Template:Did you know nominations/Nossa Senhora da Graça incident


 * The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as |this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:42, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

Nossa Senhora da Graça incident

 * ... that the Nossa Senhora da Graça fought for four days against samurai before being sunk by its own captain?
 * ALT1: ... that the suicide of the captain of the Nossa Senhora da Graça became part of Japanese folklore?

Created by Underbar dk (talk). Nominated by Kolbasz (talk) at 15:41, 27 June 2014 (UTC).


 * Symbol question.svg Review underway. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:53, 27 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Symbol possible vote.svg I have reviewed the article, and sadly I am leaning towards rejection.
 * First, the good points. The article is newly-created.  It was developed as a userspace draft, and then copy-pasted today to article space.  I would have preferred that the article had been moved rather than pasted, and suggest a history merge, but the article clearly fits the DYK criteria of recent arrival in mainspace.
 * At 22 kB (3847 words) of "readable prose size", it far exceeds the 1500 characters minimum size for DYK.
 * The article is well-written, in engaging prose, and tells a compelling narrative of a critical historical incident. AFAICS, it appears to be neutral, and it is thoroughly referenced. There are a few points where I have added fact tags, but these are minor issues which I do not see as an impediment to DYK.
 * Most of the images appear to be free, but there are unresolved licensing issues with File:Tokugawa_Ieyasu.jpg. Before a DYK could proceed, the image should ether be removed or have its licensing status resolved.
 * As a historical event, there are no BLP issues.
 * The hook fact is interesting and correctly formatted, and I AGF that the off-line source has been used accurately.
 * However, that brings me to the big problem. The article is based on only 3 sources, each of which is a book written by C. R. Boxer. The article is therefore based wholly on the work of one writer.
 * That raises a number of problems, including a risk of copyright violation or close paraphrasing, and failure to include different perspectives on events. I have not encountered anything like this before, so I am unsure what the consensus is on the acceptability of using a single source like this.  My own initial view is that it is inappropriate, and that the article should be restored to userspace for a complete rewrite, but I would prefer wider input.  So I have listed the page at Copyright problems/2014 June 27.
 * I am sure that the huge effort put into creating this article was done in good faith, but this use of sources does need further evaluation. Pinging both the creator Underbar dk and the nominator Kolbasz. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:19, 27 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I can see rejecting it due to potential bias from the sources having a single author, but to go from "sources having the same author" to copyright violation feels like quite a leap of logic. Kolbasz (talk) 23:27, 27 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I am also confounded by the sudden accusations (based on nothing but wanton speculation, no less), which does not seem AGF at all. I also do not appreciate my work being replaced by a copyright violation notice with, again, nothing more than impulse. I ask that the copyright violation be removed until someone has concrete evidence that the article was plagiarized, which I assure you is not. Getting to the crux of the "issue", Boxer is the only authority that I know of to have dealt with this incident in any significant detail. All the general references I've seen cite his works when they mention this incident, for example in China and Maritime Europe, 1500-1800 by John E. Wills Jr. _dk (talk) 00:33, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Oh dear. Please can you step back, and AGF, and accept my assurances above that I raised these concerns reluctantly and for the reasons stated above?
 * As I made very clear both here and at DYK, I did not speculate. I noted that the article contains "a risk of copyright violation or close paraphrasing".
 * Nor are my objections based on "impulse". They are based on a genuine concern that basing such a detailed article so closely on the work of one author carries a great risk of copyvio, even if only by close paraphrasing.
 * I am aware that you put a huge amount of work into elegantly writing the article, but it remains a problem that it is all drawn from 3 published works of the same author. Whether that is best labelled as a copyvio or not is debatable, but I believe that there is a serious problem in basing such a lengthy article solely on the work of one author whose work is still in copyright. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:33, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * In the interest of centralizing discussion, I'll copy my exasperated reply from WP:CP to here, and add some more. "If you are not even sure that citing the same author should be labelled as a copyvio, perhaps it would be best if you have sorted out the interpretation of the rules on the Village Pump or elsewhere before you blank someone's work with a copyvio notice that you're not even sure if it's proper? Last I know, summarizing an author's work is not plagiarism if it's in my own words." In fact, WP:Close paraphrasing says "Editors should generally summarize source material in their own words, adding inline citations as required by the sourcing policy", which is exactly what I did. _dk (talk) 01:44, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I have started a thread on the village pump on your suggestion. _dk (talk) 02:56, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * As noted at the village pump, I didn't actually want to blank the article, but that's what the template does.
 * There is no deadline. If the consensus is that this use of sources is appropriate, then the article can be easily unblanked. In the meantime, nothing has been deleted; it is just on hold pending clarification. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:28, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * There are serious breaches of accepted Wikipedia protocol that you need to address, specifically that if you are not sure, then you shouldn't be blanking people's articles "reluctantly", understanding that is what the template does. This is biting behaviour, and I'm not even a newbie. _dk (talk) 03:43, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * _dk, I have tried very hard to be understanding of the disappointment you must be feeling at criticism of an article which you have written so carefully and so well, and I have at all stages assumed good faith.
 * However, I am starting to feel that this dialogue is becoming a little one-sided, because I see from you no reciprocal respect for my good faith concern that this is an inappropriate way to use sources. When you start citing WP:BITE even tho you acknowledge that you are not a newbie, I feel less inclined to be gentle in reply.
 * Look, this isn't complicated. I have questions about sourcing which raise important issues of editorial policy.  As you can see, I proactively set out to find venues to get quick answers, and I hope that these questions they can be resolved quickly.  In the meantime please try to focus on the substance of those questions rather than making wikilawyering attempts to find some flaw in my efforts to get wider input into assessing them. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:04, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry if I come across as rude or snide, but I'm sure you can understand my frustration at my hard work being blanked for reasons that I struggle to wrap my head around. Thankfully I am not the only one to feel this way, and I am glad to see the matter resolved to my satisfaction. My "wikilawyering", if you call it that, only seeks to get you (an admin, no less!) to follow the accepted practice on Wikipedia, which you continue to dismiss. You may be acting in good faith, and I can appreciate that, but you can hardly expect me not to sound accusatory after blanking my page. May we meet on better terms in our next encounter. Cheers. _dk (talk) 05:40, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

