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RFC on dash-separated titles for sports events

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
I have been brought here from WP:RFCL to close this confusing mess of a discussion and so here I am.

The first thing I will do is try to determine what the point of this RfC was. It appeared to have been started after a discussion on a tennis tournament's talk page resulted in a consensus to sentence case subparts of a tennis tournament, which has resulted in an interested party coming here to harmonize the practices of capitalization after dashes with respect to a broader range of sporting events, as the closure of that move resulted in inconsistencies. This appears to have rapidly spiralled into a debate on whether or not dashes should be used at all in article titles on sport events. This has confused the RfC immensely as it has now become a debate on two separate issues instead of one. First, should dashes be used in article titles, and second, if we are allowing dashes, what is the correct capitalization of the text after them? I will try to evaluate both of these issues separately.

The dash debate

In terms of the "allowing dashes" issue, I will categorize participants into "pro-dash" and "anti-dash" as "Option E" is ambiguous in this RfC. Note that "pro-dash" does not mean forcing dashes on sports event articles, but refers to being in favour of allowing dashes in some way.
The main arguments of the anti-dashers are that dashes read unnaturally and inconsistent with other article titles in different subjects. Editors believe that non-dash options are generally superior to dashes in every case where a dash may be used in a sporting event title. Some editors have raised a number of arguments based on WP:Article titles as well as claiming WP:CONLEVEL doesn't allow for projects to create rules against sitewide guidelines. This seems questionable, since the point of this RfC is to discuss possible changes to the WP:Article titles policy. If the usage of dashes in article titles went against WP:Article titles, the appropriate place to discuss exemptions would be WT:Article titles, which is where we are now.
The main arguments of the "pro-dashers" are numerous. The first main argument is the belief that we should follow the titling convention of reliable sources. This is a very compelling argument given Wikipedia's emphasis on sourcing, but others have brought up that the locus of this discussion is relating to subevents of larger sporting events and often these subevents do not necessarily have reliable sources that agree on titles. Dicklyon says deep in this discussion (in relation to all of the issues here) that "since sources don't use titles resembling these at all, and refer to them in a wide variety of ways", "follow the sources" is a misguided ideal. That being said, there seemed to be at least some agreement on this arcane point and "follow the sources" is something that has consensus in cases where sources agree on something.
The second argument from the "pro-dashers" is that there are a bunch of articles with very lengthy titles where removing the dash would cause them to become incomprehensible. The anti-dashers have proposed alternate titles for the specific examples given by Sod25k, but have not addressed how the proposed rule of removing dashing would be generally implemented in those cases. This, in my opinion, is an important point that should be addressed before any broader rule change occurs.
The third argument is that this would be hell to deal with in templates. "Natural wording" will result in more inconsistency given that "main event" dashed with the "sub event" is a significant format. Cinderella157 has created a section specifically for the template issues which can be summed up as "While I am not familiar with the language or syntax of templates, this is potentially an opportunity to improve the flexibility of the templates." I don't really see the appeal of this refutation as it didn't address how this potentially massive issue will be resolved and just proposed other people doing more work to fix the template issues.
The fourth argument is one that inconsistency is fine and that they'd like to leave it up to WikiProjects, and that creating a firm rule is busywork for the sake of busywork. This is embodied in Thryduulf saying "I still fail to see any benefit from imposing a single rule for all occasions". This is an interesting argument, although not as compelling as the template/lengthy titles argument.
Based on the arguments made here, I will close by saying that dashes should be allowed for the future, based mainly on the fact there may be major practical issues to implementing a ban on dashes in sports event article titles that weren't addressed here by the anti-dashers. This was one of the most commonly cited beliefs among the pro-dashers and was not effectively refuted.

The capitalization debate

The capitalization debate is more painful to resolve as unlike the dashing debate its scope is unclear. It appears to me that option C would only be applicable to tennis, option B has an unclear breadth, and option A may be applicable to all sporting events. However, during the actual RfC itself, assumptions were made from those opposed to capitalization requirements that this would be widely applicable to all sporting events. The "background" section provides Luge as an example and the original question is vague as to whether this is a "tennis-only" RfC or not.
To try to resolve this, I will first say that there is no consensus for all sporting events. The RfC is sufficiently unclear that I don't see any consensus to mandate capitalization standards on all sporting events, and many !votes in favour of mandating a capitalization style appear to assume this will be a tennis specific rule. Likewise, many !votes oppose standardized requirements across all sporting events as a rule. If there is another RfC on this, it should be specifically focused only on capitalization and clearly delineate its applicability.
Secondly, I will say there is a consensus to let the editors in the tennis topic area decide the capitalization issue themselves, although it's unclear what that decision will be. The RfC's structure presupposes that it's OK to make guidelines for specific topic areas and appears to be focused on whether or not to harmonize tennis articles with an alleged broader consensus. Many !votes on the capitalization issue deal with a purely tennis perspective. Many "Option E" !voters also based their !votes on allowing for individual WikiProjects to make decisions on these issues, or generally believe these issues should be decided on a case by case basis. Only a few !voters seem to believe that the capitalization (or anti-dashing) rules proposed should be broadly applicable to all sporting events.

Conclusion

To re-iterate, there is no consensus to ban dashes in sports event titles, there is no consensus on capitalization for sporting events in general, and there is a rough consensus that specific capitalization rules for the tennis project are permissible at this time, although it's unclear what those rules should be due to this RfC getting sidetracked by the dashing debate. Chess (talk) (please use ((reply to|Chess)) on reply) 22:57, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

What is the most appropriate title style or pattern for articles with dash-separated two-part sports event titles such as 2014 US Open – Men's Singles? Dicklyon (talk) 05:20, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Background

Many two-part article titles, with parts separated by a spaced en dash, have title-case or sentence-case capitalization after the dash. In a sentence context, MOS:SENTENCECAPS suggests to not cap after a dash, but there's no guidance in a title context, where the usage is more like illustrated in MOS:LISTDASH, where again there's no capping after the dash. This RFC is to look at these and decide what to do about the style variations, particularly in the context of sporting events for now, since that's what most of them are (find more context re other areas, and discussion of capping in tennis titles, in a talk section further up this page).

Some titles are not capped after dash, consistent with MOS:CAPS:

But many have title-case or sentence-case subtitles after dash. Most sports mostly follow this sentence-case subtitle pattern:

Tennis articles usually have title case, with capped Singles and Doubles, in tennis-only events:

but not in Olympic and similar International games contexts:

The reasons for the capitalization variations don't seem to have much to do with WP's style guidance, and even the dashed two-part construct seems an unusual pattern per all the advice at WP:AT. Dicklyon (talk) 05:20, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Options

Possible resolutions to choose from, support, oppose, or comment on:

Dicklyon (talk) 05:20, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Discussion, comments, !votes

  • PS: Another reason for "D" (or A) relates to naturalness per WP:CRITERIA. "Naturalness" should require minimal changes to capitalisation in prose. WP linking does not differentiate on first letter capitalisation. Any capitalisation that follows in a title (from the first) should follow naturally. The status quo (lots of variations listed above) doesn't. See WP:TITLEFORMAT and particularly use sentence case. As this discussion has progressed, I am seeing (claimed) project and article level decisions to over-ride the broader level community consensus at WP:AT, WP:NCCAPS and MOS:CAPS (including MOS:SENTENCECAPS). Most of the examples of usage I am seeing here to justify capping, are where we would "expect" to see title case. How a particular convening organisation would cap a term is largely irrelevant because of the internally perceived "importance" and emphasis consequently assigned by capitalisation (per WP:SSF). WP (per P&G) relies on how same is capped in independent sources. Assertions that such terms are "proper names" doesn't fly unless they are substantiated against objective criteria and evidence (per P&G cited - not "it is clearly a proper noun [because I say so]"). The broad community consensus is to use sentence case for article titles and headings (unless otherwise necessary). Capitalisation is important. WP has and can change how capitalisation is implemented in the RW. This is orthographic citogenesis. WPs mission is defined by policy wrt WP:RS, WP:VER and WP:NPOV - which align with other previously cited P&G. It is akin to Star Trek's prime directive. What I can see is at least one particular editor changing "natural" capitalisation in text to conform to a title case styling that is quite contrary to P&G and the broader community consensus. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:03, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
  • PPS: Regardless of whether the dash indicates a subtitle or not, comments are consistently referring to disambiguation and the dash as being a disambiguation delimiter. Policy (WP:AT) is quite explicit on the subject: Commas and parentheses (round brackets) are the only characters that can be used without restriction to separate a disambiguating term in an article title. Colons can be used in the limited cases of subtitles of some creative works and lists split over several pages. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:38, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
  • PPPS: From the comments below, what appears after a dash is seen both as a disambiguation and a subtitle. For an example, in "2021 Wimbledon Championships - Men's Singles", the general perception here is that "Mens Singles" is disambiguating "2021 Wimbledon Championships". This appears to be just plain wrong, since the subject of an article is not the disambiguating term. It is the article subject which gets disambiguated. The article's actual subject is the men's singles title at the 2021 Wimbledon Championship - ie, if anything it should be: "Men's Singles - 2021 Wimbledon Championship". The dash, in creating a subtitle type disambiguation, is creating a subsidiary article relationship. This is quite explicitly contrary to policy (see WP:AT at WP:TITLEFORMAT: Do not create subsidiary articles).
I would also observe that the actual article titles pluralise "Championships" this would also appear contrary to WP:TITLEFORMAT: Use the singular form.
A much more natural title would be: "2012 Wimbledon men's singles". We might use the more precise title "2012 Wimbledon Championship men's singles" but WP:PRECISION deals with actual need due to real conflict in article titles rather than a perceived or hypothetical need for precision. While the shorter title might just possibly refer to a group of single men sometime in 2012, somewhere in Wimbledon, I could say with some certainty that we are never going to have such an article but, if we ever did, we can deal with that then. WP is not a crystal ball. A natural title may not work well for all existing articles (per some examples given below) but this would assume that aren't better ways to form the title. Cinderella157 (talk) 04:53, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
  • Changed !vote I change my !Vote from a second preference of "A", since "A" or any dashed title form that uses the dash as a subtitle/disamiguation delimiter is clearly contrary to policy at WP:AT at multiple levels. My second preference is now "E", where this would only be some other alternative that is consistent with P&G. I am not seeing that any such specific proposal has been made. Cinderella157 (talk) 05:38, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
  • WP:TSC (at WP:AT) gives technical reason for not using (or at least avoiding) a dashed construction. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:53, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
  • To add/clarify, this should not be a one size fits all approach (and nor is the implication of D to just "remove the dash and caps" without any additional thought) and so almost all of the problems highlighted so far are a non-issue; i.e. we use a disambiguation option consistent with MOS. wjematherplease leave a message... 15:38, 13 December 2021 (UTC)
  • Note: my !vote above has been clarified and expanded. wjematherplease leave a message... 12:22, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
This query shows many long titles that would be mangled by such a change. The dashes are there for a reason, and cannot be indiscriminately removed. Downcasing after the dash (option A or B) on the other hand would alleviate the MOS:CAPS concerns without impacting on the titles' meanings/comprehensibilities, and would require the fewest changes to affected templates, so seems to be the optimal approach. No preference between A and B. Sod25k (talk) 13:44, 13 December 2021 (UTC)
  • No idea if a shorter title is possible. Those are just random examples I picked of titles that would be degraded if a naïve "remove dash" approach was taken. Sod25k (talk) 21:59, 13 December 2021 (UTC)
Some of these article titles are horrific. Taking your example, "Volleyball at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Women's tournament South American qualification" – this makes no sense as it is missing critical punctuation (at least one comma); "South American qualification for the women's volleyball tournament at the 2012 Summer Olympics" would make more sense. Likewise "Shooting (running deer) at the 1952 Summer Olympics" would be better as there was only one running deer event. wjematherplease leave a message... 12:34, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Agree that those event names are word salad. If they are the official titles of these obscure events (unclear), then they might still be the best option. My point was that the situation would only be worsened by simply removing the dashes. Sod25k (talk) 16:01, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
Sod25k, if we remove all of the unnecessary over-precision (the word salad) you can arrive at something like "Men's running deer (1952 Olympics)" or "Men's running deer,1952 Olympics". Furthermore, these options are easily parsed. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:28, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
No, the RFC author's motives for the larger move request are separate and covered in #Background. The tennis issue I raised because the conflicting capitalization styles for tennis articles in light of the recent consensus needs to be addressed, and could be by this discussion if a non-"do nothing" choice is decided upon. If no broader consensus is reached here, a tennis-specific discussion will have to be started. Sod25k (talk) 21:59, 13 December 2021 (UTC)
Fair enough. I did read Background, and while Dicklyon sets forth some of the variations that have been seen, he's left out the critical question: why is this something we need to "fix?" What is the actual problem here? Ravenswing 22:10, 13 December 2021 (UTC)
Two things. Tennis Project did address this years ago and decided enough sources used "Australian Open - Men's Doubles" so consensus was to use that form throughout. Hence all the articles are done that way except for the few that Dicklyon is changing even today. That said, Dicklyon is a good editor and a fair editor. He did try to form a fair RFC and listened to my concerns. But he is biased on this issue because it is his pet peeve... his own words in one recent discussion: "over-capitalization is a pet peeve of mine. It's broken and ought to be fixed." The fact that in forming this RFC it was discussed to specifically do it one Wikipedia area at a time to more easily weave through the process really bothered me. Sort of a divide and conquer feeling I got. I said this is a solution in search of a problem that could affect 10s of thousands of articles. That was before this RFC was plopped here, yet here it is. If this is iffy with some aspects of our MOS guideline (which is in the eye of the beholder imho), and there are 10s of thousands of articles throughout Wikpedia that use this style, then perhaps it's MOS that needs looking at? MOS does change to conform to large scale usage. It's done so many times. That's why it's a guideline not a policy. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:44, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Some clarifications

  • Hrm. Well. I'm not quite sure from where you get the notion of each sport (or, come to that, any project typically using dashes in titles) making its own style being a "non-starter," why this is something that needs to be "fixed," what makes this by definition an "improvement," or how this shapes the direction of the encyclopedia one way or another ... serious hyperbole if I've ever seen it. You have articulated the case for none of this. So I will ask again: what is the benefit to the encyclopedia for one option to be chosen over another? Ravenswing 01:50, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
The benefit is for capitalization on WP to mean something to the reader. Dicklyon (talk) 02:45, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
That rather sounds like "The benefit is that neither I nor those who think like me will be irked at seeing an orthographical construction we don't like." I'm pretty particular myself over what I believe to be proper grammar and spelling, but I don't fall down the rabbit hole of presuming that what suits my linguistic amour propre is universally shared or a self-evident virtue. In any event, thank you for your candor. Ravenswing 03:48, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
It's nothing personal to me, just trying to go by the spirit of MOS:CAPS mainly. Dicklyon (talk) 04:55, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
It's bizarre that someone would be accused of being "irked at seeing an orthographical construction we don't like" or that "what suits my linguistic amour propre is universally shared or a self-evident virtue", when they are simply trying to bring a certain group of articles into line with a Wikipedia-wide style guideline. Primergrey (talk) 04:20, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
Not that bizarre – people grasp for straws. And you haven't registered your own opinion above, have you? Dicklyon (talk) 04:43, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
Far from it, when they cannot articulate a credible, tangible benefit for a proposal. See, what irks ME is creating rules for the sake of creating rules -- we already have a vast amount of that on Wikipedia -- especially when doing so produces no benefits and will require a hefty amount of work and disruption. Ravenswing 09:30, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
That you can see no benefit and jump from that to accusing someone of "creating rules for the sake of creating rules" is just a bad look. You asked Dicklyon to tell you the benefit of this proposal, then took his answer and completely disregarded it. That's pretty much the definition of bad-faith negotiating. Primergrey (talk) 09:51, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
Ravenswing, I'll assume you just didn't understand my too-short answer. WP decided many years ago that capitalization should mean that something is a proper noun (or proper name; don't ask me what's the difference, as that's for others to argue), and that excess capitalization besides that and starts of sentences (and starts of titles and headings) should be avoided. Besides avoiding the dilution of what capital letters are meant to mean, using "sentence capitalization" in preference to "title capitalization" style for article titles allows for article titles to be linked in sentences, without excess capitalization (this kind of linking is a benefit to both editors and readers). In the tennis project, we had a few hundred sentences (that I fixed yesterday) that said somebody "won the Men's Singles tennis title" (and such). I doubt that anyone would argue that "Men's Singles" is a proper name in that context, and nobody has commented on or reverted any of those fixes. Titles should be the same way, so I could write in an article that somebody "won the 2021 US Open men's singles tennis title"; if I use the current title and say he "won the 2021 US Open – Men's Singles tennis title", that defeats the usual scheme, putting both excess capitalization and excess punctuation in the sentence. If usopen.org can title an article "Take Two: Predicting Djokovic vs. Medvedev in the US Open men's singles final", it would seem natural for us to use the pattern I proposed in D. Nobody is proposing new rules here, just trying to move the articles to titles consistent with longstanding guidelines. It's broken; let's fix it. Dicklyon (talk) 23:10, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
Ravenswing, pls see the PS I added to my initial comment, since it touches on "why". This RfC is not about creating new "rules", it is about bringing articles into line with long-standing "rules" (eg WP:AT) because certain articles/editors have either been ignorant of the rules or have chosen to ignore them for their own preference. In editing on WP, there is an implied social contract to abide by WP's P&G. Cinderella157 (talk) 01:00, 17 December 2021 (UTC)
I had forgotten, or not noticed, that you'd already made the WP:NATURALNESS point above, so my extended explanation seems a bit redundant. Dicklyon (talk) 23:21, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

Background to forming this RfC An RM was opened at The Championships, Wimbledon to address inconsistent titles in some of the earliest events, with an initial proposal: 1903 Wimbledon Championships – Ladies' Singles → 1903 Wimbledon Championships – Women's Singles (typical). The close ultimately determined: 1903 Wimbledon Championships – Ladies' Singles → 1903 Wimbledon Championships – Women's singles (typical). The discussion did identify MOS:SENTENCECAPS as an issue but the closer made no specific comment WRT to this. A discussion was commenced at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tennis concerning various title formatting issues, including the use of a dash delimiter and capitalisation, both generally and more specifically after a dash. A discussion was also held here, with a question as to what, if any guidance existed WRT capping in a dashed title. Looking at the discussions, the matter of dashed titles appears to be most prevalent in sports article. I am not certain, but within sports, my understanding would be that tennis is the most prevalent for that style (by article count)? More certainly, it is the more prevelent WRT the issue of capping after the dash. Cinderella157 (talk) 03:21, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

What next?

