Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style

See also
Wikipedia talk:Writing better articles
Wikipedia talk:Article titles
Wikipedia talk:Quotations
Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/quotation and punctuation

Usage section

(1) I seek consensus to add the following:

Avoid the use of wordings such as "note that" and "remember that", which change the tenor by directly instructing the readers.

(2) As the invisible comment says, this is probably better in the Abbreviatinos section: "Abbreviations of Latin terms like i.e. and e.g., or use of the Latin terms in full, such as “nota bene”, or “vide infra”, should be left as the original author wrote them. In the main text of articles intended for a general audience, consider spelling out the item in English (“that is”, “for example”).<!-- why is this not in [[#Abbreviations]]?-->

(3) I wonder whether this is better in the Varieties of English section: "Use an unambiguous word or phrase in preference to an ambiguous one. For example, use “other meaning” rather than “alternate meaning” or “alternative meaning”, since alternate means only “alternating” to a British-English speaker, and alternative suggests “nontraditional” or “out-of-the-mainstream” to an American-English speaker. Tony (talk) 01:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Agree strongly with 1, but it could (should?) be made more general - we do not address the reader directly. I think we already do say that somewhere, so we could just add these examples as subtle variants to watch out for. Point #2 sounds very reasonable. Same for #3, as far as placement, though I think it probably exaggerates the actual case considerably (not the topic under discussion here; just a side comment). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 04:55, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with your first suggestion. These are rhetorical phrases, and much finely crafted prose uses them freely. I strongly disagree with your third suggestion as well, at least as far as your example goes. "Other meaning" is awkward, and "alternative meaning" will only suggest "nontraditional [sic]" in a slang context. An encyclopedia needs to be written in formal prose. I mildly disagree with your second suggestion. TheScotch 07:44, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

(2) and (3) are not my suggestions: they're there already, if you'd bothered to look. I disagree that much finely crafted prose uses "note that" and "remember that". Please provide examples. Doesn't sound finely crafted to me. Tony (talk) 09:47, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Words to avoid covers (1), though that guideline does ramble a bit. I'm not clear what the "Usage" in the "Usage and spelling" section title means. It seems a bit of a mixed bag. I can't see any spelling guidelines in that section either. Colin°^Talk 11:33, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

1. 1 is fine with me (perhaps it should live with Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Avoid second-person pronouns). Could we add the Latin phrase Nota bene to your short list of what constitutes addressing the reader? N.B. instructs the reader to "note (this information) carefully" and as such is another direct mode of addressing the reader. WhatamIdoing 16:10, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I would say that that that isn't really what n.b means anymore. It might stand for nota bene, which literally means "note well" (or indeed "note good"), but the usage has drifted so much that it really doesn't mean that literally anymore. Usually, writers use it for emphasis or to denote a caveat. It's not great to use, but I wouldn't want to see it recommended against strongly. Plus, of course, if it's in a quote it gets left alone. SamBC(talk) 18:26, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

deBolding Synonyms

When did not bolding synonyms for a person become the new rule? Or not having it as a standard in MOS? Can I now deBold every synonym in every biography in Wikipedia? See: [[1]] --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 08:50, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Since that part of MOS was overhauled a few months ago. Now it's optional. "Equivalent names may follow, and may or may not be in boldface." Sometimes it just makes the opening look ugly/lumpy. But don't upset people by mass debolding—unless you think they won't mind. Tony (talk) 09:45, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Links in titles

On "Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context" it says: "As a general rule, do not put links in the bold reiteration of the title in the article's lead sentence or any section title." Following the link given: "from Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Article titles" - I couldn't find an account of this guideline concerning section titles. I found Wikipedia:Lead section#Bold title, which refers only to avoiding links in the bold title words. Does this guideline still apply to section titles, and if so, what's the reasoning behind it? Dan Pelleg 10:43, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

The reasons are that:

1. Some preference settings make clicking on the section head open that section for editing - this means the links are non-usable
2. In certain settings and for some vision problems the presence of links will be hidden.
3. It overloads the section heading.

Rich Farmbrough, 12:35 9 October 2007 (GMT).

Nobiliary particles: usage and capitalization?

Hi, I just would like to clarify our usage and capitalization conventions for nobiliary particles. These are the "of" words used in many European languages to denote that the family belongs to the hereditary nobility. Examples might be Charles de Gaulle, Simone de Beauvoir, Max von Laue, Johannes Diderik van der Waals and Lorenzo de' Medici.

My questions are whether we should include the nobiliary particle (de, della, von, van, etc.) whatsoever, and where it should be capitalized. My own preference would be to include it as part of the last name (e.g., "After winning the battle, de Gaulle returned to...") and to capitalize it only when it occurs as the first word in a sentence, e.g., "Van der Waals proposed a modification of the ideal gas law, which von Laue confirmed experimentally..." or (possibly) in a section heading or article title, e.g., ==Della Rovere family==.

I'm sure that this is treated in one or another style manual, but I haven't found it as yet. Any suggestions or clarification would be very welcome — thank you! :) Willow 15:15, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Good luck. The article van (Dutch) shows some of the problems that arise as one country differs from another in its use of prefixes. rgds, johnmark† 16:59, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Also note that these are not always "Nobiliary" as they are in German and as such their capitalization varies. Even the usage of Van and van differs between Belgium and Dutch in the same language. We can apply to each name the same common use in English standard we apply in other situations. Rmhermen 20:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your help and insights! I never knew all that about the Dutch van. :) Unfortunately, I'm a little unclear on the solution. Do you mean that we should adopt the same custom as the originating country does, e.g., Belgian typography for Belgian names and Dutch typography for Dutch names? It's a minor technical point, I realize; I was just curious whether WP had any consistent policy on such nominal particles. Willow 22:42, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

We should do what English does. If you are using an English source, follow it, unless a majority of other English sources disagree; this will usually (but not always) be what the original language does. Since the original languages are not consistent among themselves, and English is not consistent in following them, no simpler rule is possible, or desirable; although your example is often a good first guide. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:00, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Establishing geographical context

I didn't know where to post this comment, so please move it to the appropriate page. I noticed that many editors (especially those working on US articles , and obvsiously know intimetly the country) take for granted that the average editor have the same knowledge of the country as them and often omit specifiyng the country in which the article refers to. Examples include:

• In biographical infoboxes, for a US native the country USA is rarely mentioned (Portland, Maine instead of Portland, Maine, USA)
• For an article related to a place of person in the United States, the name of the country is not mentioned once in the lead, instead editors rely on the name of the state to establish the geographical context.

What Im saying is that editors should be precise when establishing the geographical context of the article in the lead, and indicating the country should be highly recommended.

Note that the same applies for UK-related articles, however when commenting on this issue, editors were strongly opposed to using (for example) Manchester, England, UK or even indicating that it is located in UK. Thank you for your comments. CG 16:29, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

I think that this context is often aided by wikilinking the location. If this is sufficient is certainly open to debate. SamBC(talk) 18:47, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Heck, who doesn't know where Maine is? Tony (talk) 09:37, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Um, WP:BIAS? SamBC(talk) 14:07, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

To give a slightly better response, I know plenty of people here in the UK who wouldn't recognise Maine as being in the US, or even a US state. A lot of British people certainly couldn't name the 50 states (I can on a good day), and many couldn't even recognise them (given a list of, say, 60 place names, they wouldn't be able to say confidently which 10 weren't US states, unless you chose the 10 to be ones they would recognise). Your example is especially good because it isn't one of the states that British folks tend to be aware of (like California, Florida, New York, Texas and the like); a lot of Brits are also unaware of the difference between Washington DC (which we are probably all familiar with) and Washington state. Outside the native-English-speaking world, I wouldn't be surprised if the same is true of the UK nations. Well, maybe a little surprised. The point is, just because most contributors would be surprised to meet people who didn't know it, doesn't mean we can work with the assumption that people will. SamBC(talk) 14:14, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Portland, Maine, is American idiom; Portland, Maine, United States, is nobody's idiom. Therefore we should use the first, in accordance with the section on National Varieties of English. Some readers will have to click on the link to Portland, Maine, which is the reason we require the link. Portland is not alone in this; far more readers will have to click on Naypyidaw, or even Myanmar.Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:09, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

As it happens, I agree with you. I was just explaining above why there might be a concern about geographics context. I think the link provides the context just fine. SamBC(talk) 17:34, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Nice to find an area of agreement. Yes, we should be careful; but we should not require the unnatural. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:39, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I understand that Portland, Maine, USA is odd, but aren't we following a US or UK bias when it is required to specify that Rangoon is in Myanmar, while it is assumed that the location of Maine is known? I'm thinkin of proposing a change to WP:LEAD to make the geographical context (up to the country) required in the lead. What do you think? CG 15:43, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

No. We are not required to provide infinite amounts of context; for example we are not required to say that Rangoon, Burma, is in SE Asia. Those who need context can follow links; that's what they are for. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:36, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

We are not, strictly speaking, required to say it's in Burma, and it may yet be the settlement to a POV dispute to say neither Burma nor Myanmar. It's a good idea, of course. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:07, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Giving the country a city is located in can hardly be called "infinite" context. It is one of the most elementary geographical indicators. Leaving the country name out if it happens to be the USA is clearly a regional bias. −Woodstone 21:45, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

No, it's called writing English; in Portland's case, in accord with a long-established convention here, American English. I regret that sound American does not satisfy you; but Wikipedia is not a language reform movement. Feel free to start one, and I'm sure Wikipedia will adapt when you succeed. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:03, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

This is interesting, at Wikipedia: WikiProject Ice Hockey we decided for NHL players birthplaces - if born in Canada or USA, used city-province/state and if born elsewhere city-country. GoodDay 22:11, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

And our existing guidelines at WP:NCGN and WP:NC (settlements) say that

• we should refer to Portland by the name of its article,
• the names of American municipalities should, with some exceptions, be in the form Portland, Maine.
• There is some sentiment to change the naming convention, but all of it would change to Portland, or, for disambiguation, Portland (Maine). The exceptions are also simple forms, like Chicago. No one has yet argued, in pages and pages of discussion, for Portland, Maine, USA. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:19, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Sept has a point, would we change Chicago to Chicago, Illinois, USA or Toronto to Toronto, Ontario, Canada? GoodDay 22:30, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

(outdent)A balance is required between the easy, unambiguous identification of a city, and uncluttered brevity for the readers (and even the avoidance of irritants). Where a city is very well-known, let's not go for the formulaic US-address mantra, especially when the country-context is clear. "Chicago", "Los Angeles" and "New York" (when clearly the city), should be well-enough-known to every English speaker in context. Including the state is entirely ephemeral, and the country unnecessary in most cases. Same for "London", unless it's not clearly a UK context and there's a need to disambiguate with "London, Ontario". For less well-known cities/towns, the state would be good, but not the country unless the context gives no help. Triple-bungers might occasionally be necessary (Portland, Maine, US - unless we're already talking about Maine), but they clutter the text.

But please, after the first occurrence in an article, it shouldn't be necessary to tag the name of a city with any state/country ID, should it? Same for links, of course. Tony (talk) 03:37, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I think you're getting far from what I originally suggested. I'm not talking about changing article titles to for example Chicago, Illinois, USA , this is up to the community to decide for a naming convention that harmonize all geographic titles. I'm talking about defining the context in the lead of the article so any reader will be able to localize the subject of the article easily. For example, I've been pushing for using the form it is located in the U.S. state of Pensylvania instead of it is located in Pensylvania as a minimum format in order to help the reader (Look how a tributary of a river is located in thePlunketts Creek (Loyalsock Creek) article). My idea is to adopt a convention that require that at least the country name is mentioned in the lead. CG 20:09, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about that, my misunderstanding. GoodDay 20:23, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Article Layout

What is the policy or consensus on the structure (alignment) of an article?

