Talk:Strategem (album)

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Requested move[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved. As often happens due the leeway in the wording at WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, both 'sides' have made reasonable arguments that are in accordance with the guideline and I don't see one being stronger than the other. But there is a clear numerical majority and in this case, where the debate is effectively subjective, that is enough to achieve a consensus. Jenks24 (talk) 11:08, 14 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]


Strategem → Strategem (album) – While in modern English the more common spelling is stratagem, historically English used to spell as the Greek and Latin originals with an "e", στρατήγεμα stratēgema, and as "strategy", "strategic", etc. and consequently "strategem" is still a widely found spelling 56,100 English results since 1950. See Cummings ReCreating Strategy 2002 Page 239 "When strategoi emerged into English in the fifteenth century as strategem, it still meant either any 'operation or act of generalship'. Colorado rock band Big Head Todd and the Monsters are not the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for the variant spelling. Strategem should redirect to the dab stratagem. Relisted. Favonian (talk) 18:17, 25 May 2014 (UTC). In ictu oculi (talk) 23:06, 16 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note this article was created at Strategem (Big Head Todd and the Monsters album) presumably because of two minor Amazon.com albums with no band article at en.wp. In ictu oculi (talk) 23:17, 16 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. This is the only article on WP titled "Strategem". Sorry, In ictu, but that means that it is indeed WP:PRIMARYTOPIC over a variant spelling of a dictdef. If Stratagem was an encyclopedic article rather than a dab page, there could be a reasonable argument here. But this album is the only contender for encyclopedic content at "strategem". Anyone wanting to find out that WP has no article Stratagem will be served by the hatnote (added by In ictu - thanks). Dohn joe (talk) 23:25, 16 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No, sorry but Wikipedia having an article at a base title, or even only title, is not proof that that title is WP:PRIMARYTOPIC:

A topic is primary for a term, with respect to usage, if it is highly likely—much more likely than any other topic, and more likely than all the other topics combined—to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term.
A topic is primary for a term, with respect to long-term significance, if it has substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic associated with that term.

