Talk:Al Williamson

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Good articleAl Williamson has been listed as one of the Art and architecture good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
June 7, 2009Peer reviewReviewed
November 8, 2009Good article nomineeListed
On this day...Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on March 21, 2017, March 21, 2021, and March 21, 2024.
Current status: Good article

Name[edit]

James van Hise's THE ART OF AL WILLIAMSON lists the artist's name as "Alonso Q. Williamson" at one point. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.243.214.133 (talk) 00:10, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Star Wars Adaptations[edit]

Although Dark House now owns the rights, the work Williamson did on the Star Wars adaptations was done for Marvel. Saying "Dark Horse's Star Wars adaptations" is misleading, since Dark Horse didn't exist when Williamson adapted Empire and Jedi. DailyRich (talk) 22:32, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Williamson is currently retired and is suffering from Alzheimer's disease. This (albeit sad news) should be included at the bottom of the biography. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.81.23.226 (talk) 17:18, 2 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If that information is to be included, I think that it's important to respect BLP policy - therefore there would need to be very reliable references cited, otherwise there's a respect of privacy factor to consider. --Scott Free (talk) 20:31, 21 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A peer review has been started -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Peer_review/Al_Williamson/archive1

--Scott Free (talk) 20:11, 6 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

To do[edit]

  1. Do a detailed grammar check of your article, as I happen to spot a ton of stray commas. I tend to do this too, but you need to squash them.

OK

  1. Complete the infobox, especially notable works & awards. Make the image caption a little more informative (perhaps include the year it was done, for instance).
  2. Throughout the Biography sections there are quite a few poorly connected threads/thoughts. Scan the phrasing to make sure everything reads correctly.
    i.e., "He took an interest in comic strips via the Mexican magazine Paquin at the age of nine (the magazine featured American strips and 'the Underwater Empire by Argentinian cartoonist Carlos Clemen)." reads better as "At the age of nine, Williamson displays an initial interest in comic strips by reading the Mexican magazine Paquin, which reprints American work alongside original Mexican stories." That's still not great, but you get the idea (I hope).

OK

  1. In each decade you seem to have a list ("Some notable work from that period include" sort). Try to assimilate this information into the article more fluidly.

OK

  1. Be a tad more selective with the External links, most of them should be Footnotes and that's all. Also use more descriptive titles and impose a bit of organization to their order.

OK

  1. Please expand the lead to conform with guidelines at Wikipedia:Lead. The article should have an appropriate number of paragraphs as is shown on WP:LEAD, and should adequately summarize the article.[?]

OK

  1. Consider adding more links to the article; per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links) and Wikipedia:Build the web, create links to relevant articles.[?]

OK

  1. The script has spotted the following contractions: wasn't, haven't, didn't, can't, if these are outside of quotations, they should be expanded.

OK

  1. As done in WP:FOOTNOTE, footnotes usually are located right after a punctuation mark (as recommended by the CMS, but not mandatory), such that there is no space in between. For example, the sun is larger than the moon [2]. is usually written as the sun is larger than the moon.[2][?]

OK

  1. Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that it exemplifies some of Wikipedia's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a.[?]

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. OK

--Scott Free (talk) 13:13, 25 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This to-do list is by Hornoir, originally posted at peer review.--Commander Keane (talk) 13:01, 18 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Photograph[edit]

Can anyone provide a free to use photograph, as not having one is going to kill the GA nomination (Hell it makes it fail the B-class assessment as it stands). (Emperor (talk) 15:27, 1 September 2009 (UTC))[reply]

As far as I can tell, although a free image would be better, the guidelines don't specifically restrict the image originally provided (especially, considering that the artist is retired). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Non-free_content#unacceptable_use_images_of_living_people --Scott Free (talk) 16:42, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The policy point is:
Yes, the person is retired, but he is still alive, and his appearance at a certain time is not tied to how he looks. And remember, free images do include fan taken photos at conventions - pre or post retirement. The general criteria for cases where a non-free drawing is used is that the person is either extremely reclusive or has a strong religious/personal aversion to having their photo taken. - J Greb (talk) 19:22, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Non-free images[edit]

Right now there are 13 image here... way more than is warranted, especially since the layout is creating an "art gallery" effect.

