Wikipedia:Featured article review/Antarctica

Antarctica

 * Article is still a featured article

Minor review commentary
This is overall a worthy FA, but needs a copy-edit (Criterion 2a). Here are examples of problems in the lead.


 * The lead states that Antarctica is the "highest" continent (whatever that means), and then that it's the "third highest" continent.


 * "The continent was largely neglected in the 19th century"; then we read "it was mostly unexplored until the 19th century". These statements are slightly inconsistent, and the second implies that it was mostly explored during the 19th century, which I don't think was the case.


 * "The Antarctic Treaty, which was signed in 1959 by 12 countries and prohibits any military activity, supports scientific research, and protects the continent's ecozone." "Any" is redundant. What is claimed for the treaty might be an overstatement; whether it does in fact protect the ecozone is a matter of debate, even if the intention is there, and "supports scientific research" is ambiguous—does it provide the funding?


 * "Ongoing experiments are conducted by more than 4000 scientists of many different nationalities and with many different research interests." Does it mean to say the more than 4000 scientists at any one time are conducting ...? It's unclear. "Many different" occurs twice in seven words.

The whole article needs a massage. Tony 05:11, 9 June 2006 (UTC)


 * "Highest" means "highest average elevation"? I'll remove that from the lead because it's uncertain enough and post a talk point. Marskell 21:13, 9 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I've reworded the "third highest" comment to clarify what it means. -- Avenue 23:42, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Have you managed to garner support for a quality-audit on the whole text? Tony 07:30, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * The article is great, set asise the sentence "highest of all the continents" which I don't understand. Plus, what does the last image mean? It looks like an ad. Plus the article could use a map which shows clearly the Transantarctic Mountains, the Ross Sea and other geographical features described in the Geography and Geology section. CG 15:50, 14 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Further comment—Please keep working on the prose. I should not be able to pick out poor sentences at random. They're everywhere. Here are some:
 * "Physically, it is divided in two by the Transantarctic Mountains close to the neck between the Ross Sea and the Weddell Sea." Since this starts a paragraph, "it" should not be used; it could refer to a number of items in the previous sentence. "Divided in two"—spot the two redundant words.
 * "Belief in the existence of a Terra Australis — a vast continent located in the far south of the globe to "balance" the northern lands of Europe, Asia and north Africa — had existed since Ptolemy suggested the idea in order to preserve ...". Belief had existed? And there's "existence" and "existed" in the same sentence. "In order to"—spot the two redundant words.
 * "The continent of Antarctica is located mostly south of the Antarctic Circle, surrounded by the Southern Ocean." Why do we need to be told again that it's a continent. Isn't it almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle, not just "mostly"? Is it the Antarctic Circle or the Antarctica that is surrounded by the Southern Ocean?

Someone needs to go through the whole text to reword repetitions; I see "sailed" in one sentence, then in the next. It ends up being laboured. But that's only a fraction of what needs to be done to satisfy Criterion 2a. Since only a patchy attempt has been made to address the problems (see []), I'm transferring the listing to major review. Tony 12:26, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Major review commentary
''Please note that the intention was to move this nomination from minor to major review, rather than FARC. The first two comments here are the result of the temporary move to FARC a few days ago. Please now make comments relevant to the major review.'' Tony 09:41, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Keep FA I think all in all this remains a fine article. The "highest" business has been addressed. Copy-edit always welcome, of course, but this probably should have remained a minor review. Marskell 13:57, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Keep FA per above. &mdash; Deckill e r 04:10, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * As noted to you Tony, I did a copy edit. Even managed to find a date and a couple of extra comments to add. It's a fine article I think, with nicely balanced sections. Marskell 10:56, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Sorry to be like a terrier at someone's ankle, but the first thing my eyes came to rest on was:
 * "scientists from many nationalities", in the lead.

It's better than it was, but I don't want to find sentences that can easily be improved, such as:
 * "The continent of Antarctica is located mostly south of the Antarctic Circle, surrounded by the Southern Ocean." (Try: "Most of Antarctica lies south of the Antarctic Circle; the continent is surrounded by the Southern Ocean."
 * "About 98% of Antarctica is covered by the Antarctic ice sheet. The ice sheet is, on average, 2.5 kilometers (1.6 miles) thick." Merge these two sentences to save words.
 * "If the sheet were to break down ocean levels would rise by several meters"—"break down ocean levels"? Insert a comma to be kind to our readers. Is it written in AmEng or what? "Meters" and "metres" are used, and we're not talking coin-in-the-slot machines here. And see WP's policy on abbreviations where imperial equivalents are provided in parentheses.
 * "Due to the lake's similarity to Europa, a moon of Jupiter, confirming that life can survive in Lake Vostok might strengthen the argument for the possibility of life on Europa." Hmm, nice grammar.

Not entirely happy yet. It's such a good article in other respects—I agree with Marskell—that I wonder why some of the contributors don't want to feel proud of the writing. Tony 03:34, 4 July 2006 (UTC)


 * "From" --> "of" in first. I dropped "continent of" in the second to make it simpler. I had actually noticed the redundancy noted in your third bullet earlier, but I left it so that both "Antarctic ice sheet" and plain "ice sheet" are dabbed; perhaps that's unneeded.


 * Where is the policy (or guideline) on metric and imperial? Marskell 06:50, 4 July 2006 (UTC)