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Manual of Style

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MOS:NICKNAME

MOS:NICKNAME is not currently clear about middle names. In the UK, almost every person only goes by their first and last names, with middle names only really used in legal contexts. Some people, however, decide to use a middle name and their last name as their known name. This is then further complicated if the are known by a hypocorisms of a middle name. For example, the British general John Nicholas Reynolds Houghton is known as Nick Houghton rather than John Houghton. Its not just the UK, with William Bradley Pitt being known as Brad Pitt rather than William/Will/Bill Pitt: the opening sentence did once read William Bradley "Brad" Pitt.

I have noticed in recent weeks that there has been a huge increase in editors removing "nickname" from the article openings while citing MOS:NICKNAME. While Jonathan Reginald Smith being known as John Smith is obvious and traditional, being known as Reggie Smith isn't. Articles don't have a word count limit, so I don't see why (barring the most obvious nicknames) slightly more obscure/non-standard are being removed. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 16:09, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't see anything in MOS:NICKNAME that says "Nick Houghton" and "Brad Pitt" should not appear in the first sentence of their respective articles. I suppose you could argue over whether it should say "William Bradley 'Brad' Pitt" or "William Bradley Pitt, better known as Brad Pitt." But it seems to me MOS:NICKNAME actually requires the nickname in the first sentence. Kendall-K1 (talk) 16:53, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Should definitely be toward the start of the lead. There's nothing wrong with using two sentences if that works better, e.g.: "Alice Beeson Ceesdale (various parenthetical bits here) is n American painter, actress, musician, and local politician. As an actress, she is usually credited as A. B. Ceesdale; in her band, The Snorkel Weasels, she performs as Lady ABC." So, use common sense. In most cases, it can be done one way or the other in the lead sentence without difficulty to the reader. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 21:42, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Agreed, but in the case of "Brad Pitt", those exact words do not appear anywhere in the lead. That seems wrong to me. Kendall-K1 (talk) 21:57, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for your input. The issue is that people have been removing the examples above citing MOS:NICKNAME. The second to last sentence states: "If a person has a well-known common hypocorism used in lieu of a given name, it is not presented between quote marks following the last given name or initial, as for Tom Hopper which has just Thomas Edward Hopper". This sentence is being used to remove any nickname that is vaguely obvious. So Lady ABC would be okay but someone would come along and delete A. B. Ceesdale. I have noticed in recent years there has been an increase in people following the "Law of Misplaced Pages" to the letter rather than using common sense. Perhaps this MOS needs a writes? Gaia Octavia Agrippa 15:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

It also says "provide a short explanation if a person uses a non-standard contraction of their name". You might argue that "Bill Pitt" would be a standard contraction but "Brad Pitt" is not. Using MOS:NICKNAME to justify removing "Brad Pitt" from Brad Pitt's lead just seems wrong. Kendall-K1 (talk) 16:08, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I completely agree, Gaia Octavia Agrippa 17:46, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Re: "someone would come along and delete 'A. B. Ceesdale'" – except that's an abbreviation not a hypocorism, so there's no basis to delete it. It can actually be quite important to retain things like this, especially for people best known in a particular context by a particular short name but sometimes also known by the long one. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 23:25, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Just as readers can be trusted to understand that "Reggie" is short for "Reginald", they can be trusted to understand that some people go by their middle name. We often overload our opening sentences, which be the most accessible sentence in an article. Stopping to explain that "Brad Pitt" (appearing in large font as the title of the article) and "William Bradley Pitt" (appearing in bold at the beginning of the first sentence) are in fact the same person does more to harm readability than to aid it. Where there are unusual nicknames, those are best explained explicitly by providing context, as in SMcCandlish's examples above.--Trystan (talk) 21:41, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

There is an actual problem here (beyond middle names in particular). To continue with the Brad Pitt example, the world knows him entirely as Brad Pitt, and that's the article title and his name in the infobox, so it's not at first clear that there's any value to adding Brad Pitt in bold in the lead sentence or immediately after it. The best argument for doing so is probably WP:REUSE: people may re-use the article text by itself, without the title and without the infobox, so the article (and especially its lead) should make sense in a stand-alone manner. Presently the Brad Pitt article fails in this regard. We should probably revisit this section the MOS:BIO rules, since the end result is not desirable, and it is pretty much always ignored, except in the rare instance we get an "enforcer" at an article like Brad Pitt who is more interested in forcing compliance with a particular rule interpretation than with WP:COMMONSENSE and with serving the readership's interests. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 23:25, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

MOS:NICKNAME says "If a person is known by a nickname used in lieu of a given name ..." Isn't a middle name part of a given name? If not, maybe use the less ambiguous first name instead?—Bagumba (talk) 00:57, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Given name includes first and middle name(s). "First name" is not synonymous with "given name". And none of these are nicknames. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 01:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

So as the MOS is currently written, we should generally not write "William Bradley 'Brad' Pitt", as "Brad" is a common nickname of one of the given names.—Bagumba (talk) 01:27, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Yet either that or "William Bradley Pitt, better known as Brad Pitt" is the editorial preference across our bio articles, site-wide and by a large margin. So, the operational consensus and what the guideline says have gotten out of sync. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 01:44, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I think the best way to deal with a nickname is First name Middle name "nickname" Family name, so "William Bradley "Brad" Pitt" - It goes after the middle name regardless of whether the nickname is derived from the given name or the middle name. BTW, Bagumba, I think the nikname should be included, as people from non-western cultures may not understand how Western nicknames work. Chinese people, for example, may not realize "Bobby" would be legally known as "Robert". WhisperToMe (talk)

This doesn't seem to pertain to the discussion, which is about people removing nicknames, hypocorisms, and initials completely. Anyway, not everyone agrees with your preference here; many of us prefer the short form to come after the name part it is a shortening of, but nicknames per se immediately before the surname, and to use parentheses for things that are not nicknames, and to have aliases completely separate: William Bradley (Brad) Pitt, William (Bill) Jefferson Clinton, Earvin "Magic" Johnson, Dutch Schultz (born Arthur Simon Flegenheimer) or Arthur Simon Flegenheimer, better known as Dutch Schultz. It's fine to separate any such case, e.g. William Jefferson Clinton, better known as Bill Clinton, etc., if that works better in the context. Numerous cases have been forced into William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton format, which is wrongheaded for multiple reasons, and does a disservice to readers, especially non-native English speakers (for whom "Bill" is not obviously a hypocorism of "William"). — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 16:51, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

'Brad' is not a nickname - it is a shortening of one of his given names, Bradley. It should not appear as 'William Bradley "Brad" Pitt' per WP:ALTNAMES. Instead the wording for these kind of situations should be 'William Bradley Pitt, known as Brad Pitt', is an American actor...' Giant Snowman 09:38, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

Oh, I strongly agree. I've been arguing for years that we should not be putting hypocorisms in quotation marks, but I keep seeing it in article after article, we have no rule saying not to do it, and when I've tried to fix the guideline to say not to do it, I get reverted on it. If you want to RfC this, be my guest, and I'll support. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 09:08, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Brad is a nickname: as per the wiki article on nicknames, "A nickname can be a shortened or modified variation on a person's real name", and there's a whole section on the different types. Including the nickname within parenthesis "William Bradley (Brad) Pitt" is wrong. The parenthesis section of WP:QUOTENAME refers to other names such as maiden names or foreign names that would appear in the parentheses eg "Prince Henry of Wales (Henry Charles Albert David; born 1984), known as Prince Harry". Parenthesis are sometimes used to show names that aren't used, eg "(John) Harold Francis" if he was only known as Harold Francis. So if you tried to introduce nicknames in parentheses that would be confusing. Using "William Bradley "Brad" Pitt" is a lot shorter than "William Bradley Pitt (born 1963), known as Brad Pitt". The latter way makes sense if it needs explaining, eg "William Bradley Pitt, known professionally as Brad Pitt", but could other make the opening sentence needlessly long.

The MOS states: "If a person is commonly known by a nickname that is not a common hypocorism (diminutive) of their name, used in lieu of a given name, it is presented between quote marks following the last given name or initial" and "Also acceptable are formulations like "Alessandro di Mariano di Vanni Filipepi, known as Sandro Botticelli", when applicable." The latter is best used for complicated case but the MOS doesn't say that hypocorisms can't be included; just not a common hypocorism (this is where my argument stemmed from). Editors have been removing the likes of "William Bradley "Brad" Pitt" and "William Bradley Pitt, known as Brad Pitt" citing MOS:NICKNAME. I'm arguing that a hypocorism from a middle name isn't common and that uncommon hypocorisms should be included in quote marks. For the latter Kit Harringotn is a good example: being nicknames "Chris" is is obvious/common, "Kit" (though derived from Christopher) isn't. The Hypocorism article has a long list of English Hypocorisms. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 21:54, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Nah. Hypocorisms from middle names are extremely common. Not being the most common doesn't make them uncommon. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 12:52, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

More nickname ambiguity

I did not specifically see our MoS discourage or prohibit article titles like Jack "Basher" Williams and Frank "Buck" O'Neill though I think it should be decided. I believe it poor form, am I wrong?--John Cline (talk) 09:11, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

If they are known as Basher Williams and Buck O'Neill, then per WP:COMMONNAME the articles should be located there. See for example William "Dixie" Dean. We should not have both given name and nickname in the title. Giant Snowman 09:36, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

Generally true, but there are rare exceptions (a handful of people are actually know by names of the form Foo "Bar" Baz, quotation marks and all. I forget the examples, but they're real (I have no idea if Jack "Basher" Williams and "Frank "Buck" O'Neill"; haven't looked over their details and the sources for them). That said, article titles aren't an MoS matter, but a WP:AT one. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 09:08, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Thank you. I will ask at WP:AT in the near term, but I don't think our MoS should take a free-ride on this matter; either.

Just as the way we use dashes, ampersands, and the suffix of a person's name, (as MoS prescribed), is reflected in how articles are titled, our MoS conventions that become, when appropriate, a name with an included nickname inside quotation marks, are potentially influencing increasing examples of biographical article titles in that form; as well.

What poor stewards would we be, (if it were so), choosing silence over mitigation by voice; in bureaucratic tribute alone? I prefer doing no such!--John Cline (talk) 18:18, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

@John Cline: There is Ed "Too Tall" Jones, who was hardly ever called just plain "Ed Jones".—Bagumba (talk) 09:04, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

If people are known as 'John "Nickname" Smith" then the article should be located there - but I don't think that applies to Basher/Buck above. Giant Snowman 09:19, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

If it wasn't already their WP:COMMONNAME (no opinion), I'm going to guess it was used for WP:NATURALDIS of Jack Williams and Frank O'Neill, respectively.—Bagumba (talk) 10:10, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Ah, yes, Ed "Too Tall" Jones was the case I was thinking of. He wasn't regularly called just "Too Tall" Jones either, except in particular insider contexts. He really was called Ed "Too Tall" Jones. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 16:59, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Recent change to the guideline

SMcCandlish, regarding this edit, my concern is the following: "Common nicknames, aliases, and variants are usually given in boldface in the lead, especially if they redirect to the article, or are found on a disambiguation page or hatnote and link from there to the article."

