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Advice needed

I need advice on the title of an article. Currently the article is called "Invader Zim" (it's a TV programme). The official title is "Invader ZIM". Would using the fully capitalised official name in the title be appropriate for Wikipedia? ●BillPP (talk|contribs) 02:54, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes of course, you wouldn't spell Manu Ginóbili as Manu Ginobili because ´ doesn't appear in English, you do it because you spell things like names in the matter in which they are spelt.T ALK•QRC2006•¢ʘñ†®¡ß§ 21:00, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
You might, however, consider bringing this up on the talk page of the article in question first, making sure to reference the fact that 'ZIM' is capitalised like that. Wider discussion is needed on the talk page. — neuro(talk) 11:01, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

To Be or Not to Be

Hi all. The example link on the project page to To Be or Not to Be leads to a disambiguation page. I would imagine it's supposed to point to one of the two films and not the soliloquy (which uses lowercase per the MoS). I'm not sure which film it is intended to link to though. I have a bias towards the Mel Brooks version which I've always thought was much funnier. Cheers! —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 14:22, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't really understand, what is the problem? Are you wanting to move the disambig to "To Be or Not to Be (disambiguation)" and have the main article as one of the links within that disambig? — neuro(talk) 11:02, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Prepositions five letters or longer within film titles

The convention in its current version provides that articles, prepositions, and conjunctions within the title of “books, films, and other works” are not capitalized. However, the current version of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (films) says that articles, prepositions, and conjunctions are not capitalized if they are “shorter than five letters”. This is an apparent inconsistency because long prepositions and conjunctions like ‘through’ and ‘before’ would be capitalized under one convention but not the other. --Mathew5000 21:15, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Moreover, the word ‘to’ when used as part of the infinitive of a verb is not a preposition. It also is neither an article nor a conjunction. It is simply a grammatical particle. For correctness, the convention should specify that ‘to’ when used as part of an infinitive should not be capitalized (unless it begins the title). Otherwise the examples “To Be or Not to Be” and “Failure to Launch” are inconsistent with the rule as stated. --Mathew5000 21:26, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
Longer prepositions such as "without", "through", and "before" are generally agreed to be capitalized by most parties, AFAIK. Whether or not that was ever stated on this page, I don't know, but clearly the WP:NCF articulated it. Perhaps this should be adopted here (if it wasn't deleted by mistake). Actually, I'm just going to be bold and see what happens... Girolamo Savonarola 20:29, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
I'm confused as to what "generally agreed ... by most parties" is meant to imply in the previous comment. My copy of The Chicago Manual of Style (14th ed.) notes in 7.127 (pp.282–283):
Articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, for, nor), and prepositions, regardless of length, are lowercased unless they are the first or last word of the title or subtitle.
(the bold is mine). My copy of MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (3rd ed.) notes in 2.5.1 (p.50):
Therefore, capitalize nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and subordinating conjunctions (although, if, because), but not articles (a, an, the), prepositions (e.g., in, to, of, between) ...
notice that one of their examples is a seven-letter preposition. Which style guides recommend lowercase only for short prepositions? Alan smithee (talk) 22:49, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
Until just now, ours did... -GTBacchus(talk) 01:00, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Single article

I believe the Associated Press style is to always capitalize a single article when printed in title case when no other articles or prepositions are present, for example:

  • Ride A Cable Car Today (correct)
  • Ride a Cable Car Today (incorrect)

I notice that the convention gives the example of "A New Kind of Science", which would be compliant with AP style, as I believe the "capitalize single articles" rule only applies to articles, and would not apply to "of," of course.  :)

I ask because I moved Why I Am Not a Christian to Why I Am Not A Christian earlier, a move which was shortly thereafter reverted, citing WP:NAME, although WP:CAPS seems not to address single articles one way or the other.   justen   00:47, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

When you say ‘single article’ do you mean ‘single-letter article’? In any event, Why I Am Not a Christian is correct capitalization for Wikipedia. It is stated explicitly in WP:CAPS that an article shorter than five letters is not capitalized (unless it is the first word in the title). That is standard for both English and American usage. --Mathew5000 06:28, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Is there any precedent, policy, or guideline related to subpages here or on meta? Thanks. --Emesee 03:19, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

WP:SP is not on meta, but it does have some links to related meta articles at the bottom. — neuro(talk) 11:08, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Magazine/newspaper/journal article titles

Am I correct that titles of newspaper, magazine, and journal articles should be capitalized as an ordinary sentence, and not considered a "work" in the current guideline:

"In general, each word in titles of books, films, and other works take an initial capital...."

If so, is mentioning that somewhere on this page appropriate, perhaps at the end of the paragraph quoted above? If there is no consensus opinion, maybe it could say that at the end of the paragraph. Or is this the wrong page to advise on capitalization of article tites?

-Agyle 21:46, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Contractions

Do contractions of conjunctions still count as conjunctions or should they be treated as proper nouns? For example, the "n" in Bone Thugs-n-Harmony is a contraction for either "in" or "and". I think it should be uncapitalised, but maybe others think otherwise? Spellcast (talk) 20:50, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Dynasties

Among the articles about a specific dynasty more have a name with "Dynasty" using a capital "D" (Ahom Dynasty, Arghun Dynasty, Arsacid Dynasty, Artaxiad Dynasty, Askiya Dynasty, ...) than use a lower-case "d" (Afsharid dynasty, Aftasid dynasty, Antipatrid dynasty, Ardennes-Verdun dynasty, Argead dynasty, ...).

Is there a justification for this widespread use of capitalized "Dynasty", such as "Ahom Dynasty" being considered a proper name? Which should have the preference:

  1. Rename "Ahom Dynasty" etcetera to "Ahom dynasty" etc.
  2. Rename "Afsharid dynasty" etcetera to "Afsharid Dynasty" etc.
  3. Leave it to the discretion of the article creators, just as for American vs. British spelling.

70.137.187.239 (talk) 06:16, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Page names that only differ by capitalization

It seems like a bad idea to me that page names may differ only by the tweaking of a single character.

These are confusingly similar:

also

Unless one is reading with extraordinary care, it can be easy to overlook the differences in the examples above.

Terseness takes precedence over readability when conservation of disk space is a higher priority than readability. It doesn't appear to me that terseness generally takes precedence over readability in Wikipedia. Making page titles easy to confuse by virtue of being terse seems inconsistent with the verbosity elsewhere.

These seem like better titles to me:

  • Blackberry (disambiguation)
  • Blackberry (fruit)
  • BlackBerry (mobile device)
  • Santa Lucia (disambiguation)
  • Santa Lucia (song)
  • Santa Lucia (places)

-Ac44ck (talk) 07:39, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Most articles with multiple capitalisations leading to different articles have a hatnote to either a disambiguation, or the other article. — neuro(talk) 11:06, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Request for comment

Should all conjunctions and prepositions in the title of a published work be lowercased, regardless of their length? – Cyrus XIII (talk) 00:33, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Length of what? Length of the title or length of the conjunction? Can you give examples of situations where this issue would or would not arise based on length? -Ac44ck (talk) 02:58, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Good point, it would be the length of the conjunction (I have adjusted the initial RfC description to address that ambiguity). To provide further context:
When dealing with titles of published works (i.e. books, films, music albums, etc.) Wikipedia editors currently appear to favor uppercasing conjunctions of five letters and longer (like "over" and "through"). Subsequently, such a five-letter-clause of sorts was added to this guideline as well as the style guide of several WikiProjects (i.e. Albums and Films). An editor recently challenged the rule here and on aforementioned other guides and since an omission of it, while subtle, would affect quite a lot of articles, I considered broad input to be appropriate.
Personally, I would favor to keep the clause, as it provides a more consistent typeface and is also not unheard of in professional style guides. Capitalizing such conjunctions as a principle has little bearing on matters of verifiability and neutrality and as such, this is, to me, a case where our rules should remain descriptive of what appears to be the most common approach among Wikipedia editors, rather than being top-down prescriptive. – Cyrus XIII (talk) 09:05, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Shouldn't prepositions be addressed as well? I was taught to capitalize the first and last words of the title. All other words are capitalized except for "a", "an", "the", and conjunctions and prepositions of four letters or fewer. I'll see if I can turn up a source.
Examples
  • The Bridge on the River Kwai
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (although "At" is a short preposition, it is the first word in the subtitle)
  • A River Runs Through It ("Through" is a preposition greater than four letters)

Jim Dunning | talk 00:08, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree, this also concerns prepositions. And the example you list correspond with the way I've been formatting titles as well. – Cyrus XIII (talk) 09:56, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure what is meant by a "(more) consistent typeface" — could you please elaborate, Cyrus XIII? While I agree that these capitalization issues will likely not have much bearing on matters of verifiability and neutrality, etc., why should the rules be descriptive? You present the case that determining capitalization based on length is "not unheard of in professional style guides" (and cite a book called The Copyeditor's Handbook) — how is the support of one (in my opinion) lesser-known book of any significance compared to the support of giants such as The Chicago Manual of Style or The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers? As noted above ...
My copy of The Chicago Manual of Style (14th ed.) notes in 7.127 (pp.282–283):
Articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, for, nor), and prepositions, regardless of length, are lowercased unless they are the first or last word of the title or subtitle.
(the bold is mine). My copy of MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (3rd ed.) notes in 2.5.1 (p.50):
Therefore, capitalize nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and subordinating conjunctions (although, if, because), but not articles (a, an, the), prepositions (e.g., in, to, of, between) ...
notice that one of their examples is a seven-letter preposition. Alan smithee (talk) 04:03, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
"More consistent" in the sense that the obvious distinction between (grammatically) important and less important words is complemented by one that basically goes like "long words get capitalized, short words don't". Such an amendment is obviously based on aesthetics, but the same may be said about the notion of rendering titles differently than regular prose in the first place. And there are obviously style guides and high-profile publications that opt for that approach (the New York Times for example, as a quick search of the word "through" in the nytimes.com archive shows).
Regarding descriptivism vs. prescriptivism: Our policies and guidelines are shaped by community consensus - their purpose is merely to describe what happens down in the trenches and a (prescriptive) top-to-bottom approach is only necessary when the few basic principles of Wikipedia are concerned, as these, naturally, have to remain non-negotiable. (Note that I'm more or less quoting an older talk page comment made by another, more experienced editor here. The related discussion turned out rather interesting, look it up when you have the time.) Hence I believe that what happened in the trenches in this particular case is that Wikipedia editors, by and large, found the approach to capitalize long prepositions and conjunctions more appealing and subsequently, it was added to this and various other pages of our own Manual of Style. We always have and certainly will be looking at the style guides you quoted, for inspiration, but if the Wikipedia community deems an approach that differs from these manuals appropriate for its own work, then this is how it goes down. – Cyrus XIII (talk) 12:26, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
I still don't see the "long words get capitalized, short words don't" approach as "more consistent" in any sense, though I certainly concur that at least one (seemingly minor) style guide and one of the world's most respected newspapers may use that approach (for prepositions). Of course, Wikipedia is not a newspaper.
For what it's worth, I'm surprised Occam's razor hasn't been mentioned — adding the length criterion seems like unnecessary complication.
It seems, however, that your primary point is that what is "right" in some abstract (perhaps even philosophical) sense is not what is relevant, but what is relevant is what the Wikipedia community as a whole wants. (If I'm mistaken, and that's not essentially your primary point, please correct me.) I'm still pretty new to Wikipedia, so clearing this up is very helpful — thank you.
Now how do we know what the Wikipedia community as a whole wants?
The only discussion that I've seen beyond the two of us is Ac44ck's short clarification, Jim Dunning's short comment, and a limited discussion under Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(capitalization)#Prepositions_five_letters_or_longer_within_film_titles — these few Wikipedians presumably make up only a small fraction of the Wikipedia community. Alan smithee (talk) 03:18, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
What is the next step, now that RFC bot has removed the RFC? Alan smithee (talk) 18:25, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

First word nominal prefixes

Question: what is the appropriate capitalization if the first word of the article title is a nominal prefix that is ususally not capitalised?

For example, without capitals: de Casteljau's algorithm, de Broglie hypothesis, de Gaulle family, de Havilland Albatross

With capitals: Von Neumann entropy, Van der Waals force, De Boor's algorithm, De Rham cohomology, Von Mises–Fisher distribution

My view would be that since the first word of an article title is like the first word of a sentence, which is capitalised, so capitalization of the prefix is correct. Sesshomaru (talk · contribs) on the other hand thinks lower case (which may be how such things are sometimes indexed at the back of books?)

Either way, definitive guidance would be appreciated; and perhaps should be added to the guidelines? Jheald (talk) 19:51, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Uh, my name is User:Sesshomaru. The lord part is just an addition in my signature. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 19:53, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
Okay. Jheald (talk) 19:56, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

See also: articles starting with De, articles starting with Von. Jheald (talk) 11:45, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

+ some discussion at Talk:de Havilland. Jheald (talk) 11:56, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Any thoughts from anybody? Jheald (talk) 10:25, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Capitalization of contractions of long conjunctions/prepositions?

I know that prepositions and conjunctions under five letters aren't capitalized in works like books or movies. However, would contractions of these long words not be capitalized? For example, should No Life 'Til Leather be changed to No Life 'til Leather? (until is the preposition in this case, and now it's shortened to 'til which is shorter than five letters) Another example is a song on Lou Gramm's album Ready or Not, a song called "Arrow Thru Your Heart". Since the preposition "through" is now shortened to the four-letter "thru", should it be spelled "Arrow thru Your Heart"? Thanks for your input. Xnux the Echidna 02:16, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Capitalization of unusual prepositions

See here for relevant discussion; the issue being brought up is whether or not to make it a guideline to capitalize unusual prepositions including "like", "than", "upon", etc. Under the current consensus that prepositions under five letters shouldn't be capitalized, these unusual prepositions would not be capitalized (so we would have to rename many articles, such as "Smells like Teen Spirit", "Just like Heaven", Better than Ezra, and a whole lot of Once upon a Time articles). Here is a somewhat comprehensive list of four-letter-or-smaller prepositions (taken from here):

A huge list of prepositions

Here are a lot of words that can be used as prepositions:

The main argument against not capitalizing some of these prepositions is that the media (and often the artists themselves) almost always capitalizes them (see the external sources and/or cover art for Bridge over Troubled Water, "She's out of My Life", "More than a Feeling", "Sweet Child o' Mine", and Long Road out of Eden). The argument against this particular point is that the media's capitalization rules are inconsistent (for example, the media rarely capitalizes "into" or "with", but almost always capitalizes "like" or "than") and Wikipedia capitalization rules should be more consistent.

Another point is that many of these prepositions are frequently used as subordinating conjunctions (such as "like" or "than"), which shouldn't be capitalized according to WP:CAPS. Under those rules, "like" would be capitalized in "Drop It Like It's Hot" but not in "Smells like Teen Spirit", which would undoubtedly create many disputes in the future because these parts of speech look so similar. What should would do regarding this? (keep in mind The Chicago Manual of Style says never to capitalize the word "as" when used as either a preposition or conjunction due to common practice).

Whatever is decided, I think that in addition to adding a section to WP:CAPS about this, we should create a page of words that shouldn't be capitalized (noting that there are exceptions). -Xnux the Echidna 15:00, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Template titles

I understand the following to apply to articles, but does it also apply to templates?

"For page titles, always use lowercase after the first word, and do not capitalize second and subsequent words, unless: the title is a proper noun."

Most template titles I have seen on Wikipedia appear to follow this convention, but a few do not. Should we aggressively move the templates with names that violate the convention to names that comply? --Teratornis (talk) 23:47, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I would support this as a useful guideline. I don't like the word "aggressive" just a careful moving of templates where it can be done easily. Rich Farmbrough, 23:07 20 August 2008 (GMT).

