Wikipedia talk:Article titles

RFC/Move Request

There is a move request at Talk:China that could use the opinions of editors involved with Wikipedia naming issues and not invested in intra-China politics. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

minor corrections

Changed "discussion of" to "policy on" at WP:COMMONNAME, as this is not a discussion essay and wikilawyers love to pick on these things to try an "win" an argument. Changed the intro of the WP:POVTITLE's list of common reasons not use a common name to explain these are neutrality reasons, because neutrality is not the only reason not use a common name - there are others in the policy.

Both of these are hopefully non-controversial changes as they do not change the meaning, just use more precise language.--Cerejota (talk) 19:31, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

I think Neutrality is also considered; our policy on neutral titles, and what neutrality in titles is, is below. would be the same content and shorter; but since I do not intend to change policy, I put it up for discussion here instead of inserting. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:59, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Done, since there was no discussion and I don't think this changes policy. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:05, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Not so minor change

I no longer see the argument, which Blueboar repeats above, that what almost everybody uses to describe a subject is neutral; to impose "neutrality" on it is to substitute our judgment for that of the sources. Is this disputed, or is this absence collateral damage? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:05, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't get that argument either. Makes no sense to say that something is "neutral" just because it's common. But I thought you were committed to staying out of this stuff. Guess I misunderstood. Dicklyon (talk) 20:27, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

No, I am committed to staying out of the Manual of Style; this is not part of it - there was an ArbCom decision on that during the date delinking affair. I would not have responded to you unless addressed; although I do appreciate your effort at collegiality here.

As to the substance of the matter: this is really no more than your own comment: We should accept a title if it is used in "almost all" or an "overwhelming majority" of reliable sources (like your Boston Massacre example), with a little analysis of why this is compatible with WP:NPOV. Boston Massacre does not express a POV, because all points of view use it, including those who think there was no massacre (quite common) and those who think the British were blameless (not as common). Similarly, Edward the Confessor no longer expresses the view for which it was coined: that Edward was laudable for his ascetism. Everybody uses it, including anti-Christians, and those who think his practices unChristian superstition; so it does not express a point of view. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:41, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I would suggest that it's compatible with NPOV because of the existence of WP:NPOV#Naming, which creates an exception for the use of non-neutral names under certain circumstances. If that section were absent from NPOV, the standard for using non-neutral (but common) titles would have to be far stricter. I share Dicklyon's disagreement with the argument that a common title is neutral; neutrality and commonness are two different things. Jakew (talk) 20:56, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

All right, then there is disagreement. However, please note that I said (as I quoted) almost everybody; that's more than commonness. Once a name becomes practically universal, what point of view can it be expressing? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:00, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, sorry, somewhat missed your point—I agree that with a threshold of almost everybody it makes sense. Of course, we'll still have to discuss whether that threshold is met, on a case-by-case basis, probably. Dicklyon (talk) 23:12, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes neutrality and commonness are not the same, not per policy nor per the English language. Over at "CRU email controversy" I made a rather long dissertation of that that I should have made here, but you can read above further elaboration. Also, can we stop using Boston Massacre as an example in discussion (in the text for now I am okay with it)? There very specific reasons that event came to be known as such in historiography, and some of them are precisely related to the reasons Wikipedia has an WP:NPOV, one of the reasons was that the winning side of the American Revolutionary War was the USA, and in the 19th century, history was always written by the winners. In the 20th century this began to change, and the concept of a Neutral Point of View emerged - a concept that is still controversial in academia, criticized by relativists (who argue one can never have a neutral point of view so why even try to pretended one does) and absolutists (Who argue there are no sides to a question, just truth and falsehood) alike. However, modern controversies as subjected to more varied sourcing, to less groupthink, and in the case of wikipedia, the WP:NPOV policy. Lets say that "Boston Massacre" got grandfathered into existence. It doesn't mean it is a good example for the naming of new articles about current or recent events. That is unwittingly attacking NPOV by accepting the criteria for naming events that existed long before NPOV as a concept existed. This is an NPOV, collaborative free encyclopedia on the internet, not some old-timey Almanack written by partisans in a nation-creating war.--Cerejota (talk) 23:44, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

That is a bad example for such an argument; while the United States wrote more on the Revolution, many of the losers wrote about the Boston Massacre; the British had a larger, and more prolific, publishing industry. One of the books found complains that the Americans call it not the Boston Massacre, but the "bloody massacre."

