Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (settlements)/Archive 8

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed change of the naming convention for USA and Canadian cities below. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was no consensus to change. In fact a majority preferred to retain the current convention. Scott Davis ^Talk 01:21, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Proposed update to U.S. and Canada section

This is a proposal to clarify that the [[City, State]] convention is primarily to provide a standard naming convention for resolving ambiguities, and that cities without ambiguity issues can use their common name, (e.g., Boston, Chicago, New York City, Hollywood), as the name of their main page.

What the section currently says

A vote to reject this proposal means you support leaving it like this (vote below):

Cities in the United States and Canada, however, will be disambiguated with a format of [[City, State]] or [[City, Province]] (the "comma convention"). Over 30,000 U.S. city articles are already in the form of "City, State" even if they do not need disambiguation. Those U.S. cities which need additional disambiguation will be disambiguated with their County (e.g. Elgin, Lancaster County, South Carolina and Elgin, Kershaw County, South Carolina).

There is some dispute as to the general applicability of this convention. See the Talk page.

Proposed update to the section

A vote in support of the proposal means you support changing the current section from the above, to this (vote below):

Famous cities, neighorhoods and other notable places in the United States and Canada without significant name conflicts, like Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles, Yosemite, San Francisco, Houston, Hollywood, Manhattan, Montreal, La Jolla, etc., should comply with the Wikipedia rule for common names, and the main article name should be the name alone when that is the common name.

City names with conflicting names will be disambiguated with a format of [[City, State]] or [[City, Province]] (the "comma convention"). Neighborhoods with conflicting names will be disambiguated with a format of [[Neighborhood, City, State]] or [[Neighborhood, City, Province]]. Those cities which need additional disambiguation will be disambiguated with their County (e.g. Elgin, Lancaster County, South Carolina and Elgin, Kershaw County, South Carolina).

Cities, neighorhoods and places that are not famous nor have any naming conflicts may be named with either the name alone, or using the comma convention. Again, the Wikipedia rule for common names applies:

"When choosing a name for a page ask yourself: What word would the average user of the Wikipedia put into the search engine?"

However, for every city and neighborhood not named using the "comma convention", a redirect page name according to the "comma convention" should send one to the main page.

Rationale

A mandatory [[City, State]] rule results in absurd looking entries like New York, New York (instead of New York City), Chicago, Illinois, and, if extended to neighborhoods, even the contrived and cumbersome Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. For what? For the sake of a standard? So that city and neighborhood names line up nicely when looking at Categories? (that can be resolved other ways).

It should be noted that a mandatory [[City, State]] rule does nothing to resolve naming squabbles. If the simple name (e.g., Portland) has significant ambiguation issues, then the main page is a disambiguation page using either approach. If the ambiguation is between a famous name and less well-known name, (e.g., Hollywood and Hollywood, Florida), then the famous name gets the simple name as a redirect page anyway. For example, Chicago is currently a redirect to Chicago, Illinois, and Hollywood is a redirect to Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. This proposal is essentially about reversing these redirects, to be in line with common sense, rather than tunnel vision standards for the sake of standards.

Join me in saluting the wisdom of the main rule for city names, which is: there are no special naming conventions for cities, unless multiple cities with the same name exist., by voting in favor of this proposal. It is unfortunate that we have to clarify it further at this level, but so it is.

Please indicate whether you support or reject this proposal, reasoning is optional but appreciated. --Serge 02:02, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I decided to give the voting a month or so. THE VOTING WILL CONTINUE THROUGH 15 January 2006. --Serge 07:58, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Other arguments in support

(Add your arguments of support here. Vote below.)

