:5 -- this is the one that presents some difficulties. Including examples would seem to suggest that we changed those article names specifically because of this policy, when in fact those titles predated this policy and were probably more common in reliable sources anyways. The Nanking Massacre one basically makes sense, but again, who says the Rape of Nanjing name was used less frequently because it was a pejorative? There are probably a multitude of reasons for historians moving away from the Rape term. [[User:CaseyPenk|CaseyPenk]] ([[User talk:CaseyPenk|talk]]) 01:26, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
:5 -- this is the one that presents some difficulties. Including examples would seem to suggest that we changed those article names specifically because of this policy, when in fact those titles predated this policy and were probably more common in reliable sources anyways. The Nanking Massacre one basically makes sense, but again, who says the Rape of Nanjing name was used less frequently because it was a pejorative? There are probably a multitude of reasons for historians moving away from the Rape term. [[User:CaseyPenk|CaseyPenk]] ([[User talk:CaseyPenk|talk]]) 01:26, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
:I separated name changes out from becoming-used-less-often-because-pejorative. They seem like two clear-cut, well-defined cases. [[User:CaseyPenk|CaseyPenk]] ([[User talk:CaseyPenk|talk]]) 01:28, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
:I separated name changes out from becoming-used-less-often-because-pejorative. They seem like two clear-cut, well-defined cases. [[User:CaseyPenk|CaseyPenk]] ([[User talk:CaseyPenk|talk]]) 01:28, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
:: (1) No, entities like schools, buildings, and even sports teams cannot ''state'' a preference, nor are they the kinds of things that can ''have'' a preference, but wait for point 4 for more on this....
:: (2) :-)
:: (3) Ok
:: (4) When I say "names that were officially changed" I am thinking of schools, buildings, and sports teams. These things do not change their own names. Someone in an official position to name them does it. So the University administration at St. John's were the people who officially changed the sports teams' name. The "or that have become used less frequently" was meant for things that do not have an official name beyond what we happen to call it, like the Nanking Massacre.
:: (5) "Including examples would seem to suggest that we changed those article names specifically because of this policy" - I disagree. Re-read the text you are proposing. It says ''nothing'' about "changing" the name of articles. Your proposal is about how to name articles in the first place. It certainly will have consequences for cases where a change is proposed, but that is not what the text reads. Furthermore, it ''must'' read this way (as opposed to be about changes) because we want to cover cases where an article is being created for the first time as well. As for the specific Nanking example, I think it is a good one, but if you think there is some doubt that the name is less used because it might offend, then a different example could be used.. [[Special:Contributions/99.192.74.67|99.192.74.67]] ([[User talk:99.192.74.67|talk]]) 02:01, 4 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)
The project page associated with this talk page is an official policy on Wikipedia. Policies have wide acceptance among editors and are considered a standard for all users to follow. Please review policy editing recommendations before making any substantive change to this page. Always remember to keep cool when editing, and don't panic.
Recently I have noted that some editors evoke WP:COMMONNAME in move discussions to suggest that most common layman's usage (as determined through recognizability and usage in general public, ngram results, google hits, etc.) trumps the most common usage within the field of expertise that relates to the article topic (the sources that would be reliable for writing the article). This RfC asks you to provide your opinion and arguments about whether WP:COMMONNAME should be interpreted as an injunction to follow layman's usage if it conflicts with expert usage, and whether you think current policy should be clarified in this regard.
Survey:
Comment I think this interpretation of policy is incorrect and problematic because it leads to situations in which a title can be divorced from the usage in reliable sources (e.g. all the reliable sources use one title, non-reliable sources and/or general usage uses another - so we adopt the latter in spite of all the reliable sources using the former). I think that this interpretation conflicts with the passus in WP:COMMONNAME saying that "Though official, scientific, birth, original, or trademarked names are often used for article titles, the term or name most typically used in reliable sources is generally preferred." I take this to mean that common name tells us to judge which title is more common through using the sources that are reliable for writing about the topic, not that we must blindly follow layman's usage. Even so, because of its apparent liability to this misunderstanding, I think we should amend policy to say clearly that assessments of what is the COMMONNAME should be based on the reliable sources for the topic, not on general usage frequency in the wider public. I don't consider this a change to policy, but a clarification of the originally intended policy. User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw·19:41, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. I'm not sure a hard-and-fast rule here would be helpful or address any known problem. Sometimes we should eschew common usage which is inexact or too informal, even if it is the most common (e.g. "correction fluid" not "Tipex"). But neither is esoteric expertese desirable in titling (e.g. "orangutan" not "pongo"). Maybe the OP could provide examples of where they think problems can arise. Formerip (talk) 20:08, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It can arise for example in relation to names of historical persons or ethnic groups that were previously known by an incorrect, mangled or derogatory name but where historians or ethnologists have since adopted another convention - often the earlier name lives on in popular works and things named after the earlier name and will have higher frequencies of overall usage even when they no longer appear in recent literature about the subjects. I am of course coming from a specific discussion that I have in mind but I am not going to link to it because I want this to be a more general discussion of policy, not about that specific case.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw·20:28, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Neither - WP:COMMONNAME is not about laymen vs specialists. When the policy uses the word "common" it is talking about frequency of usage, not the academic status of the person using it. COMMONNAME calls for an examination of all reliable sources (specialist and lay). We are looking to see the frequency of usage in reliable sources that discuss the topic, regardless of whether those sources are "lay" or "specialist". If it is clear that one term is used significantly more frequently than other terms, we use that term in our articles. We don't actually care whether that term comes from "laymen" or "specialists" (and it is important to note that sometimes the specialist term actually can be used more frequently... the prime example is in our flora articles... where layman's names for flowers is very localized, but the "scientific" name is universal).
Now, when usage is mixed, and a true COMMONNAME can not be determined, I would certainly give more weight to specialist's terms than to laymen's terms... and that weight might make a good tie breaker. But the point is that we don't give an automatic preference to either. Blueboar (talk) 20:55, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree with your notion that WP:COMMONNAME is about frequency - it is about frequency within the domain of relevant knowledge and it weighs frequency against a number of other concerns (I also disagree with the idea of reliable lay sources - at least in my field there is no such thing). User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw·23:31, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I believe newspapers, for example, would be reliable lay sources. It’s not uncommon for the reporter of a story to not be a highly educated expert on the subject of the story. —Frungi (talk) 01:17, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Neither – while I agree that WP:COMMONNAME is widely abused and inappropriately "evoked", I don't think trying to make it more prescriptive will help. It is just one strategy in support of recognizability and naturalness. Sometimes a layman's term is more natural or recognizable than a specialist's term, but we deal with those in a variety of ways in different domains, sometimes leaning one way or the other. Dicklyon (talk) 21:17, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Neither – there is a need to clarify the way that WP:COMMONNAME should be used, but this isn't it. The subsection title is "Use commonly recognizable names". It expands on one of the five criteria, recognizability, to be balanced by editors in choosing an article title. The problem, as I see it, is that some editors interpret "COMMONNAME" as trumping the other four criteria, regardless of how they decide on what is "common". I agree with Dicklyon: trying to be more prescriptive isn't the answer. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:00, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well... to quibble COMMONNAME isn't just a way to determine Recognizability... it helps to determine Naturalness as well (since the most Recognizable name is also likely to be considered the most natural). That's why it is such a good tool for determining the best article title, it hits what are usually considered the two most important of the five principles. Blueboar (talk) 23:00, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"Usually considered" by whom? Not by me. The most important should be Precision. When editors choose common but ambiguous titles we end up with more and more article titles with parenthesised disambiguation, which helps no-one as far as I can see, and certainly doesn't lead to Naturalness. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:25, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Neither - COMMONNAME isnt a trump card, its to be weighed up against other options, and alot of other things come into play, such as: ambiguity, inaccuracy, non-neutrality, vulgarity or pedantry. This is exactly why we have numerous naming conventions for specific problem areas. I think we need to be much clearer about this aswell. -- Nbound (talk) 22:44, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Another quibble... both this policy and the NPOV policy actually implies that COMMONNAME does "trump" non-neutrality concerns. Blueboar (talk) 23:04, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
And if the common name is either incorrect or confusing - what then? Also NPOV doesnt imply any such thing, the common name isnt necessarily free from POV problems (it often is, which is why common name can help; but not always). -- Nbound (talk) 00:47, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Is there anyone actually calling either of those wars the things you said, probably not... if all sources are in agreeance to a name there, isnt any NPOV issue. if its a contentious issue, there may be a reason to choose a neutrally worded name. For example, some kind of issue between two religious groups, one side might refer to it by a negative name, one side might by a positive name, it may be best to choose a name from the middleground, as long as it is reasonably obviously referring to the thing in question. And as always, with any WP rule, use common sense! - furthermore there are other reasons (some listed above) why other names may be chosen over the "common name" -- Nbound (talk) 08:09, 30 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I am a little surprised at the "neither" comments - given that I didn't phrase the question as either-or. I also didn't propose being prescriptive, merely clarifying the policy wording so that it becomes LESS prescriptive by clearly stating that COMMONNAME does not necessarily privilege overall frequency over frequency of use within the relevant domain of knowledge. User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw·23:28, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I believe that COMMONNAME is:
One tool among many, and not always the best tool.
Best interpreted in reference to the frequency in high-quality and English-language reliable sources, not all sources or all webpages.
Neither it has to be the most common usage in reliable sources. This does not mean that the sources are restricted to specialist publications, only that the source be reliable. WP:JARGON clearly indicates we should not be restricted to just specialist publications (such as publications not in English, which is being used to move articles around, because it is the "original language" source). -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 04:58, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly. It all depends on the topic, how different usage is between specialized and non-specialized publications, precisely how specialized the publications are, etc. An article about some aspect of nuclear physics which is rarely covered in the popular media is quite different from an article about a well known historical event, for example. There is no substitute for editorial judgement; no "magic formula" which will avoid the need for discussion in problem cases. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:25, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
WP:JARGON does not cover it as it is a MOS guideline and is neither part of the AT policy of its naming conventions (guidelines). It is covered in the AT policy by "Recognizability – The title is a name or description of the subject that someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject will recognize" (my emphasis). -- PBS (talk) 10:54, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
What does it mean to be familiar with? To me it means to have read reliable sources about the topic written by experts. Reading a book by an expert doesn't make you a specialist but it makes you familiar with specialist usage.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw·03:15, 31 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Theres going to be examples where lay people with an interest will not recognise article titles, purely because a topic has been drilled down far enough that no lay person could be expected to know about it. Another possibility is that a lay persons concept or idea of something could be at best ambiguous; or at worst completely incorrect. As has been said by many here, these policies, especially common name, arent catchall rules, they are tools. Apply common sense and weigh up article names using any and all criteria available; including, but not limited to common name. -- Nbound (talk) 21:42, 30 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This discussion has been citedhere. The citation appears to represent contributors here User:WhatamIdoingUser:Dicklyon 76.65.128.222 User:MaunusUser:FormerIPUser:NboundUser:BlueboarUser:Frungi as supporting that the basic-ASCII html version of an East European name is the WP:COMMONNAME for that person. For all I know it's quite possible that some of the editors in the discussion here do believe that the basic-ASCII html version of an East European name is the WP:COMMONNAME for that person, however I see it nowhere in the discussion here, and we just added François Mitterrand (which is unicode, not basic-ASCII) to WP:COMMONNAME partly to prevent exactly this kind of misunderstanding. In ictu oculi (talk) 05:35, 30 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, our Mitterrand example intentionally says nothing about the ASCII vs Unicode issue... The example given is "François Mitterrand (not: François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand)"... it is an example of where a person's first and last names are commonly used, but the full name (with middle names included) is not. Blueboar (talk) 18:55, 30 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I remember the discussion... you may have had that intent in mind, but I am not sure the rest of us had the same intent. (I know I didn't). Blueboar (talk) 00:29, 31 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if the two people who were primarily involved in adding the Mitterand example were/are not in agreement as to its intent... is there any wonder that that others disagree as to its intent? Blueboar (talk) 14:10, 2 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Keep the recommendation that it be based on usage by Reliable Sources (which can include popular sources such as newspapers). To base it on general lay usage (however measured - Google hits, ngrams, polls, etc.) rather than Reliable Sources would degrade the encyclopedia. You would wind up with articles titled "Princess Di" and "A-Rod". You might as well base the encyclopedia on a Family Feud model, where the winning answer was based on "Survey says...." even if it was factually incorrect. --MelanieN (talk) 17:17, 3 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Sometimes a common term refers to a specific condition (common cold equals viral rhinopharyngitis) and when it does we should use the common term. Sometimes the common term equals many condition (heart attack could mean either cardiac arrest or myocardial infarction, different condition need different articles). We need to use common sense. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 12:48, 16 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
While absolutely agreeing that we need to use common sense (which, as per the cliché, is not always common), we also need to keep remembering that WP:COMMONNAME is just an expansion of one of the five criteria used in deciding on an article title. "Precision" applies in the frequent cases where a single common term corresponds to more than one article topic. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:27, 16 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry for being a bit late to this party! With respect to the exact way in which you phrased your question, I think that in the unlikely event the name used in reliable lay sources is hopelessly in conflict with the name used in reliable expert sources, I do indeed think that the lay sources should triumph. The reason why is pretty well stated in this this essay that another editor wrote perhaps a little to stridently on perhaps a slightly different topic. Basically, wikipedia is a general knowledge encyclopedia, not a specialist source for experts, so why should we follow the generalists when there's a conflict. For instance, as the person said above, and assuming these two things are the same, the article should be named orangutan and not pongo even if biologists exclusively use pongo in their literature. Our readers aren't likely to be expert biologists. (I don't know anything about orangutans or pongos (?) so I'm sorry if this is a terrible example.) Nor should we be running around using super-obscure medical and legal names when more recognizable alternatives will do. I am not sure given the way this discussion is phrased that you adequately considered the possibility of reliable non-expert sources. With regard to the latter question, I'm not familiar enough with COMMONNAME disputes to know whether it needs to be clarified. Sorry. AgnosticAphidtalk06:02, 28 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support clarification as suggested by User:Maunus. Wikipedia should reflect the recent expert knowledge, not layman names. I think that follows from what sources are considered reliable. --Space simian (talk) 09:22, 31 August 2013 (UTC). As an example: alcohol should refer to the article about alcohols and not ethanol; i.e. it should reflect usage by reliable expert (chemist) sources. (And regarding orangutans, I suspect experts refer to them as orangutans for the most part as well.) --Space simian (talk) 07:38, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Diacritics in Latin alphabet European names titles
I've noted over the last 2 years that the WP:LOCALCONSENSUS of the little group of editors (some of whom are not notably active article space contributors) at WT:AT is out of line with the consensus of the community on the subject of full spelling of Latin alphabet European names. The local group here includes at least 1 of the most dedicated anti-diacritic campaigners on en.wp and a couple of editors who sympathize with the position, while at the same time 100% of en.wp's straightforward case Latin alphabet European BLPs use full diacritic unicode titles (except for 1 WP:POINTY exception). The dislocate between guideline and reality is both evident, and potentially disruptive, since the guideline re. (i.e. against) use of full spelling of Latin alphabet European names here occasionally generates confusion outside WP:AT itself.
For this reason the guidance here is probably going to have to go to RfC at some point to attempt to bring what WP:AT says into line with reality and near universal article-contributor consensus in the project. One small improvement that can be made now however, would be to correctly link to WP:Reliable sources. The bluelink [Wikipedia:Verifiability|reliable sources] is currently pipelinked away from WP:Reliable sources to WP:Verifiability, which is a different issue. I propose to correct the pipelink to direct to the correct page. In ictu oculi (talk) 01:56, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This has nothing to do with Unicode or fonts. Those are underware. It's about diacritics. Unicode also includes Cyrillic and Greek and CJK characters among others, but we try to limit ourselves to the Roman alphabet, because those are the characters that English readers have some familiarity with, and can cope with even if they don't know what the diacritics mean. I agree that we should usually use them, except when a name has become very commonly adopted into English without as an exonym. Not all cases will be easy to decide. Dicklyon (talk) 02:14, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Dicklyon, evidently I was using "unicode" as shorthand, I have changed the above to read full spelling of Latin alphabet European names, since that is what is meant. Given that 100% of BLPs (minus 1) are full spelling of Latin alphabet European BLP names, do you believe that those circa 500,000 BLPs appear in high-MOS full diacritic unicode (glossy hardback academic books) more often than they appear in html sources like sports websites? In other words, are en.wp editors following the instruction to count the number of appearances in high-MOS sources vs. number of appearances in low-MOS sources? Take Lech Wałęsa, a typical example, does that title agree with the guideline here to count appearances in high-MOS (10) and low-MOS (12,400) sources? Is the guideline here out of line with article reality or not? In ictu oculi (talk) 02:44, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Diacritics does not mean non-English letters. Diacritic modified English letters are not the same thing as full spelling of Latin alphabet European names, since (1) the true Latin alphabet is smaller than the English alphabet by a few letters, (2) European Latin-derived alphabets contain several characters from non-Latin alphabets, or which do not exist in English alphabets at all. ETH, THORN and ESZETT come to mind as the most prominent examples of non-English letters that are not diacritic modified letters. They clearly are not mostly recognizable by most English language users from outside of Europe itself. The ESZETT looks like a B or Beta and clearly engenders confusion, and the lowercase ETH isn't what most people would think it is (a lower case "O" with an accent) so clearly engendering confusion. THORN looks like someone did a p/d/q incorrectly, which can't happen on a computer, so is uninterpretable. -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 02:58, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hi 76.65.128.222, yes, I think everyone knows this, I think everyone also knows that there are cases such as eszett which are not straightforward cases. What I said above is that "100% of en.wp's straightforward case Latin alphabet European BLPs use unicode titles." Is what I said correct or not? In ictu oculi (talk) 03:10, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I've taken the liberty of (re-)renaming this section to something that's hopefully unambiguous and precise. This isn't about the use of the full set of characters available under Unicode, or the use of any particular alphabet; this is about whether we can/should use diacritics in titles.
And while we're at it: IIO, if I'm not mistaken, 100% of Wikipedia's everything uses Unicode characters, because the site itself uses UTF-8. If you tried to use anything else, it would not display correctly. —Frungi (talk) 06:53, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hello Frungi
You are correct in your question, I can confirm that 100% of wikipedia uses unicode characters, because the site itself uses UTF-8, however not all sports websites cited as sources make full use of the possibilities of unicode.
That correction seems entirely uncontroversial, but I don't see such a link in this policy. Are you sure you've got the right page? Or maybe I'm just missing it. —Frungi (talk) 07:12, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Frungi, yes, you are right, my mistake, on this page WP:UE "reliable sources" is not linked/pipelinked at all, it is 'dead' black text. I was confusing WP:UE with WP:EN, where it is so pipelinked, and based on your comment above I have made this edit there and noted on Talk there. Thanks. In ictu oculi (talk) 09:21, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The linkage should be to WP:SOURCES that is the policy on reliable sources. It should not be linking to guidelines. This page used to point to WP:SOURCES I am not sure when that was changed but I propose that it is changed back. -- PBS (talk) 13:43, 8 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
User:Frungi, I made the edit there as per your "entirely controversial" comment and was reverted by PBS. As I said I believe there's a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS of a small group of editors at WP:UE and WP:EN/WP:DIACRITICS who are at odds with the project as a whole on this issue and that an RfC will probably be necessary to remove the disruption caused by having a guideline WP:POINTedly at odds with article title reality. But in the meantime, how many editors here in addition to PBS object to bluelink reliable sources actually linking to WP:Reliable sources both in WP:UE (here) and WP:EN (there)? In ictu oculi (talk) 06:44, 11 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
As WP:SOURCES points to WP:RS "for further information," I would not object to the text "reliable sources" linking to either one. But I wonder why such a trivial matter as which project page is linked seems to be such a large focus of what seems like it should be a discussion about how articles should be titled. Shouldn't these be two separate discussions to avoid confusion and distraction? —Frungi (talk) 06:59, 11 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Frungi, in an ideal world yes. However given the WP:LOCALCONSENSUS problem at this Talk page I think it's best to be upfront about a principal reason for wanting "reliable sources" bluelink to actually lead to WP:Reliable sources. But this should be a separate discussion and is. In ictu oculi (talk) 07:26, 11 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Frungi, for a long time WP:V carried a statement that when WP:V and WP:RS appeared to contradict each other WP:V took precedence. This (AT) is a policy page: it is better that it links to WP:SOURCES as section in the policy WP:V, than to a guideline WP:RS so that there is no confusion over what reliable sources means. -- PBS (talk) 22:55, 11 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Frungi, I won't waste too much time on this as this is just 2 pages (WP:UE and WP:EN) and two statements which are largely ignored by the editing community since they conflict with article title reality and the overwhelming community consensus. Pace PBS' comments there is now confusion about what reliable sources means, which is why WP:UE and WP:EN mention of "reliable sources" actually linking to WP:Reliable sources would be helpful. Allowing readers to click through from bluelink mention "reliable sources" to see what WP:Reliable sources actually says would confirm that article title reality is in line with WP:Reliable sources definition of WP:Reliable sources as WP:RS "sources reliable for the statement being made", and head off the disruptive interpretation that (e.g.) sources which do not carry French accents are reliable sources for the spelling of French names.
It's unfortunate that a number of editors at WP:UE and WP:EN should have taken up such an antagonistic position against article title reality, whether that is in denial of that reality, or in deliberately wording guidelines to conflict with that reality. But it seems no one is greatly concerned - article contributors ignore the guideline, and the writers of the guideline ignore article contributors. So the situation can be left. This may not be the only example of a MOS guideline which is wildly out of touch with article reality. In ictu oculi (talk) 06:15, 12 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
User:BD2412 I don't think this discussion will help in relation to Zurich since Zurich claims English exonym status, which villages and tennis players don't. I only commented in that RM, my feeling is that Zürich is moving from exonym to endonym (per Lonely Planet Eastern Europe 2012 "Air Berlin (AB; www.airberlin.com) Flies to Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Munich, Zürich and Geneva." which is the pattern seen in other English exonyms where the exonym is only distinguished by lack of an accent or umlaut. This phenomenon is covered in relevant literature such as UN conf on geo names. It seems pretty much inevitable that all exonyms which are distinguished only by lack of a simple French/German/Spanish accent/umlaut will eventually transit to being treated as typographic limits rather than genuine exonyms. This has already happened for modern Cádiz, happened for modern Aragón (and en.wp is lagging behind the change and fighting the sources), but in the Zurich case the en.wp move is perhaps ahead of the print sources change - but nevertheless going in the same direction. In ictu oculi (talk) 04:52, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Energy is not precise enough to indicate unambiguously the physical quantity (see Energy (disambiguation)). However, it is preferred over "Energy (physics)", as it is more concise, and precise enough to be understood by most people (see Primary topic, and the conciseness and recognizability criteria).
