Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style

"known mononymously"

Someone has developed a hobby of introducing the obscure word "mononymously" into every lead it can possibly fit into. It's bad style for an encyclopedia; it has the feel of a teenager trying to sound smart. Can we agree that this is silly, and that the word should only be used where it's really needed? —Gendralman (talk) 01:07, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I can agree. JIMp _talk·cont 01:22, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

• Agree that we should never use big words where simple ones will do. In this case, the word "mononymously" is close to being redundant; at a push, one could say "simply". -- Ohconfucius ^{ping / poke} 01:29, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
• "Simply" sounds like a value judgment to me. I don't mind the use of the standard term for this (none of us would likely object to "known pseudonymously as..." or "published under the pseudonym..."), but "known by the single name" would be acceptable here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:49, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The word to describe this is sesquipedalian. --  Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 21:01, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Although I do not wish to encourage pompous sesquipedalianism, I consider the word "mononymously" to be sufficiently useful and sufficiently understandable from its roots to be acceptable for use in Wikipedia, just as the word "disambiguation" is acceptable.

—Wavelength (talk) 15:52, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's an MOS point as such, but it's undoubtedly aesthetically horrible English and pretentious, as well as being both redundant and rarely seen elsewhere, especially in comparison to the extent to which it seems to have been deployed on various WP pages. What does it actually add? And what next, "William Jefferson Clinton, known duonymously as Bill Clinton"? N-HH talk/edits 16:38, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Somewhere in the body, I could imagine "adopted the mononym..." but in the lead simplicity is even more important. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 16:52, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it's definitely not that hard to figure out and may be useful at times. If we do need it, we should use it, but I've just checked the first five dozen examples linked to and could not find a single instance where the word did seem useful. In each of these sixty sentences (I only got through three pages) the word added nothing but the feeling that someone was trying to be smart. JIMp _talk·cont 16:53, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Quite right; every dictionary is full of words that no one encounters elsewhere, and that no one but a schoolkid or a mental mediocrity would show off with. And it definitely reflects badly on all of us if we don't get rid of such puerility. JonRichfield (talk) 19:51, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree that mononym could fit into the article body much better than mononymously does in the lead. —Gendralman (talk) 22:11, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

• This would never be a good word to use in the lead of an encyclopaedia article, except perhaps the article on the phenomenon itself. --John (talk) 20:01, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

• I've added it to the section on "Technical language" (WP:JARGON) as an example of "Do not introduce new and specialized words simply to teach them to the reader, when more common alternatives will do." Gendralman (talk) 23:57, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree with that addition. It's in the "wrong" section, in that we are not talking about technical articles per se, and it misdefines the problem, in that we are not talking about using an obscure word where a simpler one would do, but using an obscure word where no description is really needed at all. Also, even though it might be useful as an example, I'm wary of adding such specific advice based on the latest highlighted problem; the MOS needs to take a broader view. Isn't perhaps the "contested vocabulary" section where we are – with its existing advice to avoid "straining for formality"? Judging from the near-unanimity above I don't think it's going to be controversial to simply remove the word from most places where it's been added and to point to the MOS as it already was, standard English practice and the above discussion to whichever editor[s] is/are so fond of it if they complain? If anything, if we simply add it now, they can argue, however spuriously, that the goalposts have been moved and retrospective legislation imposed. More generally, I can't imagine this specific word is one that's going to keep cropping up. N-HH talk/edits 08:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

I think it's the right section. I wouldn't describe "mononymous" as formal, just jargon; I see the word's existence as a novel bit of trivia, and editors are adding in order to draw attention to it, hence the link. It's like a mini-coatrack where people disingenuously try to use the popularity of some articles to get people to notice their trivial hobbyhorse.

The problem is the word will keep cropping up: if it's in 80% of the mononymous artist's articles, people will inevitably rush to add it to any article it's missing from, as though they've made a contribution to some grand cause. We see this all the time on Wikipedia: someone creates some kind of novel warning or term or template message, and nerds rush in to spread it into every article it can possibly fit into, like it's a video game they rack up points for. Taking it out of a few articles won't suffice to get rid of it. —Gendralman (talk) 21:41, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Apologies btw if my comment came across as critical at all (that wasn't the intention of course). Anyway, I think between us we have now taken the word out from pretty much every page it had been added. Let's see if it starts creeping back in and then maybe rethink the best way to deal with it if necessary. N-HH talk/edits 08:36, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I believe there may be some left; some of the links are the result of someone adding 'mononymous person' to the 'See also' section. -- Ohconfucius ^{ping / poke} 10:00, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Could I put in a plea for plain English? Let's use the fact (or is it my home-grown theory?) that English is unique in the extent to which elegance and plainness are close partners. Tony (talk) 08:41, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Removing an "explanatory" section

As noted above, in the Quotation marks section, there's a subsection entitled "Reasons to prefer straight quotation marks and apostrophes (and double quotation marks)". I've read this over a couple of times and can't quite see the point for including it.

The section almost entirely discusses and defends the "no curly quotes" rule, which has been stated explicitly a couple of lines earlier. There's no ambiguity needing explained here; we have a very simple recommended vs. non-recommended position, and no room for saying "in some cases, do X".

As far as I can see on a quick skim, very few other sections of the MoS have this sort of justification/explanation added to them, and from a practical standpoint, it's another several paragraphs and 275 words in an already very long MoS page!

Would anyone object if I simply removed it? I can't really see that the annotation is adding much value to the section. Andrew Gray (talk) 08:47, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

I think if we're going to have the rule, we need to justify it, since it runs rather dramatically counter to what seems to be the general MoS philosophy (which places professional appearance above ease of typing). However, unless someone can give a real and precise usage scenario where the use of curly quotes is going to do significant harm, I think the rule should be changed. In running text it hardly matters, since (if my browser and screen are typical) you don't see any difference, but in article titles and the bolded bit at the start of articles, we should be using proper quotation marks. And curly apostrophes as well, I would suggest, though that's going to affect a lot more articles than the quotation marks would. Victor Yus (talk) 09:31, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

We discussed this recently, as I recall, and there was nothing like a consensus to change the rule. Do we have to have the debate again? Andrew Gray (talk) 10:51, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Do you mean the thread titled "The reasons currently provided for using straight quotation marks are dubious at best" in archive 138? It doesn't seem to have gone into the matter in much depth; the only real "reason" given (apart from vague unsupported claims about searchability and portability) is ease of typing. That's easily answered - let people type how they want (they do that anyway with hyphens and dashes), and then let other people tidy after them. The effect of the "rule" is that if someone does go to the effort of installing proper quote marks, then someone else is going to make the counterproductive effort of replacing them with typewriter quotes so as to "conform with the MoS", which is pretty absurd. Victor Yus (talk) 11:00, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

From my technically-naïve standpoint, I’d expect proper quotation marks and apostrophes to be easier for software to deal with, because they can’t be mistaken for coding delimeters, mark-up shortcuts, or the like; unlike the straight quotes, they shouldn’t ever need to be ‘escaped’. Although I haven’t reviewed the previous discussions, I agree entirely with the latter part of the above as well as Victor’s previous post. Personally, I have to make a special effort not to use them in article-space here (and in ASCII-only environments), but I can also understand others’ reluctance to revisit a debate—over what many consider minutiae—that has the potential to go the way of the ‘dash wars’.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 03:22, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Victor, installing curly quotes and en-dashes is messing things up, not tidying them up. There's no meaningful difference to people, and the difficulties that they cause for users is constant. For example I can easily search for "isn't" when editing: put a curly quote in there, and I have no idea how to type it. I'd have to go to another tool, search through the "insert symbol" menu, grab a curly quote, come back here and paste it into my search bar. There's probably some way to type one by knowing a fancy alt sequence or memorizing its UNICODE ordinal value, but that would be an utter waste of time. There's no reason to make people go to extra effort to satisfy typography fetishists.—Kww(talk) 03:51, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

I thought the whole purpose of MoS was to encourage people to go to extra effort to satisfy typography fetishists (or as they are otherwise known, people who know what professionally edited texts look like and would prefer Wikipedia to look like that too). The problem you have with "isn't" (which you can solve practically by searching for just "isn", although I suppose that in other cases there might not be such a good solution) applies just as much to en dashes, and anyway, wouldn't be a significant problem if we restricted the change to titles and bolded introductions, which is all I'm suggesting. Victor Yus (talk) 10:30, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Exactly why I would also forbid the use of en-dashes and minus signs. Your suggestion of restricting it to partial use only creates the problem of mixed representations of the same text string.—Kww(talk) 14:00, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Couldn’t the software be tweaked to treat the corresponding “printers’ ” and “typescript” punctuation characters (to avoid loaded terminology) as fungible equivalents in a search field? It already does something similar with accented characters: if I type “Québec” in the box above this edit window, the popup suggestions all start with “Quebec”.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 01:09, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Wikimedia software certainly could be. When editing, though, the search functions are handled by the browser, not by Wikimedia software. This kind of thing also makes every bot writer's job more complicated, as all of our pattern matching has to compensate for multiple flavors of punctuation. It's not that it can't be done, it's just that because it's useless, there's no reason to undertake the effort of an indefinitely long and mistake-prone task.—Kww(talk) 01:28, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Straight quotation marks are "proper".

Can we please not rehash this debate? —David Levy 03:50, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

What debate? Has there been some sort of compromise agreed here - the Fetishists get their way over the dashes, the Philistines get their way over the quote marks? Victor Yus (talk) 10:30, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Sooner or later, the Philistines will prevail on the dash issue as well. The Fetishists are making editing Wikipedia more difficult, and satisfying their fetish adds no value.—Kww(talk) 14:00, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

I prefer straight quotation marks because when trying to edit articles with quotations that confusing and sometimes not properly marked, I can search for a straight double quote character to make sure I'm not missing something. I can't search for curly quotes without looking up how to do the keyboard gymnastics. I do think an explanation in the MoS is in order because the reasons for the rule are not obvious. Personally I'd prefer to get rid of all our variations on the dash too, but that's another story. SchreiberBike (talk) 19:09, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Back to the question: the section on reasons

Back to the original question, then; I think we should firstly separate the reasons for preferring double quotes to single, from those for preferring straight to curly. The only valid reason I can see for preferring straight to curly is the last of the three given (basically the point made above about searches for items like "isn't"), in combination with the "easier to type" point. I would remove the other two more dubious "reasons". All the reasoning might be relegated to footnotes. Victor Yus (talk) 13:46, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

This is more or less what I've now done (though with only limited use of footnotes). Hope it meets with approval. Victor Yus (talk) 11:15, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

All right; it wasn't (but I don't know why people feel the need to revert a whole lot of changes over one minor objection). What is the "important point about within-Wikipedia searches"? Victor Yus (talk) 11:33, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

I disagree with your statement on "reasons", as well as your edits changing the guideline. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:18, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Can you be more specific? What additional reasons do you think should be included (assuming that's the thing that you disagree with)? Victor Yus (talk) 20:21, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Tony, Arthur, anyone? What do you think was wrong with my changes? Victor Yus (talk) 07:53, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

If no-one wants to discuss this further, then I'm assuming there won't be any objection if I redo my changes? Victor Yus (talk) 06:52, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Victor, there most certainly are objections. Could I refer you to the entirety of Archive 126? Notable is this subsection. Please review all of the reasoning there, rather than calling again for further iterations of the same discussions. Tony (talk) 08:37, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure what exactly you're referring me to. There seem to be various arguments presented there, and not much sign of consensus, and more to the point, no attempt to justify any of those "reasons" which we seem to have now concluded are not in fact valid (but are still in the MoS). Whatever one's personal views on the subject, surely we should all agree that if something is presented in the MoS as a reason for something, then it should make sense and actually be a reason? Otherwise the whole thing loses any credibility.