Yes, we include J.Lo in the lead of the Jennifer Lopez article, but that is because she has adopted that nickname and has used it on her albums and/or brands. But what about cases like J.Law for Jennifer Lawrence, K-Stew for Kristen Stewart, or ScarJo for Scarlett Johansson? Lawrence is commonly called "J.Law," Stewart is commonly called "K-Stew," and Johansson is commonly called "ScarJo," but we don't include those nicknames in the leads of their Misplaced Pages articles. Johansson dislikes her nickname, and we mention this in her Public image section. I think that the new addition to the guideline needs tweaking because it might lead some editors (especially newbies) to think that a nickname should be included in the lead simply because it's commonly used. And what if the nickname is derogatory? Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 19:35, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

I see that the derogatory aspect is currently handled by the "and may also be against the neutrality policy if the phrase is laudatory or critical" piece. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 19:45, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

I'd actually been thinking of sportspeople when working on that NPoV material, but it should also apply here. I think a key thing is that reliable sources don't usually treat "ScarJo", etc., as alternative names for these people; it's a tabloid and fandom writing practice. Should probably be in the article somewhere (as sourceably existing) but probably isn't lead or infobox material. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 02:50, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

SMcCandlish, I'm stating that we need something in the guideline about this (when not to include these nicknames in the lead even when they are common), given your recent addition to the guideline. You know, other than the "laudatory or critical" aspect. I and many other Wikipedians have seen editors, especially newbies, add celebrity nicknames to the lead of celebrity Misplaced Pages articles. And these celebrities usually are not sportspeople. You stated, "I think a key thing is that reliable sources don't usually treat 'ScarJo', etc., as alternative names for these people; it's a tabloid and fandom writing practice." But I and another editor (FrB.TG) demonstrated in the recent FAC for the Scarlett Johansson article that it's not just the tabloids that refer to her as ScarJo. We very likely would not even note the ScarJo nickname in Johansson's article if it were not for the fact that Johansson has spoken out against the nickname more than once. She wants the media and fans to stop calling her that.

The guideline, as written, does not restrict itself to sportspeople. And even in the case of O. J. Simpson, I don't see that the nickname "The Juice" needs to be there in the lead. If it's a case like "The Rock" for Dwayne Johnson, then, yeah, since that is his ring name and he is still better known by that name. Editors have also debated if "The Rock" should redirect to Johnson's article. But in cases like "J.Law," "K-Stew," etc., we don't want editors adding the nicknames to the lead. And there's currently nothing in the guideline discouraging such use. SNUGGUMS is one of our more prolific celebrity biography writers; so I'm pinging SNUGGUMS for thoughts on adding nicknames to the lead (celebrity or otherwise). Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 23:18, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

I'd say nicknames should be included when it is something the subject commonly goes by (at least when first introducing full name in opening sentence). For example, Thomas Jacob "Jack" Black is something I'd recommend using for Jack Black. On the other hand, things that the press uses that the subject is commonly known by but doesn't seem to have actually used themselves (i.e. FDR for Franklin D. Roosevelt) would be better having a "commonly referred to as" or "often called" (thus "Franklin Delano Roosevelt, commonly referred to as FDR" is what I'd go with) so long as it's not degrading or something they've denounced. Derogatory things like "Slick Willie" for Bill Clinton or "Tricky Dick" for Richard Nixon should be left out of the lead entirely as Misplaced Pages isn't supposed to be a place for demeaning article subjects regardless of our personal opinions on the people. "ScarJo" for Scarlett Johannson is definitely something I wouldn't add when she has never gone by it at any point, she's publicly denounced its use, and its usage isn't so prominent compared to things like "The Rock" for Dwayne Johnson or "RFK" for Robert F. Kennedy. Snuggums (talk / edits) 23:53, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

SNUGGUMS, thanks for weighing in. This will be my last time pinging you to this section since I assume you will check back here for replies...unless you prefer that I ping you here for replies. As you can see, a lot of changes are currently being discussed on this talk page, and I assume you will be interested in some of these discussions since you often work on biography articles. Are you okay with what SMcCandlish's wording in the guideline currently states about nicknames? My issue is that other than the "laudatory or critical" part, the guideline doesn't make it clear when frequently used nicknames should not be used. I know that you object to any mention of "ScarJo" in Johansson's article (I remember reverting you on that removal), but FrB.TG and I feel that its inclusion is important because not only is it a part of the "in the media" aspect of her life, Johansson has addressed it more than once and it's clearly something she wants the public to know she doesn't approve of. I've known people to state that they will no longer call her by that nickname because they now know she doesn't approve of it. If the name was meant in a derogatory way, I wouldn't support including it at all. I obviously agree that it shouldn't be in the lead, though. When it comes to "J.Law" for Jennifer Lawrence, "K-Stew" for Kristen Stewart, and others who have not addressed their nicknames or disapproved of them, I don't think we should mention those at all. Also, does "The Juice" in O. J. Simpson's article count as laudatory? I mean, after all, it came about as a way to praise him. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:35, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Agreed with SNUGGUMS, and I'd tried to give that implication with mention of NPoV at the end of the section, but it might not really be clear enough. IIRC, it's attached to something about not using one-off descriptions by journalists as if they're nicknames, and the PoV concern goes a bit further. An example that comes to mind is Steve "Interesting" Davis, a pejorative nickname (based on his expressionless tournament demeanor) that we might have avoided except in attributed quotations and not in the lead, but which Davis himself has "pwned" and used in two book titles (and he's become an electronica DJ and had a film made about that, and generally has become quite interesting and gets the last laugh). It started as something like "Slick Willy" or "Tricky Dick" and has become something like "Magic Johnson" and "Dr. Phil" – something the subject uses professionally. O. J. Simpson seems to be the same deal as Oran "Juice" Jones; it's just an orange juice pun in both cases.

The problem with things like "J.Law" and "K-Stew" is pretty much no sources use them except low-end entertainment press; while secondary sourcesin some cases, they are poor-quality ones (and much of their material is actually primary – first-hand reportage of gossip and so-and-so-was-see-with-you-know-who-at-some-place, which is eyewitness testimony on the part of the paparazzi). It's different from JLo, which has actually been used by the subject and is more common. I had no idea about K-Fed, but a quick Googling so far shows somewhat broader usage, just as with JLo: Newsweek, CBS News, United Press International|UPI]], etc., plus of course all the dreck publications). "ScarJo" is virtually all tabloids, pop-culture magazines, and blogs. Same with "J.Law" and "K-Stew": Local papers' gossip and reviews sections (primary), fashion and celeb rags, and entertainment pabulum like E! and Rolling Stone and Access Hollywood (mostly also primary material). There are a few spotty exceptions, but the vast bulk of the usage (like 95%+) is in junk sources.

Also, it looks to me like Flyer22 Reborn is arguing for retaining ScarJo in the article at all, while SNUGGUMS is concerned about its presence in the lead; they're different concerns. Of course it can be in the article somewhere, since the controversy about the appellation and her loathing of it is well-sourced; we'd be remiss to omit it. But it doesn't belong in the lead, since it would be WP explicitly equating the term with her as an alternative name, yet (to quote Flyer) "She wants the media and fans to stop calling her that." WP continuing to do so just because we think we can get away with it on a sourcing technicality would be a WP:BLP and WP:ABOUTSELF and WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE and WP:UNDUE policy problem. Putting it in bold in the lead, and having it mentioned somewhere lower in the article are not comparable in this regard.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 09:12, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

See here and here. SNUGGUMS did not want the "ScarJo" aspect lower in the article. It being in the lead was never the issue, and I was clear above that I agree that it should not be in the lead. As for use of "ScarJo," respectable news or entertainment media (such as CBS News) have either acknowledged that she is called that and/or they have called her that. Sources like Rolling Stone are high-quality as far as entertainment media goes, and it is mainly entertainment media that covers celebrities. Try looking for scholarly book sources on celebrities, and you will mostly find unauthorized biographies, tell-all books, and other lower quality books. That stated, in the FAC for her Misplaced Pages article, I did point to this quality 2015 "The Oxford Handbook of the Word" source, from OUP Oxford, page 1019, which states, "A small set of public celebrity nicknames combine a forename initial with a truncation of the surname Forms that combine forename and surname truncations, such as Cujo for Curtis Joseph or ScarJo for Scarlett Johansson, are also found." Because Johansson is commonly called "ScarJo," which is why she has even spoken out on the matter, and reliable sources have covered it, it is WP:Due and WP:BLP-compliant to mention this is in her Public image section. And, again, I have no issue with the nickname aspect being there. Not seeing how WP:ABOUTSELF applies in this case. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 11:19, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Ah, well, I can't make SNUGGUMS's argument, only mine. I wasn't aware of the attempt to keep it out of the article at all. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 11:26, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Not sure what to say about using "The Juice", but regarding SMcCandlish's changes, they seem fine as I agree that we should note well-known nicknames while obscure referrals aren't lead-worthy nearly as often (if at all). This and my above comments are all I really have to say on the matter. Snuggums (talk / edits) 00:45, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Re: "we need something in the guideline about this" – But the more things we add to the guideline the more people complain of micro-management of matters that could/should be left to editorial discretion and consensus on an article-by-article basis. Surely what we should provide is general suggestions like don't clog the lead sentence with alternative name after alternative name, and do leave out those that aren't regularly used by (not just admitted to exist in) reliable sources for the subject in question.

