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Proposal for a new rule for media adaptations and multimedia franchises

Currently, we have an incoherent hodgepodge of different rules for the treatment of media adaptations, remakes, and multimedia franchises. In the discussions above, my sense is that there is general agreement with some of the comments that I have made about the organization of this specific kind of topic. Examples abound of the disparity in the treatment of these topics:

I believe that the use of the disambiguation tag is incorrect with respect to these (particularly those for which the page lists many partial title matches or non-matching titles). The film adaptation of a novel is the film of the novel. In any decent article on those topics, the novel will necessarily be linked in the first line of the article on the film, and vice versa. There is no ambiguity because these are merely two variations of a work relating the same story, for which the novel is the work of origin. To put it another way, the primary topic here is the set of characters, settings, and events that add up to "the story being told"; the novel and the film are merely different media conveying the same "story being told". The basic elements of my proposal are:

  1. Pages merely listing numerous adaptations or installments of an original work are not properly disambiguation pages, per WP:DABCONCEPT, because they are capable of being described in an article on the broad concept.
  2. Where a page, in fact, merely lists numerous adaptations or installments of an original work (or where such a list, taken as a whole, is substantially more likely than the other topics to be the primary topic of the term), then one of the following options should be carried out:
    1. If the franchise originates from a notable original work, and that original work is the most notable aspect of the franchise, then the original work may occupy the base page name.
    2. If the a specific adaptation of the original work is substantially more likely than other works in the franchise to be the primary topic of the term, then that adaptation may occupy the base page name.
    3. If the franchise is eponymous to the main character, and is substantially centered on that character, an article on the character may occupy the base page name.
    4. If there are numerous adaptations of the work, and neither the original work nor any particular adaptation is the primary topic of the term, the page should be rewritten to be a franchise article describing the breadth of the franchise as a whole; if such a franchise article already exists, it should be merged with the disambiguation page (to the extent that the disambiguation page contains links to installments or adaptations of the franchise) to occupy the base page name.
    5. Alternately, if the original work is relatively obscure, and there are a substantial number of adaptations sharing the exact same name, the page can be reclassified as a set index or a "list of adaptations of Foo" article. See, e.g., Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch.

This is somewhat rough, but it basically encompasses my vision for these topics. Per the discussion above, I do not think that any particular "astonishment" would arise from the implementation of these principles (i.e., from an editor looking for "Rambo" or "The Wizard of Oz" landing on a page about the Rambo franchise or the Wizard of Oz franchise, or for an editor looking for a film adaptation of, "Doctor Zhivago" landing on a page about the novel from which the film was made). I would welcome suggestions towards cleaning up this morass. Cheers! bd2412 T 04:34, 11 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This idea is backed up by common sense and it conforms to the spirit of summary style by going from the broad concept to the specific. The only concern I have is that a PTOPIC argument is not specific and has its flaws by both long term interest and page accessibility. However, the proposed changes outweigh my personal views on that matter and I support the implementation of BD2412's proposal. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 12:49, 11 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A&M adaptation debate is unrelated and Wikiproject related. Collapsed for larger scope and on-topic discussion