My changes removed the various pseudo-reasons, and placed the remaining "real" reasons in the appropriate places so we can see what refers to what (i.e. the reasons for using double rather than single quotes next to the guidance that tells people to do that, and the reasons for using straight rather than curly quotes/apostrophes next to the guidance that tells people to do that). I also made another independent change in the bit about not bolding quotation marks in the bold bit at the start of articles (an exception for cases like "A" is for Alibi where the quotation marks are in fact a part of the title, which I wouldn't have expected to be in any way controversial). Now, what parts of this do people in fact object to? Victor Yus (talk) 11:44, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Victor, I haven't looked into either your edits or the history, but I have a suggestion. If your whole bunch of changes were reverted due to one minor objection, then you might want to try one minor edit at a time. See how it is accepted before going to the next. Even better, propose changes individually and specifically here on the talk page first, and see if you get some support for them. The MOS is a delicated negotiate set of compromises and consensuses, so changes shouldn't move quickly. Dicklyon (talk) 15:04, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I spent half my elementary schooldays in England and half in New England. Although I know British printers, editors and designers tend to prefer single quotation marks, this is one area where I've always preferred the American convention (unlike the one that sticks every punctuation mark within quotes, willy-nilly).
My reason for preferring double quotation marks (double inverted commas) is that an apostrophe is far more likely to occur within a direct quotation than in the much-rarer enclosed or inner quotation (requiring an alternation between single and double quotes). Seeing
John said 'Mary's hair's on fire!' or 'Oh, you shouldn't have!', protested Susan.
can make the reader pause half a beat, as opposed to
John said "Mary's hair's on fire!" or "Oh, you shouldn't have!", protested Susan.
In my normal writing, I have to ad-lib when the apostrophe falls within an enclosed quotation, sometimes beginning the outer quotation with single quotation marks (British-style) in order to double those around the enclosed quotation, e.g.
'Did you not', asked the prosecutor, 'scream, "Mary's hair's on fire!" ?'
as vs
"Did you not", asked the prosecutor, "scream, 'Mary's hair's on fire!' ?"
or, rather (using curly quotation marks in my normal writing outside Wikipedia and e-mail),
‘Did you not’, asked the prosecutor, ‘scream “Mary’s hair’s on fire!” ?’
to avoid
“Did you not”, asked the prosecutor, “scream ‘Mary’s hair’s on fire!’ ?”.
¶ The "curly" alt- (or ASCII) codes I used here were Alt+145 for ‘ (open single quote), Alt+146 for ’ (apostrophe or close single quote), Alt+147 for “ (open double quote), and Alt+148 for ” (close double quotes) [plus Alt+182 for ¶ ]. —— Shakescene (talk) 09:21, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I've tried British style with the idea that punctuation shouldn't be overly visible, and American style does sometimes seem garish, but in this case I agree British just ends up being confusing. Here on WP there are also many words and names with a final apostrophe transcribing a glottal stop, so in some articles it's even worse than in your examples. And yes, it's often convenient to generally use American but to switch to British as in your last examples, but that's not going to fly in formal writing. — kwami (talk) 09:34, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Victor, could I reiterate Dicklyon's suggestion above: "propose changes individually and specifically here on the talk page first, and see if you get some support for them". Referring to your edit to MOS earlier today:

1. It was fine when when every example had non-bold ""; but the difference between bold and non-bold "" is elusive, especially in some fonts, sizes, and resolutions. Now each example would need a gloss: "Quotation marks are [bold/not bold]."
2. As we've seen again and again, the matter of proper names is distracting and problematic. This whole construction could be taken as a single proper name: William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton.

So then, "" would need to be bold. Compare Bill_Hickok_(American_football), which currently does not conform to the rule you propose. Should it, though? A mess! I'd be inclined to forget the proper names. No one understands them.

This would be the accurate rule to reflect what you seem to want; and the intent of the examples is clear from the immediate context:

• An article title may include quotation marks, and these should be in bold just like the rest of the title when it appears at the start of the lead (from "A" Is for Alibi: "A" Is for Alibi is the first novel ...).
• When a title is shown altered in the lead, any added quotation marks should not be in bold (from Jabberwocky: "Jabberwocky" is a nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll ...; from Bill Clinton: William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton ... is an American politician.).

Please don't treat MOS as your sandbox. Tony (talk) 12:11, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Like any Wikipedia page, it's all our sandbox - that's how it works. Your version is a clear improvement on mine, so go ahead and change it (or I will, if you prefer). Victor Yus (talk) 14:03, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

"Wikipedia has an article on..."

In March 2012, Nick Levinson inserted advice inconsistent with Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Self-references to avoid. I just read the talk page discussion cited, wherein I see no evidence of consensus (but also no mention of the WP:SELFREF contradiction).
Apparently, this problem was overlooked until today, when PinkAmpersand edited the example. So for more than a year, we've been advising editors to use the language "Wikipedia has an article on..." in the encyclopedia. Is there any reliable means of identifying and correcting the articles affected? (For some reason, Google and Bing are providing false positives for the quoted string.)
As a courtesy, I've left a note on Nick Levinson's talk page. —David Levy 19:26, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Putting "Wikipedia has an article on" (with the double quotes) in the Wikipedia search box throws up some articles. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:45, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Either form meets the intended purpose. If anyone wants to make changes to articles, there's also the plural, "'Wikipedia has articles on'" (with double quotation marks only). Nick Levinson (talk) 16:51, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Either form meets the intended purpose.

Have you read Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Self-references to avoid? —David Levy 02:30, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure why you're being contentious. Either form meets the intended purpose. The intended purpose was to link where what is to be linked is within a quotation and therefore cannot be linked from in the usual way. I think the now-deleted form was clearer (keeping in mind that copies of pages need not be of the entire encyclopedia) but the new form also meets the intended purpose. I probably missed WP:SELFREF when I made my proposal, it was already cited above, and I saw it then, so I don't know why you chose the tone proffered. I'm happy with the guideline change. I've yesterday updated my offline drafts in progress and I thank you for the notification. Nick Levinson (talk) 15:01, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure why you're being contentious.

I'm not trying to be contentious. I don't know what tone you perceived, but I wasn't being sarcastic.

From your first reply, I sincerely didn't know whether you read WP:SELFREF and understood the relevant concern. It was clear only that you regarded both wordings as satisfactory and didn't object to others' edits. (It wasn't clear that you intended to modify your future contributions.)

The intended purpose was to link where what is to be linked is within a quotation and therefore cannot be linked from in the usual way. I think the now-deleted form was clearer (keeping in mind that copies of pages need not be of the entire encyclopedia) but the new form also meets the intended purpose.

When you note that "copies of pages need not be of the entire encyclopedia", are you citing a distinction between these links and those presented "in the usual way"? (Please note that this is another sincere question; I'm not trying to be rude or confrontational.)

Another concern, which I noted above, is that there doesn't appear to have been consensus for the general format (irrespective of the wording used) when you proposed it. That's why I haven't begun editing the affected articles yet; I'm not sure that either form should be included.

In the thirteen months since you inserted the advice, the practice doesn't appear to have been widely adopted. I see a handful of applications, most of which were added by you. (I found four added by others, along with a few false positives caused by similar wording coincidentally used in other contexts.) —David Levy 16:33, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I had the problem, found no solution, invented my own, and applied it to articles but an editor took it out of one, I think as unauthorized. At any rate, I found the instructions clear but contrary to the general preference to support cross-Wikipedia navigation with links, I proposed a solution, discussion ensued, the solution survived, I edited the guideline, no one reverted it, someone recently improved it, and I improved that. Consensus existed on the principle that "consensus is a normal and usually implicit and invisible process across Wikipedia. Any edit that is not disputed or reverted by another editor can be assumed to have consensus" (decapitalized and internal link omitted). Where consensus may be most fragile is on whether linking from within quotations should be barred but even that remains as consensus by other editors' decision prior to my edit of the guideline.

If I'm the most frequent user of this kind of linking (assuming other similar wordings are not in use), that may be because I know of it and other editors didn't notice the provision but either didn't want to link quoted strings or should've known the guideline. We don't usually publicize new provisions and it didn't seem to warrant writing a shortcut redirect. Maybe the problem is uncommon but one editor said that lots of linking occurs within quotations.

If this kind of linking looks bad, a new consensus can be developed; feel free to proceed. A major alternative that perhaps wasn't considered when I made the proposal is not to link anywhere from a string found only within a quotation, but that seems contrary to Wikimedia's intent.

Usually, when an editor tells another to read something, including in the Wikipedia namespace, most other editors likely assume they did so either then or earlier or know the content well enough and are responsible accordingly. That's why I didn't provide notice of having read them or of updating my drafts; it's not normal to do so. That's what made repeating the advice to read stand out, but it's not a problem now.

In response to "[w]hen you note that 'copies of pages need not be of the entire encyclopedia', are you citing a distinction between these links and those presented 'in the usual way'?": You're right (if this is what you're saying) that ordinary links found on incomplete copies of Wikipedia, especially single-article copies, also could point into nowhere and therefore that there's no distinction. Nonetheless, there's a problem with the new formulation that I forgot about in thinking the new one is just as good. It's not a problem with something like <ref>See also [[math]].</ref>. But <ref>''History'', p. 6. (See also [[math]].</ref> could confuse readers into thinking that the History source has somethng on math (presumably findable in the table of contents or the index if the source is a book), when what is meant instead is that Wikipedia has an article on math. A bundling format within a single ref element, using a <br /> element, would, I think, still be too subtle and confusing. Maybe a solution is to require that this kind of link be within its own ref element. What do you think?

Nick Levinson (talk) 16:20, 26 April 2013 (UTC) (Clarified a phrase and corrected syntax: 16:31, 26 April 2013 (UTC))

At any rate, I found the instructions clear but contrary to the general preference to support cross-Wikipedia navigation with links, I proposed a solution, discussion ensued, the solution survived, I edited the guideline, no one reverted it, someone recently improved it, and I improved that.

What do you mean by "the solution survived"? As I noted, I don't believe that the discussion established consensus for the change.

Perhaps you disagree (which is fine), so you went ahead and edited the guideline. Your addition remained for thirteen months because it went largely unnoticed. Otherwise, someone would have caught the WP:SELFREF contradiction sooner and editors (other than you) would have applied the advice to more than four articles.

Maybe the problem is uncommon but one editor said that lots of linking occurs within quotations.

The problem certainly isn't uncommon. Your solution is.

This doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad idea. We appear to agree that very few editors have seen it suggested. I'm not citing its rarity as evidence that the community has actively rejected the practice. My point is that if its use were widespread, that would constitute evidence of acceptance.

If this kind of linking looks bad, a new consensus can be developed; feel free to proceed.

The setup seems illogical and unintuitive. Readers have no reason to expect such links to appear among the article's references (an unrelated context) and won't seek them there.

