User talk:FOARP/Archives/2024/February

Invitation

Hello FOARP/Archives/2024, we need experienced volunteers.

• New Page Patrol is currently struggling to keep up with the influx of new articles. We could use a few extra hands on deck if you think you can help.
• Reviewing/patrolling a page doesn't take much time but it requires a good understanding of Wikipedia policies and guidelines; Wikipedia needs experienced users to perform this task and there are precious few with the appropriate skills. Even a couple reviews a day can make a huge difference.
• Kindly read the tutorial before making your decision (if it looks daunting, don't worry, it basically boils down to checking CSD, notability, and title). If this looks like something that you can do, please consider joining us.
• If you would like to join the project and help out, please see the granting conditions. You can apply for the user-right HERE.
• If you have questions, please feel free to drop a message at the reviewer's discussion board.
• Cheers, and hope to see you around.

Sent by NPP Coordination using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:27, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Happy Holidays!

Hike395 is wishing you Happy Holidays! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user Happy Holidays, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Happy New Year!

Spread the cheer by adding {{subst:Happy holidays}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

— hike395 (talk) 21:55, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

A belated cheers from me! FOARP (talk) 08:12, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Opinion sought on Geostub AFDs

Hi Foarp, I wanted to get your opinion. I've been reading talk pages and the recent rfc about notability on wikipedia. My thinking is most of the AFDs that come up, can be dealt with by just a boiler plate argument for delete or merge. I want to write one and use it. Would that be frowned upon by anyone that matters?James.folsom (talk) 22:31, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

I would steer away from using boilerplate text. FOARP (talk) 08:12, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Bloody flipping hell

There's another huge placenames dump: basically all of Myanmar was put in back in 2010 by one of the usual offenders, using (supposedly) GMaps and Bing maps as the source. Tehre are of course hundreds of "populated places". And I suspect the loyal opposition will do anything to prevent a mass deletion. Mangoe (talk) 00:20, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I’ve had my eye on these for years. It’s the usual mix of GNS spam and real places. The GNS data would (judging by the source of the Korean place-names) likely have come from military maps dated back to WW2 so, yeah, accuracy may be an issue. No blame on Slim and Stillwell’s men - they weren’t to know that the half-understood location names they wrote down whilst advancing through the Burmese jungle were going to get turned in to articles in an encyclopaedia ~70 years in the future. FOARP (talk) 08:07, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Unreferenced articles February 2024 backlog drive

WikiProject Unreferenced articles | February 2024 Backlog Drive
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:38, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Recognizability

Re the close at Talk:King of Malaysia, recognizability in WP:CRITERIA is specifically tailored to be about "someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area". Given more articles use YDPA, including both the sources on the page and those presented in the RM, YDPA is quite plainly a name that will be recognizable to someone familiar with the subject area. Very odd to read the idea that this more used name is less recognizable to someone familiar with the subject area as being "incontestable". CMD (talk) 19:22, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

It was, though, a point endorsed by a number of people in the discussion. However recognizable you believe YDPA to be (and it surely means something that we are writing this as an acronym because it is easier to do so), the point that the proposed title was more recognizable (e.g., easier, more familiar, or similar terminology) was one put forward/supported in the discussion by GoodDay, Traumnovelle, Killuminator, Kaiixin, VectorVoyager, and Azarctic by my count. In the face of such an strong numerical endorsement, it would take a particularly weak argument to close that as not moved, and there is no obvious serious weakness with the argument that people familiar with the subject of the Politics of Malaysia (or monarchy in general) are going to find a fully-descriptive English-language name made up of relatively simple words more recognizable than a name that is not even in the English language nor a common currency in English-language discussion in the world at large. FOARP (talk) 21:33, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

A point being endorsed does not make something "incontestable". At any rate, many editors you list there don't mention recognizability at all. GoodDay did use the word, but phrased it about general English language rather than recognizability as defined by WP:CRITERIA. Traumnovelle's argument was explicitly opposite to recognizability: they note it as better for "anyone unfamiliar", whereas recognizability refers to "someone familiar". As for your last point, Yang di-Pertuan Agong is used in the English language, hence its use in the English language sources in the article. The wider support count is also poor, given how some seem made up at best. CMD (talk) 13:30, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

You are welcome to seek review on this if you wish. I cannot of course predict how that will turn out, but I doubt anyone is going to seriously accept any serious error, even from the point of view of someone familiar with Malaysian politics, in the proposition that "King of Malaysia" is more recognisable than a term that we are abbreviating even in this conversation because of its complexity.