"Art Nouveau" dispute

"Art Nouveau is how the name of a certain art movement is usually written in English" – says who? Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary 11th ed. does not even provide the capitalized variant as an option (same goes for "art moderne", "art deco", "expressionism", etc.) Neither do the Oxford Encyclopedic English Dictionary (a strong indication that the Oxford English Dictionary will follow suit; I can't seem to locate my OED CD-ROM right this moment) , Dictionary.com, American Heritage Dictionary, Online Etymology Dictionary, WordNet, etc. A lot of individuals capitalize this (e.g. at eBay auctions, etc.), but that's not relevant; a lot of people write "fresh Orange's $1 a pound", too. Some works specifically about art do like to capitalize it, but even skimming them you can see that they like to capitalize everything about art that they feel they can get away with capitalizing; it isn't standard English usage. I believe this example should be removed from this passage, as misleading, and a different one found, since the statement that it is "usually" capitalized in English is patently false. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:41, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Subtitles

I knew prepositions and articles should be capitalized if they come after:

  • -
  • :
  • . and ...
  • "" and «»

Is this correct? And what about the words after a "(" (for example "Break on Through (To the other side)" or "Break on Through (to the other side)") and after a ")" (I don't know an example, I can invent, "(Bla bla) On My Face" or "(Bla bla) on My Face"). --Superchilum(talk to me!) 08:58, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure if it is correct in your context, but general English usage would say that the next word should not need to be capitalised (think about having a sentence, half way through the sentence parentheses come in, and then after them the sentence finishes). As for after quotations, I would say that this does indeed generally apply to Wikipedia, but not in a lot of other situations. As for the colon, ellipsis and hyphen, I can only say that I would have thought that you shouldn't in general capitalise after those if they are within a sentence. As for capitalisation where parentheses are coming at the end of the title, I would have imagined normal song capitalisation rules would apply (ie. don't capitalise words that are prepositions or articles, iirc). Please do correct me if I am wrong, I am pretty sure this is right, but not completely. — neuro 10:19, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Capitalising "that"

Help! I was hoping someone could suggest whether the word "that" in the short story title "The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World (short story)" should be upper or lower case. I can't work out the grammatical sense in which the word is being used and whether it falls into one of the categories for which lower case is appropriate. Thanks. GDallimore (Talk) 13:02, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

How does it appear on the cover and/or frontispiece of the book as such? That, I'd think, would be the final arbiter of this; as for grammatical sense I think - ? - it's a "relative conjunction" or something like that; and should be uncapitalized just like "of" and "the"....unless the publication itself capitalizes all or any of those....Skookum1 (talk) 17:30, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
Where is this rule to follow the capitalisation of the work itself? I can't find it in policy or guidelines. To answer the question, I believe in this case, that is a pronoun, and should be capitalised. I'm not aware of any cases when that would not be capitalised. --Rogerb67 (talk) 22:36, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Articles about letters

A, B, C, etc. Should the article name be capitalized (A, B, C) or not (a, b, c)? ... discospinster talk 21:57, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

My thinking would be capitalized. Not really seeing any reason why they'd be in lowercase. GlassCobra 22:08, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Case sensitivity and searching

Is this section now obsolete? I've just entered "Oborniki county" and pressed Go, and got straight to Oborniki County without any redirect (which doesn't happen according to the guideline). The software has probably been improved since this was written.--Kotniski (talk) 11:30, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Oops, sorry, didn't read it carefully enough. But how about List of national parks of Poland, then, which I've just got to by entering all lower case. I'm taking this section out (it doesn't have much to do with naming conventions anyway) until someone can convince me that it makes any sense. --Kotniski (talk) 12:11, 13 January 2009 (UTC)
All right, I've rewritten the section according to what appears to be the current status quo. Please correct me if anything's still wrong.--Kotniski (talk) 12:31, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

PC LOAD LETTER

What should be the title of the article currently at PC Load Letter? EAE (Holla!) 20:40, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Improper capitalization of common nouns

I've noticed that some people insist on this, such as putting the article on U.S. national monuments at National Monument (United States), as if it were the proper name of a single thing like the National Mall. I move it to the correct lowercase title at national monument (United States), but it gets moved back. Although it should be obvious as a basic rule of English, can we get an explicit statement here that capitalization of common nouns is incorrect, so that it (and articles like it) will stay where they belong?  –radiojon (talk) 20:26, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Counties, districts, etc

"Greene County, Ohio" follows what is clearly the WP standard for U.S. counties, treating "Greene County" as a proper noun, even though most counties have an official name more like "County of ...". I've no wish to upset that. But districts of India vary in style. Most seem to have "district", which conforms more to the overall rule. If there has been a decision one way or the other, I haven't found it but I would like to. Where? (I might even help lower some capitals if that's the way they should go.) Robin Patterson (talk) 09:24, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Spanish albums and singles

Does anyone know if Spanish albums and singles are capitalized? For example: Mi Plan and "Manos al Aire". The Spanish Wikipedia writes those lowercased. I can't read the Spanish equivalent of the guidelines. 8/--Totie (talk) 15:33, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

RfC: Should we allow article titles that differ only by capitalisation?

An RfC on this issue is currently being discussed on the naming conventions (precision) talk page. Dpmuk (talk) 13:39, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

It is wrong to state that a different capitalisation "is" a method of disambiguation. --Francis Schonken (talk) 17:08, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't see that it's particularly wrong, but it certainly seems unnecessary to say it (the phrase the recent edit war was about, that is), so I would leave it out.--Kotniski (talk) 17:23, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Err, there's consensus for it at a closed RfC, which was open for three weeks and a consensus reached. Please follow the link above - this was never where the RfC was discussed but rather just a message providing a link to the actual location given it concerned both pages. Dpmuk (talk) 17:27, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

No-one's disputing that we should say it's acceptable to have article titles that differ only by capitalization (which is what the RfC was about), it's just this extra phrase ("this is an acceptable method of disambiguation") that seems redundant. I don't see what it's supposed to add.--Kotniski (talk) 17:42, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Before this change the guideline only says that it's possible to create two article titles that differed only by capitalisation, it did not make it clear that it was acceptable as well. There were discussion ongoing on requested moves concerning whether such was acceptable (rather than just possible) and this clarifies that it is. Additionally I've still seen no good objections to it being added other than it being unnecessary but in that case nothing is lost by it being added but in my opinion (and presumably that of at least one other editor) clarity is gained by adding it.
To a certain extent however I think this discussion is moot - the appropriate point to have discussed it would have been in the RfC which is now closed. If editors want to change what was agreed upon in the RfC then it should be them that seek consensus first before making changes. Process was followed - if you're unhappy with the result continue to discuss it don't unilaterally change what was agreed upon. I've posted at AN/I to try to get an uninvolved administrator to look at all this. Dpmuk (talk) 22:05, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

It is generally a good idea to avoid the situation if it can conveniently be done; it makes it too easy to confuse the articles, defeating one purpose of disambiguation. I trust that the reminder that there are often other solutions will be uncontroversial. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:06, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

So long as the existence of other solutions doesn't lead editors who disagree with the consensus to try to run around it. -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:10, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
I see some comments which agree to permit this, provided that the permission is non-binding. What was agreed is that editors may use such titles without having guidance quoted against it; are you contending that editors may not choose to avoid such titles? What is there to run around? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:12, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
(ec) Editors who disagree with differentiating article titles with capitalization only, despite the recent RfC, would (I predict) point to the particular wording and move any such titles to new titles, rendering the RfC moot (by running around it). -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:19, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
If the two titles are consensus, no such problem will arise. If they are not consensus, they should not be imposed. This does not render the RfC moot; it has accomplished all that can be expected of it, by establishing that such titles are permissible. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:34, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Then there should be no problem avoiding the implication that one is better, more clear, or less confusing in the guidelines. -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:41, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Which is what I have attempted to do. Like many naming discussions, such questions are a balance of different principles; the arguments will often be that one way is confusing vs. that the other is prolix or not usage. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:46, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

At WP:PRECISION there are some examples: Red Meat vs. Red meat is acceptable, whereas Streets of London vs. Streets Of London requires additional disambiguators. Maybe it would be helpful to give such examples here (with explanation of the principles involved).--Kotniski (talk) 19:29, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Reasonable. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:34, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I've had a quick look at things and am broadly happy with the current wording and wish to think users for the additional helpful input. I have one minor issue with the exact wording used but I'll raise this tomorrow as the main point of me posting is to say that I'm having internet connection issues and are currently having to use my mobile phone as a modem, which is both slow and possibly expensive. I haven't forgotten about, given up on, or left this issue it's just that at the moment I'm not in a position to fully read everything and reply properly. I'm certainly not in a position to hang around and have a discussion. Dpmuk (talk) 22:29, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

As I said above I am broadly happy with the new wording and think it says the same thing I was trying to say, just more verbosely. I was trying to word it neutrally as well so that although accepted it wasn't mandated. I didn't feel it necessary to expand on this as I thought my wording adequately covered it and guideline are always open to common-sense exceptions. I do however not like the use of the phrase "further differentiated", something about it just grates at me. Personally I'd prefer "differentiated in other ways" or similar. Dpmuk (talk) 09:57, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Not my wording. Differentiated (which was mine) may well have been a bad choice to begin with; feel free to tweak. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:32, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
I was writing in general, not in reply to a specific editor. Will tweak now. Dpmuk (talk) 16:43, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I removed the philosophising without actual guidance, replaced by a link to the place where the actual guidance can be found. I'd dread a guideline fork, which was actually what was happening. A key concept, RECOGNISABILITY as measure for how to to decide on these matters, was missing from the philosophising here. There is no good reason to have slightly contradictory guidance in two separate places. --Francis Schonken (talk) 17:10, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

The above to me is a reasonably clear consensus to include such information. I'd agree that having two policies is somewhat confusing but that doesn't mean that a blanket revert of the new wording, which has consensus, is the way to go. I'd also note that the two policies have been around for a while so this new 'fork' is not new. I'd support a bold merge of the two policies (or at least the relevant bits) but this wording (or something to the same effect) should stay as there is now consensus for it. If a merge doesn't take place then, given the consensus for the inclusion of something like this, if anything needs changing it's the wording at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (precision)#Minor spelling variations to match the new wording here as there is now consensus for a statement like this. However I'm still unsure as to how the two contradict and you've not yet explained how they do in your opinion. Dpmuk (talk) 17:40, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I see a consensus about inserting examples, none were inserted, so no there's no consensus about a new wording; current guidance is well established at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (precision)#Minor spelling variations, a recent RfC did not bring anything to light that there was any change needed for that guidance, so link there, finito.

If you'd like to start an RfC about changing the content of W:Naming conventions (capitalization), then do so here, not on another guideline's talk page. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:01, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't see that it matters what page an RfC was held on. I'm happy for the information to be in one place, although it seems more intuitive to have it here than on the nebulously named "Naming conventions (precision)" page. In fact I think the precision page is now just about ready to be redirected to the main naming conventions page, since all its content has been merged there, so if it is felt that more needs to be said about title capitalization differences than what's at the main page (under WP:NC#Disambiguation), then this is almost certainly the place to do it.--Kotniski (talk) 13:47, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
There's no need to convene another RfC. There's no requirement for an RfC to be held on the talk page of the affected policy. In this case the policy could have affected neither, only one, or both policies. Given that it made sense to hold the discussion in one place. A link was posted here to point at that discussion.
I disagree with your comments about the previous RfC. There was clear consensus for option number one. Consensus for introducing words to this policy was less clear although both me and the only other user to comment (JHunterJ) supported my proposal - no one objected. Since then Pmanderson has also added similar wording to this policy so that's at least three editors supporting some sort of new wording and so far you're the only editor to object. Do you disagree either of the following statements:
  • There was clear consensus at the RfC for option #1
  • Consensus from both the RfC and since is that some new wording should be added to policy
If you do disagree then please explain why - don't just say you can't see a consensus, explain why. Other editors clearly do see a consensus. The final form of words may still need a little work but the basic principle of what needs to be said has clear consensus. If you disagree with the actual words then change them, as long as you keep the meaning the same. Similarly if you disagree with the location of the advice then change it. Just removing it in it's entirety is unhelpful especially when you're only reasoning given to date seems to be either "I dislike it" or "I don't agree that consensus was reach". You seem unwilling to explain your reasoning further and without this it seems like you're pushing your point of view against consensus. Dpmuk (talk) 17:34, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Caps in templates

I began editing {{Boston Road Transportation}} since just after it was started by another user. The title should be {{Boston road transportation}}, correct? It is among the templates in Category:United States metropolitan area highway templates, which contains members with both styles. I don't know if redirecting a template will make a mess of "what links here", bolding of current page, etc. and so I am looking for advice on whether renaming is wise. I don't use AWB so relinking 40 or so articles would need to be done manually if it causes those problems. Sswonk (talk) 22:34, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Prevailing style is all-lowercase, yes. So long as the double redirects are fixed it won't have any impact: special:whatlinkshere has support for following redirects, and automatic bolding of self-references isn't impacted any more than it would be in any other case of a page move. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 20:42, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Unusual prepositions revisited

What about the situation where Wikipedia is the only source using one capitalization, when all other sources covering the same subject use a different capitalization? This is an issue mentioned above without a clear outcome, and it surfaced today with Just Like You (Allison Iraheta album).

Every source that I checked—including Billboard and the Allmusic guide, refers to the album as Just Like You. Even the intro of the article capped it that way, while the name of the article used the MOS-preferred Just like You. I went ahead and moved it to capitalize the L. If nothing else, that's the format of the title that's verifiable in other sources, so altering the title per the MOS is just this side of original research.

Any objections to, in cases where there is a clear preferred capitalization in reliable/authoritative sources, using that capitalization? —C.Fred (talk) 00:54, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds (and looks) very sensible to me.--Kotniski (talk) 07:04, 13 January 2010 (UTC)
I always thought the conventions seek to prevent naming issues within Wikipedia. If album and song titles follow the title case style, without prepositions and such, then I think we should follow the convention even if the press or other media says otherwise. I just don't like inconsistency (see for example A Girl Like Me).—Totie (talk) 17:24, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

These Rules are Stupid

The rule that all words except the first word, and proper nouns, should be lowercase in a Wikipedia title is stupid and wrong. In grammar, the rule is that, in a title all words, except words like "a, the, or, etc." MUST be capital. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.209.142.39 (talk) 21:33, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Application of English-language capitalizing conventions to foreign-language works of art which are best known in the English-speaking world under their original titles

To access discussion on the above topic, specifically as it relates to the Italian classic film, La Strada, see Talk:La Strada#Upper or Lower Case.—Roman Spinner (talk) 00:56, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

lowercase proper nouns - clarification needed

The lead para currently states:
"For multiword page titles, one should leave the second and subsequent words in lowercase unless the title phrase is a proper noun that would always occur capitalized, even in the middle of a sentence."
What about a proper noun (multi-word) that is not normally capitalized? The case in point is regarding Bottle Rockets (magazine) which I am proposing to move to either Bottle rockets or Bottle rockets (magazine) (and use {{lowercase}} to lower the initial capital). Both the website and the magazine adhere exclusively to the lower-case version, so this is not "a proper noun that would always occur capitalized, even in the middle of a sentence". I find it hard to imagine there have been no precedents. Clarification and advice welcome. --candyworm (talk) 12:49, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

I've tracked down the origin of the wording in question. The original phrasing was
"For multiword page titles, one should leave the second and subsequent words in lowercase unless the title phrase would always occur capitalized, even in the middle of a sentence (for example, a book title)."
It was changed in this edit in 2005 to
"For multiword page titles, one should leave the second and subsequent words in lowercase unless the title phrase is a proper noun that would always occur capitalized, even in the middle of a sentence."
I believe this makes clear that the original intent is not as you read it, but that the text "is a proper noun" was only added to clarify "would always occur capitalized". Powers T 17:22, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
No, that's not very clear at all. As it stands, the current wording states that the lowercase rule should be respected "unless the title phrase is a proper noun that would always occur capitalized". Why is there no punctuation after 'noun'? Why are the words "that would always occur capitalized" present at all? In case we don't know what a proper noun is?? Hardly. In any case, guidelines need to be applied with commonsense, and if a magazine title occurs always (in the real world) in all lowercase (or all uppercase) it seems absurd for WP to pretend otherwise. In any case, since posting earlier I have found no shortage of precedent: complete review, One cool word, FIELD (magazine), BOMB (magazine), BLAST (magazine), RATTLE etc. so it appears the guidelines need to be updated to reflect the reality on the ground. --candyworm (talk) 07:06, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
There are any number of counterexamples as well, so the reality on the ground is not so clear-cut as you seem to think. Powers T 13:29, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Capitalization of expansions for acronyms and initialisms

When a topic is normally referred to by an acronym or initialism and the article title is spelled out, should the letters for the acronym be capitalized? E.g., should [[Reduced instruction set computer]] be [[Reduced Instruction Set Computer]]? Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 12:58, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Unicode block names capitalization (Rename and Move)

Here is a proposal to rename Unicode block names into regular (Unicode) casing, e.g. C0 controls and basic Latin be renamed and moved to C0 Controls and Basic Latin. Some 18 pages (=block names) are affected. -DePiep (talk) 09:12, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Capitalisation of "versus" in a title

Any opinions regarding the capitalisation of "versus" in a title? For example: RoboCop Versus The Terminator or Spy vs. Spy or "Chuck Versus the Ring"? Rob Sinden (talk) 10:18, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Sale El Sol

I just wondered, what is the correct capitalisation for Sale El Sol? I assumed it was correct as Sale el Sol because 'el' is a proposition? But someone has just moved Sale el Sol to Sale El Sol. -- Lil_℧niquℇ №1 [talk] 19:19, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Why capitalize first word only for titles of articles?