In the normal course of viewing the reference list, they'll encounter links to Wikipedia articles, the presence of which is confusing and potentially misleading (as it appears to suggest that Wikipedia has been cited as an additional source), irrespective of what wording is used.

Usually, when an editor tells another to read something, including in the Wikipedia namespace, most other editors likely assume they did so either then or earlier or know the content well enough and are responsible accordingly. That's why I didn't provide notice of having read them or of updating my drafts; it's not normal to do so.

I don't mean that I expected a statement along the lines of "I've now read WP:SELFREF." I mean that I expected some acknowledgement of the relevant concern (if not an outright apology and commitment to assist in tracking down and editing the articles affected). Your initial response seemed to convey the opinion that there was nothing wrong with either wording.

Maybe a solution is to require that this kind of link be within its own ref element. What do you think?

I'm baffled as to why we would want to place these links among the article's references. If we're to include them at all (and there isn't even consensus that we should), why not group them in the "See also" section (or a subsection thereof), where internal links are supposed to be listed? —David Levy 17:36, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Consensus was established; see my quotation of Wikipedia:Consensus in my last post above; thus my proposal survived. There's nothing wrong with a solution beng unusual in either design or execution, as long as it meets our requirements and, generally, preferences, such as by maintaining or increasing Wikipedia's accuracy. I think we're discussing whether it meets those requirements.

Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Layout#See also section, you're right that the links could be added to a See Also section, although there they should be annotated, since otherwise some of the links would be unclear as to why they're even in that section and they'd be deleted. They'd be away from their context (the quotation) and I'm not enthusiastic about that distance but maybe that's as good an option as what I put into the guideline. Annotating in the See Also section for any reason is unusual but is supported. I don't recall having seen that Layout provision before.

Apart from that, I agree that endnotes are not ideal locations but in-body locations did not seem consistently to work. Sometimes, a text in an alternate location can be linked from instead; for example, "Jones said that 'many buses go on Broadway.' [[Broadway (New York City)|Broadway]] is an old street." Perhaps we should offer that option explicitly in the guideline, if it's not there now, although editors sometimes object to using guidelines to offer options rather than to guide people into a preferred method, although what I wrote in the guideline included options and that was implicitly accepted. But in many texts added unquoted text would be cumbersome and what is perceived as extraneous text would be deleted with the link.

What would be intuitive would probably be to link from within a quotation and a scholar's approach to that would be to annotate the quotation as that linking was added, just as quotations in various publications are annotated as that emphasis was added or was in the original. But adding linking inside a quotation right now is against consensus, so that would have to change.

I don't apologize for applying the guideline even if the guideline was written by me, since it was discussed and consensus was and is implicitly present. Nor do I apologize for having previously applied a solution similar to what the guideline eventually said, since there was a problem and my solution was reasonable. You're free to disagree; I don't object to that, but our disagreeing does not require an apology from either of us.

There are articles I edited in my early involvement with Wikipedia years ago that I would not edit the same way now, but I don't think I should go back to them and rewrite them whenever a policy or guideline is changed or whenever I discover one. Sometimes I do, but not most of the time. Unless an error is substantial, such as a copyright violation (one might have thought a source was in the public domain and later found out otherwise and I don't think I ever had an error on that scale), most editors are not expected to edit retroactively simply because they're the ones who edited the article in the past and they can track them down. Instead, we sometimes edit articles as we come across them, sometimes with the assistance of bots, regardless of who previous editors were. If previous editors were required to spend their time updating, that would soon overtake adding new content and new content would suffer because editors would leave or be squeezed for time. My watchlist is over a thousand articles now, although some are rarely edited by anyone in any way. I mostly apply policies and guidelines going forward.

Right now, both guidelines are in effect and both have consensus. I recognize a problem with part of what is present but I don't feel driven to change either guideline now as I don't think the problem is as large as some I have addressed (priorities will vary). If you believe any provison should be deleted or changed, I leave that initiative to you, that being the normal procedure.

Nick Levinson (talk) 18:53, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Consensus was established; see my quotation of Wikipedia:Consensus in my last post above; thus my proposal survived.

You referred to a chronology in which "the solution survived" after your proposal was discussed and before you edited the guideline.

There's nothing wrong with a solution beng unusual in either design or execution, as long as it meets our requirements and, generally, preferences, such as by maintaining or increasing Wikipedia's accuracy. I think we're discussing whether it meets those requirements.

Agreed. And I'm explaining why it doesn't. Internal links don't belong in a list of references. This is problematic not because it's unusual, but because it's unhelpful and potentially harmful (for the reasons noted above).

Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Layout#See also section, you're right that the links could be added to a See Also section, although there they should be annotated, since otherwise some of the links would be unclear as to why they're even in that section and they'd be deleted.

Yes, that's what I mean. They could be annotated in a similar manner (perhaps with Latin letters or Roman numerals instead of Arabic numerals, thereby making the distinction clearer).

They'd be away from their context (the quotation) and I'm not enthusiastic about that distance

The links appearing alongside the references already are away from the quotations. They also are away from the sections in which readers expect to find internal links.

but maybe that's as good an option as what I put into the guideline. Annotating in the See Also section for any reason is unusual but is supported. I don't recall having seen that Layout provision before.

It would be a significant change. The idea shouldn't be implemented without clear consensus, preferably established via an RfC. When attempting to introduce a brand new practice to the article namespace, a discussion along the lines of this is nowhere near sufficient. (And in that instance, there wasn't even strong agreement among the four editors who expressed opinions.)

I don't apologize for applying the guideline even if the guideline was written by me,

You've misunderstood. I wasn't referring to your creation or application of the linking practice. I was referring to your introduction of wording incompatible with our longstanding self-references guideline.

But I didn't expect an apology, let alone request or demand one. As noted above, I merely expected an acknowledgement that the original wording was inconsistent with WP:SELFREF.

since it was discussed and consensus was and is implicitly present.

It wasn't and isn't. A tiny discussion among four or five editors (depending on whether we count the one who requested an example but never expressed an opinion), with exactly one editor other than the proposer halfheartedly supporting the idea as an interim alternative to a better solution that he intends to use instead, does not establish consensus to fundamentally alter both our internal linking practices and our reference lists' scope.

Likewise, the text's mere existence for thirteen months doesn't mean that the community accepted it. As we've discussed, it simply went largely unnoticed. Almost no one followed the advice, and the flagrant WP:SELFREF contradiction "survived" as well (because it, like the rest of the addition, was overlooked).

Nor do I apologize for having previously applied a solution similar to what the guideline eventually said, since there was a problem and my solution was reasonable.

I disagree that it was reasonable to unilaterally introduce a new internal linking format and a new/disparate purpose for our articles' reference lists.

But again, I seek no apology.

There are articles I edited in my early involvement with Wikipedia years ago that I would not edit the same way now, but I don't think I should go back to them and rewrite them whenever a policy or guideline is changed or whenever I discover one.

You accidentally inserted text contravening a longstanding rule and modified a guideline to encourage others to do so. (Fortunately, almost no one did.) I'm not saying that someone learning that he/she committed such an error is required to assist in the consequential cleanup, but it's helpful and ethically responsible.

Right now, both guidelines are in effect and both have consensus.

As discussed above, I see absolutely no evidence of that.

I recognize a problem with part of what is present but I don't feel driven to change either guideline now as I don't think the problem is as large as some I have addressed (priorities will vary).

Your point about the "see also" wording's relative ambiguity is valid (though I believe that the format is inherently likely to cause such confusion). And unlike your wording, it would be virtually impossible to track down.

If you believe any provison should be deleted or changed, I leave that initiative to you, that being the normal procedure.

Perhaps you didn't notice this edit. —David Levy 22:56, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

No, I had not noticed that edit; thank you for your courtesy in pointing it out. Please note that, however, while consensus existed for the previous state of the provision, the new attempt at consensus is between only two of us. If the two of us disagree on whether so to edit, that is not consensus.

The previous solution survived the discussion and then I edited the guideline. The chronology and the relevance of surviving were correct. I'm not sure about calling my solution a "unilateral" introduction unless most edits to articles, guidelines, and template docs are considered to be unilateral, in which case unilaterality is normally acceptable; I discussed my proposal and Wikipedia:Consensus described implicit consensus, which was achieved. An RfC was not appropriate although anyone could have invoked one; the discussion never got to a stage, in my opinion or evidently in any discussant's opinion, justifying it. "[I]t always helps to first discuss the matter with the other parties on the related talk page. If that does not resolve the problem," an RfC is an option. When my proposal was discussed, in the end it was not unresolved. The discussion had gone off on a tangent of opposition to the bar to linking from within quotations but the discussion came back to the original proposal and there was no disagreement in the end with my proposal and when I edited the guideline and it was not reverted consensus was implicitly achieved. Your disagreement with whether consensus was implicitly arrived at appears to be a disagreement with the concept of implicit consensus in Wikipedia:Consensus, a policy, which you can edit or which you can discuss editing at that policy's talk page. Comparing the caution on the editing form for the policy page where it says "[you are editing a page that documents an English Wikipedia policy. While you may be bold in making minor changes to this page, consider discussing any substantive changes first on the page's talk page"] (presumably typical for policies) to the absence of any such caution on the editing form for a guideline (presumably typical for guidelines), besides considering the meaning of the comparison, indicates that discussion without an on-point dispute remaining among discussants does not normally require an RfC for either a policy or a guideline.

I acknowledged what I sought to acknowledge; e.g., I accepted the validity of the change to a see-also wording in a ref element when not next to a source. To posit that any change to one guideline is wrong if the change contradicts another guideline (such as WP:SELFREF) prevents evolution of the whole body of guidelines; while the contradiction should be pointed out, a case can be made for stasis or change, which might result in the other guideline being changed, such as by adding another option.

People tend not to read endnotes and are often intimidated by the presence of any at all, so I agree that links in endnotes are less likely to be seen or accessed. The best place is in the main text; navigation boxes help because of their concentration of links related to each other and a box title; a See Also section is also distant from where something is discussed but may be better than in endnotes. I would annotate narratively. I'm not sure why one would number them instead, unless perhaps to group links (e.g., group I for general links, group II for quotation support, etc.), but that numbering seems to be extraneous, since narrative labeling would be needed anyway.

On the newly-deleted second alternative, you haven't discussed it in this topic/section. What is your objection to it?

Nick Levinson (talk) 16:10, 28 April 2013 (UTC) (Clarified a wording, corrected syntax, and corrected a bracket format: 16:20, 28 April 2013 (UTC))

Please note that, however, while consensus existed for the previous state of the provision,

No, it didn't. That change was barely discussed and almost entirely unnoticed.

the new attempt at consensus is between only two of us. If the two of us disagree on whether so to edit, that is not consensus.

There must be consensus to include the advice, which has never been established.

The previous solution survived the discussion and then I edited the guideline.

What do you mean by "survived"? That no one came along and stamped it "rejected"?

One person supported the idea as an interim alternative to a better solution that he intended to use instead. You regarded this as evidence of community consensus?

I'm not sure about calling my solution a "unilateral" introduction unless most edits to articles, guidelines, and template docs are considered to be unilateral, in which case unilaterality is normally acceptable;

To be clear, I was addressing your pre-proposal application of similar formatting.

Yes, most article edits are unilateral. And most unilateral article edits are acceptable. Those that fall outside Wikipedia's basic framework are not. This includes the introduction of a new internal linking format and the use of references sections for an additional purpose unrelated to references.

