Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Planet Stories/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 promoted by SandyGeorgia 22:53, 19 March 2011 [1].

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Planet Stories

Planet Stories (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

• Featured article candidates/Planet Stories/archive1

Nominator(s): Mike Christie (talk – library) 00:31, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Another pulp sf magazine from the 1940s and 1950s, with bizarrely dressed women on the cover. How can you resist? Despite the melodramatic cover art, Planet Stories actually published some good fiction, including a very early story in Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles, and Philip K. Dick's first sale, "Beyond Lies the Wub". It's now one of the most sought after pulps from that era. Mike Christie (talk – library) 00:31, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Copyediting

• "...a series of adventures involving Eric John Stark..." It's kind of unclear how Stark was involved. Was he a fictional character or a collaborator of Brackett's?

  He was the hero of the stories. I've switched to "featuring", which is the word used in the body in the discussion of Brackett; I hope that makes it clearer. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...was Jungle Stories; which was launched in early 1939..." should be a comma instead of a semicolon after "Jungle Stories".

  Yes, done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...such as survivors from Atlantis." You might want to link Atlantis.

  Good idea; linked. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...though he was not always the named editor on the masthead: when other editors were involved..." would read better with a semicolon after "masthead", instead of a colon.

  A colon looks OK to me, but so does a semicolon, so I've switched it. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• "With the Summer 1950 the editorship..." is missing the word "issue".

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• "Bixby lasted only a little over a year..." seems kind of awkward. Is "only" really needed here?

  No; probably debris from another version of the sentence. Removed. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

--Gyrobo (talk) 19:26, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

More copyediting

• "...with scantily-clad women..." adverbs ending in "ly" don't need hyphens. The phrase "...a separately marketed genre..." appears in the next section, and doesn't use a hyphen, so it really should be consistent.

  Agreed; done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...but it often featured storylines..." is "it" necessary here? I don't have a strong opinion, both ways read well.

  Removed; I think it's better without. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...editorial oversight and control throughout its life..." could this be rephrased as "throughout its run" or something similar? The first time I read that, I misread it basically "he retained control throughout his life". The rest of the sentence uses Malcolm Reiss as the subject, so it's pretty easy to miss the pronoun and completely misunderstand the sentence.

  Changed to "run"; those of us who write a lot about magazines forget that this sort of metaphor isn't automatic to most readers. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...who was already editing Jungle Stories, and soon thereafter it switched..." This could probably be broken up into two sentences. It's also not clear what was switched, did Jungle Stories change its schedule as a result of the change in editorship?

  Yes, the split is an improvement, and I clarified it a little more; it was Planet that changed its schedule. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...and was able to improve the quality of the fiction over the succeeding issues..." would probably read better as "...quality of fiction in succeeding issues" or "in subsequent issues" or something similar.

  I went with "quality of fiction in succeeding issues". Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "Despite the focus on space adventure, the fiction in Planet Stories improved..." I think this could probably be phrased a little better, it currently implies that focusing on this specific genre would be detrimental to the magazine's quality, and that it's extraordinary that that wasn't the case. If the source says this, it's fine, but perhaps it could be clarified or even removed as unnecessary.

  That's what the sources say; it was not a high-brow subgenre. I've added "melodramatic"; does that make it clearer? The source actually says "This magazine ... which had always promoted extravagant adventure, nevertheless developed remarkably ...". Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "She wrote a well-received series of adventures featuring Eric John Stark..." could use a little explanation of who Eric John Stark is. Is he a starship captain, colonist, mad scientist? He's mentioned in the lead, but it isn't clear why he's important.

  He's a pulp hero; I switched to "adventurer" and added a link to the article about him. I haven't read them, but if he's like most pulp heros he could fight, drink, and romance the ladies, and would have generally been on the trail of treasure and on the side of the underdog. Does "adventurer" cover that well enough? Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• Western fiction could use a link.

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...and finding unusual treatments of the interplanetary adventure theme..." could use a link to Film treatment, the concept isn't terribly common.

