Talk:United States at the 2012 Summer Olympics

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National varieties of English - soccer/football[edit]

I added the section for the sport of association football (also known as soccer or simply football) to this article. I titled the section "Soccer (football)" which was the practice in United States at the 2008 Summer Olympics article. Soccer is the American English name for the sport. In the United States, the most common meaning by far of the term "football" is American football. Without any edit summary, the section was moved up to "f" and retitled "Football". No mention of the word "soccer" was included in the revision - whether in the title or the body of the section. The Wikipedia Manual of Style has a section on national varieties of English. It notes, "The English Wikipedia prefers no major national variety of the language over any other." Then, it sets forth four factors to consider in making determinations regarding which variety to use in a given article. I believe my version was proper under those factors. (1) Consistency within article - I haven't notice any switching between varieties. (2) Strong national ties to a topic - The article is about the U.S. Olympic team, and is thus strongly tied to American English. By analogy, the policy notes that Usain Bolt, a Jamaican Olympian, should be written in Jamaican Standard English. (3) Retaining the existing variety - American English was initially used before it was changed to another variety. (4) Opportunities for commonality - Not strictly possible since the national varieties use different words. In fact, soccer vs. football is explicitly mentioned in the policy as a term that differs between policies. But I tried to aid in common understanding by using both terms in the heading. The rebuttal was that the competition is called Football so it has to be called football. I believe that is incorrect for several reasons. First, it's a sport, not a proper noun. I'm perfectly willing to see that proper nouns retain their spelling. See my edit to Elvis Schoenberg's Orchestre Surreal just this weekend. But it's a common noun in this case, not a proper one. There is no factor in the policy giving weight to the variety used by the IOC. In fact, the explicit mentions of soccer and Usain Bolt in the WP:ENGVAR policy go against such an interpretation. But even assuming for the sake of argument that one thought football was the appropriate usage, it's not helpful to scrub the section of any use of the word "soccer". I probably shouldn't have referred to treating American English as second-class in my edit summary as that may imply bad faith by an opponent. I shouldn't let past experiences (e.g., an editor back in 2008 who went on bigoted, anti-American rants in U.S.-related Olympic articles) color my views of new national variety disputes. I'll make efforts to assume good faith in future discussions on this topic. --JamesAM (talk) 21:04, 29 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you on the basis that because the article is about an American topic, "Soccer (football)" would be the proper term. Most Americans would associate "football" as American football, like you said. This is simply about consistency, not "special treatment". Philipmj24 (talk) 21:49, 29 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It should be "soccer" on this article, along with "track and field," an edit I have just made (in American English, "athletics" is a perhaps vague term for ALL sports, not the running/jumping/throwing you do on the track and in the field). Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 09:31, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that it should "soccer" in this article, and probably in the Canada article too. You don't even have to mention "football" in parenthesis. Links to the main article using Template:Main can be altered to display "soccer" with the l1= parameter. HandsomeFella (talk) 09:36, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Athletics and football should remain in parenthesis if nothing else to explain the alphabetical positioning to a casual reader (as they do for previous Games). American/British terminology aside the IOC names are football and athletics - Basement12 (T.C) 09:40, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Changing the links seems a bit much. The prose should adhere to ENGVAR. That's all that's really pertinent. Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 09:41, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Formatting odd tables[edit]

I think we need to have a discussion about how we should format some of the nonstandard results tables. First on the list are the decathlon and heptathlon events. If we follow WP:OLYMOSNAT we need to have the athlete column first followed by the event column. If we divide the events by rows we get this:

Athlete Decathlon Event Result Points Rank Result Points Rank
Athlete 1 100 m
Long jump
Shot put
High jump
400 m
110 m hurdles
Discus throw
Pole vault
Javelin throw
1500 m
Final
Athlete 2 100 m
Long jump
Shot put
High jump
400 m
110 m hurdles
Discus throw
Pole vault
Javelin throw
1500 m
Final

Or if we divide by columns we get this:

