Talk:Burnham-on-Sea

Population

Why was it shown as 21k? What does the 'whole of the built up area' mean?

Using Ward boundaries i used the following lower Super Output Areas to find a pupulation of 13k in dataset :

• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 005D
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 004C
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 004D
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 005A
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 004B
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 004A
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 002E
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 004E
• Super Output Area Lower Layer Sedgemoor 002D

Census 2001 reports 13k.

Anyone disagree? Bjrobinson 10:52, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Tree frog

Congratulations to User:195.194.86.1 for spotting that the official animal of Burnham is not the tree frog and removing the fact and accompanying citation. This "fact" has been in Wikipedia for a very long time, introduced as a joke, and the addition of a true fact, properly cited that nearby Brent Knoll was call the Isle of Frog, lent the spurious claim some credibility. The tree frog incident is a prefect illustration, if one is needed, that there is an awful lot of crap in Wikipedia and that you should not take all you read here as fact. Of course, the very last thing I'm ever going to confess is involvement in this incident ;-) --TimTay (talk) 12:23, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

b.t.w. what really makes me laugh about this is the effect that it has had on downstream consumers of Wikipedia content. A great example is the commercially run Information Britain website which offers paid-for advertising for holiday properties etc. in the town. Its write-up on Burnham includes the tree frog and Isle of Frogs information. Classic! --TimTay (talk) 12:40, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

The text on tree frogs appears to have been added on 16th Feb 2007 by User:217.35.94.43 with this diff with the additional sentence about Brent Knoll being added by User:Cheesy mike on 24 May 2007 with this diff. It shows something that several editors (including me) have since edited the article & not spotted it. It is obviously bad of the anon editor to add the spurious "fact", but it could be seen as worse for a registered editor to knowingly compound the error rather than deleting or changing the fact they know to be false. "Downstream consumers" and their users can worry about themselves, but this sort of "joke" doesn't enhance the reputation of wikipedia.— Rod ^talk 14:18, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Good point Rod. I suspect Cheesy Mike is now a little ashamed of his actions. --TimTay (talk) 14:39, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps if Cheesy Mike were still an active contributor he should edit this article to at least GA level - in case the incident gets media coverage.— Rod ^talk 15:01, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

burnham-on-sea.com fails WP:ELNO

burnham-on-sea.com is a site about Burnham that contains some useful information, but it fails on WP:ELNO on the first criteria. It is also, in my opinion, listed to get advertising click-links for the person who hosts the site. If it is an official site for the town then it wouldn't need large amounts of banner advertising. It doesn't belong on wikipedia, it is spam. Discuss. --Simple Bob (talk) 21:36, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

This comment doesn't seem to have produced much response but, as we try to move this towards GA standard, I think it should be explored. There are now at least 10 citations to burnham-on-sea.com in the article & I used it in the recent articles on the lighthouses. It does provide useful information & I have not seen any challenges on the grounds of accuracy. If it is the "best" or only source of certain information about the town does that mean it can not be used because of the amount of advertising. WP:ELNO does include the caveat "Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject,..." I'm not sure how "official" is defined in this context. burnham-on-sea.com appears to be the work of Mark Newman but I can't see anything more official eg from the council etc. except Burnham on Sea & Highbridge Town Council which doesn't provide as much information. The who we are page makes a virtue of the fact that the creators are local residents "100% independent of political groups, local newspaper companies and also county, district and town councils". I would welcome further comment/debate before we think about nominating this for GA & a reviewer challenging the reliability of the site.— Rod ^talk 11:29, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

What else is needed to get this article to GA?

I've been editing this article to try to bring it closer to the guidelines at WP:UKCITIES and would be interested in what other editors think is need to get it to meet the Wikipedia:Good article criteria? Obviously we need to revise the lead to summarise the article & reference (or remove) the uncited claims, but is there anything else which would be required?— Rod ^talk 08:15, 3 May 2010 (UTC)