I agree that it is unlikely for any name of a recent event to have the degree of unanimity we are discussing here, and still be open to question on these grounds. (The Velvet Revolution may be an example, if it still counts as recent.) But let us discuss Charlemagne: as a matter of historiography, he was originally so called because he won; but what point of view does it convey now, in the twenty-first century? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:31, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I think my point about "grandfathering" just flew over your head like a shot heard 'round the world... You might consider my point invalid yet, but I am fully cognizant of the debate contemporary and until the British and the US made kissy-kissy and became BFF. That is why it is so relevant as an example of "grandfathering". If we were naming this even today, using Wikipedia, there would have been an ArbCom case deciding that the entire American-British conflict area (Known as WP:ARBAB) is subjected to sanctions, and the article would be titled the 2011 Boston British Army incident. That is my point. You cannot use examples that didn't go through the vetting process of our consensus-based NPOV, V, and RS rules to advance a position. In fact, you can, but to do so is hilarious. In fact, we should change the examples, but I won't be too fuzzy and will live with them... just find one example in which there is current live controversy and on which both sides are present in wikipedia, in which the common name as you define exists. It took me months to get Gaza War to be named Gaza War, in spite i tbeing the RS common name for most of that war, except the first few days. We had to fight the hordes screaming Gaza Massacre and Operation Cast Lead - ultimately NPOV won, not COMMONNAME. Consensus, dear fellow editor, is whatever the current version is :).--Cerejota (talk) 06:48, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

I linked to (and was quoting) nineteenth century sources, well before any "special relationship".

Please do explain why objectivity in historiography should be considered a twentieth century development, not concerned with Leopold von Ranke. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:39, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Recently added bullet points

The name

1. Trendy slogans and monikers that seem unlikely to be remembered or connected with a particular issue years later
2. Colloquialisms where far more encyclopedic alternatives are obvious
3. Persuasive names and slogans crafted by partisans on still-active, contentious advocacy issues

The first contradicts WP:CRYSTALBALL, this is not a paper based encyclopaedia so the name can be changed when the common name changes and besides trendy slogans and monikers can stick. At what point in the future "years later" does a name stop being a trendy name?

The second one is a weasel reason, for using descriptive names when there is a common name with justification other than "I don't like it". There may be cases when WP:IAR is appropriate, but we should not be crafting this policy in such a way that people can use bullet point such as this one to wriggle out of basing the name that used in reliable sources.

The example given in the third one is confusing because it is mixed up with National varieties of English it is worded in American dialect "contentious advocacy issues" (and uses a specific American example which means little to people outside America as the names mentioned are not usually used for abortion and so a better reason for choosing another name is "Fixed-wing aircraft".

--PBS (talk) 21:00, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Would you be happier with the first if it said Trendy slogans and monikers which are not yet normally used of a subject? I think the examples intended are things like Octomom (which, although I figured out who was meant without clicking, I had not heard) and (for the third) Climategate (which is used by one side of an argument and rejected - as inaccurate - by the other). I am sorry not to provide British examples; but I do not know them and might not recognize them - which is the problem. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:17, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

On the first one if they are not yet normally used then they are not an exception to common name. I am not sure what the third one is trying to say. During the recent discussion on climategate a number of editors said it was biased but they all did that without reference to a reliable sources making such a claim, and it is evident that sources such as the Indy do use the term in their bylines even when reporting that the outcome of the independent inquiry into the affair. We frequently use "persuasive name[s]" if the press uses them, take for example the name of terrorist organisations, one of the few examples I can think of where the press did not do so was for the "Baader Meinhof gang. It was not until they were dead, that the press started to use the name Red Army Faction for those who followed the same path (even thought they were clearly not an army) -- in Britain the initials RAF were are not used for obvious reasons "RAF kidnaps a prominent business man" would have been a very confusing byline! -- PBS (talk) 04:20, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