I realise that all the articles (that I have visited) are left aligned, but has anyone considered the fact that it may be more encyclopaedia like to have the text 'justified' for some or all of the articles. Anyway, since I am new, I was wondering if someone could tell me there opinion on this matter, as it was just an idea I had. -Jack 04:42, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Justified type is, generally speaking, more difficult to read than regularly left-aligned type. I think it could be left alone. EVula // talk // ☯ // 04:44, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm...For arguments sake, is this your opinion or are u speaking on behalf of everyone? Note: Please don't take my question the wrong way (I do not mean anything by this question, other then the fact that I wish you to expand on what you are saying), I am just wondering how you find it harder to read, when it can make a document (or article) appear more professional (more reliable). -Jack 05:37, 2 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle (talk • contribs)

Strictly my opinion. What I do feel comfortable speaking on behalf of everyone on, though, is that changing the formatting of the page won't make a document look more reliable; adding references and reliable sources will. Anything less is just a shallow attempt. EVula // talk // ☯ // 06:01, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Formatting of the page is done by the reader's software. Find a web browser which will do text justification. (SEWilco 13:56, 2 October 2007 (UTC))

You do realise I am refering to the alignment structure of an article, not some software which helps people build websites for them. Anyway, text justification is done by inserting the following code in the 'edit this page' section (without the brackets) and by appropriately placing the relevant parts where necessary:

(<)div style="text-align: justify;"(>)TEXT(<)/div(>) -Jack 04:28, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

It's already there. If you are a registered user you can set justification in your user preferences. Go to tab "misc" and check "Justify paragraphs". −Woodstone 21:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Number of references

Well, what you have just mentioned leads me to a new question I would like to put forward. Why is it that some articles have a lot of proper references (and citations) and reliable information and yet, some articles (I have also come across) have factual information but few (and sometimes no) citations or references? -Jack 06:29, 2 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle (talk • contribs)

Because nobody has provided the references for it yet. :) EVula // talk // ☯ // 13:50, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Hahaha, well that is a point. But it doesn't really justify the reason for articles being set out like this. Let me give you an example I have come across...Age of Empires III: The War Chiefs - It has factual info, but only 2 references, one of which I added. So, how can you state that it hasen't been referenced yet, when people continue to add stuff to it. Therefore, the information they have obtained will most likely have to have come from a source...however, I do realise that some of the info given is based on gameplay and I will admit that this info cannot be referenced, generally speaking, but besides this how can you justify this? Hahahaha, it should be referenced more like Age of Empires III...I congratulate those who did this and my hat goes off to them, wow, what a lot of effort. Anyway, any comments? - Jack 04:22, 3 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle (talk • contribs)

You know, none of that is really relevant to the talk page for the Manual of Style. EVula // talk // ☯ // 15:48, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Recent edit to "avoid first-person pronouns"

Someone has added this: "It is customary to use we in mathematical derivations; for example: “To normalize the wavefunction, we need to find the value of the arbitrary constant A." In historical fields, it is also customary to use we of the present age as a whole: "The fragments of Menander which have come down to us...".

I do wish that such additions to the text were posted here, even for a day or two, so that they could be improved. Why, for example, wouldn't you just write "The surviving fragments of Menander"? Is there a need for the ellipsis dots? If so, insert a space before them. Why not use the customary formatting for examples in MOS: parentheses, pure and simple?

There's also a faint possibility that some folk might object to the addition. I don't, at first look, but it would be practical and, dare I says it, courteous, to use the expertise of users on this page. It's a collaborative project. And does the Mathematics submanual sing from the same songsheet? It would be nice to be reassured first. Tony (talk) 13:58, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Aww, did someone insert a fact on the page Tony owns? This is a wiki; improve it in place. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Um, WP:BRD? It's a nontrivial change, so if one is more than slightly dubious, revert and discuss is generally recommended. Would you care to discuss? SamBC(talk) 17:46, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Also, Tony didn't revert it, and he started this discussion section before it was reverted, I think. SamBC(talk) 18:10, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes; I oppose the attitude that we need to discuss changes in the absence of any objection or reversion. Without an actual objection, there's very little to discuss. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:44, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

WP:MSM cautions against "we", but doesn't say it's unacceptable. The implication seems to be that it's best avoided, but not a huge problem; it's in a huge list of constructs to which there's the same attitude. It certainly contradicts the idea that it's "customary". However, the idea that it's acceptable was, I believe, present before the recent edit in question.

As regard history, I'm no historian. It seems, however, the contexts like that given are just as easy to avoid using the first-person plural in, and very nearly as desirable, including for the sake of consistency. SamBC(talk) 18:15, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

I can, I think, speak for the classicists; the phrase quoted is idiom, and I've seen it pointlessly objected to. Since the we involved is not Wikipedia, while the mathematical we usually could be, the arguments in the rest of the section do not apply. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:44, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

By raising the matter here rather than reverting this unannounced change, I was trying to be polite and non-confrontational; I do this where possible. This time, for my trouble, all it got me was an accusation that I think I "own" this page. Tony (talk) 23:27, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

You don't dispute the change; you admit that it is unlikely that anybody does, and no-one seems to. If this is not ownership, it is bureaucracy for its own sweet sake, which is nomenklatura. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:19, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

There was a reasonable concern, and some specific queries, but nothing to definitely object to it. Questions about comparisons with other sections of the MOS. What exactly is wrong with that? Or are you just objecting to Tony for objection's sake? SamBC(talk) 00:31, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Tony, I'd advise you to ignore the ownership thing... it's totally bogus. Discussing without reversion is the most appropriate thing to do when there's no major objection, but some question. SamBC(talk) 00:31, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion is always welcome; and if Tony comes up with a question, I will be happy to answer it, or revise to meet it. It's the bogus procedural claim which I reject. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:34, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Thing is, substantive changes to policy and, to a lesser extent, guidelines is supposed to merit discussion in advance. The {{guideline}} tag even implies this - how can you have any confidence that a substantive change represents consensus without discussion? I don't think Tony's comment was unreasonable. SamBC(talk) 00:42, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

This page doesn't represent consensus now; even less than it is a rational manual of style. It represents a few willful cranks. The only possible evidence that it was consensus would be if many Wikipedians read it, which does not appear to be true, and all of them were free to change it without revert warriors defending it, which is not true. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:26, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

(Outdent) Your comment is coming awfully close to a personal attack of others here, Anderson. I've removed the third example of the "open your eyes and you see something" example; it's stronger and clearer with just the two examples, and mixing up the passive voice issue with the main point here will confuse some readers. But no one is going to find it a compelling usage when illustrated with such a lame example. I'm also uncomfortable with the fuzziness ("it might be better") and the inappropriateness of citing a usage that is explicitly framed as inferior to the example just provided. Too many shades, angles, levels. MOS should be simple, clear and plain.

"Nevertheless, it is sometimes appropriate to use we when referring to an experience that any reader would be expected to have, such as general perceptual experiences. For example, although it might be best to write “When most people open their eyes, they see something”, it is still legitimate to write “When we open our eyes, we see something”.

Tony (talk) 07:36, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, the alleged "norm" of "we" does not in my experience apply outside of elementary school texts. I just went back to university after ages, to finish my degree finally, and got arm-twisted into taking a math class; the textbook does not use "we" phrasing. I don't see a rationale for supporting infantilizing language in Wikipedia. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:22, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I take it it was not a graduate degree in mathematics; the locution is routine at that level also. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:11, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm beginning more and more to resent accusations here and at MOS subpages that Tony1 is engaging in WP:OWNership. For one thing, it is a very blatant accusation of bad faith on his part, and secondarily relegatates the participation of others here to irrelevancy, as if my and 50+ others' input has no value. Enough of that, please. I didn't get every darned thing I wanted when I first came to MoS and started editing, but I've realized over time that this is a good thing. The MoS needs to be stable. I hope you (PMAnderson/Septentrionalis) figure that out ,too. I'm honestly shocked that you haven't; your and my participation at in the enormous debates at and revolving around WP:ATT seemed pretty mutually helpful and rational (against a wave of nonsensical crap) to me, so I find it frustrating and odd to be at loggerheads with you so frequently here. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:30, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry to see that, as I said above. From my POV, this page strongly resembles WP:ATT: Tony and a handful of friends are revert-warring for a strong POV, which they have written into this obscure page, and which is not widely supported beyond it, and attempting to control Wikipedia by setting Rules for All Wikipedia to Tremble and Obey. I don't think I need to spell out the analogy, especially since the ATT disaster is long since over; but the result is likely to be the same. Good ideas were lost when ATT crashed, in the middle of the sea of -er- nonsense; and in this case, there's no obvious fallback. As for their good faith: no, I do not doubt their sincerity; but then I am sure that most of the protests of a certain prominent admin that her actions were all intended for the good of Wikipedia were sincere too.

As for MOS; no, it does not need to be stable; it needs to be consensus of Wikipedia, which it is not; it needs to support clear, intelligent, English in all its varieties, which it does not. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:20, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Foreign terms

I see a contradiction between these two sentences as they stand, the section entitled "No common usage in English":

Wikipedia prefers italics for phrases in other languages and for isolated foreign words that do not yet have common usage in English. However, in an article on a subject for which there is no English-language term, the foreign term does not require italicization.

Surely the foreign term should be consistently italicised throughout? BrainyBabe 08:10, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

The second-sentence clarification is key here: "in an article on a subject for which there is no English-language term". There is no English-equivalent term for enchilada. In some other article (e.g. Mexican cuisine) this term would be italicized as a loanword. At Enchilada it would not be italicized, as this italicization would rapidly become tedious for both editor and reader. I can actually see an argument... scratch that, I am hereby making an argument, that the first (i.e. beginning of lead sentence) occurrence of "enchilada" should be italicized (as well as boldfaced per WP:LEAD) at Enchilada. <yelling for others' input goes here> I'm not entirely certain that this makes sense. If not, please WP:TROUT me. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:05, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I could go either way on that, to be honest. It does make logical sense, but the meaning of the italicisation may be lost when combined with bolding. SamBC(talk) 11:23, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Hmm. In my idiolect, "enchilada" has been accepted as a loan word into English and as such is a poor example, although I acknowledge the point, and the distinction between item-mentioned-in-passing and item-mentioned-as-subject-of-article. I disagree that consistent and repeated italicisation is necessarily tedious. Visually, I would have to agree that emboldening and italicising in tandem is too difficult to process. BrainyBabe 11:39, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I would agree with you on the specific example (I would consider enchilada, taco, burrito all loanwords, and possibly fajita as well - much like bolognese), but I think we all get the gist of what is meant. Consistent and repeated italicisation is okay, and I would say that isn't the best (or even a very good) reason to not italicise the subject of the article. One good reason to my mind, is to avoid any possible confusion as to why the word is italicised, especially with new users. Another is that it seems strange to highlight the foreigness of a word that we're actually writing an article about (or about the actual thing the word refers to). Where there's a subject that is often referred to by a non-English-language name that also has a (possibly less well known) English-language name (not that I can think of an example), then generally I think the article should be at the English-language name as an article, with redirects for the others, and those can certainly be consistently and repeatedly italicised when they occur in the article, even when bolded on first use, in my opinion. SamBC(talk) 11:48, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I think enchilada is a bad example, because I agree it is a loan word, meaning "enchilada". Please consider banausos, which is not, despite occasional nonce uses, accepted in English; the article italicizes, and I think it does well to do so. But drawing this line should be a matter of article-by-article editorial judgment, not a ruling here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:25, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Double Standard in British/Irish related articles

There seems to be a 'double standard' applied to these articles. For example - British Isles is forbidden at Ireland and Lough Neagh & yet Irish Sea is allowed at Ireland, Great Britain. Why is this so? GoodDay 17:30, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Because it is a point of honour for Irish nationalists, but not for British nationalists, in their several varieties. Should it be so? Probably not. Will fiddling with MOS change it? Almost certainly not. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:14, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

It's just Wikipedia frowns, on edits being politically controlled. GoodDay 22:32, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

While bare logic would agree with you, it's more complicated when there's strong feelings about such things. Plus, I don't know anyone who objects to the Irish Sea being call the Irish Sea. The Irish wouldn't exactly object, and it's what the British call it because it's the sea between us and Ireland. In any case, trying to "solve" the problem is a bit of Cnut situation. SamBC(talk) 23:32, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

