User:Andrewa/negative benefit

In that all pages belong to the whole project, any user may edit this one. But it's generally more helpful (and polite) to discuss the proposed change on its talk page first.

This might be expanded with other examples in time. For the moment it's just about the most glaring one.

For example primary topic

For a specific example see User:Andrewa/Why primary topic is to be avoided#The problem

It's often assumed, for example, that when an article name is ambiguous and we have several articles each covering a different meaning of the term, it's to the readers benefit to have the article they want at the ambiguous base name. This is the unspoken assumption behind the policy on primary topic.

It may be true in some cases (even that is doubtful, but let it ride for now). But it's certainly not true in all cases, contrary to what is often assumed.

Reader benefit

A reader arrives at an article either through a search or an incoming external link. In the case of a link, it matters not what the article name is, all that matters is that it is stable. Any article move away from an ambiguous name currently breaks links which we can neither fix nor even detect. By producing link-breaking moves whenever a primary topic changes, ambiguous article names disadvantage readers who arrive via external links.

Or, when a reader searches by an ambiguous name, they get a result list. So far so good. On that list is the article they want, assuming we have one. But there are other articles too, as the name is ambiguous.

There are exactly two possible scenarios:

Scenario one

Scenario one is that there's an unambiguous link to the article they want. That is easy. They click on it, and whether it's a redirect or the article itself, it doesn't matter. Success, in one mouse click.

It would be better if the unambiguous name was top of the list, admittedly, and if the unambiguous name is a redirect (which is common, typically because the article is at the ambiguous base name) then it's not likely to be, regardless of how popular the article is. (In fact in some search engines it might not have been there at all, but that's scenario two.)

Or it's possible that instead they click on the link to the undisambiguated name, not realising that there are other possible meanings. If that's the article they want, again, success, in one click. But if not, then two more mouse clicks required, one on the hatnote to the DAB, and then another to the article they want.

Scenario two

Scenario two is that the article is there but only by an ambiguous name. Disaster. They must now guess that this is the article they want. They may do this, but even if they do there is no advantage over just having the unambiguous link. Or they might see an entry for a disambiguation page, and they may click on that either knowing or correctly guessing what that means. And they're only one mouse click from the article they want... but hold on, that's still one more mouse click than scenario one, a small but negative benefit.

Conclusion

So it doesn't matter very much whether the primary topic is at the base name or not, but there's no benefit in having it there, and several small reader benefits in having it at an unambiguous name instead... which is the very opposite of Wikipedia policy admittedly!

There is a far more significant reader benefit in always having a redirect from an unambiguous name, one to every article with an ambiguous name. But on this Wikipedia policy and guidelines are silent. (Better still to make every article name unambiguous, but if we must have these ambiguous article names, then these redirects would at least work around most of the damage.)

Editor benefit

Editor benefit is a no-brainer.

A disambiguated article name, with a DAB at the base name, warns an editor that they've linked to an ambiguous term, and even if they don't fix it other editors will. Linking to a disambiguated name via the pipe trick is simple and easy... there are a few extra keystokes.

The lack of this warning linking to a borderline primary topic (or even a wrong one, it does happen) occasionally leads to large numbers of mislinkings. Probably the best example yet is the many thousands of mislinkings to New York intended for New York City, created when for many years the base name pointed instead to the State. Such cases are however extremely rare.

And our bottom line is the readers. There would need to be a very big editor benefit in order for it to be relevant, and there's no way that can be supported.

A case can even be made that for the convenience of editors, it's best to have all articles at unambiguous names... that is, having any article at an ambiguous base name is another negative benefit, see for example User:Andrewa/Let us abolish the whole concept of primary topic#Creating new articles in detail. So that's a line call at best, and again no way that allowing any ambiguous article name can result in a big net benefit for editors.

Overall conclusion re P T

Several small reader benefits in having every article at an unambiguous name and no downside. No reader benefit in the current policy.

Larger reader benefit in always having an unambiguous redirect to any article at an ambiguous name, which currently only happens for other reasons, most often from a previous article move.

No editor benefit in the current policy.

See also

• User:Andrewa/Why primary topic is to be avoided