• It would seem that the idea that this allows editors to know exactly where articles are isn't working. Several of the larger/more famous cities have a number of links to their redirects, (note Los Angeles especially). The current policy relies on people reading it first. In the majority of cases that isn't going to happen. josh (talk) 07:59, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• So many of these articles have the proper, shortened name redirecting to an extended one, and I have yet to understand why checking for cases like Birmingham, Alabama (as opposed to the English city of Birmingham) or Sacramento, California (as opposed to the disambig page Sacramento) would be such a problem. Every other country's editors do it. Why do I have to type [[Anaheim, California|Anaheim]], [[California]] instead of [[Anaheim]], [[California]] to get the same thing? 'That wastes more time than taking the time to check a city name for conflicts. Additionally, I know most do not view it this way, but one could say it looks inferior; as the primary meaning is a top-level name (London, Paris, etc), forcing American cities to use the state name by default puts it in a second-class light. I don't feel strongly about that, but the extra typing to properly link somewhere (laziness leads people to simply type [[Boston, Massachusetts]] instead of linking properly as in my Anaheim example) is what bugs me most. Answar 21:17, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• Many cities have worldwide reputations, and it makes little sense to put them at "Cityname, Statename" or "Cityname, Countryname" in those cases. For example, London, Antwerp, and Los Angeles. What seems to be happening here is an argument that in the United States alone, we should never put a city name alone as the article title. Is that in fact what is being advocated here? If so, what is the justification for treating the US differently? If not, do those who advocate the longer naming scheme also feel that cities such as Rio de Janeiro should actually be at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil? --Yath 21:46, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Arguments for rejecting this proposal

(Add your arguments to reject here. Vote below.)

• This issue was already debated and resolved back in August. There is no intelligent reason to debate and vote on this issue again so soon, when the majority of American editors have already indicated their support for the existing standard.

I see a 2 day vote was held in July that had a handful of participants. That's not very serious. There are complaints about the cumbersome names on almost every major city page, yet none of those people voted here. This vote will be held for over a month to give people a chance to learn about it, think about it, and vote seriously. --Serge 08:02, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• Furthermore, Serge's proposed rule would result in silly games between residents of major cities as they do repeated page moves while attempting to develop a consensus. For example, San Jose is the name of major cities in both Costa Rica and the United States. It is easily foreseeable that residents of both cities might see their own as the more famous one, and then might keep moving the other one out of San Jose and moving their own city in. At least in the current system, such tug-of-wars are limited to edits to the redirect page. --Coolcaesar 05:55, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Please read the wording of the proposal. This proposed change would affect current redirect pages with unambiguous names like Chicago, Hollywood and San Francisco (making them be the names of the respective main pages, instead of redirects to unnecessary, cumbersome and contrived names for these well-known and unambiguous places). The proposal would clearly not affect disambiguation pages like San Jose, Portland and Kansas City. --Serge 06:43, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Notes

• This policy seems to already to apply to canadian cities (See Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa). josh (talk) 07:59, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Good point. Montreal is an excellent example of what I'm talking about. If this policy is not clarified, they will try to change it too, if they haven't already. Note how the current "convention" is worded, referencing [[City, Province]]. --Serge 08:06, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• The issue of ambiguity is separate. This proposal applies only to cities without ambiguity issues, and addresses the question of whether [[City]] should redirect to [[City, State]], or vice versa. If someone wants to argue that [[City]] should be a disambiguation page, that applies with either approach (as Pentawing noted below that he found out with Boston). Note, by the way, that Boston remains a redirect page, not a disambiguation page. Also, a redirect link to Boston (disambiguation) makes sense to me at the top of a page named Boston, but not on one named Boston, Massachusetts (which currently has that link). No? --Serge 08:28, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• While the namespace for cities is large, it is still only a fraction of the entire namespace that Wiki editors have to deal with. I don't understand the particular "can of worms" associated with U.S. city names per se that warrants a contrived naming convention utilizing uncommon names for common places, even when there is no ambiguity issue. What makes U.S. cities so different? Nothing. This is standard Wiki stuff. More importantly, what this vote is ultimately about is whether we should be trying to improve the environment for the editors, or the users of Wiki. Using Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, and Manhattan, New York City, New York, and San Francisco, California instead of simply Hollywood, Manhattan, and San Francisco is putting the needs of Wiki editors above the need to provide a positive experience for our users. Worse, it's all for naught, since it improves nothing for the editors anyway. --Serge 22:37, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• It seems there are multiple kinds of consistency, but they conflict. I don't much care which convention we have, but it would be nice it if did not change every six months. It would also be nice if actual practice were kept consistent with the convention. Please note that city categories, where they exist, should be named consistent with the corresponding city articles. We do have bots for category renaming. -- Beland 01:01, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