• Let me be less cynical: You are almost certainly right; but it will take a lot of work, and this is not the most productive place to do it. Try WT:NPOV, and if the Irish are really obnoxious about it, the methods of Wikipedia:dispute resolution. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:26, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

That's OK, there seems to be compromise in the works. Irish articles leaning to Irish edits, UK articles leaning to British edits and mixed articles accepting 'compromise' edits. Here's hoping. GoodDay 15:49, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I have had this argument many times with Irish people personally. They always seemed cool about it once I explained the "British Isles" is merely a geographical expression. What else could you call them? Any other term I can think of would also include the Frisian Islands and half of Denmark! TinyMark 16:09, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

British Isles simply isn't being accepted. Currently, there's a compromise proposal (British-Irish Isles) at Ireland and Lough Neagh. It may be the only way to end the dispute. GoodDay 16:12, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I seem to recall that the term "British Archipelago" is a more inclusive and correct term, but it's the "British" that causes the objections, because it puts Britain in a position of conceptual seniority. I'm stating this without reading the actual dispute, by the way. If that compromise works, then that's fine, as long as it doesn't lead to a renaming of the British Isles article. SamBC(talk) 16:31, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the British Isles article will be renamed. The proposed compromise would be 'wiki-linked' to it - Example: British-Irish Isles, that's all. GoodDay 16:41, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Re: "British Isles", simply use "Britain" and "Ireland" as geographical/geological terms ("the Isles" is a common all-encompassing term, but not understood by many who don't live there, so not of any encyclopedia-writing value to us). If you are writing political material, use "United Kingdom" and "Republic of Ireland". Do not mix the geo. and the poli.; "Great Britain and Ireland", in the modern context is a particular no-no, as it leaves Northern Ireland open to interpretation and resultant political ranting on talk pages. "British Isles" is deprecated (everywhere, I mean not WP-specifically), beause it asserts the Britishness of Ireland and its people, which is simply wrong in virtually every possible interpretation, all the way back to the first recorded (Roman and Greek) names for these parts of the world and their peoples. "Irish Sea" make no such assertion (except perhaps about mermaids). It is just as neutral as "Gulf of Mexico", "English Channel" and "Indian Ocean"; while there are perhaps a few cranks who'd like to rename them the "Gulf of Texas", the "French Channel" or the "Bangladesh Ocean", no one would take them seriously because there's nothing politically offensive about the current names, even if you hate Mexico, England or India politically. If the Irish Sea were ever to be renamed, it should probably be the Manx Sea. :-) PS: "British-Irish Isles" should be avoided like the plague as it is a Wikipedian-invented neologism and misleading to our readers, who may think it is a well-accepted term they should use. And it still favors Britain over Ireland, so the Ireland boosters will never be entirely happy with it anyway, leading to more dispute on the talk pages. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:16, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

PPS: Minor point of clarification: To properly do what I suggest for geo. topics, you'd need to wikilink it as "Britain and Ireland" because Wikipedia has made the (to me rather grave) error of using "Great Britain" as synonymous with "Britain", while relegating Britain to being a disambiguation page. What a total screwup. I guess it is faintly understandtable, but "Great Britain" is a political term, not a geographical one. The confusion stems from the French term (which is geographical) for the island, Grande Bretagne, "Great(er)/Grand/Big Britain", as distinct from Bretagne, Brittany, a cultural confusion of the French from the days of the Normans, who thought of their local mini-Britain (settled by the "Great" British during the Anglo-Saxon invasions) as "the" Britain. This appears to be a confusion not shared by anyone else I can think of; in paritcular, contrast the English: "Britain" and "Brittany", which is a funny-spelled diminutive, i.e. "Little Britain", derived from mispronouncing Bretagne to agree with English use of -y as a diminution suffix, as in "dog" and "doggy"). A current compromise judging from some infoboxes and navboxes is "British Islands and Ireland", but the article is still at British Isles. To completely resolve all of this mess, the Britain DAB page's content should move to Britain (disambiguation), that of Great Britain to Britain with a DAB hatnote pointing to the new DAB page, Great Britain turned into redir to Kingdom of Great Britain with a DAB hatnote pointing to Britain (disambiguation) for people looking for the island and other potential meanings, or maybe just to Britain the island, depending on what is really on that DAB page in detail (I haven't memorized it), and finally British Isles should be moved to British Islands and Ireland since that seems to be what people want to use. Irish die-hards would probably want it to be Ireland and British Islands, but Britain has had more impact on the history of the world and the region, so too bad. NB: Virtually any work (in English) you pick up on the history and/or archaelogy of the region uses "Britain" to refer to the island; I cannot think of a single book I have read (out of several hundred!) in those fields that used the term "Great Britain" geographically without also referring to the historical period in and after which the Kingdom of Great Britain arose. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:57, 8 October 2007 (UTC) <Sigh> It gets even more complicated: There is a half-stub, half-DAB page at Great Britain and Ireland that needs to be merged or simply deleted. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:04, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Even as a descendant of Celts, I find this exaggerated. Great Britain is a calque of Grande Bretagne; one is as much a geographical term as the other. (I have no doubt that the adjective appealled to James' I sense of self-importance, and appeals to British nationalists nowadays, but so what?) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:15, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

• [Britain is] The proper name of the whole island containing England, Wales, and Scotland, with their dependencies; more fully called Great Britain; now also used for the British state or empire as a whole. - OED.

As usual, the answer to "so what" is "avoid ambiguity". "Great Britain" was historically initially synonymous with "Britain", sure, and certainly as you say appealed to British vanity, but it became the name of the political kingdom, and except, as OED documents of course, inasmuch as "Britain" is used informally to refer to the political entity, "Britain" never stopped meaning "the island of Britain". The principal meaning of "Britain" is the latter, while the principal meaning of "Great Britain" is the political one, which for WP purposes means we should distinguish between them. The difference has plenty of relevance in British history too. There have been long periods during which the kingdom, despite its name, did not rule or even occupy all of Britain, meanwhile Wales and Scotland have been part of Britain, the island, since prehistory, and remain so, even when they have had their own kings and neighbored on England while "Britain" (Great or otherwise) had no existence as a political concept and had not since the early Dark Ages. Anyway, the point wasn't really to go on a renaming spree, but to answer the original question: for now "British Isles" can be avoided with "British Islands and Ireland", and eventually the piped link can be made a real one after an article move. I just got sidetracked. PS: This is all somewhat like, but inversely, the term "America", which basically means "the Western Hemisphere", but is often used informally to mean the United States of America, much to the chagrin of Central and South Americans. While that usage, even in those countries is very common in informal speech it is widely considered inaccurate, insensitive, imperialistic, offensive, etc., when used in more formal registers. There are Welsh, Scottish, even Cornish who don't like the terms "Britain" or "British" applied to them for similar but reversed politico-linguistic reasons. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:34, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

"Sources" section now close to the top

Why? It might be important, but it's not central to the specific purpose of the MOS. Now it interrupts the flow of sections on style. I think this should go back to where it was. Tony (talk) 02:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't see why it's here at all. All of it is somewhere else, mostly in more complete form; see WP:V, WP:CITE, WP:FOOT. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:17, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Quite so. Tony (talk) 03:38, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Then let's get rid of it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:27, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Anyone object? If not, it should be removed, say, tomorrow. Tony (talk) 14:32, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Delete it. Jɪmp 06:03, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Bands - Is/Are

Wiki grammar gurus! If you're talking about a band, do you use "is" or "are"? "Iron Maiden is a band", or "Iron Maiden are a band"? Band = noun = is, surely? The members "are", the band "is"... Cardinal Wurzel 08:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I would regard this in the same way as "data" and say it's a singular noun used in a plural way. Only pedantics say "data is". The same goes for "police". Nobody says, "The police is erecting a roadblock." TinyMark 09:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I've never heard anyone say anything but "data is", but there you go. You're right about the police. Anyone else? Cardinal Wurzel 09:47, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, my mistake. It's the other way round with data! "Data are" sounds awful. TinyMark 10:00, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Police is already a plural noun; you don't say "polices" to indicate more than one, and there is no singular form of the word when used as a noun referring to police officers, so "police are" is correct. Data can be plural or singular in US English (see dictionary.com data for a good explanation). Bands vary, and I'd say it depends on whether the name itself seems more like a singular or plural term. Iron Maiden seems singular, so "Iron Maiden is...." The Beatles (even though a made-up word) seems plural, and people generally say "The Beatles were a great band." The band The Police, to tie in the first sentence of this paragraph, is also generally used as a plural, so "The Police were a great band." If Iron Maiden had been named Iron Maidens, then I'd use a plural verb. If a band were called "The Data," I think a lot of editors would be stumped. :-) Note that I'm just giving my opinion, no sources to back it up, other than checking Google's news archive that my interpretation seems consistent with common usage. -Agyle 11:35, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Bands are technically a single unit each; hence, use it would be correct to use the singular. "The Replacements is a band", just like "Metallica is a band." However, it sounds awkward in some circumstances but not others so there seems to be a mini-rule about this. If you look up "The Rolling Stones are" versus "The Rolling Stones is" in google, for example, plural is running 4-1 against singular.Wikidemo 10:54, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I think it's the more the fact that it's the British English way of saying it. Iron Maiden are [sic] an English band. If it reads okay as "are" then it should stay. Cradle of Filth are an English band. It reads fine with "are" and there shouldn't be a problem with that. "Is" and "are" are both correct grammar, but "are" should take precedence being the predominantly British grammatical way of saying it. But that's just my opinion. Scarian^Talk 12:06, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Previous, longstanding concensus across many many articles over this hard fought topic is that proper/international English accepts group nouns as plurals. The "simple" singular form is very common in the U.S.(for various "simple" reasons) In Canada, we accept both variations as norm... depending on who our audience is. The plural form is commonly used in the east(Auld Canada) whereas western Canada(more Yankee-fied... or 'simple') uses the 'dumbed down' singular version. Pink Floyd 'are' a band. Led Zeppelin 'were' a band... They 'are' a band... They 'were' a band.... they/their/are/were/ always plural indicating group. Never "It"... it's not a group of objects... it's a group of people... they/their... etc. Pink Floyd(GB) are, Grateful Dead(US) was... it's been a long standing rule-of-thumb on Wikipedia... and an edit war that's been slowly fading away(or so we all hoped) as more regular editors "catch on" to whats accepted. They WAS a band... They IS a band...????. Dat jus' ain't properly spoke stuff :D. I work at a University. A local band are to perform here on Friday. They are very talented. Wiki-alf... I leave the forum to you :D . 156.34.142.110 14:39, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

"Proper/international" English is an excuse for that deprecated thing: an Anglo-American edit war. In American, which uses (with one glaring exception) "logical" number, a band is, no matter what it's doing; this should be used for American bands; in British English, it depends on whether you are speaking of the band as a whole, which is performing, or as individual players. The anon's suggestion is a hypercorrection, and should be avoided. (In all varieties, if you use "they", you are speaking of the players, and they are.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:40, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

An academic buddy of mine at Bristol University comments "a collective noun is properly given in the singular. Write 'is'. The other usage is commonplace but ghastly." Scarian, this is not a matter of British English versus American English. Anon, there's no question of saying "They was a band". The question is do you say "It was a band" or "They were a band"? Cardinal Wurzel 17:49, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes of course it is a matter of British English versus American English. I am sorry to hear that the tradition of denying the existence or propriety of AmE lives on; I hoped it had died half a century ago. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:54, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm doing nothing of the sort - I'm saying that the gramatically correct answer is the same in both! Cardinal Wurzel 18:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Still don't agree. The correct formulation, logically, is to use "is" because the band is a single thing. There's something peculiar abound bands and I don't think we've hit on it. In other contexts we don't pluralize the verb just because we have a name for something created out of a plural noun. We say "the United States is", "The Rolling Stones, a new book on the band, is", "Shingles (the disease) is", and so on. It seems that insisting on using the plural when referring to a band is fussiness, perhaps not quite coming to grips with recognizing a musical act as a corporate entityWikidemo 18:48, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