The Independent's reporter uses climategate in lower case, and in scare quotes, both of which express some doubt it's an established term. The practice of headline writers is not the considered judgment of the paper. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:58, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Critics call it "climategate". Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:45, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I wrote byline deliberately, they are the Indy's and NYT's equivalent of an article title. Yes critics may have coined the term the word has common currency among heavyweight newspapers of the day. -- PBS (talk) 08:56, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Usage has gone beyond just critics and the press... the term has been used in scholarly writing as well. Whether it has been used enough to pass WP:COMMONNAME is a slightly different question. Blueboar (talk) 13:01, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I see that Google Scholar has expanded to include Telegraph op-eds; but much of that result is scholarship. Let's not while it's still being used in scare quotes, as in B Nerlich: " 'Climategate': Paradoxical Metaphors and Political Paralysis". Can we find a way to put that into these bullet points? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:42, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Oh it passes COMMONNAME. The question if it is worth pushing NPOV aside, something POVTITLE allows but doesn't require. These two cannot be separated, as some try to do. They are Ying and Yang...--Cerejota (talk) 06:51, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Cerejota's question is more on track, but I think we are getting sidetracked here, I was addressing the bullet points and so far no one has sprung to the defence of the first two. As to the third, we are now addressing a specific example through sources (how I think it should be addressed), in which case the bullet point is not relevant. If "Persuasive names" are adopted by neutral parties and are common coin then we should use them even if the are not neutral (see my terrorist group example). But notice that even when the initial headlines are not neutral often in cases like "9/11" neutral terms tend to come to the fore (even if it should be 9/11 to be ISO compliant!). I do not think the points bring more clarity to the section. -- PBS (talk) 08:56, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

I think the key is to remember that usage changes over time... Something can start as a trendy slogan, moniker or colloquialism and become the accepted and widely used name. Hell, the same is true even with names and slogans crafted by partisans (Boston Massacre was crafted by partisans after all). I don't think it matters how a potential title started ... what matters is the preponderance of the name/title (compared with any other potential titles) in current usage. If and when current usage changes, so should our title. Blueboar (talk) 12:25, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

PBS, as you want a defense I'll give it to you:

• Trendy slogans and monikers that seem unlikely to be remembered or connected with a particular issue years later

We could probably fix it as per WP:CRYSTAL, but this is basically an emphasis on avoiding neologism, in particular, avoiding neologism that have no reasonable expectation of enduring. THere is a difference between crystal balling and making a resonable expectation for the future. For example, we make a similar valuation at WP:NOTNEWSPAPER in order to not accept as notable any widely reported news. Sometimes, mistakes are made, and a few months down the road it has to be fixed, but usually the judgement is not mistaken. Likewise, it is possible to make a reasonable expectation of a trendy name that will not be in used down the road is not to be used. If this expectation turns out to be mistaken, nothing is lost because it is trivial to reverse.

• Colloquialisms where far more encyclopedic alternatives are obvious

I can think of several examples for this one. For example, choosing Caesium over Cesium. Sometimes, the common name in reliable sources is incorrect for an encyclopedia because it is colloquially used, while we are choosing to use some narrower authority for definition. In history, some colloquial terms have become the standard formal term. When that happens, we can change it easily. But in general colloquialisms should be avoided, even if common, because they tend to be transient historically, or even highly variable across the English speaking world. FOr example, colloquialisms like "fag" mean entirely different things across time and location.

• Persuasive names and slogans crafted by partisans on still-active, contentious advocacy issues

This is reinforcing what WP:POVTITLE tells us. The key here is "persuasive". We do not exist as an echo chamber for the latest viral snowclone a given partisan campaign has invented. Perhaps the most clear refinement of this principle is the general prohibition of using "Operation names" in MILHIST MOS: operation names are given only by one side of the conflict, for events often not named by the other side, and which are generally named for propaganda reasons. This principle does apply more generally. Furthermore, being partisan slogans, there is no way to tell if they will endure into neutrality, so its better to go neutral than go common.

