Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)

WP:UE

Should it also redirect here? Incnis Mrsi (talk) 09:09, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Pointer to discussion about WP:DIACRITICS and MOS:FOREIGN

I've posted the following question here: Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#WP:DIACRITICS_and_MOS:FOREIGN.

It seems WP:DIACRITICS and MOS:FOREIGN plow nearly the same ground but slightly vary with each other. Would there be a way to harmonize and/or consolidate the two? --Hodgson-Burnett's Secret Garden (talk) 17:16, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

--Hodgson-Burnett's Secret Garden (talk) 17:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Always ignore the Manual of Style. It's not English, it's not supported by reliable sources, and it's not consensus. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:57, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

English is a highly endangered language. It has only one speaker: PMAnderson. Anderson, would you mind updating the English-language article and changing the population to "1"? Thanks. — kwami (talk) 22:43, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

* If Wikipedia is off doing its own thing, trying to change the very alphabet of the English language beyond that used by Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic, then that is a strong clue to back off. German, French and Spanish diacritics for proper nouns (accents in words like François, señor, and von Blücher) are routinely accepted for use with English. That is not true for Vietnamese and other languages, where doing so results in stuff like Dục Đức. Wikipedia has zero business trying to expand the envelope for what amounts to the very alphabet the English language uses.

A perfectly acceptable compromise (solution) is to write as follows: General Nguyen Ngoc Loan (spelled locally in English as "Nguyễn Ngọc Loan")… Going beyond this and expanding the alphabet to beyond that used by other most-reliable English-langauge sources such as Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic amounts to nothing more than mere all-volunteer wikipedians wanting to feel worldly and smart and try to lead by example. But we often end up looking naive and pretentious instead. Greg L (talk) 20:10, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

P.S. By the way, this is not about “technology” and “Unicode” enabling Wikipedia to Lead By Example®™©. For decades, Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic have access to diacritics and graphemes from quality type foundries. They have eschewed doing so for obvious reasons. Greg L (talk) 20:54, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

• If Wikipedia is off doing its own thing, trying to change the very alphabet of the English language beyond that used by Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic, then that is a strong clue to back off. German, French and Spanish diacritics for proper nouns (accents in words like François, señor, and von Blücher) are routinely accepted for use with English. That is not true for Vietnamese and other languages, where doing so results in stuff like Đặng Hữu Phúc. Wikipedia has zero business trying to expand the envelope for what amounts to the very alphabet the English language uses.

  A perfectly acceptable compromise (solution) is to write as follows: General Nguyen Ngoc Loan (spelled locally in English as "Nguyễn Ngọc Loan")… Going beyond this and expanding the alphabet to beyond that used by other most-reliable English-langauge sources such as Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic amounts to nothing more than mere all-volunteer wikipedians wanting to feel worldly and smart and try to lead by example. But we often end up looking naive and pretentious instead. Greg L (talk) 20:10, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

  
  P.S. By the way, this is not about “technology” and “Unicode” enabling Wikipedia to Lead By Example®™©. For decades, Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic have access to diacritics and graphemes from quality type foundries. They have eschewed expanding the set of diacritics beyond the traditional ones long used for centuries because English speakers are generally unfamiliar with them and these editors know something lost on many here. The editors of these most-reliable sources are properly gauging what diacritics are commonly used and what English readers are accustomed to sounding out. They rightly know that English readers are accustomed to knowing how to pronounce “François” and “señor”. How many people do you meet on the street who can fathom how to pronounce “Đặng Hữu Phúc”? How many more readers would be able to do so were Wikipedia to march off and do its own thing and flout the practices of wise and well respected, most-reliable English-language sources? If the answer is any more than “My mommy would ‘cause I’d maker her read what I wrote,” then you aren’t being intellectually honest.

  One day—perhaps quite soon—as Asian countries gain more head-space in English-speaking peoples, Asian proper nouns will be so common that pronouncing their names and the diacritics associated with that effort will become engrained in the English language. But Wikipedia don’t try to put the cart before the horse. This phenomenon, where wikipedians have deluded themselves that Wikipedia affords them The Power To Change the World and make it a better place resulted in such unwise things as our three-year-long effort at using IEC prefixes like “mebibyte (MiB)” and “kibibyte (KiB)” in our computer-related articles because it was *better and a standard and is logical*, even though the rest of the computer industry and the RSs didn’t use such terminology. It was just a “Wikipedia thing.” Most cute. Greg L (talk) 22:12, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

  Actually...no. If you are going to make a point make it with the fact that while several publications spell the names François, señor, and von Blücher it is far, far from routine. It is the minority view and not common English. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:07, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

• It doesn’t matter what newsletters hanging on the corkboard at a convent read like nor what a local newspaper does, Fyunck. It only matters, in my opinion, what most-reliable, English-language publications like Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic do. These publications should serve as the paradigm for wikipedians to look towards. Thus, Encyclopedia Britannica: François Mitterrand and Encyclopedia Britannica: Vu Ngoc Nha. Note also National Geographic’s print article on François Mitterrand.

  Furthermore, I’m not sure you took the time to actually read and comprehend what I am advocating above. I am advocating Wikipedia follow the diacritical practices of most-reliable English-language sources such as encyclopedias. Those do spell it François Mitterrand. But they don’t adopt diacritics from other languages that are not traditionally part of English. Did you realize that was my point? Now…

  If you did correctly read my post and understood my point, then what you seem to be advocating is that Wikipedia not even do what Encyclopedia Britannica does. That is simply not realistic and arguing that point is an utter waste of time. Get serious. It’s easy to argue things in black & white terms with arguments ranging from “Adopt all the diacriticals on the planet because not doing so is racist,” to arguments like “Don’t use any diacriticals because the vast majority of English-language publications (including newspapers and newsletters from my junior high) don’t use them.”

  Understanding gray areas and appreciating how to deal with the nuances is the hard part (witness Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. and how they “simplify” things). Greg L (talk) 22:28, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

• Oh I did read it and that's why I did not criticize your content... only your incorrect view that most reliable sources spell those names with diacritics. You are incorrect there. Those two sources are not the gold standard for common English protocol. Sure there are many non-native English speakers that would have you think so but that is simply their own pov... nothing more. In fact many times an encyclopedia is a second hand source where we need the original source instead. As for tv, newspapers (NY Times, London Times, etc), books, media and for sports personalities things like Tennis Pro tour (ATP and WTA) and Hockey federations like the NHL... I and 99% of first language English speakers will take those as high level sources every time (not withstanding your jr high newsletter). It's fine a dandy of the squeaky wheels around here to demand and get article names in diacritics... good and bad that's the way things work around here. I didn't say to change it above. But to use a falsehood to make a point and lambast me for correcting your falsehood is strange. You said "diacritics for proper nouns are routinely accepted for use with English" and "most-reliable, English-language publications" do also... no matter how you slice it that is incorrect. Are they used more often on wikipedia...yep. Are they used more often in English language sources that wikipedia endorses...nope. It is not routine and most reliable English sources don't use diacritics on a regular basis. Making your point is cool... doing so with pov falsehoods is not. Fyunck(click) (talk)

• Oh, well… just pardon me all over the place for falsely thinking that Encyclopedia Britannica sets the “gold standard” for encyclopedic practices. Between that, and the oh-so worldly National Geographic, I thought I had something there but you have dismissed these as “pov falsehoods” (*sound of wistful sigh*). Besides, I think it is a galactic waste of time for you to try to swim upstream of a torrent of desire for Wikipedia to at least use the same diacritics that Encyclopedia Britannica is using. In short: you and I will simply have to agree to disagree when it comes to any notion of gutting the vast majority of diacriticals on things like “François Mitterrand” and “naïve,” M’kay? Greg L (talk) 00:51, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

H-BSG what do you see as the inconsistencies between WP:DIACRITICS and MOS:FOREIGN? They do not cover the same ground one is for usage in an article the other for the title of an article. We run into problems is on article titles like "Lech Wałęsa" where ignoring the guidance in one automatically leads to ignoring the advise in the other for the sake of consistency within an article (not with only with "Lech Wałęsa" but also the presentation of other foreign names within the article (ignoring the advise in MOS:FOREIGN to follow the usage in the sources). The only thing I can see that I think needs to be changed is the sentence "Provide redirects from alternative forms that use or exclude diacritics." in MOS:FOREIGN. I think it should be removed. -- PBS (talk) 22:47, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

• Maybe I’m all confused, PBS, as to what Wikipedia’s real policies are because our articles don’t seem to be consistent. Please advise, which of these articles are fully compliant with all of Wikipedia’s guidelines—considering article names, first-sentence lede, and body text:

1. Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park
2. Nguyen Ngoc Loan
3. Duc Duc
4. Vạn Hạnh
5. Petrus Ký (note that this one isn’t consistent with the Encyclopedia Britannica article it references with regard to diacriticals)

Please advise. Greg L (talk) 23:15, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

I fixed "Petrus Ký". That was pretty silly. I've removed the Vietnamese diacritics from most of the biography titles. I tried removing them from the place name articles as well, but so far without success. Nobody uses them in published English -- not Britannica, not National Geographic, not the travel guides, not the scholarly tomes, and certainly not the war stories. Kauffner (talk) 11:10, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

See above #Conflict between usage and policy wording where I was involved in a discussion about whether we should junk using reliable English language sources and role our own set of rules. After very long discussions on this page there does not seem to be consensus to move away from using sources to decide usage to a rule based method. Can we instead concentrate in this section on the inconsistencies between WP:DIACRITICS and MOS:FOREIGN and if they exist how to fix them rather than the inconsistencies between some articles and guidance? -- PBS (talk) 06:06, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

separating from above... Just a quick note on the prior stricken "For decades, Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic have access to diacritics and graphemes from quality type foundries." Having the molds to cast lead into was never the impediment to producing text with diacritics faithful to the native representation of languages. It is that, simply, there is a mechanical limitation to how large you can make a Linotype. It's a tremendously labor-intensive operation to change font faces or to change out molds of special characters—remember, text was created by assembling a bank of single-letter molds for each line of text into which hot lead was then cast. It is, in fact, (1) the advent of phototypsetting and (2) standardization on UTF et al. (that is, a standard for accomodating multiple font code pages simultaneously instead of being stuck with only one language at a time) that enabled the widespread use of native syntax. The widespread use of diacritics in scholarly text today is a direct result of anyone being able to sit down anywhere on earth with a computer and create documents in the language of that place. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 01:19, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

P.S. I did R&D and converted printers from hot type to cold type, trust me on this. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK

Greg: ". I am advocating Wikipedia follow the diacritical practices of most-reliable English-language sources such as encyclopedias. Those do spell it François Mitterrand." - Except of course, that "most-reliable English-language sources" doesn't spell it like that at all, but most encyclopedias does. There is a conflict between what reliable sources do and encyclopedias do, and unless we recognize it we'll be stuck in this debate for ever. Do we follow general English usage, or do we want to behave like Britannica. We can't do both. --OpenFuture (talk) 07:28, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Actually, yes, we can! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:31, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Of course, the question is what version would be the redirected. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 08:40, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Redirects don't have much effect on traffic patterns anyway. Readers get to the the articles through the search engines, which don't consider the redirects. Kauffner (talk) 11:10, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

It is true, but we discuss a different topic, the titles of specific articles (not redirects) here on en:wiki. --Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 14:07, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

All: I am rather new to this issue and I know there has been water under the bridge.

I have noted that there are some who advocate that Wikipedia adopt diacriticals from all the languages of the world. One editor recently told me it would be “racist” to be selective and exclude some languages (notably Asian ones). Others are wildly at the other extreme and don’t want common diacriticals like ü, ö, ï, é, ñ, and ç used on Wikipedia.

Then there is the issue of treating article titles differently from body text.

And then there is the issue that Jimbo weighed in on this issue; as I recall, it was in opposition to diacriticals (or opposition to expanding their use) in article titles. HIs presence made for a deluge of not-particularly-well-thought-out opinion on the subject, and possibly prematurely hardened positions.

Then there is the problem that this issue is apparently being addressed in different venues on Wikipedia. Is this the correct place? If so, I would be interested in participating and would like to assist in working towards a consensus.

So that everyone knows where I am coming from, I generally despise black or white solutions; I think the absolute extreme corners on issues are often a refuge for weak minds. It takes thoughtful analysis and appreciation for exceptions to craft solutions that deal with shades of gray. And then taking these shades of gray and trying to communicate them in plain-speak is double-tough.

So I will be candid and explain precisely what my position is right up front: I think the primary purpose of using certain diacriticals in English (there is at least one more), is to tell English-speaking readers how to pronounce words. England’s proximity to its European neighbors being what it is, English has adopted certain words from France, Germany, Spain, and Italy into its vocabulary. English speakers are supposed to know that señor does not rhyme with tenor. They are supposed to know that résumé does not sound like the word that means “begin to do or pursue”. Accordingly, these common diacriticals:

´ ˇ ¨ ˜ and the grapheme ç (the list is probably incomplete)

…have long been used as part of the English language and a knowledgeable readership is expected to have some facility in dealing with them.

What is clear is that Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic do spell it “François Mitterrand” Encyclopedia Britannica online, as does National Geographic (link to “Essential Visual HIstory of the World”). So too does the French-language version of Wikipedia: François Mitterrand.

At the same time, Encyclopedia Britannica does not use diacriticals much beyond the ones I listed above; ergo Vu Ngoc Nha has no diacriticals (link). I think it is obvious that the editors of Encyclopedia Britannica realize that 99.99% of an English-speaking readership has no facility whatsoever in fathoming the Vietnamese alphabet. Here is the Vietnamese-language version of “Vũ Ngọc Nhạ”. And here is the Vietnamese-language version of “Đặng Hữu Phúc.” Go ahead… click on that and think about what proportion of our readership will have any facility with dealing with an entirely new alphabet.

Now, I can personally recognize and pronounce words like “résumé,”François,” and “señor.” But I would have no flying clue how to pronounce “Đặng Hữu Phúc.” Is that “ặ” supposed to sound like a ringing bell being submerged in water? English-speakers are never going to pronounce Asian words like that—even if taught. Nor would there be much point to learning this alphabet and all its diacritics if Wikipedia were the only preeminent English-language learning source throwing this stuff at me.

Finally, there is one more reason to use diacriticals (besides cluing a reader how to pronounce a word): to educate a professional writer who may have to correspond with a native reader. In such circumstances, what better place than Wikipedia to go find out how to properly spell the word in all its native glory? This aspect (service to our readership) is easy to address and can be done for all languages based on the Romantic alphabet. So…

Here is what I propose for consideration:

1. Do not use diacriticals in article titles.
2. For routine use in body text, the following diacriticals: ´ ˇ ¨ ˜ and the grapheme ç from French, German, Italian, and Spanish are permitted. {The list is expandable since I may easily have overlooked some key common ones routinely accepted for use with English.}
3. With regard to precisely how one spells and accents foreign words, editors should put great credence in most-reliable English-language publications, with particular emphasis on Encyclopedia Britannica and National Geographic.
4. When the English-language, encyclopedic practice of using diacriticals in a Romantic-language foreign word varies from the practice of its native speakers, and/or if the word is not permitted to be spelled with diacriticals in the main body text as provided herein, then editors are encouraged to provide a one-time parenthetical showing how the word is as written in the native language; thus…
   1. In biographies, where there is typically already a parenthetical after the individual’s name providing year of birth and so on, the first occurrence of the name after the first paragraph shall include a parenthetical providing the native spelling; thus Dang Huu Phuc (Vietnamese: Đặng Hữu Phúc) studied music at the National Music Academy VN…
   2. For non-biographies, provide a parenthetical in the first sentence of the lede; thus Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnamese: Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh) is the capital city…
5. Editors are reminded to abide by the principle that Wikipedia endeavors to follow the practices of reliable sources and is not to be used as a platform to promote change in the encyclopedic practice of the English language, no matter how meritorious the motives.