Getting back to the discussion at hand, are there any objections to anything in the proposal as written? Any changes or additions? bd2412 T 20:01, 11 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • Generally agree and support. A consistent and well thought out vision. Tentative only in that some unexpected problems in the details may appear, or narrow focus article writing editors may get upset, as a knee jerk reaction, to suddenly being told to do something different. Please don't upset local editors by rushing, if they don't respond well, but explain calmly and involve them in the decision making. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 20:50, 11 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't like the idea of making franchises, the character, or list of adaptations the broad concept by default. PTOPIC is flawed, as I agree. But broad concept is not easy to create or determine in terms of fiction. We have Kansas City redirected to metro area, but I didn't like the fact that the metro area is not titled "Kansas City". A proposal to make the franchise of A Nightmare on Elm Street the broad concept was rejected. Maybe I'll make the title the dab page some other time... --George Ho (talk) 16:25, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The problem with that line of thinking is the A Nightmare on Elm Street is not ambiguous. Compare a truly ambiguous term like Seal, which can refer to an animal, or an emblem, or the connection between pipes, or Heidi Klum's ex-husband. Those are multiple unrelated terms; there is no single idea that comes to mind when you say "seal". "A Nightmare on Elm Street" is the opposite. Would you not agree that no matter which specific installment you are referring to, you immediately think of "a fictional world wherein a scarred, razor-gloved villain named Freddy Krueger attacks people in their dreams"? bd2412 T 16:41, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yet the 1984 film, current prime topic may be as popular as the film series. The stats will tell you, or at least its perspective is distorted. --George Ho (talk) 16:57, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
My proposal above takes that into account, specifically allowing the original work to occupy the base page name if it is "the most notable aspect of the franchise". Right now, A Nightmare on Elm Street is in conformance with my proposal, and would not need to be changed absent a consensus that the original work was no longer the most notable aspect of the franchise. bd2412 T 17:01, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You are proposing an overthrow on local consensus that opposes the franchise as the prime topic, correct? What about The Fast and the Furious situation? If that's not ambiguous, why did the local consensus oppose the film series as the prime topic? --George Ho (talk) 20:04, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think you are misunderstanding my proposal. With respect to A Nightmare on Elm Street, I am not seeking to overthrow any consensus at all. The current situation would be unchanged by the rule that I propose, unless there was a consensus that the franchise as a whole was primary over the initial film. Since A Nightmare on Elm Street is not a disambiguation page, there is nothing to address under my proposition. With respect to The Fast and the Furious, there was not exactly a local consensus against the proposed move; there was virtually no participation in the discussion, with the only clearly expressed opposition coming from an IP who did not address the question of a primary topic at all, but who instead pointed out that variations exist in the film series name. This is not relevant to my proposition, as it is entirely possible for the primary topic of the term "The Fast and the Furious" to be the first installment of the series, rather than the franchise as a whole, and it entirely possible for a separate article to exist on the franchise which covers more than just the film series (as there are also video games in the series). Since no attempt has been made to effect either outcome, there is no gauge of consensus with respect to either. bd2412 T 21:07, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If the proposal approves, "Elm Street" won't be a dab page or be proposed as a dab page. We have people distinguishing the original and the remake, but how can the very first film be defined as the primary topic? Neither franchise nor the remake meets criteria of primacy, so why can the original? Because it was an original that led to subsequent media? Because the numbers are big (yet inconclusive)? --George Ho (talk) 21:30, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
To be very clear, A Nightmare on Elm Street is not a disambiguation page, has never been a disambiguation page, and there is no A Nightmare on Elm Street (disambiguation) because it is not an ambiguous topic. There is no ambiguity about the name because all of the topics are related, just as there is no ambiguity between United States Senate career of Barack Obama and Presidency of Barack Obama, because they are different aspects of the same career. bd2412 T 22:47, 14 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'll propose an unambiguity on the original if the dab page is undeleted by consensus. Also, I'll request a deletion review on the dab page soon. --George Ho (talk) 01:10, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