I like this kind of open ended bright-line and more policies need this. I am happy with the message, but are open with stylistic changes.--Cerejota (talk) 04:11, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

The problem seems to be here that you want to emphasise these points, but they rely heavily on the discretion of editors and that with he use of this discretion discussions will be more than votes on "I don't/do like it". I see this like that of the using of diacritics, people may not be able to agree on their appropriate usage but they can agree on their usage in reliable sources. In a similar way I think that asking people to make judgements about whether something is a "Trendy slogans and monikers" is a recipe for disagreement and for people to push their own "I don't like it" agenda. Much better to go with the common name than ignore it by introducing rules that will be used by POV warriors. In the rare occasions where this is not the best path then IAR can be used. The reason this is better for this policy is because even if in the end the decision comes down to IAR, it means that the argument to use IAR will be made on top of a survey of the usage in reliable sources, rather than just "I don't like it". This bullet point will encourage people to take a stance without any analysis of usage in reliable sources. "oppose because its obviously a moniker" ... "It doesn't matter that its used in many reliable sources because its a moniker". BTW I am baffled by your example of "choosing Caesium over Cesium" because Cesium is a spelling mistake just like encyclopedia ;-)

Let me give you an example of the problem with the second one everyone in London referrers to the clock tower of the Palace of Westminster as Big Ben, "look there's Big Ben", but that expression used to mean specifically the biggest bell in the tower. Is Big Ben being used as a colloquialism for the name of the "Clock Tower, Palace of Westminster"? If this bullet point stays there will be pedants who would use it for such arguments, even though the reliable sources are split on the usage and most unreliable sources use the term to mean the tower and the bell -- it is possible (they say) to see Big Ben from the London Eye and hear it from there as well.

Point three what term do we use if we agree that Roman Catholic Church and Catholic Church are "Persuasive names and slogans crafted by partisans on still-active, contentious advocacy issue"?

--PBS (talk) 20:55, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

Point by point:

• That happens with all policies. Just because some editors want to wikilawyer their way into a perceived "victory" in a discussion is not a reason to not make policy clear and specific when needed. There is no way we can make editors conform to policy or make them understand it. We can, however, reflect consensus as best as we can. I think your argument that a lack of specificity is counter-productive is unpersuasive, and actually contradicts the experience I have had. Bright-line policies, like BLP, are violated on a minute by minute basis, yet the reversions of these violations are easy to make because they are bright-line. We need more bright-lines, not less. "Trendy slogans and monikers" might yet promote what you are saying, but that is a relatively minor problem. More importantly, and you seem not to consider this, it will (and has!) also keep meatpuppeted/SPA partisans from overwhelming good faith consensus building and using Wikipedia as a platform to promote their ideas - even if their ideas are notable, it doesn't mean we should cover them under the name they have carefully and strategically considered for their cause when other, more neutral, alternatives are available. Partisan opponents, likewise, are prevented from using derogatory trendy slogans against their opponents. Protecting neutrality is much more important to the project than keeping the "I don't like it" crowd under control. This a recognition that we are not unfeeling robots and will often not have NPOV in mind, even if we should. I have no idea how can you construe this clause as enabling "POV warriors" when it actually disarms their primary tool of choice when pushing POV, the "commonness" of their slogans to use them in article titles.
• Do a Google Scholar search for "cesium" or "caesium". Which is more commonly used? And that is in scholarly sources, the most reliable of sources. This is a case were the correct name is not the the common name. And this is not an exception, but the rule. For example, many species of organisms are given their scientific name, rather than common name, because common names are often highly variable, and even used for related but different species. Clearly, while common names are preferred, often a more obscure name helps the encyclopedia improve its coverage.
• Big Ben is an extremely bad example, and shows you are not understanding the purpose of the policy at all and not even its letter. Common names are preferred *always*, and should only not be used when there is a number of reasons, none present in Big Ben. Unless you can point me to another structure with an independent claim to name, a notable, significant controversy around that naming, that it is a colloquialism (rather than a common name), or other reasons, it is an ok common name. Either you are being facetious or you do not the meaning of colloquialism.
• Point three doesn't apply to "Roman Catholic", clearly, as that is the given name of an institution. It is, clearly, about slogans or names given to issues not institutions or group given names.

