Talk:Sony ILCE-QX1

SmartShot Alpha vs. ILCE

User:Samsara just raised an interesting topic regarding how to best name this camera on my talk page, which, I think, better belongs here, therefore I'm copying it to here:

"I think precedence on the English Wikipedia goes to the English press release. Regards, Samsara (FA • FP) 17:46, 6 September 2014 (UTC)"[reply]

Hi, Samsara. As far as I can see, most announcements in the US seem to call it "Alpha QX1", "Alpha ILCE-QX1", "α QX1" or "α ILCE-QX1", whereas most announcement over here seem to name it "SmartShot QX1" or "SmartShot ILCE-QX1". Some use both designations "α" and "SmartShot".

The ILCE-QX1 (with E-mount) actually carries an "α" logo on its right shoulder, whereas all other cameras of the QX series with fixed lenses (DSC-QX10, DSC-QX30 and DSC-QX100) carry a "Cyber-shot" logo. Sony uses the "α" name for all A-mount and most of their E-mount products (except for some E-mount cameras of the Handycam and NXCAM lines), whereas they use the "Cyber-shot" name for most of their fixed-lens cameras.

All four cameras are also marketed as being part of the SmartShot family, apparently Sony's new (since 2013) designation for "lens-style cameras".

If the camera would be actually marketed under different names in different countries, I think, we should list them all. However, I assume that the product name is the same everywhere, and that the press announcements are just misleading and/or incomplete (which would be typical for Sony ;-> ). I think, what's most relevant is how it is called in the manual and on the box. photokina will probably help to further clear up the name issue. What do you think?

--Matthiaspaul (talk) 18:32, 6 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

If you look at Sony NEX-5, you will see that there is longstanding consensus for that article naming in spite of there being an alpha logo on the shoulder of that camera, too. So I think we can rule out marks on the camera as being obligatory parts of the name, not least because it borders on original research.

We cannot rely on what Sony has done in the past as marketing decisions can change quickly and silently. Ricoh has recently dropped the Optio part from some camera names, for instance. There was no press announcement about this, the Optio just stopped appearing as part of the product name. Our role is to simply follow the names used by the manufacturer faithfully, no matter whether they are at odds with previously used names or not. In the case of Sony, you'll be aware that naming conventions have changed a lot recently.

The English Wikipedia articles on Sony cameras should, as a foremost priority, represent the name or names used by Sony in English-speaking markets. To that end, this is the product page for the QX-1 on Sony's USA website:

http://store.sony.com/interchangeable-lens-style-camera-zid27-ILCEQX1/B/cat-27-catid-collections-ifa

Neither SmartShot nor Alpha appear as parts of the name, or in fact anywhere on that page.

The case is similar on the UK site:

http://www.sony.co.uk/electronics/interchangeable-lens-cameras/ilce-qx1-body-kit/specifications

There is an alpha symbol on the page title, but nowhere else and not part of the product name. SmartShot is nowhere to be seen.

Another one:

http://www.sony.net/Products/di/en-gb/products/cm32/index.html?contentsTop=1

So I think the case is very clear that Sony does not use those two words as part of the product name in English-speaking markets.

For the QX-30, the links are the following:

In fact, "lens-style cameras" are treated as a completely separate category:

http://www.sony.net/Products/di/en-gb/products/index.html#ctgy2

Samsara (FA • FP) 19:58, 6 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The funny part is that although Sony announced the camera as SmartShot over here, they list the ILCE-QX1 under "α" on the web site. There is no separate category for lens-style cameras, yet. But this doesn't mean much, I have often observed changes in the weeks past announcements on both the US and the European Sony sites. That's why I suggest to give Sony some time to sort out and fix their inconsistencies in the weeks to come - in particular a week ahead photokina.

Since you mentioned the Sony NEX-7 article as a good example, it is even possible that we both prefer the same naming scheme. If I had to decide on the naming scheme to be used, I would consistently use "Sony <model-name>" without family names, without truncations, without transliterations (like "Alpha", "a" or "A" for "α") unless they would actually be part of the model name. So, "Sony NEX-7" is perfectly okay with me, whereas "Sony QX1" is not and would have to be changed to "Sony ILCE-QX1". I would also rename "Sony Alpha 7" to "Sony ILCE-7", "Sony Alpha 900" to "Sony DSLR-A900", and "Sony Cyber-shot DSC-RX100" to "Sony DSC-RX100", etc. (always catching the other naming variants with redirects, of course, and also mentioning the corresponding family names in the lede of the articles). This would avoid a lot of (real or potentially future) ambiguity (f.e. "Alpha 7" could refer to the Sony ILCE-7, the Sony NEX-7, or the Minolta α-7, etc.) and also allow us to maintain a consistent nameing scheme over decades. Since the model names on the name plates are always verifyable and are RS in itself beyond any doubt, it would also avoid problems with inconsistent naming schemes used in the various announcements.

--Matthiaspaul (talk) 21:24, 6 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There is no problem with changing it later if changes become apparent. However, for now we need to be using the name that is most correct on current evidence. Therefore I don't object to moving the QX1 article to the longer name, "Sony ILCE-QX1", as suggested.

You should be aware that those other articles you mention are watched and periodically edited by a number of other people. Therefore I suggest that proposals to change those names should receive input from those other users.

As far as "a consistent nameing scheme over decades" is concerned, I agree that this is desirable; however, note that sometimes manufacturers do not cooperate in the way we might expect them to. For instance, Canon has released two different cameras under the name "Canon PowerShot S100", once in 2000 and then again in 2011. So we should always assume that nothing is set in stone and we may have to be flexible in future. Regards, Samsara (FA • FP) 23:17, 6 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]