VOTE TO SUPPORT the above proposal here

1. Voting for my own proposal! --Serge 02:02, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
2. Yath 07:53, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
3. Answar 21:07, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
4. Sometimes naming conventions are more trouble than they are worth. Why use Manhattan, New York City, New York when you can use Manhattan. Common sense above all. Quasipalm 22:02, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
5. Jibbajabba 19:13, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
6. Tedernst | talk 06:51, 12 December 2005 (UTC) I see no reason for city names to have a different convention than any other type of article. Naming conventions, in my opinion, should come into play only with ambiguous names.
7. That Guy, From That Show! 04:23, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
8. Do it. "Toronto" worked; "Chicago" will work. It's the right thing. 66.96.28.244 07:34, 6 January 2006 (UTC)\
9. Septentrionalis 06:22, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
10. G-Man * 20:37, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Comments on votes of support

1. Serge
2. Yath
3. Answar
4. Quasipalm

   You could go even further, with [[Lower East Side, Manhattan, New York City, New York]] — too cumbersome. ---Aude 22:44, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

5. The one thing I don't like about the proposal is the list of examples. First, La Jolla isn't nearly as famous as the other places listed. Second, the most common way to refer to New York (City) is simply New York, but that has a conflict with the state, and the examples are supposed to be places with no important conflicting names. Using New York City for the article title makes sense as a compromise, but it should be treated as a separate case, not a typical example. 66.96.28.244 07:34, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
6. I agree with the reservations immediately above, but the principle seems obvious; when the most natural usage in running text, like Chicago, is unique or overwhelmingly the principal usage, it should be used; why redirect? Septentrionalis 06:21, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

VOTE TO REJECT the above proposal here.

1. Voting to reject for the reasons I have stated during the past two weeks and also back in July and August. --Coolcaesar 05:55, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
2. Oppose after reading the previous discussions on similar proposals. Furthermore, we could get people of different municipalities squabbling over which city, town, or group would get the direct naming scheme, even for names that do not appear ambiguous (I have seen an instance of this between Boston, Massachusetts, and Boston, England). Pentawing 08:11, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
3. . We've been over this many times. There are too many potential conflicts to handle placenames on a case-by-case basis. Doing so would mean that editors would have to constantly check to see how individual places are handled. The policy has been settled for a long while and over 30,000 places are using the existing scheme. There is no pressing need for this proposal, and passing it would lead to confusion. -Willmcw 09:50, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
4. Oppose, redirects are free and this is an area which, due to its size, requires a firm guideline. Hiding talk 10:54, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
5. Reject. The supposed "awkwardness" of a very few constructions like New York City, New York is nothing compared to the can of worms opened by a non-standardized naming convention. Why use "Manhattan, New York City, New York" when you can use "Manhattan"? In casual conversation you use the latter, but this is supposed to be an encyclopedia. In casual conversation "America" is often said in place of "United States", but should the article on that country be titled "America", simply because it's shorter and more colloquial? "Manhattan" can refer to any number of places. Denvoran 18:16, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
6. Oppose. I don't see standardizing city naming as a major priority, but it has the advantage of clarity, and Serge's rhetoric seems overheated. There's nothing particularly "absurd" about "Chicago, Illinois"; newspapers and other reference works describe U.S. cities that way all the time. Another particularly exaggerated counterexample given above is "Lower East Side, Manhattan, New York City, New York" - I don't think anyone actually proposed making the borough mandatory. ←Hob 23:42, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
7. Oppose, prefer formal names for articles, shortened names should always point to disambiguation, and this policy should be expanded to all place names. New York, New York is a perfectly reasonable title. The local papers commonly use Chicago, Illinois in the tag line, and it's only a state away. Consistency makes for faster and better editting. (I would have preferred the parenthesis, not the comma method, but since one has been chosen, we should try to stick with it!) William Allen Simpson 04:08, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

   Comment. While I think the guideline should apply in the vast majority of cases, there should be some exceptions. New York, New York (generally used only for Manhattan) is not quite the same as New York City, which encompasses all five boroughs. Addresses in Brooklyn use Brooklyn, New York, Bronx uses Bronx, New York, etc. New York City should be one exception, and we should allow for others on a case-by-case basis. All-in-all, I'm favor of the status-quo (keeping Houston, Texas, Chicago, Illinois, New York City, etc.) ---Aude 04:33, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

