Talk:Kamloops

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was move.

Kamloops, British Columbia → Kamloops

The Canadian geographic naming conventions permit an article to be moved to the undisambiguated title if the city has a unique name or is the most significant use of its name internationally. The title Kamloops exists as a redirect to this article, and as the name derives from a BC First Nations word, it's not likely to be repeated elsewhere in the world. Accordingly, this article is a candidate for a page move to the plain title Kamloops. Any discussion? Bearcat 20:13, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

This is a no-brainer. Support. There are no other Kamloops. Kamloops already redirects here. For the same reason that Lethbridge, Gatineau, Saskatoon, etc. got moved to undisambiguated titles, so should this one. Skeezix1000 21:40, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. No brainer. Support. --Kmsiever 00:09, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Support move. Chensiyuan 01:39, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. We should continue to move Canadian cities to the new convention, so Support. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 00:32, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Comment Not sure how to vote here, actually; seems like a no-brainer, perhaps, but there are other BC cities where the same would easily apply, and not all are native names (Cranbrook perhaps, Parksville perhaps, Alberni perhaps - Alberni's Spanish btw, not native as some people think); the current "standard" within "BC Wikipedia" is for major regional/locational names to be disambiguation pages even when also municipalities - Nanaimo, Squamish, Lillooet, Comox, Cowichan, Saanich, Sechelt, Coquitlam (all are native-nation names, or versions thereof anyway...their native-name articles and the native-nation articles are in "preferred" native forms e.g. Sneneymux, Sḵwxwú7mesh, St'at'imc, K'omox (or would be if created; currently Comox people, Quwutsun [not created] Sencoten (a language page, as there is no Saanich nation in the same way as the other examples), Shishalh, Kway-quih-tlam.....Tsawwassen, Chilliwack come to mind in the same context but not sure about their disambig format, if any....Matsqui may be a redirect to Abbotsford, British Columbia, Sumas should be a disambig because of an identical US name, although Chehalis is primary-American despite an identical Canadian placename, Sts'ailes in the original language). So....I haven't looked, but what's the format on Kelowna, Penticton, Quesnel, Sicamous, Kaslo, Keremeos.....need I go on?? Point blank, if you/we do this for Kamloops it should be done across the board, no?Skookum1 07:19, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Updated comment OK, I've just gone through them, or am in the process of doing so. Currently:

Nanaimo - redirect to Nanaimo, British Columbia, with "There are several federal and provincial electoral districts with the name Nanaimo. These are listed on Nanaimo (electoral districts) "Nanaimo" redirects here. For the SkyTrain station, see Nanaimo Station" (IMO there should be a disambig page for various reasons)

Squamish - redirect to Squamish, British Columbia, with ref to Squamish (disambiguation) (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Lillooet - disambig page (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Comox - disambig page (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Cowichan - disambig page (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Saanich - currently an article on the Saanich people with "This article is about the Saanich indigenous people; for the municipality in British Columbia, see Saanich, British Columbia" Sencoten redirects to Saanich (linguistics), which IMO is mistitled and if anything other than Sencoten should be Saanich language (aka Straits Salish I believe). (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Sechelt - redirect to Sechelt, British Columbia; includes "This article is about the District in British Columbia. For the Aboriginal people, see Shishalh." Should have a secondary disambig line because of Sechelt Peninsula (as also with Saanich) and other uses (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Coquitlam - redirect to Coquitlam, British Columbia with "This article is about Coquitlam, British Columbia. For the adjacent city of Port Coquitlam, see Port Coquitlam, British Columbia. For a discussion of the "Tri-Cities" municipalities, see Tri-Cities (British Columbia)." There is as yet no Kway-quih-tlam page or Kway-quih-tlam First Nation page.

Tsawwassen - redirect to Tsawwassen, British Columbia. IMO there should be a disambig page because of Tsawwassen people, Tsawwassen First Nation, Tsawwassen Ferry Terminal. NB Tsawwassen is not a municipality but a part of the Corporation of Delta (I just now created that as a redirect to Delta, British Columbia). (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Chilliwack - disambig page with Chilliwack, British Columbia and Chilliwack band. IMO more entries needed, e.g. Chilliwack—Fraser Canyon (federal electoral district) and various org names. There is no Chil-hi-wa-yeuk people (not exactly anyway, or not anymore; now the Coqualeetzas I think, plus others in the area as well as Chilliwack River, Chilliwack Lake etc as well as the BC electoral district Chilliwack-Sumas

Sumas - redirct to Sumas, Washington. Prob OK as Sumas, British Columbia is now part of Abbotsford, British Columbia but should have disambig page because of Sumas Lake (now Sumas Prairie, Sumas First Nation, Sumas River, Sumas Mountain (Canada), Sumas Mountain (United States) (those are different mountains, though looking at each other across the border), Sumas Border Crossing. (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Chehalis - currently disambig, though Chehalis people (for the US native group) and Chehalis people (Canada) are still in need of creation (Chehalis people (Canada) -> Sts'ailes NB their government article would be Chehalis First Nation). (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Kelowna - redirect to Kelowna, British Columbia

Penticton - redirect to Penticton, British Columbia IMO needs disambig/dabline because of other uses (e.g. Penticton First Nation

Quesnel - redirect to Quesnel, British Columbia (no article yet on Jules Quesnel, the member of Simon Fraser's party it was named for. BTW for all you non-BC readers it's pronounced Kweh-NEL rather than a la mode française. (dab page; has non-BC meanings as well Bearcat 05:59, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Sicamous - redirect to Sicamous, British Columbia (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Kaslo - redirect to Kaslo, British Columbia (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Keremeos - redirect to Keremeos, British Columbia (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

Matsqui, British Columbia - exists as a stub, now part of Abbotsford, British Columbia like Sumas, British Columbia (since 1995); needs dab line at least because of Matsqui Village, Matsqui Prairie, Matsqui Prison (or whatever its formal name is) (not a city Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

There are scores of lesser-community names in the same bailiwick, e.g. Shalalth (where I'm from, sort of), Spences Bridge....Bella Coola and Bella Bella may already be redirects to Bella Coola, British Columbia or Nuxalk and Haisla cf Waglisla, British Columbia (-> Waglisla if the standard is applied). Other names that pop to mind are Kitimat, Hazelton, Atlin, Malakwa, Cache Creek, Tete Jaune Cache Alert Bay, Tofino, Ucluelet etc........Nazko, 100 Mile House. Likely ...the list is very long. How much moving do you want to do anyway (I don't have time, and I think there's other articles needing to be written that are more important than this move; format propriety should be secondary to expanding/improving content, no?).Skookum1 08:04, 16 August 2007 (UTC) not cities Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

minor note on one name - Boston Bar should have a disambig page because of Boston Bar Association, Boston Bar First Nation, Boston Bar, British Columbia, Boston Bar Aerial Ferry (now defunct), Boston Bar Mountain.Skookum1 08:11, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