I discussed my proposal and Wikipedia:Consensus described implicit consensus, which was achieved.

Four or five people discussed your idea, with a single editor halfheartedly supporting it. The absence of opposition doesn't imply community-wide support. Almost no one even considered the proposal.

An RfC was not appropriate although anyone could have invoked one; the discussion never got to a stage, in my opinion or evidently in any discussant's opinion, justifying it.

As explained at WP:PROPOSAL, establishing local consensus among early participants is the step that precedes an RfC.

"[I]t always helps to first discuss the matter with the other parties on the related talk page. If that does not resolve the problem," an RfC is an option.

As clearly indicated in the text that follows, the advice pertains to an article content dispute (the ramifications of which generally relate to that article in particular), not a guideline proposal.

When my proposal was discussed, in the end it was not unresolved.

Because three people (not counting you) commented on the idea, with one of them halfheartedly supporting it and neither of the other two directly opposing it?

and when I edited the guideline and it was not reverted consensus was implicitly achieved.

As we've discussed, there's no evidence that the text was widely seen. You've explained its virtually nonexistent adoption via the theory that editors "didn't notice the provision" (and I agree), but you simultaneously seek to cite the span in which no one reverted as proof that it's backed by consensus. How can anyone object to a change that they haven't noticed?

Now that it has been noticed, it's been reverted.

Your disagreement with whether consensus was implicitly arrived at appears to be a disagreement with the concept of implicit consensus in Wikipedia:Consensus, a policy, which you can edit or which you can discuss editing at that policy's talk page.

You're misinterpreting the advice. As explained at WP:BOLD, editors are encouraged to perform routine edits without first requesting permission. Until someone reverts or otherwise objects, it can be assumed that the changes reflect consensus. (They might not, but we don't know that yet.)

Substantial changes to a policy or guideline aren't routine edits. They stand to immediately influence editors' behavior, thereby affecting the encyclopedia as a whole. Unlike revisions to an article (which can simply be undone), we can't afford to assume that they reflect consensus until we learn otherwise (by which point significant damage may have been done). As explained at Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines (also a policy), such proposals require wide exposure and broad community support.

I would annotate narratively. I'm not sure why one would number them instead, unless perhaps to group links (e.g., group I for general links, group II for quotation support, etc.), but that numbering seems to be extraneous, since narrative labeling would be needed anyway.

Please provide an example of what you have in mind (including the formatting of the links that would follow the quotations).

On the newly-deleted second alternative, you haven't discussed it in this topic/section. What is your objection to it?

It seems cumbersome, but my main objection is that precisely three people — its proposer, someone who expressed confusion, and you — have discussed it. (See above.) —David Levy 20:09, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

When we disagree on what an authority says, a solution is to cite or quote the specific portion that governs the fact situation. If the citation or quotation is unsatisfactory to the other of us, a solution is to cite or quote a contrary provision either in that authority or in a superior one. I have already quoted the Wikipedia:Consensus policy on point. You cited WP:BOLD; but it's a guideline and, even if it purports to contradict Wikipedia:Consensus, the latter, being a policy, is superior to WP:BOLD. WP:PROPOSAL is about new policies and new guidelines, but I didn't post a new policy or a new guideline; instead, what I posted into the guideline is well within the scope of the existing guideline, because merely being very important (if it was that important) is not the same as posting a whole new guideline. The result is that you have not cited or quoted a controlling provision contrary to what I quoted from Wikipedia:Consensus. Please do. Until then, it appears that you are, not in wording but in substance, simply repeating your view that this particular edit of a bunch of months ago was out of bounds. I understand your view. We disagree.

WP:BOLD's Wikipedia Namespace subsection does not require going outside the talk page even for bold edits. What is said on before starting the RfC process after what I quoted is not limited to articles. It lists "some other forums for resolution" and all three listed are about articles but it does not attempt to be exhaustive for articles or for any other namespace. However, I see why you might have thought the section's opening paragraph was limited to articles and perhaps that should be clarified, if someone wants to.

Reviewing the consensus on this matter, Kevin McE and SMcCandlish disliked my proposal (criticizing refraining from some intraquotational linking as an unjustified "restriction" and calling my proposal "grotesque", respectively) but their alternative was to ignore the existing guidelines and so they had nothing to suggest either within the policies and guidelines or by amending any of them. As, at the time, they were not proposing that intraquotational linking be allowed by the guideline, their proposal was to violate a guideline. Since policies and guidelines are presumptively as meaningful as their faces specify, no permissible consensus can be to violate an authorized policy or guideline. Therefore, those two editors' views on that point, that editors should violate a guideline, are not part of the consensus. Their views are informative on other things, such as whether intraquotational linking should be added to a guideline, but on the then-pending proposal to amend the guideline their view to allow intraquotational linking did not contribute to consensus. Even so, among all the discussants, only one expressed a view on what the guideline should or should not say pursuant to my proposal: SMcCandlish said, "[i]n the interim is [sic] seems like a good solution". No particular format for rejection is required; the content of what is said is what we go by. No one objected except by suggesting violating the existing guideline, and that view cannot be part of a consensus. Insofar as voting applies, that makes a vote of two in favor (one for the "interim" and one who's me) and none against. This does not waive or override consensus having been arrived at in the way I've already described and with which you disagree. You're right that objecting to a guideline provision already in place is harder when not noticed, but I put the provision in a logical place for easy finding and did not phrase it in some obscure way so it would be missed or misunderstood. It's unlikely it was so completely unnoticed in between our edits; the guideline was viewed over 100,000 times in the last 90 days and we're talking about roughly four times that time period. And it's unlikely you were the first nondiscussant to have noticed the change. The guideline has been edited 659 times by over 100 editors between my addition and your deletion, although the section itself was edited only a few times, all within the scope of our discussion. It's unlikely that the addition was reverted by the first nondiscussant to have read it.

You observe that I had previously edited inconsistently with a guideline. There was a problem and I solved it. When it turned out that this was inconsistent with a guideline, I joined in solving that, too. I gather we disagree on whether those were satisfactory solutions. Your premise seems to be that your intensity of repetitive critique is justified by my not having followed the guideline when I was unaware of it. (Apparently, that is worse, in your judgment, than editors announcing that they will not follow a guideline even when they know of it, as in the discussion leading to my edit of this guideline; if you critiqued them, I missed it, but, at any rate, you're entitled to your opinion about which is worse.) But the alternative to not having followed the guideline because of unawareness of it is that every editor must be familiar with every policy and every guideline before editing at all. We don't require that, and for good reason. I'm still learning them; apparently you are, too; and apparently many or most editors also are. And no guideline is always binding.

I have a suggestion. Let's simply treat this as a matter of disagreement about the past and as a matter of determining what the guideline should say. That means we should concentrate on what the guideline should say and its rationale. Please try to focus on what the guideline should say n the future, if anything. If you want an RfC, consider invoking one; but don't blame me for doing what already is authorized (insofar as we disagree I acknowledge that we do) but feel free to exercise your right if you wish. If a good linking method for strings within quotations is found or created without adding or re-adding to the guideline, that's fine with me. If it needs adding or re-adding, then either of us can do that, preferably but not necessarily with prior consensus or wide community support and definitely with contemporary consensus that complies with Wikipedia:Consensus and Wikipedia:Policies_and_guidelines, e.g., as done previously; as you may disagree with Wikipedia:Consensus, I've already suggested that you can pursue a change to that policy, and that may change what counts as consensus.

The second alternative: How would you make it less cumbersome? Let us know how you would change it or edit the deleted wording and post it yourself into the guideline. Its posting was implicitly approved by consensus so if that were your only ground for deleting it that would be against Wikipedia:Consensus, but if you wish to suggest a rewording and you prefer not to add it yourself then I'll probably be glad to. And consensus can change.

A references section can be titled, say, References and Notes; it's not necessary to have separate sections for bibliographic and discursive endnotes. I realized that some articles I've been working on had the shorter title for the section and that the longer title was a more accurate description, so I re-edited accordingly. The more descriptive title encompasses links being in endnotes apart from source citations, if they're acceptable in endnotes anywhere.

A See Also section might say this, if I were drafting it:

== See also ==

* [[Math]]

* [[Astrology]]

* [[Bermuda]], for the Jones quotation

* [[Yellow River]], for the Chinese history quotation

I didn't number any of it, as I don't think that would be useful. I think numbering is what you were suggesting, but maybe that's not what you meant.

I'm editing a couple of articles one or both of which have the "Wikipedia has ..." formulation; I'll probably get to them within a few days.

Since you characterize one view, apparently SMcCandlish's favoring linking from inside quotations, as "a better solution", perhaps you wish to propose that. I think it's not a good idea because it reduces accuracy of quotations, but we have a few other conventions that also reduce accuracy, but relative consistency of their application and the availability of guidelines stating some of those conventions (such as for hyphens and dashes) make that less of a problem. However, intraquotational linking would offer convenience for editors and readers. It's generally not allowed now but if you'd like to generally allow it I recommend that you edit a guideline accordingly or propose doing so.

Nick Levinson (talk) 15:14, 29 April 2013 (UTC) (Corrected nowiki markup and an incomplete sentence: 15:27, 29 April 2013 (UTC))

When we disagree on what an authority says, a solution is to cite or quote the specific portion that governs the fact situation.

A big part of the problem is your mistaken belief that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are "authorities" that "govern" our actions.

I have already quoted the Wikipedia:Consensus policy on point. You cited WP:BOLD; but it's a guideline and, even if it purports to contradict Wikipedia:Consensus, the latter, being a policy, is superior to WP:BOLD.

No such contradiction exists. I cited WP:BOLD in the hope that you would read it and better understand how bold editing is supposed to occur.

WP:PROPOSAL is about new policies and new guidelines, but I didn't post a new policy or a new guideline; instead, what I posted into the guideline is well within the scope of the existing guideline, because merely being very important (if it was that important) is not the same as posting a whole new guideline. The result is that you have not cited or quoted a controlling provision contrary to what I quoted from Wikipedia:Consensus.

Unlike you, I'm not attempting to cite statutes that "govern" our actions through their wording. I'm linking to policies and guidelines for the purpose of relaying the valuable information contained therein.

In this instance, I linked to WP:PROPOSAL because it explains that an RfC is useful when proposing significant changes to practice (not merely when attempting to resolve a conflict among a discussion's current participants, as you apparently believed).

You introduced brand new practices. You seem to think that because you edited an existing page (instead of creating a new one), you exploited a legal loophole, thereby bypassing the step of achieving wide exposure and broad community support. That isn't how Wikipedia works. "Do not follow an overly strict interpretation of the letter of policy without consideration for the principles of policies."

There should be no need for us to obsess on whether something is written down somewhere. It's obvious that the discussion didn't gauge (let alone establish) community consensus. Unfortunately, you seem more interested in citing rules and perceived technicalities than in applying common sense. Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy. (Please try to understand that I'm linking to that policy for explanatory purposes, not because it's a law that "governs" us.)

What is said on before starting the RfC process after what I quoted is not limited to articles.

It doesn't make sense in the context described at WP:PROPOSAL (setting aside the question of whether WP:PROPOSAL is relevant to the matter at hand). It applies to a situation in which the RfC's purpose is dispute resolution. I'm trying to explain to you that this isn't the only valid type of RfC.

