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GA Review

[edit]
Passed. —Kusma (talk) 22:51, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Nominator: Cartoon network freak (talk · contribs) 15:27, 18 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewer: Kusma (talk · contribs) 17:21, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]


Content and prose review

[edit]

I will comment on anything I notice, but not all of my comments will be strictly related to the GA criteria, so not everything needs to be actioned. Feel free to push back if you think I am asking too much, and please tell me when I am wrong.

I remember this song well, originally from when it was #1 on the German charts through most of the summer of 2004 and then I was reminded by last year's OneRepublic version.

  • Lead: perhaps a bit too long and detailed, will comment on that after reading the rest of the article.
I think it summarizes the key aspects of the article well (however, I am open to trimming suggestions). The key aspect are:
  • General info about the song's release, producers and writers
  • Composition and lyrical content
  • Critical reception and important accolades
  • Commercial performance, including sleeper hit status in most of Europe and status as one of the best-selling singles of all time
  • Haiducii's cover that played a huge role in the song's exposure to international audiences (including info on how it competed with the original in various territories)
  • The song's rise to virality after its use on the Japanese internet and its use by Gary Brolsma
  • The song's music video and live performances
  • The song's use in some popular remakes and movies
  • What does "it was also interpolated" mean?
The term "interpolated" is linked to and means that not a portion of the original DDT recording is used directly in a song (which would be called sampling), but rather only its melody is used. "Live Your Life" contains a sample of the original recording as the song starts, but when Rihanna sings different lyrics over the original's melody throughout the rest of the song, this is called an interpolation. So in this case, "Live Your Life" both samples and interpolates DDT, while "I Don't Wanna Wait" only interpolates it.
Ok, I learned something.
  • Background and writing: compared to the length of the rest of the text, we learn very little about O-Zone here. "O-Zone was a Moldovan Eurodance group founded in 1998. In 2002, the band, which consisted of Dan Bălan, Radu Sîrbu, and Arsenie Todiraș, moved to Romania where they found success with ... and the number one hit ... ")
Added the suggested information with additional sources to support the claims. I have corrected the establishment year to 1999, both here and in the O-Zone article, because it was a false claim. Plus rewrote to "is a band" since they are still active.
I linked O-Zone, but kept the links for "written" and "composed". The background behind this is that these are two things that are often confused. "Written" related to writing the words only, while "composed" means writing the song's melodies and music. I can remove however, if you wish to.
If clarification is needed for what "written" and "composed" mean, I would prefer to clarify in the article, but I won't argue this.
Removed the links altogether.
  • Romanian-language links: Per H:FOREIGNLINK, best practice is to link these via {{ill}}, for example {{ill|Bogdan Popoiag|ro}} to produce Bogdan Popoiag [ro]. This is the best of both worlds as it shows both that we don't have an article in English and tells people how to find the article in Romanian. (And once someone creates Bogdan Popoiag the Romanian link will disappear and the template will soon be removed by a bot). This comes up several times in the article.
Fixed this on any instance I could find.
Think you got them all (I use CSS to underline interwiki links so they stand out more and didn't see one at a glance)
  • "Composition and lyrics" section should logically come before "Release and marketing". I think "Background" should focus on O-Zone; you could consider moving the "writing" bit into the "Composition and lyrics" section.
I wasn't able to find this in the Manual of Style, but a thread I see across multiple music articles is to have the "Release" section after "Background" and before "Composition", such as the Featured Articles "Alejandro" and "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)". Also, these articles are also an example of this, the info on the writing and producing is typically part of the "Background" section, whereas "Compostion" only focuses on how the song's composition is described by the press and critics.
Ok, the other way felt better to me, but I am happy to accept that this also follows a logic.