"The guideline, as written, does not restrict itself to sportspeople." Well sure; it wasn't meant to. I just meant that constant squabbling about alleged "nicknames" of sportspeople is what came to mind for me with regard to that line about NOR and NPOV; I concede that the focus is too narrow, though the sportwriter example was explicitly intended to just be an example. I'll try to address that by de-coupling the sentences; the policy concerns are not just about falsely calling things nicknames.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 09:12, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

I definitely agree that the lead should not be clogged with alternative name after alternative name. WP:Alternative name is also in agreement on that. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 11:19, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

I think this will resolve the recently raised issue above. Pinging: {{U|Flyer22 Reborn|SNUGGUMS]]. Oh, and FrB.TG, previously pinged though not commenting yet. I used Nixon as an example, being an FA, but it also addresses the Johansson case. I also tied it more clearly to the core policy reasons. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 09:29, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

This and this are good additions. Thanks. I think we might still get someone wanting to add "J.Law" and "K-Stew" to the leads of their respective Misplaced Pages articles, but your "disputed appellations" piece takes care of cases like "ScarJo," and I'm sure that our significantly experienced editors will know to keep stuff like "J.Law" and "K-Stew" out of the lead (well, some will know better anyway). Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 11:19, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

This is my fervent hope! — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 11:26, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Hypocorism of COMMONNAME

Related to MOS:NICKNAME, if a hypocorism is not a person's WP:COMMONNAME, but is nonetheless often used to refer to that person, should it be listed in the lead? The issue has come up at Talk:Stephen_Curry#Steph, where Stephen Curry's full name is "Wardell Stephen Curry II", and he is generally known as "Stephen", but references to him are often shortened to plain "Steph" (just not enough to be COMMONNAME). "Steph" is not currently mentioned in the lead. An existing example is Donald Rumsfeld, who is sometimes referred to as "Don", and the lead has Donald Henry "Don" Rumsfeld—Bagumba (talk) 09:15, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

What has occurred to me is to look through other articles:

"Honest Abe" Lincoln: explained once in the body with context
Eugene Victor "Gene" Debs: used just at the start of the article
"Jed" or "Jerry" Colbath: explained in body
Sam Brannan: not mentioned, although some of the sources use Sam

There doesn't seem to be a standard about people's second-most-common name... Perhaps they should just be mentioned in prose? --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 14:18, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Seems reasonable on a case-by-case basis. Especially here, since Steph is really rare in English as a male short name for Stephen (it's mostly often feminine for Stephanie). Users might be confused if they came looking for Steph they'd heard of and though was female and arrived at that article. Using "Don" in the other article is kind of iffy, since he's not commonly (just quite uncommonly) referred to that way. And the hypocorisms should be in parens not quotation marks; it's not a made-up nickname or alias. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 16:59, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Would you suggest this?: Wardell Stephen (Steph) Curry II Or is there something else? --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 17:04, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

I think it needs to be, for an article about Jonathan Smith, 'Jonathan James Smith, also known as John Smith' or something. 'Don' and 'Steph' are nicknames and do not merit being in the opening name per WP:ALTNAMES, but are widespread enough to justify mentioning in the lede. Giant Snowman 17:17, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Not sure I follow you. John isn't short for Jonathan; Jon is. If that's what you meant, then that would work. Some might prefer "'Jonathan (Jon) James Smith" or "'Jonathan James (Jon) Smith", but that works much better when there's just one given name and a surname presented (we don't want to imply he's known sometimes as "Jon James Smith", unless its' really true. What we really don't want to see is "Jon" in quotation marks, because it's not a nickname or alias. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 19:03, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Yes, but with boldface markup and spaces fixed so the bolding is around the names parts, without spaces in them. It's also fine to do an "also known as" thing, though that is less concise. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 19:03, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

@GiantSnowman: One issue with your edit to change to "Wardell Stephen Curry II (born March 14, 1988), also known as Steph Curry" is that it might leave readers with the impression that "Steph Curry" is more common than the page's title of "Stephen Curry". Already from the MOS:NICKNAME thread above, there was suggestions that people whose middle name is their common name should have a format like "Wardell Stephen Curry II (born March 14, 1988), better known as Stephen Curry". Combined with your suggestion, we'd end up with "Wardell Stephen Curry II (born March 14, 1988), better known as Stephen Curry and also known as Steph Curry.—Bagumba (talk) 17:37, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

But that acurate;y reflects the position for that person? Giant Snowman 18:16, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Per WP:ALTNAME, the length borders on " to balance the desire to maximize the information available to the reader with the need to maintain readability." So is the point of adding "Steph" because someone that entered "Stephen Curry" must know that "Steph" is sometimes (but not commonly) used, or is it that someone entering "Steph Curry" would be terribly shocked that they ended up at an article named "Stephen Curry"? I'd argue both cases are not that big of a concern.—Bagumba (talk) 18:40, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

One large reason for the inclusion of Steph is that there are quotations later in the article that use it. It also makes the page more useful as a reference (the current wording isn't ideal). Something like this could be done: --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 18:49, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Sure, but people are generally not going to scratch their heads when they see "Steph" in a quote in an article titled "Stephen". Otherwise, the WP copycats will start cluttering the lead with trivial things like "Timmy" to Tim Lincecum (just because there is a quote with the diminutive form), or the ever-present (and obvious) 1st-initial-with-1st-syllable-of-last-name nickname (e.g. "D-Fish" for Derek Fisher).—Bagumba (talk) 19:10, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

I was thinking this is more like the page Iron Man. It currently says Anthony Edward "Tony" Stark, which is redundant, and though he is much more often referred to as just Tony Stark, the full name is included in the lead. --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 16:54, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

PS whatever is decided, it should never be brackets...! Giant Snowman 17:20, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: Your concern about "Steph" being a rare male name can alternatively be addressed by showing in the first sentence that "Stephen" is pronounced as STEF-en (and not like "Steven").—Bagumba (talk) 18:01, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Except no one reads those pronunciation things unless they've encountered something mystifying to them. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 18:22, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

True, but entering "Steph" and seeing "Stephen" isn't incredibly shocking either.—Bagumba (talk) 18:40, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the point is of responding to my case outlining why it can be confusing to just assert "no it can't". That's not a rebuttal, it's just contrariness. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 19:05, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Note

^ He is most commonly referred to as Stephen Curry (STEF-en), and less frequently, Steph (STEF).

I don't see the problem with "Wardell Stephen Curry II (born March 14, 1988), commonly known as Stephen Curry and sometimes as Steph Curry". It's clear and unambiguous. We need to get away from inserting hypocorisms and nicknames in the middle of the name; that's certainly not clear. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:44, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

Agreed. Giant Snowman 14:20, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

Works for me, too, though I think "certainly not clear" is a stretch. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 17:44, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

It's not clear because it's never obvious how common the nickname is. For instance, we used to have 'John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy'. That implies he is commonly known as Jack Kennedy, whereas in fact, of course, he is commonly known to the world as John F. Kennedy or JFK and was generally only known as Jack to his friends and family. And there are a lot like this. These things need to be spelled out. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:56, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, I'll buy that. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 14:16, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

I've done this edit, which also moves the pronunciation. Improvement, I hope? --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 21:39, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

Criteria for "common" hypocorisms

Who determines whether a hypocorism is sufficiently "common" to be removed from an opening sentence? For example, at Dolly Collins, born Dorothy Ann Collins, an editor has removed "Dolly" from the initial mention of the name on the basis of MOS:NICKNAME. And yet "Dolly" is not listed as a hypocorism for Dorothy at our article - Dotty is. Are these issues to be determined on a case-by-case basis, or does there need to be a list of "common hypocorisms"? Ghmyrtle (talk) 22:02, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

Clearly Dolly isn't a common hypocorism, definitely add it back. There really needs to be common sense used with MOS:NICKNAME, its getting pretty ridiculous. Perhaps "common" needs to be changed to "obvious" in the MOS. As someone has mentioned before, the English Misplaced Pages is not just British/American English, it includes Indian English, Caribbean English etc. Even if Dorothy Ann Collins was known as Dotty, it wouldn't be clear to some readers where that has come from. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 22:51, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

The problems come when different editors have very different interpretations of what is "common sense", or "obvious". A list of common hypocorisms - or a link to the list at the hypocorism article - might help maintain consistency. Ghmyrtle (talk) 07:39, 22 November 2017 (UTC)

Most of our policy and guideline material is written this way; it's just the nature of the beast. Cf. parallel discussions at WT:Misplaced Pages is not a dictionary about neologisms and whether something qualifies as one, and many similar discussions. Our WP:P&G aren't a legal code, but generalized rules of thumb we collectively interpret via application of WP:Common sense and consensus building. (Where a policy approaches legal rigidity, it's generally because there is in fact a legal issue at stake, as with WP:COPYRIGHT and WP:BLP and WP:THREAT; most of that policy material was imposed on the community, at least in its core elements, by WP:OFFICE.)

As with any "style" (broadly defined) matter not enumerated in detail (as some things are, usually for technical reasons), it's up to editorial consensus at a particular article whether a hypocorism is common/obvious enough to need or not need mention. This is largely avoided by just including a "better known as" line. If someone named Christopher or Christine is not actually better known as Chris, then we have little reason to ever mention that hypocorism in our article. Edward James Olmos is a great example; if you watch interviews and listen to DVD commentaries, you'll find he's regularly referred to as "Ed" or "Eddie" by people who personally know and work with him, but reliable sources about him do not do this, so WP has no reason to ever mention either hypocorism is relation to him as a subject here, at his own article or elsewhere.

Anyway, Dolly and Dottie (along various spelling variants) as hypocorisms of Dorothy are not "common" or "obvious" enough (especially given the lack of popularity of any of these names since ca. the mid-20th century) to do without something like "Dorothy Ann Collins ... better known as Dolly Collins" or "Dorothy Ann (Dolly) Collins". We need to avoid making regional or generational assumptions about typical reader understanding. As just one example, the female given name Gemma is extremely common in the UK and fairly common in some other parts of the Commonwealth, but only rarely unencountered in the US; the average American probably assumes it's a hypocorism of Jemima (Jemma is probably better attested in US English than Gemma), Gemini, Angelica, or some other name. And not everyone called Dolly is named Dorothy; some people pick up nicknames for other reasons than hypocorism.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 20:05, 22 November 2017 (UTC)

Merge bio material from MOS:LEAD to MOS:BIO

At Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Lead section#Usage in first sentence, there's a detailed footnote on common hypocorisms. There's also other bio material, including a summary at Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Lead section#Biographies of living persons. This material should merge to Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Biographies#Opening paragraph, and just leave behind pointers from MOS:LEAD to MOS:BIO in the first instance and WP:BLP is a second. Biography is a topic, and we have have an entire MoS page about that topic; MOS:LEAD is not about a topic, but about a generalized approach to all articles, so it should avoid "hoarding" information on a topic about which we have a dedicated MoS page. As with ongoing cleanup to consolidate all the MoS material about titles of works/compositions, such merging is important because a) having it scattered around makes it very difficult to find all the details, and b) it also lends itself to WP:POLICYFORKing, resulting in different pages with inconsistent rules and and recommendations. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 08:38, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

I'm fine with merging in this case as long as the WP:LEAD page still has decent-sized content on the matter while pointing to MOS:BIO for further detail. You know, in a WP:Summary style way. WP:Lead concerns biographies as well. Editors wanting to know how to format a lead for a biography article might click on either WP:LEAD or MOS:BIO. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 20:45, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Yep, that is the plan. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 02:59, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

Dummy?

