Talk:Vladimír Svačina

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Requested move[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

No consensus to move. Vegaswikian (talk) 02:18, 30 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Vladimir Svacina → Vladimír Svačina – Relisting. -GTBacchus(talk) 02:46, 23 August 2011 (UTC)Rename to include diacritics, to reflect the standard practice across most biographies. The name is used by the person, who played only in the Czech Republic. The name is used by most non-English sources, therefore Wikipedia:DIACRITIC#No established usage should apply here. Also please note, that the only articles in the "Czech ice hockey players" category without diacritics in article titles, have been created by User:Dolovis. Reference for diacriticized name is included in given article. Darwinek (talk) 20:20, 14 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support. Makes sense to me. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 05:19, 15 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. Not sure how hard you looked if you couldn't find any English sources. Here are some that don't use diacritics: Canadian Online Explorer [1] [2] [3] [4], Toronto Star [5] [6], Guelph Mercury [7] [8] [9] [10], Erie Times-News [11] [12], NHL.com [13]. I could find no English sources that use "Vladimír Svačina". Also, looking at the sources shows that he has not "played only in the Czech Republic", but has in fact played in Canada (although our article does not mention that). Jenks24 (talk) 06:38, 15 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Please update the article, but nobody made the claim that he is mentioned only in Czech, but mostly in Czech. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 15:23, 15 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • Referring to Wikipedia:DIACRITIC#No established usage implies that no English sources can be found (or at most, only one or two). I have shown that is not the case. As to being mostly mentioned in Czech, a google news archive search shows 18 English articles, compared to only 7 Czech articles. While google searches are by no means the be-all and end-all, I have yet to see any evidence to the contrary. Jenks24 (talk) 18:35, 15 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per policy of WP:UE and WP:COMMONNAME. Dolovis (talk) 03:20, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. 'č' =/= 'c' The article is to be moved to reflect the subject's real name. --Ohconfucius ¡digame! 07:45, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - Wikipedia guidlines are to keep it at most common name per English sources. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:44, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support This person's name is Vladimír Svačina. Vladimir Svacina is not English, it is nonsense. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 08:46, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support the English language sources use the non-diacritic version for technical and printing reasons. I'd go as far as to consider it an error, though intentional (that's probably an oxymoron). We might as well resort to using solely the surname for most biographies, because that's commonly used in the press to save space. This person has a name, and that name is Vladimír Svačina. Puchiko (Talk-email) 09:39, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per standard encyclopedic practice and English style guides (including Chicago, AMA and APA): Foreign names must be spelled correctly and have the appropriate diacritical marks. Prolog (talk) 16:57, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per WP:HOCKEY and absense of other guidelines, whether in WP:UE or WP:COMMONNAME. HandsomeFella (talk) 16:34, 20 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, standard WP practice; to deviate from it would introduce pointless and misleading inconsistency.--Kotniski (talk) 10:13, 22 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. No evidence above that this is his name in English, just the opposite. Using diacritics is not standard WP practice although this move is part of a campaign to make it so. There is no absence of other guidelines. Wikipedia does not necessarily follow standard encyclopedic practice of other encyclopedias, in particular that Foreign names must be spelled correctly and have the appropriate diacritical marks, that's the underlying issue here. Yes, the person has a name, possibly several names as do I; In French I am Andre, to western desert aboriginal people I am Antiroonya, these are in a sense the same name spelled and pronounced according to the phonology and spelled according to the typology of their language. English Wikipedia uses English. Andrewa (talk) 17:59, 22 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It uses, as surely we all know, the style of English that includes diacritics in names like this. The only "campaign" seems to be in the other direction - to dumb Wikipedia down by removing diacritics, for no purpose that I can see that has anything to do with improving the encyclopedia, but just to pander to a few people's discomfort at having to look at certain letter forms which they regard as "foreign".--Kotniski (talk) 07:28, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I personally would be very happy for Wikipedia to adopt the standard that you and others are advocating here (not for the first time), and wish you well in getting it adopted. I'm happy to go either way, in fact. But the reasons given here do not impress me. It's not dumbing down at all, and having and following the guidelines is very helpful for improving the encyclopedia. It's about time you accepted the fact that some at least of your opponents have something useful, and dare I say intelligent, to say. Andrewa (talk) 15:58, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I object to the phrase "No evidence above that this is his name in English". Do people have different names in different languages? Of course not. What's your name in, let's say, French or German? It's the same, right? Like yours, his name is obviously the same in any language – unless he decides to change it (e.g. drop diacritics). And that would need a reliable source. HandsomeFella (talk) 