The responses above show a clear super-majority in favor of some kind of case fixing (options A, B, and D), and a small minority in favor of doing nothing (C or E), so we should focus next on what's the best path forward. A number of editors favor the "natural" dashless form (D), while a similar number find that to be the worst approach (due mostly to the fact that it would be very hard to get right in general, for such a large and diverse set of pages, and wouldn't be compatible with a bunch of existing nav templates). So it seems to me that we need to choose between A and B. About half of respondents supported A, and nearly as many B (with different orders of preference). Personally, I prefer A, though I know B will be a lot less work.

The question really goes back to where I started in a section above: what is the intended function of the dashed two-part titles, and how should they be styled? It seems the main interpretation (at least in sporting events) is as a "subtitle", and some see that as justification for starting over "sentence case" after the dash; other point out that titles should be rendered as they would be in running text, and it would be unusual to see such capitalization (or dash) in running text.

Note that in lawn bowls the convention used on most is to treat the subevent as parenthetical disambiguation, as in Bowls England National Championships (Men's Fours), but still over-capitalized. It might be more logical as Men's four (Bowls England National Championships). Others, in the context of broader games, use the dash form, with various case variations, e.g. Lawn bowls at the 2010 Commonwealth Games – Women's triples. Several respondents mentioned parenthetical disambiguation as a possible improvement, so I'd like to see if there's more support for that, too.

So, I solicit here further comments that would help us converge on a consensus of the best way to move forward, particularly A vs B, but still open to alternatives. Dicklyon (talk) 20:03, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

Template Issues

Yes, there will be an issue with templates. I have a look at a couple of examples. Templates would be of two general types. For a particular event (year) they create links to the titles played for. For a particular title they create links to other titles played during a particular event. The latter are effectively sub-pages of an event page. In either case, the templates assume a particular article title format in order to generate the links. The templates will fail if there is no target article having the "assumed" article title format. However, this issue is easily remedied by ensuring there are redirects from the "assumed" article title format to the "actual" article title. I believe this already occurred for Wimbledon tennis championships that used "ladies" and "gentlemen" instead of "men's" and "women's" for titles. It is a simple solution to what might otherwise be perceived as a near insurmountable problem. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 10:59, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

So we will also have to create more redirects in order to facilitate this massive change. Another thing for the closer to consider. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:10, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
In the first instance, one simply leaves the old target as a redirect, rather than deleting it. My primary observation is that the matter of templates is not insurmountable by any means. And of course, the templates can be modified to accept the new pattern (per DL below). Cinderella157 (talk) 23:43, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
The templates can also be modified to use the new patterns where needed. Currently have the over-capitalization assumption built in, but that's not hard to fix. Dicklyon (talk) 18:15, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
Good grief, In other words they can be mass-modified to handle either under-capitalization or over-capitalization. Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:53, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
There are not many templates to modify; it's not a "mass" operation. Dicklyon (talk) 07:17, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

I have only looked at a couple of tennis templates but would make these observations. These are not "smart" templates that rely on recognising a dashed construction to generate an infobox - they simply assume such a construction and capitalisation. Consequently, any change whatsoever to "any" part of a "standard" title format will require a revision of such templates at the template level. They lack flexibility. While I am not familiar with the language or syntax of templates, this is potentially an opportunity to improve the flexibility of the templates. The issue is not a matter of parsing that is reliant on a dashed construction. Secondly, these templates are not the ducks nuts. Specifically, they create red-links for titles played for that don't appear to exist - such as invitation or masters titles. The templates are not being applied to "acknowledge" para titles being played for. However, this is not a deficiency in the templates per se but in how they are being applied. Any change can be seen as an opportunity for improvement and an opportunity to make such templates more resilient. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:36, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

Current state as of December 20, and moving forward

I'm creating a new subsection here so that stuff not relating to templates can move forward, and the conversation regarding templates can continue in that section. Herostratus (talk) 07:57, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

So let's see, counting heads as of this date, we have, as a first choice:

Lot of editors gave a second choice, and these are:

And, five editors opposing D.

C got no traction, and there were three E votes that weren't "do nothing" were for one-vote proposals: 1 for parents, 1 for following sources, 1 unclear. Let's promote those editors' second choices (or drop them if there wasn't one)

Since D has 7 first choices (and no second), but five explicit opposes... I can't see D as going forward since it has essentially a "net vote" of 2. Five editors really don't want D, and I think it would be pretty divisive to go forward with that. (The D voters will object to that, but what can you do? Ignore the editors who specifically called out D to say they hate it?) So, also discarding D and promoting those editors second choices, we get:

First choice:

Second choice:

I can see a couple of ways to cut this cake, assuming you're even still on board with me here:

1) Combine A + B into "Do Something", giving "Do Something" 11+4 vs "Do Nothing" 6+1. Counting just first choices gives 65% to "Do Something", which with 17 people involved, I suppose that could count as a win, barely. Then, "A" having 7+2 vs "B" having 4+2, well, "A" is 7-4 among first choices (which are what mainly count), which is 64%... which 64% of 11 people doesn't mean much I'd say. Others may think it does. In this way you could either anoint "A" the winner, or run another RfC, "A" vs "B".

2) Drop B since it's the weakest of the three. Promoting "B" voters second choices (if any) adds one to "A" and one to "Do Nothing", giving First choice:

Second choices are no longer in play. 8-7 is a tie.

None of this considers strength of arguments, but what can I say? Nobody has a killer argument that I see. C'mon, it's a matter of opinion basically. If your argument is that good, it'll probably convince other people and you'll win the headcount anyway. If you're not changing people's minds, either your argument is maybe not as strong at you think, or else it really is a matter of opinion and arguments don't much matter.

So, these multi-choice RfC usually don't end with a clear "winner" and aren't so much intended to as to just generally be discussions, and also to narrow the field. I suppose the next step would be to have a new, binary, RfC, which will I guess could take the form of "A" vs "Do Nothing" (I reccomend this as simpler). (The annoying is that if "A" has 13 votes and "Do Nothing" has 10 votes, "Do Nothing" wins, since no consensus == no change. Oh well.)

or you could have something like:

If "A" is a clear win, then you see if "A1" is clear win over "A2" or vice versa; if so, Bob's your uncle, if not you're screwed, and I have no idea what you'd do. Herostratus (talk) 07:57, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Comments on "Current state as of December 20, and moving forward"

First off, as you note, consensus is not built on headcount (or single transferrable vote) but on strength of argument; you also acknowledge that you are completely disregarding this in your unhelpful attempt to steer this discussion – plus we have Dicklyon's steering above. Second, many of the !votes above (including your own) directly contradict policy and existing guidelines, so very little weight can be given to them. wjematherplease leave a message... 10:35, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Also there's no indication of who was counted in each group there, so it's hard to check the interpretation. My impression is that the "do something" vs "do nothing" question is pretty much decided, and it's really just the second question that needs to be settled to move forward. Since I would expect most of the "do nothing" people to prefer the "do less" alternative, that's back to B being the output for all practical purposes, and maybe going to an RM discussion would be a way to test that. But other analyses may see it differently. The fact that Fyunck is re-canvassing at tennis project suggests that he too thinks "do nothing" has lost. Dicklyon (talk) 18:15, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
Considering only the votes and not rationales or strength, scoring each option as 1 for a first preference, 0.5 for a second preference and -1 for an oppose I find the options have the following vote counts (all working is shown at the end):
  • A: 4
  • B: 3.5
  • C: -0.5
  • D: -3
  • E ("case consistency"): 1
  • E (follow the sources): 1
  • Do nothing: 5
Considering only first preference supports and counting "follow the sources" as effectively "do nothing": Do something totals: 13, Do nothing: 7
Factoring in opposition and implied opposition (those who supported only "do nothing" can be implied to oppose doing something): Do something: 10, Do nothing 6
Considering only numbers that's a weak to very weak consensus to do something, but that could easily change to a clear consensus either way or no consensus when arguments are considered. If we assume, for now, that there is a consensus to do something we would need to look at what particular something has consensus, and that is clearly not C or D. "Case consistency" could be taken as a support of any of the "do something" options and we've already dealt with "follow the sources" so we're left with just A and B.
On the face of it there is no clear preference between them, especially if Sod25k's preferences are equal (see below) which would put them exactly equal. However, of those who expressed a first preference for an option that has been dismissed (C, D, E or do nothing) and a second preference for A or B, 4 went for A and 1 B, suggesting that A edges ahead. However A got 2 explicit opposes while B only got 1 which suggests B edges ahead. As 1 of the explicit opposition votes for A and the only one for B was from the same person we can infer they opposed both equally and the other opposition to A was from someone supporting B that also suggests B is the least opposed.
So if I were closing this now based solely on the numbers, I would say there is a weak consensus to do something, a clear consensus against option D (especially as almost all the "strong" votes are in opposition to it), a weak consensus against option C and no consensus between options A and B and so would recommend a follow-up discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 19:44, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
My working for the above comment. Thryduulf (talk) 19:44, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

1st preference:

  • A: 3 - Sod25k, Jayron32, Kaffe42,
  • B: 3 - Amakuru, Sportsfan77777, Iffy,
  • C: 0
  • D: 6 - Dicklyon, Cinderella157, wiemather, SMcCandlish, Tony1, BilledMammal
  • E ("case consistency"): 1 - Mjquinn_id
  • E (follow the sources): 1 - Montanabw
  • Do nothing: 6 - Fyunck, Ravenswing, GhostOfDanGurney, GraemeLegget, GoodDay, Thryduulf

2nd preference:

  • A: 6 - Dicklyon, Cinderella157, Amakuru, Iffy, SMcCandlish, Tony1,
  • B: 3 - Sod25k, BilledMammal, Thryduulf
  • C: 1 - Fyunck
  • D: 0
  • E (parenthesis): 1 - wiemather
  • Do nothing: 1 - Sportsfan77777

Oppose:

  • A: 2 - Sportsfan77777, GhostOfDanGurney
  • B: 1 - GhostOfDanGurney
  • C: 1 - GhostOfDanGurney
  • D: 9 - Lee Bilrndki, Sod25k, Joseph2302, Sportsfan77777, GhostOfDanGurney, Iffy, Mjquinn_id (implied), Kaffe42, Thryduulf

E: 0

  • Do nothing: 1 - Joseph2302 (implied)

Notes:

  • Sod25k's preferences for A and B may be equal
  • Iffy opposes applying any of A-D "unevenly" and thinks doing nothing is preferable to that.
  • Mjquinn_id has not explained what "case consistency" means but the comment implies keeping a dash and thus opposition to option D)). Thryduulf (talk) 19:44, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
I don't steer conversations. That's what you all do, and you're just projecting. And anyone thinking the matter is clear is guilty of partisan self-dealing or unsubtle thinking.
You'll note that I offered two ways of counting. #1 leads to "A" (not my preferred outcome) and #2 leads to "Do Nothing" (my preferred outcome). (Both lead to second, binary RfC IMO; and there are other ways of counting of course.). That is, as I said, "if you're still on board". You could be not on board with complicated manipulation of data and be ike "D has plurality, discounting negative votes which I do, so D" or whatever.
Absent new votes coming in, don't argue with me, don't argue with each other. We're all arguing for the closer. Name-calling won't help you there I bet. I proffered some raw data and a couple different ways one might consider it leading to different outcomes. The closer will decide how or if she uses the data and what, if any, advice she wants to take. (I do apologize for not including names as I usually do, I was rushed. Thank you User:Thryduulf for correcting this (but I'm not included (I was 1st=Do Nothing, 2nd=B, and opposed to D))).
It's not a headcount, but it is basically a matter of opinion, and if you don't want to count heads, then it has to be "no change" since opinions can't really have strength of argument. Herostratus (talk) 22:31, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
@Herostratus my apologies for missing you (not sure how that happened) but that pushes the headcount closer towards no consensus between "do something" and "do nothing" (if you accept that as a valid binary, and @Colin M makes a good point regarding that), strengthens the opposition to D and makes the lack of consensus between A and B even clear imo. Thryduulf (talk) 22:44, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
Sure, User:Thryduulf, no problem. As I said before, multi-option RfC seldom come to a consensus, they serve more to whittle down the options. Whether that should be "A vs B" or "A vs Do Nothing" I'll leave to closer. Herostratus (talk) 01:01, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
More creative counting. Good one. wjematherplease leave a message... 23:53, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
What's that supposed to mean? Herostratus (talk) 01:01, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
There is no value in such an invented vote counting methodology with arbitrarily assigned values, selective negative counting (i.e. ignoring obvious opposition to the "do nothing" option), overlooking and misinterpreting !votes, etc. Why not assign zero to all !votes that disregard MOS, and minus one for "do nothing" to all non-"do nothing" !votes – the result would be very different. wjematherplease leave a message... 10:56, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Defining the issues

Defining the issues As with many RfCs, the issues become clearer as the discussion unfolds. As I see matters, there are now two clear issues:

  1. Whether it is reasonable/permitted to use a dash as a subtitle/disambiguation delimiter; and,
  2. Assuming it is, how should the phrase following such a dash be capitalised (and why)? For simplicity, the options can be summarised as: "men's singles", "Men's singles" or "Men's Singles"