SMcCandlish inter alia: do we have any links to good biographical articles of short, medium and longer content, examplifying more or less the essential contents of the manual of style and WP:CONSISTENCY? Chicbyaccident (talk) 14:47, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

Not that I know of. Recent WP:FAs and maybe WP:GAs are more likely than average to be completely compliant. William A. Spinks is likely to be, because I wrote almost all of it and few others edit it, but it could use a once-over; even I haven't done much with it in a long time. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 19:14, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for an example. However, for one thing, I have the impression that the section "Private life" most often emerges as content within "Early life, and background", presented most often as the first section? Well, I hope this serves to explain what I am looking for in a dummy. What about Jimmy Wales or Tim Berners-Lee?Chicbyaccident (talk) 19:41, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

Oh, didn't know you were asking about sectional layout stuff. Yes, I think that article could have that material split into "Early life" and "Later life and death" sections, though having all the private-life stuff in one section is hardly unheard of (many stubs begin with it that way), and it was more common when I first wrote the article. Anyway, dunno how compliant the other two articles you mention are, when it comes to MoS basics. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 13:37, 26 November 2017 (UTC)

Would it be convenient pushing a little bit more encouragement for WP:Consistency in sectional layout stuff where applicable, perhaps by referring to these mentioned articles? Chicbyaccident (talk) 19:24, 26 November 2017 (UTC)

WP:Consistency is an internal disambiguation page; I'm not sure which one you mean (WP:CONSISTENCY is a titles policy, not part of MoS). MOS:LAYOUT wants consistency in the order of "stock", non-content sections like "See also" and "References" and "External links", but beyond that, it's generally been left to editorial discretion at the article and to wikiproject essays on suggested default layouts for articles on particular topics. I think we'd get a lot of flak if we started trying to specify what bio sections had to be present, in what order, and/or with what names, since it would have a strong effect on the actual content, and might suppress a more effective presentation in one subject's case just to follow a prescribed template (in the general-English sense of that word) that resulted in front-loading the article with comparatively trivial details and burying the lead, as it were. A bio like Mark Twain is a detailed whole-life story, while one on a typical academic or local politician may completely focus on their career with little private-life material. Some bios are more chronological (usually), while less commonly they may be more topically focused, especially if the person's notable for something short-term, like a controversy, a crime, etc. Some editors are even upset about the idea of the lead sentence being pre-determined details in a particular order, so normalizing the sectional structure is surely off the table. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 17:19, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

Makes sense. Chicbyaccident (talk) 12:26, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Substantive revision of "Birth date and place"

I've worked on MOS:BIO#Birth date and place (before and ) to centralize the basics on this, because editors expect to find this information here, not scattered around randomly. The gist:

Describe actual practice.
Make it agree with, and cross-reference, the brief mentions of some of this stuff at MOS:DATE
Also make it consistent with MOS:ABBR.
Provide good examples.
Discourage willy-nilly inclusion of birth/death details when not needed.
Indicate that using "b." and "d." in leads is deprecated (this was only found in MOS:DATE until now)
Distinguish lead-sentence use from other cases (without dwelling on the latter, since this is a subsection of the "Opening paragraph" section).

— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 01:04, 27 November 2017 (UTC); "after" diff update, to reflect some revisions. 03:26, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

How long has it been definitively required (as the version you wrote states) that full dates should be included in the lead, when known? I would greatly prefer allowing as an alternative (but not requiring) that the lead include only the years of birth (the important part) if the dates are described more fully in the body of the article. I think that allowing a years-only style could be very helpful in decluttering our (long, filled with extraneous parenthetical details that only add noise to the start and make it difficult to remember how it even started and what it was about) lead sentences. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:30, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Agree (in general more efforts would be welcome to make the above said need) that specific dates are one thing that seems a bit superflouous in the first paragraph. Chicbyaccident (talk) 02:43, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

It doesn't actually say that, but the opposite; it retains the wording that full dates are better in the body not the lead. Will replace an example, to show this style, though frankly it is not dominant. I just looked at ~~20+~~ 80+ WP:FA bios and 100% had full dates in the lead sentence. I, too, would like to see a reduction of this (it seems mostly just appropriate for stubs), but I'm not comfortable writing a rule into MOS effectively mandating "(1943–2001)" dates it the lead sentence, when it's not well-supported in actual practice (i.e., does not appear to represent consensus yet). See also the "we don't want to be micrmanaged" bit in the RfC mentioned below; I've tried to work this in terms of "usually", etc. PS: I think this should clarify. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 03:19, 27 November 2017 (UTC); revised: 03:30, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Just a note that we recently had an RfC about parenthetical information in the lead; see Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Lead section/Archive 19#Request for comment on parenthetical information in first sentence. I don't think wording here should contradict the consensus found there. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 02:53, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Right. Will review and ensure it does not, if you don't beat me to it. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 03:03, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Update: I've gone over it again, and the four bullet points of consensus in it are not implicated in the revision I've done, other than a couple of them are actually reinforced. The "big change" ones, like limiting the number of non-English names and discouraging unnecessary pronunciation information in the lead, are additional points we could work in. I would think they should be worked into MOS:LEAD first in general terms (and one of them appears to need a follow-on RfC), then a summary, specifically as it pertains to bios, should be added here with a pointer back to the more general set of "rules" at MOS:LEAD. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 03:23, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Open question: Should we use full birth/death dates in the lead?

I'm very busy at the moment, but I've swung by to say that full dates of birth/death are the standard in the opening sentence and this should be made clear in the MOS. There are only really three cases where YOB/YOD is preferable to DOB/DOD: if BLP privacy is considered; if the full dates are unknown/unreliable; or if the opening sentence is partially cluttered (this one would need addressing on a case by case basis as to what needs culling). Removing the full dates usually goes against the established standard; an editor's personal preference holds very little weight in the grand scheme of things. I think the Virginia Woolf example should be returned, as at the moment the first example is a YOB/YOD one which suggests (consciously or not) that that is the agreed standard.

"These specific dates are important information about the person being described, but if they are also mentioned in the body, the vital year range (in brackets after the person's full name) may be sufficient to provide context." This sentence needs rewording to clarify the infrequent nature of this; "may" is too strong as suggests it is a common occurrence. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 18:48, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

@Gaia Octavia Agrippa: your argument sounds very circular to me: it seems to be saying "we should strengthen the MOS to state that full dates in the first sentence are standard because they are standard". We need a better rationale than that. Why are the full dates so important that they should come before even a description of who the subject is and what they're known for? We should put the important things first, and the month and day of birth or death are not important enough for that. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:59, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

They are important. The current standard is to use full dates. The onus is on those who want to change this standard to year only to provide a counter argument. As stated above, there are some occasions when YOB/YOD is appropriate but the current wording suggests that those occasions are much for frequent than it is in reality. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 21:58, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Either they already are required by the standard (disputed by others here and if so what change are you requesting) or they are not required by the standard (in which case your claim that people are trying to change the standard is false and your argument that they should be included is lacking in substance). Which is it? —David Eppstein (talk) 22:01, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

"The opening paragraph should usually have dates of birth and (when applicable) death." - This is the first sentence after the heading Birth date and place, therefore full dates (DOB/DOD) are the standard. I'm saying this needs to be supported with an example; the Virginia Woolf was fine.

"These specific dates are important information about the person being described, but if they are also mentioned in the body, the vital year range (in brackets after the person's full name) may be sufficient to provide context." - This is the next sentence. It suggests that YOB/YOD may be adequate in some cases. I'm saying that this needs to be strengthened to clarify that this is rare; perhaps "may occasionally". I provided three (rare/occasional) examples above when it would make sense to use YOB/YOD. As SMcCandlish, states above, every single FA article (the pinnacle of article writing) that he looked at uses full dates. In your (David Eppstein) comment above you used the phrase "I would greatly prefer": this is your opinion and is asking for a change to the MOS (I am not asking for a change, just a clarification).

This isn't something SMcCandlish has introduced. Its existed in one for or another for many years: it was worded "Opening paragraph .. Dates of birth and death, if known" in 2009 for example. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 22:46, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

It's correct that I did not introduce or substantively change that wording. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 04:30, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps we are writing at cross purposes. You seem to be talking about the entire opening paragraph. I am concentrating on a specific part of the opening paragraph, the stuff in parenthesis that usually comes after the subject's name in the first sentence. I don't mind if the dates are later in the first paragraph; I would just prefer them not to clutter the first sentence. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:58, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

I'm neutral on the matter, but have broken this out into a sub-thread. We definitely should be clear on this one way or the other, but this appears to be an ongoing dispute that's been ongoing for a long time without resolution. We might need to RfC this in order to make a firm recommendation in MoS pro or con full b/d dates in the lead. The current text is accurate in that it permits both styles and we know both are used, but there's also a clear historical preference for using full dates and this is conflicting with a non-silly observation that doing so when the information is elsewhere in the article might not be the best practice. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 04:27, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

For my part, I would not want to see both date formats done in the lead of the same article. Either put full dates in lead, or short dates in the lead and full dates in the body (perhaps especially if long dates also appear in the infobox). Otherwise, we have a redundant structure of "Foo X. Bar (1934–1998) was a . Born in on January 1, 1934 . She died in on December 31, 1998 of .", with dates appearing in the lead twice. While I'm habituated to full dates in the lead, I used short ones in William A. Spinks (a GA, and probably FA-able), because the exact details didn't seem terribly important in the overall context of "who was this guy and why do we care?" Full dates a probably more important in articles on bio subjects of very high notability like Benjamin Disraeli and Hellen Keller (i.e., likely to be the subject of kids' school papers, and the topics of trivia questions, and added to timelines, and so on). But I don't feel strongly about it. Only about not being redundant inside the lead. (Its the function of the lead, and the infobox if there is one, to be "redundant" with the body, in being forms of summary/abstract. An argument can be made for avoiding excessive redundancy between the lead and infobox, because the IB is also a summary of body, not of the lead.) — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 04:41, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

I definitely think the full dates should be used in the lede. I might be the only one but whenever I come across a shortened date in the lede my mind first goes to the idea that the full date just isn't known. Nohomersryan (talk) 07:21, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, only because full dates have been so common for so long. Otherwise I don't think that would be your reaction; rather, it might be that the lead, by definition and of necessity, omits details that are provided later in the article. I'll come in on the side of recommending years-only in the first sentence, but such a dramatic, high-profile change won't happen without an RfC consensus.
My rationale: To my mind, the function of DOB/DOD in the first sentence is only to provide a very rough time context for the individual's existence. Did this guy live in the 18th century or the 19th? Including month and day in the first sentence makes as much sense as including places of birth and death there; i.e., very little. "Because it has always been done this way" never means much to me, in Misplaced Pages editing or anywhere else, because it inhibits innovation and progress. ―Mandruss ☎ 12:54, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Agreed that full dates should be used if known. Giant Snowman 14:18, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

