Wikipedia:Peer review/Have a nice day/archive1

Have a nice day

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I want to receive feedback on the article's prose, structure, and depth. I plan to take this article to WP:FAC.

Thanks, Cunard (talk) 18:34, 19 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Note to nominator: Due to a shortage of reviewers, peer reviews are being delayed for up to two weeks. It will help to speed things up if you can find time to review one article from the backlog list, which appears on the WP:PR page. Thanks. Brianboulton (talk) 23:39, 23 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Though it wasn't in the backlog, I reviewed Saw VI at Wikipedia:Peer review/Saw VI/archive1. Cunard (talk) 05:02, 24 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your review! Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 19:17, 25 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ruhrfisch comments: I thought this was an interesting article and enjoyed it, but think it needs some more work before FAC. Thanks for your work on it; here are some suggestions for improvement.

WP:LEAD strongly suggests that the article start with an image in the upper right hand corner, so I would move the one image there.
I think the image is OK in terms of copyright as it is just text and smiley face, but it will be checked at FAC.
I wonder if an image of a bumper sticker with the phrase or something similar would work - I tried searching on Flickr for Creative Commons free images and found these three (may be more, I stopped at three):
- here is a freely licensed Flickr image of graffiti of it.
- here it is on an archway, apparently in Germany. And here it is on a carpet or floormat, also apprently in Arabic.
- here it is on a plastic bag
  - I've uploaded File:Smile have a nice day sign.jpg, File:Have a nice day and smiley face sun.jpg, File:Have a nice day Friday Arabic.jpg, and File:Have a nice day and smiley face bag.jpg to Wikimedia Commons and added two of these images to the article. Cunard (talk) 23:04, 29 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The lead says the variant in Chaucer is "have a happy day", but the article quote says it is "have a good day" - which is it?

Corrected discrepancy. Cunard (talk) 22:59, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The article deals not only with the phrase have a nice day, but also with many variants - I think the article should be clearer that noted authorities see these other phrases as variants. Otherwise I can see someone at FAC reading the History section and saying "Have a happy" is not the same thing, why is it in here?

Clarified. Cunard (talk) 22:46, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There are several short (one or two sentence) paragraphs that impede the article's flow, including one in the lead. I think in most cases these should be combined with other paragraphs or perhaps expanded.

Combined. Cunard (talk) 05:59, 28 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I do not think one weather girl in New York City would spread a phrase to the whole eastern US - TV reception (especially in the early 1960s) is not that widespread - In 1964, Carol Reed spread the phrase in the Eastern United States, closing her weather reports with "Have a happy".[2][3]

The source from Safire says, "Soon after, that phrase was popularized in the East by WCBS meterologist ... Carol Reed". The other source from Shepard says, "In 1964, Carol Reed had been for years a popular household image with her weather forecasts on WCBS. Her catchy, if meaningless, sign-off, Have a happy, had become a metropolitan area cliche."
Because the second source sounds more reasonable, I have revised the article to say that the phrase was spread in the metropolitan area. Cunard (talk) 22:46, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Much of the article appears to be anecdotes rather than history or analysis (though some things like Safire's piece are clearly more analytical). I am not sure how the FAC reviewers will react to things like this one sentence paragraph in the History section In the twenty-first century, Ann Raimes writes in her 2009 book Pocket Keys for Writers that after she bought Chinese food, she discovered that the food came in a bag decorated with a smiley face and the phrase "have a nice day".[9] What makes this a historical observation as opposed to an anecdote?

I have commented above this below to East of Borschov. I will keep the example there for now and will remove it later if I cannot find a historical observation about "Have a nice day" has prevailed into the 21st century. Cunard (talk) 23:01, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed the anecdote. Cunard (talk) 06:05, 28 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Another potential problem is that the article is very US-centric. There is a short section on usage in Israel (how much English is spoken there?), but the rest of usage is from the United States and much of it is anecdotal.
One could argue that the phrase is not used in Europe much as Europeans do not mostly do business etc. in English. There is relatively little on usage in Ireland and the UK (one paragraph), and I did not see any mention of Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, or India.
Comprehensiveness is a FA criteria, so the USA focus will likely be an issue, and may be seen as a WP:WEIGHT or even WP:NPOV problem.
A model article is useful for ideas and examples to follow - I am not sure what a good model would be/ Chinese classifier or Sentence spacing are both recent FAs and may be useful as models.
Kudos for finding so much material on this topic. I am not sure if FAC reviewers would react this way for sure, but I am pretty sure the US-centric nature would be raised, and the other points seem likely to me.

Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). I do not watch peer reviews, so if you have questions or comments, please contact me on my talk page. Yours, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 19:17, 25 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the review! I will work on the article over the next few weeks to address your concerns and will try to find more non-US sources. Cunard (talk) 06:11, 26 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

comments.

The last sentence in the lead falls apart from the rest of it.
The article uses too many "notes", "muses", "opines", "acknowledges" and other loaded synonyms for "wrote" or "said" (WP:SAY).

Revised. Cunard (talk) 23:09, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Usage section: the phrase "usage is particularly common among United States citizens" is ambiguous. Does it mean that recent immigrants to the US (non-citizens) don't catch up with the industry standard, or does it mean "U.S. vs. rest of the world"?

I have clarified it to "people in the United States". Cunard (talk) 06:03, 28 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Immigrants do catch up to the industry standard: example. Cunard (talk) 23:37, 28 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To second Ruhrfisch comment, the words of Thomas L. Friedman or Ann Raimes or the Israeli soldier seem redundant. You have already said that the phrase is used in commerce and for sarcasm, these examples don't add up much.

I've removed the paragraph from Thomas L. Friedman, so I think the Israeli soldier example is the remaining sarcasm example. The Ann Raimes example was to demonstrate that "Have a nice day", which "defined the '70s", survives in the 21st century. I'll try to find a more historical example for that and will remove the example if I cannot find another source. Cunard (talk) 22:58, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Israeli segment leaves the impression that this is the only country (other than the US) where the phrase is widely used, but also leaves the reader in doubt: is it really the case? I'd recommend moving the paragraph on "Europeans generally feel the phrase is fake ... " up, into the "Usage" section, to clear these doubts. P.S. I've heard the phrase from shop attendants in Amsterdam. No, it was not a coffee shop :).

Moved. I've expanded the article with analysis from publications in London, Australia, and Ireland; much of this information I have placed in the "Criticism" and "Defense" sections because they belong better there than in the "Usage" section. There has been a lack of sources about instances of usage in other countries, including cities such as Amsterdam. As such, I have to say that you must have been going to the wrong shops—shops that do not represent the true spirit of the Amsterdam people. If you went to the right kind of shops, where the most intelligent people in the world go, you wouldn't have heard such nonsense. ;) Cunard (talk) 05:59, 28 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Cheers, East of Borschov 10:00, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! Peer reviews tend to receive only one review, so I am grateful for another one. Thank you especially for this correction of my embarrassing mistake. Best, Cunard (talk) 22:58, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]