I would prefer to see all the five criteria explained a bit more in their own sections, and then each linked, rather than see two linked to the same section. This is not to say that the five are equally important, but to stress that each should be considered. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:22, 17 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to see some examples of possible article titles that would be equally correct to use under the other criteria, but for which conciseness would require using the more compact or less wordy one over the other. bd2412T22:46, 17 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This all makes sense, and I'm sorry the addition of the shortcut to the section about precision was premature. The shortcut is there (along with another if you want it: WP:Concise). Both can easily be retargeted to the section title of your choice when it has been created. – Paine EllsworthCLIMAX!01:13, 18 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Even though they need to be considered together, it would be nice to have a distinct explanation of what each one means. bd2412T01:30, 18 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see changing a redirect to redirect to an irrelevant place as a recommended way to avoid deleting a useless obsolete redirect. Just because they don't list useless and obsolete as a reason to delete doesn't mean one can't delete for that reason; the list specifically says it is not limiting. Dicklyon (talk) 17:17, 18 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Conciseness – Titles are concise, and not overly long.
Conciseness – The title is no longer than necessary to identify the article's subject and distinguish it from other subjects.
As best I can tell, this wording has been stable through the four months since then. Hours ago, someone replaced part of the new text with the old, so it read (with the changes underlined):
Conciseness – The title is concise, not overly long, but long enough to identify the article's subject and distinguish it from other subjects.
Another editor reverted that change, a third editor reverted the revert, and then there were two subsequent reverts citing WP:BRD…
In the interest of sanity, I’ve reverted it to the wording that’s been stable for the last four months, and I’m opening this discussion about changing it from that. Personally, I prefer Finell’s version over the most recent change. It’s more concise, for one thing. —Frungi (talk) 01:57, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The "to" text above ignores the definition of the word "concise", which does not mean "as short as possible". A concise title is both short and comprehensive; it is brief yet still conveys useful information. Some editors prefer to see the shortest possible title as the most concise title, which just isn't what the word means. Omnedon (talk) 02:11, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, it's worth talking about. When I boldly made today's change, it was to undo what may have been an inadvertant change of emphasis. In this edit of last April by User:Finell, with edit summary Recast characteristics as singular in active voice, use terminology consistent with rest of page, the wording was changed as indicated above. So I fixed the old concept to a singular version, incorporating Finell's extra info. What I left out, which is what User:Born2cycle is bothered about, was "no longer than necessary". He always seeks rules that push editors into corners of zero freedom, to make the titling process more algorithmic. He has done this to precision, and now he is trying to do the same for conciseness. It is not necessary to be that restrictive. Editors can consider what "not overly long" means, as we had in there for years. Dicklyon (talk) 02:18, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In reply to both: “concise(adjective): giving a lot of information clearly and in a few words; brief but comprehensive.” To me, “no longer than necessary to …” matches this definition better than “not overly long, but long enough to …”. And with that, I think that’s about all I have to say on the matter; I have no opinion re its restrictiveness. —Frungi (talk) 02:30, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The trouble is that "no longer than necessary" is a novel change that snuck in under a misleading edit summary. The previous concept goes way back; in 2009 it was simply "Concise – Good article titles are short; this makes editing, typing, and searching for articles easier." It morphed around over the years, but never before "as concise as possible", which is too restrictive. Dicklyon (talk) 02:48, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If we do end up going with your version, might I suggest tweaking the grammar? “The title is concise: not overly long, but …,” since the text following “concise” seems to be clarifying what is meant by the word. —Frungi (talk) 03:01, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Aside from other considerations, "overly long" would be better as "over-long"; but either way, the original seems to be tautological. Tony(talk) 04:44, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think the point of having "concise" on this list of preferred attributes at all must be that if two possible article titles are equal in terms of other aspects, then the shorter title is better. For example, New York City and New York, New York probably fare equally well as natural, recognizable common names for the city, and are equally precise. However, the article is at the shorter title, New York City, because nothing longer is required to fully identify the subject. In any case, I think that we should have some examples like this showing that, where all else is equal between two possible titles, conciseness is a tiebreaker favoring the shorter title. bd2412T12:39, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with that to a degree - after all, editors would just as easily recognize Lord of the Rings as opposed to The Lord of the Rings, but we use the full title, and we don't substitute "&" for "and" in titles even though it would make them shorter. On the other hand, we don't use titles like The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, even though that would be accurate and perhaps more informative, because the additional information is unnecessary to get the reader to the article. I like the Merriam-Webster Dictionary's definition of "concise" for this purpose: "marked by brevity of expression or statement: free from all elaboration and superfluous detail". Frankly, I think it is better than our own Wiktionary entry: "brief, yet including all important information". Nevertheless, I think that if we are going to say that titles should be "concise" at all, we should have some explanation, including some examples, expanding on what conciseness means in terms of picking the best title. Once we have that explanation, we can adjust the short version as needed (if needed at all) to better match the broader explanation. bd2412T14:33, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Here are others: from oxforddictionaries.com, "giving a lot of information clearly and in a few words; brief but comprehensive". from dictionary.com, "expressing or covering much in few words; brief in form but comprehensive in scope; succinct; terse". From thefreedictionary.com "expressing much in few words; brief and to the point". The overriding theme here is the idea of balancing brevity with comprehensiveness. An example came up earlier this year regarding naming conventions for geographic names; it involved the city of McLouth, Kansas. The title "McLouth" would, of course, be shorter; but "McLouth, Kansas" is both longer (though not very long) and more concise. Omnedon (talk) 15:17, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent. Let's write it that way and put it in a section on this policy page. To paraphrase what you have written, The overriding theme of conciseness is the balancing of brevity with comprehensiveness. An example arising from the naming conventions for geographic names is the city of McLouth, Kansas. The title "McLouth" would, of course, be shorter; but "McLouth, Kansas" is both longer (though not very long) and more concise. I still think, however, that my examples of choosing New York City over New York, New York, and The Lord of the Rings over The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, are also valid examples of conciseness, and that there is something to be said for choosing the shortest title from a set of equally common and equally informative options. bd2412T16:05, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hang on. If "McLouth, Kansas" is more concise than McLouth, then "San Francisco, California" is more "concise" than "San Francisco". Is that your opinion?
I don't agree that "the overriding theme of conciseness is the balancing of brevity with comprehensiveness". Comprehensiveness is not a criterion at all. --B2C16:09, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
B2C, it's the overriding theme in the definition of concise.
BD2412, I agree that if there are multiple options that are equally informative, then in general shorter is better. It's just that in some cases, the shortest possible title is not very informative at all. I entirely agree with your LOTR example; adding "by J.R.R. Tolkien" begins to move away from conciseness. Omnedon (talk) 16:15, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
B2C, I agree with Omnedon that "McLouth, Kansas" is a more concise title because even though it is the primary topic of "McLouth" (as evidenced by "McLouth" redirecting there), it is still a small and obscure place for which the average reader would have no frame of reference at all without "Kansas" being included in the title. Therefore, McLouth, Kansas is the shortest title to give the reader a comprehensive sense of what an article with that title will be about. Most of the tens of thousands of small towns in the world, even if they are unique names, require such a geographic indicator. Most of the handful of "world cities" (San Francisco, Paris, Hong Kong, Nairobi) do not, because the average reader already has a sense of where they are from hearing that much of the name alone. New York City stands outside of this paradigm only because the primary topic of the term, New York, is the state that encompasses the city, but "New York City" is still identification enough without saying New York, New York (or even New York City, New York). bd2412T17:06, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
bd2412, I agree with what you've said. To take a higher-level view of article titles, there are broad categories of articles to which special considerations may apply -- such as populated places, among others. For that reason I disagree with the idea of stating in policy that the shortest name is always best or most preferable, or that the shortest name is always the most concise. Sometimes it is, but sometimes it is not, and we need some flexibility. There may be an argument that says, "Then why not 'McLouth, Kansas, USA', or 'McLouth, a city in the state of Kansas in the United States'?" As you rightly said, "McLouth, Kansas" is the shortest title that conveys something about the subject of the article. It strikes the balance that is called for by the goal of conciseness. One can go too far either way. Omnedon (talk) 17:27, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I mostly agree with BD2412 and Omnedon. Conciseness does not equate to brevity. I'm not sure New York City is a particularly good example of conciseness though. I would rate it a wash on conciseness or perhaps a slight edge to NYC. I think NYC is preferable more so on naturalness and common usage than on conciseness in that "NY, NY" is really only commonly used in a) postal-form references, b) presentations in which NY, NY is used to be consistent with other cities, and c) some occasional pop culture references alluding to the song popularized by Sinatra. older ≠ wiser18:35, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think those involved in this discussion would benefit from considering some of the points previously raised about this issue. The (short) names of legislation is an interesting area to discuss because the names are already unique within a jurisdiction, so the only reason to add to them is for disambiguation unless one considers the short names given to legislation are too short (this is discussed in detail in the archive section Wikipedia talk:Article titles/Archive 33#Article specificity) -- PBS (talk) 19:53, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I've read the linked sections, and seem to disagree generally with you preferences, and strongly disagree with rationales offered by some who agree with you (you yourself provide few words of rationalisation). I find I agree with basically every word offered by Tony.
Arguments against helpful titles include "Bottomless quagmires of dispute", "Slippery slopes" and other logical fallacies. Is there a history of reader-helpful titles causing readership problems? Policy shouldn't be written to serve editors over readers.
If most readers cannot reasonably make an educated guess as to the subject of an article from its title, then it needs more information in the title.
Title bloat? Is there evidence? What does the real world do? I think I read in some archive a driving reason for super incision being that it is easier to type short titles. Well, that's an editor concern, not a reader concern, and should be dismissed as such. Superconcise titles make great redirects. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:20, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think that to a degree articles are titled for people who already know enough about the topic to be looking for it. From B2C's list below, for example, I've never heard of Tuulepealne maa, and because I've never heard of it, I would have no reason to search for it. A qualifier like (TV series) or (Estonia) or (Estonian TV series) would not be useful because for me to go looking for that title at all, I would basically have to know what it was already (although, yes, all of those titles could be made into redirects, which would not hurt anything, and theoretically might possibly help someone, sometime). We might say, then, that the best title is the most succinct title to completely identify the topic as it is likely to be known to the average person searching for that topic. bd2412T00:38, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
One way to look at this is, what is wrong with a clear, accurate and precise title? Especially one that is unambiguous and is likely to not need moving in the future. Vegaswikian (talk) 01:12, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, you say: "If most readers cannot reasonably make an educated guess as to the subject of an article from its title, then it needs more information in the title." If we apply that to the list below of random titles, 9 out of 10 "needs more information in the title", since most cannot make an educated guess as to the subject of the respective article from those titles. Even if you exclude the four that are apparently about people (if "about a person" is a close enough guess about the subject of the article), we're still talking about a majority. Not only that, but for most of these there is no obvious "more informative" title, so we can expect endless debate about each. And, apply that to 50-95% of all of our titles, depending on how you define a good enough educated guess. No matter how you slice it; totally unworkable. Titles were NEVER meant to convey the subject of an article to someone who is unfamiliar with that title/subject. This scope limit has always been made clear at recognizability. --B2C03:22, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
BD, I think this is pretty good: " the best title is the most succinct title to completely identify the topic as it is likely to be known to the average person searching for that topic.", though I would strike "completely".
Vegas, what is wrong with "a clear, accurate and precise title" is that Tuulepealne maa, for example, may be "clear" to some but is not to most. So how do we decide what is "clear"? --B2C03:22, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
A random sampling
Okay, let's dispense with the strawmen arguments: Nobody is saying that conciseness means shorter is always better. We all agree Yogurt is better than Yogur, even though Yogur is shorter.
Now here is something we all agree about: Concise means short and informative. But informative about what, exactly? Let's look at ten actual random titles to get an idea of what "informative" might mean with respect to WP titles:
Whenever I grab a random sampling of our titles, it's quite clear that with respect to topics that have names, we try to make our titles "informative" in only one respect: to inform the reader what the name of the topic is. We don't try to inform our readers, in the article title, that Tuulepealne maa is an Estonian TV series, that Kevin Chapman is an actor, or that Honey and Dust is a book.
Now, let's look again at the cherry-picked (not random) example of McLouth, Kansas. It (and other US cities) is an aberration/exception compared to regular practice. We don't try to inform our readers, via the article title, that Mount Shadow is a small peak in New Zealand. Why is there a need to inform our readers, in its title, that the town named McClouth is in Kansas?
Right now it's generally clear that, with a few exceptions (most notably US cities), when a topic has a name that does not require disambiguation, we use that name as the article's concise title, and such a title is as informative as it needs to be. If we wish to make our titles more informative, so that they become recognizable to even people who are not familiar with their respective topics, that opens up an enormous can of worms. Suddenly at least nine of the ten titles in the random list above, currently stable, become open to change.
Putting aside a few exceptions like US cities, there is very little precedent in policy or especially in practice for making our titles "comprehensive" or "informative" (beyond informing readers what the name of the topic is), except when disambiguation or a contrived/descriptive title is necessary. We should not state or imply otherwise. --B2C20:38, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No strawman arguments were presented, and my single example was not cherry-picked; rather, it was an example that has been discussed before. And yes, you have suggested that this interpretation of "concise" was wrong, and you have tended to equate "concise" with "short", insisting that Wikipedia has its own definition of "concise" (which, if true, should not be true). A concise title is not always the shortest possible title, and an example has been given, representative of tens of thousands of similar articles. I am not suggesting that titles be comprehensive; that the definition of the word "concise" can include the word "comprehensive" doesn't mean that the latter term suddenly becomes a criterion of its own. But titles certainly should be informative to at least a minimal degree. What is this article about? Almost no one looking at the title "McLouth" would assume it was a city; it might be any number of things. Add the state and it is immediately much more clear to a large number of readers. No more is needed; but no less is sufficient. In other areas of Wikipedia, such as articles about people, the situation is different. Hence the need for flexibility in titling. Omnedon (talk) 23:58, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think we should value "helpful to our readers" above "need to inform our readers". "Need" is very extreme a requirement, and its thrown around with little definition. Titles are important because they are the main information available before loading a page. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:24, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
BD, yes, Tuulepealne maa and Honey and Dust are titles of works, but you can't know that from looking at the titles. For example, Honey and Dust could be a band name, or the name of a notable boat. We are not informed from the title about what it is, nor should we be. More to the point, conciseness should not imply that these titles need to have additional information in them in order to be "informative".
Yes, Kevin Chapman, Priyanka Vadra, Bert Marshall, and Marcus Griffin are all obviously human names, but that's by happenstance. Is Astrid Lampe a human, a place, title of a work, or what? Do you know without looking? I, for one, had never heard of any these people. If the article title is to inform readers that McLouth is a city in Kansas, shouldn't article titles also inform readers that Chapman is an actor, Vadra a pol, Marshall a hockey player, Griffin an American football player and Lampe a poet? I don't understand how you're defining "informative"... informative about what, exactly?
Now, consider the countless cities all over the world that are not obviously cities from the titles of their articles, like Ceri, Haringsee and Casape. Why is it so important to make an exception out of US cities like McLouth? But I don't really want to get into debating the merits of adding state names to US city names here - my point is that practice is an exception; it is not a standard practice for article titles, not even for city article titles, and we should not state or imply otherwise. The reason we specify state in the titles of US cities is not to be informative, but because McLouth, Kansas can be seen as the full name of that place.
To reword conciseness in a way that says, suggests or implies that WP titles are supposed to be informative (or, God forbid, comprehensive), opens the door for proposing the moves of the majority of our articles. Maybe that's exactly what some people want, but I don't see consensus for that. --B2C23:21, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, what does "helpful to our readers" mean in terms of how it affects our title choices? Look at my random list. Nine out of ten could easily be seen as currently unhelpful. If that's a representative sample, we're talking about 90% of our titles. Are you in favor of changing almost all our titles in order to make them more "helpful to our readers"? Not to mention that opening them for rename means opening the door for deciding on what exactly the "helpful" title should be. --B2C23:26, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Most titles are fine. Many could be more helpful, and changing them is best done on a case by case basis on individual merits. Obscure small towns would be helpfully disambiguated by location, even if their indigenous name is technically unambiguous. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:43, 19 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
On what grounds do you say that "most titles are fine"? I mean, I agree, but I also don't think we should be changing titles in order to make them "more helpful". If I believed we should be changing titles in order to make them "more helpful", then I would have to say that most titles are not fine.
When I read articles for pleasure or work, I rarely encounter obviously unhelpful titles, queen consorts being a major exception. The Random article link rarely gives me an obviously unhelpful title. Policy should freely allow for helpfully amending by location the titles towns of lower Austria, but only if editors genuinely interested in the towns do the renaming. I do not support WP:at title experts performing mass bot-like edits/moves as they may be unaware of a particular ancient town having great sensitivity about being labelled Austrian. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:35, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
WP:USPLACE has us use state names in almost all US place names for reasons other than conciseness, but that aside: The way I see it, “McLouth” sounds like a surname. It sounds like something that is not the subject of its article, so the qualifier is warranted. “Tuulepealne maa” and “Honey and Dust” could be anything and don’t sound like anything in particular, so there’s no conflict with expectation; that is, one wouldn’t likely search for those names expecting to find something else. —Frungi (talk) 01:38, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, I cannot understand what you're saying because you keep using terms like fine, helpful and obviously unhelpful without defining what that means to you in a way that I would know how they would apply to various titles. I know the dictionary definitions, of course, but I don't know why you would think (if you do) that McLouth is unhelpful (or even "obviously unhelpful"), but Simuna and Salorno, are, perhaps, among the "most titles" which are "fine". What criteria do you use to decide if a given title is "fine", "helpful", "unhelpful" or "obviously unhelpful"? In the random list, how would you classify each in these terms, and why?
You, or any random person here, is likely in a very poor position to decide what is the best title for a topic, with regards to helpfulness. Helpfulness is a quality with meaning to people associated with or interest in the topic. "Fine", as I used it, means it seems OK to me, I have no particular problem, however I am not expressing a deeply considered opinion. "McLouth" is unhelpful because it looks like a name, it looks like it is probably an article on a surname, or a clan. "Simuna" and "Salorno" seem fine to me, and may or may not be fine to people interested in these subjects. "Salorno", I would probably prefer to see at "Salorno, Italy" but I would certainly not presume to boldly do it without input from people interested in the topic. On your ten random titles, I consider them: (1) fine, specific and precise and very unlikely to be mistaken for something else; (2) fine, expecting to find a biography; (3) fine, probably, accepting that the title case indicates that this is a creative work and not a bee keeping subject; (4) fine, looks like an eastern name, expecting a biography; (5) fine, wondering whether it should be Chinese instead of China; (6) fine; a name, expecting a biography; (7) fine, sounds like a mountain, not so concerned about mountains needing more information like obscure towns, could be expanded or merged to Admiralty Mountains; (8) fine, a name, expecting a biography; (9) maybe fine, I might prefer to see it at Siribala, Mali; (10) name is fine for now, article needs expansion or merging. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:53, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Frungi, maybe I missed it before, but you seem to be introducing a new criterion. That is, you seem to be saying that if a title "sounds like something that is not the subject of its article", it shouldn't have that title. And you want to incorporate this new criterion into conciseness? Is that right? How are we supposed to decide if a given name sounds like a certain type of thing? I mean, does Plaus sound like a surname? --B2C02:07, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I didn’t say it even had anything to do with conciseness (rather, it’s naturalness); it’s simply another consideration, of which conciseness is but one. You asked specifically about that title, and I gave rationale for it off the top of my head. Titles aren’t, and can’t be, decided on just one of the WP:CRITERIA while ignoring the rest. —Frungi (talk) 02:27, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This section is about the wording of conciseness, and, therefore, what it means and how that applies to titles. In this subsection I'm asking about how the "informative" aspect of "conciseness" applies to the list of 10 random titles. In particular, if McLouth, Kansas is preferred over McLouth because the latter is more "informative", why doesn't the concisness "informative" criterion apply to each of the obscure names in the list? --B2C03:22, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry for my confusion; I thought you were suggesting that we consider conciseness in a vacuum in evaluating these titles. Personally, I agree with both the current wording and Dick’s “The title is not overly long, but long enough [or: informative enough; comprehensive enough] to identify the article's subject and distinguish it from other subjects.” To my eye, many of the selected titles are sufficiently informative to not be confused for other possible subjects. They don’t need further detail because they already meet recognizability in that “someone familiar with … the subject[s] will recognize” them (I think; I’m not actually familiar with any of them), and they’re not ambiguous. McLouth, on the other hand—even if it weren’t in a US state—is also clearly a surname, so it needs that additional detail to “distinguish it from other subjects”. Clear? —Frungi (talk) 04:39, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Even if there weren’t other uses on Wikipedia, there would still be other possible uses, as well as the natural inclination that a term like that is a surname. Adding the state is a concise way to clarify that. Also see SmokeyJoe’s recent comment above re helpfulness. And I don’t know if it’s just the way I’m reading your comments, and I apologize if that’s the case, but it still seems to me that you’re looking at conciseness exclusively from all other considerations rather than in concert with them. —Frungi (talk) 02:55, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If there weren't other uses on WP, then the WP process of disambiguation would not apply, other possible uses notwithstanding. US city names are an exception - for the vast majority of our articles we use the concise commonly used name of the topic, and only make it more informative if necessary to disambiguate from other uses of that name on WP, without regard to other possible uses. We should not imply otherwise in our policy. --B2C16:22, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Proposed wording for a section on "conciseness"
I have made an effort to synthesize the discussion above, and would like to propose that we keep the wording for "conciseness" in the first section as is, and add the following section to the project page, after the section on preciseness:
The overriding theme of conciseness is the balancing of brevity with sufficient comprehensiveness to identify the topic as it is likely to be known to the average person actively searching for that topic. An ambiguously named topic will require a longer title to distinguish it from other, similarly named topics. This is the case even for terms that have a primary topic. For example:
NYC redirects to New York City, but even though NYC would be a much shorter title, it has a number of other meanings that are completely unrelated to the city. Therefore, NYC is inappropriate for use as an article title.
