Talk:Telek R'Mor

Nomination
Telek R'Mor: an article I made a modest effort in making what it is today. --Gvsualan 01:08, 13 Feb 2005 (GMT)
 * Support pending. I don't know if guest characters should or can be featured at all. Nervertheless, it's a good article. --BlueMars 17:41, 13 Feb 2005 (GMT)
 * Strong support. Anything can be an FA, provided it is of good enough quality. Consider the discussion when I nominated USS Equinox, my own similar "guest character" article. -- Michael Warren | Talk 20:13, 13 Feb 2005 (GMT)
 * Supported. It has everything a featured article needs. Ottens 16:29, 15 Feb 2005 (GMT)
 * Support. Lots of info on a relatively minor character, which makes it all the more worthy of featured status. -- SmokeDetector47 00:53, 16 Feb 2005 (GMT)
 * Supported Tyrant 19:19, 21 Feb 2005 (GMT)Tyrant
 * Supported. An example of a page which should be a featured article at time of writing, as the nomination was made eleven days ago! --Defiant | Talk 01:33, 24 Feb 2005 (GMT)

Removal
For the simple reason that, although it is a well written article, the majority of the information comes from one episode and therefore it little more than an episode summary that omits the parts not relevant to the character. When you compare this with other featured articles of the same type, I don't believe this stands up. Also, where are the nomination comments? I can't see any archive on the talk page. -- TrekFan Open a channel 06:39, February 2, 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment - I found the nomination; it was validly nominated. Then I had to fight Wikia's spam filter cos it thinks a single character in an old comment is spam (uh, what?). But anyway, now it's there.–Cleanse ( talk 07:25, February 2, 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose - There is no size limit for featured articles. Anything written well and in an interesting manner that fully covers the subject as well as it can be within canon is an example of MA's best work, regardless of the number of episodes or films that subject was in. - 07:34, February 2, 2011 (UTC)

Comment: I'm not disputing that it isn't well written. Just that it may not represent the best of the MA community's work when put up against similarly themed featured articles, such as Boothby which is also a relatively short article. I have seen a few articles that are based on one source that, when put up for nomination, have been opposed with the reasoning being "It's well written and informative but reads like an episode summary", which I believe this one does. -- TrekFan Open a channel 07:46, February 2, 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose: quite well written, IMO, and from R'Mor's perspective to a surprising degree, which is also good. --Defiant 10:32, February 2, 2011 (UTC)


 * I support removal, though mostly for different reasons than those that have been stated so far: According to the comments now available on the talk page, this article has been made a "Featured Article" in early 2005. It's now 2011. In these six years, the definition of what constitutes our "best work" surely will have changed. What's more, the article itself has changed considerably (see this diff), if not completely - so, whatever is on the page now is absolutely not what has been voted for and accepted as "good work" at the time. -- Cid Highwind 11:05, February 2, 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose removal, for the reasons given. I'm not really seeing a specific reason as to why it should be removed- "doesn't stand up" to other featured articles needs something specific to support that assertion.  If the changes made since FA status was granted have made the article worse, then specific examples should be cited- we invite users to contribute to featured articles and the mere fact that an FA was changed should only be relevant if it is alleged the article is worse.--31dot 11:58, February 2, 2011 (UTC)


 * This very page states that "having been changed" is a valid reason for suggesting FA removal - and this article has not only "been changed" here or there, there isn't much left of the article that originally went through this whole process. This is like getting a business plan for a steak house approved, but building a vegan grocery store later. ;) I wouldn't mind it that much if the FA template actually made clear that a specific "past version" was considered to be a good article - I'm going to clarify that on the template. -- Cid Highwind 12:37, February 2, 2011 (UTC)
 * That is a very good and helpful template change, but I still feel in this case that the status should remain.--31dot 12:56, February 2, 2011 (UTC)

While the new template is great I would, just for the record, like to say that I still believe that this article doesn't hold up when you put it up against Ayala, Damar, Michael Eddington and Elim Garak to name but a few. Notice these articles all achieved FA status at roughly the same time as Telek R'Mor. Perhaps if we could have tier levels to the FAs? For example those articles that are short but nicely written and perhaps are not deserving of complete FA status could be categorised as "Good article" or such? I just fail to see how an article, the majority of which is sourced from one episode, can be anything more than a summary of that particular episode. -- TrekFan Open a channel 13:02, February 14, 2011 (UTC)
 * Under that logic, episodes couldn't be FA articles, since they are only dealing with information from one episode. - 13:12, February 14, 2011 (UTC)

