Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Burger King legal issues/1

Burger King legal issues edit

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Result: Keep. A consensus has been reached that the article meets GA standarts. All minor isssues mentioned by reviewers have been addressed. Ruslik (talk) 13:24, 22 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, this article was recently elevated to GA status by LimetoLime. Another editor, JimDunning, who was helping me with the article felt that LimetoLime had failed to properly vet the article before its elevation to GA. I partially agree, however I believe the changes I made to the article during the discussion with Jim more than qualify the article for its current rating. We would like to have a neutral party take a look at the article and give their opinion and determine if its rating is appropriate.

GAN discussion is archived here.

--Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 20:27, 20 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment, I don't have time to look over the article in full right this moment, but one small thing did catch my attention when I skimmed it just now. The citation numbers need to be in numerical order. For example, [20][17][21] --> [17][20][21]. This isn't a reason to delist by any means, but it would be nice for it to be fixed. I'll be back later (probably tomorrow) with my full opinion. Nikki311 04:49, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Out-of-order citation numbers are usually caused by ref name. It's not a problem; the alternative would be to introduce duplicate citations, which is clunky. Majoreditor (talk) 06:18, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I fixed the ones I could find. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 07:10, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, I've read through the entire article now, fixing very minor things as I read. The article is very informative, well written, and sourced where appropriate. Nikki311 22:58, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, the article is interesting, well-written and informative. -epicAdam (talk) 20:07, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I still have concerns that assertions in the article are unsupported by the cited sources and statements in the Lead are unsupported by material in the article body (see WP:LEAD). For example, in the Lead it says, "Depending upon its ownership and executive staff at the time, its responses to these challenges have varied from acceding to demands to refusal to concede its position regardless of the outcome." The source article used to support this statement (a statement which implies recklessness and fiduciary irresponsibility) includes a comment from Fast Food Nation author Eric Schlosser which says, "makes the behavior of Burger King ... seem completely unjustifiable." The Lead statement does not seem to be a fair characterization of the situation, especially since it is based on statements made by a source known to be biased against Burger King. It seems for a statement saying Burger King has been uncaring about the outcomes of business decisions, an objective source, such as a well-known business analyst, is needed (and the opinion needs to be presented as such, not fact). Also, the word "recalcitrant" is used to describe Burger King in the relevant section; again, this presents the company in a negative light when the sources do not support such a characterization (perhaps "reluctance" would be better?). See Wikipedia:NPOV#Attributing and substantiating biased statements for relevant guidelines.

Another statement in the Lead ("Several legal decisions have set contractual law precedents in regards to ... ethical business practices") lacks similar support in the body. The word "ethics" appears only one more time in the article, and it isn't applied to Burger King. Also in the Lead is the statement, "many of these decisions have helped define general business dealings that continue to shape the entire marketplace." The two cited sources (http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=CASE&court=US&vol=471&page=462 and http://www.invispress.com/law/civpro/burger.html), however, are merely summaries of a single case and provide no context or analysis about the subsequent effect of the court decision on the "marketplace". Additionally, in the relevant section in the article body there is no treatment of the decision on later business practices, thus nothing supporting that Lead statement.

Similarly, in the section on the Hungry Jack's case, it says, "The case introduced the American legal concept of good faith negotiations into the Australian legal system". Neither of the two sources provided support the assertion that this case "introduced" the concept to Australian law. The relevant source certainly supports that the case is evidence that its use may be growing or survives, but using the word "introduce" gives it more importance than the source seems to state.

I cleaned up that statement, it reads more accurate of the courts decision. Jeremy ( Blah blah...)

I am still concerned – despite solid, significant improvements as these and other issues have been raised – that not all statements in the article accurately reflect their source material and the Lead does not accurately reflect and summarize the body material. More work needs to be done to rectify these issues.
Jim Dunning | talk 03:48, 24 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment The lead is meant to be a general overview of the article and not specifically address in detail issues in the article, as per the issues you have had with the article, Jeremy has seemed to add the appropriate citations. This review isn't for an FA, it is for a GA and the article currently fulfills all of the current requirements for a GA article. I also think that you might be dealing with prose issues by talking about words like "introduce" (with the Hungry Jack's issue) which aren't sourcing issues, they are language issues, which again fall under the FA criteria, not the GA criteria.--Chef Tanner (talk) 03:15, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the Lead does not go into detail, but it must accurately summarize the key points in the article. This applies to any class of article, B to FA. One of the examples I cited is not supported by anything that says Burger King has acted without regard to the consequences of its actions. For that statement to be made, someone has to either be reading the minds of the key decision makers or it has to be presented as a quote of from a reliable source's analysis of the case(s). I don't see either anywhere in the article (or buried in the source articles, for that matter). The other statements about cases setting legal precedents about ethical business practices and helping "define general business dealings that continue to shape the entire marketplace" are not supported by copy elsewhere in the article (whether summarizing a number of passages as a group or specific ones). No matter the class of the article, what's in the Lead must be reflected in the body and vice-versa.

As for "introduce", it's not a prose issue. The case did not introduce the concept of good faith to the Australian legal system. Moot, since the issue has been resolved.
Jim Dunning | talk 20:44, 26 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

RE: Burger King has acted without regard to the consequences of its actions.

I am speaking of the whole Coalition of Immokalee Workers morass outlined in the Labor section v. the actions of the company outlined in the Nutrition and Animal welfare sections; with the CIW incident the company behaved in a way that brought scorn, public protests and unfavorable press. It continued to do so until the mass of the situation caused everything to crash down upon them in April and May of this year.

You assertions are problematic to me as we have discussed the issue at length. As I have stated in our other conversations, it does not have to be spelled out in specific terms in the sources as it is implicit in the tone of the articles and the facts stated that are presented in those publications which I have cited, and in the behaviors of the company outlined in the body of the article itself. The sentence refers to the pattern of behaviors and outlined as a whole in the "Controversies" section. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 04:11, 27 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't matter any way, I reworded it. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 07:16, 27 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep The article has a good level of writing which is well written and well sourced and seems to fulfill all the requirements for a GA.--Chef Tanner (talk) 03:19, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I am unable to read it completely at the moment, but I think the article should be renamed. Aside from the fact issues is vague and fluffy, I think the use of "legal issues" is misleading. Much of the article is not related to legislation, or legal disputes of any kind, and instead deals with controversies and protests (e.g. the "Animal welfare" section). Maybe the article would be better titled Burger King controversies and legal disputes. - Shudde ^talk 09:41, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please read the lead, only those controversies with legal concerns or outcomes, such as binding agreements or violations of said agreements, are included. The Islam ice cream issue relates to Shariah, or Muslim canon law. --Jeremy ( Blah blah...) 17:39, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's completely pushing it, the animal rights section hardly touches on legal issues at all. The use of "issues" still sucks regardless, it's fluffy and vague. I would rather it be replaced with "disputes", which is much more descriptive. - Shudde ^talk 23:36, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]