PS how many of you voting above are British Columbians? Please note this discussion on Wikipedia:WikiProject British Columbia and ask for input from actual British Columbians pls. BTW Bearcat - I meant to recomment on your response on "Canadian standards" vs normal/traditional BC usages re capitalization of "the Island", "the Interior", "the Mainland" but can't remember what page that was on....I've been on the road these last few months, and will be again in a few days (Montreal bound, currently in the beautiful Slocan Valley of British Columbia aka "the Slocan".....which btw should be a disambig page because of Slocan City, Slocan Park (both towns), Slocan Lake, Slocan River etcSkookum1 08:11, 16 August 2007 (UTC) (not cities Bearcat 05:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC))

tangential comment on that last; Slocan should be a redirect to Slocan Country (which I'll create before I leave this oh-too-blissful place next week sometime.....); Slocan, British Columbia, which is the village at the south end of Slocan Lake (not sure if that's official village or just the usage in the article; I'm just fifteen miles away and don't remember seeing a "Village of Slocan" sign while entering the place)...also referred to simply as "Slocan" in local parlance, but distinct from the Slocan, which is the whole valley/region from Slocan Lake down to the Kootenay River. It's mis-written at the moment as its official name is Slocan City (even today, to distinguish it from Slocan Park, which is ten miles the other way from where I am, Winlaw, British Columbia <- Winlaw? (aka "Winlove" or "Planet Winlaw"...I've never seen so many dreadlocks in BC outside of Commercial Drive or Okanagan fruit-picking camps....). This is only partially related to the name-<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Lupin/navpop.css&action=raw&ctype=text/css&dontcountme=s">move discussion but points up issues with another needed disambig page (Slocan), which is a region as well as town(s) and river/lake name (Category:Slocan Country may already exist within the BC-region hierarchy, as a subset of Category:Kootenay Country.Skookum1 08:18, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

This is perhaps information that would best be raised at Wikipedia:Canadian wikipedians' notice board/Cities, perhaps on the talk page because the project page is focusing on cities for the moment. As for these other places, page moves are traditionally considered on a case-by-case basis, in line with the Canadian <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Lupin/navpop.css&action=raw&ctype=text/css&dontcountme=s">naming convention - a larger-scale move might be a good idea, and could be raised over at the talk page for Wikipedia:Canadian wikipedians' notice board/Cities, but I think the initial focus right now is on sorting. As for your comment about British Columbians, Wikipedia discussions are never restricted on that basis. Skeezix1000 12:27, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

You misunderstood me, although I do grant I am a British Columbian chauvinist ;-). What I meant was that input from other BCers on this naming convention vis a vis British Columbian towns/localities is needed i.e. the list I've provided of parallel situations is only partial; the further issue, speaking as someone who finds "Canadian conventions" grating, whether in Wikipedia or not, is that this convention for Canadian Wiki articles was apparently made without consideration of the whole Canadian situation, in particular in BC's case because of the plethora of native placenames which here also have further meanings and of those meanings there are those which have different international meanings than their primary local ones; e.g. Lillooet outside of BC is mostly known as the name of a people/language (even though their own name for themselves, St'at'imc/Stl'atl'imx, is different). In Cowichan's case it is primarily known outside of BC as a type of sweater, whereas here it mostly refers to a region/valley and (incorrectly) in reference to the collection of Hulquminum-speaking peoples/nations in that area (around Duncan, British Columbia; the sweater-type was originally made by the women of those people. And also the primary meaning of various names, e.g. Slocan, may not be for the town/village of said name so much as for something else; in that case "the Slocan". In the case of Kamloops it's a bit simpler as there is no region or other name-use that may have a more primary context, at least locally; there is a term "Kamloops Country" which is more or less synonymous with Greater Kamloops, but unlike for example there's not also a Kamloops people (although there is a Kamloops First Nation/Kamloops Indian Band, and there's also Kamloops Lake and Fort Kamloops; unlike Lillooet, Cowichan or Slocan where there are "the Lillooet" (which can mean either the Lillooet Country or the Lillooet people aka St'at'imc), "the Cowichan" (for the region, sometimes for the peoples) or "the Slocan" (for the region only, except when speaking of the river per se). Internationally, yes, these other meanings are unimportant; but in other cases they are not (Lillooet and Cowichan primarily, but there are other potential examples). In the case of Vancouver there's of course also Vancouver, Washington, which complicates the matter but as in a discussion on Talk:Vancouver somewhere the internationally-known usage is for the BC city, not the Washington one; and in the pre-railway "Vancouver" referred to Vancouver Island explicitly (in Canada and the UK and the US as well as in BC itself). In Kamloops' case there should be a dab line to Kamloops (disambiguation) because of the other usages (Kamloops Lake, Kamloops Indian Band, Fort Kamloops, perhaps a few others but not as bad for other uses as with Comox, Lillooet or Cowichan). But back to the notion of "Canadian conventions" which I alluded to in my note to Bearcat above; it appears to me, speaking as a British Columbian who's also over the years followed the homogenization of the Canadian identity/culture as largely dictated by the Central Canadian self-image/mythos, such conventions are often at odds with local realities/usages....in other words, the Canadian conventions have been imposed on regions where they were unsuitable. In BC's town-name case here this is, as noted above, partly because of the plethora of unique names, even non-native ones, which exist nowhere else and which sometimes have a different meaning to most people outside of BC than than their primary meaning in BC. I'll leave it to other BC Wikipedians (who I've notified of this discussion on the BC project talkpage) to comment further on this; but I do submit that "Canadian conventions" are often unfair or concocted in a vacuum of awareness about the realities/traditions in the non-central regions of the country e.g. the thing about how we have always capitalized region-names in a way apparently "outside of Canadian conventions"; "the Interior", "the Island", "the Mainland" are region names and proper names in BC, and so we capitalize them; "Canadian" (Toronto) editors look askance at this, whether in Wikipedia or not (e.g. in Toronto-published histories of BC such as Jean Barman's noxious tome). So, fine, impose Canadian conventions as you see fit; it'd just be nice if they had been created with some kind of awareness of their contexts/consequences in the "outer" parts of the country. We have our own history and identity, and IMO there should be "BC conventions" just as there are also (or should be) Quebec conventions and First Nations conventions. Deal with it or not; cultural imperialism is rife in this country, it's the nature of the place. But it's why I asked how many of the voters/commenters here are from BC, as the implications of this one move are that a whole host of BC town (and other) articles are going to need renaming if the convention is to stick. In my view, it's unsuitable to start with......Skookum1 18:17, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