As a Brit, I'd find myself saying "The United States is a big place" and "The United States is over there" (points west), but it would be "The United States are involved in this" , "...are dominating the market", "...are negotiating with Canada" and so on...--Alf ^melmac 19:52, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

The well know "Fowler's Modern English Usage" calls these words "nouns of multitude", giving as examples amongst others: committee, crew, orchestra, army, crowd, number, majority. It states that they are treated as singular or plural at discretion, depending on whether they are seen as a group of people or a single entity. So it's definitely not incorrect to use the plural form and we should leave it up to the editor. −Woodstone 18:59, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Interesting. Useful, although one could draw a distinction between some "nouns of multitude" and others depending on whether the individual members are acting independently or whether the action is instead done by the entity. I can see why Americans would tend to use the singular; they tend to insist on precision and logic in the language, whereas the British enjoy formalism and convention. Wikidemo 19:14, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I didn't know of the Brit/Am distinction, but media usage corroborates; NY Times (1999) says "Iron Maiden is a band more....", Guaridan.co.uk (2005) says "Iron Maiden are headlining this year's...." Plural-like bands being the exception: NY Times (2005) says "The Beatles are the most famous rock group...", and NY Times (1997) says "The Rolling Stones are one of the few rock bands...." Wikidemo, I agree with your logic, but accepted proper usage is sometimes independent of any logic. :-) As a legitimate Brit/Am distinction, with a British band, "Iron Maiden are" seems reasonable to me. If this is a previously much-discussed topic, was there a consensus that could be added to the MOS, or a clear non-consensus ("Opinions vary...") that could be added to it? -Agyle 19:18, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

With the exception of United States, largely for constitutional reasons, American will use are with formally plural nouns, like Beatles, and is with formally singular nouns, like Iron Maiden. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:03, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Both constructions are very frequent; as others have noted, American English tends toward is and British English tends toward are. I assume the guidelines concerning US vs. UK English in an article still apply. Strad 01:47, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

For those interested more information is at synesis. Rich Farmbrough, 13:27 5 October 2007 (GMT).

Thanks, Rich - that's exactly what I needed. Cardinal Wurzel 16:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

I'd say scrap the whole debate, and recommend "are" across the board, since it will be correct in American English as well, even if it is somewhat more common to use "is" in A.E. when the band's name sounds somehow more singular. No big opposition to the "leave to to a US/UK distinction" tactic, but why bother? I'm hard pressed to imagine an American editor getting genuinely upset with "ZZ Top are a band from Texas". If anything I have a suspicion that the majority of WP's American editors would prefer "are" to "is" there, that the vast majority of the readership would not mind "are", and that of the probably over-50% of the American readers who if pressed on the matter would prefer "is", only a tiny handful would even notice the difference if it weren't pointed out to them. Meanwhile, use of "is" probably rankles more British/Commonwealth speakers than "are" does Americans and Western Canadians. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:26, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

PS: A side point: In today's world of electronic music, it has probably already happened many times that a single person appears to be a "band" or "act", with a plural-sounding name, but has no bandmates, in which case only "is" makes sense, regardless of the name format. If I decide to make a one-man ambient electronica album under the name, I dunno, how about "Dark Whispers", the local music mag, and Wikipedia, can only sensibly say that "Dark Whispers is...", not "...are..." It'll sound funny, but the plural verb would be absurd. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:31, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Quotations and Punctuation

After a lengthy disagreement today I would like to see a definitive example in the manual of style for the following problem:

"Satellite" was also featured on an episode of the television show Miami Vice titled "Amen...Send Money," which first aired on October 2, 1987.

IMO the comma is a part of the sentence and not a part ot the program's title. For this reason, the comma should be after the quote. Comments anyone? TinyMark 09:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

It should definitely be after the quote, otherwise we have the totally absurd result of asserting that the episode title was "Amen...Send Money," rather than "Amen...Send Money", an obvious problem. NB: Miami Vice should be italicized up there (in the article; if you just didn't bother to italicize it here because that wasn't the point, I don't mean to nitpick. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:00, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

There have been wikiwars over this issue, in case you want to read through the archive. I think the outcome (or rather non-outcome) is that you can use either, but be consistent within a page. Wikidemo 10:55, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

There was no doubt about the outcome. Wikipedia consensus to abandon logical quotation just because a handful of people don't like it was not reached. At all. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:00, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree with TinyMark here. The comma is an inherent part of the logical thrust of the entire sentence. --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 11:32, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

The example provided here is indeed wrong. WP uses logical punctuation at the end of a quotation; i.e., keep the comma/period outside the quotation unless it belongs as part of the quotation. It's clearly set out in the guidelines, isn't it? Tony (talk) 11:35, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

If it is I couldn't find it! TinyMark 13:53, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

It's under "Inside or outside" at Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Quotation_marks. Tony (talk) 14:31, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

It's not clearly enough explained there. Too many people are focusing on the physical presence of punctuation in the quoted element rather looking at the dynamics. Better examples would emphasise the difference between unquoted text as scene-setting and as a crucial part of the sentence's thrust, for instance, He wrote, "Brighton was dreadful." and He disagreed that "Brighton was dreadful". I suppose a simple test would be that if you can put the unquoted text in brackets without changing the meaning of the sentence the point or comma goes inside the quotes. --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 14:40, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

The "dynamics" of the sentence are not effected in any way in the quoted example; the comma still follows the episode title, just as intended. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:00, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if it's not clear enough (it made sense to me), but the defining point isn't how it fits into the structure, it's whether or not the source the quote is from contains the punctuation. In the unlinkely event that the official title of the episode ended with a comma, then that would be correct, but under logical punctuation the comma goes outside the quote marks simply because it's not there in the source being quoted. SamBC(talk) 14:46, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

It's whether or not the source the quote is from contains the punctuation AND how that punctuation impacts on the sentence as a whole. The second example illustrates this but is overlooked:

Correct:	Martha asked, “Are you coming?”
	(When quoting a question, the question mark belongs inside because the quoted text itself was a question.)
Correct:	Did Martha say, “Come with me”?
	(The very quote is being questioned, so here, the question mark is correctly outside; the period in the original quote is omitted.)

--ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 15:31, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Ah, you're talking about the seperate but related issue of whether to include the punctuation from the original, which I wasn't thinking to address. Perhaps the two points should be addressed seperately, but as I see it it's quite simple. The punctuation in the original, at the end of the quote, is only included if it fits the sentence structure or is integral to the meaning as quoted. Punctuation marks are only inside the quotation marks of that punctuation is present in the material being quoted. Between the two, I think that tells you everything. SamBC(talk) 16:36, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Quotation_mark#Punctuation states that this is (another) British vs. American English discrepancy. Apparently the punctuation is always inside the quotes in American English. I suppose it will be a case of first come, first served! What annoys me is the "my way or the higheay" attitude some people have. "That's the way I learnt it and that's the only way to do it." Maybe I have no tolerance, but its only towards people with zero tolerance ;-) TinyMark 16:33, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Interesting. The discussion here recently about logical vs aesthetic punctuation has demonstrated that that isn't true in practice - many americans learned and/or prefer logical punctuation, and I believe that some brits prefer aesthetic. It's complicated by the fact that, when the quotation marks represent dialogue, there should always be terminating punctuation. SamBC(talk) 16:39, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, the Quotation mark article is simply wrong; typesetters' quotes have been abandoned in US publishing except for very general audiences who still prefer it as a "tradition"; your average American novel and newspaper still use it, but it is virtually unknown in technical and scientific writing any longer. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:00, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Even if I believed this claim, so what? We should be writing American for the general reader, not for the followers of "technical and scientific writing." Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:57, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I see this is back, much sooner than I predicted. Can we, this time, deal with the matter soberly, and admit that there are two systems; both are used; and the important thing is to be consistent within an article? Then we can stop discussing this every month. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there are two systems and both are used, however the use of typesetter's punctuation here goes against policy. Change policy so we can stop discussing this every month? Such a change would only turn the heat up. It's not really "back" though, this time it's a call for further examples not for change in policy. What is the important thing, however? Is it to be consistent within an article ... or is it more important not to change a quotation willy-nilly just to fit one's own idea of æsthetics? Jɪmp 22:07, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Not policy; just the whim of this guideline. Please note that insisting on logical punctuation when taking a quotation from a source that uses aesthetic punctuation will often involve changing the quotation; and quite often involve guesswork as to how the source's source was punctuated. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:43, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, no, because you punctuate exactly how your source punctuates, so quotes within the quote get left alone. SamBC(talk) 23:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. A whim—"a sudden desire or idea, especially one that cannot be reasonably explained" says one dictionary. It's hardly sudden & has been explained in minute and very reasonable detail. Jɪmp 23:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Stop trying to muddy the waters, Anderson: you know very well that if illogical punctuation (there's nothing aesthetic about it) is used in a quote within a quote here, it's not tampered with. That's the point behind WP's insistence on logical quotation in the first place: don't tamper with quoted material. This is quite apart from and in addition to the analogy with brackets (where no one would put the dot inside.) Tony (talk) 00:07, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

How curious. In an article now at FAC, the original source says:

At one point during Tool's set, Keenan acknowledged his debt to the long-running art rockers: "For me, being on stage with King Crimson is like Lenny Kravitz playing with Led Zeppelin, or Britney Spears onstage with Debbie Gibson."

Our article used the quoted sentence, precisely as given, including the quotation marks. A certain editor objected to this, as not being logical punctuation. That would seem to me to depend on whether Keenan, in the original interview, ended a sentence after Gibson or not; it is one of the difficulties of logical punctuation that we cannot be sure from the evidence at hand. But we can postpone discussing this further until Tony manages to agree with himself exactly what logical punctuation is. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:18, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Not difficult at all. If WP quoted the entire passage you just did, it would remain unchanged. If it quoted only Keenan (which is the case here; I just looked at the diff and compared it to what you quoted above), it would end with the period outside the punctuation, since WP has no basis on which to know whether the original source quoted Keenan entirely or in truncated form. I think you are trying to make this sound difficult because that suits your argument, but really, how hard do you think anyone else is going to find this? It's trivially simple, just like whether to put the period inside or ouside a parenthetical at the end of a sentence. Why on earth is hard about asking "Do I know that this is the end of the original, primary-source sentence? If no, outside, if yes, inside." Compare "Does this parenthetical form a complete sentence by itself (or end with an exclamation point, question mark or elipsis)? If no, outside, if yes, inside." — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:00, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

It is not trivially simple; neither is determining whether a form of words forms a complete sentence. But we do the latter all the time: every time we punctuate unquoted prose. You are, however, in the name of accuracy, recommending that we change a quoted sentence from the punctuation of the source; allowing aesthetic punctuation would avoid the nedessity of thin, and the necessity of making the decision. Aesthetic punctuation is purely formal, and it has survived precisely because it makes no assertion about the original position of the comma in question. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Again, you just seem to be making this hard for yourself. If it were really hard, the rest of the world and plenty of Americans would not be using logical quotation, and WP would have an e-riot on its hands about this, and yet it doesn't, unless (sorry, my bad) two editors somehow marks an overwhelming trend. If the source is not reliable on a particular thing, then do not rely upon the source for that thing; that's simple and reasonable as well. There's nothing wrong with making some simple decisions; as you say, we do this every time we punctuate. I understand that you do not see the potential difference between what the primary source actually said and what the secondary source chose to report of what was said, in a manner that leave us by definition uncertain as to the primary's actual statement, or that you think the distinction is trivial if you do recognize it. Either way, you are clearly someone who has never been misquoted-by-truncation in the press. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:12, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't see any "disagreement" on Tony's part with himself. What I do see is you lurking like a vulture waiting for any opportunity to dredge up this debate because it is your personal pet peve and you just won't let it go. I would like to observe that this current topic began as a request for advice on interpretation which diverged, reasonably and rather constructively, into a suggestion that that guideline's wording could be improved to make the matter clearer. You, and from my read only you, are trying to turn it into yet another redundant debate about whether the guideline's underlying advise should change, an idea you never get even close to consensus on, no matter how many times you bring it up. Give it a rest, huh? A really long one for a change. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:39, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

In fact, TinyMark disagrees with the present wording; it is not consensus among Wikipedians, far less among the users of English as a whole. That SMcCandlish still wants to get back at the professors of his elective courses is a pity; but it should not determine our guidance on the matter. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:57, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Strange characterizations of my alleged movites doesn't make an actual argument. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:12, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

So when are you planning on holding your next public flogging of this dead horse, PMA? Tony (talk) 05:09, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

U.S. vs US.