Athlete Decathlon Event Final
100 m Long jump Shot put High jump 400 m 110 m hurdles Discus throw Pole vault Javelin throw 1500 m
Time Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Time Points Rank Time Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Time Points Rank Points Rank
Athlete 1
Athlete 2

Both of these get huge either horizontally or vertically. If we hew closer to the way it was done in 2008 we get this:

Decathlon Event Athlete 1 Athlete 2
Results Points Rank Results Points Rank
100 m
Long jump
Shot put
High jump
400 m
110 m hurdles
Discus throw
Pole vault
Javelin throw
1500 m
Final

A lot more compact but doesn't quite follow the "rules", although MoS's are supposed to be taken as guidelines anyway instead of strict rules. I would prefer to go for either the wide option with athletes first, unless we're still supposed to be formatting for 1024x768 screens, or the compact version from last time. Any other opinions? Torlek (talk) 20:34, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You saw my attempt to roll with what existed already--vertical. The more standard way of presenting it is horizontal. You can see the way I have designed to present it using sub-templates in a defined width at List of world records in masters athletics. I happen to like that solution, within the limitations of wiki formatting, but it is far more complex for the average editor to figure out. I have had several less experienced editors unable to add to that content because of it--which kind of defeats the wikipedia principle. That page has less traffic and now that I have done the work, less editing required than this one. You've seen both sides of my 2¢ Trackinfo (talk) 21:06, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
That is an elegant looking solution, but I agree that it is very complex in terms of wiki formatting. We probably don't want to do that here, this page will get a lot of traffic starting in five weeks and someone will undoubtedly take issue with such formatting and it could get messy. I fear we may just have to go with the vertical. Torlek (talk) 21:27, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I can't even see the who table for the second option. I like the third, but I think there needs to be a more clear differentiation between the first and second athlete. Can you put the "bgcolor=#DDDDD" between the two to separate the two? 146.7.62.186 (talk) 21:11, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
That's what I was afraid of with that option. If you don't mind me asking, what resolution is your monitor at? Torlek (talk) 21:27, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
1366x768, just an average laptop computer. 146.7.62.186 (talk) 21:32, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, thanks. That one really won't work then. We probably should keep the width to where a 1280x1024 is the smallest that can see the whole page. Torlek (talk) 22:11, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
We could also do the horizontal format in a stacked group, with Day 1 results above Day 2, which would cut the necessary screen width in half. Trackinfo (talk) 23:44, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I was just thinking that myself. That would give us something like this:
Athlete Decathlon Event Final
100 m Long jump Shot put High jump 400 m
Time Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Time Points Rank
Athlete1
Athlete2
110 m hurdles Discus throw Pole vault Javelin throw 1500 m
Time Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Distance Points Rank Time Points Rank Points Rank
Athlete1
Athlete2
Hmm, interesting. I think it should be an option but I'm afraid some people would find it confusing. Torlek (talk) 01:30, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This is also coming up at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Athletics where I suggest this is a sport specific WP:MOS issue we need to design. For the example above, personally, I think the rank within the competition in each individual event of a multi is not that important to warrant the screen space for a full column. The sport is about points derived from performance. It is a given that some athletes excel at certain events, while others don't. The rankings are an old school perspective that went out when the first tables were created (that would be a century ago). Trackinfo (talk) 21:08, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I would cast my vote for the most compact version of the table. That would probably be the third option, even though I see it goes against some MoS rules. However, the first option would work in the case of elimination stages, so it would depend on the situation, I suppose. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 13:12, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Other editors keep playing around, so I finally applied my version to fix this. I am anticipating the spaces as filled out. I'm filling out Eaton's world record values to show the anticipated layout as this will appear when the event is completed.