More later! —Kusma (talk) 21:38, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  • Release and marketing: not too thrilled by the image of someone not connected to O-Zone as first photograph in the article. Before I looked at the caption, I was sure this must be Balan (who else would you feature first?).
Included a picture of Balan in the "Background and writing" section. Side note, I have wanted to use this only image of O-Zone throughout the article, however I am not able to since the photo is copyrighted and usage is only allowed on the O-Zone page.
Good. Sad we don't have a free image, but we can't use a copyrighted image of living people except in truly extraordinary circumstances.
  • The release date would be nice to know, or date of first radio airtime. From the source I can tell that some people had heard the song by 27 July 2003, not that the song was officially released (as stated in the infobox) or where. But this might be difficult? Other language editions have all kinds of release dates, rowiki claims both 2002 and 1 August 2003, dewiki has 10 August 2003, itwiki has 10 May 2003... All unsourced, what a mess! I will look at more sourcing later, but MusicBrainz has a collection of remixes from 3 June 2003 ...
  • its copyright was legally registered in the region a month later. the first source from 27 July and the second source says "in August", which could be less than a week later.
Reworded to read "in August 2003".
  • "advertized" should be "advertised", no matter which variant of English you use.
Fixed
  • "Ma Ya Hi" was a solo venture for Balan you just said Prata was involved, so it was not solo?? Do you mean that the other O-Zone members did not contribute?
The latter is the case. Reworded it to be more concise. Let me know if this sounds better.
Yes.
  • Composition and lyrics: section is generally overlinked. a tempo of 130 beats per minute is particularly bad, since "beats per minute" redirects to "tempo".
Unlinked a couple of things, including "beats per minute". Let me know if you have any other suggestions.
Better now. I tend to err on the side of underlinking, so we can meet in the middle.
  • The book cited is edited by Thede Kahl, but the bit mentioning "Dragostea dintâi" is an article by Marina Cap-Bun.
Fixed
Now it looks as if Cap-Bun wrote the book. {{cite encyclopedia}} is probably what you need here (despite the name, it is the current standard for multi-author books), with Kahl as editor and Cap-Bun as author and including the title ("Muzica romaneasca in Portofoliul Muzical European" or something like that).
I believe it is fixed now, but please take a look.
  • It is a bit of a tease to tell us it is a hipster neighbourhood, but not what it is.
I only included it because I have seen some talk online that the song could reference the Tei neighbourhood in Bucharest. However, the source doesn't say it is this neighbourhood specifically. Should I remove the information althogether?
Personally I would drop it, but you can keep it in if you like.
Removed.

More later! —Kusma (talk) 22:21, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  • Critical reception and accolades: the BBC quote is a bit long given that it is a general observation about summer hits. Do you have other sources classifying Ddt as a summer hit?
    Just ctrl-F for "summer" gives me enough so I don't need you to do anything here. Not striking so you see :) —Kusma (talk) 20:15, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I ended up removing the BBC quote and only keeping its description as leaping language barriers. You were right in the initial comment, the bit about summer hits is a general observation, not necessarily tied to Ddt.
  • Unlink "music critics" and especially light music, it is about something else.
Fixed
  • Lippitz of Der Spiegel is the only journalist mentioned without his first name (Ulf).
You usually don't mention a journalist's first name again after the first mention (which in this case was in "Composition and lyrics")
Sorry, I overlooked that one.
  • Commercial performance: do we know anything about performance in Moldova?
Sadly not. Moldova didn't have an official chart back then or any kind of measurements.
  • Again, it would be better to use {{ill}} for links to other Wikipedias (there are more that I haven't flagged up individually)
Fixed
  • As of April 2004, "Dragostea din tei" has sold over 250,000 copies in Romania better "By April 2004, Ddt had sold over 250,000 copies"; stating in 2024 that your newest data are from 2004 and changing the tense breaks the flow a bit.
Fixed
  • In the former, it was certified double platinum not totally clear what "the former" is; seems to refer to "Germany and Switzerland".
Reworded to be clarer that it is about Germany
  • the Unu' in the Dub Mix this hasn't been mentioned before; what is it?
It is a remix of the song. Adjusted to be more concise.

