Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of currencies in North America/archive3

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was archived by Crisco 1492 05:14, 5 September 2014 [1].

List of currencies in North America[edit]

List of currencies in North America (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): Matty.007 14:16, 5 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured list because (fairly obviously) I feel this meets the requirements. Hopefully this will be third time lucky, the previous two nominations seem to follow a pattern: small issues are raised, I try and fix them, a large issue is raised, I try and fix it, then no-one else votes. I have done the things suggested in the previous FLCs (sort by currency rather than country, remove all sorts of things, and re-jig it). Now, I hope there is nothing too major needing doing. Third-time lucky? Thanks in advance, Matty.007 14:16, 5 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • First of all, I apologize for not getting back to the previous nom, things got busy. That said:
    • Guadeloupe and Martinique are not dependencies of France; they are part of it. Listing them separately would be akin to listing each U.S. state or Canadian province. Likewise, San Andres etc. is part of Colombia and should at least use the Colombian flag, if not simply say "Colombia". I'm unsure if the same applies to some or all of the Netherlands islands.
    • British Virgin Islands is missing.
    • No need to say "United States of America", few other long-form names are used.
    • The intro states that "all de facto currencies" are listed here. I know you mean this instead of de jure, but that leaves out a lot of currencies. For example, I know that Mexican pesos are accepted at some stores inside the U.S. along the border; does that make it a de facto currency of the U.S.? So my thought is this should focus purely on de jure currencies, with the major de facto ones (i.e. ones with official or semi-official support) mentioned either separately or with a healthy footnote. --Golbez (talk) 18:43, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Golbez, sorry, thought I had replied to this. Fixed first three (though US Virgin Islands is doing something odd, would you be able to fix it please?), but I don't quite understand what you suggest with the fourth point, please can you clarify? Thanks, Matty.007 15:43, 14 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Well, is it listing de facto or de jure currencies? It claims de facto; where does that diverge from de jure? And "USA" is also too informal, "United States" is quite fine, sorry I didn't clarify that before. Also, the table is now a bit weird around the USVI. And... France appears to have disappeared entirely? As well as Colombia? I didn't say remove them, they're still in North America and their currencies are still used there. --Golbez (talk) 16:23, 14 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
          • No idea regarding USVI, I'll have to try and see if I can get someone who knows their way around (Godot 13?) to help. Re-added France and Colombia. I think it is probably de jure, as you say. What are you suggesting is changed though, other than the opening statement? Thanks, Matty.007 16:49, 14 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
            • Well, is the U.S. dollar de facto or de jure a currency of Panama? Or Ecuador? If the list states itself to be a list of de jure currencies, but it's not a currency by law in those countries but is widely spread enough to be considered a national currency, they should have a note explaining why they're on this list. --Golbez (talk) 21:47, 14 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
              • Ah, think I get you. Changed to de jure. Are there any currencies such as that, widely circulated but not the official currency? Thanks, Matty.007 10:52, 15 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Resolved comments from Bloom6132 (talk) 18:12, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Initial comments –
  • Image should have ALT text per MOS
  • It's preferable if there can be a separate column for the references, since they look rather cluttered within the table.
  • US dollar needs an extra rowspan in order to encompass US Virgin Islands.
  • Scope row needed for all entries under the "Present currency" column per WP:DTT.

—Bloom6132 (talk) 21:38, 16 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

    • Bloom6132: done all. (I also made some comments on your GAN.) Thanks, Matty.007 09:18, 17 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry I forgot to mention this, but in order to remove the bold effect that comes along with scope row, the "class=" parameter at the top needs to read "sortable wikitable plainrowheaders". —[[User:|Bloom6132]] (talk) 09:33, 17 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

More comments –

  • A commonly used North American currency is the United States dollar. – this sounds kinda "random" to stick it in as the opening sentence of a paragraph. Do you have a source verifying it as the most commonly used NA currency?
    • No. Anyway, specifying it as the most commonly used currency would mean determining whether to use population using it, amount in circulation, or some other rationale. I could probably find a reference for either, but I think the first sentence encompasses both. Thanks, Matty.007 15:01, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • But by increasing the United States dollar's value, its position as a reserve currency damages United States exporters. – replace with "However, its position as a reserve currency damages American exporters [or exporters from the United States] because this increases the value of the United States dollar."
  • The last paragraph is a bit disorganized. The second sentence (The East Caribbean dollar is pegged to the United States dollar, and has been for over 35 years since 1976) should have the comma deleted between "years" and "since"; it should also be followed immediately by "…, having previously been pegged to the pound sterling." (no capitalization on the "p" of pound).
  • By adding the above phrase, you can delete the sentence Before the East Caribbean dollar was pegged to the United States dollar, it was pegged to the Pound sterling
  • The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank was formed in 1983. – How is this relevant to NA currency? This appears to have just been randomly stuck in.