What does "propose an unambiguity" mean? As for deletion review, I would be surprised if a unanimous determination by a half dozen editors that no such page was needed would be deemed to be incorrectly decided. Is WP:DABCONCEPT unclear? Is it not clearly conveyed in our rules that topics that are not actually ambiguous (i.e. unrelated topics sharing the same name) do not require disambiguation pages? bd2412 T 01:28, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'll rephrase: if there is either an overturn or no prejudice to recreating a dab page, then I'll propose that an original film not be the primary topic. Your attempts to make any franchise, character, or very first medium the broad concept or primary topic would violate WP:NOTBUREAUCRACY by proposing a guideline based on your "overly strict interpretation" of broad concept, primary topic, and disambiguation. Your interpretation of "the primary meaning of a term" may differ from others'. Rules aren't that perfect, as I begin to learn. Pages exist and will continue to exist to serve their purposes to readers, until a page may be deleted by consensus. An example is Resident Evil and Resident Evil (disambiguation). You did propose a deletion on the dab page, but many opposed deletion. --George Ho (talk) 04:01, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It would not give me terrible heartburn for a page to exist at the "Foo (disambiguation)" title, although I would consider it redundant to the existing setup, with a franchise article that covers everything. However, if the film is not the primary topic of the term, then the franchise must be, as there is no other topic so titled. Consider the "Joe is an expert" test. If I say "Joe is an expert on Mercury", I might mean that Joe is an expert on the chemical element (but may know nothing about the planet); or that Joe is an expert on the Greek god (but may have no knowledge of chemistry); or that Joe is an expert on the car company (but may know nothing of mythology). It is probably possible to find out which one of those is correct, and fix the link. However, if "Joe is an expert on A Nightmare on Elm Street", there is no separation of fields to consider; expertise in "A Nightmare on Elm Street" inherently implies "the franchise", the collection of all media. Absent a franchise article, the disambiguation link would be unfixable, because a link to the disambiguation page itself would imply expertise in the phrase, but not any particular subject. bd2412 T 14:40, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
As I told you, many opposed the idea of swapping the franchise and the film of the same title. But there is no prejudice on swapping the original film and the dab page if the dab page is successfully undeleted. Also, I requested a "userfication" at the DRV. --George Ho (talk) 14:44, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
My concern is that we should not have disambiguation pages for the sake of having disambiguation pages, where these may throw up a roadblock for the reader seeking the primary topic (as B2C pointed out in the previous discussions on this page). I think that it is very easy to lose sight of the fact that disambiguation pages are merely a navigational aid, and not an end in and of themselves. They should not exist unless their existence is necessary for navigation. bd2412 T 14:55, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately for you, disambiguation pages may exist in case that there is no primacy on topics of the same name, and in case that franchise or series is NOT the primary topic or the broad concept. I don't know what B2C perceives what a primary or broad topic must be, and I don't think his views are same as mine. --George Ho (talk) 15:11, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It would be unfortunate for Wikipedia's readers if they were forced to sort through a disambiguation page for the unambiguous topic of a multimedia franchise, just as it would be unfortunate if instead of having an article at Richard Nixon, we had a disambiguation page linking to sub-articles on aspects of Nixon's life. bd2412 T 15:26, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Let's leave a real-life person out of this, and solely focus on media instead. Why forcing one topic of the (so-called unambiguous) same name, either original, well-known adaptation, or franchise, to be the primary topic when it is neither popular nor significant as others? --George Ho (talk) 17:59, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Okay then, focusing on media, should Star Wars, Star Trek, Final Fantasy, and Harry Potter be disambiguation pages? If not, what principled distinction is there between those articles and A Nightmare on Elm Street or Resident Evil? bd2412 T 19:57, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Confused - I apologize, but I'm not clear on what is to be done based on the original proposal, and became even more confused on the subsequent discussion. If I understand correctly, the proposal is to have a an article on the franchise where there are multiple articles related to the franchise. There should be no disambiguation page, and if there are a bunch of adaptations, it should be covered in a set index article and not a disambiguation page full of partial name matches, see also entries etc. Is that right? -- Whpq (talk) 17:19, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    Basically, yes. If there are multiple installments or adaptations of a single work, which is what comprises a franchise, then the primary topic for that term should either be that work, or the most noted work from the franchise (if there is a single work that is most prominent), or the franchise as a whole (including all of those installments and adaptations). Rambo is an excellent example of this. It is probably beyond dispute that when the average person hears the term "Rambo" they think of some aspect of the franchise, probably the character, but possibly the film. When a reader looks up Rambo, they are expecting to find an article on at least some aspect of the franchise, so if there was an article at that title on the franchise as a whole, their expectations would be met without further searching. Instead, those expectations are stymied by the imposition of an extra layer of searching. Now, if they were taken to the content currently at Rambo (film series), they would see this first paragraph:

Rambo is an action film series based on the David Morrell novel First Blood and starring Sylvester Stallone as John Rambo, a troubled Vietnam War veteran and former Green Beret who is skilled in many aspects of survival, weaponry, hand to hand combat and guerrilla warfare. The series consists of the films First Blood (1982), Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985), Rambo III (1988), and Rambo (2008).

  • This by itself probably wraps up 99% of what readers will be searching for, and amply demonstrates that to the extent that the primary topic of the term Rambo is the multimedia franchise, this is "capable of being described in an article", which is sufficient, under WP:DABCONCEPT to require that the title be the article on the concept. bd2412 T 19:54, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    Dab page gets 58K views in last 90 days. Film series gets 120K. The latest 2008 film gets 63K. The first film gets 85K (novel 10K). The character gets 56K. Of course, people assume that Rambo is the official title (or the alternative title) of the first film. --George Ho (talk) 20:09, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    How many hits are there for the topics on the disambiguation page that are unrelated to the franchise? bd2412 T 20:14, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    The 2012 film gets 9K. Some apple gets 3K. Dack Rambo gets 17K. I can provide just three. The rest aren't spectacular. --George Ho (talk) 20:30, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    So the Rambo franchise taken as a whole gets about 280K, compared to probably less than 40K for all other uses combined (and I'll bet that much of the 9K for the 2012 film is from people accidentally thinking that it was part of the franchise too). Compare Star Trek, which is not a disambiguation page, and for which Star Trek got 757K views in the last 90 days, Star Trek: The Original Series got 282K, Star Trek (film franchise) got 206K, Star Trek: The Motion Picture got 114K, and Star Trek (film) got 368K. Again, under your interpretation of other media franchises, Star Trek should be a disambiguation page; so the question is, if you don't think so, then what principled distinction can you offer? bd2412 T 20:41, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    Twisting everything I say, eh? Dab page stats aren't loading well right now (so do other stats)... we'll get back to it later gets 14K. Anyway, Talk:Rambo (film series)#Requested move can tell you that "Rambo" may refer to also the character or the first film, not just the film series. "Distinction" part may refer to case-by-case and various consensus on media, not unilateral decisions. --George Ho (talk) 20:56, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    I am merely following your reasoning straight to its conclusion, which would make disambiguation pages of all multimedia franchises for which there were some shared titles, with none being the most popular title of the franchise. Note also that the "Rambo (film series)" discussion is about the film series, not about the franchise as a whole (which includes media other than just the film series). Furthermore, the Rambo discussion included comments in support of the move about how "this article is currently a pretty sad sight", which highlights another problem. Disambiguation pages are often used as a substitute for doing the actual work of writing a decent article. I have seen plenty of discussions where editors can't agree over how to put together an article on a complex or highly abstract topic like Estimation or Efficiency, and therefore they throw their hands up and say "let's just make it a disambiguation page". I have seen this proposed for multiple seasons of a single TV series. This helps no one. A thorough and well-written article on the Rambo franchise as a whole would quickly and effectively satisfy the needs of the vast majority of readers looking for "Rambo", without sending them to search for bits and pieces of it scattered in a dozen different articles. bd2412 T 21:12, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Unfortunately, there is no Rambo franchise. Rambo (film series)#Other media and John Rambo#Appearances can suffice, even when at poor quality. The very first novel First Blood (novel) is very different from the film series and media BASED on films, including novelizations of films. In the novel, Rambo dies. In adaptations, Rambo lives on. --George Ho (talk) 21:21, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In the 2009 Star Trek movie, the planet Vulcan is blown up. In the last batch of James Bond movies, M is a woman (clearly different from the books), and is killed (and replaced with a new M). The fact that liberties are taken across adaptations is hardly news, and does not take away from the franchise being a franchise. To the extent that these differences exist, they can be discussed in the article. bd2412 T 21:33, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't call Rambo a franchise... just a film series with other media based on the film series. But then you can call it a franchise just to concise the term. I wonder how A Nightmare on Elm Street (franchise) is not "(film series)". Alas, you can propose a change on that title (or other). --George Ho (talk) 21:42, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The very first line of A Nightmare on Elm Street (franchise) references "a television show, novels, and comic books" in addition to the films. As for Rambo, the other media may well be based on the film series (which, as you have noted above, is itself based on a book), but how does that make it anything other than a franchise? Indeed, that is pretty much the definition of a media franchise - a collection of media whereby the owners of intellectual property in the form of a character, settings, and story events, profit from reshuffling bits and pieces of those things, and licensing others to do so. bd2412 T 21:49, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still interested in the refinement of the set index option. Specifically, what would be the requirements from switching a set index to a franchise or vice versa? ChrisGualtieri (talk) 23:47, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would say that not every list of works derived from an original work rises to the level of being a franchise. Consider my treatment of Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch and Madame X, which have no sequels or adaptations in media other than film, but which have multiple remakes in one media. bd2412 T 00:37, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Arbitrary break

When the consensus finds no primary topic on Moonraker, how would this affect this proposal? Or the other way around? --George Ho (talk) 06:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