See also Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 81#U.S.

It has been a long standing feature of the MoS that it promotes U.S. over US. How long standing can be seen by this proposal to delete the then wording [for those who don't want to follow the link - dated 2004]... "When referring to the United States, please use "U.S."; that is the more common style in that country, is easier to search for automatically, and we want one uniform style on this. When referring to the United States in a long abbreviation (USA, USN, USAF), periods should not be used."

While I have no strong view either way, it has always seemed to me a good thing that the MoS has one, and in this case a long-standing one.

Imagine my surprise when on the 6th of September I was unable to find something I was sure was in the MoS! Perhaps it was in a subpage, but diligent searching revealed nothing. Nor was there recent "talk" of a change, an the history going back yonks did not reveal a likely change. Nonetheless I checked a very old version, and indeed it was there, so I assumed I'd missed the discussion and change. I eventually found the change hidden in the midst of a lot of minor changes here. Clearly this was an error (not mentioned in the comment, but an HTML comeent asks why it's not in the "Abbreviations" section), so I reverted it (with this comment "Acronyms and abbreviations - restoring section that was commented out by Crissov in this ed"), and thought no more of it.

The following day Tony reverted me with "Rv: This needs discussion. At the moment, formatting of "the US" is by consensus for each article; please discuss reasons for imposing this text".

Well I agree such a change needs discussing, which is why I restored the original text! And Tony, I wish you'd told me that you reverted me.

I am restoring once more the status quo, please discuss it here if it needs discussion.

Rich Farmbrough, 09:11 5 October 2007 (GMT).

I'm unsure of the history of whatever MOS used to say about how to format this item, but since I started hanging around MOS, it hasn't prescribed one set of usages and proscribed others. There are a few issues:

• Why would it be good for one country to be privileged over others by having one particular formatting practice enforced for its name in MOS? There's no equivalent section saying "No dots in UK". There's no dictum that you must write "People's Republic of China" rather than "China", or to refer to Taiwan or Tibet by the names the Chinese regime would prefer.
• In most varieties of English outside North America, the dots are not used except in upper-case text, where the abbreviation would be the same as the personal pronoun "us". The rule about spelling out "the United States" when in the same sentence as the names of other countries is a nuance that Chicago, is it, recommends, but this is not practised consistently by Americans and is an unknown rule outside North America. Many Wikipedians might resent being told, or even urged, to "toe the line" with respect to an American practice that goes against what they are used to in real-life, and which has no logic to it.
• On a purely linguistic level, you dot es dot goes against what is now an almost universal practice of losing the dots in abbreviations, in all varieties of English. To many people, it looks cumbersome against that practice, whereas a few decades ago, people were so used to dotted abbreviations that it wasn't an issue.

Thus, I suggest that MOS continue to remain silent on the issue, so that WPians may dot or not, and abbreviate or spell out regardless of the presence of the names of other countries in the sentence, provided consistency is maintained within each article. Tony (talk) 11:22, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Tony I see you've reverted me again. I think that a consensus in needed to remove this from the MoS, regardless of individual opinion. And with the widespread use of infoboxes and navboxes, consistency within an article is not always limited to changing that article. Further the MoS doesn't prescribe or proscribe, it is a style guide. The reason U.S. was adopted seems to have something to do with self-identification - if you look hard enough you'll find extensive talk archives on why this is/isn't acceptable for various entities and where it crosses the line to POV pushing. Nobody is being told to "'toe the line' with respect to an American practice" as identified in the discussion I refer to above U.S./US is no more exclusively American/Commonwealth than date ordering or many of the other dilemma characterised as such. In terms of dottiness, it would make more sense to remove the previously slightly deprecated Ph.D. etc. from appropriate section of the MoS. And if we are to change, the "Mos staying silent on the issue" is a recipe for fudge and muddle. Rich Farmbrough, 12:31 5 October 2007 (GMT).

Rich. You say a consensus is needed to remove this. I would counter that you inserted it arbitrarily without consensus. If it was previously in the MoS and was removed then surely that would also have happened with consensus. Perhaps a little more investigation as to why it was removed would be the order of the day??? TinyMark 13:08, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Tiny, please read the explanation I gave above. WP:AGF it was removed by accident. See the diff. See also the talk page from that day which does not mention it. Both as checked by me before restoring, together with scads of archived talk and history. Rich Farmbrough, 13:20 5 October 2007 (GMT).

This was decided by consensus -- way back in 2003 (see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive (abbreviations and acronyms)). It was added to the MOS on "Revision as of 21:03, May 14, 2004 Jiang (=Usage and spelling= from archive 3, w/o objection)" where it stayed until the uncommented removal "12:14, March 30, 2007 Crissov (quotation marks, see Talk; words-as-words rule is not consistently applied, neither is the order of punctuation and quotation marks)" I have returned it to the MOS. Please build a consensus if you wish to change it. Rmhermen 13:49, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

It can't have been there in MOS for quite a while. I don't think you can come back and insert it and then ask for consensus to remove what you've just inserted. I, for one, would be very much against the insertion. What exactly is the point? Why are you so keen to discourage people from using the dotted or undotted versions they're used to—in their variety of English—as long as internally consistent? It's akin to inserting a clause that metric units should be spelt with "-re", not "-er". I also reverted at the Abbreviations submanual your removal of "am/pm" as an (undotted) option (instead of "a.m./p.m."), which was explicitly allowed by MOS and MOSNUM by consensus several months ago. Tony (talk) 14:38, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

OK, so you don't mind if MOS says that you can't use US spelling for "kilometre", then. Because that's what it will come to. The suddenly shoved in guideline to use you dot es dot is in conflict with the MOS guidelines on "National varieties". In my variety of English, it's "US", and that's that. This is a blatant attempt to impose some notion of US English on all other varieties, and it's outrageous. I will fight this until the end of the earth. In fact, tomorrow, I'll be changing the guidline for the spelling of "kilometre", to insist on the non-US spelling. Tony (talk) 15:36, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I doubt you would get consensus for that. All we have done is restore the consensus version - unless you can find the link to some consensus that led to the uncommented removal of the lines, it should stay until a consensus forms for the change. Rmhermen 15:52, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Nor would you get consensus nowadays for a guideline that is just as blatantly an infringement on other varieties of English. I've improved the wording and, along the lines of PManderson's compromise edit a few minutes before, made it clear the the spelling-out rule also applies to AmEng articles: there's absolutely no justification for forcing this Chicago MoS thing on other varieties either. And I should let you know that many Americans observe neither, on WP or elsewhere, no matter what Chicago huffs and puffs about, and no matter what some school textbook might prescribe. Tony (talk) 16:10, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

It is, however, already our advice to use American English for American articles, and it should be considered elsewhere. Consider all the arguments that respect for self-identification requires that we use Myanmar; shouldn't the same apply to the United States? (This seems to have disappeared in a flurry of vandalism fixes at the end of March, although I can't find the exact edit; I don't see any discussion either. If the removal was a slip, there's no reason to revert-war for it; although that everyone just assumed it was here rather than consulting speaks to our obscurity.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:48, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Bush used Burma the other day. Tony (talk) 16:28, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Not an exemplar of perfect style, is he? But, in fact, I support the move back to Burma; I merely note that there are arguments on both sides. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:45, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Everyone in the UK uses Burma - most people will look at you blankly if you say Myanmar. But we're getting a bit sidetracked now. SamBC(talk) 20:57, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

My opinion: the "U.S." recommendation was removed from MOS in a hard-to-notice way in this March 30 edit, and changed in MOS:ABB in a hard-to-notice way in this September 27 edit, and I don't think those two changes should remain, even though they've been around a bit, given that they were rather hidden until now. (By hard-to-notice, I mean they were a couple words changed in edits that involved many little changes in several dozen places, with the abbreviation change not mentioned in the edit comment or in the talk page.) While I'll assume good faith in this case, allowing hard-to-spot changes that aren't noticed for a while to become the established the style guideline seems like it would encourage people to make these sorts of hard-to-spot changes as an alternative to discussing changes and reaching consensus. Note that it wasn't changed in MOS on March 30, it was simply commented out (removed from normal display) altogether, which is why it was hard to notice. Until a couple weeks ago, you could still look up the previously recommended "U.S." abbreviation on MOS:ABB, so the change was further obscured until then. I think the debate here over which abbreviation style to recommend ignores the question of whether it's appropriate to allow MOS changes to be made in this manner. -Agyle 08:01, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree that both the MOS change back in March and the ABB change last week were both hard to notice. The editor concerned—Crissov—has leapt in and made unilateral changes that may be controversial on other occasions. I think that he should have at least posted a note on the talk pages on those occasions, or have proposed the change beforehand. It's understandable why those who might have an emotional investment in the dotting of "the US" might be upset.

Be that as it may, now that the re-inserting of the original text has caused sudden debate, multiple reversions, a compromise initiated by PManderson (who I believe is American himself), and further tweaking by Noetica and me, I can't see that there's anything to be gained by going back to the original text, which, had it remained, would most certainly have been raised here (by me, if no one else), as a serious "variety of English" infringement. Richard Farmbrough has told me he's more concerned about the provision of an option than the allowance of the undotted version; but allowing all varieties of English on WP (consistently within each article) implies that there won't be individual restrictions on this. I don't see it as fair or workable to force what is a preference by many (not all) American writers on all English-speakers. Tony (talk) 11:29, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I'll point out that it is not just this MOS and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (abbreviations) that speak to the US-vs-U.S. question, and unfortunately there is conflicting guidance. Many guidelines for naming articles have suggestions, some more strongly worded than others: see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (abbreviations)#Acronyms as disambiguators, Wikipedia:Naming conventions (abbreviations)#Acronym usage in article body, Wikipedia:Naming conventions#Album and song titles and band names, all of which currently suggest U.S.; on the other hand, Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television)#Additional disambiguation says to use US instead. There may be others; these were just the ones I was aware of off the top of my head. I think it would be simpler if there was one standard (and my vote would be for US). --Paul Erik 17:21, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree the issue of which style to recommend should be discussed further. I just think that until that is decided, the current recommendation should revert to how it was before the unnoticed changes occurred.

Side topic: in Paul's examples, until April, WP:ACRONYM suggested US just for disambiguation in article titles, U.S. otherwise; WP:TV-NAME cites WP:ACRONYM but wasn't updated to reflect the April change, so still suggests US in disambiguation. In April, WP:ACRONYM decided to follow other MOS recommendations of "U.S.", even in disambiguations. -Agyle 18:04, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I strongly concur with Agyle that we should stay with the longstanding consensus version in favor of U.S. For one thing, as any typesetter/graphic designer can tell you, U.S. is much easier on the eyes. It's the dominant usage in the United States, especially in many legal documents (e.g., the United States Code) and government publications. Plus it's substantially less ambiguous. US can be a typo of "us" or can stand for numerous other things as noted at US (disambiguation), forcing readers to parse the token twice against context to eliminate ambiguity. Wikipedia should be trying to reduce ambiguity, not promote it! --Coolcaesar 19:53, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

(Outdent) Sorry, but my variety of English uses "US", except perhaps in all-caps (not all that common in normal text, now that we we've dispensed with typewriters). You can't come along and tell people who speak and write in different varieties of English that they must now use the AmEng term, when in real-life they see and write differently. Otherwise, I'll make a pronouncement that you must use "kilometre", not "kilometer"'. Same deal. WP is already used to both versions, and I hate to say this, but quite a few Americans use the undotted variety, not wanting to fuss with the distinction between the ugly you dot es dot in normal text, and the undotted USA, USAF, UK, and the rest.

