Talk:Mobile, Alabama

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Good article Mobile, Alabama has been listed as one of the Geography and places good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can delist it, or ask for a reassessment.

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Mobile, Alabama article.
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[edit] Annexation

Annexation of West Mobile —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.27.147.94 (talk) 02:06, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

We also need to find an updated picture of Mobile County showing the new city limits.--Donovan Ravenhull 13:08, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
I left a message on the talk page of Arkyan, the original creator of the current image. Judging from the info he already has posted there his images utilize geographic boundary files provided by the US Census Bureau, and therefore cannot be simply updated in that way until the next census. He recommends manually editing the map to reflect updated boundaries with a utility for editing the Scalable Vector Graphics files. He recommends Inkscape. I have downloaded it, but it may take quite a while before I can use it. On another note, the local news media have been reporting that the Mobile Regional Airport will probably ask the city to annex it soon also and this will not require a vote, so Mobile's city limits may expand again soon. Altairisfar 20:17, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Update on the updates

I've done much work on the history section in an effort to make it fair and balanced, it still needs some work but I think that the basic structure is there now. Now need some other people to review it and leave some of their assessments of where the article is still weak. Thanks. Altairisfar 18:54, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Completed more major work in the history section, requesting some constructive criticism. Altairisfar (talk) 00:31, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Intro and readable prose

I've just completed more major work on the intro for the article and did some minor edits to the body to reduce the size per WP:SIZE I did an estimate of the readable prose and came up with 47 kilobytes as per Wikipedia:Article_size#References. The total size of the page is still 92 kilobytes. Most other cities seem to range from 80 to 110 in total size. Still waiting for someone to give the article a peer review/assessment. Altairisfar (talk) 06:22, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

The use of Template:Infobox Weather and a few other fixes have brought total size down to 84 kilobytes. Altairisfar (talk) 23:58, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Update: Nominated for WP:GA again

I'm nominating the article for GA assessment again, I believe that all of the old issues have been taken care of. Didn't get much feedback from the peer review or my assessment request from my fellow members of WP:ALA, but hopefully I haven't been too blinded by the work I've done on the article. Altairisfar 07:51, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

The article is currently under GA review by User:Rudget. Altairisfar 16:55, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
I will be reviewing this article tomorrow. Brace yourselves. No, I'm only joking. :) — Rudget contributions 18:54, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mobile's social problems

02-Dec-2007 - Mobile's social problems: I find it highly amusing about the emphasis on Mobile's "segregation" as a major issue. You see, Mobile has had extreme social elitism since the first French settlers stopped, on the way, at Panzacola (Florida) and fought the Spanish settlers (but left), then founded Mobile and fought (over titles & position) circa 1702, leading to today's exclusive parties of the debutante season, including the Mardi Gras mystic societies, as obvious examples of the social elitism. Now, to really complicate the issues, note that secret societies are, well, secret, so it will be difficult to get so-called "NPOV" sources to verify Mobile's highly elitist society. I'm not saying that segregation was not an issue, but perhaps, the section should be called "News Trendy Views of Mobile" rather than an attempt at some actual objective view of Mobile's 305-year history.

I'm not laughing at anyone in particular, just at the notion that "segregation" is at the core Mobile's social problems. Hence: Give me a break! OMG, There's dumb & dumber, and then there's Mobile's "segregation" problem (invented in Mobile, you see): it's not like anyone in France ever said, "The people have no bread? Let them eat cake," about non-black people. LOL!! LOL!! Bump it down the road...to SELMA!!!! Hehehe. Ever heard of Prichard? Oh, too funny! Put that one with the news reports that Hurricane Katrina went into the French Quarter and parked (without affecting anywhere else)! Those 23 fishing boats grounded in downtown Alabama towns must have been an illusion (no, Katrina was pushing them to the French Quarter, but missed and pushed their seawater 12 miles inland through Mississippi). LOL!!!!! Sorry, I just couldn't stop laughing. Oh, too funny. Anyway, there might be some way to hint at Mobile's historical social elitism to downplay the "Mobile-invented-segregation" viewpoints. Too, too funny. -Wikid77 17:14, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Sarcasm is neither helpful nor welcome. Regarding your views, please see the original research guideline and the neutral point of view policy. Also, keep in mind that this is not a forum for general discussion of the subject matter. Thanks. /Blaxthos ( t / c ) 17:32, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
To USER:Blaxthos: Please read the above paragraphs again, focusing on the discussions about the word "segregation" further above, and also, please note that this is not a forum to link "WP" links, but rather focus on the issues discussed for improving the article. Also, sarcastic multiple links to "WP" pages is neither helpful nor welcome, or did you not realize how your attitude affects your posting? If you must be sarcastic, please focus on issues and not attempt sarcastic insults to someone who has worked on over 10,000 Wikipedia articles. Thank you, in advance, for attempting a better attitude, WP:CIVIL. -Wikid77 17:56, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
An overwhelming consensus was reached during the last GA review (see above) as to inclusion of segregation in this article. All of the material in the article is referenced from reliable sources, and verifiable. Nowhere does it state that segregation was or is at the core Mobile's social problems, though one could infer that. The inclusion of this material is vital to making the article fair and balanced as roughly 50% of Mobile's population is African American. Altairisfar 23:51, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Attempted objectivity in Mardi Gras text