This needs to get cut down. There may be an argument for 6 image, though that is a stretch.

- J Greb (talk) 21:22, 1 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Suggestions:
- J Greb (talk) 19:38, 8 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not aware of any policy or guideline restrictions concerning the specific number or images per article. The current images were added with respect to the image use guidelines. I invite editors to consult the individual fair use rationales provided in each image's description. My point of view is there are many factors to consider for image use, notably purpose of use and copyright laws. Please note that all images were included to complement and illustrate specific, diversified points of article text and that although there are 13 fair use images, they aren't from the same copyright holder, there are at least 7 different copyright holders. --Scott Free (talk) 16:51, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I remember you pitching a fit when this was brought up with your preferred version of the John Buscema article. And just as there the policy is at WP:NFCC. "Minimal usage" - all of the images are in the article as examples of William's work. As well, using the to create a de facto gallery is against guidelines drawn from that policy - WP:NFG.
And to be honest, providing a suggestion list of images to keep is being overly nice. By the policy the images could be stripped down to 3-6, or none, and the onus would be on the editor trying to get the image back in to provide a valid reason for it. - J Greb (talk) 19:11, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. Also aesthetically if you have too many images vertically overlapping at a reasonable screen resolution, then it tends to squeeze the text into a narrow column in the middle of the page which is not great for the look of the page and makes the page more difficult to read (as it popped up as a potnetial GA I thought I'd take a quick look over the page and the image use is what immediately struck me and I jumped onto the talk page to raise the issue). J Greb's suggestions seem reasonable and we do need to address this for the GA review (if need be we can open it up at WT:CMC to get a consensus if this is going to be a contested issue).
Of course, the irony is that we do need a photo for the infobox. (Emperor (talk) 20:25, 7 October 2009 (UTC))[reply]
  • Ive cut back images in line with discussion here and the policy: Multiple items of non-free content are not used if one item can convey equivalent significant information. I'll go see if I can find a photo. Hiding T 08:53, 8 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nothing is turning up. We'll have to appeal. Hiding T 09:03, 8 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • We could crop his signature from here: [1], is that of any use? Hiding T 09:10, 8 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review[edit]

I was going to do the GA Review on this article, but it looks like it needs a bit of work still. Perhaps cut down the images? Cheers JRA_WestyQld2 Talk 03:48, 7 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review[edit]

This review is transcluded from Talk:Al Williamson/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Jezhotwells (talk) 18:10, 24 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I shall be reviewing this page against the Good Article criteria, following its nomination for Good Article status.

Quick fail criteria assessment

  1. The article completely lacks reliable sources – see Wikipedia:Verifiability.
  2. The topic is treated in an obviously non-neutral way – see Wikipedia:Neutral point of view.
  3. There are cleanup banners that are obviously still valid, including cleanup, wikify, NPOV, unreferenced or large numbers of fact, clarifyme, or similar tags.
  4. The article is or has been the subject of ongoing or recent, unresolved edit wars.
  5. The article specifically concerns a rapidly unfolding current event with a definite endpoint.

No problems with quick fail criteria. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:19, 24 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Checking against GA criteria[edit]

  1. It is reasonably well written.
    a (prose):
    • Lead: His first marriage, to Arlene Williamson, a professional letterer and colorist, ended with the latter's untimely passing. Suggest replace with the latter's untimely passing. with the date of death, thus removing POV wording.

