Talk:Ľubomír Višňovský

WikiPoject: NHL team formats / Using Diacritics in Players' Names
Wasn't it agreed, to have title of European NHL players, written in English? GoodDay 22:06, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
 * What do you mean in English? Is there an English translation, like how Enrique=Henry? If so, please provide it. --Muéro(talk/c) 04:51, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
 * What I mean is 'Lubomir Visnovsky'. This is the English Wikipedia meaning English letters. As an English reader, I can't read 'squares' (that's how they appear, to me). Is their any Japanese names written in Japanese letters, on Euro-Wikipedias? Visnovsky (like the rest of the euro-NHLers), has consented to have his name Anglonized on his NHL jersey, why can't you pro-diacritics to the same? At least compromise, have the 'title' of this page in 'English' (eg 'Lubomir Visnovsky'). GoodDay 02:55, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Looks funny for me too, but I still respect (not saying that you're not) that in his country they spell his name like this and then Wikipedia should spell it like this to. And like Muéro said; There isn't any translation of his name. The japanese language use another writting system and therefore japanese text must be translated to the latin alphabet, slovak language doesn't. --Krm500 04:08, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * No problem, leave it as is (with diacritics), let's just make sure, there's no diacritics on this name in the Los Angeles Kings article. GoodDay 22:39, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Let's also note, the NHLPA's Visnovsky bio page is English titled (with diacritic in content) as well. GoodDay 23:20, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, there's no diacritics in his NHLPA bio content. Hmm. GoodDay 23:28, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

If I understood, diacritics in his name is allowed, but I have to add - his corect name is "Ľubomír Višňovský", so i will move the page --kelovy 08:26, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Are the squares in his name truely neccessary, can't we just use 'dots'? Honestly, I can't read 'square' shapes. GoodDay 17:46, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
 * This is an issue with your browser and the software you use, GoodDay. Wikipedia is fully Unicode (UTF-8)-capable, so there shouldn't be any squares for you to see anywhere. That said, I don't care one way or another regarding this article. The correct Slovak spelling should appear at least once even on the English Wikipedia page, while the rest of the spellings could be Anglicized – or not. Doesn't seem a big issue as long as your browser and software are properly adjusted. --Faterson 20:18, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Support, the title should reflect the english spelling because this is the english wikipedia. His full name spelled correctly should be in the lead. As is common for biographies.MilkStraw532 (talk) 22:39, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. 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. 

The result of the move request was: No Consensus to move at this time. Good arguments on both sides. Everyone made a good case based on policy and guidelines, but no one it seems was swayed either way. Stalemate. Lots of issues to resolve before moves like this should even be proposed. Thanks to those who did some summarizing, it really helps on lengthy discussions like this. Mike Cline (talk) 19:57, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Ľubomír Višňovský → Lubomir Visnovsky – Relisted. Discussion still active. Vegaswikian (talk) 21:28, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support – Per WP:UE and WP:COMMONNAME. Lubomir Visnovsky is a veteran NHL player of over 700 games. He has been playing in North American for almost 12 years, and his name is commonly used in its anglicized f orm. The established Wikipedia policy regarding diacritics is to follow the majority of the English-language reliable sources. All English language sources spell his name without diacritics. A Google search confirms that Lubomir Visnovsky is the COMMON NAME that is most frequently used to refer to the subject:
 * Lubomir Visnovsky = about 295,000 total hits, whereas
 * Ľubomír Višňovský = has only about 5,780 total hits.
 * His Official NHL profile uses name without diacritics and even the name on his sweater is “Visnovsky”. Dolovis (talk) 14:48, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * These ghit counts are embarrassingly wrong. ErikHaugen (talk &#124; contribs) 17:15, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * If that is so, then please feel free to correct them. Regardless of how you might format the query, the ghits count will overwhelmingly support 'Lubomir Visnovsky'. Dolovis (talk) 18:08, 18 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support. ESPN, Los Angeles Times, and CBS Sports give this name without a diacritic. Kauffner (talk) 15:59, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support, as we should go with english language sources. This is the English language Wikipedia. GoodDay (talk) 16:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support: WP:COMMONNAME is official policy of this encyclopedia, and the evidence is overwhelming as to which version of Visnovsky's name is most commonly used in English-language sources.  Ravenswing  18:32, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

As for Mötley Crüe and Häagen-Dasz, neither are words, nor names, let alone English or any other language; they are, rather, Registered Trademarks, as Häagen-Dasz® makes clear at their website. A Trademark has nothing to do with language, or for that matter characters; examples include McDonald's Golden Arches or the Nike Swoosh ; similarly, the combination of English and foreign letters Mötley Crüe, or Häagen-Dasz® are simply a registered brand, which, because of legal considerations, can't be freely copied and are owned by the related corporation; if these things were words, it would actually be impossible to trademark them since words cannot be trademarked, only copyrighted; further, you'll note that the Mötley Crüe web site writes the band's name as Motley Crue and only include the umlauts when they are talking about the brand, i.e. a concert. And by all means, if you think these are words, just paste the English dictionary link for us to check out. If "Ľubomír Višňovský" is a internationally Registered Trademark, please let us know as that changes the conversation entirely. As for Pelé, this is one of the rare occasions where the English RS spell the name more commonly as Pelé than as Pele; this is likely due to the fact that Pelé was an internationally renound personality and resident of a foreign land, when he first started being written about by English press. Of course, Wikipedia should, and does, in accordance with all the policies, follow the English RS and spell the name using non-English characters, in this case the acute accent over the e (which is a common French configuration and much of English stems from a French root); but, of course, none of these deal with things like the caron diacritic, or accents on the y, which are both decidedly un-English. —  Who R you?  Talk 11:07, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support Should go with english language sources, because its the english wikipedia. Besides that no one has those charactors on their keyboard.MilkStraw532 (talk) 18:50, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Per WP:HOCKEY, consistency and common f*ng sense. The diacritic-hating one-man wrecking crew Dolovis has been on a crusade against diacritics for months, if not years, and to such lengths that he even had a page move ban imposed on himself. Nevertheless, he keeps working tirelessly to introduce discrepancy and inconsistency to wikipedia. A good many of us have previously kept an eye on Dolovis's actions, but we have obviously lost focus lately. And now he's back – with a vengeance. He's even using the sweater as an argument. Since when are sweaters a source in wikipedia? Is there a WP:SWEATER guideline? (The reason there's no diacritics on his sweater, by the way, is that he currently plays in NHL, and NHL's official policy is to ignore them. It's not his choice, and it does not mean that his name is spelled without them.) Yes this is the English wikipedia (and not the Simple English one), but so what? Yes, many English language sources skip the diacritics – but it's only for their convenience, they don't claim that this is how the name is spelled. The only sensible thing is to keep all diacritics on names written in alphabets derived from the Latin one. Otherwise we will end up have a virtual mess of kept and thrown discritics. Why don't we rename Mötley Crüe, Häagen-Dasz, Pelé and café too while we're at it? HandsomeFella (talk) 19:52, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: Support for established policy should not be construed as "diacritic-hating". This page move request follows the established Wiki-policy of WP:UE, WP:COMMONNAME, and WP:RS, whereas the recent multiple-page move request made at Talk:Dominik Halmosi by User:HandsomeFella is follows no established policy. Dolovis (talk) 21:23, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * As you yourself usually put it: Rubbish. First, "diacritic-hating" refers to you personally. WP:UE should not be construed as to meaning that diacritics should be ignored. There's nothing that supports your claims there. Instead, your move proposal is contrary to the guidelines at WP:HOCKEY. So, following established policy there, this page should be kept were it is. Why don't you get a life, instead of maintaining your crusade that would ultimately lead to a poorer wikipedia, being much less accurate than it can be? Have you ever imagined a wikipedia void of all diacritics? It would be totally uncyclopedic, totally unreliable, and ultimately totally disregarded in topics unrelated to the English-speaking world. Oh, and your disrupting additions WP:RM to might lead to another round at WP/ANI. HandsomeFella (talk) 21:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Cool off, like I've been doing these last few RMs concerning the dios. GoodDay (talk) 22:18, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Not very big on WP:CIVIL, are you, HandsomeFella? That being said, Wikipedia's definition of "disruptive" isn't "I don't like it."  And that being said, are you seriously suggesting that WP:HOCKEY's now-fraying and always-threadbare gentlemen's agreement supercedes official Wikipedia policy?  Ravenswing  02:04, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I admit I was a bit pissed off when I added my post. But if you had followed Dolovis's actions over the last year, I bet you'd understand. He's been ignoring the WP:HOCKEY guidelines since forever, and if anyone deserves being hit with the I don't like it argument, it's him. First he kept moving pages to diacritic-less versions, against WP:HOCKEY consensus, and despite being repeatedly told that this was violating WP:HOCKEY. Then he edited the redirects so the moves could not reversed without admin help. For this, he was deservedly reported to WP:ANI for gaming the system. A page move ban was ultimately imposed on him as a result. Immediately after that, he instead started peppering WP:RM with move requests along the same old lines. Most (or even all) of them where opposed by the community of editors that by now was keeping an eye on his actions. It seems to me that he's been keeping a low profile for a while, making us lose concentration. But no he's obviously back, trying to sneak in one single move after the other. He's apparently an SPE: he wants to rid wikipedia of all diacritics. That's why I call his additions to WP:RM disruptive.
 * Regarding WP:UE and WP:COMMONNAME, there are no guidelines that support what Dolovis claims, so nothing is really superceded by the WP:HOCKEY guidelines. HandsomeFella (talk) 17:39, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You unfortunately seem to misunderstand North American culture and laws as much as you misunderstand the English language. First, the simple one, "café"; this is the etymological root of, and is an alternative spelling to, the English word "cafe") it is often used in English, with the accent, to give a foreign flair to a coffee shop, but the English word is, none-the-less, "cafe"; and I think you might be right, we probably should look at correcting the WP article's title.