McLouth redirects to McLouth, Kansas. Even though the title "McLouth" would be shorter; but "McLouth, Kansas" is both longer (though not very long) and more concise because the average reader would be likely to read McLouth alone as a surname.
Eric Clapton is the only notable person having that name. Eric Patrick Clapton, Eric Clapton, CBE, and Eric Clapton (musician) are all titles containing more information than is necessary to identify the subject, and in fact are less likely to be the title searched for by the average reader.
Tuulepealne maa is an Estonian TV series, which a very small proportion of English-speaking people are likely to have heard of at all. Although Tuulepealne maa (TV series), Tuulepealne maa (Estonia), or even Tuulepealne maa (Estonian TV series) would contain more information, this additional information would be unhelpful to the person who would typically be searching for this title, because they would not be searching for it if they were not already aware of the show.
It is important to note that conciseness can not be considered in a vacuum. Very often, the name which people come to adopt as the common name of a thing will also be the most concise name, because the ease of using a shorter name contributes to its adoption as a common name. Furthermore, if the most concise name for a subject is also an ambiguous title, then a longer name will need to be chosen, or a disambiguator added, to avoid ambiguity.
I like some of the language above quite a bit; the introduction provides some good clarification, but I am opposed to one example. We have some local consensus for the naming of geographic locations that may vary the general rule and impose "internal disambiguation". I do not want to get into whether we should honor the local consensus, nor whether it is correct or not and the project page already states "Exceptions to the precision criterion, validated by consensus, may sometimes result from the application of some other naming criteria.... The point is that the general rule should not be changed and the principal we should be highlighting is stated in your introduction (and contradicted by the McLouth example as well as the Tuulepealne maa example): "...to the average person actively searching for that topic." Precisely. A person searching for McLouth already knows what it is. A person typing it into an article knows what it is also and will make the editorial decision of whether it needs a pipe or by context whether it's 100% clear ("the neighboring town, [[McLouth]]". Our readers will only come upon Mclouth because they are searching for it (so know what it is), or through an article (which will in almost all cases give context to what it is). What other possibilities are there, if any? We don't need to disambiguate titles "internally" unless they are descriptive titles, as opposed to named things and you can't get more precise than describing a topic by its actual name. Advising that we should in any way is a slippery slope. Most things in the word cannot be recognized from their names unless someone already knows what they are. Ask yourself what you would think Pink Floyd was if you had never heard of them. I would guess a type of sea sponge. The logic scheme behind having McLouth, Kansas is no different than Pink Floyd (band) and there's the soap for the slope.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 22:13, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I see your point, and I suppose that it is too much to try and shoehorn a justification for geographic naming conventions into conciseness, particularly where they may represent an exception to the rule. bd2412T22:36, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. I'd actually prefer to remove the USPLACE example from the precision section as well "Bothell, Washington" for similar reasons. Dohn joe (talk) 22:54, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Let's avoid using "ambiguously" ambiguously. Do we mean "ambiguously" in the dictionary sense (conflicts with other uses uses on or off of WP), or in the WP sense (conflicts with other uses on WP)?
I continue to object to the use of "comprehensive" or "comprehensiveness" with respect to describing a goal of titles. A term, which is all titles usually are, are not comprehensive. Titles are just convenient ways to refer to topics. There is no balancing to brevity - brevity (and conciseness) encompasses sufficiency.
I suggest we use shortness and accuracy instead. We use "New York City" rather than "NYC" because while NYC is shorter, "New York City" more accurately reflects the most commonly used name for that topic.
"Typical" is better than "average" in this context.
The sentence "This is the case even for terms that have a primary topic." is not true. E.g., Paris, Water, Houston, diamond, etc. etc.
So, putting it all together...
The overriding theme of conciseness is the balancing of shortness with sufficient accuracy to identify the topic as it is likely to be known to the typical person actively searching for that topic. A topic with a name shared with other uses on Wikipedia that is not the primary topic for that name requires a longer title to distinguish it from other uses. For example:...
To me that makes it sound like the examples refer to instances where the term is not the primary topic. All of the examples are primary topics of the title, and other than NYC, are therefore the titles themselves. bd2412T17:00, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I see. I guess I don't understand what exactly these particular examples are supposed to illustrate. NYC is not inappropriate as the title of that article because it has other uses; it's because "New York City" is the more commonly used name in reliable sources. Eric Clapton is the quintessential primary topic example. Tuulepealne maa is the quintessential "only topic" example. None of the examples support the contention that "An ambiguously named topic will require a longer title to distinguish it from other, similarly named topics for terms that have a primary topic." --B2C17:10, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The point of NYC is that although it is shorter, and the city is the primary topic of the term, it is too abbreviated to be the title. Note that New York City (disambiguation) exists, and that New York City itself is therefore not the only topic of that name. However, New York City is still more clearly about the city than NYC would be. As for Clapton and the Estonian TV series, they show that whether a name is famous or obscure, if it is the primary topic of the term, nothing else should be added or included. I would go so far as to say that if we were to title our Clapton article, Eric Patrick Clapton, the additional material would confuse readers rather than assisting them (although that is as much a common name matter as it is a conciseness matter). bd2412T17:20, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
NYC is not "too abbreviated" to be the title. If that were the term most commonly used in reliable sources, it would be perfectly fine to use as the title. See IBM, AT&T, NBC, etc. If "NYC" were "too abbreviated" to be a title, then countless other examples, like these, would be too. We should not be suggesting that NYC is not the title of that article because it's "too abbreviated" because that's not the reason it's not the title. With respect to Eric Clapton and Tuulepealne maa, those two again are the most commonly used names to refer to their respective topics, for which each is either the primary or only use, respectively. Conciseness or preciseness has very little if anything to do with these particular title selections. --B2C18:06, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
New York City over New York, New York or San Francisco over San Francisco, California are good examples of conciseness. It's difficult to find such examples because conciseness only applies when there are two potential titles both of which are used about just as commonly in reliable sources. In other words, in practice conciseness is only used as a tie breaker criterion, when the recognizability and naturalness don't indicate one (except for US cities which are the primary or only uses of their short names and are not on the AP list for which consistency is used instead of conciseness for the tie breaker). --B2C18:51, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
NYC is not the name of New York City. IBM, on the other hand, is arguably a name of the company which is also known by a longer name, International Business Machines. So no, NYC should not be the title of the article on New York City. It is not concise. Omnedon (talk) 19:03, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In practice? I can't recall a single case where conciseness was a significant criterion and it was not between two potential titles of which neither was clearly favored by naturalness/recognizability (per usage in reliable sources). Can you? Where? --B2C19:08, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You seem to be talking about moves. I am talking about titling. New articles are created all the time, and conciseness is one of the five criteria to be considered when deciding upon a title. It matters. Omnedon (talk) 19:26, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm talking about both. Can you provide any examples of article titles in which the title would likely be different if not for conciseness, and it's not a title where naturalness and recognizability (per usage in RS) don't clearly prefer that title over others?
My point is this: when someone is picking a title, if naturalness and recognizability clearly indicate one particular title, and there is no ambiguity issue with other uses of that name on WP, that title will be used without regard to conciseness. In practice, conciseness only matters in selecting titles when naturalness and recognizability do not clearly indicate one particular title, or the disambiguation process is at play.
Just a note from someone who was active when we first outlined the five criteria... we were not thinking of conciseness in as nit-picky detail as choosing between New York City and New York, New York (we would have said those are essentially equally concise). We were thinking of a situation like: Supreme Council, Scottish Rite (Southern Jurisdiction, USA)... while not short, we chose that title because it was a hell of a lot more concise than the full (official) name of the organization... which is: [[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]]. I hope you would agree that the full "offical" name would be ridiculously long if used as an article title. Blueboar (talk) 18:42, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
As I remember there were two reasons why we didn't go with "Mother Supreme Coucil of the World"... one was ambiguity (it helps to say what organization one is talking about in the title)... the other was POV (the Supreme Council, Scottish Rite (Northern Jurisdiction, USA) disputes the claim of primacy made by the Southern Jurisdiction... so we chose to avoid that issue in the title.) Blueboar (talk) 00:27, 22 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Again, usage in reliable sources (naturalness/recognizability) indicates the shorter one anyway. --B2C19:08, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Lack of conflict between the criteria is a good thing, yes, but then it's not an example of a title that is what it is due to conciseness. --B2C03:52, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would argue that if we choose a given title based solely on a single consideration (such as conciseness) that’s mutually exclusive with anything else, something has gone wrong. Why can’t it be an example of conciseness among other things? Or are you arguing for the removal of that criterion? —Frungi (talk) 04:29, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am trying to generate an explanation of what, exactly, conciseness means in terms of article title policy - beyond the blurb in the list of five things. That is why I would like to include a section teasing out exactly the circumstances where this rule would come into play in determining an article title. bd2412T04:48, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Somehow, a term I used in discussing the definition of the word "concise" has made its way into the discussion in another way. I used "overriding theme" to describe the concept of balancing brevity with comprehensiveness, in that definition. In other words, that's the gist of "concise". In terms of the way conciseness is applied to article titling, I entirely disagree with using it to say anything that suggests the title should be as short as possible. I also disagree with excluding geographic name examples; the title "McLouth, Kansas" is a very good example of the balance we need. Omnedon (talk) 12:14, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
“Conciseness” list wording
Since the original topic seems to have sputtered out without much of a consensus, I have a pair of questions for everyone:
Does anyone other than User:Dicklyon have any objections to the wording “no longer than necessary to …”?
Does anyone other than User:Born2cycle have any objections to the wording “not overly long, but long enough to …”?
I have been following this discussion, but have not posted on it until now as I did not feel I had anything to add that had not already been said. However, having been asked for an opinion now. to answer your two questions: 1. no 2. yes. The wording “not overly long, but long enough to …” is clumsy and the objections raised to “no longer than necessary to …” are frankly ridiculous. Just my 2c. - Nick Thornetalk05:45, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am not attached to the awkward "not overly long" wording, but that's what we lived with for a while before the more absolutist "not longer than necessary" wording came in in April. We could go back to something more like what we had a few years ago: "Concise – Using names and terms that are brief and to the point." Dicklyon (talk) 06:36, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
However, the wording is actually "The title is no longer than necessary to identify the article's subject and distinguish it from other subjects". You are cherry picking only part of what is being said in order to make it seem to say something it does not. Taken properly in context the current wording equates to conciseness, properly amplified for clarity, - Nick Thornetalk23:49, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, I agree that we should not have our own redefinition of the word here. With that in mind, we could use something like this: "Concise - the title is both short and informative." Omnedon (talk) 12:53, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
How about this: "Concise - the title is not substantially longer than needed to identify the subject". I propose this since the "informative" aspect of the title is identifying the subject, and not, for example, providing additional biographical information. Eric Clapton (born 1945) is clearly more informative, but the date is not needed to identify the subject. bd2412T13:21, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The combination of "short" and "informative" would not tend to lead to the title you suggest, especially when combined with the other four titling criteria. Omnedon (talk) 13:42, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Let's not get hung up on the dictionary meaning of "concise" or "conciseness" and focus on the concept which actually is and has been the relevant criterion used to select titles for WP articles. At least partially because of this criterion, we prefer Ernstbrunn over Ernstbrunn, Austria, San Francisco over San Francisco, California, Sega Genesis over Sega Genesis and Mega Drive, Nikau over Nikau tree, David Owen over David Owen, Baron Owen and Napoleon over Napoleon I. When push comes to shove, what's going on here is this: if two titles are otherwise equally well supported by the other criteria, and both are available, we prefer the shorter one. Maybe conciseness is not the right word, but that's what this criterion is really about. Therefore, that's what the policy should say. --B2C20:17, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But the definition matters, as much as you wish to sweep it aside. And you should not say "we prefer" because not everyone agrees with you on these examples. One of those examples is spurious, because San Francisco does not include the state due to a completely separate issue. Further, I would not agree with your statement; sometimes the shorter title is preferable, but not necessarily. So no, that is not what this criterion is really about. Omnedon (talk) 20:21, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You want to live in a black and white world. And your direction is to get changes that can be enforced as black or white. The problem with this is that we live in a grey world and the negative consequences of black and white choices are ones we can not live with, especially when someone is willing to draw a line in the sand and allow now variations. Most of us can not live with that. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:42, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Although that was not directed to me, I am interested in having a section offering expanded discussion of this topic precisely so I can know how to weigh those shades of grey. bd2412T03:22, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
WP title space is not "the world". We have control in WP title space that is incomparable to our lack of control in "the world". "The world" is way over on the gray end of the gray-to-black-and-white spectrum, but where WP title space falls on that spectrum is almost entirely dependent on how we define the relevant polices and guidelines. Can we get it all the way over to the extreme where there never is any debate about any title? Of course not. But can we move it closer to the black-and-white end by tightening up some of the language in our policies and guideline, in order to greatly reduce how much debate we have about titles? Absolutely. But those who want to have the grounds to argue for any title they happen to prefer will of course favor keeping the relevant rules regarding WP title space closer to the gray end of the spectrum. --B2C00:35, 26 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Stylized non-trademark titles
I’m copying this from WT:MOS since this page seems more active: Do we have a guideline or consensus about non-trademark names, like song and album titles, that use strange stylization? I can’t find anything, but my impulse would be to apply MOS:TM to any oddly styled titles and use the most standard-looking format in common usage. —Frungi (talk) 18:04, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would tend to stick a bit more closely to the original artist-made titles of creative works than to merely commercial products. bd2412T18:34, 20 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
First, let's be clearer about what exactly we are talking about? On one hand you have stylized typography. For example, the Beatles used a stylized typography on most of their early albums and on Ringo's drum kit. An example of a stylized typography which we don't repeat when presenting a name in Wikipeida. On the other hand we have stylized spelling. For example, the way deadmau5 is stylized with the number 5 instead of an "s".
To me the key to figuring out whether to present a name with stylization in Wikipedia is to determine the stylization is used by reliable sources when talking about the topic. When talking about the Beatles, very few (if any) sources use that band's stylized typography ... so neither does Wikipedia. On the other hand, when talking about Deadmau5, lot's of sources use the artist's stylized spelling ... so Wikipedia does as well. This is essentially a function of WP:COMMONNAME. Blueboar (talk) 12:55, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"Deadmau5" is an exception to the rule - from recent discussions, it seems 100% of sources use this, so we would be at odds with the rest of the world if we didn't. Otherwise, I'd say apply WP:NCCAPS or MOS:TM - the same principle would apply to non-TMs with similar stylings. See Se7en and all the other examples at MOS:TM. --Rob Sinden (talk) 13:01, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No, Deadmau5 isn't an exception to the rule... it's a perfect example of the rule in action. I think you may misunderstand what the COMMONNAME "rule" actually says. In most (if not all) of the examples at MOS:TM, WP:COMMONNAME does not apply ... because the sources are mixed in how they present the name (for example, about half of the sources use "Se7en" and half use "Seven"). In other words, they are cases where we don't actually have a COMMONly used name to follow. Blueboar (talk) 13:27, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
We had a dispute a while ago about the film, Dot the i. The title is self-evidently intended to have a lowercase "i" (since you can't dot an I, unless you are speaking of the Turkish İ, which this film is not). Nevertheless, many sources capitalized the "I" in reviews and commentaries; others did not. The result of the two move discussions involving this title was to keep the "i" lowercase. This is, to me, a perfect example of artist's intent trumping other style considerations. bd2412T13:57, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, you'll find that is far from being a perfect example - it's a terrible example, as the requested move was closed as no consensus, despite theirthere being a consensus to move. The move review was poorly handled also. There is however definitely no consensus to WP:IAR in that case. --Rob Sinden (talk) 14:10, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There were nine !votes in support of moving (including the nominator), and nine !votes opposed to moving. There is no scenario under which that constitutes "their [sic] being a consensus to move". Virtually all of the support for moving was by reference to Wikipedia policy, not the actual merits of one title or another. This discussion is about what the policy should, in fact, be. The fact that half of the people in that discussion preferred substance over a mere recitation of policy indicates that the policy needs to be adjusted to match circumstances in the real world. bd2412T14:19, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Apologies, my memory failed me - it was closed as not moved, despite there being strong policy and guideline based arguments for the move, and weak arguments along the lines of "it's what the poster says" against. At worst it should have been a no consensus. The move review was badly handled also. So, yeah, not a good example. --Rob Sinden (talk) 14:25, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think it is an excellent example of the need to expand upon article naming policy to state that where the artist has chosen a certain title styling for a creative work, and at least some reliable sources use this styling, then that styling should be permitted as an article title. bd2412T14:40, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Good luck with that - I think it illustrates perfectly why we shouldn't permit it. I think the last paragraph of the lead at WP:NCCAPS explains it well, and may help Frungi, as it shows the ethos behind why we don't use "official" styling. --Rob Sinden (talk) 14:54, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"Dot the i" is also a terrible example of anything because the movie poster clearly shows a capital I being dotted by a blob of blood (and a lowercase "dot": "dot the I"). Why some people insist on seeing and wanting to ape a lowercase i there baffles me. Dicklyon (talk) 15:11, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I get the idea that people are trying to figure out what the "official" Stylization for a movie/song/album/artist/etc is. That's wrong... Remember that we do not necessarily use "official" names... nor should we necessarily use the "official" styling. That said, I strongly feel that we should be "sourcing" style presentation. It's time to create a COMMONSTYLE policy that echoes COMMONNAME. We can not judge COMMONSTYLE usage on one movie poster or youtube trailer... we need to examine style usage in multiple reliable sources. For example... To settle whether to present the movie's name as "Dot the I" or "Dot the i", we would need to see how the name is presented in a wide range of reliable sources... especially those that talk about the movie... industry magazines, news paper reviews, etc. (and since I have not done such an analysis, I have no opinion on which it should be). The same is true with all other "styling" disputes. If a significant majority of appropriate (reliable) sources present the topic/subject using a given stylization, then (assuming it is physically possible given the limitations of our software) Wikipedia should follow the sources and do so as well. If, on the other hand, source presentation is more mixed... then we can say that there is no COMMONSTYLE, and we are free to discuss what presentations we (the article editors) think would be best and reach a consensus. Blueboar (talk) 17:09, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That is exactly what happened in the Dot the i discussion (at least with regards to my participation in it). I provided reliable sources of exactly the kind you mention (industry magazines and newspaper movie reviews) showing use of the lowercase i. Of course, there are sources using it both ways, just as there were reviewers of U-Turn (1973 film) and of U Turn (1997 film) which left out the hyphen when it belonged in the title, or added the hyphen where it didn't belong, and just as a number of reviewers carelessly wrote about "Inglorious Bastards". If you were to put the Dot the i reviews on a scale, probably more sources weighed in favor of the uppercase I, but if the author's intent was to name the film with a lowercase "i", then this is no different from carelessly "correcting" the spelling of "Basterds". bd2412T17:28, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Personally, I’d prefer that guideline to say (I know it’s awfully worded, but still) to use standard-looking style if it could reasonably be said that such a style is in somewhat common use (as is the case with “Seven”, and not the case with “Deadmaus”). It shouldn’t be a matter of which style “wins”, but whether our preferred (lack of) style is actually used. But that’s a discussion for MOS:TM, and my question was about non-trademarked names that it does not apply to—or should it be applied to all stylized names regardless of legal status? —Frungi (talk) 18:29, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That's why I like the idea of a COMMONSTYLE guideline... the legal status of the name does not matter... usage in sources is what matters. If a significant majority of sources present the name with a given stylization when talking about the subject, we would present the name with that stylization too. If the sources don't stylize, then neither would we. And if the sources are mixed, we discuss, argue and reach a consensus as to what we think is best in that specific instance. Blueboar (talk) 18:55, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
We are really not talking about legal status here (except, perhaps, under some European Moral rights type of regime); in the United States, at least, the titles of individual works of art are not protected other than by trademark attaching to their commercial use. Nevertheless, if a majority of sources errantly identified Tarantino's World War II opus as "Inglourious Bastards", or wrote about K.D. Lang, we would be wrong to follow their mistake. bd2412T19:10, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
So do we have any such guideline, or anything that would contradict it, or anything? Or is MOS:TM currently the only place we directly address the matter (aside from capitalization)? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Frungi (talk • contribs)
I would say that MOS:TM doesn't really "address the matter" at all, since it apples to trademarks, and titles are not trademarks. It's the wild west out here. bd2412T20:18, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This was prompted by a discussion (between two people) about Japanese song and album titles (which aren’t trademarked), since Japanese artists and labels have a habit of inserting characters like 〜 (wave dash) and ☆ (star) into some of their titles. Sometimes they’re purely decorative, and sometimes they serve the purpose of dashes or parentheses. —Frungi (talk) 01:32, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Moral rights
This discussion got me thinking about whether Wikipedia does, in fact, recognize the moral rights of artists. The principle is mentioned here, with respect to paraphrasing. It seems to me that, just as Wikipedia recognizes copyrights (and therefore will not allow copying of a copyright-protected work) and dignitary rights (and therefore would not allow libel or slander to occur either in the body of an article, or in an article title), we should recognize some measure of moral rights. Under Article IV of the Berne Convention, the author of the work has the right to have the title of the work appear on any copies of the work distributed. Presumably, this would be the title as chosen by the author, including any unconventional capitalization. I think it is a reasonable precaution to apply that to articles discussing such works, to the extent that this does not broach technical limitations or conflict with other legal regimes. bd2412T17:45, 22 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well, no. It's not a legal concept here in the US. and there is nothing in the style guides suggesting it as a consideration. Whether it should be, is another matter. — Arthur Rubin(talk)02:22, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at it just from a reader point of view, unconventional capitalization (or punctuation, etc.) in titles could very likely hinder readability in prose. As a display title, it’s fine, but we don’t really use display titles. —Frungi (talk) 02:31, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I can imagine some artists intentionally naming a work using a mix of camel case, letters, numbers, punctuation, and so on, just to make an artistic statement. I suppose a good example would be Prince's adoption of a symbol as his name, which lead to the papers calling him "the artist formerly known as Prince". If we were to recognize moral rights, I think they would still be trumped by at least technical limitations and readability concerns. Beyond that, as an intellectual property attorney, I would say that it would be difficult, but not impossible, for an artist in a moral rights country to get a court to issue an order demanding that we title our article on his work just as the artist titled the work. bd2412T03:46, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Temporarily closing this section, pending a resolution of the Manning rename. That rename discussion has had a lot more input that this page, so the whatever comes out of that should inform what we do here. As such, I propose we keep this closed until a week or so after the move request is closed, to let things settle down, then re-open or start a new section with any new proposed policy changes. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 01:57, 26 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
This policy (Wikipedia:Article titles) does not appear to deal gracefully with titles of articles on transgender individuals. In particular, the section on "Use commonly recognizable names" (WP:COMMONNAME) does not address a situation when someone declares a certain gender identity and coverage by organizations/media** shifts from using the old name to the new name.
