Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation

Long-term significance vs usage

I made a change to the primary topic section, switching the order of the two criteria given. Wikipedia:Five Pillars are our core values, and chief among them is that "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia". In an encyclopedia, long-term significance of general knowledge topics is the primary value for inclusion. "Usage" (aka page views, search results) certainly has value, especially in a digital medium such as us, but should not be presented as the top criterion. Usage is a fluid and fickle thing - it is heavily dependent on time, region, and context. Taking the example in that section, apple is given primary topic because it is a general knowledge topic compared to the transient commercial popularity of Apple Inc.. Usage is perhaps better presented as a "tie-breaker" when two topics have roughly equal long-term encyclopedic significance.

As such, I would like to reinstate my edit, switching the order, as a first step. I think this community should also discuss rewording the two criterion so that it is clear that usage is used when long-term significance doesn't give a clear result - perhaps changing the line to "A topic may be primary for a term with respect to usage..." while the other line stays "A topic is primary for a term with respect to long-term significance...". -- Netoholic @ 05:02, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Disambiguation is required whenever, for a given word or phrase on which a reader might search, there is more than one existing Wikipedia article to which that word or phrase might be expected to lead. In this situation there must be a way for the reader to navigate quickly from the page that first appears to any of the other possible desired articles. So when the reader types a search term, we're aiming to provide the page they expected and desired, even if another page might advance their knowledge of a topic that we consider more worthy. Usage, over a period of decades rather than months, is a good indicator of what's expected and desired. Where it conflicts with the general knowledge criterion, we probably have no primary topic and should put a dab at the base name. Certes (talk) 10:09, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Netoholic, in one respect, if discussion here establishes consensus for the change then I'm OK with that. But it is a significant change. The criteria was based primarily of usage from the earliest days and the long-term significance criteria was added later (and is still disputed by some). I don't think a subjective reading of WP:5P justifies elevation of that criteria without some broader discussion and consensus. older ≠ wiser 15:35, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, it's bad enough that long-term significance even got added as a criterion; trying to make it a higher priority is even worse. We are building an encyclopedia, but it's an online encyclopedia, and we're trying to serve our readers as well as possible. That includes trying to get them to the article they are seeking in the fewest clicks possible, when reasonable. I've long held that historical significance is inherent in likelihood of being sought. That is, if it's that historically significant, then that supposed significance should be reflected in how often the article is sought, thus page view counts, link counts, etc. There is no need for a separate historical significance criterion. It does nothing to improve the encyclopedia, and just gums up the primary topic decision-making process. --В²C ☎ 02:44, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

We have access to many techniques which can get a reader quickly to an article. A PRIMARYTOPIC debate rarely (never?) requires more than a single extra click for the reader who lands on a subject they were expecting, so the effect is negligible. Even the best encyclopedias (print ones) often had to include page references to guide the reader. We also have the major benefit of search engine technology, which I think almost makes this concern moot. Its a small sacrifice (if you can even call it that) for the benefit of being a reputable encyclopedia which prioritizes its topics appropriately by putting general human knowledge about commercial products, fan content, etc. -- Netoholic @ 05:39, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

There is a long-standing and insoluble problem with page views. As for being a reputable encyclopedia, things like the NYRM2016 fiasco certainly don't help that. We will only be reputable to the extent we follow our own rules.

One of the problems with primary topic is that Wikipedia is becoming a citeable authority to others. Google search cites us for example. So our use of language, and in particular our choice of article title and in particular of primary topic, influences English usage. It has become in this sense content. However, it's not content that can be related to its sources by citations in the same way that article content can be, and in presenting it as content we are subtly violating both NPOV and NOR.

We would stand far more chance both of being regarded as a reputable encyclopedia and of attracting and retaining good editors if we got rid of the problematic and unnecessary concept of primary topic altogether. It seemed a good idea to the founders. It has proven otherwise. Andrewa (talk) 19:21, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

"Proven" how? We should move William Shakespeare (disambiguation) to the base name? Mexico (disambiguation)? Bread (disambiguation)? No, it may be at times problematic (and not necessarily insolubly so), but it most certainly is necessary. -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:25, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Proven by experience in many RM discussions and others such as this one. Yes, it would do no harm to have William Shakespeare (playwright) as the article title, and similarly for the others. It would take some getting used to by the old hands!

Why exactly is it most certainly... necessary? Andrewa (talk) 19:43, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

To keep exactly that from happening: to add qualifiers to a bajillion titles that don't need them, hindering both readers (predominantly looking for the, hm, "primary" topic for a title) and editors (who now have to figure out which qualifier to add to nearly every wikilink to a "primary" topic). -- JHunterJ (talk) 20:03, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply, and for answering the whole question, that is, you've said not only that you think William Shakespeare the playwright should be at the base name but that this is for three reasons: To avoid needing to change many articles (I agree that's a consideration but I think the task is manageable); To spare some readers (hopefully a majority) from loading a short page and needing then a single mouse click to get to the page they want; And to spare editors the need to choose and type a disambiguator. I don't think any of those are serious problems. Andrewa (talk) 04:36, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

They are serious impacts with negative return on investment. You say "some readers" and "short page" and "single mouse click" to minimize it, but that is exactly the negative return on this investment you're seeking: we do a bunch of editor work (and increase the ongoing maintenance editor work) in order to worsen the overall reader encyclopedia experience. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:47, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

See my replies at User talk:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Ongoing discussion. Andrewa (talk) 16:29, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I agree with the change. IMO it's an improvement, and will save a little editor time and improve overall reader experience a little. A far bigger improvement would be to abandon the whole problematic and Wikipedia-invented concept of primary topic and disambiguate whenever there is ambiguity, but I can't see that happening. Andrewa (talk) 05:28, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

If I've understood you correctly Andrewa, your change would make Corvette a dab, and I don't think that's what Netholic had in mind! Certes (talk) 10:53, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

I would indeed make Corvette a DAB, and would retire the pseudo-disambiguator (disambiguation) completely, as unnecessary. I concede that this is unlikely to be accepted, in fact I'm not sure it will ever have any (other) supporters at all! But I can see many positives, and absolutely no negatives, to this approach. One more click does no reader significant damage, and yet we spend many person-hours seeking this elusive primary topic, which achieves nothing significant. Andrewa (talk) 11:17, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

We would need to keep a redirect at William Shakespeare (disambiguation) to mark the few wikilinks which are genuinely intended for the dab page, so the long-suffering gnomes can skip them when editing the daily torrent of new links to dab page William Shakespeare to read William Shakespeare (playwright). Certes (talk) 16:04, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

Agree. Exactly.