  I'm hesitant here; the link might imply too much, in that writers do treatments of themes without reference to film, and I don't want a reader to think there's a connection to films here. Is there another link that would work? Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

  All the articles I find seem to be related to films. Would "variations on" read better than "treatments of"?

  Yes, that's more straightforward. Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 12:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...in which a human in a world of robots suffers from discrimination." The "in"s are pretty close. Rephrasing it as "in which a human suffers discrimination in a world of robots" would place a little more distance and move all mention of robots to the end of the sentence, making readers initially think it's about discrimination... and then, BAM! Robots.

  Yes, that's much better; done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "During the World War II..." doesn't need "the", and should link to World War II.

  Fixed. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• sexual dimorphism could use a link.

  Linking within quotes is frowned on, so I linked in the caption; it's quoted, but those are really scare quotes. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...through which bikinis or swimsuits can be seen..." should be "could be seen", the sentence is in the past tense.

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "SF artist and historian..." the use of "sf" has been lower case throughout the article, perhaps it could be rephrased as "Historian and sf artist..."

  I made it "Artist and sf historian", since it's the historian hat which most needs to be qualified by "sf". Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...almost Rembrandtian in his use of light and shade..." could use a link to Rembrandt.

  I don't think I can, because of the prohibition on linking within quotes. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• Would the editorial succession data be better represented by a table? It seems tabular.

  Yes, but then I'd have a table next to that tabular image showing the issues -- I thought that would be visually uglier. Do you think it should be made into a table anyway? Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• I have no strong opinion on it, just wanted to float the idea.

• "...for most of its life..." again, this would read better as "existence" or "run" or "publication", the word "life" makes me think a person is involved.

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...reduced to 96 for the March 1952 issue, but returned to 112 until Summer 1954..." should say when it was returned to 112 pages.

  Clarified -- it was reduced to 96 pages for just that one issue. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• The sentence now seems to repeat "returned to" (not sure if it did before). The second instance could be changed to "was again reduced to", there aren't many ways to say this, but at least the "again" makes it less like the preceding clause.

• "...which was followed by Summer 1954." Would read better if it specified "...which was followed by a Summer 1954 issue".

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "The volume numbering was completely regular..." would read better as "The volume numbering was consistent throughout the magazine's publication".

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

• "...a thirteenth has been rumored but not seen by any sf bibliographers." Could this be changed in any way to include a link to Bibliography or some other word choice (sf chronicler)?

  Done; I linked to bibliography. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:14, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

--Gyrobo (talk) 22:07, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Support the prose. --Gyrobo (talk) 21:42, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review and support; and also for fixing that last issue -- I missed it in the list above. Mike Christie (talk – library) 21:46, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Support by Ruhrfisch. I find this meets the FA criteria and is a welcome addition to the series on sf magazines. I have a few quibbles which do not detract from my support.

• Why isn't Amazing Stories linked in the Publication history section?

  Oops. No reason; linked now. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• Isn't "Fiction House" singular and "their" plural? Or is there a convention that publishers are plural? At the end of 1939 Fiction House decided to add an sf magazine to their line up...

  That's a BrEng slip; the article is in AmEng, given the subject, but I speak more BrEng than AmEng so I do miss these things from time to time. Fixed. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• Missing word? With the Summer 1950 [issue?] the editorship passed to Jerome Bixby, who was already editing Jungle Stories...

  Fixed. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• MOS says that Mike Ashley should only be spelled out on first mention (just Ashley the second time)

  Yes; fixed for Ashley and also for Clareson. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• Why not link Poul Anderson and Theodore Sturgeon?

