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Please remove "Otherwise, include the title if it can be accommodated in normal English"
This sentence makes absolutely no sense, and wasn't there in the past. Who added it and why? Wikipedia is supposed to be objective and neutral. It is in the business of reporting the names of things, not creating or promoting new names for things.
If an article title is merely descriptive, and not a commonly-held name, it should not be included in bold in the first paragraph. Doesn't matter whether it can be written naturally or not. Bolding it gives undue weight to that particular wording, implying it's a title or commonly-held name when it's just a description.
Bolding of key terms serves a lexical purpose, it's not just decoration. Don't mindlessly mimic the text formatting of other articles when it doesn't make any sense to do so. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.167.72.181 (talk) 14:43, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
This might be a valid reason for removing the text, if the only reason for emboldening the text were lexical. However, it is not lexical (and in fact we don't use bold for that purpose at all). Rather it is so the title appears as bold when the lead is transcluded onto other pages, like the main page for featured articles, portal pages, and so forth. Sławomir Biały (talk) 15:44, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
Precedence of disambiguation links and maintenance tags
Disambiguation links should be the first elements of the page, before any maintenance tags, infobox or image; if a reader has reached the wrong page, they typically want to know that first.
This is incorrect IMHO. When maintenance tags are placed under disambiguation tags, the result is an ugly imbalance of elements. Maintenance tags are temporary, while disambiguation links are permanent. Putting maintenance tags under disambiguation links gives the impression that the maintenance tags are a part of the article, when in fact they are not. A disambiguation notice, because its permanent, is essentially a part of the article itself, while a good maintenance tag is one that's completed and removed. -Stevertigo (t | c) 06:37, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
I disagree. A maintenance tag is a part of the article (albeit hopefully a non-permanent one) in the respect that it relates directly to its prose.
Conversely, a disambiguation link is a navigational tool pointing elsewhere (a task unrelated to the article's content and ideally performed straight away). —David Levy 06:48, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
I also said putting maintenance tags under disambiguation hatnotes is ugly. What say you? -Stevertigo (t | c) 07:15, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
I regard neither setup as ugly (though your preferred order seems relatively unintuitive). —David Levy 08:12, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
The disambiguation link helps the reader who doesn't want to be on this page anyway, so that all maintenance tags are irrelevant for them. The order is especially significant for people using Screen Readers, who have to "view" the page line by line and need to know, as soon as possible, that they need to move to another page, without wasting their time going through maintenance tags for the article they don't want. Most readers who see the whole screen will start to read the lead sentence and recognise they are at the right place, and happily ignore the hatnotes. "Ugly" doesn't really come into it: functional is what matters. PamD 09:40, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
The disambiguation link helps the reader who doesn't want to be on this page anyway - Theres a thing now called Google, which is pretty good at giving people the exact article they are looking for. And even Wikipedia's search does well. Hence Im reluctant to accept your worldview, Pam, that everybody on Wikipedia is right now looking at an article they don't want to see. Hence the maintenance tags are relevant to more people than are disambiguation hatnotes. -Stevertigo (t | c) 05:58, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
Which element is useful to more persons is immaterial. Either way, we're providing both. And either way, users arriving at the correct article will encounter both (which they may either read or skip past).
But for users arriving at an incorrect article, the maintenance tags are irrelevant. The disambiguation link is there to serve them, and it's the only element that they need. So placing it first acts to their benefit and no one's detriment.
PamD made an excellent point about visually impaired people using screen reader software, for whom it's particularly important that the hatnote come first. —David Levy 06:39, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
People using screen readers don't want to be interrupted by either disambiguation tags or fixit templates, they just want to read the article. I feel much the same way, and I'm not even visually disabled. -Stevertigo (t | c) 07:03, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
I don't doubt that many people (irrespective of their visual acuity) feel that way, but this has no bearing on the matter at hand. —David Levy 07:12, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
I wasn't the one who brought up screen readers. -Stevertigo (t | c) 07:19, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
I meant that the disinterest you've described has no bearing on the matter at hand; to someone who cares about neither element, their order is inconsequential (regardless of whether he/she uses a screen reader).
But someone to whom the disambiguation link is useful is best served by its it immediate presentation. This is especially true of screen reader users, for whom non-sequential content access is significantly more challenging. —David Levy 08:08, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
Have you given any thought toward summarizing our discussion at WP:HN? -Stevertigo (t | c) 08:20, 17 May 2012 (UTC) PS:Oh and the death article hatnotes are out of control - care to take a crack at it? -Stevertigo (t | c) 08:32, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
Have you given any thought toward summarizing our discussion at WP:HN?
I'm waiting for further comment.
PS:Oh and the death article hatnotes are out of control - care to take a crack at it?
I see that you already have. You made some improvements, but you also replaced a useful link to Dyeing with a link to Dying (disambiguation), which you then created as an invalid two-article disambiguation page (and to which you added inappropriate links to two other disambiguation pages, both of which lack relevance to the word "dying", a few minutes later).
I've restored the direct link to Dyeing (while retaining the other changes). —David Levy 12:50, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
I can live with that. Yeah I figured you went to bed for the night, and I couldn't leave it alone. Quite out of control. And hopefully dying can get 3-dabbed.-Stevertigo (t | c) 19:13, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
Yeah I figured you went to bed for the night,
You figured correctly.
and I couldn't leave it alone. Quite out of control.
Indeed, it was. Hatnotes (and the links contained therein) have a tendency to multiply, with their pileup apparently perceived as justification for further pileup (causing the problem to snowball).
For scientific or medical articles, is it true that the lead should summarize the generally-accepted consensus of the issue? It maybe I this was explained and I missed it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Crimsoncorvid (talk • contribs) 02:36, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
The lead should summarize the body of the article, giving greatest prominence to the most salient facts. I would imagine that in most scientific and medical articles, the generally accepted consensus would be covered in the body of the article, and would be one of the most salient facts reported. Are you working on a particular article that raised the question? —Ben Kovitz (talk) 13:44, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
There is an article where the lead prominently enumerates statements from a study that has been called into question by a reliable secondary source. Furthermore, the viewpoint in question is held by a minority of medical organizations. It seems the statements should be relegated to the body. I am trying to make sure I have a good understanding of the policy before I approach the article. Thanks for your clarification. Crimsoncorvid (talk) 06:30, 13 June 2012 (UTC)
In any article, minority viewpoints should be clearly marked as such and should not be presented out of proportion to the majority opinion; see WP:FRINGE. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:35, 13 June 2012 (UTC)
Articles about controversies
There are a number of articles that talk about controversies within a particular subject. Perhaps these pages were created because the "controversies" sections were becoming too large. I searched for the word "controversies" in the title so I could check how other articles of this kind handle the lead section, because I found the one I was working on unsatisfactory. Here are those that looked at:
I looked at the MoS for guidance, and I feel a need for extra guidance. These pages seem to treat the lead section inconsistently, yet some of them are assessed at a fairly high level. The MoS says If possible, the page title should be the subject of the first sentence. However, if the article title is merely descriptive—such as Electrical characteristics of dynamic loudspeakers—the title does not need to appear verbatim in the main text. Some of the articles use the regular convention of giving a definition, some don't. Would you consider "Controversies about x" to be "merely descriptive" so that's sufficient reason to leave out the definition? Nczempin (talk) 14:31, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
Yes. The first sentence should probably include a link to the topic that the controversy is about. If there is a single proposition that the controversy is about, that proposition should probably be stated in the first sentence, as in Ashkenazi Jewish intelligence. That defines the controversy. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 07:54, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
"Controversies in autism encompass the disagreement over the exact nature of autism, its causes and manifestations" is a poor first sentence, because it doesn't summarize the controversies. That's a good example of a descriptive title that needs no definition. Thanks for bringing up this topic. I agree: the MOS should offer some guidance about how to summarize a controversy in the lead. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 08:02, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
I don't think much of the change. I think the lead should give a little bit about what is being discussed rather than wholly depending on links. I believe the old led of controversies in autism was better. Dmcq (talk) 13:28, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
Please improve it. Or maybe find a better article to use as an example (though this might be a good example because the article is in a pretty immature state; that's when editors need the most guidance). I don't disagree about giving some helpful background info about the topic. I left it out of Controversies in autism only because the body doesn't have that info. My main concern is that the summary of a controversy should tell the proposition(s) under dispute and the main facts surrounding the controversy, rather than our all-too-common swirl of vagueness. Neutral coverage of a controversy states the facts about the controversy without taking a side. That's different from being so vague that a reader can't tell what the controversy is about. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 02:19, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
The example is horrible, please do not edit war trying to stick in your effort at editing into a guideline. Try and find some example you didn't write yourself and perhaps you might view it without the rose coloured glasses. Dmcq (talk) 23:10, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
I've removed the newly-added section. That the lead should summarize the most important points of the article is already part of the manual of style. There's no need for a weirdly specific additional section that elaborates on this point as applied to a very small subset of articles. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:15, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
Sławomir Biały: Thank you for articulating the problem with the (now-deleted) section so precisely. Could you suggest another approach to giving editors guidance in writing the leads of controversial articles? Editors come looking to MOS:LEAD for guidance in resolving differences of opinion about how to word or structure the lead, and they are especially in need of this guidance when editing articles about controversial topics. Where would be a good place to include a guideline that a controversy is usually defined primarily by the proposition under dispute? I think many editors resort to vagueness as a way to implement neutrality, presumably because they don't know a better way. A guideline that tells how to summarize a controversy both factually and neutrally could be a big help. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 20:25, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
You like "Generally, although not always, one will..."? "those who, despite evidence of evolution, ...." is taking a side (imagine the outrage at "those who, despite evidence of creation, ..."). But since I was mainly looking for help on the first sentence, I guess I can ignore those for now. I'm watching the discussion mainly from the sidelines, but I hope that my original questions will eventually be answered, either as some opinions here that I can take my pick from, or as consensus that makes it into the guide. Nczempin (talk) 21:19, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
I was trying to find something I thought better than what was put there. Those are fair summaries of the controversy as far as I can see. Wikipedia does not give equal validity to all viewpoints like some television programme giving equal time to climate change scientists and deniers. Have you some examples you think are good? We might as well have a few different ones to inform any debate. Dmcq (talk) 22:15, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
Your original questions seemed to be whether the title of a controversy article should be used verbatim in the lead and the answer was no and I agree with that. However you then said something about describing what the article was about. I believe the lead should always say in the first paragraph what the topic of the article is - it is just that the topic does not need to be referred to by the exact wording of the title when it is descriptive. Dmcq (talk) 22:26, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
I don't recommend such wording. "Generally, although not always, one will find nationalists using the name Derry, and unionists using Londonderry" seems like a clumsy way to say "Most nationalists favor Derry; most unionists favor Londonderry." The former wording sounds to me like an attempt to achieve neutrality by using wishy-washy or bureaucratic language. The phrase "despite evidence of evolution" is not neutral, because many creationists don't agree that there is evidence of evolution. It's a slight dig against them, and it subtly declares that the article is going to take a pro-evolution stand. An article about a controversy should describe the controversy and take no stand in it at all. I've heard people cite WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE to justify the use of dismissive, condescending, or otherwise non-neutral language when describing a minority view. I hope the MOS can make clear that this is not acceptable, and I think any proscriptions we make about this will have much more effect if we include suggestions for rewording neutrally without giving undue space or apparent credibility to the fringe theories. What WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, and WP:FRINGE describe in broad principles, the MOS (or some other appropriate WP article) can show people how to implement in actual writing. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 23:18, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
I disagree that "an article about a controversy should take no stand at all." If it is a controversy about which there is a mainstream, well-established position and a fringe position (as your example of evolution is), then the article about the controversy should clearly say so. But of course it should do so through factual statements ("The consensus of biologists is...") rather than through innuendo and editorialization. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:25, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
I agree. The article should make clear what the mainstream position is, through factual statements and without innuendo (nice word). Factual description is what I mean by describing the controversy without taking a stand in it. Please take a look at this deleted text and see what ideas you get. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 23:42, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
Reply to Ben Kovitz: I don't think that articles about controversies need any kind of special treatment in the manual of style. The current guideline is that the lead should summarize the contents of the article. In an article about a controversy, this will typically mean summarizing the various positions. I don't think anything in our current guidelines and policies would give editors the idea that "vagueness" implies "neutrality". If you're seeing this in leads, then I suggest you revise them and point other editors to this guideline (as it is currently written). Unfortunately, just because we have guidelines doesn't mean that people read them and follow them, and no amount of instruction creep will change that. Sławomir Biały (talk) 18:04, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
I realize now what the primary reason is that I don't find the given examples particularly helpful: All the pages I mentioned are about multiple controversies within a given subject area; Derry/Londonderry name dispute and Creation–evolution controversy are about specific individual controversies, for which in general I would find it much easier to find a definition. IIRC; one of the articles I mentioned is actually of list-type. I wonder if perhaps all or most of these articles about multiple controversies should be lists. Should we split the discussion between individual controversies and multiple ones? It seems that the specific example about autism still falls in the "multiple" category (and I'm more interested in that one; but perhaps someone else is more interested in discussing individual ones?). Nczempin (talk) 18:22, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
Well there are bound to be problems with articles like the ones you mention. But I don't think it should be the function of this guideline to provide guidance on writing such an article (or indeed if such articles should be allowed as articles or only lists). To look for a tailor made policy solution, one would have to be drafted first as an essay. I have no opinions on this. Sławomir Biały (talk) 18:53, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
Controversies in autism
Here are the two versions of the lead to Controversies in autism. Let's see what improvements we can make and what we learn in the process. You might need to look at the body of the article to see the material that's summarized in these leads. But, to make a good test, try reading both versions of the lead before you read the rest of the article.
Controversies in autism encompass the disagreement over the exact nature of autism, its causes and manifestations. Autism is considered to be a neurodevelopmental condition which manifests itself in markedly abnormal social interaction, communication ability, and patterns of interests.
Scientific consensus holds that vaccines do not cause autism, but popular rumors and an article in a respected scientific journal, The Lancet, provoked concern among parents. The Lancet article was retracted for making false claims and because its author was found to be in the pay of litigants against vaccine manufacturers.[1]
Dmcq, you said elsewhere that you thought Lead 1 is more detailed than Lead 2 (or maybe the other around—I can't parse the sentence so I'm not even sure you were talking about levels of detail). Would you care to elaborate? Or at least tell a little more about why you favor Lead 1? —Ben Kovitz (talk) 07:33, 5 July 2012 (UTC)
I've had another look at that lead for the controversies in autism article, and I believe the article itself is the major source of the problems I see with it. The article is a list topic of controversies rather than an identifiable topic about some controversies written about or argued about in a secondary source. You can see the problem from the autism article itself which has no section with this as its main subtopic and most of the subtopics of the article direct off to other articles. Sticking in stuff about genetics, eye gaze,, vaccines, and intelligence all together means to me it should be titled 'list of autism controversies'. That article is useless as an example for a lead about an article about controversies. The related MMR vaccine controversy is a lead about an actual proper controversial topic, and the vaccine controversies article is one which deals wth a number of controversies but has a reasonably well identified topic. Dmcq (talk) 08:05, 5 July 2012 (UTC)
I hadn't seen this when I wrote my last comment. Perhaps there should be a guideline for deciding which "something controversies" article should be a list, and which should be an article per se. What would someone expect from a (the lead section, specifically the first sentence of a) featured article or list on/of "subject x controversies"? Nczempin (talk) 18:27, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
In general, I strongly prefer the type of definition shown in lead 1. It seems possible in this case to have an actual definition-style first sentence. However, it doesn't really add any information; we could automate the whole thing and just say in article "subject x controversies": Subject x controversies encompass controversies arising in subject x. IIRC there is a specific guideline against circular definitions such as these (for lists?). Nczempin (talk) 18:32, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
For instance Dungeons & Dragons controversies says 'Part of the controversies concern the game and its alleged impact on those who play it, while others concern business issues at the game's original publisher, TSR' which indicates there is not a clear topic - it is an amalgam and in this case could probably be split rather than turned into a list type article, in fact the business dispute bit would be better stuck into the main article. 'The 2006 FIFA World Cup generated various controversies, including onfield disputes, critiques of official decisions, and team salary issue' certainly sounds to me like a mish mash all stuck together by editors and thus is a list.
