Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Meg White/archive1: Difference between revisions

Meg White (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

As of 14 December 2025, 18:52 (UTC), this page is active and open for discussion. An FAC coordinator will be responsible for closing the nomination.

Nominator(s): Watagwaan (talk) 18:34, 5 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about Meg White, the drummer of the White Stripes. Watagwaan (talk) 18:34, 5 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• That’s really strange, actually. It’s been on the website for quite a while too, and was even used in her DYK… I’m not sure what happened there. It was supposedly reviewed and verified in 2007 though. Watagwaan (talk) 04:57, 6 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Removed!

• The link to hall of fame in this file should be blue?

Can I be honest, I have no clue why that is.

• There are several sources without a link to verify them (e.g., 7, 21, 117), which isn’t a problem but can we add webpages or pdfs for extra verifiability?

I’ll look through and try to add links/webpages where I can!

• Clarify … she has not been active in the industry since. Some readers may not understand that “industry” is short for “music industry”, so they might benefit from an added word there.

• Clarify: White Blood Cells would have a major label re-release with V2 Records in 2002, which brought them to the forefront of the garage rock revival and made them one of the most acclaimed bands of the year.[31][7][15] It was their last album to be released with the “Sympathy for the Record Industry” A couple of issues there:
  • Consider flipping the sequence of those sentences to present facts in chronological order: WBC released under (minor) Sympathy label; that is the final album with that label; WBC re-released with a second, major label.
  • The name of that minor label is problematic for readers. The first place it is used is okay because there is a blue link Sympathy for the Record Industry; but the 2nd place is confusing: reader cannot tell it is a label, tho quote marks are used, which helps a little. Consider: (a) deleting the sentence altogether It was their last album to be released with the “Sympathy for the Record Industry”.  ; or (b) adding the word “label” Into the that sentence. or (c) move that sentence up immediately after The White Stripes rose to widespread recognition in 2001 with the release of their album White Blood Cells.. This issue is not a showstoppper for FA.

• Date last active? Info box says Years active 1997–2011, but the body text says “last public appearance was in 2009”. Can that discrepancy be clarified?

  • There is a discrepancy between her last media appearance and retirement; the former was in 2009 on Conan, and the latter was an official retirement statement announced through the band.

• Any more details? They presented themselves as siblings to an unknowing public… Seems odd that a married couple would pretend to be siblings. Do the sources have any additional insight into that? Were they trying to hide their marriage from friends and family?

  • I added another source for the siblings thing, but it is heavily explained in the White Stripes article so I didn’t want to go in-depth about that since it has to do with the band as a whole.

  To note for other reviewers, this was a whole big thing, it added to their mystique and for years there was a did they/are they thing. Ceoil (talk) 14:41, 14 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• More details? That same year, she began appearing on Late Night with Conan O’Brien as a guest host and performer. I’m not an expert in talk shows, but being a guest host seems like a huge honor. Normally, only a few guest hosts are used, and they are generally famous Hollywood persons, and are extroverted & talkative. This seems in stark contrast with her later reclusiveness. Do the sources have any details: how often was she a guest host? What did critics say of her performance in that role? When and why did her guest host duties come to an end?

  • I made a mistake about Conan, they did not host. The White Stripes were performers and they appeared in skits for the show, which is not the same as hosting. I apologize for my denseness.

• Need for quote marks? … called “minimalistic” and “primal” … She is also noted for her few interviews and her elusive media image, calling herself “very shy” and reclusive. This is in the lead, which should be very smooth & concise; probably no need for quote marks around these 1 or 2 word phrases. E.g. the word “reclusive” in that passage is not quoted and poses no problems. Quotes would be appropriate if the words were bizarre or controversial, but these are words are typical for musicians/celebrities. IF you drop the quote marks, may need to drop word “very”: compare calling herself very shy and reclusive vs calling herself shy and reclusive

  • I dropped the quote marks.

• Alt text for images: The two images at the top of the “Equipment” section are missing Alt text … The “multiple image” template supports alt text. Suggest double-check all images.

  • I added alt-text to the images.

• Wording? Furthermore, saying that she respects other drumming techniques, but concludes that her style suits the band best. It looks like that sentence is missing a couple of words. Is it trying to say She said she respects other drumming techniques, but determined that her style is best for the band.?

  • I’m not sure what happened to that sentence, thanks! I fixed it.

• Wording White was the subject of some internet memes during her activity. Doesn’t sound right. Maybe White was the subject of some internet memes during her career. or White was the subject of some internet memes. or White was the subject of some internet memes during the period she was performing.

  • I actually sorted a bit for clarity and removed that sentence entirely. I moved the “Megbot” sentences to her personal life, since it has less to do with her image and it was more of a joke.

• More on misogyny/sexism? The only refutation of sexist comments is this from Jack Jack considered her drumming “the best part of this band”, said that negative reviews and comments were sexist… If the sources support it, consider adding a sentence on others in the industry that called-out the misogyny.