09:24, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That's ridiculous. People have different names in different alphabets. They don't look the same in Chinese, Russian, Hieroglyphics, Swedish or English. I may be Kołodziej in Poland but in Canada I'm Kolodziej. Fyunck(click) (talk) 10:18, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You just proved my point. If you drop the diacritic, that's your choice. Several people have done that, Martina Navratilova, Bob Nystrom, Yan Stastny, Zach and Jordan Parise, just to name some. It's their choice, probably because they have chosen to stay for good in English-speaking countries. Without a reliable source (or at least some trace) to such a decision, we should not impose diacritic-less versions on anyone. HandsomeFella (talk) 10:59, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Just the opposite... While there may be an element of choice in rare circumstances, it's unnusual. The reason I'm Antiroonya in many Australian Aboriginal languages is that there is no "d" nor any three-consonant cluster in those languages. It's nothing to do with my personal wishes. This is typical of the reasons that proper names change according to the language. Andrewa (talk) 13:01, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Someone is clearly confusing spelling with something else here. "Antiroonya" is not another spelling of "Andrew", and "André" is not another spelling of "Andrzej". HandsomeFella (talk) 18:11, 25 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Agree that neither is merely another spelling. Not sure what you mean by clearly confusing, can you explain? There's quite a lot going on here, both in orthography and phonology, and it's all relevant both to this move discussion, and the bigger discussions of which it is part, unfortunately! Andrewa (talk) 15:47, 26 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Couldn't be more wrong. In French my name is André, in many Australian Aborginal dialects Antiroonya, in Russian and Polish Andrjez, I don't know about German. So it's not the same, right? at all. Argument utterly demolished, I think. Andrewa (talk) 13:09, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In (written) Polish your name would just be Andrew. How it's pronounced would depend on the speaker (as it would in English, for that matter), but it wouldn't be written or pronounced "Andrzej" except as a kind of mild joke. Similarly we don't call people like Andrzej Lepper "Andrew" in English.--Kotniski (talk) 14:13, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting... and it probably explains a lot of the heat in this debate. I speak no Polish, and apparently I've been mislead there. Languages vary in their treatment of names. In France, when I lived there, I was definitely André, and was given no option! One of my Russian-speaking friends calls me Andrzej, and as you say it's a mild joke, a term of familiarity and affection in this case. In English, we don't automatically follow the person's wishes, nor do we automatically use the diacritics. As would I thought have been obvious to anyone not pushing a barrow!
I actually think there's some progress here. I would, as you know, like an overall standard as to using diacritics in article names, and don't care whether it's to put them in or to leave them out. But let's keep it to the issues. The often-made suggestion that a convention to leave them out is dumbing down Wikipedia is, in my opinion, just dumbing down the debate. And there are many other similarly baseless assertions. My concern is not that readers are in any way mislead by the article title (I don't think they are, either way; the lead may be a different story!), but that we waste a lot of time, and discourage a lot of people, by the discussion in the meantime. Andrewa (talk) 19:59, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Names in different languages are always a tricky thing. We had three friends come over from Poland/Austria with first names of Wojciech and every one of them had it transliterated to George. That's what they are now in English. One had a kid, George "jr" on his birth certificate. Of course to his Polish relatives he's little Wojciech. Of course all their last names were butchered completely in English, not just the diacritics, and that's what they go by now unless they travel to Poland. My point is that things change when you use a new language which uses different spellings and it's why in multiple wiki's the article titles are are not spelled the same. Usually the original spelling is placed in parenths or mentioned in a birth bio so that we give information to readers whose first language isn't English. But we don't start using their languages' lettering system if we have English sources. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:40, 25 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Well said. Andrewa (talk) 15:26, 26 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
PS and one key may be the parenthetical (written) above. Some languages are a lot more phonetic than others in spelling; English tends not to be. The comment above about confusing spelling seems related. I think it may be an important factor in the obvious near-dichotomy of views in this general area. Andrewa (talk) 15:47, 26 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. -DJSasso (talk) 19:35, 22 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Relisting - Discussion is still active. I note that current usage in Wikipedia is mixed: We've got lots of pages with diacritics in place, and lots of pages where they're not included. -GTBacchus(talk) 02:46, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per Jenks24. Absconded Northerner (talk) 07:01, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. In a major and stable variant of the Latin alphabet, of long standing; and a name that has apparently not been anglicised for this person. NoeticaTea? 07:47, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per English use shown by Jenks24 above. Slavic diacritics rarely appear in published English. It would be most unusual if this name was ever to appear in the RS with diacritics. Let's not mislead our readers as to what conventional English-language usage is. Kauffner (talk) 15:10, 26 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