On the other hand Video game controversies says 'Controversies over video games center on controversial content of video games and effects that video games have on behavior' so it is a set of controversies that are reasonably dealt with as a unit and there are secondary sources dealing with these as a topic. Dmcq (talk) 21:06, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
Significant information and the lead
The lead guidelines state: "Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article" (emphasis mine). I think there's a need to define more precisely what significant information constitutes. In doing GA reviews, I've come across nominators who insist that all information in the lead, including relatively insignificant names and/or dates included in infoboxes, need to be repeated in the body of the article for no other reason than to satisfy the WP:Lead guidelines. These names/dates are often worthy of inclusion in the article – things like statistics for sports teams and players, or assistant coaches for a team – but make for awkward reading when they're listed in the body. So here are two questions:
1) Is there general agreement with the contention that not all information included in infoboxes needs to be included in the body if it is not deemed significant, or am I misconstruing the guidelines?
2) If there is agreement about the above, is there also agreement that a fuller explanation of significant information, especially as it relates to the type of information often included in infoboxes, would be helpful?--Batard0 (talk) 14:57, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
Non-lead sections
If a section that appears in the main body of an article (e.g. under a Level 2 heading) contains elements that might normally feature in the lead (e.g. {{Hatnote}}, {{Copy edit-section}} and an image), should it also follow the structure that this page lays out? Thanks, A Thousand Doors (talk | contribs) 12:38, 5 August 2012 (UTC)
Certainly not for hatnotes. It's normal for (1) a redirect to go to a section of an article, (2) some other article B to have a similar name to the redirect, and therefore (3) a {{redirect}} hatnote to be placed at the top of the section. For an example that showed up adjacent to your query in my watchlist, see superfactorial. That shouldn't imply anything about what's in the section or how it's written. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:41, 5 August 2012 (UTC)
What I mean is if you have a section of an article that contains a hatnote, a cleanup template, an image and text, e.g. like this:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Praesent bibendum massa id lectus facilisis eu viverra risus dignissim. In posuere convallis mauris non imperdiet. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. In sit amet magna vitae lectus vulputate adipiscing. Nam ornare nunc ac mauris auctor adipiscing. Morbi eget justo mauris. Aenean vel pulvinar arcu. In tempus turpis leo, id pretium turpis. Morbi imperdiet accumsan dolor, quis sollicitudin mi lacinia nec. Fusce et dui et magna fermentum lobortis at in nulla. Aliquam gravida ullamcorper posuere.
then should those elements also follow the order given in "Elements of the Lead", or is that guideline only really applicable to leads? Thanks, A Thousand Doors (talk | contribs) 17:15, 5 August 2012 (UTC)
Oh, I see. That would make sense, yes. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:54, 5 August 2012 (UTC)
Reorganisation
I think the article should be reorganised so that how to write the first sentence appears at the top, making it easier to read for someone who is trying to work out how to write a lead.
I'm thinking about doing this and may put a draft on this talk page. Just wondering if there were any strong feelings about it first. Risingrain (talk) 13:40, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
Wow, people are even more excited by this proposal than I thought :). I suppose I'll just go ahead and do it. Risingrain (talk) 13:15, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
I can see the logic of a guide to the first sentence as a summary of the lead section, but I suppose the existing organisation aims to get people to read the other stuff too before launching off on an article! My tuppence-worth would be: "Remember to give a geographical context where appropriate: nationality for people, and country (and appropriate subdivisions, eg state, province, county) for places, structures, organisations. Remember Wikipedia is an international encyclopedia, and not everyone is as familiar with your own country's geography as you are." PamD 18:17, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
I think the section on citations should be moved further down, since it is a comparatively minor consideration for a style guideline. Other than that, I think the structure is about right: "Elements of the lead" should be followed by "Introductory text" which contains information about the "First sentence". Sławomir Biały (talk) 00:25, 6 September 2012 (UTC)
Based on the above discussion, I don't think I would encourage people to think that adding nationality for people is required, especially since UK editors believe that word means something different from what the rest of the world does. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:08, 7 September 2012 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
I'm closing this RfC per a WP:AN request. The result of the discussion is that there is no consensus for establishing any new policy about mentioning people's citizenship in article leads, whether in general or as concerns British people in particular. Sandstein 07:38, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
Can we create a coherent policy on whether someone's citizenship should be mentioned in the lead of an article? Particularly someone with dual citizenship. Should we mention that in the lead or focus only on the country an editor is more involved with? RyanVesey 16:22, 9 August 2012 (UTC)
Ryan Vesey, in theory there should be not discussion about it. If the person in question has dual nationality this should be reported in the lead but only in the lead and the rest of the article should be focused on the "main nationality" (e.g. in the case of Giovanni Cernogaraz, this is Croatian). If the acquisition of the dual nationality is the result of a change in residency for any reason (good exemples would be Ivan Lendl and Martina Navratilova), then the article should be developed adding information about the life of the person according to the chronology.
Unfortunately, in reality things are not that easy.
Everything about Istria (and at a minor extent Dalmatia) is more complex than that. This part of Europe was inhabited by Slavic and Italian people since centuries. The borders changed many times and during the last change after WWII the most of the Italians were forced to leave (or left voluntarely according to some Croatian sources), their properties were occupied (or were taken by Yugoslavia as separation for the war's damage, according to other sources). The few remaining were forced to culturally assimilate to Yugoslavia (according to other souces, they were granted same rights and decided for some reasons to abandon their culture). This happened only 65 years ago.
The issue is made more complex because the positions taken by the editors cover a large spectrum from the estreme "Italian" position affirming that these regions were inhabited since ever mainly by Italians and that almost all the culture has to be exclusively reconducted to Italy (or Venice) to the extreme "Croatian" position affirming that the Italian historical presence is just a mere invention of Italian nationalists (also called "Irredentist").
Useless to say the truth is in the middle, but the research of the compromise is always very difficult.
This issue is periodically revived an International level. The last case was when Croatia officially affirmed that Marco Polo is Croatian and part of the Croatian history, check on hr:wiki to get convinced.
So I am not surprised of all the mess around Giovanni Cernogaraz. We will get to a consensus, but expect this to be not the easiest task. However, it is a pity that
we had to protect such a minor article, but unfortunately there was no other solution.
--Silvio1973 (talk) 07:11, 10 August 2012 (UTC)
Keep talking about a single case doesn't help to resolve the issue. The dual nationality may be Angolan-French, Turkish-Japanese, doesn't matter. On it.wiki there is this bot-template, mandatory for all biographies, with three parameters: Nazionalità (Nationality), NazionalitàNaturalizzato (Naturalization), Cittadinanza (Citizenship). Just enter the data, without any discussion about it: the bot-template automatically creates the lead and the categories. If there are more nationalities they are all included in the introduction and there are more categories --Felisopus (talk) 08:46, 10 August 2012 (UTC)
In most modern-day cases this will mean the country of which the person is a citizen, national or permanent resident, [...] --Felisopus (talk) 09:59, 10 August 2012 (UTC)
One issue here is that for many people we have no reliable sources for their citizenship. Birthplace or place of residence are much more commonly sourceable, but do not necessarily imply citizenship (citizenship can change and most countries do not have birthright citizenship). —David Eppstein (talk) 15:53, 10 August 2012 (UTC)
Without reliable sources, we all agree: nothing is better, especially in the lead section. --Felisopus (talk) 10:40, 17 August 2012 (UTC)
For instance, we'd call someone an American mathematician if most sources call the person an American mathematician, if they are at an American University, etc. But this rarely has anything to do with citizenship. For instance, I know someone who is indisputably an American mathematician, but was born in South Africa and holds an Irish passport (despite never having even been to Ireland for longer than a brief visit.) Sławomir Biały (talk) 17:28, 10 August 2012 (UTC)
Comment - It is customary for the Lead section of a biographical article to contain a statement about the person's nationality (e.g. " ... was a French physicist..." ). The nationality is determined on a case-by-case basis, but the fundamental rule is that it is whatever the best sources state the nationality is. Citizenship (as in having a passport) is not as important as source-based nationality, and I don't think WP:LEAD should be changed to mandate that citizenship be mentioned in the Lead. The two articles cited at the top of this RfC as instigations for the RfC are pathological (meaning rare) cases concerning dual citizenship - and we should not add a lot of detail into a guideline based on these rare situations. See WP:CREEP. Regarding those two articles: my opinion is that the Lead section does not have to mention the dual nationality; that information may be better off in the body. --Noleander (talk) 23:30, 13 August 2012 (UTC)
Comment One of the problems with these discussions is that most people don't have a clear idea of what they're talking about. So the Brits seem to use "nationality" in a way that everyone else uses "ethnicity" (the same person is accurately described as having "Scottish nationality" in the UK but "Scottish ethnicity" everywhere else). Some of our editors think that nationality is a matter of personal affiliation or national identity ("Well, I feel mostly Irish..."). Unless we can agree on a set of terms and their meanings, we have no realistic hope of understanding each other. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:16, 17 August 2012 (UTC)
Comment: we already have a guideline for this — WP:LEDE (the counterpart of this talk page). If something isn't mentioned in the article, it has no place in lede under whatever circumstances. — Dmitrij D. Czarkoff (talk) 18:35, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
Oppose adding any rules about nationality. We usually do say something about nationality (X is a French writer), but I would oppose adding it to this guideline as a requirement. SlimVirgin(talk) 19:01, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
Opposed to instruction creep. I think the relevant guidelines already exist: WP:VERIFY, WP:LEADFOLLOWSBODY, and WP:DUE. Any statement about nationality or ethnicity or citizenship or whatever has to be verified by reliable sources anyway. We don't need to add a rule for every possible permutation. I say use your best judgement on a case-by-case basis. Braincricket (talk) 08:04, 7 September 2012 (UTC)
British nationality
Support always including citizenship in lead. I believe there should be a clear policy that citizenship be mentioned in the introduction of a biography. There is a particular problem with British nationals, as some editors seek to censor any mention of "British" from wikipedia, only allowing article introductions to mention, English, Welsh, Scottish or Northern Irish. Whilst completely failing to mention in the introduction and even infobox that they are infact British citizens. BritishWatcher (talk) 22:24, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
Note - To avoid clogging up this RFC with too much focus on the British issues i have moved responses to my post to a new section below. Clearly if there is any general agreement on this matter, British citizenship may need some additional qualifiers. Although of course it would be unreasonable if all citizenship was mentioned in the lead, except British peoples. But it is clearly controversial so would need more discussions, as in part are happening below.. BritishWatcher (talk) 11:28, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
Comment. I am against any mandate in our MOS that British citizens must be called "British". Indeed, this would be clearly favoring one point of view over another. Our encyclopedia must adhere to the pillars, in particular our articles must reflect a neutral point of view as evidenced by weight of those views in corresponding reliable sources. If a majority of sources say that an individual is "Scottish", and if very few sources describe him as "British", then the article should describe that person as "Scottish" rather than "British". Attempting to lobby for inclusion of a requirement to the contrary in the MoS seems to be an attempt to short-circuit the pillars. I should add that a username like "BritishWatcher" suggests that perhaps you are not a great authority on neutrality when it comes to this issue; another indication is accusing editors you disagree with of "censorship". Sławomir Biały (talk) 22:45, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
how is it not neutral to state fact that someone is a British citizen? Is it neutral to censor information because of their own tastes? We are talking about citizenship here not nationality, and people are clearly British citizens.. they can revoke that citizenship if they wanted but it is fact. As for censorship issues, i started a conversaration on the MOS biographies talk page about these matters a few weeks ago, which demonstrates some of the underhand actions that take place by some editors in a crusade to wipe British off of certain articles. I proposed there a modest suggestion which would have avoided mentioning anyone as British if they reject that British nationality or support the breakup of the UK. The trouble is at present on articles about people who are clearly sourced say saying they are British and are most known for something British related... there is an attempt to prevent them being described as British in the opening sentence. BritishWatcher (talk) 22:52, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
See WP:WEIGHT. If most sources describe a person as "Scottish", and very few describe that person as "British", then our article should describe the person as "Scottish" to avoid giving undue weight to those "British" points of view. Also, it's probably a minor point, but in general we aren't here talking about "citizenship". As has already been noted, we don't usually have sources for that (as in, what passport the person carries). Moreover, this is often not the same as the person's nationality. Nationality is a somewhat more difficult thing to pin down—that's what the pillars are for, not guidelines like this. Sławomir Biały (talk) 22:57, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
Also, I note that in this discussion you continue to use the concept of "censorship". Usually this is a clear indication that an editor has an agenda that makes it unlikely that a neutral point of view is the desired outcome. In the linked discussion, the word "nationalist" also appears—again, a fairly clear indication of an agenda. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:04, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
What happens when many sources describe someone as both Scottish and British for example? I have no interest in an article on Alex Salmond calling him British as his nationality, although he is absolutely a British citizen yet we would not say that for political reasons. But what about someone like Chris Hoy, notable for being a British cyclist, and on the record as being proud to be both Scottish and British.. yet all hell breaks loose with attempts to say he is British in the opening sentence there. BritishWatcher (talk) 23:05, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
Sorry, I'm not seeing any issue saying "Scottish" at Chris Hoy. The lead says that he represented both Scotland and England and that he is the most successful British Olympian of all time. Seems NPOV as it is. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:13, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
The problem is he has stated he is Scottish and British, there are numerous sources describing him as British, he is most notable for being a British cyclist (at the Olympic games, world championships) rather than as a Scottish cyclist at the commonwealth games, and he is a British citizen. Yet we are prohibited from stating he is British in the first sentence... unlike how ANY other nationality / citizenship is handled on wikipedia. That is bias. BritishWatcher (talk) 23:23, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
But the article already does say in various places that he's British. I think you're seeing bias where there isn't any. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:34, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
Im not paranoid, the activities that have been taking place are highlighted by the post i made on that MOS biographies page linked above. Yes it mentions British in the introduction in other places, but why do we not factor in what is more suitable for the first sentence in this case if it should be Scottish or British, or both as some agreed to on the talk page at the time. This has been going backwards and forwards on numerous articles with constant changes, all because there are no clear guidelines. What do you think of the suggestion i made on that link, is it really so unreasonable? BritishWatcher (talk) 11:20, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
Instead of trying to smear me, why do u not actually look at the example i showd on the link in question. Someone going around changing English to British, and British to Scottish. I view that as censorship, an attempt to hide the fact Scottish people are British people. BritishWatcher (talk) 23:07, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
Oh and this RFC was clearly about citizenship / dual citizenship. Nationality is a different thing yes. BritishWatcher (talk) 23:10, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
As a general rule, citizenship cannot be mentioned because we usually lack credible sources, and moreover it's usually irrelevant to the subject of the article. It's obviously more relevant for politicians and diplomats, and we have sources for such. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:20, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
This RFC asks whether citizenship should be mentioned in the lead. This doesn't ask for citizenship vs. no mention of any country-related information, but citizenship vs. reasonable alternatives, such as nationality. So discussing nationality is relevant here. Oh, and BritishWatcher, let me just add another outside perspective that you are showing clear signs of bias here. Nczempin (talk) 08:10, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
I believe that people who are known for being British, state they are British, happen to be British citizens, and are sourced by numerous articles as being British.. should be described as British. If that means i have a "biased view", then so be it. It is my opinion that we should state facts, not censor the fact someone is British from the first sentence because of political reasons. My position on these matters is not unreasonable, it is based on the important principles of wikipedia. If someone is a footballer that plays for Scotland.. that is what makes them notable so i do not see a problem with saying they are a "Scottish football player". If someone is a politician in Scotland, i do not see the problem saying they are a "Scottish politician". The problem comes when someone who represents Great Britain which is what they are most notable for (ie winning gold medals at the Olympics for the British team), is sourced as being British, is on the record as saying they are British.... Yet for some reason we are prohibited from describing the person as British in the first sentence. A looser term is apparently always superior to their legal nationality/citizenship. I do not think that is reasonable. and the always Scottish not British.. is far more biased than my views on these matters, or the sorts of editing that has been taking place i highlight in the MOS Biographies page. BritishWatcher (talk) 11:15, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
Strongly support: British citizenship must be included. As in it.wiki, sovereign entities and their passports are the most reliable and neutral sources. Beyond this, British is an "umbrella term" that solves many ridiculous disputes, like "welsh-english", "scottish-english" and so on. --Felisopus (talk) 10:54, 17 August 2012 (UTC)
But passports aren't publicly accessible, so they can't be used as sources. Sławomir Biały (talk) 13:19, 17 August 2012 (UTC)
Strong support: per the many arguments above by both User:BritishWatcher and User:Sławomir Biały, I would opine that depending on which is more relevant and credibly sourced, either citizenship or nationality should always be mentioned in the lead paragraph of biographies. ❤ YutsiTalk/Contributions ( 偉特 ) 12:17, 17 August 2012 (UTC)
Strongly oppose any new requirement that we include information that may not always be available or adequately sourceable, that has many competing and incompatible definitions (are we going with legal citizenship, country of residence, country of birth, affinity with a nation like Scotland that is not currently recognized as a sovereign entity, or what?) and that has in several past cases been quite contentious (e.g. see various disputes about whether certain people from Lwow were Polish or Ukrainian). If forced to make a rule on this, I'd rather go with something like Wikipedia:Categorization/Ethnicity, gender, religion and sexuality where we only include information that is of clear relevance to the subject's life, but per WP:CREEP I think it would be much better just to let individual cases be handled by the judgement of individual editors. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:49, 17 August 2012 (UTC)
This is what i suggested previously on the other MOS page, i dont know how people would feel about this..