That’s my 22¢ on the matter. No, I am not trying to beat up on other little countries and be racist and mean “full of hatefulness” and all that sort of bad stuff. I am simply trying to keep Wikipedia from taken out into left field where it would depart from common English-language practices. Greg L (talk) 18:56, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I too find the euro-centrism of this attitude less than desirable. I vote minus infinity on that. --OpenFuture (talk) 19:46, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

It’s not the role of mere all-volunteer wikipedians, OpenFuture, to try to change how the real world works—even if their sense of “what is right” seems violated by some sort of grand conspiracy by “the ‘white man in powdered wig’.” Wikipedia goes with the flow and doesn’t try to promote change by leading by example, particularly when doing so just baffles our readership. For guidance, wikipedians can look towards the practices of prestigious encyclopedias like Encyclopedia Britannica, which has professional editors with journalism degrees thinking about how best to communicate clearly to a readership without causing undo confusion. Greg L (talk) 21:11, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

You are right. And one billion flies can't be wrong. So I will immediately start eating shit. Or not. It is attitudes like yours that make this discussion impossible and a constant flame war. No, we shouldn't try to change the world. But just because everyone else in Europe thinks it is the center of the world doesn't mean that I or you, also have to believe that. Also, Wikipedia is not a *British* encyclopedia. It's a global one. Even the English language Wikipedia is a global encyclopedia. We do not have the same purpose goal or target audience as a British Encyclopedia created in the 18th century. Wikipedia is already a larger, and in many cases a more accurate encyclopedia than EB. We are also not an authoritative source and do not try to be one. We do a lot of things differently and sometimes even better than EB. Trying to be EB and restricting ourselves in what we do and what principles we have to copying EB is immensely misguided. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:56, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Principles 1 and 5 will often conflict. Since principle one has just been written whilst principle five is at the core of how wikipedia works, where the two are incompatible I think it's best to favour the latter. In other words, if reliable sources use diacriticals... bobrayner (talk) 19:57, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

But that has not been the way wikipedia has been working as of late as far as diacritics. The number of reliable sources is thrown out, one or two specific ones we are told are the only ones that matter, and then a vote happens where non-English-first voters (whose main languages use diacritics) dominate the scene. Common English then gets washed away. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:31, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

This is an international project, and it is to be expected. Many of these editors and other highly educated and culturally sensitive ones place a great deal of emphasis on orthodoxy and precision in spelling. I used to oppose diacritics in article titles, but sustainability is new paradigm. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:26, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

It has international input but non-english spelling is not to be expected. This is an English language wiki just as there are other language wikis and while it's sensational to have input from around the world, they should conform to common English here, not the other way around. Diacritics are not some pedestal-like example... they are being forced upon us against wiki guidlines imho. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:47, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Wrong. Once we have satisfied WP:GNG and verified the spelling, whether the name is properly spelt is a fundamental matter of neutrality. I really don't see how using a name that is correctly spelt can possibly be misleading. If we need any further justification to use diacritics, we cite truth above all. Reject rules that don't make sense, then our pillars are fulfilled. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 16:38, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Incorrect. And how do we verify English spelling... By checking multitudes of English sources. And if those many English sources spell it without diacritics we go with that. If they use diacritics we go with that. But we don't cherry pick English sources to fit our decisions. These rules make perfect sense to many of us. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:25, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Of course we cherry pick sources, all the time. We may use The Telegraph to fill in our biographies, but we place much less reliance on gossip and society columns of the same journal. We look to the sources that would tend to give us the most reliable information that pertains to a certain aspect of the subject of the article. Even WP:COMMONNAME states explicitly that we should weight what is used by quality sources such as encyclopaedias, whereas WP:RS asks us not to rely on tertiary sources. That would indicate a strong preference for encyclopaedic accuracy over common garden usage as far as article titles are concerned. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:57, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

If you talk tennis players I'll grant there's a big difference between an Encyclopedia and an article in "Modern Woman." Equally I find EncyBri lacking when compared to the WTA, ATP, ITF, Fed Cup and US Open as far as sourcing for common English players names. And when looking for a direct source for the player I'm likely to find them at the WTA, ATP, ITF, Fed Cup, and US Open official sites. Most won't even be listed in EncyBri to begin with, so it's useless for those players. It's gotten so warped and anti-English here that you could go to the player's own official English website, like "Ana Ivanovic" where it's spelled diacritic-free, just like the WTA and ITF official sites, yet at English wikipedia we have to have it at "Ana Ivanović" to appease the always-diacritic crowd. There is something really wrong with that! Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:01, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

IMO, the article title should be the way the person or thing is most commonly referred to in published English, as measured by Google Book results since 1980, book titles, entry titles used by other encyclopedias, or a selection of the best English language sources on the subject. (Hopefully, these are the sources used by the article itself.) It is currently a common practice to put in diacritics that never appear in published English, for example for Slavic sports figures or for Vietnamese place names. This misleads the reader as to what acceptable English-language usage is. A typeable title is easier to search for and easier to link to, so the default should be no diacritic. Britannica and National Geographic are both excellent sources, but there are numerous quality sources that make far less use of diacritics. The formal version of the name, i.e. with diacritics, should be given in boldface in the opening and above the box. This version of the name can be taken from a non-English source. Kauffner (talk) 04:39, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

"This misleads the reader as to what acceptable English-language usage is." - You are saying that it is unacceptable to use correct diacritics. I really don't think English-speakers are *that* daft. :-) You probably mean "commonly accepted" or something, right? --OpenFuture (talk) 06:01, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

So you're going tell the world about "correct diacritics", are you? This is crusading. The whole philosophy of Wikipedia is that we find the best sources on the topic at hand and let them tell us. If the sources aren't using diacritics, the title shouldn't have them either. Kauffner (talk) 10:33, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

That comment is rude and ignorant, and deserves no more comment than that. I think you will realize yourself why it is rude. If you want to know why it is ignorant you can ask. Also please do not second guess what my opinions or standpoints are. You will be wrong. --OpenFuture (talk) 10:53, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

There seems to be an assumption that there will be english-language sources about a foreign subject; that's not a very safe assumption, since the independent coverage required by the GNG does not have to be a certain language or nationality. bobrayner (talk) 05:07, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

I think this is one of the few arguments against the "what common sources do" position. Although you may have enough sources to show notability, there may be no obvious consensus amongst them on spelling. --OpenFuture (talk) 13:37, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

I think this point is covered by Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)#No established usage -- PBS (talk) 01:39, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

It's mentioned yes. Covered, not so much. "a neutral one is often best". Well, duh. :-) Doesn't really help as such in this case. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:55, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

GL please see my comment on 23 April, if reliable sources do use accent marks for words from European languages like French and Spanish, but not Vietnamese, then that will be reflected in the simple metric of using reliable English language sources to decide common usage (if so your point 2 above is not needed). As to your point 3 I think the current wording is better, as the most reliable sources depends on the context and for the content and title of articles, highlighting specific sources does improve the guidance. So I think that the points you have raised are already covered in this guideline. -- PBS (talk) 01:39, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Some musings

It is a weird claim that "Common English" somehow gets "washed away" by diacritics and even stranger that somehow the world forces and imposes correct spelling on Wikipedia. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. This debate is almost exclusively about non-English persons names. As a non-English person my name is not a matter of the English language at all. The name is Swedish, and although my name happens to contain only letters from A-Z and isn't affected, there is no such thing as an English spelling of my name, and spelling it or any other Swedish name is not an attack on English in any way. If there is an English spelling of Björn Borgs name, it is not "Bjorn". That is just a misspelling, because the character doesn't exist in the English alphabet so most people writing about him doesn't know that the dots make a difference, and even if they do they don't know how to type it, or they don't care. With the result that the man becomes famous as "Bjorn Borg". This is perfectly understandable. Swedish has characters that aren't in English, and English in fact has a character that doesn't exist in Swedish, namely "W". But there is no "Swedish Spelling" of the name Waldo Williams. Spelling it Valdo Villiams is not Swedish, it's just wrong. Recognizing this is not an attack on Swedish. Neither is it an attack on Swedish to recognize that a Swedish person who doesn't speak English will tend to mispronounce american names. The common american name Ronny would by most Swedes be pronounced Swedish pronunciation: [rony] (with a rolled r and a different end-wovel) rather than /roni/. This is not an attack on English either. I've heard my name massacred in many languages, and this is not an attack on either me nor them.

But that there is a correct spelling, and that spelling isn't English on the other hand doesn't mean that we automatically must name Björn Borgs article "Björn Borg", the issue is not that simple. But claiming that spelling his name correctly is an attack on English is utter nonsense. And claiming "Bjorn" to be English is also nonsense. It is mispronounced/misspelled Swedish. The English would be "Bear". But nobody would suggest calling him "Bear Castle" cause that would be silly. :-)

So calm down. Nobody is attacking anyone. Spelling things correctly is not an attack, and neither is using generally accepted misspellings. So stop being so frigging rude to each other, Mmmkay? --OpenFuture (talk) 18:15, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

• I suggest, OpenFuture, that you not confuse exposing the shortcomings of someone’s arguments as being rude to the individual who offered up an all-you-can-eat buffet of BS sandwich. If you were strongly influenced by your experiences in primary or secondary school and grew accustomed to teachers giving you an “A for effort” even when you turn in a real stinker for homework, then your experiences on Wikipedia are going to be disappointing at times because it is part of the real world. Here, people aren’t paid to inflate Dick’s or Jane’s self-esteem and there is no politically correct requirement for others to admire your suggestions and ideas as much as you do.

  Now let’s examine something you wrote above: Also, Wikipedia is not a *British* encyclopedia. It's a global one. Even the English language Wikipedia is a global encyclopedia. We do not have the same purpose goal or target audience as a British Encyclopedia created in the 18th century. I’ve been on Wikipedia long enough to have seen this “GLOBAL” argument used tediously often. It is invariably the refrain of someone who is not a native-English speaker—or, as is the case for you per your own user page, a “near-native speaker of English” who wants to see the customs and practices and conventions of his native country expanded and observed. Thus, they resort to all sorts of absurd arguments such as how “The English-language Version of Wikipedia belongs to the world”. Wikipedia tends to get its share of fresh, ambitious faces who are giddy with a wide-eyed epiphany over how wise and knowledgeable they have become in only three months now that they have taken a college class in World Politics 101 or something similar. Now…

  There are scores of Wikipedias in languages other than English. The En.-version of Wikipedia is to primarily serve the interests of those who speak English as their native tongue; namely America, the U.K., Australia, New Zealand, and some other countries. Readers and even wikipedians from other countries are welcome to contribute to en.Wikipedia. But they will just have to expect that certain practices they think are drop-dead ready for en.Wikipedia to adopt, (such as delimiting numbers like 12345,75 instead of nasty barbaric American way of 12,345.75) just isn’t gonna happen. Oh yes, we had oodles and oodles of oh-so worldly editors who came here arguing about how “En.Wikipedia Is the Common Heritage For All Mankind and Must Embrace All Its Customs” and point to how the BIPM in Paris (the people behind the metric system) say numbers should be written that way for an international readership so American just better get with the game plan. You know: change the world.

  Uhm… no. It doesn’t work that way. If the en. version of Wikipedia had to start being concerned about the diacriticals of Mongolian yak herders and had a Mongolian wikipedian jumping up and down, holding his breath, and insisting that the language practices of his country be honored and sanctified because Mongolian is founded upon the same 2500-year-old Roman-based alphabet as English and deserves respect too, nothing would get done. Moreover, we’d just end up letting Wikipedia be hijacked so it could be put in the position of trying to change how things are done with the English language.

  If you want to keep advancing nonsense arguments to support changing the very alphabet that is customarily used in proper English, don’t profess to be all hurt and confused and try to hide behind the apron strings of AGF and NPA when someone says your arguments amount to a metric ton of weapons-grade bullonium. You are no-doubt a splendid individual, but it seems to be you have an agenda to change English to honor the practices of other languages and your arguments are weak beyond all comprehension. Greg L (talk) 23:42, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Greg, I do not confuse anything. And although you hadn't been rude before, you were immensely rude here (and not only towards me, but pretty much towards everyone). (And I could possibly have understood that if you had been immersed in the debate for too long to being able to listen to others, as sometimes happens, but you yourself says that you are rather new to this discussion, so that's not the case). You also wrong in every single thing you say about me above.

I started out this discussion firmly in the "we do what sources do" camp, as this intuitively seemed to be the Wikipedia way, but since it is filled with idiots who can't argue for their point without insulting others I'm seriously reconsidering that standpoint. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:41, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

LOL! Juxtaposed in the same post: “you were immensely rude here” and “since it is filled with idiots”. Bravo. Hiding behind the apron strings of personal attacks to deflect legitimate criticism of your writing utter nonsense… well… it does not impress.

I’m quickly seeing a pattern here with your style of “the best defense is a strong offense.” I note also the above thread, where another editor responded to you as follows: So you're going tell the world about "correct diacritics", are you? This is crusading. The whole philosophy of Wikipedia is that we find the best sources on the topic at hand and let them tell us. If the sources aren't using diacritics, the title shouldn't have them either. Then, to that you pulled out the same ol’ stunt you just tried with me: That comment is rude and ignorant, and deserves no more comment than that.

Double-bravo. This modus operandi appears to be a schtick of yours: level an accusation that someone was “rude” and at the same time accuse the editor of being ignorant or an idiot. Perhaps this has been a successful tactic of yours in the past. But that is rapidly coming to a close because it is apparent that the emperor behind this tactic has no clothes. You can advance some sensible arguments founded in actual Wikipedia policy, or you can suffer people ridiculing your writings as being absurd. Get used to it. BTW, those are my “musings.” Greg L (talk) 03:45, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, maybe next time, try using arguments instead of insults and I will change my mind on the issue. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:50, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Believe it or not, I had a valid point (“argument”, as you say) when I quoted this fallacious argument of yours that amounted to how you desire to change the English language so it essentially embraces and honors the language practices of the country you hail from: Also, Wikipedia is not a *British* encyclopedia. It's a global one. Even the English language Wikipedia is a global encyclopedia. We do not have the same purpose goal or target audience as a British Encyclopedia created in the 18th century and then tore that sort of hogwash down as being absurd and untrue. Kauffner too had an argument when he wrote this: So you're going tell the world about "correct diacritics", are you? This is crusading. The whole philosophy of Wikipedia is that we find the best sources on the topic at hand and let them tell us. If the sources aren't using diacritics, the title shouldn't have them either.

But you seem to be unable to see “arguments” and can only see “opposition to you (which is bad)”. I tend to think you can see quite clearly when others make points and are just quick to allege “insult” and “personal attacks” because such tactics have worked in the past for you. That ship has sailed; I can see right through you on this one since this isn’t my first rodeo with that sort of strategy.

I can see engaging you is a waste of time. Moreover, I don’t need to convince you of anything; Wikipedia is fortunately, ruled by consensus and a lone holdout who can not see others’ points (is quick to allege that others have no point and have only hurled *hateful insults* [yadda yadda]) can not interfere much with consensus building. So…

To all others: It appears to me that OpenFuture is lightning quick to confuse criticisms of his positions on Wikipedia affairs as personal attacks—or at least allege that is the case. All we need to accomplish anything on Wikipedia is establish a consensus. If User:OpenFuture—or any other editor for that matter—edits against consensus, please contact me on my talk page and I will see if I can help to establish a general consensus so that progress can be made. It could not be clearer that the En.Wikipedia follows the practices of English-language RSs. Mere all-volunteer wikipedians are not in a position to advocate that common English-language practices should change for what they think are the better and to be “inclusive” and that sort of thing. Greg L (talk) 20:23, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

You claim that I "desire to change the English language". Where did I say that? Can you quote me, please? No, sorry, you didn't have a valid point. You aren't listening to what I say, and therefore you can't come with a valid response to it. As usual every single thing you say about me is completely wrong, you are fighting against a giant windmill of your own making. --OpenFuture (talk) 20:43, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Certainly you didn’t say you want to change the English language to make you happy. You know full well that couching it in those terms would fly like a lead balloon. Instead you use language like how en.Wikipedia is a *global* encyclopedia in an effort to put lipstick on a pig of an idea and pass it off as a prom date. It happens all the time on Wikipedia; you certainly didn’t invent the phenomenon of coming here with an agenda to beat around the bush with wholesome sounding slogans and misdirection to conceal the obvious. What part of “follow the practices of reliable English-language sources” has you confused? All of it? Greg L (talk) 20:50, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

None of it. What part of "windmill" has you confused? I would be most interested in knowing what my agenda is. Can you tell me? You seem to know my opinions better than I do myself. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:57, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

OpenFuture you wrote "But that there is a correct spelling", I don't see how you come to that conclusion as there is no "correct spelling" see my comment on 21 April we may not be able to agree on correct because of deep seated prejudices, but in editors can agree to differ on that while in good faith agreeing on common usage (even if that usage is not what they prefer). -- PBS (talk) 01:39, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

"Common usage" and "correct spelling" are two separate things. There *is* a correct spelling of Bjorn Borg, and there *is* a correct spelling of Lech Walesa, and those are not it. There is also a correct spelling of Mao Tse-Tung, and that's not it either. You need to recognize this before the discussion can go on in any sensible way. That does *not* mean that English Wikipedia should use the correct spelling. One major reason for that is that the correct spelling of Mao Tse-Tung is 毛泽东, which is a highly impractical title on an English Wikipedia. But as long as a large group of editors refuse to accept that their preferred spellings are by the global majority simply seen as misspellings, this discussion will not go anywhere. You have to try to listen to others and understand their viewpoint to be able to reach an accord. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:50, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

You are trying to change the playing field to one that suits you, OpenFuture. We could be bogged down night and day over what is “correct” spelling. The simple matter is that Wikipedia follows the spelling and diacritic practices of the majority of reliable English-language sources. Period. That may not seem fair to some, but it is not up to an all-volunteer band of fresh-faced wikipedian hobbyists to gather around in back rooms of Wikipedia strategize on how best to improve and expand the English language and its alphabet.

For someone like you, OpenFuture, for whom English is a second language, the desire to Change and Enhance the English Language To Make the World A Better Place©™© because the English language somehow seems capable of being so much more. But what you seek is out of your grasp. If you keep coming to this venue intent on undermining or overturning that bedrock principle and try to get Wikipedia to start spelling certain foreign-language names in ways they are not customarily seen in English-language publications, then you are in for a bunch of disappointment.

Is any of this sinking in? Or was this whole post just a personal attack (again) in your eyes with no point to make whatsoever? If the latter, then go up one paragraph and re-read that one. Then reflect upon what the majority of reliable English-language sources means. Greg L (talk) 20:43, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

No, we can't be bogged down in what the correct spelling is. There is no question about which spelling of Björn Borg that is correct. The question which we can be (and is) bogged down in is what spelling we should use. That is a different question. Your constant insults and misrepresentations of my standpoint is not helping that discussion. I repeat: Don't try to guess what my opinion is on any question. You *will* be wrong. And you aren't saying anything I don't already know. You are arguing against a windmill, not against me. --OpenFuture (talk) 20:50, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

OpenFuture you wrote "That does *not* mean that English Wikipedia should use the correct spelling." Well that is a step towards an agreement. If instead of "correct spelling" we substitute "native spelling" then are we in agreement with: That does *not* mean that English Wikipedia should use the native spelling for article titles, they should use the spelling that is usually used in reliable English language sources? -- PBS (talk) 22:59, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

The word "correct" above does not need to be replaced, as the native spelling is the correct one in these examples. But "native" works as well. It is still important that people understand that the spelling without diacritics is incorrect. If that is not understood, this discussion will continue to be stalled. --OpenFuture (talk) 08:43, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Should Wikipedia abandon following the RSs?

