Wikipedia talk:Article titles

“ Few indeed are illustrious enough to claim such privileges as these. Those who alter names, often for the worse, according to arbitrary rules of their own, or in order to aim at consequence which they cannot otherwise attain, are best treated with silent neglect. ” — James Edward Smith, An introduction to physiological
and systematical botany, p.385.

Self-identifying names controversy

This discussion is being started following comments in the "Unagreed change" section above:

In the policy section "Common names", Pmanderson recently altered the longstanding agreed sentence beginning "When there is no common English name..." (use the name the entity calls itself), to "When a subject is too rarely mentioned in English to have a common English name..." He listed this in the edit summary as a "clarification."

I attempted to restore the original wording, since this was not a clarification but an unagreed change to the policy. Official, and self-identifying names have always had a significant role in naming choices on Wikipedia. And PMAs new wording does not reflect actual Wikipedia practice. However my edit was reversed.

When the former page "Wikipedia:Naming conflict", (which dealt in detail with self-identifying names), was merged into this one, the principle that was settled on was that self-identifying names can be used as a factor to help decide what name is chosen when there is no clear "common" name for an entity. There was NOTHING about "only when the entity is rarely mentioned in English."

Since what is proposed is indeed a new change to the policy wording agreed, and which was put in place at the merger, then solid proof of broad community support for such a change is required. I would ask what reason there is for such a change, what proof there is of the practice of wikipedia editors reflecting this change, and what proof there is that this change does not in fact run directly against the practice of wikipedia editors, and against the direction of other guidance? Also we need to discover what sort of wording on self-identifying names will satisfy the needs of all contributors. Xandar 23:43, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Can you please provide an example (or several) of subjects that

1. are commonly discussed in English-language sources
2. do not have a common English name and
3. have a single name by which the group normally self-identifies

so I can figure out how your preferred system works in practice? I'm having trouble understanding how criteria #1 is happening without #2 happening. Are the sources in #1 discussing "those nameless people" or something like that? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:23, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not interested in re-discussing this for the gazillionth time. For the record: I endorse Pmanderson's change; I'm not convinced it has the import Xandar claims for it; and even if it does I still support it, because I think Xandar's position on self-identifying names is horribly misguided, which is about what you would expect from a position extrapolated from a single cherished article title. Hesperian 02:23, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I too endorse PMA's wording... whether you want to call it a change, a clarification, or something else.

In fact, I would go further... I would change the second part of the sentence as well... my suggested change in bold):

• "When a subject is too rarely mentioned in English sources to have a common English name, it is acceptable to use the most common non-English name that is mentioned in reliable non-English sources."

In other words... we should always follow the reliable sources, but we give preference to English sources over non-English language sources where possible (since this is the English version of Wikipedia). Blueboar (talk) 03:20, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

An interesting idea. I think it might exacerbate some of our existing problems in places like Silesia or the South Tyrol, where the fundamental debate is "which foreign language do we use?" The present wording, and Blueboar's emendation, answer some of that with "whichever English sources follow", but we are too close now to "are there more German or Polish books on-line?". Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:57, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

In the case of Silesia or South Tyrol, there are numerous English language sources that can be used. So there would be no need to ask whether there are more German or Polish sources on line. The issue of "German vs Polish" is moot... we use English. Blueboar (talk) 16:50, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

He didn't mean "Silesia" or "South Tyrol" themselves, but the various (relatively obscure) places in them and people in their histories, for which there is often no significant body of English sources.--Kotniski (talk) 16:59, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I know... but even relatively obscure places will appear in English language sources... atlases, guidebooks, road maps, tourist pamphlets etc.

OK... I suppose there could be some tiny three house hamlet that is so small and insigificant it does not appear in any English source... on the other hand, it is unlikely that such a place will appear in a non-english language source either. Blueboar (talk) 17:26, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

So what exactly is your proposal for, if you don't think such cases ever arise?--Kotniski (talk) 17:32, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

For other situations, where there might not be any English sources we can use, and thus no name that is commonly used by English sources. Blueboar (talk) 15:51, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Returning to the previous ambiguous wording is not the way do this. If you want to clarify or change the use of self-identifying names please propose something that will do that.--SaskatchewanSenator (talk) 20:27, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't care how much hesperian doesn't want to discuss this unagreed change, or how much Blueboar personally wishes to change the wording. The simple fact is that we amalgamated the pages on the proviso of an agreed compromise wording. PMA has changed that wording unilaterally to one that would virtually eliminate the usage of self-identifying names. HE and those. like Hesperian, who support him, are therefore the ones who have reopened this controversy, not me. If Hesperian doesn't want to discuss changes made to policy his solution is simple. Leave the page.

On the substantive issue. It is clear that self-identifying names ARE used across Wikipedia in terms well outside those which PMAnderson wishes to limit them to. In other words, the introduced new wording does NOT reflect Wikipedia practice, but seems to have been introduced to back the POV of certain regulars on this page. Numerous examples of the usage of self-identifying names have been presented in the previous debates on this issue. If it is wished, we can re-introduce them here.

In answer to SaskatchewanSenator, I did not write the previous compromise wording, and am not married to it. What is needed is wording that states the principle which was earlier established in discussion that Self-idintifying names are a valid naming principle where there is no clear and accurate "common name". Xandar 01:47, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Xandar, I understand that you thought a balanced deal had been cut, and that you say your agreement to this deal was based on certain key features being handled in an acceptable (to you) fashion, and that these key features no longer exist.

However, there are no binding deals on Wikipedia. None. Even if there were incontrovertible evidence of the deal, the existence of a prior consensus is completely irrelevant. If there's no agreement to include self-identification now, in this way and on this page, then it doesn't matter what agreements were or weren't made yesterday.

So you can start from the top and tell me what practical difference this change makes, or you can give up in dismay, but please stop claiming that consensus isn't allowed to change. If you want me to understand the 'substantive issue' that you're claiming, please name a couple of specific, concrete, extant articles whose names 'should' change as a result of this change to the advice. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:07, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Xandar, kindly do not mischaractise my comments. I did not say that I do not want to discuss this. I said that "I'm not interested in re-discussing this for the gazillionth time."

On the substantive issue, it does not suffice to show that "self-identifying names ARE used across Wikipedia"; it must be shown that self-identifying names are used because they are self-identifying, despite other guidance suggesting that some other title ought to be used. And the examples given must be largely uncontroversial; i.e. sufficiently consensual that we can take guidance from it here. This has been going on for months now, and despite many requests, still no-one has given a single example where there is consensus to use a self-identifying name because it is self-identifying, instead of the name that would have been chosen under the present wording. Without examples, you're just blowing hot air. Hesperian 02:10, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

What do you mean by "no clear and accurate common name"?--SaskatchewanSenator (talk) 02:58, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

examples

User:What, the reason I think that self-identifying article names should take precedence over common names is because I think entities have the right to call themselves whatever they choose. The current wording juxtaposes what is common versus what is self-identified. What is the benefit of the common name? I see no benefit that is superior to an entity being able to name itself. Why create a conflict when none should exist.

What is being proposed are situations where the common, i.e. the majority, is allowed to determine what an entity shall be called and the entity's desires be damned.

There is no logic behind the "use the common name" brigade except, "I like it that way".

Let's look at two examples that demonstrate why the old wording focusing on self-identification is preferred and one where the current wording creates silliness:

1. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the chosen name of this organization; however, Mormon Church is by far the more common name.
2. Burma, this is one of the stupidities that exists BECAUSE of this illogical rule. Editors argue that Burma is the common name, but the common name by all sources is Myanmar. More importantly, Myanmar is the name the nation has chosen for itself for over twenty years. The only reason the title Burma exists is because editors have ignored facts and used this silly reasoning presented here.

Yes, I know my language is unhelpful, but I really detest this type of stupidity. It is one of the weaknesses of Wikipedia. What is valid and important is that self-identified names are superior to what is "common". The common is too easily misinterpreted and misapplied. The purpose of Wikipedia is to inform and teach factual, accurate information. We succeed when when you self-identified names. --^StormRider 03:39, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Note that those who say "There is no logic behind the 'use the common name' brigade except, 'I like it that way'" can themselves offer no reason for self-identifying names other than 'I like it that way'.

... unless the statement "entities have the right to call themselves whatever they choose" is meant to be read as "entities have the right to force everyone else to call them whatever they choose". If that is meant, then it is merely a restatement of a position, not an argument in support of it.

As an uncontroversial test case that Storm Rider and Xandar have no vested interest in, I ask them which is a better article title, Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of several Ships, being the name chosen for that book by its author; or Gulliver's Travels, being the name foisted on it by the majority?

Hesperian 03:56, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Storm Rider. I really appreciate it.

Your first example strikes me as weak. Many reliable sources commonly identify the LDS by its formal name in formal contexts. Many members self-identify as belonging to "the Mormon Church" in informal contexts (e.g., chatting with non-LDS neighbors). So I don't think that "LDS vs Mormon" is useful to us in this discussion, because it's a choice between two names that are both commonly used in sources and both applied by members to self-identify. IMO the distinction it illustrates (admirably) is "formal vs informal".

Does my analysis make sense to you? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:41, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

The second example is also weak, in a way characteristic of "self-identification": who is the self involved? The present Government of Myanmar, a military dictatorship? or the Burmese exiles, who can plausibly (but not certainly) claim to represent a majority?

Both are defensible - and I am not arguing for either, merely that both are defensible; but "self-identification" would require us to adopt one or other point of view, while our test of recognizability does not. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:35, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I think the distinction between "formal" and "informal" names is usefull, but not something we can put in a policy. Which name we actually use is often a matter of consensus, ballancing the various criteria we currently lay out.

Take the example of our article on Supreme Council, Scottish Rite (Southern Jurisdiction, USA)... as cumbersome and awkward as this seems, it is actually the informal name for the subject. The formal name is the far more cumbersome and awkward: "The Supreme Council (Mother Council of the World) of the Inspectors General Knights Commander of the House of the Temple of Solomon of the Thirty-third Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry of the Southern Jurisdiction of the United States of America" In this case the formal name is obviously not a good article title: It isn't common (although it is used on all official correspondence, no one else uses it), it is not that recognizable, and most importanlty it is not concise. So, while we mention the formal title in the article, we use the informal name as the title of the article.

On the other hand... the LDS vs. Mormon example discussed above illustrates that sometimes we have opted to go the other way... to use the formal over the informal.

In other words... we can list examples that "prove" both sides of the coin here. This is because we reach different consensuses on different articles. There is nothing wrong with this. Consensus is how Wikipedia works. The same is true for the broader issue of self-identification... If the consensus at an article is to use a self-identified name... great, no problem... but if the consensus is to not use that name... also great... and also no problem. Blueboar (talk) 17:01, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Equating a government that has been running for over twenty years to a group of ex patriots seems weak. The example works precisely because you have a recognized government, it has become the common name, but Wikipedia still ignores it. Exactly how long does a government has to run before Wikipedia chooses to acknowledge reality? If a majority of editors felt we should ignore the US government and again call it a British colony, would it be appropriate? Of course not, but does a country have to exist for over 200 years to finally be acknowledged as legitimate? Are we the judges between what is an appropriate form of government? IMHO, a policy removes these types of conflicts. It has the added benefit of acknowledging reality.