The introduction by default of a British citizen should start "is a British..." except when:
The person's primary notability is for a sport that is competed by the Home nations (Such as Football and Rugby)
The person is a politician for one of the devolved assemblies or parliament or governments.
The person's notability relates specifically to being English/Scottish/Welsh/Northern Irish.
Sources are provided showing the person rejects their British nationality or favours the break up of the British state.
The person considers themselves Irish and holds an Irish passport.
The infobox nationality field states British by default:
If the person is known in the media or to identify as English/Welsh/Scottish/Northern Irish or is notable for that reason (culturally, politically, sports etc) then the infobox should say British (Scottish) / British (English) etc.
If the person rejects their British nationality or favours the break up of the British state then simply put English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish or Northern Irish.
(Alternatively putting English (British), Scottish (British) etc rather than British (English), British (Scottish), if it makes more sense to do it that way.
These safeguards/exemptions i believe would result in a reasonable balance. Where English, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish is used where appropriate, but British is used by default as the legal nationality/citizenship recognised around the world reflecting the fact it is a sovereign state. Such a policy would prevent someone like Alex Salmond being described as British, but it would mean where it makes sense such as Chris Hoy who is British, states he is British, is most notable for winning gold representing Britain, he could be called British... rather than the current prohibition as people are insistent it only say Scottish in the first sentence or no mention at all of his nationality. BritishWatcher (talk) 08:59, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
Once again, I oppose any mandate that articles about British citizens must say that they are British. There isn't even a mandate that citizens of other countries indicate the country of citizenship. Whether and how to mention nationality is handled on a case-by-case basis. In many cases, the color of that person's passport is irrelevant to the article, and not a subject of discussion in reliable sources. Sławomir Biały (talk) 13:33, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
Articles about almost any other country's citizens tends to start with their nationality. The proposal above does not mandate that articles about British citizens must say they are British.. i suggest you look at what i proposed. BritishWatcher (talk) 13:50, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
You say that by default an article about a British citizen must state that they are British. That's a mandate. Obviously the solution is just to reflect what sources have to say about the subject. That's what NPOV demands. This is usually not the same thing as citizenship. If there's a plurality of opinion, then the article should reflect that plurality according to the weight of different points of view in reliable sources. In the end, it will probably come out to about the same scheme that you've proposed for most of the articles that you are thinking of. But there are many British expatriates the world over, who should not necessarily be described as British. For instance, many American academics still hold citizenship abroad. Sławomir Biały (talk) 14:07, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
Oppose. Sometimes it's appropriate to say English, Scottish or Welsh (rather than British), or nothing at all. It should be left to the editors on the page. SlimVirgin(talk) 19:01, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Diacritics?
Should pronunciation diacritics be included in the first sentence, e.g. for Indic languages? See for example Kharavela, which starts with "Khārabēḷa (Khāravēla, 193 BC – after 170 BCE) was..." Kharavela is by far the most common spelling in English sources, so the article title should be that. But what's the rule for the lead sentence with respect to pronunciation diacritics? MOSLEAD says that the first sentence may differ, and gives the United Kingdom example, but it's not very clear why... Tijfo098 (talk) 21:16, 11 September 2012 (UTC)
Why should Indic languages be treated differently from non-Indic languages?
It sounds like your real question is, should pronunciation be included? The answer is, yes, if it seems helpful. How should you include it? There are many ways. The example you give is one way. Another would be to treat the spelling differences as alternate names and then give the IPA pronunciation. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:25, 11 September 2012 (UTC)
I wrote "e.g. for Indic languages". Tijfo098 (talk) 12:05, 12 September 2012 (UTC)
This article has its own readability issues.
I am a native speaker of English with a college level education, and I found this sentence unnecessarily hard to parse:
"For example, it is better to locate a town with reference to an area or larger place than with coordinates."
I realize it is grammatically correct butI question its readability.
Specifically, I got stuck on the combination of the verb "locate" (in this case, meaning, "to help a reader understand where the town is"), and the contextual use of "reference" (instead of using an article like "with a reference to an..."). Individually they are less than optimal, but together they are simply difficult to scan.
Following the "make it simpler" guidelines of "writing down one level", I encourage you to consider a rewrite with plainer language/simpler syntax.
Another editor and I dissagree on what this policy calls for on a page like Gospel harmony. Currently that page has the lead section is followed by a overview section that repeats all but one paragraph of the lead, and uses 90% to 95% of the same langage. I have quoted from Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#Relative emphasis: not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text, etc.
Could editors hear either comment there at Talk:Gospel harmony#Lede, and/or try to make the policy on this page more clear. Many thanks. tahcchat 18:21, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
It should be pointed out that there is no "content dispute" here at all, but packaging of content. My view of WP:LEDE is that it is just a summary of the body and hence should only include and summarize what there is in the body. My point is that if X is a summary of "A, B, C, D... G" then X can not include anything that is not in "A, B, C, D... G". Tahc's take of WP:LEDE seems to be that it can be an intro which includes items that do not necessarily appear in the body. I beg to differ on that. Ideas? Thanks. History2007 (talk) 18:53, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
This guideline explicitly says "not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text". How is that not clear? —David Eppstein (talk) 21:02, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
Repeated is one thing, totally novel is another. If X is a summary of Y, can X include what Y does not? How is that not clear? Do we need a Venn diagram for this? History2007 (talk) 21:05, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
Here the word "repeated" is about repetition of information, not about repetition of wording. Not every piece of information in the lead must be repeated in the body, but *significant* pieces of information should come from the body. Repetition of the exact wording from the lead to the body is bad writing style and should generally be avoided, but is beyond the scope of this specific guideline. And having an overview section that repeats the same function as the lead section is probably also a bad idea — if you have that section at all it should be less about summarization and more about supplying enough background and context to make the rest of the article clearer. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:08, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
Repeated is one thing, totally novel is another. The "not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text" is preceded by:
"Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article"
So nothing major in the lede unless already in the article. Simple. Is that not clear? History2007 (talk) 21:05, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
I agree that major items of information should be in the article. More to the point, they should be treated in *greater detail*, and spread *throughout* the article, in sections that are about the different aspects of the article's subject, not just repeated verbatim in a section whose only purpose is to repeat things. Major chunks of verbatim text should *not* be repeated in the article. Frankly, the case in point, gospel harmony, looks stupid. The repetition of the same paragraphs in two consecutive sections does nothing to enhance reader understanding, and putting pieces of information into an "overview" section simply to avoid the appearance of novel information in the lead is a misinterpretation of this guideline. That is not what overview sections are for, and legalistic arguments about "it has to be that way because that's what the guideline says even though it looks stupid" are not what the guideline is for. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:21, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
Well, stupidity is a matter of opinion, and you are entitled to yours. But you have already conceded the point that "nothing major in the lede unless already in the article". End of that discussion. History2007 (talk) 21:23, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
You are exhibiting what appears to be a bad case of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. More particularly, you seem to be picking and choosing what you want to hear and ignoring the rest. Perhaps a RFC at Talk:Gospel harmony is called for as the next step. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:24, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
We have had 3-4 interactions and jumping on IDIDNTHEARTHAT between the two of us in uncalled for specially for an admin. That is a two way street and both parties can hear that. I will thus ignore your WP:TE comment. You should know better as an admin. Now, if you wish to spend the next 30 days of your life on an RFC on that page, be my guest. I do not like to spend time that way. History2007 (talk) 21:27, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
While History2007 is a good editor, I have to agree with David Eppstein. The section repeatition serves no purpose except to fulfill History2007's partiular view of these guideline, and you History2007 seem awful quick to declaire there is nothing more to dicuss. tahcchat 05:09, 15 September 2012 (UTC)
Section structure is a separate item. I am not even discussing that here because this talk page is about a guideline, not an article. If you want to discuss section structure, let us do that on the article talk page, for a guideline talk page is for discussing the guideline, not the article. The only item I am discussing here is that "Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article". That is true of every article, not just that one. And I think that question has already been answered here.
So, for section structure, let us discuss on article talk page. I started a section on the talk page for Gospel harmony so it can be discussed in the relevant place. But whatever the section structure turns out to be in that article, anything of significance that appears in the lede should have appeared in the body, per the above. By and large much ado about nothing here now. History2007 (talk) 09:56, 15 September 2012 (UTC)
"Lede" never means more than a few sentences
Does anyone object to this edit? "Lede" is a neologism used to mean the first one or two sentences of a news story used as a hook, and only the first paragraph if that's all it has, and never more than one paragraph. Editors are using "lede" to mean "introduction section" all over, and that's wrong and confusing. The guideline already tries to clarify this, but doesn't do a very good job unless you click through. (Dare I say that the lede's definition is buried?) —Cupco 19:19, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Yes, I do. As can be readily seen on Quantum mechanics, United States, The Beatles, DNA, Einstein and a host of other articles that is not what ledes have meant in Wikipedia. The lede has to be a standalone summary of the article (the 2nd paragraph of this page states: "The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview") and one can not explain Quantum mechanics in 4 sentences. A Wikipedia lede is not a tweet - obviously. History2007 (talk) 19:27, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Are there any reliable sources which agree with the definition you've pointed out is being used? I'm not saying it isn't being used that way, but it's particularly bad when a neologism is being widely used incorrectly, because it is more likely to confuse large numbers of new editors causing the term to continue to be used incorrectly because there are relatively few sources at people's fingertips to correct them. —Cupco 19:30, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Look, this has been a standing guideline with lede as a few "paragraphs" not sentences. Changing it makes half a million existing articles become deviant. Enough said. History2007 (talk) 19:32, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
The edit being discussed only concerns a description of the spelling "lede", not the actual guideline. — Carl (CBM · talk) 19:39, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
The confusion in the current wording is in thinking that "lead" is less of a journalism jargon term than "lede", when they are actually different spellings of the same journalism jargon term. Nobody uses the two spellings as if they had different meanings. But in any case, I think everyone agrees that for the purposes of Wikipedia the term "lede" ( = "lead") refers to the first section, which does not have a separate section title and which servers as an introduction and summary of the article. — Carl (CBM · talk) 19:39, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
If you clarify it more, then no objection from me. History2007 (talk) 19:41, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Related to this discussion, I'm hoping at some point to address in this guideline the issue of people writing a "lead within the lead," whereby they try to force the latest developments of a current affairs issue into the first paragraph or first sentence. I think this stems from the misunderstanding of a Wikipedia article as a piece of journalism, and a lead as a "lede." SlimVirgin(talk) 19:49, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Please feel free to lead the way to fix that - pun intended. I was here by chance, usually do not watch this page, and will unwatch now. But as a side note I have always wondered what percentage of people even read things beyond the intro. History2007 (talk) 19:55, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
I have certainly seen this, but I don't think it's due to people who know what's going on. I think it's an unavoidable by-product of "anyone can edit". Newer information should be integrated into the structure of the existing article, but very often I see edits that look like the person simply clicked "edit" and then typed the new content into either the beginning or the end of the first section because that's the most convenient place. I have also seen people completely duplicate an existing section of the article (in their own words), which fits my theory that they are not looking at the entire article before editing it. For example see this edit summary [1]. — Carl (CBM · talk) 19:57, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Unfortunately experienced editors do it too. People literally fall over each other trying to get their "most liked recent development" into the first paragraph, and if possible into the first sentence, regardless of whether they throw off the chronology and weight of the lead overall. And if you try to oppose it, they suspect you of doing so because you don't agree with their POV, rather than because of an editorial decision related to quality of writing. They also cite this guideline as their justification, because it says something about making clear in the first few sentences what the key issues are (I forget the exact wording and haven't looked). So I was thinking of trying to word something about this for the guideline, i.e. "avoid the lead-within-a-lead" approach. SlimVirgin(talk)
Use-mention distinction
Hi Kwami, I reverted your reference to this for now, [2] because it's sometimes better writing to begin an article with a phrase such as "X is a term normally used to describe Y," without the article needing to be about the word itself. Having said that, I'm struggling to think of an example, but even so I think we should not be so categorical. SlimVirgin(talk) 21:25, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
Agreed in general that overly categorical statements are to be avoided, but Kwamikagami's hitting on a real point here. Is there a better place and/or way to integrate this idea? Perhaps just a less categorically condemnatory way of saying it? This seems to be a particularly pervasive lead-writing problem. I can't begin to count the instances of "X is a y term that refers to z", and "A is the name that the b concept is called by in the c field", and "In foo, the concept of bar is designated baz", etc., constructions I've encountered and undone. I can't recall a single case where rewording wasn't practical, and only a few where it was even challenging. — SMcCandlishTalk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ Contrib. 03:00, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Use "WP:PREFACE" to refer to non-text non-picture elements of the lead
Currently WP:PREFACE (and MOS:PREFACE) does not point to anything. It seems to me that — in analogy with WP:APPENDIX and MOS:APPENDIX — it makes sense to use those terms to refer to the non-text, non-picture elements of the lead, i.e., hatnotes, tags and so forth. Those elements are logically distinct from the introductory sentences and images of the article itself. For somebody like me who likes copyedit, I find a mention of WP:LEAD too broad to use as a succinct edit summary for changes to lead just for order. Defining and using WP:PREFACE as I'm suggesting would fix that. In a perfect world, I think WP:LEAD should have only refereed to the introductory text and images of the article proper with WP:PREFACE reserved for the other elements at the beginning of the article. Comments? Jason Quinn (talk) 17:29, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
Solution in search of a problem? Maybe you should draft the page you are proposing, e.g at WP:Preface (draft). — SMcCandlishTalk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ Contrib. 03:02, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Special verses general terminology
I propose, that in section Introductory text, subsection Provide an accessible overview, where it begins
"In general, specialized terminology and symbols should be avoided in an introduction."
that it might rather say (there more than elsewhere)
"In general, introduce useful abbreviations, but avoid abstruse terminology and symbols."
Earth uses the concept "billions of years" 26 times, and "millions of years" 21 times.
I think its intro should begin using bya, byr, mya, and myr; otherwise it might need to gloss those terms every tight little subtopic. (There are about six or seven there.) This re-intro of glossing the abbrevs might be fine for what links to subtopics, but I think rather the article should be independent in its style, and let what links there adjust themselves. — CpiralCpiral 11:26, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
Per Wikipedia:SIZE#Readability_issues, where it says "6,000 to 10,000 words, takes between 30 and 40 minutes to read at average speed, which is right on the limit of the average concentration span of 40 to 50 minutes", encourages me to take Earth's 8700 words as "one sitting". Because the one best one place for abbreviations in such cases would have to be in the lead, and because the current sentence might discourage using abbreviations there because they might be "specialized terminology and symbols", I'll just make the change... — CpiralCpiral 20:46, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
References in lead or body for nonquotes and GA status
I sourced statements in an article's lead but an editor took them all out, moving them to the body in lieu of shorter citations there, explaining that s/he had edited a number of articles that were rated as Good Articles and this was the way to edit the lead, so I didn't put them back. (I don't remember if there were quotations in the lead and I forgot which article or editor it was.) I've since followed that style when I did a major rewrite of a lead (not when mainly editing other than the lead), including for links, and don't know what the reaction will be. Should this guideline perhaps permit both styles, other than for quotations? Nick Levinson (talk) 23:27, 21 October 2012 (UTC) (Corrected my misspelling: 23:35, 21 October 2012 (UTC))
That which is not forbidden is permitted. The guideline already thus permits both styles, by default, even if it favors one. My rede on "general Wikipedian editing common sense", for what it might be worth, is that as an article develops, statements that are only sourced in the lead are developed more in sectional parts of the body of the article, and the citations move to the main body, uncluttering the lead. A major exception is when something controversial or disputed appears in the lead, especially in a bio of a living person. If it's likely to generate a negative editorial reaction (e.g. by supporters of a subject the facts about which/whom tend to be negative from the preponderance of reliable sources), continue to source it in the lead section, even if this seems redundant. The main "no-no" to me is to put initial source citations in the infobox. This is a terrible idea, because re-users of WP content often drop the entire infobox section, so any subsequent in-prose citations to the same source that was first cited in an infobox will be killed off. Put the main citation in the main article text and use <ref name="whatever" /> in the infobox. — SMcCandlishTalk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ Contrib. 03:14, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Unique claims in lead only - allowed, after all?