Ahh. Björn Borg. I see… Is that what has your hackles up? Wikipedia doesn’t give a holy dump what you think is *correct*. Just serve up the facts as to how the English-language RSs handle it. My very first stop in my Google searches doesn’t bode well. Here is The New York Times: “Borg and McEnroe, in Rivalry and Friendship”. And then there’s Tennis.com. This is silly, OpenFuture. I’m arguing with what you write because it is false. “The only battleground of truth upon which this will be settled is by establishing the practices of a majority of the English-language RSs. Do you have a problem with that last sentence?? Yes or no? Greg L (talk) 20:54, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't "think" it is correct. It *is* correct. Until you realize this, you will never be able to contribute constructively to this discussion. Spelling it "Bjorn Borg" is no more correct than spelling it "Björn Barg" och "Tjörn Torg". And you still aren't arguing with what I say, you are arguing with a windmill that you made up. Most of your arguments are against things I have never said and opinions I have never had. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:51, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

What? It is a bit looney to say that Bjorn Borg, Björn Barg and Tjörn Torg are equivalent spelling analogies. Bjorn Borg is the correct spelling using the English alphabet. Obviously it's spelled differently in Chinese, Russian, and Swedish. His accurate sourced name in Swedish is Björn Borg, English is Bjorn Borg, Russian is Бьорн Борг. In Hieroglyphics they aren't going to spell it Björn Borg... they are going to spell it with the letters or characters they use in that language. It's still the correct spelling, but in Hieroglyphics. It may not be the correct way it is spelled in his native tongue with native lettering, but it is still correct per the language it's being used in. Since no language sources I know spell it Tjorn Torg that would be incorrect. If in Sweden they spelled it Bjorn Borg that would be incorrect. If in Russian they spelled it Бьорнooooo Боргoooo, that would also be incorrect. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:48, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

You make an excellent point, Fyunck. User:OpenFuture is trying to put lipstick on a pig and pass it off as a prom date by trying to characterize this as an issue of what is “correct” and then insisting that the only metric for correctness is how someone’s name is spelled in their host country. What most of us know is that it is well cemented into the very DNA of Wikipedia is that the only correct practices are for the English-language version of Wikipedia to follow the practices of reliable English-language RSs. To do otherwise is a flagrant foul of our basic principles. Greg L (talk) 00:59, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

@Fyunck: No, you see, it isn't a "bit looney". All of these spellings are equally wrong in as much as one letter has been replaced with another. They are as such all incorrect. Until people understand this, you will not be able to understand all these editors which you now complain about that persist in putting diacritics on articles where you think there should be no diacritics, and until you understand this, this discussion will continue forever. --OpenFuture (talk) 04:15, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

But if you use that philosophy then you must say not only is the spelling incorrect in Hieroglyphics but also that it is impossible to spell it correctly in Hieroglyphics. And if you have a Hieroglyphics encyclopedia where using Hieroglyphics characters is your alphabet, one must spell Bjorn's name incorrectly or not have it in the encyclopedia at all. I guess you can look at it that way though it seems strange. I'd rather have it in the encyclopedia. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:39, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

This is basically correct, yes. Now we are getting somewhere. :-) I'd also rather have it in the encyclopedia. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:59, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

In his autobiography, Borg gives his own name as "Bjorn Borg" (no diacritic) at least 12 times. This also the way the name appears on the cover. Perhaps he is somewhat confused on the issue of correct spelling? Borg's diacritic is one of the best attested on Wikipedia, yet it still falls short of genuine common use. Kauffner (talk) 02:04, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

• Maybe he ought to sack his publishers. ;-) --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:23, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Another twist is he is given with a diacritic as author of the book. So perhaps he is author Björn Borg, but tennis player Bjorn Borg. Kauffner (talk) 04:50, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

It's just sloppy. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 08:25, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Maybe his parents really named him Bjorn but he's been spelling it wrong all these years? Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:06, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Funny. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:15, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

See also [1], [2], [3], in all the Author is Björn Borg, but only in one the title is spelled that way. So what source is most reliable? (or when it comes to names we do not care and just count blindly?) Him as the author or the title? Or is it more important to see how the name is spelled most often than what is correct? Maybe the publisher wants to spell the title Borg, and he agrees just to get the book sold (they claim that the buyers will not know who he is and not buy?) You can twist this anyway you want. --Stefan ^talk 14:43, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

I think this is a case of Google Books recognizing that the authors name is Björn Borg, and listing him as the author of the books, even though the actual printed book omits the umlauts in his name. Google probably has checks in place to prevent the same author showing up as different authors because of spellings, middle names etc. --OpenFuture (talk) 16:38, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Google makes a lot of mistakes with respect to diacritics for authors and titles. WorldCat is much more reliable, but certainly not perfect either. IMO, Borg's "tennis player name" should be taken from a sports reference work, the most authoritative being Sports Illustrated Almanac, ESPN Sports Almanac, and Notable Sports Figures. Kauffner (talk) 17:12, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

We're talking about his name. If it was a question of Borg's sporting achievements, I would agree with you unhesitatingly. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 09:11, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

"The English Alphabet"

I'm sorry, but the often made or implied claim that there is "The English Alphabet" which has exactly 26 letters is plain wrong. It's wrong in the same sense that $E={\frac {1}{2}}mv^{2}$ for kinetic energy is wrong - it's a convenient approximation taught to pupils early in their education because its close enough for their purposes and is easier to grasp for new learners. Wikipedia readers, on the other hand, get treated to theory of relativity, and likewise can be expected to cope with Björn Borg (or Wilhelm Röntgen, to stick with the physics analogy). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:26, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Are these "ß,Ð,ð,Þ,þ,Ŋ,ŋ,Ə,ə" in the English alphabet? It is not really possible to say definitively unless the majority of expert sources are broadly in agreement. Otherwise the only way to do it is to find a source that has analysed their usage (See the English alphabet#Letter frequencies) and state how common that usage is compared to say the usage of "e" and "z". In the same way whether we use "Wilhelm Röntgen" title of the article, (or "Wilhelm Rontgen" or "Billy What's-his-name"), the decision should be based on analysis of the usage in reliable English language sources. -- PBS (talk) 23:16, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Before Unicode, only the Western European, or Latin-1, letters were ordinarily available. Unicode has been standard for only a few years and I don't see anyone other than Wikipedia going Unicode crazy. As far as Röntgen goes, I get 510 post-1980 Google Book results for "Wilhelm Röntgen", compared to 5,240 for "Wilhelm Rontgen" OR "Wilhelm Roentgen". These numbers haven't been deghosted, so he hasn't really been mentioned in anything like 5,000 books. For 1990 to 1995, a deghosted search shows 124 results for "Wilhelm Röntgen", compared to 443 for "Wilhelm Rontgen" OR "Wilhelm Roentgen".

I don't favor picking a title based on this kind of analysis, but rather by consulting five to ten of the most authoritative English-language sources. There is also ngram, but that doesn't work for diacritics. Kauffner (talk) 04:20, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

I also don't favor picking titles on google hits, as Google has various complex normalizing rules in place for searches, so searching on diacritics like that isn't guaranteed to be very accurate.

I do agree with the statement that the English alphabet has 26 letters, A to Z. In English you can however also apply diacritics, like putting accents on the letters, Café, or umlaut to signify that it's not a diphthong, "coördination". These are however not separate *letters*. The diacritics here are modifiers. In Swedish, you can also stick an accent on e, but you can not put an umlaut on an o. "Ö" is not a modified "O", it is a separate character. When writing Björn Borg, this is an acknowledgment that the name is not English, it is a Swedish name.

These letters and diacritics has been available to printers for a long time so it is not a matter of technical restrictions that they haven't been used. It is partly a matter of it being difficult to enter. This is certainly true of man news organisations which work under time pressure and might not find it particularly helpful towards the deadline to figure out how to write Dołęga on a US keyboard. :-) --OpenFuture (talk) 06:11, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

Discrepancy in article

The following is a closed discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was

Closed. This has turned into a pointless exchange of personal attacks rather than a useful discussion — kwami (talk) 18:31, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

If I may draw everyone's attention to the pasted text that follows:

• The use of modified letters (such as accents or other diacritics) in article titles is neither encouraged nor discouraged; when deciding between versions of a word which differ in the use or non-use of modified letters, follow the general usage in reliable sources that are written in the English language (including other encyclopedias and reference works). The policy on using common names and on foreign names does not prohibit the use of modified letters, if they are used in the common name as verified by reliable sources.

I am involved in a conversation on Talk:Andrea Petkovic and have entered a heated debate on one issue. It seems the "is neither encouraged nor discouraged" passage is a source of potential conflict as it promotes two-way argument and does not arbitrate in a way that it needs to. I see the recommendation to "follow reliable sources" but WP:RS itself focuses on content dispute and not usage itself. It is indeed the case that we should continue to provide reliable citations and those publications may very well simplify foreign names to be stripped of their outlandish features. If so, it is apparent that the "simplified" form is the true Anglicised standard. However, this cannot be verified unless the same source has proven that it does acknowledge diacritics but chooses not to in some scenarios because the version without accents really is English (for example, if National Geographic were to write about Timișoara (as displayed) but also refer to A Coruna as apposed to A Coruña - one can ascertain that Timișoara and A Coruna are the appropriate titles to be used in English). If however, a publication chooses to leave all diacritics out then it stands to reason that this is an editorial decision and the concept of the source being reliable no longer applies. To state that for one subject, diacritics are all right and for another they are not WHILST pointing to sources at the same time can only indicate that it has been pot luck with one subject's sources over another. Wikipedia doesn't operate on a "lottery" basis. Can I suggest we extend this section to remind readers that if sources are to be valued according to reliablity for content, then the same applies to naming conventions. In other words, authentic name forms can be supported by reliable citations when the source language is also the native language of the subject: it is already the case that non-English sources can be used provided measures are taken to translate them where content is an issue, also remembering that English is preferable. If we cannot do this then it leaves an unclear guideline as to how some articles merit their modified letters and others do not. After all, a reliable source for one subject is also reliable for another. If the wider English-speaking policy with media is to leave out modified letters yet we continue to have articles on persons and themes which display diacritics, it can equally be questioned whether the subjects are notable enough in the English speaking world to warrant their own articles. I look forward to replies here. Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 11:33, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately a lot of editors seem to believe that the source lottery you describe is a good thing -- presumably because they prefer us to spell names the same way as tabloids do and not the same way as English dictionaries and encyclopedias do, and this is the only way of enforcing this at least in some cases.

To clarify: It appears that some editors either do not understand that some words are written in English with accents or without depending on context, and that it's a style matter that is decided by a publication's style guide, or believe that we shouldn't have a style guide at all and should instead do what boils down to using the average style guide of reliable sources (the average usually being different for different topics). But since I have never seen any of these editors explain which of the two theories they adhere to, I suspect that they really just start from the premise that diacritics are not English (false, especially in the context of reference works), and then just make up pseudo-arguments to support their desired outcomes. Hans Adler 12:01, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely. You've hit the nail on the head with the appropriate term "made up pseudo-arguments" because where they have been successful, the desired outcome has been something that lies between original research and completely false information. I've noticed these past hours that there is not only a wealth of inconsistency but a vast grey area whereby we just cannot truly separate the requirements to determine whether diacritics be used or not (compare Yugoslav-born Bojana Bobusic with Australian-born Aleks Marić). Don't get me wrong, I am not in the least pushing for their universal usage and I never will (I exlain on next paragraph) but I do firmly believe that IF reliable sources are to be the deciding factor, we either use them or we don't, one or the other can extinguish the grey patch. If it came to this, I would obviously push for their usage rather than campaign against them. Because let's be honest with ourselves, I used the term "lottery" but in reality there is no "on-and-off reliable source": the pro-diacritic users tend to be dominant in some areas (namely politics here) and the torpid anti-diacritic mob gain more grounds in sports, mainly tennis. What happens when there is to be a clash?[4] The Telegraph here presents both the tennis player and the Serbian president the same way - without diacritics. Just as they would do this, so will all others leaving only non-English sources to use diacritics. But they are still sources and they DO testify to the authentic nature unlike the journals that "keep it simple"!

Be that as it may. I do accept that even with strict guidelines that might demand modified features which seem alien to English, there will be times when which the diacritic-free form will be more appropriate. Sometimes it is clear that a national writing system has adopted amendments and this can often be helped by the individual dropping the accents himself, especially when living outside his country of origin. A good example is Alex Bogdanovic whereby it would be folly to add the diacritic on his surname when his first name has itself been modified (ie. from Aleksa - note it isn't just the final "a" to have come off but the "ks" has been replaced by "x" which is a true phoneme that doesn't appear in the source language). So all I am saying is, I am sure that by adding a few guidelines, we can clean up this mess and end this myth about "reliable sources must be English only and everything revolves around them". Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 13:42, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

On any article about a non-anglophone subject, I think it would be silly to deliberately and methodically exclude local (non-English) reliable sources. Titles should certainly be readable for typical English readers, and we should pay attention to English sources too, but we cannot hope to get accurate articles or titles by keeping one eye shut. I'm very much in favour of building an accurate encyclopædia, and if that means the occasional diacritical at the top of an article on a foreign subject - because the most reliable sources also use a diacritical - then so be it. bobrayner (talk) 13:55, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I do agree with you. Think about it, if there is no English language source to be found anywhere concerning a subject, we could question its notability and whether it warrants an article. I'd say a fair percentage of articles fall into this category but I have been the author of a few (such as singers famous in the home country/surrounding area but not anywhere in the English-speaking world). So far, the rules have allowed these to remain - but with English I don't see a problem, most official sites of foreign celebrities (which can be used as reliable depending on what is being stated) will either be wholly in English or will be in the source language but offering a click option to view the entire presentation in English. Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 14:04, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

But if there are no English sources, and the only sources available spell a name with diacritics, even though this is an English Wikipedia we would spell it with the diacritics intact. We have always done that as it follows wiki guidelines. It's when there are English sources, whether it be the US or Australian Press, Canadian tennis organizations if the person is a tennis player, the US chalk–painter society if the person is a chalk painter, the UK basket–weaver organization if the person is a basket weaver, etc... that's where we run into sourcing disagreements on a regular basis. Different projects use different guidelines and that's a good thing. It keeps wikipedia from being a cookie cut set of articles and allows breathing room on topics. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:17, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

In general, people don't look to professional organizations as sources. WTA might be a good source for tennis scores and rankings, but otherwise news organizations are more authoritative. For sports, I'd follow ESPN or Sports Illustrated. Kauffner (talk) 08:39, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

And you know this how? The WTA and ITF are the governing bodies of ladies tennis. They are certainly great sources for everything tennis related. Of course the press is too, and ESPN and SI. So is Wimbledon and the other 3 Majors. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:53, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

No, they are not great sources for everything tennis related. They are excellent sources for the things they specialise on. They are only middling sources for the things they are not particularly interested in. And they are poor sources for the things that they distort systematically: They put all names through a filter that removes diacritics, the same way that newswires do. Since their core competency has nothing to do with the spelling of names and their audience generally doesn't mind, they can afford to do so. The resulting spellings are acceptable, but they are not the best spellings for all contexts. As a result of the filter applied by WTA, ITF and newswires, we cannot use them to determine whether English encyclopedias would spell a name with or without diacritics. You can test this in the case of Björn Borg (and presumably others, but I am not interested in tennis so I can't think of examples) on Britannica online. Hans Adler 09:32, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Of boy... a shouting match of "yes they are" "not they aren't". Britannica is usually the last place I would go for tennis sourcing. And of course we CAN use the WTA, ITF and newswires sources for determining common English spelling and players bios, you just won't. That's your prerogative. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:15, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

"They put all names through a filter" - really? You know this how? Please stop making stuff up to try to prove your point. It's not up to you to decide what sources are and are not allowable. Absconded Northerner (talk) 09:34, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I am not making anything up. It's very easy to prove me wrong. Show me one tennis player profile at WTA or ITF that contains any diacritic. If you can't do this, I suggest you shut up. As for newswires, it's documented in reliable sources: In newspaper style manuals which explain that for technical reasons newswire reports never contain diacritics, and which explain when and how to restore them when using such a story in their paper. Hans Adler 15:03, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

@Hans Adler - dictionaries and encyclopedias are tertiary sources, not secondary sources. If you want to try Wikipedia policy, good luck to you, but that's not the way it works at the moment. Absconded Northerner (talk) 18:26, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

We need sources for facts, not for style issues. English reference works tell us how English reference works handle matters of style. For European languages, all major reference works such as Webster's Geographical Dictionary or Britannica agree in using the original diacritics almost always. And you can easily check that Britannica has done this even 100 years ago, when it was still a tricky business for strange Polish diacritics and such. Before this background, it is no wonder that roughly 4% of Wikipedia's article titles contain diacritics, while roughly 0% drop diacritics from foreign words that have them in the original language: Given that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, most editors try to write it in the same style that encyclopedias are written. If you want to change that, you need a better argument than following the sources on something that is not a matter of facts but a matter of style. If we followed the sources on style, then in many cases it would mean use diacritics while someone is not mentioned in English sources, drop them once they are mentioned in English tabloids, and add them again once they get into quality papers and high-quality print products. That's just ridiculous. Hans Adler 09:24, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

"All" .... "almost". Nice bit of handwaving to try to cover up that you're pulling stats out of the air.