Cinderella157 (talk) 06:14, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

I think it's a little hazier than that. It's not always totally arbitrary in dash usage. If everywhere you looked it said "Campo Brazillia - Crocodile Especial" then that it what it should be at Wikipedia also. Now if some sources capitalize everything and some do not, it's up to the project to decide what works best. Same with the dash. If a dash is never ever used and the second part of the title is never ever capitalized, again that's much easier. It's when we have a mix of usage in the title (as we have in the RFC) where decisions have been made. But when decisions have been made, and it's been done to thousands of articles, then you don't move it to a different form because it's a pet peeve. There's no good reason to do it. Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:01, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Actually Fyunck, it really is that clear and that simple. Perhaps you might re-read my !vote. By policy at WP:AT, the dash, as a disambiguation delimiter is expressly not to be used. The dash disambiguation/subtitle construction is contrary to WP:AT on several levels. Any issue of capitalisation after such a construction is consequently mute (yes, I mean mute - as in silenced). Cinderella157 (talk) 10:15, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Actually, it is not, and it's a sticking point. You said "as a disambiguation delimiter." That's not what this is. The dash is actually part of the title in sources. Certainly not all sources, but some sources. And also... if Women's Singles is often capitalized in tennis title sources, and Wimbledon is often capitalized in tennis sources, why would you uncapitalize one of those terms? I also went to WP:AT and searched the terms you used... dash, disambiguation, delimiter. I am missing your argument's location. If you start saying everything is a disambiguation delimiter, instead of "2021 Australian Open" we'll have to start using Australian Open (2021) and George Washington (farewell address). There are certainly good reasons for different points of view but this is not black and white by any stretch. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:53, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Unfortunately, you are misinterpreting what the sources are doing. They are following their own manual of style. The dash is (in general) not part of the title, it is merely the chosen means of separation used by the source in accordance with their MoS. Similarly, many sources commonly use title case; we do not. We have our own manual of style, which states that we use sentence-case and also guides against the use of dashes for this purpose. wjematherplease leave a message... 11:04, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Fyunck(click), a delimiter is a sequence of one or more characters for specifying the boundary between separate, independent regions in plain text, mathematical expressions or other data streams. In this case, I am referring to a dash, which is separating a title from a subtitle or the "main" part of the title from its disambiguation. Your comment per: If you start saying everything is a disambiguation delimiter, instead of "2021 Australian Open" we'll have to start using Australian Open (2021) and George Washington (farewell address). It makes no sense to me since it appears to not understand what a delimiter is. To me, it seems to be a red-herring argument. If you were to read my !vote (in full), I have already directly quoted the particular text that is an explicate statement not to use a dash as a disambiguation delimiter. It is at WP:QUALIFIER (in WP:AT): Commas and parentheses (round brackets) are the only characters that can be used without restriction to separate a disambiguating term in an article title. Colons can be used in the limited cases of subtitles of some creative works and lists split over several pages. I have also identified at my !vote, other "levels" at which the dash construction is contrary to P&G, particularly at WP:AT. A significant number of editors have specifically identified that the dash is separating terms in a title with the function of providing disambiguation. The subtitle perception of the construction is also dealt with by the afore quote. A colon (and only a colon) is permitted in the subtitles of some creative works. We are not dealing with a creative work here and a dash is not a colon! Per WP:COMMONNAME at WP:AT: In Wikipedia, an article title is a natural-language word or expression that indicates the subject of the article. A dashed construction is not a ""natural expression" Consequently, we don't rely on "titles" and headings in sources using such a construction to determine a WP article title. The weight of P&G (particularly WP:AT - a policy) would determine that the dashed construction, the subject of this discussion, is not to be used on a number of levels. To argue otherwise would appear to me to be pettifogging. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:35, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
We are running into the same thing here. Why isn't the title at "George Washington's farewell address"? Per your arguments it should be and that is the situation here. As for the dash it's in sources even in sentences and I didn't see that talked about at WP:AT. But this is what's fun about Wikipedia, and yes I still have fun. Often things follow MOS to the letter, sometimes MOS gets shoved aside by consensus or no consensus or local consensus, and sometimes MOS gets changed because many don't like a certain rule (or the rule is too vague). Sometimes you go with 99% of English sources, and sometimes what 99% of English sources say gets banned here. That's Wikipedia. It's complex, but as long as we always keep in mind our readers' best interest, things usually work out ok. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:45, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Fyunck(click), WP:AT both permits and even tends to prefer natural phrases for article titles and disambiguation (see WP:CRITERIA and WP:QUALIFIER). Your examples of "George Washington (farewell address)" and "Australian Open (2021)", would unnecessarily and unreasonably impose a constructed or artificial "qualification" over a perfectly natural construction that should be and is preferred. This sort of argument is therefore a red-herring. Furthermore, in the phrase "George Washington's Farewell Address", the attributive phrase "George Washington's" modifies the subject "Farewell Address". The subject of the article is then, the "Farewell Address". Placing the "farewell address" in parenthesis changes the subject and is wrong. Headings and the like are not natural language. They often drop "parts of speech" for brevity, such as preceding articles. I am not saying the dashed construction isn't used at all in sentences but I'm not seeing evidence presented that it is at all a WP:COMMONNAME - ie that it is commonly used that way in sentences in sources. WP:AT is not the MOS. It is not a guideline, it is a policy. From the passage I quoted for you, the policy lists the "only characters" that can be used as disambiguation delimiters. Consequently, an argument that says "Oh but it didn't specifically say I couldn't use a dash", would be just plain pettifogging. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:01, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Obviously I'm not doing a good job of explaining because you keep missing my point. That's on me but I don't have a better way to say it. That or we have a different definition of "disambiguation delimiters" (which also is not on the WP:AT page) vs a proper name. Since I can't explain better and what you are saying keeps missing my point I guess we might as well move along because we have a communication snafu. Cheers. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:33, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
This particular thread is about disambiguation. If you don't understand the term "delimiter", despite my previous explanation, it is largely immaterial. The purpose of the dash within the context of this thread (and this RfC) is to provide disambiguation. If it wasn't, I'm sure you would have said so by now. Disambiguation also appears to be the whole basis of your comments in this thread? WP:AT (per the passage already quoted), specifically says that there are are only certain characters that can be used to separate a disambiguator within an article title. A dash is not one of these. How then, is the statement quoted in any way unclear in respect to a dash being not permitted to separate a disambiguating term in an article title? Cinderella157 (talk) 14:14, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Let's come at it from a different angle then so I can better understand. Let's fictitiously say we have the official "Nova Scotia Zoo – Botanical Garden." That's what they use and that's what most sources also use. New York Times writes articles that say there is a fire at the Nova Scotia Zoo – Botanical Garden, and Quebec Daily News says the CEO of Nova Scotia Zoo – Botanical Garden was fired yesterday. You seem to be telling me that even though you can use Nova Scotia Zoo – Botanical Garden in prose, as a title at Wikipedia it must be "Nova Scotia Zoo Botanical Garden" or perhaps "Nova Scotia Zoo, Botanical Garden"? We can't use "Nova Scotia Zoo – Botanical Garden" as the title here? That seems to be what you are saying to me and I want to understand you as it pertains to "Wimbledon – Womens Singles", "Wimbledon, Womens Singles", or "Wimbledon Womens Singles". Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:41, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Obviously, Fyunck, your desire for "Men's Singles" to be a proper name has nothing sensible behind it. Unlike Washington's Farewell Address, which is a composition title, well known as such for well over a hundred years even if not original written by that exact title. Dicklyon (talk) 15:44, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Actually that's a different story and it has much sensibility behind it. It's quite similar no matter how much you don't want it to be. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:41, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
The problem with fictional hypotheticals is just that. At WP:AT: In Wikipedia, an article title is a natural-language word or expression that indicates the subject of the article ... that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources). If you are trying to say that the dashed construction is commonly used in prose (natural language) in a substantial majority of independent reliable sources, then show the evidence. Most often, you are seeing things like: "Highlights of Wimbledon Championships men's singles final". As to what WP:AT says on using a dash as a disamiguation separating character, I think it is self-evident. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:09, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
But you didn't answer my question. You simply added another question. In that hypothetical what would we use as an article title? It is also very often seen as 2019 Wimbledon Men's Singles event. No type of source dominates but you will see Wimbledon – Men's Singles, though certainly not as frequently as without the dash. Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:41, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
Firstly, your fictional hypothetical is very unlikely to the point of being improbable. Secondly, your example is not a disambiguation/subtitle construction, which is the subject of this RfC. Consequently, it is not being ruled against by WP:AT at WP:TITLEFORMAT (that limits disambiguation delimiting characters). It should still be avoided per WP:TSC at WP:AT. It also creats an issue with readability in prose, given the grammatical function of a spaced dash. Similar to a colon or semi-colon, it begins a new independent clause that could be a grammatically separate sentence. This is contrary to the fictitious name where it is intended to join. For this reason, I would find it unlikely that your news sources in the fictitious example would not use an alternative (such as "and"). Consequently, we would not likely be the seeing the fictitious "official" name as the WP:COMMONNAME in independent reliable sources.
To the issue at hand and particularly for tennis. You have not provide evidence of actual usage of the dashed construction in prose. However, you acknowledge that it is not the "most"WP:COMMONNAME and that the undashed construction is more common: It is also very often seen as 2019 Wimbledon Men's Singles event. I have looked quite hard to find evidence of the dashed construction in prose. I'm not finding anything; though, I am seeing it in headings and tables etc. Even then, I'm not seeing it consistently capitalised either in full or in part.
I do think we are now back at the start of this thread. The spaced dash construction used in many sports articles as a subtitle/disambiguation is quite contrary to WP:AT at a number of places. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:51, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Herostratus, given that you have stated: Nobody has a killer argument that I see. Have you seen my revised !vote and the reasons I have given overall? Cinderella157 (talk) 09:59, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Hi User:Cinderella157. Yes, I have now, and thank you for digging up the "Do not create subsidiary articles" bit. And I mean those are all good points, and yes I see how as a matter of the written policy you're correct. So alright, yes, "matter of opinion" isn't entirely accurate, and strength-of-argument, in the sense of "how well do the various arguments adhere to policy" could be play. I stand corrected.
Your point remain unconvincing to me because I don't care about the letter of rules details so much, and this isn't really an "Azerbaijan/Transport" or "Azerbaijan (transport)" type situation in my opinion. Olympic-type sports events are just different, is all. "2017 FIL European Luge Championships women's singles" is just too run-on for my taste, "2017 FIL European Luge Championships – Women's singles" (or "woman's singles" or "Woman's Singles", whatever) is an aid to the reader in helping to separate out and hilite an important second part of the title. I don't think that WP:AT is intended for or helpful to be completely controlling at this level of detail. "Do not create subsidiary articles" is generally true and useful advice, but not here. And I don't think "Well, X would be better for the reader, but if you did thru the rules and follow the exact letter of them, we have to do Y" is a good approach.
However, yes one could take the stance "WP:AT as a policy must not and cannot be violated except in extreme and important cases", and "It's clear that 'Do not use titles suggesting that one article forms part of another... it should be named independently' is part of WP:AT. If the closer feels honor-bound to support the letter of policies (she might), then that might be a winning argument for her, and fine. Herostratus (talk) 14:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Herostratus, you omit to address that WP:QUALIFIER (in WP:AT) lists the "only characters" that are permitted as disambiguation delimiters? It's not a headcount, but it is basically a matter of opinion, and if you don't want to count heads, then it has to be "no change" since opinions can't really have strength of argument. [per yourself herein] Except it isn't? Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 03:26, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Well... User:Cinderella157, I don't worry about stuff like that too much. There're a lot of rules here. Some of them are put in by a couple-few people, and some of them are put in by people who like to micromangage stuff, and a fair number contradict each other, and a fair number aren't followed generallt. I try to ignore at least one rule before breakfast, it keeps me young. After all the rules were made for the readers, not the readers for the rules. So, whatever is best for the reader. This is hard to know, but my considered opinion is that the abscence of a dash (or other mechanism, but the dash seems best to me) makes the title just a tiny bit more difficult to suss the title in a half second or so. For my part, I don't much care about the capitaliztion of the the second part of the title. Title case (Men's singles) seems best, but it's hard to know. Herostratus (talk) 15:32, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Is the spaced dashed creating a subtitle/disambiguation?

Is the spaced dashed creating a subtitle/disambiguation? To my observation of the discussion herein, it is. It has specifically been referred to as such. With the exception of perhaps Fyunck, it has been at least tacitly acknowledged as such. In templates, it is being used as such. However, I am now specifically asking this question. This relates to matters of policy at WP:AT. For details, see my !vote (second down - please read in full) and the discussion immediately above (#Defining the issues). If it is not creating a subtitle/disambiguation, then what is the function of the dash? Cinderella157 (talk) 12:09, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Comments

Actually, Fyunck(click), your characterisation is quite inaccurate. This all started with an RfC initiated by Sod25 at Talk:The Championships, Wimbledon because of inconsistencies in titling. It was that RfC that bought "issues" to the attention of the broader community and in the first instance, an issue of capitalisation. It also created a precedent to change the capitalisation. The proponent of this RfC Dicklyon then discussed the matter with the tennis project and, both you, Sod25 and others were instrumental in bringing this RfC here. Your characterisation of this being because "one editor didn't like it" is quite inaccurate and may be considered an "aspersion". Unintenionally, things may have been done in a way that did not invite scrutiny by the broader community but it has happened now. Such decisions should then be able to withstand the scrutiny of the broader community or be bought into line with the consensus of the broader community. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:44, 28 December 2021 (UTC)
I think it is pretty accurate but you are correct in who brought it up. That RFC was made by Sod25 only to change a few articles that retained the word Gentlemen's and Ladies' so that it conformed to all the thousands of other articles. In the RFC Sod25 started, he specifically asked not to move to a different case or remove the dash. It was a truly massive RFC of what.... six? Two wanted things moved only and four wanted less capitalization but not necessarily moved from Gentlemen's and Ladies'. I'm not sure why you feel Sod and I were instrumental to bringing this RFC here. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:45, 28 December 2021 (UTC)
At the Tennis project, Sod states: now that there is precedent to change the capitalization, I will support your RFC. And you state: I would not single out sports articles by any stretch. The latter widens the scope and determines a central venue. You certainly played a role (ie were instrumental) in bringing the RfC here. Cinderella157 (talk) 01:18, 29 December 2021 (UTC)
  • Men's singles tennis at the 2012 Summer Olympics would be perfectly acceptable. The English language works perfectly well, and there is nothing special about sports that justifies having titles that are non-compliant with MOS with respect to case, punctuation and disambiguation. Please also read my comment in response to your !vote above with regards to nonsensical titles that exist due to current practices. wjematherplease leave a message... 14:52, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
  • That construction does seem to work ok grammar-wise even with long multi-sport competition event names, but it's also more difficult to parse. I wouldn't oppose a change to it, but I still lean towards the dashes for readability reasons and because it would be less work to change just the capitalization of the current titles. Sod25k (talk) 16:01, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
  • I'm also not sure I've seen the "Men's singles tennis at the 2012 Summer Olympics" format used elsewhere? I'm not the greatest sports fan, but from a quick google it seems that when both parts are needed for context that the event comes first, and yes the dash does make it easier to parse. There is no single rule that can work for every title of every topic in the encyclopaedia so we shouldn't try to shoehorn things. Thryduulf (talk) 16:46, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
  • If there is no requirement for a title format to be used elsewhere, why are arguments for article titles rejected because there is no evidence of them being used elsewhere? You can't have it both ways. Thryduulf (talk) 17:09, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
  • There is a difference between there being an official and/or common name, and not. These articles fall under the "not". Seriously, please read the guideline. wjematherplease leave a message... 17:58, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
Re "why are arguments for article titles rejected because there is no evidence of them being used elsewhere", Thryduulf, can you say who has rejected what titles on that basis? Dicklyon (talk) 04:15, 24 December 2021 (UTC)
There are very many examples of you and others doing exactly this, most recently that I was involved in was the RM of New York Subway, where nearly every single one of your arguments was based on what sources use. Thryduulf (talk) 01:22, 28 December 2021 (UTC)
No title was "rejected because there is no evidence of them being used elsewhere" in that discussion. It was certainly acknowledged, by me and others, that the capped "Subway" is used in lots of places; it was objected to because our our style is to cap only if caps are used consistently in sources, while in this case that caps were in an actual minority. You have misunderstood and/or misrepresented the position that you adopt as strawman to object to. Don't do that. Dicklyon (talk) 05:08, 28 December 2021 (UTC)

Where are we now, 31 December 2021

Background

Where are we now

  • 6 are for either A or B
  • none are for C
  • 6 are for D
  • 2 are "not D". Another 4 editors are expressly opposed to D.
  • 7 are for E and state that this is to do nothing.
  • 4 are for E and are to do something.
  • The last of these is somewhat ironic, since the dashed construction has been applied across articles precisely for the sake of consistency.
  • While following the sources is always good advice, the discussion above is indicating that there is not a clear WP:COMMONNAME. However (also from the discussion above), we are not seeing dashed constructions in prose. What we do see, with some regularity is something like "Wimbledon mens' singles" in prose. It was observed that some articles differentiated by gender probably don't have sufficient coverage in sources to warrant their own articles.
  • Such ungainly article titles appear to be prevalent in certain projects. Consequently, there would appear to be a good rationale for resolving the issues herein at project level rather than centrally (as in this RfC).
  • It would be wrong to oppose D on the assumption that it would be applied blindly and result in the same "word salad".
  • Arguably, D is most consistent with P&G.
  • An example such as "2012 Wimbledon men's singles" can be easily parsed and applied to a template. Such a format can be consistently applied over similar events - eg "2012 French Open men's singles". An argument that it can't be applied consistently or parsed for usage in templates lacks validity.
  • This ignores the strength of argument. The support for D is strongly and explicitly grounded in P&G. The opposition to D is largely based on ungainly titles that should be fixed in any case.
  • C is effectively the status quo. To effect, it applies title case to that which appears after the dash.
  • Evidence of usage in prose is that things like "Wimbledon mens' singles" more often appear just like that. There is no evidence support for the proposition that "Mens' Singles" is consistently capped in sources and is therefore a proper noun phrase as determined by criteria at MOS:CAPS.
  • There is no support for the status quo.
  • This is straight up false. All of the votes for E that are "to do nothing" are "to maintain the status quo". By your own count, it's the most favored option. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 03:26, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
  • Arguably, a close that simply determines "no consensus" here would therefore be wrong without indicating some way forward.
  • Previous attempts to analyse the !votes would tend to reduce the outcome to a choice between A or B that would need to be resolved by further RfC. Such analyses have relied on considering second choices.
  • Option A is for no assumed capitalisation after a dash (ie sentence case is applied across the article title and capitalisation is only applied to words that would normally be capitalised in prose). This option is consistent with P&G in respect to the issue of capitalisation.
  • Option B would assume that what occurs after the dash is capitalised as if it were the start of a new sentence. This is specifically contrary to MOS:SENTENCECAPS. Those that "opine" support for B do not acknowledge the contradiction. The preference appears to be largely on aesthetics.
  • Only one editor has acknowledged inherant P&G issues with the dashed format and would WP:IAR but acknowledge this is a personal opinion to prefer the dashed construction. The P&G issues with the dashed construction were only identified late in the discussion. Only 2 !votes have been added since the issue was identified.