I've always been used to the fact that lead should contain no new claims; in fact in a number of GA and FA reviews I've asked the authors to copy some claims to the body (and nobody ever object to my request). However, today at a GA review it was pointed out to me that one can cite parts of this MOS guideline and defend some unique claims in the lead, as this policy allows for them. I am puzzled about that. Is this something new, or an on oversight? If the latter, I'd like to suggest that this policy makes it clear than the lead should not contain any unique information. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 03:05, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
Despite being a real stickler for following the LEAD guideline, I've always thought there was room in Wikipedia articles of the highest caliber for the kind of good writing style that would give the reader an interesting tidbit in the lead section, one which is not repeated exactly but is indicative of themes that are present in the article body. For instance, the lead section might offer a quote from a person who is mentioned later in the article body, perhaps even quoted later, but the lead section quote could be unique. I think it is a case-by-case interpretation. Binksternet (talk) 04:22, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
I can see the reason for quotes, as they don't need repeating. But outside quotes, I don't really see a need for any unique info in the lead. Any other examples come to mind? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 19:18, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
If a birthdate appears in the lead, it doesn't need to be later on (it should probably be repeated if there is more to say about the circumstances of birth, but not if it is just a bare date). If an alternative spelling of someone's name in some other language appears in the lead, it almost always does not appear later on. An epithet ("the father of modern chariot riding" or whatever) can appear in the lead, as part of a general statement about what the subject is known for, without being repeated verbatim later on; that's similar to the quote example. More generally, my preference would be: statements in the lead should be repeated later if more detail about the same statement can be given, but should not be repeated later if they are incidental to the topics of the later sections and there is nothing more to say about them than what's already in the lead. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:11, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
I tend to disagree re birthdays. Dates and locations are important enough to be referenced, and it looks better (IMHO) if it is done as a separate sentence at the beginning of a bio than in the lead. I agree that alt spellings are another exception that only rarely needs repeating later (occasionally it is done in some form of etymology section). The father of and such summaries are borderline; I guess what it boils down to is that they have to be referenced, and I think it looks better if there are fewer refs in the lead. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 22:26, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
"Significant information should not appear . . ."
I know what the last sentence in the second paragraph is getting at, (we don't want the lead to say "Mr. X has been involved in a lot of controversies" but then not mention them later on), but I think we need at least a footnote that clarifies this rule in the case of certain identifying information related to the subject of the article: for instance, WP:OPENPARA says that the birth date and death date should appear in the lead paragraph of articles on people; in the George Lucas article and many others the birth date is never mentioned again. Other examples are the Latin name for living species and case citations for legal cases. I took a shot at adding this but was reverted. Objections to this? UnitedStatesian (talk) 15:29, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
I was the one who reverted. Please see this brief discussion on my talk page. I still think UnnitedStatesian's well-intentioned change would not be helpful.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:57, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
You don't think that the "Significant information should not appear . . ." sentence, as currently written, directly contradicts the guidance given farther down on the page? UnitedStatesian (talk) 03:25, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
I worded it "apart from trivial basic facts", and clarified the wording lower down, where it was not clear we were covering exceptions. — kwami (talk) 23:40, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Tables not discouraged?
This time I was asked to find any backing for my claim that tables are discouraged in lead, but nothing here of at MoS/Table seems to offer any support for my argument. Seriously?? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 19:16, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, I found one, but probably it is not what you would expect. It is in lead to article 'Table' :). But I will search further. Take for consideration the word 'pervasive' in this article. I learn to use table in my works also very early, since they are 'pervasive'. In complicated info it make subject clear and easy to remember. --Burham (talk) 22:16, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Since no-one puts tables in the lead (apart from info boxes, nav boxes, and the TOC), we don't need to actually say so. There are probably rare occasions where we want a table in the lead, but I think we can leave it to common sense. — kwami (talk) 23:34, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Confusing section of the article. Can somebody more knowledgable clarify and rephrase the section?
In the Relative emphasis section.
"Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article, although not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text. Exceptions include specific facts such as quotations, examples, birth dates, taxonomic names, case numbers, and titles. This should not be taken as a reason to exclude information from the lead, but rather to include it in both the lead and body.
Exceptions of what? It can be interpreted into so many things. Exceptions of "not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text"? If it's this case, then it means the included examples are not allowed in the lede if it's not in the body.
Or is it the exceptions of "Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article"? If it's this case, it means the included examples can be allowed to appear in lede without being mentioned in the body.
Which is it? Can somebody clarify this and help rewording that section so that some new users can understand it? Write in positives, please! Anthonydraco (talk) 09:13, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
It's "Exceptions to the rule that 'everything in the lead must be covered in the remainder of the article'". So, the usual rule is "Only put it in the lead if it's somewhere else in the article." But it's okay for some very basic info to appear only in the lead. I think that birth date is the best example there; in many biographical articles, the only place where the birth date appears is in parentheses immediately after the person's name.
As for rewriting the section, I do agree that the phrase is not as clear as it should be. I'm not going to try to fix it, though, because the wording on the MOS is often hotly debated, and I'd rather some of the regulars tackle it. Qwyrxian (talk) 12:12, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Is the use of "article" here undesirably specific? I'm of the opinion that information covered in extensive content forks which speak to the notability of the subject should appear in the lead section, whether or not it is covered in the article itself. For example, a city with geopolitical significance and controversies whose main article covers more mundane aspects of the city itself shouldn't get off the hook of describing those controversies, otherwise the content fork becomes in essence a POV fork. ClaudeReigns (talk) 00:45, 21 December 2012 (UTC)
Question
Is it permissible to cover two different topics in the same paragraph in the lead? Pass a Methodtalk 18:53, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
Background: This is coming from my reversion of this edit. ~Adjwilley (talk) 19:04, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
No opinion on whether that edit was appropriate, but in general, yes, it is not necessary for paragraphs of the lead to correspond to sections of the article. For instance, it is permissible to have an article with multiple sections but with only a single paragraph in the lead. On the other hand, the paragraphs in the lead should make sense as paragraphs, with topics that fit together, and that often means organizing them one per section. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:34, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
Followers of this page may be interested in this discussion. It emanated from first an effort to delete any mention in the lede of a controversy. And now, to only say that a controversy exists, without stating the nature of it. Epeefleche (talk) 20:53, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
re: Provide an accessible overview
What on earth is meant by "accessible overview" and, specifically "It is even more important here than in the rest of the article that the text be accessible"?!? I can guess the meaning, but its largely speculation. If the intent is to convey clarity, brevity and a concise lede, then this guide should say that, in plain English. If something else, then that should be explained. Also, this is referred to in this template (which is what led me to this guide). If the template is to be used where the lead section is too short, then the displayed box should say that. As is, it is not clear exactly what is required, and clicking on this style guide is not much more help.
This article's lead sectionmay be too short to adequately summarize the key points. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article.(January 2013)
"Accessible" in this case means "easy to comprehend without significant prior knowledge". There is a subtlety about the "too short" template in that the real problem is a failure to provide an adequate summary: it is possible for a lead section to be quite lengthy without providing a summary, but it is never not possible for a very short lead to adequately summarise an article. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 12:50, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
Guidelines about translations in first sentence
A couple days ago I came across the Trombone article, and the first sentence was:
The inclusion of the German and Spanish translations here seemed completely pointless and arbitrary, so I was bold and removed them, citing WP:NOTDICT.
Just now I came across the Vienna sausage article, whose first sentence is:
This huge mess of 14 translations into 10 different languages is ridiculous. In this case it is perhaps reasonable to include one or two of the regional German terms, if that helps to show where the English name comes from—but French, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, and Romanian? Really?
Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#Foreign language does not seem to address this issue. It gives guidance about how the translations should be formatted, but it does not give guidance about when it is reasonable and relevant to include a translation in the first place. I don't really have a feeling for what guideline is generally used to decide this question. Thoughts? —Bkell (talk) 07:09, 18 March 2013 (UTC)
Arabic & Israeli print
Am I the only editor, who's having trouble with editing around Arabic & Israel print? GoodDay (talk) 01:02, 7 April 2013 (UTC)
Propose change to lead
I would like to change the following sentence in the lead:
The emphasis given to material in the lead should roughly reflect its importance to the topic, according to reliable, published sources.
to
Weight given to material in the lead should accord with its importance to the topic, roughly reflecting weight in the article itself.
I would like to prevent situations where the lead and the article do not concur with each other about what is important, and also prevent repeated arguments about 'weight in reliable sources' in the context of both the lead and in the article itself. In my opinion, arguments about weight belong in discussions about what should be in the body of the article. The lead should only be edited so as to bring it into harmony with what is the body of the article. I feel that this already reflects best practice on Wikipedia, where editors just ask when deciding about changes to the lead, 'does the new lead better summarise the body of the article?' Thoughts? Objections?LK (talk) 04:54, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
Sounds like a sensible proposal, LK, but I am curious to hear the comments and input of others on point. Small ripples in a key MOS provision such as this can create large, unanticipated waves. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 05:11, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
Agree that would be sensible in principle, but it does come up against the rather large practical problem surely that many, if not most WP articles, are an incoherent, unbalanced mess. This change would simply give licence to people to extend any such failings to the lead, either by blocking necessary improvements to it that didn't also make commensurate improvements to the body or by insisting on hacking up any relatively decent one that nonetheless found itself at the head of a shoddy wider article. I'm sure I'm not alone in rarely reading or editing beyond the lead, and I think we'd be disadvantaging both readers and editors who happen to have that focus. As a wider point, I think a better way to build decent encyclopedia entries (and, realistically, it's the way most pages here develop from when they are first created) is to start with the broad overview and then pick out the key details from that for expansion and elaboration, rather than basing a purported broad overview on the fairly arbitrary and randomly selected pieces of detail we happen to have at any one time. N-HHtalk/edits 12:16, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
I suspect that the purpose of this statement is to indicate that "its importance to the topic" is defined by "reliable, published sources" rather than by editors' personal interests. Both the lead and the article body should "roughly reflect its importance to the topic, according to reliable, published sources". In the case of an under-developed article, there's no good reason to have a lopsided lead to match a lopsided article. The lead should reflect the weight that should be present in the article, which often is not the weight that we actually have at the moment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:35, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Placement of deletion templates
The helpful list of elements of the lead includes "Maintenance templates" (second, after Disambiguation links) but does not explicitly mention Deletion templates - Speedy, PROD, AfD. Is there any guideline as to whether these should be above, or below, maintenance templates such as {{unreferenced}}? They seem to be placed fairly randomly above or below, at present. The text of WP:PROD says "Add the {{subst:Proposed deletion|concern=reason for proposed deletion}} to the top of the main article page", which is vague. At present Yobot is moving maintenance tags to be above PROD, but I've asked Magliodatis and there seems no guideline. My own feeling is that deletion templates should probably be placed above other maintenance templates (though after disambiguation hatnotes). Any thoughts, or any links to policy or guidelines? PamD 08:28, 7 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for bringing the matter. I also would like that we reach a consensus on this. I think the best choice is hatnotes, deletion templates, maintenance templates as you said. I think infoboxes should follow. -- Magioladitis (talk) 16:16, 7 April 2013 (UTC)
Hearing no objections during the last two weeks, I think we could consider that proposal to be approved. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:37, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
"Lazy" Links should be Minimized in the lead.
Lazy links (lazy in-line contextual links or "lazy hyperlinks") are cases where links are used exclusively to define uncommon terms within very important sentences when simply adding a few words within or near the sentence would give enough clue that the reader is not forced to click on a link to understand the main article/topic/definition. They are "lazy" when the writer uses links to replace clear writing, rather than as an optional aid to clarity.
Minimizing lazy links is particularly important in the lead to keep it "stand alone,"—to keep it a quick definition.
The main danger of not minimizing lazy contextual links in our leads is readers being forced to skip from lead to lead to lead in virtual perpetuity, for almost any topic. (This happens to me all the time!) But this is particularly true in technical, often jargon-ridden articles or in topics where a reader is unusually ignorant. A Wiki-wide tendency towards lazy linking in the lead is diminishing its usability and conceptual continuity. In fact, I see this as Wikipedia's greatest weakness.
(And a weakness of lazy links outside of the lead is that often a few words in context is more precise than a link to an entire article written outside of that context.)
I think this is important enough that warning against lazy links, and suggesting we minimize locally unexplained terms deserves to be in the Lead_section's lead. Thoughts? --69.110.90.125 (talk) 19:14, 20 April 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford
So consider a subject like Inferior gemellus muscle. How would you write a proper introduction for that subject, so that nobody had to click through to find out what any of the technical terms meant? I don't think that I could do it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:14, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
As someone who is by now quite used to seeing systematically removing 'Lazy links' of common terms in the lead (and indeed elsewhere within articles), I can quite sympathise with the opinion expressed by the OP. Links used for glossing ought to be used with great restraint. Uncommon terms, as exemplified above, might be the exception. -- Ohconfucius ping / poke 08:17, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
I frequently edit technical mathematics articles. In this area, although some terms should be glossed, it is *necessary* to provide links for context rather than glossing everything, because the tree of definitions you would need to expand goes extremely deep. So I am wary of this proposal, that seems to be suited for some kinds of Wikipedia articles and not others. —David Eppstein (talk) 15:58, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for your thoughts! (I don't know what "glossed" means.) I don't systematically remove 'Lazy links,' but I do often repair them. ...meaning I reluctantly follow the link in the unclear sentence, then come back and add the few words that clear writing demands. (Typically the most wasted time is in the learning, not the actual repair—BY FAR!) OK, I see I was not clear in my Original Post. So I edited the top paragraph. At the sacrifice of clear sentences I combined two for better technical precision in my above definition of lazy links. I hope it's still readable. Does the definition still need clarification?
WhatamIdoing, I think your lead to the Inferior gemellus muscle is fine. I don't think those links meet either of the two "They are "lazy" when..." conditions given above, for the reasons you suggest. (Plus you have pictures! Grin.) Again I stress, we are NOT talking "hard and fast rule," here!
I also agree with every word David Eppstein said. We do need care here. I'd only clarify that I'm not against all links at all, only lazy links, in the lead section, as better defined above: three conditions. I agree that a few articles don't fit my suggestion well. This is why I never suggested a strict prohibition on undefined terms in the lead, but rather; their discouragement, a posture,....a general minimizing, not an elimination. Indeed it is true that in some few cases a robotic repair of all or most undefined terms could do the opposite, it could clutter and un-clarify. Sometimes naked links are best, and I didn't intend to suggest that all naked links are lazy links.
However, if we suggest suggesting an attitude rather than a hard rule, I think it in no way subtracts from the importance of this issue. Nor would the difficulty and complexity of communicating this concept. ...Because this is a true weakness in Wikipedia's efficient conveyance of information! Are we all in agreement now? Dread. I find this almost overwhelming. Ideas? --69.110.90.125 (talk) 00:54, 27 April 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford
You can read about Glossing at the article on the subject.
If you think that fasciculi and tuberosities and medial surfaces of trochanters are everyday words that readers will understand without needing to read another article, then I'm not sure what your problem is. Can you give an example? WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:23, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
I have a problem!? An example of a lazy hypertext is: "Joe J. Blow denied it." Repaired: "Joe J. Blow, Norway's king, denied it." Also I've left dozens of Edit summeries saying: repaired "lazy hypertext", —but my Google's not finding them, can yours? Also, I suggest re-reading what I've written, you've seemingly misunderstood or forgotten many sentences. I'd repost, but my redundancy meter is already nearly pegged. But let me suggest a careful, slow, intuitive reread of the very first sentence of the Original Post. (Substitute "gist," "idea," "theme," or "feeling" for "clue" if you like.) Your complaint seems off topic. --69.110.90.125 (talk) 22:35, 27 April 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford
Here's more examples: I was exploring the article: Hollow-point bullet. There is a lazy link for the unknown word; "nominalizing", quote:
"The term is shortened by nominalizing the unit adjective hollow-point. Logically, the hyphen should remain when writing the nominalized form. However, this distinction is lost on most of the population, and if we were to style the nominalized form thus in this article, I suspect that we would constantly be upbraided by users telling us that the "right" way to style the nominalized form is...."
