I appreciate your efforts to improve the article on one of the most infamously reclusive duos in video game history, but as the article stands it is not even close to comprehensive, lacking even basic vital statistics about the subjects. I am well aware some of this material does not exist in reliable sources at this time, but I don't see how we can promote this article in good conscience absent better biographical information on the subjects.
As such, I am going to quick fail this nomination on the grounds that it is a long way from fulfilling the "broad in coverage" criteria for good articles. While this is a lesser standard than the comprehensiveness requirement of FA, the lack of any information on their early lives, the lack of coverage of their personal contributions to the industry outside of founding certain influential companies, and the frequent conflation of company history with personal history feel like significant issues that may be difficult -- if not impossible -- to correct through currently available sources. With luck, the Stampers and their closest confidants will one day end their silence, and we can give them the biography they deserve.
Indrian (
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22:55, 30 July 2017 (UTC)
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- @
Indrian, with respect, nowhere is article completeness defined by what should exist in reliable sources but what does (see
Wikipedia:What the Good article criteria are not#breadth, esp. 2nd bullet), and I would think that you know me well enough to not have nominated this if I didn't expect to receive a full review against the GA criteria.
czar
02:16, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
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- I should have used the term commonly available reliable sources in the first paragraph above, as I do not believe that an exhaustive search of sources has been conducted. My guess is the local paper would at the very least have birth announcements. Coin Slot, the trade publication of the British Coin-op industry, would undoubtedly have info on Zilec and perhaps on the Stampers. Just because the popular gaming mags of the day failed to score interviews does not mean this info does not exist. If this were an 12th century duke, major gaps would be acceptable, as the scholarship would be fairly settled, but these are living people for whom at the very least vital records exist. This is no disrespect to your work on the article, but I remain unsatisfied that breath of coverage has been satisfied. It is your right to seek a second opinion, and I think there is a decent chance you would be successful; it's just that to me this feels more like a summary of Ultimate and Rare than a biographical article. I do not believe I have failed an article outright before, so I don't do this out of habit; I felt strongly about this one. I still appreciate your hard work on the article.
Indrian (
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04:43, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
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- You're talking about archival sources. There's no reason to believe that their local papers would have necessarily announced their birth(?) or that Coin Slot, which is held by
less than a handful of libraries in the world, would have any than trivia (if even that) on the Stampers. You're welcome to feel strongly, but it would have been more appropriate to have expressed it through other means than a quickfail, because you need more evidence behind your claims of greater breadth in sources if you're going to call it a review.
czar
15:23, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
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- Birth announcements are common in newspapers of the era and trade publication often profile the histories of individuals or companies. Not sure why you are attempting to trivialize these "archival" sources, which are actually not archival because they have been published. The magazines you cite to in the article are also "archival" sources by your expanded definition of the term, just easier for us to find and check. You have cited only one monograph, and there are only a couple of additional monographs out there that discuss Ultimate and/or Rare. Nothing book-wise discusses the Stampers in any greater depth. They quite frankly nearly fail Wikipedia's notability guidelines. Now we both know they are not only notable, but also hugely influential, but that's just how the sourcing breaks. If the company info were removed, there would not be enough material on their backgrounds, influences, and personal contributions to their businesses to sustain a sizable article. That is a breadth of coverage issue. If reliable sources don't provide enough info on the individuals themselves to form an article much larger than a stub, then that is a notability issue (as silly as we both know that sounds in this case). Either way, there is not enough article there for a GA in my opinion, which could well differ from someone else's. Check out
Kellee Santiago for a GA video game bio that is short (and even missing some vital statistics) but still manages to feel like a biography rather than merely a company history. Again, I appreciate the work you have done on the article, it's just a difficult subject.
Indrian (
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22:58, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
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- It's off-topic, but non-current periodicals that are held in less than a handful of libraries (archives/special collections) worldwide and not available online are uncontroversially archival sources. The difference being what can be proven to exist for use and what is inaccessible behind glass or oceans.
- If you have unused monographs on the Stampers, now is the time to produce them... (Since you briefly participated in the peer review, I know you know why I felt this was source complete, which too is a status far above the very low bar of the GA criteria.) I understand your breadth point, so it doesn't need repeating, but the GA criteria do not fault an article's completeness for sources that do not and may never exist. That's why there cannot be a breadth issue over immaterial sources. Indeed, I've put far more time into this than the GA criteria demands. It's 9k of tight prose, close to FA quality, and pertains specifically to the role of figureheads in the company, not a straight company history itself. I don't see how notability would even be in question, and I don't see why you took the review if you weren't planning to review it.
czar
21:02, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
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- I did review it and found it extremely wanting on one specific criteria. I'm sorry that hurt your feelings, but I never claimed what was present was not well-written, so your straw man above is puzzling. I have no doubt you will be able to find someone that believes I am a completely looney for taking the position I did and will be able to get it passed in short order to soothe your bruised ego. One thing though: this article has a case for GA status, it is nowhere near FA status and I am shocked an experienced editor like you would consider it so. The comprehensiveness criteria is far more exacting than "breadth of coverage" and the well-researched criteria would require you to track down any harder to find sources. I think you are getting a little too close to your work here.
Indrian (
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21:41, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
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- No need to make it personal. Heed your own advice.
czar
21:55, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
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- I have taken nothing here personally, but you seem to have done as we merely have a difference of opinion of policy and you are turning that into me somehow not reviewing the article. Also, you have quibbled over archival sources while still apparently not understanding what they are. Wikipedia's own
Archive article should help with that. Just because you can only presently easily find a source within a handful of libraries does not make a source archival; it just makes them rare. If it was a widely printed and circulated published source in its day, it does not fit that definition.
Indrian (
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21:59, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
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I do see your point though after looking over a few more GA biographies. I still feel pretty strongly, but I can admit I am a bit out of step with consensus here. Tell you what, why don't we let bygones be bygones and I will give it a full review based on currently available sources with the aim of passing after any minor concerns are met.
Indrian (
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22:26, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
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