Not really. What I meant was in-world character/item/technology etc articles with only one source wouldn't be very detailed. Yet the episode articles themselves are an entirely different type of article, dealing with everything in that article; the summary, impoartant events, character progression, quotes, background information. Not to mention they are written from a real world POV. The judging for an in-universe article is different than a real world POV article because they are written completely differently to one another. -- TrekFan Open a channel 13:18, February 14, 2011 (UTC)
 * Yet the wiki's in-universe POV has the importance of in-universe articles placed well above the episode ones. In fact, episodes and films are the bottom of the importance pile as far as naming goes, so why would we want an article from our primary focus to be considered less than one from the secondary? - 13:31, February 14, 2011 (UTC)

I'm not saying it's considered less - just different. How can you judge an in-universe article the same way you judge, say, an episode article? When looking at an in-universe article (in my opinion, of course), you would look at the way it reads as an encyclopaedia, make sure it is complete in that all references are in there along with any relevant background info. Whereas, on an episode article, it's more about making sure the summary is entertaining yet informative and is not going to bore the reader, ensuring there are sufficient images that compliment the text, memorable quotes that are short but actually memorable, background information that talks about the production of an episode etc. You have to look at them differently because they are two separate types of article. I'm not saying either one is worth less than the other. I simply meant that short yet informative articles that people agree are very good and well written yet aren't perhaps as good as an FA, be given a different title that still points them out to the readers as being on their way to an FA but not there due to reason x, y and z. However, bringing it back to the article in question, this is what I believe Telek R'Mor should fall under. As much as I want to, I simply cannot see it standing up to the aforementioned articles (above) which were nominated at roughly the same time as this one. I don't believe that the community would make, for example, Rachel Garrett or Melora Pazlar featured articles due to the fact all their information comes from one episode. I just know that some of the reasons will be "reads like an episode summary" or "too little information". However, I feel I have made my point now and if everyone wishes to keep this as a featured article then, in the spirit of democracy, so be it. -- TrekFan Open a channel 15:02, February 14, 2011 (UTC)


 * Hippocrates Noah. One episode.  Not an episode summary.  That's all. -- sulfur 15:15, February 14, 2011 (UTC)

I guess I am simply the new "Logan 5". I agree with his points in the FA nomination process of that article, particularly when he says "To me this one falls in the mirky area between clearly non-FA worthy characters like Grathon Tolar/Ethan Novakovich and ones like R'Mor. There's a little more back linking with this character, so thats a point in its favor, but even though its "complete" there's no real information here outside of action summary" Furthermore, "there really isn't anything in this character article that can't be gotten from reading an episode summary or hearing a description of such". However, like I have said before and like Logan said in that nomination, "By my count this article probably should be an FA because it seems to have overwhelming support from the community. I registered my objection and I'm satisfied to let it end there if the community still believes it deserves to be an FA". It's just a shame that Memory Alpha doesn't have much an actual "community" beyond the same old admins. -- TrekFan Open a channel 15:42, February 14, 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, whose fault would that be? Not me. - 17:51, February 14, 2011 (UTC)

You misunderstand. My comment was genuine. It is a shame that there is not more of an active community on Memory Alpha. While it is unreasonable to think that it would become as popular as Wikipedia, more activity would be great. I by no means directed that comment toward you Archduk3. Anyway, this conversation seems to have gone off topic slightly so I am going to refrain from commenting further to give others a chance to read my point of view. If it is decided that the article remains an FA, then so be it. I just wanted to bring it up here regardless. -- TrekFan Open a channel 18:38, February 14, 2011 (UTC)


 * Archived. - 17:32, February 21, 2011 (UTC)

Was this successful or not? It should probably be clearly indicated somewhere in this archive what the outcome was... --OuroborosCobra talk 22:50, February 21, 2011 (UTC)
 * It was unsuccessful, with only two supports and three opposed. I have now added that to the header.–Cleanse ( talk 04:58, February 22, 2011 (UTC)