Keep in mind, (this part is critical!) in this case the topic was hollow-point bullets. So, clicking on the link nominalizing, I was hoping for a quick definition, or at least a clue, just enough to grasp the original theme or intent. As is typical on Wikipedia, my goal was NOT an education on nominalizing. Just: "What is this guy talking about!?" A clue. Instead, I found another lead full of lazy links for more linguistic jargon. I gave up there. Wiki failed me. What caused that failure? My expectation that following more links would not illuminate, but dig a deeper hole into my day...on an OFF TOPIC subject. I now dread links. They have become rabbit holes, unwanted adventures too often ending in futility and wasted time. The author(s) had unconsciously used a link as a crutch, as an excuse to use sloppy, lazy, unclear writing (in this case; inappropriate jargon). So Wikipedia faces two serious problems or faults here: dreaded links and unclear/sloppy writing. ...but problems with a potential fix.
In contrast, an example where I think a naked link does NOT need expanding is the "color space" in the CIE 1931 color space article's lead, —for several reasons: They include: 1) "CIE 1931 color space" is a subset of "color space," therefore an understanding of "color space," is either assumed, or required, a few words would not help that. And 2) "CIE 1931 color space," unlike "color space," is technical enough that the general reader is unlikely to encounter it. Finally, 3) "color space" is not off-topic to "CIE 1931 color space." addendum: And last, perhaps my major reason: 4) I simply could not think of a few words or a sentence that would have improved clarity and readability.
But all this is subjective, debatable. Again, I'm suggesting an attitude or value, not a rule. The overriding goal is aiding in clear, elegant, and efficient communication, enabling better user-experiences. I can think of nothing as easy to do, with such a large payoff. --69.110.90.125 (talk) 00:02, 1 May 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford
So in the section: Introductory text, Provide an accessible overview, we find this sentence: "Where uncommon terms are essential, they should be placed in context, linked and briefly defined." That could be what I'm saying! Yes...no? What are example(s) of "placed in context," and "briefly defined?" --69.110.90.125 (talk) 19:36, 1 May 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford
I think that this is a problem everywhere, not just in the introduction. What confused me is that you seemed to accept "The gemelli are two small muscular fasciculi", when almost nobody knows what a fasciculus is, and the statement that it "arises from the upper part of the tuberosity of the ischium," when almost nobody knows what either a tuberosity is or where the ischium is. If we're going to explain who Joe is (and IMO we normally should), then why shouldn't we explain these rare technical terms?
Anyway, yes, pages should be well-written (e.g., terms placed in context, which is what you want), but this problem extends well beyond the introduction, and so should be addressed elsewhere (on a page that applies to everything, not just to the first few paragraphs). Also, you might like to enable WP:POPUPS, which I think will let you read the beginning of linked articles without actually having to click through. 19:45, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
You ask: "If we're going to explain who Joe is (and IMO we normally should), then why shouldn't we explain these rare technical terms?" The short answer is; because sometimes adding a few words is not better than following a link. I could be more specific if you were: —So what about my above listed (1-4) reasons and adjoining concept do you find unclear? Again, I wonder if you are seeking a bifurcated, True-False RULE for editors to apply, where again and again and again and again and ....hello? I keep saying it's NOT a rule, it should be a value or guideline. Specifically to your example, my examples "2)" and "4)" apply to how I would edit it. Me. But YOU may, in light of your own education, values, and a different article context have another set of reasons. Creating a list of all possible reasons would be futile and silly. Put another way, I NEVER SAID WE "shouldn't explain these rare technical terms!" You can if you want. The overriding value to apply is: will a few added words or a sentence improve clarity, speed, and readability over following the link. In the Joe-example, 3 words gave a meaningless declaration; logical existence...thus a "clue" or hint to the uninformed into what is being said. Again, often the reader is only seeking a quick, foggy concept to apply to a side-argument in his main topic of interest.
You say: "should be addressed elsewhere (on a page that applies to everything, not just to the first few paragraphs)." Yes, and I should be a millionaire. If others want to lead on that, I'll certainly support it! I also think my arguments why it's far more important in the lead are strong, valid and true. But look how much trouble I've had explaining that! Perhaps your suggestion is ideal and mine is only good. But let's not let wanting the ideal, ruin the good. ...Or, learn arithmetic before algebra. --69.110.90.230 (talk) 19:28, 5 May 2013 (UTC)Doug Bashford
News style
I added some links to the overview section today. Bbb23 has reverted it on the grounds that I did not obtain written permission in advance, even though the overall meaning was not changed, the edits responded directly to the previous edit summary left by a very inexperienced editor, and WP:POLICY requires no advance discussion. Here is the explanation:
The previous editor removed a longstanding link to the article on news style because it "implied condonation while the lead of this article explicitly condemns its use." This indicates that what we've provided is not communicating our intentions well.
There are some important elements from news style that we want editors to use. They include:
Never burying the lead: See "most important information comes first".
No teasers: The article on that subject is at cold open, which I linked.
I also rephrased a sentence to eliminate the potential confusion over whether leads are supposed to be WP:ACCESSible (to disabled people) or accessible in the sense of comprehensible (to everyone), and added the word definitions as the most relevant case of an overly specific description that ought to be avoided in the lead.
There are, of course, some journalistic styles that we don't want, namely extremely short paragraphs (often just one sentence), extremely short introductions (often just one sentence), and catchy headlines, but it is incorrect to say that we reject news style completely. In fact, we want every introduction to be written in a traditional summary news style. (We do reject what you might call "magazine style", with teasers and personal anecdotes and other non-encyclopedic and non-news styles.)
So that's the explanation, and if anyone has any actual substantive objections, I'd like to hear them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:53, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Hi WAID, we don't normally use news style (inverted pyramid, and so on), as the first paragraph says. Some editors do prefer it, and it does sometimes make sense, but in general WP leads are stand-alone summaries of the article, rather than ledes. SlimVirgin(talk) 16:46, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
"Inverted pyramid" means that you put important and basic information first, and that you make it possible for the article to make sense to a person who stops reading after the lead. That is exactly what we do here. Or, at least, I've never seen you write an article with unimportant trivia preceding basic facts, or whose lead did not "stand alone as a concise overview", exactly like the inverted pyramid and standard news requires.
When we talked about "news style" a while ago, we had people asserting that "news style" was a code word for using teasers, which—if you go read that article, or any reputable newspaper (rather than tabloids or magazines)—it most certainly does not. We routinely do proper journalistic leads in the lead, exactly like that footnote says: an immediate summary of the most important facts presented in the first paragraph or so. That's what we want and that's what news style requires. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:18, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Editing?
I see some Intro sections that have errors (bias, inflammatory statements, inaccuracies, unsupported assertions, etc.) but I see no way to edit this one section of the article. How can I do this? If you need to have some kind of privileges to do so, this should be mentioned in this articles. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 13:49, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
If you are logged-in, you can set one of the user preferences "Add an [edit] link for the lead section of a page". Otherwise, here's how to do it in a Windows-based browser: there are at least two ways.
When viewing (not editing) a page, go to the URL address bar of your browser, and immediately after the existing URL, add ?action=edit§ion=0 and press ↵ Enter
Find the "[edit]" link for any section; right-click on that and select "Copy link", "Copy link location", or "Copy shortcut" (it varies between browsers). Then paste that link into the URL address bar of your browser, but before pressing ↵ Enter, alter the last part of the URL from e.g. §ion=1 to §ion=0 and then press ↵ Enter. --Redrose64 (talk) 14:17, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Plural
should the plural be in the first sentence if there is only one plural, and it is obscure? Regardless of whether you should or not, that information should be on this page. Thanks. 24.246.101.50 (talk) 15:28, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
Late bolding
Is it appropriate to bold a repetition of the title when it appears (somewhat by chance) later on in the opening paragraph, as here? Victor Yus (talk) 07:41, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
No. On English plural, the opening sentence should say what the English plural is, and there "English plural" should appear in bold. —Ben Kovitz (talk) 21:22, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
No, that's just pedantic and strange. —Designate (talk) 22:11, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Boldfacing minor variations of article titles
This guideline says If the article's exact title is absent from the first sentence, do not apply the bold style to related text that does appear. This seems overly strict to me — I agree that the example given of something not to do is indeed, something not to do, but there are many exceptions:
An article title with a disambiguator should not generally have that disambiguator included in the text of the lead sentence; nevertheless the rest of the title should be boldfaced.
An article about a city should probably have a lead sentence like "X is a city in Y" and an article title like "X, Y", but should still boldface X.
An article about a person should be titled with the most commonly used variant of the person's name, but the lead should use the full name in boldface (e.g. Woodrow Wilson starts with Thomas Woodrow Wilson)
Although articles generally have singular subjects, it may be more convenient for the lead sentence to use the plural form, e.g. Wakefield power station is actually about two power stations, and the lead uses Wakefield power stations. (Possibly this is a bad example and the article should be retitled but I believe that singular/plural issues should not in general block boldfacing.)
In some cases for technical reasons it may not be possible to assign an article the title that it should have; nevertheless, if that title appears in the first sentence, it should be boldfaced. (For instance, suppose we had an article about a company whose name began with the string "User:".)
Would it be possible to find a less restrictive wording that allows these cases to continue, so that we don't someday have people inappropriately removing the boldfacing from many of our articles? —David Eppstein (talk) 22:55, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
I get what you're saying. The spirit of this guideline is that we should only boldface "proper" titles as opposed to "common" titles, but that's a different distinction from "proper" and "common" nouns. It's hard to put a finger on the actual terminology to use. —Designate (talk) 23:53, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Some of the naming and redirect policies make reference (in examples) to bolding of non-exact titles, and a lot, if not most, celebrity/famous person articles with longer names do so. Just look at Liberace or Madonna or Sting (musician). I think BOLDSYN generally covers most of those scenarios though, which is of course the next section. I would support fixing that wording since it is directly contradictory with the very next section. Shadowjams (talk) 23:18, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Citations in lead
At one time, I'm pretty sure there was a guideline that said citations were needed in the lead only if the statement was exceptionally open to challenge (for example, if conventional wisdom happened to be erroneous); otherwise, as long as the statement was well supported by sourced article text, the lead need not be cluttered with citations, for ease of reading. Did this change as the result of a discussion that someone could point me to? The current guideline seems far more complicated; it seems to say that the intro requires citations in the same manner as body text. Cynwolfe (talk) 00:18, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
I believe WP:LEADCITE covers this issue, specifically the bit about "Because the lead will usually repeat information that is in the body, editors should balance the desire to avoid redundant citations in the lead with the desire to aid readers in locating sources for challengeable material". (Emphasis on redundant.) As I read the guideline, it does not require material to be fully cited in the lead (other than "direct quotations and contentious material about living persons") when that material is repeated and cited properly in the body of the article. Many good article have little-to-no citations in the lead, which I believe falls under this policy. As with many guidelines, consensus is required to not have citations in the lead even if they are in the body. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 02:47, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
OK, thanks. I've often declined requests for citations in a lead on the grounds that the point is thoroughly discussed and adequately cited in the body, with the further suggestion that if the tagger feels this isn't so, then please restore the tag and state more specifically on the talk page what the sticking point might be. For some reason, when I was reviewing the guidelines this time, they seemed less supportive of that approach. "Balance the desire", although an elegant and diplomatic phrase, may be what made me see a more open invitation to demand what you rightly characterize as redundant citations in the lead. Thank you again for a thoughtful response. Cynwolfe (talk) 14:48, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
I would like to seek clarification over the use of contentious labels such as "controversial" in the lead section of an article. According to MOS:INTRO:
"The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article. The reason for a topic's noteworthiness should be established, or at least introduced, in the lead (but not by using "peacock terms" such as "acclaimed" or "award-winning")."
Though the section on providing an accessible overview specifically advises against the use of peacock terms, would it be reasonable to assume that, at the same time contentious labels are advised against as well? I understand that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines tend to be more descriptive than prescriptive, however since I am currently involved in a dispute on a biographical article, I thought it best to seek opinion of the regular contributors to this page. (User:SlimVirgin, User:Stevertigo, User:CBM, User:WhatamIdoing, User:SMcCandlish) — Nearly Headless Nick {c} 12:45, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for initiating this discussion, Sir Nick. I would like to add that there are several Featured Articles and Good Articles (examples Yasser Arafat, Neville Chamberlain, George W. Bush) that currently contain such statements in the lede. This particular point of contention arose as part of discussions on Narendra Modi. Aurorion (talk) 13:52, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
And there are several others that only describe the controversies without labelling the subject of the article or their actions as "controversial". My position is summarized here – This discussion is generally about the MoS guide rather than any specific dispute. — Nearly Headless Nick {c} 17:20, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
(Note: It was my suggestion that a statement along the lines of "Modi is a controversial figure in India" be added to the article lead.) According to WP:LEAD, the lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview. It should define the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is notable, and summarize the most important points—including any prominent controversies. If "controversial" is a widely applied label, is one of the reasons why a topic is notable and if it is an important defining characteristic well backed up sources, we certainly should include it. The applicable tests are whether it is noteworthy and whether it is well supported by sources. --regentspark (comment) 16:57, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
WP:LEAD further states: "When writing about controversies in the lead of the biography of a living person, notable material should neither be suppressed nor allowed to overwhelm: always pay scrupulous attention to reliable sources. Write clinically, and let the facts speak for themselves." (emphasis mine)
Nick, the test for that (your emphasized part) is also straightforward. If sources describe an entity in a certain way, we can assume it is clinically written. If academic peer-reviewed ones do so, we can safely assume it is clinically written. --regentspark (comment) 12:25, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Since it's not a secret that Narendra Modi is the subject here, see this discussion before coming to any conclusion. There is more than what meets the eye here. Mr T(Talk?)(New thread?) 17:14, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
@Uninvolved editors: Should it be concluded that "controversial" is al right for use, kindly also clarify whether that sentence should give readers enough information to identify what the controversy is about (cf. WP:LABEL). Mr T(Talk?)(New thread?) 12:46, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Proposal: move most translations and transliterations from lead sentence to footnote
I want to propose rewriting the "Alternative names" section to reduce clutter in the lead. Only major names used commonly by English-language sources should appear in the first sentence. Any transliterations and translations should appear in a footnote. Any etymologies sections should appear in the body of the article or in a footnote.
Proposal for "Alternative names"
Alternative names
By the design of Wikipedia's software, an article can have only one title. When this title is a name, significant alternative names for the topic should be mentioned in the article, usually in the first sentence or paragraph. These may include alternative spellings, longer or shorter forms, historical names, and significant names in other languages. Indeed, alternative names can be used in article text in contexts where they are more appropriate than the name used as the title of the article. For example, the city now called "Gdańsk" can be referred to as "Danzig" in suited historical contexts. The editor needs to balance the desire to maximize the information available to the reader with the need to maintain readability.
Usage in first sentence
The name of a person is presented in full if known, including any given names that are not included in the article's title or are abbreviated there. For example, the article on Calvin Coolidge gives his name as John Calvin Coolidge, Jr.
In articles about people, literary and artistic works, scientific principles and concepts, and other subjects, the title can be followed in the first line by major alternative names. (The guideline for place names differs in this regard.) Such names may be listed in parentheses or offset by commas, whichever maximizes the clarity of the lead sentence. Decisions about which names to include should reflect consensus. The following are examples of alternative names in the lead sentence.
Angela Dorothea Merkel (née Kasner; born 17 July 1954) is ...
Widely used nicknames, either before the last name in quotation marks, or later in the sentence.
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK, was ...
Stage names, pen names, and other aliases.
Park Jae-sang (born December 31, 1977), better known by his stage name Psy ...
A local official name different from a widely accepted English name.
Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is ...
If an article subject is covered significantly in English-language sources, the standard English-language name(s) should take priority over foreign-language names, especially if there are several. For articles primarily relying on non-English-language sources, the best name should be arrived at via consensus. In any case, less common names, non-Roman-script names, and additional foreign-language names should appear in a footnote or in the body of the article, in order to reduce clutter. They should be labeled appropriately. Such names may include:
Foreign-language names in non-Roman scripts, and their transliterations.