With the current policy in place, it would be too easy to see a group of editors say the title should be Mormon Church or even The Church of Latter-day Saints, another name often used. The entity rejects both (i.e. they have stated their preference is the full name), but it could still be argued and all that is needed on Wikipedia is a consensus, which is really a euphemism for majority rule. Too often the majority is not informed or is emotionial (a dictatorship is a bad thing therefore let's ignore them and hope they go away) and their conclusion is wrong. Th MoS should guide to assist in reaching proper conclusions.

No one is arguing for "official" names and your examples don't fit the old language. Official names can often be rather long, tedious things as you have demonstrated. However, the issue is preferred names. The Catholic Church, for example, prefers Catholic Church rather than Roman Catholic Church. Both names could easily be used for the title, but there is a preference that, IMHO, should be acknowledged by MoS.

The tyranny of the majority, or consensus, is not the answer. That is why a MoS is important. It removes the opportunity for tyranny to exist. It supports the right of an entity to name itself. --^StormRider 18:16, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

There are two ideological positions here:

• There is the statist position; SLORC is Burma; Henry VIII was England (as he called himself); and so on. L'État, c'est nous. Those who hold this position are indeed consistent to hold that the publicity of a government is always binding on its subjects - and on everybody else. I will admit that I find a certain novelty in presenting this as a stand against tyranny.
• On the other side, there is a populist position, however unAmerican it may be, that governments are established by the people to accomplish certain ends, and when they become destructive of those ends, the people have the right to alter or abolish them. The long-haired and slovenly sorts who hold this view will inquire what the Burmese people call themselves.

Wikipedia, however, takes neither position - both are points of view, and we cannot, and should not attempt to, decide the issue between them; instead, we let both sides stand undisturbed, and enquire what our readers will understand. On this issue, unlike many naming disputes, we have the judgment of the BBC, a neutral and usually reliable source. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:39, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, the BBC is a very good source for many things, but it is certainly not neutral (is anyone?). The BBC style guide does not directly emphasise this issue, but they hint on Page 55 at the use of self-identification. In my experience this is certainly the practice. If we use the BBC as the source we will always get self-identification names. Thehalfone (talk) 11:38, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I knew the RCC vs CC issue would come up sooner or later... Storm Rider's statement is not quite right... the Church uses "Roman Catholic Church" as a formal self-identifying name quite commonly (examples: here, here, and here... just to point to a random three.) So both names are "official" and both names are fairly commonly used. However, there is a good argument that "Catholic Church" is more commonly used (by both Church sources and non-Church sources), and therefore is the better choice. But again, that is a matter for consensus at the article level, and not something policy should dictate. Blueboar (talk) 19:09, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Blueboar, it is best not to misrepresent the months long discussion about why Catholic Church is the preferred term. The CC does use Roman Catholic Church, but most often in ecumenical situations. In almost all other situations she calls herself Catholic Church. --^StormRider 03:25, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I would not call the websites I linked to "eccuminical situations", but that is besides the point. My intent was not to reargue that debate. I was simply making two points: 1) The RCC vs. CC debate is not really useful for this discussion because the Church uses both names in the context of being a formal self-identifing name. This means that we are not choosing between a self-identifying name and a name used by others... we are choosing between two common names, both of which are used by the subject entity to self-identify, and both of which are used by others. 2) There are often a hoast of subject specific factors that influence how we name specific article. We don't need to spell them all out on this page... because we already say that the determining criteria is consensus on the article talk pages. Blueboar (talk) 14:37, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that no past agreement is perpetually binding. My beef is an attempt at unilateral CHANGE of that agreement by a small number of editors without achieving the broad community consensus (or discussion) required. Now that we are down to discussing the actual issue. I can present several examples of the consistent and stable use of self-identification by Wikipedia editors in article naming. This longstanding and stable usage of self-identification must remain reflected on this policy page:

• Policy guidance. The Wikipedia [Manual of Style, one of WPs most used and authoritative guides, has long stated with regard to self-identification:

When there is no dispute, the term most commonly used for a person will be the one that person uses for himself or herself, and the most common terms for a group will be those that the group most commonly uses for itself. Wikipedia should use them too.

• This position was strongly presented on the old Wikipedia Naming Conflict page, stable from 2005 to 2009.
• Naming conventions such as Wikipedia:Naming conventions (sports) specify the use of self-identifying official names.

Some article titles in which self-identifying names have been used by editors.

• In the case of Republic of China the self-identifying name is used against the great weight of common usage, which would specify 'Taiwan'
• People's Republic of China is used rather than 'China', or Mainland China.
• Guangzhou vs Canton
• Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria vs Coptic Church
• Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church vs Ethiopian Coptic Church or Ethiopian Orthodox Church
• Kolkata vs Calcutta
• Canadian Forces Maritime Command vs Canadian Navy
• Ho Chi Minh City v Saigon
• Inuit vs Eskimo
• Romany vs Gypsy
• Religious Society of Friends vs Quakers
• SyFy vs Sci-Fi Channel
• Willis Tower v Sears Tower
• Russian Ground Forces vs Russian Army
• Indigenous Australians vs Aborigines
• Dalits vs Untouchables
• Indigenous peoples of the Americas vs Red Indians or American Indians
• Native Americans in the United States vs American Indians
• First Nations vs Canadian Indians
• In addition there are the cases where agreements have been reached over ares such as South Tyrol, Switzerland, Belgium and elsewhere to use the self-identifying names of the relevant communities.
• In the case of the Derry - Londonderry dispute, the solution has been to use the self-identifying name of the city (as voted by the elected city council) over the Official name, as stated in law. The County, however, is listed under Londonderry.

In addition, self-identification was used as a principle in settling the Macedonia controversy. Xandar 03:08, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

The first one I checked, Inuit vs Eskimo, had articles at both titles, because they are not the same thing. The second one I checked, Romany vs Gypsy, has a disambiguation page at the former title, and articles on both Romani people and Gypsy, because they are not the same thing. The third one I checked, Indigenous Australians versus Aborigines, had a disambiguation page at the latter title, and articles at both Indigenous Australians and Australian Aborigines, because they are not the same thing. A long list of bullshit proves nothing except that someone is full of bullshit and is inclined to make lists out of it. Hesperian 04:32, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't know why, Hesperian you are incapable of discussing things in a rational manner, without breaching WP:CIVIL filling your posts with obsenities and abuse. If you think this is the way that policies should be discussed on Wikipedia. You need to leave. Your three so-called are largely diversions to article forks. The main articles are on the pages stated. And what about all the other examples? Just ignoring them, eh? Xandar 03:34, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Try telling a Torres Strait Islander that Indigenous Australian equals Australian Aborigine.

As I said above, "no-one has given a single example where there is consensus to use a self-identifying name because it is self-identifying, instead of the name that would have been chosen under the present wording." Tell me, is even one of the above examples a case where there was a choice between two names for the same article, and the one that was chosen was chosen because it is a self-identifying name, even though the present guidance indicated the other name was better? I'm asking because the first three I looked at were blatantly bogus, and I don't see why I should have to trawl through a long list of bullshit in order to make your case for you. If one of your examples meets that criterion, please advise, and I'll have a look at it. Hesperian 05:28, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

• The largest piece of bushlit here is the attempt to drag in the Macedonia controversy. It is true that both sides claimed to be exercising self-identification - this is why there were tearful cries (not dissimilar to some of this page) that we must use FYROM or harm millions of inhabitants of Greek Macedonia; but it was not settled that way: FYROM is deprecated, and ArbCom expressly disavowed self-identification: Wikipedia does not take any position on whether a particular person, group or nation has the right to use a particular name, particularly the name it uses for itself (a self-identifying name). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:09, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply, Xandar. So you believe that if WP:NC were a strictly enforced 'law' (which it's not, but pretend for a minute) that this change would require all of these articles to be renamed?

Well, no, you can't, because you've named a couple of things that are different subjects and therefore have different articles at the different names (e.g., Eskimo and Inuit; people in a place and their current government). But perhaps excluding those errors, you think that this change is so substantial that it would require at least some of these articles to be renamed? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:30, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

No. I believe that Wikipedia policy pages are intended to codify what actually happens on Wikipedia, and what editors actually do. Otherwise they become irrelevant and misleading. The question of whether changes to the policy pages can force articles to adopt different names to those their editors have agreed is a different one. I believe some people want policy pages to reflect their idea of what policy should be, and even to impose that on editors. Republic of China certainly does not fit in with the changes some people seem to want. So if the wording was successfully changed, other editors eventually would insist that article names conform. However, as I have said, that is not the principal point - which is that the page neeeds to correctly represent what editors actually DO (and often for very good reason), rather than what some editors WANT them to do. Xandar 03:34, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

That is indeed what this page should do, and does do. However, Xandar would have this page claim something which Wikipedia does not do, and of which he has provided no examples whatever:

• That editors have taken an article on a subject which has a common name in English,
• have rejected the common name, and agreed to use a different, self-identifying, name
• because it is the self-identifying name.

It is not difficult to find pages where common names have been rejected for consistency, or precision, or the other principles mentioned here. It is also not difficult to find pages (East Timor, Kiev), where a different name has been proposed as the self-identifying name, and the self-identifying name has been rejected because it's not common; but we're still waiting for X to mark his spot. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:52, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

As to determining "what acutally happens on Wikipedia and what editors actually do"... The examples are meaningless... The fact is, while some articles have used self-identification as a determining factor in reaching a consensus, other have articles have rejected self-identification as a determining factor. So we can not say that either is "what actually happens". Blueboar (talk) 16:11, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

PMA misrepresents my position (as usual). I am not specifying a particular rigid wording, I am wanting to keep a form of wording that acknowledges that editors do in circumstances use self-identification as a legitimate factor in making naming decisions. (Fact). The new wording he proposes appears to rule that out, and thus would be a significant and unwarranted policy change. The same argument applies to Blueboar. Some editors have used self-identification, others have rejected it. In the majority of cases the self-identifying name of an entity - or some form of it - is the same as, or not significantly different from, the common name. It is on other occasions where the policy needs to continue to state that self-identification is used in some circumstance (not just when there is no English language mention of the topic). The policy and guidance have said this for the past five years with no perceivable problems raised, and there is no reason to alter this. Xandar 00:05, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

This is, like almost everything else Xandar has said on the subject, a direct and deliberate lie.

• There are some instances in which the self-appointed tribunes of national and ideological causes have appealled to "self-identification". In almost all cases, they have met with the tribunes of the opposite faction, and cancelled each other, while the rest of us have determined what English actually uses.
• In some cases, such as Kiev, there has been no opposite faction, and their contentions have been rejected anyway, as contrary to English usage.
• In one case, Xandar himself - a single-purpose account - succeeded in getting an incompetent mediator to change one article name to express a point of view, despite an immediate protest from other members of the mediation. Ever since then, he has been attempting to distort guideline and policy to retroactively support this fraud.
• In no case has "self-identification", which is an essentially point-of-view idea, been upheld by consensus against any of the other considerations which go into our naming conventions.