  • Austria,[82] Europe,[83] France,[84] Germany,[85] Netherlands and Switzerland Alphabetically sorting "Europe" as equivalent to "Austria" and "France" looks odd to me.
Fixed to mention the name of the chart (European Hot 100 Singles).
This is fine now but the lead still has "Austria, Wallonia, Denmark, Europe, France, Germany" which looks odd.
I removed Europe from the lead. I think it is enough for the lead to mention the countries only.

  • Continued success in the United States and Japan in 2005: As of that month, it has sold over 35,000 digital downloads in the region should be "it had sold", especially if "certified gold" meant 500k sales (do you know what it meant at the time?). BTW do you link to List of music recording certifications anywhere? It is needed to make sense of silver/gold/platinum certifications.
Fixed and linked the first use of "certified".
  • ressources should be "resources" unless it is a notable typo in the source
Fixed. The source had it right.
  • Virality: Do you know where the Japanese version was uploaded to?
  • Music video: Thede Kahl see above.
Fixed
  • gay anthem is there any evidence other than Balan's word for this?
I couldn't find anything more upon research :(

  • Live performances: I assume this is quite incomplete, focusing mostly on TV appearances. Or did O-Zone never play any concerts? Generally, I think some of this is excessive detail.
(For this point, also see "Alejandro" and "Single Ladies" as examples) "Live performances" should only feature performances on prominent TV shows or performances that are either part of a tour or that are special because of something else (e.g. because they were played at a renowed venue), so no one-off concerts at small venues. This is all I could find for "Dragostea din tei" (I couldn't find any specific tour that they performed). You can suggest which ones you think are excessive detail and can be removed.
"Single ladies" is more than a decade old, and I doubt the primary sourcing used for the performances would pass FA these days. Alejandro is a lot better and has far more critical commentary in the corresponding section. I would drop the Hessentag (not really a major music festival), keep Wetten dass (major TV show), perhaps keep TOTP (merge with NL version), keep Star Academy and just merge everything else into "performed in further TV shows in Germany, the Netherlands, Russia and Spain". —Kusma (talk)
Better now (good enough for GA at least). —Kusma (talk) 20:15, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I solved this a little differently, only keeping the performances on shows that have a Wiki article and seem notable. Is this okay?

  • what does fellow programmes mean?
Reworded to read "shows"
  • Haiducii release: serviced as Haiducii's debut single is there a more suitable verb than "service"?
This verb is generally used when talking the release of a song. I didn't use "released" because it's already used in the following sentences. If you have any other suggestion, please let me know.
  • Commercial performance: blocked by the original do you mean "just behind the original"?
Yes. Reworded to read that.
  • Similarly, held back by O-Zone's original how did one song act against another song?
Reworded.
  • Promotion: Haiducii's site why not just "room"?
Chose this because "room" is so overused in this section. I can use "room" again, though, or another suggestion if you have one.
As everything else is "room", using a different word here (that is not a full synonym) just confuses me. —Kusma (talk)
Fixed

Done
Oops, I meant you should write "On VIVA and RTL" so both are TV stations instead of one show and one TV station. It reads a bit strange, like the one below. —Kusma (talk) 20:15, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I ended up removing all but the shows that seem notable and have a Wikipedia article. Is this better?
  • La Chanson de l'année and France 2 again, "she appeared on show A and on channel B". Again, this seems a bit overly detailed.
See comment above.

  • Dispute over legality and impact on the original version: According to Balan, they had relied on an Italian law which they alleged allowed the release of covers, however he concluded that such a law did not exist and would not apply to Haiducii, a Romanian citizen, as well as not to "Dragostea din tei", which had been recorded in Romania first. this sentence is exceedingly long and complicated, untangle and split
Done
  • Multiple observers argue tense, I think "argued" flows better with the following which is all in past tense.
Done
  • Other usage: why is the Crazy Frog bit here? what is its connection to Haiducii?
The Crazy Frog version uses Haiducii's cover, not the O-Zone original (which makes sense since her version was more popular in Sweden).