While I've noticed this issue, I've never been sure exactly what the conventions were, even after a pretty good search of WP:NAME or the more specific Naming Coventions, settlements in Canada, which seems to give advice on going on a case by case basis and reaching consesus, rather than offering any clear guidlelines. Therefore I don't feel knowledgable enough on the issue to add my opinion too loudly. I assume for the sake of simplifying searches, the one name should be used in the few cases when it is truly unique. (Side note here, I found Jules Quesnel under Jules-Maurice Quesnel, which is a good example, I guess, of an article's name being overly specific, making it harder to find). Anyway, the naming issue here came up with me on the Moyie articles, there was Moyie, British Columbia Moyie Lake, Moyie River and Moyie (sternwheeler) that I know about... so I asked the help desk what to do with it all, and after this answer, made Moyie go to a dab page. Now whether that is absolutely the correct "convention"...? So, maybe a specific set of "guidelines" for these different scenarios could be prepared and wrote out somewhere (if they aren't already). New editors in particular, would really be aided by such a guide. As for Kamloops itself, it is clearly not a unique name, but I would guess that it could be the title of this article. But I agree with Skookum, that a note at the top linking to a dab page is neccessary, for the sake of Kamloops Lake and the electoral district, the Indian Band, the yet unwritten Fort Kamloops, Kamloops University and who knows what else "Kamloops" will get written. Even Kaslo redirecting straight to Kaslo, British Columbia (as noted above) may become an issue someday, as there is the Kaslo (electoral district), Kaslo and Slocan Railway and a Kaslo (sternwheeler) with that name. It seems that no BC town's name is truly unique and most will need an accompanying dab page in some form or another.CindyBo^talk 21:04, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, and that's why I think the "Canadian convention" is inappropriate; Kamloops should be a disambiguation page as also with Lillooet, Comox etc; the CanWiki convention, as established by other Canadians, is that the primary international context of a name should be the redirect; but in some cases that may be to a town/city (Kamloops) and in others to a language or people (Lillooet, Bella Coola, Comox) and in other cases to still other things (e.g. a river, as in Stikine). Better to have these "name-nodes" as disambiguation pages, and to create a "BCWiki convention" irrespective of what those east of the Granite Curtain have mandated and preserve the comma-tized town names, with the only exception I can think of being Vancouver ("and even then...."); there are too many uses with too many "internationally known" variables for it to be any other way. Sorry, Toronto, but you really don't know best.....Skookum1 17:17, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, but the notion that British Columbia somehow has a unique set of geographic naming circumstances that no other Canadian could possibly understand simply doesn't wash. Try reviewing the naming situations that apply to Mississauga, Yellowknife, Temagami and Ottawa if you think that no Canadian city or town outside of BC shares its name with a First Nation. Try reviewing Ottawa, Montreal, Saguenay, Winnipeg, Oromocto, Miramichi, Cheticamp, Petawawa, Kagawong, Shubenacadie, Pohénégamook or Napanee if you think no other Canadian location shares its name with a river or a lake. Try reviewing, well, any freaking city in this country if you think only BC cities share their names with railways, forts, colleges, universities, hospitals or other institutions located in or near those cities. You're free to think whatever you want on your own time, but you're not free to pretend that British Columbia somehow has special circumstances which dictate a special BC-specific naming convention separate from that for any other Canadian province or territory. It doesn't. And plenty of BC residents not only supported, but actively fought for, the national convention as it currently stands. Sure hope you didn't think you'd found yourself a hunting dog there... Bearcat 08:32, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

And to add to Bearcat's point, cities take precedence over regions, rivers, lakes, geographic areas, First Nations, electoral districts, and anything found in/around that city that uses the same name (eg, Calgary takes precedence over the University of Calgary). And before you ask, it's a de facto convention/standard. It's why Saskatoon is the city and doesn't redirect to Saskatoon berry (which existed long before the city and gave the city it's name). -Royalguard11(T·R!) 23:42, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Of Bearcat's second batch of examples, only Ottawa, Montreal, and Winnipeg have the no-comma form, plus Calgary; Oromocto, Saguenay, Petawawa and Kagawong are disambiguation pages; Shubenacadie, Cheticamp and Pohenegamook all use the comma-form; Napanee redirects to Greater Napanee, Ontario i.e. comma form. Of the first batch Mississauga, Yellowknife and Temagami all redirect to pages with the comma form. Fine they share their names with lakes, rivers, native peoples etc but the point is that the towns (other than the major cities (all well-known outside Canada) are all articles with the comma-form (either directly or via disambiguation pages). Kamloops and other regional centres in BC (e.g. Nanaimo and Kelowna are NOT well-known outside of Canada, even within Canada more often than not (among newly-arrived residents of BC to the Lower Mainland, many do not even know where they are, or even have not heard of them); for major cities like Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg, Ottawa etc FINE, they ARE well-known outside of Canada; the others are not, despite being major cities within the Canadian context; and Mississauga, for example, is much larger and more important than Kelowna or Kamloops. Certain major BC regions - Okanagan, Kootenays, Cariboo are also all stand-alones, but they ARE well-known outside of Canada, even though the cities inside them are not. And I had a look at the Naming Coventions, settlements in Canada WP:Naming Conventions for Canada cited above by Cindy Bo and it's NOT clear at all, as she notes, that what Bearcat is maintaining as an absolute standard holds, or should. At the very least "Kamloops redirects here. For other uses, see Kamloops (disambiguation) is more than adequate and I see no reason to impose the major-city standard as, well, Kamloops is not a major city even by Canadian standards, though it is an important city within BC. And what "plenty of BC residents" actively fought for this? Not the majority of participants on the BC WikiProject, I'd wager. They also wouldn't have gone for Bearcat's insistence that "Interior" and "the Island" and "the Coast" and "the Mainland" are not proper names; they are, within BC English usage; if Canadian conventions ignore BC usages, then IMO they're not really Canadian, except in a culturally-imperialistic sense. In BC, the capitalized forms "the Interior" clearly refers to "the Interior of British Columbia" (article is British Columbia Interior which is the alternate form) and "the Island" clearly refers to Vancouver Island and no other; "the Mainland" tends to refer to "the Lower Mainland" and so on; "the interior", "the island" and "the mainland" do not, and can mean or be used in other unrelatecd and/or vaguer contexts. That the Canadian academic/Wikieditorial precedent/consciousness has not encompassed this is a failing of Canadian-think, not a failing of British Columbian usages. That's a side-issue, but related. Kaslo, British Columbia and Sandon, British Columbia are unique names; but the comma-form is needed for people from outside Canada IMO, just as the various other examples cited by Bearcat use and NEED the comma-form. I think this is all red-herring, and as noted there's a lot more important things for Canadian Wikipedians to be doing than screwing around with irrelevant formatting issues.Skookum1 00:47, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Any article for which "City" currently exists as a redirect to "City, Province" is eligible for consideration of whether it would be appropriate to move the article to just city; the fact that move discussions haven't all already taken place does not undermine my point. Every single article on that list is either (a) already moved, or (b) eligible to be considered for a move as soon as somebody actually initiates the discussion. Not a single one of them has, as of right now, been nominated for a move debate that failed.

And as for your irrelevant tangent about whether words like island, coast, interior or mainland can be taken as proper names or not, the point remains that Wikipedia is governed by correct English style, in which such words are only capitalized when appearing in the actual proper name of a specific mainland or a specific coast or a specific island. It has nothing to do with "BC English" vs. "Canadian English" — it has everything to do with correct writing style within the English language in general. English capitalization rules cannot be overridden simply by asserting that non-standard capitalization somehow constitutes a unique provincial dialect of the language (in spite of the fact that no published linguist on the planet has ever asserted that BC English constitutes a distinct dialect — they decide whether such a thing exists or not, not you.) But I digress, at any rate; this has exactly nothing to do with the question at hand. Bearcat 02:27, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, you do digress, and as usual you're not getting the point, just as you didn't before, about the FACT that "the Island" and "the Interior" are PROPER NAMES in the same way "the Muskokas" and "the Laurentians" are, i.e. for regions. Correct English usage? ROTFL. Check the CP style guide for BC placenames; the usages I'm talking about are STANDARD ENGLISH and remember that this province was "the most British of all". That your concept of correct English usage can't grapple with the FACT that these are proper-region-names in BC is a fault of your own, and of your understanding of BC's geography and history. Correct English usage, as used by British Columbians, the British Columbia government, the national newspapers AND the CBC, is the capitalized form. Check the styleguides. User:Keefer4 is on wikibreak or I'd ask him to dig out his CP style guide, but I already know what it has to say about this; the proper usages are capitalized, because these are proper names for regions of BC - and not just any regions, but the province's major subdivisions. Unless "the lakehead" is "only a term" and shouldn't be capitalized for the same reasons you claim for our regions, or "western Ontario" vs "Western Ontario" for that improbably-named triangle between Hamilton and Windsor. Get a grip and find something more valuable to nitpick over rather than try and tell us how to spell our own region names, fer chrissake. Someone here made a comment about "gee, and I thought Toronto was bad for thinking it was the centre of the universe"; to me, your attitude in this equation/discussion is darned good demonstration of that from-on-high arrogance your city lords over the rest of us with. "He went to the interior" could mean the interior of a house; "he went to the Interior" means, in a book about BC, that he went to the Interior, i.e. behind the mountains, which is our biggest region. "He went to the island" could mean any of Galiano, Mayne, Bowen or the ten thousand other islands; "he went to the Island" means he went to Vancouver Island. No doubt you probably think "lower mainland" is "correct English usage" too, but it's not; it's a proper name like all the rest cited and is used as such, unless some twit of an editor (like Barman's at UofT) decides that British Columbian usages don't make sense and Toronto's version of "correct English usage" should hold sway; It's that simple, and we don't need any pontificating Wikipedian from TO telling us that our usages aren't "correct English usage". They are, and that's that. if this needs to be laid out point-by-point for non-British Columbian Wikipedians, then that's a good thing as it's time you got educated instead of forcing your ignorance down our throats.Skookum1 08:34, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Skookum1, now you're getting into other issues. The policy for all article names is Use the Most Common Name. The article here is about the city of Kamloops. The most important part of the title is Kamloops. The BC part is an addon used to distinguish it from other possible Kamloops. Since there are no other Kamloops, there is no need to distinguish it, so the article can simply be called Kamloops. No article on Wikipedia needs to be distinguishable. That's an incorrect interpretation carries by the US cities convention. That's we formed our own, because we didn't want an all-inclusive convention, but rather a fluid one that can reflect the ideas and values of Canadians.