   Comment. The use of "New York, New York", "Brooklyn, New York" and "Bronx, New York", etc. for addresses within the same city is a misleading and decidedly false postal convention. For some reason the U.S. Postal Service treats the boroughs of New York City as separate cities (while "Manhattan" is unacceptable in addresses and Queens is divided further into the postal designations of "Flushing", "Forest Hills", etc.) An inconsistent practice used by the Postal Service, arguably in place only to facilitate mail delivery, should not simply be blindly transferred into Wikipedia or any other reference work. Just because the USPS forces some residents of New York City to write their address as "Flushing, New York" does not mean that the article on that neighborhood in the borough of Queens should be titled that way as well. The "postal" designation for Manhattan is "New York, New York", but no one would suggest that the article on Manhattan should be titled "New York, New York". Let's not perpetuate the Postal Service's confusing practices when a more consistent convention is available. Denvoran 16:03, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

   Comment. That's why I'm in favor of using New York City (as currently is the case), in this particularly case. In the vast majority of other cases, I agree with you. [[City, State]] should be a guideline but not a policy, as we need to be flexible for particular cases such as New York City. I'm content with the status-quo. ---Aude 16:17, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

   Comment. Just FYI, the postal people aren't being misleading, false, or otherwise unreasonable in this practice; they're making mail delivery possible, which is their job. The problem is that the street names aren't unique among boroughs, especially the numbered streets and avenues. ←Hob 19:10, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

   Comment. As I wrote, the inconsistent practices are in place to facilitate mail delivery, and I am aware of the multiple street names quandary - but standardizing the constructions Bronx, New York, Brooklyn, New York, Flushing, New York, etc. does mislead because it leaves anyone who uses them with the impression that they are distinct entities independent from one another, when in fact they are all part of the same city. Denvoran 19:39, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

8. Oppose prefer full name for articles; separate policy can deal with deciding which article gets redirects for common names. (SEWilco 07:21, 7 December 2005 (UTC))

   Comment. That's a violation of Wiki policy, which is to use the common name for the primary page, not for a redirect. --Serge 05:33, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

9. Oppose Current policy is fine. Exceptions can be hashed out on an exception by exception basis. jengod 23:27, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

   Comment. Except that the "current policy" is cited as reason to adhere to the "comma standard" in all of the exceptions. It is that problem that prompted me to prpose this change. --05:33, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

10. Oppose. The status quo is working fine. There's no need to invite additional chaos. Truly exceptional situations can be worked out on a case-by-case basis. older≠wiser 23:39, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

    Comment. Sigh. The point of his change is to reduce the chaos caused by the "status quo". Over in Talk:Chicago, Illinois you have folks wondering why the page was renamed from Chicago, as one example. --Serge 05:33, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