^Arabic: الشرق الأوسط, Asharq Al-Awsṭ; Armenian: Միջին Արևելք, Merdzavor Arevelk’; Azerbaijani: Orta Şərq; French: Moyen-Orient; Georgian: ახლო აღმოსავლეთი, akhlo aghmosavleti; Greek: Μέση Ανατολή, Mési Anatolí; Hebrew: המזרח התיכון, Ha'Mizrah Ha'Tihon; Kurdish: Rojhilata Navîn; Persian: خاورمیانه, khevrmyenh; Somali: Bariga Dhexe; Soranî Kurdish: ڕۆژھەڵاتی ناوین, rrojhellatî nayn; Turkish: Orta Doğu; Urdu: مشرق وسطی, hashrq vsty
Ideally, translations or transliterations of names should be verifiable to reliable sources. (This may not be possible if writing about a subject for which no reliable English-language sources exist.)
Alternatively, if there are more than two alternative names, these names can be moved to and explained in a "Names" section. Once such a section or paragraph is created, the alternative English or foreign names should not be moved back to the first line. Etymologies or explanations of names generally should not appear in the lead sentence; consider creating an "Etymology" section or adding them to an existing section.
I suggest the section "Foreign language" be removed, as the only purpose of this section is to say "Don't put etymologies in boldface"—but etymologies shouldn't appear in the first sentence anyway. Otherwise it just distracts from "Alternative names" which is the relevant guideline. Read my proposal over and let me know what you think. —Designate (talk) 15:34, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Agree only when there are so many it takes up a full line. Otherwise, no. -- Ypnypn (talk) 01:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
What does "full line" mean? Screen sizes vary widely. Ironholds (talk) 01:56, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Approximately 75 – 150 characters or so. My point is there's a difference between Christopher Columbus and the Middle East. – Ypnypn (talk) 16:39, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Personally I strongly support this proposal. Ironholds (talk) 01:56, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
The emphasis on English-language sources in this makes me very uncomfortable. We don't need to have any English-language sources to have an article here. This is an encyclopedia of everything, not an encyclopedia of America, England, and the former British colonies. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:31, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
That's a good point, thank you. I've edited the proposal to tone down the focus on English-language sources and present it as a consideration rather than a necessity. —Designate (talk) 02:57, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Oppose - when a subject's name is not English, it makes good sense (to me) to include their native name in the lead. --ThaddeusB (talk) 16:47, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
In the first sentence, though? Is that maximally useful to readers who are looking for an overview of a subject? —Designate (talk) 17:11, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
I'm not sure where all you would put it besides in parentheses after the English name. Is someone's birthdate really the single most important thing about them? Of course not, but convention is to put it in parenthesis immediately after their name too. The current guideline encourages footnoting when not doing so causes clutter. That is perfectly good advice. However, your proposal is basically to mandate such names are always be footnoted. As a matter of personal preference (there is no obviously right answer), I like having the non-English names at the top. Enwiki is used by many people who's native language is not English. To me, including the native name of non-English subjects at the top makes the encyclopedia more friendly to our global audience. --ThaddeusB (talk) 20:36, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
I support any proposal that serves to trim the first sentence of excess baggage, with the goal of making it actually readable. Binksternet (talk) 21:00, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Alternative names: To clarify the examples used above, it would be good (for us discussion participants) to have better before&after comparisons of what repercussions this might have. Eg. the suggested Middle East edit has already been entered (difflink, see before and after). I agree the "before" is problematic, but I'm not sure if this is the best solution. Eg.2. the Ban Ki-moon article currently looks like that, in contrast to the only English that is in the collapsed/proposed example above. Based on those 2 examples, I would oppose the proposal as currently written, and I oppose any proposal that completely removes all non-English titles from the lead. It is beneficial to remind ourselves (and any readers) that English is not the primary/original language used to describe everything. "Ban Ki-moon" is not the name given to that person by his parents at birth, and we would be making a harmful decision if we didn't include that, right up front. I do completely agree that it's an issue that needs further thought and discussion. –Quiddity (talk) 21:38, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Etymologies: This should really be a separate thread. There has been much past discussion (here and elsewhere). Etymologies shouldn't overwhelm a lead section, but they do often warrant a mention. They should not ever be banned or forbidden from the lead. Gentle discouragement of excessively long etymologies, in the lead, would be fine. There's also a vast difference between "lead section" and "lead sentence", and we must be careful to keep them separate in discussion and in style/guidelines. –Quiddity (talk) 21:38, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Limited conditional support per Ypnypn. As Quiddity points out, English is not the primary language used to describe everything or even most things. More broadly, the vast majority of articles on Wikipedia are far more akin to Kim Seong-Min (footballer) than Christopher Columbus, in terms of both the language of the sources which describe them and the language capabilities & interests of the people who are most likely to read them, and it's unlikely that a guideline designed to address problems on a few very-high-profile articles is going to produce appropriate results for all those other articles.
On the other hand, I can see the need for some encouragement for editors to move extremely lengthy non-English name information to footnotes/infoboxen, particularly when for reasons of NPOV editors would otherwise feel the need to include multiple languages, orthographies, and/or transcription systems. A guideline which encouraged the use of footnotes/infoboxen in those particular cases would have the advantage of describing and building on existing practice & consensus rather than trying to prescribe new practice; for example, Korea-related articles deal with this problem all the time, and WP:KOREA's usual advice is to put just hangul or no Korean at all in the lede sentence, while everything else goes to {{Infobox Korean name}}. quant18 (talk) 05:11, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment. I dislike complicated, technical discussions of etymology even near the top of an article. I think these are off-putting to the general reader, and they occur often in Greek mythology articles right after the intro, where they create undue weight (that is, in the intro or as the first sentence, an etymology can imply that this is more important in understanding something than it may in fact be). But as Quiddity notes above, this is perhaps a separate discussion, and with some topics an etymology is both basic to understanding and quite helpful. So in general I don't think the guideline needs to be rigid. I'm extremely wary of banning transliteration from the beginning. Some languages, such as Chinese and Arabic, have such varied transliterations that I'm often not sure I'm in the right place, unless I see all the forms laid out. I find an explanation of the name most helpful in languages I don't read at all—which seems to be the opposite of the proposer's impression that alternate names or transliterations are merely confusing. An explanation of naming convention in the language (example) can immediately clear up confusion for the uninitiated. For bilingual readers, alternative names and transliterations may be vital. In classical studies, the transliteration of ancient Greek can vary; some translations, even those used in high schools, may not use the "most common" or traditional latinization (Achilles for Akhilleus). I do agree wholeheartedly with the goal of reducing clutter in the intro, as represented by "Middle East" (note 3) above: this is a perfect example of a general term that doesn't need all this stuff at the top. The list of names seems to represent mere translations of "Middle East", not actual alternative names or varied transliterations of a source-language. "Middle East" is a conventional geographical designation in English from the Western perspective in the first place, not a name brought into English. So this is quite different from the nomenclature given, for example, at the beginning of Turkey. Note 1 is an example of something I wouldn't want to see moved to a note, and expect that alternative anglicizations might be available and useful. Cynwolfe (talk) 18:37, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose. This one-size-fits-all piece, in my judgment, is inattentive to the function of the lead sentence, which is to present, in a single sentence, the absolute core of what an English-language reader should be told about a subject. Perhaps for many or most subjects, this would not include transliterations or foreign-language terms. But when we get into articles on technical subjects in philology and other cultures, such terms often do have the single-sentence level of notability. I suppose that "Only major names used commonly by English-language sources" could be taken to mean, "As long as expert secondary and tertiary sources in English frequently have reason to mention these terms in transliteration or in their original languages, of course that counts as 'used commonly by English-language sources,' so don't dream of removing anything unless you're sure that's not the case." However, unless such instructions are clearly written, I believe the change would be misunderstood and lead to edits that harm the quality of our encyclopedic information in areas such as Greek antiquity (where I have often edited). If clarification along the lines I suggest were adopted, I'd certainly switch from opposition to support. Wareh (talk) 18:25, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
Support. DECRUFT! Please, please, please. The very start of an article is the most high impact part. When I write a lead I think about that sentence very carefully. Then, to waste attention with a parenthetical? What a waste. And I suspect the people going in for this thing think it "looks intelligent". But what is really smart is to convey as much info as smoothly as possible. Some of these openings with Arabic, Chinese, even Egyptian hieroglyphics are just...silly. And crufty.
If the etymology is really so important have some discussion of it in article in a para or two. But I suspect the same gnomes running around pushing this cruft...are not the sort to write thoughtful discussion of word evolution and translation. And there are very few topics where the etymology would be important enough to even make it into the lead at all, let alone front of first sentence.
Strong Support. Restating the subject's name in multiple languages and scripts, with multiple phonetic pronunciations, even before the statement of the subject's birth date does a great disservice to the overwhelming majority of our readers. For those few readers in need of the multiple restatements of the subject's name, they can go to a linked footnote or explanatory note to find the additional detailed information they require. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:36, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose. Moving most of them e.g. to a separate section right after the lead (just like the Etymology section at many articles) would be be OK; demoting them to a footnote, no, they're imo too important... Put in another way I'm with Wareh, Quiddity or Cynwolfe... Thanatos|talk 07:31, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose. Ignoring the etymology issue (as it seems completely separate to me), I'm not convinced that this is enough of an issue to warrant the proposed change. Yes, there are some articles where too much space is devoted to their name and it can be problematic. But that issue is already covered in the existing language ("Consider footnoting foreign-language and archaic names if they would otherwise clutter the opening sentence.") and the single non-English name used in the vast majority of articles is not particularly distracting, IMHO. Cckerberos (talk) 14:54, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Question. Would the proposer consider separating the issue of etymology and transliteration? With transliteration, I see the issue as distinguishing between English terminology (the Middle East example above, which might be considered cruft) and words brought into English, where the relation between the English name and the original needs to be clear from the outset. Cynwolfe (talk) 15:15, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose, largely per Wareh's reasoning; I also agree with Cckerberos that the clutter advisory is sufficient material to be invoked when editors have concerns about a lead and need to discuss the best way forward, which is how this issue should be dealt with, not via a leveling MoS rule that eliminates the discussion and doesn't take into account the norms of the many disciplines which are covered in our multiform encyclopedia. (But yes, etymology will generally only have a place in the first sentence or lead when the topic at hand involves etymology as a primary concern.) davidiad{ t } 23:23, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose per Wareh and Cynwolfe. We don't need to shoehorn every introductory sentence into the same slipper. Technical information such as a transliteration or etymology can be appropriate and helpful, as long as it's not too long or involved. Then, and only then, does it need to be partitioned off into a separate section. But just what is appropriate and what needs to be pared down, partitioned, or moved, has to be determined on a case-by-case basis. That's what editors are for! P Aculeius (talk) 01:16, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment. The proposed wording does allow for a case-by-case determination (hence "by consensus", "may include"). But it's designed to shift the prejudice away from automatically putting the transliterations in the first sentence, which is what the current wording implies. The current wording implies that we need a reason to exclude the information, but I think it's the opposite: editors should need a reason to include this information in the middle of the first sentence. Even one extra name makes the sentence less clear.
For those who like the current wording, can you explain why it's generally useful to the majority of our readers to include the transliteration of a name before saying who a person is? Do you disagree that the fraction of users who need that information ahead of all other information is a very small minority? —Designate (talk) 01:28, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment we don't even use the English-language name for most European articles, we use the local non-English Latin-derived-alphabetic name of the local alphabet. When we have evidence of the common English language name, it isn't used, instead we use the local name. If you've looked at Requested Moves over the last year, articles have moved from the name found in English language sources to names found in native language sources. -- 65.94.76.126 (talk) 07:02, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
65.94.76.126, en.wp has been using non-basic-English ASCII fonts for all Latin alphabet titles - that is anything circa 300-500,000 of the 4 million titles since 2004-2006. Two pockets of ASCII names existed for a minority of tennis stubs, and a minority of ice-hockey stubs - and RMs have brought those stubs into line with en.wp practice. The only English exonyms used where non-ASCII titles are involved are Zurich and Istanbul (correctly) and Izmir, [[Iznik] and Aragon (debatable). In ictu oculi (talk) 02:44, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
Strong Support. The problem is endemic in Chinese articles, with some editors filling up templates to include all the various writing and phoneticisation systems. And although MOS:CHINESE stipulates on ejecting to infoboxes or footnotes, the practice seems engrained. Just have a look at the lead section of Mao Zedong. It was 'clean' six months earlier, but comes back like wild grass. For me, the way Sanskrit, Thai or Arabic render on page (sometimes it gets replaced by truly odd characters taking up several lines) and affect other elements of the lead is what creates the biggest headache for me. One of the most interesting cases was dealt with like this, condensed into 'Note 3'. The sooner this practice can be banished, the better. -- Ohc ¡digame!¿que pasa? 09:02, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment It seems to me that this is already covered in the MOS Clutter section. Maybe I don't understand how this proposal is different from what is already listed there. Rystheguy (talk) 05:24, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose: It what cases would using the current, existing practice become problematic? Using the examples given, you wouldn't have every single language placed in the lede for Middle East; at most, we would have an infobox containing the names in various languages (but funnily enough, we don't, so "Middle East" is still quite an extreme hyperbole example). I myself have never seen a single case where there were a billion language names in the lede paragraph itself (i.e. not in a template). If there are one or two non-English languages in the lede, does it hurt the article in any way? Is it a problem for something that takes up no more than 2 inches of screen to be present in the lede? If it ain't broke, we shouldn't try to fix it, and I believe that the current practice is not broken. -- 李博杰 | —Talkcontribsemail 12:21, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
See this edit from 5 weeks ago (check the "before" version). It was like that for a few months, after growing from nothing in mid-2012 (See semi-random August diff as comparison). (Note that I do agree with you, in opposing the proposal. But that's why the Middle East example is in it. It's not a common problem, but "new rules" are often proposed to deal with edge-cases. (And often, the non-edge-cases suffer as a result.)) HTH. –Quiddity (talk) 19:04, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
Note that the person who changed it was... me! So no, Benlisquare, it's not hyperbole. —Designate (talk) 21:27, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose: Per quant18 and others, authoritarian beyond an Orwellian level, and no readability issue exists when there are less than three languages and three transcriptions per language. Only for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, ASEAN and similar topics where there is a cluster of relevant/native non-English scripts should they not at all be listed in the first sentence. GotRTalk 22:48, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose - this seems an extremely ill considered proposal. If there is an infobox, then some of this material can be dispatched to the infobox, but at a minimum Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский) still needs to be in the main lead line. If there is no infobox, then the lead is where the information goes. Can we ask the proposer to indicate an article he/she has contributed of an Arab/Russian/Chinese subject to get an idea of the type of format proposed? In ictu oculi (talk) 02:26, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
However... at the risk of mentioning the other extreme, remember that there are still a small number of editors who sincerely believe that leads François Mitterrand, in English Francois Mitterrand or footnotes such as Stéphanie Cohen-Aloro ....often spelled as Stephanie Cohen-Aloro by the sport's governing bodies and English sources are legitimate and not having ASCII names is "censorship". I doubt WP Russia etc will agree with "Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский" always being moved to a infobox, but if so then it then should the infobox include "Daily Express: Francois Mitterrand", or "WTA website: Stephanie Cohen-Aloro" as equivalent to "Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский" ... not being silly, apparently a number of sincere editors think otherwise and a place of these ASCII names in infobox is less disruptive than current place in lead or ostentatious footnote. 10:47, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
Support. This kind of material is exactly what infoboxes are good for: to display details that might be of interest to readers, but which would clutter up the lead. SlimVirgin(talk) 19:42, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
Infoboxes are meant to be a feature "that summarises key features of the page's subject". They are definitely not a place to sweep information that is only of partial interest. See many examples above, of information that is core to the article topic, eg Ban Ki-moon (which is not the name his parents gave him, which should be established in the first sentence). Eg. Germany (which is not generally called "Germany" by the people who live there). Etc. –Quiddity (talk) 20:13, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
The threshold for inclusion
Original poster here. I'm thinking of ending or possibly restarting this conversation, as people seem confused by it. Let me try to clarify.
What I want to do is replace the burden for exclusion in the first sentence with the burden for inclusion. The current guideline is (assentially) to include all conceivable transliterations and translations in the first sentence, unless it clutters the lead, in which case an editor can make his case for removing things. This is not the best way to craft the opening sentence. The guideline should be (essentially) to put these things elsewhere in the article, unless the reader's understanding is immediately hampered, in which case an editor can make his case for putting it right in the first sentence. An editor should have to make a case for including something, not for excluding it; the fact that the transliteration exists is not an argument for including it.
