Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/S Club/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted 19:02, 9 April 2008.

S Club
Self-nomination I'm nominating this article for featured article because I feel I have worked extremely hard at providing Wikipedians a detailed history of the UK pop band S Club. We were successful first time at reaching GA status, and had a positive peer review. Everything is neatly referenced and I'm hoping we could see the S Club article on the main page sometime in the future. -  ǀ Mikay ǀ   15:20, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Comments


 * http://www.discogs.com/home says on the home page "Welcome to Discogs, a community-built database of music information." What makes this reliable? Granted, the information it's referencing isn't exactly something that is likely to be highly challenged, but it would be better sourced to the promo single or to a commercial site like Amazon, etc.
 * http://www.spotlight.com/interactive/cv/1/M90794.html says the information is provided by the subject. Might try to find a better source.
 * All the links check out with the link checker tool. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:38, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * First, I don't mind interspersed comments, but Sandy might. Second, I've struck out the ones that are resolved, but now...

I'm not sure if it's common practise to reply to each of your points above, but I have anyway. There's a couple I'm going to come back to in a second.. -  ǀ Mikay ǀ   15:59, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * What makes http://www.popbuzzuk.com/ a reliable site? (grins) Ealdgyth - Talk 23:11, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I've just re-read the bits above, and it told me to not break up commenters thoughts, so I'll list them below as per the points above:

-  ǀ Mikay ǀ   18:55, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) I went for substance over reliability I think when I chose this reference. Obviously, it's a well respected fan site (which means nothing, I know) but I couldn't decide upon a reliable source to use for the summary, and it would count as original research (I think?) if I didn't use one. I have the movie on DVD somewhere, I guess I can cite straight from the film? Edit: Done this for Back to the '50s, Boyfriends & Birthdays and S Club 7 Go Wild! - thus eliminating all VivaSClub.com references
 * 2) I'm having trouble with this one. I know there's an Industry website that is searchable by song (I visited after the whole Ronnie Hazlehurst thing) but I cannot seem to find it at the moment, which is a pain. But I'll keep on it.
 * 3) Will dig out my CD in a second.. Edit: Done.
 * 4) Digital Spy is one of the recognised Entertainment websites in the United Kingdom. I'm not sure in terms of Wikipedia if that makes it reliable, but I know it is certainly well respected within the industry.
 * 5) Fair enough, but if it's the official site of his agent, does that not make it reliable? Or does it make it less reliable because information can be skewed (even though it's only a CV..)
 * 6) I think the site is just down. I will check back soon, and if it isn't back up, will look for another source. Edit: This source is now back and fully working
 * 7) Fixed that :)