Tertiary sources aren't important here. The reason we follow reliable sources is to provide the best possible service to readers. What's ridiculous is to pollute English language articles with a load of stray ink that means nothing to most people and which will be totally obsolete within a few years. Absconded Northerner (talk) 09:29, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

"Almost" was necessary in my statement for established English spellings such as "Zurich" (not "Zürich") or people who genuinely changed their spelling after moving to the US. Excellent idea to attack someone for being precise. If you want to complain about the fact that English reference works use foreign diacritics, complain to Britannica and Webster, not to me. I have no influence on them. I am only trying to make sure that Wikipedia doesn't depart from established practice in an inconsistent, almost random way. Hans Adler 09:36, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

You've just proved my point. Zurich no longer uses a diacritic in standard English because they're becoming obsolete. I don't care what Webster and Britannica do because they are tertiary sources and are disfavoured as sources here. You haven't addressed that point. We use reliable secondary sources. If you want to complain about the fact that Wikipedia prefers secondary sources to tertiary ones, please do so on the WP:RS talk page. Absconded Northerner (talk) 10:00, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I have not proved your point. Zurich is virtually the only place from a German-speaking area which got a diacritic stripped off in Webster's Geographical Dictionary. All others that I have looked at keep them, and so far nobody has found another example in spite of numerous discussions. (Also not for French, Spanish or any other European language.) Hans Adler 15:03, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

We need a precise guideline regarding using diacritics, the current situation is absurd. I agree with Hans, the guideline should be build up in accordance with the standard practice of the English reference works, not sports websites or news servers. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 10:26, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Good luck in changing the policy then, because that's not current practice. Absconded Northerner (talk) 10:42, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Careful, with your systematic ignoring of what has been said before you are getting into troll territory. As I pointed out already, roughly 4% of our articles contain diacritics, while roughly 0% don't where they could theoretically. Of course nothing prevents you from using Special:Random to make your own experiments and prove me wrong, but please do so before contradicting me in this way. Hans Adler 15:03, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, it isn't easy, but the policies aren't unchangeable. The current practice is chaotic and inconsistent, harmful to this project. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 10:54, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I have tried to make sense of the argument "The reason we follow reliable sources is to provide the best possible service to readers. What's ridiculous is to pollute English language articles with a load of stray ink that means nothing to most people and which will be totally obsolete within a few years..." the first sentence is fine, of course, but the only meaningful thing I can get out of the second sentence is a notion that diacriticals are going extinct somehow, and a notion that the set of "reliable sources" somehow excludes both foreign sources and those english sources which accurately reflect spelling of foreign subjects. Both notions are absurd and false. Possibly this is an example of Poe's law; it's so hard to tell on the internet. bobrayner (talk) 11:29, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Poe's law is about religious fundamentalism, despite the efforts of that article to portray it otherwise. Diacriticals are becoming obsolete in English. Their continued use on this site should be discouraged. Absconded Northerner (talk) 11:56, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

With Unicode, there is somewhat greater use of diacritics now than there was in the days of Linotype or ASCII. But the level of use you see in Britannica is still way, way outside the mainstream -- and Wikipedia is even further outside. We put the diacritics boldface in the opening anyway, so why is there a pressing need for them in the title as well? An article is obviously easier to find and easier to link to if the title is typeable. Kauffner (talk) 13:27, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Take a look at the article Vladimír Svačina (currently a WP:RM candidate located at Vladimir Svacina). The opening sentence says: Vladimir Svacina (Czech: Vladimír Svačina; born April 28, 1987) is a Czech professional ice hockey player... The article suggests that there exists an entity called Vladimir Svacina (not English, not Czech, just a nonsense), while the correct name of that person is a Czech translation. This is utterly ridiculous. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 14:04, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

That was silly. I fixed it. I hope it sticks this time, although I noticed someone tried before. Kauffner (talk) 14:33, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Not at all. The letter "č" does not exist in English, so to render it as "c" is entirely sensible. Absconded Northerner (talk) 14:14, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

The name is not English. You don't get an English name by removing the accents. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 14:20, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Well I'm afraid reliable sources disagree with you. You might not like it, but that's just the way it is. An English site shouldn't be full of symbols that English doesn't use. It's unhelpful. Absconded Northerner (talk) 14:32, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like an issue of WP:CRYSTALBALL. If diacritics become obsolete, we will of course reflect that fact. But we won't anticipate it. It seems like people are spilling a lot of ink to argue with one editor who is expressing opinion rather than making substantive arguments. — kwami (talk) 15:14, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I wish Evlekis would stop doing that. It's quite simple: until the source policy is changed, reliable secondary sources will remain the requirement and no amount of foot-stamping will change that. That means "Vladimir Svacina" is the correct article title. Absconded Northerner (talk) 15:21, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

When you are in a hole, stop digging. You are not a politician in an average talk show on TV, who can basically say everything and when he is corrected it looks just like a matter of opinions. Everybody can easily verify that high-quality English reference works use diacritics for words from European languages in practically all cases. You are verifiably wrong, and it's time for you to realise this fact. Britannica uses diacritics, Webster uses diacritics for proper names, and so does Wikipedia (in practice, though admittedly our guidelines leave this open). Hans Adler 15:46, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I've already pointed out that those are tertiary sources. Since you don't seem to have re-read WP:RS recently, let me quote the important part that I've directed you to several times: "Wikipedia articles should be based mainly on reliable secondary sources. Tertiary sources such as compendia, encyclopedias, textbooks, obituaries, and other summarizing sources may be used to give overviews or summaries, but should not be used in place of secondary sources for detailed discussion."

In other words, it doesn't matter a damn what Websters or Britannica says because secondary sources are more important. Unless you are going to change that policy, it's you who is verifiably wrong. Absconded Northerner (talk) 15:49, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Huh? What are we writing? A professional tennis organisation website, a tabloid paper, or an encyclopedia? In case you forgot, we are writing an encyclopedia, and therefore we are using basically the same conventions that other encyclopedias use. It's what we do in practice, and it's what we should do. Your self-serving misreading of policy is not going to change this. Verifiability is for facts, not for style. Hans Adler 15:56, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

When writing about a sportsman or sportswoman, a professional tennis organisation website is a perfectly sensible source to quote. I'm reading policy perfectly correctly. Your deliberate attempt to ignore policy you don't like is not acceptable. Absconded Northerner (talk) 15:59, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

We are not discussing what sources to quote, we are discussing how to determine the spelling of names. Your deliberate attempt to misinterpret policy in order to enforce a radical change to roughly 4% of Wikipedia's articles is not acceptable. Hans Adler 16:23, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Your continued ability to ignore policy is astonishing. I really suggest you read through WP:RS and WP:COMMONNAME and learn what the policy actually is, not what you think it is. You are the one making the mistake and I'm getting rather tired of having to correct you. Please do not respond until you thoroughly understand the appropriate policies because you simply wasting everybody's time right now. Absconded Northerner (talk) 16:36, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

I really don't get it

Can anyone explain to me how the result at Talk:Verónica Boquete#Requested move at all comports with our guidelines here? Doesn't WP:DIACRITICS say "follow the general usage in reliable sources that are written in the English language"? All but one source found so far spells her name without diacritics, but yet I could get no consensus to follow this guideline. Powers ^T 23:03, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

I don't know why I have to repeat this all the time: It's a question of register. Sports organisations and many newspapers drop accents. Encyclopedias and dictionaries don't. It is a well established principle that reliable sources are not automatically reliable for everything. Common sense must be used. When a sports organisation writes a name without accents, it says nothing about whether encyclopedias write it with an accent or not, so it cannot possibly be a reliable source on this.

As I have pointed out repeatedly, you are fighting against the status quo from roughly 4% of Wikipedia's articles. Hans Adler 23:36, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

That's ridiculous. They drop accents because it's not common English. And sites like the ATP/ITF do use diacritics in place names that are used regularly in English and then don't for the common English names. Saying they are not a reliable source for the people they represent is simply a blatant falsehood. Those tertiary sources like encyclopedias often source their articles to those very organizations. Plus this wikipedia deals with direct sources... you show me a dictionary with the name Verónica Boquete so we can all say it's a great source. You can't. Show me her name in Encyclopedia Britannica while you're at it... you can't. They are not sources for her or most players. The NY Times is, the Boston Globe is, so are the ITF and WTA plus countless others. It is not the status quo in tennis articles, just the work of a very passionate few mostly secondary English speakers trying to abscond with the English alphabet. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:58, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

As you have been told before, that's not what the site's policies currently say. That's why this requested move was defeated. Hans, please drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass. Absconded Northerner (talk) 23:50, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

Is it me who is trying to rename 4% of Wikipedia's articles? Hans Adler 10:14, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

The part I really don't get is why diacritics attract so much interest when the subjects are exceedingly obscure sports figures. We have open diacritic-related RMs for Turkish cities and for former Vietcong, but they get no equivalent level of interest. Kauffner (talk) 00:21, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

That's probably because their names are in European languages. Nobody seems to care very much about non-Europeans, fewer even are capable of understanding how diacritics work in Turkish, and an even greater number are downright intimidated by the character set in Vietnamese. National Geographic has it about right. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 00:31, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

All I'm saying is that the language in this guideline seems quite plain to me, but there seems to be a contingent that insists that anyone who has diacritics always has diacritics, even the majority of available sources drop them. Powers ^T 02:17, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:32, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

I don't know if you are unable to understand a nuanced argument or if you simply close your ears when you encounter one. If you are unwilling or unable to acknowledge reasonable arguments that contradict your opinion and keep aggressively denying that they exist, then at some point you will be taken to task for the resulting disruption.

While "anyone who has diacritics always has diacritics" is a reasonable approximation to what we do in practice because the exceptions (such as Vietnamese names or names of Americanised people) form a tiny minority among our articles, as an absolute rule this is clearly a minority position and rarely argued in the recent diacritics discussions. You are setting up a strawman because you know your arguments don't hold water against the actual majority position, which is to follow general English usage in other reference works, not in random barely reliable sources.

People lose their accents when their names become household words in English. This is very rare and happens only to the cream of the most notable people, such as Napoleon (not: Napoléon). All other names from any of the more commonly encountered foreign languages keep their accents in all high-quality reference works, lose them systematically in many reliable sources that are less concerned with niceties of typography, and are treated inconsistently by quality sources that operate under time pressure, such as the New York Times. By spelling Verónica Boquete as Veronica Boquete in a reference work, we would claim that she is as important as Napoleon. I am pretty sure she isn't, as I have never heard of her. A lot of people who I have actually heard of have articles in Britannica, and they are all listed their with their names spelled correctly, i.e. with all applicable diacritics. That applies to the 1911 version as well as to the modern online version. The only diacritic-dropping that I have seen in Britannica article titles was for Vietnamese names. Webster's Dictionary of Geographical Names confirms, for place names, that this is how English reference works operate. Hans Adler 10:32, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

While sources such as articles in Britannica are worth considering for article titles, but Britannica has its own eccentricity and if it is in a minority then its usage should be balanced against usage other reliable third party English language sources when deciding on an article title. In the case of other article titles then we should rely on reliable English language sources. For people who play at Wimbledon we have to use the reliable sources that are available and if the common fashion in reliable English language sources such as upmarket newspapers and books that specialise in tennis and tennis biographies drop accent marks so should we, if they keep the accent marks so should we. I find your statement "By spelling Verónica Boquete as Veronica Boquete in a reference work, we would claim that she is as important as Napoleon." strange we should rely on what is used in reliable sources and not interpose our own editorial opinions on the issue otherwise by analogy anyone who's biography on Wikipeida that is not Anglicised -- such as Lech Wałęsa -- is by that definition not important. Luckily if we stick to common usage in reliable English language sources then we do not have to make such editorial judgements. Also we do not need to speculate on why reliable sources retain or drop accent marks all we have to do is label our articles using the title that reliable English language sources use and we will meet the criteria that we have set ourselves event if that results in a name that some editors think is incorrect.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Philip Baird Shearer (talk • contribs) 11:33, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Usagewise, Britannica is not in a minority among encyclopedias and other English reference works. That's the whole fucking point. While I wouldn't be surprised to learn that there exist a few badly edited specialist reference works here or there that drop diacritics, so far none has ever been put forth by the diacritic dropping zealots. And of course Lech Wałęsa is a lot less important than Napoleon. (You are less important than Jesus. Now report me for insulting you.) And his name has had a lot less time to become incorporated into English. And the current trend is to not come up with special English spellings or adopt the French spelling, as English speakers used to do. The current trend is to write Frankfurt rather than Francfort, München rather than Munich, etc. The same trend exists in may other languages, because in a globalised world this simplifies things. Hans Adler 11:57, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Britannica may well be in a minority among reliable English language sources. I find your tone interesting "diacritic dropping zealots" is the opposite of that "diacritic retaining zealots"? I think that for article titles we should use the name that is commonly used in reliable English language sources. Your argument "his name has had a lot less time to become incorporated into English" will be reflected in the usage. We do not have to speculate on this we can look reliable English language sources and see what is used and reflect that usage in our article title. -- PBS (talk) 15:00, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

There is no reason to follow the majority of reliable English language sources on usage. The majority of reliable English language sources is not organised into articles that try to give a concise overview and begin with one or more summarising paragraphs. Nobody wants to rewrite the Barack Obama article so that it starts: "Last week, the president ...". Maybe you are an adherent to the practice of Cargo cult encyclopaedia article writing? Hans Adler 15:27, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Kind of a moot point, isn't it, since Britannica doesn't have an entry on Veronica Bocquete. Powers ^T 12:14, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

It is not a moot point because Spanish names never lose their diacritics in any respectable English-language reference work, as you can verify by looking up any person with an accent from a Spanish-speaking country on Britannica. They all keep them. Show me what you think is a counter-example, and I will provide you reliable sources showing (1) that the diacritics are not present in Spanish, either, or (2) evidence that the person has moved to the US. Hans Adler 13:03, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

es:José I Bonaparte Britannica: Joseph-Bonaparte ;-) Or perhaps Spanish Wikipedia shoudl be forced to drop its usage of diacritics on names that are not originally Spanish ;-) We have found in the past that when we write naming conventions that use rules like "Name nominal, major realm" there are always exceptions to the rule (King of the Scots, Alfred the Great). You are making a statement that "Spanish names never lose their diacritics", but we do not need a rule like that because if it is true it will be reflected in usage in reliable English, and for those exceptions then they too will be covered by usage in reliable sources. Equally we do not need to decide whether or not Vietnamese names should or should not always loose or keep their diacritics, as we can follow the usage in reliable English language sources and that will reflect usage in English and make Wikipedia both accurate and accessible. We could have a house rule like the Economists [5][6], but as a follower rather than a leader we can piggy back on whatever is determined as the correct style by the majority of reliable English language sources (and hence use verifiability rather than truth as our guide) -- PBS (talk) 23:06, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

As I've said many times, I don't believe this guideline accurately describes our actual practices as regards diacritics, and ought to be changed accordingly. Hans summarizes the actual situation well.--Kotniski (talk) 11:33, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

It baffles me why you do not think that we should be guided by the usage in reliable English language sources for the names of articles, when in other areas you argue that we should. PBS (talk) 11:44, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

I think I've explained this many times before. And this isn't particularly in relation to names of articles (that's another thing I keep saying - this guideline should be renamed simply "WP:Use English" and apply to all parts of articles). With diacritics, the best sources we might imitate for our encyclopedic purposes (e.g. Britannica) do use diacritics in the way we do; so we are being guided by sources, as a matter of general practice. Of course, we're much bigger than EB, so we can't point to EB's actual spelling of many of our article subjects, because it doesn't mention them, but that's no reason to follow different spelling conventions for those subjects - to do so is to introduce pointless and misleading variation that wuold make us a worse encyclopedia.--Kotniski (talk) 11:59, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Why is it worse to follow what is used in the majority of English reliable language sources? I see no point in following what Britannica does if it is no in line with common usage in reliable English language sources. -- PBS (talk) 15:00, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Because we are an encyclopedia, aiming to convey information to people. Diacritics do that, without doing any harm to our mission except to annoy a few people who "don't like" them because they think they look foreign. This has all been explained countless times before.--Kotniski (talk) 15:12, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Because in this particular aspect the common usage in reliable English language sources is not in line with the common usage of high-quality reliable English language sources and in particular English language reference sources. Dropping accents is trivial to do if you don't like them. Adding them after they have been dropped requires research. That's why mid-quality English reliable sources such as the New York Times, which have to work with what they get from the news agencies (which drop all accents for stupid technical reasons), only try to restore them in those languages with which their staff is most familiar, and do not even manage to do that consistently. (See the New York Times manual of style for details.) High-quality English reliable sources such as scholarly books generally include all accents as their authors and editors do not have to work under the pressure of a deadline. Hans Adler 15:34, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

If what you say is true then you will support using reliable sources as they reflect usage in English, but I suspect you are giving yourself lots of wriggle room: Only if the reliable sources spell words the way I agree with are they high-quality reliable English language sources, if they do not spell words the way I think they should they are low-quality English language sources. -- PBS (talk) 14:44, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

I might say rather that if they are not high-quality encyclopedias, then they are not a guide as to exactly how high-quality encyclopedias should write. In fact, not even EB is necessarily a guide to how Wikipedia should write - if we've got a style that works well for us (and isn't a complete innovation) then we should follow it consistently, except where there's a concrete identifiable reason to deviate.--Kotniski (talk) 07:32, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

The guideline isn't totally wrong, just misleading because it wasn't written with spelling/typography disputes for barely notable subjects in mind. WP:DIACRITIC asks us to consider three kinds of sources: The sources used in the article, a quarter century of books, and encyclopedias. But the vast majority of subjects does not appear in any book, let alone in an encyclopedia. The guideline does not say what to do in that most common case. This makes sense if the disputes were once primarily about the spelling of Napoleon, Zurich, Göttingen or Besançon. But the anti-diacritics crusade of a handful of sports fans who apparently have never seen a proper English encyclopedia has changed this. Hans Adler 11:47, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I suppose that's true - the section "No established usage" is tucked away at the end as if it was relatively unimportant, whereas in fact it describes the far more general case.--Kotniski (talk) 12:01, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

The idea that there's "no established usage" for a major league award winner is laughable. I found a number of sources, the majority of which supported spelling her name without diacritics. Powers ^T 12:14, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that's what I mean, "no established usage" misleads into making people think this only applies to really obscure people and places, whereas in practice it's applied (though not always with total consensus as to where the line should be drawn) to subjects as well-known as Walesa, Mitterand, Schroeder and Gdansk. You have to be a Napoleon, an Aragon or a Mexico to get treated differently. --Kotniski (talk) 12:59, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

All of the names you have mentioned have "established usage" in English. It may be split but the names have an established usage in reliable English language sources. "no established usage" is for names that do not appear in reliable English language sources. -- PBS (talk) 15:00, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, this is basically the point I'm making. When there is what you call "split" established usage, we follow the rules which are given in the section titled (misleadingly) "No established usage". It's actually the cases where there is established diacritic-less usage (like Napoleon and Zurich) which are in the numerical minority, so it's they that should be presented as the exception, not the other way round.--Kotniski (talk) 15:12, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:55, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Are you agreeing that article titles like "Gdansk" which is far more common than "Gdańsk" should follow common English language spellings used in reliable sources and be placed under the article title of Gdansk? If not why make an exception for Zurich and Napoleon Bonaparte  ? -- PBS (talk) 14:44, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Because those forms of the names are so well-established in English that it would look and sound weird to spell them or pronounce them in the diacriticked form. As I say, there may be disagreement about exactly where to draw the line (you might think Gdansk and Krakow are well-established enough to be written so; Britannica, from what I remember, even puts the umlaut on Zurich), but the current wording of this guideline misleads quite badly as to where the line is in fact drawn.--Kotniski (talk) 07:24, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

In the case of Zürich, I'm afraid I'd have to disagree. I wouldn't dream of writing Zürich without an umlaut (I'm English) and most reliable British sources that I've seen follow suit. To say it's "so well-established in English that it would look and sound weird to spell them or pronounce them in the diacriticked form" is simply untrue. In America, possibly. In Britain, definitely not. We tend to use accents where they are used in the relevant country. Maybe we didn't once, but we do now. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:27, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Every sports figure appears in published English without diacritics. This is the convention of sport writing, a usage that is just as established as anything with Napoleon or Aragon. Kauffner (talk) 00:40, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Exactly. Almost no Reliable Source uses diacritics. The idea that WP should be some kind of bastion of outdated usage is ridiculous. This is the English Wikipedia, and titles should reflect standard English usage. Absconded Northerner (talk) 01:23, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Wait, what? "Outdated"? What universe did that come from? Using the wrong letters or ignoring important diacritics is an old practice (though it is very much an American practice nowadays). Computers made it increasingly hard to write things properly for nearly half a century because of restricted character sets (ASCII, the American character set having been inflicted on much of the world during most of that period), which made things worse for a while, but writing things correctly is not an obsolete practice.