Not sure what to do here, as I don't have specific dates. --Scott Free (talk) 23:05, 31 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

      • Is the untimely passing phrase used in the print source or could it be implied from it? Also note that this is not mentioned in the article. The lead is a summary of the article, so it needs some expansion. The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article. It should define the topic, establish context, explain why the subject is interesting or notable, and summarize the most important points—including any notable controversies. The emphasis given to material in the lead should roughly reflect its importance to the topic, according to reliable, published sources, and the notability of the article's subject should be established in the first sentence of the lead, if possible. Please read WP:LEAD.
    • The lead remains unaddressed Jezhotwells (talk) 10:24, 6 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No, only the fact of death is mentioned. Untimely was meant as a temporal description based on inference. Mainly a photo of Williamson and his second wife, with his children from his first marriage. Untimely threrefore referring to the socio-cultural notion that if a mother dies before her children have reached adulthood, then her death is considered premature in regards to her role of child rearing. But if it's just a case of one word, I have no objection to it being removed.--Scott Free (talk) 21:18, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

    • Early life and career: Consistency - Wallace Wood or Wally Wood?
    • 1960s: In 1960, little work to be found in the comic book field due to a downturn in the industry, he went to work as an assistant to John Prentice on the Alex Raymond-created comic strip Rip Kirby for a three-year period. Grammar, surely needs something like: In 1960, with little work to be found in the comic book field.
    • Later career: Since 1998, there have been five career retrospective books published, of which Williamson has cooperated with the production. Grammar!
    • Awards: 1989 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Nominee - Best Art Team: (Daredevil [Marvel] - with John Romita Jr.) 1991 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Winner - Best Inker 1996 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Nominee - Best Penciller/Inker: (for Flash Gordon [Marvel Select/Marvel]) 1997 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Winner - Best Inker: (for Spider-Man and Untold Tales of Spiderman #17-18 [Marvel]) 1998 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Nominee - Hall of Fame 1999 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Nominee - Hall of Fame 2000 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards - Winner - Hall of Fame: (Voter's choice)
    • Harvey Awards 1988 Al Williamson, for Daredevil (Marvel) 1989 Al Williamson, for Daredevil (Marvel) 1990 Al Williamson, for Daredevil (Marvel) 1991 Al Williamson, for Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser (Marvel/Epic) 1993 Al Williamson, for Spider-Man 2099 (Marvel) 1994 Al Williamson, for Spider-Man 2099 (Marvel) 1995 Al Williamson, for Spider-Man 2099 (Marvel) Punctuation needed!
  1. b (MoS):
    • Many of the cartoonists mentioned in the Early life and career have WP articles, please wikify - also other words like Tarzan. I have started off but look carefully at other candidates, also magazine titles, etc. I recommend you find someone to thorughly copy-edit this artcile for style, punctaion and wikification.

I went through - smoothed things over - wikified - I think it could stand some more work, but I hope the basics have been covered.--Scott Free (talk) 23:05, 31 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  1. It is factually accurate and verifiable.
    a (references):
    • I tagged one dead link, assume GF for print, other refs check out Still one dead link Ref #29, if you can't find something remove the statement.
    b (citations to reliable sources):
    • All sources RS in context.
    c (OR):

#::*1970s: Samples of his sketches also began appearing in various 'fanzines' of the period (Heritage, Squa Tront).[original research?] Care to address this? Not sure what to do here - the whole 'fan' movement thing in comics has some historical importance for that field. I added references and removed a phrase. --Scott Free (talk) 23:08, 31 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  1. It is broad in its scope.
    a (major aspects):
    b (focused):
  2. It follows the neutral point of view policy.
    Fair representation without bias:
  3. It is stable.
    No edit wars etc.:
  4. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.
    a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales):
    b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
    • I see that several images have been removed. As all those remaining are non-free, I recommend no more be added.
  5. Overall:
    Pass/Fail:
    • On hold for seven days for above concerns to be addressed. Jezhotwells (talk) 19:07, 24 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • OK nearly there - one dead link to be sorted and some expansion of the Lead to encompass the whole article, remains on hold. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:40, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Aces! Will get on it tonight. --Scott Free (talk) 16:09, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

      • OK, I made a few copy-edits to complete Boz's work. I am happy to pass this as a good article as it satisfies the criteria now. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:01, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Lead[edit]