We might even keep a long term concept of primary topic just to help partly automate this process. But primary redirects and pages named XYZ (disambiguation) would go. The DAB names would still be there for navigation, but they'd be redirects not pages, and ambiguous primary redirects would point to a DAB (or in some cases be one). And non-ambiguous redirects aren't primary redirects at all, and would be unaffected. Andrewa (talk) 16:35, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I too support the change. It seems clear from the move discussions I've participated in, that long-term significance is more important than page hits.--Ykraps (talk) 06:56, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Again, see user:andrewa/The Problem With Page Views, and please add to the Examples section there. And while it's not the only or even the best evidence of search term likelihood, it's almost always the only one cited, and the arguments above demonstrate this unfortunate tendency too. Andrewa (talk) 19:32, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

The problem with page views is that a large proportion of the community don't believe they should determine Primary Topic. When it first came into being, Primary Topic was about the "most important" and "central meaning" of a word or phrase.[[1]] Page views were later introduced, only as one of a number of ways to help determine this.[[2]] Since then of course, the importance of page views has been pushed to the forefront to the point that some people think they are now the determining factor. Rather than try to force this view on an unaccepting community,[[3]] the guidelines ought to be rewritten to reflect what is actually the custom.--Ykraps (talk) 09:35, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

Great summary of some key evolutionary steps of this section. It really makes me wonder how we've strayed so far. I think the problem stems from human nature, and how we have a bias toward "countable" factors like page views over more in-depth criteria that is involved in determining long-term significance. We really need to add some alternative advice to replace the simple page view measures. Criteria like: "If you were forced to pick one article to delete from then encyclopedia, that article is likely not a primary topic". -- Netoholic @ 14:42, 18 February 2018 (UTC)

Agree. The PT guideline is busted, see the latest evidence. Whether fixing it is practical... perhaps it's worth having a go, as it's a lot less work than abandoning it. But I'm not convinced that there's any more prospect of consensus to fix it than there is of consensus to abandon it. Andrewa (talk) 00:02, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Well analysed, Ykraps, and well put. I missed that post at first. Andrewa (talk) 22:14, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

There's no problem with "a large potion of the community" disagreeing with the consensus here in particular. Large portions of the community disagree with many of the consensus guidelines and policies. Wikipedia consensus is not unanimity. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:42, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Agree.

But I don't think that's being challenged anywhere here. The question with regard to specific RMs is, what do we do when there is no consensus? The question with regard to the guidelines is, can we build consensus here to improve them, and how? Andrewa (talk) 22:14, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

It was challenged above. My statement "There's no problem" is a direct contradiction of the "The problem with page views" claim (and the follow-up comments congratulating it). If the issue is with how to handle RMs with no concensus, WT:RM would seem to be the correct venue. The question here seemed instead to be "has consensus changed on the use of page views along with long-term significance". Which it doesn't seem to have. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:45, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrary break 1

It was challenged above. My statement "There's no problem" is a direct contradiction of the "The problem with page views" claim (and the follow-up comments congratulating it). OK, so when you say There's no problem with "a large potion of the community" disagreeing with the consensus here in particular you mean that there's no problem with taking page views as the end-of-all-discussion in RMs. I didn't understand that. Yes, that view is both expressed and challenged both above and elsewhere.

If the issue is with how to handle RMs with no concensus, WT:RM would seem to be the correct venue. That's one of several correct venues, depending on how we propose to improve things. RM closers consider the instructions at WP:RM certainly, but also the closing instructions and other policies and guidelines, including of course this one. A change to the instructions at RM would need consensus on its talk page, certainly.

The question here seemed instead to be "has consensus changed on the use of page views along with long-term significance". Maybe. It's also possible that we just need to clarify the guideline rather than change its intent.

But the original question wasn't just about page views, it was long-term significance vs usage. Part of the problem is that page views seem to be taken by some as end-of-discussion evidence of usage, which of course they are not. They're an excellent starting point but a very poor closing. Which is what my essay says, and what you dispute, is that correct?

Which it doesn't seem to have. Too early to call IMO. Andrewa (talk) 20:37, 20 February 2018 (

• No, I wasn't saying that.
• This is one of many more incorrect venues for discussing how to handle RM's with no consensus.
• You are seeking to change the intent of the current guideline to one, not clarify the existing guidelines.
• I've stated my position above, unsplintered. I'll await the eventual formal RfC or other proposal, rather than continue down this hole. -- JHunterJ (talk) 20:58, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm very glad that you weren't saying that there's no problem with taking page views as the end-of-all-discussion in RMs, but I can't then see what you were saying by a direct contradiction of the "The problem with page views" claim (and the follow-up comments congratulating it... (my emphasis) since that is the whole point of the essay in question. I can only hope that others read the essay rather than accept your dismissal of it at face value. And of course it belongs to the whole project, not to me, so help in clarifying what it does say (obviously not as well as it might) is always welcome.

I think I've already answered the second point, but I guess you could similarly say this is an incorrect place to discuss the essay. That didn't stop you, nor should it have stopped you. It's relevant to the project page, and therefore discussion on the project talk page (ie here) is appropriate.

The third point could be seen as a personal attack, or as irrelevant speculation. In either case it's just a distraction (whether deliberate or not). You say you disagree with my essay. You deny that you disagree with what it says. You just don't like it, but nor do you seem to understand it.

Thanks for foreshadowing the sort of opposition such an RfC would receive from yourself, I think that is helpful. I'm unlikely to move any such until the dust finally clears from NYRM, whose loose ends still include deciding whether NYC is primary topic for New York, and whether if so we should move the city to the base name. That's obviously related to this discussion. But I'd probably participate if someone else wants to get it started. Best. Andrewa (talk) 00:07, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrary break 2

I support the change. Srnec (talk) 20:19, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

Or just drop PT altogether

I'm encouraged by the response... it's negative but not as negative as I had feared, and more encouraging still, the arguments against so far are very easily answered IMO. But it's not ready for this talk page IMO, and has gone off-topic for this section. See User talk:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic and its user page, where I intend to try to develop the proposal. Comments welcome there of course! Andrewa (talk) 06:30, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I am completely onboard with eliminating "primary topics", the use of (disambiguation) pages, and in fact, I'd love to get rid of all parenthetical disambiguation and replace it with a "subtitle" field so that each page could be named as they should, and the subtitle would be a of short phrase of clarifying text (very much like you see on Wikidata entries). This would also require that our wikilinking mechanism work like Wikidata's dropdown selection menu rather than straight text. This is probably a big change to the mediawiki interface. Your solution might be a good one in the meantime, since any conversion process could move anything in a parenthetical into that subtitle field. -- Netoholic @ 21:12, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I empathise with this position and can see the benefits (not least the potential to massively reduce discussions like the one about Corvette). However, if we remove primary topic entirely that introduces new problems shown by a couple examples:

1. Mathematics is ambiguous. Do we really want to disambiguate one of the top-ten vital articles? When the competing terms are 2 relatively obscure songs and a hip-hop producer? And even if we did, how do you clarify such a major topic further?
2. Bangkok is apparently unique. Even if it is today, that could change tomorrow. That means messing with stability, generating page moves and adjusting thousands of links, just because of a new article with less than 10 links. Is that good? We could avoid that by pre-emptively disambiguating everything? But is that wise?--Nilfanion (talk) 21:28, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