  Another oops; done; and I linked Campbell too. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• The word "though" seems out of place here (my suggested change is in bold and strikethrough): "One of the best artists to work on Planet was Alexander Leydenfrost, whose work "epitomized much of what Planet Stories represented in the 1940s",[9][3] though according to sf historian Thomas D. Clareson, though his cover artwork was less impressive than his black and white interior illustrations.[22]"

  The problem here is that the opinion in the second half of the sentence is from the Clute/Nicholls Encyclopedia, not from Clareson. I will think about a rephrase. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

  I've had a go at rephrasing this to clarify -- how does that look? Mike Christie (talk – library) 00:47, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• Two suggestions - not actionable requests for this FAC, but things to think about. 1) Why not add a nav box to the bottom of these sf magazine articles? Perhaps "Golden Age sf magazines"? Something similar to {{CurrentAmericanSFMagazines}}. 2) Have you thought of going for a featured topic on these magazines?

  I'd like to add a nav box, but haven't been able to come up with a good one. "Golden Age SF magazines" is a good idea, but the problem is what to do about magazines that span many decades -- would Analog Science Fiction and Fact have that navbox and also the "CurrentAmericanSFMagazines" navbox? And maybe a 1950s and 1960s one too? So far I've been dealing with this via categories (Category:Science fiction magazines established in the 1930s). If you can think of a scheme that would work for magazines across multiple decades I'm all ears. Re the featured topic: I'd have to figure out what subtopic it would be, I think. There are hundreds of sf magazines. If the navbox problem is resolved, it will probably also give me an idea of what featured topics could be done. The pulp vs. digest paradigm is one possibility; at least there's a finite number of pulp sf magazines, though it's a large finite number. Mike Christie (talk – library) 00:47, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

  Hmmm, how about a nav box for "American SF magazines: 1930 to 1959" - the box could have a row for each year and magazines could be listed by the year they were founded. Perhaps they could even have a date they closed in parentheses and small text after the name, so this would be in the 1939 row as Planet Stories (1955), and Analog would be in the 1930 row as Analog (still in print). Just an idea, then the topic would be the magazines in the box. If you want to see an article with multiple nav boxes, look at Joe Paterno. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 01:31, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Nicely done, image review to follow Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 19:50, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• All my issues have been addressed. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 01:31, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

  Thanks for the review and the support (and the image review). I'll think about the navbox issue; I'm still worried about having too many navboxes. I hadn't seen Joe Paterno before; that's a pretty startling example. Mike Christie (talk – library) 01:51, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Source review

• Earwig's and Coren's tools found no copyvio; I was unable to carry out spotchecks due to lack of access to sources
• Full bibliographic info for Brackett appears in both Footnotes and References

  My usual footnotes style is to give the article author and name, and a brief form of the containing work, since I only list the containing work in the references. That adds up to an almost complete bibliographic listing. Is there a better format I could use? Mike Christie (talk – library) 01:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

  What about "Leigh Brackett, "The Science-fiction Field", p. 27."? Nikkimaria (talk) 19:19, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

  Sounds good. I cut it to just 'Brackett, "The Science-fiction Field", p. 27.". Mike Christie (talk – library) 21:17, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

• Kyle, Carter and Asimov appear in Footnotes but not in References

  Missed those; added. Mike Christie (talk – library) 01:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• be consistent in whether second authors are listed first name or last name first

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 01:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• In Footnotes, why "vol." for Ashley but "Vol." for Tuck? Both are capitalized in References

  Should have been "Vol."; fixed. Mike Christie (talk – library) 01:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• "Westport CN"? Do you mean "CT"?

  Aaargh. That's what I get for living in the US for 20 years and thinking I've learned the state abbreviations. Yes, it's CT; fixed (and I had to go fix it elsewhere too). Mike Christie (talk – library) 01:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Other than that, sources look good, although I can't speak to comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:34, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Issues mostly addressed, good luck! Nikkimaria (talk) 19:19, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Image review

• All images are of magazine covers which are no longer covered by copyright (as their copyrights were not renewed), and thus are free to use on Wikipedia. All images are fine, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 20:59, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Can you add a color key to File:Planet Stories issues grid.png using {{legend}} or {{legend0}}? The color coding in the chart isn't as useful, forcing a casual reader to click the image to get the color coding when a simple line of boxes would do the same. M-102 (Michigan highway)#Racial and economic divide has such a key in the caption for a population map of Detroit as an example of what I mean. Imzadi 1979 → 01:56, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