Nobody in the original thread has made the case for why transliterations should be included "unless they clutter the lead"; in my opinion, they automatically clutter the lead, and there needs to be some threshold for including them. I would like to hear the case for generally including this extra information, which (I hope we can agree) is utterly useless to almost every reader. For the few readers that can use this information, why does it help so much in almost every case that it overrides the general purpose of the lead sentence, that it would be detrimental to include it elsewhere? Why are those readers not served perfectly well by putting it in the second paragraph, or the infobox, or the body, or a footnote?
It's not enough to say "It should be case-by-case", since it's not being handled case-by-case under the existing guideline: it's de facto assumed and understood by everyone that transliterations just go there even though there's never been a discussion about why that is the best place for information that has such little general benefit. —Designate (talk) 21:51, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
I don't think there's really any confusion over what your proposal is. I agree that the transliterations are beneficial to a relatively small group of readers, but I disagree that their mere presence is a distraction. I think a short transliteration is neutral to uninterested readers, something that they are able to skip over without difficulty. Cckerberos (talk) 04:30, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
Support for better readability. Binksternet (talk) 21:57, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
Restart the discussion in 6 months if its important to you, but restarting it immediately won't be productive (b/c people will be frustrated about having to respond to the "same" proposal twice in a short period of time). --ThaddeusB (talk) 03:40, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
Well, I don't know what else to do. Most of the responses are just ignoring the question I'm trying to raise. I can't just delete their responses, I can either rephrase the question or just let this zombie conversation sit for six weeks without advancing anything useful. —Designate (talk) 04:04, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
By all means feel free to end the discussion early if you don't think anything productive will come of it. Restarting it immediately after closing it though will just cause annoyance and some people (not me) may even accuse you trying to sweep opposition under the rug. --ThaddeusB (talk) 05:07, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
In articles such as Pham Van Dong (ARVN general) there exist two kinds of hatnotes. A disambiguation hatnote and an 'Eastern name order' hatnote. The first one is placed above the tag and the second one is placed below the tag. If this is to be the general rule, I propose we edit the MOS to reflect that. --Omnipaedista (talk) 08:40, 22 June 2013 (UTC)
New shortcut
Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Lead_section#Foreign_language is one of the most often applied guidelines. I have personally cited it in hundreds of edit summaries and discussed about it several times on my talk page. Its wide application indicates that there should exist a shortcut for it. If there are no objections, I will create such a shortcut: MOS:FORLANG. --08:53, 22 June 2013 (UTC)
Editing the lead section
How come there's no edit link in the lead section? Palosirkka (talk) 16:37, 28 June 2013 (UTC)
MOS:BOLDTITLE and its application to specific situations
I believe bolding and inclusion of a descriptive title in an article's lead should not be done in many cases per BOLDTITLE and WP:BEGIN, and that the intro sentence should provide a concise non-redundant summary, while the other two editors believe in more widespread use of bold titles as shown below. Further, I agree with the general advice in the WP:SBE essay, including not giving undue weight to unofficial descriptive titles.
One of the editors has also stated that WP:REDUNDANCY only applies if the entire title is repeated (e.g. "The Boston Marathon bombings were Boston Marathonbombings"), not if only individual words are repeated out of order, but I don't believe that's what the policy says at all for descriptive titles (WP:BEGIN footnote 7 helps clarify this with the example there.) Input on that particular guideline would be appreciated as well.
Not all of these examples may be viable to change, but primarily, I'm looking for guidance on whether or not the titles I have suggested do comply with MOS:INTRO. (Regardless of whether they end up being changed.) I think the MOS examples may need improvement to prevent this type of contention, and hope to provide input on doing so as this discussion hopefully progresses.
"During the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013, two pressure cooker bombs exploded ..." (current version, which I prefer and has been stable on the page for weeks)
"The 2013 Boston Marathon bombings were a series of bombings that occured during the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013." (version proposed by Shadowjams)
I believe the "Mississippi River" example in MOS:BOLDTITLE clearly shows that this wording is disallowed, as it is nearly identical to the example situation, creating an unnecessary WP:REDUNDANCY. The article title is descriptive and per WP:BEGIN is not required, and in fact should not appear at all since it would prevent the terms "Boston Marathon" and "bombings" from being properly explained in context without that redundancy.
"The first explosion of the Boston Marathon bombings occurred on April 15, 2013, at 2:49 p.m. EDT (18:49 UTC), 13 seconds later, the second explosion was visible ..." (alternate version proposed by My76Strat after a discussion about removing redundancy)
My objection: "What was the attack? How many bombs were there? (Is the article even about a bombing event, or about the explosions that occurred?) The description of what the attack was (two bombs exploding) is split into two parts and less descriptive. Your suggestion does not tell the reader whether the attack happened during the marathon, or if it was a related attack that affected the marathon, or if there were additional explosions." This version severely distorts the wording simply to bold the title, contrary to what the MOS says.
"The 2011 Joplin tornado was a catastrophic EF5multiple-vortex tornado that struck Joplin, Missouri in the late afternoon of Sunday, May 22, 2011." (original version, reverted to by Shadowjams)
My change here removed the redundant information from the beginning of the sentence. I believe the "Mississippi River" example is a good guide here as well; this is again a descriptive title, and "2011", "Joplin", and "tornado" are all redundant to the rest of the sentence.
"On the afternoon of May 20, 2013, a deadly EF5tornado impacted Moore, Oklahoma ..." (my preferred format, details may be dated)
"The 2013 Moore tornado was a deadly tornado that occurred on the afternoon of May 20, 2013. The EF5 tornado, with peak winds estimated at 210 miles per hour (340 km/h), impacted Moore, Oklahoma ..." (current version supported by Shadowjams and My76Strat, details may be dated)
This is a descriptive title, and moves the wikilink for Moore, Oklahoma, further down, making the sentence less informative. If that wikilink is reintroduced to the first sentence, it would create an additional redundancy. "2013" and "tornado" are also redundant.
"This list of English monarchs begins with Æthelstan and ends with Anne ..." (original version, reverted to by Shadowjams)
My change was to allow more information to be wikilinked. Per WP:BEGIN: "if the page is a list, do not introduce the list as 'This is a list of X' or "This list of Xs...'".
"A series of coordinated bomb blasts occurred on June 20, 1985, in Kathmandu and other cities in Nepal." (my version)
"A series of coordinated bomb blasts occurred on June 20, 1985 in Kathmandu and other cities in Nepal." (original version, reverted to by Shadowjams)
The bolded text is not the title, nor is it an alternative title, it just paraphrases parts of it (the "Beatles" example in BOLDTITLE says not to bold related text.) I do not see any rationale for bolding in this case.
"From May 15–17, 2013, a small, but intense and deadly, tornado outbreak produced several damaging tornadoes ..." (my version)
"The May 15–17, 2013 tornado outbreak was a small, but intense and deadly tornado outbreak that produced several damaging tornadoes ..." (original version, reverted to by Shadowjams)
I am less clear on what the policy says to do here. I changed it since "tornado outbreak" is a WP:REDUNDANCY, and it is a descriptive title and thus is not required to be in the text. "Tornado outbreak" needs to be wikilinked, so it cannot simply be removed from the original version.
"The black Givenchy dress of Audrey Hepburn refers to the little black dress that was designed by Hubert de Givenchy and worn by Audrey Hepburn ..." (original version, reverted to by Shadowjams with the comment "this is the most specific lead i've ever seen... your mosbold objection is absurd")
This is a purely descriptive title, yet the text suggests it is an official term being used to refer to that item. I googled "black Givenchy dress of Audrey Hepburn" before changing this, and it is not a widely used name of any sort, so it does not seem to belong per WP:REDUNDANCY and the information presented in the "Mississippi River" example yet again.
Additional point I made in the DR/N discussion: "The titles in question are descriptive titles that we editors have assigned to these articles. The media may commonly use their own versions, e.g. "Boston Marathon bombing", "Boston Marathon bombings", or "Boston Marathon attacks". There isn't a single name in use for this specific event; the various names are simply descriptions just as we use at Wikipedia, not official names for the event. WP:BEGIN (footnote 7) says that a title like "Pakistani-Iraqi relations" is descriptive and should not be bolded, even though such a term is likely to appear in general usage. This gives further credence to the idea that these are not "formal or widely accepted names", but descriptive ones, and thus do not need to be included if they don't comfortably fit."
Clarification on which versions of these titles are best supported by MOS:BOLDTITLE, WP:BEGIN, and any other MOS guidelines would be appreciated. (I realize both versions may be supported to some extent in some cases.) Thanks. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 14:12, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
Note: It was decided that the broad application of MOS:BOLDTITLE was out of the jurisdiction of DRN. -- Nbound (talk) 10:08, 24 May 2013 (UTC) (DRN Case Volunteer)
Ugh, that last example. Any lead sentence containing "refers to" is almost always written incorrectly. —Designate (talk) 01:11, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
That's correct, however that's not the point of this discussion. Shadowjams (talk) 05:54, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
The point appears to be concerning interpretation of this guideline's sentence "If the article's title does not lend itself to being used easily and naturally in the opening sentence, the wording should not be distorted in an effort to include it". I think the little black dress sentence is a good example of distorted wording made in an effort to include the title. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:31, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Yes, Hepburn's dress is a good example of a title that's particularly distorting to incorporate into a sentence as a bold lead. In general, I like having a bold lead, but am pretty sure it's because I'm used to it as a visual stimulus. I do like bold to call attention to alternate names that are redirected to the page, especially if they appear slightly deeper in the lead, maybe not in the first sentence (though I mean specific alternate names, not just general descriptive phrases as would be the case with the Boston Marathon bombings). About "refers to": there was a discussion on moving WP:REFERS (which appears in an essay) to WP:NAD (a policy page), but I'm not sure it ever attracted the additional input I wanted before proceeding, and I lost track of it. I see that, however, as related to this issue: it's the desire to treat the title-topic as a term to be defined that results in the kind of sentence db8 is trying to avoid, with the bold phrase as the thing to be defined. That's how it's related to NAD. Cynwolfe (talk) 15:15, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
As for my undoing and 2001:'s examples, I undid them rather than substituted my own reworking because 2001: had done a surprising number of these out of the blue; I'm surprised I even found them. We were discussing just the Boston Marathon article, and then I saw all of these changes done without any consensus (we hadn't reached one at the Boston page). Many of them don't meet LEAD, but I'm not confident that just removing the bolding is right either. Either way, I don't see this discussion about these examples, but rather the general policy. Shadowjams (talk) 23:11, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
Discussing the appropriateness of the fairly small number of applications is beyond the scope of this discussion in any case; any such discussion would have to involve the reverts as well, and both are certainly not MOS-talk issues. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 04:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
I agree that WP:REFERS, even though not a guideline, does help explain one often-misapplied point of WP:NAD; but in the examples given there, the bolded terms don't actually involve any awkward redundancies, so I'm not sure they're the best comparisons for these examples. The only contention over "refers to" here was in the "little black dress" example, which has since been changed...but still introduces a complete redundancy in the process of defining its subject, better covered by MOS:BEGIN. (Basically, the same point I've made over whether it's okay to say "The ABC was C of B of A" or similar.) I think WP:REFERS ought to cover when just simplifying wording as in the "computer architecture" example is enough, or when making the same change for the "little black dress" example still results in a WP:NAD-style definition for a term. (Thus making that explicitly cover redundancy and bolding as well with its examples, instead of just leaving them to MOS:INTRO.) And I agree, as I think most would, that bolding is usually good, as being a visually consistent and "standard" format for readability, when the basic MOS:BOLDTITLE guidelines are met without hitting any of the exceptions. (And of course, we're talking about those exceptions here.) – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 04:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
The current consensus is that bolding descriptive titles leads to awkward English and gives undue weight to a "name" for an event (or object) that isn't actually a name at all. The purpose of the first sentence is to define the (bolded) subject, or give a description of what the article is about. If there is no term to define ("May 15–17, 2013 tornado outbreak" is already defined, for example), there should be no bold. If an event does have a name, then bolding is usually OK. Thus "Boston Marathon bombings" can probably be bolded (assuming the event is most often referred to by that name, rather than, "the bombings at the Bombing Marathon" or similar). [This is a borderlien case, so I'd defer to local consensus.] The rest probably should not be bolded. If a (non-reoccurring) event needs a date in its title, it is almost certainly not known as the "2013 blah blah" but rather just as a blah blah that occurred in 2013. --ThaddeusB (talk) 16:20, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
I also think that "Boston Marathon bombings" in particular is possibly a borderline case, and in previous discussions, I've noted that I think a bolded intro would make perfect sense if it didn't introduce improper redundancy. How would you suggest such an intro be worded, if we did bold the title there (as opposed to the current unbolded consensus title)? I think that's what determines the borderline case, whether it can be bolded or not without just adding a bunch of words. If it can be done, then I believe we should do it, but the problem is that I haven't seen a suggestion that works while fitting the overall policy. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff)
Like I said below, avoiding repetition at all costs is not desirable. Something like "The Boston Marathon bombings were a series of bombing attacks that occurred during the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013" would be fine by me. --ThaddeusB (talk) 16:26, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
I believe this violates WP:REDUNDANCY, unless that's an unambiguous proper name for the subject, which it does not appear to be. See below. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 03:35, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
Without rehashing too much of what I've already said elsewhere, my approach is this: if there is a well known term used to refer to the article's subject, such as "Boston Marathon bombings", or "September 11 attacks", that phrase should be treated as a single "article" (in the linguistic sense) and be bolded. It doesn't matter if a part of that formalized title is later repeated. Some of 2001:'s examples could be done differently (I don't dispute all of them); but generally I believe his interpretation is that any repetition of the title in the lead sentence means we don't bold it (that's the impression I got at the marathon bombing talk page). That is an extreme departure from normal practice. It would apply to almost all articles that have a year in their title (7 July 2005 London bombings is another good example; the second sentence uses the date). There is a huge conceptual difference between a truly redundant phrase, and one whose title happens to make reference to a defining feature. The media, and thus common name of most events are not particularly creative; they will usually refer to themselves to some degree. That is the rule; it is a tiny exception to the much larger policy that 2001: is referring to. Finally, there are some practical points to bear in mind. 1) Bolding the title makes reading and skimming much easier, and helps anchor the article's title for the reader. Simply put, it is a tremendous help to our readers. 2) Many of the "reworks" to avoid the bolding "redundancy" end up being awkward passive tense sentences. It's enforcing a rule (or a novel interpretation of one) for its own sake. 3) Bolding it and anchoring it in the text makes squabbles over article titles themselves much easier to manage. Idiosyncratic article titles can't survive because they need to fit into the text. It's a nice inherent check and it helps make article title debates surprisingly scarce (more than one might expect). Shadowjams (talk) 23:01, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
My issue isn't simply introducing a minor redundancy, but when basically the entire title is made redundant (while pushing down information as well.) You've previously suggested using a synonym like "explosions" in the unbolded part, but I don't think that really agrees with the core of the policy; WP:NAD states "A good definition is not circular, a one-word synonym or a near synonym." When we need to redefine and relink basically all of the title, that's when I think it definitely violates WP:BEGIN. I'd absolutely disagree with the current state of 7 July 2005 London bombings. That's certainly only a descriptive title, even more so than "Boston Marathon bombings", and it creates one of the exact issues that concerns me; it just defines the title itself: "the...'<date> bombings'...were suicide attacks..." rather than concisely defining the event itself. The WP:NAD suggestion before tangentially covers this (but could do so better.)
You're also suggesting WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS here; while it seems clear that a lot of articles do have bad intros (and not just bolding), that's seemingly due in part to people just copying the general format of other articles without reading the policy. I don't think the point about making "reading and skimming easier" makes sense, since the article title is already presented multiple times, including a much-larger version in the header, even if it's "common." Awkward passive-tense sentences are better than redundancy, as far as I read the policy; the goal isn't to avoid particular grammatical styles, it's to use "normal English", although I agree some of those probably could be rewritten (without needing to bold.) And finally, I don't think article title debates should factor into this discussion at all. Personally, I'd probably be more likely to dispute an less-favorable title that's prominently bolded in the first sentence, than if it's just used as a generic descriptor for the article.