 * Oppose this isn't simple. --—KRM (Communicate!) 23:13, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * What does simple have to do with this issue? And, as an FYI, simple do use diacritics (e.g. Björn Borg). Jenks24 (talk) 07:33, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Diacritics are a part of English language and English Wikipedia and this is not Simple Wikipedia, we do not change people's names and surnames here. - Darwinek (talk) 19:39, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * In reality, only a few hundred words exist in the entire dictionary (of somewhere between 171,476 and 988,968 words) which contain diacritics, and they are all alternative spellings (such as the way the French word "café" is the etymological root of, and is an alternative spelling to, the English word "cafe") to the preferred English spellings (which do not use diacritics); further, no word in the English language has ever used a caron or an acute accent over the y or as a replacement for the dot in the i; therefore, in reality, none of the proposed foreign characters are, in any way, part of English. —  Who R you?  Talk 09:21, 13 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Per WP:HOCKEY and common sense. Accuracy should be before simplicity. --Sporti (talk) 11:03, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Strong Support It is clear why simple nose-counts of the !votes in this RfC don’t cut it and why the closing admin must look at the strength, consistency, and merits of the reasoning to ascertain the true consensus. The move must be made and the article’s spelling made compliant with the rest of the English-speaking world. No legitimate argument has been (nor can be) put forward to justify why this article should be treated differently from our “Marek Zidlicky” and “Milan Jurcina” articles. Lubomir Visnovsky has moved to North America, now plays on the NHL, and his name has clearly become Anglicized through frequent and familiar use in the preponderance of most-reliable English-language RSs. The NHL itself (here) is one of the most reliable RSs and they spell his name without diacritics. So too does The New York Times (here) and Sports Illustrated (here). It is not within the purview of mere wikipedians to pretend to debate—with pouted lower lip—the *proper* practices for the English language, as if they fancy themselves to be soldiers of the God Of Literary Higher Truth (and to help make Slovaks feel their culture is being *embraced*).®™© None of that can possibly justify eschewing one of Wikipedia’s most bedrock principles: follow the RSs. Greg L (talk) 18:32, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It goes without saying that NHL could not count as an RS when it comes to the spelling the names of foreign players – their openly-stated policy of ignoring diacritics obviously disqualifies them in that respect. Or are you saying that the players didn't really know how their names were spelled until they started to play in NHL? NHL are intentionally introducing less than precise spelling, and that says it all.
 * You're right in one respect: the Židlický and Jurčina articles should not be treated differently than this one; they should be moved to their diacritical versions too. A person's name isn't anglicized just because he plays hockey in NHL for a few years. It's the player himself who decides if he wants to officially change his name (probably because he has decided to stay in the US or Canada for good). One such example is Bob Nystrom. Unless a player officially changes his name, dropping the diacritics, we should adhere to the correct spelling.
 * It's a silly notion that the spelling of personal names vary by language. James Bond is not spelled Jämes Bönd in German, Dolovis isn't spelled Døløvis in Danish, and Greg L isn't spelled Grëg L in French. HandsomeFella (talk) 21:00, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Quoting User:HandsomeFella: [The NHL’s] openly-stated policy of ignoring diacritics obviously disqualifies them in that respect. Wow. Under “circular logic”, dictionary’s definitions should say “See User:HandsomeFella’s above argument.” Nice job, BTW, ignoring that inconvenient truth about the practices of The New York Times. They are defined as being an RS in numerous policy pages on Wikipedia. Should we disqualify them too since they embraced a practice regarding the use of diacritics that meets with your disapproval? Why not go to WP:Spelling and replace “The New York Times” with “User:HandsomeFella” so we don’t have new editors running off half-cocked. Earth calling HandsomeFella: It’s not Wikipedia that defines perfect English, that’s done by the rest of the English-speaking world; we follow them. M’kay?? Greg L (talk) 21:59, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Circular? What's circular about it? Are you saying that if you just misspell something intentionally, then it becomes the correct spelling. So, if NHL would declare this is the way we spell Grëg L, it would suddenly become the de facto "correct" spelling?
 * Think this through: 1) is it good if we have consistency in wikipedia? 2) consistency can only be obtained on two ways, either we rid wikipedia of diacritics, or we keep them; and if we rid wikipedia of them, will it be a better place, more correct, more encyclopedic? 3) what harm do they do?
 * In my view, the only sustainable position is that we spell people's names correctly, to the best of our knowledge. That would be the most encyclopedic. HandsomeFella (talk) 20:55, 9 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support — The policies and RS only support a move. The RS could not be clearer; Google results are: Foreign spelling – "Ľubomír Višnovský" – News: zero – Books: zero; compare with English spelling – "Lubomir Visnovsky" – News: 74 – Books: 115; the reality is that those opposing this move would be unable to provide a single WP:RS capable to proving that their version of spelling is similar to how this name might be spelled in a foreign language; perhaps the non-English spelling is really "Łǖƃǒɰɨŗ Ṽḭṩṋṏṽšǩỷ", we don't know because there isn't one reliable source that spells it in any form other than the requested destination of "Lubomir Visnovsky".
 * But, of course, WP Policy isn't "find some single source that backs up a foreign looking spelling and go with that because it makes us feel like we're superior to the stupid population of English speaking countries and we will get a kick out of telling them how stupid they are for not recognizing how much better our mother-tongue is when compared to theirs"; as a matter of fact policy is article titles on English Wikipedia follow the most common name used in English reliable sources. I'll provide the relevant sections of the policies below (as they appeared for Zidlicky and Jurcina and as the policies have themselves existed, based on consensus, going back to the founding of Wikipedia); if one of the oh-so-vocal pro-diacritic group, who claim that policy is not follow the English RS to determine English spelling, would care to provide their interpretation of these policies, I would be interested to see how an ESL translation of repeated statements in plain English end up meaning the opposite of what they say.  And as indicated in WP:CONSENSUS, relevant sections of which are also cited below, secret agreements made in private by small groups like WP:Hockey, in an attempt to re-write English through back-room private deals, (given that all attempts to gain consensus to change the existing policies to use English have failed), are specifically identified as carrying no weight in WP.  The fact that a small group of like-minded ESL editors got together and usurped WP:Hockey as the vehicle for their anti-English tear through en.WP does not replace the global en.WP policies developed by consensus.  The members of WP:Hockey like to repeatedly argue that they are justified in moving countless (thousands) of articles to foreign spellings because there is no consensus and therefore the dozen or so editors from WP:Hockey get go create their own rules and run around en.WP saying we've decided, as per WP:Hockey; but a reality check paints an entirely different picture; the reality is that there is no consensus to change the existing policies on the use of diacritics; several thousand attempts have been made, including countless proposals to change existing WP policy, and they have all failed; but these ridiculous claims that, because proposals to change the agreed policies continually fail, this somehow means that the agreed policies are null and void is stupid and goes against even the most common of common sense.  The policies are as they have always been, WP:EN, WP:UCN, WP:DIACRITIC, and WP:UE all clearly establish, that English Wikipedia decides the titles of articles on the basis of the most common English spelling as determined by the English RS, period.  One has to shake one's head after trying to follow the lunacy of the arguments from the other side, that WP:Hockey's private little agreement supersedes accepted consensus policy because consensus doesn't support WP:Hockey's proposed changes.  And the fact that this scheme would appear to be being undertaken by a group of admins, who on the one hand propose the policies to convert en.WP to non-English, while alternatively using their authority as admins to make mass moves and reversions, and worse, bully other editors in bureaucratic processes like ANI, is quite simply sickening.
 * As for these constant attacks focused squarely on, I am quite honestly offended to see such slanted, biased attacks against an editor who, from all appearances, is attempting to do what he feels is right, to follow policy established by consensus, and to fight against back-door politics at WP:Hockey. Having read some of the numerous discussions at ANI, it seems that the same group of admins and editors whose names appear on many of these move discussions as part of the pro-diacritic movement are the same ones voting to ban Dolovis from moving articles to adhere with policy because the consensus policies fly in the face of the secret agreements, enforced by this small group of admins, in furtherance of their usurpation of WP:Hockey and consensus based democracy.  The fact is that a review of the countless moves to diacritics, made by some of the editor/admins participating above, demonstrates that they are in direct opposition to the WP:RS as was the case when this article was moved to its present foreign spelling without so much as a single supporting source.  And clearly Dolovis has made a few minor mistakes in dealing with people in the past, as every human being (including myself, and every other WP editor) has, but the difference appears to be that in his case those missteps are used as justification for something resembling a witch-hunt more than a considered discussion of any minor violation of guidelines, which in this case resulted in a baseless decision for a move ban against the editor who was following policy, while the admin who consistently conducts moves in violation of consensus policy is protected by their admin buddies who conspired with them to come up with WP:Hockey's anti-English, consensus opposed, non-policy to begin with.  Serious flaws and abuses at Wikipedia begin to become apparent.
 * But ignoring that digression, on the topic of this move, the RS, the backbone of Wikipedia, indisputably support the move to the man's name in North America, which is "Lubomir Visnovsky". And while the foreign, ESL editors and admins who oppose this move might have their hearts set on dictating English spelling to the English world, the truth of the matter is that we (of which I am one, and which I know, from living in an English country, having travelled in English countries, and having spoken with countless native English speakers, the vast majority of English speakers agree that we) reserve the right to determine what the English spelling of names are, that our media and press (i.e. the RS) represent and present our views of what the proper English spelling of a name is, and in this case (as with almost every case of individuals immigrating to an English speaking country) the English name does not contain diacritics.
 * For those who oppose this move to the English form, while I certainly recognize that you don't think that we have the right to determine English spelling of names and you believe that it is your inherent right as a citizen of a non-English country to dictate to the English speaking world how English should be spelled, and what our policies should be on the use of English, the fact is (without any real intention to offend you) I personally don't care what you think on this topic; I don't give you the authority to dictate to the English world, or to English Wikipedia, what our policies must be, with regard to spelling of foreign names or anything else; and I challenge you to follow WP policy and cite a preponderance of English sources that support your demands that the English language double the size of its alphabet because we've developed computers capable of generating the symbols. And please ensure that your citations include links to the relevant sections that backup your claims so that the rest of us don't have to waste our time, searching in vain, for statements that don't exist or that aren't supportive of your interpretations. —   Who R you?  Talk 00:49, 7 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support per WP:UE, WP:UCN, WP:OFFICIALNAME, WP:COMMONSENSE, WP:RS. 65.94.77.11 (talk) 10:48, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose per our de facto policy, WP:NOT (the likes of sources presented here are known to disagree with encyclopedias and dictionaries), the BLP principle that we must get the article right, the practices of other English-language encyclopedias and the recommendations of authoritative style manuals. The common name here is Ľubomír Višňovský. The common spelling is "Lubomir Visnovsky", but this is a grammatical error ("Common errors of grammar are: comma splices, mixing tenses, using “however” as a conjunction, confusing “its” and “it’s,“ confusing “that” and “which,” and not putting in diacritical marks in foreign words or names. [emphasis mine]") The idea that we should deliberately propagate common errors and misconceptions is contrary to the goal of building a high-quality encyclopedia. No amount of wikilawyering, alphabet soup or policy interpretations that ignore the spirit or the letter of core policies, or both, can justify such silliness. Prolog (talk) 13:12, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment That is not a WP:POLICY, that is a list article. 65.94.77.11 (talk) 14:07, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Which is probably why he said defacto, he is showing that even if the written word says one thing that actual actions on the wiki show otherwise. And since our written policies are supposed to reflect what actually happens we have a defacto policy of using them. -DJSasso (talk) 14:16, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Really? See my above “Ditto” post for why “de facto actions” of some well meaning wikipedians—who like the concept of, as you say, the written word says one thing that actual actions on the wiki show otherwise—will seldom be pleased with RfCs like this. Why? Because aberrations like that are not allowed to persist once exposed: we would otherwise end up with Wikipedia running off *being unique* and talking about “256 mebibytes of memory” despite what the rest of the English-speaking world does and the project would look foolish as a result. Wikipedia actually did that insanity (mebibytes and kibibits) for three years—just because a local cabal voted to do so. Eschewing the vast majority of most-reliable English-language RSs is just soooo bankrupt of a notion. One of the proponents of doing precisely this (ignoring the RSs)—right here on this page—declared that since the NHL has a stated policy of not using diacritics in these circumstances, (and since this is an outcome he doesn’t like) the NHL can’t be properly regarded as an RS. (Wow…) Perhaps The New York Times must also be invalidated as an RS because they apparently have an unstated policy of not using diacritics in this regard (and the above editor thinks that to be a poopy thing). Gee, if I see reasoning like that actually gain any traction, I think I’ll try some of it myself on other wiki-issues. I’m sure there are all sorts of motivations of some editors here to advocate that Wikipedia should ignore how the rest of the English-speaking world handles the spelling of Visnovsky’s name. However, the rules Wikipedia has for governing this are clear. That inconvenient truth seems to have left the proponents of defying the RSs with little recourse but to use arguments that crumble under even the slightest critical scrutiny—like the one that goes “The NHL must not be an RS ‘cause they don’t use diacritics.” Fortunately, Wikipedia is generally pretty good at assigning admins who are sharp and on-task at closing these RfCs. They tend to do a pretty good job of looking at the stated reasoning behind these !votes to see if they have weight and consistency and are well grounded in our policies, which is a strong factor in determining what a consensus is. Greg L (talk) 17:04, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * All I was pointing out was that Wikipedia's guidelines are descriptive not prescriptive. Currently they don't clearly explain what the actual practice of the wiki is. The vast majority of articles on this wiki in any subject that require diacritics have them. As such to say it goes against our guidelines is a bit of a farce as our guidelines should actually be describing that they are used in most cases. Your example of megabytes is different, that word isn't someones proper name. Proper names don't change simply by dropping the diacritics. That is factually incorrect, even if the New York Times does it. If you are going to make the name english by properly translating/transliterating it to its correct spelling then by all means. But that usually does not mean simply dropping the diacritics. Any sources which do just drop the diacritics are making errors. Now whether or not that makes them unreliable that can be debated, but generally factual errors render a source unreliable for that topic. (in this case spelling of names with diacritics) -DJSasso (talk) 19:11, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * NYT's policy on diacritics is based on the fact that it's a newspaper targeted for a specific and limited audience, and that getting diacritics right consistently would be a hassle for them. They do not claim that this is a good practice in English generally: "Accent marks are used for French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and German words and names. [...] Do not use accents in words or names from other languages (Slavic and Scandinavian ones, for example), which are less familiar to most American writers, editors and readers; such marks would be prone to error, and type fonts often lack characters necessary for consistency." It is good to note that the most respected American newspaper is the one that most often uses diacritics (as far as I know). In the UK, the situation seems to be the same with The Guardian and The Times. Prolog (talk) 07:41, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You mean NYT targets its english readers. GoodDay (talk) 13:38, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Ditto A list of Slovaks is not a WP:POLICY, de facto or otherwise, and certainly does not override WP:RS. The “oppose” reasoning on this page all amounts to “forget what the RSs do; we know what is best.” Our three-year-long fiasco with writing garbage like “the computer came stock with 256 MiB of random access memory” serves as a paradigm of what happens when a cabal of wikipedians set off to ignore what the rest of the English-speaking press does and instead do something that is more *righteous*. It’s folly, which is why WP:RS exists, including for spelling (see WP:Spelling). Greg L (talk) 15:59, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The list article shows the established practice on the issue (WP:NOTBURO). There are no clear written rules on the interwiki sorting order either, but through practice one format turned into a de facto policy. The verifiability of this person's name is not in doubt, so I don't know why you bring up WP:RS. Your spelling link seems to be about variations of English. Proper names are covered by WP:MOSPN and the Paul Erdős example is suitable here; the common spelling is "Paul Erdos", followed by "Paul Erdös", but we still use the rare but correct double acute. Prolog (talk) 07:41, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose per Prolog. The defacto policy on the wiki is to use them. It is clear by the tens of thousands of articles in all subjects that this is the case. The guidelines already clearly allow for this albeit should obviously be written clearer so as to stop this constant fighting to remove them by those who just don't like them. -DJSasso (talk) 13:22, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose Removing the diacritics looks ridiculous. So what if any English-language newspaper has bad keyboards lacking keys for inputting diacritics? Using a bad keyboard doesn't make anything more English than using a good keyboard. This person doesn't have any English name. --Stefan2 (talk) 01:08, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: This person doesn't have any English name. Really? An overwhelming abundance of English-language reliable sources show otherwise, and his English name is spelled Lubomir Visnovsky. 