  • As the article goes on, there are some more mentions about sexism and how White is a feminist icon. They are minimal, but in this context, that was a quote of Jack when he responded to negative press regarding Meg. I made it clearer that that’s what he said.

• Primary source? In 2016, the satirical site Nevada County Scooper published a hoax article claiming that White would replace Neil Peart in the Canadian rock band Rush. The cited source for that sentence is the Scooper’s own website, correct? That may run afoul of WP guidance (see WP:OR, WP:RS, WP:SYNTH, WP:UNDUE, WP:PRIMARY). That sentence could be okay if other sources (e.g. Rolling Stone, or White herself) commented on the Scooper. A website can be used as a source if the site’s statement (e.g. “White is a drummer”) were in the article to tell the readers White is a drummer. But here, the article is not telling the reader she is replacing Peart, it is telling the reader that the Scooper published a satire. So: the necessary source would be a website/musician that said “The Scooper wrote a satirical piece about White”. If such a source does not exist, the sentence should probably be removed.

• The FA policy is that the titles of all sources must use the same capitalization convention: either Title Case; or Sentence Case. This article has a mixture:
  • Sentence case Twitter rallies to defend The White Stripes’ Meg White from sexist slander”.
  • Title case: Meg White’s Drumming Chops Are the Hot Topic of the Day, and Yes, It’s 2023

The editor needs to pick one or the other and make all titles adhere to the convention.

• • The capitalization conventions I used were based on the sources themselves (like how the articles and references themselves were titled). If it’s absolutely needed, I’ll change them all.

Under this wikipedia policy you ignore the way that the sources capitalize themselves, you pick either sentence case or title case and use it throughout for all sources. I don’t remember the Wikipedia page that has this policy… I forget what it’s called. This style guideline is in MOS:TITLECAPS and WP:CITESTYLE (“Preserving the capitalization style of each individual source is not considered a consistent style.”) This was a decision made recently in this RfC in early 2025. Noleander (talk) 05:03, 11 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That would explain why I didn’t know. I’ll update them as soon as I can! Watagwaan (talk) 15:58, 11 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Done! Watagwaan (talk) 21:31, 11 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

FYI there are still a couple of source titles that are not using Title Case. Noleander (talk) 18:50, 12 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• I examined all the images at the home location in Wiki Commons, and they all appeared to have appropriate “Free to use” justification there. But I am not a image copyright expert.

• Source from youtube: The Howard Stern Show (January 17, 2024). Tré Cool Answers Who the Greatest Drummer of All Time Is. The WP policy WP:Reliable sources/Perennial sources says: “Most videos on YouTube are anonymous, self-published, and unverifiable, and should not be used as a reference. Content uploaded from a verified official account, such as that of a news organization, may be treated as originating from the uploader and therefore inheriting their level of reliability. However, many YouTube videos from unofficial accounts are copyright violations …” Some reviewers may feel that any YouTube video is unacceptable as a source, so if you can find a different/better source, that may be wise.

  • I’ll look into it, but that show was directly where Tré cited White among his favorite drummers. I’m not sure if there’s a transcript online somewhere, who knows.

• Lots of authors for a source: Weingarten, Christopher R.; Dolan, Jon; Diehl, Matt; Micallef, Ken; Ma, David; Smith, Gareth Dylan; Wang, Oliver; Heller, Jason; Runtagh, Jordan; Shteamer, Hank; Smith, Steve; Spanos, Brittany; Grow, Kory; Kemp, Rob; Harris, Keith; Gehr, Richard; Wiederhorn, Jon; Johnston, Maura; Greene, Andy Consider making that cleaner by reducing it to one author plus “et al”: Weingarten, Christopher R.; et al. with this markup: |last1=Weingarten |first1=Christopher R.| display-authors = etal | ..

• Categories: the InfoBox lists her occupations as: Musician composer actress model. I’m not sure what the rule is for including people in “Model” category or “Actress” category. Consider looking at those categories and see if they have some minimum requirement needed to be in the category.

  • From what I saw, it counted so long as they worked in the profession, even if it was minimal. I’ll add those!