First, not finding the film to be the primary topic is not the same as there being no primary topic. Second, I have also noted above that it is possible for a franchise as a whole to not be the primary topic of a term (see Terminator, Halo, above). There appear to be many meanings of the term Moonraker not related to the media. Finally, I would add that the James Bond Moonraker works are not a franchise. James Bond is a franchise; the Moonraker works are one literary and one film installment in that franchise. If the franchise came out with a book and film merely named "James Bond", it is highly doubtful that these would upset the primacy of the franchise as a whole. Similarly, with respect to the Rambo discussion we had above, the novel, First Blood, may differ from the film, but the franchise is "Rambo", not "First Blood". bd2412 T 03:02, 23 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - Unfortunately "common sense" is all too often uncommon amongst editors (One only need to see the debate above concerning anime/manga to prove that : ) - That aside, I, Robot (film) is one of many examples where the film may have some names, but the names have nothing to do with the characters or locations created by a particular author. Susan Calvin of the I, Robot works is a decidedly different persona than who is on film, and the story had little to nothing to do with the set of short stories in the book, except that Asimov's rules of robotics were cited. See also I,_Robot_(film)#Similarities_with_the_book. So to come back to this proposal, these things are just broad enough that while we could cherry pick examples that work for this system, there are far too many that do not fit the mold as it were. this is something that just needs to be done on a case by case basis. All that said, kudos to BD2412 for trying to make sense of something which at times has no sense to make sense of : ) - When dealing with the subjectiveness of artistry, we often find that artists and their works rarely fit in the nice orderly boxes we create for tham : ) - jc37 05:37, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Dark Knight

Need help on this page. There are partial matches, normally discouraged by guideline. If the page can't be the set index, then partial matches should be removed. But I can't figure out which to remove. --George Ho (talk) 06:02, 1 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

None of those need to be removed; the topics appear to be refer-to-able as "Dark Knight". But Talk:Dark Knight would be the place to discuss, or tag it with {{disambiguation cleanup}}. -- JHunterJ (talk) 10:37, 1 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Stuart Saunders

Can someone check out the details at

Talk:Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Town

and see if a disambiguation page could be made for the 4 people who share two of their name parts Stuart Saunders

I am not quite sure who should and how a Disambiguation page is set up. I will try and add some details where I can to get rid of the red links if the 4 names can be separated.

Idyllic press (talk) 12:37, 14 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I did update the hatnote on Stuart Saunders to point to the academic as well. The two "first + middle" name holders aren't ambiguous with the title. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:34, 14 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I've created a dab page, and found an actor with several incoming links. The first+middle names seem usefully added as "See also", as we've got a dab page going. PamD 13:45, 14 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Section, example and shortcut needed

Re the opening paragraph:

(A "topic covered by Wikipedia" is either the main subject of an article, or a minor subject covered by an article in addition to the article's main subject.)

Would it be possible to add a separate section with example and shortcut to this part of the guideline, because editors are evidently having trouble seeing it. In ictu oculi (talk) 02:25, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
For example

Primary redirects - a primary redirect occurs when the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC of a term redirects to an article with a different title. For example "Hurricane" redirects to the primary topic of Tropical cyclone, requiring Hurricane (cocktail) to have disambiguation by "(cocktail)", the Hurricane aircraft to have disambiguation as Hawker Hurricane and so on, even though no article "Hurricane" exists.

In ictu oculi (talk) 02:25, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
....any objections? any comments? In ictu oculi (talk) 00:30, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Request for comment

Due to no consensus on a previous discussion re: article naming involving WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, there is a second discussion open about moving Australia national association football team to Australia men's national association football team. We are seeking outside input. Contributions to the discussion are much appreciated. Thank you. Hmlarson (talk) 01:31, 5 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Merging disambiguation and surname articles.

Hi all, I am highly frustrated by what's happened on a couple of disambiguation pages recently. Both edits were made by editors who believed they were following WP:D and I even think they are right, but if so, WP:D is wrong. Let's explain: The history for "Yeager" and "Bieber (disambiguation)". In practice both pages had previously been disambiguation pages in the months prior to my edits, which precipitated the edits shown in the diffs.