However, it remains the case that the article relies entirely on a single source: the work the historian C. R. Boxer. It includes no other perspective on events. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:51, 28 June 2014 (UTC) The use of File:Tokugawa Ieyasu.jpg remains unresolved, but could be fixed either by sorting out the licensing or by removing the image from the article. That point is not a deal-breaker. However, the fundamental problem remains that this article is derived solely from the works of one historian. No other sources are cited. I am glad that the consensus at the Village Pump discussion (permalink) is that this does not raise copyright problems, but per my initial comments, copyright issues are not my only concern with single-sourcing. There remains the wider question of what I described in my initial review as failure to include different perspectives on events. This could be resolved by a rewrite which included other perspectives, but as it stands the article does not attempt to incorporate different perspectives, and as such should not appear on the front page. Feel free to seek a third opinion. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:07, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * The issues have been addressed. _dk (talk) 09:44, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Sorry _dk, but I am afraid that they have not been resolved to my satisfaction. The consensus at the village pump is that this use of sources is not of itself evidence of a copyvio, and I am happy to accept that consensus. That resolves one issue.
 * Symbol delete vote.svg With regret, I am changing my tentative "no" to a firm no.
 * The article now uses File:Tokugawa Ieyasu2.JPG. Until or unless I or someone else finds another author who wrote about this incident (Japanese writers, maybe), I'm afraid that this is how things will stand. Thank you for your review in any case. Cheers. _dk (talk) 16:03, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * The article also covers a lot of the historical context. Surely other  sources exist for that aspect of the topic? -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:08, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm astounded by the controversy here. This event is obscure enough that there may indeed be just few RS on it, possibly by just one author. If so, then there's nothing wrong with basing the article entirely on those sources, whose author (in his own article -- C. R. Boxer) is described as producing a lifetime of work "highly original, pithy, and path-breaking ... 350 publications, all of the highest order of scholarship". Incredible crap is passed by DYK a dozen times a day, and somehow this article is a problem? EEng (talk) 11:17, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Agreed. The worst sort of petty-minded bureaucratic nonsense I've seen in a while. Ericoides (talk) 06:17, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * You obviously don't spend much time at DYK. EEng (talk) 07:21, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Shrewd rewording, very good. No, I can't say I find it as congenial as it used to be some years ago. Ericoides (talk) 13:51, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * EEng (talk) 14:13, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * apparently, User:Heramba is currently the subject of an extensive SPI. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:28, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * How about you and I post a joke ANI report along those lines? "According to [1] this user admits to having at least 32 accounts blah blah presenting a number of different personalities blah blah. " I think that would be hysterical. To give equal opportunity to all the major religions, we'd be sure to include a "Trinity" of sockpuppets etc. EEng (talk) 15:35, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Utter heresy, you malevolent booby! Can't you hear us all, chanting from the terraces, "There's only one Jimbo Wales." etc, etc. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:43, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Is this DYK nomination or a WP:GA review? I can't comment on the status of the books written by C. R. Boxer with regard to this subject matter. But at first sight he would appear to be something of an expert in the field. I'm astounded. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:54, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I should mention that I asked ME123 to comment, precisely because he and I have not always seen eye-to-eye on such matters. (In fact, we've sometimes fought tooth-and-nail -- even getting our noses out of joint! Sometimes when I tell him stuff it seems to just go in one ear and out the other. I'm speaking tongue-in-cheek, of course -- wouldn't want to shoot myself in the foot.) EEng (talk) 19:02, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * (...it was my foot actually, I've still got the bullet holes to prove it, thanks) Martinevans123 (talk) 19:10, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Once again I've put my foot in my mouth. EEng (talk) 20:58, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

<I did specifically say that the creator should seek a 3rd opinion if they were not happy with my conclusion, and it looks like you have just provided one. I don't think that any one editor should have a veto, and if your considered conclusion is different from mine, then you have done the right thing to set out your asessment. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:27, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Symbol voting keep.svg I know has already marked this as rejected, but it seems to me that that doesn't really do the article justice in terms of DYK eligibility, which as  says shouldn't be a GA or FA review. Boxer seems to be the only comprehensive English language source and all the accounts in Portuguese I could find that cite their sources use Boxer too. The jp wikipedia entry agrees with this article but isn't well cited, though it does refer to some other offline Japanese sources in the reference section. I did find this which is a very detailed account with pictures  in the blog of a "history trivia" buff and quotes as its single source as 中央公論 "歴史と人物" from April 1957 (I can't untangle whether "歴史と人物" (history and people) may have been a supplement of 中央公論 (Chūōkōron), but if you can find it and can read Japanese it might help; assuming it wasn't written by Boxer; my head hurts when reading Japanese, so I'm not volunteering, but there are fluent readers around). Anyway, the blog pretty much agrees with the details of this article. BHG, if you want to undo my tick, you can (obviously you will become my mortal enemy in the process; that's a joke...you'd only become a regular enemy; also a joke...you get the idea; I'm not going to get prissy about it). Belle (talk) 02:19, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the ping, Belle.