The first issue is a reason to retain the delineation of "American English" in the MOS guideline; the second is a reason to soften it from a "you must use" tone. Tony (talk) 01:12, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't care to bicker and argue about who edited what, when. The important part seems to me whether the guideline makes sense on this point. I think after the changes I made to it today that it does. For one thing, it stops asserting falsely that in American English it just is "U.S."; that was absurd. "U.S." is sharply on the decline, along with periodizing all other acronyms. Looking at the stuff around me right now, about all I can determine is that some but not all newspapers and magazines, as a rather jingoistic exception, periodize "U.S." and US states like "N.Y.", but do not do so with 100% consistency, and that most other types of publications have abandoned it. I have the good fortune to have my grandmother visiting, and just asked her to write "NASA is in the US" on a piece of paper; she wrote "N.A.S.A. is in the U.S." This leads me to the tentative conclusion that use of periods increases with age of the writer, and that the lingering practice in a newspaper that utterly consistently leaves off the periods for every other kind of acronym other that "U.S." and US states, is a sentimental, patriotic bit of silliness being curmudgeonly insisted upon by some senior editors. I'd be willing to bet real money that in 10 years (i.e. after a bunch more editor retirements) that the incidence of "U.S." will have declined by at least 30% more in US newspapers and that by that time the slow-moving Chicago Manual of Style will have changed its tune on the matter. From a Wikipedia perspective, I would much rather that the MoS just said "don't do it", for consistency's sake, but can live with the version we now have, which makes it a second choice, and advises against several particular situations in which it is especially inappropriate. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:14, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

PS: Part of the point that I'm making is that there is no American Engish practice of dotting abbreviations; There was one about 3 generations ago, but it has been in fatal tachycardia for about the last 20 years, with the last 10 seeing a very rapidly accelerating decline while the dotless style has taken over. There is a lingering practice of dotting "U.S." and a handful of other things in mainstream news publications, but so what? Wikipedia is not written in news style. Anyway, just to make it clear, I am disagreeing with Tony that it should be relegated to the US vs. UK English "do whatever you like" pile; it simply doesn't qualify. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:20, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

False. But it has long been clear that SMcCandlish is not a reliable reporter of his native tongue. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:34, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

PPS: WP:MOSABB needs to conform to WP:MOS on this; in order to get consensus here (I kind of like these separately-posted consensus polls; polling isn't always evil!) we should probably give some notice at WT:MOSABB in case there are folks who care a lot over there but don't hang out in here. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 22:01, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

We should certainly give notice; but the idea that they have to conform to us is pointless bullying. We should, in the long run, reach consensus with them, because they are also editors. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:34, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

They do have to conform, or rather both documents need to be in conformance with each other, and that MOS versus MOS* serves as the more authoritative document is long since settled. The reason that they must conform is due to the nature of Wikipedia guidelines, which have to prepresent consensus; if they do not agree, then by definition one (or both!) is not representing consensus and therefore cannot legitimately be designated a guideline. MOS's subpages are elaborations on MOS, not alternatives to it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:55, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

PS: If your point is that the editors on this page should not be "bullying" editors at that page, we are in violent agreement, since that was my point too - that's why I say we should invite MOSABB editors (to the extent they differ from MOS editors) to give their input, or we run the risk of forming what we think is a consensus but isn't because key minds are missing. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:02, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Naming conventions (abbreviations) is just as important. It took several months to get them to come alongside the old policy... Rich Farmbrough, 12:01 9 October 2007 (GMT).

I beat SMcCandlish to it in predicting, above, that soon the dots in "US" will be history (I think I cited the year 2015). If Americans' usage on WP is any guidance, SMcC is right in asserting that the anally retentive practice of dotting "US" is on the wane. I don't entirely agree with him that it's outside the bounds of a variety of English issue. In Australia, no one dots it. Maybe they did 30 years ago, but not now. And the major dictionary, the Macquarie, agrees. The naming conventions page needs to be alerted to this issue. Tony (talk) 12:13, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Italics before punctuation

Italicization is restricted to what should properly be affected by italics, and not the surrounding punctuation.

I'm not sure this is wise, especially for semicolons, which look dreadful on default IE settings, especially after y or f; while sentences can be recast, it is a cost to do so to solve a purely typographical problem. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:45, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

IE 6, is it? It sucks, and is almost universally denigrated by IT professionals. It's also the reason WP can't use quite a few formatting innovations, such as non-breaking thin spaces; why not use another browser? Tony (talk) 01:10, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Because, like many of our readers, I'm not usually using my own computer. A university computer has many advantages; but I can't reconfigure the system at will. We should serve our readers where they are. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:29, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Within reason cater for all types of computer, OS and browser. Compromising by not promoting the option of the otherwise excellent non-breaking thin-space template, and other formatting improvements, to suit a bad but sadly commonly used browser was frustrating enough. I don't think I'd favour further compromises that go more deeply into WP's practices, here, its long-standing guidelines on the logic of using punctuation at the right level. I just hope the appalling IE Version 6 is superseded promptly, but my tech friends give me no reason for optimism. Firefox and other freeware browsers are readily available for download onto Windows, and Mac users would be eccentric not to use Safari or another good browser. That's a better option, or put up with the jangling of italics up against roman parentheses, etc. Tony (talk) 03:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, I would be glad to see the Soft Revolution which would sweep Microsoft away altogether; but Wikipedia is not a crystal ball. In the meantime, we have to be readable on all widely used platforms, as a minimum.Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:58, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

My typographer friend reminds me that this is a general problem: italic punctuation has survived because italic text jangles with roman punctuation in general. (There are exceptions, like the period; but is it worth insisting on the roman instead of the italic period? How many pixels do they differ on? Sample follows, with the italic on the left.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:58, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

..

More than I thought; on this machine the italic is double size - but does this matter? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:00, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

No. If we tried to handle every browser hiccup, we'd have to revert back to *ASCII* _markup_, as in Usenet. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:59, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

We cannot allow improper handling of literal strings (for the same reasons we've settled on a logical-quotation norm) to handle suboptimal Browser display. That problem is (slowly) self-fixing, and is already non-problematic in Mozilla-family browsers regardless of OS and in all modern MacOS browsers, as long as non-stupid fonts are used. The only problematic area seems to be IE6/Win (maybe IE7; I haven't used it much and didn't think to look into its behavior here). I can't think of anthing worse than including extraneous punctuation like semicolons inside italics and quotations, and I revert it mercilessly wherenever I find it. It would also lead (and has led; I revert several of these per week) accidental redlinks, when people do things like "...Intel, IBM, and Apple..." out of the bad habit formed by typesetters' quotation style. I also encounter mis-paranthetization of punctuation fairly often as well, probably from the same root habituation cause. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:59, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Is there any other support for this position, or is it simply another prejudice of this editor? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:45, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

A typically PMAnderson non-responsive handwave. You've not actually responded to my point at all, and attempt instead to mislead the reader with emotive and illogical language. How can it be "another" alleged prejudice on my part when I've made it clear that there is no difference between the rationale for logical quoting and logical italicization (and logical parentheticals, and...); they're the same: Don't mess with quoted material, be it a quotation of someone's speech, a book title, or whatever. How can it be a "prejudice" when it is a logical argument backed by a solid rationale that I have been presenting entirely consistently for months, based on the facts and issues presented, as they apply to Wikipedia, rather than personal feelings of what looks better or nicer or suits notions of prescriptive, subjective "correctness" or tradition? Please go look up the word prejudice and think about how your own arguments on these matters stand up. In the interim, perhaps you can explain how you come to the conclusion that italicization not not be restricted to what should properly be affected by italics, and should be allowed to pollute the semantics of the text and its markup, with potentially ambiguous, confusing and error-causing results, simply to make the visual display look a little better for some people using certain fonts in a certain browser (that is widely known to be deficient in more ways than can be enumerated), on a certain operating system, especially when simply changing to a better-kerned font will probably resolve the local problem? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:37, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I suppose the two are both forms of the same argument; unfortunately, the common argument is WP:ILIKEIT. This instance does contain two things more: the unsupported value judgment "improper handling of literal strings" and a series of remarks to the effect that the reader will have no problems if only she upgrades her software to the bleeding edge enjoyed by SMcCandlish. This will not do; I hope it is not merely "Tough on you, Jack; I've got mine", but it certainly reads like it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:21, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

That's not the common argument at all. "I like it" is an expression of emotional, subjective preference (aesthetic, habitual, beaten into me by a mean mom with belt, whatever.) The common thread of my argument, and Tony's, is the common thread of much of the MOS: "Don't change quotations or other verbatim material" (i.e. "don't improperly handle literal strings"; sorry if it wasn't clear that I was using them as synonymous). I don't urge that everyone upgrade or sidegrade. It's just that preference for a particular browser always has some kind of cost associated with it, because all of them have implementation problems. We cannot make endless exceptions and changes to compensate for browser compliance problems, and we're already making some for IE that have people ticked off; I understand proponents of the thin-space character when it comes to various numerical formatting applications, but folks overall seem to agree that the IE problem with it is serious enough (there's a difference between a semicolon being a little closer to italic text than it should be and characters not appearing or worse yet appearing as the wrong character. Triage has to happen somewhere, and font kerning seems to me to be a really good line to draw. Especially when the "remedy" for the "ailment" would be sacrificing the discreteness of literal strings like quotations, titles of works, etc. A bit like killing the doctor to save the patient. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Back to the impasse about words as words: call for consensus

Thanks to Noetica for his recent copy-edits to MOS. However, they have brought up again a niggling issue that was raised by SMcCandlish only last week on this page, and which received but one response apart from mine (an extremely negative one for which the reasoning escaped me). Insisting on italics for words as words requires writers and readers to be aware of an all-too-subtle boundary between noun phrases and larger chunks of text. A whole clause clearly does not fit the ambit of words as words, and under the current rule should be marked by quotes, not italics.

Following the current rule, only the last item (Old Man Winter) should be italicised:

Seasons, in almost all instances, are lowercase: “This summer was very hot”; “The winter solstice occurs around December 22”; “I’ve got spring fever”. When personified, season names may function as proper nouns, and they should then be capitalized: “I see that Spring is showing her colors”; Old Man Winter.

But all examples are now italicised. This looks better and avoids the need for readers to wonder about this fussy grammatical distinction, but goes against the current rule.

Above, SMcCandlish called for a compromise proposal: that both styles be allowed, as long as consistency is maintained within each article. This would allow editors to get rid of the need to observe this awkward grammatical distinction it they wish, by using quotations marks for all examples. The quote-marks method is widely used in all varieties of English.

Existing text in MOS:

Words as words

Italics are used when citing a word or letter (see use–mention distinction). For example, “The term panning is derived from panorama, a word coined in 1787.” “The most commonly used letter in English is e.” Here, word includes noun phrases (e.g., the brown dog).

Proposed text:

Words as words

Words discussed as words are indicated by either quotation marks (The term "panning" is derived from “panorama”) or by italics (The term panning is derived from panorama). Be consistent within an article.

Tony (talk) 02:17, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

• Support—Tony (talk)
• Support- The sort of compromise we should be using a great deal more often than we are. Tony, the reason for the hostile response seems clear enough: the declaration that there is only one right system on this matter is Original Research. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:33, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

  Rejoinder to PMA: the hostile response was to the compromise proposal, strangely. Tony (talk) 03:37, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

  So I see, but th suspicion that this is salami tactics, is (while I do not share it) not entirely unreasonable.

  • General comment; this seems wordy; surely it is sufficient to say something like In any given article, words discussed as words may be indicated either by italics [example], or as by quotation marks: [example] but be consistent within any given article. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:47, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

  Rejoinder: OK, done. Tony (talk) 04:01, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

• Support. Makes sense. But I'm not sure how a manual of style can be accused of original research, as this is not a page in the article space and doesn't have to worry about citing sources or NPOV. — Brian (talk) 05:07, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

• Reject – Only because the formulation we are now contemplating is incomplete.