Combined events Decathlon
Athlete Event 100 m LJ SP HJ 400 m 110H DT PV JT 1500 m Final Rank
Ashton Eaton[1] Result 10.21
+0.4 m/s
8.23 m
+0.8 m/s
14.20 m 2.05 m 46.70 13.70
-0.8 m/s
42.81 m 5.30 m 58.87 m 4:14.48 9039 1
Points 1044 1120 741 850 973 1014 722 1004 721 850

Since this is an American list, someone may add an additional line under all the results with imperial measurements, which will make things more consistent, with the exception of the LJ which will have the wind reading and the running events which will not need a conversion. Obviously I think this is a reasonable and complete layout which does not take up too much horizontal or vertical space. Lets discuss changes here. Trackinfo (talk) 17:21, 7 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Athlete Event Round Robin Rank Knockouts Rank
France Russia Australia Sweden Netherlands New Zealand Portugal Finland Spain Denmark United Kingdom Q-final S-Final Final
Debbie Capozzi
Anna Tunnicliffe
Molly Vandemoer
Elliott 6m

It's neat looking and compact but there are some things wrong with it. First, the flags need to link to the nation's page for the 2012 Olympics. Second, the points in the round robin need to be included along with the rank. Now if we do it strictly in keeping with WP:OLYMOSNAT we get something like this:

Athlete Event Round Robin Quarterfinals Semifinals Final Rank
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Points Rank Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Opposition
Result
Debbie Capozzi
Anna Tunnicliffe
Molly Vandemoer
Elliott 6m  France (FRA)
 Russia (RUS)
 Australia (AUS)
 Sweden (SWE)
 Netherlands (NED)
 New Zealand (NZL)
 Portugal (POR)
 Finland (FIN)
 Spain (ESP)
 Denmark (DEN)
 Great Britain (GBR)

However that's just going to be too wide once it's filled out. I propose a compromise:

Athlete Event Round Robin Quarterfinals Semifinals Final Rank
 France  Russia  Australia  Sweden  Netherlands  New Zealand  Portugal  Finland  Spain  Denmark  Great Britain Points Rank
Debbie Capozzi
Anna Tunnicliffe
Molly Vandemoer
Elliott 6m

Still won't quite fit on a 1024x768 but there doesn't seem to be any helping it here unless we break out the knockout rounds into a separate table. Anyone else have ideas? Torlek (talk) 22:11, 23 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I would vote for manipulating the {{flagicon}} template or creating a new template to allow for the flagicons to link to the "NOC at the 2012 Summer Olympics" pages. I'm not a fan of having the nations' names in the table, since that produces unnecessary and potentially circumventable clutter. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 14:21, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting thought, I'll look into that. My only concern about not having nation names associated with the flags is running afoul of WP:COLORS since we need the page to stay accessible to the color blind. Torlek (talk) 19:22, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I will gladly help with working on that template, if that turns out to be the final decision. I think another possible option would be having the flagicons complemented with the nation's IOC code in parentheses in a new line. Perhaps something like this? or something similar? Just throwing out an idea for consideration. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 10:02, 25 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Athlete Event Round Robin Quarterfinals Semifinals Final Rank
France
(FRA)
Russia
(RUS)
Australia
(AUS)
Sweden
(SWE)
Netherlands
(NED)
New Zealand
(NZL)
Portugal
(POR)
Finland
(FIN)
Spain
(ESP)
Denmark
(DEN)
United Kingdom
(GBR)
Points Rank
I like the way that looks. Looking at the flag template documentation I guess one quick and dirty option would be to just make those IOC codes links to the "nation at 2012 Summer Olympics" pages and leave the flag icons as they are. Creates redundant links but I have no idea how to edit such a high level template as that. Torlek (talk) 02:10, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If we're going that route we might as well use the flagIOCathlete template...
Athlete Event Round Robin Quarterfinals Semifinals Final Rank
 
 (FRA)
 
 (RUS)
 
 (AUS)
 
 (SWE)
 
 (NED)
 
 (NZL)
 
 (POR)
 
 (FIN)
 
 (ESP)
 
 (DEN)
 
 (GBR)
Points Rank

A bit outside the box, but it's the closest we're going to get without creating new code. JoshMartini007 (talk) 05:28, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Here's some template code I manipulated in one of my subpages. Pretty much the same as the above, but we can work on it. What do you think about this so far? Prayerfortheworld (talk) 13:04, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Athlete Event Round Robin Quarterfinals Semifinals Final Rank