By the way, there is no such thing as an "English alphabet". Modern English words use a selected part of the latin alphabet in their orthography, but not all words use that small subset and not all words are of English origin either. — Coren ^(talk) 04:28, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with you when you say that "no such thing as an English alphabet" as do the authors of 100s of books that have "English Alphabet" in their title. If what you say is true about technology, then why do primary sources now over 200 years old such as Treaty of Orebro strip the accent marks off some words such as "Orebro" but leave it on words such as "d'Engeström"? Could it be that these decision are made for reasons other than simple technological expediency? The big advantage of following the lead set in reliable English language sources is that we do not need to speculate on what is as you put it "correct" nor do we have to speculate on why it is done -- as such speculation which only leads to different hypothesise and disagreements which can not be resolved -- instead all we have to do is follow where the sources lead, as editors acting good faith can usually agree on common usage while disagreeing on whether that usage is "correct". - PBS (talk) 14:44, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely. I can't believe anyone can claim with a straight face that there's "no such thing as an English alphabet". That's so bad it's not even wrong. Absconded Northerner (talk) 15:19, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

The big advantage of following the lead set in reliable English language sources is that we do not need to speculate on what is as you put it "correct" nor do we have to speculate on why it is done, Snap. Same goes for using diacritics universally in names of all foreign nationals. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 15:45, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Getting back to Ms. Boquette. I found, surprisingly that the NY Times dropped the ó, although I have a copy of their style guide, that says to keep spanish diacritics. I did not find a 'critical mass' (IMO) of sources on the internet to support using the ó over the simple o. So, I would have to describe the article titling in this case to be defined 'by consensus', rather than by strict rule of commonname. Since she has moved to the US, she may have dropped the ó. I don't see any evidence of her correcting the spelling. Since she achieved notability in Spain, there is a case there to use the ó, but not much evidence of its use in the American or English Internet media. Had I an !vote, I would have supported the spelling using the simple o on what evidence I did find. That said, I am not opposed to the current spelling, but I don't think we should be establishing precedents.

Maybe we need to publish a list of moves of these types of articles, so that a more wide discussion occurs on the naming? If we are to do it by consensus, then we should always attempt to get the widest consensus. Especially since the evidence is not large. ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 16:22, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Just directed by a veteran editor who is going around changing everything to accent graves, acutes, umlauts, diacriticals and hypercriticals, and marks that I don't know the names for. None of them are used by ordinary Americans (Okay, maybe Canadians and Australians and English). Nor are they easily produced on my keyboard. I know. I know. Encyclopedias and dictionaries. But none of these are used, recognized, or nameable by ordinary American readers. Nor do they know how to pronounce them, once viewed (yes, we tell them in dictionary-speak at the beginning, if it's the titled article, but not ordinary imbedded words). Doesn't that say something? I'm certainly not the first to suggest WP:UE. And I won't be the last. Student7 (talk) 12:15, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll bet Mrs. Bucket uses diacriticals when writing her last name. It would appear that everyone ignores them. As well they might! Student7 (talk) 12:20, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Is it really our job to feed ignorance? Our job is surely to correct ignorance. "I can't easily reproduce it" (yes you can if you try), "I can't pronounce it" (so what?) and "none of these are recognised by ordinary American readers" (who, according to surveys, don't even know where many places outside America are, let alone how to spell them) are really not good arguments for not using diacritics where they should be used. Obviously we shouldn't go overboard (especially for transliterated names from languages like Vietnamese and Japanese, which can become unreadable if all the diacritics are added), but umlauts, graves, acutes and the like which are used on names written in a language which is commonly written in the Roman alphabet shouldn't be a problem for anyone. It's been stated many times before: "use English" does not mean "remove all accents". -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:36, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

No, but it does mean "do what English-language sources do". And we failed to do that in the case I mentioned at the start. Powers ^T 15:21, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, we do what a majority of English-language sources do. Which does not necessarily (or even commonly) mean removing all accents. If it does in a specific case then it does, but too many editors seem to have the opinion that accents should rarely or never be used because "they're not English" and/or "Americans don't understand them", which is simply untrue and/or irrelevant. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:19, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

There is no reason why we should do even what a majority of English language sources do. We should try at least to do what some English-language sources do - but as to which ones, we can pick the style that best suits our encyclopedic purpose – and good evidence that we've got it right is provided by the fact that other renowned encyclopedias, such as Britannica, treat diacritics in the same way that we do, and not in the way that this misleading guideline would have us do.--Kotniski (talk) 18:53, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

In many tennis article names we do not do what "a majority" of English-language sources do. In fact in looking for a direct source of how a person's name is spelled in English, quite often we handle it the exact opposite...ignore English language sources and go with foreign language alphabet sources. And we are not Encyclopedia Britannica (EB). We do use EB as an occasional tertiary source but many items listed in wikipedia are not listed in EB. For those items EB is useless as a source at all since we need first-hand citations. It's also not an opinion of editors about accents/diacritic usage. The fact is they are rarely used in English and when they are used, over time they tend to disappear, like in "cafe." If there are "no" English sources for a word or statement i.e nothing in sports organizations, the press/media, magazines, tv... and then nothing in tertiary sources like EB...then we must look elsewhere. That is the time we look at different alphabets like Swedish and use their spelling until such time a source in English can be found. We don't do it the other way around and push English to the background while raising Russian, Chinese, and hieroglyphics to the forefront. That's what other language wikipedias are for. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:45, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

I do not see any advantage to putting diacritics in titles. If the title is not typeable, it is harder to search for and harder to link to. The form with diacritics can appear boldface in the opening. If you check Google Books or Google News, diacritics are nowhere close to majority use for anyone who is likely to have a bio on Wiki. You occasionally see French, Spanish and simple German diacritics in published English, per New York Times Stylebook. In practice, the Times usually drops out even these diacritics. More extreme diacritics, such as Slavic, Scandinavian and Vietnamese, are well outside mainstream English-language usage. Since common name is our practice elsewhere, not using the common name in this situation misleads the reader. Kauffner (talk) 02:23, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

As has been said before, we are not a newspaper or sports website, and we do not have to imitate their styles. By including diacritics, we convey more information than we would otherwise: given that we all know that both diacriticked and diacriticless forms are possible in English, people can deduce the latter from the former, but not the former from the latter. The diacritics also provide information about the pronunciation. Anglophones know that certain diacritics are commonly dropped in English, so they are not going to be misled by our using them. What would be most stupidly misleading, however, is to do what some people would have us do (and what this guideline can be read as implying) - use diacritics for some foreign names but not others, based on counting how many sources of which type we can find using one style versus the other in each individual case. That way people are going to assume that certain names don't have original diacritics when they do. (Obviously we should make exceptions for cases like Napoleon and Mexico, which have been fully anglicized.)--Kotniski (talk) 09:00, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

We don't have to imitate any particular style... but we need first hand English sources for everything. It's not a question of conveying more info as we also put the foreign diacritcally spelled name in parenths after the proper English spelling. I have no idea why foreign spellings and alphabets are being forced upon us in this English wikipedia when English sources tell us how to spell a name in English. As for pronunciation diacritics are not needed in English since our 26 letters have always been pronounced in a variety of ways. We have always been flexible. Makes it tough on foreign students but that's the way it works here. It's not stupid to use diacritics in some names but not others... it just depends on the sourcing. Some names through a multitude of English sourcing still retain their diacritics. Some do not. It's always been a case by case thing. But to use a foreign alphabet when we have most English sources spelling a name within our 26 letters is crazy. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:51, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

There's a really easy solution to this. It's called a redirect! Searching's not a problem, as diacriticked versions will appear as well (try searching for "Zurich" and see what you get!). It is simple rubbish that Scandinavian and Slavic diacritics are "well outside mainstream English-language usage". What's the mainstream? The redneck on the Clapham omnibus? Or the person with a certain amount of education and respect for other cultures? We are not in the business of catering for the lowest common denominator. I would agree with Vietnamese diacritics, since they are transliterated from another alphabet, but for words from languages commonly written in the Roman alphabet we should use the diacritics as properly used. In addition, as I have said before, I believe this is a WP:ENGVAR issue, as diacritics are commonly used by reputable publications in the UK. Americans do seem to have a bit of an aversion to them that is not shared by other English-speaking peoples. -- Necrothesp (talk) 09:09, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Not many readers use redirects. They don't make much practical difference. When thousands of English-language sources don't use the diacritic, and only Britannica and Columbia do, then I'd say it's outside the mainstream. Vietnamese is not transliterated. The Vietnamese alphabet really has all those funky diacritics. Kauffner (talk) 12:04, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I create the diacritic redirect just as easily for those who feel the need to spell in a foreign language. It's simple rubbish to imply that Scandinavian and Slavic foreign letters are in mainstream English usage... they are not. They are not taught in schools unless you are learning a foreign language either. It's also not a question of respect. I expect Serbian books to spell English names in their own fashion... it's fine with me. I have Polish family members who add diacritics and change spellings of English names to suit themselves. That's also fine. I have seen plenty of Canadian, UK and Aussie sources that use no diacritics, and what you might think are reputable sources others might think stink and vice-versa. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:51, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

So what exactly is your problem with Wikipedia using diacritics? They may not be used by the majority of English sources; but they are certainly used by some (and good ones at that); and they seem to serve our encyclopedic purposes best. What exactly is the problem people have with this, except that "it looks foreign" and therefore somehow makes them feel uncomfortable? --Kotniski (talk) 10:53, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

It IS foreign. But on occasion we do use foreign words in English. I'm ok with that even if it's split 50/50 in English sources. But English will eventually remove those diacritics like it does on words like cafe and nee. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:06, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

This discussion is getting very confused. There appear to be three basic camps here:

a) Always use diacritics wherever they are used in the language from which the name originates.

b) Never use diacritics, even when they are commonly used in English-language sources.

c) Only use diacritics when they are commonly used in English-language sources.

Is this correct? My personal opinion is that b) is unsustainable and unnecessary. It would put us in a ludicrous situation where even people from English-speaking countries (e.g. Peter de la Billière) who use diacritics in their names would have them removed in their articles. The fact that many such people exist shows just how misguided the "there are no diacritics in English" argument is.

The problem with c) is determining what common English-language usage actually is. As we can see from the above discussion, different people have different ideas. Should we not use diacritics because newspapers and websites often don't bother? Should we follow usage of one English-speaking country over another? Should we not use them because many English-speakers don't understand how to pronounce them and cannot find them on their keyboards? Although a native English-speaker who does not speak German, I still always spell Zürich, for example, with the umlaut and regard the spelling without the umlaut as rather weird. I therefore find the allegation that "foreign" spellings are being forced upon us to be rather a strange one. Nobody forced it on me: I use it as being the correct spelling of a foreign word. A foreign spelling being forced upon me would equate to being told I have to use the foreign "color" instead of my own native "colour", for instance. A foreign spelling of an English word, as opposed to a foreign spelling of a foreign word. Not the same thing at all. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:58, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I should just point out that, although (a) is the option I support and which Wikipedia generally applies, it isn't quite "always" - there are exceptions such as Napoleon and Aragon, where the form without diacritics (and often an anglicized pronunciation) has become so established in English that we would use it in preference to the original form. I suggest that Zurich is perhaps somewhere on the borderline.--Kotniski (talk) 11:09, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

In other words, you actually support c), which merely says that sometimes we use 'em and sometimes we don't, depending on usage in reliable English-language sources. All we need to negotiate, then, is where the line is drawn. Powers ^T 11:26, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Although my personal preference for my own use is a), for Wikipedia usage I would suggest c), with a tendency towards a) if it cannot be determined that there is an overwhelming preference for non-use of diacritics in reliable English-language sources across all English-speaking countries. This would lead me to favour spelling Zürich (no idea why that seems to be so commonly used as an example) with an umlaut, as I really don't think there is overwhelming evidence that English-language sources usually drop it. -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:01, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I guess I never see it spelled Zürich but I admit I never researched it to find out. I am more familiar with names of players in tennis and that is a different can of worms as far as sourcing. Tennis is governed by the ATP, WTA and ITF. Its Major tournaments are Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and US Open. It has international events in Davis Cup, Federation Cup and Hopman Cup. There are 100s of other tournaments. Results and articles are written in the NY Times, London Times, and ESPN. 99% of the time no diacritics are used in a players name from any of these sources yet people around here insist on diacritic usage in their names. Often a player will have an English website where throughout that website even THEY spell their name without diacritics, yet we still have editors here insisting we use their foreign alphabet birth spelling. Their rational...EB and dictionaries use diacritics. Well unless you are a super-superstar your name won't be in those places so as sources for tennis players they suck. Plus we don't want tertiary sources anyway unless we can't find an original source. I always put their native spelling in parenths after their English spelling so that readers can see how it's spelled in their native alphabet. I also create a diacritic version of their name that redirects to the English version for those readers more comfortable in spelling with their native alphabet. So I'm for choice "c". Heck I could even compromise and say to use diacritics if even 40% of the time English sourcing is found to use them. But less than that 40% threshold and we use the English alphabet in this English Wikipedia. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:06, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm still not seeing your motivation - what good does it do to drop the diacritics?Kotniski (talk) 09:58, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Motivation?? Good? I'm not sure I'm following your logic here. Why don't we use hieroglyphics instead of English letters? Because it's not English. Same with other alphabets. It would be good for scoring in basketball if they changed to rims 5 feet in diameter. Of course it wouldn't be basketball anymore. We could use diacritics on everything to help in pronunciation...of course it wouldn't be English anymore. We normally have 26 letters... that's it. We drop Russian letters in favor of English too. Occasionally we borrow "foreign" words, which for a time retain their diacritics but over time English usage usually removes them. Plus English wikipedia requires English sourcing. If we can't find English common usage sources, it's then that we look to foreign sources, not before. My ancestry is Polish... well all my relatives dropped the diacritics and non-English letters upon coming to the US and Canada because it was not English. Relatives that were born here and went back to Poland changed their names to fit in with the Polish lettering system. What is so hard to understand about this? Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:17, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) One answer could be that we would be using the principle of least surprise. If the large majority of sources do not use diacritics, most readers will reasonably expect our article title not to use diacritics. Ask yourself, would most English wikipedia readers expect it to be Novak Djokovic or Novak Đoković? Jenks24 (talk) 10:22, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

With Djokovic I agree we shouldn't use the original spelling, since you can't see Dj from Đ. But I see nothing wrong with surprising a few readers by writing Šibenik rather than Sibenik, for example - once they realize that we're a fairly serious encyclopedia which (like other such works) uses that style, they'll stop being surprised and become grateful for (or at worst indifferent to) the extra information we're supplying them with at no extra cost.--Kotniski (talk) 10:43, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

One of the main problems I am having with Japanese articles is that the authors turn them into "Japanese lessons" which usually turns the text off WP:TOPIC. Who cares if the -do suffix is used and not -noh? No English-speaker, that is for sure!

Meanwhile, over here, we have some people trying to teach Americans (primarily) some facets of French, Spanish and German. c-circumflex? I am familiar with the "hat" from mathematics. But what is the upside-down "hat" called above in Sibenik? And do I really need to know?