Fine, for mention of individual words. But the reason Tony started this present discussion is that there are problems when we go beyond such small units. Units larger than words that one might wish to mention are these: noun phrases; other sorts of phrases; clauses; defective or incomplete sentences, cited as fully as in their original use; portions of sentences, cited with or without an ellipsis before or after (or both); "sentences" that do not include a finite verb; and finally standard, full, sentences that one wishes to mention in their entirety. My proposal is that any of these may be mentioned by enclosing in double quotes, or alternatively by use of italics. There is no principled motivation for treating sentences and smaller units differently, when they are mentioned. And let's be clear about this: mentioning is exactly what we are doing in our MOS, and in its auxiliary pages, and in all articles that discuss sentences or their parts.

Beyond that principle of consistency, in such pages as MOS italics are overwhelmingly clearer (as my recent editing should demonstrate). Glance at any part of the italicised text and you know immediately that it is marked off for some special purpose. Not so with quotes, where one has to search back and forth for the markers that show whether and with what boundaries the text is delimited. One can be and should be sensitive to special local needs in a section, of course. For example, when italics are under discussion, use quotes for the mention of strings of words (of whatever size and construction). That is a rational modification, and one that we can all easily compass, I'm sure. See examples from my recent edits.

Another good reason to prefer italics, especially in MOS-style articles and the like, is to avoid those damnable curled quotes: “ and ”. Easy to fix en masse by special techniques, sure – for those with the necessary technical knowledge. But the bane of editors in the ordinary course of editing, and utterly frustrating for users who might want to search for text that includes quote marks with their browser's search facility, or with Wikipedia's own search system. How do we input them, in continuous editing within Wikipedia's standard editing system? It's not as if they have the status of Greek unaspirated initial lower-case epsilon with an acute (ἔ) – quotes are standard punctuation, and we need them as a matter of course. So let's not compound the difficulties by requiring that mention of sentences be by quotes, especially when they are those wretched curled ones.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 05:24, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

(1) Curly quotation marks and apostrophes are not much used outside MOS; I was surprised to find them used here. Why not just change all in MOS to straight quotation marks, and we've solved one of your issues.

(2) I'm not quite sure what you're proposing—that either quotations marks or italics may be used, consistently, for words as words and larger examples that couldn't be considered to be such? If so, please confirm. What term/description to use for the larger ones? Tony (talk) 12:09, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Reply to Tony:

(1) I'd be delighted if we could settle on having only straight quotes, both here and outside MOS, as established policy. They are simply a liability in Wikipedia, as things stand. Let's have a vote on that! Having only straight quotes would make life easier for everyone – except the curly zealots – even if the issues with mentioning were not settled rationally. (Meanwhile I have just recently edited out some straight quotes here at MOS, simply for consistency. And I speak as one who would never use straight quotes in normal wordprocessing, of course.)

(2) First: I have a strong preference for italics by default, for all mentioning of any string of characters or words, up to and including a full sentence. Accordingly, my term for the mentioned items would be any string of words or characters, including whole sentences. Call this the uniform italics way. This way would sometimes need to be modified to fit the context, as I note above and as I implemented in my recent edits here. Second: We won't agree that the uniform italics way be adopted as the default for mentioning. Some will always prefer the uniform quotes way. So realistically, let's at least agree that every article should restrict itself to one way or the other, and not mix styles – except, again, in cases like MOS, where the default style must be varied in order to exhibit something that concerns punctuation itself, or italics.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 13:46, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Reply to Noetica: Sounds good to me. Can we get consensus on both of these matters?

(1) Quotation marks or italics, consistently within each article, for all mentioning of any string of characters or words;

(2) Straight quotes and apostrophes recommended.

I've suggested "recommended" for (2), because I think some people may object to a blanket ban on curlies.

Over to everyone else ... Tony (talk) 16:31, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Noetica, I think you may have missed some of the earlier debate on this, if you are so pro-italics, since you don't address or seem to recognize the problem of the overloading of italics to do so many other functions compared to quotation marks. The main problem is that italics are used very widely here for empphasis, with the result that everything italic looks like it's really, really important, which is often not the case. In something like the MOS itself, laden with both lots of emphasis and lots of examples (some of which use even more functions of italics, such as flagging a word as foreign or formatting a book title), it makes the document unnecessarily difficult to read and to parse correctly. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:56, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

• Support consistent quotes or italics. Support strongly recommending straight quotes because curved quotes tend to come from the nonstandard Microsoft "smart quotes" character set which often end up displayed as question marks (or otherwise not displayed). Suggest splitting quotation mark discussion out to a separate topic before discussion fractures. (SEWilco 16:48, 6 October 2007 (UTC))

• I'm happy on both counts, but would be happier with a blanket ban on curly quotes and apostrophes. --Paul Erik 17:06, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
• For the record, I support both. A blanket ban on curly quotes (and apostrophes, I guess, for consistency) would be fine, but I'd climb down to a strong recommendation if there's significant opposition to a blanket ban. Tony (talk) 03:26, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

• Support. But I also note and echo Paul Erik's support of a blanket ban on curly quotes altogether. I think that should go to a separate subsequent vote. Meanwhile: I have edited the page to replace all curled apostrophes and quotes with straights (yes, apostrophes need to be considered together with quotes), except where the variants are themselves under discussion. This is how the article started out, so the original style should – by its own principles – be respected! If we are, in the eventual outcome here, to accept curled apostrophes and quotes consistently in an article, any editor should be encouraged in overriding them at will if they are not part of the original style of the article. That is not an extreme position, by any means.– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 03:36, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

• Strong support for quotes-or-italics, and would add that we should directly advise the use of quotation marks in material that is otherwise making heavy use of italics for other purposes, and advise italics for articles already using a lot of quotation marks e.g. for quotations and titles of things. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:52, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Also the use of quotation marks for meanings, when italics have been used for words as words. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:38, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

• Why? What is wrong with ' "myocardial infarction" is a medical term for what is commonly called a "heart attack" '? Both are mention, not use, cases. I think it would be weird/confusing to use ' "myocardial infarction" is a medical term for what is commonly called a heart attack'? Or did you mean something else? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:56, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Nothing; the distinction should be: 'The phrase acute myocardial infarction is used only in the sense "interruption of the blood supply to a part of the heart"; heart attack has this as its strict sense, but is more widely used.' The italics mark words; the quotes the denotation. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:43, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

• Support recommendation on curly quotes also. I recommend that we say something like Curly quotes are not well-supported by browsers, and may well display as straight quotes, a little square box, or gibberish. Some editors also regard them as an archaism. We therefore recommend the use of straight quotation marks only. Any editor who sees that and still uses curly quotes will not be deterred by a ban; we are large enough to tolerate editors with such strong beliefs on proper punctation. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:38, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
• Support curlies deprecation also (I wouldn't go so far as ban, which a guideline can't really enforce anyway). Cool, I actually get to agree with PMAnderson on something. I wish that happened more often! While I agree with some editors that curlies look better, they are a major editing nuissance. I'm not terribly swayed by the browser compatibility issue (we use Unicode right and left in here, so any browser that freaks on curlies is going to freak all over the place anyhow.) I see them was may more of a usability than accessibility issue, and would like to see that in the text, but otherwise like PMA's version. Concur in principle with however said curlies should be addressed separately, but I think that horse is out of the barn, thus this supplementary !vote of mine. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:56, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
  • We can certainly add "difficult to edit", "hard to search for", or whatever else usability issue means in this context. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:23, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

• I don't have any particular preferred wording; I think the main points would be those two - it is much harder to find in the characters feature below the edit box, or memorize keyboard codes, to generate those characters than to use what's right there on our keyboards, and (as far as I know) search results will come up short. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:39, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Identity

Where known, use terminology that subjects use for themselves (self-identification). This can mean using the term an individual uses for himself or herself, or using the term a group most widely uses for itself.

This is confusing recommendation. So, if the KKK claims they are not racist, then should Category:Antisemitism or Category:Racism be removed off the KKK article? Or if the AFA claims they are not homophobic, should Category:Homophobia be removed off the AFA article even though there is substantial proof the AFA are involved in homophobia? Please clarify. Thank you. —Christopher Mann McKay^talk 17:27, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't say "don't use other terms", just to use those terms. For example, say that the KKK describes itself as a "fraternal association dedicated to this-that-and-the-other", then you might say (in an the KKK article) "The KKK are a fraternal organisation dedicated to this-that-and-the-other, with a history of association with antisemitic and racist activity". Just a thought, but that's as I understand it. SamBC(talk) 19:15, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

I have recently edited in the section Identity. The issue for me is nothing to do with any political stance or campaign. I only want the guidelines to be as crisp and readable as the complexity of the content will allow. A certain point was not made lucidly at all, and indeed I failed to discern the meaning, until someone kindly left a note at my talkpage. (Thanks for that!) Here is the separate bullet point that I have made, now that I know what was meant:

• A transgender person's latest preference of name and pronoun should be adopted when referring to any phase of that person's life, unless this usage is overridden by that person's own express preference in how this should be managed.

Some of us are concerned first of all to have things put clearly, for all users everywhere. Please consider the section as I have now tidied it, as a whole. Doesn't it still reflect the fragile partial consensus towards which people were working here? At least now we can all see what was intended!

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 01:13, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

I support the wording currently in place - it's clear, oriented towards readability and best reflects 'self-identification' as the primary guideline for identity of transgendered individuals. Good job, Noetica. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 01:33, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

The "fragile partial consensus" is very much both of those, and thus not a consensus. The problem here is that this issue was being debated at much more length in two other topics, and this third one has failed to get the attention of most of those involved in the discussion, forming an accidental case of "asking the other parent" as discussed at WP:CONSENSUS. As I suggested earlier, the wise thing to do would be to archive all of these threads, and start a new one clearly labelled something like "Resolution of the gender neutrality discussions", and propose very specific things, based on the previous discussions (all three of them, not just this one, which is missing crucial points including that there is out-standing dispute both here and elsewhere about whether using currently preferred pronoun for all phases of a subject's life actually makes any sense (there is a sharply divided opinion on that matter), and both sides of that issue's agreement, for several weeks now, that one way or another awkward/confusing phrasing like "fathered her first child" should be avoided. Among other problems. I think the current edit while philosophically-minded is too much so, and has lost sight of practicality (in a way that actually points out the root problem with the "use currently preferred pronoun" meme): "that person's own express preference" is simply not going to be available to use 99 times out 100 (or worse), which means that most of the time the usage is basically original research on our part - what we think the subject would want. Which doesn't really address the core question of what is useful to our readers, what we should really be caring about. All that said, the only part I'm particularly insistent upon right now is the "she fathered" caveat. Addressing that already had consensus before your third thread even got started. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:10, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

A genuine consensus can, of course, be fragile; and a genuine consensus – even, or especially, a fragile one – can be partial by having settled some issues and not others. Therefore fragile partial consensus does not involve a contradiction.

Do I care? No.

Do I care how transgender folk get talked about? Not a lot, so long as it be with respect for them, for the language, and for the readers or hearers.

Do I want our guidelines to be rational, well expressed, consensual, and well integrated into Wikipedia as a whole? Emphatically yes. I'm happy to let others sort all this out among themselves, but I'll be among those sorting out wording and such details in the guidelines themselves.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 02:37, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Alternative approach

A completely different idea is that this could be handled the same way that non-transgender-related alternate names are. Typically (there's no rule about this, I just see it), it goes something like this:

Joe Foobar (born James F. Bazquux, date, place) is a professional Scrabble player, four-time world champion. He is also the banjo player for the bluegrass group My Hands are Too Small.

Born to a coal-mining family in West Virginia, blah blah blah. Bazquux, a poor student despite his obvious gift for words, left school at age 16, and while working as a waiter took on the name Joe Foobar when he entered his first regional Scrabble championship.

By 1983, Foobar had won the Eastern Regional Championship three years in a row, and took the national title in 1984, and the international title a year later.

I.e., the original name is used up until the new name was assumed, and use of either is avoided in th e lead's additional sentences. Works just fine. Pronouns would be adapted in the same way to the extent that they should be used at all; it is quite easy to write around them. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:10, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Adding both Notes and References sections

The following MOS guideline was added today, in an edit with the associated comment "Merging "Article titles" with 'Sections and headings'—more logical)":

"Create both Notes and References sections only where this is helpful. Their order can be reversed, depending on the system of references and notes used in the article."