Exactly. Maybe Mathematics (primary topic)? :-) Primary topic is a solution, not a problem. User essays are fine, but I'm not going to go read and comment on them when they have no chance of becoming consensus. -- JHunterJ (talk) 21:38, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

Fair enough. I felt I needed to give you the opportunity as I have replied there to two of your posts here, and will probably do the same to the points you just made (such as a solution, not a problem). But if and when this comes back here, you'll have ample opportunity to comment then. Andrewa (talk) 23:12, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

Reply now at User:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Objection 3 if anyone else is interested. But even better, take a look at User:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Creating new articles. The benefits of abandoning this tangled web of locally invented linguistics are far greater than I thought. Andrewa (talk) 09:10, 16 February 2018 (UTC)

Two excellent points, thank you, and the example of Mathematics (disambiguation) is an excellent one, I doubt we will find a more challenging example. I'll add them to my user page and critique them there. Andrewa (talk) 23:12, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I have added them at User talk:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Mathematics etc and User talk:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Bangkok and there is some discussion there already, more would of course be welcome. Andrewa (talk) 02:45, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

Wow, that's an even bigger project. As you say, this would be a good first step. I'll need to digest the pros and cons of your proposal. Andrewa (talk) 23:16, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

• I don't think that abolishing PT entirely is viable; it would produce absurdities like "Water (H2O)", "Mathematics (numerical science)", "Africa (continent)" and "Sky (blue layer above your head)".
  However I would support raising the threshold for PT from the current "more likely than all the other topics combined" (which is effectively 50%+1) to "much more likely than all the other topics combined". --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 07:39, 10 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support raising the PT threshold considerably. I suggest the level at which everyone familiar with any one of the ambiguous topics is necessarily familiar with the PT. This will apply mostly to topics that are the original term and from which all others derive. Avatar would meet this. Paris would not. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:44, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

  That would be a horrible threshold. All you would need is one editor saying WP:IDONTLIKEIT (only phrased as "I've never even heard of {the fruit called apple|the Muse in mythology|the prime minister named Churchill}) and we'd move the dab to the base name? *shudder* -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:25, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

  Any reasonably likely reader, group of readers, not any editor’s claim. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SmokeyJoe (talk • contribs) 12:31, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

  "every reasonably likely reader familiar with" is an improvement over "everyone familiar with". Still has the problem with "Muse (band)" vs. "Muse" (the myth). There are indeed fans of the band who have no idea where the name comes from. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:58, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

  I think the PT threshold should be higher, but the driving reason is not simplicity. There will still be arguments. It will not simplify the Avatar arguments, but will fit the underlying principles that rubbed so badly against “PT goes to maximum usage”. Concise it good, but too concise is not good. Much of the PT low threshold support seems to have as an objective having the most frequently downloaded pages at the shortest titles, which I think is a pretty pointless objective. I don’t understand the point of your Muse example. Muse is currently a DAB page, which I think is good. Muse is both ancient mythology, and a simple word. Simple words usually mean a DAB page is best, I think. NOTDICT tells us not to make word definition articles, it does not tell readers that Wikipedia doesn’t do words. We do the wiktionary linkbox, which goes great on DAB pages. On Muse, the most popular topic would be the currently trading entertainment group, and as a for-profit organisation trading under a catchy single-word name, I think it needs to pass a very high hurdle before being given PT for the word. As for Muse group fans who don’t know the meaning of the name, I hold the sometimes contentious view that Wikipedia is a scholarly reference work that should bias towards the scholarly, not the music fan base looking for gossip or tour information. Any serious scholar interested in the group should know the meaning of the name, or should be prepared to quickly find out when visiting Wikipedia. I’m not sure how this speaks to your point? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:17, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

• I admire the subtitling system used by Britannica online, which is similar to the approach outlined by Netoholic above. Every article gets a two or three word subtitle that also serves as a parenthetical descriptor and pops up during the autocomplete process. This approach eliminates the need for both primary topics and for disambiguation pages. But there would have to be a software upgrade to strongly encourage editors to follow the new rules. Until then, primary topic remains the least awful option. If editors were willing to accept an unambiguous criteria like page views, the process would be less frustrating and the results far more reasonable. Nine Zulu queens (talk) 08:44, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
  • To clarify the above, I favor an article as primary topic as long as the alternative is to make a disambiguation page primary. These pages are often poorly written and few readers appreciate being sent to them. If a "(disambiguation)" parenthetical was attached to every DAB page, they could be avoided more easily. Nine Zulu queens (talk) 01:35, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Less radically

Interesting comment here As stated above, the fact that there is a legitimate argument over what the primary topic is is a good sign of the lack of a primary topic. I tried wading through the previous discussion and didn't find the as stated above but did see links to two previous archived RMs. Presumably it's there somewhere (diff appreciated if you find it... or perhaps Old Naval Rooftops might chime in here and give it).

Could this principle be usefully incorporated in the disambiguation guidelines, or the the closing instructions, or preferably both? It stands to save a lot of wasted editor time and ruffled feathers. The main problem I see is just assessing what is legitimate, and note that the emphasis is there in the original post.

Not to mention (which of course means I will... English is like that), some poor admin or page-mover or a very bold user who is neither will need to close this RM eventually. Give them a break? Andrewa (talk) 16:45, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm with you in wanting a dab but there is a subtle distinction. If there's legitimate argument over what the primary topic is (is it topic A or topic B?) then that's a strong argument for a dab. But if there's agreement that A is the only candidate and the argument is only over whether A passes the threshold, then things are less clear. I think Corvette may be the latter case, despite the quote. Certes (talk) 19:09, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

Agree that the distinction is important.

I'm trying to avoid !voting on that particular RM. Certainly under my radical proposal we would have a DAB at the base name, but under the current rules it is less clear, and I think this matters.

