Wikipedia talk:In the news/name

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The reason is simple. Wikipedians uses the acronym ITN to discuss this page. That is actually the registered acronym of a real news agency Independent Television News. The page already uses acronyms like ABC, BBC, RTÉ, CBS etc for news sources. A friend of mine who works in the real ITN has already had someone complain about an erronious "ITN" story that showed up in a google search that actually was from our ITN not the real one. (The search had found somewhere on Wikipedia where people were rowing about whether "ITN" was accurate or too Americocentric.

A more serious problem could arise at any time if we get something seriously wrong and a google search links people to the acronym ITN meaning us, not the real ITN. To avoid any problems that might arise (and as they have a legal right to use ITN) we need to use a name that cannot cause confusion with a real news agency.

I raised this issue on the Wikilist and while there was no consensus on what to rename the page to, there was a consensus that it would be best to change to a new page to stop people using ITN for our page on Wikipedia.

The name proposed, "Around the world" isn't set in stone. It was just a name that I thought of when requesting the move. But it is important to get rid of the initials ITN from our pages, so that when they do appear it is clear that they mean only one thing, Independent Television News. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 04:13, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose
    • The name "In the news" has nothing more in common with "Independent Television News" than its initials. "ITN" is never used on anything but talk pages, and outside groups should have no say over our internal discussions- this side of the page is no different here than an internet forum.
      • Wrong. It is used by Wikipedians in all fora they communicate through, from the Wikipedia lists to talk pages, messages, emails, websites that discuss Wikipedia and a host of other locations and crops up on pages taken from us under our licence [1] [2] [3][4][5] In the event of a legal case we would not have a leg to stand on. ITN is a registered name of a worldwide news supplier. We use the acronym to refer to news stories and discuss what is on ITN meaning our ITN but which can be misunderstood if stumbled across by others, especially when the same page uses valid acronyms for other news agencies alongside our improper usage of some other agency's registered name which we wrongly use as our own. Furthermore, ITN has a reputation of being ruthless in initiating court cases. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 16:16, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If someone googles random forum pages for an initialism, they shouldn't be surprised at the ambiguity of TLAs if they don't read in context. What if someone here in future complains that "ATW" has lost artistic relevance, is a disservice to Wales or was once innovative but is now outmoded.--Pharos 12:49, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

      • None of the "ATW"s you cite have anything to do with news. The same clearly cannot be said with ITN. Proteus (Talk) 12:55, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • For starters, I'm not convinced that a little bit of whining from a couple of guys at ITN warrants changing the page name. However, if we do change it, it would be nice if the new name had some remote resemblance to news. "Around the world" could refer to just about anything from featured articles to the systemic bias WikiProject. Ambi 13:05, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • The name is simply a rough suggestion. It is simply a reminder that the last thing we need to do is quite innocently piss off a major news organisation, one we may need in the future to work with, simply because we were foolish to continue to allow the use of a name that when acronymised produces the name of a very large rival organisation. If we make a major error that gets attention and we discuss it by using the acronym we could find outselves in serious legal water because we would be discussing an error using what legally is some other major news organisation's name, so implying to people who weren't au fait with our template name that it was their error. ITN are famed in the industry for legal cases. They once closed down a magazine in a case. It would be unthinkable for us to refer to this page as the BBC, or NBC. (Every US Wikipedian would be on like a shot to warn us not to be so stupid if we tried to call this page CBS) It should be equally unthinkable to use ITN. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 16:16, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • Though Around the World is also a Daft Punk song, which would be cool. More seriously, I'm not sure that I would characterize ITN as a "rival organisation". There are no hits for "ITN Wikipedia" that appear in Google news for the simple reason that we are not a news organization, do not intend to be a news organization, and would deny being a news organization if anyone asked. Again, see Wikinews. And if we move the page then we have to worry about Air Transport World, which has a news office, suing us for causing confusion with their ATW acronym. Let's not make work for ourselves. - BanyanTree 17:53, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose strongly. Template:News would be nice, but the header should certainly remain "in the news". — Dan | Talk 18:21, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support move per JTD's arguments, but would prefer {{News}} & "Front-page news" (or other similar) over "Around the world". –Hajor 14:06, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - no need. violet/riga (t) 19:26, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - So what it shares an acronym with something else? Does it really matter that much? --AllyUnion (talk) 12:45, 10 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • This is silly. Acronyms are overloaded, deal with it! — David Remahl 18:52, 18 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - our internal affairs should not be dictated by an outside organisation. Especially when it comes to TLAs. It's not like the Wikimedia Foundation uses it (or endorses it), just average people on Weblogs and Webforums (like this discussion page is effectually). ITN (the news station) wouldn't have a leg to stand on in a court case (although I'm not a lawyer). --Celestianpower háblame 09:16, 19 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. In the news is what this section is all about, no need for it to change. —Cleared as filed. 14:02, 19 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, but kill off redirect or redirect to an actual article. - Ta bu shi da yu 15:04, 19 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, the reason for the proposed change is unconvincing. The problem is not with the name "In the news" but with an acronym which is used only internally and only be some. The problem with "Around the world" is the title doesn't necessarily imply news but can be anything ie little known facts about geography and different cultures. We could try "News of the World"... oh, wait a second:) Homey 23:51, 25 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments

"In the News" is a condensed version of Current events, isn't it? so why not name the page "Main Current events"/"Summary of Current events" or something like that? Then we can change the title of the block on the main page to Current events (with the link). That would be consistent, it would change the name of the template from "ITN" and it would generate an amazing amount of traffic towards Current events. (See also my proposal for time stamps in ITN, further up on this talk page). Jules.LT 17:24, 21 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

That's not really what ITN is, they both have different requirements. Current Events is for stuff that belongs in 2005, November 22, etc. ITN, for one thing, requires an updated article, which CE does not and rarely has. --Golbez 17:35, 21 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

What ITN has is additional requirements. Seeing a more complete version on the outside and going in to see a less complete but still informative content looks like perfect wikipedia spirit to me. Plus, the additional traffic to CE would improve the rate of update of its articles. Jules.LT 18:31, 28 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It was requested that this article be renamed but there was no consensus for it be moved. violet/riga (t) 00:00, 26 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]