To reword a quote from Animal Farm, some languages are good (Japanese), others are "better" (European?) Student7 (talk) 13:30, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

No, you don't need to know what it's called (unless you want to increase your knowledge, which is rather the point of Wikipedia, although I grant you that the article on the city isn't the place to talk about language and pronunciation). But you do surely need to know it completely changes the way the letter is pronounced! And that omitting it would be extremely confusing (leading to us ignorant English-speakers saying "Sibenik" instead of "Shibenik"). I'm fully aware that there are plenty of people in English-speaking countries whose response would be "who the hell cares how it's pronounced - it's foreign and therefore isn't important (and by the way, where's Croatia?)", but I would hope that most of us here are rather more educated and less ignorant and obnoxious than that. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:12, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

There's a big difference between Vejvancicky and Vejvančický (btw, the word — my surname — has nothing to do with the English language). The first is a nonsense sequence of letters, the second is correct (an important fact for an encyclopedia) and reveals something about the sound of that name. That is noted and respected by significant English reference works (see an excellent summary at User:Prolog/Diacritical_marks#External_guides), but it can be hardly respected by some (mainly sports) editors here at Wikipedia. I can live with that, but it is in my opinion a step back. They don't really need to know. Moreover, the terrible wiggles squiggles could apparently damage mental state of an average English reader or destroy the English language. I respect that. Not long ago, there was an attempt to find a way out of this endless circle of the same arguments, see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)/Diacritics RfC. It failed and we start the same discussion again. In the meantime, some categories look like a bad joke, names are chaotically split without any order (this applies almost exclusively to sports related categories). Maybe there was something wrong with the proposal, but I can't find out what it was. In any case, I don't believe that we can find a consensus. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 15:41, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

There is indeed a big difference between the two words. The first one is made up of English letters while the second has two strange symbols that have nothing to do with the language. This is the English language wiki, and we should Use English on it. End of. Absconded Northerner (talk) 07:44, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

It's not an English name. The only way to satisfy your requirement is to delete all articles about foreigners. --OpenFuture (talk) 09:53, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

What? We have Russian alphabet language names spelled in English. We have Chinese alphabet language names spelled in English. We have Arabic alphabet names spelled in English. Why would we need to delete Polish or Swedish alphabet language names spelled in English? I see no problem. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:07, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Polish and Swedish is written in Latin script and there's no need to transliterate (see also Latin_alphabets#Basic_Modern_Latin_alphabet). As for the Russian, Chinese and Arabic scripts, the transliteration is unavoidable, of course. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 10:34, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

No, they are not "Spelled in English". These names are not English. They are transliterated to the Latin alphabet, but they are not English, even if you remove all the diacritics. --OpenFuture (talk) 11:15, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Fine. There IS a need to transliterate then since we don't use those letters as is shown in the countless transliteration sources for these names. We use the English alphabet not an alphabet being thrust upon us by foreign editors. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:10, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Excuse me Fyunck, but I'm English, my native language is English, I don't even speak any other languages beyond the most basic level, and I fully support the use of diacritics. Am I a "foreign editor"? You may not agree with my point of view, but please don't dismiss those who oppose you in this way. -- Necrothesp (talk) 21:19, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, It wasn't directed at you. It was directed at the person who was throwing his own pompous statements around. Ditto for OpenFuture. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:28, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Ironically, I am a foreign editor, and I think we should follow the sources. :-) --OpenFuture (talk) 21:38, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Well...Vejvancicky doesn't think we should follow the English sources unless he gets to pick and choose which sources agree with him. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:28, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

There is no need to transliterate. You may desire it, but there is no need. I don't think unreasonable argumentation and claims with no validity is going to help this debate. We need to get some sort of grounding in reality and reason here. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:38, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

There is if you want to spell in English. If you don't that's fine. But wiki requires English sources. If the names in those many English sources spell it in a foreign alphabet then that is what we can use here. If they spell it in English then spell it here in English. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:28, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Again, you can't spell it in English. English for "Björn Borg" is not "Bjorn Borg". It's "Bear Fortress". English for "Tomas Tranströmer" is not "Tomas Transtromer" it's "Twin Cranestreamer" (or possibly "Twin Codliveroilstreamer", if you wanna be funny). --OpenFuture (talk) 04:52, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

I would say you are incorrect. Some English language sources have been spelling it Bjorn Borg for 40 years and when he shook my friends hand I distinctly heard Bjorn not Bear. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:30, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, and what you hear is not English. It's mispronounced Swedish. And what you read is not English. It's misspelled Swedish. "Bjorn" is not English for "Björn". The English for "Björn" is "Bear". And that's a fact. So your arguments that the English Wikipedia should use English is based on a misunderstanding from your part. Which is of course also why nobody else supports that standpoint. This is not a discussion of English vs Non-English. It's a discussion of diacritics vs no diacritics. Removing the diacritics from a foreign word does not make it English. "Bjork Gudmundsdottir" is no more English than "Eg verd nu ad kvedja i kvold" is English for "Ég verð nú að kveðja í kvöld". Once again and hopefully for the last time: Foriegn languages, be it words or names, do not become English because you remove the diacritics. OK? --OpenFuture (talk) 06:19, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

I go by English sources not what you are telling me. And saying "nobody else" supports that standpoint is incorrect. If you'd like to put up an article on Bear Fortress though, be my guest. It's why in English words like café become cafe or général becomes general. You may call it wrong but others do not. Whether someone goes by Paweł Kołodziej or in English, Pawel or Paul Kolodziej, it's the same thing. And with a last name of Armstrong are you telling me that when I go to France they will spell and call me by Monsieur Brasfort? No... they call me Monsieur Armstrong. And if I tell them I spell it my own way, ΦΨΩ™₣, but it's pronounced Armstrong I wonder how they will spell it there? As I said from the beginning, if the multitude of English sources spell it with diacritics then I have no problem with it here in an English wikipeida. If the English sources don't spell it with diacritics then I do have a problem with it being spelled with them. Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:36, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

No, they won't call you Brasfort. They will continue to use your ENGLISH name. But badly pronounced. Which is my whole point. They will not translate it to French.

"it's the same thing" - Yes, and that thing is not English. "Kolodziej" is not English. It is not clear to me if you understand this or not. --OpenFuture (talk) 08:36, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

For my family, Kolodziej is the correct English spelling though you say it is not English. It has worked out just fine. And in historical journals and newspapers and even books printed in Michigan that's how we spell it. You can spell your name however you like but we spell iours Kolodziej in the States and Kołodziej in Poland/Austria. Now maybe the terms you are using for what is English still mesh with that, I'm not sure. But it is a fact that Kolodziej is spelled correctly in the States even though it is spelled Kołodziej in the homeland. Maybe it is not English, but it is the correct spelling using the English alphabet. Fyunck(click) (talk) 17:58, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

How immigrants choose to spell their name in the US is obviously up to them. But we are not talking about people living in the US here. We are talking about foreigners who have foreign names.

"It is the correct spelling using the English alphabet." - For somebody living in the US and spelled his name "Kolodziej" on official US papers, then it would be correct to say that this spelling is correct, yes. But that is not the issue here. Compare for example the "discoverer" of the Kensington runestone, Olof Ohman. He was born in Sweden, and his name is spelled Olof Öhman. But when moving to the US he chose to drop the umlauts. That's up to him. Therefore the Kensington Runestone article spells his name Ohman. But he could have chosen to spell it Oehman, or take a new name, perhaps a translation of the name, or simplified it (OK, hard in this case, pretty simple already, but there are cases of Shumachers who changed their name to Shoemaker, for example). That would then be his official name. But what is a correct spelling is still up to him, and not to you and not to "English". Neither Ohman, Öhman or Oehman is English. --OpenFuture (talk) 18:22, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Actually it's up to the English speaking people to decide how to spell anything at all in English. It is their language and they can do what they want. Neither you nor I have much to say about that. And you say it's not the issue here but in some cases people have come to the US, dropped their diacritics when writing their own names in English and yet still we have people here fighting to use their foreign alphabet. Unless rules are overturned here at wikipedia, if I see names that are English-sourced without diacritics that's what I'm going to use. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:00, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

It's still not in English. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:49, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

lol...I think this one is going nowhere fast. Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:02, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

That is correct. As mentioned above, "Bjork Gudmundsdottir" is no more English than "Eg verd nu ad kvedja i kvold". It doesn't become English because you remove the diacritics. It is still unclear to me of you understand this or not. Until you understand it, we won't get anywhere. --OpenFuture (talk) 07:30, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

ditto. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:23, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Until you understand that the English language doesn't use these symbols, there's no point continuing this. I really can't believe we're wasting so much time listening to non-native English speakers telling us what English is. Absconded Northerner (talk) 08:02, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

I understand that English doesn't use these symbols. Once again: Non-English names are not English. I really don't understand what it hard to understand with this. --OpenFuture (talk) 09:19, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

This is the English language version of Wikipedia, on which we use the English language - hence the name. That means English symbols and none of this non-English nonsense. If you want to use foreign symbols, do it on a foreign wiki. Absconded Northerner (talk) 09:27, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

The only thing I want, is for you and Fyunck to understand that non-English names are not in English, and does not become English because you remove the diacritics. It's vital that you understand this for you to be able to participate in a constructive discussion on the issue. Do you understand this? --OpenFuture (talk) 10:03, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

It's like talking to a brick wall... You're just wrong about this. Please stop embarrassing yourself. Absconded Northerner (talk) 10:34, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, so "Eg verd nu ad kvedja i kvold" is English. Good to know. At least we agree on that it's pointless to continue. --OpenFuture (talk) 10:40, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

As I said, you're embarrassing yourself. Stop introducing pointless strawmen. Absconded Northerner (talk) 10:53, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

It's not a straw man. You and Fyunck claim that when you remove the diacritics it becomes English. That claim is incorrect. Neither "Bjork", "Bjorn", "Stromback" or "Eg verd nu ad kvedja i kvold" is English. This is a fundamental and important fact. Discussion about this issue is impossible if you refuse to acknowledge fundamental facts about reality. We won't get anywhere as long as you have these unrealistic and absurd positions, and therefore your views will in the whole be ignored. --OpenFuture (talk) 11:09, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Actually I was not saying it automatically becomes English by removing diacritics. I say we use English sources. Now, by those sources using a word repeatedly it enters English lexicon and becomes English as with an Exonym. That's the way English works. You can't simply stop the process and say don't let that word become English. If you hand me a new fruit called a beebo in Sweden and I mishear and tell the US it's a beeloo and soon all the major sources start calling it a beeloo, that'll soon be the English word for beebo. That sort of thing has happened many times. And with personal names and talking and writing in English, and having 26 letters to play with, the US isn't going to say "hey you" and write "that dude" over and over, so the US compromises and tends to drop diacritics rather than spelling the name phonetically. That's the word that tends to enter English sources and the English vocabulary. Not always, but almost always. I certainly didn't mean to imply we "only" use English here, we do however use English sources. I'm not sure why this is so hard for you to grasp. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:44, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Of course it's a bloody strawman. We're saying that the current policy of using reliable sources should be followed, while you're trying to convince us to cover the English Language with non-English symbols. Until you learn to read policy, understand it, and stop making pointless arguments you should stay away. I believe there's a Swedish language wiki, and I suggest you edit there if you don't like the rules here. Absconded Northerner (talk) 11:52, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

No, that's not what you are saying at all. You said, and I quote: "This is the English language version of Wikipedia, on which we use the English language - hence the name. That means English symbols and none of this non-English nonsense. If you want to use foreign symbols, do it on a foreign wiki." That's a completely different position that "Follow the sources". Both you and Fyunk has argued that "only English" should be used, which is an absurd position. "Follow the sources" is not an absurd position, so if that's the position you want to defend that would be a big step forward. --OpenFuture (talk) 15:29, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Read back through my comments in the previous topic and this one. Then apologise. Then stop bothering people. Absconded Northerner (talk) 16:02, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

I assume though that this is your way of admitting that you were wrong, and distancing yourself from the quote above. However, it is very difficult to have a constructive discussion when one persons arguments consist mainly of insults, so it would be better if you engaged in consensus building and followed WP:NPA instead. Thanks.

In any case, it seems that we can then now lay this to rest? Nobody is any more claiming that accents and diacritics should never be used on Wikipedia? Nobody is claiming that you get English by removing diacritics from foreign names? Good, that's one step forward. --OpenFuture (talk) 16:41, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

I assume that this is your way of admitting you never bother reading anything before blessing us all with your massive intellect? It is very difficult to have a constructive discussion when one person's arguments are uninformed by what other people have already said, and it would be better if you paid attention instead. Thanks. Absconded Northerner (talk) 17:44, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

I was searching an article in "edit" mode, for a word, using Mozilla/Firefox. Could not find all instances of a word because of the accent marks. IMO, this is not a good thing for an English keyboard. Student7 (talk) 15:32, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Do you mean Ctrl+F function? I search thousands of items (English or non-English) using this function, and it was never problematic. What about trying copy-pasting? According to this logic it means that we should delete all accent marks from Wikipedia. I can't support that, as the English tourists misled by wikipedia may be lost and starve to death in the forests under Děčínský Sněžník, while searching Decinsky Sneznik. --Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 16:23, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Luckily most English tourists have their trusty smartphones so that when they google English Decinsky Sneznik it comes up with the Czech alphabetic spelling of the word. That way they wouldn't have to worry about some lowly idiot in the street directing them to a tattoo parlor. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:10, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Tell that to the steady stream of tourists who show up at an obscure village near my parents because they think it is some other similar but diacriticed famous town. Agathoclea (talk) 22:05, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Better have a talking-to that guy in the street. :-) Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:28, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. I know little about smartphone, but it looks that the clever machine can provide correct information to a reader, so I (and the English speaking tourists) can sleep safely and Wikipedia can stay nobly confused :) --Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 05:51, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

@Necrothesp in reply to the comment that starts "No, you don't need to know what it's called..." Spelling Zurich as Zürich changes the pronunciation to German not English (if one knows what the dots over the u are supposed to sound like in German). If the word was to be transliterated into English it would be "Zuerich" (which is closer to the German pronunciation than English). This is not something that is commonly done because English speaking people do not pronounce the name of the city the way the Germans do. Likewise do you (Necrothesp) pronounce Mousehole, Southwark and Shewsbury the way they are spelled? (I don't I say /ˈʃroʊzbri/). As you must know, English people get very used to American tourists mangling place names because they pronounce them the way they are spelled ((not their fault it shows they can read) and asking for "Worcestershire source" in a standard English accent in the USA tends to get a confused look from a waiter). Placing accent marks in article titles (and hence in bold in the first line of an article) that are not usually pronounced by English people that way and not usually included in reliable sources may allow a person educated in the use of accent marks, to pronounce the word as it is pronounced by a native of the subject of an article, and at the same time be completely incomprehensible to other English language speakers because it is not the way English people pronounce the name (Think of Inspector Clouseau pronouncing "room" as "reum"). I think it is much better to use the spelling as frequently found in reliable English language sources and then if the native language spelling is different place the native language and native spelling in parenthesise after the English spelling, that then give the reader full information about English language usage and that of the host language. -- PBS (talk) 03:03, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Which is what I said! Use reliable English language sources. Always our policy. No need to make a special case for diacritics (i.e. never use them because they're "foreign") as some seem to be demanding. However, it should be taken into consideration that reliable sources in the UK and the US (and no doubt in other English-speaking countries as well) do often seem to differ on this issue. It is my experience that the British seem to be more receptive to "foreign" spellings than the Americans. For instance, while we in the UK used to use the spellings "Marseilles" and "Lyons", as Americans still often do, we have not commonly done so for many years. The Zürich issue is similar: I have usually seen it spelt with the umlaut in British print sources and the spelling without looks weird to me. Yes, I'm sure opponents could dig up umpteen British online sources that spell it without the umlaut (the BBC doesn't use the umlaut, for example) and it's a borderline issue, but it's certainly not true to say that English-language sources always spell it without the umlaut. Arguments that diacritics should never be used in English Wikipedia because they're foreign are misguided and diverge from our usual naming policies. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:39, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

(Thread has become (just become?) a bit out of hand and "someone" might consider starting a new one.

I don't think most Americans (or Australians, or NZ-ers, or Canadians, or British) can read an "accent acute," know what it means, why it is there and how it affects the pronunciation. And neither do I for non-French language examples above.

What audience EB is aiming for is irrelevant. We aren't aiming for that audience, per se. We don't have professional, paid editors! Nor are we aiming for the college crowd, per se. I admit that I don't know where the "target audience" is defined. But for general level material (places, for example), aiming at the general literate online public seems reasonable. But except for language articles, not at language aficionados. Student7 (talk) 13:24, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, most British adults should bloody well know what French accents mean, since we've all done O Level/GCSE French! Frankly, I don't think there's a great deal of point starting a new thread, since we're quite clearly not going to agree. We may as well just continue doing what Wikipedia has always done - follow the reliable English-language sources and argue over the borderline cases! But we should certainly acknowledge that "Use English" certainly does not mean "get rid of all diacritics even if the reliable English-language sources do use them". -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:59, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

But that leaves us with the original reason I started the thread. We have a name where the vast majority of English-language sources drop the accent, but yet I could not get consensus to drop it from our article's title. There's a disconnect here between practice and policy. Powers ^T 19:17, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

LOL... yep. That's what always happens with this. All factions write a bazillion words and when it's all sifted we're back at square one where practice and policy don't match up. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:46, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

The problem was that Boquete is a borderline case and they will always provoke arguments. You're never going to get away from that. Others disagreed with your assertion that an overwhelming number of reliable English-language sources dropped the accent and pointed out that sports writers are not exactly known to be the greatest users of the English language and their writing therefore shouldn't necessarily be taken as gospel. The operative word here was "reliable". This wasn't a case of going against our usual practice but a fundamental disagreement by some editors with your position. I should point out that I'm fairly neutral on this particular issue (i.e. re Boquete) and am merely stating the facts as I see them. -- Necrothesp (talk) 08:10, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Well first off, we consider sports writers reliable sources for information on sports, don't we? We have featured articles on sporting events and sportspersons, whose references no doubt largely comprise the writings of sportswriters. So why discount those writers' reliability in this singular case? Second of all, even if we do consider sportswriters unreliable for purposes of orthography, that ignores the direct evidence presented by her own team's website, which I would think would be among the most reliable of all possible sources. Powers ^T 15:06, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

I said sports writers are not well-known for their skills with language, not for their knowledge of facts about sport. Which team's website are you talking about? The Russian team she currently plays for, from a country that doesn't even use the Latin alphabet, or her former American team, from a country which does not appear to much favour diacritics even when they are used in other English-speaking countries? And let's also remember that sports teams' websites are also written by sports writers! The UEFA website, incidentally, does use the accent. As I said, this is a borderline case and not as cut-and-dried as you are presenting it. -- Necrothesp (talk) 07:49, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Obviously I meant her former American team's site; the Russian team's site would not be a good source for how to spell a name in English. I love how you discount American sites en masse because they don't "appear to much favour diacritics" -- it's awfully convenient to recommend ignoring any source that disagrees with you because they disagree with you. Powers ^T 12:51, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Just as you are discounting the UEFA website presumably? As I said, I really don't care how Ms Boquete's name is spelt in her article, so there's really no need to attack me and assert I'm discounting sources that disagree with me, since I have not expressed an opinion about this article. I'm merely pointing out the faults in your argument that normal Wikipedia practice is being disregarded in this case. The debate was held in the proper place, on the talkpage of the article in question. A majority of other editors disagreed with you and the article was not moved. You seem to be saying that this was against standard Wikipedia practice. I'm saying it wasn't, as this is a borderline case and not as obvious as you are presenting it. Standard Wikipedia practice is to follow a majority of reliable sources, but always allowing for WP:ENGVAR (which means appreciating that the name of a non-American should not be determined purely by American sources if there is evidence from non-American English-language sources that the non-use of diacritics in her name is not universal). -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:14, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Although the "how to spell in English" is still a misnomer, the name doesn't become English, it's still Russian, just transliterated. This should be obvious, but it isn't (see debate above) so I'm just pointing it out here, for accuracy. :-) --OpenFuture (talk) 15:39, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

I'd never say there is no such thing as English alphabet because there is one indeed. It is also correct that diacritics do not feature in the language's orthography. My question is, since when did an orthography have to contain every symbol that was permitted and accepted in the language? Sasha Vujačić is Slovene but /ć/ is not a symbol of Slovene and I have been the one to keep this on my watchlist to stop pro-Serb enthusiasts removing his sourced Slovene variation (Vujačič). Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 17:38, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

The problem here is gaining a consensus that all will observe. I have been enlightened about O-level French for Brits. Didn't know that.