Again, the devil is in deciding what's a legitimate argument. In both this RM and the farcical NYRM, there have been three camps, those who suggested A or B as candidates for primary topic as well as those who said neither, and in fact the foreshadowed NYRM2018 is to decide this very issue. But were their arguments legitimate? Andrewa (talk) 20:04, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

He might be referring to a sentence that used to be in the guideline: "There are no absolute rules for determining primary topics; decisions are made by discussion between editors, often as a result of a requested move. If there is extended discussion about which article truly is the primary topic, that may be a sign that there is in fact no primary topic." I never found it especially helpful; it only led to added discussion as to whether or not it was in fact a sign in the particular case. Station1 (talk) 19:53, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

Good point. Again, the devil is in deciding what is legitimate. Andrewa (talk) 20:04, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

• I haven't been following this thread – so apologies if what I say is irrelevant – but if the motivation for these rather bold proposals is the existence of controversies over at RM, then I think the issue has less to do with the guidelines and more to do with editor behaviour. From my experience so far (not very extensive, let me admit), all the primary-topic-related controversies have seemed to be caused by a small number of tenacious RM regulars who apparently pretend that PTOPIC doesn't exist. – Uanfala (talk) 20:23, 17 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Very relevant IMO, can you give an example (the best readily to hand) of one of these primary-topic-related controversies that have seemed to be caused by a small number of tenacious RM regulars who apparently pretend that PTOPIC doesn't exist? I've replied further here. Andrewa (talk) 01:33, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
    • Uanfala has now provided two examples as requested. One of these they proposed and we were both heavily involved in the subsequent discussion, and they were heavily involved in the other but I was not involved at all.
    • Both discussions were long, involved and passionate, with Uanfala arguing for a move of the DAB away from the base name on the grounds that a primary topic exists. Both closed as no consensus and therefore no move.
    • Both would have closed with the identical practical result under either of my proposals, just far more quickly, in fact possibly neither move would have been proposed.
    • Agree that neither was a good result, in that no consensus is never a good result.
    • Disagree that this is a behavioural issue.
    • In my opinion, both examples demonstrate that both of my proposals have at least some merit. See User talk:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Behaviour of the regulars for more on this. Andrewa (talk) 17:59, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
• I suppose, yes, I do need to give context for "as stated above". My comment was in reference to the lack of consensus in the RM itself, not to any specific proposal that the car is the primary topic for "Corvette". Take a look here: my "as stated above" referenced Certes's refutation of WP:IAR. ONR (talk) 13:06, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Perfect, thank you! Andrewa (talk) 17:17, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Still less radically

Which solution best serves readers who type in "Corvette", and surprises them least? The fact that a panel of experienced editors disagree suggests that the answer is a dab. [4]

This suggests to me that, at the very least, no-consensus decisions on primary topic should default to no primary topic, rather than to no move as at present. Particularly interested in Certes view on this as it's their comment and I don't want to be misquoting them. This would also clarify the two examples quoted by Uanfala above, confirming those decisions, and would have reversed my old hobbyhorse NYRM2016 without all the hassle of NYRM2017 and possibly now NYRM2018. Andrewa (talk) 16:59, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

I hope that if one editor thinks topic A is primary and another thinks topic B is primary then each will see that the term is more ambiguous than they thought, and they may reach a consensus to put a dab at the base page. But if no such consensus emerges, the established procedure is that we keep the status quo. Certes (talk) 17:18, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Exactly.

But the examples considered to date all suggest to me that this established procedure is not the best. Basically it reduces our article naming to the child's game of I bags. Andrewa (talk) 04:57, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

User:Andrewa, I haven't been keeping up with this. I do believe there are times when discussion showing that there is no strong consensus in favor of moving a primary topic out of the way can also be good evidence that a dab should be at the base title... and I believe I have closed discussions like that, rarely, in the past. Usually I would be likely to let the request sit for longer than usual in that event to see if the discussion will straighten itself out. But the type of discussion now ongoing at Talk:Bad Company#Requested move 7 March 2018 seems like a good reason to worry about the criterion "a panel of editors disagree." We don't want to encourage initiating move requests without a rationale with the purpose of gauging whether the discussion can reach "no consensus," do we? It seems that "the default is no primary topic" is an interpretation that's been picked up by some along the way. Dekimasuよ! 23:25, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Interesting example, thank you. This is on the back burner while I gather such examples and try to make sense of them all, but it's certainly not abandoned, see here and here. Andrewa (talk) 04:51, 14 March 2018 (UTC)

A hopefully quick !vote

There are many detailed discussions above, but do we think we've reached agreement to swap the order by putting long-term significance above usage? Certes (talk) 21:57, 28 February 2018 (UTC)

• Long term significance is the more important. Usage is a quick and easy rough indicator. Avatar is a good example of where long term significance and original versus derivative use beats recent usage. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:18, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
• Long-term significance is a subjective factor, so overemphasising it is problematic. Usage, if averaged out over a sufficiently long period (not excluding the future), probably approximates most understandings of "significance". – Uanfala (talk) 22:28, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
• There is no real consensus among editors, either generally or often in individual cases, as to which, if either, criterion is more important. One is objective and one is subjective. The guideline doesn't and shouldn't favor one over the other, so there's no reason to change the order. Station1 (talk) 07:51, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
• Long-term significance is the more important. Usage is a handy tie-breaker between topics of equal (or both relatively low) long-term significance. Topics of general knowledge should always trump topics of fleeting popularity, like commercial products, entertainment, news of the day, and the like. These general knowledge topics may not "sexy" in the moment, but their presence is core to what it means when we call ourselves an encyclopedia. Wikipedia is not a zeitgeist and its not a popularity contest. In the era of modern search engines, primary topic status is relatively unimportant as searchers will generally get delivered immediately to the right article based on keywords and context. Yes, some people type URL address manually, but I think that's rare. In fact, high usage on a disambiguated topic is proof that people are finding the way to it without a problem. We need to stop worrying so much. The importance of primary topic isn't about usage, its about being taken seriously as encyclopedia. (added) It occurs to me that maybe we shouldn't even call it "long-term significance", but rather rewrite it to describe primary topic in terms of general knowledge trumping specialized, pop culture, or niche knowledge. At issue should be how many people are aware of a topic, not how many view the page (ironically, the more widely known a topic is, the less people look it up). Very few people view the apple page, yet most know what it is and would be astonished if it wasn't the primary topic over a company. -- Netoholic @ 10:18, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) I think we should promote long-term significance over page hits. Station1 is correct in that the guideline doesn't favour one over the other but having page hits at the top appears to have the psychological effect of giving it greater significance. Those who think I'm talking nonsense surely won't mind indulging me.--Ykraps (talk) 09:58, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
• Usage isn't just page hits. And usage by its nature (being used) encompasses much of significance. The significance is there as a reason to go against the usage to avoid surprise, like with "apple". The usage-then-significance order reflects the process, not the prioritization, so they shouldn't be swapped. -- JHunterJ (talk) 15:13, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
• Long-term significance should trump recent usage, especially in light of WP:NOT#NEWS, when an article gets spikes in coverage and lots of editing. Example: Scott Walker (politician) came to attention during the latest Republican primaries and was crowned primary topic in July 2015 against Scott Walker (singer) and other less-notable dab entries. Editors a year later moved the dab page back to the unadorned base name Scott Walker, but much energy was wasted fixing links back and forth. Paying more attention to long-term significance would have prevented the 2015 PT grab. Several editors had justified their support for the 2015 move by interepreting the guideline as giving primacy to usage, e.g. Clearly meets the objective primary topic criterion, usage – I don't think anyone would disagree with that. The other criterion, long-term significance, is of course subjective. Personally I would say a governor and presidential candidate has more long-term significance than a singer, but I guess others could disagree.