Nothing seems to have been done to address the lead as mentioned above. The lead should be a succinct summary of the entire article. If the lead mentions his retirement and his wife Cori then the article should give more detail and vice versa. It needs to be about three paras wrong . Read [[WP:LEAD}} for clues. On hold for three more days, then will be failed if improvements not made. Jezhotwells (talk) 10:24, 6 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Scott - let me know if you need help with this part; I think lead writing is my specialty. ;) BOZ (talk) 12:43, 6 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hellz yeah...thanks ... need...help...with...lead - I have no kind of feeling for lead work - Lead on, MacBoz! (A little paraphrase from MacBeth,there:-)--Scott Free (talk) 14:57, 6 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've had a chance to read through the article and I will work on the lead probably tomorrow or Sunday. There is definitely some work to be done, but I think I have a good idea of where to go. Throughout the article there is a lot of listing what he worked on from one thing to the next, so I will have to sift through that to get to the juicy bits; I definitely saw some things in there that I'd like to mention in the lead. Also, I think I'd like to break it up into most likely three paragraphs. Note the previous work I did for Alex Raymond, a subject mentioned frequently in this article. BOZ (talk) 02:38, 7 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good. Let me know here when you're done. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:53, 7 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'm mostly done with it; I'll like to get some input from Scott, especially on the intro paragraph. BOZ (talk) 15:41, 7 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I'm tickled that we seem to have passed GA sometime between my contributions last night and when I came here this morning — Yay — though I still do see patches that need touch-up, plus the image issues. I'll try and address those later today. Anyone else want to jump in pool? I'd say the water's fine! -- Tenebrae (talk) 15:54, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Compact footnotes[edit]

Since several of the footnotes are from the same sources with the only difference being the page numbers, isn't there some accepted way to abbreviate the source while keeping the links/ISBNs intact? What's the MediaWiki equivalent of Ibid.? --GentlemanGhost (talk) 19:30, 27 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, it's in APA style, I started that along with general proofreading - I'll be trying to do a section per day this week. --Scott Free (talk) 21:44, 27 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent! Thanks! --GentlemanGhost (talk) 22:14, 27 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Added the Williamson/Frazetta page - because it's public domain - replaced Star Wars with Blade Runner for variety, because there were two Star Wars images. --Scott Free (talk) 20:29, 30 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Added the infobox imae because I thinkt that there's been some good faith attempts to locate a free one which did not give any results - plus the Wally Wood article uses a similar self-portrait for the infobox so it seems OK.--Scott Free (talk) 20:50, 30 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

On the images:
  • Something concrete to show that a free use image cannot be had is needed. Has Eilliamson stated that he does not whant his photo taken? Has he avoided public appearance like comic book or sci-fi conventions? Etc.
  • Wally wood is dead, Williamson isn't. The "precident" doesn't work.
  • Based on the upload information none of the image present in the article prior to this edit - [2] - are in the PD. And even if they are, they would replace the image in the relavent section, not add to it.
  • While a variety of subject matter would be good, it would also be a goo thing if the replacement were an art piece as a whole, not a section that needs to have cover trade dress cropped off.
- J Greb (talk) 21:57, 30 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Williamson used to be quite an active convention goer until around 2000. But now, at 78, he is apparently not in good enough health to make public appearances. I could provide refs., but I won't, out of respect for the man's privacy.--Scott Free (talk) 22:04, 30 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So... there is a likelihood, a very good one, that there is at least a photo or two out there from 2000 or earlier. In that light, the infobox can wait for one of those to surface. - J Greb (talk) 23:45, 30 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I finished the revisions - kudos to all for the recent contribs - great work. --Scott Free (talk) 23:09, 31 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Unexpected visit[edit]