13:37, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * An English-language reliable source needs to use some name for people mentioned in the source. This doesn't make the name English, though. Typically, people only possess real names in one language, and so reliable sources in other languages are required to use a real name written in a language different from the language of the rest of the text in the source. In this case, the person doesn't have an English real name, so English reliable sources are required to use two Slovak words (his first name and his last name) instead of two English words. Similarly, if an English reliable source mentions a French or German book title, this doesn't make the French or German book title into something in English. If the book doesn't have an English translation, using the original title (which is not in English) is typically the best option in English reliable sources. --Stefan2 (talk) 14:22, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Question/Comment. It strikes me that we discussed this precise issue, just days ago. Are we really going to discuss the same issue, on bios ... one-by-one?  That seems an awful waste of time for people on both sides of the issue.  Am I missing something?  If not, shouldn't this be centralized in some manner?  For the benefit of all involved?--Epeefleche (talk) 18:41, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It has been discussed centrally recently. With an almost exact 50-50 !vote on the issue. Basically the wiki declared a great big no-confidence on the policies that the people here keep quoting as being what the wiki believes in when really the wiki had an RFC and quite clearly said we don't agree with those policies. -DJSasso (talk) 13:20, 10 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment. As has been stated earlier, but deserves repeating No legitimate argument has been (nor can be) put forward to justify why this article should be treated differently from our “Marek Zidlicky” and “Milan Jurcina” articles.  For the usual suspects to continue to flog their POV of opposition, which is unsupportable by any wiki-policy, must now be viewed as disruptive. Dolovis (talk) 19:04, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll make one right now. How about all of the RMs that haven't succeeded through your POV RM move process? It's funny how you argue that those who support dios are being disruptive, when you fail to consider that you ignore any evidence that opposes your stance? Doesn't that make you disruptive for not being open to democratic debate. Democratic debate is the foundation of Wikipedia, so for you to suggest that having people oppose your view is disruptive really goes against what the Wiki stands for. – Nurmsook!  talk...  00:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose: An issue that will never die. Some Wikipedians interpret policy to make their argument that dios do belong on the Wiki. Other Wikipedians interpret policy to make their argument that dios do not belong on the Wiki. Problem is just that; interpretation. No policy says that they do belong, and no policy says that they do not belong. All of these move debates are simply endless arguments that will be won by whichever side has more of their supporters notice this RM. It's so sad that this will forever keep going on, wasting everyone's time and energy to contribute to Wikipedia. – Nurmsook!  talk...  00:25, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment/Reply: You wrote: All of these move debates are simply endless arguments that will be won by whichever side has more of their supporters notice this RM. That would be sad if it were true, but thankfully Wikipedia's policy is that this move will not be decided based on a head count, but on the strength of the arguments presented. Wikipedia administrators understand and accept that it is their role to enforce established policy. Specifically on point is the policy of WP:UCN which says that we are to use, for the article title, the name that is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources, and there is no policy that is more fundamental to the principles of Wikipedia than Reliable Sources. Dolovis (talk) 02:10, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: And no such argument is the underpinning for the proposed page move. To suggest that "diacriticals don't belong on Wikipedia" is the stance in question is a straw man.  That is blatantly incorrect.  Obviously, in all cases where diacriticals in a proper name is the most common usage in English-language sources, that is the version which should be the title of any such article.  This has nothing to do with a putative WP:IHATEDIOS.  It is a matter of WP:COMMONNAME.  Nor is this a matter of policy being "interpreted" by the pro-diacritical troops; it is a matter of relevant policies being ignored outright, between "Oh, we've done it this way," "Oh, this is the way they do it in other languages/on other wikis" and the ever-popular "It's not our fault if English keyboards aren't properly designed."  Come now ... what "interpretation" of WP:COMMONNAME is being proffered by the Oppose advocates here?  Ravenswing  02:15, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Those opposing this move interpret common names the same way as all professional publications. Or can you name even one publication that uses common spellings with the proper names of European people? For example, Britannica (their policy: "Title: the personal name by which the subject is best known") uses correct spellings, complete with the (common or uncommon) diacritics. The fact is that some sources usually retain the marks (reference works and scholarly journals) and some don't (newspapers and sports writing), but all agree on one thing; consistency. We too have consistency as one of the criteria on WP:AT, so the established practice does matter. Prolog (talk) 08:06, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The Britannica has its rules, absolutely, and I expect that entries conform to them. Wikipedia has its rules, and we expect that entries conform to them.  The "consistent" approach ought to be in accordance with those rules, and WP:COMMONNAME is clear on what the pertinent rule here is.  If you disagree with that, you should be on COMMONNAME's talk page seeking consensus to overturn it.  Have you been?  Ravenswing  14:49, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * To be fair WP:DIACRITICS does emphasize that you should use them based on the common use in encyclopedias and reference works. So there is policy that makes his statement relevant. The argument of course is always what is the more important one...wp:commonname or wp:diacritics. -DJSasso (talk) 16:50, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Overturn which rule exactly? I'll clarify my position a bit: Not only does COMMONNAME not advocate for common spellings, it points out that factually incorrect names, even if most common, are often avoided. Per several reliable sources, the stripping of diacritics proposed here leads to a common but incorrect spelling and should therefore be avoided. Prolog (talk) 17:22, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry Prolog, but I have to call bullshit on that one. COMMONNAME makes no reference to factually incorrect names. Where are you getting this stuff from? COMMONNAME refers to the name most commonly used in English-language reliable sources. Dolovis (talk) 18:03, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * From the very first paragraph: "ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined by reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources." Prolog (talk) 18:39, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * And that has always been my point...and why I have zero problem with names that are properly translated from diacritics. ie not the ones that just strip them off the letter so ö becomes o. When the correct translation would be oe. (in the case of German) -DJSasso (talk) 20:26, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: Also, it's not unreasonable to expect 'english only' readers be given preferential treatement - when it comes to making sure English-language Wikipedia is readible. GoodDay (talk) 02:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support. This is an unfortunate waste of the time of lots of good editors, as it seems to be popping up w/regard to more than one athlete.  The discussion seems repetitive to what editors have said before.  I find the views of the supporting editors to be more policy-based and logic-based, and therefore think that view should prevail as it did in the instance of the last hockey player where we discussed this.  It will also be unfortunate if the habit of discussing it as to player after player seriatum continues ... we need the talents of the editors in this discussion in other areas, where they will do more than simply repeat themselves endlessly, on tp after tp.--Epeefleche (talk) 17:43, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
 * So the opposition is simply tossing out nonsense? How are the arguments of the supporters more logical or policy based? The first paragraph of COMMONNAME reads, "ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined by reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources". This is exactly what's going on with diacritics in names. And what is more logical than leaving diacritics in names? An 'ö' is not the same as an 'ô', but because this is Wikipedia both an 'ö' and an 'ô', two completely different letters, are considered to be another different letter, an 'o'? How is that logical? How is it at all logical to take two different things and say they are the same as another different thing? Is a '-1' the same thing as a '+1' because they both have some fashion of the number 1? Not at all, yet we are supposed to apply that logic to letters? 1=1=1 and o=o=o, but -1≠1 and ö≠ô≠o. See the math, it works from grammar too. – Nurmsook!  talk...  02:19, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You ignored my main point -- that making the same points, on tp after tp, is a waste of everyones' time. It may scratch an itch for some people with certain disorders/syndromes, but it is a waste of time.  Of good editors.  On both sides of the issue.  As to the "arguments", I find the supporters to have the better argument, for the reasons outlined above (and on other talkpages).  Frankly, I don't see much difference in your arguments between using diacritics and in using Japanese (where the name is Japanese), and Hebrew (where the name is Hebrew), etc.  Just make a redirect of the diacritic in these circumstances.  No need for diacritics, and Japanese, and Hebrew as the primary form of the name.  This is especially true where the people are notable, as here, performing in uniforms that don't even bear the diacritics ... this is about as "worst case" as one can get for those seeking to require that diacritics be in the primary form of the name used.--Epeefleche (talk) 08:47, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I couldn't agree with you more; and without a doubt all of the English editors here would like to be spending their time concentrating on productive work on articles. All the efforts wasted on these and the countless other RMs, without any real benefit to the readers and the project as a whole, are a complete waste of time; but if those of us for whom English is our native language don't waste our time to defend en.WP against this small group of non-English editors, apparently bend on a private agenda of converting English into esperonto or something equivalently meaningless, then the English readers, the ones for whom we're all contributing our time, suffer.  Apparently some of us must sacrifice our production to prevent en.WP from becoming the fore-runner to Blade Runners &apos;Portu-Greek&apos; multi-lingual non-language.  Personally, I wouldn't donate my time to a multi-lingual encyclopedia; and perhaps that's just one more reason why tens of thousands of editors are leaving WP; at this point it's hard justifying wasting my time to help all the foreigners in this discussion, and other RMs, practice their English and debating skills.  Maybe at some point we'll be able to get enough of the English editors to recognize that if we all just invest a little bit of time and revise the policies to prevent these constant arguments and move wars we could all enjoy spending some time making en.WP better.  But somehow that appears less and less likely; but then I suppose the proper attitude would be Churchill's "We will never surrender".  Cheers —   Who R you?  Talk 07:38, 13 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment: Holy smokes. Orlandkurtenbach (talk) 21:04, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose, per HandsomeFella. bobrayner (talk) 17:28, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose as per WP:BLP and WP:COMMONNAME avoid inaccurate titles, be correct about persons. --OpenFuture (talk) 18:04, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment all the non-Latin-derived character names are highly inaccurate, so we should move them all to their original native scripts? And they will be more common in their native forms. Indeed, Greek names will likely be more recognizable to anglophones than the diacritics found here, since Greek letters are taught as part of math and science the world over. 70.24.248.23 (talk) 22:52, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * As far as I can tell, this name is not using a non-Latin script. Hence that argument is irrelevant. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:27, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support I looked at this this way. He's made his notability in North America, so I think his (most) common name is without the diacritics. While his birth name is probably the same as the article title, (and really if you want to argue -that- then provide the official source - not that I doubt it) there doesn't seem to be any evidence that he's objected to the common English spelling without the diacritics. He's been living and working in North America for over ten years. And the amount of references to the non-diacritic spelling is overwhelming. Especially due to playing in Los Angeles, I think. Regrets to Prolog, I think those persons made their notability in Slovakia, not here in North America. If he had played only in Europe, I would have no objection to the use of the diacritics, as there would be little or no English sources. And we cannot blame bad keyboards or old dated references, as Visnovsky is a current player. I don't agree that using the non-diacritical spelling would hurt wikipedia. Certainly not in this case. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 23:54, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose We all know that counting google hits is not research, we also know that removing diacritics doesn't make a name English – it just makes it WRONG. The drive to encyclopaedic quality must mean we ought to do our best to achieve accuracy of a subject's name so long as it can be verified, even if it may disappoint some among us – though it cannot in principle disappoint if there are redirects in place allowing us to find articles. -- Ohconfucius  ¡digame! 02:44, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment I think it is relevant in this case, as it is a person who is currently engaged in the activity which has made him notable. This is the media of today. We are not talking about right or wrong here. And that, in any case, is of course, subjective. Overwhelming, the person is known by the non-diacritical spelling. There is no indication that the person has objected to his coverage. (There are athletes who have gotten diacritics on their jerseys, in LA, in fact) Besides, the media which discusses his play, while it may be not scientific or encyclopedic, would considered to be the equivalent of his peers, to compare to a serious topic, such as science. This is everyday stuff, not particle physics. We should judge similarly. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 15:15, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * We are talking about right and wrong here. Per We must get the article right. (emphasis in original) Common name specifically says to not use inaccurate names. Stripping diacritics without properly translating them is inaccurate plane and simple. Just because this is sports does not mean it should not have the same level of coverage and scrutiny that science does in an encyclopedia. We are not writing for a sports mag, we are writing for an encyclopedia which is an academic work. -DJSasso (talk) 15:44, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * But what you don't seem to grasp (or, prefer not to) is that rendering the name in English format, without diacritics, would be "getting it right". That is the way his name appears in the vast majority of English-language sources. And if anyone wanted to know how his name appeared in Slovak, it'd be in the first line of the article, in brackets. Or they could follow the interwiki link to the article on the Slovak WP (oh, whaddyaknow! there isn't one!) Swanny18 (talk) 20:57, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I repeat: Removing diacritics does not make it English, nor does it make it into an "English format". To do that you would need to translate or transliterate. "Björn" would then be eitehr "Bear" (English) or some transliteration like "Bjoern" (English format). "Bjorn" continues to not be English in any way shape or form, It's just misspelled Swedish. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:28, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Except that it wouldn't be the getting it right, because its a mistake, its not a proper translation. Per WP:COMMONNAME inaccurate names even if used more often in reliable sources should not be used. -DJSasso (talk) 16:20, 18 November 2011 (UTC)