**Shorthand for "major international organizations, major English-language media outlets, quality encyclopedias, geographic name servers, major scientific bodies, and notable scientific journals"
The case of Chelsea (formerly known as Bradley) Manning presents a great example. There is considerable debate on that article's talk page with regards to what the article should be titled. The debate is weighty and multifaceted, but the discussion here (on this talk page) should be limited to article titles and not to pronoun usage or any topic other than titles.
I see there being three major options to address the uncertainty many editors (including myself) feel with regards to this policy.
Option 1
Recent coverage by organizations/media should be weighed more heavily than older coverage when considering titles of articles about transgender individuals. Coverage produced after someone declares a given gender identity should be given more weight than coverage produced before the declaration. Reports using the person's previous name should be considered less weighty than more recent reports.
This proposal rejects, at least in the case of transgender individuals, the notion that the article title should not be changed until / if the sum of historic coverage of the new name outweighs the sum of historic coverage of the old name.
Whether this change should apply to all articles or just to articles about transgender individuals is another, related question.
Option 2
The titles of articles on transgender individuals should be exempted from the organizations/media coverage consideration. Instead of following the reports of organizations/media, Wikipedia should title articles according to the person's latest preferred name. The intent of this option is to respect the wishes of the transgender individual, and refer to him or her using the title he or she prefers. This proposal echoes MOS:IDENTITY, which currently does not address article titles but does address vocabulary.
Option 3
Keep the policy as it is. Do not change it.
In summary, I propose discussion about these three options:
Recent coverage should be given more weight than older coverage in the case of titles of articles on transgender individuals. (Whether recent coverage should be given more weight for all articles on Wikipedia is another, broader topic).
The titles of articles on transgender individuals should be exempt from considerations about coverage by organizations/media, and should instead follow the person's latest preferred name.
This policy (Wikipedia:Article titles) should remain as it is. No change is necessary for transgender individuals.
I think that it is abundantly clear that sometimes names change, and that these name changes can come about irrespective of a change in legal status. I would agree that "Recent coverage by organizations/media should be weighed more heavily than older coverage", but I would say that such a principle should apply universally, and not just with respect to gender changes. Chastity Bono became Chaz Bono, but by the same stroke, Ron Artest became Metta World Peace, Stacy Ferguson became Fergie, and Chad Johnson became Chad Ocho Cinco, then Chad Ochocinco, and is now back to Chad Johnson (although he has not legally changed it back, due to cost considerations). In each case, the new became the predominant usage in the media, and the article title eventually followed, changing to the new name. bd2412T18:50, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In any case, I do think it would be nice to clarify the policy on name changes. How do we handle situations in which some entity changes its name? That's an open question, and one of the core discussions we'll need to have. CaseyPenk (talk) 18:53, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I've been following the discussion on too many Noticeboards and Talk Pages and this is the first one I've encountered that actually thoughtfully talks about Manning in the light of how this should be addressed by Wikipedia Naming and BLP policies and whether those policies need to be amended to deal with notable people's name changes.
Personally, I think we should call people the name they identify with. This can change based on marriage (or divorce), pseudonyms, nicknames, showbiz names, etc. Think of it this way, if there was an actress everyone knew as "Margaret Sullivan Smith" and she got a divorce and wanted to be known as "Margaret Sullivan", wouldn't Wikipedia change her article title, even if people still referred to her as "Margaret Sullivan Smith"?
I was going through old bios of actors who worked circa 1900-1950 and I'd guess only 25% of them used their birth name. But, of course, Wikipedia refers to them how they chose to be identified in their careers, not by their given names.
This is itself a weighty and multifaceted question that I can't say I have thought about enough to have a fully informed opinion about. But I did want to point out that, given that the MOS does require the body of articles to use (sorry!) pronouns reflecting their self-declared gender, it may be worth considering whether or not it's awkward to use a birth name with a unexpected pronoun. Personally, it seems awkward to have sentences like "John was arrested when she went to the grocery store", but on the other hand, with certain article subjects the birth name may be so familiar that using the new name so that it matches the pronoun could be equally or more unexpected. AgnosticAphidtalk20:56, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well, that's certainly an excellent point. Perhaps my feeling of awkwardness with name/pronoun disagreement just reflects my lack of exposure to this issue. AgnosticAphidtalk22:51, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
With respect to the issue B2C raises, had Manning announced a desire to be treated as a women without simultaneously announcing a name change, we would still change the pronouns in the article to reflect this new gender identity. bd2412T23:06, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The reason I am uncomfortable with just adopting reliable sources' names wholesale based on a head count is that it is unclear to me how we would determine whether reliable source X's decision to continue using birth name was a deliberate choice or not. I totally agree that it makes sense to distinguish name and title from pronoun use now that you've shown me that male names can coexist with female pronouns in WP articles, but just using this example that I am familiar with (sorry again! especially since you need to have no opinion about it!) it's not clear to me that news sources that continue to use "Bradley Manning" necessarily made a deliberate decision to do so. Furthermore, Manning's not really a good example, so leaving that article to one side, with regard to transgender people that are notable but not especially famous, it's entirely possible that a reliable source would ignorantly utilize a birth name without knowing that the person recently announced a they preferred a differently gendered name. AgnosticAphidtalk00:21, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
My thought on the matter of naming is that we use the common name, except when that name is wrong. Mark Twain is a perfectly acceptable common name for Samuel Clemens, since it was his pseudonym. The Statue of Liberty is a perfectly acceptable common name for Liberty Enlightening the World, since it is a descriptive name given by the people. Sears Tower, however, is not acceptable, because it is incorrect. It's not a current valid name, nor was it an organic name given by the people. It was the name of a building, and now it is not. We should give more credence to accuracy than commonality. So, in the case of Manning, the decision seems clear: The article should be at Chelsea Manning. To do otherwise would either be inaccurate, or be an admission that names cannot be chosen by the parties involved, they can only be determined by a government or culture. --Golbez (talk) 21:05, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support Option 1 - We should follow usage in reliable sources, as always, and, when there has been a recent change, give more weight to usage in recent publications. Absolutely reject Option 2 - WP needs to follow the lead set by reliable sources. We do not make the decision to use the new name someone has announced they prefer to be called, unless and until other reliable sources do so. We have no obligation or responsibility to be more sensitive sooner to such matters than the New York Times. --B2C21:56, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support Option 3 - It pretty much is the normal for newer sources to have more weight than older ones when it comes to an article title, making into policy I don't think is really needed. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:34, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well, of course, many of the Support votes are doing so. But many of the opposes are arguing we should follow the person's request immediately, and not wait for reliable sources. I favor Option 1 because I think we should be clear that even in such cases we follow sources, albeit the recent ones. --B2C23:28, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support option 2 as this option is in accordance with our existing policy on the matter per MOS:IDENTITY and WP:BLP. Someone's name, and hence the title of a biographical article, is really a BLP issue, and the only requirement for using someone's correct name will be that we have reliable sources, not volume. You simply don't refer to someone using a name which they have explicitly asked not to be used, that's just not acceptable. In any case, media coverage prior to the name change is obviously irrelevant in regard to the title. Obviously, a new situation in that regard emerges when someone adopts a new name. The old name then simply becomes inaccurate/its use outdated. Josh Gorand (talk) 23:31, 23 August 2013 (UTC) (some minor changes added later) Josh Gorand (talk) 23:42, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Per your statement "In any case, media coverage prior to the name change is obviously irrelevant in regard to the title," would you support option 1 as a fallback or alternative? CaseyPenk (talk) 23:37, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I obviously agree with the principle that media coverage after the fact carries more weight. Although I still think this is a BLP issue and an issue of factual accuracy, not media coverage. Josh Gorand (talk) 23:42, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict)×2 Where any living person unambiguously expresses a wish to be known by a certain name, and this expressed desire is verifiable in reliable sources (including in a reliable primary source) then our article title should match that desire, subject only to disambiguation and transliteration issues. Anything else is incompatible with WP:BLP. Where an expressed wish does not meet either criterion, we should wait until it is both verified and sufficiently unambiguous for our purposes. If relevant, we can report on what other sources, which do not necessarily have an equivalent to our BLP policies, choose to do. I don't know if this translates well to articles that are not about living people, so I offer no opinion about them at the moment. Thryduulf (talk) 23:43, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support option 3 - there is no need to change a system that clearly works for transgender people (and presumably including Manning, once the article is unprotected and people have a chance to fix it). It should also be noted that COMMONNAME is not, and never has been the overriding tool in title choice. It is one tool amongst many. This is exactly why we have naming conventions (formally or informally) for many sections of wikipedia, where using the "common name" is likely to create issues -- Nbound (talk) 23:44, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Who knows? Even the numbers you have suggested (which could be and probably are quite wrong [it could be higher or lower] for all we know) would still leave tens of thousands of articles that dont follow it alone. I would of course contend that almost all articles are compatible with COMMONNAME, because it is one tool amongst many, and not the be all and end all or article naming. -- Nbound (talk) 00:38, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
What I mean by "compatible with COMMONNAME" is the title is the name used most commonly in reliable sources to refer to the topic of the article (or that name disambiguated). You don't have to look at all titles to determine the percentage. Just keep clicking on SPECIAL:RANDOM, ignoring titles of unnamed topics with descriptive titles, taking note of how many do and don't meet this criterion, until you have a statistically significant sample size. Yes, there is a tiny percentage of articles, which amounts to a few hundred or maybe a few thousand, which are exceptions to this, but they are extremely rare indeed (go ahead, try to find one), and all have very good reasons to use some other name. I see no reason for this article's topic to be one of those rare exceptions. --B2C00:49, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
As a roads editor, I know that both the US and Australian Roads projects have article naming conventions (WP:USSH and WP:AURDNAME), WP:USSH even being part of the result of an ArbCom decision, which suggest usage other than the common name (or a "specific" common name instead). The main issues for roads were ambiguity and plain incorrectness. These are not the only naming convetions by a long shot, and there are others which arent formalised (The main points of AURDNAME were only formalised very recently for example) -- Nbound (talk) 04:12, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I will also point out that without an intimate knowledge on many topics, you may not know what is the official name, common name, legal name, and so on of these said topics either. Just because going through a tiny percentage of wikipedia articles (well, minuscule fractions of a percent), we cant find any that are obvious to a layperson, doesnt mean they dont exist, or arent even common. Games consoles like the original Nintendo Entertainment System, had different names depending on where you live. similarly sources will depend on where published. For these articles again, there are other considerations than basic common usage.-- Nbound (talk) 04:21, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Its just occurred to me that all 3 options are very similar depending on interpretation of whats written. I infact agree with 2 and 1 aswell. If we need something at AT for transgendered people than so be it. Im not the only one who has had issues with interpreting this. This needs to be clarified, and a new discussion started. -- Nbound (talk) 05:48, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Insisting upon usage of a former name because the media clings to it is possibly a very offensive and hostile act. When a user at Wikipedia has their account renamed do we still go around openly referring to them by their former user name? No. Some people will know it. Others might learn it. But it is considered disrespectful to flaunt it. Why would we even entertain the idea of treating the subjects of articles worse than we expect of each other? Would that surely not violate the very spirit of the policy on the biographies of living people? When it is a member of a royal family their article changes the day their 'top title' changes and no consideration is given for how little coverage there is in the media about them by that title. American media still frequently refer to her as Kate Middleton but there doesn't seem to be a fight to move the article on her away from Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. Insisting upon a certain amount of media coverage before an article on a transgender person is renamed while doing so instantly for royalty is basic discrimination. This is what redirects are for. Only at Wikipedia and only when the change of name involves a transgender person who has their own article is such fundamentally basic information as a person's name challenged with the aim to reject it as unencyclopædic. Creating an explicit policy/guideline/whatever that justifies discrimination is a dumb thing to do. Casey, you asked on the article talk page why use of a transgender person's birth name is "among the worst things to call a transgender person". Think for a moment simply of the person. Attach to that a great social stigma regarding the reason for the name change. Try to imagine how a name can be used as a very personal pejorative. It seems innocent but if you actually look at it what use of a birth name is doing is refusing to acknowledge the person they are actually speaking/writing about/to. It is conveying "you were and are and always will be <birth name> regardless of everything else" and i/we don't accept/acknowledge this. There isn't the same social stigma attached to marriage but a woman might have similar feeling if you habitually refuse to acknowledge her marriage by insisting upon using her maiden name. The "my name is now Chelsea" letter is published on NBC's website, both in text and a photograph of the original. Do we really think we need or are owed a personal invitation to use her name in referring to her? I guess i fall somewhat near Option 2 except that i don't think accepting or rejecting any person's name based on what the editor of The New York Times likes is an acceptable thing in any way; it is just deferring blame to someone who didn't actually edit the article at Wikipedia. Media are very often against changes of name for private and public matters because it disassociates people with their past and requires re-connecting-the-dots to establish why this name is worthy of mass news coverage. Expect there to be for months or years to come sources which use the name Bradley because that is the famous name. This is what redirects are for. delirious & lost ☯ ~hugs~00:48, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You have many good points, but you should be persuading the editors of the reliable sources whose (recent) adopted usage we follow, not the editors of WP. --B2C03:47, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This goes beyond that, its a BLP issue as well. Imagine for a moment there was an article about you, most people get offended/annoyed when there are small innaccuracies (COI problems on these articles arent exactly rare). Now imagine if the article refered to you by the opposite gender than the one you identified with, most people would be annoyed or even angry with this. Wikipedia isnt a news agency, we dont need to keep around old usages to sell more copies. We can be very very accurate though, that is generally the point of Wikipedia, and indeed any encyclopedia. Right in the WP:BLP lead it states "We must get the article right." -- Nbound (talk) 04:12, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support Options 1 and 3 (I see them as being the same)... It is important to realize that name changes are not unique to the transgender community... lots of people change their names... hell even entire countries can change their names... and we deal with all name changes the same way: With patience. In any name change situation, there will be a period of time when the subject is still more recognizable under his/her/its old name. Once a reasonable number of reliable sources start using the new name, and that new name becomes more recognizable, then we would change the title. How long this takes depends on the individual subject/topic and source usage... It took years before we had enough sources to justify moving Bombay to Mumbai... with other name changes it took only a week or so. Blueboar (talk) 01:14, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 3 This is obviously related to the Bradley Manning / Chelsea Manning debacle and so I think it needs to be considered after that requested move as the outcome of that will inform this discussion as to what community consensus actually is. I think a significant thing to remember is that article titles are the names we call articles by. The names of the subject of those articles (including the names we call the subject of those articles by) may be very different. The two are not the same thing. From that perspective, I don't see why articles on transgender people should be treated any differently. An article is an article is an article. The name we give to the article is not necessarily the name we call the subject of that article by. --RA (✍) 01:35, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support Option 2, also support Golbez's expansion: while transgender issues are currently a flashpoint for how COMMONNAME works, I've long been opposed to how COMMONNAME is used as a stick to beat others with. See, for example, Paul McCartney's Russian album, in which COMMONNAME ended up overruling common sense: while many sources used the formulation "Choba B CCCP", it was clear from other reliable sources given (and the album cover itself) that it was supposed to be "Снова в СССР" (tr: "Snova v SSSR"), which is Russian for "Back in the USSR".
With regards to transgender issues, as with all BLPs and to quote the policy, "we must get the article right". When a transgender person transitions, as I am doing, when we change our name it's an intention to leave the old name, which often does not match our gender, behind. To see it being used in a deliberate fashion, often against our express wishes, is incredibly insulting. I can't see how that would comport to BLP's requirement of ethical treatment at all.
The GLAAD media guidelines for transgender issues clearly state that we should use someone's chosen name in all cases. NHS guidance on trans care also state that "names and titles must be changed to reflect current gender status". I'd like to know why Wikipedia should travel a different route. Definitely, we should not rely on reliable sources to change themselves if we have a RS for trans status; as Lord Justice Levesonremarked:
It is clear that there is a marked tendency in a section of the press to fail to treat members of the transgender and intersex communities with sufficient dignity and respect; and in instances where individuals are identified either expressly or by necessary implication perpetrate breaches of clause 12 of the [Press Complaints Commission Editor's Code of Practice]. Parts of the tabloid press continue to seek to ‘out’ transgender people notwithstanding its prohibition in the Editors’ Code. And parts of the tabloid press continue to refer to the transgender community in derogatory terms, holding transgender people up for ridicule, or denying the legitimacy of their condition.
In some ways, the attitude that keeps appearing with regard to trans people vs. COMMONNAME very often does the same thing Leveson criticised the press for. Sceptre(talk)01:55, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Articles are given names that are convenient for readers to find. More often than not, that's the same name as the subject of an article. But it might not be. I think the primary mistake here (and on the Manning page) is conflating the title we give to an article with the name we call a subject by. We can start calling Manning, Chelsea right now, for example, but the page should only move when readers expect to find the article under the title "Chelsea Manning". We're not the NHS. We're not here to help Chelsea Manning transition from being a man to a woman. We can extend courtesy and respect to her choice, but the titles we give to our articles are named with respect and courtesy for our readers, not Manning. --RA (✍) 02:31, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 4 (an alternative proposal) - the 3 options as initially proposed do not properly frame the issues. Depending on how one reads Option 1 (and a little clarification from its proposer may be in order on this point), Option 1 and Option 3 are the same. Option 1 says that "recent coverage should be given more weight than older coverage in the case of titles of articles on transgender individuals. (Whether recent coverage should be given more weight for all articles on Wikipedia is another, broader topic)." Well, Wikipedia's policy on titles already requires that "if the name of a person, group, object, or other article topic changes, then more weight should be given to the name used in reliable sources published after the name change than in those before the change," which is essentially the same as what Option 1 proposes, so Option 1 does not change existing policy. The problem with Option 2 is that it errs in the how it assigns relative degrees of reliability to sources. Option 2 treats media organizations, for example, as more reliable on the subject of an individual's name than the individual him- or herself. That is an understandable result of how Wikipedia's policy on reliable sources might be interpreted, since that policy emphasizes the importance of "third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." However, to claim that a third party knows a competent adult's name better than the person him- or herself does is nonsensical. We need an Option 4, which would add a statement to the WP:TITLE policy explicitly clarifying that in cases of individuals announcing a name change related to a self-affirmed gender identity transition, the individual him- or herself is the most reliable source and the final arbiter on the subject of the person's name and gender identity. Article titles should consequently be based on the name the individual has announced for him- or herself. (The person's earlier name/s and gender transition would be discussed in the body of the article.) The existing redirect system would make it easy for readers to still be able to find articles even if they search for the past names of individuals who have changed their names as part of their gender transition. Dezastru (talk) 04:06, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 3 for now. In the middle of crisis is not a good time to work on a careful adjustment to policy. And we should be careful. Let's revisit this after the Manning thing settles out one way or another. Dicklyon (talk) 04:13, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 2. This seems the most logical choice. If someone no longer self-identifies as male, female, or robot, they shouldn't be referred to in that manner any more. The same is true of anyone who changes their name. We shouldn't have to wait for The New York Times to update their style guide before we can update ours. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 05:23, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
option 3 + a section for TRANS people, describing that while we use pronouns that they have self-identified with, the title of the article is still based on WP:AT. Otherwise, I don't see a need to have a special accommodation for people who change gender w.r.t article titles - remember, the title of an article is NOT the person's name, it is the title of an article. The person's legal or preferred name can be (and often is) different than the title, which is chosen for the sake of the readers, not the subject. As such, the current language, which states that we prefer sources AFTER the name change is announced, should be sufficient. Also per Dicklyon, it may be worth shutting this discussion down for a week's time, awaiting the results of the Manning mess, then coming back here to finalize this discussion.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 11:13, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 3 It seems wholly confusing to modify the policy midstream (as we all know which article this is about). And, more importantly, I remain unconvinced that there's something with transgender people that warrants a special case. Wikipedia is not here to promote or advocate for any cause. As everywhere else on Wikipedia, we are a reflection of society; we base our information on reliable sources, not on the desires and preferences of editors. It is not our fault if society, represented by reliable sources, does not heed a subject's name change, transgender or otherwise, and it is not our role to pioneer a trend. -- tariqabjotu14:46, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 2 We are not talking about SEO optimization , we are talking about people. This is needed specially for cases when the person is still alive. This is consistent with MOS:IDENTITY and WP:BLP. "Confusion" is really an unimportant issue that is easily solvable, just use a redirect from old article name. Also note that these are cases in which media treatment is severely afflicted with systemic bias, so this exception is needed to avoid it. Vexorian (talk) 16:59, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Option 3 (no change) is best in the present editorial climate. Note that Option 1 is almost the same, and would be a better solution in practice provided we added some small guidance to the effect that public name changes by an individual do not cause an article to begin violating BLP or other core policies, and do not require blazing-speed out-of-process moves for the sake of avoiding such violations. So long as we recognize the legitimacy of debate over what name is actually used in recent sources, there is no practical issue. The ugly nonsense seen recently was caused by certain editors believing that exigent circumstances, such as the fleeting opportunity to demonize persons not the subject of an article, override not only consensus but every other consideration. 168.12.253.66 (talk) 17:11, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sure you're aware that this would be a major and dramatic change, and would require moving dozens or even more articles possibly - all in contravention of COMMONNAME and recognizeability. Cat Stevens, Snoop Doog, etc...--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:16, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Cat Stevens is a very good example. In that case, the subject changed his name for an equally sensitive and passion-raising reason: religion. We respect their choice of name in the text but the article title is at the name readers are most familiar with regardless of the subject's preference for their own name. --RA (✍) 20:24, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Have relevant wikiprojects been contacted? (ie. LGBT/transgender related) - Failing to do so will cause all kinds of trouble if any changes get passed without input from interested groups. ArbCom - here we go!? -- Nbound (talk) 23:44, 23 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
They need to be contacted in regards to any individual discussion thats likely to have any significant effect on their project - If it has not been done yet - I would suggest it is done before the this progresses much further. -- Nbound (talk) 00:08, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Please note that name change issues extend beyond transgender articles. For example, it is fairly common in the United States for a person converting to Islam to adopt a new name (see Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Kareem Abdul Jabbar). This name change similarly reflects a rejection of their life prior to that conversion (Malcolm X described it as shedding his "slave name"). Where any such name changes occur, more recent sources should be given more weight in determining the proper article title. bd2412T02:36, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Question: Is the issue of whether the article is a BlP at all relevant? Is this assumed to apply only to BLPs (e.g. respecting the subject's wishes)? Would BLP policy be mentioned? StAnselm (talk) 10:28, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Another suggested solution
First a quick recap of relevant policies and practices:
Underlying issue is about 'any real name change', not gender. The broader issue is any name change at all, since article title usually only reflects gender as a result of the name. (Example - if someone called "Mark" in the news had asked to be known as "John" because "Mark" was their name while being abused as a child, and it is painful and would be preferred to leave behind, would we change the article title? Similar considerations apply)
Usual default policy. Generally, in principle, we title articles, including biographies, after the topic's common or significant usage in sources (to summarize the general idea).