My main point about this irrelevant name/move issue is that it's irrelevant to the work needing doing, and if applied across the board sets a precedent for thousands of articles/moves, all a frigging waste of time. Internationally Kamloops is known as Kamloops, British Columbia or, say commonly in the US, Kamloops, Canada; if you say Vancouver or Calgary someone knows what your'e talking about; if you say Kamloops, people go "huh?" until you explain it's a city in British Columbia; people know what a Nanaimo Bar is, but they may not know what Nanaimo is. And as above re Cindy Bo's point, the naming conventions for settlements in Canada are NOT clear about this, it's just being claimed that they are. There's far more important things for Canadian Wikipedians to be doing than moving/renaming articles to conform to a convention that never was defined clearly, and really doesn't make much sense even if it were (and it's not clear). If you want to do it for your own provinces, fine; "we" don't think it's a good idea for ours. If it takes secession to get our way on stuff like this, maybe that's what it will take; "across the country" standards are homogenization efforts, and noxious to start with as well as pretentious; and there's no need for them, and no time for all the work you're talking about. Better to create all the town and other articles yet in need of creation. You guys remind me of the Demon of Useless Tasks in The Phantom Tollbooth.Skookum1 08:45, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

And many places of local dialects, but that's all they are; local. In Saskatchewan we call it a bunnyhug, but if I'm in Ottawa and I say bunnyhug I don't expect them to know what it is (and as a matter of fact that's actually happened to me in a store. After about 5 terms a sales associate pointed at something and said "You mean that thing with the hood?"). I've got cousins in BC (who live in Peachland, a little town next to Summerland and Westbank in the Okanagan) and have never heard any of those terms before. If you think that local terms should be known to the nation, that's just being egotistic. In Saskatchewan we don't care what the Interior refers to, and in BC they don't care what a bunnyhug is. And I thought Toronto had a "we're the center of the universe" attitude. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 04:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

"The Interior", "The Island", "The Valley", "the Mainland", "the Coast" are NOT bunnyhugs; they are commonplace British Columbia usages and generally capitalized that way in BC publications, particularly newspapers and in particular government documents and in some cases agency/region names within the government. They are proper names, not bunnyhugs. If you're ignorant of that, it's just another example of what we in BC call the Granite Curtain. They're not local dialects; they are standard provincial-language usages. That they are unknown of in the rest of Canada, or dismissed by hoity-toities from east of the mountains, is irrelevant. Why not "united kingdom" or "republic of france" or "the pennines" or for that matter "the laurentians" or "the muskokas". Wake up and smell the cappucino. And if your cousins in Summerland and Peachland have never heard the term "the Interior" or "the Island" in BC, they're either dolts or they don't talk to anyone else; that they're in the Okanagan and have never heard the term "the Interior" seems ridiculous (their federal riding, for one thing, is Southern Interior; they're possibly the kind of people who use the non-BC pronunciations PeachLAND and SummerLAND, too (ick, something like hearing QUEEbeck). But the Okanagan is full of refugees from the colder parts of the country who don't know anything about BC, so that's not so much of a surprise either.Skookum1 04:29, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The proper names of the things are British Columbia Interior, Vancouver Island, Okanagan Valley, etc. Using the generic term as a shorthand when you have an audience that is likely to understand the same thing by it as you do is not the same thing as a proper name. "The Muskokas" and "the Laurentians" are an invalid comparison, because those are shorthands which use the name part rather than the generic part of the full name. It would only be a valid comparison to the matter at hand if the shorthand names for those things were "the District" and "the Mountains". Bearcat 12:21, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The Interior IS a proper name, period. It happens that I came across it in Canadian Geographic in that format - Walrus, a literary magazine, does not use it. But I'd go with geographic editors over literary ones, especially pretentious-literary ones like those at the Walrus. The Interior has always been capitalized in BC, because it is, and is used as, a proper name, w/wo "British Columbia" attached to it. That raw application of supposedly hard-and-fast rules mean that "the interior" is supposed to be the correct version, doesn't mean that it's right. The interior of what? When it's capitalized, we know what it means. When it's not, it looks funny. Just like "the lakehead" or "the interlake". Those, also are proper names even though, as with lakehead, it's also an abstract geographic term. The main reason the Interior is a proper name is that it is one of BC's main regional subdivisions, and it's in that form - not "the British Columbia Interior" - that people use it; also in the form "the Interior of British Columbia", where again "the interior of British Columbia" according to you should not be capitalized, while "British Columbia Interior" should be. That's poppycock and redundant/conflicting. It's "the Interior". Ditto with when we write "the Island" - we mean Vancouver Island, not Saltspring, Gabriola, or Princess Royal; when we write "the island" it's then generic. And, if used to mean Vancouver Island without the capitalization, always would tend to result in the question "which island?". ditto with "the North" vs "the north", with one used as a proper name for a region (whichever context, BC's or Canada's) vs the compass direction. One is a proper name, the other is not, and that's why the distinction exists. You may not care, or may wish to cite style guidelines, but those are only guidelines and obviously do not embrace reality, or the vernacular. Academicists and pontificators, that's all you are.Skookum1 14:01, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

You mean Vancouver Island when you say "The Island". A person in Halifax means Cape Breton Island. A person in Sudbury means Manitoulin Island. A person in Toronto means Toronto Island. A person in Port-au-Prince means Hispaniola. A person in Douglas means the Isle of Man. A person in New York City means Long Island. A person in Hobart means Tasmania. A person in Davao means Mindanao. . A person in Iqaluit means Baffin Island. And on, and so forth. That's why "the island" cannot be treated as a proper name: the phrase means different things to different speakers. It only means Vancouver Island to a very small corner of the English-speaking world. Bearcat 05:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