 * "Morally right or wrong." Wikipedia is a fascinating place. Want to make a point? Use a shortcut. Is it useful in context? Hmm. And Wikipedia is not an academic work. Otherwise, we would use full names, not common names. How could you possibly think that? There may be some articles that are peer-reviewed, but this is not a peer-reviewed journal. Get off that line of thinking. Accuracy or inaccuracy is determined by reliable sources, not my opinion or yours. (That's the context missing from using a shortcut) I don't go for this hard-headed thinking about names, unless we had a policy to not use common names at all. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 17:25, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It most certainly is an academic work. It is an encyclopedia. I did not say it was a peer-reviewed journal. But it is higher than just your average sports rag. You are correct that reliable sources are used. But that is the problem, determining what is reliable. Frankly I think your position is the hard-headed thinking about names so that is a bit of a misnomer to say that. Our common name policy specifically mentions to not use common names when they are inaccurate even if they are used more often in reliable sources. So our common name policy already accounts for this issue and says don't use the common name when it is inaccurate which is what simply stripping the diacritic off is instead of translating it. -18:57, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I disagree. You are twisting this by taking one sentence. Sam Cooke should be Samuel Cook under your analogy. Cooke is the accurate common name, but clearly the inaccurate legal name of the person. Of course, there is a diff between Sam Cooke being adopted, and Lubomir Visnovsky being imposed, but I think the effect is the same for the purposes of determining a "common name" for the person. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 21:13, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't think misspellings and nicknames are really comparable. --OpenFuture (talk) 22:27, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Do -you- determine which is which? Or do you use reliable sources? ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 23:44, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It's self-evident. "Sam" is short for "Samuel". "Visnovsky" is "Višňovský" stripped of diacritics. There is no possibility to confuse one case for the other. --OpenFuture (talk) 04:57, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
 * So, to be clear, your answer is 'yes' -you- do, and not the sources. Cooke is not any kind of nickname for Cook. Look up the Sam Cooke article. I am willing to go along with consensus, but I dislike this 'right or wrong' thinking. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 15:21, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Ditto for Ringo Starr and Richard Starkey, however I think that if he were a Slovak drummer whose native spelling was “Richard Štařkeý”, that the oppose vote would be pushing for that monstrosity to be used as the article's title there also. Dolovis (talk) 18:30, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, Sam Cooke is a "nickname" (or in this case a stage name) for Samuel Cook. We have sources to support this. "Starkey" is not a nickname for "Štařkeý", and nobody pushes for using even Richard Starkey as the article name. His common name is Ringo Starr. Bjorn is not a nickname for Björn, it is a misspelling. I don't really see what is confusing here. --OpenFuture (talk) 02:47, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It's pretty simple. In the English world, Visnovsky only attained notability here in North America. His name, as backed by however many references there are here, does not contain the diacritics. That's what I would call his common, nick, or stage name. (What else would you call it, but not a name?) Similarly for Cooke, he had no notability as Samuel Cook. He achieved notability as Sam Cooke. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 16:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * No, a nickname and a misspelling are two completely different things. Proper translation rules determine if it is a misspelling, just like a dictionaries determine spelling. And Ringo Starr is a pseudonym again a completely different situation. -DJSasso (talk) 22:21, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
 * And are you going to properly translate the names into English so that en.WP can follow the consensus policy and use English article names? No, because if you did that would be OR, so we leave it to the RS to determine proper translation, and the fact is that they have determined that the proper translation is "Lubomir Visnovsky".  If you've got RS that says the proper translation is something else, just provide the source.  If you've got a book from some guy somewhere that said: 'Hey, I think everyone should use this method to translate Slavic names to English', then the fact is, the peer-review of that guy's work is that it has been rejected by the majority of his peers, the English media, and they have decided that the proper translation is to drop the diacritics, the fact that you and the rest think they're wrong is your collective OR and POV, but that isn't a source.  If you're right it should be quite easy to find some reliable sources to back you up, if some 295,000 people (or if that's only 29,500 in reality) have written about him and 98% of the time have said that the English spelling is diacritics dropped, if 74 newspaper articles and 115 books have said the same and not one other English media or publishing source has disagreed, where do you 11 Wikipedia editors get off claiming &apos;They're all wrong; I'm a wikipedia editor and I know the truth!&apos;?  I'm sure you'd think anyone else, making that kind of claim in regards to any other topic, was incredibly arrogant to assume that the press and publishers are fools. —   Who R you?  Talk 03:57, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not a matter of translating. The translation of Björn Borg is "Bear Fortress", not "Bjorn Borg". "Bjorn" is not a translation of "Björn", it's a misspelling. Foreign names do not become English names by any changes in spelling, they remain foreign. "Mao Zedong" is not a translation of "毛泽东" it is a transliteration. The name remains Chinese, not English. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * To an 'english-only' reader, these markings are decorative but not educational. So, why force them on 'english only' readers? GoodDay (talk) 06:31, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * They are only non-educational if you refuse to be educated. And many (if not most) readers of Wikipedia understand more languages than English. A better question (but still not a good one)would be why you want to force through uneducated misspellings, just because a minority doesn't understand that they are misspellings. As you say, to those who knows nothing about foreign languages it's just "decoration". So what is the problem with keeping them? --OpenFuture (talk) 06:53, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * 'Cuz, they're annoying. GoodDay (talk) 07:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, that's the first argument for removing them I've seen for months that at least makes sense and isn't based on racism or ignorance. I don't think it's a sufficient argument, but that's a matter of opinion I guess. --OpenFuture (talk) 08:05, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * First of all, I'd love to see your OR that "many (if not most) readers of Wikipedia understand more languages than English."  I think you either meant editors, as opposed to readers, or when you said of Wikipedia did you mean of the combination of all language versions of Wikipedia?  And secondly, from your OR, how many of these English readers understand the Slavic alphabet and languages?  (And I hope you'll pardon me because I've made the rest of this argument many times now, though I'm still not particularly efficient at it.)   Now personally I'd say that the people most likely to use an encyclopedia, particularly the free English WP, are going to be kids/teens especially in terms of using it as a reference (total assumption), I also assume that he (implied, or she) is EFL (First) and perhaps EOL (Only) (as opposed to ESL); where an adult's using it, it's likely for curiosity or as a source of initial sources if they're looking to be confidently accurate.  So dealing with the kids, what are we telling the 10&minus;12 year old that reads this article; well, first we're saying "Ľubomír Višňovský" is English and that "&thinsp; Ľ &thinsp;", "&thinsp; š &thinsp;", "&thinsp; ň &thinsp;", and "&thinsp; ý &thinsp;" are letters in the English language; and I say that because our policy, as an English Encyclopedia, is that we print the most common English names for things as the article title; and when you disagree, as I'm sure you'll feel compelled, please tell me: Where in the existing article do we tell the 10-year-old what the English spelling of this name is?