Given the 56,100 English results since 1950 for the variant spelling in English; Does this album pass either of these tests? In ictu oculi (talk) 00:56, 17 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. It passes both. First, we ignore the dictdef usage of "strategem", because Wikipedia is WP:NOTADICTIONARY. That's what links to Wiktionary are for. At that point, we look at actual encyclopedic uses of "Strategem", and we see that this album is the only article with that title. Thus, by default, it passes both tests of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Dohn joe (talk) 13:03, 17 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
WP:NOTDIC Wikipedia is not a dictionary, we do not list every synonym for a topic just so that the redirect can exist. The redirect can exist without having the term explicitly listed on the page to which it points. Confidence trick "strategem" is a subtype of the generic one. Many subjects have a large number of synonyms and ancillary subtopics for which their articles cover which also have a boatload of synonyms. We do not have a synonyms section on every section for every topic in order to have the redirect exist and point there. -- 65.94.171.126 (talk) 04:43, 20 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nominator. ╠╣uw [talk] 09:47, 19 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    Please see the above comment to the IP. How does it help our readers to send them to pages that don't discuss the term they're looking for? Dohn joe (talk) 17:15, 19 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose and speedy close per User:Dohn joe's initial and follow-up comments. Proposals like this fly in the face of policy and convention, and just waste time. This is WP Titling 101. The current title is fully compliant with policy and convention. There is no other use on Wikipedia for this title. Please! --В²C ☎ 05:47, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I would counsel against a speedy close since these two users, В²C and Dohn joe, have previously, as here, demonstrated a view of titling which arguably goes against the current wording of WP:AT and WP:DAB. Note "There is no other use on Wikipedia for this title" - despite a RH box search showing 141 results for articles using the Greek/European spelling as opposed to the modern/American one. It is possible that there may subsequent to my reply here be a flurry of activity to "correct" all those uses of strategem to stratagem, but the substantial use of the spelling in Google Books, even since 2010, remains. As in this recent album for example, proof that the "wrong" (but Greek-based) spelling continues to be used... In ictu oculi (talk) 07:03, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
If I understand you correctly, you're arguing that mispellings of "stratagem" as "strategem" should count as uses of "strategem" on Wikipedia when determining primary topic for "strategem". Never mind that there are no incorrect links to this article in article space[1], not to mention that there is no precedent for such an argument. Speedy close, please. --В²C ☎ 18:46, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The precedent for the argument is recognized in many variations of US and UK English tire/tyre yogurt/yoghurt etc. In this case the variant spelling is caused by the common spelling being a misspelling of the Greek/Latin, which explains why many sources persist in spelling it per the Greek and Latin. As indeed do Big Head Todd and the Monsters, three times (1) variant spelling in album title, (2) variant spelling in song title, (3) variant spelling in song lyric. That accounts for 1 of the 141 variant spellings as the Greek/Latin for this word on en.wp. It isn't our role to prescribe the language, if it was we'd move this to Stratagem (album). In ictu oculi (talk) 01:02, 24 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Well, except the band apparently considered it a deliberate misspelling, according to the source you found.... Dohn joe (talk) 01:24, 24 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
That reading (and the edit you just made to the source I added) is capable of 2 readings: Colin Larkin is a music journalist, not a member of the band, and the fact that Colin Larkin marks it (deliberately misspelled) is in the same format as Larkin's other readers notes, such as (inspired by 14th Century mystic St John Of The Cross) which follows his next comment. The lyrics to the song "Angry hands upon the wheel turn slow. Without a star the water turns to stone. Here I stand by lovely strategem. When love is gone I'll invent again. Lady in Ashes, Forget her name. Her beauty was matchless, her nature untame." show no hint of deliberate misspelling, this isn't a rap group adopting a wrong spelling as a stylism, but the group reflecting that the Greek/Latin spelling is common in European English. Further the reason I am confident that it is Larkin's opinion of the spelling is that he replaces (deliberately misspelled) with the simpler (sic) in the 2000 revision of his comments. So please reverse that change to the article text.
That aside, even if this was a rap crew deliberately creating a wrong spelling, so what? Strategem still means stratagem, it's still just a variant spelling. In ictu oculi (talk) 03:58, 24 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
English is a notoriously difficult language to spell "correctly". Even switching to "[sic]" indicates that the author still considers it a misspelling. What is your evidence that any of the other uses of "strategem" are intentionally using the Greek-derived spelling, as opposed to simply getting it wrong? Why is "strategem" not listed as a word by Oxford online or Merriam-Webster, or listed as a "misspelling" in Wiktionary? Dohn joe (talk) 18:45, 24 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
More evidence that "strategem" is generally regarded as a misspelling in contemporary English: The Fine Art of Copyediting p.61; Garner's Dictionary of Legal Usage, p.847. There's also another source that explicitly says that the band intentionally misspelled it, so I'll re-add. Dohn joe (talk) 19:17, 24 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Wiktionary probably needs to footnote Ebenezer Cobham Brewer's opinion that it should be corrected back to the Greek/Latin added, but that's by the by; whether we agree with American sources that say once something acquires its own "English" spelling the Greek/Latin spelling is now a mistake, this is irrelevant. As above a RH box search shows 141 results for en.wp articles using the Greek/European spelling as opposed to the modern/American one. In ictu oculi (talk) 07:14, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • support per nom. Agathoclea (talk) 09:50, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per Dohn joe's sound analysis. The hatnote is more than enough. Cavarrone 17:57, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: The current article title seems just as likely to be encountered as a spelling variation of the dabbed term than as someone looking for the album. Per WP:DAB, for disambiguation purposes, we concern ourselves with topics, not just with exact article title strings. Moreover, the album article has very little in it and appears to cite no reliable sources that discuss the topic in depth – thus failing to satisfy WP:NALBUMS / WP:GNG. The article seems destined to never be more than a stub and should probably just be deleted. —BarrelProof (talk) 21:55, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support—Great disservice to readers if the disambiguation is not inserted into the page name. Are we now expecting character-perfect typing, spelling talent? I could well have got the vowel wrong myself. (And Dohn Joe's hatnote methodology needs to be hung out on a line to dry.) Tony (talk) 04:58, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    User:Tony1 - normally, I would agree that a misspelling should be redirected to the proper spelling. But I would imagine that most misspellings don't have an article using those misspellings. Here, we have an actual article located at an intentional misspelling. Maybe you can answer my question(s) above as to how it betters serves our readers to send them to a dab page (Stratagem) that has no encyclopedic content when we can send them straight to an actual article? Dohn joe (talk) 18:50, 25 May 2014 (UTC) And what's wrong with hatnotes? They're standard WP practice. I don't suppose you have any evidence to demonstrate their effectiveness or lack thereof?[reply]
  • Support per In ictu oculi's argument.--Staberinde (talk) 13:31, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support move. Coreyemotela (talk) 20:32, 25 May 2014 (UTC).[reply]
  • Support Omnedon (talk) 21:42, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per Dohn Joe. Calidum Talk To Me 00:37, 26 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per in ictu oculi. The common alternative spelling of stratagem is at least as likely a claimant to primary topic status as an obscure album. For the sake of the ease of reader navigation, this proposal is the only sound option. Xoloz (talk) 17:34, 2 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Seriously? Is nobody going to actually analyze whether or not the article we're talking on merits the primary topic or not? Someone called it "obscure", which is a compliment. No charting and no indication at all of any significant influence. This ain't Results. I'm going to have to say that this album would lose to almost anything else - even a misspelling of a not-particularly-significant dictionary word. Support. Red Slash 00:05, 12 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
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