    Sorry, but having a simple, consistent standard for all U.S. cities is much better than having to pick and choose and fight over the appropriate name over and over again and again. older≠wiser 19:44, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    Oh, yeah, and it's working so well, like all those fights we're not having over and over again on the Chicago Talk page. A unique form of logic your utilizing here, I suppose? --Serge 20:10, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    It is working better than opening the door to having the same sort of discussions umteen times for places across the U.S. older≠wiser 20:38, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you really don't realize you have it backwards. In the beginning, cities were named according to standard Wikipedia naming policies, one at a time, and all was good. Then someone, using a bot, created entries for all missing cities according to the contrived format, [[City, State]]. Whatever. It's the next step that opened the door to all the fights and problems: changing established entries, like Chicago, to also conform to the contrived standard. And resisting changes from the bot-generated contrived format to the more common name, even though there was no ambiguity issue. The changers got away with it much of the time, because for most entries there weren't enough people around who cared much one way or the other. By the time some of us became aware of what was going on, most of the changes were already completed. That doesn't make it right. And it certainly doesn't make it a bonafide standard. Most importantly, it doesn't make for a better Wikipedia. These hokey names, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California (???) are a blot on our entire effort here. It's embarrassing, and a shame. I urge you, and all others who oppose the proposed change, to give this issue some more serious thought, and reconsider your position. Thank you. --Serge 21:06, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    Gee, thanks. First, at the time Rambot created articles for most of the U.S. places, there were only a tiny handful of articles. So there was relatively little moving or renaming involved. Second, it is hardly a "contrived" format. It is nearly universally recognized (in the U.S. anyway, though it has since been adopted to some degree in articles for some other countries as well). As for the not enough people around who cared -- there have been numerous extensive discussions of this, all with the same conclusion (although there are always some who refuse to recognize this)--that the comma-separated titles are OK (even if not not well-loved). As for bona fide standard -- practice IS what defines standards. The mere fact that 99.99% of all U.S. articles are named consistently is precisely how the standard is defined--it is a codification of the way things are. You are proposing to change this de facto standard. As for Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, I actually agree that that is poorly named. It is not a Rambot-created article. I'd prefer to see the title for this neighborhood article as either Hollywood, California or Hollywood, Los Angeles. older≠wiser 21:48, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    • The application of the "convention" to subdivisions of cities is not so much "hokey" as it is unwieldy. I agree, simply limiting a reference to two levels would be a simple solution: Hollywood, Los Angeles. The problem I have with Hollywood, California is that it sets a subdivision of a city on the same level as a city, and creates the confusion that Hollywood is actually independent of Los Angeles. After all, we limit ourselves to Los Angeles, California although we could have Los Angeles, California, United States, which itself fits with the convention of naming a city with a country, e.g., Nassau, Bahamas. The two-level naming convention fits nicely to accommodate places like Lower East Side, Manhattan, which would otherwise become the monstrosity Lower East Side, Manhattan, New York City, New York. Denvoran 22:19, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
    • The default format that happened to be used by Rambot does not a standard make. Yes, it is a universally recognized format (I should clarify that the "contrived" aspect applies mostly to the [[neighborhood, city, state]] format), but that does not mean it's appropriate to use it for cites that are much better known according to their simple name (for lack of a better term). At any rate, the imposition of this format on articles where the simple name is much better known causes much more controversy, fighting and arguing than would ever take place in the absence of the imposition of this format. --Serge 22:13, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
    • Sorry, but there is a de facto standard. It is just that you don't like it. Sorry for that, but that's the way it is. [[neighborhood, city, state]] is not part of this de facto standard -- and I agree that that is a contrivance (that would only be necessary if there were multiple neighborhoods in the same state with the same name). What generates the most controversy is NOT the existence of this de facto standard, but the repeated attempts to change it, even though such proposals have never garnered anything close to a consensus. While you are entitled to your opinion that there would be less controversy if this were changed, I see no reason whatsoever to accept such a hypothesis. older≠wiser 22:25, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    • Whether I like the default format used by Rambot is immaterial. For the record, I can't think of a better one. What I don't like is the imposition of that format as a "de facto standard" when there are good reasons to use the alternative more commonly known simple name. What if I used a bot to rename all city article names to start with the prefix Serge? According to you, that would establish a "de facto standard". Claiming bot-generated names establishes a standard is specious at best. As to whether there is any reason to support my hypothesis that there would be less controversy if this format were not imposed as a standard, I submit all the controversies on virtually every famous U.S. city talk page, almost all of which are centered around debates involving usage of the commonly known/used name versus this format imposed as a standard. Take away the defense of the bogus "standard" in all of those controversies, and you would have virtually no controversies. Also note that this only applies to all of the names like Chicago, where the simple name currectly exists as a redirect to the city article page, indicating the lack of controversy about using that article name for other purposes. If you see that as "no reason whatsoever", I suggest you're not really looking. --Serge 22:42, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

    This is becoming nonsensical. If you tried running a bot to do such an idiosyncratic renaming, you'd probably be banned. Rambot did not rename articles--it created most (nearly all) of the U.S. city articles from scratch. Although there were some objections, the bot operated by and large with the support of the community. I.e. the community accepted this naming convention and it works (as in it's not broken and hence not in need of fixing). It is not that the bot determined the naming convention -- there was thought put into it and it has largely been accepted by the community(except for the occasional recurrence of polls such as this--which generally demonstrate fairly conclusively that there is no consensus for changing this de facto standard). older≠wiser 02:35, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

    I did not mean to imply that the bot determined the format. But the use of the bot to create all the names determined the need for a fixed format of one kind or another. If all the names were not created by a bot in the first place, then there would be no such need (just like for any other Wiki articles that are created without bots). That's what makes the need artificial. Yes, given the need for a consistent format because of Rambot, the format chosen is most reasonable. But what seems to have happened since then is a sense for a need of a standard based on this format beyond the requirements of the bot, and the imposition of this artificial standard on pages such as San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angeles, etc. etc., where, because of this imposition, there are now constant battles about it. What started as a need for convention because of the bot, has become a standard-for-the-sake-of-the-standard. I see in earlier discussions about this issue, long before I became involved, on the side of those supporting the convention, there was a lot of room for concession, special cases, and the like. But now you guys are using the "standard" as the reason that trumps all others in determining the name of a city article. Some of you are even trying to impose it on New York City. I'm glad this standards-for-the-sake-of-standards obsessed perspective so far seems to be limited to this one area in Wikipedia, but it's bad enough. --Serge 17:12, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