In short, the only controversy here is whether one or two single purpose accounts have been disruptive enough to be banned. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:33, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, Xandar, you've missed the point of my question, which is a roundabout way of saying "Is there really, truly, definitely any practical difference between these two statements?" That is, if we tell editors to draw a line that's about four inches long today, and we tell them to make it about ten centimeters long tomorrow, then they're going to do the same thing. If we tell them to consider X, Y, and Z, and also tell them that Z typically exists only in unusual circumstances, today -- and tomorrow we tell them to consider X, Y, and Z, and don't bother mentioning the most common reason for needing to consider Z, then are we really telling them "different" rules on the two days?

That's why I asked for examples: if yesterday's rule is different from today's rule -- really, importantly different in its direct effect on the end result -- then you should be able to name an example that any reasonable editor would say "Under yesterday's rule, we correctly named this ____, but under today's rule, this other name would be a far better choice".

For example: WP:MEDRS says to use technical names under certain circumstances (primarily to provide necessary precision). It requires myocardial infarction, and I know what sentence would need to be changed (and how) to get that page moved to its redirect, heart attack. But I'm not seeing any such problem between, say, the Friends and the Quakers with the recent change. The recent change would not result in a page move for that example, even if the recent change were implemented with all the force of an unquestionable law. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:37, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

This is a great question, User:What. If there is no difference, why make the change? It might be appropriate to ask those who unilaterally changed the text to explain why. If they can't explain the benefit, it should go back to the original language. I prefer the language that had been used for years because with it I know it prevents editors with an axe from gaining their way. I also think it provides clearer guidance to prevent the waywardness we see see at times with the ignorance of the majority. So, please explain what the change achieves that the old language did not. --^StormRider 23:42, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

If there's no difference in the results, then my first question is why should anyone be upset about which words are used? Think of this as my own version of "No Big Deal": these changes may or may not be helpful to editors, but if they don't actually change the names of real, live articles, then this is a little, unimportant, everyday, routine dispute -- probably worth the discussion, but not worth any stress or emotional involvement.

Not having a practical effect on the names editors choose doesn't mean that the change automatically isn't valuable. Many changes to guidelines like this one don't actually change the practical outcomes. Much of what I've written over the last couple of years at WP:External links, for example, is focused on reducing confusion by more fully explaining what's already on the page, rather than changing how the 'rules' operate. Spam's spam, IMO, and nothing I do at WP:EL can change that, but clearly expressed spam-identification rules are more efficient for editors (=better for the encyclopedia) than confusing ones, even if editors could, and did, eventually puzzle out what the confusing wording meant is the same.

The bottom line: If this changes outcomes, we need to be more careful. If this doesn't change outcomes, then we should still be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, etc., but the level of upset can be safely dialed back down to something approaching zero. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:35, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

hope for resolution

Yes, and as I have said all along, there is nothing wrong with editors discussing self-identification as one of many considerations they might consider in naming an article... However... it comes into the picture at a later part of the process than you have been advocating. To explain... here is how I see the naming process working:

1. Examine the sources and see if there is an obvious common name for the topic, one that is used commonly by a significant majority of reliable sources. If there is... we should use that name. If not...
2. Determine whether the topic is something that should have a) a descriptive name or b) a proper name. If a descriptive name is called for, we may either choose a name that someone else has invented, or invent our own name... keeping in mind that the resulting name must be neutral, easy to find, precise, and concise... also take into account any project consistancy preferences. If, on the other hand, a proper name is called for....
3. Re-examine the sources to see what names are used... reject any names that are rarely used. From the rest, reach a consensus of editors as to what name is best. Various factors should be considered in reaching this consensus... including (but not limited to): neutrality, self-identification, the need for disambiguation, etc.

You will note that in this outline of how the article naming process works, the discussion of self-identification is only discussed when there is no obvious common name. It is also not the only consideration being considered in reaching this consensus. It might be the determining factor... but then again it might not be; some other consideration might be the determining factor. Blueboar (talk) 04:46, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

I concur; can you come up with wording which says no more than this and yet cannot be abused when quoted in isolation, as it will be? if these nuisances were banned, there would be someone else. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:33, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

I think it is more like

1. Examine the sources to see how the topic is usually referred to (there is no point getting hung up on whether "Canadian navy" is a name or a commonly used descriptive term; it is how the topic is referred to, regardless)
2. If nothing stands out, concoct a concise, neutral descriptive title;
3. If one stands out, use it;
4. If multiple candidates stand out, consider principles such as accessibility, precision, consistency, neutrality; and reach consensus.

The issue here is whether our principles include "self-identification". They do not. Hesperian 05:17, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

I think we are essentially saying the same thing, except that I am taking the process one step further than you are (by outlining some of the things that should be considered when reaching a consensus). I do think self-identification is a valid issue for editors to discuss when we are evaluating the pros and cons of multiple candidates and reaching a consensus as to which one would be best... I would agree that it is not a "Principle" rather it is a "consideration". Considerations are things that should be thought about, but can either be accepted or rejected according to consensus. This accords with practice... accounting for the fact that some articles have chosen a self-identifying name over another name, while others have not.

Perhaps what this all comes down to is the question: Do we need to spell this out some of the factors that can be considered when reaching a consensus over naming, or is simply saying: "reach a consensus" enough? Blueboar (talk) 13:38, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Hesperian is wishing to exclude self-identification as a legitimate concern when editors are coming to consensus. In this, he is trying to proscribe what editors should do, rather than reflecting what they actually (and often for good reason) do. That is not what this page should be doing. Self-identification has been an accepted factor in naming guidance since at least 2005, and there is no good reason to remove it or censor reference to it. If such wording is removed, people will soon start saying that it is an illegitimate factor, and this will create a lot of problems. I therefore think that Blueboar's proposal above, presents a good starting point for wording that is helpful and covers the situation on the ground. Xandar 01:19, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Self-identification has been an accepted factor in naming guidance. No, it hasn't. It was mentioned on a genuinely obscure page, which went unedited and largely ignored for years. Some dozen efforts were made to cite it, all of which were rejected.

While it continues to be pushed only by a handful of doctrinaire extremists, it should be ignored on this page; if it ever becomes widely influential in naming discussions, we can reconsider.

Leaving well enough alone will produce no problems and no changes, unless Xandar and StormrRider choose to make some - and we have other forums to deal with disruptive trouble-makers. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:44, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

While it's easy to imagine situations where it should not be a controlling consideration, self-identification does seem to be a simple, common-sense factor to consider when naming articles. If nothing else, it should be one factor we consider when deciding whether an article's name is truly neutral - it's not uncommon for "common" names to have been originally assigned by outsiders hostile to a group or organization. Beyond that, in many situations dealing with religion, politics and philosophy, it's important to avoid confusing closely related groups that "common" names don't distinguish between (examples would be the different "Eastern Orthodox" denominations or the different "Mormon" groups within the Latter Day Saints movement, or atheism vs. nontheism vs. antitheism). While we need to make it easy for readers unfamiliar with a topic to find the relevant articles, sometimes it takes a touch of formality to handle a topic in a truly precise and encyclopedic fashion. EastTN (talk) 23:49, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Re: "it's important to avoid confusing closely related groups": yes, which is why "precision" is one of our principles. This has nothing to do with self-identification. Hesperian 05:44, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

Self-identification isn't always associated with precision, but it many cases dealing with religion, politics and philosophy, it is. The various groups that the average person would lump together as "Mormon" are very careful to distinguish between each other as they identify themselves. The same goes for the different flavors of Eastern Orthodoxy, political parties, and philosophical movements. Again, self-identification isn't the only factor we should consider, but it is a legitimate one and in many cases can help achieve precision in distinguishing between closely related groups. EastTN (talk) 15:05, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

An example where self-identification just happens to agree with current guidance (such as where it is clear that more precision is necessary in order to distinguish between religious denominations) is not an argument to change the current guidance. The only way to demonstrate that the current guidance needs to be changed is to show that there are cases where our current guidance recommends one name, the principle of self-identification recommends another, AND there is consensus that the latter name is preferable.

To put it another way, you haven't shown that the current guidance needs to be changed until you've shown an example of the current guidance getting it wrong. Show me such an example, and we'll talk. Hesperian 15:16, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

Self-identification is a common-sense factor to consider; as a practical matter, I'd be quite surprised if many editors aren't already considering it (I certainly do). A group's own name for itself should be considered as one of the terms a knowledgeable reader might be searching for, and as part of the process of making sure the name is neutral. Beyond that, many articles do use the terms groups use to identify themselves (e.g., Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Church of Christ, Scientist, Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, Orthodox Church in America, Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, Christ's Sanctified Holy Church, True Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Redeemed Christian Church of God, Church of Jesus Christ, the Bride, the Lamb's Wife, Righteous Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, United Holy Church of America, True and Living Church of Jesus Christ of Saints of the Last Days).

You seem to be establishing a very high hurdle here. It would help me if you could explain the potential problems that might be caused if the guidance recognized the self-identification of a group as one of the considerations in selecting an article name. I don't understand why you think it would be harmful, and why you seem so confident that editors don't already consider it. EastTN (talk) 16:24, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

That high hurdle is called Occam's razor.

As I've said numerous times already, the only cases of any relevance here are cases where current guidance and self-identification would lead to different article titles. As I've said numerous times already, show me a single one of those cases where the self-identification title would be better than the current guidance title. Now you're saying "no, you show me cases where it would be worse." Sorry, but I'm not buying that: if you want to change the convention, you have to state your case. Hesperian 01:21, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry - I purely don't understand the relevance of Occam's razor here. We're not talking about two alternative explanations for the same phenomenon. We're discussing what factors are valid to consider when naming an article.

The name a group uses for itself is a common-sense factor to consider, and at least some editors are already using it (beyond those of us who claim to consider self-identification as a factor, it beggars the imagination that editors would have chosen to call a particular group the United Holy Church of America or the Righteous Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints if those had not, in fact, been the names the groups had already chosen for itself). You seem to be arguing that the current text accurately and completely reflects current practice - in other words, that editors are in fact not ever considering self-identification when naming articles. That doesn't make sense - there are far too many articles names that match or closely resemble the self-identification of the group for that assertion to be true.EastTN (talk) 17:01, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

That's because in many cases the self-chosen names already meet our criteria (they're reasonably recognizable, precise, neutral in most cases - except in those rare cases where some other group disputes the first one's right to use the name). It doesn't mean that self-identification is a separate criterion from those.--Kotniski (talk) 17:46, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

And when "the self-chosen names already meet our criteria" we are in practice considering them - we are not creating new names de novo in that case. The name a group selects for itself is one of the things editors are looking at. Sometimes it makes sense to use them; in other cases it does not. But to point to an extreme example again, Righteous Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not something that Wikipedia editors came up with on their own based on only the criteria of "reasonably recognizable, precise, neutral" - you can't get there unless you recognize it as the name chosen by the group itself.EastTN (talk) 19:01, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think I can agree with your interpretation. Independent high-quality reliable sources refer to this religious group as "Righteous Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints". The Wikipedia editors didn't "come up with it on their own", but they also didn't pick it 'because it's the self-identified term. The editors picked this name for the same reason that they normally pick any name: namely, it's what the best sources use. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:30, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

There seems to be a presupposition that "best sources" may ignore self-identification preferences and that because "they" say so, we should respect "best sources" because obviously they know better than the entity themselves. Does that make any sense? If you name is Peter and I am an "best source" and I call you Pierre, we should ignore you preference and call you Pierre? Or if I am a great source who is also a critic and I call you Crazy Joe from Illinois we should respect the best source?

