Talk:Washington Initiative 1029

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Move?[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: not moved. There appears to be no consensus for the proposed moves. Malcolmxl5 (talk) 20:57, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

– Undo massive unquestioned technical request moves. (formatting request, not proposing or opposing) Apteva (talk) 03:08, 11 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Washington Initiative 1029 → Washington Initiative 1029 (2008) –

Please add

These were changed shortly before the election as well, but I had not yet moved them back in keeping with previous convention. Rorybowman (talk) 22:59, 9 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • This is a copy of a message to me on my user talk page (Anthony Appleyard (talk) 13:33, 9 December 2012 (UTC)) "Massive Article Moves of Washington Ballot Measures w/o Mention on Talk Pages":-[reply]
    • I was surprised to see that you had recently performed several moves of articles about Washington ballot measures without having noticed any discussion of those moves on the pages for the articles, but rather at the more obscure WP:RM. I would ask that you please revert those until the matters can be discussed on the various individual pages because I believe that all of these moves violate WP:AT in that they break consistency with other ballot measures across Wikipedia.
      Although I see what you are trying to do, I am strongly in favor of including parenthetic years for all US ballot measure articles as a matter of consistency, whether a state re-uses numbers or not. The basic title format of State + Type + Number + (Parenthetical year) provides maximal information very concisely: California Proposition 13 (1978), Oregon Ballot Measure 9 (1992), Washington Referendum 71 (2009), Washington Initiative 502 (2011), and Colorado Amendment 64 (2012). Redirects such as Proposition 13 can easily be established for famous items or from year-to-year, with those easily converted do disambiguation pages as needed should similar titles be WP:Notable. The State + Type + Number + (Parenthetical year) format is well established for many states, if not most, and this seems to me the simplest, soundest, most comprehensive and least ambiguous solution. This article, with its previous parenthetical year number, was consistent with long-established practice across all of Wikipedia. The permanent article should include the year number, with redirects such as Initiative 502 created or changed as necessary.
      If you could please undo these moves and open discussion of any future moves up on the page of the article in question, I would much appreciate it and the opportunity to discuss this on an article by article basis. On that basis I believe the key principle of consistency across articles as set at WP:AT is key. Rorybowman (talk) 07:15, 9 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have just looked through all these pages' talk pages and found no discussion about presence or absence of the bracketed dates in the page names. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 13:40, 9 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you again, Anthony, for the conscientious and rapid way you are moving to make these consistent with previous conventions visible at Category:Initiatives_in_the_United_States. I shall go back through previous Washington initiatives to see if I can help make *all* of those consistent with the "parenthetical year" naming convention so this is clearer in the future. I think that minor category note or change in a few places would also help this effort. I'll aspire to check other states as well, and to figure out the best place to make that convention obvious. The wide number of jurisdictions and inconsistency (even within a single jurisdiction) about re-using or not re-using designators is a further point of confusion which I hope this shall help to address. Thanks again! Rorybowman (talk) 22:48, 9 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose We disambiguate when necessary; in the absence of conflicting topics, prefer the more concise titles. --BDD (talk) 17:32, 10 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support These are mostly restorations of previous (undiscussed) moves and I would respectfully note that the issue here is not WP:DAB but WP:NAMINGCRITERIA. The five key WP:NAMINGCRITERIA are identified as (1) Recognizability, (2) Naturalness, (3) Precision, (4) Conciseness and (5) Consistency. Given naming conventions for other US ballot measures across Wikipedia, inclusion of the year is most consistent, and simple redirects solve the issue of naturalness quite easily. Although these articles relate to current events for a time, they are historical in perpetuity, and a view toward that is more encyclopedic. The inclusion of year numbers also makes the evolution of a given issue across state history much simpler to see in "see also" lists and the like around issues with multiple ballot measures, both within and across states. Over the long-term, the more complete and precise title is ultimately more concise, such as with Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution. Rorybowman (talk) 18:16, 10 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per WP:PRECISION, WP:DAB and WP:NAMINGCRITERIA - the version without the year is more recognisable, natural, precise and concise. The consistency characteristic there does not mean we have to add disambiguators just because WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS (i.e. we don't add "(film)" to every film article just for consistency's sake). Disambiguation should only be used when there is more than one topic that the title could refer to. 82.132.248.219 (talk) 20:21, 10 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support moves — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.3.129.202 (talk) 03:41, 11 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. When there's nothing to disambiguate from, adding parenthetical disambiguation by rote is absurd - and does a great disservice to readers, who are very unlikely to type in such an unwieldy string. bobrayner (talk) 10:56, 12 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