All this does it prove that BC has become as egotistical as Toronto. Let me wake you up here: The rest of the country could care less about what BC thinks on most matters. The rest of the country could care less about Saskatchewan, Manitoba, the North, PEI, and the Maritimes too. Just because it's commonplace in BC doesn't mean the rest of the country needs to know everything about it. Bunnyhug is very common here too. As Bearcat has said, there is no such thing BC English. Maybe you could stop tooting your own horn for a minute and realize there's people that live outside outside of BC. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 01:14, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Oppose move. No practical reason. Keep to the core naming convention "Settlement, Province", and avoid endless and useless discussions as to what what or who is ore important. A redirect of "City" to "City, Province" already solves the problem from a casual wiki reader point of view. From an editor's point of view, having a convention without exceptions makes things easier (such as automated tasks). --Qyd 04:06, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Big surprise that you're in opposition. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 04:07, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Please don't take it personally. It's nothing against you or Bearcat, I appreciate you both as editors. But on this particular issue I'm not convinced you are going the right way. --Qyd 14:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

That sounds more like a personal attack than anything else....more to the point, User:Qyd is a long-time and active member of the BC WikiProject. Are you?Skookum1 04:29, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

First of all, it was mealy an observation that Qyd has opposed every move proposed over the last year (and if you don't believe me, look at all them yourself) with nothing more than a comment that we should adhere to some wacky convention the US follows (see Bearcat below) even though we left that long ago. Second, do you really think Wikiprojects are all that powerful? A Wikiproject is a collaboration of editors who have interests in the same subject/area, and does not mean anything more. Being part of a project does not make you more of an expert on a certain subject than someone else (but if you pay attention to everything that goes on in that area you'll be more in the know, which still doesn't make you an expert). Being a member of a wikiproject doesn't give you some higher rights on a subject, just like being an admin is just some extra tools (I would never say "I'm an admin so therefore I know better"). -Royalguard11(T·R!) 18:58, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

It's not a question of expertise, it's a question of "cultural territory"....or would you be happy with Brits coming up with a convention system for Canada simply because of their (former) imperial claims here, or if Ohioans came up with conventions for Ontario? My point is that the convention you're claiming is a Canadian standard isn't supported by the active Wikipedians who have been building British Columbia articles, and grappling with name problems (e.g. Christina Lake, British Columbia and Christina Lake (British Columbia) had to be separated from the previous one-article Christina Lake. It's a unique name, but it's got two contexts, and the format helps editors AND readers distinguish between which one is a town, and which is a geographic feature. Got it? Probably not.....Skookum1 23:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

A town of 1,450 would not be important enough to take name primacy over the lake it's located on anyway, so a move would never even be proposed in that situation. Did you miss the part of the naming convention in which it clearly states that this can only be done in cases where the city is the most important use of the name? (And for the record, BC still doesn't have any unique naming considerations that don't also exist in Alberta and Manitoba and Ontario and Nunavut.) Bearcat 04:46, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

A town of 1,450 in BC is an important place; who are you to decide it's not? It's very debatable which usage of Christina Lake is more important - speaking as a BCer familiar with the place. Importance isn't a numbers game in BC, as there are lots of important places well under 2000/3000 inhabitants. They may not be important from your perspective, but then your perspective clearly doesn't include the BC realities.Skookum1 13:53, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Because only cities are eligible under the current convention to be moved on the basis of being a primary meaning. Towns and smaller settlements can only be moved if their names are unique. This has been pointed out to you before. Bearcat 05:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Just an observation: I've never invoked the US convention, but always given practical arguments, which have been refuted or ignored. --Qyd 20:51, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

And as underscored by Qyd, twiddling over formatting issues when there's content in need of being written is SUCH a time waster; there's no need for the changes in question, but there are all kinds of articles and talkpage templates in need of doing (including the WP:Canada template on many of the pages cited by Bearcat, e.g. Cheticamp).Skookum1 08:20, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

You're just as free as anybody else to add those templates anytime you want. Nobody on Wikipedia has any responsibility to put a project on hold just because you think there are more important things to worry about. Bearcat 17:40, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, it just seems to me ironic that you cited pages that don't carry the WP:Canada template since you're a core member of that project, and also because those cities (e.g. Cheticamp) don't conform to the format you're trying to claim is an absolute convention (no convention is absolute, and this one's very vague).Skookum1 23:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

(a) As I stated before, Cheticamp is eligible for a move discussion — the fact that nobody's actually nominated it for one yet does not undermine the convention, given that the convention requires a discussion in advance of a move. (b) Just because I'm a member of a Wikiproject does not mean that I have a responsibility to monitor every article for whether it has the right templates on it or not. I'm also a member of the radio stations project, but I don't exactly lose sleep over the fact that I haven't necessarily remembered to add {{RadioStationsProject}} to the talk page of every single radio station article I've ever touched. I do what I can; I don't have a responsibility to be perfect. And besides, the whole templates issue is a red herring here anyway. Bearcat 04:39, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

The core naming convention, as practiced by every country on Wikipedia except the US, is that cities go at "City" whenever possible; including the higher division in the title is an exception that's done only when it's necessary as a disambiguator. That the US contingent deems it necessary in all cases for their cities does not make that form the core convention — it's still the exception, not the rule. Bearcat 12:21, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

If that is the case, then, for once, I agree with the US. I still haven't been shown a practical reason for moving the articles (the fact that a convention allows it is procedural, not practical). --Qyd 14:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

To me, at least, the practical reason is that articles should always be at the simplest title that's feasibly possible. If Kamloops is already a redirect here anyway, then why does the title need 18 extra characters in it that one doesn't actually have to type to get to the correct article? What I haven't been shown is a convincing reason why Canada should stand with the United States under a naming convention that (a) goes against the naming conventions in place for every single other country in the world, (b) is actually in violation of Wikipedia's policy that articles should always be at the simplest unique title possible, and (c) is an endless quagmire of debate. Bearcat 17:39, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

There's the stink of Canadian knee-jerk nationalism/anti-Americanism in your complaint that we're conforming to a US convention when other countries don't; just because it's used in the US doesn't mean it shouldn't apply here (and that's if it really does, since there's a Canadian convention-definition which you're interpreting for your own bandwagon, but questionably in the interpretation, as noted by Qyd and Cindy Bo as well). Point of the matter is most Wikipedia users, in English anyway, like it or not, are in the US; another is that they're the most likely people to look up Canadian towns and cities and it would be helpful for them (if they are as "stupid" as you say their naming convention is) to see the province where the town/city is located when the article comes up; and further to Qyd's point below, it also makes sense that, say, Seymour Arm, British Columbia is distinct from Seymour Arm (Shuswap Lake) (where that townlet is located) or Seymour Arm (Queen Charlotte Strait) and, although in that particular case a disambig page is likely (all are obscure, except for a huge pot bust at the town a few years ago), there are countless other cases where the cityname-only format is going to HAVE to be adjusted, e.g. Peace River (presumably the river is the primary article, but I haven't looked), so your name-only format is NOT going to hold across the board and some towns are going to HAVE to have the comma-form, no matter whatever damned Ontario-concocted convention it is you want the rest of us to follow; you may think the American convention is "stupid" - I'm finding yours to be so.Skookum1 23:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Point of Clarification: I am from Saskatchewan and helped to further this convention, so it is not Ontario centered. On another point, BC is not special. BC is a province in Canada. Nothing more, nothing less, so I'm not sure where you've gotten this BC nationalism from. We are not attacking BC. We are not insulting BC. I didn't even get this much yelling at when I supported a move for a US city (and their convention is more like Religious Law, if you disagree with it it's blasphemy). And if you read the convention, it says IF and only IF x redirects to x, y do we change it. And the province will be in the first sentence of the article (Kamloops is a city in south central British Columbia, Canada, at the confluence of the two branches of the Thompson River and near Kamloops Lake.). And on another point, I don't care how many US users there are, I don't have to listen to them. If the US users wanted to ban Russia from editing, do you think it would happen? -Royalguard11(T·R!) 01:31, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

There's nothing anti-American about the fact that Canada doesn't slavishly follow the American geographic naming convention on Wikipedia — to assert that there's a nationalist whiff about it is nothing short of absurd. One of the reasons the Canadians didn't want to stay with that convention is that even the Americans don't agree on it; there's been an endless and unresolving debate about whether they should move to something much more like the Canadian convention, which is itself virtually identical to the conventions in place for almost every other country in the world.