The problem is that you are elevating sources over the entity themselves. Who actually knows best? The entity or a third party? This is beginning to sound like insanity to me. What am I missing? --^StormRider 00:51, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

You're apparently missing the fundamental principle that Wikipedia cares about "verifiability, not truth—what counts is whether readers can check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true". If reliable sources call me Crazy Joe from Illinois, then Wikipedia will call me Crazy Joe from Illinois. Along those lines, you might notice that Joe the Plumber is the page name, not Joe Wurzelbacher, which is the name he seems to use in everyday life. In this and many other cases, we follow the sources, even if what the sources use isn't the primary or legal self-identification. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

You are the one who is supporting the recent unilateral change. And no one but you three or four, lock-step, editors support it. None of you, as in Zero, nada, zip have offered any reason why the change was made except, "I don't like it". You wanted the changed, just explain yourself. I don't know why it is so hard. I don't even need an example (I have no idea why that is valid), I just want to understand why make a change to something that has existed for several years. --^StormRider 01:36, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

You mean the change from "When there is no common English name..." to "When a subject is too rarely mentioned in English to have a common English name..."? No wait, you don't actually know what we're discussing, do you? You just come when Xandar calls. Hesperian 01:48, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

The hurdle is actually quite low, IMO, and exactly the standard used for every policy or guideline: We provide the guidance that's actually needed, and we don't provide guidance that isn't actually needed. If our guidance is actually interfering with editors who want to do the Right Thing™, then we need to fix our guidance. If it's merely incomplete in a way that doesn't cause real problems with real disputes at real articles, then we don't care. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:25, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

Which argument might stand up a little, if the group you support hadn't just changed the guidance unilaterally to fit your views. If there is no need for change, put it back the way it was before PMA invented a new policy. There is no doubt that the guidance has always recognised the usefulness and legitimacy of using self-identification as a factor in naming. It is your group that wants to change this, not us. YOU must find the justification. Xandar 02:50, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree, EastTN. There are often very good reasons for the use of self-identifying names to be a factor in naming decisions by editors. And Wikipedia's re-direct system does not make the use of even relatively little known names like First Nations for Canadian Indians a problem. As far as Pmandersons points are concerned, "leaving well enough alone" is to leave the original agreed wording on self-identification intact, not his recent unagreed alteration, currently sitting on the page. In actual fact, I think the original merged wording could be improved, if we can gain agreement. I will propose an alternative wording shortly. Xandar 01:09, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

" There is no doubt that the guidance has always recognised the usefulness and legitimacy of using self-identification as a factor in naming" - well no, not really.

The main document for naming was this page, created in 2001 [1], with no mention of preferring official/self-identifying names (and in fact, pointedly preferring common names to "full" names for people). By 2005 [2] we've got something comparable wnough to what we have now - and there's still no mention of self-idnetification or preference for official names. 1000 edits in [3] in 2008, we still have no mention - even though we do have a mention of the "naming conflict" guideline.

The naming conflict page is the origin of this chestnut: started in 2005 [4] "for ChrisO", the first mention of self-identification is when ChrisO adds it in this edit when he drafts a proposal - another editor points out this is not yet polcy [5]. Another adds a POV template [6], but this is removed [7], by ChrisO. Radiant! removes the proposed tag here, but this doesn't appear to be the result of any community discussion on the talk-page. Gurch adds the guideline template in 2007 and this remains unchallenged, and the text is harmonised a year later [8] and the status persists until the page's redirection. Kotniski rephrases the guidance in April 2009 [9] and is reverted by Xandar in May [10]. Thus we arrive here.

So self-identification was always a consideration? Certainly not in WP:NC, only much later in ChrisO's WP:Naming conflict page and only as the result of very little community discussion. Compare this to the inclusion of the much longer-standing principles of recognisable and unambiguous naming - these have been truly universal, right from the start, on a page regularly used in page renaming discussions.

For background and completeness' sake, Knepflerle (talk) 03:10, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Proposal

The following is a proposed new wording for the section in dispute, based largely on Blueboar's suggested resolution, and which would reflect actual Wikipedia practice. This is not MY wording but an attempt to find a wording around which a compromise solution can be based:

When there is no obvious common name for the topic, as used by a significant majority of reliable sources in English, Wikipedia editors should first determine whether the topic should have a descriptive name, (for example one that covers an event, a controversy or an area of knowledge); or a proper name, (for example the name of a person, a country or an organisation).

• Descriptive names. Where there is no clear common name, Wikipedia editors may devise a name of their own or choose an appropriate name that someone else has devised. In each case the name chosen should be neutral, easy to find, precise, and concise. If an individual Wikiproject has a particular style or format preference for such articles, this is usually followed.

• Proper names should always be based on reliable sources, rejecting names that are rarely used. Editors should then reach a consensus on which of the remaining names is to be used as the article title. Factors that should be considered in reaching this consensus, include, (but are not limited to): neutrality self-identification, the avoidance of ambiguity, precision, and the official name of the entity as it appears in a constitution or other legal context. Xandar 04:10, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Strong Oppose. (1) because it once again promotes "common name" above all other principles; (2) because it elevates self-identification and officialness as principles, when there is no evidence that they are so; and (3) because it over-emphasises the mostly spurious distinction between proper name titles and descriptive titles.

With respect to the last of these, it makes no difference whether or not "Canadian navy" is a name or a description; so long as it is the best title according to our principles, we use it. It has previously been proposed here that we should never choose a descriptive title if a name is available. That is wrong. If a name is available but reliable sources consistently ignore it in favour of a particular descriptive phrase, then that descriptive phrase is what we should be using. You might argue that such a phrase thereby becomes a name, which only supports my assertion that the distinction is mostly spurious. Hesperian 04:38, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Self-identification is not here elevated as a top of the article "principle" (though I might prefer it to be so), but as a consideration to be used by editors. And in the vast majority of cases there is a significant difference of order between a descriptive name like Controversy over linguistic and ethnic identity in Moldova and proper names like Moldova. Do we need a specific rule for where overlap occurs - as in Canadian navy? Xandar 02:02, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm opposed to this policy endorsing self-POV in naming.

The "significant order of difference" is essentially the fact that reliable sources would almost universally refer to Moldova by the term "Moldova", so it is easily identified as the most common name for the topic; whereas reliable sources would use a range of terms and phrases to refer to the controversy of linguistic and ethnic identity in Moldova, and it probably is not possible to identify a particular term or phrase as predominant. It is this that leads us to construct our own title in the latter case. Thus the "significant order of difference" is already captured adequately by our principle of following usage in reliable sources. To draw a class distinction between names and descriptions is unnecessary and only causes confusion and harm. Hesperian 05:13, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

• The "section in dispute" means the last sentence of the WP:NC#Common names section, right? I don't see a need to replace that one sentence with all this lengthly text - it just adds words to the policy, without saying anything we don't already say (in that one sentence or elsewhere). I'm not saying the policy as it stands couldn't be more clearly written, but I don't think that just lengthening it like this is going to improve it.--Kotniski (talk) 09:58, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

The "one sentence" you speak of originally said "When there is no common English name..." (use the name the entity calls itself), which PMA recently changed to "When a subject is too rarely mentioned in English to have a common English name...(use the name the entity calls itself)". I am quite happy to remain with the original agreed version. However people said that that was too vague, and needed clarification. This is an attempt at introducing that clarification along the lines suggested by Blueboar in order to find a solution. However the default wording if this is not accepted is not PMAs, but the original wording agreed at the page merger. Xandar 02:02, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

• Very Week Support... I think we are actually narrowing in on something I could live with, but it would need additonal tweeking. My major criticism is that I would tone down the "shoulds" (and, yes, I am aware that I used that word myself). "Things to consider" are not really a "should do" topic... they work more as "might" or "can". I would also make it clear that, while self-identification might be something to discuss when reaching a consensus, discussing self-identification does not guarentee that the end result will be to use the self-identifying name. In some articles, the consensus may be to use the self-identifying name... but in others the consensus will be to not use it. Both outcomes are fine, because they are based on consensus. Blueboar (talk) 23:03, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Choosing the self-identification name because it is most often used in reliable sources, is perfectly acceptable, and will happen very often indeed. Choosing the self-identification name solely because it is the self-identification name is endorsing the self-POV. You are comfortable having our naming convention policy endorse violations of our neutral point of view policy? Hesperian 05:18, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

• Support - I am open to tweaking the wording, but it is absolutely beyond my comprehension why Wikipedia would deny an entity the right of self-identification. This is not about official names, this is not about difficulty of readers finding an article, it is about naming an article by "a" preferred name of an entity. I still do not understand why it is not a priority for naming an article. No a single editor has every provided any reasoning why it is best to ignore an entity's preference. Last of all, all of the recommendations in the world are meaningless when a temporary majority seeks to change a name; consensus can and does ignore all rules. Regardless of how much time we spend on writing this, it is worthless when a group seeks to ignore it. Consensus is the rule, not rules. Just look at Burma. --^StormRider 00:18, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

It isn't that we ignore an entity's preference... it's that we pay more attention to the reliable sources. Ultimately, WP:Common name is an application of WP:NPOV... we give things the same weight in Wikipedia that the reliable sources give them, and this applies to names no less than facts. When a self-identified name is "ignored" by the sources, it would be a WP:UNDUE issue for us to do the opposite. The reason why we use Burma and not the official name of Union of Myanmar is because a significant majority of sources use Burma and don't use Myanmar. It really is that simple. Blueboar (talk) 02:02, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

No, it most certainly is that we ignore an entity's preference. It is called having a neutral point of view. The alternative—to take into account an entity's preference—is to give more weight to a particular point of view than all other points of view. That is an unacceptable violation of our neutral point of view policy, which is a pillar of this encyclopedia. We follow usage in reliable sources, and if an entity doesn't like what it is called in reliable sources, that is tough shit for them. Hesperian 05:23, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

You are confused about the definition of POV and how it applies. There is no POV to you calling yourself Hersperian. That is the name you use. It would actually be POV not to call you by your chosen name. That is a red herring and I hope to God you know it. If not, I kindly implore you to never vote on anything that has to do with NPOV on Wikipedia. --^StormRider 07:35, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