This thread also reminds me fondly of the PT discussion about Fingering: is it primarily a musical or a sexual skill? I feel the proposed change will avoid much unnecessary drama. — JFG ^talk 15:43, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

• Should we add something to the relevant section about timescales? A chart-topping singer who was unknown last month may not be a candidate for primary topic, but a product that's been famous for 30 years may be. Certes (talk) 16:25, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
  • I think more important is to preclude currently promoted topics from claiming PT over pre-existing topics or even common dictionary words. Last month's chart-topping singer will be subjected to her manager's promotion machinations. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:20, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
• For the record, long-term significance is more than adequately represented by the usage criteria (the extent to which a topic is historically significant is reflected in usage in reliable English sources), and, if it must stay, then it certainly has to be secondary to usage. --В²C ☎ 02:14, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
  • Note your opinion. Disagree on all points. Andrewa (talk) 20:53, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
• Support giving long-term significance priority over current usage, partly because of the difficulty noted in deciding just what timescale is current and what is long-term and what is just recentism. (Still prefer to abolish PT as a concept and still gathering evidence there!) Andrewa (talk) 20:53, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
• Disagree. Usage is the best (not the only!) way to determine what our readers and editors expect as the primarytopic. Dohn joe (talk) 21:16, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
• Support giving long-term significance priority over current usage. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia; it is not clickbait, nor is it a sales-driven tabloid newspaper, or a ratings-chasing TV show, and favouring usage amounts to prioritising transient news or pop culture. Current usage should only ever be a tie-breaker criterion .
  I also support the proposal that no consensus defaults to no primary topic, because chosing one topic as primary over others should require an explicit consensus without first mover advantage. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 07:25, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

That seems to be a no-brainer to me. If we can't get consensus on a primary topic, then surely it's best to assume there is none, rather than defaulting to squatter's rights. I still don't think that goes far enough, but it would solve the most blatant (and sometimes downright ridiculous) cases. Andrewa (talk) 04:08, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

If editors make reasonable cases for two different PTs then I also suggest there is no PT. But if everyone agrees that there is only one candidate for PT and the debate is merely over whether it passes the PT threshold then it's not clearcut. Certes (talk) 09:15, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Agree. Andrewa (talk) 07:20, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

• No – a PT should be avoided unless both long-term significance and clear majority usage coincide. Otherwise, disambiguation is better. Dicklyon (talk) 03:59, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
  • Agree (I don't think that goes far enough but that would be a step in the right direction at least). Do you think we have any chance of getting that accepted? Andrewa (talk) 05:23, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
• Strongly support giving primacy to long-term significance, and using the popularity as a tie-breaker. I'm still appalled that Luther is a dab page because some editors considered that a TV crime series in 2011 was at least as important as the father of the Reformation. — JFG ^talk 12:59, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
• Disagree. Both elements are taken together with the main goal of getting readers to the information they're looking for in the quickest fashion. The second bullet, especially being as subjective as it is, is certainly not more important than the patterns of use by our readers, and so changing the order is unnecessary. The problem with overemphasizing a subjective measure of significance over an objective measure like use is that it will very often come down to what the small selection of Wikipedia editors who participated in the RM happen to think is the primary use. That is bound to create more situations like we're experiencing at Plymouth, where a topic that gets only a fraction of the page views and that many people don't agree is the primary use, has been treated as the primary use regardless″.--Cúchullain ^t/c 18:37, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
• Disagree. Primary topic should be based on page views and on a page of search engine results. How do you measure long-term significance? There is no indication in the guideline. There isn't even an indication of what time scale is meant. I interpret "long-term significance" as an attempt to limit the influence of pop culture of the current generation. But many editors interpret it to mean that the older subject must be primary, even though the guideline itself says that, "historical age is not determinative." Nine Zulu queens (talk) 08:00, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
• Strongly Support. Long-term significance defines encyclopedic information, and should be listed as the first criteria. Many editors never mention or take into serious consideration, in RMs and other Wikipedia discussion formats, this equal point in the two-tier determination of primary topic. Acting more like this is a search engine rather than an encyclopedia they then sometimes engage in attempts to place primary naming determination to song titles, the names of current celebrities, film titles, etc. Long-term significance has everything to do with encyclopedic knowledge and, specifically, how Wikipedia will define and pass this knowledge on to the human race through the coming years. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:07, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
• Strongly support giving long-term importance automatic favour over page viewing figures when it comes to establishing what to designate as a primary topic. We already do it in practice in so many places (Supernatural over Supernatural (U.S. TV series) for instance), so it would be best to have that enshrined in our guidelines. Midnightblueowl (talk) 10:45, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
  • It's nice to know that supernatural qualified as an educational topic even though fingering (music) did not. Nine Zulu queens (talk) 12:38, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps just avoid rather than abolish

I've been away, and was pleased if a little surprised to see this still going.

So I've had another go at User:Andrewa/Why primary topic is to be avoided, incorporating some more recent thoughts based on comments above. It addresses the original question Long-term significance vs usage more directly than my previous attempt.

Comments on its talk page and/or here welcome of course. Andrewa (talk) 05:24, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't really support you're plan of abolishing ptopic, however I do agree on raising the bar somewhat. If it isn't very clear I do think a disambiguation page is best, to reduce bad links and a dab is often better for the reader to get to, but in other cases it'd be ridiculous IMO to have the page disambiguated, and it'd also lead to a lot more problems of links having to be fixed (it'd be a pain to have to link Michael Jackson (American singer) or whatever it would be then, every time, and Donald Trump (president) and so on, and people would constantly have to fix those links) Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:18, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the input!

It would take some getting used to, but I disagree it would be ridiculous or a pain to have to link to [[Donald Trump (president)|]] (etc) rather than just [[Donald Trump]] as presently, and the resulting running text is identical. Yes, it's a few more keystrokes. We need to consider those against the benefits.

And the benefits are somewhat greater than even I first supposed. See User:Andrewa/negative benefit for my latest analysis. Andrewa (talk) 18:28, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

A case in point

See Talk:Plymouth#Discussion. A very messy RM, and just the latest. ISTM that there would be a case here for saying, no possibility of consensus so the DAB goes to the base name, and we disambiguate the town as proposed. That principle if applied generally would raise the bar on P T considerably. Comments? (And feel free to join the RM discussion of course.) Andrewa (talk) 18:14, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, please. Far too many sketchy primarytopic grabs. Disambiguation is always a better idea when one topic does not have an overwhelming majority of views. Dicklyon (talk) 03:57, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

As in, an overwhelming majority of !votes? Andrewa (talk) 05:24, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

Page views are neither votes nor !votes. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:29, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

I'd welcome some more clarity on this point - long-term significance is always more of a "know it when you see it" kind of thing. In this as in most cases, if reasonable people are disagreeing about whether something is ambiguous, it probably is. In general, in cases where the page view evidence is clear-cut that something isn't primary in terms of use, it should take a very strong long-term significance case for it to be considered primary. It's better to err on the side of caution and have a dab page be the baseline, rather than risk sending readers to the wrong topic. When it goes the other way - ie, page view evidence is clear-cut in support of a topic being primary, but another topic is more historically significant (as often happens when a recent popular culture topic gets more page views than a more historically significant topic) - there's more room for debate about what should be done.--Cúchullain ^t/c 16:19, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

To clarify in terms of my comment in the section below, there's a substantial difference between a reasoned statement based upon "knowing it when you see it" and a blunt statement that the primary topic is self-evident. Dekimasuよ! 18:03, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

In practice I think the two types of argument have rather a lot in common.--Cúchullain ^t/c 18:40, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

Clarity needed first

Over at the 6th (is it?) RM at Talk:Plymouth, many of the discussions this time round have centred on the meaning of the second bullet of WP:PTOPIC - about long-term significance (LTS). Basically that bullet says that it's necessary to consider whether a topic has a lot more LTS than any other topic associated with the term. The average reader would understand that to mean the need to compare the topic's LTS with each other topic's LTS separately, and not the sum of all the other topics' LTSs – as in "this car is faster than any other car I've driven".

