Template talk:Did you know/Synaptula lamperti

Synaptula lamperti

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as 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

• ... that Synaptula lamperti (pictured) is a sea cucumber that lives in association with a single sponge species?
• ALT1: ... that Synaptula lamperti (pictured) is a sea cucumber that feeds on matter from a single sponge species?

• ALT2: ... that Synaptula lamperti (pictured) is a sea cucumber that feeds on matter from the elephant ear sponge?
• Reviewed: Joe Harrison (Louisiana politician) ([1])

Created by Cwmhiraeth (talk). Nominated by Rcej (talk) at 06:14, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

• Date, length, and hook all OK. I have changed the abhorrent grammar ("feeds off of") to something more acceptable, and more in line with the sources. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:26, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

• I'm not sure "lives in association with" is an improvement over "feeds off of"—it's less specific, in that I don't really know what it means to "live in association with" something. If you don't like the double preposition, maybe "feeds on" is the way to go. rʨanaɢ (talk) 10:10, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

• "in association with" is a standard botanical phrase and is a great improvement on "feeds off of"; see eg here. Ericoides (talk) 13:09, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

• How is it now? Rcej (Robert) – talk 02:48, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• It's OK, but it's no improvement over "lives in association with", which is perfectly precise biological parlance, and accords with the references. I have restored my wording, and renumbered yours as ALT1. (One should never need to mention matter unless anti-matter is a plausible alternative.) --Stemonitis (talk) 06:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• This is a lay-publication, and use of scientific jargon may be appropriate, but is not always so. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 07:07, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Hook

• Length, format, content rules:
• Source:
• Interest: I think ALT2 is the hookiest. Tony (talk) 14:35, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• Image suitability, if applicable: Doesn't seem more than a pretty splotch of colours at 100px. Tony (talk) 02:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC) PS it does look like the pizza I threw up when I was a kid. Is there an alternative for a 100px thumb? Tony (talk) 13:00, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• You had sea cucumber on pizza as a kid!? There are a few images at Commons:Category:Synaptula lamperti, but they are mostly more distant views of the animals, and only one looks likely to work at 100px. I have added it at the right-hand image above. --Stemonitis (talk) 14:20, 28 July 2011 (UTC) Your alternative looks better to me at that size. Tony (talk) 14:35, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• ALT hooks, if proposed:

Article

• Length: --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 08:49, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• Vintage: --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 08:49, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• Sourcing (V, RS, BLP): Tony (talk) 02:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• Neutrality: Tony (talk) 02:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• Plagiarism/close paraphrasing: A few strings are close to the "Advanced aquirist" site, but probably ok. One or two might have been tweaked more. They say "about 1 hour", whereas the article says "one hour". Better to use quote marks if the alternative is to fuzz the info in paraphrasing? Tony (talk) 02:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

It is difficult to extract information from the few available sources about an obscure species and which may use technical terms without doing some close paraphrasing. If I find several sources, I can often see how they have all close paraphrased one of their number. Either I use the same material that they have done or I can't write the article. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:32, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree, it can be hard, and no I didn't think there were serious issues. Just a suggestion. Tony (talk) 13:00, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• Copyvio:
• Obvious faults in prose, structure, formatting:

Comments/discussion:

• Um..., thanks, Tony, but this hook has already been passed. Adding empty checkboxes when the work has already been done is not exactly helping. I disagree that the image is unappealing; for a sea cucumber, that's beautiful. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• The principle is that any editor can put any item under additional scrutiny at any point, and may even recall it from the queue or have it delisted from the MP. Tony's points are perfectly valid, and not all are opinion. The images are appropriate and attractive, IMHO. But he demonstrated quite clearly, contrary to your assertion that "the work has already been done", that it was not to a satisfactory level. However, I have copyedited it some to remove the traces of close paraphrasing. If anything, it shows what can actually be done despite the limited sources available. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 06:33, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• Let's examine that claim. "A few strings are close to the "Advanced aquirist" site, but probably ok. One or two might have been tweaked more." The phrases are "probably OK", but "might have been tweaked" [implicit therein: but needn't be]. "Not to a satisfactory level" is a gross mischaracterisation on your part. I am not complaining about extra scrutiny – that's fine – but adding a checklist with empty boxes, even though those aspects have been checked, makes it look like those aspects haven't been checked when they have. That makes work for someone else – work which has already been done – and is counterproductive and slightly insulting. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:52, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• Actually, let's examine those similar strings, shall we? The repeated text is exclusively reference titles, scientific names, and other fixed phrases that could not be re-worded without compromising accuracy. Ianthella basta must be referred to as "Ianthella basta"; calcareous plates must be referred to as "calcareous plates"; and so on. Anyone who doesn't recognise this is unfit to review biological articles. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:52, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• Ah, perm-link wasn't used. That doesn't make things any easier. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:57, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• You're engaging in semantics. You seem to be implying I shouldn't be reviewing biological articles. I did not even contemplate changing 'calcareous plates'. OTOH, you reverted my simplification of 'coelomic cavity – a redundancy – on the grounds that "The cavity is not the same as the fluid which fills it". It seems perhaps you may be confused because coelom is the cavity. The fact that it may be fluid filled is not relevant to the discussion. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 07:21, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• Yes, I got confused about the coelom. Sorry about that. My comments remain, however, and I don't see how they are "engaging in semantics". My point is a serious one. You interpreted "probably ok" to mean "not satisfactory". I think Cwmhiraeth has done good work on difficult material. There will always be room for improvement, and you have helped to improve the article. It is clear to me that Cwmhiraeth did not intend to plagiarise or to breach copyright, and I think he/she deserves praise for the work done. --Stemonitis (talk) 07:44, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• May we use ALT2, now that the sponge has a stub article? Rcej (Robert) – talk 08:34, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
• (edit conflict)We are in agreement that it's good work. Tony expressed a doubt about certain phrases. Hoping to get this interesting article passed, I reworded some of the potentially problematic segments. Noting that it's probably easier for an outsider to cleanup, I also wanted to change the mindset from "can't be avoided" to "can do". --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 08:40, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Let's go with ALT2. Rcej (Robert) – talk 05:26, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

• (I hope I'm not overstepping the mark here, but just to make sure everything's abundantly clear...) All three hooks are acceptable; both they and the article they come from satisfy all the DYK criteria. The promoting admin may choose whichever hook he/she thinks best. --Stemonitis (talk) 09:19, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

• Moved to Template:Did you know/Queue/_ on ____ by ____.