Here's where each of the editors I referenced above, according to my reading of the discussion, apparently endorsed the point that King of Malaysia was more recognisable than YDPA:

• GoodDay - "as an english language reader, the title "King of Malaysia" is recognizable"
• Traumnovelle - "King of Malaysia makes much more sense to anyone unfamiliar with the Malayan language or decent familiarity with Malayan politics/culture". I understand your point that the WP:CRITERIA talks about familiarity with the subject, but Traumnovelle appears to think "familiarity with the subject" is not the same as familiarity with Malay-language terms, and that it would require a decent (i.e., high) degree of familiarity to recognise this name.
• Killuminator - "Support as more recognizable"
• Kaiixin - "YDPA is in the Malay language (we are on the English wiki), and King of Malaysia is known to both locals and outsiders". Kaiixin does not explicitly use the term "recognisability" but this is clearly an argument based on "King of Malaysia" being more recognisable than a Malay-language term. I understand your point is that the term is also used in some English-language texts, but this does not appear to have been endorsed by many other editors in the discussion.
• VectorVoyager - "per nom and ease. King of Malaysia is used officially in sources and even if its not the primary official usage its still the common and easier usage in English." References to ease of use are essentially references to recognisability.
  

Additionally Fandi89 endorsed Killuminator's argument whilst Azarctic endorsed Kaiixin's position. FOARP (talk) 14:00, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

We are abbreviating the term because it is long, for the same reason we write DRC rather than Democratic Republic of the Congo. GoodDay as mentioned refers to the English language, rather than anything related to "someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area". Traumnovelle as mentioned makes entirely the opposite point. Kaiixin's argument is again unrelated to "someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area". VectorVoyager's point was entirely unsupported, so far we have a single tweet with a screenshot of one document issued literally this year. The claim of common usage was also entirely unsupported. On your inference, recognisability is "The title is a name or description of the subject that someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area will recognize", rather than being related to ease of use, so I'm unsure how the latter could be an essential reference to the former. As to the point I made, it seems slightly misinterpreted. The term is used in almost all English language texts, including explicitly every one that is currently a source on the relevant wikipage (as well as in far more sources, as was demonstrated in the discussion). CMD (talk) 20:14, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I'm afraid I read what they said differently. Particularly I don't agree that Traumnovelle is saying the "opposite" of King of Malaysia being more recognisable than YDPA, as this is to interpret their !vote as the opposite of what was clearly intended.

However, there's an easy way of confirming what they intended: @GoodDay, Traumnovelle, Killuminator, Kaiixin, and VectorVoyage: - do you agree with my interpretation of what you said or with CMD's? FOARP (talk) 20:38, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I think my vote doesn't leave much ambiguity. King of Malaysia is a recognizable term used in international media. YDPA (which I wouldn't know how to write without going copy/paste) is a Wikipedianism. I wouldn't support keeping the original Malay phrase just because that's what longtime editors are used to seeing. Killuminator (talk) 21:05, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

"King of Malaysia" is the recognizable title. The other title? I can't even spell correctly, let alone understand. PS - Recommend we start implementing "King of Malaysia" in the related-bios, as it's more recognizable & thus avoid the redirects. GoodDay (talk) 21:08, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I said that King of Malaysia is more recognisable to anyone who is unfamiliar with the Malayan language. (Which compromises most Wikipedia readers), I only entered the discussion because I clicked on the article after being featured on ITN due to having no clue what the YDPA was. Traumnovelle (talk) 22:02, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

This seems pretty clear. I guess WP:AUDIENCE is also worth mentioning here as to who text should be recognisable for. I don't think the idea that people weren't arguing for recognisability, or even arguing the opposite of recognisability, is supported by the explanation from the editors concerned as to what they intended when they wrote their arguments.

@Chipmunkdavis - my advice is to wait a decent time period and if it turns out that the support !voters were wrong about e.g., use quickly transitioning (or already having transitioned) to the English version of the name, then raise another RM to return to the old title. However, I have to say that this seems unlikely - I see The Times, Sky News, Tatler, Reuters, and the Guardian all using the term "King of Malaysia" in their coverage of the new king so it seems highly reliable sources are at least not avoiding this term. Compare and contrast this with non-English terms like Knesset or Taoiseach, where reliable English-language sources often use these terms with minimal explanation on the assumption that they will be recognised by their users. FOARP (talk) 11:19, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Clear again, as repeated above, that the recognizability being mentioned is not that defined in the WP:CRITERIA. Many English sources have never avoided the phrase, that has never been an issue. I'm not looking to overturn at the moment, what I'm looking for is a close that does not make an odd point about incontestability, and does not rawly count votes which make no sense. (In addition to the couple pointed out at the RM, one of the supports for example, cites three sources as using "Malaysia's king". This is both not the proposed title, but is not used in two of those sources. One does use "King of Malaysia", two use "Yang di-Pertuan Agong".) CMD (talk) 11:28, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