Reviewing the consensus on this matter, Kevin McE and SMcCandlish disliked my proposal (criticizing refraining from some intraquotational linking as an unjustified "restriction" and calling my proposal "grotesque", respectively) but their alternative was to ignore the existing guidelines and so they had nothing to suggest either within the policies and guidelines or by amending any of them. As, at the time, they were not proposing that intraquotational linking be allowed by the guideline, their proposal was to violate a guideline.

They made no formal proposals, but they clearly expressed a belief that such linking should be allowed (in which case the guideline shouldn't state otherwise).

You seem to be under the impression that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines dictate behavior. This is incorrect. Our policies and guidelines are descriptive, not prescriptive.

We don't do things because policies and guidelines tell us to. Policies and guidelines describe how we do things, with varying degrees of precision.

When you added advice to the guideline, that didn't enact it as an official convention. As noted at WP:NOT (and again, please understand that I'm linking to that policy for explanatory purposes, not because it's a law that "governs" us), "written rules do not themselves set accepted practice. Rather, they document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected." At no point has the community accepted (or actively rejected) your idea.

I'm attempting to explain why your actions, while undoubtedly taken in good faith, were unhelpful. You seek to counter this assertion by quoting rules and claiming that their wording technically was followed. "The rules say so" (or "the rules don't say so") is one of the worst arguments that can be made at Wikipedia. Our ultimate goal is to build an encyclopedia, not a rulebook.

Since policies and guidelines are presumptively as meaningful as their faces specify, no permissible consensus can be to violate an authorized policy or guideline.

You note later in your message that "no guideline is always binding" (and therefore seem to be familiar with WP:IAR, at least in principle), so I assume that you mean that there can't be consensus to routinely violate a policy or guideline. I agree, in the respect that such consensus should result in the policy or guideline being changed or eliminated.

Therefore, those two editors' views on that point, that editors should violate a guideline, are not part of the consensus.

I disagree (as noted above, Kevin McE and SMcCandlish clearly expressed the opinion that the restriction shouldn't be in the guideline), but okay. Have it your way. This leaves two editors (A. di M. and you) whose discussion of the proposal we're left to consider. And it leaves no one supporting your idea.

Even so, among all the discussants, only one expressed a view on what the guideline should or should not say pursuant to my proposal: SMcCandlish said, "[i]n the interim is [sic] seems like a good solution".

Indeed, as I've noted several times, SMcCandlish halfheartedly supported the idea as an interim alternative to a different solution that he preferred and intended to use instead.

But we just excluded him from the consensus, so that doesn't matter.

No particular format for rejection is required; the content of what is said is what we go by.

And almost nothing was said.

No one objected except by suggesting violating the existing guideline, and that view cannot be part of a consensus. Insofar as voting applies, that makes a vote of two in favor (one for the "interim" and one who's me) and none against.

And this, evidently, is your definition of "consensus" to fundamentally alter our internal linking practices and references sections' purpose.

You're right that objecting to a guideline provision already in place is harder when not noticed, but I put the provision in a logical place for easy finding and did not phrase it in some obscure way so it would be missed or misunderstood.

In case it wasn't clear, I'm not accusing you of intentionally obscuring the text (or, for that matter, of doing anything in bad faith).

It's unlikely it was so completely unnoticed in between our edits; the guideline was viewed over 100,000 times in the last 90 days and we're talking about roughly four times that time period.

And yet, your formatting was applied to four articles not edited by you. Four. In thirteen months.

How do you explain this? By theorizing that "other editors didn't notice the provision". And yet, you also assert that they noticed it and implicitly supported its inclusion by not removing it.

And it's unlikely you were the first nondiscussant to have noticed the change.

Certainly, PinkAmpersand noticed it earlier that day. (The resultant edit brought it to my attention.) And it's highly likely that others saw the text during the preceding thirteen-month span, but there's no evidence that anyone recognized its significance or investigated how it ended up on the page. No one even caught the flagrant WP:SELFREF contradiction until PinkAmpersand happened along.

But if you prefer to assume that hundreds or thousands of editors read the advice and actively declined to apply it, so be it.

You observe that I had previously edited inconsistently with a guideline. There was a problem and I solved it.

I've explained why I regard your format as unhelpful and potentially harmful. Neither discussion nor actual practice has demonstrated otherwise.

Your premise seems to be that your intensity of repetitive critique is justified by my not having followed the guideline when I was unaware of it.

No, not at all. Everyone makes mistakes.

(Apparently, that is worse, in your judgment, than editors announcing that they will not follow a guideline even when they know of it, as in the discussion leading to my edit of this guideline;

I don't know what led you to believe that I was even comparing the two things, let alone passing such judgement.

if you critiqued them, I missed it,

I didn't. My objective isn't to "judge" people; it's to address the current situation and determine how best to proceed.

But the alternative to not having followed the guideline because of unawareness of it is that every editor must be familiar with every policy and every guideline before editing at all. We don't require that, and for good reason.

Of course. I'm not attacking you for missing a guideline (or for any other reason).

I have a suggestion. Let's simply treat this as a matter of disagreement about the past and as a matter of determining what the guideline should say. That means we should concentrate on what the guideline should say and its rationale. Please try to focus on what the guideline should say n the future, if anything.

That's precisely my intention. Note that I haven't rushed to remove your formatting from articles (though I would feel justified in doing so). I'm discussing it, along with possible alternatives (in the hope of building toward an RfC).

I've addressed the past primarily in response to your assertions that the text in question reflects "consensus" (and the possibility of reinstating it on that basis).

If you want an RfC, consider invoking one; but don't blame me for doing what already is authorized (insofar as we disagree I acknowledge that we do) but feel free to exercise your right if you wish.

What do you mean by "doing what already is authorized"? That you intend to continue inserting the formatting into articles?

as you may disagree with Wikipedia:Consensus, I've already suggested that you can pursue a change to that policy, and that may change what counts as consensus.

I don't disagree with Wikipedia:Consensus. I disagree with wikilawyering.

But if we must play that game, "any edit that is not disputed or reverted by another editor can be assumed to have consensus." Well, the edit has been disputed and reverted, so it no longer can be assumed to have consensus. That's what the policy says, after all.

The second alternative: How would you make it less cumbersome?

Probably by not using it.

Its posting was implicitly approved by consensus

Here we go again.

A references section can be titled, say, References and Notes; it's not necessary to have separate sections for bibliographic and discursive endnotes.

As discussed above, readers don't expect to find internal links in such a section. I see no reason not to place them in the section that exists for that very purpose (perhaps under a subheading that communicates the distinction from those not connected to specific quotations).

I didn't number any of it, as I don't think that would be useful. I think numbering is what you were suggesting, but maybe that's not what you meant.

I requested an example "including the formatting of the links that would follow the quotations". In other words, on what sort of link would a reader click to be taken from the quotation to the relevant Wikipedia article link? If not via lettering or numbering, how would such a setup be organized? What would the link appearing alongside the quotation comprise?

Since you characterize one view, apparently SMcCandlish's favoring linking from inside quotations, as "a better solution", perhaps you wish to propose that.

That isn't my characterization. I meant that SMcCandlish regarded such an approach as better.

On the matter of whether such linking should be used, I'm undecided. I believe that both its proponents and opponents have valid points. —David Levy 21:36, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

You say my "belief that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are 'authorities' that 'govern' our actions" is "mistaken"; it's not mistaken. The website belongs to the Wikimedia Foundation and somewhere underneath its top corporate decisions are Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. While violation does not cause us to be taken out back and shot, nonetheless they are binding on us to a degree, and would be even if they were merely community norms. "Policies explain and describe standards that all users should normally follow, while guidelines are meant to outline best practices for following those standards in specific contexts." If we should "normally follow" them, that's good enough for my purposes and should be for most editors'. If you see them as only descriptive, you are confusing them with such things as user surveys and log analyses. They are partly descriptive through their prescriptiveness in the same way that the enactment of anti-murder statutes in most societies describes our rejection of murder and coincides with a tendency of people to not murder except often enough that moral rejection is deemed to be not enough to prevent all murders. But policies and guidelines are partly prescriptive, as shown by the outcomes of various dispute resolutions, including at the Arbitration Committee and by office action. You seem to be arguing that I should do what Wikipedia wants when it is what you see it as what Wikipedia wants but not when you disagree with what Wikipedia wants. Things don't work like that. If what Wikipedia wants is not what you want, your main choices are to conform to it or reform it. If you feel it appropriate to ignore any policies and guidelines and you do so, then you should take responsibility for doing so; don't expect other editors to conform to someone else's decision to ignore them. That seems to be a major part of your argument; please don't take more of my time with that (after the initial statement), because that looks like an effort to have me do the ignoring that you choose to do in order that you not be solely responsible for it. I don't want to do that and I've already stated that we disagree on some relevant points.

What Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, which is a policy and largely binding on all of us even if some editors wish otherwise, says includes "Wikipedia ... is not governed by statute" and "[w]ritten rules do not themselves set accepted practice. Rather, they document already existing community consensus...." The former statement is, of course, wrong; statutes enacted by U.S. legislatures do govern Wikipedia, but what probably is meant is that Wikipedia does not enact its own "statutes" called by that terminology, which is silly but technically true, and probably what is meant is that some exceptions are allowed, which, of course, is also true of many Federal and State statutes (I don't know about tribes or about other nations). The second statement reinforces that consensus was achieved. What I introduced was consistent with the principles, since I was preserving the accuracy of quotations. "Disagreements are resolved through consensus-based discussion, not by tightly sticking to rules and procedures", as it says, and that is precisely what is happening; some long time after I edited the guideline, you disagreed and we are now developing a new consensus and we are not "tightly sticking to" them contrary to what they say; I already accepted that my work can use See Also sections for the purpose even before your deletion of the guideline provision we're discussing toward a new consensus. I don't see any provision we're discussing as a loophole unless everything is a loophole. I rely on policies and guidelines. If most other editors did not find the provisions I added useful, that is not a fault of the provisions or of me for adding them. It would have been if the provisions or my editing of the guideline had been to remove an option; instead, I added options. One could argue that adding an option misleads people away from what they should do but that's important only in some cases (e.g., if you have cancer curable only with surgery and I advise you to drink orange juice (that's hypothetical) and I say that both options are equally good, that's a problem, but I didn't quite do that here); the closest argument on that score regarding the MOS provision is that I offered "[t]wo alternatives" when we should have offered three once anyone here effectively mentioned the See Also sections.

What I introduced was new. That's probably true of many or most edits to policies and guidelines except those for minor reasons (such as correcting meaningless syntax or misleading disorganization), for going back to something old, or for conformance to external law (such as on copyright).

Probably not approximately 100,000+ editors times 4 read the specific provision when they viewed the page, since perhaps most visit for specific purposes elsewhere on the page, as I often do, but probably a significant number did. I don't think either one of us is responsible for whether they discuss the provision or not.

You've again brought up what you say was a lack of consensus. The reference to wikilawyering, as in Wikipedia:Wikilawyering, doesn't change the fundamental nature of our disagreement; it applies if I went against Wikipedia's principles or acted inapporopriately; your view on point is that I did and mine is that I did not. As to the remedy I suggested if you reject Wikipedia:Consensus, you say you don't reject that policy and presumably therefore you don't want to use the remedy. I don't think there's more I can explain on that point that would be significantly new to our discussion. I could probably find yet another provision for you to read, but the basic point has already been made. I've made reasonable efforts (before counting the approximately two hours I spent today just on this reply) but apparently I can't help you. Until there's a change in those views of one of us, please find some other forum for that.