Can someone explain to me the rationale behind the convention of capitalizing only the first letter of articles?

If it is true that "adherence to conventions widely used in the genre are critically important to credibility" Wikipedia should not be using a convention that is used nowhere else. I don't know about anyone else, but every time I see an article title that follows this quirky convention I think that some semi-literate computer nerd named the article. (-;

Thanks in advance from a WP newbie!

Webbbbbbber (talk) 23:41, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

It seems to be a hold-over from the early days of Wikipedia:
Some article titles are not displayed correctly because of limitations in the original MediaWiki software, e.g. the first character is forced to be upper case.
I don't know why the limitations of the original software continue to restrict the naming of Wikipedia articles today. It seems that an article name at Wiktionary starts with a lower case letter unless the name is a proper noun. I don't know how or why the two wiki systems differ. -Ac44ck (talk) 08:20, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
See the mainspace article Capitalization#Headings_and_publication_titles, particularly the discussion of "sentence case", and the advantages described for it. Jheald (talk) 19:24, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
Relevant discussion initiated between me and Jheald over here. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 19:37, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
You can use {{lowercase}}. — neuro(talk) 11:04, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
Er, I think Webbbbbbber is asking why more words are not capitalized, not suggesting none. Globbet (talk) 11:43, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

Proper-names, and first words in sentences, with Bantu-language grammatical prefixes

  • In Bantu languages the rule for capitalizing proper-names that have a Bantu grammatical prefix seems to vary. In the Swahili language, the first letter seems to be uppercased even if the word has a prefix, e.g. Swahili / Kiswahili. But in some South African Bantu languages the rule seems to be to uppercase the first letter of the stem and not the first letter of the prefix, e.g. umuZulu (= "a Zulu man"). I saw this rule obeyed recently in a sign in 4 languages on a big building in South Africa on television.

Confused about all caps.

MOS:ALLCAPS says "Reduce track titles on albums where all or most tracks are in all capitals." And WP:CAPS isn't explicitly clear. Jennifer Lopez's upcoming album is called LOVE?. Currently the page is called Love? (album) would a move to LOVE? be more appropriate? — Lil_℧niquℇ №1 [talk] 01:06, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

I suppose we could be more explicit and say "the remainder of the letter should be lowercase", but when the guidance says the word "takes an initial capital", is it such a stretch to imagine the rest of the letters aren't capitalised? --194.176.105.147 (talk) 07:25, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Discussion about the capitalization of wind farms' names

There is a discussion and move request about the capitalization of names of wind farms in Australia. Guidelines and your comments are welcome. Beagel (talk) 07:38, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

There's been a move request at Talk:Chief Mechanical Engineer to downcase the title of that article, per WP:Job titles (part of the title policy), and the MoS section on the same point. The move request was notified at the UK Railways WikiProject (at variance with the generality of the article title, this article was intended to be specifically about chief mechanical engineers in British-related railway companies). At that stage, this was expressed in the one-line lead followed by a huge number of unreferenced examples of holders of such positions mostly in the 19th century. In trying to fathom the theme of the article, I failed to see that the title should have been more specific as well as downcased: the job title is used generically (still is) and the scope is restricted at the same time (not US-related, not chief mechanical engineers in power stations or on ferries or in aeronautics or factories).

Now, the railways editors really care about the notion of chief mechanical engineers—in good faith, like the wider phenomenon of corporate and professional upping of importance via capitalisation—but where will it all end? They descended on the RM and !voted en masse against downcasing.

Because I pointed out the shambles the article was in, an editor has kindly worked on it, adding references and expanding the information. But the theme is still scoped in relatively narrow terms, and in the main text it's not, for example, Joshua Smithers, Chief Mechanical Engineer, Northampton Railway Company.

I do think we need a centralised approach to this. Almost the entire category of transport occupations is in lower case, as are just about all other occupation catogories. Why must this one stick out? And is it hogging the name-space of the generic article that probably should/will be created on chief mechanical engineers? (There are quite a lot of chief this and chief that articles, surprisingly.)

Your advice and comments at the RM would be appreciated—maybe I'm confused now. I'm leaving the same notice at WP:TITLE and WT:MOS. Another editor has recently come in and downcased throughout the article main text, I see, to negative reaction by at least one editor on the talk page. Tony (talk) 16:04, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

"With"

The capitalization of that word should depend on whether it is done by the one who has wrote it. A song called "I Can't Be With You" by The Cranberries has the "W" capitalized on their albums and I own them all and none of them show it lower cased. I really strongly suggest that we change it to with being optional as some do capitalize it. JamesAlan1986 *talk 18:59, 8 September 2011 (UTC) Reference Reference 2 Reference 3 Reference 4JamesAlan1986 *talk 19:15, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia follows the style guides of academic English, not "however it's done by the one who has wrote it". Often this means that titles of works (and other phrases) will not appear on Wikipedia in exactly the same form (capitalization, stylization, etc.) as they appear on the original work. I do not see why you insist that one particular article should follow a different standard, nor why this example means we should change our standards. --IllaZilla (talk) 08:09, 9 September 2011 (UTC)


I don't believe that JamesAlan1986 is insisting that one particular article should follow a different standard. Rather Wikipedia should realize that if something is called a certain name and is spelled a very precise way, it would be in the best interest of Wikipedia to spell the name correctly. Names are proper nouns and therefore should be capitalized as the writer dictates. This also makes Wikipedia seem more informed about the subject. An article loses credibility about a subject if it can't even spell the subject correctly. Mjohn127 (talk) 20:35, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Question about proper nouns

A representative of Feed The Children contacted me recently after I moved the page to Feed the Children, saying their name is always spelled with an upper-case "The".

Is the organization's name considered a proper noun that should be capitalized? Or do the rules for "titles of books, films, and other works" apply to organizations and other names? In short, should it be Feed the Children or Feed The Children? Thank you. — Malik Shabazz Talk/Stalk 05:31, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I would say we follow the official capitalization in such cases, unless third-party usage is overwhelmingly for the other way.--Kotniski (talk) 09:56, 12 November 2011 (UTC)


The main reason, as stated on the Wikipedia naming convention page, is that Wikipedia wants to be taken seriously in its genre. I have argued that Wikipedia would not be taken seriously with the information in its article if it doesn't even spell the name right. If the group spells its name a certain way, than Wikipedia should follow whatever way that is unless the group does not expressly state how their name is spelled or capitalized. For example, if a person spells their name D'Angelo and a group is started in his memory to fight child cancer, the group would spell its name like 'The Cancer Fighters for D'Angelo.' The 'for' is not capitalized because the group doesn't state that it expressly should be, however, the Wikipedia convention as argued above would spell the group 'The Cancer Fighters for D'angelo'? No, because it is expressly stated that D'Angelo spells his name with a capital A so the group should too. Therefore, the Wiki article for this group should follow that. Sorry if that example was a bit convoluted but I feel that it gets my point across. Mjohn127 (talk) 20:11, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

List of Plasma (physics) articles needs to be uncapitalized

How do I change the Capital P in Plasma to lower case like plasma. And this article I created still wont show up on wikipedia's search box. Why is there a delay. How can I get it approve. Shawn Worthington Laser Plasma (talk) 21:28, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Organism capitalization synch

FYI
 – Pointer to related discussion.

I'm working to make sure that WP:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, WP:Naming conventions (capitalization)#Organisms, WP:Naming conventions (fauna)#Capitalisation of common names of species WP:WikiProject Tree of Life#Article titles, WP:Manual of Style/Capital letters#Animals, plants, and other organisms, WP:Naming conventions (flora)#Scientific versus common names, etc., are synched with regard to common name capitalization.

Please centralize discussion at WT:Manual of Style#Organism capitalization synch

— SMcCandlish Talk⇒ ʕ(Õلō)ˀ Contribs. 07:59, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Referring to articles

Each article has a capital letter for the first word; yet when a link is made, it need not do so. What happens when we refer to that article in a hatnote? The capital still still remains. Should't this appear in the MOS? Hyper3 (talk) 17:03, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

RFC – WP title decision practice

Over the past several months there has been contentious debate over aspects of WP:Article Titles policy. That contentiousness has led to efforts to improve the overall effectiveness of the policy and associated processes. An RFC entitled: Wikipedia talk:Article titles/RFC-Article title decision practice has been initiated to assess the communities’ understanding of our title decision making policy. As a project that has created or influenced subject specific naming conventions, participants in this project are encouraged to review and participate in the RFC.--Mike Cline (talk) 19:11, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Should Foo Province be capitalised?

Does it vary according to country? I am getting inconsistent results for Ben Tre province/Province In ictu oculi (talk) 02:04, 26 August 2012 (UTC)crossposted at WT:NCGN In ictu oculi (talk) 02:07, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

I think this is a recurring problem with proper names that contain nouns that could be common nouns, particularly when translated from another language. At least in an ideal world, I would say such nouns should be capitalized when used as part of a proper name; I would also say that sources are normally irrelevant, since capitalization (and where to draw the line regarding proper names) is a matter of house style and consistency. I would say the lack of an article (or the possibility of use without an article) usually indicates that the term is a proper name (though its presence does not necessarily indicate the opposite). So "in Foo Province" should normally be read as using a proper name, because a common noun would require an article (as in "in the Foo area"). It does make the job of a copy-editor easier if there is a fixed rule that requires little judgement; so if it is felt that there is a need for such a rule I would say: if in doubt, capitalize. --Boson (talk) 10:03, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
So should it be like this?
Tỉnh Cà Mau = Cà Mau Province
Thành phố Cà Mau = Cà Mau [town]
Huyện Phú Tân = Phú Tân District, Cà Mau
In ictu oculi (talk) 23:52, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
I think it is a matter of editorial judgement, in this case, probably a matter of translator's judgement. It depends on whether the terms are being used as proper names or not and whether the English name is a true English name (as established by the English language community) or a calque of a foreign name. In your example, it looks to me as if the addition of a word like "town" or "province" is being used to disambiguate (not necessarily in the strict Wikipedia sense) between two entities with the same name. In other words it looks as if there is a town called "Foo" and a province with the same name. In that case, I would not normally regard "town" or "province" as part of the proper name. On the other hand, frequent use of the whole disambiguated name in the language community can mean that it becomes a proper name in its own right, like New York City. Since there is unlikely to be sufficient use of the name of a Vietnamese town and a Vietnamese province with the need to distinguish between them in the English language community, I think editors have to decide whether the Vietnamese equivalent is used as a proper name, the English article title merely being a calque of that (in the same way that we talk of the French National Assembly). If we were to regard the term as a purely English name (not a disambiguation), I would tend (at least in British English) to expect a descriptive designation to take the form "province of Foo" and a proper name to take the form "Province of Foo" (like "county of Surrey" or "City of London").
Though I think the general principles can be laid down here, I don't really think individual cases can be decided without editorial judgement. It is the sort of problem that translators (and, less often, lexicographers) deal with on a routine basis. Similarly we use editorial judgement to arrive at "New York City", "Grand Central Station", "London Bridge station", "London Underground", etc. Sources (and considerations of consistency) are important in informing that judgement but they do not replace it.--Boson (talk) 10:55, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

Main Page

OK, so how about "Main Page"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.10.204.202 (talk) 02:55, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

Main Page is an artifact of the software that defaults to a main page called "Main Page". It is not an article. Apteva (talk) 04:54, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (birds) listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Wikipedia:Naming conventions (birds). You might want to participate in the redirect discussion. JHunterJ (talk) 11:36, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Also "xx Dynasty" ?

See Tang Dynasty etc., and category:Vietnamese dynasties. Where is the guidance please? Thank you. In ictu oculi (talk) 09:29, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

"Nguyen dynasty" beats "Nguyen Dynasty" on this ngram. It's not by that big a margin, though. Kauffner (talk) 14:13, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

There are quite a few books, like this one, that use lower case for both Chinese and Vietnamese dynasties, implying that caps are not "necessary" for either. Therefore, it is WP style to go with lower case, avoiding the unnecessary caps. It's a simple WP:MOS issue, not special to titles. Dicklyon (talk) 06:24, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Dicklyon. Tony (talk) 06:37, 2 September 2012 (UTC)
Same here. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:06, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Proposal: bird names

