User talk:Laodah/around

(Note: the following introduction was lifted, more or less whole-cloth, from the Talk page of Giraffedata's essay on "comprised of" and his campaign to remove it from Wikipedia.)

This is the talk page for the user Laodah's user subpage "Around", an essay on the "lazy around" and Laodah's work to remove it from Wikipedia.

The purpose of this page is to talk about that essay (in continuous development), including any discussion of the subject of the essay, with anyone and everyone who is interested in the topic.

If you have something to say to the author of the essay but it doesn't amount to discussion of the essay or the subject of the essay (i.e. it isn't something you intend to discuss with everyone who is interested in the topic), a more appropriate place to comment is Laodah's user talk page.

Laodah is the editor of this page (as a form of user page, unlike an article page, it has an owner). Laodah does not manipulate the conversation, but does maintain the format of the page.

If you add a new comment, please put it in a new section at the bottom of the page. A response, of course, should go in the same section with the comment to which it responds.

The English language is important.

Laodah 06:16, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

"based around"--approved by leading editors, publishers, and authors in over 10,000 scholarly books

I look into a variety of style guides and several recommend against "Based around." However most of them dealing with "around" do not have a complaint here. "Based around" Is standard usage for many of the best publishers, including Oxford University press, Cambridge University press, Harvard University press, Yale, Chicago, Illinois and so on. As well as Norton, Cengage and commercial & textbook publishers. Google books shows over 9000 different scholarly books published by Oxford and Cambridge University presses that use "Based around." The authors, editors, proofreaders of the most prestigious and respected publishers are the ones who set the standards for high-quality publication. "Based+around"+inpublisher:Cambridge+inpublisher:University+inpublisher:press&num=20 Here are 3000+ books published by Cambridge that use the phrase.; and Here are 6000 books published by Oxford University press; and Robert Allen (2008). Pocket Fowler's Modern English Usage. Oxford University Press. p. 94. here--from Oxford!-- is a style guide that's negative. Rjensen (talk) 05:39, 9 May 2015 (UTC)

I'd agree with @Rjensen: that this campaign appears to be on dubious or spurious grounds and is rather based on the personal preference of the essayist. I'm even more concerned about the nature of edits that are carried out enact this predilection. They are accompanied by the edit summary "Resolved a disputed usage of "around". Cheers.", which makes it sound like something decided by a resolution of the community rather than that of a solitary individual. What's more, that the edit is recognised to regard a dispute specifically excludes it from being characterised as minor ("(an edit that) could never be the subject of a dispute"), which these edits routinely and inappropriately are. This practice has persisted following a request - and I had thought agreement - not to do so. In the same exchange, the user acknowledges that at least some of their edits may "weaken accuracy" which makes it baffling as to why one would carry it out for so little reciprocal gain. I'd contend that a significant number of these edits actively change the meaning of what is said, render the phrasing less clear or less elegant and the remainder of edits are largely neutral, at best. Mutt Lunker (talk) 12:54, 13 March 2022 (UTC)