Reconfirmation
Another good article to start with would be Telek R'Mor, which was made an FA in Feb 2005 and whose FA removal discussion in Feb 2011 eventually lead to this page. Removal was suggested because the article was based on only one episode, there is no size or episode requirement, and that it had changed in the intervening 6 years. It survived removal with 3 opposed to the two supporting, and I think it still remains one of the best articles we have. - 01:26, December 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Support, as indicated above. - 01:40, December 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Support reconfirmation. Under Background information, I added a couple of quotes from the actor about the role, courtesy of . I think that rounds the article out a bit.–Cleanse ( talk 01:43, December 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Support.--31dot 02:30, December 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Just passing through and saw this... thought I'd still support it as I was pretty instrumental in transforming it into something out of nothing. --Alan 03:05, December 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Support.--Sennim 05:58, December 2, 2011 (UTC)
 * Support. Tom 17:13, December 2, 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: Please provide a link to the current main page summary (if it exists) - according to new FA policy, that one should be written during the nomination period, so it should exist for a renomination. Conditional oppose if that summary does not exist, or doesn't match the current article. -- Cid Highwind 21:46, December 4, 2011 (UTC)

See Template:FA/Telek R'Mor. - 22:57, December 4, 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose : There seems to have been an error in copyediting. In the paragraph starting with "R'Mor communicated with the Romulan Senate," a possible "temporal implication" is mentioned although the fact that both ships are 20 years apart is mentioned only several paragraphs later - basically, the whole first half of that paragraph seems to be out of place. On the other hand, if the "temporal implication" refers to something else, that aspect needs to be clarified. Also, on a more general note, big parts of the "history" section are not, in fact, about the character, but are about events somehow involving the character. I admit that it is hard to make out an exact boundary between "acceptable" and "too much", but I think this article crosses that boundary. Another copyedit attempt should be made to trim the article content to be a little more focussed - and at the same time lose the micro-paragraphs of only 1-2 sentences. -- Cid Highwind 13:03, December 9, 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: I agree with the point about removing the miniscule paragraphs. Some more clarification should be made. The bg info section currently states, "Dr. R'Mor was the first contact Voyager had with the Alpha Quadrant since becoming stranded in the Delta Quadrant." Is this established on-screen, in which case it can be moved to the in-universe portion of the article, or is it just the first time in the series run that we see contact being made between Voyager and the Alpha Quadrant? If the latter, I think some clarification should be made, regarding this. --Defiant 13:34, December 9, 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment: I agree with Cid's points 1 (I totally overlooked the discrepancy-Janeway's nixing the proposal comes IIRC after the discovery of the time difference in act 4 of the episode) and 3 (micro-paragraphs). As for the overdoing the history bit, I do not see it that way, but this might be a matter of personal taste. For now I let my "support" stand pursuant the handling points 1 and 3--Sennim 13:52, December 9, 2011 (UTC)

I've made changes to solve some of the problems mentioned, though I'm unsure how the article could be trimmed, since I had to include information to solve the other problems. - 15:11, December 9, 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment: And you did them well, so as far as I am concerned my "support" stands--Sennim 15:32, December 9, 2011 (UTC)
 * Kudos for sorting out the "micro-paragraphs" issue, though I personally still think the article could use some more clarification – this time, pertaining to which episode(s) the info comes from. Is R'Mor even mentioned at all in the later cited episodes, or does he just appear in ? I suspect most of the info in the article as a whole pertains to that single aforementioned episode, though a newbie might have little idea or no clue at all. IMO, some more clarification could easily be made with the use of citations, which I tried to do earlier, though it was reverted. --Defiant 17:08, December 9, 2011 (UTC)

In paragraph citations have been on the decline for awhile now, with them being moved to the end of the paragraph in most cases. If you want, you can re-add the citation where the info from "Eye of the Needle" only ends, as I don't really have a personal preference either way, though some others might. I do think that over using proper nouns where a pronoun works just fine is making the article "sound" cumbersome and repetitive though. - 17:19, December 9, 2011 (UTC)
 * Is that last sentence in reference to the citations issue, or concerning a different matter? --Defiant 18:36, December 9, 2011 (UTC)