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
The result was: Inactivity. (non-admin close) Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 03:50, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Add bird names as capitalized. This is a procedure used by ornithologists and Wikipedia, but not used in most dictionaries and literature. See[1] Apteva (talk) 04:30, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Note: Most words preceded by a dash are not capitalized, but not all. See, for example Yellow-bellied Sunbird-Asity, which is correctly capitalized. Apteva (talk) 18:33, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Support This is long-accepted and agreed practice on Wikipedia, and is used consistently in all the thousands of articles that fall within the Bird project's remit Jimfbleak - talk to me? 06:09, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    No articles fall within any WikiProject's remit. —David Levy 18:57, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I had to look up the word remit.
    re·mit [ri-mit] verb, re·mit·ted, re·mit·ting, noun
    verb (used with object)
    1. to transmit or send (money, a check, etc.) to a person or place, usually in payment.
    2. to refrain from inflicting or enforcing, as a punishment, sentence, etc.
    3. to refrain from exacting, as a payment or service.
    4. to pardon or forgive (a sin, offense, etc.).
    5. to slacken; abate; relax: to remit watchfulness.
    In this case it seems the meaning was "forgive". Apteva (talk) 22:03, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    "The thousands of articles that fall within the bird project's forgive"? That doesn't make sense.
    You've overlooked the noun form. From the page that you quoted: "the area of authority or responsibility of an individual or a group: by taking that action, the committee has exceeded its remit"
    —David Levy 00:51, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose expanding the codifying of that naming convention beyond the bird project. If a bird name appears as part of a quotation (hypothetically), then it would not be capitalized. -- JHunterJ (talk) 11:12, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    What you are saying is that in internal discussion on WP Birds it is ok to name birds correctly but if WP Birds ventures out into article space they can not do that? What you are saying does not make any sense. If a bird name appears in a quotation it is correct to add [sic] after the name if it is not correctly capitalized. But doing so would actually add confusion, as it would tend to indicate that the spelling was wrong, not the capitalization. Apteva (talk) 18:03, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I'm saying that I don't want to see WP:BIRDS odd choice in capitalization (not "correctly", mind you, but "jargonly" -- the language particular to discussions within a field is "jargon", and can well deviate from general usage such as in a general encyclopedia without making general usage incorrect -- and I really, really, really do not want to rehash that here) foisted upon other articles as if it's a general capitalization convention. In quotations, it wouldn't get [sic] because it's not incorrect. And since we're in "naming conventions", I'm talking about articles about quotations, which would never have [sic] in the title anyway. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:14, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Other articles? We are talking about article names. All of the bird articles use this convention. All we are doing is recognizing that. This is not a change to what has always been done. It is definitely not an "odd choice". What is an odd choice is to call a Grizzly Bear a Grizzly bear. Just as odd as calling Robert Smith by the name Robert smith. Both Grizzly bear and Robert Smith are proper nouns. Why use one convention for people and another for animals? We do that because that is what the "jargon" people use. Apteva (talk) 18:42, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Grizzly Bear is not a proper noun. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:48, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    When used to distinguish between types of bears it is a proper noun. When used to describe a group of bears of the same type it is a common noun. There is only one bear that is called a Grizzly bear. There are thousands of Grizzly bears. In the first case it is a proper noun in the second case it is a common noun that is capitalized. Go figure. Apteva (talk) 22:19, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    [citation needed]
    Do you apply this logic to everything? The term "sink wrench" refers to a specific type of wrench, distinguished from others. Does that make it a proper noun in that context? And if plumbers' specialist publications used the styling "Sink Wrench" (while everyone else wrote "sink wrench"), which form would be more appropriate at Wikipedia? —David Levy 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I figure that you do not understand the term "proper noun". Hercules is a proper noun. Old Ephraim is a proper noun. Each refers to only one bear. "Grizzly bear" is not a proper noun. It is the common noun that identifies the class to which Hercules, Old Ephraim, and unnamed multitudes of other grizzly bears belong. It does not magically become a proper noun based on context, any more than "book" becomes a proper noun when used to distinguish between types of media. It might be jargonly capitalized, but even changes in capitalization would not confer proper-nounhood upon it. -- JHunterJ (talk) 23:30, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    The name of the species is "Grizzly bear". It is not grizzly bear. Why is the first letter capitalized? Because it is a proper noun. Why is the second word not capitalized? Because that is convention. The name of the species is "Grey Heron", not grey heron. I have no problem with using the name of a species as the title of an article. People learn about proper nouns in the second grade, according to this book. Get Ready! For Standardized Tests: Reading Grade 2 ISBN 9780071374064 pg. 57 However, English is a very complex language. WP is not a one size fits all item, and all policies tend to have exceptions that are noted. This exception is noted, but not correctly. This is not "a proposal". It is what editors have been following. Apteva (talk) 02:01, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    The name of the species is "Grizzly bear". It is not grizzly bear. Why is the first letter capitalized? Because it is a proper noun.
    [citation needed]
    People learn about proper nouns in the second grade, according to this book. Get Ready! For Standardized Tests: Reading Grade 2 ISBN 9780071374064 pg. 57
    Now you're just being insulting and condescending.
    WP is not a one size fits all item, and all policies tend to have exceptions that are noted.
    Exceptions are appropriate when Wikipedia consensus — not WikiProject consensus — dictates. —David Levy 02:23, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    My measure of consensus of the community is the 10,000 articles that are named with capital letters. For every one of them the "community" had the opportunity to change them and lost every battle. What I see is that the community chose to use capital letters 10,000 times. Apteva (talk) 05:13, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Either you're unfamiliar with the situation's background (as some of your other messages suggest) or your definition of "consensus" doesn't jibe with policy. —David Levy 05:42, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Yes I am unfamiliar with the "situation's background", but I am familiar with an excellent index of all of the discussions on the topic that has been compiled, and have little interest in reading them, and secondly my definition of consensus is the outcome of a consensus decision making process, and it is my assumption that process occurred 10,000 times, once for each article, with the result always the same. In view of past discussions it is my hope that by some miracle people are ready to come to a consensus on this issue. The consensus of capitalizing names seems to be clear, as it has been applied 10,000 times. Many times there are situations when bodies want to talk about what to do and in the meantime either nothing gets done or others just go and do it, such as wp:bold. The consensus process tends to be slower than a top down approach, but when consensus is reached the body can act much quicker than when the decision is top down. In negotiating with Japanese companies Americans were confused when it seemed that the Japanese were sending over everyone including the janitors and the Americans had to start all over with each and explain the program all over again, but then when a decision was made to act, the Americans were left in the dust and were astonished at how quickly the Japanese were able to react. In an American company when the owner/CEO makes a decision, it is common for those who disagree to drag their feet and slow things down, which does not happen when consensus decision making is used. Apteva (talk) 08:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Yes I am unfamiliar with the "situation's background",
    And you're relying upon inaccurate assumptions.
    but I am familiar with an excellent index of all of the discussions on the topic that has been compiled, and have little interest in reading them,
    What was the point of mentioning the "excellent index" that you don't intend to utilize?
    and secondly my definition of consensus is the outcome of a consensus decision making process, and it is my assumption that process occurred 10,000 times, once for each article, with the result always the same.
    As noted above, your assumption is inaccurate. —David Levy 11:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    If I have a discussion about whether Spotted Owl should be capitalized and three people participate and conclude it should, that is a local consensus. There are less than a handful of thousands of active WP contributors. If there are 3,000 discussions about a particular question, it is highly likely to come to the attention of most if not all of the active contributors. This then becomes a community consensus, because all of the community of active contributors has weighed in, and in many cases codified the decision. You will note in the edit summary for the creation of the convention of capitalizing all animal species names in 2003 that it was done not as an out of the blue suggested style, but that it was an "added agreed naming convention for animals (plants?)". That is the difference between a local consensus and the consensus of the community - solely the level of participation. Please note that out of the hundreds of millions of people in the community who use wikipedia, there is a far greater community of people who do not and may not have even ever used a computer, though that number is declining. Occasionally we have an expert who stumbles upon a WP article and notes something that is completely false and edits it, usually as an ipuser. That was my first edit - fixing a glaring error, that was glaring to an expert, but taken as fact by the WP community who had put it there. Now if you have some other definition of local consensus, I suggest that an edit to that section is needed. I would say that it was not until about 2010 that most people started taking WP seriously - prior to 2005, or even 2008 it was a running joke to quote something from WP, and even now no one asks for a reference in WP in support of something, but always a RS, with the explicit assumption that WP is inherently unreliable. That could change in 50 years. Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I've attempted to explain the situation, but it appears that you still don't understand.
    The Wikipedia editing community hasn't endorsed the style "10,000 times". It hasn't done so once.
    The community has weighed in, and it disagrees with the local consensus established at the bird WikiProject, whose members believe that they possess the authority to overrule the community and control "their" articles' content. Attempts to address this problem have been met with stonewalling, distortion and threats of leaving Wikipedia in protest, leading many to conclude that it's more practical (and far less stressful) to let the WikiProject have its way than to persist in trying to set things right.
    This is not the same as "consensus" for the status quo, the mistaken impression that you seek to propagate. —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    I was not a participant in any of those discussions, but to say "than to persist in trying to set things right" assumes an outcome that is not warranted. The WP:Bird editors have a very valid reason for stating that they have "set things right" by using their version of capitalization. There are mediation processes available, and it seems like your mythical community that excludes WP:Bird is simply not willing to admit that they are wrong. What is done in bird articles has exactly zero interest or affect for me. Not a subject that I ever either use or have any interest in, and I certainly am not going to make up rules for them and try to impose them on them. And if I did, I would codify whatever it was that was current practice. The only time I see bird articles is recent edits or move requests. Apteva (talk) 01:45, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    I was not a participant in any of those discussions, but to say "than to persist in trying to set things right" assumes an outcome that is not warranted. The WP:Bird editors have a very valid reason for stating that they have "set things right" by using their version of capitalization.
    You're conflating two separate (but related) issues.
    Unquestionably, the bird WikiProject's members sincerely believe that their preferred style should be used at Wikipedia, and they've presented reasonable arguments.
    When I refer to "setting things right", I don't mean "using the right style". I mean "honoring consensus".
    I personally disagree with some of Wikipedia's style conventions. But I don't believe that overruling the community and forcing my non-consensus preferences into articles would constitute "setting things right".
    Likewise, even if I agreed with the bird WikiProject's preferred capitalization style, I wouldn't condone the manner in which it's been implemented.
    There are mediation processes available,
    And attempts to utilize them have occurred. In the most recent instance with which I'm familiar, the main party arguing on the WikiProject's behalf announced her retirement from Wikipedia (after threatening to quit under any scenario in which 100% of the WikiProject's demands weren't met) before any progress could be made.
    and it seems like your mythical community that excludes WP:Bird
    I explicitly stated that "the opinions of a WikiProject's members matter no less than those of any other editors". —David Levy 03:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    I am not the least surprised that they quit. You can only beat a dead horse so long. However, whatever the guideline says is the defacto consensus, and it said for 8 1/2 years that what WP:Bird was doing was within the guideline. The current guideline is just plain wrong, and misleading. Apteva (talk) 03:41, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    I am not the least surprised that they quit. You can only beat a dead horse so long.
    Oh, she didn't actually quit. She merely announced it, thereby obstructing further discussion (including the mediation that you just cited as a viable course of action). And as I recall, it wasn't the first time that she employed that tactic.
    However, whatever the guideline says is the defacto consensus.
    That isn't how Wikipedia works. When a WikiProject forces something onto a guideline page, that doesn't create consensus.
    Our policies and guidelines are descriptive, not prescriptive. They're written because they're true, not true because they're written. And if one isn't true (e.g. if it doesn't accurately reflect consensus), it isn't valid. —David Levy 04:01, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    This exception is noted, but not correctly.
    It's noted correctly (as a deviation imposed by a WikiProject).
    This is not "a proposal".
    It's not? Then why did you label it as such? You aren't proposing that something be done?
    It is what editors have been following.
    It's what a WikiProject has forced editors to follow, in contravention of policy. —David Levy 02:23, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    What I meant is this is not a proposal to change policy. It is simply a clerical correction to allow the written policy reflect what I see as a defacto policy. Apteva (talk) 04:57, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I've explained why the proposed change carries far deeper implications.
    The current wording reflects a great deal of discussion. It isn't accidental, doesn't contain a clerical error, and wasn't thrown together on a whim. —David Levy 05:11, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Point is that it says one thing and editors are doing another. It may have seemed like a good idea when it was written, but it does not seem like a good idea now. Has anything changed? Could it have been written better, in a way that five years later it would be meaningful? What is worse is looking at the page history, which went from saying that capitalization was disputed, to saying that birds are capitalized,[2], to the current wording that it is proposed that bird names are capitalized. It may have been a proposal in 2003,[3] but in 2009 it was a re-cast in concrete policy, and remained that for two years and three months. And after that it became a proposal? No, that just does not make any sense. Apteva (talk) 09:03, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    It may have seemed like a good idea when it was written,
    (earlier this year, resulting from a massive discussion)
    but it does not seem like a good idea now.
    (in your opinion)
    Has anything changed?
    Not that I know of. You simply aren't familiar with the relevant circumstances and refuse to become informed.
    What is worse is looking at the page history, which went from saying that capitalization was disputed, to saying that birds are capitalized,[4], to the current wording that it is proposed that bird names are capitalized.
    The earlier wording didn't accurately reflect consensus. —David Levy 11:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I am really astonished to see arguments made against going back to what has been policy for over eight years by saying that it is a project that is trying to violate policy. When in fact it is anyone who does not want birds capitalized who is violating policy. Apteva (talk) 09:15, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    The WikiProject is violating WP:LOCALCONSENSUS. To what policy are you referring? —David Levy 11:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    See timeline below. The way you are wording your argument it sounds like there was a policy that no animal species names should be capitalized and WP:Bird used a local consensus to override that. As mentioned it no longer is a local consensus if you do that thousands of times. But actually there is no policy on the capitalization of articles, there is a guideline, and since 2003 that guideline said that bird species names get capitalized - until the confusing wording of January of this year was added, saying that there was a proposal to capitalize bird species names, and you make it sound like they are using local consensus to jump the gun and capitalize before the proposal is ratified. This is like Kyoto. It was never ratified by the United States, but many cities have jumped in and ratified it for their own community. So in light of the history of the convention on capitalization, clearly all those arguing against capitalization are bucking eight and a half years of a guideline and 10,000 articles that were created, not as a violation of guideline, but inline with this guideline. So the burden of prove is not on the side of anyone who wants to capitalize species names, but on the side of anyone who does not want to capitalize them. That would be you. Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    The way you are wording your argument it sounds like there was a policy that no animal species names should be capitalized and WP:Bird used a local consensus to override that.
    You've misunderstood. WP:LOCALCONSENSUS is a section of WP:CONSENSUS. That's the policy that's been violated, as I've plainly stated several times.
    As mentioned it no longer is a local consensus if you do that thousands of times.
    You're arguing that if a WikiProject forces its local consensus upon the community a sufficient number of times, it somehow is transformed into a community-wide consensus. That doesn't make sense.
    But actually there is no policy on the capitalization of articles, there is a guideline, and since 2003 that guideline said that bird species names get capitalized
    Those versions of the guideline, like the practice itself, reflected local consensus contrary to that of the Wikipedia editing community at large.
    This is like Kyoto. It was never ratified by the United States, but many cities have jumped in and ratified it for their own community.
    You claim to have read WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, but you evidently don't understand it.
    So in light of the history of the convention on capitalization, clearly all those arguing against capitalization are bucking eight and a half years of a guideline and 10,000 articles that were created, not as a violation of guideline, but inline with this guideline.
    Said "guideline" never reflected consensus (and therefore was invalid).
    You're arguing that it's appropriate for a WikiProject to create and enforce a Wikipedia guideline, overruling those created by the community at large. And hey, they weren't doing anything wrong...because look, there was a guideline! And the community didn't manage to stop them, so that means that there's consensus. In fact, the consensus decision making process occurred 10,000 times; whenever someone created a bird article with IOC-style capitalization and refused to allow others to change it, it was yet another instance in which the community chose to use capital letters. —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Firstly, WikiProjects are simply groups of normal editors with shared interests, collaborating to improve and maintain articles. They possess absolutely no special authority.
    Secondly, neither capitalization style is inherently "incorrect". One is prevalent in specialist usage and the other is prevalent in general usage (including encyclopedias like this one). —David Levy 18:57, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose This creates undesirable inconsistency between birds' names and other animals' names, and generally flies in the face of policy and guidelines. See WP:LOCALCONSENSUS ("participants in a WikiProject cannot decide that some generally accepted policy or guideline does not apply to articles within its scope") and WP:PJ ("WikiProjects have no special rights or privileges compared to other editors and may not impose their preferences on articles"). I see no good reason for this wild deviance from this well-established guideline. If I said American black bear is bad capitalization because it could refer to any bear which is black and American, no one would take me seriously. It doesn't make any more sense applied to birds. --BDD (talk) 15:12, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Sorry but that is what it is. If you read the link you will see that Ornithologists made a conscious decision to break with the tradition used by other species naming conventions, and it is a tradition that WP has no reason to ignore. What the guideline actually says is that capitalization follows the practice used by experts in the field. In the case of Grizzly bear, zoologists follow the convention of capitalizing the first word and not the second or third for the English name. For the Latin name both ornithologists and zoologists follow the normal Genus, species naming convention. In the case of birds ornithologists note that Grizzly Bear is a proper noun and really should have been capitalized and use Grey Heron as the name. Since WP reflects industry practice, it is correct to do exactly what we have always been doing. Robert Smith is a proper noun. Are we supposed to only capitalize Robert and not smith? No, because that is not common practice. If ornithologists change their mind, we will follow suit, but in the meantime we need to do whatever they do. And if zoologists change the way animal species are named, we would likewise change Grizzly bear to Grizzly Bear. An encyclopedia reports on the world, it does not make up its own spelling rules. Apteva (talk) 17:44, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    And what it is that it is is part of the birds project, not part of the general encyclopedia. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:14, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    What you are saying does not make any sense. Are you saying that the article on Yellow-bellied Sunbird-Asity is not a part of article space, but is a part of WP Birds? Apteva (talk) 18:35, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    It would help if you would say "I don't understand" when you don't understand what is written, rather than accusing the writer of not making sense. Introducing the "rule" here would mean that it would apply to all article titles, not just articles in the WP Birds space. All WP Birds articles are part of article space, but not all parts of article space are WP Birds articles, see? -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:42, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    This convention only addresses the capitalization of article names. If you make a wikilink from another article and do not like the capitalization, there is always a redirect from the uncapitalized spelling that will get you there. Redirects are not costly, and can be used freely. I would add "common exceptions include articles on birds, fish, cultivars, and breeds". There is no need here to add rules of naming. The linked MOS can cover those details. All that is needed here is to point out the major exceptions. There may be others. Obviously the criteria of proper noun is inadequate because no one knows what a proper noun is. All the references I can find are oriented at the second grade level.[5][6] Truck is a common noun, but Ford F-150 is a proper noun. Is that because there is only one F-150 truck? No, it is because there is only one kind of truck called by that name. Duck is a common noun but Mallard is a proper noun for the same reason. In context it becomes a common name when used in a sentence if you are talking about the duck, and a proper noun if you are talking about the name of the species. F-150 always stays a proper noun. City is a common noun but Chicago is a proper noun. A sink wrench is a common noun, an Allen wrench is a proper noun if made by the Allen company, and a common noun which includes a proper noun if made by anyone else. The words "This convention often also applies within the article body" are not using the word "convention" in the context of this [[Wikipedia:Naming conventions (capitalization)|convention]], but in the context of this [[Wiktionary:convention|convention]]. If that is not clear, the wording can be clarified. In the case of both birds and fish, ornithologists use caps when they are talking to each other, the general public normally commonalizes the names of the species and does not capitalize them. Ditto for ichthyologists. To me it makes sense to default to the ornithologists and ichthyologists in the article title, and to the general public in the body of all articles other than those one the species itself, and leave it to individual preference to create an article that uses capitalization or not - it is, after all, an ornithological article. The main rational I see for that is heaven forbid if some ichthyologist actually used WP, for example to get a list of fish and why make them change the capitalization of each? Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
Some of that is simply false, Apteva. You're either ignorant of the actual state of things in ichthyology or intentionally misstating the facts about capitalization in that field, which is controversial. Either way, you appear to be disingenuously trying to make it seem like bird capitalization is normal and just a common thing that some fields do. Nothing could be further from the truth. There's an explicit convention against the practice for mammals, for example. With fish, the AFS/AFIH capitalize, and no one else does. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
  • Obviously the criteria of proper noun is inadequate because no one knows what a proper noun is.
    Wow. I lack the patience to go through this point by point. I can only reiterate The Blade's suggestion that you read our Proper noun article. (Wikipedia isn't a reliable source, but plenty of reliable sources are cited.) But I am compelled to respond to a couple of statements.
    Duck is a common noun but Mallard is a proper noun for the same reason.
    You really didn't think this through. By the same logic, "Duck" is a proper noun (because only one family of birds is called by that name). Likewise, "Bird" is a proper noun (because only one class of animals is called by that name) and "Animal" is a proper noun (because only one kingdom of eukaryotes is called by that name).
    A sink wrench is a common noun,
    Why? Only one kind of wrench is called by that name. —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Really? Home Depot sells two of them, one by Brasscraft, one by Ridgid.[7] No one has ever said that the rules of English are simple. It is a very rich and a very complicated language. Apteva (talk) 02:16, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Multiple companies manufacture that kind of wrench. —David Levy 03:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Evidently not a very good example. What you are saying is that just because it is a kind of wrench it should be a proper noun. As should be pipe wrench, monkey wrench, and lug wrench. Not because it is a unique design, which would make it more likely to be a proper noun. That would be suggesting that mammal be a proper noun because it is a particular type of animal. Not specific enough. Star is not a proper noun, Sun is, and sun is not. The word moon is not, the word Moon is. From what I can see family and above are not proper nouns. Genus for each species is a proper noun, and species is an adjective, which is why our style guide says always capitalize genus, and never species, and italicize both because both are in Latin. Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species, Individual. Above genus is a common noun. No one disputes that the name of an individual is a proper noun. I say that the name of the species (which includes the genus, such as H. sapiens (or Human), is a proper noun, with only the first word capitalized, such as Grizzly bear, and is used as a common noun, human when referring not to the name of the species but to the members of that species. On this point you and I will both evidently need to wait for others to weigh in as neither has presented any "Reliable Sources". Apteva (talk) 05:22, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    What you are saying is that just because it is a kind of wrench it should be a proper noun.
    No, I'm not saying that. Good grief.
    That would be suggesting that mammal be a proper noun because it is a particular type of animal. Not specific enough.
    According to whom? You, evidently.
    From what I can see family and above are not proper nouns. Genus for each species is a proper noun,
    ...according to a college handout of indeterminate authorship, which you found via a keyword search.
    But let's assume, for the sake of discussion, that this is accurate. What bearing does that have on English names?
    I say that the name of the species (which includes the genus, such as H. sapiens (or Human), is a proper noun.
    Right. You say it. And someone from a message board agrees.
    On this point you and I will both evidently need to wait for others to weigh in as neither has presented any "Reliable Sources".
