Talk:Siemens

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[edit] Redirect to company or dab page?

We should talk about changing this redirect before doing so. . . I think it makes sense to point to the company, I believe most people will be looking for it (or one of its products). Why should we change that? (John User:Jwy talk) 00:37, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Here's why I would like to change it:
1. In my case, I wasn't looking for the company at all. I had clicked on a link in a molecular biology article that used the unit as a measure of conductivity, and found myself looking an article about the company. It took some poking around to find what I was looking for.
2. I think that since the redirect is likely to affect other articles, and since it may be difficult to ascertain which articles will be affected, redirecting to the disambiguation page is safest.
3. Redirecting to Siemens AG needlessly promotes the company by redirecting users who may be looking for something else.
4. Do we have any evidence that most people on Wikipedia will be looking for Siemens AG? I would think that people looking for the company would google the company website.
5. Redirecting to (disambiguation) doesn't hurt anything: the link to Siemens AG is prominently featured on the disambiguation page.
Webbbbbbber (talk) 19:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
The link in the molecular biology article should be fixed (and any other link intending to link to other-than-the-company) to direct to the article directly. This would be the case no matter what we do this redirect. You should never have gotten here. Articles should (almost) never link to a disambiguation page. I'll start cleaning that up. If most people are looking for the company, directing it to the company is the best thing to do. It has nothing to do with promoting it over anything else. And if we change the redirect, the "prominent position" of Siemens AG on the disambiguation page will change. Have a look at WP:MOSDAB for some of the more detailed thinking here.
Item 4 is where I think some discussion could take place. I tend to think most people, when entering Siemens in the search box, will be looking for the company. Not that its conclusive, but the first two pages of a google search are all for the company. Which of the other articles do you think will be nearly as popular? (John User:Jwy talk) 04:20, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your input and consideration!
I wasn't aware that articles shouldn't link to the disambiguation page, but that makes sense.
As far as popularity goes, the only links I can see as being reasonably popular are: Siemens AG, Siemens (unit), and Siemens (train). All the others are names of people, and I think WP users seeking those people are likely to use first and last name in their search.
It sounds like you are fairly familiar with WP style, which I am still learning. Is it fairly common for [Topic] to link to [Topic (disambiguation)], or is that generally frowned upon?. Is it acceptable practice to redirect to a disambiguation page for 24-72 hours and look at the traffic to determine article popularity? It would be really easy to see which Siemens people are after by (temporarily) redirecting to the disambiguation page, then checking the traffic of each main article. Or are experiments along these lines verboten? Webbbbbbber (talk) 21:19, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
And thanks for "listening." I actually haven't used any of the statistics actually, so I don't know what works. And I'm not sure 24-72 hours is long enough - don't know how often anyone is looking for these guys. I have never seen anyone experiment like that. I'm actually pretty certain most people will be looking for the company - they have quite a "presence" on American TV, at least, and the name is spewed across many a footballer's jersey in Europe. The train is made by the same company. And the unit is pretty specialized. I would love to see statistics, but I don't need them here.
My criteria there (which I just came up with myself and some are pushing back on a little) is that if any one article is the desired article more than ALL the rest, then it should be the primary target. I truly think that is the case here.
Thing to Thing (disambiguation) is quite normal when there is no primary article agreed upon. You want people entering "Thing" to get to the dab page and it is arguably clearer to have the page name actually include the (disambiguation). If you want that, the only way to do it is to redirect as you say! But it doesn't HAVE to be that way. Sometimes - because of the way the history went, the redirect goes the other way and that works okay, too. Both work getting the user to their desired information quickly, which is the main goal of dab pages. (John User:Jwy talk) 06:08, 17 April 2008 (UTC)