02-Dec-2007: After having read multiple sources about Mobile's Mardi Gras festival, I noticed peculiar terms in the article "Mobile, Alabama" refering to Carnival as the "religious" term, whereas Mobile treats Carnival/Carnivale and Mardi Gras as a city festival they alter as they wish. It began as French Catholic circa 1703, was segregated by British rule from 1763-1780, and was forced to Spanish Catholic from 1780~1812; however, Mobile added parades on New Year's Eve in the 1830s, and today, the final Monday & Tuesday have been declared school holidays, regardless of political affiliation, and the joint "International Carnival Ball" has been held each November in Mobile for 15 years, since 1993 [see: MardiGrasDigest about 1993]. Perhaps one source tries to force a view that "Mardi Gras" is the final Tuesday, but multiple other sources refer to that Tuesday as "Mardi Gras day" because "Mardi Gras" is a term for the whole festival season in Mobile. Saying a phrase like "the parade was held on Mardi Gras" is like saying "the parade was held on summer" (that's not sarcasm, it's an analogy).

Overall, I recommend consulting multiple sources, especially those posted or published around Mobile, because a particular author's book or website might try to slant terminology contrary to what many other groups in Mobile actually use. I am concerned the article is becoming a "text book" view of Mobile, and ignoring many other available sources around Mobile, within a broader view of the subject. -Wikid77 20:46, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

The article cites the Mobile Bay Convention & Visitors Bureau website, the Mobile Carnival Museum website, a national newspaper article, a Mobile Press-Register article, and the Mobile Area Mardi Gras Association website. Where are these other published sources of which you speak? You do not include them in the article Mardi Gras in Mobile, to which only today you cut/pasted the entire Carnival and Mardi Gras section of this article, of which I wrote every word using the above mentioned sources. You mention MardiGrasDigest as a source, but it's disclaimer statement reads "Mardi Gras Digest & "Carnival Lasts All Year!.....Now! So Does Your News", & " The News & Business Journal of the Carnival Industry", are registered Trademarks of Clark Companies of N.C., Inc. Many pages in the Mardi Gras Digest.com Web site feature links to other sites, of which are operated by companies unrelated to us. Mardi Gras Digest has no control over the content or availability of any linked site." Is that a reliable source? On another note that really doesn't belong on this talk page, I find it questionable, considering our past interactions on other articles (Talk:Mardi Gras in Mobile) that this bone of contention suddenly arises as this article is up for GA review. Altairisfar 21:23, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
To User:Altairisfar: Your reactions here are all over the board. I changed just 2 sentences, which you have reverted twice, without prior discussion. I did not say the remaining text was incorrect, so why shouldn't I copy some of that into the main article? I checked the sources, to verify accuracy, and adjusted several phrases into the other article, but overall it was okay. Saying the Mardi Gras text in the article "Mobile, Alabama" doesn't belong as a subject on this talk page is really reaching. Then, mentioning "this bone of contention suddenly arises as this article is up for GA review" sounds like you are trying to suppress opinions about the article under review. Please stop, stand back and be objective. There is some kind of psychological situation arising here, and the reactions are way off center. I am not the enemy here. I am trying to correct peculiar, incorrect wording in that article: everyone knows Mobile Mardi Gras starts before New Year's, with society balls, so why keep deleting that? -Wikid77 01:43, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

A psychological situation? Someone's been reading my userpage. Objective? Your arguments seem to tend toward a confirmation bias. The verbosity of your statements does not verify the facts.