Legal/'real' name is irrelevant here. We do not defer to "legal/real" names at all. (For example, DJs or similar may be titled "DJ Cool".) So "legal name" is not given deference just because it's the legal name. It might be used anyway but that's only since most of the time it is in fact the same as the common use name. So legal/real name is a red herring.
BLP requires great deference to matters that can deeply impact a person, but we must still be neutral and accurate. In BLP terms, we show great deference to a person's choice of gender, of which their name is a core expression and often extremely important to them. However this is not a license to rewrite all matters at the whim of the subject.
Genuine name change may not involve legal documentation. In a number of jurisdictions a person can change name by simple use or declaration. So no legal formality need exist. Some people have done this repeatedly or to make a point, sometimes using increasingly absurd names for fun. But some change names because of a real and significant sense it's crucial to them, and will feel hurt if others don't treat their choice seriously. So there will be times we want to respect it, but perhaps also times we don't.
Overall the missing criteria that seem to work here is whether there is good evidence that the intention to change [publicly used? most commonly used?] name is a genuine and enduring one, and appears likely to be non-temporary.
No one has argued that BLP or any other policy is a license to "rewrite all matters at the whim of the subject." Rest assured that no one making a sincere announcement of a gender identity transition does so on a whim. And most who reach the point of making a public announcement of their transition will not subsequently return to their former identity. Which is why the issue of how to handle name changes for transgender people is NOT comparable to some of the other kinds of name changes that have been suggested in this discussion as being relevant. While there are reasons, for example, that Wikipedia should consider deferring to a performer's request that he or she be referred to by a particular name, performers are far more likely to announce changes of their names on a whim (eg, Sean Combs). The motivations behind many of these other kinds of name changes are very different and in many cases not likely to be as enduring as in the case of transgender transitions. Dezastru (talk) 15:34, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The question is not about motivation, nor questioning sincerity and significance. So saying it wouldn't be on a whim answers a point nobody's questioned. The issue here is Wikipedia article titling. If we added the above clause, then it would allow the genuine cases where it's a non-temporary sentiment that seems to be genuine and enduring to be recognized immediately within titles, without opening doors for transient, dubious, uncertain or possibly volatile name changes that we wouldn't want jumped on but would like to see more certainty first. FT2(Talk | email)17:02, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Just curious as to how (or if) people would apply WP:POVNAMING to the issue of transgender name changes. I read it as saying we should the follow the sources, even if they are seemingly biased. Blueboar (talk) 12:00, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Blueboar, I was unaware of that bit of policy, but was thinking of exactly the same issue. While I do not think there should be or needs to be a policy that specifically deals with the naming of articles for transgender people and that the current general policy on dealing with name changes (of both people and non-people) is sufficient, sometimes whether or not a name is the "common" one is a political matter. Is the country name "Burma" or "Myanmar"? Wikipedia says it's "Burma", but that is the "common" name because most countries refuse to accept "Myanmar" as a name for political reasons.
While this is a long time before Wikipedia was created, Muhammad Ali's name change was rejected by a lot of people in the media at first also for political (and racist and Islamophobic reasons), so had Wikipedia been around at the time the article would have remained with the title "Cassius Clay" for some time after he had changed his name. Wikipedia does have an article called "Star Wars Kid", which is about Ghyslain Raza, who made the infamous video of himself with a lightsaber. The experience of the video going viral was traumatic for him and being known as "Star Wars Kid" was not what he wanted, but the article does use that as it is the "common" name for him.
So for now I think that the policy should stay the same, but if any change is to be seriously considered it should not be a special caveat for transgender people. If considerations of bias in how things and people are named is going to be reconsidered with regard to article naming conventions, it should be a more general discussion. 99.192.67.148 (talk) 12:22, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think we have to be cautious in using wikipedia, or our article titles, to try to be progressive. Ultimately, wikipedia should be a mirror of society. If society is rather crap on a particular point, then wikipedia should likely be the same - without purposefully offending of course. In the example of a trans name, suppose Joe comes out and says he now wants to be called Mary. If 99% of sources out there ignore his request, then we probably should too - even if it hurts Joe to the core. If we get into the business of trying to improve society, rather than document it, then we have strayed from our NPOV mission. In any case, we also should make clear that article titles are not the same thing as people's names.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 12:36, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it is about trying to improve society or advance a cause, it is about trying to determine good editorial policies. While we are a mirror of society in the sense that our factual content is necessarily limited to the factual content of our reliable sources, we set out own editorial policies. Those policies determine which other publications we consider to be reliable in the first place. (e.g. There is an overwhelming amount of tabloid trash available, which we most definitely do not mirror.) On this point, what do the most reliable sources suggest? I would consider the most reliable sources to be scientific and medical literature on transgender people, which support using the name that does not misgender the person.
To address the initial post in the section, I would say that yes, POVNAMING absolutely applies, either way you cut it. Either we respect express transgender identities, or we do not. It's a political decision either way; there is no purely neutral out for us. There is very strong support for respecting them in the scientific and medical communities, which is what determines the issue for me. On the other hand, there is very little support for respecting them in society at large.--Trystan (talk) 16:34, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm, I'm not sure this is the case. We're seeing active debate within major media outlets right now - not all have come down on the same side, but the debate is there. I'm not suggesting we follow tabloids, I'm suggesting we do what we've always done, follow RS, even in the case of TG people. If, for whatever reason, RS don't follow, we shouldn't either, no matter what that person says. We ignore name changes all the time, we should be able to do so for TG people too, if sources point us that way.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:15, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Part of this issue is not encyclopedic in nature. It has to do with respecting one's right to self identify, regardless of outside intervention. In some ways this may actually make it encyclopedic in nature, in that the subject themselves has made a public declaration. We live in a world where these issues are not cut and dry or black and white. Consensus should determine the outcome.--Mark21:38, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But consensus has already developed WP:AT here, with lots of thought and reasons behind it. One of the problems I see with the whole Manning discussion, and the discussion here, is that we are treating Wikipedia as if it were a news source - but we are tertiary, not secondary, so the considerations that NY Times might apply should not apply to us. There is a HUGE difference between "respecting one's right to self identify" and "decide the title of an article" - one is about how you relate to a person, the other is what you put in bold letters at the top of a page that covers that person. They are usually the same, but not always - and besides Cat Stevens, there are LOTs of other examples (such as Prince, etc) where a person's own self-identity does not align with the title of the article. Our goal is to provide the greatest utility for the greatest number, and that applies to article titles especially. If you say "it doesn't matter that much, you can have redirects", then that same argument can be turned against you. The reason COMMONNAME is powerful is because it is based fundamentally on the issue of what is best for the reader, while balancing with the needs of the subject (e.g. not choosing a name they find patently offensive).--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 21:45, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Failing to change the article title to the transgender person's preferred name directly harms him or her by slowing the public's acceptance of the new identity. It also harms him or her by effectively declaring, in bold print at the top of the page (and in large bold letters in a prominent location on the first page for Google search results), that others know better what is best for him or her. What harm is done to the reader to redirect from his or her search term to an article with a title preferred by the transgender person? The opening sentence of the body of the article, if not the lede, will likely include a reference to their pre-transition name. The term the reader originally searched for will be honored, to the extent that it will lead the reader to an article on the subject of interest. So no harm at all is done to the reader when the article is titled according to the transgender subject's preferred name. In fact, if a reader searched for the pre-transition name, it's probably because the reader is unaware that the person has undergone a name change, or the reader cannot remember what the new name is. So putting the new name at the top of the page in bold letters helps educate the reader, which, after all, is our ultimatel goal. Dezastru (talk) 00:16, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Please remember that Wikipedia is not the place to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS... it is not Wikipedia's job to speed the public's acceptance of a new identity. Our job is to accurately reflect the public's acceptance (or lack of acceptance) of the new identity. If the public accepts the identity... wonderful... Wikipedia should and will reflect that acceptance by changing the title of our article. But... if the public actually rejects the new identity, Wikipedia has to accurately reflect that rejection by keeping the title at the old (publicly preferred) name. That's what occurred in the Cat Stevens case. Blueboar (talk) 16:47, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's not Wikipedia's job to speed the public's acceptance of a new identity, true, but neither is it Wikipedia's job to stand in the way of the public's being informed of the change of identity, which is what occurs when Wikipedia holds media organizations as being more reliable on the subject of a person's name than the person him- or herself. Wikipedia's job is to provide readers with information while doing the least harm to subjects of BLPs as possible. Dezastru (talk) 17:52, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Lets wait on this
Right now the above section is a mess, it is clear that the people supporting the move from Chelsea to Bradley are choosing Suggestion 3 while the people who Oppose the move and want Chelsea as a name are choosing Option 2. We should wait until after this hype has died down to get more of a neutral consensus. Not only that but people are also coming here directly from the move discussion page as the two are linked. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:51, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Totally agree... it is never a good idea to change policy when emotions are high over a specific issue. That's how you end up with unintended consequences that nobody thought about at the time. Blueboar (talk) 16:51, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Some thoughts
Hi everyone,
I noticed the discussion has been closed. I was away from Wikipedia for the weekend (everyone needs some time off) and didn't see most of what has been written. I do want to address some of the points that have come up and lay out what I feel about the future of this discussion.
First off, I want to thank the contributors for the thoughtful and varied responses. I've seen new interpretations of existing policy and new explanations of why transgender issues are so important. I was particularly struck by Deliriousandlost's notion that one's name is a deeply personal and important aspect of one's identity. One wishes to be referred to using one's preferred name and gender, and that's quite understandable.
Along those same lines, I'm conflicted about what role Wikipedia should play in transgender issues. It cuts both ways: we have a responsibility to report based on reliable sources, but also to be sensitive to biographies of living persons. The notion that we are beholden to the truth and to accuracy is quite admirable ("We can be very very accurate though" -- Nbound). I feel the same way in some sense. However, for better or for worse the reality is that we report what reliable sources report, even though they may be somewhat or wholly inaccurate. So, try as we may, we are not allowed under policy to correct what we may see as wrongdoings on the part of the media. This really gets to the fundamentals of what Wikipedia is: are we a force for social justice? I think the most common belief is that we are not. Whether we should make exceptions to that rule is a matter of debate, and was the focus of the discussion I created. I hope we can have further discussions, along the lines I laid out but also along different dimensions.
In terms of the options I presented, I appreciate the comments from several people that option 1 was in fact very similar to existing policy. I had not noticed that clause in the policy and it helps shed more light for me on how to proceed.
The policy itself is simply unsatisfactory. It does not provide the necessary clarity as to articles about transgender people. The fact that so many of us are debating what to call the Manning article makes it clear that the policy is not sufficient, and does not cover the topic sufficiently. I would support a portion of the page specifically dedicated to transgender individuals, as it would make absolutely clear what should be done in such cases, where sensitivities about one's name may be heightened. Spelling out the word "transgender" on the policy page would leave absolutely no doubts as to how to handle such cases. To assume that transgender individuals can be grouped with other cases (such as Snoop Dogg --> Snoop Lion) does not seem to be satisfactory to some editors. Providing crystal clear guidance could help.
I agree that we should suspend the debate for the time being; even my own views continue to evolve rapidly. However, I ask that we do not let this narrow window of opportunity pass us by. Interest and motivation in this topic is at, perhaps, a record high on Wikipedia. We have this rare chance to clarify the policy in a healthy and constructive way.
It would be incredibly disappointing to maintain the status quo on such a polarizing issue. Just imagine: we keep the policy the same, then next year when someone else reveals a name change, we have the same debate again. That would be terribly inefficient and would distract from both editing substantive encyclopedic content (such as the article text itself) and from educating ourselves about transgender topics.
I appreciate all the discussion and I very much hope the debate will continue and the community will reach an agreeable consensus. CaseyPenk (talk) 20:13, 26 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Consistency detail
A pair of editors(@Red Slash:, @GrandDrake:) added "Unless a page has strong ties to a particular English-speaking nation it should not be moved from one variety of English to a different kind in order to maintain consistency." to the one-sentence "definition" of consistency. I don't see discussion, nor do I see it as a paraphrase of comments elsewhere in this policy. Comments? — Arthur Rubin(talk)18:35, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know if it needs to be stated in the "Deciding on an article title" section but this information can be found in the section on "National varieties of English". --GrandDrake (talk) 19:31, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think this should be part of the one sentence "definition" of consistency... It's perfectly OK to move an article title from one variety of English to another if there is consensus to do so... what we want to avoid is constant shifting back and forth (edit warring). To the extent that consistency is a factor in the move, that should be part of the discussion that is held while reaching (or not reaching) consensus. Blueboar (talk) 20:33, 24 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm more troubled because it's ambiguous. What is the "consistency" that is being referenced? Within the article? Across articles? both? neither? Bonus points if you can explain how, or if, this change would have affected the infamous RMs for the Yogurt article, and also the RM for the Strained Yoghurt article. AgnosticAphidtalk00:28, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But MOS#Retaining the existing varietydoes allow for changing the version of English within the article.... provided there is consensus to do so. I think it can be taken as granted that any discussion of change to the text would by default also include discussion of a change to the title, and vise versa. Blueboar (talk) 17:10, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In more detail; consistency is (and should be, contrary to B2C's statements) a factor in article naming; and WP:ENGVAR "informs" WP:COMMONNAME, but no one of the five factors is overriding. I don't think it is more necessary to note that consistency does not override WP:ENGVAR than any of the other factors. — Arthur Rubin(talk)18:13, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Sponsors and "naming rights"
It is common, particularly for sports stadiums and similar buildings, for sponsors to have temporary naming rights to a building. This means the official name for a building may change frequently. Sometimes the common name reflects these changes, and sometimes it doesn't. Generally the Wikipedia convention is to stick to the more generic name for the article, even if the sponsored official name becomes fairly common. However that practice isn't currently reflected in this policy, or as a separate written convention. Should it be?
Emirates Stadium - generic name is "Ashburton Grove (Stadium)" but it was named the Emirates before building was completed and has never had an alternative official name
I'm not so sure that it is accurate to say there is "Wikipedia convention" to stick to the old name... It really is more a question of WP:COMMONNAME (do sources start using the new "sponsor" name, or do they reject it and continue to use the old name).
International organisations that take over a city or a country for a jamboree throw up some interesting naming problems. For example they will inst that a venue does not include a commercial name that has not paid them to use the name, so the Aviva Stadium (which IMHO ought to be called by its old stadium name Landsdown Road) was called the "Dublin Arena" for the 2011 UEFA Europa League Final, and more recently The O2 Arena was called the "North Greenwich Arena" for the 2012 Summer Olympics.
As an example consider when the Welsh Rugby Union renamed Cardiff Arms Park the National Stadium everyone including commentators in reliable sources ignored them and continued to call it the Arms Park. But when the old stadium was knocked down and a new one was built the WRU christened it the Millennium Stadium and that name stuck. So I think COMMONNAME covers this issue of naming stadiums and there is no need for a specific paragraph, although I think it might be a good idea to add "third party" before "reliable sources" in the phrase "then more weight should be given to the name used in third party reliable sources published after the name change than in those before the change" to cover purely commercial changes of name, (this is something which I had already considered proposing over the discussion above about #Article titles for transgender people. -- PBS (talk) 17:10, 27 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think this is the province of COMMONNAME, with the Etihad forming part of the borderline (as that name has easily entered into the footballing lexicon, but not fully). Sceptre(talk)17:36, 27 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
A similar problem has come up with shopping centres. Various companies will buy out the complexes and slap a uniform corporate branding upon them. However locals frequently carry on using the existing name, which is often restored after the next buyout, but the web searches can be dominated by chains using the new name in postal addresses on their branch list rather than by the usage in the local press and various local organisations. Timrollpickering (talk) 23:01, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Preparation for another discussion: Article titles for transgender people
Hello everyone -- if you look a few sections above you will see that I previously proposed a clarification of the policy on article titles for transgender people. That discussion took place in the midst of a heated debate over what to call Private Manning (I use a neutral term here to avoid picking sides). That discussion was somewhat disorderly, a situation I would like to avoid for the next discussion. Following advice from the administrator (BD2412) who closed the Manning move request, I would like to re-open discussion in due time.
Before we begin another formal discussion, I would like for us to first lay out the terms of the discussion. I would like feedback on the following points (feel free to discuss others I hadn't considered):
1. Scope of discussion: Should the discussion cover only article titles for transgender people, or article titles for the names of all people, or name changes of all entities in general? Should the discussion cover name changes or all articles in general?
2. Discussion points: What points should we discuss? Within each point, which precise options should be available for people to !vote for? Here is a list of suggested discussion points:
Modifications to WP:COMMONNAME - only consider reliable sources
Avoid birth names: Should we amend WP:COMMONNAME to state that birth names are problematic in the case of name changes for transgender people?
More specifically, should we state that birth names "have problems" for the purpose of WP:COMMONNAME's "When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others"? (generalized from Cam94509)
Name when notable: If the subject gains notability (widespread media coverage) only under one name, should that name continue to be used after a name change? (based on suggestion from Vegaswikian)
Only recent sources: Should we consider only post-announcement sources in the case of name changes?
More precisely, should the phrase "more weight should be given to the name used in reliable sources published after the name change than in those before the change" be changed to "one should consider only the name used in reliable sources published after the name change, and not consider those before the change"
Other considerations (not covered under WP:COMMONNAME) - consider more than reliable sources
Should we create a new section covering aspects separate from WP:COMMONNAME? (idea from 99.192.77.201)
Legal status: Should we consider the subject's legal name or legal / biological status? If so, how heavily should we weight such considerations? (FT2 mentioned this in previous discussion)
Subject's intentions: Should we consider the subject's intentions?
More precisely, should we change article titles only in the following situations: "if there is good evidence that the intention to change [publicly used? most commonly used?] name is a genuine and enduring one, and appears likely to be non-temporary." (FT2 mentioned this in previous discussion)
Subject's preferences: Should we consider the subject's preferences?
More precisely, should we add a statement to the policy explicitly clarifying that in cases of individuals announcing a name change, the individual him- or herself is the most reliable source and the final arbiter on the subject of the person's name." (generalized to all name changes from Dezastru's statement in the previous discussion)
Avoid offense: Should we avoid potentially offensive article titles?
More precisely, should we not use a given name if it reasonably possible for a group to be offended by that name, unless there is an overwhelmingly clear reason to use the potentially offensive name? (basic idea from Space simian)
3. Page layout: What should be the page layout of a discussion? Should we create a subpage? Should we create certain sub-sections, and if so, which ones?
I ask that we hammer out these procedural details before beginning a substantive policy discussion. This will ensure that we have an orderly discussion. Thank you. CaseyPenk (talk) 20:40, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Preparatory discussion
If you think this would result in an orderly discussion you are more of an optimist then I. One issue that you have not addressed is, if a person gains notability only under one name, should that name continue to be used after a name change? Changing names is common in marriage. So does the our precedent there offer any guidance for you? For performers, we seem to chose the name of the moment since some seem to change on a regular basis. Vegaswikian (talk) 21:36, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would very much like to see an option to vote for something that made it clear that, except in cases where it would be truly unreasonable, a trans persons preferred name would be preferred for titling Wikipedia articles about them over their birth name. I have no real strong feelings either way on the third one, and I think for the first one we should stick to discussing trans people, although discussing all name changes wouldn't be the end of the world. Cam94509 (talk) 21:49, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
At the very least this should be restricted to people although probably even more than that. There are all manner of factors with non-human cases that need to be considered separately, in particular national varieties of English, what actually is "an English name" when the new declared name in English is taken from another language, the subtleties of official naming policies where approaches vary wildly, and the inevitable politicisation attached to these name changes. There are enough issues relating to people alone without getting into Australian rocks, Indian cities, British shopping centres and all the rest. Timrollpickering (talk) 22:57, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hey. I'd like to clarify that I'm actually interested in discussing "Subject's prefrences", that is to say, whether the subject's PREFERENCES should be used. (Because that's what I think we should be using, if at all possible.) Names when notable is *not* what I'm interested in discussing. Cam94509 (talk) 00:24, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion should deal only with transgender people who have changed their names. Name changes in those situations involve a unique set of issues that do not really apply to other kinds of name changes (such as people changing their names following marriage, or divorce; performers changing their names as a career move, or simply out of vanity; corporations changing their names to enhance their business prospects; or political entities such as cities or countries changing their names). Dezastru (talk) 02:04, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think that name changes accompanying a religious conversion can present similar circumstances, and perhaps it could be said that all instances in which a person changes their name in a way that rejects their previous life and sets out on a new course could fall into this category. This differs from changing one's name because of marriage (which signifies embarking on a new life, but not necessarily a rejection of pre-marital life), or changing one's name on a whim, or for commercial purposes. However, I also would agree that our rules should provide for particular sensitivity to transgender name changes. bd2412T02:14, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The scope should be changing the titles of any article. Existing policy about article naming applies to all articles. It would be a mistake to decide to use different policies for different kinds of articles. I should note that so far as I have followed the Manning page title discussion (which is only a little), most of the discussion was not about what the criteria should be, but about whether the criteria was met. That is, most people agreed that the common name should be used, but disagreed about what the common name for Manning is. So discussion of just how the common name is determined seems to be more the specific issue than whether or not the title should be the common name. 99.192.68.167 (talk) 03:14, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
"So discussion of just how the common name is determined seems to be more the specific issue than whether or not the title should be the common name." That's correct. We all agree to use WP:COMMONNAME to a greater or lesser extent, but WP:COMMONNAME itself is somewhat vague in these situations.