    Are you asking me to prove a negative (i.e. to find documents containing the statement that "English species names are not proper nouns")? Please see Russell's teapot. —David Levy 05:55, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Are you aware of the extent to which this matter has been discussed (often heatedly, unfortunately) at Wikipedia? I get the impression that you aren't.
    You're mistaken in your belief that Wikipedia routinely adopts the style conventions preferred by a subject's specialists (when they differ from those prevalent in general usage). We rely on such sources for factual information (e.g. a bird's migratory behavior), but on matters of style, we follow the examples of reliable mainstream (non-specialist) publications.
    As has been discussed in the past, most (not all) bird specialists deviate from the style convention overwhelmingly followed elsewhere (non-specialist books, newspapers, websites, etc.). They do so not because bird species names are proper nouns (a claim evidently made by one ornithologist), but to draw emphasis in field guides and such (in a manner intuitive only to bird experts/enthusiasts, not to an encyclopedia's readers in general).
    The bird WikiProject, like every other WikiProject, possesses absolutely no special authority. The current situation (in which specialist styling is tolerated in bird articles, but not in articles in which birds are merely mentioned) exists in the interest of maintaining the peace. Some of the WikiProject's members are so strongly opposed to the use of mainstream styling that it's easier to simply let them have their way (in contravention of WP:LOCALCONSENSUS) than to deal with the endless argumentation, deliberate distortion, stonewalling tactics, and threats of quitting the project if their demands aren't met. (To be clear, not all of the WikiProject's members behave this way; some have expressed their opinions in a highly reasonable manner.)
    It seems that for the most part, they're satisfied with owning the bird articles. We needn't turn over the rest of the encyclopedia, nor should we endorse the idea that WikiProjects are entitled to control "their" articles. —David Levy 18:57, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    No but we can certainly ask the advice of a project. And we need to write down what our actual practice is and not say that it is a proposed change when that change has been followed for years. Apteva (talk) 20:10, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    The status quo is something analogous to a ceasefire, not an actual agreement within the Wikipedia community. The current wording (already a major concession) reflects that. Your proposed wording would make the WikiProject's decision "official", thereby endorsing the idea that WikiProjects possess such authority (and encouraging other WikiProjects, which currently respect WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, to act in kind). —David Levy 20:33, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I can think of two cease fires that took place in Asia. Vietnam and Korea. In one case the country went back to doing whatever it wanted without intervention. In the latter the country remained divided with no contact between two halves of one country. What we have done in the case of bird articles is akin to Vietnam, not Korea. I say we "formally recognize the country". WP Projects are not evil savages that need to be kept at bay. They are editors like any other editors. Apteva (talk) 21:54, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    At no point have I suggested that WikiProjects' members are "evil savages that need to be kept at bay". On the contrary, I believe that their efforts benefit the encyclopedia tremendously.
    That they're "editors like any other editors" is my point. The proposed change would convey that they possess special editorial authority. —David Levy 22:07, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    The proposed "change" does not change anything. It specifies how to name bird articles, using the same convention that has been applied to every other bird article. In the same fashion, we use section headings "in the same manner that they are used in every other article". By the way it has come to my attention that capitalization is not unique to bird articles. This change, though, is. Apteva (talk) 22:31, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Our section heading style reflects consensus within the Wikipedia editing community at large. The style in question does not. Your proposed wording formally endorses the idea that a WikiProject is entitled to dictate the content of articles within its scope. That is a substantial change, and it contradicts policy.
    Such "capitalization is not unique to bird articles" precisely because other editors and WikiProjects have followed the example set by the bird WikiProject. This is a problem, not justification for further encouragement. —David Levy 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose, for the reasons expressed above. —David Levy 18:57, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
  • See The Capitalization of Birds' Names, a 1983 article in ornithological journal The Auk, helpfully linked by Enric Naval in a related discussion. In it, an ornithologist writes about how his field "never change[s] convention but only succeed[s] in violating it." I understand the wisdom of following expert practice rather than general practice (although this isn't necessarily a good idea on Wikipedia due to WP:COMMONNAME). The expert practice makes sense in context—if you're writing an article for an ornithological journal, it makes sense to conveniently distinguish individual species. But for a general encyclopedia, all this is going to do is create a constant stream of editors making individual move requests due to the break with Wikipedia's capitalization conventions. Again, other animal articles don't capitalize species names, and I don't think that has caused any mass confusion. --BDD (talk) 19:03, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    One article did nothing to change the convention. What I am trying to do is end the constant stream of move requests that we currently have by noting that bird name articles follow the IOC. It does not apply to all article titles. The proposal is to add "except for bird articles which use the English name from the IOC". The proposal is to change "A possible exception is common names of birds, for which WP:WikiProject Birds proposes that the initial letter of each word be capitalized (but not after a hyphen)" to "An exception is English names of birds, for which the initial letter of each word is capitalized (but usually not, after a hyphen), as listed in the IOC World Bird List, such as Red-winged Grey Warbler and Yellow-bellied Sunbird-Asity." Note that if the Latin name of a bird is used as the article title, only the first word would be capitalized, as is done in the IOC. It is not a "possible exception" it is in fact an exception that has been applied to all of the thousands of bird articles that have been created. The IOC has 10,572 bird names, and I would expect that WP would have the goal of creating 10,572 bird articles all of which can be expected to use the Zone-tailed Hawk convention. Apteva (talk) 19:39, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    And I see that we have picked up all but about 20 of them Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds/Missing IOC names/Bird names. Apteva (talk) 20:02, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    The community reluctantly tolerates this situation because members of a WikiProject, acting in contravention of WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, have effectively obstructed all attempts to do otherwise. The current wording (already a major concession) reflects that. Your proposed wording would make the WikiProject's decision "official", thereby endorsing the idea that WikiProjects possess such authority (and encouraging other WikiProjects to act in kind). —David Levy 20:33, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I see nothing wrong with what WP Birds has done. What I take issue with is ignoring the fact that all bird articles are named per the IOC and not putting that into the naming convention. The fact is that all bird names are proper nouns and the IOC has chosen to capitalize them. The fact is that all animal species are proper nouns and zoologists have chosen to only capitalize the first word. To me what is strange is what zoologists do, not what ornithologists do. However, it is a fact that all bird articles follow the IOC and we need to state that and not ignore it. Projects get an equal say in adopting policies, and yes this change makes what has been done for years official. You want to try to force WP Bird to change the names of 10,000 articles? I see no point in proposing that, and if this proposal fails, that is what needs to happen. A WP Project simply tends to be made up of people who have an interest and knowledge of a subject, and who better to turn to for advice? Apteva (talk) 21:46, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    No one said anything about making the WikiProject move the articles. Give me the permissions and I'd gladly change those names, checking for double redirects and everything. Note that the IOC's own documentation concedes their capitalization rules are "contrary to the general rules of spelling for mammals, birds, insects, fish, and other life forms." Per WP:UNDUE, "Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserved as much attention overall as the majority view." So this is a case where a self-admitted minority's personal preferences overrides multiple Wikipedia policies and guidelines because... they know a lot about birds? --BDD (talk) 22:00, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I'd never thought of the UNDUE approach to this issue. I'll add that to the long list of why capitalizing bird names is a bad idea here. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
    Due to the fact that there are other examples of similar capitalization, it seems best to use whatever the IOC uses. The other examples are there for the same reason, and if anyone proposed changing the name you would get arguments on both sides - that it was always called this with this capitalization, that it violates WP:NAME. The purpose of a policy is to decide what to do and run with it. This ship has sailed long ago, and 10,000 articles use IOC. If IOC decides to change capitalization, there are plenty of editors, yourself included, who are willing to make changes to WP. Apteva (talk) 22:43, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    On what do you base the assertion that the IOC's decision should determine ours (i.e. that Wikipedia prefers specialist style conventions to those followed by mainstream reliable sources)? —David Levy 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    The purpose of the IOC Bird name list is to standardize the names of birds. The convention used in naming birds just happens to be different than the convention used in naming, say rocks. IOC is simply a convenient way of resolving questions, such as should it be "gray heron", "grey heron", "Gray heron", "Grey heron", "Gray Heron", or "Grey Heron". Apteva (talk) 00:23, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Reliable non-specialist publications have overwhelmingly declined to emulate the IOC's style convention. Why, in your view, should Wikipedia (a non-specialist publication) abide by it (instead of looking to mainstream reliable sources, as we do on most style matters)? —David Levy 00:51, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    You may be misinterpreting my view. My view is that policy should reflect common practice, not the other way around. We create policies to codify common practice so that following editors will know how to write articles correctly. We do not create policies out of the blue just to create policies - other than the five pillars, which are the foundation of the encyclopedia and are what allowed it to be created. What has evolved seems like a very simple procedure to follow, and I see no reason for asking anyone to change it - and if I did want anyone to change anything, I would ask zoologists to change the way they name animals, not ornithologists, because I happen to think that the way birds are named makes more sense, than the way animal species are named. Can anyone think of any other proper nouns that only capitalize the first word? Apteva (talk) 02:17, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    At this point, it's becoming difficult to assume good faith on your part. Your comments, which initially seemed sincere, are beginning to resemble trolling. —David Levy 02:23, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    It is unfortunate that you might think that. I am 100% sincere. I see a problem, and I am seeking a solution. Apteva (talk) 03:46, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I'm doing my best to assume good faith (and if I were convinced that you're trolling, I wouldn't still be posting replies). But honestly, you aren't making it easy. —David Levy 03:55, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    True, and like I said all I am doing is trying to fix a problem. Trolling would not accomplish a solution. Apteva (talk) 04:42, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I see nothing wrong with what WP Birds has done.
    Have you read WP:LOCALCONSENSUS?
    The fact is that all bird names are proper nouns
    [citation needed]
    The fact is that all animal species are proper nouns
    [citation needed]
    —David Levy 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Proper nouns are capitalized. In the scientific name, the genus is a proper noun, the species is an adjective. The English name is a proper noun.[8] Guidelines on creating new names:[9] Apteva (talk) 00:02, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    The PDF contains nothing remotely resembling a statement that "the English name is a proper noun". Neither does the webpage, on which the capitalization of bird names is mentioned simply as a style convention. —David Levy 00:51, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    The reason why a genus is a proper noun is because there is only one. Ditto for the name of a species. There is only one, making the name of it a proper noun. If you click on the link of the webpage at the bottom you get rules of capitalization, with the example at the top of "Grand Heron". Apteva (talk) 01:01, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    You're formulating and citing your own conclusion. I'm asking you to cite reliable sources stating that English species names are proper nouns.
    And again, that webpage — belonging to a committee of wildlife specialists — documents its style convention of capitalizing bird names. It contains no statement that this practice has anything to do with said names being proper nouns. —David Levy 01:21, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    [10] Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    A message board thread? Do you understand what's meant by "reliable source"? —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Projects get an equal say in adopting policies
    To be more precise, the opinions of a WikiProject's members matter no less than those of any other editors. But they aren't supposed to matter more. That's the issue.
    and yes this change makes what has been done for years official.
    And I've explained why that's problematic. "What has been done for years" doesn't reflect consensus within the Wikipedia community.
    You want to try to force WP Bird to change the names of 10,000 articles?
    No. I want the WikiProject to accept the fact that it doesn't own those articles and permit the Wikipedia editing community to rename them in accordance with the mainstream English style conventions to which we adhere. Unfortunately, this hasn't occurred. That doesn't mean that we must formally endorse the WikiProject's policy violation. —David Levy 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Let me explain where I am coming from. As an RCP and a frequent contributor at WP:RM I need to know how to name articles. I do this by following policies. This policy is a problem because it says one thing and all the articles do another. I can either change all the articles or change the policy. Whichever is easier. I am positing that changing the articles is not possible. Apteva (talk) 23:13, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    There is no deadline. Adherence to policies and guidelines is a worthwhile goal, and specifically worth the time it would take. --BDD (talk) 23:15, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Two examples of capitalization similar to birds. List of apple cultivars and List of horse breeds. Apteva (talk) 22:47, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Such deviations exist precisely because other editors and WikiProjects have followed the example set by the bird WikiProject. This is a problem, not justification for further encouragement. —David Levy 22:59, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I see no evidence that anyone creating an article about a flower has even seen any of the articles about birds. "however, there is currently no consensus within WP:PLANTS regarding the capitalization of common names in articles". What this says is capitalize them any way you wish. Apteva (talk) 23:05, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    Also, cultivars and breeds have a better argument for being proper nouns than species. Cultivars and breeds can be proprietary, for one. It's largely a separate issue. --BDD (talk) 23:10, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
    I see no evidence that anyone creating an article about a flower has even seen any of the articles about birds.
    That's because you evidently haven't followed past discussions (in which editors of plant articles have attempted to cite the bird articles as a precedent).
    "however, there is currently no consensus within WP:PLANTS regarding the capitalization of common names in articles". What this says is capitalize them any way you wish.
    No. It means "follow the normal English style conventions used throughout the encyclopedia", which would be correct even if there were "consensus within WP:PLANTS". —David Levy 00:51, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    An empirical study of a few articles on apples suggests otherwise. It would be good to address those exceptions as well, but that is outside of the scope of this proposal. Apteva (talk) 01:08, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    You're citing deviations from policy as evidence that it's correct to deviate from policy. —David Levy 01:21, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I am citing deviations as evidence that after careful reflection on the best name to use for the article the ones that I find are what were chosen. Red Delicious, if it was the only one capitalized, would make me think it was in error. A whole list and it makes me think it is correct. Apteva (talk) 01:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I am citing deviations as evidence that after careful reflection on the best name to use for the article the ones that I find are what were chosen.
    They were chosen by editors/WikiProjects under the mistaken impression that they're entitled to ignore/overrule Wikipedia's style conventions (and others emulating them). As noted above, this is a problem — one that the proposed change would exacerbate.
    Red Delicious, if it was the only one capitalized, would make me think it was in error. A whole list and it makes me think it is correct.
    In other words, if editors violate policy with sufficient consistency, their actions become correct. —David Levy 01:56, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Bingo. You hit the nail on the head. If people started spelling "spelling" with one l, speling, and then more and more, until everyone spelled it speling, it would be codified in dictionaries as speling. That is just the way the world works. We have an example of this called OE spelling, where the Oxford Dictionary insists on using an archaic spelling, even though most people use a different spelling. Apteva (talk) 02:27, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Again, the deviations in question don't reflect consensus within the Wikipedia community at large. Have you read WP:LOCALCONSENSUS yet? —David Levy 02:31, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Yes I am long familiar with that policy. As was pointed out there has been previous discussion of this topic. And unless policy is corrected to agree with practice it will continue to come up. The argument against letting this project do it seems to be a ship that has long ago sailed. And the argument that projects are somehow like dominoes that will fall one after another if you let this one get its way does not seem very valid. Projects do not request variances unless there is a reason for that variance. If there is a reason, it should be carefully considered, not rejected just because of policies that were written without knowing about that reason. Apteva (talk) 03:27, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    The argument against letting this project do it seems to be a ship that has long ago sailed.
    I don't know whether it's realistic to hope that the situation will change. I do know that tolerating the status quo isn't the same as formally endorsing it. —David Levy 03:47, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Actually turning a blind eye is worse than formally endorsing it. For example, almost no one obeys speed limits or stops at stop signs, which severely penalizes those few who feel they need to obey the law. Apteva (talk) 04:36, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I haven't the foggiest idea of what point that analogy is intended to convey. —David Levy 05:11, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    And the argument that projects are somehow like dominoes that will fall one after another if you let this one get its way does not seem very valid.
    Again, members of other WikiProjects have attempted to cite it as a precedent. This isn't speculative. It's a problem that already exists. —David Levy 03:47, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I would interpret this not as a problem, but as a recognition that other projects have valid reasons for wanting exceptions. The solution is to use words like mostly, or many, in policies so that we recognize that they do not apply all of the time. Apteva (talk) 04:36, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I would interpret this not as a problem,
    You disagree with WP:LOCALCONSENSUS?
    but as a recognition that other projects have valid reasons for wanting exceptions.
    1. On what do you base the conclusion that their reasons are "valid"?
    2. "Wanting exceptions" isn't the same as forcibly making them. As noted below, it's perfectly reasonable for WikiProjects to suggest exceptions. They simply lack the authority to dictate them. That's what some fail to realize/accept (the "problem" to which I've referred). —David Levy 05:11, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Projects do not request variances unless there is a reason for that variance. If there is a reason, it should be carefully considered, not rejected just because of policies that were written without knowing about that reason.
    No one is saying that input from WikiProjects should be dismissed out of hand. Indeed, they're entitled to suggest exceptions, and the Wikipedia editing community at large should consider these requests carefully.
    In this instance, the community disagrees with the WikiProject's rationale (on the basis that we routinely favor mainstream style conventions, not specialist ones). Unfortunately, the WikiProject didn't "request variances". It decided to overrule consensus and impose its preferences within "its" articles. —David Levy 03:47, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Evidently some editors may disagree but have clearly lost the battle. Like I said the ship has sailed. Apteva (talk) 04:36, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    And like I said, tolerating the status quo isn't the same as formally endorsing it, thereby officially condoning a policy violation and encouraging others to act in kind. —David Levy 05:11, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    It is no longer a violation if it is endorsed. The problem is saying one thing and doing another. Almost everything in WP is subject to discussion and change. Articles today look a lot different than they did a few years ago, and I am sure will look different a few years from now. Apteva (talk) 08:13, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    It is no longer a violation if it is endorsed.
    So you acknowledge that you seek formal endorsement of the WP:LOCALCONSENSUS violation. —David Levy 11:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    Actually, the guideline has always called for capitalization. For five years it said that was disputed, and that either was acceptable. Then for two years it correctly said that the main exception was birds were capitalized. It was not until January of this year that the confusing and incorrect language was added that there was a proposal "that the initial letter of each word be capitalized (but not after a hyphen)". That is false, and should be simply removed. No capitalization rules are needed because there is already a link to the complete guidelines, which should be moved to the MOS. Summarizing them is not helpful, and provides incorrect information. Under Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Capital letters#Common names, instead of saying that the rules for names of birds are complicated and the link to WP:Birds, simply add in the sources for common names of birds. That section, by the way, is poorly worded. "Use a consistent style of capitalization in all articles" is misleading, as is "As of March 2012, wikiprojects for some groups of organisms are in the process of converting to sentence case where title case was previously used." If you are taking about the animal, it is correct to use lower case, if you are talking about the species name, it is correct to use the species name, which capitalizes only the first word (Grizzly bear, not Grizzly Bear), other than birds and fish (Spotted Owl, not Spotted owl, Rainbow Trout, not Rainbow trout). There are many examples of articles that use capital letters in one context and lower case in another, within the same article, and the use of capital letters makes it clear which use is meant. Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
    I repeat: Apteva's statement that there's a pro-caps convention for fish is false. Only two (closely-related) ichthyology organizations do it, and the rest think it looks unprofessional and harms the field's credibility. See reliable source citation I posted elsewhere here. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
    Actually, the guideline has always called for capitalization.
    Said "guideline" never reflected consensus (and therefore was invalid).
    It was not until January of this year that the confusing and incorrect language was added that there was a proposal "that the initial letter of each word be capitalized (but not after a hyphen)". That is false, and should be simply removed.
    No, it isn't false. The WikiProject advocates such a convention, which lacks consensus within the Wikipedia editing community. The fact that the WikiProject decided to go ahead and enforce it anyway doesn't change that.
    You seek to undo a long-overdue correction. —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    What? Just because some people disagreed with it does not mean a lack of consensus, and the policy if you want to call it that, became that either capitalization was acceptable. And it is not a long overdue correction - it is an error - and ignores that it has been a guideline for years. However carefully you think it was worded, it is simply not a factual statement. A correct wording would be that either is acceptable and WP:Birds has a proposal to limit capitalization in bird articles to all caps. That is what should have been done, and that is an accurate statement. You will note that I have identified the January change not as a recognition of bird articles, but an attempt to change bird articles. We go from AB to either AB or ab to AB in bird articles to a statement that all articles are ab and there is a proposal to use AB in bird articles. This is false. The guideline of using AB in bird articles has existed unabated since 2003. The guideline that all articles use ab other than bird articles is patently false, as there are other examples of AB that are just as valid as the bird articles. All published guidelines and policies are defacto valid unless they are deleted or changed within a short period of time. For example, if I write a constitution for Israel and publish it on the official website, it is defacto the constitution unless it gets pulled down as soon as it was discovered. As you will often hear, the US should have ended the sentence after "Congress shall pass no laws." But the US constitution is the defacto constitution. You might like to hear the definition of official, which few people know. It is, because I said so, and am in authority to say so. Basically there is only one person of that status in WP, Jimbo. Other than that, if a policy or guideline is published, and stays up, it is defacto valid, no matter how much anyone may disagree. Bear in mind that most editors simply would like to see "the style sheet" for WP, and are willing to follow whatever it says. If it says "Use ab spelling for bird articles", it seems clear that editors familiar with the subject are going to disagree, and there is no point in putting them into that position. It is like telling people in my field that we can not use standard industry terminology in our articles because someone who knows nothing about the subject wants them written differently. That's a real quick way of losing editors. Apteva (talk) 01:45, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    What? Just because some people disagreed with it does not mean a lack of consensus,
    Of course not. That isn't what I wrote. No Wikipedia policy or guideline is supported unanimously.
    The "guideline" never reflected consensus, as defined at Wikipedia:Consensus.
    and the policy if you want to call it that,
    No, I haven't called it that. "Guideline" is the correct term.
    became that either capitalization was acceptable.
    And that didn't reflect consensus either.
    And it is not a long overdue correction - it is an error
    No, it's quite intentional (your disagreement notwithstanding).
    - and ignores that it has been a guideline for years.
    We haven't ignored the previous text. We've addressed its inaccuracy.
    You seem to be under the mistaken impression that Wikipedia's policies and guidelines derive legitimacy through their very existence (i.e. that a rule becomes official and binding when it's written down). That isn't so. Our policy/guideline pages are descriptive, not prescriptive. They serve as documentation, not bills signed into law.
    If it says "Use ab spelling for bird articles", it seems clear that editors familiar with the subject are going to disagree, and there is no point in putting them into that position. It is like telling people in my field that we can not use standard industry terminology in our articles because someone who knows nothing about the subject wants them written differently.
    If we were to apply that principle to my field, our film/television articles would contain such terms as "aud", "ayem", "boff", "chopsocky", "competish", "crix", "distribbery", "floppola", "hotsy", "kudocast", "laffer", "meller", "mitting", "nabe", "nitery", "oater", "ozoner", "percentery", "perf", "praisery", "preem", "prexy", "sked", "spesh", "sudser" and "terper". —David Levy 03:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    That is very colorful, and hopefully someone will make an article that explains each term. In many fields most things are technical and proprietary and regarded as company secrets. Apteva (talk) 18:19, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    That is very colorful, and hopefully someone will make an article that explains each term.
    Wikipedia is not a dictionary or a slang, jargon or usage guide.
    In many fields most things are technical and proprietary and regarded as company secrets.
    How is that relevant? —David Levy 21:25, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Break (bird names proposal)