Your "small" changes to this article were reverted for several reasons, in addition to the fact that your version changed the context of the heading. I sought and received a third opinion on this after your last revision from User:AuburnPilot, a fellow Wikipedia:WikiProject Alabama member. You also received an opinion regarding your statements on segregation from yet another Wikipedia:WikiProject Alabama member, User:Blaxthos, and then accused him of incivility. The subsection is about the Carnival season as defined by the refereced material. Regarding changing format styles, you should follow the style already present. Per WP:FN: converting citation styles should not be done without first gaining consensus for the change on the article's talk page. Per WP:MOS, consistency promotes professionalism, simplicity and greater cohesion in Wikipedia articles. An overriding principle is that style and formatting should be applied consistently throughout an article, unless there is a good reason to do otherwise. Regarding sources, internet and published, sources must be verifiable and reliable. Per WP:SOURCES: In general, the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks; magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; and mainstream newspapers. As a rule of thumb, the greater the degree of scrutiny involved in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the evidence and arguments of a particular work, the more reliable it is.

Other issues raised:

  • The prior weather table did not provide conversions to metric, therefore excluding a large part of the wikipedia community. It does still need to be addressed with a more compact table that autoconverts however.
  • The article is graded mid importance per the Wikipedia:WikiProject Cities guidelines.

Please see your talk page for further details as some portions of this discussion are better suited to be discussed there than on this talk page. Altairisfar 02:45, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Beyond good enough article

03-Dec-2007: The article "Mobile, Alabama" has been greatly expanded in the past few months, and I believe it now contains a very impressive range of information. It could be very close to achieving "Good-Article" (WP:GA) status. Regardless of that situation, I say congratulations (already) to all who have contributed to greatly expanding the article's content.

Now, for the future, we should focus on more civility in dealing with other editors' additions to the article. Let other people make contributions, without a cut-throat pursuit of reaching the WP:GA goal. Who cares? The article is good enough for qualifying as "good" material.

There are more troublesome issues, which I would address:

  • bizarre huge climate table: someone changed the narrow climate table into an over-wide insert that calls Template:Convert 60 times to convert rainfall inches to mm, or degrees F to C, even though the calculations were already done, hardcoded as short numbers in the prior narrow table. Anyway, the table is now 7kb (about 8% of the entire article) just to show temperatures/rain. There are weather-templates already existing which format that data in about 1kb of article text, potentially reducing article size by about 6kb, quite quickly, without having to proofread large sections of text. Also, in the future, the article might be a candidate for an even better, smaller weather-template table.
  • balancing history coverage: Ideally, the history could be summarized into planned sections representing major events, say for each 50-year period. Even though hitting some highlights will likely satisfy WP:GA, I think a representive sampling of each 50-year period (or so), outlining urban renewal, would make the article better than WP:GA.
  • wider range of photos: The clean skyline photos are very good; however, just "off-screen" to the left of the skyline is another important picture for Mobile, the extensive shipyard operation along Mobile Bay; similarly, other photos could be added from various sources to help diversify the visual range, including perhaps photos of Mobile's older abandoned areas. Security risks could be more blurred. Extra photos are not mandatory for WP:GA but could surpass that level.
  • roll-out detailed sections: I believe more could be done to shift details out to other "main" articles, so that the core of the article "Mobile, Alabama" could be made even smaller, focusing on a "Mobile-in-a-nutshell" type of article.
  • reconsider medium-importance city: Maybe along some scales, Mobile would be considered medium-importance, but that doesn't seem to make sense, when all factors are considered. I think Mobile should be reconsidered: the first full-fledged capital of French Louisiana (over 17 years), oldest city in the area, very probable inspiration for founding New Orleans, a major seaport, massive trading center, an antebellum city that wasn't burned to the ground, large population center, highest rainfall for growing crops (outside Tacoma), vital I-10 link as a bridge/tunnel into Florida, testament to social elitism, etc.

Mobile is not an isolated, fringe city, and I think the article could be better balanced in view of that position. However, again, I must commend all those who have expanded this article in the past few months: great job, in a very short time. -Wikid77 01:43, 3 December 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Weird Clouds

I doubt that this would be good to put in the article, but I just had to share it with my fellow editors around Mobile. The following link is to a page at the nat'l weather service branch in Mobile, AL, and it includes a picture of a cloud formation that appeared over Mobile, AL back in 2003. If nothing else, you just _have_ to see this. Also, someone might want to check to see if nat'l weather service photos are public domain--if so, it would make a great pic for the page. www.srh.noaa.gov/mob/121103hole_punch/holepunch-main.html — Eric Herboso 10:25, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I from Daphne here. It's a remarkable photo, NWS pics, like all federal government employee works, are public domain. However I am not sure it would really fit in the Mobile article. A little extra research and a stand alone article could be useful. - JodyB talk 13:14, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Good Article Assessment

Here is the revision of the page I assessed, but I have since made subsequent edits. Below is my assessment.