Your last edit changed several pronouns to R'Mor, which I think was already borderline overused in the article. This was an episode where he didn't give his name until the very end, but we seem to be stating who he is formally more than I think is necessary. If we do need to use a proper noun in every instance, we should use his first name a few times to avoid constantly repeating ourselves. - 18:46, December 9, 2011 (UTC)
 * I accept you may have a point there, Archduk; I wasn't really conscious of it. I recall that I changed the first "he" to R'Mor because it seemed quite an abrupt transition to go from talking about the Talvath to "he". I don't think we want people asking, "Who's 'he'?" in the middle of a paragraph, where it's used so jarringly. There may have been other cases like that - I can't really remember, right now. I'll have another look soon and I agree that possibly using "Telek" seems like a good idea, if needed. --Defiant 18:55, December 9, 2011 (UTC)
 * I've now tried to sort out those issues. Just out of curiosity, is there any possibility of a quote at the top of the page? --Defiant 19:26, December 9, 2011 (UTC)

That's much better, thanks. As for a quote, I guess the question would be what do you have in mind? - 19:44, December 9, 2011 (UTC)
 * I've double-checked the episode but there doesn't seem to be anything immediately noteworthy. I'd support this article. --Defiant 01:49, December 10, 2011 (UTC)

Having gone over this again, I don't see what Cid is suggesting can be removed. All of it is either about the character or is needed for context. I think the last round of edits focused the article better by adding more info, not less, and I'm not sure what could be removed and have this still be complete. - 17:58, December 10, 2011 (UTC)


 * It's hard to point to some specific paragraph and state "that one needs to go away", because it's more an excessive level of detail scattered across the whole article than a single paragraph that is off-topic. For example, it's not necessary for context to know that "four separate scans of the probe, each one on a progressively narrower band" have been made - nor does it tell us much about the character Telek R'Mor. It's not necessary to know that the initial transmission was "comprised of a series of sub-harmonic pulses", or that someone thought about "reconfiguring the protocols of his signal amplifier [...] to penetrate the radiation stream", either. Basically, the whole technobabble aspect of the episode is not important as characterization other than, perhaps, in a very condensed form to let the reader know that R'Mor knew what he was doing. Everything else should be placed on one or another technology article, and perhaps the episode summarization in addition to that. -- Cid Highwind 20:24, December 10, 2011 (UTC)

Well, I suggest you make the changes you think need to be made, and we'll see how that that works out. :) - 23:48, December 10, 2011 (UTC)

With the changes made, are you still opposing this Cid? - 23:56, December 12, 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry, just wanted to see how my changes are received, first. I'm no longer opposing the article - although, just as a comment, I see two things that might need to be checked. First, some sentences seem to be overly long - I was sometimes lost in constructions with too many commas and hyphens. ;) Second, do we accept "littlereview.com" as a proper source in the background section? Haven't checked that in detail, but the pages look a little "cheap" to me. -- Cid Highwind 10:14, December 13, 2011 (UTC)


 * Regarding the "littlereview.com" note – I'm wondering if it's actually notable. Wouldn't getting measurements be standard procedure for most people playing aliens on Star Trek? And isn't that process more relevant to Vaughn Armstrong than to Telek R'Mor? –Cleanse ( talk 10:25, December 13, 2011 (UTC)


 * You're right, that should be standard procedure and really isn't that notable. We should probably move or remove it, unless something of interest happened while taking those measurements. There's a second reference to "littlereview" at the end of the section, though, where the actor talks about the character. That bit is on-topic if the source is considered valid. -- Cid Highwind 10:30, December 13, 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I didn't see the second "littlereview" note. I think that bit should stay. There really hasn't been any established criteria/policy here for what is and isn't a valid source. I'd be happy to discuss a policy having criteria for deciding which sources are and aren't acceptable if you want to start a forum (I do have a few ideas for some general guidelines).


 * Here, I think its okay. Many articles use similar webpages. According to the parent page, "Many of these interviews originally appeared at AnotherUniverse.com and Fandom.com; the remainder are housed at The Trek Nation". This suggests its just an archive of other sources. While there may be some inaccuracies in the transcription, I think its unlikely the interview was entirely made up.–Cleanse ( talk 10:56, December 13, 2011 (UTC)


 * I doubt having one's head measured would be common practice for minimal makeup (such as Bajoran or Skagaran), so I think it should stay. However, I'd opt for it being on the Romulan page than this one. It means that the usual TNG-ENT makeup was so extensive that it required measurement. Also, in my experience, littlereview.com was first on the Martha Hackett article as an external link, I then used parts of that interview for the articles about and . That was quite a while ago, and the info hasn't been removed in the interim. I support Cleanse's opinion that littlereview.com should be counted as a valid source. --Defiant 11:45, December 13, 2011 (UTC)