This interpretation is encouraged by the use of the same phrase "any other topic" in the first bullet, where one needs firstly to compare the topic's usage with that of any other topic, and secondly to compare it with the usage of all the other topics combined. If "any other topic" meant the same as "all the other topics combined", the first bullet wouldn't make any sense.

Now, there seems to be a widely-held opinion – often voiced and often swaying RM discussions – that despite the wording of the second bullet (the need to compare individual LTSs), what it really intends is that it is necessary to compare the topic's LTS with that of all the other topics combined. This is a much higher hurdle, and it may be a sensible one to set to ensure that primary topics are really really much more significant than the contenders, even though the need for a "substantially greater" amount of LTS is already specified.

So here's my question: Is that the intent of the second bullet, and if it is, how should PTOPIC be worded to make it clear?

I am of course ignoring the difficulty of actually determining "enduring notability and educational value", which is what LTS actually means; and I'm particularly ignoring the difficulty posed by the need to add together the quantities of LTS inherent in each contender topic, which can potentially be about widely different subjects. Those are different, probably more complex, issues that may or may not need to be considered separately.  —SMALLJIM  19:03, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

I've always interpreted the second bullet to imply that the topic should be more significant than all other topics combined. That's just common sense - we shouldn't be treating something as the primary topic if it insn't the most significant of all, especially if it's also not primary in use. I'd support amending the wording accordingly.--Cúchullain ^t/c 16:24, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

But, but... what you've written there isn't common sense at all. Shoot me down if I'm wrong, but what you're saying is (IF, just for the sake of this argument, we could assign numbers to these factors), that if topic A has 10 units, B has 5, C has 4, and D has 3, then A cannot be PT because it doesn't have substantially more than 12 units (5 + 4 + 3) – it would need to have something like 20 units. In contrast, I'd say that A could be PT because it has substantially more than each of the others – and (to use your words) it still is "the most significant of all" (same as saying it's the fastest car of all). That is the standard that the guideline as written clearly requires.

But if there is consensus for your view (that a super-excess of 20 units would be required) then the significance criterion needs to be rewritten to change "...than any other topic" to "...than all the other topics combined". It appears from the comments below that Galobtter and Dekimasu support your interpretation.  —SMALLJIM  21:54, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

If it were possible to reasonably convert long-term significance to "units", then yes, the topic should have more "units" than all the others combined, or close to it, to be considered primary in significance. And of course it would still be considered along with actual use. Otherwise it makes no sense to send all readers to that topic, especially if it's not also the thing most readers are actually looking for. The issue is that there's no way to measure long-term significance in that way, so we have to look at different measures and rely on editors' judgement.--Cúchullain ^t/c 19:42, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. So if I understand you correctly – just considering the second bullet here – a form of words that would match your interpretation would change the comparison from "substantially greater" to something like "a similar degree of", and also change the test from being with each other topic individually to be with all the other topics combined:

• A topic is primary for a term with respect to long-term significance if it has at least a similar degree of enduring notability and educational value than all the other topics associated with that term, combined.

I thought you were still requiring a super-excess of LTS, e.g. as in the above numerical example, something like 20 units, so that A's 10 units stood no chance of making it PT, whereas since 10 units is quite close to the 12 gained by adding B, C and D's units together, A may be in with a chance. So I now wonder whether the bullet as currently worded does approximate to your requirement in most cases (especially since we're trying to make comparisons of an inherently uncountable factor here) and you are perhaps unconsciously applying a higher standard than you intend to.  —SMALLJIM  11:28, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

I too would support; if there are 5 topics of similar significance and one is somewhat more that doesn't mean it is the primary topic. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:31, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, though the standard required is "significantly more", not "somewhat more".  —SMALLJIM  21:54, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure that rewording this to be more explicit would be helpful. How long is a piece of string? The "long-term significance" criterion is necessarily subjective, and I'd rather not be attempting to "count up" significances or adjudicating disputes over whether a politician, a footballer, and an author combined amount to a similar "amount" of significance as a famous singer. There's enough of that sort of thing already without attempting to place numerical values on significance (what User:Smalljim called "quantities of LTS" above). The statement that significance should be "substantially greater" just requires a broad consensus (in practice) that one article is particularly important to the encyclopedia, rather than an analysis showing that individual editors have properly weighed significances.

I do think improvements to the guideline could be made. We could add a statement related to arguments to avoid in discussions of long-term significance, such as appeals to the idea that a primary topic is "simply obvious" or that it is particularly relevant whether B is a namesake of A. And in the case of discussions like Talk:Plymouth, it would also be much cleaner to have a guideline that resolves the paradox between discussions that 1) show no consensus to move anything, which logically defaults to taking no action and 2) show no consensus that there is a primary topic, which would logically default to moving the dab to the base name. Dekimasuよ! 18:01, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

'...I'd rather not be attempting to "count up" significances...' Yet we do that all the time with the first bullet – we use pageviews as a countable proxy for the indeterminable "to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term", even though it's generally accepted that it's a really poor substitute. I think we could consider incoming wikilinks to be a countable proxy for "enduring notability and educational value". Incoming wikilinks are first in the list of tools at WP:DETERMINEPRIMARY; seem to me to be at least as good as pageviews is for searches; and giving more weight to them would help avoid the problem of personal biases swaying the result depending on who turns up at the RM.