GA review (see here for criteria)
  1. It is reasonably well written.
    a (prose): b (MoS):
  2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.
    a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
  3. It is broad in its coverage.
    a (major aspects): b (focused):
  4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.
    a (fair representation): b (all significant views):
  5. It is stable.
    (no edit wars etc.)
  6. It contains images, where possible, to illustrate the topic.
    a (tagged and captioned): b lack of images (does not in itself exclude GA): c (non-free images have fair use rationales):
  7. Overall:
    a Pass/Fail:

Further analysis of my findings:

  • All images were correctly tagged, captioned and appropriate to the article in question. YesY
  • Grammar, spelling and prose was excellent.YesY
  • Everything is readable, and doesn't incorporate words that a "beginner" wouldn't understand.YesY
  • It is very good for the single-handed work of Altairisfar, and avoids POV-style content, something important for an GA nominee.YesY
  • It is factually accurate and is backed up comprehensively with verifiable and independent, reliable sources.YesY
  • The article is focused and addresses a broad range of information without going into unnecessary detail. YesY

[edit] Other Comments

I am willing to pass this article based in it's reivision cited, and the subsequent edits I have made. It's a very well written article. Next step FA. Regards, — Rudget contributions 17:38, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Population density

Its been commented a few times (outside of here) about how Mobile has a low density compared to other cities in the same population area. Perhaps we can find some cite for this, for it is an unusual feature of the city. --Donovan Ravenhull (talk) 07:22, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] column reflist

the references were soooo long I switched to a 2 column list. Fell free to change it if you like. - JodyB talk 20:36, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Recent edits

A few recent changes, partially in an effort to reduce page size:

  • Added Healthcare section, after coverting this recent addition into prose and adding sources:
There are 5 hospitals in Mobile, Alabama.

http://www.hospitalsreport.com/Alabama/hospitals/Infirmary_West.asp http://www.hospitalsreport.com/Alabama/hospitals/Mobile_Infirmary.asp http://www.hospitalsreport.com/Alabama/hospitals/Providence_Hospital.asp http://www.hospitalsreport.com/Alabama/hospitals/Springhill_Medical_Center.asp http://www.hospitalsreport.com/Alabama/hospitals/Univ_Of_South_Alabama_Medical_Center.asp

There are 15 nursing homes in Mobile, Alabama.

http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Allen_Memorial_Home.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Cogburn_Health_And_Rehabilitation_West_Inc.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Cogburn_Health_Center_Inc.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Cogburn_Nursing_Center_Midtown.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Crowne_Health_Care_Of_Mobile.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Gordon_Oaks_Convalescent_Center.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Gordon_Oaks_Convalescent_Center.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Little_Sisters_Of_The_Poor.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Lynwood_Nursing_Home.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Mercy_Medical_Snf_Mobile.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Mobile_Nursing_And_Rehabilitation_Center.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Sea_Breeze_Health_Care_Center.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Springhill_Manor_Nursing_Home.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Springhill_Senior_Residence.asp http://www.nursinghomespro.com/Alabama/nursing_homes/Twin_Oaks_Nursing_Home_Llc.asp

  • removed the table "10 largest manufacturers in Mobile", of which I was the author, as it really didn't contribute very much to understanding the economy of Mobile.
  • removed some Carnival and Mardi Gras info that is covered more extensively in the subarticles Mardi Gras in Mobile and Mystic society.

Altairisfartalk 19:08, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Additionally, I finally got around to creating the articles for Mobile's nine historic districts. Altairisfartalk 04:31, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Unlinked material above as possible spam links, a link to this site was added again today in the External links section. Altairisfartalk 16:53, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Media

I just wanted to advise the editors who are most active here that according to current Wikipedia practice, we don't do separate lists of radio stations for each individual media market — however, we do permit larger overview articles that list all media, including radio, television and print, by individual city. Accordingly, I've moved List of radio stations in Mobile to Media in Mobile, Alabama — however, as I'm not personally familiar with the market, the television and print sections on that article are currently just straight copy-and-paste from the short blurbs on television and print media in Mobile that were already present in this article. So I'd invite somebody more familiar with the Mobile media market to expand Media in Mobile, Alabama to provide more information on the television and print markets. Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 22:37, 31 May 2008 (UTC)