So now that you've told this 10-year-old that, as a native speaker/reader/writer of English, he is expected to know, memorize, read, write, pronounce, and correct the errors of others in relation to the "&thinsp; Ľ &thinsp;", "&thinsp; š &thinsp;", "&thinsp; ň &thinsp;", and "&thinsp; ý &thinsp;" (plus the 100 or so other letters with diacritics in the Slavic language that en.WP has told him are English), what about the other English letters; the ones from German and French, and Spanish, Italian, Mexican, Greek, Portuguese, Icelandic, Vietnamese, Japanese, Arabic, Hebrew, Chinese, and Cyrillic to name a few, because of course as English countries, unlike your country of Sweden, we aren't some tiny little minority who interact with three or four countries next door to us; for example from here in North America, just about everything on the planet except Australia, the Antarctic, and parts of Russia are geographically closer to us that Slovakia, the total population of the country is less than the metropolitan area of the city I'm in; in short, the entire country rates somewhere around the level of passing interest for us. And don't get me wrong, I'm not implying that there is anything at all wrong with the country, they no doubt have many interesting things and no doubt many nice people, but the odds of any resident of an English country ever knowingly meeting someone from Slovakia, or travelling to Slovakia, or having anything in their life be in any way influenced by anything happening in Slovakia are slim to none.