I would tend to agree that this info is more relevant to the species' makeup than just this character, and it should be moved there if we're keeping it. - 12:09, December 13, 2011 (UTC)
 * Done. --Defiant 20:00, December 13, 2011 (UTC)

I've updated the blurb text to reflect the changes to the article when I was removing the other links in it. Just a FYI. - 23:02, December 24, 2011 (UTC)

Romulans and Voyager
There is a reference in one of the Pathfinder episodes to 'the Romulans always had an intest in Voyager' something like that, I took it to mean his msg did get passed along, just not as planned. Tyrant 02:49, 26 Jan 2005 (CET)Tyrant

Got it, it's from, when Barclay was telling his commander about possible governments that would want to interfere with the Pathfinder Project, he mentioned the Romulans. And he says the Romulans have been interested in Voyager for years. Tyrant 16:04, 26 Jan 2005 (CET)Tyrant


 * That is, by far, purely speculation. --Gvsualan 23:43, 26 Jan 2005 (CET)

And it was noted as such. "Telek R'Mor may have sparked Romulan interest in Voyager, on Inside Man, Barclay says the Romulans have been interested in Voyager for years." I am not the first trek fan to notice that tidbit and I think it most definitly deserved that small note. Tyrant 23:55, 26 Jan 2005 (CET)Tyrant

I just think it's a cute reference to this episode for the fans. Nothing else went on with Romulans between (besides ) and there's not really any other good reason the Romulan govenment would be interested in one ship of a class, that wasn't even around to be interested in. Tyrant 00:07, 28 Jan 2005 (CET)Tyrant


 * The thing is -- it isn't a reference at all to this episode or character: zero evidence exists. Voyager had already been lost for "years" at that point. Barclay's comment could be attributed to any one of a dozen things: from his paranoid tendencies, to him grasping at straws (which is what he was doing at the time) or just plain good intelligence on the part of the Tal Shiar. After all, the Romulans certainly seemed to have their 'A-game' on when they learned about and were able to capture the Prometheus. Keeping that in mind, finding intelligence on and having interest in 'some ship lost in the Delta Quadrant' would be small potatoes compared to capturing the most advanced starship in the Federation, much less any indication that they had off-set fore-knowledge of the situation. The Romulans are in the business of good intelligence. Secondly, the Ferengi seemed to be fully aware of Voyager as well, and there was no contact made with them prior to that that would have given them the knowledge they had. So, the reality of the situation is that it was fairly common knowledge. Whichever the case, there is far too much speculation to support any theories when there is no direct references tying the two links together. If Barclay had said, "They have been interested in Voyager for years, ever since they sent us that data transmission from the crew they received 20 years ago,? or "Our intelligence is aware of Romulan contact with Voyager," then you may be able to make the speculation that that data was received by the Romulans from R'Mor. Bottom line, it's not necessary to mention something that has no direct relevance to the issue. --Gvsualan 00:45, 28 Jan 2005 (CET)

Haha, well played. I retract my argument, hope I didn't get you too hot. Tyrant 00:53, 28 Jan 2005 (CET)Tyrant


 * I know it's a bit late and after-the-fact to state this, but the above post by Gvsualan was slightly untrue - I just wanted to clear that up for future readers who may not be entirely experienced with MA. The bit where his post goes a bit wrong is right at the start; he states that Barclay's comment about the Romulans having had a long-held interest in Voyager is not a reference to Telek R'Mor and . In reality, it is unsure whether the comment was a reference to the earlier episode and wishing for it not to be so does not discard the fact that the writer of "Inside Man", Robert Doherty, may have meant it as an injoke. --Defiant 12:27, July 7, 2010 (UTC)

More speculation

 * By 2353, R'Mor had returned to Romulus, and would see his daughter, who was now two-years old, for the first time.

There is absolutely no evidence of this in the episode. It's pure speculation. 24.168.150.118 20:14, 5 August 2006


 * Yes, it was supposed to happen, but it is not cerain that is actually did. 90.231.197.44 19:07, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * That, however, does not change the fact that it is speculation and non-canon.--31dot 00:13, 16 August 2008 (UTC)