Talk:Hitachi Magic Wand/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Kaciemonster (talk · contribs) 01:43, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm going to get started now and should have the review up within 24 hours :) Kaciemonster (talk) 01:43, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Oh, thanks very much, Kaciemonster, most appreciated! :) — Cirt (talk) 01:47, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Hi Cirt! I just finished going over the article, and I think it just about meets the good article criteria. As far as I can tell the article is neutral, stable, appropriately illustrated, and accurate. I really enjoyed the academic research section, especially the part about its use in infant heel stick tests. Overall, this article was really fun to review and I only have a few notes. I figured I'd do the lead separately, so this is just for the body.

Design and features

This section is pretty good and I only have a couple of notes:

• The first sentence in the second paragraph ending with "are available to purchase" might be better as "became available to purchase" or "were designed."
• Also in the second paragraph, it wasn't totally clear to me who the company behind the attachments is. Is it Betty Dodson? I'm just assuming that Hitachi didn't make the attachments (correct me if I'm wrong) but the last line in the paragraph refers to an attachment made by an unaffiliated company. Is that a different company than the one that makes the other attachments?

History

In the Debut as a massager section:

• The sentence "It is effective at relieving pain associated with back aches" is a bit choppy on it's own, and could probably be merged into the sentence before or after it.
• The line "Kabushiki Kaisha Hitachi Seisakusho has registered the trademark to the Hitachi Magic Wand" is sandwiched between two sentences about its use and might fit better after the first sentence in that paragraph.

In the Vibratex distribution section:

• Everything between "Vibratex has continued to sell the device in the U.S. through 2014" and "Because of its concerns about having its name attached to a popular sex toy..." would be better off either in the reception section or in a separate section. I'm not sure if any of it has anything to do with Vibratex.
• The line "On 5 May 2014, the device was featured in a comedy segment of the television program Louie on FX" has two sources, the first points to the Wikipedia page for Louie, and the second is what looks like a video clip of the scene from FX. That sentence should probably just be removed.

Academic research

Overall, everything in this section is good. It's a super interesting read and the language is great. My only note here is that there are paragraphs in this section with multiple inline citations to the same source (the neonatology, otolaryngology, and postural sway sections all have only one source each, for example.) It looks like almost every sentence is cited. I think that if it's all in the same paragraph and not immediately following a direct quote or pointing to a different page, it's alright to just put the cite at the end of the paragraph.

Kaciemonster (talk) 20:52, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Response from GA nominator

@Kaciemonster:, thanks very much for the thorough review. The only suggestion I disagreed with was about moving that material you mentioned out of the sect dealing with Vibratex distribution, and here's why: It shows a clear progression of (1) Vibratex taking over distribution, (2) Product becoming more popular as sex toy over time, (3) Popularized by sex toy in media through various mediums, (4) Hitachi company gets uncomfortable with popularity in media as sex toy and wants to stop producing product, (5) Vibratex convinces Hitachi to continue selling relaunched product with new name and dropping "Hitachi". As far as your other suggestions, I've got no objections to anything else and your recommendations were most helpful, so I've gone ahead and implemented them all directly into the article, diff. Hopefully that's satisfactory to you, Kaciemonster, if not, of course we can discuss it or perhaps I could move some of that info to an In the media sect, but as I said above, I think it goes well with the chronology due to its impact on possible production through history. Thanks again for your review, — Cirt (talk) 01:21, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Just peeking in here, as I suggested Kaciemonster pick this review up. I think the vibratex section might be better with two changes. First, the title should better invoke what we're trying to say: these are eras in the product's history. This is an era where distribution switched as the sexual reputation of the toy became more salient. Is "vibratex distribution" going to get us there? Second, we want to link the shift in popularity from "cult" item to widely discussed icon. I think we do an ok job of that, but it may merit a close look to see if we can improve the structure a bit. Protonk (talk) 16:02, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion, Protonk, I think I agree with where you're doing here, but what subsection title change do you recommend? — Cirt (talk) 16:06, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

@Protonk:Maybe something like have the Vibratex distribution sect be just that first paragraph, and the rest be in a sect titled Popularization and impact or something like that? — Cirt (talk) 16:11, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

That seems good, but I'll let kaciemonster be the judge of that. :) I guess the big point is that the switch in distributors isn't the salient event in this product's history (for this period). It's the rise in prominence as a sex toy icon. Sure, that forced the relatively staid manufacturer to pull out, but it's an interesting flourish in the story. Protonk (talk) 16:15, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Okay, or how about just switching to pure chronological labeling of sects and just break up the History sect into time periods of years? — Cirt (talk) 16:19, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

So I read through the history section again, and it looks like there are 3 major events: The product's debut (covered by everything up until Vibratex distribution), the switchover to Vibratex as a distributor, and the rebranding in 2013. Maybe it can be chronologically broken up into those three subsections. Kaciemonster (talk) 17:36, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Done. I've modified the sect names in History sect per input from Kaciemonster, and thanks very much, because after your recommendation I think it looks much better! — Cirt (talk) 20:48, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Lead Section Review

I think the lead section is great, and does a really good job of giving a thorough overview of the rest of the article. I'd say it's basically fine now, but I have 2 suggestions that I think would make it better:

• "Tanya Wexler's film Hysteria featured the device while showing the evolution of the vibrator, and Clayton Cubitt used it in his video exhibit Hysterical Literature which showed women reading texts until they climaxed." I'd suggest taking this line out of the second paragraph and moving one of the examples into the last paragraph. The second paragraph is mostly about the device's history, and I think either of those examples would better represent the device's impact.
• In the last paragraph, I think that there are better, more powerful examples of the praise it's received. For the second sentence, what about using the quote from Cosmopolitan, "...the vibrator most often suggested by sex therapists" to follow up the recommendation by Ruth Westheimer and Laura Berman, instead of the quote from the Star Tribune. Maybe also include the line about it being the most recognizable sex toy on Earth instead of the line about the Sex Awards. Kaciemonster (talk) 19:23, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

@Kaciemonster:I've implemented all your suggestions as they're all most helpful, thanks for the excellent recommendations. — Cirt (talk) 21:02, 23 October 2014 (UTC)