In a rather surprising case of coincidence, apparently Mr. Williamson himself has made a few edits to the article. This seems to be legitimate, although I have no experience in dealing with BLP input from the subjects themselves.--Scott Free (talk) 21:23, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at the edits and some of the above comments...
  • Generally residency and family ties are touchy subjects. And it has been pointed out else where that persons like Mr Williamson are not public personalities - we don't have an inherent right to put up the same level of minutia as would go on a politician's or celebrity's bio.
  • Same with his parent's lives.
  • I'm not sure what "Bogota'" means though...
  • As for the bit about the Theakston books... Are they the "five career retrospective books" mentioned in the previous sentence or are they something else? If the later, the first sentence may need to be expanded on for clarity. And it may need it any way... since the assertion needs a secondary ref, though the same can be said about the first sentence there.
- J Greb (talk) 22:37, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There's a full-page photograph of "The Williamson Clan — James, Al, Cori, Valerie and Victor" on page 3 of the James Van Hise book The Art of Al Williamson that we cite all over this article. That's a 1983 book, so after 26 years, no one pictured there is still a child. It's a book anybody can buy — Amazon, for one, has used copies starting at $17 each — and in writing an encyclopedic biography, which perforce includes mention of family, which is hardly minutia, we cannot responsibly ignore readily and easily available, fully public information. Additionally, with several books written about him and high-profile, award-winning work for one of the largest media companies in the world, Williamson — and I say this not as an attorney but as a multi-decade journalist with extensive newsroom experience — is unarguably a public figure by American legal standards. The information in the Van Hise book is pertinent, relevant, and already in the public sphere.
I apologize if I seem a bit forceful. As much as I respect and admire Al, whose work on one of my own projects was one of the joys of my professional career, I respect truth and accuracy more. It's wrong for any of us to ignore relevant biographical facts for personal reasons. The editors of Encyclopedia Britannica would not fail to include pertinent and already public facts, and I strongly believe Wikipedia must adhere to the same high standards.
That said, I didn't find any mention of his state in the Van Hise book or online, so I would opt to remove his place of residence from the article. --Tenebrae (talk) 04:37, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Moot point: That information was already removed; what I saw appears in a commented-out section of the HTML text, and is not on the live article. --Tenebrae (talk) 04:44, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Today's edits[edit]

I've been asked to help contribute, so I've come in to make mostly c/e and line edits to streamline some phrasing ("It was during this period that William got the chance to meet...." --> "During this period, Williamson met...."). Also, the names of illustrators we refer to as notable s.b. wikilinked; if they're notable, the redlinks will eventually become bluelinks, and this is an important way to highlight missing notable. It's the reason I glommed onto Coby Whitmore, who was a giant of 1950s illustration yet had not article till I noticed the redlink. -- Tenebrae (talk) 18:27, 7 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If we're going to use examples of an artist's work, we need to use unambiguously credited examples. I've removed a couple of early examples since they appeared in one source only and were not corroborated -- and in one case refuted -- by Grand Comics Database.
Also, a punctuation thing: In U.S. English, story titles are in double quote marks, not single quote marks. -- Tenebrae (talk) 18:48, 7 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding the chronological fix I mentioned in the edit summary:
In Van Hise's The Art of Al Williamson, p. 18, Williamson discusses the Famous Funnies and Heroic Comics [sic; it's New Heroic Comics per GCD] and says initially, "I think I did the Hogarth stuff prior to that," before then immediately saying, "Wait, I think I did it afterwards, because I know he gave me a chance and I just couldn't do it. And that's when I suggested John Celardo."
At this point, Williamson says, he had already known Celardo from Fiction House "about six months or a year," meaning the Fiction House sentence must precede the Tarzan Sunday-page material.
Williamson then goes on to describe working on Tarzan Sunday pages after Celardo had do so "for quite some time." -- Tenebrae (talk) 02:39, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Images[edit]

The "Food for Thought" image, though from a color comic book, appears here in black-and-white. We need a color image, as published, from one of his EC works, one of his major areas of notability.