If I call myself "Hersperian" and every reliable source calls me "Bob", then "My name is Hersperian" is my POV. If you don't get that, then I implore you to never vote on anything that has to do with NPOV on Wikipedia. Hesperian 07:54, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

• "This is not about official names" - the text you have just supported suggests considering "the official name of the entity as it appears in a constitution or other legal context"
• "this is not about difficulty of readers finding an article" - if not, it really, really ought to be. I write articles for people who can find them.
• "I still do not understand why it is not a priority for naming an article." -the question is rather whether it should be given priority over our readers' ability to find the article. Knepflerle (talk) 02:04, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

There is no problem finding articles on Wikipedia. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mormon Church, and LDS Church all link to the same article. This is also a red herring. --^StormRider 07:35, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

The simplest and best way of ensuring unambiguous recognisable titles is to ask editors to use unambiguous recognisable titles, and not through promoting self-identification and hoping that someone takes the time to mop up any ambiguities or little-used titles that may arise using redirects, hatnotes and disambiguation pages. Knepflerle (talk)

• Support - though this was not posted in order to have a vote, but in order to reach a consensus on appropriate wording that represents what editors do. So hopefully editors will be constructive, and try to make this work. Perhaps Blueboar and those with problems would propose specific wordings he might prefer. Xandar 02:04, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose - I agree with Kotniski's summary, and further find that this wording obscures the primary considerations of recognisability and unambiguity in the push to promote self-identification and "official" names (and "official"ness is a slippery concept, guaranteeing neither a neutral nor a single, unique name - never mind one which is recognisable and unambiguous). Our articles should be as easy as possible to find and to link to, whilst having an unambiguous title. In the cases presented above where the common name is not used, it is because the most common name is ambiguous or imprecise; this is what our guidelines already tell us to do. The over-emphasis on a descriptive/proper name divide is also artificial and unilluminating, as Hesperian also points out. Knepflerle (talk) 02:04, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

There is no attempt to "promote" self-identification. Self-identification has long been, and remains a Wikipedia naming consideration. What we are trying to attempt here is to maintain this convention as one that describes what Wikipedia editors actually DO, rather than writing a list of what certain people think editors OUGHT to do. So we are trying to find a synthesis that acknowledges that editors do use self-identifying names, and to set out the more detailed exposition of when and why this happens that has been demanded. The issue of "descriptive" and "proper" names is a separate consideration, which has been added as per suggestion. The original wording simply said (paraphrased) "Where there is no common name, use the name by which the entity self-identifies or is officially known." Xandar 02:12, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

"There is no attempt to "promote" self-identification. Self-identification has long been, and remains a Wikipedia naming consideration." - for far shorter time than the universal principles of recognisability and unambiguity: hence I cannot support any text which could possibly be construed as promoting an ambiguous or little-recognised title just because it happens to be the subject's self-identification. Knepflerle (talk) 03:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

arb break

I have no problem leaving it as is... but if it will help resolve the issue, I would propose something very simple...

• When there is no obvious common name for the topic, as used by a significant majority of reliable English language sources, editors should reach a concensus as to which name is best. Issues that might be considered in reaching such a consensus, include (but is by no means limited to): Neutrality, Self-identification, Precision, Ambiguity, etc. Blueboar (talk) 02:40, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Ambiguity is not a second-level consideration to be examined in the absence of a common name. An ambiguous title is not acceptable. Knepflerle (talk) 03:16, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Telling people it is okay to consider self-identification is telling people it is okay to endorse the entity's point of view over and above all others. This is not acceptable. Hesperian 05:26, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

That is just plain balderdash. We are talking about what an entity calls itself. That is not POV; in fact, there is no POV. We are talking about reality as in facts. There is no one more qualified to know the name of an entity than the entity itself. Claiming this is POV issue is a red herring. POV has nothing to do with it at all. Because you call yourself Peter is POV? Please don't make me laugh. You call yourself Peter and thus we call you Peter; it is as simple as that. Either you are confused or you don't understand what a POV is. I reject completely that a "common" name is somehow of more value than the actual preferred name of an entity. --^StormRider 07:35, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Please be civil. It's been explained many times why this argument is fallacious; Wikipedia will obviously report the fact that A calls itself "X" (and that B calls A "Y"), but that doesn't mean Wikipedia has to follow either A or B in its choice of name for A (and automatically following A rather than B would not be neutral between A and B).--Kotniski (talk) 07:53, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

"You call yourself Peter and thus we call you Peter; it is as simple as that." Sounds good. In such a case my name is unambiguously Peter, we don't have a problem, and we certainly don't need self-identification in the policy to get this right. A problem arises, however, when I call myself Peter and every reliable source calls me Simon. In such a case, "my name is Peter" is my point of view, my POV. And our NPOV policy forbids us from endorsing that POV. Hesperian 07:54, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Not at all. This is your personal belief. And your "example" is not a real world one. Wikipedia policy has, at least since 2005 strongly endorsed the use of self-identification as a naming criterion. This is a FACT. Wikipedia editors, and groups of editors endorse self-identification in their choice of article names. That is another fact. The purpose of this page is to reflect those facts. Your personal opinion on whether you like self-identification or not is irrelevant. The page does not exist for you to force others to adopt your viewpoint. And you are not free to unilaterally change the naming policy page to reflect your personal preference. So, either we agree a compromise wording such as that suggested by Blueboar, or we have to remove PManderson's unagreed change to the accepted wording, and return it to the wording as agreed at the page merger. Xandar 23:46, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Strongly endorsed? It was put on to a proposal page with no community discussion, which was "upgraded" to a guideline by an undiscussed removal of a template, the phrasing was rejected when it was raised in WP:RM discussions and there was no mention of it on WP:NC at all until Kotniski added it in 2009. If that's a strong endorsement, how bad is a weak one? Knepflerle (talk) 10:48, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I've been asking you to provide evidence for your two "FACT"s for months now, and you won't. Instead you give lists of article pairs that have no bearing on this discussion and certainly don't do anything to establish your "FACT"s as facts. I haven't made it at all hard for you here: I asked for just one clear and uncontroversial example: an example where there is consensus to choose the self-identification name instead the name suggested by current guidance. There's nothing onerous about that. If you can't give a single example, you must accept that "Wikipedia editors endorse self-identification" is merely something you choose to belief, despite the absense of any evidence for it."

Let me make this clear:

1. I dispute your two assertions of "FACT".
2. If you could convince me of them, I would come entirely over to your side.
3. Restating your "FACT"s over and over and over and over and over and over again, without ever presenting evidence to back them up, is not going to convince me. On the contrary, it suggests to me that your argument has nothing to support it.

So kindly stop wasting everybody's time by repeatedly screaming "this is a fact". It fools no-one. Evidence, Xandar, Exidence. Hesperian 00:28, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Hesperian. It is QUITE clear that Wikipedia editors use self-identifying names for entities in articles. I gave a list of examples above. I also listed a wikipedia naming convention that specifically uses self-identifying names as standard, and pointed to Wikipedia article groups, such as those for South Tyrol and other similar areas, where the name chosen by the majority poulation is used. Self-identifying principles were used as a basis for the solution of the Macedonia dispute. Even further, self identification has been endorsed by the Wikipedia Naming-conflict guideline, which was recently merged into this page. Further still, self-identification is clearly indorsed by the Wikipedia Manual of Style. Continual denial of these clear facts does not make your version of reality true. Xandar 00:07, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Having demonstrated that a random sample of your "list of examples" was utter bullshit, I have repeatedly asked you to identify a single entry in that list that is not bullshit, so that I may examine it. How many times do I have to ask before I am entitled to presume the list is 100% bullshit? You other assertions have also been refuted. With respect to your Macedonia comment, I quote PMA above: "The largest piece of bushlit here is the attempt to drag in the Macedonia controversy. It is true that both sides claimed to be exercising self-identification - this is why there were tearful cries (not dissimilar to some of this page) that we must use FYROM or harm millions of inhabitants of Greek Macedonia; but it was not settled that way: FYROM is deprecated, and ArbCom expressly disavowed self-identification: 'Wikipedia does not take any position on whether a particular person, group or nation has the right to use a particular name, particularly the name it uses for itself (a self-identifying name)'. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:09, 13 January 2010 (UTC)" How anyone can have the nerve to keep trotting out the same refuted garbage over and over again is beyond me. Hesperian 02:10, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

No, it doesn't work that way. When PMA made his change, the consensus for the previous version became void. There is no consensus for the old way; there is no consensus for the new way. The fact that the old version came first does not give it priority: you may reject PMA's change, and PMA can reject your preferred version. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:10, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

What nonsense! PMA has no right to unilaterally alter the policy Page. He has no mandate to do this - or to change the wording agreed at the page merger, which REMAINS the policy until it is altered by a wide-broad-based community consensus. You, PMA, and a handful of page regulars DO NOT make up that consensus, and have no right to abrogate a policy that has held firm throughout the last half decade of Wikipedia. PMAs wording has no status whatsoever, no matter how much it may be improperly edit-warred onto the page. Xandar 00:07, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

• sigh*

I have never said that PMA had any right to change the policy; I have never said that PMA's change to the text at WP:NC changes the actual policy; I have never said that there is a consensus for the change. Please read what I actually wrote, paying close attention to the specific words "there is no consensus". If you interpret my statement that "there is no consensus" as actually meaning there is no consensus, then you'll be much closer to understanding what I said, and perhaps a little less needlessly upset. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:30, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Who said there was consensus for the new way? Just because it was changed does not mean there was consensus. It only means it was changed. I continue to reject that an entity stating what it should be called, i.e. choosing its own name, is POV. That is beyond absurd and no one has explained how it is POV. Even worse, the bizarre example of your name being Peter and others call you Simon; therefore you don't know your own name and must be called Simon brings back too many memories of 1984. Since when does any elite group get to demand what others be called? Only on Wikipedia does a majority of editors gain the god-like power to rename entities to suit a cabal's objectives. This gets more and more strange. Do you really read this stuff and believe it? This is becoming a very scary place. "No, you, the dark, can't call yourself that anymore, what arrogance to think you know your own name. From this day forth you will be called light because we say so." "Further, how dare you think you can share you POV by naming yourself, you impudent prig." --^StormRider 03:13, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Re: "I continue to reject that an entity stating what it should be called, i.e. choosing its own name, is POV. That is beyond absurd and no one has explained how it is POV.", I'm not sure how to "explain how it is POV" because as far as I am concerned there is no other way to parse the phrase "an entity stating what..." other than an entity stating its point of view. To say that that particular point of view should be privileged is one thing; to deny that it is a point of view at all is just bizarre.