I should also point out that the current Canadian convention is neither mine, nor is it "Ontario-centred"; it was supported and developed by a group of Wikipedia users from every single province in this country, including BC. And if you peruse the "What links here" feature on Kelowna and Kamloops, you'll notice that outside of this talk page discussion itself, BC-based editors are virtually the only ones who do use the plain "City" links instead of "City, Province". So the situation here clearly isn't that eastern imperialists are perpetrating a naming convention that BC editors would never actually support; based on how the links are actually used, BC editors are more likely than anyone else to expect these articles to be at "Kelowna" and "Kamloops". Bearcat 03:50, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Whatever BC Wikipedians you're talking about and claiming contributed to these guidelines, they are not currently active and weren't around during the creation of the ream of BC town/feature articles in the last couple of years. The guidelines are ONLY guidelines and, being guidelines and NOT rules, can and should be changed. The Christina Lake/Babine Lake/Williams Lake examples - all with different results for "importance" (if you're from BC and understand what and where those settlements are - are apt demonstrations for that. The ACTIVE BC Wikipedians in this discussion don't agree with the rest of you, and the "BC is not special" line is patronizing (and yes, I am a BC nationalist and think Confederation is a crock, as is the attitude of the rest of the country that we should think/behave and observe "guidelines" as if they were hard and fast rules). For MAJOR cities, OK, but for the host of small towns, it just doesn't make sense and creates one hell of a lot of SUPERFLUOUS work. Entirely superfluous, like the arguments in favour of treating these so-called guidelines, created in the misty past, as if they were constitutional. They are NOT, and should be changed if they conflict with reality. Telling someone that they HAVE to abide by "national guidlines" is noxious.....again, it may be that some British Columbians participated in the development of the guidelines you're worshipping, that doesn't mean they can't, or shouldn't be changed or adjusted. My main objection is the volume of work to get all BC towns to conform to this standard, and also that the inconsistencies that will result not only during that conversion but ALSO at the end of it, are unwieldy and will be more confusing than what you claim is the confusion now. Wiki readers are not stupid, but damn Wiki format-obsessors sure come across like it. Wrap your head around this - the guidelines are not hard-and-fast and, being guidelines, are not laws. And you (Bearcat) are not a Wikicop, though you're behaving like one. It's SO Canadian - tut, tut, tut.....Skookum1 13:53, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd just like to know; what's your problem with non-BC people? Do you have some kind of beef with the rest of Canada? Are you xenophobic? -Royalguard11(T·R!) 00:59, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Constant pompous, arrogant, homogenizing misrepresentations about BC, and downright shoddy history and shoddy political/historical writing, from people east of the mountains, as well as the "BC isn't special" attitude, when for anybody who's ever lived here for very long it's clear that it is. We get short shrift in national politics/media, except as a curiosity ("wacky British Columbians") and the shaft we got/get from Confederation/the national polity is dismissed as so much whining. Add on top of that the efforts to redefine BC according to the Canadian National Homogenization Paradigm. Xenophobia hardly. More like righteous outrage.Skookum1 14:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

PS in your own words, Royalguard: "The rest of the country could care less about what BC thinks on most matters." Yeah, including about BC itself, as exemplified in this very discussion.Skookum1 14:40, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

The more you talk the more you sound like a lost Quebec separatist. But this is Wikipedia, and no one province is more important that any other province no matter what you say. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 22:15, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

It's dismissive comments like yours that underscore the problems with Canadian nationalism's "levelling" of regional identities/realities; you may not be a Central Canadian but you're clearly indoctrinated into the "separatism is treason" line that's so common in our media/political mythology. Quebec separatists have a point, and so do BC "nationalists"; no one's saying BC is more important, but it is different and we DO have different perspectives and experiences of the national polity and so-called culture/identity; there is widespread support in BC for Quebec as a "distinct society", on the proviso that it's conceded that so is BC. And we always have been. You may be content to be a maple-leaf-waving whitebread Canadian; I'm not, and know too much about my province's history to ever buy into the credo that you so clearly think is "superior". It's the self-aggrandizement of Canadian homogenizers/nationalists that's so nauseating, and so repellent west of the mountains, where our identity and history have never been incorporated into the national mythology (except in negative, tut-tut sort of ways). Whether it's this city-province thing or the capitalization issue for our major regions, the high-handedness and "Canada knows best" attitude of the "guidelines" is noxious and repellent. We all miss the Rhino party's old platform of walling off the passes through the Rockies and NB it was aimed as much at Saskatchewan as it was at Ontario....Skookum1 14:45, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Separatism is treason to the Canadian Confederation. If you want out, then get out. Oh, but don't forget that you'll have to mint your own money, put your own health care system together, and don't forget about BC's share of the national debt (which includes the 2010 Olympics). And the Quebecois are a distinct society because of their roots in Confederation (and in France) and because they are one of 2 major areas of French culture/language in North America. They are different. BCers aren't. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 00:05, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

More proof of the invective-driven nature of Canadian nationalism and its supposed tolerance of differing views, and yet another demonstration of how LITTLE you know about BC's history. Newfoundland and BC were drummed into Confederation, and had separate histories; and the lines about national debt etc are such stock Canadian-federalist propaganda/cant that it's just underscoring the pedantic nationalism that is part of my (and many BCers) complaint about Canadianism. Using "treason" is a heavy word, but typical of the "oh, Canada is sacred and even better than white bread and Jesus" mentality that's such a turn-off to so many people, not just in BC. BC is different. All you have to do is walk through downtown Vancouver, or even Merritt or Port McNeil, in comparison to the everyday sameness of Prairie and Ontarian towns. We ARE different. That this country is going to come apart at the seams in the next few years may not appeal to you; to me, it's long overdue.Skookum1 16:16, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Kamloops and Kelowna are cities, not small towns. We do not apply subjective criteria regarding how "major" a city has to be; original research is prohibited on Wikipedia. Bearcat 05:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Greenwood is a city, legally and formally, and MUST have the city-province format because of so many other similarly named cities/towns/localities; it is much smaller than the Corporation of Delta or the Township of Langley; the point AGAIN is consistency, that some cities MUST have the city-province format while others will not; and given that so many places in BC are district municipalities, despite being city sized (Delta, Langley, Saanich) the rest of the province's communities WILL have the name-province format; myself I think the particularism here - that you point out it's only 15 examples in BC, out of hundreds of communities, but you INSIST that this change is NECESSARY simply because of a tweedly guideline - just says to me "anal, anal, anal" about twiddly-f**k. It's not necessary, it's a waste of time, and creates one standard for incorporated cities vs other types of incorporations (district municipalities, towns, villages). the issue here is consistency, not some righteous "Canadian guideline" concocted in Wikipedia's distant past. CHANGE THE GUIDELINE is the solution. I think this is one of those examples of "admins on a rampage over nothing important" that makes Wikipedia such a turn-off to so many other people (indeed, part of the reason I took my wikibreak that now seems to be necessarily softening, because of the inanities of the rule-crazy).Skookum1 16:16, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If consistency were a requirement on Wikipedia, then every book's article would have "(book)" in the title, every album's article would have "(album)" in the title, and on and so forth. We do not have a "consistency" requirement on Wikipedia. We do, however, have a "simplest title possible" requirement — which means disambiguate only when unavoidable, not "predisambiguate an entire class of articles whether the title requires it or not". Bearcat 23:25, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and by the way...out of all the Canadian provinces and territories, Alberta, not Ontario, is the one with the most cities currently located at "City" instead of "City, Province". And Ontario isn't even in second place; Quebec is. So if you want to characterize this as an interprovincial dispute, you're whining about the wrong province. Bearcat 05:06, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reasons to stick with the "Settlement, Province/Territory" naming