Where to from here

1. As previously identified, the status quo (option C) is untenable as an outcome from this RfC. However, there is no clear alternative outcome from this particular RfC. The closer will consequently need to guide the direction forward.

2. Do we proceed forward with a new RfC trying to reach a central decision on the issue of capitalisation in a dashed construction - this being the initial premise of this RfC.

  • It would appear that the issues across projects are not all equal (particularly with some of the titles that were identified in opposition to option D).
  • Previous analysis would suggest moving forward centrally on the basis of a choice between A and B. The analysis did not consider weight. It primarily counted !votes.

3. Do we cease trying to resolve this centrally (ie revert to a more project specific approach).

  • One editor appears to be strongly opposed to this.
  • A number of editors that would "E-do nothing" would specifically leave it to be determined at project level. Whether they intended this particular course is moot. However, there is some specific support for such a course.
  • Issues affecting different projects are not all equal. Proceeding on a project-by-project basis is more suited to dealing with varying issues.
  • If there is no outcome here, an RfC at the tennis project has already been foreshadowed. This is because of an inconsistency in capitalisation that has been created by this recent RfC.

4. Given the number of articles that appear to use the dashed construction and that such a construction appears quite contrary to P&G, can we simply ignore that?

  • Should we proceed with an RfC to resolve the matter - ie a proposal to amend WP:AT to be permissive of such a structure. This may require amendment at several points or one proposal that would make it permitted for sports type articles and similar - ie an event with multiple awards or titles being competed for.
  • An outcome that specifically opposed such a proposition would render any further discussion about how to capitalise after the dash redundant.

Cinderella157 (talk) 06:13, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

Hi, Dicklyon, Cinderella157, Fyunck(click), Wjemather, Lee Vilenski, Amakuru, Ravenswing, Sod25k, Sportsfan77777, Joseph2302, Jayron32, GhostOfDanGurney, Iffy, GraemeLeggett, Mjquinn_id, GoodDay, SMcCandlish, Tony1, Montanabw, Kaffe42, BilledMammal, Herostratus, Thryduulf, SmokeyJoe, HawkAussie - you have contributed to this RfC by offering a !vote in the initial section. You may be interested in contributing to further discussion immediately below. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 02:03, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Please see this section (above) for an assessment/summary. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:33, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Comments on where are we now, 31 December 2021

Fyunck(click), this RfC has been conducted centrally and broadly notified. If a close here would recommend further action on a project-wise basis, then the existing notifications stand to inform on this. Your concerns about a piece-by-piece approach have been addressed both now and into the future for any outcome of this RfC. Tennis is broken as a result of the recent RfC. The way things stand here, with no support for C, I can't see tennis not changing and all the things you mention are going to need to be done when it does. Avoiding work is not a compelling reason. I don't see anybody actually saying P&G "allow flexibility in these matters". One can WP:IAR but not on the basis of "I don't like it" or "I like this better". There needs to be good objective reasons. Policy tends to be quite firm and WP:AT is a policy. You might see WP:PG and WP:IARMEANS. If the dashed construction is such a good idea, one should be able to convince others to change the policy to permit it. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:25, 1 January 2022 (UTC)
I didnt say this wasn't done broadly. It has been. But piece by piece is unfair to all projects that this could affect. Policy does not preclude the dash, but to be honest I'm not sold the dash needs to be there even if it can be sourced, but there are plenty of things I will argue against my own feelings if I feel it's not in the best interest of or helpful to Wikipedia readers. I see this as frivolous. Tennis is not broken and Wikipedia is full of different opinions. We really disagree on that term. I simply see no consensus to change here. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:48, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

I'm too old & too confused, as to what direction this RFC has taken. All I ask is that we use english in the titles. GoodDay (talk) 02:10, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

LOL... post of the day! Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:08, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
This is straight up false. All of the votes for E that are "to do nothing" are "to maintain the status quo". By your own count, it's the most favored option. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 03:26, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
Ya mean my IQ is higher, then I'm aware of? sounds good. GoodDay (talk) 05:28, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Just noting to anyone reading this that Cinderella157 moved one of my comments to make it look like I was disagreeing with GoodDay, when I was in fact criticizing Cinderella157's distorted summary above. I moved my comment back to the correct place, and put a strikethrough where Cinderella157 moved my comment. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 07:36, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Sportsfan77777, you edited my assessment (above). There were actually two other edits that followed. I moved your comment to the comment section with a first level dot point with the edit summary Pls put comments in comments section. I believe that to be reasonably consistent with policy on the matter though I acknowledge that I might have done that better. If GoodDay misunderstood the "result", I took steps at their TP to remedy this. You reverted my move with the comment please don't edit others' comments, Cinderella157. Yes, I have removed your edits to my comment/assessment (above) with the edit summary Please don't edit others' comments, User:Sportsfan77777. I actually moved your edit to the correct place with the dot point in place so that it was a first level comment. This has all started with you editing another's comments. I welcome your comments but I would expect you treat others with the same courtesy that you would expect. To not do so is hypocrisy. Please fix this. Your comments are welcome (but in the right place), even if I disagree with them. Then, with the consent of GoodDay and Fyunck(click) (who have contributed to this thread), I would be happy to strike this whole section. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:00, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
Strike or hat it. GoodDay (talk) 18:37, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Left to fix

These patterns, with years prefixed to them, about 5000 articles with the opercapped "Singles" and "Doubles". I think they're pretty much all tennis, but haven't verified that carefully. The ones with "Singles" or "Doubles" immediately after the dash, without "Men's" or "Women's" or whatever, can be left as-is. I'll make a filtered list of article titles and ask for a bot to move them after we establish consensus. Dicklyon (talk) 20:18, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