FRA

RUS

AUS

SWE

NED

NZL

POR

FIN

ESP

DEN

GBR
Points Rank
I think the valign=bottom works better than if it were aligned to the top or middle. The text seems a lot neater. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 13:08, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I like it. This has my vote. Thanks for working out the code. If we don't get any objections in a week I think we should use this format. Torlek (talk) 04:17, 28 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
That's great. My pleasure! I'll move the code to an actual template if we do end up using it in a few days' time. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 07:21, 28 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

References

Standings tables/sports infoboxes[edit]

Is it absolutely necessary to have the standings tables and (for lack of a better term) sports infoboxes (i.e. the basketball boxes) filled with useless zeroes? I feel that the standings tables/infoboxes will be a lot better without them. In the case of the basketball boxes, the zeroes are technically incorrect, since they imply that the game's final scores are 0–0, most points on either side are 0 points, etc. I would argue this point for other sports infoboxes. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 14:25, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I would have thought it fairly obvious that the templates are just empty placeholders for now. However, if they bother you that badly I doubt anyone will take issue with you removing zeros from the templates. So I say go for it if you want. Torlek (talk) 19:15, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Ultimately, I don't feel that it's a huge issue, but I personally think that it's better if the zeroes are removed from the templates, for clarity. Prayerfortheworld (talk) 09:49, 25 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Berets[edit]

Should Fox News' objections to berets be part of the uniform controversy? ("berets" are French, pronounced in French, and unAmerican ) -- 76.65.131.160 (talk) 10:19, 14 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Don't tell that to the U.S. Army. Seems to silly to bother with. Rmhermen (talk) 14:14, 22 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Uniform controversy in the lead?[edit]

I don't believe the uniform controversy belongs in the lead section, as it has it own section and I don't believe there is enough substance for it to be notable enough. Take example the Michael Phelps article. In the lead for that article, you will find what he's known for, his accomplishments, etc. But do you see anything related to his marijuana incident or DWI charge? No, because the majority doesn't relate him to those incidents, but his Olympic exploits. That's just one example but the same can be said about other numerous articles. My point is the main topic on this article is the Olympic games, the athletes, etc. We shouldn't put a domestic issue on this global article because that's not really the main point. It takes away attention from the Olympics and directs the reader to a totally different topic. The reason for the revision was, "The lede summarizes the article. That's in the article, so it can be summarized in the lede." However, Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section says the lead is suppose to be a "summary of its most important aspects." Is the uniform controversy one of the most important aspects of the America Olympic Team? That's just my two cents. 146.7.60.19 (talk) 18:08, 20 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You might be interested in reading WP:LEDE. To sum it up, the lede section is meant to summarize the article. The uniform controversy is in the article, hence, it can and should be mentioned in the lede. You could also check out WP:N, which states that "Notability does not gauge the content of articles, but only whether the topic should have its own article." Questions of notability do not enter into the question of constructing a given article's lede section. Regarding the Phelps article, that's really just other stuff -- it's against guidelines, and I'm not quite sure how that article made it to GA without summarising the controversy section. WP:BLP issues, perhaps? Anyway, it's not actually relevant to this article. Evanh2008 (talk|contribs) 23:54, 20 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Date formats[edit]

This article should use the American date format mdy, both in the medal table and in the templates giving rosters for the team sports. I understand that other articles which use those same templates will want dmy, and a really fantastic solution was found for the Vancouver Olympics where the templates contained a parameter that you could set the dates to display as either mdy or dmy (see: Template:2010 Winter Olympics United States men's ice hockey team roster as an example). Could something like that be worked out here? It is decidedly curious right now - the men's basketball roster uses mdy, but all the others (including women's basketball) use dmy. I imagine the usage of mdy for the men's basketball roster is jarring in other articles where the template is used, just as dmy is here (especially since event schedules, some right next to the roster templates, rightly use mdy).

I tried diving in to take care of this myself, but I really cannot make heads or tails of the code (it is very different from the linked hockey roster template).