I am seeing a tendency in your questions to try an find examples that disprove policy. Don't. At best, any exception is a case-by-case valuation by those editors of WP:IAR, at worse, those articles are an un-addressed violation of policy that should be addressed by interested editors. Policy cannot be disproven by usage, usage should be according to policy - albeit usage is often why policy develops. Please concentrate on the actual principles of the policy, rather than actual implementation, which are actually unrelated. Specially when speaking about relatively recent changes to policy, for which one can expect a large number of grandfathering to happen, such discussion is not productive and can be seen as disruptive.--Cerejota (talk) 21:39, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

I have not replied promptly because your comments seem to have moved from discussing the points to discussion my actions. If I were to reply then I think it will distract from the point I made. I think it would be healthy if some others would join in the conversation. -- PBS (talk) 10:45, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Google Trends and WP:COMMONNAME

In a conversation over determining whether one title or another is the common name, I happen to think of Google Trends. The case being discussed was Calcutta vs. Kolkata. The Google Trends comparison is here:

• http://www.google.com/trends?q=Calcutta%2C+Kolkata

I think this can be a nifty way to determine common names (of course among other things, including common sense). What do others think and is it worth adding to this article (or to Wikipedia:Search engine test)? --RA (talk) 20:31, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Advice on job-title capitalisation?

There's been a move request at Talk:Chief Mechanical Engineer to downcase the title of that article, per WP:Job titles (part of the title policy), and the MoS section on the same point. The move request was notified at the UK Railways WikiProject (at variance with the generality of the article title, this article was intended to be specifically about chief mechanical engineers in British-related railway companies). At that stage, this was expressed in the one-line lead followed by a huge number of unreferenced examples of holders of such positions mostly in the 19th century. In trying to fathom the theme of the article, I failed to see that the title should have been more specific as well as downcased: the job title is used generically (still is) and the scope is restricted at the same time (not US-related, not chief mechanical engineers in power stations or on ferries or in aeronautics or factories).

Now, the railways editors really care about the notion of chief mechanical engineers—in good faith, like the wider phenomenon of corporate and professional upping of importance via capitalisation—but where will it all end? They descended on the RM and !voted en masse against downcasing.

Because I pointed out the shambles the article was in, an editor has kindly worked on it, adding references and expanding the information. But the theme is still scoped in relatively narrow terms, and in the main text it's not, for example, Joshua Smithers, Chief Mechanical Engineer, Northampton Railway Company.

I do think we need a centralised approach to this. Almost the entire category of transport occupations is in lower case, as are just about all other occupation categories. Why must this one stick out? And is it hogging the name-space of the generic article that probably should/will be created on chief mechanical engineers? (There are quite a lot of chief this and chief that articles, surprisingly.)

Your advice and comments at the RM would be appreciated—maybe I'm confused now. I'm leaving the same notice at WT:MOS. Another editor has recently come in and downcased throughout the article main text, I see, to negative reaction by at least one editor on the talk page.

Thanks. Tony (talk) 16:06, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm... tricky... If we follow the principle of consistency, we see that other job position articles like Chief executive officer and Chief financial officer use the standard format (upper case on the first word, lower case thereafter). If, on the other hand, we follow the principles of Recognizably and naturalness, we see that most of our sources capitalize all the words (using Chief Executive Officer, and Chief Financial Officer), which indicates to me that our standard format is probably wrong in this case. WP:Job titles does not help... it seems to allow for both depending on usage (and is obviously focused on how to capitalize in the body of the text, rather than in the article title). I am going to have to think about this one a bit more. Blueboar (talk) 19:39, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

There are two distinctions:

• One is between a particular job title, as when we discuss Governor Smith, the Governor of [state name here], against the general description, "the governors of the fifty states." The first should be capitalized; the second may or may not, and Wikipedia often doesn't.
• The other is between job title and function. Most organizations of more than a dozen have a chief financial officer (function); they may or may not title him Chief Financial Officer (title). Some call him Treasurer or Chancellor of the Exchequer; many call him CFO as well as whatever other title he may have. The first use is generally uncapped; the second capped.

As often, where a given text falls is partly a question of intention. Mechanical rules are not generally helpful. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:29, 7 September 2011 (UTC)