Most of us would agree on the use of references/footnotes. Because of the consensus, that can be enforced. And when tagged, if no footnote is forthcoming, most editors would support the removal of the material after a reasonable period of time.

Not much agreement here. For me personally, I would not change a marked word back, but will certainly never insert one, unless I had copied it from somewhere. The problem is consistency within an article. If I insert "Zurich" someplace, there will have to be a person or bot that "cleans that up." Too obscure for me. Student7 (talk) 21:18, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Diacritics in European ice hockey bio articles - A solution?

I participate in many RM discussions related to using diacritics in the ice hockey biographies of European players. It was noted somewhere that "concrete situations are the soil from which our policies and guidelines grow", so I jump from discussion to discussion along with two groups of editors. The groups, the names and opinions of the editors are basically the same at each RM: There's a group of (mainly North American) hockey fans/editors (only the ice hockey bios are affected by this long-lasting dispute, as far as I know), who always vote for a title without the accent marks. The other group (mainly Europeans) always vote in support of the accent marks. The votes are still the same and the result depends on various factors (it is not always the strength of arguments - the arguments are on the table for long time and they are just repeated in various combinations). One never know what result to expect (it's a lottery), but the actual result for this encyclopedia is an inconsistent mess. After the RM at Marek Zidlicky (won by the "anti-diacritics group") and a short congratulation at User_talk:Dolovis#RM_Milan_Jurcina we've moved to Talk:Milan Jurčina (a Slovak playing in the NHL). At that RM you can find an interesting idea to move "all pertinent hockey-related pages", as "the current road (RM to RM) is a long bumpy ride". What do you think about the situation? Is there any way how to resolve the problem?

An important note: I'm a supporter of the "pro-diacritics" opinion, which is — I believe — clear from my previous comments and actions in this area.

--Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 13:30, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• I would propose that we should freeze the articles with or without diacritics in their current guise. "Both sides" ought to submit to a moratorium on page moves instead of engaging in this perpetual tug of war, which is frankly disruptive. Whichever group that can create the largest number of articles (adhering to DYK size criteria) in their preferred format "wins". ;-) At least that way, the encyclopaedia is the winner, with a larger number of articles being created by either side. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 14:32, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• It is not a bad idea, and I would agree. The problem is how to check the new articles and the size. For example User:Dolovis is a prolific creator of one line stubs (I have nothing against their creations, a little information is better than no information) and it would be difficult to force them to create DYK size articles or prevent them to continue in their style of editing. I'm not sure, but you are right that this fight has to be stopped. --Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 15:38, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• Yes, to be honest, making a size rule would heavily favour the better-known players or players who play in N. America. Local Slovakian players' articles are more likely to remain stubby for longer. Nevertheless we ought tojust call for all the regular suspects to sign up to a binding moratorium on proposing and voting on such page moves for an indefinite period. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:45, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Has anyone ever suggested a widget/preference that automatically strips all diacritics when the page is displayed?--Boson (talk) 18:49, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
  • That's it! Just like the image filter, a "diacritics filter", at the option of (and customizable by) each user. That way, those of us who would like to read English Wikipedia in the English alphabet can turn off the diacritics, and those who want to read English Wikipedia in other alphabets can do that. Neutron (talk) 20:31, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
    • That's a good idea. If people want to self-censor their information, and dumb it down without limiting others access to it, that's fine. I think this is an excellent idea, and I'd strongly suggest you raise it at another forum (WP:VPT, perhaps)? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 15:45, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• I think it could help to resolve this issue in a peaceful way, but it is a complicated question affecting a large part of the project and millions of our readers. It shouldn't be as controversial as the image filter poll, however, think about the possible weak points or gaps in a possible new setting/preference. I'm not sure if the readers (English speaking or non-native English) fight with the accent marks similarly as the small group of editors at this forum. On the other hand, the English Wikipedia is read globally and the opinions on using diacritics differ significantly, which is evident here, among the people who create and maintain this project. Another question is if it's possible technically, it could be more complicated than we can imagine. I agree with Piotrus, we should copy/move this part of the discussion or start a new one at WP:VPT. --Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 16:47, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Well, for one, it would be helpful if you didn't distort the comments made on the Jurcina talk page, Vejvancicky. My comment, in its entirety, was "While on the face of it I support such moves, on the grounds that WP:COMMONNAME should trump the fanaticism of a vocal minority for non-English usages, this move will be futile without securing the consensus to apply this to all pertinent hockey-related pages." I did not propose any such mass move, and the "bumpy road" comment was not mine. That being said, I would heartily support any consensus that ice hockey-related articles were not, in point of fact, exempted from WP:COMMONNAME, an official Wikipedia policy which explicitly holds that "Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it prefers to use the name that is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources."

  That being said, your proposed solution is, frankly, farcical. Questions on policies and guidelines are settled with debate and consensus, not through sideshow competitions. Ravenswing 20:39, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• What gives a self-acknowledged group of Europeans, for whom I must assume English is a second language, the right to dictate how English speakers must spell English.  You seem to be incapable of comprehending that we know we spell names of people differently once they move to English speaking countries.  Marek Zidlicky, Milan Jurcina, and all the rest chose to move to English speaking countries; part of the price of that is that their names get spelled without diacritics.  Please, if you think this is a major deciding factor on whether or not these people will accept the $10 million a year contracts they're offered to come here to play hockey, or whatever sport, please let them know that they should turn down the offer and stay in their homelands; no doubt they'll be heroes to their countrymen for defending the precious diacritic.

But the fact is (at least based upon my knowledge, as one of them, of English speakers), we English speakers are unwilling and uninterested in learning how foreigners spell and pronounce words, names, etc.  Oh, perhaps for a few, as a hobby, that's not the case; but for the mainstream rest of us, we simply don't care.  Do whatever you like in your country, spell with upsilons (ʊ) and gammas (Ɣ), omegas (ɷ) and macrons (ū), write in Sanskrit for all we care, just don't think that you're going to dictate to us that we must do the same in English.  Our English speaking societies determine the spelling of our language for ourselves; it's done initially by our press and by our publishers; thus the reason that, it is the policy of en.WP to determine what the English RS use as the common English spelling and follow that.

Those proposing that en.WP title our articles in foreign languages often imply that our sports press are incapable of accurately determining the foreign spelling of these names due to publication deadline restrictions; but what you obviously fail to understand, is that if our press had any intention of writing in a foreign language, we are quite capable of setting up computer databases to ensure that proper diacritics are added; we don't; not because we can't; not because there isn't enough time; but because we speak English and English doesn't use diacritics such as those.  Different story if we're writing about some foreigner in some foreign land, then we're likely to hardly ever discuss them, so nobody really cares if the odd extra scrawl is added to the name, partially in respect of their foreign culture, and partly as indication that they are of little or no importance to us; but when talking in English about people resident in English countries, the standard is no diacritics.

If your name has diacritics and you're planning on moving to an English speaking country, either accept the fact that your name will not have diacritics here, or don't and don't come here; the choice is entirely yours; we really don't care one way or the other.  But please stop the disruption of bimonthly proposals to change en.WP into foreign languages; there is a HUGE list of other wikis where you can do that.

I propose that we correct all the article titles, move them all to English (as determined by the preponderance of the RS), in accordance with the policies established by consensus, and stop wasting everybody's time arguing one proposal after another to change existing policies in this area. — Who R you? Talk 02:27, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• That's not the issue. There seems to be no real consensus one way or another about what we should do with the articles globally; there is certainly no consensus to mass move them to namespaces other than the ones they occupy at present. What you suggest will escalate and enflame. I feel the "right" solution must be one that preserves the peace and minimises disruption by perennial page move requests and battles. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 02:37, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• The majority of the articles in question appear to have been created with the English spellings, as per the English RS. It then looks like a small group of pro-diacritic, (as Vejvancicky says) European, therefore ESL editors have moved them to the non-English names. And while this appears to have been successfully achieved primarily because most of the editors that care about en.WP being kept in English don't seem to find out about these RMs until long after the fact (since most editors apparently don't spend most of their time on WP checking things like the RM lists). It would appear, now that more people have gotten fed up with this anti-English crusade being carried out, that some want to say, Okay, hold on, we got away with a lot of non-consensus changes, let's just call a halt to things the way they stand now; but, I for one, have no interest in that. Perhaps you should have avoided trying your big July/August proposal to ignore all RS and spell en.WP in a foreign language; but you didn't; and while I couldn't have cared less about the issue prior to seeing that kind of ridiculous anti-English sentiment, it is now simply a bone of contention which I believe should be corrected; and which I am confident that the vast majority of English editors will agree should be corrected to reverse some of the harm being caused to en.WP. And so now those of us that oppose these anti-English attitudes will have to waste our time trying to correct the random inconsistency that has been created all over en.WP by a small group of ESL editors ignoring the policies and moving articles to foreign spellings. — Who R you? Talk 03:14, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• You're disingenuously trying to blame me for something that happened long before I joined this circus. Judging from your rhetoric, you seem to feel that diacritics are utterly alien and are happy to continue the flame war until diacritics are banished from en.wp. I don't know whether it will get you want you want, but please be my guest. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• It isn't any one proposal, nothing wrong with one person thinking diacritics should be used and suggesting a policy change.  But as the partial summary of past conversations about diacritics, at the bottom of Talk:Milan Jurčina, indicates, this conversation has happened literally thousands of times; and in every case there is no consensus to change the existing policies.  And, (again as per that list), policy is eminently clear that on English Wikipedia we use the English spelling as identified by the English RS.  And yet all of these various articles have been moved to non-English spellings at the same time that these proposals to change policy are failing to achieve consensus.  As for an RfC, you don't mind if I put together a proposal first do you?  Rather than just winging it with the simple policy clearly says follow English RS so I'd like to propose that we follow policy; not that that isn't the jist of it.  And I have no problem with diacritics for (for example) Köln, despite that fact that when I was there last it was Cologne even in German (which is likely why the article is still here in English); but the pro-diacritic side fails to comprehend that your proposing that English Wikipedia articles be titled in non-English.

I seems that you (a euphemism which I use only to shorten the description of the pro-diacritic forces but which is honestly not intended as a WP:PA) think that it's no big deal, but you fail to understand that you are asking us (the English speakers of the planet) to tell all the English speaking children that use en.WP as a resource that they are misspelling Milan Jurcina if they write it as such; you are asking us to tell them that English media are incompetent morons incapable of properly spelling a persons name; and you are asking us to tell them that they are idiots if they don't (on top of everything else we expect them to learn) learn not only these hundred, or potentially thousand, odd extra symbols, and learn to be able to recognize them, write them, type them, correct them when they see them misused, but also that we expect them to learn the linguistic significance of these scribbles.

And while that's likely fine for you as a Czech or Slovakian, we of course deal with a lot more countries that a few little Baltic states; so we will also expect our children to understand, differentiate, and properly pronounce e é è ė ê ë ě ĕ ē ẽ and ę in English (okay so that's only "e" which has what three possible pronunciations; "long-e" as in "keep", "short-e" as in "kept", and silent "e" as a modifier of another vowel as in "came" vs "cam"), plus all the other diacriticized forms of "e" in Czech/Slovak; oh ya, and in Spanish; and then there's French, and of course there's Italian, and Greek, and I'd be willing to bet that someone who has even the faintest interest in linguistics (which I pretty obviously don't) could add substantially to that list.  So, briefly, if English has 5(6) vowels, with roughly 15+ different sounds, and then we add 9 possible diacritics (which some will argue are technically part of the latin character set since they are, somewhere or other, used in languages also based on Latin), then that would be really roughly ( 5 × ( 9 + 3 ) ) = 60 vowel sounds.  Add to that diacritics on the remaining 20 consonants and then multiply that out by the 5, 10, 15 languages that English draws it's words from, and the 100 odd countries that people immigrate to English speaking countries from, and you start to get into thousands, if not tens of thousands, of possible pronunciations for everything in English. 

My response is, not gonna happen!  Couldn't care less how much you whine and complain about it, oh, boohoo, if these people didn't move to English speaking countries their names would be spelled differently on Wikipedia (actually of course, if these people hadn't moved to English speaking countries their names wouldn't appear in en.WP at all).

I seriously would like to respect your national pride, and it certainly isn't about trying to offend any foreign person or country; but, if you want to come to the country where they speak my language, you're going have to accept that the people that speak English are going to decide about things like speaking English (spelling included). — Who R you? Talk 05:09, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I observe that this conversation (above and below me here) seems to be acquiring a rather sarcastic / condescending tone, so I think it unwise to continue in this conversation which isn't going anywhere but down the pan. My national pride has absolutely zilch to do with anything in this debate. My country doesn't use diacritics. Hell, it doesn't even ordinarily use Roman script – that's if you consider 99.9% of its citizens. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 05:59, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• And given that you now tell us that your country doesn't even use the Latin character set, just what makes you think that you can tell all the English speaking people of the world how to spell English.  Or is it simply that you enjoy harassing and disrupting others by trying to dictate to them how their languages should spell things.  Why don't you provide us the examples of where your language spells English names in the English form with Latin characters?  How about you provide the link to Jimmy Wales', or Bill Clinton's, or Ronald Reagan's pages on your wiki so we can all see how this isn't just a case a you coming to the English wiki to intentionally disrupt and create problems. — Who R you? Talk 12:39, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Gosh, how I detest smart-arses! The city I was born in country belonged to one country when I was born, and belongs to another one today. In addition to living in my birth city for quite a few years, I have lived for over a decade in the UK, nearly a decade in France and 2 years in the Czech Republic. I am trilingual. I will have you know that 'Bill Clinton', 'Ronald Reagan' and 'Jimmy Wales' are spelt exactly the same as that in French and the Czech Wikpedias; not all Wikis are as stupid as Latin WP by spelling Jimmy wales 'Iacobus Wales'. Now it's time for me to STFU, as I clearly know nothing. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 14:10, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Atleast Dolovis is using the RM route, in having these hockey player articles moved to their english-sourced names. If memory serves me correct, alot of these player pages were moved to their non-english names (i.e diacritics) without seeking consent or via an RM. They were moved to their diacritics titles, rather unilaterally & (if I may) quite arrogantly - with summaries along the lines of 'moved to the correct name'. GoodDay (talk) 04:37, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• And it looks like some of those moves were taking place shortly after long disruptive discussions on proposals to change the existing policies failed to achieve consensus, while some apparently decided to just go ahead and move articles regardless (See this 2006-2007 discussion and this March 2007 move for example).  Apparently some think no consensus for change translates into consensus against the status-quo. — Who R you? Talk 05:35, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Quite aside from anything else, there's an important point to be made. I - and I expect a number of others on the so-called "anti" side - am not "against" diacritics. What I am is for WP:COMMONNAME, supposedly a policy of this encyclopedia, to be respected and enforced. Any name or usage where diacritics prove to be the most commonly recognized form of the term in English-language sources should, of course, be the one used by the English Wikipedia. The issue is really quite that simple. Ravenswing 05:21, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• We couldn't possibly be arguing to follow policy established by consensus, could we? — Who R you? Talk 05:37, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• You are suggesting that a diacritic needs to have more than 50 percent usage on Google Books or Google News to go into the title? This never happens. Kauffner (talk) 05:51, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Certainly never going to happen for Books/News written in English about people living in English countries.  Of course if you'd like to look up a foreign person in a foreign country, say like François Mitterrand, perhaps surprisingly you'll find that both the majority of the RS and English Wikipedia use diacritics.  Isn't it interesting how the English Wikipedians at en.WP establish policies about determining the English spelling of names and then follow them; unlike the small group of foreign editors who apparently just come here to get their kicks out of disrupting the en.wp and vandalizing our pages by moving them to foreign spellings? — Who R you? Talk 12:39, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Would you mind assuming good faith and not accusing people of vandalism just because you disagree with them. I'm an English Wikipedian (i.e. actually one from England, not just one who speaks English) and I generally favour native spellings, although obviously I bow to consensus (which, incidentally, we haven't got with diacritics or we wouldn't be having this discussion). Claiming that all (or even most) English-speaking people oppose diacritics, as you seem to be doing in several posts above, is inaccurate and without any evidence whatsoever. "If your name has diacritics and you're planning on moving to an English speaking country, either accept the fact that your name will not have diacritics here, or don't and don't come here." Oh really? Tell that to General Sir Peter de la Billière, to give one example plucked out of the air, who is as English as I am (although presumably of immigrant origin somewhere along the line, as are many people ultimately) and uses the diacritic on his name. Inaccuracies, misrepresentation, insults and generalisations get you nowhere. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:10, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Perhaps you should try checking your facts first next time.  Isn't it interesting how when one actually reads the sources in that article one finds out that, in fact his name isn't spelled with diacritics, and the only reason you were misled into believing that it was is because some Necrothesp (talk · contribs) decided with this move in Sept 2005, to ignore all the RS and create his own spelling of this guy's name.  And of course if this user had bothered to follow Wikipedia policies and checked the RS, he might have realized that all the RS references linked to the file show the spelling as Billiere (sans diacritics).  But apparently people deciding to get creative with the English spelling of peoples names isn't a new thing on en.WP.