    Any naming convention is "articifical". There is and was no "imposition". The de facto standard reflects the current situation and, whatever the historical circumstances that led to it, most people seem to be OK with it and do not see any compelling reason to abandon a simple, consistent system for naming places in the U.S. older≠wiser 17:41, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

11. Speedy close this vote, we don't have to keep voting on this over and over and over again. User:Zoe|^(talk) 22:29, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
12. Oppose. Answar asks, "Why do I have to type [[Anaheim, California|Anaheim]], [[California]] instead of [[Anaheim]], [[California]] to get the same thing?" I suggest you just type [[Anaheim, California]]. There's generally no need to provide a direct link to California, any more than you would need to type [[Anaheim, California|Anaheim]], [[California]], [[United States]]. JamesMLane 00:37, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
13. Oppose. Anaheim, California should identify what I'm referring to. I didn't know it was "famous", and doesn't make sense to have to check fame rating of a city to know how to properly name the city. Is there a Fame Infobox? What is fame rating of Peoria? (SEWilco 02:51, 6 January 2006 (UTC))
14. Oppose and speedy close of vote - Dead horses are for eaten', not beaten'. --mav 06:32, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
15. Vehemently oppose. And I hope that all the oppose voters also visit the talk:Los Angeles, California page to oppose the current proposal to move that page to the very ambiguous Los Angeles. ^BlankVerse 13:14, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
16. Oppose. Happy with the status quo. Stan 15:57, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
17. Oppose: keep the well-established standard for cities in the U.S. Jonathunder 17:58, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Comments

1. I'm okay with keeping redirects such as Houston to Houston, Texas, as is currently the case, and keeping New York City as New York City (as-is). In a small number of cases, such as New York City, there should be exceptions to the [[Neighborhood, City, State]] rule. In the case of Hollywood, I think it should just be Hollywood — "Hollywood" is the sort of term that signifies something broader — the movie or entertainment industry. This is analogous to "Wall Street", "Broadway", "The White House", "The Pentagon"... when the evening news says "Wall Street had a good day", it doesn't mean the pavement is happy. ---Aude 21:35, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
2. There's an important distinction to be made between "Hollywood", the entertainment industry, and "Hollywood", a district of Los Angeles. Similarly, "Wall Street" is shorthand for financial markets, while "Wall Street" is also an actual location. Both the former and the latter in each example merit Wikipedia articles of their own, and each article should be titled according to consistent conventions. --Denvoran 22:28, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I disagree about using separate articles for "Hollywood", the place and "Hollywood", the entertainment industry. One article can handle explaiing the place and its cultural or broader significance. As presently done, Wall Street covers both the specific place and the cultural significance, and Hollywood discusses the place and "Hollywood and the motion picture industry". And the article should be just "Hollywood" and not "Hollywood, Los Angeles, California".---Aude 22:40, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Please consider expressing your view in terms of a VOTE FOR SUPPORT above. --Serge 22:45, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't entirely agree with all aspects of the proposal, including:

"Cities, neighorhoods and places that are not famous nor have any naming conflicts may be named with either the name alone, or using the comma convention. Again, the Wikipedia rule for common names applies."

Or deviating from [[City, State]] in all the examples you provided. What about Chicago, the musical? Chicago, the band? I think it's a smaller number of instances where we should deviate from the standard conventions. ---Aude 22:53, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

But there is a separate article for "Hollywood", the entertainment industry -- Cinema of the United States. Are you proposing that it be removed? If "Hollywood", as a district of Los Angeles, is to "stand alone", then what about Westwood or Van Nuys or any other part of that city? Who decides whether or not there is "broader significance", allowing the district or neighborhood to transcend its lowly status and escape the shackles of having to be associated with the city that it is a part of? A "stand-alone" article title would perpetuate the false but widely-held notion that Hollywood is an actual city or a place that is separate from Los Angeles. An encyclopedia should educate, not mislead, and the very article titles can inform and dispel misconceptions. Denvoran 22:55, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

No, Cinema of the United States does not need to be removed. But Hollywood can and does explain the significance of the place and connection to Cinema of the United States. And the article starts off with saying "Hollywood is a district of the city of Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.", so that should dispel misconceptions. ---Aude 23:00, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Abstention and commentary: here's why ...