I prefer years-only in the lead, with no placenames. The dates (full if known) and places if known of both birth and death should be sourced where they appear elsewhere in the article. The dates in the lead are there to help the reader establish at a glance whether this is the article they are looking for or not (especially if they are seeing the lead sentence in a list of search results or by hovering over a link). PamD 14:20, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Full dates should be listed in the lede (per standard encyclopaedic practice), but not places of birth and death. They should only appear in the body of the article. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:05, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

This should be left entirely to editorial discretion—the MoS should neither encourage nor discourage full dates. Sometimes the dates are disputed (as with Winsor McCay), in which case Misplaced Pages should neither take a stance nor overcomplicate the lead sentence with these disputes. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:38, 9 December 2017 (UTC)
Well, the current situation is that it's left to discretion now, and this causes frequent conflict at articles and recurrent debate here. Meanwhile, a review of bio FAs shows an overwhelming preference for full dates (but not the places!) in the lead sentence. It's not my preference when it comes to well-developed articles (even if I think it's also almost inevitable in stubs when we actually have the dates, because there are no "Early life" and "Later life and death" sections yet in most stubs). But the guidelines are supposed to codify best practice, and it seems pretty clear what consensus is on this, or FAs wouldn't be the way they are, one would think. (That reasoning can be taken too far, though – FAs from the 2000s that have not been edited much in the interim aren't evidentiary of current practice). If there is such a consensus, and there seems to be, it should be recorded here, even if it's not stated as a rule but as the default to use absent a good reason to diverge.
It's probably better to consider this matter apart from pronunciation, alternative names, post nominals, etc.; the thread below that's commingling them all as "too much" is failing to distinguish between different levels of consensus for completely different material that just incidentally happes to converge on the lead sentence. The recent RfC that failed to come to very clear consensus other than a vague "too much" also suffered this problem.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 14:27, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

"frequent conflict"—so tell the people who can't leave the established style in the article alone to fuck off. That's what I did to the PoV-pusher who kept trying to insert their preferred birthdate into the Winsor McCay article—I didn't come whimpering to this talk page about it. This is not a MoS issue. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:12, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

The proliferation of metadata on lead sentences (was Really?)

Are we honestly holding up this as an example of good practice? It looks dreadful. I would see it as an example of bad practice. I cannot recommend or follow this style. The inclusion of the full name, the full dates and the pronunciation makes it terribly cluttered, almost painfully so. I often use the MoS and advise others to do so, but advice like this brings the whole thing into disrepute.

François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand (Template:IPA-fr; 26 October 1916 – 8 January 1996) was a French statesman, who served as President of France from 1981 until 1995.

What do others think? --John (talk) 10:14, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

I agree. And the comma is unnecessary. I would greatly prefer "François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand (1916–1996) was a French statesman who served as President of France from 1981 until 1995.", with the missing details provided elsewhere. Or maybe even better "François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand (1916–1996) was the President of France from 1981 until 1995." on the assumption that the readers who know what a statesman is will also know that being president automatically makes one a statesman. If someone wants a pronounciation they will be willing to look a little harder than the first line for it; it is unreadable to most and just serves as line noise delaying the punch line of the sentence. And I also prefer to put the full dates somewhere else than in the first sentence. However I'm still generally in favor of full names at the start. —David Eppstein (talk) 10:25, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Full name and full date of birth are essential. Giant Snowman 11:49, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Why's that then? --John (talk) 11:55, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Yes, that wasn't much of an explanation, was it? But also, why are they essential to place before telling us that Mitterand was the president of France? Why are they so much more important that they should go earlier? —David Eppstein (talk) 11:58, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Because things like 'names' and 'when they lived' tend to be important details about people... Giant Snowman 17:09, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Very true. But what we are actually talking about is never-used middle names and exact dates of birth and death. Why are they so important that they need to be in the very first sentence? John (talk) 17:33, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

If I may, I have several reasons. One point is that it is what readers have come to expect. When a famous/widely known person's full name or full date of birth is not on Misplaced Pages, I assume that the information is unknown. Take Felix Mendelssohn, for example. Were it not for the full name at the start of the article, it would seem that his full name was just "Felix Mendelsson".

The IPA (or re-spelling) also is necessary for pronunciations that are not obvious. The article Matt Damon begins thusly: "Matthew Paige Damon (/ˈdeɪmən/; born October 8, 1970) is an American actor..." All three parts – full name, pronunciation, and date of birth – are at the very beginning, but it's not clunky and is very helpful to readers. There are ways to go overboard, like quite possibly on Fanny Mendelssohn, which has three names in bold and square brackets. All articles, of course, can gain consensus to start a different way if it is beneficial to the encyclopedia, but in most cases, First Middle Last (/ahem/; January 1, 1900 – December 21, 1999) was... is perfect. --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 21:41, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

None of that explains why it needs to go in the first sentence before any information about what the person is notable for. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:43, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

An article doesn't need to start with what someone is notable for. It needs to provide context around whatever its subject may be, the most basic of which is the actual name of the person and when they, in a crude way, literally began and ended. You shouldn't start any biography by asserting its notability first, because otherwise it would begin something like this: "President of France from 1981 to 1995, François Mitterand (26 October 1916 – 8 January 1996) served the longest time in office of any French president." --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 03:09, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Indeed, but I don't think anyone is arguing for that. We are trying to make it better, not worse. --John (talk) 13:59, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Incidentally, I asked a similar question in the peer review for Felix Mendelssohn. Why feed the readers unexpected birth names and IPA before getting to the point that he was a composer, or President. The IPA could go to a footnote, and the full birth name could go to the first sentence in the body. How is it lead material that Mendelssohn was also named Jakob, which the reader will never need to know again. Similar question came up for Max Reger. Calling Smerus, with whom I discussed Mendelssohn, and Ewulp (Reger). --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:38, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

I would love to get rid of the IPA (not completely, maybe move it to the infobox). If anyone wants to start an rfc I'll support it. I also think it would be nice to allow readable non-IPA pronunciation. Kendall-K1 (talk) 13:42, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Yes, we are. Looks fine to me. If you "can't follow the style" then your edits are likely to be changed by those of us who can. Brings us into disrepute? What a load of rubbish. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:52, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Gosh. Other than it "looking fine to you", is there a reason you are able to explain why you think this dreadful hen's breakfast is important to maintain on our articles? --John (talk) 15:07, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

You don't seem to realise that other editors completely disagree with you. Which is why we've used this style for many years. Just coming along and saying "I think it looks awful and of course I'm right" isn't much of an argument. Others don't think it looks awful. If we did we wouldn't have used and supported this style for so long. Simple really. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:53, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Ah, the good old "silent majority" argument. Nice. Your failure to justify the current wording is noted. And with the greatest of respect, if you think this is "simple really" I'd say you probably don't understand what we're talking about. John (talk) 16:50, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

John, to quote Blazin Squad, let's flip reverse this. Why do you want to change, other than WP:IDONTLIKEIT? Giant Snowman 17:10, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Mmm. Actually, let's not. I asked first, and the onus is on you to justify the current advice. I am looking forward to reading your response. John (talk) 17:31, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

The onus is on the one proposing to change established practice, especially when the arguments offered so far have amounted to WP:IDONTLIKEIT and degrade the reading experience. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:07, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure why the onus should be on anyone to justify it. It's been used for years and if we had a problem with it we would have tried to change it. Essentially it's you who doesn't like it. But just because you don't like it doesn't mean everyone else should be forced to agree with you. Neither does it mean that most other people do agree with you but just haven't said so up until now. For myself, I think it's perfect as it is. It provides the information I want and expect to see in the first line of an encyclopaedia article and I'm not sure why you don't. So yes, unless you for some reason think your opinion is somehow more valid than the opinions of those who have shaped this guideline over the years (since it hasn't just sprung into being overnight), the onus is entirely on you to justify why it's a bad guideline. At the moment you're presenting things as though it's entirely self-evident that having full names, full dates and IPA in the lead is a bad idea. Well, not to me it's not. And obviously not to many others either. I'm not so bothered about the IPA (although it can be useful for more obscure pronunciations), but as far as I'm concerned full names and dates are vital and deleting them would be crossing the proverbial red line. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:09, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I think we get it, that you think things are fine, but you're not able to explain why you think that. As I said, your unevidenced claim that "many others" agree with you is a known logical fallacy. We pretty much argue using arguments here. If you've got any it's be great to see them. --John (talk) 17:25, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Without the IPA and pronunciation file, the original (minus the comma) is just fine, because though Mitterand is likely best known for his time as president, there were also other parts of his life. It's in the same vein as writing "singer-songwriter" to encompass many facets, it appears. As with my earlier comment, this can go too far, like for the article Arnold Schwarzenegger, which currently lists nine things and says "Austrian" and "American" twice in the first sentence. --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 21:48, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

I agree that the Schwarzenegger article, like the Mitterand one, is an example of ugly and distracting lead-sentence inclusion creep. Next there might be a drive to include everyone's star sign and shoe size in the first sentence. Either of those is as significant as one's unused middle names. I believe some people consider blood types deeply significant. All of these things can be included in the article (and should be, if they are verifiable and significant). But none of them need to be in the first sentence of every single biography. --John (talk) 22:13, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

The short, familiar version of the name is the article name and can't be missed, right at the top of the page. The first sentence gratifyingly provides more, and the bolding makes it easy to leapfrog past middle names if in a hurry. There doesn't seem to be any problem there, but a load of IPA can be alienating (see Diego Velázquez). Ewulp (talk) 05:08, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Like I mentioned in the #Substantive revision of "Birth date and place" discussion above, we recently had an RfC about parenthetical information in the lead; see Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Lead section/Archive 19#Request for comment on parenthetical information in first sentence. Yes, IPA was discussed. I don't think wording here should contradict the consensus found there. This is a lead matter and MOS:BIO should not be inconsistent with MOS:LEAD. I don't feel strongly about IPA (although I do think full birth dates should be retained in parenthetical in the lead, and that removing them will be futile since editors will always feel the need to add the full birth date). Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 14:24, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Flyer22 Reborn, I am indebted to you for your diligence in searching this out. I had a vague memory of this discussion, but for some reason thought it had taken place at the VP, which meant I failed to find it when I was searching last night. The RfC was malformed but provided some evidence there is an appetite to declutter our lead sentences. It derived from this op-ed from June, which has an interesting discussion under it (which I took part in) with a pretty solid consensus that we need to simplify. This probably needs a wider discussion as I recognise there is a significant minority view that everything is fine and dandy. But I don't think the status quo is really an option now. Thoughts? --John (talk) 16:58, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Per the RfC and what I noted in the "IPA" section below, I think that editors generally agree that IPAs are not necessary. But when it comes to birth dates, consensus seems to be for retaining the full birth dates. As for other stuff, I'm not as sure, but the closer did note that "many editors are sympathetic to the proposal of limiting the number of foreign names in the lead." The closer also suggested that further discussion may be needed. If a new RfC is started on one or more of these issues, we should definitely publicize it at WP:Village pump (policy). I will also ping the previous involved editors.