    Hadn't seen that done before; that's pretty neat. Done; thanks for the pointer. Mike Christie (talk – library) 02:14, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Disambig/External Link check - no dabs or dead external links. --PresN 00:26, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Support with just a couple of quibbles. Ealdgyth - Talk 20:54, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review and support. Mike Christie (talk – library) 21:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Lead:

• "emphasized sex" implies that they depicted sex itself - I think you mean "emphasized sexual themes" or "emphasized sexuality"? (this applies in the body where it's discussed also)

  I'm not sure how to fix this cleanly. "Sexual themes", to a modern reader, might imply too much -- LGBT themes, for example, or sadism and fetishism (which Harrison does mention as lurking in the pulp illustrations generally, though he's not talking about Planet at that point). "Sexuality" might be interpreted as sexual orientation. What's really meant here is that the artists depicted sexually attractive women in revealing clothing and erotic poses. In both the lead and the body I tried to follow up "emphasized sex" with a phrase giving more details, but I can't think of a better shorthand way to introduce it than just "sex". If you think "sexuality" is OK, I'll use that; I think the implied overtones there are probably dismissed by the context. Mike Christie (talk – library) 21:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Contents:

• The main issue i have here is the length of this section - it would probably benefit from being broken down into some subsections. Perhaps something by decades? Or by "Bradbury/Brackett" "Bixby's editorship" "themes" and "artwork"?

  The problem here is layout -- I don't want to chop up the section in such a way that the images bump into section headings. I think your breakdown is accurate but four subheadings seems too much for that material; breaking into three or two sections could work but there's no organizational basis for it that I can see. I had some trouble with the sequencing of paragraphs here: the last three all mention artwork, for example, but are not exclusively about art -- the sources intertwine commentary about art with remarks on other aspects of the magazine's history, so I did the same. The result is a sequence of material that I think reads OK, but is hard to split up. So I'm not sure how to do this one well, either. Mike Christie (talk – library) 21:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

General issue:

• Planet Stories or Planet? you use both to refer to the magazine... suggest standardizing.

  This is standard in the secondary sources -- it's for variety, really; one can't always be saying Astounding Stories of Super-Science, for example, so a shortened form gets used. I've changed this per you suggestion -- see whether you think that looks OK. My preference is for the variety, but see what you think. Mike Christie (talk – library) 21:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

  • None of the above is enough to keep the article back, they are just concerns that I felt as I read it. Ealdgyth - Talk 23:08, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

    OK -- I'll think about both the points and see if I can find a way to change them, but won't treat them as critical. Thanks. Mike Christie (talk – library) 02:11, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

    I read through again and I think it's too monotonous with Planet Stories throughout, so I changed it back. If someone else comments I will look at it again. Mike Christie (talk – library) 00:52, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Comments all minor, but...

• Coming at this biased from WP:FL, but any reason why that slightly nasty Excel spreadsheet (which isn't interactive, isn't accessible" etc) is used in preference to a list? I'll knock one up for you if you like?

  I've no objection to a table if we can make it behave like an image -- I haven't found a way to avoid it taking over the width of the page. Take a look at the titles table in Galaxy Science Fiction, which has a similar table; that table I can justify spanning the screen, but these issue lists I'd really like to confine to the same size space I can put an image in. Is there a way to do that? I take your point about accessibility, but I think everything from the image is also in the text, so I don't think it's critical to make it readable to a non-sighted or colour-blind person, since there's no information that they could only get that way. The intention is to add a visual aid for those who are able to take advantage of it. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

  Well if you don't want it to take over the width of the page then I guess that's the end of discussion. You could put it in a collapsable box, but if you're not that bothered, I understand. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:42, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

• " probably helped to fund Planet Stories while it was getting established." I get this is going to be referenced later, but this is a little vague for the lead, and I'm not keen on "while it was getting established".