It appears that this user was confused and didn't understand reality, that while the general was (it appears) originally French Canadian, and therefore had a non-English name (as is French), that his name included foreign letters (such as with diacritics); but then the general apparently moved to England and, as all 11 of the britsh documents and the 3 pages of Amazon books show, when one moves to an English speaking country (even if when they're moving out of a bilingual country where they were a part of the non-English portion of the country) upon moving to an English speaking country, the diacritics are dropped, as they were for Peter de la Billiere (even thought the "de la" is a pretty good give away to the fact that his name sure as hell wasn't English to start with).  But you'll notice that, upon moving to an English only country (that is to say upon moving away from French/English bilingual Canada to unilingual English Britian) his name changed and the diacritics were removed (as evidenced by all the RS documents accessible through his article).

Not to worry, I'll do an RM to fix the ridiculous move back in 2005 when the article was changed so as not to match the sources; it appears that, like so many of these moves, some editor just decided that he was going to make up the spelling that he though would be cool, perhaps because he saw it written somewhere in some foreign language, and just went ahead and moved the article.  And by all means, please do tell me where I said that all English speaking people oppose diacritics.  And while you're at it, feel free to see if you can come up with an example of where someone uses diacritics in an English country and the RS actually backs you up on it.  Meanwhile I'll add the RM template.  And, of course, you're mistaken when you imply that there isn't any consensus on diacritics; there is a consensus policy that says Use English and follow the English RS; what there isn't is there isn't consensus to change those policies, but the fact that there isn't consensus for change does not mean that the existing policies don't still exist; and, until there is consensus to replace them with something else, there is de facto consensus for the existing policies; and that de facto consensus is Use English, follow the English RS, etc.

Meanwhile, feel free to show everyone a scan of an American passport, or immigration document or green card, or a British travel visa, or a Canadian landed immigrants card, or an Australian entry visa that uses diacritics; but the fact is they don't, the systems don't accept anything other than basic English characters (and in the case of Canada the French diacritics used in French, and in the case of the US the diacritics used in Spanish), and even then they're rarely used.  But as the argument has been the last three times it has occurred and as it is now this fourth time, the policy is en.WP uses English RS to determine spelling.  If you would like to move an article to a spelling that uses something other than the basic English set of Latin characters, you provide English RS that supports the foreign spelling; you don't post how your gut feeling and WP:OR have convinced you that it should be spelled in a foreign language and you don't just go ahead and move it and leave it to others to have to fix your mistakes and point out again and again and again and again that the policy of English Wikipedia is that we follow English RS. — Who R you? Talk 16:33, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Over the top claims can easily make you appear very, very silly. In this case, you seem to be concluding from the spelling of de la Billière's last name without accents in some sources and in the body of the article that that's the official, most correct spelling. But which spelling of his name is more likely to have been checked and, if necessary, corrected by him? The one on a random website (britains-smallwars.com), the one in military dispatches (one would expect the same technical restrictions as for wire news here), or the one that is printed on the cover pages of books authored by him, or the one with which he signs? On cover pages the critical word appears in the following variants: "Billière", "BILLIÈRE", "BILLIERE". The last version is entirely consistent with his name being spelled with the accent grave, since according to some variants of traditional typography accents on capital letters are always dropped. Where I could look inside the book, his name was always spelled with the accent. In one book I even found a facsimile of his signature, complete with the accent. Hans Adler 19:24, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, you seem to be labouring under the misconception that Peter de la Billière is a first- or second-generation immigrant to Britain. Well, you can read about his family here. It's a Huguenot soldier family, part of which emigrated to England around 1700. French always having been familiar to educated English people, and of high social prestige, there was no pressure whatsoever to change French names. I know it's different in the US, but if you want to edit an international encyclopedia you need to be open to things being slightly different in other countries. Hans Adler 19:57, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

One thing though. This is not the International Wikipedia, it is the English Language Wikipedia. It happens to be read and edited by an international audience but that does not make it an international encyclopedia. Those from other countries have to be open to the fact we don't do things their way or from an international pov. Canada, US, UK, and AU have English language differences that we must respect and work around... and we do, taking it article by article. But we use English here. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, this is one way in which knowing only your mother tongue can make you appear silly: by not fully understanding the meaning of English words of Latin origin such as "international". (Hint: think of it as inter-national. What you are referring to would be called interlingual.) This is the international English-language encyclopedia. And it is well established that for Canadian or British subjects etc. we use the Canadian or British variant of English, respectively. Since Peter de la Billière is a British citizen, British English is what we need here, and absolutist claims about English that hold more or less for American English but are plain wrong for British English are not helpful at all. (Of course, claims about English that hold for no variant at all, such as the claim that English simply does not use any accents, which is contradicted explicitly by the Oxford Companion to the English Language and implicitly by just about every English dictionary, are even less helpful.) Hans Adler 21:19, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

And this is one way that your comprehension appears silly. You didn't seem to understand that I was correcting your "international encyclopedia" comment. If you'd like to call it an international English encyclopedia that's acceptable by me. I should have added international (or multi-national) to my wording I agree, but to simply call it an international encyclopedia with no other modifier is also incorrect. And I have no qualms about using British English wherever needed. If in British English sources it is universally spelled Peter de la Billière, and we are going by British English in that article, I would have no problems using it. And I never said English uses no accents. I would say English rarely uses accents and when words are brought over, in time they usually lose their accents/diacritics. English just has no use for them. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:32, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

You were 'correcting' the following comment of mine: "I know it's different in the US, but if you want to edit an international encyclopedia you need to be open to things being slightly different in other countries." It's clear from context that by "other countries" I was chiefly thinking of Britain. Things that are clear from context, such as "English-language" in this case, don't have to be mentioned. That's a very fundamental aspect of how language works, and you have little chance of arguing away your mistake by pretending it doesn't hold in this case. Anyway, it's pretty clear from your 20:40 statement that you got confused about the distinction between international and interlingual, since you contrasted "those from other countries" with "Canada, US, UK, and AU", as if they were not other countries. Not a big issue at all, and only the fact that you made this mistake while purporting to correct me makes it rather awkward for you. Hans Adler 22:49, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

It was not clear and those that follow may or may not realize you were limiting your conversation to the UK. It is fundamental not to assume, especially here on wikipedia where things can break down so quickly, so I corrected your mistake. And you seem to like throwing in words like "silly" and "awkward" as if those will help in conversations. I assure you they do nothing but lower you down in the eyes of others as seemingly petty and disdainful. Fyunck(click) (talk) 01:23, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I never cease to learn new things from Wikipedia discussions. Here is my 'mistake' sentence again, together with the preceding one: "French always having been familiar to educated English people, and of high social prestige, there was no pressure whatsoever to change French names. I know it's different in the US, but if you want to edit an international encyclopedia you need to be open to things being slightly different in other countries." I was aware there are some editors with ADHS and similar problems, but I didn't know that some editors are able to mask really serious problems such as inability to read a sentence in the context of the immediately preceding one to the extent that you are obviously doing. Congratulations. Hans Adler 10:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The name is not universally spelled with the accent in British English sources. The reason is the usual one: Some sources have technical problems and some just don't care about such niceties of spelling. But Wikipedia does not have these technical problems and all encyclopedias care about niceties of spelling, so we have no excuse for dropping diacritics that belong in a name. Hans Adler 22:52, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Interesting. Do even half the British sources spell it with an accent? Maybe even 40%? At least then you'd have something other than a pov to bring to the table. Fyunck(click) (talk) 01:23, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

And, the context of this whole conversation is?... "Diacritics in European ice hockey bio articles".  And if you'd read all the other sets of conversations that have gone on in this regard you'd recognize that, much earlier in the conversation (long before yet another fork of it started here), the comments were that i) there are exceptions, ii) the de facto ban on diacritics in common English (regardless of specific exceptions) never included French, iii) the conversation here, and where it was carried over from Talk:Marek Zidlicky to Talk:Milan Jurčina which then linked to the new creation of this thread to whine and complain, was always about following the English RS.  By all means, if the majority of the English RS spell Billiere as Billière then his article's title should have the accent grave, and if, as a quick review of all the sources linked from his article, it is continually spelled without, then the common English spelling is de facto without; I really don't care which form it takes, what I do care about is that whatever form it takes be based upon and supported by the RS.

I see at Talk:Peter de la Billière the argument of late is, well, sure the book covers don't actually have the accent, but that's because of "… a typographical reason: A lot of typographers, though not all, subscribe to the rule that French accents on capital letters are always dropped."  And again, it comes back to the same thing it's come to in every one of these conversations, cite the English RS that shows that the most common English spelling is with diacritics and (hopefully) everyone that's currently opposing any article that has diacritics in the title immediately says, then en.WP should have diacritics to match the most common English spelling as demonstrated by the English RS.  But the fact is that, even for a name of French heredity, most of the sources seem to spell it without the accent grave; including the cover of his own autobiography and the cover of his "personal account" where the photo includes, presumably the official version of, his military nametag which doesn't have the accent.  And of course it'd be nice to just be able to trust another editor that says, well I've looked it up in such and such and it's spelled like so...; but past experience with some of the editors(admins) who keep moving these articles to diacriticized forms is, that on those rare occasions that they do cite some actual backup, a review of the documents that they've cited, as backup up for their actions, generally ends up not saying what has been claimed, or the claimed WP policy ends up actually just being something created by the editor/admin in question with the apparent intent of deceiving other editors; which makes it rather difficult (and rather stupid) to AGF.

But then let's look at what this conversation was actually about, shall we.  Rather than providing the 1 in a million exception that proves the rule, perhaps you'd care to comment on the conversation that was actually taking place; not about French accents (which were previously acknowledged with regard to potential exceptions), but rather the addition of the Ž, ý and č in the article titles for Marek Židlický and Milan Jurčina to name just two examples.  Did you have the great British citation that supports the use of these diacritics as part of the most common English spelling of names?  Because as the argument has been from the very start, no one seems to be against diacritics on article titles where there is substantial English RS to demonstrate that diacritics are part of the most common English spelling, it is rather the recent policies of editors (developed quietly in private little groups) to move articles to titles with diacritics, in some cases (Zidlicky) where not one English source uses them.  Or were you also arguing that English sources such as Newspapers, the NHL, the guy's hockey jersey, are an indication of the incompetence of everyone else but that, as a wikipedian of superior intelligence, your (meaning their) decision as to spelling is the determining factor and to hell with the sources.  Perhaps you can clarify what you've decided the policy is on determining article titles (since apparently English RS and the most common English spelling are out); or should I just AGF that you're so much more brilliant than everyone else, and are able to properly divine English spellings of Foreign names without sources, so I should just trust whoever wants to come up with a new spelling.  See I think there's a difference between assuming good faith where someone does something that could be a mistake and continuing to trust someone after a review of prior comments has demonstrated a tendency towards lies and deception (and hopefully the fact that I've never communciated before with either Necrothesp or Hans Adler will lead them to recognize that I'm obviously not talking about them in that regard). — Who R you? Talk 09:05, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Putting aside Who r you's laughably arrogant and angry response to my polite request to refrain from attacking other editors, which one must presumably put down to inexperience and possible immaturity and simply serves to illustrate my point further, I shall just point out that De la Billière's name is spelt with the accent in his own books, on the Amazon page and in Who's Who (whose entries are written by the subject). He clearly spells his own name with a grave and since he is a native English-speaker we should follow suit. As to English-speakers not using diacritics, try checking the Oxford English Dictionary, the bible of British English lexicography, and see how many words of foreign origin retain their diacritics when used in English. -- Necrothesp (talk) 21:36, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• There's nothing to salvage this conversation. It's uncivil, and it's going around in circles. And I'm glad I'm not the only one to find User:Who R you? arrogant and immature. THE END--Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:33, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Agreed, the conversation has deteriorated, but add User:Hans Adler to the arrogant/immature stack. END #2 Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

RFC on hockey names

There has been a brewing issue at WP:RM over WP:HOCKEY recommendations and how they should be applied over WP:COMMONNAME and WP:UE. Basically the hockey recommendation is that Diacritics shall be applied to all player pages, where appropriate as for the languages of the nationalities of the players in question. This is in fact a mandate that does not allow consideration of any other policy on naming. I think we need to resolve the issue of which naming convention we use for ice hockey players. Is it the one for the names of everyone else based on existing policy and guidelines, or do we have a blanket exception for one project? Vegaswikian (talk) 00:53, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

This looks like a case of a local consensus, which can't override COMMONNAME. --FormerIP (talk) 02:07, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

In agreement. COMMONAME can't be overidden. GoodDay (talk) 02:26, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Of course it can. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:33, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• Personally, I've commented at many a discussion on diacritics and RMs involving moves to / from article names containing diacritics; and I've been more than a little frustrated by the apparent leeway permitted WP:Hockey and others on this point.  Reality is that a large number of the WP:Hockey crew pushing article renaming, and all the numerous discussions that have taken place regarding diacritics, are ideas being promoted by ESL editors using the global nature of the internet to try to dictate, from their homelands on the other side of the planet (from North America), what English spelling and practices will be for the English countries and speakers of the world.  Those of us that live in English countries, and those of us that are native English speakers, know full well that diacritics do not exist in our society and are not a part of our language.  I'll try to respond to the exceptions when the people that don't understand the realities of our society mention the individual exceptional cases, which they have continually attempted to use in past discussions to imply the opposite of what we all know to be the truth, which is that we don't use diacritics in the English language and that this is the English Alphabet; not ŧĥĩş.
  Most of us try to be welcoming of foreign cultures and of immigrants; and I may have a problem with those that aren't; but that does not mean that we need to surrender our language so that others may dictate to us it's spelling and character set composition; nor that we need to force future generations of English speakers to not only learn our language, of somewhere between 171,476 and 988,968 words plus, in most cases, at least one foreign language (not to mention the large percentage of our population that speak at least one more foreign language on top of that because it is/they are their hereditary language(s)); and also now to submit to this small group of internet dictators and accept that your children, and their children, will no longer learn a language of 52 letters (26 × 2), but that they will now be compelled to learn, understand, memorize, and learn the pronunciation of hundreds of additional symbols.  This is nothing short of agreeing to harm them and make their lives vastly more difficult.
  The majority of this push appears to come from a small group of Czech editors that wish to increase the English alphabet to include a whole range of extra symbols and verbalizations.  And while they only concern themselves with their small personal nationalist agenda, we must consider the big picture and recognize that it isn't just the 200 or so added little combinations from the Czech language that we're talking about, (not that I'd suggest agreeing to that), but we, of course, as English speakers, operate on a global scale and so we have pressure to include Polish, Vietnamese, Latin, Spanish, Italian, French, German, Dutch, Netherlands, Iceland, Hawaiian, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, off the top of my head as I'm typing.  I don't agree to sell future generations down the river just to appease those that yell and scream and whine the loudest.
  Personally, I'd like to see us move towards a ban on these constant move wars and policy proposal battles; to have the opportunity to concentrate on editing articles and trying to improve en.WP.  I wonder if there is community support to put forward a proposal, with a sunset clause for 2014, to, following the adopting of the single last policy change, ban proposal of new changes to WP policies which, in any way, involve diacritics, to confirm that our policies are that names must adhere to the name/spelling that is used by the preponderance of the English RS, and to block from editing (for rapidly escalating periods of time) any editor that moves an article or starts an RM (either to diacritics or away from diacritics) without substantial talk page documentation of the RS statistics with the proviso that, actual cited RS are the only salient point in determining spelling (i.e. a move); that it doesn't matter what your argument on the topic is, good, bad, or otherwise, nobody's going to respond to your issues because only one thing matters, and that is the most common English spelling in English RS.  Harsh, but it appears to me to be warranted.
  Reality is that those that have a problem with the spelling most commonly used in the English RS should be approaching those RS to change how they spell things, not badgering the rest of us with their arguments about why we Wikipedians should ignore the RS and increase the size of the English language.  Thoughts? — Who R you? Talk 02:58, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• We should follow English sources as this is English language Wikipedia. Also, as an 'english only reading layman', I don't understand those diacritics & see no educational value in them. GoodDay (talk) 03:07, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
• Retain status quo for now. Nobody uses the transistor radio these days. People have moved to higher quality music sources; hell, they don't even listen to media files with 128k bit rate these days, preferring instead 320k or VBR. Just because some users don't feel the need for a hi-fi or an iPod, doesn't mean the world should be stuck with tranny radios. In that same vein, encyclopaedic accuracy ought to prevail. WP:IAR, a pillar of this encyclopaedia and one of our shortest policies mandates "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it." That's what we should do. I might support a more nuanced approach, such as removing the diacritics of those players who have become naturalised citizens in one of the officially monolinguistic anglophone countries, but removal of diacritics on a wholescale basis is disruptive and detrimental to this encyclopaedic cause. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:33, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
  • PS I'm not aware that "ŧĥĩş" is a word in the lexicon of any language, so it's patently absurd. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 03:45, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• The hockey project's suggestion was a reflection of previous consensus within the project, and it served us well. Alas, a couple people have taken it upon themselves to simply wear their opponents out to create a new local consensus on some articles. As I've noted elsewhere, I am neutral on their use, but I would take issue with the argument that our guideline is an attempt at overruling COMMONNAME. The truth is, it doesn't, because there is no project wide consensus on diacritics. It is a direct result of this lack of consensus that Dolovis was at one point placed under a community restriction regarding moves to and from diacritics. If you want to argue that recent local results at RM should necessitate a second look at our internal guideline, feel free. But do not misrepresent the project-wide state of the debate on diacritics. Resolute 04:04, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Oh, and no offence Who R you?, but tl;dr. I couldn't be bothered to even read that text wall, let alone care enough to respond to any of it. Resolute 04:04, 14 November 2011 (UTC)