"It would be a mistake to decide to use different policies for different kinds of articles." As you may or may not already be aware, the policy (WP:COMMONNAME) does carve out an exception for name changes. So in that sense, the policy already does not apply to all articles, but rather to a subset of them. CaseyPenk (talk) 03:19, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
CaseyPenk, I see nowhere where the policy talks about name changes for people as separate from any other name changes. As such, there is only one policy for all types of articles, be they about people, places, things, events, or anything else. 99.192.68.167 (talk) 03:26, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
Yes, the name changes clause applies to any kind of article and not just people. My point is that the name change clause applies only to entities that change their names and not all articles. The subject of any article could in theory change its name, so yes, the name changes clause does apply to all articles in that sense, but in a practical sense only a minority of subjects will undergo name changes. It might be we're just debating semantics, in which case it would be fine to view it as applying to all articles or just a subset, as long as we agree on our interpretations of the name change clause. CaseyPenk (talk) 04:17, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It sounds to me like we agree, so I guess that means we must be right! Yes, it is only a minority of articles, but many of them will be non-people articles. Films (like Star Wars), sporting events (like the Nokia Brier), stadiums (like Joe Robbie Stadium), countries (like Myanmar), and types of objects (like tidal waves) can all change names. Only a small minority will change names, but the same is true for people. 99.192.68.167 (talk) 04:32, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
Legal status, intentions, preferences
(ec) Addendum to my previous comment: As for the content of the discussion, none of legal status, subject's intentions, or subject's preferences should be part of the discussion since none of them have anything to do with determining what a person's common name is. 99.192.68.167 (talk) 03:21, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
I disagree. When a person publicly announces a name change, and this name change is widely reported, this frequently begins the process of news outlets and other reliable sources using the new name. We can recognize the historical tendency of such widely reported new names to stick and be referenced (Muhammad Ali, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Chaz Bono, Metta World Peace) as a basis to tilt article titling towards the new name. bd2412T04:02, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The key phrases in what you just wrote are "and this name change is widely reported" and "begins the process". I agree with both of these, but point out that the announcement itself is not the issue in establishing a common name, but whether or not it is widely reported and used by news outlets and others. The mere fact alone that an announcement was made does nothing to shift a common name. 99.192.68.167 (talk) 04:11, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
If Muhammad Ali had not made an announcement of the change of his name, then the ball would never have gotten rolling on reliable sources using it, so obviously the announcement itself does something. We can recognize the simple fact that most such announcements eventually yield common usage, and that forecasting against that actually predicts the less likely outcome. bd2412T14:48, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think you have misunderstood my original point. When asking the question "What is this person's common name?" various things might count as an answer to that, but saying "it's their legal name" does not matter, since it might be (like for Sting) a legal name that no one uses. Saying "it's the name they prefer people use" does not matter, since the relevant question is what name is used, not what name does the person want us to use. Saying "it's the name the person intends to use and intends to make a legal name" does not matter for the same reasons. That announcements can result in changes of use by the media and the public is indisputable, but the announcement itself is no evidence that media and public use has changed, thus no evidence that the "common" name has actually changed. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 15:26, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
My point, however, is that such an announcement almost always precipitates a change in actual usage. This is a fact that we can recognize when determining what constitutes a common name for purposes of an article title. bd2412T15:36, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Again, the key words are "almost always precipitates". If it does precipitate a change in actual use, then the change in actual use is what matters, not the announcement that caused it. If it does not precipitate a change in actual use, then the fact that is was announced also does not matter. To think that the announcement itself matters because of what is likely to follow from it is to violate WP:BALL. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 15:47, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
The WP:BALL rolls both ways. If we presume that the announcement will not precipitate such a change, despite the common experience of this change occurring, then we are just as guilty of acting on a prediction. bd2412T16:09, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No, it doesn't. It only would if I were saying that an announcement should be counted as evidence that a change will not take place. "If we presume that the announcement will not precipitate such a change...." That is not only not what I said, but would be an absurd thing to think. My position is explicitly to not predict one way or the other at all based on announcements. You say you want announcements to count for a change. That means you are suggesting something in conflict with WP:BALL, not me. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 16:19, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
99.192.77.201, it sounds like you oppose the legal status, subject's intentions, and subject's preferences considerations. However, two questions: do you think we should still discuss those points, and do you have any other (alternative) points you would like to discuss? Or do you think the policy should remain exactly as it is? CaseyPenk (talk) 18:28, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Since I do not think that any of intentions, preferences, or legal names help answer the question "what is the person's common name" then I would say that they are not worth discussing. But if they are to be discussed, it should be made clear that the suggestions are to do something other than use the common name. A little bit higher up you suggested that moving away from WP:COMMONNAME was not what you were suggesting, but clarifying it might help. That seems good to me, which is why I mentioned the experts vs general public discussion at the top if this talk page. Knowing how to tell when a name change has become a new common name would help. It seems in the Manning case there was much discussion of which sources were using the old name and which the new with regard to whether the new name had become "common", and that is worth sorting out a bit more. I should add, it took a month after Metta World Peace changed his name from "Ron Artest" before that page moved. While there were editors who thought it should have moved sooner, it took a while for there to be a consensus about the name being "common". 99.192.77.201 (talk) 18:46, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
Do you have any suggestions about where, if anywhere, considerations about intentions, preferences, and legal names could fit into the policy? Can you think of a name for a new section? Even if you don't agree with their inclusion, perhaps you have thoughts on what section they could be included under.
Also, could you clarify exactly what you mean by "worth sorting out a bit more"? What, specifically, should we sort out more? Should we clarify the bit about giving more weight to recent sources rather than to older ones? CaseyPenk (talk) 19:10, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"Can you think of a name for a new section?" They sound to me like "Replacements for COMMONNAME" or "Alternatives to COMMONNAME".
"recent sources rather than to older ones" That's important to discuss, but I was also thinking about something that goes beyond that. Suppose a person is VERY famous under one name, becomes less famous, and then switches names. What media there is left interested enough to still report on the person might all switch to the new name, yet to the vast majority of people the previous name is the one the person is known by. So it's not just comparing the media now to the media past, but also asking if we should be looking for measurements of how "common" a name is now other than what news reports say. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 19:25, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
That is the Cat Stevens problem right in a nutshell - born Steven Demetre Georgiou, became famous as Cat Stevens, and then declined in fame and became Yusuf Islam. However, what about if the person announces their name change when they are effectively at the height of their fame? That was the case with Muhammad Ali, Metta World Peace, and Chaz Bono (who is probably most famous for his change of identity). bd2412T20:13, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think it should be a case by case basis, in the case of manning what is she/he most famous for? is it the wikileaks scandal or the name and gender change? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:21, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
BD2412, with a famous person changing their name at the height of their fame it is a good question to ask whether or not the common name changes immediately. If Tiger Woods announced tomorrow that he was changing his name to something completely different, I bet it would be reported by every media outlet in the world, reporters talking to him would use the new name right away, and publications would use the new name right away while also noting that he used to be known as Tiger Woods. Serious golf fans might star using the new name right away, or they might not. People who know who Woods is, but are not golf fans might not only not use the new name, but they might have trouble remembering what it is for a while. So the question of when a new name becomes a common name even for the most famous people is a good question and one we should discuss more fully.
Knowledgekid87, it should not matter why a person is famous. So long as a person is notable enough to have an article and we can determine what the person's common name is it does not matter what their name was when they became famous. 99.192.50.11 (talk) 21:32, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
You are correct that basing titles off intentions / preferences / legal status does not strictly fall under the banner of "common names." In that sense the section header would be slightly inaccurate; perhaps we should rename the section if we move ahead with a change to its contents, or else move the name changes bit to a sub-section or some other section. CaseyPenk (talk) 04:20, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Limiting scope, legal names, avoiding offense
While it might be worthwhile to reconsider how article titles are chosen in general it is a complex topic and would be difficult to manage. Limiting the scope to people might be a good place to start. As have been pointed out in the past week, extra care should be given when dealing with living people so giving this topic extra attention seems appropriate. Limiting the discussion to transgender name changes would be a wasted opportunity and having a more general scope has the benefit of forcing everyone to consider how their arguments affect other cases, not only one particular emotionally charged issue that one might feel passionately about.
Two suggested discussion points:
Should we try to avoid names that reasonably could be considered offensive by some groups?
Is it preferable to use the most recent name, rather than the most common when referring to people in article titles?
Space simian, I can see how there might be merit in limiting the scope, as there are very many types of articles, but perhaps limiting to people might be a bit too narrow. Some things come to be named and change names in pretty much the same way that people do. So for a person, no one chooses their own name (at first, anyway). A name is given to us at birth by our parents (most of the time). The same is true for things like sports teams, films, songs, books, paintings, buildings, competitions, and commercial products. Someone responsible for bringing them into being names them first, and then changes might follow. Naming for things like discoveries of new species of living organisms, celestial bodies, and diseases also have similar stories: Someone in an "official" capacity might name it first and then public usage can take over and create a nickname that becomes the one commonly used. It might be useful to look at some of these cases as well. For example, it seems odd that the Wikipedia page for The White Album is called "The Beatles (album)", seeming to prefer a "birth" name to the name everyone - including the surviving Beatles themselves - use. A discussion of whether that really is the right name for that article might be worth contrasting with the fact that we have an article called "Elvis Costello", not "Declan MacManus" (even though it's his birth name, a name he chose to be his legal name, and the name he often uses for official songwriting credits). When names get tricky, sometimes it might be useful to look to non-humans with names too. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 13:29, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
How we use peoples names raises special moral consideration that we do not have to take into account when talking about things. People always have a current, well defined, formal name that usually can be unambiguously determined. I'm thinking it is more respectful to use peoples formal names (which would solve the transgender name change issue as well as others) rather than the most common name. --Space simian (talk) 14:17, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know what you mean by "formal" name, unless you mean "legal" name. But that would mean that the article for Elvis Costelloshould be titled "Declan McManus" and the article for Sting should be titled "Gordon Sumner" (or should it be "Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner"?) As Sting said in the film Bring on the Night when several journalists called him "Gordon" at a press conference, "My children call me Sting, my mother calls me Sting, who is this Gordon character?" 99.192.77.201 (talk) 14:27, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
I was thinking of the name that would normally be used to politely address someone that was not a close friend or family. Think "what would the Queen do?" :). Do we need to consider what Gordon thinks? Maybe the most common form of the most recent name would do. What would be the problem with moving 'Sting (musician)' to 'Gordon Sumner' and let the 'Sting' disambiguation page point to it? The article can still mention Sting of course. If we know Sting does not use his legal name but rather Sting, then that would be the name my suggestion above favours, the problem is rather that it might be hard to determine but in that case it is probably not controversial either. (An exception for stage names/pseudonyms is another possibility.) --Space simian (talk) 15:30, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There is another problem with "legal" names. Sometimes when a person adopts a stage name, they change their name legally and sometimes they do not. Sometimes they do not change it right away, but do so long after it becomes their common name. It can often be difficult to determine accurately whether or not a stage name is also a legal name. Then there are the women who get married and keep their previous name as their professional name, yet it is never clear if they took a husband's name as a new legal name. Establishing what a person's legal name is might be harder than determining their common name, and might also be less helpful to a reader looking for an article. Elvis Costello has always been famous under that name, but initially he kept his brith name ("Declan Patrick MacManus"). But then he legally changed his name to "Elvis Costello". But then he decided to change it back legally, but adding a new middle name ("Declan Patrick Aloysius Macmanus"). It's interesting reading for fans looking at his page, but confusing if his page switches locations often while his common name does not change. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 15:39, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
There is no confusion for readers since we can redirect pages and have disambiguation pages. I'm not advocating using the legal name but rather use what people want to be called (within reason). There are several cases where everyone knows the subject of the article actually uses a different name and using the old name can be considered offensive and a political statement, in those cases I think WP should use the most recent name they use for themselves. It is not so hard really. I'm not sure about stage names and pseudonyms, problem is that people might reject such names in the future as well (e.g. Cat Stevens). Determining what name someone prefer is not so hard, if it isn't the most commonly known name someone is bound to show up on the article talk-page and point it out and if they can verify it WP would change it. --Space simian (talk) 16:26, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Redirects help to a point, but when the person's legal name is not known to a reader and sufficiently different from their real name it can still be confusing. Common names are less likely to confuse because they are ... common. Also, by your suggestion the page for Martin Sheen would be called "Ramon Estevez", but there already is a page for Ramon Estevez, Sheen's son. So someone looking for Sheen's page now not only has to know Sheen's legal name, but which "Ramon" to look for.
Trying to avoid offense is a losing battle. It adds a subjective element that we need not introduce, which just makes naming harder. I like WP:CENSOR and would not like to see the policy on titles changed to conflict with that. Besides, if we do decide to avoid offensive titles, what do we do about titles that might be offensive, but to people other than the subject of the page? Should how the Kennedy family feels affect whether or not we name a page "Dead Kennedys"? Should we change the title of the page called "Nigger" to "N-word" because the title might offend people? For Wikipedia to not use a common name because it is offensive or political is for Wikipedia to take a position on the name and the politics behind it. But to have a consistent policy of using the common name, whatever it might be, says that we will not get involved on the question of whether or not the name is appropriate.
The article for Romani people begins by telling us that "Romani are widely known in the English-speaking world by the exonym 'Gypsies'...." The article is not called "Gypsies" because that term is considered offensive, but that is for Wikipedia to state it's disapproval of the name, which makes the titling political. Yet we have an article called "Eskimo" despite the fact that in "Canada and Greenland, the term Eskimo has fallen out of favour, as it is sometimes considered pejorative and has been replaced by the term Inuit." Trying to weigh what does and does not cause offense gets Wikipedia further away from it's job of providing factual information, no matter what people think of those facts. The common name is the common name, no matter how offensive it might be. Articles can tell us that names are considered offensive, as they do with "Nigger" and "Eskimo", but that does not mean we need to change the title as is done for "Romani people". 99.192.77.201 (talk) 17:50, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
This discussion is great and brings out some important points. Before we get too far down the rabbit hole, I ask that we first agree upon what points we're actually going to discuss. That is, what do you think of the suggestions above and the specific wording that follows them? That will help steer our discussion in a more focused direction. It sounds like this discussion represents the "avoid offense" bullet point; are there any other points you wish to add? CaseyPenk (talk) 18:24, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This sub-thread started as one about scope, and I think the scope should be as wide as possible. Even when we veered off into talking about offense, examples of articles that are not named for people became relevant. So I would just reiterate that the scope should be very wide. It is best if the basic rules for titles can be general enough to apply to all articles, including when we ask questions about offense. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 18:59, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
I do see the value in keeping the scope as general as possible, but it seems like the immediate desire among many is to figure out how to deal with article titles for transgender people. Since it's such a pressing current topic. Dealing with all articles, name changes or not, is a massive undertaking that I don't think is appropriate to the (relatively limited) goals most people are trying to achieve here. I think most people are satisfied with the policy in general but want some tweaks / exceptions rather than a fundamental rethinking of the entire policy. In short, I think it could be overkill to go that route. CaseyPenk (talk) 19:06, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am well aware that a very specific, single case is what has motivated people to seek policy changes. The idea that we should make a special exception in the general policy that most people are, as you admit, satisfied with for that reason is a bad one. Hard cases make bad law. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 19:33, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
"The article is not called "Gypsies" because that term is considered offensive" Actually the term Gypsy is not considered offensive in Britain. Some Wikipedia editors have claimed it to be true, but have had difficulty finding many reliable sources to back it up, while in Britain there are plenty of example of it use as a self identifying label: see for example The Gypsy Council (one of their pages says: "In the UK today we are proud to be Gypsy's but in Europe many people regard the term Gypsy as a term of abuse and prefer to be called Roma or ..." ). The term is not used for the article on Romany because it has two slightly different legal meanings (that reflect common usage) which comes under the WP:AT sentence "When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems...". The two legal meanings in England are: a Gypsy is anyone who lives an itinerant lifestyle in a Caravan who is not part of a circus under the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960; and a Gypsy is a Romany under the Race Relations Act 1976 (see Gypsy (term)#Use in English law). So under the Caravan Act meaning Romany are subgroup within a broader meaning of Gypsy. -- PBS (talk) 07:52, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I also like WP:CENSOR but do not think there is reason for concern about censorship here. I do not suggest WP should avoid mentioning facts because they might be offensive only that when choosing the best article title WP should try to avoid offensive names when reasonable alternatives are available; there is no reason to rub it in peoples face, that would only be puerile. Names that are common but by some considered offensive or derogatory can be mentioned in the article explaining that fact. I think Romani are a good example, even if Gypsie isn't considered universally offensive the fact that it is by a fair amount of people is a good reason to favour the use of Romani when choosing article title. It shouldn't be the only factor when deciding on title but it should be given some weight. Since you mention the n-word I came to think of a local debate: In Sweden there is a pastry commonly known as 'negerboll' (lit. negro ball) after some debate I think most reasonable people agreed that it makes everybody's life easier if it is called chokladboll (lit. chocolate ball) instead. ...But I think CaseyPenks's is probably right that this debate should be saved for the actual discussion. --Space simian (talk) 09:56, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There's a further problem that in many jurisdictions the concept of a "legal name" just isn't there and a person can call themselves what they like so long as they aren't using it to defraud. Here a woman getting married can use her married surname immediately after the key moment of the service without going through any further hoops and many organisations will accept just the marriage certificate if they need proof of the new name. It can be very difficult to tell when an actor has adopted their stage name as their actual name and there just aren't grand registers that can be cited. Timrollpickering (talk) 16:27, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Apply WP:COMMONNAME... with any name change we need to have some patience... don't go rushing off to change the article title as soon as you hear that someone changed his/her name. Wait for the sources to start reflecting the name change. Note that can take some time for sources to catch up to reality and start to refer to the person by their new name. What we want to make sure of is that sources have not rejected the new name. We should follow the sources when it comes to names... not lead them. Blueboar (talk) 14:06, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Question: When you talk of "offense", do you only mean offense to the person who is the primary subject of the article or anyone who might be offended? Because if you mean the former, then we should recognize (as grim as this observation is) that when a transgender person dies we no longer have to worry about offending them, so there would no longer be any reason not to go with the common name for the article title. But if we are going to consider how others might be offended, then we need to know whose offense matters and whose does not. Should the fact that members of the Westboro Baptist Church might be offended by Wikipedia using the post-transition name for a transgender person count? If not, why not? For Wikipedia to say that the offense of other transgender people counts, but the offense of WBO members does not seems to violate WP:POV. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 16:57, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (==99.192....)[reply]
Other discussions
Blueboar, it is a good question to ask just when a name becomes a new "common" name. The section at the top of this page (called "RfC: Interpretation of WP:COMMONNAME") touches on this very question. There the question is about the names experts use versus the names the public uses, but the same question could be asked about names the media use versus publicly used names. 99.192.77.201 (talk) 14:32, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
I was not necessarily talking about media sources, although they are part of the mix. I agree that when assessing a COMMONNAME we should (and do) give the various sources due weight. My point was more basic... In determining the best article title, Wikipedia follows sources, we don't lead the way. This always causes some delay when it comes to name changes. There will always be a period of time (it may only be a few hours... but it also could be several years) before sourcing (in the generic) catches up to reality and starts to refer to the subject by a new name. And occasionally, the sources actually reject the new name (The rock star Prince was a good example of this... when he changed his name to that odd symbol, sourcing rejected it and either continued to call him "Prince" or "The artist formerly known as Prince"). Also, we don't necessarily use Official names. I realize that we want to be sensitive to the subject's desires... but we do need to wait for sources to start using a new name before we change. Blueboar (talk) 15:55, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
While it is not the entirety of the discussion, I do think there's an aspect to this discussion that suggests making an exception to "waiting for the sources" and instead suggests "leading the sources." Perhaps that exception could be justified on WP:BLP grounds. I'm not sure if we would need to "justify" or provide a "policy rationale" for changing this policy if it conflicts with others, such as WP:RS. Since this one is policy also. CaseyPenk (talk) 18:07, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I also agree that the main point to discuss is whether "lead the sources" should ever be an exception to "follow the usage in sources", and, if so, under what specific conditions, and, in particular, whether a name change by a trans person situation always, sometimes or never qualifies. --B2C19:07, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to propose that we don't need to scrap common name altogether: We can simply state that birth names "have problems" for the purpose of WP:COMMONNAME's "When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others" when titling articles for transgender people in policy. Common name can remain largely undamaged; after all, I think it's not unfair to say that using birth names for trans people pretty problematic, so we should just spell that out in policy, that way it's clear how that policy should be interpreted. Cam94509 (talk) 17:53, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Our policy should reflect the permissiblility of making moves like that. Notably, we have special naming conventions for royals for no other reason than because they are royals. If our policies can recognize those archaic designations, there is no reason that our policies can not recognize the applicability of special naming conventions to persons belonging to other well-defined social groups. bd2412T20:17, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Guettarda, that those pages were moved so quickly does not mean it was the right decision. It might have been and it is certainly possible for a common name to switch right away, but nothing more general follows from that.