Valuable information is, of course, something I appreciate. Thank you. I'm happy that you were explaining the RfC, presumably for the future, but you appeared to be faulting me for not having used it in the past, but that was not a fault (a disagreement essentially already acknowledged between us). As to the future, I intend to do what policies and guidelines, and, selectively, some essays and some other good ideas, call for. I am not here primarily as a parliamentarian (and parliamentarians generally have strong usefulness). We are building an encyclopedia but we are not building everything that could possibly be built on the Web or in the universe and merely calling it an encyclopedia. For example, I'd be delighted to receive an invitation to ignore all consensus and delete or bury everything I think should be deleted or buried, sinvce lots of articles have content I would not rely on for research or for guiding my life or the lives of others. I think we can all be confident that such an invitation will never appear. Since as an encyclopedia it is only a part of the Web and is not a microcosm of the whole Web but is a specialized part of it and its owners evidently intend to continue it as a specialized part of the Web, they employ means to that end, including policies and guidelines. When that is unsatifactory, sometimes I go off the Web, sometimes I go elsewhere on the Web, and sometimes I work within Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. I continue to reserve those options.

The second alternative is not made less cumbersome by nonuse. What we do may be made less cumbersome by nonuse of an alternative but the alternative itself isn't. How is it too cumbersome?

I didn't suggest another way of linking or otherwise pointing from the quotation to the link in a See Also section. It seems you are. If so, would you please describe or illustrate (with or without numbering in any style) a method you might recommend, if any? One problem is that the method should be intuitive to readers.

Nick Levinson (talk) 16:17, 30 April 2013 (UTC) (Corrected a clause: 16:32, 30 April 2013 (UTC)) (Corrected the same: 16:39, 30 April 2013 (UTC))

You say my "belief that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are 'authorities' that 'govern' our actions" is "mistaken"; it's not mistaken.

Yes, it is. I'm sorry that you still don't understand that.

The website belongs to the Wikimedia Foundation and somewhere underneath its top corporate decisions are Wikipedia's policies and guidelines.

Are you under the impression that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are handed down by the Wikimedia Foundation? On the contrary, "office actions are extremely rare."

While violation does not cause us to be taken out back and shot, nonetheless they are binding on us to a degree, and would be even if they were merely community norms.

I'm not arguing that we aren't required to abide by Wikipedia's policies and guidelines (barring good reasons not to).

I'm explaining that you have the causation backwards. We don't follow these rules because they're written down; they're written down because we decided to follow them.

At no point has the community arrived at such a decision regarding your linking format (or A. di M.'s).

But policies and guidelines are partly prescriptive, as shown by the outcomes of various dispute resolutions, including at the Arbitration Committee

Editors are expected to act in accordance with the principles on which our policies and guidelines are based. This doesn't necessarily entail adhering to the letter of policy, and someone who does might nonetheless fail to honor the spirit (e.g. when disrupting Wikipedia to illustrate a point).

and by office action.

Oh, you're familiar with that concept. This makes your earlier comment difficult to understand.

You seem to be arguing that I should do what Wikipedia wants when it is what you see it as what Wikipedia wants but not when you disagree with what Wikipedia wants.

I'm baffled as to what you're referencing.

Things don't work like that. If what Wikipedia wants is not what you want, your main choices are to conform to it or reform it. If you feel it appropriate to ignore any policies and guidelines and you do so, then you should take responsibility for doing so; don't expect other editors to conform to someone else's decision to ignore them.

I'm baffled as to what you're referencing.

That seems to be a major part of your argument; please don't take more of my time with that (after the initial statement), because that looks like an effort to have me do the ignoring that you choose to do in order that you not be solely responsible for it.

I'm baffled as to what you're referencing.

What Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, which is a policy and largely binding on all of us even if some editors wish otherwise, says includes "Wikipedia ... is not governed by statute" and "[w]ritten rules do not themselves set accepted practice. Rather, they document already existing community consensus...." The former statement is, of course, wrong;

Okay, so you're following the above comments about the importance of respecting Wikipedia's policies (and apparent revulsion stemming from some notion that I'm brazenly ignoring them and asking you to act in kind) with a comment in which you deem one of our policies "wrong". Wow.

statutes enacted by U.S. legislatures do govern Wikipedia,

That isn't what we're discussing. (At least, it isn't what I'm discussing.)

but what probably is meant is that Wikipedia does not enact its own "statutes" called by that terminology, which is silly but technically true, and probably what is meant is that some exceptions are allowed, which, of course, is also true of many Federal and State statutes (I don't know about tribes or about other nations).

It isn't the terminology that's relevant. What's meant is exactly what's written.

Written rules do not themselves set accepted practice. Rather, they document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected. While Wikipedia's written policies and guidelines should be taken seriously, they can be misused. Do not follow an overly strict interpretation of the letter of policy without consideration for the principles of policies.

The second statement reinforces that consensus was achieved.

In other words, because your text was included on a guideline page, this proves that it documented already existing community consensus. Is that what you mean?

What I introduced was consistent with the principles, since I was preserving the accuracy of quotations.

No one asserts that your linking method is inconsistent with that principle. It's inconsistent with Wikipedia's established formatting.

I don't see any provision we're discussing as a loophole unless everything is a loophole. I rely on policies and guidelines.

You rely on "the letter of policy without consideration for the principles of policies." You introduced brand new practices, and because you did so via an existing page (instead of creating a new one), you think that this somehow negated the importance of achieving wide exposure and broad community support. You base this belief not upon any material distinction, but on a legalistic interpretation of the words that have been written.

You treat consensus not as a literal concept (i.e. a state of general agreement), but as the abstract product of rigid adherence to written instructions.

If most other editors did not find the provisions I added useful, that is not a fault of the provisions or of me for adding them.

This is a perfect example. You're literally arguing that whether the community actually agrees with your suggestion doesn't matter. As long as you followed the written steps (as you understand them), there's "consensus".

It would have been if the provisions or my editing of the guideline had been to remove an option; instead, I added options.

You added styles for which the community's support is not in evidence.

One could argue that adding an option misleads people away from what they should do but that's important only in some cases (e.g., if you have cancer curable only with surgery and I advise you to drink orange juice (that's hypothetical) and I say that both options are equally good, that's a problem, but I didn't quite do that here);

What?

What I introduced was new. That's probably true of many or most edits to policies and guidelines except those for minor reasons (such as correcting meaningless syntax or misleading disorganization), for going back to something old, or for conformance to external law (such as on copyright).

As discussed above, our policies and guidelines are intended to "document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected." One needn't necessarily confer with others before inserting new text describing a longstanding practice or one to which the community has agreed. In such an instance, the effect is to document Wikipedia as it already exists.

That isn't what you did. You introduced text describing new practices that were neither widely adopted nor widely discussed (let alone agreed upon by the community).

Probably not approximately 100,000+ editors times 4 read the specific provision when they viewed the page, since perhaps most visit for specific purposes elsewhere on the page, as I often do, but probably a significant number did.

If this is so, it means that the community actively rejected your linking format. In thirteen months, it appeared in four articles not edited by you (unless, of course, it was removed from other articles, which would be even more indicative of a lack of consensus for its use).

I could probably find yet another provision for you to read, but the basic point has already been made.

And on you go. You evidently aren't interested in discussing the situation's practicalities. You just keep seeking and citing written "provisions". Pragmatism takes a backseat to bureaucracy.

I've made reasonable efforts (before counting the approximately two hours I spent today just on this reply) but apparently I can't help you.

Never has a feeling been more mutual.

I'm happy that you were explaining the RfC, presumably for the future, but you appeared to be faulting me for not having used it in the past, but that was not a fault (a disagreement essentially already acknowledged between us).

My goal isn't to lay blame. It's to explain why the course of action taken was far from ideal and didn't result in "consensus".

Undoubtedly, you didn't realize that an RfC would have been beneficial. Setting aside what you knew at the time, you just asserted that "an RfC was not appropriate" and seem to still believe this. Why? Because you don't see it officially mandated. You aren't stopping to think about whether such feedback would actually be helpful. You're checking to see whether such a requirement is written somewhere.

The second alternative is not made less cumbersome by nonuse. What we do may be made less cumbersome by nonuse of an alternative but the alternative itself isn't.

My point, exactly.

How is it too cumbersome?

It relies upon the inline insertion of additional words (the provenance of which is unclear), thereby disturbing the quotations' flow.

I didn't suggest another way of linking or otherwise pointing from the quotation to the link in a See Also section. It seems you are. If so, would you please describe or illustrate (with or without numbering in any style) a method you might recommend, if any? One problem is that the method should be intuitive to readers.

I envision a format similar to that used for inline references (the difference being the absence of Arabic numerals). A small link (in the form of a Latin letter or Roman numeral) would appear to the right of the quotation. Clicking on said link would transport the reader to the "See also" section (or a subsection thereof), where the relevant article link would appear (highlighted and labeled with the same Latin letter or Roman numeral). —David Levy 07:48, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

On the procedural issue, most of your latest post I've already answered. I'll address what I may not have answered.

You asked, "[a]re you under the impression that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are handed down by the Wikimedia Foundation?" No, at least not in the sense that the governing board or paid employees write or sign them, but it doesn't much matter who issues them; they're still largely authorized by the Foundation and are promulgated as part of the recommendations and requirements for our behavior and edits. Some provisions to like effect and appearing elsewhere a user agrees to as a condition of using the website, and it may be a crime under U.S. law to violate those, so that violating some provisions in policies and/or guidelines may be criminal. All of the policies and guidelines may apply to whether someone can continue to edit and/or whether an edit can stay in Wikipedia.

You said, {{Nowrap|"[w]e don't follow these rules because they're written down; they're written down because we decided to follow them." Actually, we do follow them in part because we know about them and we know about them because they're written. The causation of their existence is partly reflected in your statement that "they're written down because we decided to follow them" but the causation of what we do as editors is that we follow them because they're written and published.

No, I did not say the whole policy is wrong. The statement is, but not, as far as I know, in a way that affects how I behave or edit and not sufficiently importantly that I plan to take the time to edit the statement or to question it on the talk page there. It may be that people are defining statute differently; I may be defining it more abstractly. We have executive, adjudicatory, and legislative functions without necessarily calling them that; and, in essence, the policies and guidelines are part of Wikipedia's legislation. But probably quite a few editors see compliance with them as voluntary on an edit-by-edit basis and may not see them as anything like legislation. It's not worth debating.

You wrote, "[y]ou're literally arguing that whether the community actually agrees with your suggestion doesn't matter." That's not my argument.

Ignoring, if visitors did, is not necessarily rejecting; if any opinion describes a visitor, it is at least as likely that ignoring was accepting. I read lots of policies and guidelines and I generally accept almost everything in them and probably most editors do, too. I may even read some provisions and get the gist of others without reading them word-for-word and, in the course of seeing them, accept them.

The existence of optional procedures does not always make invoking them wise or helpful. The less-useful invocations burden people who encounter them. One should choose whether and which to invoke and when. A good response may turn up from anywhere anytime but that possibility is not ground for asking everywhere and frequently. We're expected to apply good judgment. For example, on another matter, someone once suggested I escalate and I told that editor that it would be premature.