List of articles, with year prefixes removed
* ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament – Wheelchair Doubles
* ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament – Wheelchair Singles
* AIG Japan Open Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* AIG Japan Open Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* AIG Japan Open Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* AIG Japan Open Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* ASB Classic – Men's Doubles
* ASB Classic – Men's Singles
* ASB Classic – Women's Doubles
* ASB Classic – Women's Singles
* ATP Challenger China International – Nanchang – Doubles
* ATP Challenger China International – Nanchang – Singles
* ATP China International Tennis Challenge – Anning – Doubles
* ATP China International Tennis Challenge – Anning – Singles
* Aberto da República – Men's Doubles
* Aberto da República – Men's Singles
* Aberto da República – Women's Doubles
* Aberto da República – Women's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano Pegaso – Men's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano Pegaso – Men's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano Pegaso – Women's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano Pegaso – Women's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano Telcel – Men's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano Telcel – Men's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano Telcel – Women's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano Telcel – Women's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano Telefonica Movistar – Men's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano Telefonica Movistar – Men's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano Telefonica Movistar – Women's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano Telefonica Movistar – Women's Singles
* Abierto Mexicano de Tenis Telefonica Movistar – Women's Doubles
* Abierto Mexicano de Tenis Telefonica Movistar – Women's Singles
* Adelaide International 1 – Men's Doubles
* Adelaide International 1 – Men's Singles
* Adelaide International 1 – Women's Doubles
* Adelaide International 1 – Women's Singles
* Adelaide International – Men's Doubles
* Adelaide International – Men's Singles
* Adelaide International – Women's Doubles
* Adelaide International – Women's Singles
* Adidas International – Men's Doubles
* Adidas International – Men's Singles
* Adidas International – Women's Doubles
* Adidas International – Women's Singles
* Advantage Cars Prague Open – Men's Doubles
* Advantage Cars Prague Open – Men's Singles
* Advantage Cars Prague Open – Women's Doubles
* Advantage Cars Prague Open – Women's Singles
* Aegon GB Pro-Series Bath – Men's Doubles
* Aegon GB Pro-Series Bath – Men's Singles
* Aegon GB Pro-Series Bath – Women's Doubles
* Aegon GB Pro-Series Bath – Women's Singles
* Aegon Ilkley Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Aegon Ilkley Trophy – Men's Singles
* Aegon Ilkley Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Aegon Ilkley Trophy – Women's Singles
* Aegon International Eastbourne – Men's Doubles
* Aegon International Eastbourne – Men's Singles
* Aegon International Eastbourne – Women's Doubles
* Aegon International Eastbourne – Women's Singles
* Aegon International – Men's Doubles
* Aegon International – Men's Singles
* Aegon International – Women's Doubles
* Aegon International – Women's Singles
* Aegon Pro-Series Loughborough – Men's Doubles
* Aegon Pro-Series Loughborough – Men's Singles
* Aegon Pro-Series Loughborough – Women's Doubles
* Aegon Pro-Series Loughborough – Women's Singles
* Aegon Surbiton Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Aegon Surbiton Trophy – Men's Singles
* Aegon Surbiton Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Aegon Surbiton Trophy – Women's Singles
* Aegon Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Aegon Trophy – Men's Singles
* Aegon Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Aegon Trophy – Women's Singles
* American Express – TED Open – Doubles
* American Express – TED Open – Singles
* Anning Open – Men's Doubles
* Anning Open – Men's Singles
* Anning Open – Women's Doubles
* Anning Open – Women's Singles
* Antonio Savoldi–Marco Cò – Trofeo Dimmidisì – Doubles
* Antonio Savoldi–Marco Cò – Trofeo Dimmidisì – Singles
* Apia International Sydney – Men's Doubles
* Apia International Sydney – Men's Singles
* Apia International Sydney – Women's Doubles
* Apia International Sydney – Women's Singles
* Aspria Tennis Cup – Trofeo CDI – Doubles
* Aspria Tennis Cup – Trofeo CDI – Singles
* Astana Open – Men's Doubles
* Astana Open – Men's Singles
* Astana Open – Women's Doubles
* Astana Open – Women's Singles
* Australasian Championships – Men's Doubles
* Australasian Championships – Men's Singles
* Australasian Championships – Mixed Doubles
* Australasian Championships – Women's Doubles
* Australasian Championships – Women's Singles
* Australian Championships – Men's Doubles
* Australian Championships – Men's Singles
* Australian Championships – Mixed Doubles
* Australian Championships – Women's Doubles
* Australian Championships – Women's Singles
* Australian Open (December) – Men's Doubles
* Australian Open (December) – Men's Singles
* Australian Open (December) – Women's Doubles
* Australian Open (December) – Women's Singles
* Australian Open (January) – Men's Doubles
* Australian Open (January) – Men's Singles
* Australian Open (January) – Women's Doubles
* Australian Open (January) – Women's Singles
* Australian Open – Boys' Doubles
* Australian Open – Boys' Singles
* Australian Open – Girls' Doubles
* Australian Open – Girls' Singles
* Australian Open – Men's Doubles
* Australian Open – Men's Legends' Doubles
* Australian Open – Men's Singles
* Australian Open – Mixed Doubles
* Australian Open – Wheelchair Men's Doubles
* Australian Open – Wheelchair Men's Singles
* Australian Open – Wheelchair Quad Doubles
* Australian Open – Wheelchair Quad Singles
* Australian Open – Wheelchair Women's Doubles
* Australian Open – Wheelchair Women's Singles
* Australian Open – Women's Doubles
* Australian Open – Women's Legends Doubles
* Australian Open – Women's Legends' Doubles
* Australian Open – Women's Singles
* BNP Paribas Open – Men's Doubles
* BNP Paribas Open – Men's Singles
* BNP Paribas Open – Women's Doubles
* BNP Paribas Open – Women's Singles
* Badminton Asia Junior Championships – Boys' Doubles
* Badminton Asia Junior Championships – Boys' Singles
* Badminton Asia Junior Championships – Girls' Doubles
* Badminton Asia Junior Championships – Girls' Singles
* Beijing International Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Beijing International Challenger – Men's Singles
* Beijing International Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Beijing International Challenger – Women's Singles
* Belgrade Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Belgrade Challenger – Men's Singles
* Belgrade Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Belgrade Challenger – Women's Singles
* Bendigo International – Men's Doubles
* Bendigo International – Men's Singles
* Bendigo International – Women's Singles
* Benson & Hedges Centennial Open – Men's Singles
* Brasil Open – Men's Doubles
* Brasil Open – Men's Singles
* Brisbane International – Men's Doubles
* Brisbane International – Men's Singles
* Brisbane International – Women's Doubles
* Brisbane International – Women's Singles
* British Hard Court Championships – Men's Singles
* Burnie International – Men's Doubles
* Burnie International – Men's Singles
* Burnie International – Women's Doubles
* Burnie International – Women's Singles
* Camparini Gioielli Cup – Trofeo Pompea – Doubles
* Camparini Gioielli Cup – Trofeo Pompea – Singles
* Canadian Open – Men's Doubles
* Canadian Open – Men's Singles
* Canadian Open – Women's Doubles
* Canadian Open – Women's Singles
* Canberra Tennis International – Men's Doubles
* Canberra Tennis International – Men's Singles
* Canberra Tennis International – Women's Doubles
* Canberra Tennis International – Women's Singles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Gatineau – Men's Doubles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Gatineau – Men's Singles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Gatineau – Women's Doubles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Gatineau – Women's Singles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Granby – Men's Doubles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Granby – Men's Singles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Granby – Women's Doubles
* Challenger Banque Nationale de Granby – Women's Singles
* China Open – Men's Doubles
* China Open – Men's Singles
* China Open – Mixed Doubles
* China Open – Women's Doubles
* China Open – Women's Singles
* Cincinnati Open – Men's Singles
* Citi Open – Men's Doubles
* Citi Open – Men's Singles
* Citi Open – Women's Doubles
* Citi Open – Women's Singles
* Città di Vercelli – Trofeo Multimed – Doubles
* Città di Vercelli – Trofeo Multimed – Singles
* City of Playford Tennis International II – Men's Doubles
* City of Playford Tennis International II – Men's Singles
* City of Playford Tennis International II – Women's Doubles
* City of Playford Tennis International II – Women's Singles
* City of Playford Tennis International – Men's Doubles
* City of Playford Tennis International – Men's Singles
* Claro Open Medellín – Men's Doubles
* Claro Open Medellín – Men's Singles
* Columbus Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Columbus Challenger – Men's Singles
* Columbus Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Columbus Challenger – Women's Singles
* Compaq Grand Slam Cup – Men's Singles
* Compaq Grand Slam Cup – Women's Singles
* Concurso Internacional de Tenis – San Sebastián – Doubles
* Concurso Internacional de Tenis – San Sebastián – Singles
* Concurso Internacional de Tenis – Vigo – Doubles
* Concurso Internacional de Tenis – Vigo – Singles
* Darwin Tennis International – Women's Doubles
* Darwin Tennis International – Women's Singles
* Delhi Open – Men's Doubles
* Delhi Open – Men's Singles
* Delhi Open – Women's Doubles
* Delhi Open – Women's Singles
* Dubai Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* Dubai Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* Dubai Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* Dubai Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* Dunlop World Challenge – Men's Doubles
* Dunlop World Challenge – Men's Singles
* Dunlop World Challenge – Women's Doubles
* Dunlop World Challenge – Women's Singles
* ECM Prague Open – Men's Doubles
* ECM Prague Open – Men's Singles
* ECM Prague Open – Women's Doubles
* ECM Prague Open – Women's Singles
* Eastbourne International – Men's Doubles
* Eastbourne International – Men's Singles
* Eastbourne International – Women's Doubles
* Eastbourne International – Women's Singles
* Emilia-Romagna Open – Men's Doubles
* Emilia-Romagna Open – Men's Singles
* Emilia-Romagna Open – Women's Doubles
* Emilia-Romagna Open – Women's Singles
* Ericsson Open – Men's Doubles
* Ericsson Open – Men's Singles
* Ericsson Open – Women's Doubles
* Ericsson Open – Women's Singles
* Estoril Open – Men's Doubles
* Estoril Open – Men's Singles
* Estoril Open – Women's Doubles
* Estoril Open – Women's Singles
* Fergana Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Fergana Challenger – Men's Singles
* Fergana Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Fergana Challenger – Women's Singles
* Fifth Third Bank Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* Fifth Third Bank Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* Fifth Third Bank Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* Fifth Third Bank Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* French Championships – Men's Doubles
* French Championships – Men's Singles
* French Championships – Seniors Over 40 Singles
* French Championships – Women's Doubles
* French Championships – Women's Singles
* French Covered Court Championships – Men's Singles
* French Open – Boys' Doubles
* French Open – Boys' Singles
* French Open – Girls' Doubles
* French Open – Girls' Singles
* French Open – Legends Over 45 Doubles
* French Open – Legends Under 45 Doubles
* French Open – Men's Doubles
* French Open – Men's Singles
* French Open – Mixed Doubles
* French Open – Wheelchair Men's Doubles
* French Open – Wheelchair Men's Singles
* French Open – Wheelchair Quad Doubles
* French Open – Wheelchair Quad Singles
* French Open – Wheelchair Women's Doubles
* French Open – Wheelchair Women's Singles
* French Open – Women's Doubles
* French Open – Women's Legends Doubles
* French Open – Women's Singles
* Fuzion 100 Ilkley Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Fuzion 100 Ilkley Trophy – Men's Singles
* Fuzion 100 Ilkley Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Fuzion 100 Ilkley Trophy – Women's Singles
* Fuzion 100 Surbiton Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Fuzion 100 Surbiton Trophy – Men's Singles
* Fuzion 100 Surbiton Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Fuzion 100 Surbiton Trophy – Women's Singles
* Hamburg European Open – Men's Doubles
* Hamburg European Open – Men's Singles
* Hamburg European Open – Women's Doubles
* Hamburg European Open – Women's Singles
* Heineken Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Heineken Trophy – Men's Singles
* Heineken Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Heineken Trophy – Women's Singles
* Holden NSW Open – Men's Doubles
* Holden NSW Open – Men's Singles
* Hua Hin Championships – Men's Doubles
* Hua Hin Championships – Men's Singles
* Hua Hin Championships – Women's Doubles
* Hua Hin Championships – Women's Singles
* Hungarian International Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* I.ČLTK Prague Open – Men's Doubles
* I.ČLTK Prague Open – Men's Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Baotou – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Baotou – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Hong Kong – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Hong Kong – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Sanya – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Sanya – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Shenzhen Longhua – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Shenzhen Longhua – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Shenzhen – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Shenzhen – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Suzhou – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Suzhou – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Wenshan – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Wenshan – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Wuhan – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Wuhan – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Xi'an – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Xi'an – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Xuzhou – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Xuzhou – Singles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Yakima – Doubles
* ITF Women's Circuit – Yakima – Singles
* ITF Women's World Tennis Tour – Bellinzona – Doubles
* ITF Women's World Tennis Tour – Bellinzona – Singles
* Idea Prokom Open – Men's Doubles
* Idea Prokom Open – Men's Singles
* Idea Prokom Open – Women's Doubles
* Idea Prokom Open – Women's Singles
* Ilkley Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Ilkley Trophy – Men's Singles
* Ilkley Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Ilkley Trophy – Women's Singles
* Indian Wells Masters – Men's Doubles
* Indian Wells Masters – Men's Singles
* Indian Wells Masters – Women's Doubles
* Indian Wells Masters – Women's Singles
* Internationaux du Doubs – Open de Franche-Comté – Doubles
* Internationaux du Doubs – Open de Franche-Comté – Singles
* Internazionali di Tennis del Friuli Venezia Giulia – Men's Doubles
* Internazionali di Tennis del Friuli Venezia Giulia – Men's Singles
* Internazionali di Tennis di Manerbio – Trofeo Dimmidisì – Doubles
* Internazionali di Tennis di Manerbio – Trofeo Dimmidisì – Singles
* Italian Open – Men's Doubles
* Italian Open – Men's Singles
* Italian Open – Women's Doubles
* Italian Open – Women's Singles
* Japan Open Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* Japan Open Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* Japan Open Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* Japan Open Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* Jin'an Open – Women's Doubles
* Jin'an Open – Women's Singles
* Jinan International Open – Men's Doubles
* Jinan International Open – Men's Singles
* Jinan International Open – Women's Doubles
* Jinan International Open – Women's Singles
* Kazan Summer Cup – Men's Doubles
* Kazan Summer Cup – Men's Singles
* Kazan Summer Cup – Women's Doubles
* Kazan Summer Cup – Women's Singles
* Keio Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Keio Challenger – Men's Singles
* Kentucky Bank Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* Kentucky Bank Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* Kentucky Bank Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* Kentucky Bank Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* Kremlin Cup – Men's Doubles
* Kremlin Cup – Men's Singles
* Kremlin Cup – Women's Doubles
* Kremlin Cup – Women's Singles
* Kroger St. Jude International – Men's Doubles
* Kroger St. Jude International – Men's Singles
* Kroger St. Jude International – Women's Doubles
* Kroger St. Jude International – Women's Singles
* Kunming Open – Men's Doubles
* Kunming Open – Men's Singles
* Kunming Open – Women's Doubles
* Kunming Open – Women's Singles
* Launceston International – Men's Doubles
* Launceston International – Men's Singles
* Launceston Tennis International – Men's Doubles
* Launceston Tennis International – Men's Singles
* Launceston Tennis International – Women's Doubles
* Launceston Tennis International – Women's Singles
* Lecoq Seoul Open – Men's Doubles
* Lecoq Seoul Open – Men's Singles
* Lecoq Seoul Open – Women's Doubles
* Lecoq Seoul Open – Women's Singles
* Lipton Championships – Men's Doubles
* Lipton Championships – Men's Singles
* Lipton Championships – Women's Doubles
* Lipton Championships – Women's Singles
* Lipton International Players Championships – Men's Doubles
* Lipton International Players Championships – Men's Singles
* Lipton International Players Championships – Women's Doubles
* Lipton International Players Championships – Women's Singles
* Lisboa Belém Open – Men's Doubles
* Lisboa Belém Open – Men's Singles
* Liuzhou International Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Liuzhou International Challenger – Men's Singles
* Liuzhou International Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Liuzhou International Challenger – Women's Singles
* Liuzhou Open – Men's Doubles
* Liuzhou Open – Men's Singles
* Liuzhou Open – Women's Doubles
* Liuzhou Open – Women's Singles
* Manta Open – Trofeo Ricardo Delgado Aray – Doubles
* Manta Open – Trofeo Ricardo Delgado Aray – Singles
* MasterCard Tennis Cup – Men's Doubles
* MasterCard Tennis Cup – Men's Singles
* MasterCard Tennis Cup – Women's Doubles
* MasterCard Tennis Cup – Women's Singles
* McDonald's Burnie International – Men's Doubles
* McDonald's Burnie International – Men's Singles
* McDonald's Burnie International – Women's Doubles
* McDonald's Burnie International – Women's Singles
* Medibank International Sydney – Men's Doubles
* Medibank International Sydney – Men's Singles
* Medibank International Sydney – Women's Doubles
* Medibank International Sydney – Women's Singles
* Medibank International – Men's Doubles
* Medibank International – Men's Singles
* Medibank International – Women's Doubles
* Medibank International – Women's Singles
* Melbourne Summer Set 1 – Men's Doubles
* Melbourne Summer Set 1 – Men's Singles
* Melbourne Summer Set 1 – Women's Singles
* Miami Open – Men's Doubles
* Miami Open – Men's Singles
* Miami Open – Women's Doubles
* Miami Open – Women's Singles
* Morelos Open – Men's Doubles
* Morelos Open – Men's Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Casablanca II – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Casablanca II – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Casablanca – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Casablanca – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Kenitra – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Kenitra – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Marrakech – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Marrakech – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Meknes – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Meknes – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Mohammedia – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Mohammedia – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Rabat – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Rabat – Singles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Tanger – Doubles
* Morocco Tennis Tour – Tanger – Singles
* Mubadala World Tennis Championship – Men's Singles
* Murray Trophy – Glasgow – Doubles
* Murray Trophy – Glasgow – Singles
* Mutua Madrid Open – Men's Doubles
* Mutua Madrid Open – Men's Singles
* Mutua Madrid Open – Women's Doubles
* Mutua Madrid Open – Women's Singles
* Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open – Men's Doubles
* Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open – Men's Singles
* Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open – Women's Doubles
* Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open – Women's Singles
* NASDAQ-100 Open – Men's Doubles
* NASDAQ-100 Open – Men's Singles
* NASDAQ-100 Open – Women's Doubles
* NASDAQ-100 Open – Women's Singles
* National Bank Open – Men's Doubles
* National Bank Open – Men's Singles
* National Bank Open – Women's Doubles
* National Bank Open – Women's Singles
* Nature's Way Sydney Tennis International – Men's Doubles
* Nature's Way Sydney Tennis International – Men's Singles
* Nature's Way Sydney Tennis International – Women's Doubles
* Nature's Way Sydney Tennis International – Women's Singles
* New South Wales Open – Men's Doubles
* New South Wales Open – Men's Singles
* New South Wales Open – Women's Doubles
* New South Wales Open – Women's Singles
* New Zealand Open – Men's Singles
* Ningbo Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Ningbo Challenger – Men's Singles
* Ningbo Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Ningbo Challenger – Women's Singles
* Nokia Open – Men's Doubles
* Nokia Open – Men's Singles
* Nokia Open – Women's Doubles
* Nokia Open – Women's Singles
* Nottingham Challenge – Men's Doubles
* Nottingham Challenge – Men's Singles
* Nottingham Challenge – Women's Doubles
* Nottingham Challenge – Women's Singles
* Nottingham Open – Men's Doubles
* Nottingham Open – Men's Singles
* Nottingham Open – Women's Doubles
* Nottingham Open – Women's Singles
* Nottingham Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Nottingham Trophy – Men's Singles
* Nottingham Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Nottingham Trophy – Women's Singles
* ONGC–GAIL Delhi Open – Men's Doubles
* ONGC–GAIL Delhi Open – Men's Singles
* ONGC–GAIL Delhi Open – Women's Doubles
* ONGC–GAIL Delhi Open – Women's Singles
* OTB International Open – Men's Doubles
* OTB International Open – Men's Singles
* OTB Open – Men's Doubles
* OTB Open – Men's Singles
* OTB Open – Women's Doubles
* OTB Open – Women's Singles
* OTB Schenectady Open – Men's Doubles
* OTB Schenectady Open – Men's Singles
* Odlum Brown Vancouver Open – Men's Doubles
* Odlum Brown Vancouver Open – Men's Singles
* Odlum Brown Vancouver Open – Women's Doubles
* Odlum Brown Vancouver Open – Women's Singles
* Open Barletta – Città della Disfida – Doubles
* Open Barletta – Città della Disfida – Singles
* Open Castilla y León – Men's Doubles
* Open Castilla y León – Men's Singles
* Open Costa Adeje – Isla de Tenerife – Doubles
* Open Costa Adeje – Isla de Tenerife – Singles
* Open Diputación Ciudad de Pozoblanco – Men's Doubles
* Open Diputación Ciudad de Pozoblanco – Men's Singles
* Open Diputación Ciudad de Pozoblanco – Women's Doubles
* Open Diputación Ciudad de Pozoblanco – Women's Singles
* Open Seguros Bolívar – Men's Doubles
* Open Seguros Bolívar – Men's Singles
* Open Seguros Bolívar – Women's Doubles
* Open Seguros Bolívar – Women's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Chicago – Men's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Chicago – Men's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Chicago – Women's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Chicago – Women's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Houston – Men's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Houston – Men's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Houston – Women's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Houston – Women's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Indian Wells – Men's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Indian Wells – Men's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Indian Wells – Women's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Indian Wells – Women's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – New Haven – Men's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – New Haven – Men's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – New Haven – Women's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – New Haven – Women's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Newport Beach – Men's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Newport Beach – Men's Singles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Newport Beach – Women's Doubles
* Oracle Challenger Series – Newport Beach – Women's Singles
* Ordina Open – Men's Doubles
* Ordina Open – Men's Singles
* Ordina Open – Women's Doubles
* Ordina Open – Women's Singles
* Pacific Life Open – Men's Doubles
* Pacific Life Open – Men's Singles
* Pacific Life Open – Women's Doubles
* Pacific Life Open – Women's Singles
* Peters International – Men's Doubles
* Peters International – Men's Singles
* Peters International – Women's Doubles
* Peters International – Women's Singles
* Peters NSW Open – Men's Singles
* Peters NSW Open – Women's Doubles
* Peters NSW Open – Women's Singles
* Pilot Pen International – Men's Doubles
* Pilot Pen International – Men's Singles
* Pilot Pen International – Women's Doubles
* Pilot Pen International – Women's Singles
* Pilot Pen Tennis – Men's Doubles
* Pilot Pen Tennis – Men's Singles
* Pilot Pen Tennis – Women's Doubles
* Pilot Pen Tennis – Women's Singles
* Pingshan Open – Men's Doubles
* Pingshan Open – Men's Singles
* Pingshan Open – Women's Doubles
* Pingshan Open – Women's Singles
* Player's Canadian Open – Men's Singles
* Player's Canadian Open – Women's Doubles
* Player's Canadian Open – Women's Singles
* Portugal Open – Men's Doubles
* Portugal Open – Men's Singles
* Portugal Open – Women's Doubles
* Portugal Open – Women's Singles
* President's Cup (tennis) – Men's Doubles
* President's Cup (tennis) – Men's Singles
* President's Cup (tennis) – Women's Doubles
* President's Cup (tennis) – Women's Singles
* President's Cup – Men's Doubles
* President's Cup – Men's Singles
* President's Cup – Women's Doubles
* President's Cup – Women's Singles
* Queen's Club Championships – Men's Doubles
* Queen's Club Championships – Men's Singles
* Queen's Club Championships – Wheelchair Doubles
* Queen's Club Championships – Wheelchair Singles
* Racquetball World Championships – Men's Doubles
* Racquetball World Championships – Men's Singles
* Racquetball World Championships – Women's Doubles
* Racquetball World Championships – Women's Singles
* Ricoh Open – Men's Doubles
* Ricoh Open – Men's Singles
* Ricoh Open – Women's Doubles
* Ricoh Open – Women's Singles
* Rio Open – Men's Doubles
* Rio Open – Men's Singles
* Rio Open – Women's Doubles
* Rio Open – Women's Singles
* Ritro Slovak Open – Men's Doubles
* Ritro Slovak Open – Men's Singles
* Ritro Slovak Open – Women's Doubles
* Ritro Slovak Open – Women's Singles
* Rogers Cup – Men's Doubles
* Rogers Cup – Men's Singles
* Rogers Cup – Women's Doubles
* Rogers Cup – Women's Singles
* Rogers Masters – Men's Doubles
* Rosmalen Grass Court Championships – Men's Doubles
* Rosmalen Grass Court Championships – Men's Singles
* Rosmalen Grass Court Championships – Women's Doubles
* Rosmalen Grass Court Championships – Women's Singles
* Samsung Securities Cup – Men's Doubles
* Samsung Securities Cup – Men's Singles
* Samsung Securities Cup – Women's Doubles
* Samsung Securities Cup – Women's Singles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Bogotá – Men's Doubles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Bogotá – Men's Singles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Bogotá – Women's Singles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Medellín – Men's Doubles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Medellín – Men's Singles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Medellín – Women's Doubles
* Seguros Bolívar Open Medellín – Women's Singles
* Serbia Open – Men's Doubles
* Serbia Open – Men's Singles
* Serbia Open – Women's Doubles
* Serbia Open – Women's Singles
* Shenzhen Longhua Open – Men's Doubles
* Shenzhen Longhua Open – Men's Singles
* Shenzhen Longhua Open – Women's Doubles
* Shenzhen Longhua Open – Women's Singles
* Slovak Open – Men's Doubles
* Slovak Open – Men's Singles
* Slovak Open – Women's Doubles
* Slovak Open – Women's Singles
* Sony Ericsson Open – Boys' Singles
* Sony Ericsson Open – Girls' Singles
* Sony Ericsson Open – Men's Doubles
* Sony Ericsson Open – Men's Singles
* Sony Ericsson Open – Women's Doubles
* Sony Ericsson Open – Women's Singles
* Sony Open Tennis – Men's Doubles
* Sony Open Tennis – Men's Singles
* Sony Open Tennis – Women's Doubles
* Sony Open Tennis – Women's Singles
* South American Open – Men's Singles
* South Australian Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* Soweto Open – Men's Doubles
* Soweto Open – Men's Singles
* Soweto Open – Women's Doubles
* Soweto Open – Women's Singles
* Stockholm Open – Men's Doubles
* Stockholm Open – Men's Singles
* Stockton Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Stockton Challenger – Men's Singles
* Stockton Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Stockton Challenger – Women's Singles
* Strabag Prague Open – Men's Doubles
* Strabag Prague Open – Men's Singles
* Strabag Prague Open – Women's Doubles
* Strabag Prague Open – Women's Singles
* Suntory Japan Open Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* Suntory Japan Open Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* Suntory Japan Open Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* Suntory Japan Open Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* Surbiton Trophy – Men's Doubles
* Surbiton Trophy – Men's Singles
* Surbiton Trophy – Women's Doubles
* Surbiton Trophy – Women's Singles
* Swedish Open – Men's Doubles
* Swedish Open – Men's Singles
* Swedish Open – Women's Doubles
* Swedish Open – Women's Singles
* Sydney International – Men's Doubles
* Sydney International – Men's Singles
* Sydney International – Women's Doubles
* Sydney International – Women's Singles
* São Paulo Challenger de Tênis – Men's Doubles
* São Paulo Challenger de Tênis – Men's Singles
* São Paulo Challenger de Tênis – Women's Doubles
* São Paulo Challenger de Tênis – Women's Singles
* TEAN International – Men's Doubles
* TEAN International – Men's Singles
* TEAN International – Women's Doubles
* TEAN International – Women's Singles
* Tampere Open – Men's Doubles
* Tampere Open – Men's Singles
* Tampere Open – Women's Doubles
* Tampere Open – Women's Singles
* Tennis Championships of Maui – Men's Doubles
* Tennis Championships of Maui – Men's Singles
* Tennis Championships of Maui – Women's Doubles
* Tennis Championships of Maui – Women's Singles
* Tianjin Health Industry Park – Men's Singles
* Topshelf Open – Men's Doubles
* Topshelf Open – Men's Singles
* Topshelf Open – Women's Doubles
* Topshelf Open – Women's Singles
* Traralgon International – Men's Doubles
* Traralgon International – Men's Singles
* Traralgon International – Women's Doubles
* Traralgon International – Women's Singles
* U.S. Clay Court Championships – Men's Doubles
* U.S. Clay Court Championships – Men's Singles
* U.S. Clay Court Championships – Women's Doubles
* U.S. Clay Court Championships – Women's Singles
* U.S. National Championships – Men's Doubles
* U.S. National Championships – Men's Singles
* U.S. National Championships – Women's Doubles
* U.S. National Championships – Women's Singles
* U.S. National Indoor Tennis Championships – Men's Doubles
* U.S. National Indoor Tennis Championships – Men's Singles
* U.S. National Indoor Tennis Championships – Women's Doubles
* U.S. National Indoor Tennis Championships – Women's Singles
* U.S. Professional Indoor – Men's Singles
* UNICEF Open – Men's Doubles
* UNICEF Open – Men's Singles
* UNICEF Open – Women's Doubles
* UNICEF Open – Women's Singles
* US Open – Boys' Doubles
* US Open – Boys' Singles
* US Open – Girls' Doubles
* US Open – Girls' Singles
* US Open – Men's Doubles
* US Open – Men's Singles
* US Open – Mixed Doubles
* US Open – Wheelchair Men's Doubles
* US Open – Wheelchair Men's Singles
* US Open – Wheelchair Quad Doubles
* US Open – Wheelchair Quad Singles
* US Open – Wheelchair Women's Doubles
* US Open – Wheelchair Women's Singles
* US Open – Women's Doubles
* US Open – Women's Singles
* Uruguay Open – Men's Doubles
* Uruguay Open – Men's Singles
* Uruguay Open – Women's Doubles
* Uruguay Open – Women's Singles
* Volvo Open – Men's Doubles
* Volvo Open – Men's Singles
* Volvo Open – Women's Doubles
* Volvo Open – Women's Singles
* Western & Southern Open – Men's Doubles
* Western & Southern Open – Men's Singles
* Western & Southern Open – Women's Doubles
* Western & Southern Open – Women's Singles
* Wheelchair Doubles Masters – Men's Doubles
* Wheelchair Doubles Masters – Quad Doubles
* Wheelchair Doubles Masters – Women's Doubles
* Wheelchair Tennis Masters – Men's Singles
* Wheelchair Tennis Masters – Quad Singles
* Wheelchair Tennis Masters – Women's Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Boys' Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Boys' Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Gentlemen's Invitation Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Girls' Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Girls' Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Ladies' Invitation Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Men's Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Men's Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Mixed Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Senior Gentlemen's Invitation Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Wheelchair Men's Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Wheelchair Men's Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Wheelchair Quad Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Wheelchair Quad Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Wheelchair Women's Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Wheelchair Women's Singles
* Wimbledon Championships – Women's Doubles
* Wimbledon Championships – Women's Singles
* Winnipeg National Bank Challenger – Men's Doubles
* Winnipeg National Bank Challenger – Men's Singles
* Winnipeg National Bank Challenger – Women's Doubles
* Winnipeg National Bank Challenger – Women's Singles
* World Hard Court Championships – Men's Doubles
* World Hard Court Championships – Men's Singles
* World Hard Court Championships – Mixed Doubles
* World Hard Court Championships – Women's Doubles
* World Hard Court Championships – Women's Singles
* Zagreb Open – Men's Doubles
* Zagreb Open – Men's Singles
* Zagreb Open – Women's Doubles
* Zagreb Open – Women's Singles
* Zhuhai Open – Men's Doubles
* Zhuhai Open – Men's Singles
* Zhuhai Open – Women's Doubles
* Zhuhai Open – Women's Singles
* du Maurier Open – Men's Doubles
* du Maurier Open – Men's Singles
* du Maurier Open – Women's Doubles
* du Maurier Open – Women's Singles
5000 must be really low. Just Wimbledon has 140 years of events so probably 800 needless changes for just one tournament. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:38, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
834 for Wimbledon to be exact. "Needless" is just your opinion. If we want to cure the tennis inconsistency, these need to be fixed. It's not that hard. Dicklyon (talk) 22:08, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
That these "need to be fixed" is just your opinion. That's no more or less correct than Fyunck's opinion. Thryduulf (talk) 22:53, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
And who knows how many LUA written modules such as Template:Infobox tennis tournament event will have sudden problems crop up. And I have no idea about all the individual templates on each and every player article. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:14, 2 January 2022 (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.