There are numerous issues here. Throughout, the challenge is to balance consistency with pragmatism. The current US city naming convention might be adequate only for US cities and in case of ambiguity, but only where there's a need to apply it and is otherwise excessive, even awkward, and has no precedent in printed compendiums. Should we apply it to Canadian cities unnecessarily? I think not: for instance, there are far fewer cities with populations of 30K or more in Canada than the US, so the guideline is rather inequitable. And how about Australian cities? What of France: how unwieldy would Paris, Île-de-France be (redlink!)? Disambigs are sufficient:

• Paris yet Paris, Ontario and Paris, Texas, all with Paris (disambiguation):
• London yet London, Ontario (or London, Canada), all with London (disambiguation)
• Sydney yet Sydney, Nova Scotia, all with Sydney (disambiguation), et al.
• Chicago, the musical is based largely on the city and a disambig works to clarify these dissimilar notions.

Let's take this a step further: how about extending the US convention to subnational or national entities: California, United States, or Georgia, Europe/Asia (of which the country is arguably transcontinental and actually has a different name in its native language)? Excessive and awkward.

The Wikipedia convention for common names is sufficient (and I mean common from a global perspective in this global medium, not a local one), particularly for major and global cities/locales, with exceptions treated separately and disambigs when needed. Important among the reasons, simplicity: what is easiest for a visitor to type and intuit? Will a visitor – perhaps in London – be confused and intuit another Los Angeles somewhere? And if the issue is truly ambiguous (a la NPOV), a user typing "Los Angeles" should be taken to Los Angeles (disambiguation), not Los Angeles (California). For example, Kingston. To do otherwise unnecessarily redirects and complicates the issue for a visitor. If we wish to organise the city articles additionally, we should be using categories to do this, not through unwieldy names. (On the other hand, discrete lists of US (or similar) cities might be a different matter, in which case the consistent use of state names or abbreviations among all would make sense.)

And I suggest this very cognizant of a London near to my abode. Moreover, a prior discussion occurred at the Toronto article to retain its name/location, but various users have tried to apply the Toronto, Ontario 'standard' without (renewed) discussion or consensus. I and others there believe this the way to go for such major (Cdn.) locales and instances. Thus, the current US convention is inapplicable to Canadian locales and the proposal equally invalid.

So, until a renewed proposal can clearly accommodate for everything above, the common naming convention is sufficient, the US standard should not be ubiquitous (and a Canadian standard shall be developed or enhanced separately), and I abstain. E Pluribus Anthony 21:35, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

What in your "everything above" do you feel is not clearly accomodated for in the proposed change? --Serge 22:20, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

As stated: there's no reason to lump Canadian cities with American ones (based on inequitable rationale) and I do not see, or recall, a prior consensus for that. I abstain from voting for this proposal based on these and the aforementioned grounds. This not to say it's without merit, however.

Once this vote is complete, my intention is to either propose a convention for Canadian cities or to be bold and separate it out anyway. E Pluribus Anthony 23:14, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

The current version addresses Canada as well as the U.S. The proposed change does not affect that part of it. It's unreasonable to make all changes at once - you'd never get consensus on anything. Seems like having a separate policy for Canada is a separate issue. At any rate, the proposed change softens the requirements for Canadian cities as well as for U.S. cities, so it would seem to be consistent with your wishes. Are there any other important issues that you feel the proposed change does not address, that it must address, before you would support it? I say this because it appears to me that everything in your list is accomodated for, unless I'm missing something. --Serge 23:29, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

I realise that and, like I said, your proposal has merit. It also has detractors. In any event, I abstain from supporting a proposal drafted to rectify another 'convention' that I think was erroneously derived at and implemented for American and Canadian cities in toto in the first place. After the vote's conclusion, whatever the outcome, a Canadian convention will be adopted separately. E Pluribus Anthony 23:46, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this section.