BD2412, we might have special naming conventions for royals just because they are royal, but if we do it is a bad idea. That is not a good reason to name their articles any differently from any other article. If I were to walk up to anyone (here in Canada, anyway) and say "Did you hear about what Prince Charles said?" everyone would know right away that I was referring to Charles, Prince of Wales. In fact, 99% of the time people talk about him by name all they say is "Prince Charles". So that would seem to be his common name, thus what the article should be named. If I wanted to find out information about any of the other people who also have been known as "Prince Charles", there is a disambiguation page for that. But to everyone, including the media, he is just "Prince Charles", so that is what the article should be called. So we do have peculiar naming conventions in some cases, like royals, and we could decide to have more, but having any peculiar conventions is a bad idea. Simplicity is best. 99.192.50.11 (talk) 21:44, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (99.192....)[reply]
One of the main reasons that we have special naming conventions for royals is so that we can be consistent. In fact, consistency is one of the five main factors that have been deemed to be important for our article naming. There are thousands of royals, most of whom are very little known, but the ones who are well-known are titled so as to be consistent with the entire spectrum of the group. We don't always succeed in establishing this kind of consistency, but we try. As for our articles on subjects who change their names, and particularly on transgender subjects, perhaps our policy could indeed pay a bit more attention to consistency across the spectrum of the group. bd2412T03:41, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Finding the article is not a problem for the readers, WP has 'Prince Charles' (the most commonly used name) redirect to 'Charles, Prince of Wales', and on his page there is a link to the 'Prince Charles (disambiguation)' page if the reader was looking for a different Prince Charles. --Space simian (talk) 06:18, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In those cases we favoured the most recent name after a change. In society the most natural thing to do is to use the most recent name. If people change their name (for whatever reason) you do not insist on using the old one simply because it is more commonly used historically. Only Wikipedians understand the COMMONNAME argument, the rest of the world (i.e. the readers) expect the most recent name (which was also the cause for recent controversy). --Space simian (talk) 05:46, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: COMMONNAME is a problematic policy as it's worshiped as a non-negotiable sixth pillar of Wikipedia. In reality, it's guidance on what article titles we should use: the section is titled "use commonly recognizable names", not "use the most common name". Personally, I would agree with adding something like "If an article subject expresses preference for a certain name, that preference should be given weight as long as its usage is reflected in reliable sources". I've got no problems with moving Cat Stevens to Yusuf Islam, or Snoop Dogg to Snoop Lion, and I don't know why other people would either. Readers aren't as stupid and easily confused as many COMMONNAME zealots would have you believe. Sceptre(talk)03:21, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Incidentally, as has been pointed out in the original post in this section, COMMONNAME also says that it's perfectly reasonable to use less common names if the most common is problematic. I can't see how this can't apply to trans people whose birth name is commonly used; I can't count the times the Leveson Inquiry's section on trans people has been cited by people such as myself since its publication. Sceptre(talk)03:32, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, you're onto something here. As I look back more into the idea about birth names, that seems to get at the heart of the issue for articles titles about transgender people. The existing policy does already consider problematic names, it just doesn't spell out what names would be considered problematic. By clarifying which names would be problematic, we stand better chance of consensus since it's an incremental change rather than a fundamental rethinking. CaseyPenk (talk) 15:24, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
comment COMMONNAME is only one criteria for titling an article. Others are found at WP:CRITERIA, and we also have article naming conventions for dozens of different topics, including many listed here: Template:Naming_conventions. I agree we shouldn't be slavishly attached to commonname, and especially when commonname is under dispute, the other criteria should definitely be considered. Note this line, from WP:AT:"The choice of article titles should put the interests of readers before those of editors, and those of a general audience before those of specialists." The criteria are Recognizability; Naturalness; Precision; Conciseness; Consistency. I do think we should have stronger language around name changes, but I oppose any sort of transgender-exceptionalism here. There's no reason to believe titling an article with a TG-person's former (and presumably public) name, even if for a short time while waiting for sources to catch up, will do more or less harm than waiting to rename based on an artist's new stage name, a new name b/c of marriage, a country which has changed it's name, or a person who has changed their name for religious reasons, or any number of other reasons things or people get renamed. If we start to value some name changes more than others, we get into serious POV territory, where all name changes are equal, but some name changes are more equal than others. I think a stronger emphasis on the fact that much more weight should be given to post-move sources vs pre-move (for obvious reasons), and we should use the full scope of WP:AT and not just focus on commonname arguments in these cases. Again, considering the reader, what is the reader searching for? What are they expecting to find? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 03:36, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, this "There's no reason to believe titling an article with a TG-person's former (and presumably public) name, even if for a short time while waiting for sources to catch up, will do more or less harm than waiting to rename based on an artist's new stage name, a new name b/c of marriage, a country which has changed it's name, or a person who has changed their name for religious reasons, or any number of other reasons things or people get renamed." is plainly incorrect. Calling me by my former public name in a space where I was going by my current public name would be taken as an insult if you didn't correct yourself (and might even feel excluded from that space if you refused to correct yourself if asked); I don't think the same is true about an artists stage name, or a new name b/c of marriage. The only one I can think of that really might compare is a religious name change. There is a difference in level of harm, and I think that that difference reflects on a wikipedia page. That said, I agree with most of the rest of what you've said. Cam94509 (talk) 06:24, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
while it seems you have personal experience in this matter I'm not going to quibble over your own reported 'harm' thAt may come from having a Wikipedia article titled after your heretofore previously well-known name (since that is the case we're dealing with - its not about someone addressing you at the workplace, nor is it revealing a name that was previously private.) however, I cannot agree with your assertion that we can compare 'harm done' on some sort of scale and that at one end of the scale you have only two groups of ppl: trans and religious conversions - while at the other end of the scale we have everything else, including whole tribes of native people's who must continue to wear the moniker of their oppressors, as well as individuals who have changed their name for reason X. We simply cannot compare 'harm' in this way, and decide to do an emergency rename for some (by asserting that a Wikipedia title is *really* harmful) while telling the others to get in line and wait for commonname. We can't rank 'harm' in a neutral fashion in this way.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 11:43, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
How do you measure other subjective criteria when a judgement is needed to apply policy? For example, an editor can be blocked for being disruptive, but one person's disruption is another person's vigorous debate. In that case I expect you'd try to build a consensus of opinion to decide whether a person was disruptive enough to warrant a block: in this case what's the problem with building consensus and so establishing precedent about what is harmful enough for special measures? Most certainly there is a spectrum of harm, and I think we could all agree that Snoop Dogg lies well south of the threshold; meanwhile myself and others are trying to build consensus that trans birth names are above that threshold. Chris Smowton (talk) 14:07, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
How do you know Snoop Dogg is south of the threshold? He had a religious conversion. He explicitly rejects some of the past represented by Snoop Dogg. Can you say for sure that on the "harm-o-meter", Snoop is less harmed than Manning by their respective article titles (esp given that Manning explicitly recognizes that Bradley will continue to be used when discussing the trial, etc)? I think we need to find a way to treat them the same, and find a neutral way to disintermediate. I think usage in reliable sources is still the most neutral way, even if it means in some cases people get their feelings hurt. If that happens, then its simply because Wikipedia mirrors society and society can be rather harsh. The IP makes some good points below on this topic.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 14:27, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Oh wow, I had thought Snoop Dogg/Lion was the silly "what if I decided I was King of Denmark?" example du jour; I had no idea there was a religious thing going on there. In that case he may well score higher on the harm-o-meter (a term I'll happily embrace without the scare quotes :)) I see your reasoning about deferring to popular usage, in that it ducks the problem of designing a consensus-based harm-o-meter and is thus the easiest solution. It may well be that it is impossible to run the harm-o-meter without causing an unconstructive talk page explosion every time, and if so I agree we should fall back to treating identity like any other somewhat-nebulous topic of reportage; however for the time being I continue to hope that a reasonably-usable meter can be built out of case-by-case discussion and setting of precedent, with the particular goal of making the place more welcoming to trans editors and readers, and the general goal of encouraging civility towards minority groups even when the majority is largely indifferent about the group and relevant etiquette. Chris Smowton (talk) 16:24, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This was one of the reasons that we came rather quickly to a rough consensus to use the feminine pronouns, as most people here seem to agree that in terms of gender identity, the individual is ultimately the best arbiter. However, in terms of what we title an article (which is NOT the same thing as the person's real "name"), the individual is *not* the best arbiter - rather, the broader world is the best arbiter, because the goal of an article title is to indicate to the reader what this thing is usually called, and ensure that the majority of readers are not confused and that they have ended up at the right place. I'm sure BP would like one of their oil spills to be called "BP's technical fluid leakage" instead of "BP's environmental nightmare" - but that's not up to them - it's up to the world. Language, ultimately, is determined by usage. You may say, what you call someone in polite conversation should be determined by them ("Please, don't call me Joseph, only my mother calls me that, just call me Joe") - and that's fair enough - but we aren't having a polite conversation, we are talking about what is in 36 point bold font at the top of the article and what do other articles link to. If we take a hypothetical example, per the arguments made by trans-advocates, we should use the name Chelsea in the title EVEN if no news sources whatsoever have switched (I know that's not the case, but this is reductio ad absurdum). Indeed, wikipedia was feted by those same advocates and various news sources for having been ahead of the game, when in fact we should have been behind. I agree we should make wikipedia welcome to editors of all persuasions, but that may also mean that some of those persuasions have to temper their own feelings about what is "right" and what "must be done" and what constitutes "hate speech" and get behind the core policy of WP:NPOV - this is a two-way street. Take one look at the debates in Israel/Palestine or even what Ireland should point to, this is a tough neighborhood, so you (unfortunately) need thick skin if you're going to participate in content disputes! Sometimes the compromise solution is one that neither side really wanted, but that both sides agree to accept. It's not a question of etiquette - etiquette means you address Obama as Mr. President, but that's not what we do here. Etiquette means you don't mention the indiscretion of the congressman, but we don't shy away from that either - we mention it, and refuse to remove it if it's true, even if it brings his wife to tears. In fact, there are tens of thousands, if not more, BLPs (of *all* genders), who would love nothing more than to delete their bio, because on balance it hurts them more than it helps them (b/c people usually get in the news for doing something bad, but much more rarely for doing something good), but we don't do emergency admin actions in those cases. If those same people advocating for something as (frankly) trivial as an article name change were simultaneously leading the charge to clean up other numerous BLP violations for groups that weren't "theirs" - such as native american tribes, or deghettoizing categories for women, or etc etc I'd have a lot more sympathy, but for now this all reeks of serious POV-pushing into one particular area without concern or thought for what it means for non-trans articles.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:01, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You say that the title is not determining a person's true identity, but rather their heading in an encyclopaedia, and I do believe that's what (most) editors advocating for BM (for example) intend to do. However, even though the underlying rationale is "There wasn't consensus to use CM, so we'll use BM as the most commonly known identifier," it was nontheless perceived as a rejection of the CM identity in favour of BM as the "proper" one. Again I'm not saying anybody intended to send that message, only that it was received and that that reception is the root of the harm caused by the decision.
I agree that there are many cases where one has to be hard-nosed about this sort of thing, such as your congressman example; however, those examples shared the critical property that to be polite would require excision of facts, such as record of a political or sexual indiscretion. By contrast using a trans person's new name is only etiquette, in the sense that it is only a matter of style, not content. There is no need to be hard-nosed in this particular case because accuracy is not at stake; therefore by default we should pick the polite option.
It is certainly the case that many people advocating in this direction, myself included, are unusually sympathetic to the trans cause, but I think that's an inevitability -- if you're discussing X, the people that don't care much about X will drop out quickly and you'll be left with those invested in the outcome one way or another. As to what a policy about trans names would mean to other articles though, surely the answer is sweet nothing, if worded correctly! If a candidate policy used phrasing like "Biographies of people who have publically declared a trans identity" or the like then it needn't have any direct implication for other topics: those may well be discussions worth having, but are neither helped nor hindered by this one. Chris Smowton (talk) 18:27, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am personally sympathetic to the issues that trans people face. In fact, I created an article at Kristin Beck (and not Christopher T. Beck), but the reason no-one disputed that is that before "coming-out" as Kristin, "Chris Beck" was not notable, we didn't have oodles of media coverage, and readers did not know who Chris Beck was - they only knew her as Kristin. But, if we make an exception that says "As soon as a trans-person announces a name change, we should retitle the article immediately; for everyone else, we should wait until RS catch up", that is inherently not neutral, because it begs the question, why is there an exception here? Above, I think you're right, "a rejection of the CM identity in favour of BM as the "proper" one." - this is actually what happened, because that is what sources were doing at that moment - they were not yet accepting the new identity, they were rather struggling with it (read the early articles, and you can see the confusion - and see how AP, NY Times, and others flip-flopped and stumbled around before settling on the proper way to address manning). So I think the current read of sources seems to be "no consensus" on Bradley vs Chelsea, and the discussion here mirrored the real world, and the result did as well. In 30 days, that may well change, and if COMMONNAME becomes clearly a wash between Bradley/Chelsea, then we can start to look at other considerations, including WP:OFFICIALNAME, etc.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:15, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding making a special article naming convention for trans people, I agree that it would be unusual, and does indeed raise the question "why an exception?", but I think that simply reflects the fact that their situation is in fact exceptional (though not entirely unique -- again cite BD's point about religious conversion). It is unusual in the fact that the common name for a person is also arguably a slur against that person. Suppose there was a person who was famous under a clearly pejorative name ("Steve the Asshole"); I suspect wiki would sidestep appearing to back that pejorative view by using a less common name, rather than simply mirroring whether the press approved of Steve. Note also that the existing MOS/pronouns text overrides RSes in the same way, advising a particular usage if there is a publically known trans identity, not if the press adopts it.
As to rejecting the CM identity, the disagreement here hinges on what it means to reject. As you describe it, the community said "we think BM is proper because that's the most frequently used name; a thing's proper name is what people call it", whereas the message that comes across is that the CM identity isn't just unpopular but outright false; that she just does not exist, and BM should stop playing make-believe. Again to be clear I don't think you or anyone else is seriously peddling that view; I simply think a clear policy along the lines of MOS/pronouns would prevent that anti-trans impression from being given. Chris Smowton (talk) 20:16, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No change to COMMONNAME and no new section etc. I agree with what Blueboar wrote above, and I think that the current section on COMMONNAME covers this issue. The suggestion "one should consider only the name used in reliable sources published after the name change," begs the question "What about a half a second after"? If there have been no publications after that change what title do we give the article? As always there needs to be some sort of reasonableness in this which is what the curretn wording "more weight should ..." implies and I think the suggested alternative strips away. -- PBS (talk) 08:07, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Naming conventions for transgender people
Comment: suggest the scope should for the time being be limited to transgender people, because attempting to formulate a general policy that also includes stage names, maiden names and so on ignores the fact that trans people are an unusual case with features that aren't present for either performers or married people. Specifically, it is a common anti-trans slur to use a birth name in a manner that suggests it is the true name, similar to wilfully using incorrect pronouns as already covered by the MOS, and titling an article for their birth name may be, or may be read as, pejorative usage of that kind. At this point people often chime in arguing that Wiki isn't for promoting trans people's cause, and this is true, but when wiki will report on trans people, and will make some choice about how to address them, it might as well make an effort to be civil in doing so. It is of course impossible to avoid offending all people in all ways, but this is a specific offense that is easy to codify and that can be avoided at no cost to the fidelity of the encyclopaedia. Chris Smowton (talk) 09:05, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
(note: BD makes a good point above about religious conversion presenting a similar case. I suggest a good approach would be to formulate the transgender naming policy and then have a separate discussion about expanding it to religious identity if people want to, in order to keep the discussion at any one time as simple as possible.) Chris Smowton (talk) 09:05, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
So to be clear, you want an RfC on the proposal that an exception should be made to the recognizability criterion of WP:AT (a.k.a. COMMONNAME) specifically and solely for transgender people? Peter coxhead (talk) 09:23, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Essentially, yes. I think wiki ought to recognise that there is an unusual imperative to use an asserted identity on grounds of civility and respect in that case. Note that the MOS:IDENTITY passage about using gendered pronouns corresponding to a person's last-publically-asserted identity already makes a specific concession of the same scope (i.e. it applies to "any person whose gender might be questioned," which is a slightly larger set than transgender people) and with the same aim; I'd like to see a similar passage in WP:AT. Chris Smowton (talk) 09:52, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
(Incidentally I agree that some sort of general AT/IDENTITY needs to be hammered out in due course; I advocate a specific discussion first because I think starting with the general case will make it much harder to work out what consensus has been reached because the decision space is much larger) Chris Smowton (talk) 10:03, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If we can have a special naming policy for royals, who only fall into that group because they happen to be born into or marry into a narrowly defined lineage, then we can have a special naming policy for transgender people. This promotes consistency in the titling of articles within the defined area of interest. bd2412T13:43, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
BD2412, your first four words are what worry me. "If we can have...." Sure, we CAN have it, but should we? I have yet to hear an argument that the special naming policy for royals is a good idea. Someone said something about "consistency", but I don't see why the general naming policy would result in inconsistency of names for articles for royals. We CAN have 1000 different "special" naming policies for 1000 different kinds of cases, but that way lies insanity. You have already suggested sliding down the slippery slope from 1 to 2. Chris Smowton's suggestion that we deal with transgender names first and religion, race, and other cased later suggest we could have 3, 4, 5, or more. I say, if anything, we should reel that 1 back in. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 14:23, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (==99.192....)[reply]
I'll make a deal with you. You get Wikipedia:Naming conventions (royalty and nobility) removed, and I'll withdraw my support for this proposal. By the way, I would not be at all surprised if we do have 1,000 different "special" naming policies for 1000 different kinds of cases. Off the top of my head, I believe that we also have special practices for names of military campaigns, Roman family names, biological genera, U.S. cities, legal case names, asteroids, and concubines of Chinese emperors. Generally, these are in the name of consistency, bd2412T15:36, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Your "deal" sounds like you are saying that you will continue to support a new bad policy unless I can get an existing bad policy changed. Compounding errors is generally a bad idea. Also, I don't really believe that there are many separate naming conventions. I checked WP:NCRN, for example, and it has radical suggestions like "Common names as regularly used in English are preferred" and "use the common name in English sources". The rest is about how to disambiguate. It is a "special" policy only insofar as it helps people in deciding what the common name actually is, not in offering an alternative to using the common name. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 15:57, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
Chris Smowton, there are four reasons why I object to a more narrow scope. (1) If we are going to look at one kind of case first and others later, why transgender cases first? Sure, it is the flavour-of-the-moment, but that does not make it more pressing (in terms of possible future cases) or more important that other possible cases of offense. That we have not thought in the past to worry about religious offense or racial offense and now, even when we do, we tell them to get to the back of the line (even though those have been live issues for centuries and transgender naming is the new kid on the block) can (and will) appear to be offensive in its own right.
(2) The idea that we can ignore all cases but transgender ones and come up with a policy that will generalize is to make the same mistake that has been made for generations as a justification for exclusion. "Let's just find out how to treat white men for disease X and then generalize our findings to non-whites and women." There might be a good general policy that will cover both transgender cases and others, but to find it you have to consider all the cases together.
(3) Dealing with transgender cases now and others later has the potential to hide the actual consequences of any policy change. If we do decide on a new policy for transgender cases and that has direct consequences for other cases, then we better talk about those consequences before making any decision. What follows from any decision is important to discuss before making it.
(4) Dealing with gender separately from race, religion, and other cases presents the possibility that we will decide "We don't like offending people of type X, so let's change the rules to make them an exception. But people of type Y? Who cares about them? No 'special' rules for them!" If we are going to take offense seriously, then we need to be consistent on what we say about it, regardless of the basis of offense. A divide-and-conquer approach can help get a foot in the door so others can follow, but it can also set up a situation where some are allowed in and others not.
People change names for many reasons that are deeply personal and would be hurt or offended by people insisting on using their former name. Transgender people are (sometimes) one example of this. For Muhammad Ali, the name change was a religious conversion but it was also a deeply personal rejection of racism by rejecting what he called his "slave name". Matt Sandusky, who was sexually abused by his father, Jerry Sandusky, is changing his surname (along with that of his wife and their four children) so he no longer has to bear the name of his abuser. Linda Lovelace also rejected that name because of its association with her sexual abuse, yet Wikipedia's article still bears that name. Place names change for similar reasons. After the infamous "Niggerhead" camp incident involving Rick Perry, The Daily Show did a great segment pointing out that many places in America have the word "nigger" in their name. Should any of those place names be changed because the word is offensive, that should be treated the same as transgender and sexual abuse cases. As a local (to me) example, Halifax Central Junior High used to be called "Cornwallis Junior High School", but the name was changed because Edward Cornwallis, the founder of Halifax, promoted the genocide of the Mi'kmaq people. The name Washington Redskins is also widely regarded as offensive. Sports Illustrated journalist Peter King has recently announced that he will no longer use "Redskins" in his work. In 1995, St. John's University changed the name of its sports teams from "Redmen" to "Red Storm" for similar reasons. I raise all of these examples to point out that there are lots of article titles that can and do cause offense to people, so if we are going to take offense seriously as a concern we should address in article titles, then we should talk all of it equally seriously. No one's offense is more important here or should get priority treatment. Either all of it matters or none of it does. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 14:18, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
"A divide-and-conquer approach can help get a foot in the door so others can follow, but it can also set up a situation where some are allowed in and others not." All very true, but if you've been at Wikipedia for any length of time you've found that change here can be painfully slow and gets bogged down in a lot of trivial concerns. Doing even simple things takes time and concerted effort and even then only happens one step at a time. Is it not better to do something that we find to be right rather than do nothing? Gradualism is simply the way things work here; Wikipedia wasn't built in a day.
There is already a framework in the article titles policy regarding offense. Namely the bit about "the most common has problems." It just doesn't state which titles are problematic. I think we could expand that bit based on areas of reasonable offense (e.g. names the subject prefers not to be called) that's also broad. CaseyPenk (talk) 15:37, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
99.192, I agree with pretty much all of this, and Casey's comment above -- to be absolutely clear, I'm not saying trans people are more specialier than other groups, only that (a) it's a group that's the subject of a current ongoing debate, making us ideally placed to formulate policy on the matter, and (b) I personally think cooking policies in a "modular" fashion (to steal your programming metaphor :)) may be more productive than trying to address the whole thing at one time because it'll lead to a series of small, focussed conversations rather than one epic, sprawling, hard-to-assess one. I don't think it's a huge deal whether it's done case-by-case or as a monolithic title style guide though since the results should be comparable. Chris Smowton (talk) 16:45, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Chris Smowton, I have to like any comment that starts like this one :-) My one main point of disagreement is with this; "that's the subject of a current ongoing debate, making us ideally placed to formulate policy on the matter". I would say the fact that it is the issue-of-the-moment is precisely what makes it not ideally placed. Hot topics tend to brig out hot-headed advocates with strong biases, whatever those biases are. Making a policy during a crisis is always less preferable to making policy in a cool hour. So if any type of case is ideally placed, it probably is any one of the other examples I gave (well, the "Redskins" one might be a bit too hot) are cool enough right now to offer the prospect of more reasoned rather than impassioned discussion. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 17:10, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
No change needed
No change to COMMONNAME needed - I really don't see the purpose of this discussion. COMMONNAME is working fine. Bradley Manning will shortly change to Chelsea Manning once a new RM establishes that "Chelsea" is in fact the current COMMONNAME. We shouldn't be talking about changing COMMONNAME. COMMONNAME works. The Bradley Manning debate occurred b/c of rash Admin action and failure to follow COMMONNAME. We should be talking about changing policies that don't fall in line with COMMONNAME. NickCT (talk) 14:27, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No change to COMMONNAME needed—COMMONNAME, POVNAME, and TITLECHANGES already address the issue of name changes for public figures perfectly. It protects our ability to describe article subjects objectively without making exceptions for various protected classes. WP:BLP works in concert with this to protect living persons who are not generally known by their birth names, as outing them can cause physical harm. As NickCT noted, if we had followed these policies in the Manning title controversy instead of cutting off the discussion, I believe a large majority of the editors would have been happy with the result. DPRoberts534 (talk) 19:11, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"and the most common has problems"
It occurred to me in reading over some suggestions and comments (especially from Cam94509) that we already have a tool for dealing with names that may be problematic - namely, the following phrase in Wikipedia:Article titles:
When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others.