Post-close

@Chess: Thanks for closing this complicated mess. But I have to ask why you say "there is a consensus to let the editors in the tennis topic area decide the capitalization issue themselves". It seemed to me that a majority of respondents had good policy and guideline based reasons to want to fix the over-capitalization that appears on some (but not all) of the tennis pages. Where are you seeing a consensus to let that project keep it this messy way that they claim is based on a compromise with the multi-sport project? Dicklyon (talk) 23:38, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

@Dicklyon: The consensus wasn't to enforce any particular capitalization standard for the tennis topic area, but that editors are free to decide what capitalization standard is applicable to the tennis topic area. It's more or less an invitation to start a new RfC on capitalization after dashes in the tennis area; not an endorsement of what may or may not be the current standard in that area. I apologize if that wasn't clear. Chess (talk) (please use ((reply to|Chess)) on reply) 00:18, 3 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi @Chess: this RfC was never about creating new rules but a ruling on the application of existing "rules" in a particular circumstance. There was never any particular proposal on the table for a change to WP:AT. The possibility of a change to that policy was only raised three days ago. This RfC started with the good faith assumption that the dash was a permitted construction. The issue of permissibility was only identified quite late and WP:AT is quite prescriptive in this regard. Do not use titles suggesting that one article forms part of another: even if an article is considered subsidiary to another ... and Commas and parentheses (round brackets) are the only characters that can be used without restriction to separate a disambiguating term in an article title. Colons can be used in the limited cases of subtitles of some creative works and lists split over several pages. The close states that dashes should be allowed for the future, but it also states there is no consensus to ban dashes in sports event titles. Where does the close stand in regard to this inconsistency with WP:AT? Can (or should) we consider a proposal that would make the dashed construction for sports event titles acceptable within WP:AT or is the close saying we should just ignore this. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 02:40, 3 January 2022 (UTC)

WT:Article titles is pretty much the same consensus level as WP:Article titles. If a proposal here that gained consensus was found to contradict WP:Article titles, the new proposal here should hold. It doesn't make sense to distinguish between interpretation and policy. All that being said, the "inconsistency" that was raised wasn't really agreed upon to be an inconsistency. There was much debate over whether a dash constituted a "disambiguating term" or created a "subsidiary article" or didn't do anything that was banned by policy, or even claiming that the usage of the dash was an exemption that existed. Which is part of why the close was phrased the way that it was. The status quo is currently allowing dashes in these titles, and since there wasn't a consensus to ban them/interpret the policy as banning them they are allowed.
That being said, if you want to create an RfC to address that perceived inconsistency (such as by banning/explicitly allowing dashes in sports event titles) then go ahead. This RfC was a WP:TRAINWRECK and a far more focused RfC might gain an actual consensus. Chess (talk) (please use ((reply to|Chess)) on reply) 04:19, 3 January 2022 (UTC)

In reference to the quote in the close: "While I am not familiar with the language or syntax of templates, this is potentially an opportunity to improve the flexibility of the templates." and the conclusion drawn by the close: I don't really see the appeal of this refutation as it didn't address how this potentially massive issue will be resolved and just proposed other people doing more work to fix the template issues. I proposed a solution that did not require a change to templates and did not advocate for a change that would necessitate a change to templates. The quote was in the context of existing problems with the templates - if that course was chosen. If the close has a valid conclusion to make in regard to the template issue, it should be able to be made without misrepresenting what I have said. If the close has an invalid conclusion on the matter, it should definitely not be made by misrepresenting what I have said. Either way, the misrepresentation is the issue and misrepresentation is a matter of WP:CIVILITY. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:08, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Transgender people and COMMONNAME

Can we update the page, specifically WP:COMMONNAME to reflect the guidelines in WP:GENDERID and MOS:GENDERID? At the moment, the COMMONNAME section doesn't explicitly say what to do in cases where the common name isn't what the person's own name was and thus leaves a lot of room for ambiguity. For example, in cases where the majority of sources report a person's name to be X and use the name X for them, though noting they were transgender and called themselves Y, COMMONNAME has been used to argue for continuing to call them X. Since COMMONNAME is a policy, unlike the gender related style guides, it's been argued it overrides considerations of their gender identity. While there are many references to checking the applicable guidelines in specific cases, I think that an explicit reference to cases of trans people and the appropriate guides would help Wikipedia. TheTranarchist (talk) 16:08, 9 February 2022 (UTC)TheTranarchist

I don't see the need for this. When trans people change their name, WP:NAMECHANGES (part of the COMMONNAME policy) applies just as it would to any other name change. Also, BLP would also apply for living trans people. IffyChat -- 16:29, 9 February 2022 (UTC)
The page already says "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." and "When there are multiple names for a subject, all of which are fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others. (bold mine) Policy already establishes several broad exceptions for not strictly obeying the "use the most common name available in reliable sources" guidance. Deadnaming a transgendered person who has changed their name to match their gender is "inaccurate", and it's perfectly allowable by policy to use the accurate name. I'm not sure we need more than that. --Jayron32 16:51, 9 February 2022 (UTC)
Thank you both for the clarification! I thought so as well, the only reason I thought some specificity might be good for this was if you take a look at Talk:Gregory Hemingway COMMONNAME is used as justification for not following style guides, despite the relevant sections. Hopefully this should clear things up over there! In addition, what do you think about adding links to WP:GENDERID in the infobox "Topic-specific naming conventions for article titles" section "People"? TheTranarchist (talk) 18:40, 9 February 2022 (UTC)TheTranarchist (talk) 18:20, 9 February 2022 (UTC)TheTranarchist

Discussion at Template talk:Subcat guideline § Naming convention

 You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:Subcat guideline § Naming convention. –Novem Linguae (talk) 21:18, 20 February 2022 (UTC)

Query

I recently discovered the article Raleigh murders. I am not sure this is an appropriate title given that many murders have happened in that city and the sources are not referring to these killings under this naming convention consistently. Not really sure what the topic should be called.4meter4 (talk) 01:55, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

1996 Raleigh murders would be fine. 162 etc. (talk) 05:06, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Should natural disambiguation be more natural than parenthetical disambiguation?

Should we, in deciding whether to use a natural disambiguation, give extra weight to how natural the consequent names are (per WP:CRITERIA)? Should we give extra weight to official names? As written, the guideline is quite clear for common nouns where two options are similar, but my take of WP:NATDAB and WP:COMMONNAME is that we should only use names that are more natural, and are at least in common use, giving a preference to the nat dabs only as the deciding factor if they are more natural than the disambiguated commonest name.

I ask because there is current discussion on whether to apply official names to a number of New Zealand places as natural disambiguation (Talk:Cam_River_(Canterbury)#Requested_move_22_March_2022), but many of these official names are particularly rare in use, and result in substantially less natural titles. The implication of the RM is that the official name carries its own weight beyond its popular usage or naturalness. — HTGS (talk) 05:37, 25 March 2022 (UTC)

Generically speaking, I'd expect a natural dab to be somewhat-to-pretty common, which conceivably might not always be the case for an official name. It's subjective, and best left to discussion for a given area's subject matter experts.—Bagumba (talk) 09:13, 25 March 2022 (UTC)

NATURAL

The following discussion 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.


There is a proposal at Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation#How common to be sufficiently common for natural disambiguation? to reword WP:NATURAL to make it more restrictive. Crouch, Swale (talk) 19:03, 5 March 2022 (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.

Requested move: Schutzstaffel → SS

There is a requested move for Schutzstaffel that has prompted debate over several aspects of this policy, including common names and precision. As a result, y'all may be interested in weighing in. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 02:50, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

US or U.S.?

Wikipedia has over 1,300 articles with titles beginning "U.S.", including, e.g., U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School, U.S. government response to the September 11 attacks, U.S. kill or capture strategy in Iraq, U.S. senator bibliography (congressional memoirs), and U.S. space exploration history on U.S. stamps (though more than half of all "U.S." titles are highway routes), and about 300 articles with titles beginning "US", including, e.g., US General Accounting Office Building, US Breastfeeding Report Card 2014, US military watches, US public opinion on the North American Free Trade Agreement, US state laws and policies for ICT accessibility. We should have consistency, but what should be the standard, and should things like names of military units or route numbers be treated differently from generic examinations of the country's policies and activities? BD2412 T 22:09, 26 March 2022 (UTC)

Aren't a lot of these done by sourcing? In tennis the organization is quite specific that it's always US Open while in golf it's always U.S. Open. We would need to be careful not to infringe on sourcing on some articles. When it is U.S. govt specific articles it looks like its usually U.S. (U.S. Air Force), and when it's general (US public opinion) it usually US. However the article "US General Accounting Office Building" you listed officially goes by U.S. so that should change if we keep the same general format. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:28, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
Chicago Manual of Syle shifted significantly toward US in its 2014 edition; but we still need to observe the titles of institutions that haven't yet updated. Tony (talk) 00:26, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Many of these are topics, not institutions, though. I pointed out several of each kind to highlight this. BD2412 T 02:07, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Personally, the highway articles should be moved to ditch the periods as we have the inconsistency of "U.S. Route 1" and "US 1"; periods in the full name but not in the abbreviation. I've said before that we should follow CMOS on that and ditch the periods from the highway names. Imzadi 1979  02:35, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
I strongly disagree. CMOS has been showing a disturbing pattern in recent years of following trends in British English which make no sense because they appear to be attributable to the UK's gross underfunding and incompetent mismanagement of its schools. We have a lot of British expats here in California who fled to America to teach in schools that still value good writing. I read Chaucer during my senior year of high school with a Cambridge alumnus. And to be clear, I am thoroughly familiar with the differences between American and British English because I have made a point of reading UK newspapers and magazines regularly for over 20 years (it helps that California libraries carry so many of them because we have so many expats).
The better solution is to standardize all article titles about American subjects on the most common usage in formal written English, U.S. That is unlikely to change any time soon. The two most common legal citation guides, the Bluebook and ALWD, both prefer U.S. and have always done so for many years. Every decent law school in the United States pounds one or the other of those citation guides into graduates. And the prominence of lawyers in American public life ensures that the vast majority of American government agencies, Fortune 500 corporations, and top-tier universities are managed by people who learned to write U.S. with the periods and they expect everyone who reports to them to write that way. --Coolcaesar (talk) 06:25, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
Just wondering, do these same rigid manuals like Bluebook and ALWD, the Fortune 500 and top-tier universities also use U.K. along with U.S.? AP style uses both US and U.S. depending on if it's a title. Wikipedia tends to go by common style guides such as CMOS or APMOS rather than law school etiquette. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:11, 27 March 2022 (UTC)
I have no idea what ALWD does, but the twenty-first edition of the Bluebook (2020) continues to prescribe the use of both U.K. and U.S. (in the table of abbreviations for Geographic Terms at page 318).
Actually, WP generally follows domestic legal citation practice on law-related topics. Most of the WP articles that use U.S. in the article title have a legal dimension one way or another (for example, highways are normally defined by statutes enacted by state governments). Furthermore, the most prestigious American newspapers (including the New York Times and the Washington Post) continue to use U.S. because they recognize that it's much easier on the eyes.
There are only three states that have foolishly followed the British trend of omitting periods in abbreviations in legal citations: Michigan, New York, and Oregon. The overwhelming majority of states rejected that trend as extremely unwise. --Coolcaesar (talk) 04:26, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
I strongly disagree. CMOS has been showing a disturbing pattern in recent years of following trends in British English which make no sense because they appear to be attributable to the UK's gross underfunding and incompetent mismanagement of its schools. We have a lot of British expats here in California who fled to America to teach in schools that still value good writing. Nice to see that American arrogance and sense of superiority is alive and kicking! Well done for reminding us! Just to be clear, just because you write things in a certain way does not make it correct. Nor does it make everyone who does not do it that way wrong or incompetent. There is absolutely no need to insult another country because you can't cope with stylistic differences. -- Necrothesp (talk) 22:35, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

Attempting a priori standardization of U.S. or US is doomed to failure. We have redirects for a reason. We cannot dictate to our readers or our sources which is "correct" in every usage and even if we pick one for the sake of consistency neither the sources nor or our readers are consistent. It is neither useful nor necessary to have this discussion. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 13:32, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

RfC 2 on the use of dash-separated titles for sports events

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
TLDR: No change; dash-separated titles permitted, no consensus on format.