More later! —Kusma (talk) 20:36, 18 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  • BTW re Haiducii's Ddt in Taiwan: Are these the cartoon characters? The video is full of "misheard lyrics" in Chinese, for example Ma-ya-hu 嘜呀虎 Ma-ya-hou 嘜呀猴 illustrated by a tiger 虎 and a monkey 猴. (But without a secondary source this is certainly WP:OR).
Yes, these seem to be it. The song's cover art for the Taiwanese release features one of these cartoon characters. I unfortunately can't find any more information on this topic (maybe you can give it a try given the fact you know some Chinese?). Otherwise, do you think we could include this video in the article somehow (maybe as an external link)?
I couldn't find anything reliable, just the website [1]. Looking at zhwiki, the only other thing I have to offer is a recent commercial [2] for Ant Bank in Cantonese. No objections to videos as external links unless they are copyvios.

  • I am not fully convinced by the sectioning decision that shows the charts/sales for the Haiducii version before those of the original. I have looked at a few other GAs for songs with cover versions, and usually charts/sales lists for the original come before those for the cover versions. Take On Me and All Along the Watchtower are examples; in the second one, the cover version certainly deserves to be discussed at an equal level.
The solution I find making the most sense is to just include all the info on the Haiducii version after the release history of the original version. Do you agree on this?
I think that would work. —Kusma (talk) 20:23, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed
  • Use in popular media: this section mixes cover versions, translations and partial adaptations. It would be nice if the list could actually state what the connection of each of these works to Ddt is. For example, for "Unsichtbar" and "Wenn der Hafer sticht" and "Liàn'ài fēng" it is not obvious (and not well sourced) that there is a connection at all.
My way of thinking was this: I differentiated between note-to-note-covers (retaining the core structure of the original, but maybe alter the lyrics; green) and original songs that only incorporate a sample or a melody from the original (blue). This distinction, however, was done by listening to the songs, and I am not sure if this is original research. The connection to Ddt with the entries in the table is that they have Dan Balan credited as a songwriter (one exception would be "Người Tình Mai-Ya-Hee", which doesn't show credits, however I thought the song being a cover would be obvious also due to the title). What are your thoughts on all of this? How do you think I can make this section better?
The Dan Balan credit makes sense, and listening to the song makes it pretty obvious that there is a Ddt connection. I am not convinced by the difference between green and blue, but this is a minor issue so I can ignore it. —Kusma (talk) 22:49, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • (I see now that this information is colour-coded and at the bottom. Using only colour to convey information is not MOS:ACCESSIBLE, see MOS:COLOR.
This could be easily fixed by adding a dagger (out of two types) next to the title of each entry in the table.
That would be better, but not even needed for GA I think. —Kusma (talk) 22:49, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Bài Ca Mi Ya Hee: are you sure this has a title in Chinese characters?
You are right, I removed it

First pass done! An impressive article, but there are a few issues and a LOT of primary sources, so it is not clear to me yet how much of it should be classified as original research. —Kusma (talk) 10:25, 19 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

See comments above.

Source spotchecks

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Numbering from Special:PermanentLink/1269611223.