But the main point here is the degree of excess required and your use of the word "combined" in your 3rd sentence seems to indicate you are in favour of the massive excess position and consequent necessary rewording of PTOPIC.  —SMALLJIM  21:54, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

I don't think any measure yet identified could serve as a proxy for long-term significance on its own. Page views can be useful, but they have negatives of their own. They're affected only by pages that have been created, not that could/should be created, and our systemic bias has a lot to do with that. Templates and mislinks also throw them off. I prefer Gbooks and news searches (there's still some systemic bias involved, but at least it's not Wikipedia's internal bias). However, I don't think any of them really give a full picture.--Cúchullain ^t/c 19:42, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Did you mean to write "Incoming wikilinks" rather than "Page views" there?  —SMALLJIM  11:33, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

I think clarity would be helpful to remove confusion as to what we're really talking about - that something really needs to be the most significant topic to be considered primary - and to discourage people from picking around the edges of the wording to support their preferences (in this particular way, at least). I would also support making some closing recommendations along the lines you suggest. I would also support adding arguments to avoid, though that would be more for the closer to be able to point to and say "here's why I gave your argument less consideration"; I don't think it would have an affect on people coming into arguments and saying it's "simply obvious" any more than WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS stops people from otherstuffism.--Cúchullain ^t/c 19:22, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

At the risk of flogging a sleepy but perhaps not yet brain-dead horse, I'm skeptical that the second P T "criterion" can be made useful. Significant to whom? To a citizen of Albany the P T of New York by long-term significance is New York State. To a citizen of Hobbys Yards and I guess to most of the world who live more than a few miles from New York, it's New York City. If we have a vote on it, we introduce a systematic bias which it would be good to avoid for many reasons, including but not only POV and waste of time (both of readers and editors). The solution to me is simple: Avoid P T whenever possible. It's just a bit radical for many. Andrewa (talk) 20:08, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

For the first criterion we use pageviews as a countable proxy for searches. I'd assert that we should use a countable proxy for long-term significance too. As explained above, incoming wikilinks would seem to be a good one, and their use (or the use of any other determinable, unbiased proxy) would eliminate your "significant to whom?" problem.  —SMALLJIM  21:54, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Our use of pageviews is neither absolute nor without its problems, see User:Andrewa/The Problem With Page Views and of course the very wording of WP:DETERMINEPRIMARY... Tools that may help to support the determination of a primary topic in a discussion (but are not considered absolute determining factors, due to unreliability, potential bias, and other reasons) include... (emphasis as in the guideline).

So no, that doesn't address the problem at all, it just introduces others. Andrewa (talk) 11:06, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

I take your point, but isn't the use of some sort of countable property, even if rather inaccurate, better at giving an indication of whatever we're trying to determine than the alternative which is personal opinion? To quote the emphasis back to you: "tools that may help", not "tools that shouldn't be used at all".  —SMALLJIM  11:49, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

The second bullet useless in cases like that. But it's useful when you have a conflict between a historically important topic and another that gets more pageviews. It happens fairly regularly that a current pop culture topic gets more views than a more significant topic - for instance, Atlanta (TV series) currently has more views than Atlanta. The second bullet is useful establishing the TV show should never take the base name "Atlanta" as no one could seriously argue that it has more long-term significance than the city it's set in.

I find your call to abolish PT intriguing but I don't agree, as yet, that no topic should ever take a base name.--Cúchullain ^t/c 20:40, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

I've modified my original proposal considerably... I'm no longer pushing the extreme position that no topic should ever take a base name (actually I never was, my suggestion was that no topic should ever take an ambiguous base name).

But I'm still suggesting that there are relatively few cases in which it's in the readers' interest to have an article at an ambiguous base name. Even the common assumption that it saves mouse clicks is shaky. It seems so obvious... like the fact that the earth is flat ("it is where I live")... but it's not quite so simple!

I suspect that, if and when we get to considering case by case taking this latest analysis into account, we'll find that these valid (in terms of reader experience) primary topic candidates are few enough that we might then reconsider abandoning the concept entirely, again for reader experience. But cross that bridge if and when we come to it. Andrewa (talk) 23:13, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

I've changed my mind considerably about the benefits of making disambiguation more of the "when in doubt" option over the last few years. I used to feel that disambiguation should be avoided as much as possible, but that requires the RM closers to have a real sense of the relevant policies and guidelines, and know where and how to put the necessary hat notes and dab pages. But I've noticed many more less-than-optimal RM closes than there used to be, largely attributable to the expansion of page move rights (this isn't a knock on the page movers, the situation was worse before, when pages would routinely stay in the backlog for weeks or even months.) But this appears to be the new normal, and defaulting more often to a dab page, where readers can at least find their topic, is better than the inconsistency that we have now.--Cúchullain ^t/c 16:46, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

My suggestion of abolishing P T was probably politically counterproductive. (My political incompetence is well proven, I know the theory but fail miserably in the practice.) So many of us have invested so much time over the years in deciding P T issues, it was never going to be easy to sell the idea that we were wasting at least some of that time. I think we may eventually get consensus that it's in the readers' interests to raise the P T bar considerably, but even that requires a certain amount of repentance and is still not an easy sell for that reason. Andrewa (talk) 11:17, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Amateur and Amateur (disambiguation)

Amateur is a stub that consists entirely of a one-sentence definition and a list of See also items. I think that it would be better to make Amateur the disambiguation page, however, there are hundreds thousands of links to Amateur that would suddenly become inappropriate links to a DAB page. Is there any way to deal with this without having to edit the pages individually? Many (most?) of these could probably be changed to a wiktionary link or removed altogether. Leschnei (talk) 22:07, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I think WP:Dicdef applies here. Some of the links could go to an article about amateurs in a particular field, such as Amateur radio in India, but most of them should probably be unlinked. I don't think a link to Wiktionary would be very helpful for such a widely understood word. Certes (talk) 23:38, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

But how do we handle an article with so many incoming links? If I move the disambiguation page to Amateur, the 1000s of links to the term 'Amateur' suddenly become disambiguation links that need to be resoved. Leschnei (talk) 00:14, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

There are about 1200 links. Many of them fall into classes: for example, pages such as Mark Davey could link to amateur boxing or just be unlinked. Once the big groups have been done we can make Amateur into a dab and fix the last few hundred with a tool such as DisamAssist, probably unlinking most of them. But let's wait for someone else to add their thoughts before doing anything. Certes (talk) 00:26, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Amateur used to be much longer and more substantial. It was gutted in 2015 with the edit summary "remove rambling, unsourced WP:OR, essay features. The 'see also' is the only useful part of this article, apart from the definition", although it was sourced, just not with inline citations. It certainly wasn't the best possible article, but one possibility might be to restore and/or rewrite it. Station1 (talk) 06:27, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

I would opt to restore the well-sourced and informative article contents, adding inline citations, then let the normal editing process improve it. — JFG ^talk 09:13, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

I have put back and edited the gutted material, and added some inline references. It could still use a lot of work, but at least it makes more sense for the incoming links. I also added Amateur as the primary topic on Amateur (disambiguation). Leschnei (talk) 19:18, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

Great job! Looks like a decent article now. Station1 (talk) 20:05, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Unnecessary double parenthetical disambiguation?