We have two Star Wars images. We only need one. Since we mention his winning several Best Inker awards from the late 1980s to 1990s, it would be proper to replace one Star Wars image with one example of his award-winning inking. -- Tenebrae (talk) 05:41, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Also, given the prominence of Flash Gordon in his career, I believe we need an example of his Flash Gordon work. This might or might not need to replace the far more general 1940s sketch image, if consensus is not to add to the number of photographs. -- Tenebrae (talk) 20:18, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Color is really irrelavent since he is know for line work - pencilks and inks. As for the replace ment for "Food for Thought"... you do realize it needs to be cut in 1/2 to 250px, max. - J Greb (talk) 01:38, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, J. Not sure I agree that his art as published is irrelevant, but we've got a mix of color and b/w, so users can see both.
We can actually leave the color image at 350px. WP:IMGSIZE says, "Where size forcing [from default] is appropriate, larger images should generally be a maximum of 500 pixels tall and 400 pixels wide," and the image is smaller than that, while still being large enough to see appropriate details of his line work. The Manual of Style agrees; MOS:IMAGES says, "On Wikipedia, most pictures should be displayed so they are between 100 and 400 pixels wide." -- Tenebrae (talk) 02:58, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There is a nagging problem with that - all that is really necessary is a single panel, not a full page or strip. Ideally we could pull one panel, scanned at ~200-250px wide, or tall for landscape, and be covered for an exempler of his style. - J Greb (talk) 03:58, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure we can say as a blanket statement that "that is really necessary is a single panel," since a significant portion of what's important about any comics artist is his storytelling ability. But again, we have common ground in that this is not a full page — it's only a portion of one page. Why don't we see if Wiki admins have a copyright objection to this before removing anything; it illustrates his storytelling style, I believe it falls under fair use, and the size falls well within Wikipedia guidelines. -- Tenebrae (talk) 04:51, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The more I think about it, the more I'm seeing an NFC problem, not only with this article but across the comics artists bios.
Personally I can see a good argument for the "1 image per decade" model.The underlying "progression and maturation of the artist style" premise seems solid. Just as trying to include signature series and/or characters the artist is associated with is a good idea.
But... In cases like this where the artist's style is fairly static, either of the entirety of the carrier or multiple decades, it bucks the minimal use policy. Without getting into the "signature character", a single, 2-panel, black and white strip that he penciled and inked is sufficient to cover both his stiyle as an artist - both penciles and inks - and his ability as a visual storyteller. Add in an attempt to cover "signature series and/or characters" and the number of images is bumped to 2 - 1 for Flash Gordon and 1 for Secret Agent Corrigan. While it is slim, anything else is going to be redundant. That is unless there is a point or period where his style changed drastically. Based on the current image along with the others that have cycled through, such a drastic change does not seem to exist. - J Greb (talk) 22:59, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
You make very good points, IMHO. I don't know the answer. You're right that a print encyclopedia usually has just one image per artist bio. Does that necessarily apply to an online encyclopedia and to a more visually oriented culture? These are, indeed, bigger issues than just one article. That said, five does seem a lot for an article this size. -- Tenebrae (talk) 21:58, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, print encyclopedia do tend to limit images except for the flat out major artists. And by WP:NOTPAPER reasoning, we can have more since we aren't limited by this being a printed tome. That still gets trumped though by NFC - Yes, we are dealing with a topic that lends it self to image use. Yes, we are in an environment that is skewed towards heavy image use. But we are limited to the amount of non-free content.
I truly wish we had a bio of a comics artist at the FA level as an example. - J Greb (talk) 22:41, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'll bet we could bring Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko to FA. There's been a lot of scholarly material and biography published about them in mainstream publications/books. I'm game to go in and add/clean up material. What do you say? Shall we make it a Comics Project project? :-) --Tenebrae (talk) 02:34, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Name[edit]

Okay, now, Al Williamson is a brilliant artist, and I cringe at the thought of giving him grief. But we really need to note his birth name (“Alfonso”) in this article, even if he doesn't care for it. So I'm going to note it here and then flee from the problem. —SlamDiego←T 01:25, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, but where did you find that information? If we give a footnote citation, then I think it stays since it's encyclopedic --72.89.116.90 (talk) 22:47, 25 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Image for the infobox[edit]

Long and short:

  • For living people we are not supposed to be using non-free images except in a very few specific cases. Scans of comic strips generally are not free to use without a fair use rationale.
  • If art is used with a contemporary person using something that is "based on" the person's appearance isn't good enough. It should be an actual portrait or self portrait.