On a side note: Since I watch this page, it's not necessary to ping me to a discussion here. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 17:09, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Also, I advertised the aforementioned RfC at policy pages, guideline pages, and WikiProjects. So I can see why some people might think it took place at WP:Village pump (policy). Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:41, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

I think it might be worth another RfC. Here's another cracker: Robert Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell starts: Lieutenant-General Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell, OM, GCMG, GCVO, KCB, DL(/ˈbeɪdən ˈpoʊ.əl/ BAY-dən POH-əl; 22 February 1857 – 8 January 1941) was a British Army officer, writer, author of Scouting for Boys which was an inspiration for the Scout Movement, founder and first Chief Scout of The Boy Scouts Association and founder of the Girl Guides. (I forgot about post-nominals.) Does anyone here think this is an example of good, clear encyclopedic prose for the first sentence? I don't. We get a total of nine names, five post-nominals, two pronunciation guides, and his full dates of birth and death (why not times as well?) Here is a clear statement of my concern, as I know I didn't use a very descriptive header:

The proliferation of metadata on lead sentences leads to difficult-to-read first sentences and the MoS should discourage this. This metadata includes (but may not be limited to): unused middle names, postnominals, pronunciation guides, and full dates of birth and death. There is a need to include most or all of this, but it does not all need to be packed into the first sentence, before we even find out what the subject is notable for.

Any thoughts? John (talk) 22:14, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

While it is pertinent to have what someone is notable for out front, I don't think that it precludes the subject's full name or their full lifespan. Take, for instance, Glenn T. Seaborg. This, in my view, is a perfect example of how an article should begin. If the data were removed from the start, on the other hand, it would look more like Tory Christman. While I know that you would agree that this needs at least the birth year, the full date wouldn't hurt at all. Another good example, one that includes pronunciation, is Bach. Pronunciation is in a footnote and the full date is there (O.S., too!), and it still remains unobtrusive. --Hameltion (talk, contribs) 23:15, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

Powell's is an unusual case, and these unusual cases are being presented as an argument for removing this information entirely (including proposals to remove birthdates!). If Powell's lead has a problem, deal with it on Powell's talk page. There's no reason for the MoS to discourage anything like the far, far more typical opening to John Wilson Bengough. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:34, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting forbidding metadata from lead sentences, just asking that our recommendations should more accurately reflect what is already good practice, that it should be proportionate for readability. When I worked on the FAC for Vincent van Gogh we ended up putting the pronunciations of his name into a footnote. It's a bloody interesting story, but it doesn't belong in the lead sentence. There's a potential for an RfC but here on this MoS discussion page we could agree that the Mitterand example could be improved? John (talk) 00:02, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Footnoting seems more and more common. That said, I'm not sure how we're supposed to encapsulate "it should be proportionate for readability" in MoS language. We could just say pretty much exactly that, but I don't think it would resolve anything; the crux of the issue seems to be that there are editors with widely divergent ideas about what "proportionate" means when it comes to lead sentences and lead sections. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 14:13, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

John: again, van Gogh is an edge case, not an excuse to have the MoS recommend footnoting the pronunciation in John Wilson Bengough (a by far more typical case). Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:09, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

I've often thought that we make the first sentence in an article the least accessible one, when it should be the most accessible. Full names, birth names, dates of birth and death, postnomials, and pronunciations are better suited for infoboxes and the body of the article. Without all that, you end up with a simple, single sentence that sums up the subject quite neatly, even if that's the only thing the reader reads. At most, I'd leave in birth and death year immediately following the common name, to place the person in time. ("François Mitterrand (1916-1996) was President of France from 1981 to 1995, the longest time in office of any French president.") It's worth mentioning that in the Google previews of Misplaced Pages articles, they strip out all the parenthetical information, instead showing that information below, field-by-field.--Trystan (talk) 23:29, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

And for those of us who consult the opening sentence to find things like pronunciation and full birthdates—we should just bow to aesthetics? We should have to hunt around the article trying to find this information, possibly in collapsed boxes, even though this information is often the only thing we opened the article for in the first place? Misplaced Pages is a reference work—why make it more burdensome to use as a reference? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:43, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm afraid I agree with Trystan. If you are really only looking for the date of birth or pronunciation, I think it is ok to read a couple of paragraphs in, or look at an infobox or a footnote, which you may be able to read by hovering over it. I don't recall anybody saying anything about collapsed boxes, where did that come from? --John (talk) 23:48, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Yes, we know you don't like it, but that's never been an argument for the MoS to recommend their removal. You're suggesting making large numbers of readers do extra work to satisfy your personal aesthetic. You're not taking into account people's actual use cases.

You can't hover over a footnote on mobile, which is where most Wiki-reading happens today.

"collapsed boxes"—this discussion is not happening in a vacuum. You're surely aware—as a single example—of the disinfoboxers who insist on having infoboxes collapsed as a "compromise" when they can't win complete removal.

Birthdates and pronunciations are where they are on countless articles because that's where people want and expect them, and find them most useful. Given how many times proposals to remove them have failed over the years, the onus is on you to demonstrate that readers would benefit from having this information hidden away. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 00:22, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

IPA only?

Is there actually any policy or guideline that recommends using IPA and nothing else for pronunciation guide in the opening sentence of a bio? I assumed there was but I can't find it. Kendall-K1 (talk) 17:06, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

We have RESPELL but it is even worse; many articles have both competing forms of pronunciation guide, an audio clip, full dates of birth and death, full unused middle names, nationality, before we even find out what the subject was famous for. All these things were doubtless well-intended, but the cumulative effect is neither useful nor beautiful. John (talk) 17:39, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Agree; these should be removed. Kablammo (talk) 18:10, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

See Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Lead section/Archive 19#Request for comment on parenthetical information in first sentence. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 14:24, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

The IPA from W. B. Yeats was just removed, which I find very unhelpful. I had no idea his name was pronounced that way. Is there now a new policy/guideline in place to support the removal of non-obvious pronunciations? -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 14:59, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Michael Bednarek, nope. And you can see that the RfC I linked to above shows that editors ~~generally support IPA. At least in terms of that RfC.~~ Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 15:54, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

The removal was labelled "ce intro". Removing IPA is not a copyedit, and the attempt to disguise such an edit in such a dishonest way should be treated as a sanctionable disruption. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 06:51, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Michael Bednarek, my mistake. The RfC actually shows that ~~most~~ many editors feel that IPA is not necessary. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 16:00, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

I restored pronunciation to William Butler Yeats, since the average reader will think it's pronounced "Yeets", due to "yeast", "beats", and the majority of other English words with "ea". — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 01:45, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

What proportion of the public understands IPA? Kablammo (talk) 02:14, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Just directly reading it, probably less that 0.01%. But 100% of those who are competent to read the encyclopedia at all are also competent to figure out the IPA we provide, because we help them with that; we don't just use the IPA and walk away. The "gap" is people who may be reading the articles on paper. I'm not sure we can do anything for them. "American dictionary" respellings are ambiguous and inconsistent, and generally not understood by anyone but Americans and maybe Canadians. And there are numerous WP features that are not available to paper readers; it's not a good reason not to use them. Our pronunciation guides (where we actually need to have them) shouldn't even be marked up with {{unprintworthy}}, since they can in fact be used in paper form by anyone who does know IPA or who is willing to look it up in a book. I would suggest this is the reason why proposals to put the IPA stuff into tooltips and otherwise "hide" the material have not met with consensus. We could possibly get consensus to put them in footnotes, since those are still accessible to paper (and otherwise offline) readers. I would suggest making something like that a WP:VPPOL RfC to get maximum editor eyeballs and buy-in, since it would affect all kinds of articles in any topic (not just bios). I'll try the footnote approach at Yeats and see if it sticks (also added {{Respell}} to the same footnote, since space in the footnote is not the concern that it is in the lead sentence). — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 06:25, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

"probably less that 0.01%"—don't fool yourself. The number of non-native speakers of English (and readers of en.wp) is enormous, and use of IPA is widespread outside the English-speaking world. Even within the native English-speaking world its use is far more widespread than "0.01%"—anyone with a passing interest in linguistics, language instruction/learning, or a close relation with their dictionary will be familiar with it. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 06:55, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Glad to hear that, then. I'm in favor of us using IPA because it's a real standard; if it's more familiar to more people than linguistics dorks like me after all these years, that's great. :-) — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 08:44, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

I was more interested in whether there was a prohibition against non-IPA pronunciation guides. It sounds like there is not. Kendall-K1 (talk) 11:56, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Names in non-English

And while we're at it, do we really need to add their name(s) in their home language(s)? Do we need Franz Joseph's name in eight of the languages of his empire? Kablammo (talk) 17:53, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

No, would be my answer. Again the onus would be on those wishing to retain it to justify it. If the best we can say is "it's been like that for a while", that means it can go. --John (talk) 17:59, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Only if his name was different in his native language from his common name in English (e.g. William I, German Emperor, who was known in German, and also often in English, as Wilhelm). Franz Joseph however was commonly known as Franz Joseph in German too and that was the common language of the empire and his own native language. For another common example, see Arthur Kennedy (governor): putting the names of British officials in Hong Kong in Chinese too; completely unnecessary. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:28, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Agreed with Necrothesp. Wilhelm would be foolhardy to remove, but we do not need to add other variants (Polish, yadda yadda). Including "German: Franz Joseph" after "Franz Joseph" is redundant. Giving Chinese for a non-Chinese person is pointless in English Misplaced Pages (not pointless for Mao Zedong, which is just an romanized approximation of his real name). PS: For Chinese and such, we're increasingly moving this stuff to a sidebar template, since it involves multiple script and romanization systems. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 01:50, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Sidebars, infoboxes and footnotes are the way to go here. --John (talk) 08:55, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

See below—these things are not user-friendly, especially on mobile, and they force readers to go hunting for pronunciations before even finishing the first sentence—significantly impacting the reading experience. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 12:27, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Emphatically yes—it's one of the major uses I and many others have for Misplaced Pages. In the case of Japanese (where romanized pronunciations map unpredictably to their Japanese representations) removing them would be a huge problem. If individual articles include them in a problematic way, deal with it at those individual articles—don't cause the rest of us problems to serve your pet ideology. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 07:01, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Remember we are talking about the first sentence. Does it need to be there? I agree we need it in the article, but I strongly think the cumulative effect of full name, pronunciation guide(s), full dates of birth and death, and so on right at the start of the article, looks awful and is hard to read on a small screen. It seems a lot of participants in the recent RfC agree. It isn't fair to call it a "pet ideology", more like "obvious common sense". --John (talk) 07:13, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

If it were "obvious common sense", the practice would not have survived so many of these discussions over the years. Infoboxes et al. are a terrible place to shove them. Not all articles have them (and not just because of Disinfoboxers—plenty of articles do not lend themselves to infoboxes), and they are not all that accessible on mobile (sometimes they're collapsed or whatever). The mobile folk keep changing the layout (and whether boxes are collapsed), which just makesthings worse.