As for the rest of the above, I'm afraid you've gotten yourself so worked up you've lost command of the English language. I mean, Jesus H. Christ!, equating "follow usage in reliable sources" with "Only on Wikipedia does a majority of editors gain the god-like power to rename entities to suit a cabal's objectives" is beyond irresponsible rhetoric: it is utterly irrational. Hesperian 05:35, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Re: "the bizarre example of your name being Peter and others call you Simon; therefore you don't know your own name and must be called Simon brings back too many memories of 1984.", oh, now I see your problem. You think a name is some mystical property of a thing, such that every thing has exactly one of them. No. If I call myself Peter, and everyone else calls me Simon, then I have two names, one for each of two points of view. Wikipedia policy is, in theory, to use the "neutral" point of view, which, in practice, means using the "reliable sources" point of view. Now do you see how this ties into WP:NPOV? Hesperian 05:49, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

The Simon v. Peter example might make a bit more sense if we flip it - Self-identification: Simon (or Simeon in hebrew)... Common name: Peter... Guess which name we use for the article on the Christian Saint? Blueboar (talk) 15:03, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Hesperian, I don't trust that references are always neutral. We all can find references for many topics that produce outlandish statements. I don't think names have a mystical value, but I do think they are important. In the event that a reference conflicts with an entity's preferred name, I feel the preference should be given to the entity. You might have two names, but how does a third party gain supremacy in telling you what your name should be? I place a great value on the right of the entity to name itself. I remain stunned that you and others feel it is preferable to ignore an entity and seek the preference of a third party. Do you think that third parties are consistently neutral? This is just too Orwellian for me.--^StormRider 14:58, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

StormRider, Wikipedia directly defines "neutral" as being whatever the reliable sources say. If our sources say that the sky is orange and the sun is green, then claims of blue and yellow would be dismissed as unDUE and non-neutral. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:35, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose. Self-identification, indeed official titles, are often chosen specifically to push a point of view. To misquote Yes Minister "The Department of Employment is in charge of unemployment, the Ministry of Defence is for war, the Department of Industry presides over the demise of British industy...". The wording above sounds like self-identification is likely to be counted as a plus point, however, it may well be a negative point. Of course the examples in the quote are (close to) the common names for these departments so they do not come into the question. If the above departments were not commonly refered to (let's say we were talking about an obscure quango), then the main point in the self-identification would be the POV. Thehalfone (talk) 12:10, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Exactly... This isn't about rejecting a self-identified name... it's about accepting the name that is commonly used by the sources. 99% of the time, what the entity calls itself will be identical to what the sources call it... but on those rare occasions when there is a conflict between what an entity calls itself and what the sources call it, on those rare occasions when we must determine which name should be given the most weight we should follow the sources. This concept is discussed by multiple policies and guidelines. Blueboar (talk) 14:49, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I think there is something quantifiably different from a name and a fact. We are not talking about determining the date of an event where expert references are needed. There is no one more expert about an entity's name than the entity itself. The only reason there would be a conflict is the POV of the reference.

Attempting to claim the Department of Defense is the Department of War is POV and shortsided. More importantly, it demonstrates the weakness of allowing third parties to define that the "real" name should be. Who is more expert in knowing the name of an entity? The entity itself of a third party? --^StormRider 15:16, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

The entity probably knows best what name(s) it prefers for itself. Other parties know best what name(s) they prefer for the entity. One type of name is no more "real" than the other, and in the vast majority of cases there won't be any difference. If there is a difference, we have to decide what to do, and we (wishing to be as much like a reliable source as possible) serve readers best by following what reliable sources do. Why is this barely significant matter worth all this continuous discussion?--Kotniski (talk) 15:34, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

From WP:UNDUE: ... "To give undue weight to the view of a significant minority, or to include that of a tiny minority, might be misleading as to the shape of the dispute. Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation in reliable sources on the subject. This applies not only to article text, but to images, wikilinks, external links, categories, and all other material as well."

I understand the phrase "... and all other material as well" to include the title of the article. Blueboar (talk) 15:42, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE is irrelevant with regard to the name an entity calls itself. WIkipedia naming conventions and gidance has at least since 2005 CLEARLY stated that self-identification is a MAJOR element in naming decisions. If people want to change that, then we will have to go to a Community-wide debate and new-consensus on that issue. The comment is also not relevant to the propsed new wording anyway, since it states that Common names from reliable sources are preferable. Xandar 00:12, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

"WP:UNDUE is irrelevant with regard to the name an entity calls itself." Says who?

I'm pretty sure we already had that "community-wide debate", when you posted a RFC on this page several months back. And you lost. Before you create a whole lot more needless drama, please explain how the RFC would be different to the previous RFC. Hesperian 02:15, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, While I don't think this is what he meant... Xander is correct in saying that "WP:UNDUE is irrelevant with regard to the name an entity calls itself" (Wikipedia's policies don't apply outside of Wikipedia after all)... However, WP:UNDUE is not irrelevant with regard to choosing a title for a Wikipedia article on the entity. Titles are article content, and article content rules apply no less to them than they do any other part of the article. Blueboar (talk) 02:33, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

• I posted an RFC, not on this matter, but on another doctrinaire and unagreed change supported by Hesperian, which was edit-warred onto this page - namely the removal of the sentence stating that individual naming conventions could set aside the "use common name" policy advice. That RFC proved that there was NO community-wide consensus for that change. And the wording was restored. This change, on self-identifying names was made to the wording of the page following the same pattern, and NO community consensus for such a significant policy change has been agreed. In fact, as was made clear, the wording altered by PMA was agreed on at the merger of this page with Wikipedia Naming Conflict in the autumn. So once again an attempt seems to be being made to sneak a significant policy change through without community consensus.
• On the principle of self-identification, it is clear from the policy that has existed from 2005 to now, that self-identification is not POV and not Undue weight. This was explained at length in the Naming conflict guideline. And as StormRider says, no one has produced one good reason, or a single example of a REAL situation where the use of self-identification as a naming criterion has produced any problem at all. It seems that the move by a few people here is based on an isdeological desire to enforce compliance with a doctrinaire rule. As was raised in the original argument on this issue six montha ago, and now reopened, self-identifying names are especially useful when the "common-name" is offensive or inaccurate - as in "Untouchables" or "Canadian Indians", when the "Name in reliable sources is out of date, and when the name is inaccurate, as per Canadian Navy, or Russian Army. However what we are attempting to do here is not rehash the issues but, if possible, agree a form of wording that will settle the dispute and set out what editors actually do - not try to set rigid rules decreeing what certain people want them to do. Xandar 04:49, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
  • "No one has produced... or a single example of a REAL situation where the use of self-identification as a naming criterion has produced any problem at all." Oh, this is jolly funny. No-one can show where self-identification was used and it caused problems, because no-one can show where self-identification was used at all!

    "[W]hat we are attempting to do here is... agree a form of wording that will settle the dispute and set out what editors actually do...." You keep on claiming that "what editors actually do" is agreed. It is not. No progress will be made here until you either drop the claim that editors take self-identification into consideration, or provide us with an example where a self-identification name was chosen instead of the name indicated by current guidance. If you won't provide an example, another million years of uttering the same shibboleths about "what editors actually do" won't make it true. Hesperian 05:37, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

  • Okay, I've fallen for it again. Untouchable is quite rightly a disambiguation page. No-one can reasonably claim that a disambiguation page with so many entries would be an article if it weren't for self-identification principles. "First Nation/s" smashes "Canadian Indian/s" on Google Scholar by an order of magnitude. Clearly current guidance to follow reliable sources indicates First Nation is the right title; you don't need self-identification for that. Considering there are separate articles for the 1911–1968 Royal Canadian Navy and the 1968–present Canadian Forces Maritime Command, it would be ridiculously imprecise to name the latter article "Canadian navy". Precision—a principle under current guidance—requires us to provide titles that distinguish the two topics. Thus the title "Canadian Forces Maritime Command" emerges naturally from current guidance; there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that self-identification was used, or is needed, to arrive at this article title.

    Once again, I have checked three of your examples, and again demonstrated that they are all utterly spurious. All of these titles are correct under current guidance. Not one of them provides any evidence whatsoever for the claim that self-identification is used by editors. Why are you wasting my time? Hesperian 06:13, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

You cherry picked three of my many examples - and you aren't even right there. Canadian Navy redirects to Canadian Forces Maritime Command, even though Canadian Navy is the common name for the Canadian military afloat. Royal Canadian Navy is not the common name, but a historic term. There is nothing about precision that mandates use of the self-identifying term, since there is only one body that can be called the Canadian Navy. Similarly with First Nations if you google scholar just the words "First Nations", you do end up with millions of hits. However this is counting all the uses of "first" and all the uses of "nations", across the world. for example... If you google scholar on the exact phrase "First nations", the number of hits goes down to 35,000 far fewer hits than emerge from reference to Canadian indians. With regard to "untouchable". This is a particularly bad example for you. Even on google scholar Untouchablesstill gets twice as many hits as "dalit". If we associate "india" with "untouchable", it still gets significantly more mentions. On this basis, under your rules the name of the article should be "Untouchables" - or (using disambiguation) "Untouchables (India)" or "Untouchables (people)". Dalit is a self-identifying term virtually unknown in the west, and is used not because it is "common" or easy to find, but because it is the name chosen by the people themselves. Xandar 01:59, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Cherry picked? I picked the first three you listed above. Maybe, instead of worrying about how much care I'm taken picking your examples, you might take a little more care picking your examples yourself, since they are consistently garbage. I still say that "Canadian Forces Maritime Command" was chosen over "Canadian navy" because the existence of Royal Canadian Navy made the latter title too imprecise.

"There is nothing about precision that mandates use of the self-identifying term." Jolly good; let's keep it that way.

I would never be so stupid as to search without quotes; would you? For "First Nation" and "First Nations", using quotes in both cases, I get 22000 and 35000 hits respectively. For "Canadian Indian" and "Canadian Indians", using quotes in both cases, I get 4000 and 3500 hits respectively. Your assertion is false. Mine is true.

As for untouchables, I made no claim about commonness; I said that "untouchables" is too ambiguous to serve as a title for any article. You're beating a straw man.

Still you have failed to provide a single example where there was consensus to choose the self-identification name instead of the name recommended by current guidance. Hesperian 03:02, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

The content from untouchable was moved to Dalits purely for the purpose of disambiguation. See this comment, from the editor who did the move himself. Knepflerle (talk) 13:33, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

First Nations ended up at its current title after this discussion, based on the number of incoming wikilinks - the common use of editors. Niteowlneils' comment specifically mentions "per 'use the most common name' policy". No mention whatsoever is made of self-identification. This move took place two years into the article's existence, but still months before the creation of anything at Canadian Indians (a redirect to First Nations). Knepflerle (talk) 13:48, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Hesperian. "First nations" and variants, even without adding the limiting connector, "canada" may give 22,000 - 35,000 hits on google scholar. You claim the phrase "canadian indians" strictly linked gives far fewer. However use a simple variant like indians canada and you end up with half a million hits. The key concept here, rejected by the people of the First Nations themselves is "indians" not "Canada", nor the use of the possessive form of "Canada" (ie canadian), which is just a locator. In other words "indians" as a name for the non inuit native peoples of Canada is a far more common name than First Nations in the sources. And even with the benefit of strict linkage, "american indians" appears more commonly on google scholar than "native americans".