—Bloom6132 (talk) 14:40, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I wonder how many of those people have been to/seen an actual exchange office recently. Nergaal (talk) 13:12, 21 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I also commented on this last FLN but they were not added. I really think they should include the 3 letter ISO codes, not just for exchange offices, but it's on plane tickets, train tickets, stock markets, etc. Quite useful to have. Mattximus (talk) 18:42, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
As I have explained, Crisco 1492, Godot13, and Dudley Miles gave consensus to remove them. If they have changed their minds, I will add them but until then I cannot see the point of adding something which seems 50/50. Thanks, Matty.007 18:48, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lead needs quite a bit of work.
  • A commonly used North American currency is the United States dollar". What are you trying to say here. What do you mean by commonly. Is it the most? The currency with the highest circulating value?
  • As I explained to Bloom further up this page, it is a common currency. I can narrow it down if you want, but there are several options (by amount of currency, by number of people using it) which it could be narrowed down to, and I think that disambiguating to that level is a step too far. Thanks, Matty.007 19:10, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • But why does this sentence even exist? It adds nothing without some qualifier. A nice opening sentence for that paragraph would say something like the US$ is the most used currency by number of people and amount in circulation (with a ref). As is, it serves no function.
  • "It is the world's reserve currency." There are several reserve currencies, not just the US$. The US dollar is currently the one with the largest foreign exchange reserves which should be made clear.
  • You have a mess of passive sentences. For example " In international commodity markets, the United States dollar is also standard." Should read "The United States dollar is also standard in international commodity markets". But you should probably qualify what standard means.
  • Attempted fix. Thanks, Matty.007 19:10, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Many more tweaks are needed. Please be careful of passive sentences one after the other. It makes for a tough read.
  • I changed a little, but there may be more instances. Thanks for the help, Matty.007 19:10, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Here is another passive sentence that should be made active: "By the number of countries in North America sharing a currency, the East Caribbean dollar is most used."
  • Please strive for one idea per sentence. This extremely long sentence needs to be broken up, it's unreadable:

In the phenomenon known as 'dollarization', the U.S. dollar has been adopted as the official currency of several other countries;[6] but semi-dollarization also exists in a few other countries where the U.S. dollar is recognised as legal tender alongside another currency, and unofficial dollarization exists in many areas where the U.S. dollar is widely used and accepted-although it is not recognised as legal tender. Mattximus (talk) 18:50, 26 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Changed both. Thanks, Matty.007 12:36, 27 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have the feeling the lead needs a thorough copyedit. It's quite poorly written. Paragraph 2 should start off with something like "The United States dollar is the currency with the highest value circulation in North America", then talk about how it is a reserve currency. Then talk about how is is used outside of USA borders. That would be a logical paragraph. Words like "However" and "a commonly used" are not useful and should be removed. The third paragraph is mostly about the East Caribbean Dollar, but then switches to talking about countries with 2 currencies, then back to the american dollar which was the subject of the 2nd paragraph. Needs some work. Oppose until a copyedit is done to the lead. The table itself however is looking much better. Mattximus (talk) 15:11, 30 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • You may want to consider defining (in the first or second paragraph) exactly how many countries and/or dependencies exist in North America (with a few good references).
  • Both “A commonly used North American currency is the United States dollar” and “The East Caribbean dollar is the most used currency by the number of countries in North America utilising it.” are somewhat ambiguous sentences because there are no concrete anchor points (which would be possible if North American inclusion was defined with a finite number).
  • It may read better if you could make statements like “10 of 40 North American countries and dependencies (25%) use the U.S. Dollar” or something along those lines. Same thing for the East Caribbean dollar.
  • Also, if ISO codes will help garner support, you might want to use them... - Godot13 (talk) 06:05, 9 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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