The only shortcoming with that phrase is that it doesn't specify which types of names are considered problematic. I propose we expand upon the above phrase with an explanation of exactly which names are problematic some examples of the kind of situations that make a name problematic. Here is my rationale:
Such a change would be general and would not favor or disfavor any particular group
Such a change would not depart from WP:COMMONNAME's focus on reliable sources, and would still require extensive coverage of the new name (the bit about "all of them fairly common" means 'commons in reliable sources')
Such a change would provide better guidance for future cases of name changes, so we are left scratching our heads less of the time about how to interpret policy
I very strongly support this. It would be very helpful to offer some guidance on what "has problems" could mean. As written, it is too vague to be a lot of help. My only caution is a small nuance. You wrote about giving "an explanation of exactly which names are problematic", but that is too ambitious and potentially too limiting. I suggest that we try to give "some examples of the kind of situations that make a name problematic". Its a small, but important, difference in emphasis, but also in keeping with the spirit of the suggestion. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 16:08, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
By "some examples of the kind of situations that make a name problematic," do you mean a non-exhaustive listing that would include things like "when an entity changes its name and prefers to be known by the new name," among others? How would we decide which examples to include and which not to? CaseyPenk (talk) 16:19, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
My general worry is if we make a change like this...
"When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others. The most common name has problems in the following cases: A, B, and C."
... we presume that we have exhausted all possible reasonable examples of problems, which might not be true. Other editors in the future might identify further kinds of problems we failed to notice, and so it is good to keep the door open for them as well. But with a change like this...
"When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others. Examples of cases where the most common name has problems include the following: A, B, and C."
... we leave the door open for other editors to identify other problems we missed while specifying the ones we have noticed. For an example of how that worked in law, see Section Fifteen of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, particularly the subsection "Enumerated or analogous grounds" and how the phrase "in particular" was interpreted to be inclusive, but not exhaustive. As for the question of which examples to include and which not to include, we should include all of the ones that we can identify and decide are worth including. If that is 10, then it is 10. If it is none, then it is none. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 16:32, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
Your modification sounds reasonable. I agree that it would be more reasonable to give some major examples, while noting that the examples are not exhaustive. To that point, I would suggest we expand "Examples of cases where the most common name has problems include" to "Examples of cases where the most common name has problems include, but are not limited to" (emphasis mine). While common usage of "include" would allow for other examples, we want to be very clear the listing is non-exhaustive. CaseyPenk (talk) 16:43, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I recommend "names that strongly imply something factually inaccurate about the subject" as that's an application that I think might see a reasonable amount of use. I really like where we're going with this, because making small changes instead of big changes is really where we should be headed here. Cam94509 (talk) 17:58, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It sounds like you are suggesting that we should decide what names are indicators of gender and change the titles of articles where the name suggests a gender other than the person's actual gender. Well intentioned, but a hornets nest in reality. Just what names suggest ender will be contested (a web search shows that some people actually have named newborn girls "Bradley" with that spelling) and then there are the people who naturally have names that seem not to fit their gender, like Michael Learned, Noah Cyrus, and Glenn Close, not to mention cases like George Sand. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 18:15, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (99.192....)[reply]
Actually, I wasn't thinking about peoples names at all. I was thinking about the names of events or things where the name of the event or thing implied something false about it. Cam94509 (talk) 18:26, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Could you give some examples of factually inaccurate names? None come to mind, other than perhaps mis-labeling certain events as scandals or the like. Although, even then it's a matter of interpretation. We can judge the reliability of a source but judging truth is much more difficult, and not something I've seen us generally do. CaseyPenk (talk) 18:30, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I can't think of a particularly good example right now. I'm willing to withdraw it if it seems like a thing that never happens, I just mentioned it because if we're going to write it as a "for example" sentence, I just wanted to include some cases where it might not be applied to people so that the reader didn't get the impression that it was only intended for people, and this seems like a class of cases where it might happen. If anyone has a better way of doing so, I think we should get a nonperson related case in there, as we should avoid leaving the impression that the section of the rule we are amending is only intended for the discussion of people's article titles. Cam94509 (talk) 18:35, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would be circumspect about going beyond human names, since the potential for harm is greater for a person undergoing a change of identity than for, say, a stadium, or the Sears Tower. That said, I think a good "entity" example would be a company like Altria. bd2412T19:37, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm, Altria is a tricky one. They prefer to be known using the new name and using the old one can damage their reputation (by revealing who they are). I'm personally disinclined against honoring Philip Morris's name change request, but that's my personal POV. Still, objectively speaking, corporations are not people and are thus not subject to WP:BLP considerations. Any damage done to a corporation hurts their bottom line but is unlikely to result in them committing a suicide, a very real possibility for transgender people. CaseyPenk (talk) 19:56, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
BD2412, the reason that name changes for places and events should be considered if name changes in people are going to be discussed is because they can cause offense as well. Examples I gave on this page include the "Niggerhead" camp and other places with "Nigger" in their name, schools like the former Cornwallis Junior High School, teams like Washington Redskins and St. John's Red Storm. To add an event to the list, what was once called "The Rape of Nanking" is now called "Nanking Massacre". Names can be changed where they are the cause of offense, so if avoiding offending people is a reasonable goal in article titling, then these all need to be considered as well. 99.192.74.67 (talk) 00:32, 4 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
Regarding titles that "cause offense"... no, we don't always use the least offensive name as our title... See WP:POVNAMING. We follow the sources. When a significant majority of sources routinely use a seemingly offensive name, so do we. It may seem counter-intuitive, but following the sources and using the common but potentially offensive name is actually moreneutral than not doing so.
What concerns me about this entire conversation is the idea that we should follow the subject's wishes and desires. that comes close to favoring some sort of "Official name" over "commonly used names". When it comes to article titles, Wikipedia does not necessarily use what the subject of an article wants to be called ... it uses whatever name is most commonly used by reliable sources. If a subject changes its name... we wait... we don't rush immediately off and change our title... we wait until enough sources have started to use the new name. Then we change. How long this will be depends on what the sources do... but the concept is the same for all name changes... people, places, things. It's a consistent policy and there is no need to change it. Blueboar (talk) 01:30, 4 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Interpretation of "most common"
Also, we should also probably tighten up the language with "fairly common." As I interpret it, "fairly common" casts a wide net - you could have half a dozen "fairly common" names for a subject. I suggest we change "fairly common" to "common" or "highly common." That would avoid us having to give credence to outlandish names that receive only niche media coverage. In the most current case, "Chelsea Manning" is a "highly common" way to refer to the subject, whether or not it is the "most common" - so the case is still covered. I think tightening up the standards for acceptable alternatives would keep this under control. CaseyPenk (talk) 17:37, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If the most commonly used name in reliable sources has problems then why invent our own term? I can see this running into problems and would recommend going with a source used 2nd most often in reliable sources if there is one at least as a first option as long as it is WP:N, ect.... - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 18:41, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Wait, we're not inventing our own term. We're just using other names that are still very common to avoid problematic names (actually, that's a thing that The policy already discusses), and giving examples of what those problematic names might be. In fact, because of the way the policy is written, still demanding "a" common name, just not "the" common name, if we're running into WP:N issues, that implies we can't use whatever name we've decided to replace the problematic name with. Moreover, we're not required to replace problematic names if there is simply no common alternative to them; we're only required to do so if there IS a reasonably common alternative to them. Cam94509 (talk) 18:48, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That could work, but what if the second most common is a longshot? That is, if the first most common is 99% of usage and the second is just 1%. We could say "you can use the second most common name, if it is highly common." Something to that effect. CaseyPenk (talk) 18:46, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In any case, I agree that for article names we should probably only consider the two most common names. Once we start considering third most common and fourth most common names it becomes kind of arbitrary and could go in unexpected directions. I do wonder if we can definitively assess the ranking of different names.. sometimes it's a tossup. We could say, "among two names, both of which are highly common" -- that way we wouldn't have to choose which is most common and which is second, because sometimes it's unclear (as with Private Manning). CaseyPenk (talk) 18:49, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I actually don't agree. I think we should be allowed consider any name that is both commonly used and broadly recognizable when we must replace the most common name.Cam94509 (talk) 18:50, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I was just thinking about that after I wrote what I did. There are probably five different ways to refer to Bill Clinton (middle name or not, President or not, etc.) So limiting to just two doesn't quite work. CaseyPenk (talk) 18:52, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
One of the problems with "most common" is that it is also not a purely objective question, because you would have to do a very careful search of *all* reliable sources discussing a topic to make sure you've determined the "most" common name. Indeed, my own feeling is that you need to have an order of magnitude difference, across a wide sample of sources, ideally chosen randomly and in advance of any searching, to be truly sure that you've found the most common. A difference of 2x or even 5x in sources could simply indicate bias in selection of sources. Thus, 2nd most often (or even "most" often) is not something we can always mathematically determine, except in rare cases where there's a clear winner, a clear second place, and then the rest of the field.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:51, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, rankings are rather arbitrary and can stray into POV. Regardless and separate from what we're doing here (although we can consider it in the same breath), the phrase "most common" as it currently stands in the policy is not very helpful. There's no definitive "most common" name for some subjects, such as Private Manning. So I'd recommend we discuss that. CaseyPenk (talk) 18:54, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Pfft, I didn't realize which section I was in for any of my comments in this section. Please take any of my comments here with a grain of salt. I need to be more careful with my editing. I'm embarrassing myself repeatedly. Cam94509 (talk) 19:03, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
We're talking about the title of the article here, that's all. The masses of discussion about anyone who changes their name, and how WP responds to that need for change, has become overblown and a subject of the wider media in itself. People, we have #REDIRECT [[othername]]! That is all that matters to readers trying to find an article here. Frankly, it doesn't matter what we call the article, it will still be found because of redirects and, truly, it is no overhead on the WP servers to have a redirect in place. And the reader doesn't see any delay in presentation of the page. So we're back to arguing about why such a choice of title should matter.
On the performer front, how about Moya Brennan, or Máire Ní Bhraonáin, or even Máire Brennan? She only changed her name legally in 2009 yet the article recognised this way back. So, clearly, legality shouldn't be the issue here, indeed many countries either have no mechanism for 'legal' name change nor requirement for such. Just using 'a name' is sufficient.
In the case of Chelsea Manning (as against all the other trans people we've happily changed the title of once they've announced it) it seems to be some transphobia alongside the desire of some to punish her in any way they can because of perceived espionage. In the case of Yusuf Islam it could be argued (and I have) that it is Islamophobia that WP are refusing to recognise the name he has used for 35 years, though having Cassius Clay as a redirect to Muhammad Ali doesn't seem to bother anyone even though he became famous first under the former name.
So let's not lose sleep over the title, but concentrate on what matters: the content. If someone wants another name let us be nice and let them have it. We'll always have redirects. --AlisonW (talk) 17:15, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
AlisonW, the fact that you spend so much time arguing for particular positions on what the article titles should be suggests that you already know the answer to your own question. If, as your rhetorical question suggests, article titles are no big deal, then you should not care what title is chosen. But clearly you do care, so at the very least you must admit that it is a little bit of a deal. 99.192.51.153 (talk) 17:22, 3 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
"That is all that matters to readers trying to find an article here. Frankly, it doesn't matter what we call the article, it will still be found because of redirects and, truly, it is no overhead on the WP servers to have a redirect in place. And the reader doesn't see any delay in presentation of the page. So we're back to arguing about why such a choice of title should matter." This argument can be applied to either side of the argument, and in fact the reason COMMONNAME was developed is because it is presumably the COMMONNAME that is most in the interest of the reader.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 17:27, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed, even the discussion regarding transgender people is rooted in WP:COMMONNAME. Personally, I know who Cat Stevens and Muhammad Ali are, but I've only heard Yusuf Islam on Wikipedia and I've only heard Cassius Clay from Wikipedia and because I visited a museum where he was covered. So the policy passes the sanity check in those two cases. In cases of transgender individuals I'm not sure which name is correct (my intuitions are less clear, in part because I know so little of transgender matters), which is why I'm seeking revision to policy - so we can be more clear and precise. CaseyPenk (talk) 17:41, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But isn't the purpose of an encyclopedia to spread knowledge. If it can teach us that Cat Stevens name is now Yusuf Islam (I had no idea of this before either) then that is a good thing isn't it? --Space simian (talk) 19:28, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely. You hear about Cat Stevens because he is notable. You go to Wikipedia and find an article about him and learn that he eventually changed his name to Yusuf Islam. However, if you go to Wikipedia and type in Cat Stevens and get taken to an article titled Yusuf Islam, your first thought is that you are in the wrong place. DPRoberts534 (talk) 19:41, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert... Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
My name is Ozymandius, King of Kings,
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
I find it useful to read this poem, anytime I'm engaged in some epic thing, to remind myself that "this too shall pass"; something you think is so incredibly important, will be, in the fullness of time, just more sand in the desert.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:23, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. It's actually one of my favorite poems (or at least, one of the few that I both recognize and recognize the meaning of) I just wasn't quite sure what you were trying to get across. Cam94509 (talk) 19:29, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That sounds like a nice sound-bite, but it's simply not true. Qworty brutalized BLPs of writers he didnt' like for years, without sanction, and the cleanup effort to undo what Qworty did is still going on, at a snails-pace. I think people are confusing our role with the role of the media. Ultimately, it may be important to a trans person what the NY Times calls them, but it's probably more important how people address them to their face. If our article title (just the title!) is "wrong" for a month or 2 months or 6 months, that doesn't even rank at the BOTTOM of the list of bad shit that has been perpetrated against BLPs in the past. As another example, Amanda Filipacchi caused a major media shitstorm when she accused wikipedia of being sexist because we ghettoized women into categories - and guess what? There are still by my estimate tens of thousands of bios which are categorized in ways which the media/twitterverse called "sexist". But everyone moved on to a new debate. Trust me - this too shall pass...--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:12, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Regardless of who would be harmed, or even if no one would be harmed, our policy is still vague. Most perceptibly, "and the most common has problems." That vagueness will lead us to re-hash the Manning debate if we don't figure it out. CaseyPenk (talk) 20:45, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The problem is that "most commonly used" isn't something that can be quantified. The real cause of the "Manning debate" was that people didn't follow the normal procedure for name changes (we first note the change in the text... then, once more sources use the new name, we propose changing the title). Instead, people tried to force a change. Within seconds of Manning's announcement, people rushed to Wikipedia and changed the title (and every "he" to "she"). This set off a backlash, which led to a counter backlash, etc. If those wanting the change had been willing to wait (even a few days) for the sources to catch up to reality, the entire thing could have been avoided. Those who desired the change could have pointed to sources and made a reasonable argument that the COMMONNAME had changed (or at least was in the process of changing) to "Chelsea".
The debate above has been helpful in hammering out some of the outlines of what would make sense. It seems that editors generally favor a change that would clarify the existing policy without carving out highly-specific exceptions for particular situations.
As such, I propose changing the following statement:
When there are several names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others.
To this:
When there are multiple common names for a subject, all of them used frequently in reliable sources, and one of those names has problems, it is permissible (and may be preferable) to choose one of the other names. Examples of names that have problems include, but are not limited to:
Former names, when the subject has stated a preference for a new name
Names that have become used less frequently because they are widely considered to be pejorative
Rather than saying "it is perfectly reasonable", I would say "it is permissible", or perhaps even "it may be preferable". bd2412T21:08, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm leaning toward "it is permissible," because it is more precise (permission is a much more precise concept than reasonableness) and because it is neutral ("preferable" starts down the slippery slope toward "required," and I don't think "may" is a good word to include in policy that's supposed to be more-or-less definitive). Great suggestion, and I've made the change in the proposed wording. CaseyPenk (talk) 21:14, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Although, just making it permissible does not suggest that we should use it. It seems like at least some editors want to favor the name-without-problems. Should we favor it or just make it one of the options? I see the value in saying "may be preferable," because it nudges toward the names that are less problematic, and that's sort of the goal. CaseyPenk (talk) 21:23, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
We could say both - "it is permissible, and may be preferable, to choose one of the other names". The "and" makes it clear that it is not required. bd2412T21:25, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This seems a good change to me; I have no particular preference over the exact wording of "permissible" versus "preferable" etc. —me_and21:43, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
A couple of issues.
Keeping in "fairly" common is important. While it doesn't imply a hidebound rule, it should help avoid the situation where a person argues that whereas a purportedly "problematic" name has 14,000 appearances in reliable source, the target has 100, so it's also "common". This should help foster some measure of proportionality to parsing the section.
It should be fairly common "in reliable sources", with reliable source possibly linked.
We should consider adding (as we already have for changes of organizations names): "Common sense can be applied – if a person changes his or her name, it is reasonable to consider the usage since the change."
Very minor nit: pejorative should be singular, i.e., not "pejoratives".
Thank you for the suggestions. I think "fairly common" is a weaker standard than "common." "Fairly common" could include almost anything (even things with a few hundred hits). Can you think of any language that's more demanding, such as "highly common" but not quite that extreme? Maybe considerably common, or significantly common?
WP:COMMONNAME already states that "common" means "common in reliable sources," so we don't need to repeat that here. I pulled out just the relevant phrase but when you look at it in context it's clear what "common" means.
We already do consider name changes as special - the policy already states "If the name of a person, group, object, or other article topic changes, then more weight should be given to the name used in reliable sources published after the name change than in those before the change."
With "fairly", what I'm getting at is proportionality. Maybe we need to imply it (or directly state it) in a different way, but that example I gave, of 14,000 verses 100, begs to be resolved by something in the language. As to repeating "in reliable sources", we have a constant problem with people not understanding this and it should be reiterated ad nauseum.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 22:12, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The wording is clunky, but this phrasing is much more specific about what "common" means, removing any need to guess: "When a large number of reliable sources refer to a subject using a given name, but that name has problems, it is permissible (and may be preferable) to choose a different name also used by a large number of reliable sources." CaseyPenk (talk) 22:35, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I had to reread what you typed two times as it is a bit confusing:
"When there are several names for a subject, all of them common, and one of the names has problems (Which one?), it is permissible, and may be preferable, to choose one of the other names....."
I agree it is wordy. Could you clarify exactly what phrases you find to be particularly confusing? It sounds like "one of the names has problems" may not be completely clear at first? CaseyPenk (talk) 22:02, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
how about: "When there are several common names for a subject and one of the most common names has problems it is permissible, and may be preferable, to choose one of the other names....." ? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:07, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Smoother wording. I am concerned about the loss of precision by saying "common names" rather than "fairly common" or some qualifier like that. CaseyPenk (talk) 22:10, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Knowledgekid87, I clarified the wording at the beginning of the sentence and tested out changing "one of the most common names has problems" to "one of those names has problems." The "those" should help with clarity, and it avoids us having to repeat "more/most common," but I realize it still might not be totally clear. I'm trying to make the wording as smooth and non-redundant as possible but also make it very obvious what we're trying to say. Let me know what you think. CaseyPenk (talk) 23:09, 3 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I have some quibbles and squabbles. First, the word "names" appears in both bullet points, yet in the first it seems clear it is referring only to names of people and in the second only to names of non-people. It might be better to say "personal names" in the first bullet to make it clear.
Second, "the subject has indicated preference". Shouldn't that be "indicated a preference"?
Third, the very act of changing one's name is to indicate that the new name is preferred. No one changes their name and then says "keep using the old name". So I would want to strengthen the claim to say something like "Former names, when the subject has stated a preference that the former name not be used".
Fourth, "Names widely considered to be pejorative" is not strong enough. I would phrase it like this: "Names that were officially changed or that have become used less frequently because they are widely considered to be pejorative".
Fifth, WP:COMMONNAME offers a list of 14 different examples to illustrate what it is saying. I think that one or two examples for each bullet would help. Muhammad Ali might be a good example for bullet point 1. St. John's Red Storm and Nanking Massacre might be good examples of the two parts I have suggested for bullet 2. 99.192.74.67 (talk) 01:13, 4 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
"Officially" sounds a bit too close to WP:OFFICIAL (i.e. legally changed). It may be a bit wordier, but something more like "where an individual has announced a change of their name". bd2412T01:25, 4 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
1, changed to "personal names" Many entities can change their name and state a preference, such as stadiums, events, etc. (although such entities cannot voice an opinion)
2, changed
3, changed There are cases in which the subject does not strongly prefer one side or the other - for example, with Private Manning, Chelsea's lawyer said "Bradley" would still be used, although Manning prefers to be known as "Chelsea." Hence, the criteria that the subject prefers the new name, even if they don't completely disavow the old one.
4 -- how do you determine an "official" name? What if the subject has no official name, as in the Nanking Massacre?
5 -- this is the one that presents some difficulties. Including examples would seem to suggest that we changed those article names specifically because of this policy, when in fact those titles predated this policy and were probably more common in reliable sources anyways. The Nanking Massacre one basically makes sense, but again, who says the Rape of Nanjing name was used less frequently because it was a pejorative? There are probably a multitude of reasons for historians moving away from the Rape term. CaseyPenk (talk) 01:26, 4 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
(1) No, entities like schools, buildings, and even sports teams cannot state a preference, nor are they the kinds of things that can have a preference, but wait for point 4 for more on this....
(2) :-)
(3) Ok
(4) When I say "names that were officially changed" I am thinking of schools, buildings, and sports teams. These things do not change their own names. Someone in an official position to name them does it. So the University administration at St. John's were the people who officially changed the sports teams' name. The "or that have become used less frequently" was meant for things that do not have an official name beyond what we happen to call it, like the Nanking Massacre.
(5) "Including examples would seem to suggest that we changed those article names specifically because of this policy" - I disagree. Re-read the text you are proposing. It says nothing about "changing" the name of articles. Your proposal is about how to name articles in the first place. It certainly will have consequences for cases where a change is proposed, but that is not what the text reads. Furthermore, it must read this way (as opposed to be about changes) because we want to cover cases where an article is being created for the first time as well. As for the specific Nanking example, I think it is a good one, but if you think there is some doubt that the name is less used because it might offend, then a different example could be used.. 99.192.74.67 (talk) 02:01, 4 September 2013 (UTC) (=99.192....)[reply]
I would say the intent is that they should... but we should probably examine some examples before we say yea or nay (especially some "tricky" ones that could make us think about unintended consequences). Did you have one in mind? Blueboar (talk) 01:55, 4 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Done - but this isn't the appropriate place for these requests. --Rob Sinden (talk) 10:59, 22 August 2013 (UTC)