Besides all that, think of how people read articles: typically, I'll open an article and the first thing I think is "How do I pronounce Penderecki"? How could it possibly serve the reader to go hunting around the article to find the pronunciation (which could be in an infobox, a sidebar, somewhere in the body, or in some collapsed box) before even finishing the first sentence? How disruptive! The very idea is infuriating. Removing these things significantly degrades the reading experience.

Of course, those who promote this pet ideology will simply keep bringing it up until they manage to get a single RfC to "support" their decision—it's a matter of attrition. This kind of thing sucks the enthusiasm for WP out of me, both as a reader and editor. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 12:24, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Enthusiasm goes both ways. Just to give the opposing view... I don’t really care how “Penderecki” is pronounced. I simply want to know who Penderecki is/was. Having to wade through all sorts of parenthetical pronunciation stuff before I find out the answer sucks my enthusiasm (both reading and editing). In fact, since I have no idea what all the pronunciation symbols mean, having the parenthetical is useless for me... even if I WAS curious about how to pronounce the name. A link to a voice file (with someone actually saying the name) would be more helpful than a bunch of symbols I don’t understand. Blueboar (talk) 14:13, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Blueboar: "I don’t really care how “Penderecki” is pronounced."—I'd wager this puts you in a minority. I couldn't tell you how many times I've heard people stop mid-lead sentence (not just on Misplaced Pages) to ask how to pronounce the name of the subject. A significant number of readers (including myself) open the article primarily to find the pronunciation of the subject. And, again, the fact that this information has survived so many of these discussions is a strong indicator of just how many people find this information not only useful, but fundamental. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:33, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

"A link to a voice file" would be a nice extra, but does a reader no good when they're at work, on the train, in the library, etc. A voice file should never replace a textual representation.

Nobody "forces" you to read the parenthetical (and few of them are anywhere near long enough to "wade" through)—skipping the parenthetical is trivially easy. If this is burdensome to you, a body has to wonder what isn't. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:17, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

The solution suggested by Gerda Arendt two sections above, and implemented by SMcCandlish on the Yeats article, is a good compromise. An unobtrusive superscript letter immediately following the name links directly to the IPA pronunciation (and likely far more useful, to a common term with the same pronunciation). Kablammo (talk) 15:22, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Kablammo: I've already responded to this. Aside from being unpredictable (why would someone guess that's where the pronunciation's hidden?), it's also less accessible, particularly on mobile. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:33, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

I've looked at that and various other articles like Nietzsche and Mao, on mobile and they're not problematic, regardless where the info is. The order users see is the lead, then the infobox(es), then the body. Navigation is very quick, either dragging the content up/down, or poking a link. I think this really comes down to a personal preference and an individual philosophy of information architecture at the small scale. I would love to see WMF spend some of its tens of millions of dollars on a serious usability study, e.g. by the Nielsen Norman Group who are (IMO) the most practiced pros in the Web usability field. Since that's not likely to happen, there'll likely be another RfC (or more than one): When do we want pronunciation information? Where do we want it? In what detail do we want it, and should the detail level vary? — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 02:44, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

What "they" are you referring to in "they're not problematic"? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 05:41, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

"That and various other articles like Nietzsche and Mao". — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 15:43, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're calling "not problematic"—the IPA being in the lead? The positioning or collapse state of the infoboxes? Etc? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:57, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

This side discussion is getting weird. If I'd thought anything pertinent to this discussion was problematic at any of those articles, I would have said it was problematic and said what was problematic. I would not have said the articles are not problematic. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 14:10, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

All I was saying was that I couldn't parse whatever it was you were trying to express. I still don't, but whatever. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 00:23, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

As a start for reducing clutter without touching the controversial issue of foreign names themselves (which could turn into a very long no-consensus discussion): how about discouraging "Language:" and "Romanization:" labels before those names in the opening brackets? (Already de facto standard on Japan-related articles, despite advice in {{nihongo}}.) The language is usually obvious from context, and the romanization system's name is not top-priority information that belongs at the very start of the article.

E.g. cutting "Chinese:" & "Wade-Giles:" from the lead at Mao Zedong would alleviate some of the WP:SEAOFBLUE effect there. ({{zh}} has an option "labels=no" to remove those labels, but the default is "=yes".) 59.149.124.29 (talk) 15:24, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

I strongly support (and practise) this. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:35, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Aye. These linguistic details are in a sidebar, under the infobox. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 02:44, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

In the case of Japanese, they never were—but whether this clutter appears in the lead should not be dependent on whether it appears elsewhere. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 05:44, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip re |labels=no, 59.149.124.29. But while it works for {{lang-zh}}, it doesn't work for {{lang-ko}} (although {{lang|ko|labels=no}} does work...) Anyone know why and how to fix this? —David Eppstein (talk) 08:17, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

@David Eppstein: Overview of the thicket of templates:

For Korean, MOS:KO#Introductory sentence suggests using {{korean}}. That template does support |labels=no.
The lang-xx family of templates always outputs a language label (because of how they invoke Module:Lang). Only option it supports is to turn off the links (|links=no), or see #4. Or maybe put in a feature request for a |labels= option at Module talk:Lang?
{{lang-zh}} is an exception because it started out independently from the rest of that family of templates, so it has all sorts of non-standard options, including |labels=no.
{{lang|xx}} never outputs a label (the |labels=no option has no effect there). So in theory you could switch {{lang-xx}} to {{lang|xx}} to turn off labels, but in practice this probably isn't a good idea because many {{lang-xx}} templates also handle other language-specific details (e.g. turning on |rtl=yes or adjusting the font) which you'd have to specify manually every time in {{lang|xx}}.

Hope that helps. 59.149.124.29 (talk) 05:25, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Onwards

How would you like to proceed? An argument for the status quo is an argument for incomprehensibility, for Google translating our lead sentences to make them readable by normal humans. Pinging Kaldari, the author of the op-ed. Here's a great graphic from it.

. Food for thought. --John (talk) 00:03, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Stripping the parentheticals from Christopher Columbus's lead completely gives a Flesch score of 32 ("difficult to read"), so it would be difficult to argue the problem stems from that. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:53, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
That would appear to be a huge improvement, if I believe the chart. Dicklyon (talk) 02:10, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
Nope—with the parentheticals in, the score is still 33.2 ("difficult to read"). Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 03:41, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
Interesting. How would we look at just the first sentence though, which is more directly relevant? How would some of these examples that we've been looking at (Mitterand, Baden-Powell) look over time? --John (talk) 23:00, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
Paste snippets into the form at http://www.readabilityformulas.com/free-readability-formula-tests.php. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 14:13, 13 December 2017 (UTC)
It can't deal with single sentences. --John (talk) 23:00, 13 December 2017 (UTC)
I suspect it doesn't deal with these sorts of parentheticals at all. Look at the formula in the Flesch–Kincaid readability tests article. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:11, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, boys, girls, cats, & dogs... but English speaking people frequently live, work, and play outside of Australia/Canada/UK/USA. Also, this isn't 1995...many websites use a combination of languages on the same page. Additionally, more sources are now available (online and easily translated/translatable into English) that use a person's name in the script of that language (including streaming videos, VOIP chatting and pidgin websites). Researching a popular Asian topic may require the use 3 or 4 different writing systems in order to accurately investigate it. It is important to have this sort of basic data immediately and obviously available in the article so that you can confirm that the subject of an article is indeed the one that you are looking for.

I strongly disagree with the author of the op-ed. I think that the main objection to IPA is simply from people who have never been exposed to a dialect or language other than their own native tongue. It is difficult for many people who have never been exposed to a strong regional dialect other than their own to understand how much of a challenge it can be to correctly spell a word from it's pronunciation and vice versa. IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard, much like country codes are for postal addresses UTF-8 is for emails. Removal of IPA information and alternate names in foreign scripts from the introduction significantly reduces the transmission of information. Don't forget that by hiding text (moving it to obscure footnotes or an infobox), you also make reading comprehension more difficult. And no, it is not obvious that a tiny little non-standardized footnote is where you can find pronunciation information.

If anything, I would support more instances of IPA in articles, with the addition of a text-to-speech tool for those who don't know how to read it (even though it's easy to figure out from the linked chart). Without IPA, you might use the wrong version of a homograph when reading the article aloud (or have the reverse issue of ghoti). If you compare the analysis of the entire introductory paragraph with and without the language stuff you will not have a major difference. However, if you compare it with and without specialized dating, there is a major difference. You can use the tests at http://www.analyzemywriting.com/index.html with the introduction on the page El Lissitzky to see what I mean. Vandraedha (talk) 21:59, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

We are not talking about whether to include "IPA in articles", so your entire argument is a non-sequitur. We are talking about IPA in the first sentence of the article, before any description of what the subject is notable for. What justification do you have for that specific placement of the IPA? —David Eppstein (talk) 22:10, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

David Eppstein: if you read carefully what Vandraedha has written, you'll see that "the first sentence of the article" is exactly what they are talking about—it's basic information that needs to be right there for a list of reasons. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 00:54, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

IPA is very basic information that identifies the subject. When you introduce yourself to someone at something like a hotel check-in kiosk, the first thing you usually say to identify yourself is "Hello, my name is Jean Doe... spelled J-E-A-N D-O-E". IPA is the equivalent of spelling out the name so that people can understand what you just said. Vandraedha (talk) 00:39, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Hotel check-in clerks have very different needs than Misplaced Pages readers. When I introduce a speaker at an academic talk, I don't spell out their name, and I don't tell everyone their birthday; instead, I speak briefly about their accomplishments. I think that's much more closely analogous. —David Eppstein (talk) 01:18, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

(You also kindly pronounce their name for everyone.) Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:20, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Well, not always correctly. And our articles kindly spell their name for everyone, just as automatically, in the process of saying who the article is about, without the interjection of UnReAdAbLeLiNeNoIsE. My not spelling out their name should be the equivalent, for here, of not sounding it out. If this were a spoken encyclopedia for the blind, then we'd be having the same argument about not spelling out their name after we say it and before we say why we should care. —David Eppstein (talk) 01:42, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Your not spelling it out should be indicative of nothing at all. No proposal has been made to force IPA or birth/deathdates into the lead. The strife arises from the vocal minority who propose banishing this information from the lead sentence (under the claim it is "UnReAdAbLeLiNeNoIsE"—?!?). Most of us either find it useful (and most useful where it is), or just skip over it. There's no evidence that it interferes with readers' ability to read the rest of the lead sentence, except in cases where the parentheticals are excessive—and the MoS already deals with those edge cases. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 02:35, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

