Talk:Cannabis in Italy

Where to place "Cannabis light"?
I disagree with that "cannabis light" should be placed under History. First off, it's just the past couple years, so that part makes no sense. Next, the whole rest of History is about farming textile hemp. I also think that CL does indeed count as "recreational" since from what I read in news media people are basically using it the same as they do regular cannabis but just aware that they're getting other compounds other than THC. I think it has nothing to do with textile hemp, nor history, and that since changes in policy/application have led to a recent flowering (rimshot) of the CL market, it should instead be filed with Legalization/Reform. What do other folks think? Goonsquad LCpl Mulvaney (talk) 23:36, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Point well taken. However, I actually meant that that particular paragraph should be placed in the "Historical background" section since it concludes the historical theme of hemp production trends, i.e. the recent resurgence after years of production decline. Nevertheless, I'll put the second part of the paragraph in a specific subsection on cannabis light in the "Legalization efforts" section, which can also be expanded by mentioning more recent tightening of regulations coming from Interior Minister Salvini (Northern League party). Cannabis light is also already mentioned in the "Industrial cannabis" section, which I thought was the main application. Best regards, ItaMatt (talk) 08:44, 10 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Cool, I think we're at a good place now. Thanks for talking it out! Goonsquad LCpl Mulvaney (talk) 21:00, 10 October 2018 (UTC)


 * No problem. Bye, ItaMatt (talk) 23:17, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

2021 referendum and legislation
Here is some info and links. Others with more time than me might use some of this (and additional info they find) in the Wikipedia article.

13 Sep 2021: '''[https://www.italy24news.com/local/184585.html Italy. Cannabis referendum, 220,000 signatures in 48 hours. “This is a political fact. We are making history”].'''.

13 Sep 2021: Inside Italy’s Push To Decriminalize Recreational Cannabis..

8 Sep 2021: Selfie of a couple Italian legislators making progress on cannabis.. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:22, 14 September 2021 (UTC)

Overlinking
@ItaMatt, you said "most people" isn't relevant, but MOS:OL talks about just that: things that most readers understand shouldn't be linked.


 * Everyday words understood by most readers in context (e.g., education, violence, aircraft, river)
 * Common occupations (e.g., accountant, politician, actor)
 * The names of subjects with which most readers will be at least somewhat familiar. This generally includes major examples of:
 * countries (e.g., Japan/Japanese, Brazil/Brazilian)
 * geographic features (e.g., the Himalayas, Pacific Ocean, South America)
 * locations (e.g., New Delhi; New York City, or just New York if the city context is already clear; London, if the context rules out London, Ontario; Southeast Asia)
 * Common units of measurement, e.g. units relating to time, temperature, length, area, or volume. If both non-metric and metric equivalents are provided, as in 5 centimetres (2 in), usually neither unit needs to be linked, because almost all readers will understand at least one of the units.
 * Dates
 * Do not link to pages that redirect back to the page the link is on

There are a ton of links are to things like Food, Shirt, Ear, Breathing, Headache, seasons, etc. that are everyday words. Common occupations are linked like doctor and cook. Locations like Europe, the United States, France, etc. are linked multiple times. Common units of measurement are linked like km and mi, as well as the dates (the centuries are all in Roman numeral format, which I also tried to format correctly due to MOS:CENTURY). There are also a bunch of links linking back to the same page.

MOS:DL also refers to removing duplicate links since they should only really be linked once after the lead – there were a bunch, which I used the duplicate links checker to remove.

flod logic (talk) 18:58, 27 August 2022 (UTC)


 * @flod logic, I agree that there are several redundant (and other possibly useless) links that accumulated over time without me giving a second thought, and that most of them should be removed. Nevertheless, I also believe that the following points should be considered:


 * Links that lead back to the same page are used as quick redirects to specific sections of the text that expand on the subjects being discussed in the paragraphs where the links are placed, without needlessly repeating such expansions (e.g. water retting in the "Ancient Rome" section, or the benefits of crop rotations in the "Middle Ages" section), or prompting a citation needed tag (e.g. in the introduction). I therefore believe that they should be kept.
 * At least one link to each country and geographical feature should be maintained, since I certainly agree with the guideline stating "However, try to be conscious of your own demographic biases – what is well known in your age group, line of work, or country may be less known in others". Links to historical countries in the "History" section should definitely be considered relevant, because those are not the same countries that exist today, and the links expand on them in the relevant historical context (e.g. Russia in the 1910s, or Poland in the 1950s). Still, I will remove the aforementioned redundancies.
 * Links to the various centuries should also be kept, because they give further context on the various periods in the "History" section, although admittedly I overlinked them. I will therefore remove redundant dates and, while I find it weird that the guidelines forbid the use of roman numerals, I will change them also.
 * There are only a few links to common units of measurements in the entire text, most of which are due to the automatic converter not being able to compute lesser known historical units. I don't care too much about those links, it was just for intellectual curiosity for those who do not know either metric or imperial units.
 * I can accept that links to "everyday words understood by most readers in context" may not be necessary, although in your cuts the removals seem subjective (e.g. flour is removed, but not gelato), and sometimes debatable in their validity (e.g. the removed links on natural and man-made disasters in a paragraph specifically about relief efforts). I also question the point of having wikipages on these words if links to them are considered pointless on the basis that most people understand them. Nevertheless, I will check all your changes and use them as guidelines.