Here's my point - I see no reason whatsoever to hide Yeager, Kentucky (let's say) from someone who types in Yeager. The page they are landing on is not an article. It is a couple of sentences followed by a list of names. It will never be more than that because you can't really write an article on a surname. Same thing with Bieber (disambiguation). The last names removed there are absolutely possible desired searches from Bieber; when someone lands on Justin Bieber which is where Bieber redirects to, they have to click on Bieber (disambiguation) and then again on Bieber (surname) and then again on their desired article. Too many clicks. There's no reason in the word to have these split up--the articles are not too long (this is not a Hamilton-type situation). What do you say? Red Slash 22:01, 7 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is certainly possible to write a well-researched and referenced article on the origin and meaning of the surnames "Yeager" and "Bieber"; this just hasn't been done yet. bd2412 T 22:05, 7 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You can't really write an article on a surname? Seriously? Smith_(surname), for one. In any case, I think separation of the surnames into a separate article is quite reasonable. The only question now is, what is the primary topic? For Smith, its the dab page. I think for Yeager, the surname makes more sense, as there are lots more Yeager-surnamed articles than Kentucky towns - but you could start an RM and attempt to move Yeager (disambiguation) to Yeager and Yeager to Yeager (surname); same for Bieber.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:13, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think it reasonable to have articles on surnames, as long as we don't preclude individuals from inclusion on the disambiguation page as well.
Per WP:PTM, "Add a link only if the article's subject (or the relevant subtopic thereof) could plausibly be referred to by essentially the same name as the disambiguated term in a sufficiently generic context—regardless of the article's title." So anyone plausibly known simply by the last name should be on the disambiguation page. As an example, David Belasco is appropriately included on the Belasco disambiguation page, because if someone refers simply to Belasco, it's quite probable they are referring to him. It's likely he would be a contender for a primary topic for Belasco, so it would be absurd to exclude him from the disambiguation page.
Given the number of fields in which people are commonly referred to simply by their last names (sports, politics, arts and entertainment), I think we should be fairly liberal about including people on the disambiguation page for their surname.--Trystan (talk) 01:18, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There are relatively few people in the fields of sports, politics, arts, and entertainment who are commonly referred to simply by their last names in reliable sources. -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:08, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

My proposal: Disambiguation and surname pages should only be separate if there is article content for the surname. In the case of Bieber, separating them is ridiculous - there are not a lot of people with this name and we don't have any article content on the name whatsoever. In that case, all the surname page is doing is disambiguating and there is no reason for a separate page. Smith, on the other hand, has a detailed article about the name itself, and a huge number of people with the name. If both the article and disambiguation content are very short, I say it makes sense to combine them - see Heinrich Müller and Heinrich Müller (name) for the ridiculousness that results when you don't. Ego White Tray (talk) 04:53, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That one, I would merge into Müller (surname), as it is an anecdote about the abundance of a certain combination of a common given name with a common surname. bd2412 T 05:10, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I too dislike pages such as Müller (surname) and Hadik (as they are currently) - mainly because it blurs the distinction between articles and dab pages and is inconsistent with the way other disambiguation works in WP. This can cause confusion - for example a page ("Foo") is tagged as a surname page (when all the entries are surnames), then editors add other things that are not surnames ("Foo Inc", "SS Foo", "FOO" etc) without converting the page (back) to a proper dab page (which means, AFAIK, that editors won't be notified if they link to it). Etymology (including of surnames) should be separate from disambiguation (and mostly in Wiktionary). I.e. an "article" like [1] should be a dab page like [2]. DexDor (talk) 06:34, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Another example: Tornquist. There's a sentence of etymology so it shouldn't be a dab page; there are placenames so it isn't a surname page; but it seems rather petty to insist on two separate pages for so few entries! I've left it for now, WP:IAR. PamD 07:05, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm happy with Tornquist after JHJ's edit (after tweaking the grammar), but I'd understood that a page like broke the rules for a dab page as it includes "... is a surname of Swedish origin. The word tornquist means "thorn branch"." in the opening section. If we can do this, then that's excellent and we have a sensible page. I can't see anything one way or the other in WP:MOSDAB, I just have a memory of having this sort of content removed as "Inappropriate content for a disambiguation page". PamD 14:41, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • I think it falls nicely under this project page's "A short description of the common general meaning of a word can be appropriate for helping the reader determine context." -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:16, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • If the list article can't stand on its own, there's no reason to merge it back to the disambiguation page, since the entries would be partial title matches. If the list article isn't encyclopedic, delete it and be done with it. -- JHunterJ (talk) 12:25, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed change to the section on partial title matches