This discussion references and basically reiterates Wikipedia talk:Article titles/Archive 60#RFC on dash-separated titles for sports events, that was just closed this January. (I'm taking the liberty of adding a "2" to this one; please don't give your RfC the exact same name as another RfC you're going to be referring to, it causes all sorts of confusion.) Unlike what the opener here writes, that was not actually closed with "reached "no consensus" on any matters", it seems to have been closed with dashes should be allowed but no consensus on format. If someone disagrees, we can ask User:Chess, the closer, to confirm, but that's what the bold letters say pretty clearly to me. Now, consensus can change but rarely over only three months. But, in any case, here we are.

Question 1: permitting dash-separated titles for sports events: I count 8 "agree/support" and "6 "disagree/oppose". Now arguments are more important than counting, but the main arguments for seem to be that dashes are a clearer or perfectly natural way of writing article titles, the arguments against are that they're unnatural, and not how sources refer to these topics, and the status quo suffices. Those seem to balance out, honestly; I don't see many or even any citations of sources either way, just assertions. Without evidence all these seem to be just a matter of personal taste. And we'd need a fairly clear consensus "against" to overturn the clear decision of the former RfC. So, again, or still, as per the last RFC, dash-separated titles for sports events are permitted.

Fewer participated in Question 2: ordering in a dash-separated title for sports events. Again, there aren't a lot of evidence based arguments, just "it's natural" for Option 1, vs "we should be flexible" for Option 3, with a balanced number of people supporting each. Cinderella157 made a long argument for option 2, but it doesn't look as if anyone else was convinced, and I'm not sure I understood it myself. Also two people interjected that it's not at all clear that 1 and 2 should be the only options. So consensus against mandating option 2, but a split decision between option 1 and being flexible, and almost as many saying these shouldn't be the only options, so a clear no consensus on format.

Finally, fewest of all participated in Question 3: amending WP:AT, two against, one for. I'm going to read this as against making any additions for dash-separated sports titles, not "let's make this decision but not tell anyone about it", which would be perverse. While Cinderella157 believes dashes would otherwise be forbidden under WP:QUALIFIER, others don't, because it's not clear that this is an example of disambiguation, and WP:TSC, for example, specifically allows dashes in titles in certain cases. No consensus to amend.

In other words: basically what the same titled RfC three months ago decided. Anyone who wants to reopen this question in only another three months ... maybe don't? --GRuban (talk) 01:58, 10 April 2022 (UTC)

This is a proposal to explicitly permit the use of dash-separated titles for sports events, where such a construction is presently inconsistent with WP:AT. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:41, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Background

The previous RFC on dash-separated titles for sports events was initiated to address matters of capitalisation in such article titles. Dash-separated article titles are extensively used for recurrent sporting tournaments, such as the Olympic games or annual events, where there are multiple events being played for. They are used for an article on a particular event being played for in a particular tournament's year - eg 2014 US Open – Men's Singles. That article is about the "men's singles" event being played for at the 2014 US Open. The article title has been described as being a "title – subtitle" construction. This construction distinguishes different events played for within a particular tournament's year. It also distinguishes the same event being played for across different tournament years. The dashed construction inherently has a disambiguation function. The "title – subtitle" also creates a sub-article relationship.

Well through the course of the earlier RfC, it was identified that dash-separated titles for sports events are explicitly inconsistent with prescriptive advice at WP:AT.

Furthermore, at WP:TSC, we are advised to avoid the use of the dash in article titles. This is because of the need to create a redirect from the title that would use the hyphen in place of the dash. This is because keyboards do not provide accessibility to the dash characters.

The former RfC reached "no consensus" on any matters.

Outline of RfC

The RfC is presented as three questions. Please indicate your !vote for each question in the section following each section. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:54, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Rather than amend individual sections of WP:AT, the ultimate intention is to add a section to WP:AT that explicitly permits dash-separated titles for sports events. While the second and third questions might assume prior support, support is not presumed. To be clear, support for an outcome at one question cannot reasonably be construed or inferred to be support for an outcome at another question. Participants are therefore encouraged to respond to all of the questions (even though they might disagree with the first question) without fear that their views might be misconstrued. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:41, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

General comments

Hi, Dicklyon, Cinderella157, Fyunck(click), Wjemather, Lee Vilenski, Amakuru, Ravenswing, Sod25k, Sportsfan77777, Joseph2302, Jayron32, GhostOfDanGurney, Iffy, GraemeLeggett, Mjquinn_id, GoodDay, SMcCandlish, Tony1, Montanabw, Kaffe42, BilledMammal, Herostratus, Thryduulf, SmokeyJoe, HawkAussie - you have contributed to the previous RfC and may wish to comment here. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:44, 19 January 2022 (UTC) Sod25m per new name. Cinderella157 (talk) 01:51, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedian Hyphen Luddite. Always avoid dashes. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:25, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Hi SmokeyJoe, you would then disagree with question 1. Might you please place that there? Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 10:49, 19 January 2022 (UTC) P.S. Do you have an opinion on the other two questions if the consensus was to support dashes? Cinderella157 (talk) 10:51, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
No. Let me think about it. SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:43, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

I'm gonna need some article examples, for me to fully understand what's being proposed. GoodDay (talk) 17:31, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

GoodDay, All sorts of sports articles that use the format: 2014 US Open – Men's Singles. See also examples in the previous RfC (above) eg - Tennis at the 2011 Games of the Small States of Europe – Men's singles, 2015 IBSF World Snooker Championship – Men's and Shooting at the 1952 Summer Olympics – Men's 100 meter running deer, single and double shot. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:09, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

Question 1: permitting dash-separated titles for sports events

Should two part dash-separated titles be explicitly permitted for sports event articles?

This question goes to specifically to acknowledging dash-separated titles for sports events as an exception to WP:QUALIFIER. The question does not assume an order of the two parts about the dash. This is addressed in the next question.

Please respond: Agree to explicitly support or Disagree to explicitly not support.

Discussion, comments, !votes

Comment: If two part dash-separated titles for sports event articles are such a good idea (as suggested in the previous RfC), there should be no issue with agreeing with the proposition. The dash construction distinguishes different events played for within a particular tournament's year. It also distinguishes the same event being played for across different tournament years. One might argue that this does not constitute disambiguation and does not create a conflict with WP:QUALIFIER. To my mind, that would be splitting hairs. If it is such a good idea, then it would be much better to simply resolve the matter by agreement with the question posed (or not). Cinderella157 (talk) 13:51, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

From the discussion in the previous RfC (above) it became reasonably clear that the dashed construction is not a WP:COMMONNAME. It is not a construction found in the natural language of running text in sources, though it may be found be found in headings such as tables and in web pages. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:20, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi GraemeLeggett, there was quite a discussion about this in the previous RfC. The bottom line is that there was no evidence of sources using the format in prose (for at least one instance, see [search on]: You have not provide evidence of actual usage of the dashed construction in prose. and associated discussion). Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 11:43, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

Question 2: ordering in a dash-separated title for sports events

This question is contingent on a consensus supporting question 1. The present usage of dash-separated title for sports events is in the form of "Title - subtitle" (eg 2014 US Open – Men's Singles). This creates an inconsistency with WP:TITLEFORMAT. The options proposed are:

Option 1. That dash-separated titles for sports events shall be in the form of the example 2014 US Open – Men's Singles. This is an explicit exception to the inconsistency with WP:TITLEFORMAT (ie it permits what can be considered a sub-article relationship).

Option 2. That dash-separated titles for sports events shall be in the form of the example Men's Singles – 2014 US Open. This is explicitly complies with WP:TITLEFORMAT. It does not imply a subarticle relationship.

Option 3. That either format in option 1 or option 2 be permitted. This is an explicity permits an exception to WP:TITLEFORMAT but does not prescribe the format to be used.

Discussion, comments, !votes

Sportsfan77777, if you think that Men's Singles – 2014 US Open as a title makes no sense, then don't !vote for it. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:37, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Sure you didn't intend to capitalize Singles here. Same as you'd do with brackets, Men's singles (2014 US Open). Dicklyon (talk) 17:10, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
I did actually, but not because I agree with the capitalisation in either case (options 1 or 2). Option 2 is a transposition of the terms about the dash as compared with option 1, where option 1 is presently the usual format. If I had changed the capitalisation upon the transposition, it might have implied that option 2 was more than a simple transposition. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:16, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
Sportsfan77777, if the men's singles played at the 2014 US Open is the primary topic then placing "men's singles" first makes it clear that the men's singles event is the primary topic, while the "title-subtitle" construction is inherently an article-subarticle relationship. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:40, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Sportsfan77777, You can argue against whether or not there is an inconsistency with WP:TITLEFORMAT or you could !vote to support one of the options (option 1 I take it), which will ultimately go to resolve the matter of order. If the dashed construction is such a good idea (as you argue), it will get strong support. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:46, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Lee Vilenski, per the outline of the RfC, this question is contingent on support for the dashed construction and how things would then be ordered about the dash. Brackets would not be applied with the dash as well. If you don't want brackets instead of a dash, then you would disagree with Question 1. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:19, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Comment: One could argue that the "title-subtitle" presently used in the two part dashed constructions do not create an "article-subarticle" relationship. To my mind, that would be splitting hairs. If the "title-subtitle" construction is such a good idea, it would be ultimately be much better to reach an agreement (option 1) that it is a good idea (or not - in which case, there are two alternatives presented). Cinderella157 (talk) 14:15, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Question 3: amending WP:AT

This question and subsequent questions are contingent on outcomes at Q1 and Q2.

That WP:AT be amended by way of a separate section to recognise that dash-separated title for sports events are an acknowledged exception to what is otherwise written at WP:AT.

Discussion, comments, !votes

Comment: Assuming there is support at least for Q1, the proposition is to create a separate section to record that the dash separated construction is permitted for sports articles. Individual parts of WP:AT could be amended but this would require a consensus on the specific amendments to be made at several places. IMHO, it would be easier to construct a separate section permitting the dashed construction in sports articles notwithstanding anything else written at WP:AT. The benefit of such a section is that it would clearly record that the dashed construction is permitted. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:57, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

Discussion

Hi Amakuru, there are three separate questions and the "Background" would provide the background to these. The dash construction distinguishes different events played for within a particular tournament's year. It also distinguishes the same event being played for across different tournament years. It inherently has a disambiguation function. The ordering issue is at WP:TITLEFORMAT, which says not to create or imply sub-articles. Hence, the "title-subtitle" construction is contrary to that part of the policy. Since you support the dash construction, you would agree with question 1. Since you are happy with either order, you would support option 3. You have not voiced an opinion to the third question. There were a couple of other issues that were raised in the previous RfC (including over-capitalisation, long titles and notability). These are fairly peculiar to the dashed construction and might be addressed if there were a section in WP:AT specifically related the dashed construction. The problem is that too many questions at once can wreck an RfC, so I am taking a smaller step to see where this goes. On that basis, you might consider supporting question 3. Could you please add your preferences to each of the three sections. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 10:46, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
P.S. Amakuru, the previous RfC was closed with "no consensus" on all points and consequently, it did not change the status quo. However, the RfC was not closed as allowing dashed titles in these articles. In the #Post close section, the closer made specific comments that go to that matter, and ultimately, the framing of this RfC. There has been no misrepresentation. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:39, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
That is incorrect. There was no consensus on the capitalisation questions, but regarding dashes the RFC closed as "dashes should be allowed", which was in any case the status quo prior to this. It certainly did not conclude, as you are suggesting, that the dash is there as a disambiguator. That was refuted, as indeed myself and Sportsfan are refuting it now, and the closer explicitly did not endorse that view. This RFC is therefore misprepresenting the status quo.  — Amakuru (talk) 11:45, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Amakuru, please read the close and post close again. I specifically clarified the matter of the apparent ambiguity with the closer. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:12, 19 January 2022 (UTC) PS If the dash construction is such a good idea, then it will have no problem flying. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:14, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
I don't think the dash "inherently has a disambiguation function". In fact, I don't think it serves a disambiguation function at all. If it did, the parent article would be a disambiguation page, but it's not --- it's an actual article. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 11:37, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Sportsfan77777, The dash construction distinguishes different events played for within a particular tournament's year. It also distinguishes the same event being played for across different tournament years. You may disagree that this inherently serves as a form of disambiguation but I can't see how. Not every case has to have a disambiguation page as a parent article (eg primary topics don't and cases with two alternatives use a hatnote from the primary topic. In cases using dashes, the templates serve to navigate in the same way as a disambiguation page. If the dashes are such a good construction using the "title-subtitle" format, then the natural outcome of this RfC will be to support this through the question rather than arguing about semantics and interpretations. You will note that the RfC is actually premised on an outcome to support such a construction. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:09, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
Given that 2014 U.S. Open (golf) exists I'd say drop the dash business and go 2014 US Open Men's singles etc as the obvious solution. — Preceding unsigned comment added by GraemeLeggett (talkcontribs) 11:26, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
You didn't mean to capitalize Men's there, did you? Dicklyon (talk) 17:06, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
Hi Thryduulf, I'm not quite certain what you mean so I will take a stab. You don't want to amend what is already written at WP:AT in a way that would make what is already there less prescriptive? The proposition of question 3 is not to change any of what is already written but to add a section to WP:AT that would permit dash separated titles for sports articles notwithstanding anything else written at WP:AT. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:21, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
I want WP:AT to permit dashed titles where appropriate. I would prefer that this happen by way of an amendment to the existing text to make it less prescriptive. I don't object to adding an addendum for sports articles as you propose but that is imo a less good option. Thryduulf (talk) 01:49, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
So Men's Singles at the Australian Open isn't notable? Sorry but Unbelievable! Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:49, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
Some of the big ones may very well be independently notable. But not the many thousands. If the pattern was to cover the Australian Open in one place, that wouldn't hurt, but if you wanted to break out narrower articles on the notable subevents, that would be OK. And Men's singles at the 2022 Australian Open would be a good title for that. And Men's singles at the Australian Open if you wanted an article that spans the years. These would be normal titles on notable topics; what we're talking about now are thousands of odd titles on topics many of which have no significant coverage in sources. Dicklyon (talk) 17:05, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
Balderdash. They are extremely important in every tennis event. They include draws, qualifying, withdrawals, seeding, etc... With so many disciplines in tennis it would overwhelm a yearly tennis article. Our Olympic articles handle things the same way. The titles aren't odd at all. Event and then discipline within the event is the most logical choice of title. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:47, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
Your "balderdash" comment doesn't really address the question of whether most of these are independently notable, as evidenced by significant coverage in reliable sources. Many of these articles are sourced to nothing but a score tabulating website. Dicklyon (talk) 02:18, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
I reckon a lot of them are actually notable events. Just because the articles are under sourced doesn't mean that sources don't exist. Adamtt9 (talk) 02:36, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
I could pick a relatively lower level tennis tournament like the Challenger taking place this week in Chile. While it is nowhere near the level of the Australian Open notability wise and press coverage wise, it is still mentioned in a variety of different reliable sources like ESPN, local Chilean news, and in general tennis websites. All the while the actual Wikipedia article doesn't have much sourcing. Adamtt9 (talk) 02:42, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
I'm open to learning more about what's in sources. Are there articles specifically talk about the "men's singles", "women's doubles", etc. for such lower level tournaments? And what do they call them? It's hard to tell from those links. Dicklyon (talk) 03:05, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
You mean like this link, or this link, or this link, or this link, or this link, or this link, or this link, or this link, or even this link. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:01, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
The sources I provided were specifically taking about the singles event but there was no specific mention of gender as this tournament is only part of the men's tour. Adamtt9 (talk) 04:02, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
I see. That wasn't obvious. So maybe something like "Men's tour singles (Australian Open)" would be a way to express that? Dicklyon (talk) 04:47, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
Firstly, the year would have to be in the title somewhere to differentiate between different editions of the tournament. I am actually fine with the way the titles are right now and don't see a problem with amending any sort of style guidelines to permit the construction of the title that is currently being used. Adamtt9 (talk) 11:36, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
Many editors (but not a consensus) expressed an opinion in the last RfC (above) that the dashed construction was a "good idea" (summarising the various reasons given). The dashed construction has been shown to be not a WP:COMMONNAME as derermined in running text nor has it been shown to be an official name. Per WP:CRITERIA: it may be recognisable, it has been shown that it is not natural (in prose) and, it is reasonably precise but significantly less concise than other options in some circumstances. The main reason given is that it is consistent. However, notability of articles (or rather, the lack of) may be a reason for not agreeing with the dashed construction. If a significant number of articles created fail to meet WP:GNG (or do not otherwise reasonably meet other P&G), the rational of "consistency" fails as a justification for the construction. Per WP:GNG (policy): A topic is presumed to be suitable for a stand-alone article or list when it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. Local consensus does not override but gives supplemental advice. I acknowledge that "men's" singles (and like) are notable. I acknowledge that the US Open (tennis) and other tournaments are notable. I acknowledge that the 2014 US Open (tennis) event is notable and even that the winners and particular players are notable. What is not yet clear is that the 2014 US Open – Men's Singles is sufficiently notable to warrant a stand-alone article. Furthermore, that it passes WP:NOTNEWS. I am open to being convinced that a substantial number of articles taking the dashed form are individually notable and therefore justify consistency as a rationale for acknowledging the construction. I am also open to any other cogent arguments that are for or aganst the construction being acknowledged. Please convince me. Cinderella157 (talk) 13:12, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
There might be a semantic distinction between "acknowledging" and "permitting" the construction but I don't know if I any substantial practical distinction. The proposal is restricted to sports articles. Those sports that already use the dash construction will continue to do so in either case and those that don't are unlikely to change. Of course, you are not bound to respond to the questions in a prescribed way (only that it is ultimately easier for a closer and ultimately, the argument made is more important). The earlier RfC (above) did raise some concerns about these articles, including notability, title length and, of course capitalisation. I could also say that there is something of WP:NOTEVERYTHING. There are clearly some practical issues of asking too many questions at once. Even this RfC is a stretch. If there is a consensus to permit (or acknowledge) the dash construction, then these issues can then be addressed. If there is a consensus against such a construction, those issues become moot (or perhaps mute). In the previous RfC (above) advocates for the dash argued that they were a good idea. Some argued that their extensive use effectively made them a fait accompli. Answering the questions separately is not a contradiction. I specificly addressed this in the "Outline of RfC". One can disagree with the proposition at Q1 and then answer Q2 and Q3 on the basis that the response is contingent on there being a consensus for Q1 but not implying your support for Q1 - ie if we are going to have them (even though I don't like it) I would prefer this option. Myself, I am not certain where I stand on Q1 but I have some views on Q2 and ultimately think there are good reasons to record the outcome per Q3. I am just waiting to see if there are any good arguments being presented. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 03:23, 21 January 2022 (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.