Fixed on all instances
  • Random numbers 13 28 66 69 79 107 110 118 127 171 189 191 204 250 266 292 312. Already checked some of the text while doing prose review, did not find any problems with WP:CLOP or source to text fidelity unless noted above.
  • 13: Could not access. Do not use italic for Japanese per MOS:NOITALIC.
This ref uses "cite AV media notes". The parameter "title" automatically makes the title italic. Do you know any workaround to avoiding this?
Yes, use |script-title=, see my edit to the article. —Kusma (talk) 20:23, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • 28: Could not access.
It is very common to cite CD liner notes. All releases cited in this article can be found on Discogs (same for the DiscO-Zone album) and where only used if the respective Discogs entry included photos of the actual CD and packaging that prove the claims made. (The April 2003 recording date claim, for example, is backed up by the album booklet).
  • 66a: ok
  • 69: broken link? might need archiving
Hmm. It works for me, maybe it was a temporary issue
  • 79a: ok
  • 107: verifies the claim, but is a primary source
I would argue that primary sources like this one are okay for GA. I sadly don't have any other source for these performances since there are no articles written about it :( What are your thoughts on this?
  • 110: another primary source for a claim not backed up by secondary sources
No longer needed. Removed
  • 118: and another. Removed
No longer needed
  • 127: could not access
See the comment on #28
  • 171: primary source, used to describe content in fairly obvious way, probably could even go without citation per WP:PLOTREF.
Removed this for both the orginal and Haiducii music video
  • 189: could not access
See the comment on #28
  • 191: fine
  • 204: ok
  • 250: could not access
See the comment on #28
  • 266: no information on connection to Ddt.
See comments on "Use in popular media". The connection to Ddt would be that Dan Balan is credited as a songwriter on "Kumimies" (the credits can be retrieved by clicking on the dots next to the song).
  • 292: could not access
See the comment on #28
  • 312: ok

Spot checks verdict: can't access the liner notes, so don't know what's there. The 'List of notable works that use "Dragostea din tei"' doesn't seem very reliably sourced, rest looks OK.

General comments and GA criteria

[edit]
  • Some prose issues, see above.
  • Sectioning and section ordering could be improved (or at least we should discuss it).
  • A bit overlinked, see above.
  • Lead seems OK at first glance, but I should have another pass through at the end.
  • References are decently formatted even if they throw up a few CS1 maintenance messages.
  • Sources are either reliable or primary.
  • Overall, there is a lot of reliance on primary sources. The appearances on TV and the uses in other songs and media appear to be WP:SYNTH original research with little secondary sources backing up these sections.
  • No copyvio concerns.
  • Broadness: I think there is too little background on O-Zone and the composer.
  • Focus: The sections on "Live performances" and "Use in popular media" mention far more details than covered by secondary sources. The track lists and charts also seem slightly excessive, but I am not an expert on music articles so I won't comment on that further.
  • Neutrality: I think the article does an OK job covering the controversies without taking sides.
  • Stability: No signs of edit warring. Most text contributed by nominator.
  • Images: licensing is OK at first glance
  • Relevance of images: There are many images of people with only little relevance to the song and no photographs of the actual O-Zone performers, which is a bit odd.

Overall an impressive article with huge numbers of citations especially in the data sections, but perhaps a bit too much original research to be considered an exemplary Wikipedia article in this day and age. I will put this on hold. Happy to discuss any of my points. —Kusma (talk) 11:42, 19 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Kusma: Hey there Kusma, thank you very much for your review. Please know that I will likely need a little more than 7 days to complete responding to your comments. Hope that is okay with you. Greets; Cartoon network freak (talk) 12:15, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That is totally fine, I am aware that I am suggesting more than just minor changes, so responding can take a while. Take your time, we're not here to meet some deadline but to write the best articles we can. —Kusma (talk) 12:36, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kusma: Again, just a little update that I'm still onto this even though I'm very busy in real life :( In the meantime, could you maybe strike everything that you think is solved? Greets; Cartoon network freak (talk) 14:10, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Will do! —Kusma (talk) 15:25, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kusma: I have now answered to all comments, except to the ones in "General comments and GA criteria" since I believe they cover issues already covered in the preceeding sections of your review. Happy to solve what's left to solve. Greets; Cartoon network freak (talk) 10:42, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think it is good enough now, but you won't pass FA without far more secondary sources for all of the cover versions. —Kusma (talk) 22:50, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Good Article review progress box
Criteria: 1a. prose () 1b. MoS () 2a. ref layout () 2b. cites WP:RS () 2c. no WP:OR () 2d. no WP:CV ()
3a. broadness () 3b. focus () 4. neutral () 5. stable () 6a. free or tagged images () 6b. pics relevant ()
Note: this represents where the article stands relative to the Good Article criteria. Criteria marked are unassessed
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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