I've noticed a lot of our articles on individual episodes of the various Star Trek shows (maybe most, out of a total of like 500 -- sorry, I'm a "soft-core" trekkie) have titles that require parenthetical disambiguation to distinguish them from non-Trek articles, but they all also include the full title of their individual show, even though there is no other Star Trek article from which to disambiguate them, oftentimes without the simple disambiguator "(Star Trek)" existing as a redirect. Taking just season 1 of Voyager, we have articles on all 12 of the following, but at present only one is a blue link:

• Caretaker (Star Trek)
• Parallax (Star Trek)
• Time and Again (Star Trek)
• Phage (Star Trek)
• The Cloud (Star Trek)
• Eye of the Needle (Star Trek)
• Ex Post Facto (Star Trek)
• Emanations (Star Trek) (which isn't disambiguated but really should be since it's just the plural of emanation)
• Prime Factors (Star Trek)
• Cathexis (Star Trek)
• Faces (Star Trek)
• Learning Curve (Star Trek)

Is this normal? I'd create the redirects myself, but honestly I'm wondering if it would be better to move all the articles to their simpler titles.

Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 14:22, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

I apparently noticed this problem four months ago... Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 14:37, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

It's standard to give the full name of the tv series for episodes, also for other franchises like Golden Parachute (CSI: Miami) versus Unspoken (CSI: NY). It's mentioned early at Wikipedia:WikiProject Star Trek. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:49, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

Huh. I hadn't noticed that. That said, most TV series aren't parts of larger franchises that are much better known than any of the individual shows. (If talking to a non-Trekkie, I would almost certainly refer to any of the above episodes as "the Star Trek episode" than "the Voyager [or Star Trek: Voyager] episode", since TOS and TNG are basically the only entries in the franchise that are widely-known outside the fanbase.) Not sure if the same applies to CSI or other such franchises, but at the very least the argument could be made that CSI: Miami is only one character longer than the theoretical shorter Star Trek disambiguator, and so couldn't needlessly inflate the article title into something like We'll Always Have Paris (Star Trek: The Next Generation). I'm wondering if it wouldn't be a good idea to discuss amending the guideline to discourage unnecessary disambiguation in cases like this? (I should probably disclose that the reason I noticed this is because I'm a fan of a certain online video producer, who does a weekly review of a Star Trek episode, but his schedule doesn't say which show the episode is from; I come to Wikipedia and type "[Episode Title] (Star Trek)" and as a result of the lack of redirects I usually have to click through something extra to find the page I was looking for. Making more redirects would solve this problem, but I'm really not convinced it's the best solution, and if the status quo is standard across the project then asking WP:TREK to fix it would be out of the question.) Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 09:01, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes, it's better to move the articles with unambiguous titles to their unambiguous, unqualified title, per WP:PRECISION. Wikipedia:WikiProject Star Trek can't override WP:PRECISION (see WP:LOCALCONSENSUS: "For instance, unless they can convince the broader community that such action is right, participants in a wikiproject cannot decide that some generally accepted policy or guideline does not apply to articles within its scope." -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:58, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, misread the question. If the episode title is unambiguous on Wikipedia, no qualifier is needed. But if a qualifier is needed, it doesn't matter (from a disambiguation perspective) which qualifier is chosen and the project can indeed specify what to use for consistency. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:01, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television)#Episode and character articles says "add the show name in parentheses" and doesn't mention exceptions for long show names with a shorter widely understood version. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is often just called Buffy but we have numerous episode articles with "(Buffy the Vampire Slayer)" in the title. See e.g. Category:Buffy the Vampire Slayer (season 7) episodes. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:30, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Avenida Amílcar Cabral

What's the best way to handle a page such as Avenida Amílcar Cabral? I suspect that the sole entry with an article is the primary topic, but it may be a case like Urney. (Pretend that the second link in the box is red for that example to remain relevant.) Certes (talk) 11:44, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Yep, it's the primary topic, and the disambiguation page can be deleted, since none of the other entries have a blue link in the description either, and so are for topics not yet covered on Wikipedia. Different than the former state of Urney, when the other topics were covered on Wikipedia, but just didn't have articles of their own yet. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:33, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. That sounds very reasonable. I've restored the redirect for now, but ideally we should undo the page move to leave the article at the base name. Certes (talk) 00:26, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

 Done -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:03, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Asaf Ali and Asif Ali

The red link on the Asif Ali disambiguation page is actually Asaf Ali. Would it be appropriate to replace 'Asif Ali may refer to:' with 'Asif Ali or Asaf Ali may refer to:' on the Asif Ali page and put Asaf Ali as the primary topic? or would it be better to stick him in the See also section? Leschnei (talk) 15:28, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

I'd shift him to See also (fixing the link) and leave the rest of the page untouched. This is not a disambiguation page for Asaf Ali, though clearly at least one person would think of looking for him here. Certes (talk) 16:41, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for your thoughts, Leschnei (talk) 16:46, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Help with Septemberist

I've gone as far as I'm able improving Septemberist; could someone please have a look at and fix as needed? There are some alternate spellings, other page redirects, like Septembrism, and Septemberism, and other squirrely things, and I've tried to unscramble everything as best I could, but this is a bit beyond my disambig skills.

Had a hard time finding the right doc at WP:D covering things like, e.g., how to link to another disambig page with a related title. (I stuck it in a "See also" sentence.) Also, was pretty sure the initial, "may refer to" sentence at the top needed to have the actual redirect page title in it, bolded, and it didn't. There are some other peculiarities, such as an existing redirect for Septemberism which goes to a rock album; seems like that's not right. Also, I'm not sure that Septemberist really is used to refer to members of the Black September Organization, is that a valid link?

As a final point: is there a recommended practice concerning a forthcoming link from a Disambig page to an article currently in Draft and not yet ready? (I'm assuming disambig entries don't link to Draft space.) I don't want to forget to update Septemberist with a new entry, when this draft is done. The draft will end up having something related to Septembristas adapted from a section on this Spanish page, and once it does, the disambig page will need a new entry to point to it. (That Spanish page is interesting in itself, as it seems to be an article that functions as a wordy disambig page, while not identified as such.) Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 00:08, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Hello @Mathglot: I've made a few changes in two edits. The redirect Septemberism pointed to Real Talk (Man Overboard album) because it's a song on the album. I included the song on the dab page and retargeted the redirect. With regard to your final point, I think you'll just have to remember to link your new page to the dab page (and to Argentine Civil Wars and perhaps others)! Hope that helps, and perhaps others can help top. Regards, Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 05:34, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

I also retargeted Septembrism to a section at History of Portugal (1834–1910)#Setembrismo and Cartismo and added a hatnote there. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 05:43, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks! Mathglot (talk) 06:07, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Request: Big Enough (disambiguation)

Can someone please make a disambiguation page for "Big Enough"? I notice there's the song by Ayiesha Woods at Big Enough, there's the documentary film at Big Enough (film), and there's more recently another song by Kirin J Callinan, the article for which is not created and has been requested at Wikipedia:Requested articles/music/Songs. Thanks! 2601:589:8000:2ED0:4883:345A:8134:909F (talk) 01:58, 11 June 2018 (UTC)