On the substantive issue, I think I can come up with something somewhat like what you suggest, although I'm not sure. Wikipedia allows multiple sets of notes in an article. I'll work with the concept. It'll probably take me at least a few days to get to it.

Nick Levinson (talk) 15:37, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

I edited two articles as trials, African-American heritage of United States presidents and Andrea Dworkin. These should meet the MOS guideline. I'll wait a week for any response before considering doing some other articles. Nick Levinson (talk) 18:22, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Indian English example gone again

Yes it's still mentioned above the box as example crore, but in the box Taj Mahal has gone:

Great Fire of London (British English)

American Civil War (American English)

Institutions of the European Union (British or Irish English)

Australian Defence Force (Australian English)

Vancouver, B.C. (Canadian English)

Usain Bolt (Jamaican Standard English)

Taj Mahal (Indian English)

Why? In ictu oculi (talk) 07:37, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

My guess is that it was removed because the existence of a definable "Indian English" is a somewhat debated issue. Out of curiosity... we have published style guides we can point to for other varieties of the English Language... are their any published style guides that would help us to define Indian English? Blueboar (talk) 22:47, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

We have an article on Indian English, and it ought to contain such sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:19, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Although much of that page is focused on slang, dialect and pronunciation in spoken Indian English. We should not confuse that with formal standards of written English. As discussed on previous occasions, what we need is a reliable analysis of standard differences between formal written Indian English and other varieties, if they exist; as we have in US v British English for spelling (eg color v colour) and words (eg sidewalk v pavement). It's worth noting that the "Indian English" argument has been used, erroneously in my view, to try to trump WP:COMMONNAME in naming disputes for Indian cities and states. N-HH talk/edits 08:48, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Gender-neutral language

Any thoughts on what to do with statements in chess articles like:

White moved his king to e4.

According to User:Frungi, "his" is not a gender-generic term here because it refers to the metaphorical person White, who represents the white side of a chess game and is by definition male. (The term would have been gender-generic if the term had referred to the person playing chess because the actual person can be of either gender.)

However, I still have a huge concern that people will think that it refers to the actual person playing chess, who can be of either gender, in which case it would be a gender-generic pronoun. Any thoughts on what to do?? (For details on the discussion, see sections 26-28 of Wikipedia talk:Gender-neutral language. Georgia guy (talk) 19:05, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

I just want to note that this is my understanding of how chess is written about, and I could very well be wrong. It would be great to get some other opinions and knowledge. —Frungi (talk) 19:10, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

"How chess is written about" is of little concern (unless you're directly quoting source, of course). If a source has idiosyncratic style, so what? You can cite the source without copying her style. If I was citing (say) the Westboro Baptist Church (which is a reliable source for their own beliefs) I would certainly, if paraphrasing and not quoting, say "The Church believes that gay people should be executed" and not "The Church believes that faggots should be executed". That's an extreme example but the principle applies generally. We should follow our own manual of style, not that of the International Chess Federation or whomever. Herostratus (talk) 02:15, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

"White moves his king" is a textbook example of generic male sexist language. It needs to be changed, possibly by removing the deixis altogether ("White moves king to e4"). Tony (talk) 02:23, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

That’s ungrammatical, worse IMO than being gender-biased. “White moves the king to e4” could pass, but I’d prefer “The White king moves to e4.” (I’d write “K4” myself, but I suppose that just shows how long it’s been since I read anything about chess.)—Odysseus1479 (talk) 02:38, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Anything but "his". Tony (talk) 03:04, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Before everyone gets carried away, please read this, especially if you're an ombud. -- Ypnypn (talk) 03:18, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

I’ve expressed my own views of the whole concept of GNL at WT:GNL, but since it’s relevant, I’ll repeat and elaborate here: It doesn’t matter. Unless dealing with a subject for which sexism is a real and present problem, it doesn’t matter. Historically and in many languages, pronouns with a male sense also have a neutral sense. It’s clear from context that “he” does not refer to a specific individual; and in that context, “he” is a gender-neutral pronoun. Extreme political correctness (see Ypnypn’s link for an example) benefits no one. —Frungi (talk) 04:34, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

•  Question: - What do the Oxford and Chicago Manuals of Style say on the matter? I think those would be a good starting point, and I would certainly give what they say more weight than any random opinion I or anyone else would have. - SudoGhost 04:41, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

  Manual of Style on Twitter, this morning: “Tip: Section 5.225 of CMOS has a list of nine tips for using gender-neutral language in writing.—#CMOS16” —Frungi (talk) 04:57, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

¶ Maybe I'm just being hopelessly naïve and ignorant, but wouldn't it be useful to distinguish real games played between real human beings at some real time from the more-problematic generalized examples and abstract chess problems? In a match between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky, use "he", "him" and "his" for both Black and White; in a match between two of the Polgar sisters, use "she", "her" and (if necessary) "hers" for both Black and White; in a match between Judit Polgár and her father László Polgár, use female pronouns for the former and male ones for the latter. Contract bridge is another game played by both sexes where abstractions (North, East, South and West) replace the players' own names; is there a generally-recognized gender convention for either Wikipedia's articles on Bridge or the game's own extensive popular, technical and reportorial literature? (If North is a woman, do Wikipedia or bridge-columnists write "North played his remaining trump" or "North followed his partner's lead"?) —— Shakescene (talk) 07:54, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

I guess if one is talking about an actual player, one says "she" or "he" as appropriate. But when talking about an abstract or theoretical situation, I don't think there's any good alternative to paraphrasing. Singular they seems not to work here, "he or she" is over the top, "he" reinforces stereotypes, and "she" is distractingly pointed. In most cases we can paraphrase somehow (e.g. "White's king moves to e4"; "The ace draws North's remaining trump"), but for those cases where we can't, how about randomly making one player a "she" and the other a "he" (or two each at bridge)? Victor Yus (talk) 08:08, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't often see myself agreeing with Victor Yus. But that is a mighty fine explanation. Tony (talk) 13:12, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

I may be conflating memories, but I dimly recall the Washington Post's bridge column as specifically having gendered cardinal directions--so N or S were women, E or W were male, or some variation; I'm not sure if that's based in the traditions or not. Obviously if there's some sort of standard in place (like feminine pronouns for ships, etc.) I think we should defer to practice, but if there isn't Victor's suggestion seems sensible. Split the difference. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 14:01, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

After sleeping on this, I've realized that it wouldn't be so strange (where the gender of the player is either unknown or hypothetical) to use neuter pronouns, as in "Black takes the opportunity to strengthen its kingside" or "White moves its king to e4"; in fact I dimly (but perhaps wrongly) recall seeing chess commentary in such form. An analogy would be in military or strategic writing, where sometimes an antagonist is referred to as "he", sometimes as "they", sometimes as "it", and sometimes, when considered as a nation, as "she" ("Germany resumed its V-1 attacks."; "Spain strengthened her defences."; "The enemy knows he cannot prevail without air support."; "The other side depended on their cavalry".) How are sports teams referred to, when their title isn't plural? (¿"Chelsea hired its first Jamaican manager."?) —— Shakescene (talk) 00:42, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, "its" in the Chelsea case (or "their", at least in British English). But I'm not sure that works in a game like chess or bridge, where "Black" or "South" is understood to be a person, not a team or a country. Possibly one could get used to it; more readily in chess than bridge, it seems to me. Victor Yus (talk) 10:40, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

• Caution... we already have a section that suggests using gender neutral pronouns in the MOS, I think more than that would be overkill. While I agree that using gender neutral wording (when we can) is a nice thing to do, but Wikipedia policy pages are not the place to "right great wrongs". I am concerned that further mandating the use of gender neutral language will will simply lead to unnecessary arguments and disruption. Also, there really isn't a need to put more in the guideline... If you come across an article that you think inappropriately uses gender specific language, just edit the article. You don't need a policy or guideline to give you permission. Blueboar (talk) 12:39, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
  • In case anyone thinks that people don't watch behind en.WP's back when it comes to sexism, see this and this and this – links someone has just sent me. Tony (talk) 14:15, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
    • Yes. Funny how sexist it is, even though everybody opposes it, isn't it? Toccata quarta (talk) 14:34, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
• I don't know that tying ourselves into knots with over-detailed instructions that no one reads will be a good idea. The problem lies in the language, doesn't she? I am all on favour of gender neutrality, and if someone were to reverse the current male bias in English (let alone worse bias in many other languages) I wouldn't complain. Nor am I inclined to trouble specially to change anyone else's picky writing in this respect in case they refuse to let the male embrace the female. The foregoing analyses of the situation were pretty reasonable, I thought. I would have no objection to anyone referring to any piece whomsoever as "it", nor to referring to kings as "he" and queens as "she" (though if ever you catch me referring to queens as "he" or kings as "she", you know I am being sarcastic or am very sleepy). When referring to the unidentified player taking north, or black or the like, it seldom would be difficult to word it so as to avoid gender altogether. ("Black sacrificed a pawn to protect the knight" or "KB then moved to XY to protect Black's queen.") To anyone bitching about this, simply say: "You no like, you change it yourself; this is WP after all." Anyway, I get the impression that the typical modern feminist is tired of being characterised as petty and humourless, and no longer so inclined to fuss over the little things. More strength to her elbow, say I. JonRichfield (talk) 14:07, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

¶ Not surprisingly, this hasn't entirely escaped the attention of Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess. See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chess/FAQ/Format#Pronouns, should we use male, female or neutral? —— Shakescene (talk) 09:22, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

"Guidelines that aren't guidelines"

A discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council#Guidelines that aren't guidelines (version of 19:54, 30 April 2013) involves Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Philosophy.
—Wavelength (talk) 20:02, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Commas in geographical names

There does not appear to be a clear WP policy on the use of commas in geographical references dividing subordinate divisions, such as city and state (e.g., Portland, Oregon), province and nation (e.g., British Columbia, Canada) or a mix (e.g., Miami, Florida, USA). In particular, there is some debate over whether the final element should be followed by a comma when it is not at the end of a sentence or followed by other punctuation. (This arose in response to edits that I made on the article D. B. Cooper, as discussed on my talk page.)

My view is that they should be followed by a comma as the final element is effectively treated as parenthetical, that is, the commas are used in place of brackets. For example:

• Portland, Oregon means Portland (Oregon)
• British Columbia, Canada means British Columbia (Canada)

This is consistent with the comma used after the year in dates expressed in m-d-y format, per WP:DATEFORMAT:

Wikipedia does not insert a comma between month and year, nor does it insert a full stop after the day (10 June 1921); however, when using the mdy format, a comma is required between day and year. When a date in mdy format appears in the middle of text, include a comma after the year (The weather on September 11, 2001, was clear and warm).

It is also consistent with style manuals, as stated in the article Comma#In geographical names (citations omitted):

Additionally, most style manuals, including The Chicago Manual of Style and the AP Stylebook, recommend that the second element be treated as a parenthetical, requiring a second comma after: "The plane landed in Kampala, Uganda, that evening."

I see that this also sparked a debate over whether the title of a rather more prominent article should be September 11, 2001, attacks or September 11, 2001 attacks, which was discussed at length before the article was renamed September 11 attacks, skirting the issue.