Knepferle. There are other ways of disambiguating "untouchable" other than moving it to "dalit". The simplest whilst keeping to your treasured dogma of "common name", would be Untouchable (India), or Untouchable (caste). Moving the page to Dalit was the legitimate use of self-identification to solve a problem in spite of that not being the common name. The user himself in your link above, states that he disapproves of "Dalit" being redirected to "untouchable" because that name is "highly unfelicitous". In other words it is objectionable, and so the self-identifying name was used. With First Nations the move discussed was not from Canadian Indians to first nations, but from First Nations of Canada to First Nations, again the principle of use of First Nations rather than the more common "indians was not being discussed. It was linking the name explicitly with Canada. In fact the page contains objections to use of the term "indians", even in the article text. Xandar 15:42, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Xander... you forgot to put "indians canada" in qoutes... so you are still getting a flawed search that includes every source that uses the word "canada" and the word "indians" even if the source has nothing to do with canadian indians. Try it correctly (with the qoutes) and you only get 429 google scholar hits. To put this flawed example to rest:

• "First Nations" (in quotes to avoid false positives) = 36,400 google scholar hits.
• "Canadian Indians" (also in qoutes to avoid false positives) = 3,650 google scholar hits.

In other words, "First Nations" is by far the most common name for that topic that is used in reliable English language sources. THAT is why we should (and do) entitle the article: First Nations. Self-Identification has nothing to do with it. Blueboar (talk) 16:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

And it is likely that it is most common in part because it is accepted by the peoples concerned (and the Canadian Government); that indirect recognition of self-identification is one of the benefits of common names. However, when the self-identifying name is not English usage, we should not use it; we do not affirm such names ourselves, unless the enormous anglophone community has done so. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:36, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

No. Not at all. We don't put Canadian Indians in brackets when searching because this would eliminate use of "Indians of Canada", "Canada's Indians" and other variations, which lead to the false result above. The simple fact is that these peoples are described more commonly as Indians in relation to Canada, even in google scholar (which is not the sum of all reliable sources) than as "First Nations" in relation to Canada. However this is largely a red herring from the main issue.

I agree with PMA that self-identification is at the root of most common names. However I strongly disagree that we must or that Wikipedia always does use the most common name in English usage when there are problems, such as offensiveness, inaccuracy, or recent changes applicable to that name. However again this is a red herring since the issues we are talking about with this paragraph are WHEN THERE IS NO CLEAR COMMON NAME. So can we stick to what we are discussing please? Xandar 18:23, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Focussing on the issue

We seem to be getting distracted into side-arguments here, so I would once again like to focus on the issue in hand. The most recent proposal for a wording for the sentence in question that could form an acceptable compromise on the topic and replace the agreed merger wording, is the following by Blueboar:

When there is no obvious common name for the topic, as used by a significant majority of reliable English language sources, editors should reach a concensus as to which name is best. Issues that might be considered in reaching such a consensus, include (but is by no means limited to): Neutrality, Self-identification, Precision, Ambiguity, etc.

Can we focus on obtainiong an agreed wording please. Xandar 18:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the proposal is going to work:

Wikipedia essentially defines neutrality as "whatever a significant majority of reliable sources say", and neutrality is actually required, not merely something that "might be considered". If high-quality sources can't agree on a name (which isn't unusual in some articles, e.g., regions of geopolitical instability and newly described psychological phenomena [which are commonly given a plain-language descriptive name by the original describer, Smith, and "Smith's effect" by later writers), then you're going to have trouble with NPOV-style neutrality. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:52, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

OK so take out "Neutrality" as an issue for discussion in reaching consensus. I was mearly trying to come up with examples of the various arguments that might figure into a discussion when there was no obvious common name. The point of my language is that there are any number of issues are appropriate to discuss on the talk page when no common name can be determined from the sources. Self-identification happens to be one of them. It isn't a "criteria", but it is a legitimate issue to discuss. Blueboar (talk) 00:29, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

WikiProjects Covering Metropolitan Areas

It came to my attention that WikiProject Chicago coordinates work not only on articles relating to the City of Chicago proper but also the much larger Chicago metropolitan area. I suggested that the WikiProject therefore be renamed "WikiProject Chicago metro", or something similar, as "WikiProject Chicago" gives the false impression that the WikiProject coordinates work only on articles related to the City of Chicago proper (See that discussion here.) The response I received was that renaming was unnecessary because no other city does so, which I feel is argumentum ad populum--a logical fallacy. As I wrote, why not use the term that includes both, rather than the one that excludes the other? This would seem to be a more accurate naming convention. This issue is important to me because while I am located within the Chicago metropolitan area, and I am interested in many articles involving the Chicago metropolitan area, I am not necessarily interested in articles related to the City of Chicago proper. Looking through the membership of the WikiProject, most members appear to be located within the City of Chicago proper; so I wanted to move this discussion to a more general, perhaps less biased, forum that has less personal interest and involvement with the particular city or metropolitan area in question. I am proposing, as a general naming principal, that if a WikiProject coordinates work only on articles that relating to a city proper, that it is fine to name it "WikiProject City" but if it also attempts to coordinate work on articles relating to a larger metropolitan area, it should be named "WikiProject City metro". With such a convention, there would be nothing to stop anyone from creating a more narrow "WikiProject City" within a "WikiProject City metro" focusing only on articles relating to the city proper. I would very much like your feedback and consideration of this proposal. Thank you for your time and assistance! Squideshi (talk) 22:32, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

I have added this discussion to {{Centralized discussion}}. I oppose such a change in naming conventions. I assume that almost all city WikiProjects also cover their suburbs and exurbs. No name change is necessary.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 01:23, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

We're not in disagreement on at least one point--I also assume this is currently the case. I am proposing that this should be different and have provided some specific reasons to support the need. Most arguments in opposition have been appeal to tradition. Squideshi (talk) 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikiprojects are not part of article space, so the naming conventions on this page do not apply to them. The members of each individual Wikiproject are responsible for establishing the scope and name of that project.—Jeremy (talk) 01:51, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

It seems that Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Council would have been the best place to discuss this issue. I wasn't sure when I started the conversation; but there is currently a link from that talk page to this discussion, so the appropriate people there should be aware of this discussion. Incidentally, do we have consensus that WikiProjects "are not part of article space, so the naming conventions on this page do not apply" to them? Should we go ahead and put that quote somewhere in this article/page? Squideshi (talk) 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Unnecessary policy/guideline creep. Imposing such naming conventions is overkill that doesn't change anything substantive. --Cybercobra (talk) 04:59, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think this is technically correct. WP:CREEP states, "Instruction creep occurs when stated requirements which don't reflect true community consensus nonetheless appear on official guideline or policy pages." Nothing regarding this proposal has yet appeared on any official guideline or policy page. In other words, I started this discussion in an attempt to achieve consensus and prevent instruction creep. Squideshi (talk) 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

It's definitely not an WP:NC issue. WP:COUNCIL is the closest set of related pages, and every precedent there would oppose this. WikiProjects have absolute control over which articles they work on -- which is to say that groups of editors have exactly the same rights as individual editors. If the members want to call themselves "WikiProject Chicago" instead of the more accurate "WikiProject Chicagoland", then that's their lookout. If other editors feel excluded by the project's choice of name, then the project is really only hurting itself. Editors that don't care so much about the city itself might want to look over WP:WikiProject Illinois. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:47, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. This confirms what I said above about a possible better place for discussion of this issue. In regards to precedent, I would classify that as appeal to tradition. Squideshi (talk) 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

The primary issue is that the group has a human right of free speech (specifically, self-identification) to choose its own name (within the limits of Wikipedia's terms of service). This cuts both ways: They cannot force you to change your name to User:Squideshi-in-the-suburbs; you equally cannot force them to change their name to WikiProject Chicago metro. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:12, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is a free speech issue. The right to free speech is not an absolute right and is reasonably regulated in certain cases. For example, in the United States, you can't threaten to kill the President of the United States. Wikipedia has a right to regulate speech in some cases. I would argue that it even has a duty to do so in other cases. For example, one member sexually harassing another is a good case for regulation of speech. Now, this does not mean that regulation in the form of a naming convention for WikiProjects covering metropolitan areas is automatically a good idea--just because an organization can regulate speech does not mean it should do so. The real question is what evil would be prevented? Without going too far into this, let's postulate that the evil here is "confusion" of editors. Wikipedia then needs to make a decision as to which is the greater evil--(1) the confusion or (2) a narrowly-tailored regulation designed to serve the interest of the community as a whole. Isn't that what just about all policies and guidelines are about? Aren't most all of them a form of speech regulation? See Wikipedia:NOTFREESPEECH. I mean, there are rules--Wikipedia is not anarchy--and there is always the safety valve of ignore all rules. See Wikipedia:NOTANARCHY. Incidentally, just out of curiosity, are WikiProjects permitted to self-identify with vulgar, racist, or profane names; or is this type of "speech" already regulated? I suspect that these would already be examples of regulated speech here. Squideshi (talk) 13:11, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia certainly places some regulations on names that users may choose, but the criteria for unacceptable names are quite narrow (and irrelevant), even users with unacceptable names are always allowed to choose any acceptable available name, and Wikipedia never forces a user to give up an acceptable name.

There simply is no process for allowing you to change other people's perfectly acceptable names to something they have refused to be called by. The principle applies equally to all users, whether the name in question refers to a single user or a group of users. "WikiProject Chicago" is an acceptable name under all of Wikipedia's terms. If you can't convince them to volunteer for a name change, then it won't happen. Please consider the advantages (to you) of accepting the defeat of your proposal with a little grace, and stop trying to re-write the rules to gain an advantage in a dispute. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:35, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

The issue then becomes what constitutes an acceptable name and what constitutes an unacceptable name. I would argue that a name that causes confusion can be inappropriate. Isn't that why the whole public body of patent law exists? In any case, the issue isn't about asking someone to give up an acceptable name--the issue is about deciding if a name is acceptable in the first place. I would further argue that this proposal isn't about an individual--it's about WikiProjects. WikiProjects aren't people with rights. They're legal fictions without natural rights. They only have the rights given to them by the entity that permits for their creation, just like corporations. They are only allowed to exist because they serve the interest of the community. WikiProjects exist by the good grace of Wikipedia, and they should never be permitted to do anything that harms Wikipedia. It's not really a matter of individual rights. The members of the organization are distinct from the organization itself. I do recognize that the individuals have rights; but they voluntarily give up some of those rights when they choose to join this community. If they don't want to do so, then no one is forcing them to remain involved in Wikipedia. There is simply no individual rights issue involved here. Now, that having been said, I believe this whole line of argument has gotten off track. There shouldn't be any doubt that Wikipedia has the power and right to regulate speech. The only real question should be on the merits of the proposal itself (i.e. if Wikipedia should exercise the power it has the right to do in setting a naming convention.) I do recognize that the consensus here seems to be against what I have proposed; and I respect that, but I do not think it shows a lack of grace to continue to respond to issues that are raised. Trains of thought and belief don't simply stop because a one-time consensus has been achieved. To suggest that it is somehow distasteful to express those thoughts and beliefs borders on censorship. Don't support the proposal if you don't want, but please don't ask me not to continue to make a case for my own proposal. Last, I do not believe that I attempted to re-write any rules to gain an advantage in this debate. You may disagree with some of my interpretations of existing rules; but that's an entirely different story. Please don't make unfounded accusations. Squideshi (talk) 21:17, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Username policy will tell you what Wikipedia considers to be an acceptable name. As "WikiProject Chicago" does not mislead editors into thinking that the project is a bot or admin, is not promotional/commercial, is not offensive, and is not disruptive -- the four disallowed categories -- then it is not inappropriate.