(Also Knesset and Taoiseach are regularly explained: "Knesset, Israel's parliament", "Ireland has a new taoiseach (prime minister)".) CMD (talk) 11:36, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Like I said in my close, I am not rawly counting votes, but a count of votes is still a necessary part of assessing the consensus though that should be balanced with an assessment of the strength of arguments. That "King of Malaysia" is more recognisable to our audience than YDPA appears incontestable. You are arguing that it isn't based on a relatively narrow definition of what "someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area" is (from my understanding it would be someone who already knows the official title in Malay of the King of Malaysia), but the place to make that argument was in the RM and I don't see it having been made there. It appears that a substantial opinion in the RM discussion was of the view that actually you would need to be an "expert" (e.g., someone fluent in Malay as was referenced a number of times in the RM discussion) to know what YDPA was. FOARP (talk) 12:56, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Your close noted the raw count in votes without noting some were really weird. WP:AUDIENCE is for prose, not article titles. As for my definition of someone familiar with the topic and coverage in the RM, the term in question was as stated in the RM both the common name and in every source in the article. It is hard to see how a term almost ubiquitous in relevant sources requires deep expertise, and conversely it is hard to see how someone who has not encountered the common name or read one of the many sources available might be "someone familiar with...the subject area". The argument that you need to be an expert in Malay was not made in the RM; the argument that was made was that there was an alternative term (and in some cases a different alternative term) with more common English words. As you point out with Knesset and Taoiseach, that is not how titling criteria is applied. CMD (talk) 13:30, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

"The argument that you need to be an expert in Malay was not made in the RM" - sorry, the point that non-Malay-speaking English speakers would not recognise YDPA as easily as King of Malaysia was made repeatedly in the RM discussion. The excerpted quotes from GoodDay, Traumnovelle, Kaiixin, and VectorVoyager above all reference this. Conversely, the argument that this was the wrong standard for recognisability that you are making now was not made in the RM and does not anyway flow automatically from the wording of the PAGs. I can only assess arguments made in the RM (or anyway overridingly coming from the PAGs, which your point does not in my view since it relies on a definition of what some "familiar" with the subject would know that other people in the RM clearly did not agree with).

Since your not seeking an overturn of the close I'm not sure what more there is to discuss on this. I think your best option is to wait and see how usage develops in the future, but reading articles like this one in the Guardian (which does not mention YDPA), this one on Sky News (which name-checks YDPA once but uses King throughout), this one from Reuters (which does not mention YDPA), this one AP (which does not reference YDPA), this one from the Independent (which name-checks YDPA once but uses King throughout), this one from Al-Jazeera (which name-checks YDPA and mentions it in a quote but uses King throughout), this one from Nikkei (which does not mention YDPA), this one from The Hindu (which does not mention YDPA).... I don't think things are likely to move in the direction of YDPA becoming more prevalent barring some decision from the Malaysian monarchy itself. FOARP (talk) 14:09, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Holit massacre move close

Hi FOARP, thank you for your effort on this close and your compliment. But with all due respect I appeal to you to reverse your decision and let an admin close, even if that takes some, it’s important enough to wait. The outcome of this close is difficult not only because it’s a CTOP, but because it has implications for all articles about warlike action related to unarmed citizens (existing and future). So although I respect your thinking, I would like the close to be by an admin, making the unassailable interpretation of COMMON official having considered these implications, if that’s the outcome. Thanks again. Ayenaee (talk) 16:34, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Hi @Ayenaee - I said in my close that I was happy to vacate if requested, and so I shall do (it may take a bit of time). I'll try to post a request to WP:Closure requests to get someone to close this.

FYI there is a very large backlog in RM at the moment. It's partly driven by I-P disputes but also by a large number of renamings for nobility for some reason. FOARP (talk) 16:42, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. I was responding to your offer which I appreciate as I do your effort. As I said this move has wider implication, so I think it’s worth waiting for an admin close. Ayenaee (talk) 16:57, 14 February 2024 (UTC)