And I realize that, as a Swede, you probably don't give a damn about the English children that will use WP (other that the common decent compassion you no doubt have for every child of humanity), but I expect that you might understand that we care about them, and we recognize that lying to them by telling them that English is a language of 400&minus;500 symbols (which is what it would be once we include all the alphabet characters that are more important to us that Slavic), and by telling them that our media and publishers are morons who are incapable of spelling a name (when the truth is they simply do what we expect and write in English) will be harmful to them; and we are unwilling to be harmful to them. So there's your answer about what the harm is in keeping them. We should, of course, follow WP Policy which says to include the foreign spelling of the name in parenthesis, in the first sentence, and indicate to our children, and anyone else that cares to know, what the proper foreign spelling is, but we should also indicate that it is foreign, and we should follow consensus policy and have the name of the article reflect the most common English name with the most common English spelling.

Now if you know of a more common English spelling (with reference to an RS, of course, since we provide references for everything) then by all means tell us and we'll see if there isn't support to move the article to the most common English spelling as per your RS. And yes, we refuse to allow you to forcibly educate our children in your, or any other, foreign language; we do however, always seek to provide them with access to information, for them to absorb at their own pace, and thus I believe I mentioned earlier that we provide the foreign spelling, in parenthesis, in the first sentence of the article; perhaps not surprisingly that is part of WP:EN policy. And finally, the fact is that "Lubomir Visnovsky" is as much a misspelling of "Ľubomír Višňovský" as "Mikhail Gorbachev" is a misspelling of "Михаил Горбачёв", in other words, it isn't a misspelling, it is English; and I'd appreciate if you'd stop referring to English as a misspelling. —  Who R you?  Talk 09:56, 17 November 2011 (UTC)


 * No I don't mean editors. It's simple and trivial maths. There are about 1 to 1.5 billion people who understand English. There are some 300-400 million who has it as their first language. Many of those 400 million also speak a second language, as many of them are immigrants, Latinos or studies French in school. A wild guess is that about 100-300 million people in the world speak English and only English. As compared to around one billion who speak English + one or more other languages. The readers of Wikipedia who understand more than just English outnumber those who understand only English probably somewhere between 3:1 to 10:1. Your assumptions that only kids read Wikipedia it pretty absurd. I'm sure the demographic is younger than the average population because it's on the internet, but then again the younger demographic of non-English people are also more likely to understand English than the older one, so that doesn't help your case at all. Almost everyone that goes to high school anywhere in the world today will be studying English.
 * Yet again, you need only to understand the Slavic alphabet if you are intending to correctly pronounce Slavic words and names. And since, once again, this is not about pronunciation but spelling, that's irrelevant. All you need to do is to be able to read and recognize the letters, and as has been proven here over and over, English-only speakers like you have no problem whatsoever to strip diacritics from these letters. So it's not an issue.
 * No-one expects ten-year olds or anyone else to know how to correct or even pronounce these letters. And is that relevant? No. Because we are now talking about the article *name*. So even if Ľubomír Višňovský is renamed Lubomir Visnovsky the first line in the article is still "Ľubomír Višňovský (born August 11, 1976) is a Slovak professional ice hockey defenceman currently playing for the Anaheim Ducks of the National Hockey League (NHL)." That's full of diacritics, not to mention the IPA. Nobody is expected to understand or be able to correct that. Wikipedia works on the principle that this information is included for those who *do* understand it, and that it is corrected by those in the know, and referenced with reliable sources. Your arguments only make sense if you are trying to remove all usage of diacritics everywhere in Wikipedia (and for that matter all usage of IPA as well). Is that what you want? Don't you think that's a pretty absurd standpoint?
 * And I realize that, as a Swede, you probably don't give a damn about the English children - I realize it's hard to not judge others by yourself, but please do make an effort. Just because you would like other languages to disappear doesn't mean that I'm the same (although admittedly, I'd also want all other languages than English to go away, I such at learning new languages and would want to use English everywhere).
 * Now if you know of a more common English spelling - Once again, and this will be repeated until you finally understand, even if it takes years: There is no English spelling. These are foreign names. They are not English names. The concept of an "English spelling" of these names is fundamentally mistaken. You can translate them to English. But you can not spell them to English. The English translation of "Björn Borg" is "Bear Fortress", not "Bjorn Borg"; which is no more English than "Foretagarmotesfikabrod" is English. --OpenFuture (talk) 11:11, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You can leave that sqiggly stuff in the intro, just move the article title to non-diacritics. As for those multiple language readers & those ESL readers - well if their first language is Swedish (for example), there's the Swedish Wikipedia for them to see. GoodDay (talk) 14:54, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You can leave that sqiggly stuff in the intro, just move the article title to non-diacritics. - Well, duh. That's what we are discussing here. Nobody (except possibly you) has suggested dropping all diacritics from all of Wikipedia.
 * As for those multiple language readers & those ESL readers - well if their first language is Swedish (for example), there's the Swedish Wikipedia for them to see. - No, as most of them don't speak Swedish. Only around 9 million do that. And besides, with your argumentation it should be removed from the Swedish Wikipedia as well, with the exception of Å, Ä and Ö, which are in the Swedish alphabet. Or are you saying that Swedish people are more intelligent than English speakers, and are able to handle things like other languages and IPS that Americans (and presumably British) are somehow unable to deal with? That I don't believe. --OpenFuture (talk) 15:13, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * There is no need for your rude and uncivil reply to GoodDay. He was simply stating what Wiki-policies and the MOS already tell editors what to do, which is to Use English for the Article's Title and at the First mention within the article to use the subject's full and correct name. And no one is trying to tell Swedish-Wikipedia what to do. That is their business, not ours. But this is the English-Wikipedia, and here it is our business, and here we follow established Wiki-policies. Dolovis (talk) 16:01, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Nothing in that answer is rude or uncivil. I put down a lot of effort to make sure this is not so. I re-read it again and can not find anything rude or uncivil. GoodDays proposal about Swedish Wikipedia was obviously not serious, and I realize this, and I'm sure so do you. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:45, 17 November 2011 (UTC)


 * ESL editors (if there's any among the pro-dios side) shouldn't be pushing diacritics on English Wikipedia. Those editors have the luxury of being able to 'edit' other Wikipedias & should concentrate on those. GoodDay (talk) 18:12, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Now you are telling me what Wikipedia to edit. That is none of your business. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:45, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm requesting that you & your fellow ESL editors, stop pushing diacritics on English Wikipedia. GoodDay (talk) 07:14, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * No, you told me to concentrate on the Wikipedias of other languages. It's there in plain black and white. If you realize that was inappropriate of you, you should admit that is was, not pretend that you never said it. And I'm not "pushing" anything. I've understood from other discussions of you that you want to purge the English Wikipedia of anything that is not purely English, and that does mean you have to remove all mentions of all non-English persons and places. You are of course welcome to have that opinion, but it does make it quite hard to take you seriously. --OpenFuture (talk) 08:18, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, if you (ESL editors) don't like the way English Wikipedia presents your 1st langauge, then leave. GoodDay (talk) 09:27, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Again you propose that Wikipedia should prefer ignorance and incorrectness. Again, I'm quite sure you are completely alone amongst Wikipedia editors to have that standpoint. But if you think you are not, you are welcome to propose it somewhere. Meanwhile, the actual Wikipedia policies in place say the exact opposite. I suggest you: 1. Follow wikipedia policies. 2. Stop telling other people to go away. --OpenFuture (talk) 11:26, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * OF, you've already admitted to not understanding the arguments you disagree with. Yet you seem to be quite willing to argue. Maybe you should take some time and do some research? Time out? Everyone knows that Visnovsky is not the person's legal name. That's simply not the issue. It's what the person is known by. It is policy to follow the name that a person is known by, as best and as reasonable as possible, everything considered. If Wikipedia had a policy to always use the legal name, there would be no debate, correct? &#x0298; alaney2k  &#x0298; ( talk ) 16:05, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I was trying to say that the argument was illogical and didn't make sense, but in a nice way. That was obviously a mistake: I understand the argument. I've explained why I don't agree with it. What is unclear? Everyone knows that Visnovsky is not the person's legal name. - That statement is blatantly false. Most English speaking persons will, when seeing this article, not understand that. It is policy to follow the name that a person is known by - Correct. Where does it say in the policy that we should misspell it? --OpenFuture (talk) 19:01, 18 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Bjorn Borg is not a completely valid comparison. He had international and wide-spread notability, not just in North America. His notability was established internationally. He was a winner of the British and French Opens, not the US Open. He has notability as a fashion designer in Europe too. Visnovsky has none of these things, he's basically a hockey player, born in Slovakia, who's become notable in the NHL. &#x0298; alaney2k  &#x0298; ( talk ) 16:31, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * No, he was notable in Slovakia before moving to the NHL. And even so I don't understand this argument. --OpenFuture (talk) 21:30, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, keep trying. :-) No one said everything has to make sense to everyone. &#x0298; alaney2k  &#x0298; ( talk ) 03:42, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * What country you are famous in hardly changes your name. Now if he has become a US citizen, that would be relevant. But otherwise no. And your argument that Björn Borg is famous in "Europe" is incomprehensible. Most of Europe does not use the letter Ö, in particular Britain and France does not, as you think his winning the British and French Open somehow is relevant. So that argument makes no sense to anyone but you, I suspect. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:51, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