I hereby propose to add "People with the surname of the title in question should be included in the disambiguation page (generally at the bottom) unless that page would grow to an absurd length with their inclusion (see Johnson (disambiguation)). In such a case, the link to Foobar (surname) should be prominent on the disambiguation page. Surname pages may exist on their own, but do not take the place of disambiguation pages. Names should not be removed from disambiguation pages on the grounds that they also appear within the surname page (except for reasons of absurd length on the main disambiguation page), as the surname article is not a disambiguation page." This helps our readers, as again, someone looking for Friedrich Bieber who can only remember his last name does not have to go to Bieber (disambiguation) and then a step further onto the surname article. What say you? Red Slash 18:42, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • I continue to disagree. Including the non-ambiguous partial-title-match name-holder lists on disambiguation pages is a temporary state only, until someone (anyone) opts to move the list to its anthroponymy list article, regardless of length. If the length is "absurd", then that option needs to be exercised sooner. The link to the surname does not need to be any more prominent on the dab page that the existing dab page guidelines indicate. Some surnames (e.g., "Banana") simply aren't that likely to be the topic sought, and so don't warrant prominence. Names should be removed from the disambiguation page when they also appear on surname article lists unless there is grounds for including them (that is, that the topic person is commonly referred to by just the surname, and so is not a partial title match). And at no point, ever, should an existing anthroponymy list article (or list on an anthroponymy article) be merged to a non-article disambiguation page -- if the list of non-ambiguous partial-title-match name-holders is non-encyclopedic, the list article should be deleted just like any other non-encyclopedic list article. -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:06, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, it would not be a good idea to establish duplicated lists of surname-holders. If there is a surname page, then the dab page for that word only needs a link to the surname page. Duplicated lists run the risk that new names will be added randomly to one or the other but rarely to both. The present system is fine - with JHJ's welcome clarification that it is OK for the preamble to a dab page like Tornquist to include a very brief description/etymology without breaking the dab page rules. PamD 19:14, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think WP:PTM just needs a sentence or two to explicitly clarify that people should be included on the disambiguation page when they are commonly referred to by the surname alone. So Johnson (disambiguation) should include Samuel Johnson, Lyndon B. Johnson, and possibly a few others likely target articles for "Johnson".--Trystan (talk) 19:40, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    I do not think Johnson (disambiguation) should include Samuel Johnson or Lyndon B. Johnson. Is there a reliable source that refers to either of them as "Johnson" that doesn't mention the words "Samuel" or "Lyndon", respectively? -- JHunterJ (talk) 20:01, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    That's not the point. Readers might enter a surname into the search box expecting to get (possibly after a few more mouse clicks) to the article they want. Also, a (slightly sloppy) editor might put something like "During the Johnson and Nixon presidencies..." into an article. I.e. surnames need disambiguating. DexDor (talk) 20:43, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    But it is the point. Readers entering a surname into the search box can get to the article they want after a few more mouse clicks: the surname list article would be linked from the dab, and the surname holder would be listed on the surname list article (not the dab). And slightly sloppy editors might do any number of things that make navigation difficult; the solution there is to clean up after the sloppy editors, not to keep the plastic covers on the sofa year-round. -- JHunterJ (talk) 20:50, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    It's not just us referring to "Johnson" in passing and expecting the reader to understand whether the president or the dictionary writer is being referred to; it happens throughout English. It's entirely reasonable to expect that someone reading about, e.g., "the house where Johnson wrote the Dictionary" could come here, type in "Johnson", and be properly disambiguated, as they would for any other ambiguous search term. Surname lists shouldn't be acting as incomplete disambiguations and creating an extra step for readers.
    The article on the surname is currently the primary topic for Johnson, which seems odd to me. Do we really think that a large majority of people typing in "Johnson" don't want a proper disambiguation page (leading to the many people, places and other things with that name), but ultimately are looking for information on the surname itself?--Trystan (talk) 21:06, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    Johnson is an unusually productive surname. It is unlikely that someone looking for a little known person with that surname, such as anthropologist Guy Benton Johnson, would type in Johnson with the expectation that this subject will be found on that page. bd2412 T 21:18, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    Agreed. The existing WP:PTM standard is what greatly limits the Johnsons that we need to include, i.e., those who "could plausibly be referred to" by the last name alone in a "a sufficiently generic context".--Trystan (talk) 21:42, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • It is not beneficial to have a surname list baked into a dab page. They wont be correctly categorized as set indices, you can't expand them into proper articles, and by having any description of the surname in the lede you are implying that everything mentioned in the dab page is derived from the surname. Which you can't prove since you can't have references in a dab page per MOS:DABENTRY. —Xezbeth (talk) 21:50, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    Why not have the list of people in the dab page and any etymology separate (either in a surname article or in Wiktionary) linked from the dab page ? To me, the dab page seems a much better place to keep the list - for one thing it's easier/simpler for readers (who just want to get to the info about a specific person) and for another it's less likely that an editor will think "this surname page has far too many examples, lets remove some" (not realising that the list is also used for disambiguation). DexDor (talk) 22:16, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    The list of non-ambiguous partial-title-matching name holders can be a separate anthroponymy surname list article from the anthroponymy surname article if that's a problem. As for why not have them on dabs, it's because they're non-ambiguous partial title matches, and likely to be remove by editors who recognize them, in order to allow the readers to efficiently navigate to one of the actually ambiguous topics. -- JHunterJ (talk) 11:58, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Create a new article for each definition of a topic?