First, the text of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (settlements)#Canada is a deformed version of the discussions at Wikipedia talk:Canadian Wikipedians' notice board#City naming convention poll and Wikipedia:Canadian wikipedians' notice board/discussion/Archive 8#City naming convention poll 2. I've been against page moves to "City" titles (except for technically based cases such as Lloydminster and Ottawa) precisely to avoid precedent setting (which is now used as an argument).

• A redirect from "City" to "City, Province" solves the search question for someone looking for a particular place (if that is the primary meaning). This also answers the issue of extra typing in the search bar or in google.
• Double standards: having part of the articles spelled one way and the other spelled differently makes automated editing (such as off-line page/link generation or bot operations) more difficult. As many pages cannot do without a disambiguated title, the "City, Province" convention does solve this issue.
• Category listing: again, for editors search. If I want to expand articles about settlements in British Columbia, I would have a hard time finding them in Category:Articles to be expanded since July 2007, or if I want to add sources, I wouldn't find Kamloops in Category:Articles lacking sources from June 2007, but would have a much better chance with Kamloops, British Columbia. Same goes with such categories as Featured or Good articles, Settlements established in 1899, and the list goes on and on.
• Primary meaning: In most cases, this can be challenged, with or without a good reason, which in turn generates useless discussion and a waste of editing time (including here, but maybe the precedent principle is worth it). The "City, Province" naming prevents that.
• Naming patterns: there are more or less documented naming patterns that help identify the subject of an article: I would know that Peace River (Canada) is a page about a river, Sylvan Lake (Alberta) is about a lake, but Peace River, Alberta and Sylvan Lake, Alberta are pages about settlements. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Qyd (talk • contribs) 20:21, August 22, 2007 (UTC).

I would probably reconsider my position if practical reasons for moving would be given (as opposed to procedural ones). --Qyd 19:58, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I think that last point is the most compelling of practical reasons - to avoid confusion with geographic-feature articles (and other types of articles). Simple and obvious. Georgian Bay, Powell River, Prince George, etc.Skookum1 22:30, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Both of those last ones are bad examples because the x article is a dab page. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 01:20, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Might be a bad example if one is looking for precedents (which I'm not). It's a good example on how naming patterms work though. --Qyd 15:53, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

According to WP:NC, we have to prioritize what's most natural for the reader over what's most convenient for the editor. For example, we must always aim for the absolute minimum complexity necessary in a title — any article should always be at the shortest title that's feasibly possible without conflicting with other things of equivalent importance. "Shortest Title" should always be either an article or a disambiguation page. It should never be a redirect to a longer title. If it is, then by definition the title has an unnecessary layer of complexity in it. Bearcat 04:01, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

""Shortest Title" should always be either an article or a disambiguation page. It should never be a redirect to a longer title." I couldn't find this guideline anywhere on WP:NC or on WP:DAB or on WP:REDIRECT. Could you point me to the exact place where this is written? Thank you. --Qyd 05:18, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't have to be directly written down; it's covered by both the rule about minimizing complexity in titles and the rule about not disambiguating titles unnecessarily. Which are admittedly really the same rule expressed in two different ways... Bearcat 05:33, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Well then let's not make up rules as we go just to make a point. As I already said, the short redirect solves the issue from the reader's point of view. And if it's the same for the reader, why not make it easier for the editor? --Qyd 15:00, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not making up rules. Bearcat 17:23, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps not, but you're freely interpreting them according to your own agenda, which amounts to the same thing. The guidelines are NOT clear, and apparently were (anyway) built without regard to the dominant format, which is the comma-form. What seems also made up is that the guidelines were allegedly built with participation of British Columbians, which isn't clear and whoever they were, they're not all that involved with the ongoing editing and processing of articles, nor their creation, as are members of the BC WikiProject; Qyd, Cindy Bo and myself are and while I haven't polled the members of the WikiProject, they have been notified via the project's talkpage of your agenda/proposal here. Which, again, is a waste of time and if applied across the board means the renaming/moving of most BC town articles, with the result that some towns will have the comma format, others will not. In some cases such as many cited here - Christina Lake comes to mind....where should that redirect to? The unincorporated community by that name, or the lake it sits on the shore of. Neither one is "more important" than the other, and some distinction should be made, hence the application within the BC project anyway, if not in other parts of Canada (?) of the comma-format for the town and the parantheses-format for the geographic location. In others, e.g. Williams Lake the town is the more important, the lake (forgive me those from Billy's Puddle) little more than a puddle (hence the nickname). The opposite is true of Babine Lake, where the lake would be the priority and the settlement a minor blip on the population map. Consistency is the main goal of guidelines, or should be; and so if the guidelines create significant inconsistences, the guidelines should be changed. They are, after all, only guidelines, NOT rules. But you're behaving as if they WERE.Skookum1 13:43, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

As has already been pointed out to you, Christina Lake is not a city, which means it's not eligible for any kind of debate about whether the community or the lake gets to be the primary meaning. Only cities can be moved on the basis of being a primary meaning; any smaller type of community must have an absolutely unique name. And furthermore, mixed disambiguation-vs.-non-disambiguation is the status of almost every single category on Wikipedia as it is; we don't automatically add "(band)" to The Beatles or Led Zeppelin, nor "(book)" to Alias Grace or The Catcher in the Rye, just because some other articles in the same categories have to have them — and there's no legitimate reason why cities should have to have an invariable naming convention, regardless of their lack of ambiguity, if other categories don't. We only disambiguate when multiple things of comparable importance have the same name. And even the "state name at all times" fanatics in the United States didn't manage to block moves when it came to New York City and Chicago. Bearcat 05:20, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support with caveat. What a lot of discussion! What is the least complex for the reader.

Option1: Tie goes to the runner. I think Kamloops, British Columbia should redirect to Kamloops (the city) as most common usage and with a disambiguation flag atop the article.