If the english sources show his name as Bjorn Borg, then that's what his english bio article should be titled. Any editors that don't like it, can leave. GoodDay (talk) 09:30, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You still misspell English. I know you hate every other language, but is that really a reason for you to massacre English as well? --OpenFuture (talk) 11:27, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * As much as I dislike GoodDay's bluntness, I also dislike the opposite fundamentalism. It does not make you 'better' to simply always favour diacritics. You win no friends to be fundamentalist, except amongst other fundamentalists. You can quote me on that. &#x0298; alaney2k  &#x0298; ( talk ) 16:08, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I am not a fundamentalist, and in fact one of the few people who have tried to analyze both sides opinions and understand both arguments. My reward from that was an endless stream of personal attacks from the anti-diacritics side, of which calling me a fundamentalist is only the latest and surely not the last one. Every single one of these personal attacks makes me a little more convinced that the anti-diacritics side simply do not have any rational arguments. At no time when I have put forward arguments against diacritics have anyone attacked me or been rude. I think that speaks volumes. --OpenFuture (talk) 18:58, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * All right, OF, try this.
 * I can live with Swedes making fun of English (as I noticed watching this) but, that is the way English is. And you are right, "Bjorn" is neither a translation nor a transliteration of Björn; but OTOH it is the way the name is rendered in English. And it may only be misspelled Swedish to you but it 'is' also still perfectly correct English.
 * And why it is an issue here, is that, if I went on the Swedish WP, and used my school boy Swedish to edit articles there, I would expect, and would welcome, Swedish speakers to fix my efforts to the correct Swedish spellings, syntax, idiom. And if I changed, say, Storbritannien to "Great Britain", or Elisabeth II to "Elizabeth II" I expect it'd get reverted. What I wouldn’t be doing is complaining to the high heavens that they were wrong, that my edits were correct, that they should do things my way because “that the way it’s done in English”. And yet people call the Brits arrogant...
 * And as for the whole “edit on your own WP” line, it is a little rich when there are editors here laying down the law about what the English WP has to say about this Slovakian player, when they have made no attempt to put an article about him on the Slovakian WP. That smacks of ulterior motive/hidden agenda to me.Swanny18 (talk) 23:30, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, noone who speaks English never makes fun of Swedes and Swedish. Geez, get over yourself.
 * OTOH it is the way the name is rendered in English - No. It is not "rendered in English". As you admit, it is neither a translation or a transliteration. It has just been stripped of the diacritics. It is just a misspelling, because English speakers in general neither understand that the diacritics are important, nor do they know how to write them. And that's OK. I don't expect Americans to open the character map, find every strange character and copy paste them every time they write "Björn Borg" or "Ľubomír Višňovský". I certainly have no idea how to type a Ľ (I'm just copying from the article name) and not a clue how to pronounce it. But nobody is forcing you to write it. Those in the know can do that.
 * would expect, and would welcome, Swedish speakers to fix my efforts to the correct Swedish spellings, syntax, idiom. - So why do you not want us to do it here?
 * That smacks of ulterior motive/hidden agenda to me. - That's ridicolous. Most non-English Wikipedias are much smaller than the English one. The Slovak Wikipedia has 129.000 articles. The English has 3.8 million. --OpenFuture (talk) 15:20, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, I was thinking of the Swedish orthodontists in "Whoops Apocalypse"...
 * But, "not 'rendered in English'"; you do know what I mean by that, don't you?
 * Also, you said, "but nobody is forcing you to write it"; well actually, that’s exactly what is happening now. Anyone wanting this article either has to write "Ľubomír Višňovský", or to write "Lubomir Visnovsky" and be redirected. And as I doubt having an article at “Great Britain” and a redirect from Storbritannien would be acceptable on the Swedish WP, I really don’t see why we have to accept it here. Swanny18 (talk) 22:47, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support, per policies already mentioned, and per WP:DIACRITICS, which says for the "use of modified letters, follow the general usage in reliable sources that are written in the English language", and allows for diacritics in names only "if they are used in the common name as verified by reliable sources"; that proviso doesn't seem to apply here. Swanny18 (talk) 20:34, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support, this name has so many non-English diacritics I have trouble reading it this way. I don't think I've ever seen a hockey guide or sheet that uses diacritics in his name, and I've seen a lot. We go with English sources here and that makes it Lubomir Visnovsky. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:59, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose, our style and practice is to include the diacritics here. Omitting them will not help anyone except remedial readers who have trouble ignoring squiggles, whereas it will misinform others as to the original spelling and pronunciation of his name.--Kotniski (talk) 12:20, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You’ll just have to forgive all us native English speakers for being so "remedial"; obviously growing up speaking the language is no substitute for learning it a few hours a week at school. But on behalf of all those who’ll be searching for this article using the spelling they see in all the sources, I’d say spelling it the English way would be a considerable help.
 * And as the policy is to include the "original spelling and pronunciation" in the first sentence, I doubt people will be as confused as all that.
 * Also, "our style and practice is to include diacritics"? Aren't you begging the question, there? Swanny18 (talk) 23:42, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The add on here, the title is not for the benefit of editors who are already hip to how diacritics are used, or who can mentally remove them. It is for the reader who is seeking information, the one who wants to know, "What is this individual's common name and how is it normally spelled in English?" Kauffner (talk) 00:47, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Once again, mentally removing them is trivial of you don't know how they are used, as you will then automatically ignore them. And if you *know* how they are used, you don't have to ignore them. Diacritics are only hard to read for foreigners who are used to use them differently than how they are used. For example, I tend to mispronounce Eänor, Coöperation and Blue Öyster Cult, since these cases use the umlaut differently than it is used Swedish. The claim that people who are "hip" to diacritcs has it easier is completely false. It's the other way around.
 * how is it normally spelled in English - It isn't. It is not English. You can't spell it in English. The question makes no sense. You can't spell "Ľubomír Višňovský" in English anymore than you can spell "Paljon lunta mutta ei taskulamppua" in English. To make it English you have to translate it. I have no idea what a translation of "Ľubomír Višňovský" would be though, but Lubomir Visnovsky definitely is not it as none of those two words are English. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:48, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * OF:"...confusing to people who are used to diacritics"; that sounds like an argument for not having them. Certainly Turkish speakers use the caron differently to its use here.
 * And "Paljon lunta mutta ei taskulamppua"; Well you could translate it ("Lots of snow, no torch", is it?) but it’d make more sense to “render" it into an equivalent English term (the point I was making earlier). "Up shit creek without a paddle", maybe? Swanny18 (talk) 22:57, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support. I fully support the use of diacritics in many cases, and supported an RM to move nine articles to include them yesterday. But in this case, the weight of sourcing is so overwhelmingly in favour of the non-diacritic alternative that not using it would appear to go against just about every policy we have on the topic, even though it's not technically as accurate. Maybe that means the policies are wrong, but this really isn't the place to discuss that. Alzarian16 (talk) 16:19, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose. This is a borderline case. According to the article, he plays primarily in the US nowadays, which makes the move proposal reasonable though not compulsory. But he doesn't seem to be particularly notable there. On the other hand, the words "best player in Slovakia" jump out from the article. Both titles are reasonable, and if we ever get a guideline on how to deal with borderline cases this case can be revisited. But at the moment this BLP subject is just being used as a pawn in certain editors' xenophobic fight against the accurate spelling of Latin-based foreign names -- a universal practice in English-language reference works including Britannica, Britannica 1911 and, de facto, Wikipedia. Section below is manipulative. It misrepresents policy by stressing one particular, reasonable though incorrect (and de facto not followed) interpretation of policy. I have seen such sections posted by the same editor in other discussions and will examine whether it makes sense to propose a ban against that behaviour. In any case the present wave of proposals to change articles to what is de facto a non-standard naming convention with loss of information and creation of unnecessary disambiguation problems (generally speaking) should not be encouraged by success in such borderline cases. All the sources used here appear to be of the type that drops diacritics as a matter of principle or for technical restrictions, so we cannot use them as guidance on the correct spelling of the name. Hans Adler 11:42, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Hans: You said the Summary misrepresents policy: Well you are at liberty to produce a list of policies that do support your position...
 * And: "A certain editors xenophobic fight” (don’t be held back by WP:NPA or WP:CIVIL, Hans, tell it like it is!) so, not a backlash against a "cabal of non-english editors who wish to make WP conform to their idea of correctness", then.
 * Also: "de facto not followed policy". If policy has been disregarded, that isn’t an argument to change the policy so much as an argument to rectify matters and sanction the miscreants.
 * You're proposing a ban on "that behaviour"; So if someone is calling wrong-doers to account they should be prevented from doing so in future?
 * And: "sources that don’t use diacritics are unreliable because...they don’t use diacritics"; another example of the circular argument we saw earlier. Swanny18 (talk) 23:08, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Sources that systematically drop all diacritics are not reliable for whether sources that don't do this use diacritics in a specific word. Not any more than a black and white photograph in a source is reliable on the colour of an object. Wikipedia is not a publication that systematically drops all diacritics.
 * Yes, the "cabal of non-english editors who wish to make WP conform to their idea of correctness", which just happens to be the same idea of correctness as that of the editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica both today and in 1911, and that of the editors of Encarta, and that of the editors of Webster's Dictionary of Geographical Names. This "cabal of non-english editors who wish to make WP conform to their idea of correctness" must be rather strong, given that a massive, widely advertised RfC that intended to clarify the matter but went so far that even Martina Navratilova would be spelled with the diacritics which she is no longer using (I opposed the RfC on these grounds) had significantly more support than oppose !votes (60:47), although altogether not enough for a consensus. Hans Adler 23:23, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Swanny: What circular argument? If NHL has an openly stated policy of ignoring diacritics, it is pretty obvious that they cannot be trusted for the correct spelling. That's not a circular argument. It would be a strange world if someone misspelling something became a reliable source (of spelling), if he just declared his misspelling as intentional. HandsomeFella (talk) 23:48, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * (Housekeeping): Is it worth splitting this into sub-sections? it's getting pretty awkward to edit these days. Swanny18 (talk) 23:14, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * To be honest it's pretty obvious that there is no consensus to move, so that's probably not necessary. --OpenFuture (talk) 05:49, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, the reasons to 'Support' this move are grounded in rock-solid policy. Although the oppose vote has been vocal, it has not demonstrated policy that would allow this article to stay where it is. Admins are bound to follow policy, and this move will not be decided based on a head count, but on the strength of the arguments are presented. Just as Marek Zidlicky, Milan Jurcina, and Ales Hemsky were all recently moved to their COMMON NAMES, it is for those same reasons that this RM will also succeed. Dolovis (talk) 14:30, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, it has been demonstrated that policy allows it, even encourages it. Accuracy comes before usage in reliable sources according to WP:COMMONNAME, as you by now very well know. And as you very well know, there is no consensus on these issues or how to interpret policy or what policy should be, so you can't refer to policy. Which means that only headcount remains. Anyone that moves this article after this debate is partisan in this issue. --OpenFuture (talk) 14:37, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, there is consensus on these issues. The established policy of WP:UE, including WP:COMMONNAME, was developed by consensus. As you well know, there is no consensus to change the established policy, so the policy remains. Dolovis (talk) 15:55, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * As you very well know, there is no consensus on this issue, and policy can be interpreted either way. This has been discussed over and over, see Who R You?'s summary on this page below. Conclusion: There is no consensus. Denying this fact is hardly constructive or useful. You can't claim that there is a consensus when it's discussed over and over and over and no consensus is ever reached. --OpenFuture (talk) 17:28, 21 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support. This particular case seems a no-brainer in terms of existing policies. There's no case for the diacritics. But we really do need a clearer policy. Andrewa (talk) 00:28, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You mean that you didn't see this sentence – ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined by reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources – at WP:COMMONNAME? HandsomeFella (talk) 14:49, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * No, I mean I read it accurately. Andrewa (talk) 02:09, 23 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose—I don't really see a compelling analysis of evidence here that supports a move. There's a clumsy ghits count, which takes the "about ### results" and assumes ### might be related to the number of results, which of course is completely bogus. But even if the unadorned form has more hits, what does that mean? Not all outlets use diacritics for *anything*. Fan blogs, some news outlets, etc, don't use accents/etc deliberately for technical or stylistic reasons. We don't have those limitations, so we shouldn't abandon diacritics just because they do. There is a lot of noise on this page about writing in "English". It is not useful to argue that English doesn't include words with diacritics, or that words like résumé, café, or naïvety are simply wrong in English. There are abundant sources, the most reliable dictionaries, etc, to justify that kind of usage of diacritics. Similarly, it is unreasonable to assume that a name once written with diacritics must always be written that way; I don't think we would ever move Martina Navratilova -> Martina Navrátilová. In this case, I think in the absence of compelling evidence we ought to leave this title how it is. ErikHaugen (talk &#124; contribs) 18:40, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment - Let me ask. What would be compelling evidence beyond the overwhelming usage of the unadorned form in English sources, though? ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 19:49, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Is there any analysis here about the weight we should be placing on the various sources? I tried to read over the discussion here but it is of such miserably poor quality that it is hard to find anything remotely interesting. ErikHaugen (talk &#124; contribs) 20:56, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Analysis: This RM should be closed by referring to the relevant Wikipedia Policy of WP:Article titles, and then to note that Ghits favours Lubomir Visnovsky by about 80 – 1; then to look at the quality of sources showing the common name usage to immediately see that both the NHL and his Player's Union refer to him as Lubomir Visnovsky: NHL profile . NHLPA, and further, that all the major newspapers and magazines refer to him as Lubomir Visnovsky: New York Times . ABC News . ESPN . Los Angeles Times . NBC Sports . Sports Illustrtated . Canada.com . CBC Sports . Newsday . San Diego Union . SportsNet . TSN . USAToday . Winnipeg Free Press . Globe and Mail. The policy is well established, and the the evidence to support the requested move is overwhelming. Dolovis (talk) 21:50, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Analysis: I can see overwhelming evidence for something, but it has nothing to do with the subject or diacritics. Hans Adler 22:17, 22 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Per WP:V, we should use sources that are reliable on the issue at hand. The sources you presented systematically omit Czech diacritical marks, which goes against the practices of English-language encyclopedias. This raises a WP:NOT issue; we must maintain encyclopedic standards even when we are the first reference work to have an entry on the subject. Sports Reference has a history of getting names right, and The Slovak Spectator is also a good source. Interestingly, The New York Times hockey blog also uses the diacritics despite the NYT style guide ("Accent marks are used for French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and German words and names. [...] Do not use accents in words or names from other languages (Slavic and Scandinavian ones, for example), which are less familiar to most American writers, editors and readers; such marks would be prone to error, and type fonts often lack characters necessary for consistency.") Prolog (talk) 23:24, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The sources cited by Dolovis speak to the common name, yours speak to the legal name. And, as I've stated before, the legal name is not under dispute. We are determining the article title and article titles are normally the common name, are they not? Interestingly, sports-reference.com cite was for Olympics, while hockey-reference.com, a related site, does not use diacritics. As for common name, you would not choose the NYT blog over the larger number of references from the main NYT site. They would both be under the same editorial control. &#x0298; alaney2k  &#x0298; ( talk ) 00:41, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The personal name is the common name. The most common spelling of the name is undoubtedly "Lubomir Visnovsky", but COMMONNAME is not about style and spelling issues (diacritics, capitalization, hyphens vs. dashes) and we should follow other encyclopedias; the spelling used should always be proper English and suitable for a project that aims to be a high-quality reference work. For example, the common spelling for Plzeň is "Plzen", but Americana, Britannica, Collins, Columbia, Webster's and the rest still retain the diacritics. Prolog (talk) 02:40, 23 November 2011 (UTC)