And of course American English should be used as well. No -re spelling endings and no "football" or "athletics" (for example). Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 09:36, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like somebody took care of this! Fantastic. Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 10:24, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
There's a little problem with the basketball templates though, as they use either Template:Fiba player or Template:Fiba-Europe player. These use different date format, but are not dynamic, so the articles on all team rosters will display different date formats. I think the two templates should be replaced by a common one, Template:Basketball player, which should allow for different date formats (and maybe more).
HandsomeFella (talk) 10:38, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah that sounds like a fine idea, but it also sounds like a lot of heavy lifting :S I really think the hockey example from the last Olympics was pretty perfect, if someone can work towards something like that. Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 10:40, 28 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Someone fix the new Medals by sport table.[edit]

Someone needs to fix the color of the new Medals by sport table section at the bronze total table since it shows in black and we can't see how many medals on it. BattleshipMan (talk) 01:08, 2 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Mike Rodgers - 4x100 m[edit]

Why is Mike Rodgers's name crossed out for the 4x100m track relay? That needs some sort of key or explanation, because I don't if it means he's injured, disqualified, or if it's just an editing error. --JamesAM (talk) 14:14, 4 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Stress fracture. Source is here Trackinfo (talk) 16:27, 4 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ties[edit]

Currently there are two symbols being used for ties: T(number) and =(number). I think we should just pick one to use for the whole article, for the sake of consistency. Thoughts? Tad Lincoln (talk) 23:42, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"=" per recent updates to WP:OLYMOSNAT based on discussion around other nation's articles - Basement12 (T.C) 00:55, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Ok. I changed all the ones I could find, but if anyone else finds any ties marked with "T"s, please change them to "="s. Tad Lincoln (talk) 01:32, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Number of athletes[edit]

This article says that there are 530 athletes competing for the U.S., but http://www.london2012.com/country/united-states/athletes/index.html shows 539. Tad Lincoln (talk) 01:16, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Is this the largest delegation at the Olympics? -ErinHowarth (talk) 01:16, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
No. Great Britain has a few more people, because the host country gets automatic berths in every sport. Tad Lincoln (talk) 02:47, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Anyway, there needs to be a review of the athletes competing to determine whether 530 or 539, or some number in between, is correct. Tad Lincoln (talk) 02:50, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Tables on the Mobile Site[edit]

The tables in the Medalists section are a bit cumbersome on the mobile site. They should probably be messed with a bit so they stack one on top of the other on small screens. --Cneubauer (talk) 01:14, 12 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relay teams in the medalists table[edit]

Might we perhaps want to use {{CompactTable}} (a little trick I remembered from the 2008 articles) for them? I used it for the team sports (soccer, water polo, and basketball; somebody beat me to the punch on volleyball), but in the cases of water polo, basketball, and volleyball, those teams are only slightly bigger than the swimming relays where an entirely different quartet swam for the medals than did in the prelims (12 or 13 names as opposed to 8). 8 names does make for a bit of scrolling.

What do you guys think of this? I'm not sure it's necessarily what I want to do, but it very much occurs to me looking at the table. Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 03:57, 12 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

When I was first populating the rowing table with athletes I used CompactTable for the eights but somebody kept changing it back. My concern now is how would it affect the sortname template? Torlek (talk) 23:40, 12 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Bad Sorting on Medalist Table[edit]

When you sort the date on the Medalist Table, it arranges it alphabetically (With Aug. 1 coming up first, followed by Aug. 10); can this please be fixed? Thanks. 68.106.80.19 (talk) 18:15, 12 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It requires {{dts}}. I'm sure in the coming weeks/months when the furor of activity on these pages dies down, bolts like that will be tightened. Green-eyed girl (Talk · Contribs) 21:33, 12 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Just fixed it. Thanks for cluing me in to the {{dts}} template. Torlek (talk) 23:31, 12 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Athlete articles[edit]

We're nearing a milestone. By my count there are only 21 athlete red links remaining. If those get done, every 2012 U.S. Olympian will have a Wikipedia bio! --JamesAM (talk) 23:30, 14 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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