Here is an interesting example. Great Blue Heron and Little Blue Heron are both types of herons. In the sentence "The rookery was filled with adult great blue herons and little blue herons" are the herons all great blue herons? The sentence "The rookery was filled with adult Great Blue Herons and Little Blue Herons" makes it clear. Apteva (talk) 01:01, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Only to someone familiar with the specialist convention (which a vast majority of Wikipedia's readers aren't). As noted in past discussions, a much better solution is to simply avoid the ambiguous wording entirely: "The rookery was filled with adult herons, belonging to the great blue and little blue species." —David Levy 01:21, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
There are often multiple solutions to any problem. English is such a rich language that it only takes about four or five words to create a phrase that no one else has ever used. Capitalizing proper nouns is one of those tools. Apteva (talk) 01:35, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
Species names aren't proper nouns, nor are they commonly capitalized in the texts with which most Wikipedia readers are familiar (so they won't know what this seemingly peculiar formatting is intended to indicate). —David Levy 01:56, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
There appear to be disagreements on that point.[11] Evidently I am not alone in thinking that names of species are proper nouns. I also think that they can be used as common nouns. What is clear, is that the scientific genus is a proper noun, and the scientific species is an adjective. Put them together and I say you get a proper noun, with only the first word capitalized - except for birds, which capitalizes both words. I think the confusion is that a proper noun can also be used as a common noun. Apteva (talk) 02:58, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
Flowers use three names, a genus, which is a proper noun, a species, which is an adjective, and a cultivar, which is a proper noun. Apteva (talk) 03:02, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
There appear to be disagreements on that point.[12]
Now you're citing edits by other Wikipedians as evidence? Wow.
You stated above that "the fact is that all bird names are proper nouns" and "the fact is that all animal species are proper nouns". I'm still waiting for you to cite reliable sources corroborating these claims.
Evidently I am not alone in thinking that names of species are proper nouns.
Indeed. It's been suggested in past discussions. Then, like now, no reliable sources on the subject of English grammar were cited.
Even bird experts rarely make such an assertion. As noted above, the birders were able to find an article by one ornithologist who opined that the English names of bird species should be considered proper nouns.
But according to you, it's a "fact". —David Levy 03:21, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
It's a fact that the article[13] was written in 1983 and that the IOC Bird names was published in 1996. Evidently the 1983 article had no impact on the naming of birds. Apteva (talk) 03:35, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
No one disputes the IOC's style convention's existence. What bearing does this have on your claim that it reflects the "fact" that bird names are proper nouns? Again, even bird experts don't cite that as the reason behind it. —David Levy 03:47, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
Absolutely none. If you ask me all names of species are proper names, and the group of animals or plants with that name are a common name. I am saying that I can see the logic of capitalizing cultivar and some breeds, based on common usage. I have no interest in re-inventing the wheel by suggesting that all such names be force fed into a pointless style convention. Should Red Delicious be changed to Red delicious? As I mentioned, flowers have three names, a genus, which is a proper noun, a species, which is an adjective, and a cultivar, which is a proper noun. I would expect to find the names of some flowers to be capitalized and some not, just knowing that. We already say "Common names of species generally do not have each word capitalized". The problem comes in when we say "A possible exception is common names of birds". The word generally already says that there are exceptions, and by saying "a possible exception" it sounds like almost all articles, including bird name articles follow the convention of not being capitalized but there are some exceptions, and there is discussion of changing all bird name articles in the future. That is not what exists. It seems likely that were I to rename any of the bird articles they would quickly be reverted, and were I to create one without capitalization it would quickly be capitalized. Why not just point out that bird name articles are capitalized. Anyone who wishes can argue for a change in that policy, but it sounds like the ornithologists will argue just as strongly against changing it. Apteva (talk) 04:19, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
If you ask me
That's just it. No offense, but I don't ask you (just as I don't expect others to ask me).
You claim that "the fact is that all bird names are proper nouns" and "the fact is that all animal species are proper nouns". As evidence, you've cited your own personal conclusions.
I don't mean to be disrespectful. You certainly are entitled to your opinions. But do you understand why they don't rise to the level of a reliable source?
all names of species are proper names, and the group of animals or plants with that name are a common name.
You appear to have invented this rule yourself.
It seems likely that were I to rename any of the bird articles they would quickly be reverted, and were I to create one without capitalization it would quickly be capitalized.
And this is because a WikiProject imposes its preferences, in contravention of policy.
Why not just point out that bird name articles are capitalized.
I've answered this question several times. It would constitute formal endorsement of the WikiProject's policy violation. —David Levy 05:11, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
I've been watching this from afar, and this reminds me a lot of what a few people tried to do at Gadsby (novel); see here and here for reference. That it's managed to go on this long is only the difference between having two people stonewalling against community consensus versus a whole WikiProject attempting to foist their personal preference onto us over community consensus. Largely per David Levy, I don't see how the people at WP:BIRDS have any ground to stand on. MoS isn't a guideline a project can just override if they feel like it (c.f. a couple discussions I was involved in regarding FLAGBIO in March/April 2011, where the longevity project tried something similar with flag icons), so obviously birds, like everything else, should follow normal capitalization standards. And by the way, genus and species names are most definitely not proper nouns, anyone who thinks otherwise should consult the linked article to learn the actual definition of that term. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 05:27, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
Actually genus is a proper noun and species (the scientific species) is an adjective. All plants and animals follow the convention of capitalizing the genus and not capitalizing the species. This reference says "the entire name ... is a proper name"[14], but pardon me if I use a reliable source to find out what a proper noun is and not a wikipedia article. Apteva (talk) 06:40, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
An unattributed (i.e. authored by a TA, for all we know) college handout about binomial nomenclature (scientific names, written in Latin) — which, for some reason, you've deemed applicable to English names? That's your "reliable source"? —David Levy 11:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
It is adequate. As is the blog entry. This is not an article. I only need to show that they could be considered proper nouns. It is not disputed that they are treated as common nouns in most contexts, and in non-specific literature. How more specific can you get than having an article about a species? Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
It is adequate. As is the blog entry.
No, those sources aren't remotely adequate. One could find practically any statement somewhere online, particularly when performing a keyword search (as opposed to seeking materials about the general subjects).
And yet, these documents don't even say what you want them to. That's the strangest part.
I only need to show that they could be considered proper nouns.
No, you stated this as a "fact", so that's what you need to show (or retract the assertion).
Suppose that I were to state that "the fact is that whales are fish". You probably would dispute this claim and request that I cite a source. If I then linked to this page, (on the basis that "I only need to show that they could be considered fish"), would that suffice?
Of course not. A credible source is needed. —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
That only applies if I wanted to put that into an article. Talk pages have no such requirement of verifiability. Apteva (talk) 01:45, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
If you mean that you're entitled to make unsubstantiated claims, that's true. But don't expect others to believe them. —David Levy 03:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
As an example, someone wrote, what about Foo, on a talk page, and I researched it, found a reference and put it into the article. In other cases people write what about Foo, and I have researched it, found it to be false, and not put it in. In both cases there was zero need for a RS on the talk page. Apteva (talk) 01:59, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
Okay. So if you want these claims to have any bearing on what we put in articles, find some reliable sources. —David Levy 03:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
English is an evolving language. Originally "wolf" was a common noun to describe a class of objects, and "gray wolf" as a class of objects. Then scientists came along and named it "Canis lupus", where "Canis" is a proper noun and always capitalized, and "lupus" an adjective and therefor never capitalized. The words "gray wolf" can be either an adjective and a noun or "Gray wolf", the technical English name for the Canis lupus. If you want a RS, you need go no further than to read [15], which states: "we now have a single, unique name (see below) for each of the biological entities that we call bird species. These names must be regarded as proper nouns (thus receive capitals in all English publications)." It is clear to me that the words "in all English publications" means what it says, all - including books, dictionaries, and oh yes, encyclopedias. It is my opinion that the same applies to all species that are given specific names (which applies to all of them), with the recognition that animals other than birds and fish only capitalize the first word of the name (the adjective "Gray" is capitalized, the noun "wolf" is not. If you ask me it is likely that this will become standard practice "in the future". Apteva (talk) 18:19, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
AFS/ASIH decided to capitalize fish common names, but no one else does, and the practice has no legitimate traction in Wikipedia (if its happening, it needs to stop). Many real-world ichthyologists are on record as opposing the practice, and it remains controversial. See source I cited elsewhere here. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
English is an evolving language.
Indeed. And grammarians have documented the phenomenon at length. So when consulting their writings, you should have no difficulty finding mentions of the "fact" that species names are proper nouns.
If you want a RS, you need go no further than to read [16]
Do you remember when I stated that "the birders were able to find an article by one ornithologist who opined that the English names of bird species should be considered proper nouns"? Well, that's the one.
which states: "we now have a single, unique name (see below) for each of the biological entities that we call bird species. These names must be regarded as proper nouns (thus receive capitals in all English publications)." It is clear to me that the words "in all English publications" means what it says, all - including books, dictionaries, and oh yes, encyclopedias.
Indeed, Jon S. Greenlaw (whose credentials are unrelated to English studies) wrote an opinion piece advocating that bird names be "regarded as proper nouns" and "receive capitals in all English publications". This obviously hasn't occurred, nor does Greenlaw claim otherwise. Why are you conflating a man's fantasy with reality?
It is my opinion
Exactly.
If you ask me
I don't. —David Levy 21:25, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
  • I harshly oppose WikiProject Birds' capitalization procedures. The problem is, as every other opposer revealed, that the these procedures are against the estabalished consensus about capitalization of animal names. A secondary problem is that WikiProjects cannot wield power over articles in their scope, and that's exactly what WikiProject Birds is trying to do. Finally, Wikipedia prefers non-specialist sources, and the bird WikiProject is using naming procedures enforced by specialists, which is analogous with sources written by the specialists. That's all my comments on this matter. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 21:22, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    It appears that the "the estabalished consensus" on capitalization is the opposite. That either is acceptable. That is what the guideline said for a lot longer than it said that only all caps were used, and the current wording added in January is clearly not a reflection of consensus. Apteva (talk) 22:52, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Your understanding of Wikipedia "consensus" — particularly that it's established via the creation of policy/guideline pages — is highly inaccurate. —David Levy 23:03, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
    Thank you for your opinion, but opinions do not change facts. Consensus happens to be within my field of expertise. But do not let that get in the way of your opinion. Apteva (talk) 02:24, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    Do you remember what I said about your messages coming across as trolling? It's happening again. —David Levy 02:29, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    Over the course of the last couple of days there has been very little interest in this topic. Hopefully adding a link will help. Apteva (talk) 03:04, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    There has been very little support for the proposal. Since it's obvious that there is no consensus for the proposal, and since David Levy is doing an admirable job of trying to explain to you why, there is little need for additional churn. -- JHunterJ (talk) 11:17, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    Creating policy or guideline pages by themselves are not the result of consensus. There needs to be an agreement with the community for consensus to be made. Then the pages are created. Also, the ornithological community's capitalization is not relevant for a general encyclopedia, which Wikipedia is. Finally, the bird WikiProject has appeared to strictly disallow title changes to titles against their convention. This is analogous with article ownership. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 13:23, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Strongest OPPOSE I've ever offered: There is absolutely no consensus on Wikipedia that bird species common names are capitalized while others are not. What there is, is a WP:FILIBUSTER by an activistic group of editors from WP:BIRDS that has mired WT:MOS (among many other forums) in tendentious debate for the last four years (since MOS adopted the lower-case convention firmly), with the definite effect if not express intent of disrupting the consensus-forming process, so that their attempts to stick bird caps into other guideline pages, or promote their wikiproject pro-caps essay as a guideline, is not overridden by MOS. The actual consensus at WT:MOS is that WP:MOS must not make weird exceptions like this, or everyone will want one for everything. The only reason MOS appears temporarily to be supportive of the idea of wikiprojects getting to make up their own rules is that these editors have used the argumentum ad nauseam technique to browbeat all opposition, especially by way of the WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT tactic, to the point where they're sick of the debate for a while, and too worn out to continue. The statement in this proposal that bird publication "and Wikipedia" use capitalized common names of species is disingenuous nonsense. WP articles use the caps because some (very few, actually) birds editors editwarred them all to be this way several years ago and chase away anyone who disagrees. This is what is known as a fait accompli, an attempt to render a debate moot by forcing one side to already have their way. From what I can tell, it's the biggest one ever pulled off in WP history. It's also the kind of action that has already been condemned by ArbCom.