I'm not sure when it would be considered non-helpful, as "helpful" is somewhat vague as a requirement. I think this is a new style guideline, derived from guidance in Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Maintaining a separate "References" section in addition to "Notes", which said only that separate sections can be helpful, not that they must be helpful. Personally, I put non-footnote citations (which I use if they apply to a big part of the article) in a References section, and inline footnoted citations (which I use for a quote, sentence, or other limited part of the article) in a Notes section, even if there is only one entry under the Notes and/or References headings. -Agyle 19:38, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Good point, it seems to me, and further evidence that MOS and its submanuals need closer coordination. The overhaul of the Article titles and Section headings sections that I did 10 hours ago arose from my proposal that the Headings submanual (MOS:HEAD) be deleted and what little extra information it contains on the subject transferred to MOS itself. So I set about combining the best of both sources, and improving the wording; in that task, there are just a few things I didn't get around to adding, and I suspect that they're amply dealt with at the main articles linked-to by the submanual and MOS. So at some stage, I do believe that the submanual would be better deleted to avoid mild chaos.

During this process, I realised that many of the guidelines that apply to section headings apply also to article titles. This was a problem in both MOS and MOSHEAD. Thus, what were the opening two sections of MOS are now merged and the guidelines more logically allocated in relation to titles and headings. Timneu22 has since modified the sections—good, except that s/he changed the "Wording" section (previously in both sources) to "Headings", with a rider about dual applicability within several points. However, it's neater to reinstate "Wording" and insert just one rider, in reverse, as it were: that the last point applies only to headings. I've done this.

The point raised by Aryle concerns what was clearly spelt out at MOSHEAD. Can you advise whether this would be better?

EXISTING: "Create both Notes and References sections only where this is helpful."

PROPOSED: "Creating both Notes and References sections can be helpful."

or remove the whole point? Tony (talk) 02:20, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

PS I see that several of the points in Timneu's reorganised "Article titles" section apply also to section headings. Shouldn't this be rationalised? Don't make section headings more than 10 words if you can help it, surely, as well as article titles? I've reorganised. Tony (talk) 02:22, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

On the question of what to say about Notes and References, I would suggest removing the whole point, or saying "For usage of References, Notes and Footnotes sections, see Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Section headings."

Also, I'd think about the adjacent sentence added to MOS, "Standard heading titles at the end of an article are See also, Notes, References, Further reading, and External links." If that's trying to summarize what was in WP:MOSHEAD, I think MOSHEAD was trying to suggest two specific orders for those appendix sections, while the one-sentence MOS summary doesn't suggest an order. -Agyle 07:01, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

OK, this is my latest attempt: "The standard order for heading titles at the end of an article are See also, Notes, References, Further reading, and External links; the order of Notes and References can be reversed where helpful. For more information on References, Notes and Footnotes sections, see Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Section headings."

What is missing is a sense of which headings are mandatory, for all articles, and which are optional. Can you help on that? Tony (talk) 08:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm fairly sure all five of those headings are optional. Citing sources is always encouraged, but isn't required if the material isn't "challenged or likely to be challenged." WP:CITE says the Notes section name can alternately be called Footnotes, and Further reading can alternately be called Bibliography. From your recent wording, I'd omit "where helpful" (WP:MOSHEAD says there are unspecified factors, but I think it's an arbitrary choice), and omit the "more" of "more information," since it really doesn't provide any information on those sections. Here's a modified alternative:

"The standard order for optional appendix sections at the end of an article are See also, Notes (or Footnotes), References, Further reading (or Bibliography), and External links; the order of Notes and References can be reversed. For information on these optional sections, see Wikipedia:Guide to layout#Standard appendices and descriptions and Wikipedia:Citing_sources."

-Agyle 09:17, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Agyle: I've implemented your suggested wording, hoping that others agree with it. I guess we'll see. Tony (talk) 11:04, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

(Outdent) I've got the loud shouting in edit summaries from Timneu22, which doesn't impress me. S/he is insisting on a sequence of headings in this part of MOS that take you logically through the sequence a reader meets in reading an article. Article titles, First sentences, Section headings. It has some advantages, but one big disadvantage in that the guidelines for the wording of both article titles and section headings are identical, except for one (Avoid restating wording on a higher level in the heading hierarchy). As Timneu has loudly insisted, the guidelines are illogically strewn between the two. Now it's OK to use "You" in an article title, where not part of a proper noun? And "The" and "A" as opening word? And now you can insert links into article titles.

And it's unfortunate to trot out the same points twice in the space of the three opening sections of MOS. I'll have a go at fixing this while retaining the current structure. Tony (talk) 01:25, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me that there is an overwhelming trend away from using both, and a strong one away from using a Notes section at all except in article with genuine non-reference footnotes. I think it could be time to delineate more clearly between them: If all of the footnotes are reference citations, even with commentary, use References. If there are both and different footnoting systems are used (e.g. <ref> for refs and one of the footnote templates for notes of a non-ref nature, use both, and use only Notes if both are used and both use the same footnoting system. Agree with keeping notes between See also and References. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

One feature that should be addressed here is accessibility. Many ref-sections now use small type, which (even) I find difficult with perfect corrected vision. The only good reason for this is that the references are "taking too much space" which in turn only makes sense if they are not, if you will, actually footnotes at the very foot of the article. Therefore I would like to see consideration to moving the footnotes (whatever the section is called) right to the end of the article proper, possibly beyond any navboxen, at the same time deprecating small fonts. Rich Farmbrough, 12:07 9 October 2007 (GMT).

So people render their ref-sections in 10 point rather than 12? Could there be a compromise in 11 point as a minimum? And can you spell out the reason that locating references at the end is going to help? Thanks. Tony (talk) 12:25, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Ellipses policy unclear

I find two things unclear with the ellipses policy:

(1) The example of "Even more rarely, before an exclamation mark…!" seems to contradict the given rules. Is this intentional, or a mistake?

(2) What do we do for ellipses that separate complete sentences? Using "…." seems misleading, since it suggests that the elided text came before the end of the sentence. I think that ". …" would be more appropriate, but that form is not mentioned.

Tristan Schmelcher 21:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

You're right on the first count: thank you. On the second, isn't it four dots without space before them? ("The house was on the hill.... It had been unoccupied for many years.") Tony (talk) 00:56, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

It is normally so done; the fourth dot being the period at the end of the first complete sentence. Many readers will be likely to miss the distinction between three and four dots, however; if it matters, we should mark the difference explicitly. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:41, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Right, it is normally done that way. But what could be more explict a marker that four instead of two dots? Any reader paying enough attention to care about what was elided seems to me to be likely to care enough to noticed four vs. three dots. But maybe it's just; I tend to notice four dots instantly, maybe it doesn't "resonate" for others as well. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:24, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Please archive again

This page is again causing Firefox/WinXP to crash due to its bulk, on systems that don't have gobs and gobs of RAM (100%-repeatable crash on my system). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:14, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

There are auto-archiving bots; we could install one here. SMcCandlish has no problem requesting that we adapt to the peculiarities of an operating systme when it's his OS; perhaps he will be less dismissive of the foibles of other operating systems hereafter. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:50, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

As per Tony and others, why do you always seem to attempt to muddy the water with logically fallacious arguments? Things not looking perfectly pretty with your particular font in your particular browser is nothing at all like bluescreening applications that make WT:MOS completely unusable in circumstances that are likely to affect a large numbers of user (WinXP, Firefox, less that 1GB of RAM). Jee-zus. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:19, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Done. OS problems or not, the page was just too damn long. Strad 23:24, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank you! — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:19, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

British vs. American English for terms

What standard is followed in issues of term usage between British and American English? For example, the use of 'paraffin' in Tractor_vaporising_oil. Britain uses 'paraffin' for both kerosene and paraffin wax, while all other English-speaking countries, as far as I know, call it kerosene nearly exclusively. I know that in matters of spelling, articles are left in the style in which they were written, but terms seem to have a much larger impact. What should be done in this case? Phasmatisnox 01:58, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Seems best to me to avoid ambiguous terms, dialect issue aside. I assume that UK readers will understand "kerosene" and "paraffin wax"? Also, linking to more specifically-termed articles is often helpful in situations like this. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:21, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Agree with SMcC, if a suitable alternative term would be universally clear. If there is no single term that would be commonly understood in both places, I'd say pick one, and on first usage explain the other term. An example would be the Williams pear, called the Bartlett pear in the U.S. and Canada; I doubt many people are familiar with both of those terms, or the formal name which is universal. -Agyle 06:30, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

US$

Can we have a guideline that states that one does not have to put the US in front of $ for articles that are clearly talking about American things? I find the US$ wording to be an eyesore and usually unnecessary. Alternatively, perhaps have a template that goes towards the end of the article (such as in "Notes" or "References") that reads something like "All $s in this article refer to United States dollars." Other countries' dollars could have similar templates. It seems that the need to specify which dollars is only needed for articles that talk of things of a global nature.--SeizureDog 05:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

If the practice really is that common then I suppose a proscription ought to go in. There's no need to write US$ for obviously American prices, just as there's no need to write UK£ for obviously British prices. Strad 05:59, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

It's been there for a while: Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Formatting. Tony (talk) 06:30, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Closing parentheticals

There's been some confusion here on what to do with parentheticals that end in terminal punctuation and also end their enclosing sentence. As we already know from quotations, which when used inline in a sentence are basically a form of parenthetical, terminal punctuation that must be inside a parenthetical that agrees with the terminal punctuation required by the enclosing sentence, ends the sentence there, with the terminal punctuation not duplicated outside the parenthetical. This is so obvious that few style guides address it directly. Because they don't need to. A rule already given long before parentheticals are even mentioned will already address it. Examples:

• Chicago Manual of Style, 15th ed: "6.122 No double period: When an expression that takes a period ends a sentence, no additional period follows.... 6.15 Omission of period: ... When an expression that takes a period ends a sentence, no additional period follows." (Yes, they actually said it twice.)

• Mayfield Handbook: "Section 8.1.: If an abbreviation ending in a period comes at the end of a sentence, do not attach an additional period to the sentence...."

I'm sure others go into it as well, but I have better things to do that look up a multitude of references that all says the same thing.

The principle here is reiterated, even in Fowler's Modern English Usage and other style guides, when addressing quotation handling and other issues, such as titles of works, usage of commas, and so on.

By way of comparison if I wrote a song that was literally called "Foo," with the comma part of the song name, we would not write about the song with redundant commas: "SMcCandlish's song 'Foo,' released in 2007...", not "SMcCandlish's song 'Foo,', released in 2007...".

Any read through Wikipedia articles will show that the principle here is being applied consistently, and there's evidently no widespread confusion about it, but someone keeps insisting on adding redundant punctuation to MOS itself, thus this long message to address it before it starts inspiring editors at large to add redundant punctuation all over the place.

The problem probably stems from failure to recognize that the "except when the parenthetical is separate or self-contained" exception in various style guides that applies to "always put terminal punctuation outside a parenthetical at the end of a sentence" is satisfied by abbreviations that terminate with a period (again, as long as the period agrees with the sentence), because the period is indivisible from the acronym. Abbreviations that end with periods are "detached" or self-contained by virtue of their format, as they cannot be altered to move their punctuation away. The mistake is in assuming that the only things that satisfy the exception are sentences (CMS even appears to say this, until one remembers that they've already countermanded double-perioding elsewhere. Twice.)

Some examples:

• Agreement of parenthetical and sentence: He went to the pub (at 5 p.m.) (the period cannot be moved from the abbreviation to the outside)
• Redundant: He went to the pub (at 5 p.m.). (just as He said 'I'm going to the pub at 5 p.m.'. would be redundant)
• No agreement of p. and s.: He went to the pub (at 5 p.m.)? (whole sentence is a question)
• Alternative abbreviation style: He went to the pub (at 5 pm). (lack of period on comma does not force terminal punctuation inside the paren.)

Another way of looking at this is, "Why on earth would we advise doing one thing with parenthetically-constructed quotations (and titles of works, etc.), and something completely different with all other parentheticals?" (Please note that a period does not follow the end of that pseudo-quotation. :-)

— SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 13:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)