And that is what WP:REDIRECTs are for, BobRayner. Under that logic one should remove state designations from all articles as well. Given the wide number of redirects for ballot measures all across Wikipedia, nothing is saved by making the fundamental title shorter. 1st amendment (not capitalization) is a redirect to First Amendment to the United States Constitution, which also references a WP:DAB page. At issue here is what the fundamental *base* article name should be for long-term and definitive purposes, not whether there should be helpful WP:DAB or WP:REDIRECT pages.
The project-wide standard in recent years has been Jurisdiction + Measure Type + Designator + (Parenthetic Year) for a reason, and this move brings these (previously-moved) articles back in compliance with that more encyclopedic standard. Rorybowman (talk) 15:37, 12 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If your "project-wide standard" diverges from reality, you have my sympathy; but reality takes precedence over wikiproject rules which the average reader neither knows nor benefits from. Independent sources generally call it "Washington Initiative 1029"; whilst "Washington Initiative 1029 (2008)" is just used by ballotpedia and mirrors. If you wish to continue filling an arbitrary framework of standardised names, then feel free to create redirects from the bracketed titles (not to them); I'd consider that a pointless exercise, as the redirects should have practically zero traffic, but any wikiproject rule which is idiotic enough to insist on making up bracketed titles may also be idiotic enough to insist on linking to those bracketed titles from other pages... bobrayner (talk) 15:52, 12 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
As one works with a given issue across jurisdictions and time, within "see also" lists, etcetera, the value of parenthetical year numbers is much clearer. This is why I believe the parenthetical year was first introduced and why I (and other editors across many more articles apparently) find it more "encyclopedic." WP:BOLD is admirable, but this is a fairly specialized subject area, analogous to WP:REDIRECTs from common terms such as THC to Tetrahydrocannabinol. Rorybowman (talk) 16:26, 12 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Meh. If consistency is desired, why not just have these articles follow our existing policy consistently like the vast majority of other articles.
Do you have a link to this "project-wide standard"? Is it documented somewhere? bobrayner (talk) 01:17, 15 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The move template above notes that the most relevant issue to be considered is WP:NAMINGCRITERIA, not WP:DAB. A close and WP:CIVIL examination of this posted move discussion clearly notes that this action would reverse an early WP:BOLD move that was made without consideration. Restoration of the year would put most of these articles back where they were a month ago. Lastly, this discussion has encouraged a new discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(government_and_legislation) which will (hopefully) help to establish that standard, not for the view of WP:DAB obsessives, but more in keeping with naming conventions for other government and legislation articles. Some jurisdictions re-use numbers and some do not, which is presumably why year names have been added more recently. There have been dozens of Oregon Measure 1's, for example. A proposed standard is currently being discussed at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(government_and_legislation). Rorybowman (talk) 04:07, 15 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The larger issue of naming convention seems to me important enough to be addressed more broadly, so I have invited discussion at WikiProject Elections and Referenda which may be of interest. Rorybowman (talk) 16:20, 12 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There is a broader discussion of this taking place at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(government_and_legislation), within the wider context of general naming conventions, for those who are interested. Any proposed changes there are likely to supersede this discussion, so I'd encourage folks to look at that, specifically the proposal For initiatives, use the format "Demonym type initiative, date."' Rorybowman (talk) 15:13, 14 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose, as totally unnecessary. I fail to see on what grounds we need to add the year to the article title. Amongst other things, it would make it more difficult to find these. -- Ohconfucius ping / poke 04:46, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No one is adding the year to anything: the year was there previously (and fairly consistently for all western states) until someone made several undiscussed and unilateral moves, without consideration of WP:CHEAP and WP:DABCHEAP. Ballot measure initiative titles with parenthetical years are common for the past few years across all western states, with eastern states preferring to use a comma between the measure identifier and four-digit year, as discussed at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(government_and_legislation). Rorybowman (talk) 15:45, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
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