 * (Housekeeping(2)): Would it help to write summaries of the view points:


 * Oppose
 * 1) The diacritics is the "accurate" version of the name - simple removal of diacritics renders an inaccurate name, which is not a translation
 * 2) The diacritics is established as part of the WP:Hockey compromise (use of diacritics on player pages according to that player's ethnicity)
 * 3) There are examples of diacritic use on Wikipedia similar to this.
 * 4) Diacritics is good form or higher quality for Wikipedia.
 * Support
 * 1) The diacritics are not used in established reliable English sources.
 * 2) The non-diacritic form is in far greater use than the 'adorned" form in English sources.
 * 3) There are examples of non-diacritic use on Wikipedia similar to the proposed move.
 * 4) The use of diacritics is non-English.

-- Have I missed any point of the opposing groups? For what it's worth, it seems that even evaluating spellings case-by-case such as this is not more palatable to the various persons who have contributed. ʘ alaney2k  ʘ ( talk ) 22:29, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You missed that the Support group correctly cites established Wikipedia policy of WP:COMMONNAME, whereas the Oppose group relies upon WP:IDONTLIKEIT and WP:IAR. Dolovis (talk) 04:50, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You missed that the Support group insists that different spellings are different names, whereas the Oppose group relies on WP:USEENGLISH and the overwhelming precedent of English-language reference works to use the most pedantically correct spelling for European names. Hans Adler 08:37, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * @Dolovis: If you remove "correctly" from the statement you get closer to the truth. The Support group cites selected bits of Wikipedia policy, while ignoring others. --OpenFuture (talk) 15:07, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Both groups choose to give different weights to different facets of Wikipedia policy. We can leave out the testy language. Since the groups have not been able to work out a 'pyramid' so to speak of which to take above others, we are left at debating requested moves individually. As we are no further at achieving consensus at policy debates, we are no further at achieving consensus here. Are we left then with continuing the wp:hockey compromise of using different spellings in different contexts as the only compromise achieved or possible? I was hoping that since Visnovsky is primarily notable for his play in Los Angeles, (that's not up for debate, is it?) that the unadorned version of his spelling would be an acceptable compromise, without setting a precedent. Not so. How can we move forward in the context of Wikipedia? Does it mean we take it to a wider audience? The groups here do also have competing visions of Wikipedia. &#x0298; alaney2k  &#x0298; ( talk ) 16:13, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Policies

 * WP:EN: The title of an article should generally use the version of the name of the subject which is most common in the English language, as you would find it in reliable sources…
 * If an examination of the sources in an article shows that one name or version of the name stands out as clearly the most commonly used in the English-language, we should follow the sources and use it. &hellip;
 * Names not originally in a Latin alphabet, as with Greek, Chinese or Russian, must be transliterated into characters generally intelligible to literate speakers of English. &hellip;
 * The native spelling of a name should generally be included in parentheses, in the first line of the article, with a transliteration if the Anglicization isn't identical. &hellip;


 * WP:UCN: Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it prefers to use the name that is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources. …
 * &hellip;The term most typically used in reliable sources is preferred to technically correct but rarer forms, whether the official name, the scientific name, the birth name, the original name or the trademarked name. &hellip;


 * WP:DIACRITICS: The use of modified letters (such as accents or other diacritics) in article titles is neither encouraged nor discouraged; when deciding between versions of a word which differ in the use or non-use of modified letters, follow the general usage in reliable sources that are written in the English language (including other encyclopedias and reference works). The policy on using common names and on foreign names does not prohibit the use of modified letters, if they are used in the common name as verified by reliable sources.
 * WP:COMMONSENSE: Why isn't "use common sense" an official policy? It doesn't need to be; as a fundamental principle, it is above any policy.
 * WP:BURO: … Written rules do not themselves set accepted practice. Rather, they document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected. When instruction creep is found to have occurred, it should be removed.
 * WP:CONSENSUS: … Editors usually reach consensus as a natural and inherent product of editing; generally someone makes a change or addition to a page, then everyone who reads it has an opportunity to leave the page as it is or change it. When editors cannot reach agreement by editing, the process of finding a consensus is continued by discussion on the relevant talk pages.


 * &hellip; unless they can convince the broader community that such action is right, participants in a WikiProject cannot decide that some generally accepted policy or guideline does not apply to articles within its scope.
 * Wikipedia has a higher standard of participation and consensus for changes to Policies and guidelines than to other types of articles. This is because they reflect established consensus, and their stability and consistency are important to the community. As a result, the best practice is to propose substantive changes on the talk page first and then allow sufficient time for thorough discussion before implementing the change. &hellip;
 * Raising the same issue repeatedly on different pages, to different admins, or with different wording is confusing and disruptive. It doesn't help to seek out a forum where you get the answer you want, or to play with the wording to try and trick different editors into agreeing with you, since sooner or later someone will notice all of the different threads. &hellip;


 * WP:UE: The choice between anglicized and local spellings should follow English-language usage…
 * there are too few English-language sources to constitute and established usage&hellip;
 * Editing for the sole purpose of changing one controversial title to another is strongly discouraged. If an article title has been stable for a long time, and there is no good reason to change it, it should not be changed. If it has never been stable, or unstable for a long time, and no consensus can be reached on what the title should be, default to the title used by the first major contributor after the article ceased to be a stub.

Past Discussions

 * There are currently 2,285 pages in Article Talk, 833 in Wikipedia, and 615 in WP:Talk namespaces (excluding redirects) containing the word "diacritic". A brief sample of some of these ad nauseam discussions on diacritics, selected from the first 50 found in WP:Talk, include:


 * There is not now, nor does there ever appear to have been, consensus on changing the existing policies on the use of diacritics; there is, however, a policy on the use of diacritics; it basically boils down to this:

WP Policy regarding diacritics is to follow the majority of the (English) RS! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Who R you? (talk • contribs) 00:53, 7 November 2011 (UTC)


 * This is not a neutral description of the state of the discussion, nor does it appear to be intended as such. Hans Adler 22:52, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. 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.

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