  I tried a tweak, based on the wording I used in the body -- does that help? Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

• You abbreviate science fiction to sf, but then are inconsistent with its use, i.e. you have a "not primarily a science fiction magazine" after that. It might just be me, but if I abbreviate something, then I use only the abbreviation thereafter.

  I'm sure you're not the only one, but to my ear part of the benefit of abbreviation is variety. Ealdgyth (review just above) suggested I should be consistent and use either Planet Stories or Planet, but not both; I tried it (see the page history for the version) and I think it sounded very monotonous. I add the "sf" abbreviation to avoid having to spell out "science fiction" every time, but I think it's OK to use both. I'm not as definite on this as I was on the magazine title, though, so if you feel strongly I'd be OK with changing it. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

  I don't feel too strongly, it just seemed odd to abbreviate it (and perhaps odd to abbreviate it to sf rather than S.F. or SF, but hey...) and then be inconsistent with its use. No drama. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:42, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

• "black and white" would expect this to be hyphenated.

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

• "containing 7 stories reprinted from between " - 7 should be seven.

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

• "were one to one and a half cents " one to one-and-a-half cents.

  Done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

The Rambling Man (talk) 20:31, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

• Support my more significant comments addressed. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:53, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

'Quick comment' - I meant to review this, but for some reason thought the review was finished and was surprised to find it still here. I've scanned it and nothing is jumping out at me, but will give it a thorough reading and review this evening. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 20:50, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Support with a few nitpicks:

• "both were monthly, whereas Planet Stories was quarterly" > feels odd without 'published' - i.e 'published monthly' and 'published quarterly' though would add some repetition

  I added "published" to "monthly"; I think the reader can supply it for "quarterly" since it's almost adjacent. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

• It seems that Ray Bradbury should have full name for first occurrence and then be referred to as Bradbury in subsequent occurrences.

  Done -- I left one "Ray" in the lead and one further down, and changed the others. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

• "Also arguing in support of Planet Stories" - feels a little awkward. I haven't had the sense yet of overt criticism.

  Not quite sure what to do here -- Clute is responding to the suggestion that the magazine was trash, because of the covers; the paragraph starts with a comment about the melodramatic covers. I played around with some rewording to make that clearer in the introduction to that sentence, but anything I say about that point is just repeated by Clute in the quote. Can you see a way around this? I was hoping the point would be apparent to the reader, at least by the end of Clute's quote, but perhaps not. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

  I think maybe because I had to stop reading midway through that it jarred me a little - seems okay now.

• Re Bradbury's stories: "His stories for Planet demonstrate his reservations about the advance of technology, in particular "The Golden Apples of the Sun" (November 1953), and "A Sound of Thunder", which appeared in January 1954" > I think the issues should be consistently in parentheses or not

  Done; I had done this one differently because there's an additional clause and footnote about the fact that it's a reprint, but I think that's OK. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

• RE the British reprints, "There were twelve issues known" > should probably be present tense

  Yes, done. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

• BTW - am not in love with the sentence in the lead mentioned earlier. I'd remove the word sex and write something along the lines of "the artwork featured scantily clad women .... "

  I tried rephrasing this -- see if that works. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

• Would love to see a nav template for this series at some point.

  I've been thinking about this and I think the best navbox would be "Science fiction pulp magazines"; the "pulp" qualifier would prevent the navbox from becoming unmanageably large. I will put something together over this weekend if I have time. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

  Don't rush - it was more in the sense of a by-the-way sort of suggestion.

  Well, I've been meaning to get to it, so I went ahead and did it this morning. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:10, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

  It looks great! Truthkeeper88 (talk) 22:15, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Truthkeeper88 (talk) 22:10, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review and support. Mike Christie (talk – library) 11:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Comments struck. You're welcome. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 01:46, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.