It is indicative of the fact that I don't think that's what most of the audience wants to know first. As is the case with IPA here. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:57, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

If you have evidence that "most of the audience" deosn't care how to pronounce the name of the topic they're reading, I'd like to see it. That goes against a lifetime of experience on my end—most people I know would stop mid-sentence to ask or Google it. A pronunciation guide right there that they don't have to fumble around for gets them back into reading quicker and thus is far less disruptive. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 03:14, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Yet again, you're deflecting to "wants to know" from "wants to know first". Stop it. It's tiresome and it's a big part of why this argument is dragging on so long. —David Eppstein (talk) 03:45, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

"Wants to know first" is exactly what I am saying—how could you even read my comments any other way? What's tiresome is that you've now done this to both my and Vandraedha's comments, as if you can't be bothered to read them—you're reflexively disagreeing. Stop it—it's obnoxious. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 04:47, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Please adjust your caffeine intake and pay attention to my words. Yes, absolutely, yes, I want to see how to pronounce something unfamiliar when I first encounter it. Why wouldn't you want something that aids in reading comprehension at the beginning of an article? It aids me in properly retaining the information that is going to be displayed repeatedly in an article. It's quite jarring to discover that I'm mentally pronouncing something incorrectly after I have read through half of the text. It also makes it more difficult to absorb and retain information (both related to pronunciation, and immediately before the pronunciation change). I would estimate that, about 90% of the time, pronunciation is non-controversial and simple enough to deal with in just an IPA note in the intro. The rare times it needs an explanation are the edge cases where it should be elsewhere than the intro. It makes no sense to have pronunciation for simple non-controversial words buried down in the fourth or fifth or sixth section of an article. ***NOTE*** this does not necessarily include edge cases where pronunciation and etymology require detailed explanations and have their own sections linked in the TOC. Those should be dealt with in the same way as dates... put an uncontroversial summary in the intro and explain in detail further down the page. Vandraedha (talk|contribs) 06:58, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Further arguing here is unlikely to be productive. If we want to make any change in the IPA recommendations, we should follow the advice from the rfc: "Many editors view IPA as the most non-necessary parenthetical addition to lead. An RFC could be developed and launched as to seek the community opinion and tackle this issue specifically." Kendall-K1 (talk) 11:55, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Our job is not to teach phonics. (Were it otherwise, why not convert the whole article to IPA?) ESL students clever enough to take on English can surely figure out what the superscript letter links to. My preference is to eliminate IPA entirely on these articles; I accept that it is important to others, which is why I agree with the compromise further up (footnote IPA pronunciations). Kablammo (talk) 14:32, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

To my mind, the obvious half way point between these two extremists views is to place the IPA pronunciation meta data in an info box. It would then be prominent enough for those who desire to know how to pronounce the name... but without interrupting the textural flow of the lede paragraph. Blueboar (talk) 14:42, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
- Footnotes (as now used e.g. for François Mitterrand, although his needs a reliable source for its IPA transliteration) are also a reasonable way of decluttering the first sentence while leaving the information still available. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:05, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Kablammo: "Our job is not to teach phonics."—and non sequiturs are not arguments. You don't like IPA? Then skip it—the effort is trivial.

Blueboar: as has been pointed out repeatedly, forcing the IPA into infoboxes is problematic because

many articles have none, for a wide variety of reasons (many having nothing to do with WP:DISINFOBOX)
it's unpredictable—the reader cannot be expected to know that it's there—particularly if:
the infobox may be collapsed
it may not even show up on the page with long infoboxes
it forces readers to break off reading in mid-first sentence to find out how to pronounce what they're reading about, disrupting the reading experience form the get-go

The disadvantages of IPA right next to the word or phrase to be pronounced?

many people haven't learned IPA yet
some people JUSTDONTLIKEIT

the first group can (and does) just skip those few symbols; the latter group exasperates the rest of us with years of debates.

David Eppstein: the problems of footnoting pronunciations has been discussed—please stop talking about it as if it hasn't. Also, you fail to mention that it was you who unilaterally moved Mitterrand's pronunciation to a footnote (calling it "line noise")—you mention it as though some sort of consensus were reached over this. Are you going to disrupt Misplaced Pages by going around making more such changes? How many of these changes have you made? Do we have endless acrimonious RfCs to look forward to like those the DISINFOBOXers stalk? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:14, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Why is it relevant that I moved it? Are you going to ask only counterfactual questions, or do you have an actual point? Are you incapable of reading user edit histories? Are you going to respond to my point about IPA transliterations needing sources? —David Eppstein (talk) 23:26, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

"Why is it relevant that I moved it?"—what's relevant is the way you presented the move, as I said, and the fact that you present the move as unproblematic when you've already been presented with problems with doing it. That calls in your good faith.

"Are you going to respond to my point about IPA transliterations needing sources?"—assuming they do (and you haven't made a case that they do), it's easy to find in most cases. Random House gives the IPA for Mitterrand, for instance. My John Wilson Bengough has had its pronunciation referenced for over two years. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:31, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Interesting that Random House shows the readable pronunciation guide but hides the IPA. Kendall-K1 (talk) 00:27, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Kendall-K1: It's a slider that opens on whatever pronunciation guide you used last—for instance, clicking that link opens it up with IPA for me. Other dicitonaries give IPA exclusively, such as Oxford,, as does the Routledge Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English, and especially <other language>—English ones (including every Japanese–English dicitonary I've owned)—and the trend is strong towards switching from other systems (Oxford and Routledge obviously didn't use IPA twenty years ago). The fact is that IPA is taught widely around the world—my children's junior-high English textbooks (we live in Japan) are chock full of IPA. The fact that Americans tend to be unfamiliar with it means nothing—most English first- and second-language speakers (and Misplaced Pages readers) are not Americans. This is why IPA has survived years of RfCs and talk page discussions trying to have it removed—people around the world, like myself, actually use it. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:59, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Routledge is nothing but a pronunciation guide (no definitions are given), and the Oxford dictionary gives IPA pronunciations for only some of the terms (which would be unenforceable here). Misplaced Pages is neither a pronunciation guide nor a dictionary, but an encyclopedia. This focus on IPA would be better directed at Wiktionary. Kablammo (talk) 02:54, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Kablammo: The topic of discussion is not whether to force IPA into the lead, but whether to force its removal. "... but an encyclopedia ..." is a non sequitur that hasn't convnced the community in the well-over-a-decade that IPA has proliferated in Misplaced Pages's leads—in other words. We ge that YOUDONTLIKEIT, but you haven't presented us with any reason we should care about your aesthetic preferences. Why not write yourself a script that hides the IPA templates if it bothers you so much? That's not sarcasm. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 03:40, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Here's a script for you, Kablammo; plunk it into your User:Kablammo/vector.js‎, and feel free to tweak it to your needs. See how it obliterates that ugly IPA on an article such as Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario? You're now free to mispronounce it as you please. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 04:09, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Actor vs. actress at Hong Chau

There is a discussion at Hong Chau about using actor vs. actress. Please see the discussion here. Erik (talk | contrib) 13:33, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

Honorifics pre and post

I understand that post DBE (and similar) and pre Dame refer to the same thing. Should they both appear? See e.g. Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Kiri Te Kanawa. (I understand that removing "Dame" from |name= in those edits is correct.) -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:24, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

They do refer to the same thing but removing one or the other would be incorrect. Substantive dames (and knights for that matter) use both the title (dame/sir) and the post-nominals: the title and post-nom come as a package. However, if its an honorary/foreign award, its different: foreign recipients may only use the post-noms. For example, Bob Geldof is Irish (and therefore an honorary/foreign recipient), and uses the post-nom "KBE" but not the title sir (although he is often wrong called Sir Bob). There is an exception in the form of Knight Bachelor: this is complicated but usually only awards the title sir and no post-noms, unless they can't use the tile (being clergy or having a higher title such as baronet) then they only use the post-nom "Kt". Hopefully this explains how it works. Gaia Octavia Agrippa 14:51, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for that explanation. Still, the way those epithets are displayed in {{Infobox person}} strikes me as a very poor return on the investment of screen space, but that's a discussion at another place (with no interest to me). Cheers, Michael Bednarek (talk) 01:46, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Seems to be okay to list both as with Paul McCartney. AngusWOOF (bark • sniff) 18:23, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

The second is included because the Order of the British Empire (and many other orders) have multiple ranks, and it makes a difference. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 03:58, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

The pre-nominal (Sir/Dame) is included because it's an honorific title – see MOS:HONORIFIC. Post-nominals are always included somewhere (infobox and/or lead) but it's worth noting for this discussion that there's more than one "Dame" honour: besides DBE there's DCB, DCMG and DCVO, each of which may be honorary. — Stanning (talk) 13:43, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Birth/death places in lead clarification

The present wording is:

Birth and death places, if known, should be mentioned in the body of the article, and can be in the lead if relevant to the person's notability, but they should not be mentioned in the opening brackets of the lead sentence alongside the birth and death dates.

I think this is meant to read:

Birth and death places, if known, should be mentioned in the body of the article, and can be in the lead if relevant to the person's notability, but they should not otherwise be mentioned in the opening brackets of the lead sentence alongside the birth and death dates.

If one or both of these places are included because it's important in a particular case, putting it with the associated date is the most logical place for it. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ< 03:56, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Well, not necessarily. Take Fidel Castro, Napoleon and Joseph McCarthy (three random history GAs I picked). If the place of birth or death is significant in some way, then the best place to put it would be in the main text of the lead, not in the brackets, where it just needlessly clogs up what are often already very lengthy sentences. Frickeg (talk) 05:26, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

I oppose this suggested change. These parentheticals (long, irrelevant, and needlessly distracting as they can frequently become, especially when they also include other incidental information like pronounciation guides or spellings in other languages) mainly serve to make the first sentence hard to read by splitting its subject from the rest, so that by the time readers get to the rest they have forgotten what the subject was. We should eschew changes that encourage making this bad style worse. And calling it a "clarification" is at best misleading; it is a change, and a change for the worse. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:45, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

I also oppose it. It would add clutter, in my view unnecessarily. If the birth or death place is that important, it can be (and likely should be) mentioned in prose within the first couple of sentences. It doesn't need to be in the brackets.--Wehwalt (talk) 09:05, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Conflict between WP:NCP and MOS:JR

FYI – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Misplaced Pages talk:Naming conventions (people)#Conflict between WP:NCP and WP:MOS
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 23:55, 19 January 2018 (UTC)