User talk:Angie zorka

Welcome
Brendon is here  17:17, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Edits on blue whale
Hi! I saw that you made a big edit on blue whale and in the process deleted the lead section. This is an important part of the article however, as it gives a short overview of the information the article (for more information, see MOS:LEAD). Therefore I added in the lead section that was there before your edits. You're welcome to edit it if you think some things should be changed/added. Thanks! Achaea (talk) 16:55, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the help in fixing the lead section! I make a few updates, but of course feel free to edit it as well. :) Angie zorka (talk) 22:23, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Blue Whale revamp
This has caused enormous collateral damage. A lot of good information was lost, and some of what remains is without context. For instance, the average weights are without the accompanying lengths. There are also errors like saying that 92 feet was an average length in the northern hemisphere, when in fact it was a maximum. The old article has much more information on nearly every subject, much of it still with scientific sources. I tried copying and pasting parts of the old article into the new one, but many of the citations were destroyed, and I don't want to leave a huge mess for DrKay to clean up.

It's great to want to make the article more scientifically accurate, but it's better to make major changes piecemeal instead of burning down articles like this. Also, secondary sources like "Wild Blue: A Natural History of the World's Largest Animal" by Dan Bortolotti provide important information, for instance the popular culture section you destroyed, about history, misconceptions, and perception that wouldn't be found in scientific articles about technical information about the species.

Honestly I think it would be better to revert the huge edit, and make the necessary changes to it from there, adding in the new information and removing any true bad information instead of purging everything that doesn't read like a scientific paper and then some.

MrAwesome888 (talk) 22:41, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Hello, and thanks for reaching out with your concerns. I realize a major revision is a lot all at once, and I apologize if it has created any problems. I was engaged by the Society for Marine Mammalogy for the major re-write because of my expertise on blue whales. They asked for specific sections to be added/moved and that I verify/replace secondary sources with more primary sources. I posted to the Blue Whale talk page months before I posted the new version asking for feedback on the re-write. I spent six months combing through all available primary and secondary literature to make sure that everything on the page was accurate and that each statement could be backed with the appropriate citations. I kept some secondary sources but removed any that made unverifiable claims. I also replaced older primary sources with citations that had updated information. The final re-write was peer reviewed and approved by another blue whale expert, Dr. Trevor Branch, at the University of Washington. I will definitely check out the maximum length issues/citations. If there are any other specific issues, I am happy to discuss and help with updates. My goal is to make the page a robust and accurate resource. I want the page to be both informative and engaging. Angie zorka (talk) 16:47, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Maybe they should try the other FA Baleen whale species articles like Humpback whale, Fin whale and Right whale. Those articles were also passed before FA standards were stepped up in 2009. I hope they know not to WP:PARAPHRASE though. LittleJerry (talk) 15:22, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

I agree that those should also be updated! I know that one of our Marine Mammalogy experts has agreed to work on North Atlantic right whales. I wish I had the time to update the fin and humpback whale pages. But it is a lot to take on. Hopefully we can find the right people to take on those tasks.