Not a naming/title issue

Naming conventions are about article titles. The capitalization of bird names is not title specific, but a general style issue. See the lengthy recent discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Archive_127#Species_capitalization_points. Dicklyon (talk) 06:30, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Also note that books clearly contradict the idea that grizzly bear is a proper name: [17]. Dicklyon (talk) 06:36, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Any way to do that without including book titles?[18] uses Grizzly Bear 25% of the time. But this is a tangent. The subject is bird names, not animal names. I still maintain that the name of a species is a proper noun, or if you will, a proper name, and that name gets used as a common noun to describe a group of them, or even one member of that species. Like using Marbled Salamander and salamander, or Robin and robin. The subject of capitalization within an article is completely separate from the capitalization of an article. I am only addressing the capitalization of the article name in this proposal. Apteva (talk) 07:46, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
How, in your view, are they "completely separate"? —David Levy 11:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
Surely you are joking? If I write a book about lamp shades, and title the book Lamp Shades, I am using completely different rules of capitalization for the title from the rules of capitalization within the book. This is just third grade spelling. Apteva (talk) 21:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
I think Apteva is right on this one. Book titles capitalize the first letter of most words in most cases. The practice is more mixed in article titles, but the point that a book title The Grizzly Bears doesn't inform capitalization in prose (and thus Wikipedia article titles) is noted. --BDD (talk) 21:46, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
I wasn't addressing that portion of Apteva's message; I was responding to the statement that the capitalization used in Wikipedia's article titles and that used in running prose are "completely separate" subjects. ("The subject of capitalization within an article is completely separate from the capitalization of an article. I am only addressing the capitalization of the article name in this proposal.") —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
But we don't use completely different rules of capitalization (such as your example's title case) for our articles' titles. —David Levy 00:12, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
Technically we use sentence case all the time, but titles necessarily have different rules than articles because they are more like book titles than text appearing in a paragraph of text. We have very detailed and very complex rules for article naming, that anyone who jumps in to help out at WP:RM discovers very quickly. You start at WP:Name and drill down to dozens of special cases. It is not as simple as just saying "For page titles, always use lowercase after the first word, and do not capitalize second and subsequent words, unless the title is a proper noun." Apteva (talk) 01:45, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
No one has asserted that no title-specific considerations exist. That doesn't make the subject of titles "completely separate" from the subject of running prose.
In this case, irrespective of which capitalization style is used, nearly everyone agrees that the same style should appear in both titles and running prose (allowing for the uppercase first letter in titles, of course). —David Levy 03:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
But only in bird or fish articles. The language explaining that does not need to be so strongly worded. Just because a Rainbow Trout is named "Rainbow Trout" does not mean that it needs to be capitalized outside of that article, or one on another type of fish. Apteva (talk) 04:00, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
Just FYI, there's no consensus in the world of ichthyology that fish common names be upper-cased, either. AFS/ASIH decided to capitalize fish common names, but no one else does, and the practice has no legitimate traction in Wikipedia (if its happening, it needs to stop). Many real-world ichthyologists are on record as opposing the practice, and it remains controversial. See, for example: Kendall, Robert L. (July 2002). "A Capital Punishment". Fisheries (American Fisheries Society) 27 (7): 33–34. ISSN 0363-2415. Ichythologist Kendall criticizes AFS/ASIH for inappropriate "veneration" of species, undermining industry and academic credibility, pushing an agenda not within their scope, ignoring for no clear gain the grammar rules that matter to many people, trying to undo a very widespread real-world consensus that was difficult and slow to forge, ignoring the clear fact that capitalization of various things as if they were proper nouns is a practice that has been declining for "a long time", and harming the ability of the list-publishing organizations to get international consensus on the vernacular fish names they are advancing. He's right about declining practice for sure - this German capitalization of nouns has been disappearing from English since around the time of the American Revolution and was already extremely uncommon by the turn of the 20th century. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:33, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
I'm expressing disagreement with your statement that the capitalization used in Wikipedia's article titles and that used in running prose are "completely separate" subjects.
It's true that mentions of a particular species needn't necessarily be consistently capitalized from one article to the next. But nearly everyone agrees that a single style should be used within a given article — including the running prose, title and section headings (allowing for an uppercase first letter in the latter two).
In other words, if the article is titled "Rainbow Trout", the running prose shouldn't contain references to "rainbow trout" (excepting, perhaps, a mention of the alternative style in the lead). —David Levy 04:17, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Apteva, you're starting to act like a troll again. We've told you hundreds of times the answers to your questions in this dispute. You also have been obviously suffering from WP:ICANTHEARYOU. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 20:08, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

P.S, are you a member of WikiProject Birds? Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 20:08, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Well let me think about that. I rarely if ever see any of the bird articles, ditto for editing them. I do not participate in any way with any part of the project. I am not listed as a project member, nor do I even know if the project has a list of members. Knowledge of birds is very very far from being anything that I have any recognition let alone expertise or interest. I can tell a crow from a Robin if I see it up close, but if I see a hawk I can not tell if it is a crow or a hawk. I will leave it up to you to draw your own conclusions. What I do do, is edit solar related articles, and am a frequent contributor to WP:RM, and am a recent changes patroller. As part of that I often click on Special:Random to see if anything obvious needs to be fixed. I need to have guidelines that I can point to, not guidelines that say one thing and all of the articles do something else. Someone needs to fix this, and I would like to see some proposals (below). This needs to move forward, or at least go back to stating explicitly that any capitalization is acceptable if is used correctly. Saying that capitalization is not used and there is a proposal to use it for bird articles is flat out false. Apteva (talk) 23:05, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
Your statement that "this needs to move forward" illustrates the problem at hand.
Editors have expressed disagreement with your assertion that the current wording — a result of recent discussion/consensus — is "flat out false". You apparently believe that the proper response is to dismiss our objections and repeat your arguments over and over until you manage to get through to us.
To quote WP:IDHT:
"Believing that you have a valid point does not confer upon you the right to act as though your point must be accepted by the community when you have been told that it is not accepted."
"The community's rejection of your idea is not proof that they have failed to hear you."
—David Levy 23:22, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
Apteva, I'm going to remind you to please stop trolling. (the notices will be on your talk page) Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 23:34, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
For the third time, I am not trolling. I have a sincere interest in finding an appropriate resolution. Apteva (talk) 23:51, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
Trolling is an activity, not an intention or measure of sincerity. If your sincere interest is leading you to troll, you need to redirect your sincere interest, and accept that the appropriate resolution may not be the one you approve. -- JHunterJ (talk) 23:56, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
I agree with JHunterJ. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 00:07, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
Noted. I will trust that step 2 will occur, and the guideline will get fixed. If there is no resolution in a month, I will bring it up again at an appropriate interval. Apteva (talk) 00:47, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
Did you read WP:HEAR (or even the above quotations thereof)? —David Levy 00:52, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
That question is not relevant to moving this discussion forward, and does not require an answer. I follow all WP policies and guidelines. This one is broken. Apteva (talk) 04:23, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
That question is not relevant to moving this discussion forward, and does not require an answer.
Your definition of "moving this discussion forward" is "agreeing with Apteva". In your view, until that occurs, the discussion is stalled.
Unless, of course, you're simply trolling. And frankly, it's becoming harder and harder to assume otherwise.
I follow all WP policies and guidelines. This one is broken.
You've made your opinion clear. Others disagree, and you just vowed to "bring it up again" unless and until that changes. Your behavior is such a textbook example of WP:HEAR that it seems deliberate. —David Levy 05:03, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
Fact is that birding organisations (both scientists and birdwatchers, have spent huge amounts of time determining proper names for birds, hence the capitlaisation. This is like the planets and countries, and different from all other organisms. Hence we follow pracitce not invent our own. We don't noncapitalise planets when talking about them in general pages either. Period. Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:07, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
Apples and oranges. No one is disputing what the correct names are. Rather, some WP:BIRDS people are trying to force the rest of Wikipedia to adopt an orthographical style from academic publications from one particular field, and we simply don't do that. That is the actual issue. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:33, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Poll

