφία""." Why is this reliable?
 * ""20th Century Nudes in Art"." Why is this reliable?
 * Adult Video News vs AVN: These seem to be used interchangeably: one of these should be chosen and used in the sources.

This type of article is popular and thus editors often want to add less reliable sources. I highly recommend that you seek out the highest quality sources possible from reputable publications like peer-reviewed journals supported by universities and new outlets that have a record of independent, editorial oversight. In the next step, while reading the article I will check who is supporting that citation, and if there is a large claim I will look to see what source is supporting it, and if it is a lower quality source I will mention it below. I suggest that you do a readthrough of the article to see how the sourcing can be improved. Z1720 (talk) 22:28, 18 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Have made all the requisite changes and improved the article accordingly. Kept the online etymology dictionary as it's considered quite a good source for non technical words. Hope the review is continued soon. Rim sim (talk) 18:30, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay. Here are some additional thoughts: I'll pause there. Let me know when the history section is revamped. Z1720 (talk) 22:30, 20 July 2023 (UTC)
 * The lede is quite long. I would see if you could reduce it. A great place to start is to ensure that all of the information in the lede is also somewhere in the body of the article.
 * Per MOS:CITELEDE, the citations in the lede are probably not necessary.
 * The "Etymology and definition" Seems very repetitive and unstructured. I would copyedit this section and try to have a clear narrative throughout the section.
 * The erotica information isn't necessary in this article as it has its own article.
 * The 1964 US Supreme Court information seems too US centric and I think it can be removed.
 * "Further information: History of erotic depictions" All hatnotes should be at the top of the section not in the middle.
 * The blockquote in this section is creating MOS:SANDWICH with the images. I am personally not a fan of quotes in Wikipedia articles, and I think most of them can be removed.
 * "The society of ancient Greece was recognized" recognized by whom?
 * With the Hindu images and the Kama Sutra images, we have two blocks of images for one area of the world in the history section. Considering how many images are in this section, I think one of them can be removed.
 * The "Pornography from ancient times" section has ancient history, then goes to the early modern era. It also skips several areas of the world, like North and South America, Australasia, Southern Africa, and Western Europe. It is hard because you are basically creating a history of everywhere in the world at all times, but other locations should be mentioned and included, and information about the "popular" civilizations (Hindu, Greek, Mesopotamia) should be spun-off into other articles.
 * "Pornography from early modern era" Has two paragraphs devoted to Japanese, which I think should be chopped up and merged into one.
 * There's a lot of history of the Italian Renaissance which should be reduced.
 * "Criminalization" section focuses on Western Europe and the US. How did the UK's laws influence other areas of the world (especially with colonialism)?
 * The Criminalization" and "Legalisation" sections are too US and UK focused, and does not speak about Communist countries or countries that used to be colonies. I think this section needs to be reduced down and spun away into other articles, with more information about other parts of the world included.
 * "Modern-day pornography" can be reduced down, with most of the information spun-out into an article about the link between the internet and pornography. I do not know if such an article exists, or if one will need to be created, but this section is too long to encompass five paragraphs of prose for 40ish years of history.
 * "The seeds of modern-day pornography were planted" Avoid MOS:IDIOMs

I'm going to close this as failed, as there is still a lot of work to do to bring this to GA status. This is a very large topic to pick as a first article, and I suggest that you work on some smaller articles related to this topic (Pornography in a specific location, or a type of pornography) that can be used to improve this article. That way, you can bring smaller topics up to GA status and continue improving this article. Let me know if you have any questions. Z1720 (talk) 15:31, 19 August 2023 (UTC)