Option2: More than one runner - nobody wins. If others disagree and think that there are other conflicting usages out there, they should create Kamloops (disambiguation) to prove it (at least we'd get some editing done around here and not just chatting). I'm open to the idea that Kamloops Indian Band and Kamloops Lake are equally notable (one named the geographical feature that was later adopted by European setttlers for their fort and city) but I doubt that either are known by the one-word kamloops. Let's have a discussion on that, rather than what the US or Toronto does. If there are multiple competing claims with near-equal weight, then redirect Kamloops to Kamloops (disambiguation) and let's be done with it. Canuckle 00:56, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Oppose The guidelines are inadequate and need to be changed. Changing this page is the thin-edge-of-the-wedge for countless hours of similarly useless page moves/renamings. More than adequate reasons have been presented by Qyd and myself why city-comma (city, province) format is preferable. Consistency is the desired goal here, not hard-and-fast application of obsolete guidelines which were not created realistically, or with an exposure to the practical problems of unique names vs names that DO require the comma format. Fine for the major cities, but for smaller ones it's a non sequitur (and Kamloops is a smaller city, not a major one). As pointed out above, guidelines are NOT rules, and should not be treated as such. This whole affair is a CFWT and creates precedents for only more CFWTs. It's the guidelines that should be changed, not this page, or any other.Skookum1 14:38, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It is not the thin edge of any wedge; there are only 15 BC-related articles (and less than 100 across all of Canada, of which the majority are in Quebec and thus don't affect you in the slightest) that are even eligible for discussion of a page move under the naming convention as it currently stands. Bearcat 05:35, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

List those 15, then, and tell me why the cities should have this name-only format, but BC's other communities shouldn't. I'm looking for consistency, not guideline-happy rule-cinching like you apparently are. Let's see - Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, New Westminster, Chilliwack, Nanaimo, North Vancouver, - Richmond, Victoria, Abbotsford, Greenwood, and Surrey and even White Rock clearly need the city province format, so they of BC's cities will have the comma while others will not; similarly Prince George and Prince Rupert for obvious reasons, also Castlegar, Trail and still others must have the comma-format; Burnaby is a unique city name, despite Burnaby as a family name, so should it also be name-only? I think, AGAIN, that the confusion between one group of cities NOT having the city-province format while others DO is a pointless exercise in "rule" application that more demonstrates the inadequacy of the guidelines, as well as the rule-happiness of those insisting on applying them instead of reforming them.Skookum1 16:31, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Firstly: the rule is that any kind of community can be moved to the undisambiguated title if its name is unique, or if it represents the most important use of its name. The reason cities vs. towns becomes an issue is that it's simply not possible to adequately quantify whether a town of 1,400 people is more important than the lake it's located on, or whether a Canadian town of 9,000 people is more important than a French town of 7,000 people. So towns and villages and neighbourhoods have to have unique names, because "most important usage" is too subjective, too prone to "my Smithtown is more important than your Smithtown just because mine's near me and I've never heard of yours". It's easy to determine the relative importance of a city among similarly named topics — it's not easy to determine the relative importance of a town.

Secondly: Wikipedia does not have a consistency requirement. Wikipedia does, however, have a simplest title possible at all times requirement.

Thirdly: if you really need a list, Burnaby, Campbell River, Castlegar, Coquitlam, Dawson Creek, Fernie, Kamloops, Kelowna, Nanaimo, New Westminster, North Vancouver, Penticton, Port Alberni, Port Coquitlam and Port Moody are the ones that are eligible for discussion, per the fact that the plain titles already exist as redirects to the disambiguated ones. Whether they should become dab pages instead is for the move discussions to decide. Bearcat 23:30, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Burnaby is first and foremost a family name, including the city's namesake Robert Burnaby, so a disambiguation page is there. North Vancouver MUST be a disambiguation page because of the separate City and District of the same name (which is more important? And no, they're not the same); likewise the City of Langley vs Township of Langley. Dawson Creek's namesake is relatively unimportant; Campbell River's isn't. And because of Langley, Victoria, Greenwood, Courtenay, Fort St. John, Prince Rupert and others which need city-province format the issue is overall consistency on city article formats, so it's not clear at all that the guidelines you're insisting are graven in stone are useful in the first place; Vancouver is the exception despite Vancouver WA (and they're not happy about it...). Rules, rules, rules, except these aren't rules BUT ONLY GUIDELINES and they're proving to be unsuitable, and to cause differing formats within what should be parallel formats. And you can't tell me that Dawson Creek or Fernie are wellknown outside BC, although Kamloops may be (only slightly) moreso, likewise Kelowna. Names which do have international cachet (Vancouver), OK, fine; but the guidelines are not producing a useful standard, rather a confusing one and also one which is going to need yet more discussion/squabbling over nothing very much important at all. Aaargh. Fine, move away then but it's not a reader-friendly environment you're producing, it's an admin-tightened-and-cinched one not based in reality, but in somebody's one-time idea of "guidelines". As if graven in stone, and immutable.Skookum1 23:51, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

A reader-friendly environment is not enhanced by an invariable naming format that applies across the board regardless of the actual situation; for instance, it would not enhance Wikipedia's reader-friendliness to have New York City at "New York, New York" instead, or The Catcher in the Rye at "The Catcher in the Rye (book)". A reader-friendly environment is enhanced by always putting an article at the least complex title possible. That is, if a title is unambiguous enough that it can legitimately be at "Title" without conflicting with another thing that has an equally legitimate claim, then the article should be at "Title" rather than "Title, Extra Piece of Information That Isn't Really Necessary Because This Name Doesn't Mean Anything Else But Was Added Anyway Because Some Policy Decided We're Not Allowed to Exclude It". There's no requirement for consistency on city article formats any more than there's a requirement that every book article has "(book)" in the title regardless of whether its name is unique or not. That would be "admin-tightened-and-cinched" and "not based in reality". Putting articles at the simplest possible title does not detract from our user-friendliness — I can guarantee you that there are people in the world who have heard of Kelowna but don't know that it's in British Columbia; it detracts from the usability of Wikipedia to put the article at a title that's harder for them to find. And for those who do know that Kelowna is in British Columbia, the extra information is just superfluous rather than helpful. And for that matter, the Brits most certainly haven't experienced any kind of long-term problems arising from the fact that their capital is at London but the ancient Roman city of Aquae Solis is at Bath, Somerset. The many countries that already use the very convention you're arguing with simply do not experience these difficulties you're imagining. Bearcat 04:47, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and as things currently stand, Burnaby exists as a redirect to Burnaby, British Columbia, and North Vancouver exists as a redirect to North Vancouver, British Columbia. Neither title is currently a disambiguation page. If they should be dab pages instead, then make them dab pages — but don't claim that they already are dab pages, because they aren't. And don't think you've found flies in the ointment, either — the whole point of this process is to identify which of the listed redirects should become article titles and which should become dab pages instead. Nobody ever said they would all get moved — only that they would all get discussed. So taking two off the list like that helps. Bearcat 04:57, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment Just for clarification, the convention to use the simplest form possible isn't about whether something is well known. More specifically, it is about whether that subject is better known than other subjects of the same name. whether Kamloops is a big city or internationally renown is quite irrelevant. The question should be whether the city of Kamloops is the most recognized use of the term. Oh, and can we keep the mudslinging to a minimum? It's hard to follow the discussion with all the unnecessary noise. --Kmsiever 19:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Support move to Kamloops - This is the convention for unambiguous Canadian settlements, and has ben discussed to death. I think it is outrageous that a fairly noncontroversial move should be held up by discusive polemics on issues of little or no relevance to this point. I'm still waiting to hear a substantive reason to make an exception in this case. If none is forthcoming, then the move should be made - or do we need to post this at WP:RM. Geez, it's no wonder I've become so univolved in Wikipedia lately - all these ridiculous, endless arguments over semantic minutiae. fishhead64 02:04, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Renamed per consensus of all but two editors here, but more importantly the precedent established for Canadian settlement names. fishhead64 23:32, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.