Bhny will sometimes tell editors that "There is no reason to put alternate meanings" in an article and that they "could write another article about it and have a disambiguation page to direct to the two articles." I've told Bhny to "stop incorrectly informing other editors of how this site functions. You are mostly incorrect about our treatments of terms. And you should already know that.[3] We usually don't create WP:Content forks to cover each different meaning of a term. We cover it all in one article, and doing that doesn't make the article a dictionary. Even when we create different articles for the different meanings (which is only when those meanings deserve a Wikipedia article to themselves), we still usually mention them in the main article. Also, you know that we have articles about words, even if those articles are supposed to be about more than just the definitions." Bhny insists that I'm wrong, even though Bhny has seen, for example, plenty of Wikipedia articles that have a definitions section because there is more than one definition of the concept and the section significantly helps people understand the concept.[4] Bhny either doesn't know of WP:DABCONCEPT (the broad-concept article guideline) or doesn't care that it exists.

We could use some outside comments on this. I suggested to Bhny that I ask about it here. Bhny agreed that doing that would be fine.[5] 72.216.11.67 (talk) 17:44, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The specific example here is zoophobia or "fear of animals". An editor added a different meaning "fear of people who practice zoophilia", an obscure neologism that had nothing to do with a fear of animals. After I pointed this out, the editor agreed with my edit.[6] Bhny (talk) 17:59, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It sounds like the specific case is resolved, but just to be pedantic: unless I'm missing smoething, I would offer that the general case the IP poster attributes to Bhny is correct.
This is pretty much exactly why disambiguation pages exist: because we don't, for example, have a single article that covers every meaning of Mercury.--NapoliRoma (talk) 18:25, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Even if this were a separate meaning, the "fear of animals" sense would be the primary topic; where there are only two notable meanings, and one is primary, the other is addressed in a hatnote, per WP:TWODABS. bd2412 T 18:50, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't bring this here because of the zoophobia case. I brought it here because Bhny commonly tells editors that an alternate meaning of a term should not be in the article about the concept. Bhny ignores the fact that a concept can have different definitions and seems to think that a different article should always be made to address each different meaning of a term. I've explained to Bhny why that is incorrect (see the discussion on Bhny's talk page, my 06:04, 22 November 2013 (UTC) post especially). I didn't say that we always have broad-concept articles, or that every definition should be included. I merely said that broad-concept articles (which are articles with more than one definition for a term) exist. I can point to many different articles where it is important to address the different ways that the word is used in order to understand that article's concept. Female genital mutilation is one example. In no way should we create a different article for each different definition, unless those different definitions are notable enough and/or otherwise distinct enough be separate articles. 72.216.11.67 (talk) 19:19, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Strictly speaking, broad concept articles do not cover "more than one definition for a term"; they cover terms which are themselves broadly defined. For example, Particle, which used to be a disambiguation page, is a broad concept article because most of the things called "particle" have common characteristics capable of being discussed holistically. bd2412 T 19:32, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's "more than one definition for a term" to me, such as what can sometimes be seen in a dictionary entry as a different definition of a concept. But regardless of the semantics on that, you and I agree about it being commonplace for an article to cover more than one meaning of a concept. 72.216.11.67 (talk) 19:41, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would say that is more than one expression of a single broad meaning. The connection must still go beyond using the same name. bd2412 T 19:44, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that's a good way to describe it. 72.216.11.67 (talk) 19:58, 9 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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