• That’s all I have for now. Remind me near the end of December, I’ll make another pass. Article is looking great!! Noleander (talk) 15:42, 6 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  It is probably better to put the “fixed” or “done” comments up above, so they are each directly below the initial comment they are responding to. It is easier for everyone to see which are addressed, etc. Noleander (talk) 15:25, 10 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  My comments/replies are now in red! Hope this makes it easier! Watagwaan (talk) 17:31, 10 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Hey @Noleander, I wanted to bring to your attention that an editor came and removed a paragraph or two from the article. The exact wording was: “This whole article is loaded with insignificant bullshit, but a ‘conspiracy from a now defunct blog’ is just a bridge too far. We need to cut out the pointless clutter a lot.” They then removed the Megbot paragraph (which honestly I can understand) but removed some bits from the “Public image” section that I think was important. They came on pretty headstrong and I don’t want to start an edit war, so instead, do you think you could take a look and see if you agree? I want to clarify that I understand what they mean, it was just a bit jarring. Watagwaan (talk) 21:45, 10 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  @Watagwaan – It’s commonplace for random editors to make edits to articles while they’re being nominated for FA status … Happens all the time. When it happens to my articles I get outraged at first, but then I look at the changes and 9 times out of 10 they don’t make the article worse, and in many cases make it better. So I suggest that you take a look at the edits and if the article is the same quality or better than it was before, then do nothing. Only if the edits positively made the article worse then you should cautiously engage. If you present strong, sensible reasoning, that should prevail in the end. NB: If an article begins to have an edit war during the nomination it can cause the nomination to be suspended or even canceled. Noleander (talk) 22:32, 10 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Thank you @Noleander! I’m fine with leaving the changes, they were indeed valid. Watagwaan (talk) 22:36, 10 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Thank you so much!! I appreciate all of your continued help! Watagwaan (talk) 19:30, 12 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  @Noleander sorry to bother, but one more idea came to mind and I want your input: is it worth making a list for the songs Meg performed lead/co-lead on? Given the fact that she was more reclusive, it may be good for accessibility (like if people didn’t know where she sang). Just an idea though! Watagwaan (talk) 03:01, 13 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Suggest that you first research and see how other articles on musical groups treat the similar situation: Find a group where a less famous member of the group sings some songs and see how that’s handled in the article on the individual.

  To list the songs, you have a choice of listing the songs in words in a paragraph, or as a table … like a discography. It is always safe & valid to include a paragraph of text that says “White sang lead on the following songs: A, B, C, and D. And she sang backup/harmony on several songs, including E, F, and G”.

  Probably not wise to list songs in a table format unless that pattern is already established in other musician articles. The bottom line is: look at other articles about musicians and see what they do, and follow that pattern. Noleander (talk) 05:41, 13 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Have been following this. I largely agree with the removals last week, while I think the article is in good shape overall, some claims/factoids did fall into the trivia bucket. Anyway, glad to see this brought here and always thought she was underrated…being a fan of minimilist drumming myself. Detailed comments to follow. Ceoil (talk) 22:30, 13 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Ceoil A person of taste! Yes, beauty in minimalism is seriously something I try to follow in my life and it might explain part of my hyperfixation of the White Stripes. The other reason might be that Jack and Meg White are two of the coolest people I’ve ever seen. Regardless, thank you so much for looking over! I hope I didn’t sound rude when I questioned the removals before. I’m trying to improve articles regarding this band where I can, and I definitely make mistakes (hence the claims/factoids) so I appreciate your help! Watagwaan (talk) 00:29, 14 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• I get why you say “a retired American musician” in the lead, but I think it’s unnecessary and sounds a bit hypey. We establish later in the lead that she is publicity-shy, and was never really a musician. In the spirit of understatement, per her drumming style (which is fantastically expressive and intuitive but neither technical nor professional), would not say “retired” up front, but rather let the reader figure it out. A lot of musicians retire after being big, so it’s nothing new, and none of them slap a big “retired” banner on their Facebook. In her case, she just didn’t want to continue the band, which Jack skillfully used to create mystique. Ceoil (talk) 15:02, 14 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Want to barge in :). I think it is most debated question connected to this article. I do not object any solution, but mostly lean toward keeping ‘retired’ and placing a hidden note for people to not touch the word without discussion. My rationale: ‘Meg White is an American musician’ states that she is alive (which is true) and she produces music (which isn’t true as far as we know). So I would keep ‘retired’ in place. Additionally, there are several publications that refer to her as retired ([1] and [2]). —LastJabberwocky (Rrarr) 17:27, 14 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

But its a media play, same as them being married. And the article explains it a few sentences down. I just think it’s too pointed and knowing, and takes from the page’s credibility overall. To put it another way, in film terms, it’s “in universe”. PS LastJ, this is an interesting conversation and thanks for buting in 🙂 Ceoil (talk) 18:37, 14 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I’m for either removing “retired” or keeping it, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t leaning towards the latter as well. I value your reasoning though @Ceoil, I’m not trying to discredit that at all! If the consensus is to remove it, then we can remove it. Watagwaan (talk) 18:44, 14 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I still think “She did not write lyrics, but co-wrote the band’s music” is very clumsly said…why not just “co-wrote the band’s music”. I see you have reverted this change a few times. 18:52, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

• “She met Jack White in the 1990s and the two married in 1996″. – if we don’t know, just say “early 1990s”.

Fixed!

• “This, along with the band’s three subsequent albums released throughout the decade, established White as a key artist of the 2000s garage rock revival” is a bit tortured and explainy. The fact that she was a white stripe says enough.

In my opinion I still think this is super important to add. She was a white stripe, yes, but those albums were key elements to the garage rock revival and she was an important figure in it. (She and Jack)

• I’m not sure about “Indie rock” being in the infobox given V2 were a sub of Universal. XL were a sub of the Beggars Group, so no issues re indie there.

They signed with V2, XL and Warner, but those labels were only involved in terms of distribution. The band had their own record label (under Jack’s Third Man) and maintained creative control. There are also considered important figures in 2000s indie rock as well.