I think a large portion of this still centers around our disagreement of what's descriptive and what isn't. From those examples, "September 11 attacks" is a widely used/formal name, even though also being descriptive, (and thus needs bolding, along with its alternatives), while "Boston Marathon bombings" has only developed as one of several descriptive names without any sourced evidence of acceptance. I believe the WP:TOOSOON essay is somewhat relevant, with lack of secondary-source coverage of all of the proposed names being an issue as well, wheres something like "September 11 attacks" has plenty of secondary coverage as actually being a recognized name by secondary sources as applying to general usage, rather than being just the title of news articles and thus assumed to be some sort of name, rather than a description. Frankly, WP:OR applies as well, using one of several common names as "the name" rather than just a title placeholder, and that's even ignoring the WP:BEGIN redundancy and definition issues. – (rfc | diff) 04:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me that the discussion here was precipitated by the idea of developing better clarity on this rule. Presumably, if we're taking the trouble to hash something out, we'd then modify the guideline to reflect our efforts. What's not clear to me reading thus far is what specific changes in language are being proposed, if any, to clarify the existing. So, are specific changes being proposed? What are they? ENeville (talk) 19:55, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Sorry for disappearing for this discussion for several days after starting the thing; real life unexpectedly intruded. The guideline definitely needs improvement, so yes, we do need to clarify the rule. That it's ambiguous whether the "Boston Marathon bombings" and "Mississippi River floods" examples are different still seems to have contention here, even though I don't personally see any difference between the two, as far as written policy applies. I would appreciate some views on why these two examples are different; so far I've only heard arguments about "recurring events" (made on WP:DR/N and I don't believe supported in policy), and about what the real meaning of "formal or widely accepted name" is. I contend that if "Mississippi River floods" is not a formal or widely accepted name, then neither is "Boston Marathon bombings", due to generic use of both, and many alternatives for both.
Much of the contention derives from whether "a widely accepted name" can extend to, basically, one of several widely accepted names, but as generic descriptors (as "Boston Marathon bombings" is); the "Mississippi River floods" and "Pakistani-Iraqi relations" examples are what I see as evidence that all are indeed descriptive titles. It is perhaps unclear whether MOS:BOLDTITLE suggests we take one of several semi-accepted names for a "widely accepted name", and as I've stated elsewhere, perhaps WP:OR to even determine that (without secondary sources starting that, say, "Boston Marathon bombings" is an official or widely accepted name for the event, not just editors deciding that.) At the very least, I'd hope we come out of the discussion with some agreement on what to do with the "Mississippi River floods" and "Pakistani-Iraqi relations" examples, if it can indeed be shown they don't support non-bolding of "Boston Marathon bombings." – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 03:35, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
Some context on the policy we're talking about
TLDR: The policy dates back about 18 months. There was a small discussion over 3 days between 4 editors (2 constitute most of it) before the change that is the center of this dispute. The two main participants (one of whom made the ultimate change) wanted to avoid descriptive titles from being bolded; contrasted with common or proper names. Even the discussion leading up to this change, if it were adequate, doesn't support the interpretation currently being advanced by 2001:. It's an oversight in a little looked at or discussed change, that was never intended to be read in the expansive, legalistic way being advanced above.
The examples, especially the 2011 Mississippi Flood example are being used to justify debolding a large number of articles under the premise that they are "redundant." They were added in this [3] edit in January 2012. The discussion SilkTork referred to was started 3 days before he made the change: here. The GA review that SilkTork was referring to has only 1 mention of bolding, 2 days before the talk page discussion was started. In it, another editor was hesitant to give GA status to an article because... "I don't like is the decision by an editor to not have the title of this article bolded. It looks odd because it deviates from standard practice."[4]. Incidentally, that article did have a bold title for most of its start, it was only this edit that changed that. It's worth noting that the article's BOLD lead didn't conform to the LEAD policy in a number of ways when Swarm made that change. The article passed GA status about a week after the MoS edit was made.
SilkTork's discussion has a nice history of the bolding policy. In it he refers to an essay called WP:SBE. It presents some egregious examples of cramming titles into leads. Note that 2001: is aware of the essay: [5]. The discussion there, which is the impetus for the policy we're debating now, is between formal or recognized titles, and titles of convenience. It also primarily involved 2 editors, SilkTork and DavidLevy, and 2 other editors (from what I could tell). SilkTork made the edit within 4 days of starting the discussion.
Afterwards User:ENeville expressed concern over the speed of the changes, and with their substance... he suggested using WP:COMMONNAME as the litmus test for whether or not to bold and found the changes more confusing than helpful.
He ended with this line which I think he should be applauded for being so prophetic: "Following up, I remain concerned that this change moves the line but only makes it blurrier, thus not in the long term reducing contention the likes of which precipitated the proposal."[6]
That was the end of the discussion, and from what I see, nobody much cared until now. Shadowjams (talk) 00:20, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
The text previously read "If the page title is descriptive it does not need to appear verbatim in the main text, and even if it does it should not be in boldface." so I'm not sure there was a big change in policy. More likely, it was an attempt to explain what is a "descriptive title." I agree that blind adherence to "no duplication" is unwise, but again most of the provided examples are not names of things - they are descriptions of things. --ThaddeusB (talk) 02:10, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
I think you've misunderstood the extent of 2001:'s changes. Maybe I think this because of the discussions at Talk:Boston Marathon bombings. That article, which started this debate, is the clearest example of a proper or COMMONNAME, and not merely a descriptive one. And even if you want to hedge about the term "descriptive", go read the SilkTork discussion I reference above and you'll see they are talking about a specific type of article being "descriptive." If you think this debate is being overstated, then go bold the Boston Marathon article, among a few others, and it will be an easy conclusion. Shadowjams (talk) 03:55, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
(Again, you're overstating this supposed "extent of changes" as if it was suddenly applied to dozens of articles, and it's not relevant to the larger discussion.) In any case, you're ignoring the guidelines from MOS:BEGIN, which are just as important as MOS:BOLDTITLE. Whether the changes to BOLDTITLE (but not to BEGIN) were appropriate should not be the focus of this discussion; what's in the MOS is in the MOS, due to apparent consensus. You're basically saying "I don't like the prior policy consensus in this situation", which really isn't a great argument. I do not believe the guidance in WP:COMMONNAME footnote 3 applies here at all, and that policy even says "Ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined in reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources." (Emphasis mine, and the "more frequently" doesn't even apply here.) My reasoning also includes the unstated difference between a "common name" and a "formal or widely accepted name." I again do not believe you've shown that there is formal or widespread acceptance of this name, through reliable sources that aren't just personal analysis of news article titles.
I agree that the current policy is confusing, and that we need to work on providing better examples. But you still have not provided any rationale for why the "2011 Mississippi River floods" example doesn't apply to other similar articles, other than that it's apparently a "recurring event." The prior changes aren't event relevant due to WP:BEGIN covering the applicable cases. (But again, one only needs to look at the main Mississippi River floods article and similar disambiguation pages like Moore, Oklahoma tornado to see why the given example is descriptive and not recurring.)
ThaddeusB's point about not blindly avoiding duplication makes sense (there are many cases where duplication is indeed required or otherwise appropriate), but the larger point about whether things are actual names or verifiably only descriptions stands. The general guideline against redundancy makes sense here too, when the first two rules in MOS:BOLDTITLE don't fit.
Again, I cited WP:SBE as a rationale for making sure there are no WP:UNDUE endorsements of descriptive titles, so yes, I am aware of that essay. (I've also notified the users who participated in the discussion that led to the referenced BOLDTITLE change, though I do not believe that said change actually modified the policy itself.) – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 04:43, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
Lots of extra text that's not needed above, but in short, SBE's an essay, the BOLDTITLE edits have been explained as having minimal involvement from others, and your other policy arguments are the first I've heard them. I don't care much about the 2013 Mississippi example... but that SilkTork decided to include that as an example is not dispositive. The central consensus before and after is about merely descriptive titles, with some reference to awkwardness (which I discussed above; the passive tense end-run around sentences are equally if not more awkward). Shadowjams (talk) 05:36, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
Whether or not SBE is an essay is irrelevant; the question is whether its guidance about not making WP:UNDUE assertions about descriptive titles make sense. I don't think it does, given the actual guideline. The discussion is not just about awkwardness, it's about WP:REDUNDANCY in general. I don't dispute that the current title isn't ideal, but can probably be improved without bolding it, without any reason I've seen other than "must bold everything!" – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 03:35, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
It appears there has been a misunderstanding regarding the discussion and edits of Jan 2012 in which I was involved. There was no change made to the guidance - rather, the situation was clarified. Put bluntly, before the edits, it was advised not to bold descriptive titles, after the edits it was advised not to bold descriptive titles. My personal preference aligns with those who prefer titles to be in bold for easy identification and general consistency; however, there has to be a recognition that there are some situations in which title bolding is not helpful - such as when language becomes distorted, resulting in a jarring and awkward read. Looking at the above discussion regarding examples of title bolding, I think that 2001's versions are closer to the guidelines (both before and after the Jan 2012 edits to the guideline), and those versions are the ones that it would be preferable to use. This is not to say that folks shouldn't continue to improve 2001's versions, but that reverting to a previous inelegant version is not helpful and is not going to progress matters. I am not watchlisting this page, so if there are further queries regarding either this comment, or my involvement in the Jan 2012 edits, please ping me. SilkTork✔Tea time 09:14, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
As 2001:db8 and SilkTork noted, the January 2012 discussion's purpose was to clarify the existing practice, not to alter it. I'm sure that the current wording could be improved, but it's caused much less confusion than the previous wording did. The intent (both before and after that discussion) has never been to avoid redundancy at all costs. We don't introduce redundancy for the sake of cramming the article's title into the lead, but if a subject is commonly known (as established via reliable sources) by a name containing one or more words also appearing in its description, this information is important and belongs in the lead. In the case of the Boston Marathon bombings article, the question is whether "Boston Marathon bombings" is widely accepted as the event's name. Under the principle behind MOS:BOLDTITLE, it should appear in bold if it is (but not if it isn't). Such a determination should be made on the article's talk page. If it's decided that "Boston Marathon bombings" has become the event's de facto name, the awkwardness can still be minimized. Instead of "The Boston Marathon bombings were a pair of bombings that occurred during the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013.", we could state that "The Boston Marathon bombings occurred on April 15, 2013, when two pressure cooker bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing 3 people and injuring 264." —David Levy 12:28, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
The Boston Marathon example is the clearest to me, and indeed what started this discussion. The examples given initially above are a red herring. That was never the sole focus of this discussion, indeed the consensus appears to be the Boston Marathon bombings article is a clear example of what's not a descriptive title. I agree largely with Silk Tork in principle. The examples above were cherry picked, and were part of a broader pattern regarding the guideline. I'm comfortable, for now, with the "descriptive title" approach, in which the touchstone is whether or not the title is uniformly recognized as a title (even if there are some variations; e.g. September 11 and July 7 bombings). Shadowjams (talk) 05:28, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
I've considered a lead like that, but it gives WP:UNDUE weight to one of many descriptive titles that has only been used by some early media sources; it also creates a WP:REDUNDANCY, which would be fine for a non-descriptive title, but does not seem acceptable for a descriptive title when it can easily be avoided. Rather than seeing this as the clearest example (as Shadowjams does), I see this as the example most in need of clarification in policy. I have yet to see a good argument for why "Boston Marathon bombings" should be considered a "formal or widely accepted name", other than "a bunch of news articles use that name to describe the event." Isn't deciding that a descriptive title be bolded based on that the essence of WP:OR? (Even ignoring the other points about using one of a few descriptive names as the single bold title.) Your example again suggests that this event is called the "Boston Marathon bombings". No sources say that is even one of this event's recognized names, rather than a description. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 03:35, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
If you think the title's UNDUE then bring it up as a title issue on the appropriate talk page. That you don't think it's the end-all-be-all title does not mean it is not a specific enough title, as opposed to a "descriptive title", which is the only standard that we've been discussing here... unless of course you want to confirm my earlier assertion that your interpretation of the policy goes a lot further than some others here believe. Shadowjams (talk) 00:32, 5 June 2013 (UTC)
I never said the title itself is undue, only that bolding of the title is undue; we obviously need to assign some description to the event, but going further is where the relevant policies come more into play. I think that's a key part of the policy that's actually a bit unclear; can we assign such weight to a descriptive title used by some sources, particularly when doing so requires us to add redundancy? Is bolding one of several descriptive titles even appropriate, or does it violate WP:UNDUE in addition to MOS:INTRO? I'm not sure what you mean by my interpretation goes "a lot further than some others" means, other than that you disagree with what "descriptive title" and "redundancy" mean. I don't have any issues with the descriptive title of that article itself. – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 01:12, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
Neologisms and bold titles
As a general rule I do not think that descriptive titles should be in bold, unless they are widely used in third party sources. One particular problem with placing a descriptive title in bold is the danger of encouraging the use of neologisms. One example of which I was involved was the use of some badly translated foreign papers with a specific nationalistic axe to grind: Macedonism (NB not Macedonianism an alternative for Pneumatomachi and what it is called in the Britannica article). See Talk:Macedonian nationalism/Archive 2#Merge to Macedonian nationalism and the link to the section there "This and that". -- PBS (talk) 12:33, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
Two common terms for the 1945 Soviet assault on what would become East Germany and the city of Berlin are "Battle for Berlin" and "Battle of Berlin" both can be shown to be common names. Inside the article Battle of Berlin there are a number of sections including two called "Battle in Berlin" and "Battle outside Berlin". When the Battle of Berlin article became too large I, with some others, turned the Battle of Berlin article in to a summary style article. One of the detailed article to emerge from that was battle in Berlin which goes into more detail about the battle in the city (and corresponds to the section mentioned above). It is a descriptive title, and placing it in bold is confusing to readers who do not realise that is descriptive and not a common name, and may cause people to think it is an alternative name (thereby helping to create a neologism). -- PBS (talk) 12:51, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
I think your Battle of Berlin and battle in Berlin examples give us some good historical perspective on something like Boston Marathon bombings. Battle in Berlin is indeed just one of multiple descriptions; as you say, promoting neologisms (essentially what I've stated about assigning WP:UNDUE weight to one specific descriptive title.) The real question, where I think the policy could use clarification (at least as I've seen from input here), is whether selecting one descriptive title over another, for the sole purpose of bolding, is acceptable (when there are multiple acceptable descriptive titles, and the selection is WP:OR based on just picking one descriptive title used by some sources.) I don't think it's acceptable either, but some people seem to disagree (but I haven't seen a good policy-based argument, just "bolding is standard" or similar, or interpretation of "widely accepted name" from MOS:BOLDTITLE as "one of several descriptive names the media uses in headlines" seemingly based on the personal opinion of some editors, which seems rather incorrect.) – 2001:db8:: (rfc | diff) 03:17, 9 June 2013 (UTC)
For the example, perhaps something like "Battle of Berlin (in/outside Berlin)" would work?
When I've edited articles with descriptive titles, I've usually bolded key words in the lead that indicate the topic. A simple example is many of our language and ethnicity articles. We title them "X language" and "X people", when of course the usual form is running text is just "X". "X" is therefore all I bold in the lead, even when the phrase "X language" occurs: X is an endangered language spoken in ... or The X language is spoken by .... (Well, sometimes I bold 'language' in the latter – I'm not terribly consistent, but IMO it's not necessary.) — kwami (talk) 22:34, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
Citations in the lead section
Does consensus still support including citation footnotes in the lead section of an article (WP:CITELEAD)? I've been assured by several editors at Talk:Barack Obama that it does not! Wilhelm Meis(☎ Diskuss | ✍ Beiträge) 23:57, 10 July 2013 (UTC)
I think you are misreading the comments at that talk page, which all clearly state that citations are allowed in the leads of *some* articles, but that local consensus for *that particular article* is not to use them. The need for handling this on an article-by-article basis, as they are doing in that talk page, is clearly articulated in CITELEAD. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:14, 11 July 2013 (UTC)
Lead not needed?
Just recently, one editor has claimed that the article Third ventricle hypothesis of depression does not need a lead ([7]). Does any of you agree with this view? Is there a precedent for it? Thank you for your time. Toccata quarta (talk) 18:48, 22 July 2013 (UTC)
No, I don't think so. One point is that a reader with scripting disabled in their browser sees the table of contents expanded. When the lead is short and there are a few sections in the ToC, the lead may appear a little odd to someone not particularly used to them. However, the opinion "no lead needed" from one editor is not a reason for an article to not have a lead. The situation should be handled gently as it is the article creator with that opinion, and there is no need to grind them down. However, there will eventually be a lead. That's an interesting article, which I have added to my watchlist to see how it develops. Johnuniq (talk) 00:34, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
^Cite error: The named reference retraction was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
Done —David Eppstein (talk) 19:56, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
Done WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:39, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