- J Greb (talk) 11:05, 28 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's sort of counter intuitive though to leave the infobox without an image of the person - people sort of expect one - unless it's JD Salinger or Thomas Pynchon, some sort of image is kind of expected - witness the many attempts to have one here. In general, there's been good work in providing free image photos for living cartoonists, so if there isn't one for Williamson, then it's probably because there aren't any readily availible as he stopped going to conventions a little before Wikipedia's time. So far Williamson has not expressed any problems with the images.

There are a few good self-portraits available, I don't see any problem of including a low-res, cropped scan of one of those.

--Scott Free (talk) 17:18, 5 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That's one of the stumbling blocks when dealing with biographies of living people here - we're limited in the circumstances where non-free images are acceptable. Cases such as Salinger or Pynchon, where the person is/was a recluse or shuns photography/publicity through out their life, are one of the examples held up as an exception for "free use image only".
In Williamson's case, and IIRC the previous runs at this, he stepped out of the public view in 2000. Prior to that he did do the convention circuit so there is the possibility of a free use image kicking around. Since his notability really isn't linked to his appearance, a free photo from 1999 is a good as one from 1979 or 1959.
If the article is still without a free image when BLP no longer applies, using a true portrait or a promotional photo becomes an option. The rub being that even then the non-free image can/will be replaced if a free use one becomes available.
- J Greb (talk) 17:55, 5 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
What do you mean by "stretch"? Pepso2 (talk) 19:20, 5 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Creating a colage of non-free images and slapping an "I release this" on it simply to get an image placed. - J Greb (talk) 19:25, 5 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Okay. will fix. Pepso2 (talk) 19:35, 5 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We need to be extremely certain before reporting a death[edit]

CBR saying "the news broke on Twitter" does not meet the threshold of a reliable source. CBR doesn't even say WHO on Twitter claimed this. Death rumors fly around constantly on the 'net. It may be true. Or it may be the latest in a long line of false reports about prominent individuals' deaths, reports we've all seen at one time or another. Twitter is NOT a news source. It's a lead, and verified Twitter accounts are a source of quotes, if properly identified. But Twitter is not a news source. --Tenebrae (talk) 01:47, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Robert Greenberger at ComicMix.com is reporting it now, though Mark Evanier is being cautious here. Greenberger, as a longtime comics writer-editor and a journalist, would seem to be a reliable source. --Tenebrae (talk) 04:28, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
MTV News is saying they're hearing it via Twitter feed, but can't pin down a source. Mark Evanier has an obit up, but doesn't give a date -- I'm hearing from Pepso2 it may actually have happened June 12.--Tenebrae (talk) 14:03, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It's worth noting that no obits for Al Williamson have run yet at [PennLive.com: Obituaries], a centralized repository of Pennsylvania newspaper. --Tenebrae (talk) 14:13, 15 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]


Further Reading - The notion behind this section is that it lists the six career retrospectives referred to in the main text as per consensus established during GA evaluation. I suggest leaving it like this for now. Of course anyone can change this, but I suggest waiting until the commotion dies down a bit, before making significant changes to the GA version.--Scott Free (talk) 21:13, 17 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Found this - press release, family approved - http://fleskpublications.com/blog/?p=342 --Scott Free (talk) 21:32, 17 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Here's a good obit article - http://www.comicsreporter.com/index.php/al_williamson_1931_2010/--Scott Free (talk) 21:54, 17 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The NY Times finally published an obit. Pretty nice. Why hasn't the LA Times done anything? http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/21/arts/design/21williamson.html --Scott Free (talk) 15:19, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Here's Bill Stout's memento - http://www.williamstout.com/news/journal/?p=405 --Scott Free (talk) 15:36, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Again, my compliments. Good hunting. --Tenebrae (talk)

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