As a side note, you seem to have misunderstood what a patent is. Perhaps you meant trademark? And you might wish to read a bit about freedom of association, which is the right of individual humans to choose whom they associate with and how they choose to identify themselves and the group that results from their association. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:27, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

First, does Wikipedia:Username policy even apply to WikiProjects? Second, WP:CCC. Note, I'm not saying that consensus has changed--merely that it can change; thus, assuming that the username policy does apply to WikiProjects, the very point of this particular discussion was to determine a new/changed consensus. In other words, in essence, the discussion was intended to determine if the policy needed revision in the first place.

You're right about the difference between patents and trademarks. I meant to write trademark, but I made a mistake and wrote the wrong thing. Thanks for bringing that to my attention.

I am aware of the right to freedom of association as a human right. This is actually an issue that I have studied quite in some depth when working on election reform and laws relating to the regulation of political parties here in the United States. The fact is, like so many other rights, it is not an absolute right--it is subject to regulation when the community can justify such regulation for the greater good. In addition, you seem to be confusing rights in the general public sphere with what rights people have here on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a public organization. It is a private organization, and while it strives to remain very open, Wikipedia users and editors are subject to whatever policies and guidelines the community so adopts. These policies and guidelines do not constitute rights violations because, frankly, no one forces anyone else to remain active in the Wikipedia community. See WP:NOTFREESPEECH. Remaining active is voluntary acceptance of all policies and guidelines so adopted, which I note, does not imply that community members can't work to change the same. Squideshi (talk) 00:44, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Frankly, why bother with things like this--or is this is symptom of some hidden dispute about actual encyclopedia content? DGG ( talk ) 06:14, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Everyone has their own sphere(s) of interest. This issue happened to fall within my own. I think the categorization and classification scheme is every bit as important as the content. Squideshi (talk) 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree with what was said above, especially with respect to this probably being the wrong forum. It's also worth pointing out that both the project page and talk banner clearly state the coverage of the city & metro area. Without any evidence of editors being confused, or prohibiting each other from working on material, or any real content issues occurring here I'd suggest creating some some relevant redirects to the project page and moving on. If you're not interested in writing articles about Chicago proper, then don't, no one can force you. Not all material in a project's scope has to interest you to participate. -Optigan13 (talk) 09:54, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't really see any reason for this. WikiProject Chicago works with things related to Chicago. It doesn't really matter if it's the city proper or metropolitan area. --Apoc2400 (talk) 10:13, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Just to throw something out there, but what about "WikiProject Chicagoland" (as that's what the greater Chicago metropolitan area is colloquially called)? –MuZemike 00:46, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I would argue that the "WikiProject City metro" format is better because it is standardized and can be re-used for other metro areas, whereas "Chicagoland" is a term specific to use in Chicago. In other words, I don't know for sure, but I don't think there is a "New Yorkland" or "Los Angelesland"; but I don't doubt that there is a "New York metro" and "Los Angeles metro". Feel free to let me know if I am wrong about that. Squideshi (talk) 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

No, it's "La-la Land" for LA, and NYC might prefer to call itself the city. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:12, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

That rename would expand the coverage of some projects. In Vegas, the metro area, depending on definition, goes well beyond the valley which is generally the areas all of the those who participate in the project generally include. So I'm far from convinced that this is a good idea. Vegaswikian (talk) 07:29, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

No one proposed that all WikiProjects related to cities would need to rename to "WikiProject City metro". If "WikiProject Las Vegas" doesn't cover the metro area, then as I proposed, "WikiProject Las Vegas" would indeed already be accurate and without a need for change. The only cases in which I proposed the new format are those in which the metro area is actually covered. Squideshi (talk) 13:11, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

A project may wish to include immediate suburbs in its remit but not the entirety of the metro area, which might include several counties, including some non-adjacent to the city's home county. Powers ^T 14:09, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

In general, I oppose this suggestion that a WikiProject named after a city should focus only on the city itself. A city's surroundings are nearly always highly relevant to the city itself. I have found a similar trend in articles on cities that refuse to so much as mention anything on the wrong side of the city limits, and it's a disservice to our readers. WikiProjects should be similarly flexible. Powers ^T 14:09, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Since WikiProjects are in "organizational space" and not "article space", the issue of what to name a given WikiProject is a matter for consensus, not policy. The place to discuss what to name the project (and its scope) is at the Project page. Blueboar (talk) 14:30, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I find this distinction very useful. Thank you. Squideshi (talk) 00:44, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

If a Wikiproject wants to keep an eye on articles peripherally associated with their main interest, and such talk page tagging is not disruptive, then it should be allowed to do so. The members of the Wikiproject are the ones doing volunteer work to improve articles. If Wikiproject Chicago wants to improve the coverage of Category:People from Schaumburg, Illinois they should be thanked, not pestered. Speciate (talk) 06:21, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

I can't see any reason to tell a WikiProject about a city that they have to change their name if they want to cover the suburbs, or restrict their coverage to the city limits if they refuse to change their name. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 16:40, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

What if a competing WikiProject were to come along, interested in working only on articles pertaining to the city proper--not anything in the metropolitan area? Would the first, less accurately named WikiProject, have claim to the name, simply because they were there first? Squideshi (talk) 00:44, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Anyone can start a Wikiproject, so if someone started a project on the Chicago metro area that's fine; it would not affect Wikiproject:Chicago. There are many examples of multiple Wikiprojects with overlapping scope. To regard them as competing is strange to me; Wikiprojects do not own the articles within their scope, and anyone can edit those articles whether or not they are members of the Wikiprojects. Each Wikiproject has the goal of improving the articles that it identifies as being within its scope, so where two projects overlap in scope it simply means that they share the common goal of improving the the articles that fall within the overlap. —Jeremy (talk) 01:30, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The only real problem with the scope of Wikiprojects comes when someone applies potentially controvercial Wikiproject to an article for POV reasons (say, for example, placing the article on Barak Obama underWikipedia:WikiProject Crime and Criminal Biography, or placing the article on the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks within the scope of WP:WikiProject Secret Societies). Blueboar (talk) 02:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Contribute by adding different language names

We have an article Lion in wikipedia. Now Lion is known as Sher in Hindi. can we contribute to Wikipedia by having a table. with the language & what it is called in that language. so that a google search on either sher or lions focusses on this link 202.138.120.38 (talk) 14:23, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

If you go to Lion and look at the left-hand side of your screen, you should see a link to hi:सिंह (पशु). WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:16, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Conflict between COMMONNAME and UE

User:نسر برلين recently performed a very controversial move (clarification: controversial primarily because of double-movement) of Hameur Bouazza from its common usage to the literal translation of his name from Arabic. A thread has been started at ANI. I can't link to it due to technical issues, but the section title is the user's name. Anyway, the admin that got there first declined to do anything, stating that because it is the English translation, and Hameur is the French translation, there was no problem with the move. I'd never really thought about it, but I'd always assumed that we go by the common name; Thierry Henry is not Terry Henry.

Am I right in believing that the common English usage should superceed WP:UE? WFCforLife (talk), Help wikipedia. Make the pledge. 05:28, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The thread in question is WP:ANI#User:نسر برلين.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 05:50, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

This is just a simple but common misunderstanding of WP:UE: the name commonly used in English is precisely what WP:UE wants you to use.

Trying to call names unused in English-language texts "English names" is incorrect linguistic prescriptivism, and labelling names used regularly in English-language texts by English-speaking authors "not English" is incorrect linguistic prescriptivism.

Follow common use in English-language sources, and you satisfy WP:UE, WP:COMMONNAME and WP:V. Knepflerle (talk) 08:36, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

If we really meant the most common name, rather than the most common English-language name, then nearly the entire encyclopedia would have to be renamed into Mandarin (the most widely spoken language in the world). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:20, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps we should we rename?

I have a thought... What if we rename this policy... to WP:Article titles or something similar? It stikes me that conceptually a "Name" has connotations that evoke strong emotions that I don't think are evoked by the concept of an "article title". The two concepts are very similar... but I don't think they are quite the same. More importantly people seem to get worked up about "names"... in a way that I don't think they do about the more dispasionate term "title". Such a change would also make it clearer that this policy is not really talking about the article subject's name... the policy is talking about how best to entitle our article about the subject. Yes, sometimes the best article title is the subject's name... but not always. Thoughts? Blueboar (talk) 18:41, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds more than reasonable. Knepflerle (talk) 20:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I concur. It won't solve everything but it reframes the question of where an article should sit more accurately. Sabine's Sunbird talk 21:11, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I see some ways of this being used by WP:TEs to perpetuate problems (e.g., "Well, the page name can be that, but in the text of the article you still need to do it my way..."), but I think that overall this might be a positive thing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:22, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, next question... if we did this, would we apply the "title change" to all of the myriad topic specific "naming guidelines" (potentially a huge task)? If so we definitley need to file an RFC on this, post it at the Village Pump, etc. and get wide community input. Blueboar (talk) 01:20, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

The change to "Article titles" makes good sense to me. I don't see a need to retitle the other "Naming conventions (xxx)" pages, though, since by and large they do contain actual naming conventions as the term is understood by most people.--Kotniski (talk) 11:18, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

WP:POLICY has a suggested pattern for proposals and other significant changes, and it might be worth following it here (suitably modified), just so that no hair-trigger admin panics about an "undiscussed page move of a long-standing guideline" before actually checking the talk page for discussions. A little advance warning is sometimes valuable, and I wouldn't want to see anyone blocked over a silly misunderstanding. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:20, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

OK... I am going to post a formal RFC on this (below) to see if we can get additional comments and (hopefully) wider community support (or at least let the wider community know we are considering this). I will leave out the suggestion that we also rename the various topic area conventions. Blueboar (talk) 14:59, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

RFC on proposed rename

Proposed: Rename WP:Naming conventions to WP:Article titles or something similar.

It stikes me that, conceptually, a "Name" has connotations that evoke strong emotions that I don't think are evoked by the concept of an "article title". The two concepts are very similar... but I don't think they are quite the same. More importantly people seem to get worked up about "names"... in a way that I don't think they do about the more dispasionate term "title". Renaming the Policy would make it clearer that this policy is not really talking about the article subject's name... the policy is talking about how best to entitle our article about the subject. Yes, sometimes the best article title is the subject's name... but not always. Blueboar (talk) 15:05, 29 January 2010 (UTC)