As DoctorJoeE has pointed out though, this does lead to cases where it can become comma overload, where leaving them out (whilst not following the above style) arguably seems neater:

• ...hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in the airspace between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington, on November 24, 1971...
• ...hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in the airspace between Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington on November 24, 1971...

This possibly goes against the general statement (at MOS:COMMA) that:

Modern practice is against excessive use of commas; there are usually ways to simplify a sentence so that fewer are needed.

I'm not convinced that this general principle trumps style; rather it seems to suggest re-wording sentences to avoid commas in particular cases where it becomes unwieldy.

It would be good to have a clear WP policy on the matter, as trivial as it may seem. Thoughts? —sroc (talk) 22:43, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

I’m all in favour of both commas, for places and dates alike. If the result is a sentence that limps along like the hijacking example, then recast: the benefit in “neatness” from eliminating a single comma is marginal IMO. The 9-11 title is an example of a ‘false scent‘ created by the omitted comma, as a careless reader (who‘s lived in a cave for the last twelve years—OK, this particular case is admittedly a bit of a stretch … but it’s the principle of the thing) could come away with the impression that 2,001 attacks occurred one September 11.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 07:19, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Here's a comment from an editor who does not live in the US (left on my talk page for some reason): "My problem is that I don't know the names of American states, so "Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington," sounds like four different places with a misplaced "and", no matter how many commas you use." Which is sort of my point -- if a comma isn't necessary, it isn't necessary (and might be confusing), no matter what some style manual might say. If we want to get really technical, I'm aware that non-restrictive appositives -- single nouns included -- are normally set off with commas; and I might actually agree with that if I had any idea what it really meant. Again, it's not a big deal, and obviously I'll abide by consensus; but at the end of the day, as stated at MOS:COMMA, the general trend is toward less commas, not more. DoctorJoeE ^{review transgressions}/_{talk to me!} 14:20, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

See Semicolon#Usage (version of 19:10, 21 April 2013).

• Several fast food restaurants can be found within the cities: London, England; Paris, France; Dublin, Ireland; and Madrid, Spain.

—Wavelength (talk) 16:10, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Hi, DoctorJoeE. Where is that comment? I couldn't see it on your talk page.

I'm not from the US either, by the way, although I do recognise the names of the states; but more significantly, I know how punctuation is used in English, so I would understand that was meant even if they were unfamiliar. Though I can understand how people could be confused as this seems to be an oft-neglected rule going the way of their/there/they're confusion. —sroc (talk) 17:16, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I would add that if a sentence is ambiguous or confusing, then it should be re-written rather than adopting bad style. For example:

• ...hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in the airspace during a flight from Portland, Oregon, to Seattle, Washington, on November 24, 1971...

This would make it abundantly clear there there are two places — a departure point and a destination.

If the correct style were applied consistently, then this would also help to avoid confusion, which is all the more reason to have a clear policy. —sroc (talk) 17:27, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

This was discussed on January 9, 2013 (UTC), in a discussion now archived at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 135#Parenthetical comma usage with place names.

—Wavelength (talk) 18:07, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, Wavelength. So it is policy after all, just in a rather out-of-the-way place at Wikipedia:COPYEDIT#Parenthetical_comma. Is there any reason this isn't included at MOS:COMMA, which is the more obvious place to look? The above section also mentions the policy regarding dates which is already set out at WP:DATEFORMAT, so there's no harm in doubling-up if it helps people find it. I propose inserting the following before the second bullet point under MOS:COMMA:

• Geographical references that include multiple levels of subordinate divisions (e.g., city, state/province, country), each element is separated by a comma and the last element is also followed by a comma (unless it is followed by other punctuation, such as at the end of a sentence). Dates in month–day–year format also require a comma after the day and another comma after the year (unless followed by other punctuation). In both cases, the last element is treated as parenthetic.

Incorrect:	On November 24, 1971 Cooper hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft that had taken off from Portland, Oregon and was destined for Seattle, Washington.
Correct:	On November 24, 1971, Cooper hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft that had taken off from Portland, Oregon, and was destined for Seattle, Washington.

—sroc (talk) 05:21, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

I am currently opposed to this change or amendment, whatever you want to call it. I can't see anywhere that the state you're mentioning must have a comma after it, least not if Oregon is followed with the word and in the example above. I'd have to consult the collegiate manual of styles here to be certain. If a parenthetical geographical point is followed by and then this doesn't need a comma. You mention "policy"...the MOS is not policy...it is a guideline. While I am generally a fairly strict adherent to MOS, more discussion needs to go into this.--MONGO 07:19, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Reading over Serial comma, the section style guides opposing mandatory use do not suggest putting a comma before the conjunction such as and or.--MONGO 07:34, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

This is not a serial comma. Please see above reference from the Comma#In geographical names article which clearly states that the comma is required by "most style manuals, including The Chicago Manual of Style and the AP Stylebook." Unfortunately, the online versions are only available to subscribers.

Apologies for mistaking the MOS for policy. —sroc (talk) 10:11, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

From The Chicago Manual of Style:

Q. When a city and a state are mentioned in a sentence, am I correct in placing commas after the state name as well as before the state name? “Mary traveled to Seattle, Washington, before going on to California.” And when “Jr.” follows a name in a sentence, is it necessary to add a comma before it? How about after it?

A. Yes. No. Only if you put one before it. (That is, the commas around “Jr.” are optional.)

…

Q. In the sentence “Researchers at the University of California, Riverside and the University of Southern California determined . . . ,” should there be a comma after “San Diego”?

A. (Is this a trick question?) There should be a comma after Riverside.[1]

And other sources from the top web results:

"Use a comma to separate the city from the state and after the state in a document."[2]

"When writing the name of a city followed by its state, most writers know to include the comma between the two, but often overlook the comma that’s required after the state name."[3]

"Place a comma between the city and the state name, and another comma after the state name, unless ending a sentence." [4]

"If there is no street address —just a city and a state — put a comma between the city and the state. If the sentence continues after the state name, place a comma after the state."[5]

"Use a comma to separate between two place names in sequence, e.g. city and county/state/country. Add another comma after the place name if more words follow." [6]

—sroc (talk) 10:30, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

I understand, but there is great ambiguity as far as whether we need a comma preceding a coordinating conjunction. In the case of subordinating conjunctions, (words such as after, before, how, once and while) preceding commas are usually used. But there doesn't seem to be an absolute rule for a preceding comma before a coordinating conjunction. The example you show above has the word before, has a preceding comma since it is a subordinating conjunction. I do, however recognize your suggestion is about geographical data such a state or country and I am still finding some ambiguity depending on which MOS one might be following.--MONGO 17:00, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

You're missing the point! Regardless of whether style includes a comma before a conjunction (which is a matter of style preference), that is not why the comma is needed here. A comma is required after a city–state combination as the state is treated as a parenthetical remark, just like the year in a month–day–year format. See all of the above style guides and references (and the examples given on the respective pages) which universally endorse this rule. Although the rule is often forgotten, that is the rule for plain English usage. See also that Wikipedia already states this rule at Wikipedia:COPYEDIT#Parenthetical comma:

Punctuation

• Location constructions such as Vilnius, Lithuania require a comma after the second element, e.g., He was born in Vilnius, Lithuania, after the country had gained independence.
• The month day, year, style of writing dates requires a comma after the year, e.g., On September 15, 1947, she began her first year at Harvard.

It should therefore be added to MOS:COMMA as well to avoid any further confusion amongst editors.

I would add that leaving out a comma where it is required has capacity to cause confusion amongst all English speakers who are familiar with the rule. If following the rule has the potential to cause confusion in particular cases, the solution is to re-cast the sentence to avoid the confusion, not to throw the baby out with the bathwater and omit the rule from MOS altogether! —sroc (talk) 23:33, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

To look at your comment another way, consider this example:

Apples grow on trees.

You could argue that common nouns do not require a capital letter and that apple is not a proper noun, so a capital is not required.

apples grow on trees.

But that's missing this point that a sentence always starts with a capital letter. One rule trumps the other. In this case, we have two rules. One rule requires a comma after the state. Another rule may indicate a comma before a conjunction depending on style, and our style is not to have it — and if that conjunction were elsewhere in a sentence, that rule would apply — but this is overridden by the rule that requires a comma after the state, regardless of what word follows, unless it is at the end of a sentence. —sroc (talk) 23:44, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

I linked earlier to style guides which do not demand that a comma go after a Parenthetical word...the guides I have seen do not demand this if the date or geographical point are followed by a coordinating conjunction.--MONGO 16:30, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

• I'm with sroc. This is not a serial comma or coordination conjunction issue. I think it's the same as the year of a date – it's a parenthetical, as though you're saying "Seattle, which is in Washington" – so a comma afterward is obligatory. I think if it's already at WP:COPYEDIT that it should also be at MOS:COMMA, too. AgnosticAphid talk 23:13, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, Agnosticaphid.

Sorry if my earlier explanations were unclear, but I think MONGO was confusing two different uses of the comma:

• A serial comma "is a comma placed immediately before the coordinating conjunction (usually and, or, or nor) in a series of three or more terms." Whether or not to use a serial comma is a matter of style (the Wikipedia preference being not to use it), but either is acceptable in English language usage provided that the meaning is clear.

The flag is red, white, and blue.

The flag is red, white and blue. (This is the preferred style of Wikipedia.)

• A parenthetical comma is "used to enclose parenthetical words and phrases within a sentence (i.e., information that is not essential to the meaning of the sentence). Such phrases are both preceded and followed by a comma, unless that would result in a doubling of punctuation marks, or the parenthetical is at the start or end of the sentence."

My father, chewing with unbridled fury, ate the muffin.

My father, chewing with unbridled fury ate the muffin.

The source MONGO refers to relates to serial commas. What I am discussing here is parenthetical commas.

As shown in the various references in my comments above, state names (when following city names) and years (in a m–d–y format date) are treated as parenthetical and require a comma afterwards. They are not items in a list and therefore the style rule adopted for serial commas is irrelevant in this context.

The weather on September 11, 2001, was clear and warm.

The weather on September 11, 2001 was clear and warm.

The aircraft took off from Portland, Oregon, and was then hijacked mid-air.

The aircraft took off from Portland, Oregon and was then hijacked mid-air.

Note that parenthetic remarks can be set off by other punctuation, but always in pairs.

She spoke to her father, who happened to be the President, and was pardoned.

She spoke to her father, who happened to be the President and was pardoned.

She spoke to her father (who happened to be the President) and was pardoned.

She spoke to her father (who happened to be the President and was pardoned.

She spoke to her father—who happened to be the President—and was pardoned.

She spoke to her father—who happened to be the President and was pardoned.

Q.E.D. —sroc (talk) 23:20, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

I've done some research and conclude you are correct. What I found was that newspapers and similar print does not demand a comma after a parenthetical if it is followed by a coordinating conjunction...not a universal thing, and many say this is just to save space to ease printing columns. For our purposes on Wikipedia, I concur now that you are correct and I endorse your proposed changes to the guideline.--MONGO 13:32, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, MONGO. As there now seems to consensus, I hope it's safe to include the relevant section in MOS:COMMA? —sroc (talk) 14:21, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

"(Christian) clergy titles in article names"

Editors may wish to see User talk:Jimbo Wales#(Christian) clergy titles in article names (version of 02:35, 5 May 2013).
—Wavelength (talk) 03:02, 5 May 2013 (UTC)