Comment I had began a readthrough of the article, but I've only gotten past the first paragraph. Anyway, I'm a bit worried the last sentence of "Formation" would be considered OR or trivia unless someone else thought it was noteworthy enough. --Lenin and McCarthy |  (Complain here) 19:11, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Strong oppose: Could have done with another peer review and a copy-edit.
 * Prose
 * Plenty of one-two sentence stubby paragraphs throughout the article - almost always an indicator that the prose isn't upto standard. "After the group split up...disbanded in 2004.", "Of course, throughout their releases..."Say Goodbye"." and "In September 2002...Jon and Jo take lead vocals." - Combine these ideas with adjacent paragraphs, and rewrite.
 * Plenty of unencyclopedic language throughout: "Of course", "disappointingly", "This is certainly the case"
 * For some reason, band members are referred to by their first names.
 * "It featured the ballad, co-written by Cathy Dennis, "Two in a Million" and retro-styled, uptempo "You're My Number One"." "From their "disco-influenced", "Don't Stop Movin'" to their "R&B ballad", "Show Me Your Colours", the album marked a more mature approach for the band." Eh what? You've put commas and quotations in all the wrong/unnecessary places and the resulting sentences are utterly incomprehensible.
 * Plenty of POV too; the lead sentence is "S Club...were a BRIT Award-winning British pop group". You wouldn't say "Carmen Electra is a Razzie award-winning actress" would you? The first sentence is supposed to be general and neutral.
 * The writing is very ambiguous at times; what is a "strong nineties pop sound"? "the group became very quiet" - like how people are quiet in a library? "Their first singles focussed on sharing the lyrics around the group" - again, huh?
 * Too much reptition of phrases in nearby sentences, a sign of redundancy and inefficient wording; FA-standard prose requires variety: "marked a more mature direction for the group whilst still retaining their pop sensibilities. Their next single continued in this mature direction." "split. However, on 21 April 2003, S Club announced live on stage that they were to split up." (the last two sentences of the lead could be combined to form a better one)
 * Fair-use images so many fair-use violations...help
 * There are five TV/movie/video screenshots used in the article. To qualify for fair-use in Wikipedia, the prose must discuss in detail what is happening in those screenshots. Clearly, that is not the case here, as the images serve the purpose of identifying the band members, completely unacceptable per Wiki rules. It is reasonable to expect that free images of living persons can be obtained. As for that infobox lead pic, since they have disbanded, it would be under fair-use to include a promo pic, but not a screenshot.
 * A look at Rachel Stevens article shows there are a number of music video pics there too. Can you say "copyright infringement"?
 * MoS
 * Review WP:DASH. The second sentence in the lead has hyphens instead of the correct emdashes. Same mistake throughout.
 * Apart from the two times in the lead, Simon Fuller is linked throughout the article. So are the band members; totally unnecessary, after the first linked mention; refer to them only by last name. Seeing Double is linked twice in the same paragraph.
 * Other miscelleanous errors: singles in quotes not italics please. Celebrity Big Brother or Celebrity Big Brother?
 * number one or #1? Review WP:MOS regarding numbers, the article is full of errors and inconsistencies.
 * Content
 * The article seems to be nothing more than a collection of what album was recorded, what single released, the chart positions, what movie they starred in and so on... Where is the story? What were the band going through and what did the media think of them? Its really boring as of now.
 * That "After S Club 7" section seems more suited to the "Where are they now" segment of a Vh1 documentary rather than a serious encyclopedia. It should be cut down to about one paragraph length if it is need at all (I don't think so). I think its funny how the section as of now lists every movie the members acted in and their co-stars in that movie.
 * ZERO criticism of the band. I can't imagine how a manufactured pop band could escape the wrath of the press for being fake and untalented.
 * The lead needs a rewrite. As of now it tells me 1) the names of band members and their manager, 2) they were popular, and that 3)they broke up.
 * See ], [[Oasis (band)|Oasis or any band FA regarding the discography section. Names of studio albums and release year in brackets only please. For chart details and the rest the reader can go to the discography article.
 * The band template at the bottom is weird. You should probably bring it up to standard.
 * The problems I've listed are hardly exhaustive but only representative, so please don't address them individually. Like I said, this article needs a fresh pair of eyes or seven. indopug (talk) 21:10, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * PS: "Coincidentally, 'S' is the 19th letter in the English alphabet and 19 is Simon Fuller's company." - this uncited sentence sucks on so many levels that I think it deserves special mention.

Wow, well.. thank you! Every bullet point made my heart sink further, but criticism can only be taken in a positive way. I totally agree that we need fresh sets of eyes, but unfortunately there isn't as many fans willing to write comprehensively (I know you'll contest about usage of that word ;)) about the subject. I'll take it all into account (generally) and work hard on it over the coming weeks (months?). The only thing I have to disagree on is the use of a criticism paragraph. We came to the conclusion in the peer review that there shouldn't be a dissection of manufactured pop as a whole, as it's simply not the place for it. I'll still take that into considering when rethinking ideas for the article. Any more comments? -  ǀ Mikay ǀ   21:24, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose per Indopug. Some random examples of issues:
 * "The group - consisting of Tina..." Hyphens should not be employed for disjunction. Remember the rules for commas for nonessential elements of a sentence.
 * "and had at least one number one single in four different countries" Ambiguous "at least".
 * Be careful of overlinking; for example, "Simon Fuller" is linked five times in the article.
 * "Their television show also lasted four series..." What's the purpose "also" here?
 * "...became popular in 100 different countries" You sure that it became popular in all 100? Or was it just shown in 100 countries?
 * "In 2002, Paul..." In formal. encyclopedic prose, refer to people with their last names, not their first.
 * "the concept of 'S Club 7'" Why the single quotation marks here?
 * "who didn't audition to get into the group." Informality abound.
 * "Coincidentally, 'S' is the 19th letter in the English alphabet and 19 is Simon Fuller's company." As Indopug stated, this merits special recognition. I actually guffawed out loud when I read that while reviewing the article. Budding Journalist 23:10, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose As well as agreeing with many of the points raised above, at the very least please fix the article to refer to the band members by surname, rather than first name, as appropriate for an encyclopedia article. --Dweller (talk) 13:05, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.