Notice of RfC

This message provides notice that I have started an RfC at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (broadcasting)#2022 revision proposal on a proposed rewrite/update to the text of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (broadcasting). Your comments are welcome. Sammi Brie (she/her • tc) 03:55, 13 April 2022 (UTC)

Natural disambiguation RFC

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
Proposal rejected by a vast majority of editors, as unclear in application and scope. While a RfC discussion may amend or clarify the original proposal, and a more narrowly focused one could achieve some consensus, this one was rejected as a non-starter. Closing early per WP:SNOW. No such user (talk) 15:54, 16 March 2022 (UTC)


Should WP:NATURAL and WP:NCDAB be rewritten to reflect that natural disambiguation should generally only be used to settle titles where there are near equal choices such as Chinese whispers v Telephone (game) (RM) and Handa Island v Handa, Scotland (RM) and not generally allow significantly less common titles trump the most common such as Bus (computing) v Computer bus (RM) and Fan (machine) v Mechanical fan (RM)? In the 2nd sentence at WP:NATURAL I propose to change "Do not, however, use obscure or made-up names." to "Natural disambiguation can generally be used where there are titles that are near equal choices (such as French language v French (language)), where its otherwise disputed such is best (like Chinese whispers v Telephone (game)) or where adding a qualifier is difficult or impossible like Sarah Jane Brown where plain Sarah Brown is ambiguous. In general qualified titles are preferred to natural disambiguation if the choice is not near equal even if the title would be understood, thus New York (state) is preferred to New York State and Bray, Berkshire is preferred to Bray on Thames, in particular do not, use obscure or made-up names". I don't mind if all or some of this is in a footnote if this is too long and I welcome any suggestions for better examples. @Born2cycle, Amakuru, and RGloucester: Crouch, Swale (talk) 22:47, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

What sources refer to 'New York State' as 'New York (state)'? NATURAL has never, ever encouraged the use of uncommon titles. It very clearly says that any naturally disambiguated title must something that the subject is 'commonly called in English reliable sources'. This proposal does not do anything to achieve the goals you claim to have. It simply creates a pretext for disruption across the encyclopaedia...and for what? RGloucester 17:59, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
What sources refer to 'New York State' as 'New York (state)'? That is the same as asking "What sources refer to the planet Mercury as 'Mercury (planet)'? It is called plain old 'New York' in the context of states, [2] and the parenthetical disambiguation mirrors that fact. StonyBrook (talk) 05:57, 16 March 2022 (UTC)
I agree with you on that. The present wording of WP:NATURAL does as well, describing natural disambiguation as 'Using an alternative name that the subject is also commonly called in English reliable sources, albeit not as commonly as the preferred-but-ambiguous title. Do not, however, use obscure or made-up names.' This proposal doesn't do anything to further to discourage 'insufficiently common' names, which are already proscribed by the present policy. On the contrary, what it does is declare a Wikipedia-wide preference for parenthetical disambiguation, something that has never existed before. Why is such a change necessary to accomplish the goal you have described? RGloucester 03:40, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
You, and Wugapodes, have a point. I still broadly support the proposal, and would prefer it over the status quo, but a middle position might be better. Perhaps Do not, however, use made-up names or uncommon names, even when they are the official name or understandable. Natural disambiguation such as New York State will continue to be an option and so the dispute there will not be resolved, but it should address the general issue which goes beyond more ambiguous options such as that.
Note the intent of "understandable" is to prevent titles that the reader will understand, but are harder to understand than parentheticals. BilledMammal (talk) 03:57, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
I would be willing to support something like this. IffyChat -- 17:26, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
I'm not sure we need to mention official names but yes a qualified title for a common name should generally be preferred over an obscure official name. This is part of the "commonly used" part, the important point is that it should generally be almost as commonly used as the apparently preferred ambiguous title. With both the Fan and Bus RMs those supporting did so apparently mainly because they felt that natural disambiguation was generally preferred even if significantly less common while those opposing pointed out the problems with using natural disambiguation. There was no consensus in both cases and while the Fan article should probably have been reverted given the previous move request it looks like many actually supported such a move in the previous request even though they were against making the machine primary so leaving as is was probably OK especially since the move revert was because of the RM going on at that time. Crouch, Swale (talk) 22:33, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
The history of the article name of New York (state) is very unpleasant. To summarise, some editors argued that using the naturally disambiguated New York State was inappropriate, as it would give readers the impression that that was the 'official' name of the state, and hence, they preferred to use brackets. There was also some question as to whether MOS:CAPS would allow 'state' to be capitalised. The brackets allow that issue to be circumvented. Meanwhile, I tried to come in and point out that 'New York (state)' itself proudly proclaims itself as 'New York State' on its own webpage, but this was treated as folderol. RGloucester 04:03, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
User:Wugapodes, similar to the ambiguous Washington State, New York State was considered ambiguous with State University of New York. SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:20, 12 March 2022 (UTC)
 Oppose per Wugapodes. ― Qwerfjkltalk 07:07, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
Oppose because I read the proposal thrice and don't understand it, so I oppose replacing a short instruction with a long confusing one. Sandstein 16:59, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
That's not the reason why 'New York State' was rejected. You may want to read the old discussions again before making such assertions. In fact, 'New York State' is the most common way to refer to the entity when disambiguated... RGloucester 17:58, 14 March 2022 (UTC)
@RGloucester: My reading of the RM was along the lines at least of it not being near equally used/being inconsistent with other states which is the point is that it may not be a near equal choice? My understanding is that the term "state" is generally used as a modifier rather than part of the name which is why it was put in brackets rather than capitalized without. What is you're thoughts as to why the NATURAL title was rejected? Crouch, Swale (talk) 22:16, 14 March 2022 (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.

Consistency

@Primergrey: I was partially reverting an edit from two days earlier that appeared to provide additional weight to the "consistency" argument without a consensus to do so. BilledMammal (talk) 23:32, 14 April 2022 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Proposal for new article title naming convention - RfC or local consensus, which is within the scope of this WikiProject. — DaxServer (t · m · c) 18:03, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

Discussion regarding updating chemistry naming conventions

There is an ongoing discussion about an update to chemistry naming conventions occuring at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Chemistry#Updating_naming_conventions_for_groups. Mdewman6 (talk) 23:51, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

Discussion regarding naming conventions for events and incidents.

There is an ongoing discussion regarding naming conventions for events and incidents occurring at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Guidance at WP:NCEVENTS out of step with application of it. Thanks. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:20, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

"Wikipedia:CRITERIA" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect Wikipedia:CRITERIA and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 June 15#Wikipedia:CRITERIA until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. TartarTorte 21:22, 15 June 2022 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) § Improper acceptance of a new proposal as policy

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) § Improper acceptance of a new proposal as policy. —usernamekiran (talk) 06:53, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

This is related to Constituency titles. —usernamekiran (talk) 06:53, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Naming conventions Indian constituencies has an RFC

Wikipedia:Naming conventions Indian constituencies has an RFC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. BilledMammal (talk) 10:52, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

Crickets example

This example came from Wikipedia talk:Article titles/Archive 58#SMALLDETAILS and plurals, it was removed by User:162 etc. on the grounds of the article title being Cricket (insect). As far as I can see SMALLDETAILS doesn't just deal with titles as such it also deals with WP:PRIMARYREDIRECTs so the example of a title that is relatively unambiguous as a plural even if the singular is far more ambiguous seems like a good example. Crouch, Swale (talk) 21:21, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Discussion concerning WP:UE

The Médecins Sans FrontièresDoctors Without Borders discussion at Talk:Médecins Sans Frontières#Requested move 23 August 2022 may be of interest. —Roman Spinner (talkcontribs) 18:10, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Alternate place names in first sentence in lede

There has been an ongoing conflict, occasionally moving to edit-warring by single-purpose editors (see Sydney, where the article had to be protected for a while), concerning the insertion of Indigenous place names in the first sentence of the lede for articles on Australian places. There are conflicting interpretations of the wording in WP:PLACE. The "General Guidelines" section there begins:

  1. The title: When a widely accepted English name, in a modern context, exists for a place, we should use it. This will often be a local name, or one of them; but not always. If the place does not exist anymore, or the article deals only with a place in a period when it held a different name, the widely accepted historical English name should be used. If neither of these English names exist, the modern official name (in articles dealing with the present) or the local historical name (in articles dealing with a specific period) should be used. All applicable names can be used in the titles of redirects.
  2. The lead: The title can be followed in the first line by a list of alternative names in parentheses, e.g.: Gulf of Finland (Estonian: Soome laht; Finnish: Suomenlahti; Russian: Финский залив, Finskiy zaliv; Swedish: Finska viken) is a large bay in the easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea.
    • Any archaic names in the list (including names used before the standardization of English orthography) should be clearly marked as such, i.e., (archaic: name1).
    • Relevant foreign language names (one used by at least 10% of sources in the English language or that is used by a group of people which used to inhabit this geographical place (Emphasis mine)) are permitted. Local official names should be listed before other alternate names if they differ from a widely accepted English name. Other relevant language names may appear in alphabetic order of their respective languages – i.e., (Estonian: Soome laht; Finnish: Suomenlahti; Russian: Финский залив, Finskiy zaliv; Swedish: Finska viken). Separate languages should be separated by semicolons.}

The wording under question in Australian contexts is this:

…or that is used by a group of people which used to inhabit this geographical place…

This wording is being used as justification to insert additional names into the first sentence of an article using the apparently permissible reason that before European settlement in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries, Indigenous Australians lived in Australia and had their own languages and names for places. Eg.

Jelly Bean (Quenya: Gummibar) is a sweet little town in New South Wales.

Such Indigenous names are rarely in current common use or have significant literature, though there are well known exceptions such as Uluru or the many instances where the European colonisers simply appropriated the existing name for their own use, generally Anglicising it to some extent, such as in Canberra. The sort of sources being used to justify additional Indigenous names are generally specialist or tertiary sources, such as a sentence on the town council website eg. "Jelly Bean (or Gummibar as the Aboriginals used to call it) was first settled in 1806 by Captain Harry Beau who farmed sugar cane and koala bears."

There is no dispute over a "Name" or "Etymology" or "Early history" section in the content giving well-sourced details of the previous occupants and their languages and culture and what they called the region, but the insertion in the lead sentence of an archaic name that is not in wide current use, does not appear on maps or in GPS devices, and is found only in a few specialist or tertiary sources, is causing some hearted discussion. Some editors feel that they can redress some of the evils of colonisation by recognising the first Australians in adding an Indigenous name to as many Australian articles as they can find council webpage sources for. It would be helpful in minimising ongoing disruption and conflict if the wording noted above could be clarified to either support or reject such usage as a blanket rule.

I don't think that we are at the RfC stage yet, though if POV-pushing continues we will be. This question has been raised previously at the project talk page but has not gained any traction, and I would like comments from editors specialising in this area of naming conventions. Looking through the extensive talk page discussion archives there shows little or no discussion on using Indigenous names; this section appears to be more about previous foreign language names used in English literature at various times eg. Istanbul was previously known as Constantinople and Byzantium and these names are found in English maps and books and other texts of the relevant period. Indigenous Australian placenames are rarely found as standalone names in English-language texts. --Pete (talk) 08:07, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

Is this article title right?

Jonathan Kestenbaum, Baron Kestenbaum

Actually, it looks as though we are all over the place with these. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Labour_Party_(UK)_life_peers

2603:7000:2143:8500:346E:7EDB:D6A:77B5 (talk) 00:34, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

I don't know if it sheds much light, but there is this 2011 requested move on the article's talk page where someone mentions WP:NCPEER. Seems to be the relevant guideline. --DB1729talk 01:16, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
Interesting. It seems then that "of Foxcote" should appear at the end of that title, no? --2603:7000:2143:8500:95E2:8DC9:F198:3FDB (talk) 03:20, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
No. The title is Baron Kestenbaum. DrKay (talk) 07:44, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Subsections of WP:TITLEFORMAT

To me it seems very clear that the ((shortcut)) box mentioning WP:SINGULAR ought to merged with the one mentioning WP:ARTSINGLE. Those are clearly synonymous, so I moved the mention of WP:SINGULAR to where WP:ARTSINGLE is, i.e. to the specific subject that discusses whether article titles should be singular or plural. However, there is still an inconsistency regarding the other redirects WP:NOUN, WP:DEFINITE and WP:LOWERCASE, which still refer to the parent section rather that the specific subsections associated with each of their names. I suggest these should all redirect to the specific subsections associated with their names. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 18:03, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

COMMONNAME how-to guide

It's bugged me for a while that we don't have a practical guide to determining the commonname for a topic, so I finally wrote up a draft of such a guide here: User:Colin M/Determining commonname. After I do another pass of edits, I was thinking of linking it from this page's "See also". Any feedback/edits are welcome.

The closest thing we already have along these lines is Wikipedia:Search engine test, but that page is kind of a messy mishmash of advice on using search engines to establish notability (which was the historical focus of the page many years ago, but has since become a deprecated practice), using search engines to find sources for building out an article, and generic search engine advice. It barely talks about naming, and mostly deals with general-purpose web searches, which are basically useless for commonname purposes. Colin M (talk) 17:31, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

I would also include a paragraph warning about the reliability of Google search results ("About 393,000,000 results"), which cannot be taken at face value, because Google will only serve up to 30 pages of search results (300 pages) per query. The number of results becomes unverifiable if both searches end at around 300, such as if someone tries to determine the popularity of Médecins Sans Frontières or Doctors Without Borders. See this table I made in this RM for an example. Pilaz (talk) 22:24, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

Is NCEVENTS about consistency or about disambiguation?

I'm starting to get a bit frustrated with WP:NCEVENTS implementation: it's routinely challenged in move requests, usually by more novice editors (but not always) on the grounds that a year is not needed to disambiguate an incident (WP:NOYEAR explicitly states that a year is only needed for disambiguation purposes, whereas the rest of the guideline doesn't). A prime illustration of this is this discussion. However, I thought the primary idea of the naming convention was to make titles WP:CONSISTENT with each other. Is this a common tension among other naming conventions? What is the best way to go about this? I've considered altering WP:NOYEAR through RfC regarding the "disambiguate" wording, but I think this needs some discussion beforehand. Pilaz (talk) 11:52, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

So… while we do want our titles to be generally consistent, we don’t consider consistency to be the primary idea behind our naming conventions. Indeed, I would argue that it is the weakest of the five criteria… in that it is often the first to be set aside when balanced against the others. Blueboar (talk) 14:09, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
I don't disagree with your reasoning (the supplement WP:CRITERIAORDER comes to mind), and I now reckon I should have also emphasized WP:RECOGNIZABLE. In my mind, someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area will recognize an article title better if it comes with the year, with few exceptions. The problem is that one can frame the scope of "the subject area" in any way they want: for 2007 Glasgow Airport attack, for example, the attack is probably not recognizable for someone familiar with the topic of terrorism (myself included), but probably recognizable for someone familiar with the topic of Scottish terrorism. I suppose the "disambiguate only" type of !vote is a reference to WP:PRECISION, too. Pilaz (talk) 16:19, 8 October 2022 (UTC)