As noted below, this poll merely duplicates the above discussion, with exactly the same disputed claims restated as uncontested facts. At best, this is a case of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. At worst, it's outright trolling. Either way, it's disruptive and needs to cease. —David Levy 18:40, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Current wording

Organisms

See: Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, and the naming conventions for fauna, flora and birds
Common names of species generally do not have each word capitalized, except where proper nouns appear (maple tree, zebra, but Przewalski's horse). A possible exception is common names of birds, for which WP:WikiProject Birds proposes that the initial letter of each word be capitalized (but not after a hyphen). Where more than one capitalization is possible, redirects should be created from the alternative form(s). For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above.
The problem with this is that it misrepresents the fact that it has been consensus for eight years to capitalize bird names within bird articles. It is not a proposal, but what has been done from day one. The first guideline said that all species names followed the rule that all words were capitalized if not preceded by a hyphen, and used three examples - all only of birds. This was later amended to say "all words in a species' official common name should be capitalised", which is redundant because the official name includes capitalization. The official name, for example, of a red winged black bird is "Red-winged Blackbird". The capitalization is a part of the name. When you use a scientific name it is uncontroversial that the genus is always a proper noun and always capitalized, as in Homo sapiens.
A note on capitalization was also added that said:
"A group name should not have full capitalisation: "the nuthatches"; "the storm-petrels"; "the indigo birds".
The word "sun" and "moon" can either be capitalized or not. In most cases only our sun and moon are referred to, and it is technically correct to capitalize, but not required. The naming of birds is unique in that there actually are "official" names, and while technically versed persons may insist on capitalizing Sun and Moon, ornithologists and ichthyologists are unique in insisting on capitalizing their respective species names.
Plus it is inaccurate to say "A possible exception is common names of birds", because there are many other exceptions as well. Names are what they are. Robert Smith is a name. Grizzly bear is a name. No one writes "Grizzly bear", but that is the correct spelling of the species name. Language use changes over time. Apteva (talk) 15:22, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
Previous wording

Organisms

See: Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life#Common_name_capitalization, and the naming conventions for fauna, flora and birds
The common names of species generally do not have each word capitalized, unless proper nouns appear. The main exception is common names of birds, which do have the initial letter of each word capitalized (but not after a hyphen). Where more than one capitalization is possible, redirects should be created from the alternative form(s). For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above.
The problem with this is that it makes up rules that do not exist for birds. And for many it is a problem because it allows an exception for birds (while at the same time not recognizing that there are many other exceptions as well, such as Red Delicious). It is my opinion that it is better to not make up spelling rules but recognize that spelling rules exist. Apteva (talk) 15:22, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
Proposal 1

Organisms

See: Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life#Common_name_capitalization, and the naming conventions for fauna, flora and birds
The common names of species generally capitalize the first word, unless proper nouns appear. The main exceptions are common names of birds, some fish, cultivars and breeds, which do have the initial letter of each word capitalized (but usually not after a hyphen). Where more than one capitalization is possible, redirects should be created from the alternative form(s). For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above. Common names other than proper nouns within them are normally not capitalized outside of technical articles within specific disciplines such as ornithology (the species name is "Grizzly bear", but "grizzly bear" is used in text, "Spotted Owl" within ornithology, and "spotted owl" in an article about old-growth forest). Scientific names, on the other hand, always capitalize the genus, as it is a proper noun, and never the species, even if it is a proper noun, as it is an adjective.

Support

Oppose

  • Oppose. No need for special treatment of flora and fauna. The other general English rules of capitalization (such as for wrenches and types of wrenches) work here too. Also, the proposal is also in error about proper nouns. -- JHunterJ (talk) 16:47, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    So how would you fix it? It is not topics on fauna though that are asking for an exception, but birds. Note though that encyclopedias do not name things, they record the names that someone else has created. Apteva (talk) 17:03, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    I would fix it by removing the exception for birds. Also, see the above discussion. Also, it will help if you do not simply ignore the opposes above and re-propose something that is already opposed above but looks like it is fresh here. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:11, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    The reason for proposing a "non-starter" is that it is an attempt to create a correct guideline. I suspect that if you were to propose elimination of an exception for birds it would also be a "non-starter". See the note below about Red Delicious, and the discussion about common names of species being proper nouns. Apteva (talk) 17:33, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
    Right, it would be an attempt to create a correct guideline, and would be a non-starter for the reasons already well presented above. So you'll note I didn't propose it. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:37, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

Proposal 2

Organisms

See: birds
The common names of species generally capitalize only the first word, unless proper nouns appear. The main exceptions are common names of birds, some fish, cultivars and breeds, which do have the initial letter of each word capitalized (but usually not after a hyphen). In text and for Wikipedia common names of species it is common to not use capitalization other than for proper nouns. Where more than one capitalization is possible, redirects should be created from the alternative form(s). Correct capitalization, where it differs, should be restricted to the lead sentence and infoboxes or captions, and ornithological articles. Scientific names, on the other hand, always capitalize the genus, as it is a proper noun, and never the species, even if it is a proper noun, as it is an adjective.

Support

Oppose

  • Oppose. No need for special treatment of flora and fauna. The other general English rules of capitalization (such as for wrenches and types of wrenches) work here too. Also, the proposal is also in error about proper nouns. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:38, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

  • The problem that I see with this is that neither red nor delicious are proper nouns, yet Red Delicious is capitalized in common usage, to distinguish the obvious - many apples are delicious, many apples are red, but Red Delicious refers to a specific cultivar. Apteva (talk) 17:29, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Proposals

Organisms 1

See: Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, and the naming conventions for fauna, flora and birds

Common names of species generally do not have each word capitalized, except were proper nouns appear (maple tree, zebra, but Przewalski's horse). The main exception is common names of birds, which do have the initial letter of each word capitalized (but usually not after a hyphen). Where more than one capitalization is possible, redirects should be created from the alternative form(s). For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above. There is a proposal to use capitalization found in most dictionaries, with re-directs from any other possible capitalization, such as bird names, which generally treat species names as proper nouns.[19] For common names not in a dictionary, use the scientific name, in italics.

Worse than the current text. Current text correctly recognizes that the WP:BIRDS capitalization is not necessarily correct. Proposed text pretends that birds really do have Title Casing. Also, not that species names are not treated as proper nouns. -- JHunterJ (talk) 23:29, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
Bird species common names really do have title casing, but they also have dictionary common names which do not use title casing. A Bald Eagle is a Bald Eagle,[20] but appears in the dictionary as bald eagle. The use of "bald eagle" is currently more common than "Bald Eagle", but there are a couple of times in history when that was reversed.[21] Although that could be references to "the Bald Eagle Party", a political party. Apteva (talk) 01:00, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
A bald eagle is a bald eagle, period. In birding and ornithology jargon (only), it is a Bald Eagle. The Ngram will also not distinguish between words actually in a title, e.g., "My Little Book of Bald Eagles". -- JHunterJ (talk) 01:22, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
That is true, and most of the links are to book titles. I do think it is unfair to ornithologists to tell them what the names of birds are when they have taken the trouble to standardize them. Apteva (talk) 01:51, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Agreed. In ornithological encyclopedias, let's use the ornithological style, and in general-audience encyclopedias (such as Wikipedia), let's use the general style. -- JHunterJ (talk) 01:53, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. See WP:SSF for why, as well as everything else that almost everyone but Apteva's been saying here. There is no consensus whatsoever that there should be a magical "exception" for birds or anything else. Consensus has been against this idea since at least 2008, arguably 2004. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Organisms 2

See: Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, and the naming conventions for fauna, flora and birds

Common names of species generally do not have each word capitalized, except were proper nouns appear (maple tree, zebra, but Przewalski's horse). The main exception is common names of birds, which do have the initial letter of each word capitalized (but usually not after a hyphen). Where more than one capitalization is possible, redirects should be created from the alternative form(s). For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above. There is a proposal that bird names use common names from English dictionaries, not actual species names.[22] For common names not in a dictionary, use the scientific name, in italics, with a redirect from the common name.

Better? Apteva (talk) 00:15, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Current text correctly recognizes that the WP:BIRDS capitalization is not necessarily correct. Proposed text pretends that birds really do have Title Casing. -- JHunterJ (talk) 00:36, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Any way of wording it to say that? As I read it, it says that bird capitalization is not used but WP:Birds proposes capitalizing them. See note above about the difference between actual bird common names and dictionary common names. Apteva (talk) 01:10, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
What's wrong with the current wording? -- JHunterJ (talk) 01:19, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
"A possible exception is common names of birds, for which WP:WikiProject Birds proposes" to me says that if their proposal is accepted an exception will be made for birds. The actual situation is that WP:Birds has always used that convention, and it was codified in the convention for years, and as I read it, but will have to read a couple of megabytes of previous discussion, something I have been trying to avoid, some editors take issue with it and propose ending the practice, but have not been able to get the guideline to say that. The edit summary where the current wording was added is particularly strange "The WP:BIRDS thing is actually still controversial (cf. WT:Manual of Style/Archive 126#cap, etc.))". If it is controversial it means that some people do not like it, not that it is a new proposal. To me the word proposal is synonymous with "new", not "what we have always done". Apteva (talk) 01:48, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
The actual situation is the one that has no consensus outside of the birds project, and should have been fixed per WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, except that,as has been repeatedly pointed out, we opted for the current ceasefire instead. If you are not happy with the ceasefire, we can again pursue bringing the birds articles in line with the general style, but the ceasefire does not become consensus by the passage of time, and I don't want to see it enshrined as such. -- JHunterJ (talk) 19:31, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. See WP:SSF for why, as well as everything else that almost everyone but Apteva's been saying here. There is no consensus whatsoever that there should be a magical "exception" for birds or anything else. Consensus has been against this idea since at least 2008, arguably 2004. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Organisms 3

See: Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, and the naming conventions for fauna, flora and birds

Common names are generally preferred over the scientific name, in italics. Scientific names always capitalize the genus name. When other names, spellings, or capitalization are possible, such as Red Delicious and red delicious, provide redirects. For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above.

I think we were going into way too much detail here. Apteva (talk) 02:21, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
This is a good improvement. I have reservations over putting the redirect for Wikipedia:Naming conventions (birds) (which simply goes to WP:BIRDS) on parity with actual naming conventions. Perhaps "See: Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, the naming conventions for flora & fauna, and (for articles within the Birds project) Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds#Bird names and article titles." -- JHunterJ (talk) 10:26, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
How about "and for birds:" (followed by the link to WP Birds). I thought the idea was to get away from the concept of article ownership by projects. Apteva (talk) 09:45, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
No, not for birds. Birds are fauna. If we want to get rid of article ownership by projects (and I certainly do), we wouldn't link to WP Birds at all and would simply use the fauna naming conventions and would go back and correct all of the bird articles to the general style. -- JHunterJ (talk) 10:34, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. See WP:SSF for why, as well as everything else that almost everyone but Apteva's been saying here. There is no consensus whatsoever that there should be a magical "exception" for birds or anything else, and there is no such naming convention for birds. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Organisms 4

'See: Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms, the naming conventions for flora & fauna; and for birds: Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds#Bird names and article titles.

Common names are generally preferred over the scientific name, in italics. Scientific names always capitalize the genus name. When other names, spellings, or capitalization are possible, such as Red Delicious and red delicious, provide redirects. For details, see the topic-specific pages listed above.

--Apteva (talk) 09:58, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
But birds aren't so capitalized. Only articles within the birds project are so capitalized. Granted, there's a large overlap between those sets, but it is possible to have a topic that is not in the birds project but does happen to have a bird name embedded in its title. -- JHunterJ (talk) 10:35, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
Add "Capitalization of bird names is controversial, and not normally done outside of ornithology ("western chat-tanager" instead of "Western Chat-Tanager")." The example used is pretty arbitrary, I would think. There is a list here that can be referred to in choosing one. Apteva (talk) 20:59, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
Is there anyone who can suggest a better wording than this? It says nothing about capitalizing bird names, and if you wish not capitalizing bird names when they appear in the title of a non-ornithology article can certainly be added to Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds#Bird names and article titles. I would like to propose adopting this and removing the disputed tag. Apteva (talk) 21:43, 29 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. See WP:SSF for why, as well as everything else that almost everyone but Apteva's been saying here. There is no consensus whatsoever that there should be a magical "exception" for birds or anything else, and there is no such naming convention for birds. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Proposal drafted by Hillcrest98 (I give permission to edit this, if I approve of that edit)

All capitalization of animal names should be done on a case-by-case basis. (I find no way to clarify this clearly, please help me do that) Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 23:42, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Sadly, this is likely the only possible resolution. The word "All" is redundant. "is" might be better than "should be done". Apteva (talk) 00:19, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
I don't see any reason to give up the guidelines that we currently have, and I see a detriment in basically throwing in the towel to WP:LOCALCONSENSUS. -- JHunterJ (talk) 00:37, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Please tell me this is a modest proposal. This would completely disregard one of the five pillars of WP:NAMINGCRITERIA. --BDD (talk) 01:47, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
I would like to point out that Consistency says "Titles follow the same pattern as those of similar articles.", which I will emphasize as "Titles follow the same pattern as those of similar articles." It does not say "Consistency: All articles follow the same pattern." Apteva (talk) 02:02, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Sure. But while you're apparently content to have consistency among birds and consistency among other animals, I think consistency among all fauna (or, more likely, all species) has much more to recommend itself. --BDD (talk) 14:39, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
No worries. Can you tell us what you were trying to get at, and maybe we can work on a rephrasing? That policy sounded like "whatever," which I doubt was your intention. --BDD (talk) 14:39, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Nah, I'll let the others do the proposing. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 20:54, 26 September 2012 (UTC)

Convention timeline

Capitalization of animals in article titles
Date Policy
2002 No guidance[23]
4 June 2003 All words of all species capitalized[24]
20 July 2004 Guideline is disputed, both capitalized and non-capitalized (except for proper names) are acceptable[25]
29 September 2009 The main exception is common names of birds[26]
6 January 2012 A possible exception is birds (current wording)[27]

So we went from too much capitalization to total anarchy to not enough capitalization to a thinly veiled proposal of no capitalization. This is way too much wikilawyering. Names are names. Use them. Apteva (talk) 10:01, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

By the way, fish are the same as birds. The names are all caps, and in ichthyology they are all caps, in common literature they are lower case. Apteva (talk) 10:10, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Correction. This was never a "policy". It has always been a "guideline". Apteva (talk) 10:15, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

  • Apteva is blatantly misstating the support for fish capitalization in the real world, in an attempt to make it look like birders have support "out there". It's not true. There is no consensus in the world of ichthyology that fish common names be upper-cased, either. AFS/ASIH decided to capitalize fish common names, but no one else does, and the practice has no legitimate traction in Wikipedia (if its happening, it needs to stop). Many real-world ichthyologists are on record as opposing the practice, and it remains controversial. It's actually a violation of WP:RS and WP:UNDUE to capitalize fish names here. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 18:53, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Does this discussion need to drag on?

We really need the discussion to actually move forward (not meaning "Agree with Apteva"). Apteva is asking the same questions over and over again and we already answered most of them. This is troll-like behaviour and is disruptive. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 12:32, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

An RfC could be appropriate. This discussion hasn't attracted the sort of participation to form anything like consensus. --BDD (talk) 19:50, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
Who would start that? (just questioning) Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 02:55, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 Done it anyway. Hill Crest's WikiLaser! (BOOM!) 19:46, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
I certainly do not mean to ask the same question over and over. What I am asking, is there a factual wording that can be used in this convention? I have proposed about six alternatives - certainly it is possible to agree on some sort of wording? Apteva (talk) 20:19, 20 October 2012 (UTC)
But don't you mean to do exactly that, in as many forums as you can think of to raise the issue? That seems to be the evidence presented by your behavior. Your fruitless filing of frivolous actions against people who disagree with you at WP:ANI and WP:ARE has WP:BOOMERANGed. This discussion in particular strongly suggests you've been behaving in a disruptive, wikilawyering, sockpuppeteering, trolling manner, using multiple accounts to push your WP:SOAPBOX positions and make as much noise as possible while doing very little that has anything to do with building an encyclopedia. Note that I was not a party to that discussion. Multiple editors are observing this pattern. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 22:30, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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