notes[edit]

Is there any hard fast rule that administrators use to close or relist these things? I ask because I seem to see a lot of these move requests and i can never figure out what the rational is. I see 6-5 to move and boom, it's moved by reason of "majority." Here we have 8-4 to move and it gets relisted. I've seen 3 posts the same day as a move and no posts for a week and it gets relisted or move, so traffic to a subject seems to have no bearing either. I've seen 6-5 to keep and it gets moved because of better reasoning... so polling doesn't always matter. It seems to be at the whim of whatever someone feels like that day. Is there a place to see the rules we try to follow? I realize I'm on the short end of the stick if it's closed :( but it always perplexes me. Relisting this is nothing out of the normal for wikipedia, I don't mean to infer that in any way... I just don't understand these things. Fyunck(click) (talk) 03:06, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There aren't any hard and fast rules; different administrators might take different views. It might also depend on the arguments being put forward, not just the numbers.--Kotniski (talk) 07:30, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Which is why I mentioned that. But admins must have some sort of schoolin' as to when to extend and when not to or when to say "I'm going with the 6-5 majority." They must sometimes discuss within their own circles as to the best way to apply things. No matter what, they will have opinions that will differ, and that's cool... I just thought maybe there was a general guideline on some of these things. Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:43, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There are no "circles" within which I discuss these things. I call 'em as I see 'em. -GTBacchus(talk) 14:14, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
From my perspective, relisting is the safe move if there have been posts within 24 hours of the request hitting the backlog. I'll only close a still-active discussion if I see a good reason to cut it off, as occurred recently at Talk:Crepe, and that was controversial.

This one's not a totally obvious case, so another week is probably a fine idea. -GTBacchus(talk) 14:22, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That sounds fair enough. I guess every administrator uses his or her own parameters to come a decision. And since we never know who is going to step in and make the call, we never really know which way it will go. Makes for an interesting week of give and take. Thanks. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:35, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It does depend on the arguments being put forward, not just the numbers. No might about it. See Wikipedia:Requested moves/Closing instructions#Determining consensus, the lead of which reads Consensus is determined not just by considering the preferences of the participants in a given discussion, but also by evaluating their arguments, assigning due weight accordingly, and giving due consideration to the relevant consensus of the Wikipedia community in general as reflected in applicable policy, guidelines and naming conventions. Can it be plainer than that? Andrewa (talk) 21:03, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Plainer than that...maybe not for the first half but the section after "due consideration" is really open to interpretation. Things are not ridged here and every project has their own guidelines and conventions. Are your closing instructions followed? From experience I can say sometimes and sometimes not. It depends on the reviewer. And also administrators will weigh arguments differently amongst themselves because, well because they are human... it's a tough thankless job for them and they do it voluntarily. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:49, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, our instructions (inclusive our as in including you) are followed. The main difference between acting as a contributor and as an admin is that admins are expected to know and follow the rules, where contributors (including people who may have admin authority but are not acting in the capacity of an admin at the time) are encouraged to be bold. In my experience, admins take this responsibility very seriously, and while there are frequent complaints of bias against admins, it's extremely rare (not unknown but rare) for there to be any substance to them. Andrewa (talk) 02:06, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't say there's bias either. Human nature maybe. And with rules being open to interpretation human nature happens because we are not robots. I've found the vast majority of admins to be pretty darned fair and impartial most of the time. No complaints from me. I was just trying to figure out how these relist and closing things work because in seeing quite a few I couldn't make heads or tails out of how and why things are done. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:12, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Have you previously read the closing instructions, to which I linked above, and if not, do they make it any clearer? I personally think they are remarkably good. They are the result of a lot of effort by a lot of people, and the effort is ongoing, suggestions welcome. Agree that there's a lot of interpretation required, and Wikipedia is anything but perfect. But I also think it has a lot to recommend it, see User:Andrewa/creed for more on this. Yes, human nature does let us down from time to time. My first article was vandalised (there is no other word for it) by an admin in order to make a point. The point was valid, what I had created was a deletable substub; The means of making the point to a newbie was a bit unfortunate IMO, but there was no censure of the admin concerned. And we moved on. Andrewa (talk) 04:36, 25 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Questions[edit]

Copied from Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(use_English)#Discrepancy_in_article:

The opening sentence of this article says: Vladimir Svacina (Czech: Vladimír Svačina; born April 28, 1987) is a Czech professional ice hockey player... The article suggests that there exists an entity called Vladimir Svacina (not English, not Czech, just a nonsense), while the correct name of that person is a Czech translation. This is utterly ridiculous.

I pointed out to this issue at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions. After that, it was slightly modified and subsequently reverted. There are no hard feelings on my part, I enjoy another episode of this comedy :) However, I have a question (more precisely, two questions): Do some of you really think this is encyclopedic? Do some of you want to make this a standard practice? If so, I would recommend to exclude most of the non-English topics from this part of the project. It could help the English Wikipedia, as it would look less comical to the world. Just my opinion. Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 15:32, 28 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's a hot issue and one I'd like to see resolved. It will take a while longer obviously, but I believe it can be resolved. I have seen several issues that looked hopeless come to good conclusions over the years, but all took time.
Yes, Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(use_English)#Discrepancy_in_article makes interesting reading, and there are some real and complex issues. Andrewa (talk) 23:54, 28 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

WP:UE miscited[edit]

WP:UE only gives one example of a Latin-alphabet name: Søren Kierkegaard. In ictu oculi (talk) 13:48, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Move discussion in progress[edit]

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Martin Podesva which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 10:52, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Move discussion in progress[edit]

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Martin Podešva which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 15:01, 2 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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