 * These changes will probably take a few days, especially the last ones. No offence is meant in my critique, I was just taken aback by the drastic cuts with limited discussion. I'm completely open to further discussions. In the meantime, best regards, ItaMatt (talk) 20:53, 27 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Hi, thanks for your comment. I appreciate your willingness to discuss!
 * Sorry, I wasn't trying to be disruptive. My attempt was to be bold within the guidelines of overlinking, duplicate linking, relevance of links, etc. as I understand them from the guideline pages and the general consensus of how it is implemented in most articles. I enjoy the copy-editing etc. aspect of Wikipedia and end up running across a lot of articles that way – this one stood out in terms of the number/type of links.
 * After looking at MOS:CIRCULAR, I see I misunderstood the section on links back to the same article. There may be a way to link the sections to make it clearer that they go to another section within the same but I'm unsure.
 * Historical countries probably make some sense and I might have been a little overzealous there.
 * WP:DATELINK seems to say that to link to a date, the date article itself should be specifically related and improve the reader's understanding of the topic. The vast majority of articles (unless on what happened on a specific date, etc.) don't have the year, century, or date linked at all – it was common in the earlier days of Wikipedia but has since changed – and if they do, the link is to something with some relevance to the topic like "1950 in literature" in an article about a book.
 * I guess what is and isn't linked will always be a bit subjective since the MOSes just give us some general guidelines. My thought behind removing flour but not gelato is that flour is extremely widely known: it's one of the first ingredients in many foods, anyone who bakes will have it in their house, and it is available at any grocery store. Gelato just isn't on the same level of accessibility or awareness as flour is, so it makes more sense to keep a link to it vs. flour. In the case of flour, it makes more sense to link to it from an article about gluten-free diets or baking, but it has little direct relevance to cannabis in Italy in particular.
 * "I also question the point of having wikipages on these words if links to them are considered pointless on the basis that most people understand them." – it makes sense to have them so they can be linked to if they have a particular relevance to an article. MOS:LINKEXAMPLES gives some examples of how pages are linked to in context. It explains that even in an article on supply and demand, terms like price and goods should only be linked if they have technical aspects with a specific relevance, and ones like wheat and United States just aren't relevant enough to the topic itself to be linked at all. I can't see how terms like collaboration, ear, doctor, etc. could be relevant enough in this case.
 * Thanks for discussing this!
 * flod logic (talk) 14:37, 29 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Dear, thank you very much for your thoughtful response, I also apologize for my initial blunt reaction... I'm kind of a control freak when it comes to the very few articles of which I can claim most of the authorship. From what I see at the moment:
 * I believe we are in agreement when it comes to redundant links (i.e. leaving just one for each should suffice), and I'll be checking for more in the future.
 * I gather we also agree on links to specific sections of the same article... Their purpose may have been unclear at first due to the fact that, for aesthetic reasons, I intentionally avoided adding each time someting like (see XXX for further details).
 * With regards to links to different centuries, I would argue that they constitute a useful and quick expansion on the specific periods being discussed in the "History" section, similarly to historical countries, while I definitely agree that links to specific years would be excessive.
 * The remaining issue would be what does or does not constitute a relevant link... If we judge relevance with respect to the entire article, I agree that things like flour, cooperative, or doctor are not directly related to the Cannabis in Italy discussion... However, if we consider the individual sections, I would argue that most of these links would be relevant (e.g. flour in the section on cannabis-based food, cooperative in the section on the private sector, and doctor in the section on medical cannabis). This would be similar to the relevance of links to centuries in the "History" section.
 * I admit that I do not know much about the guidelines, since my contribution to Wikipedia is limited to very few articles... If I find anything on the last point, I will certainly act accordingly... Any comment or suggestion from you on any of the points is of course welcome. Best regards, ItaMatt (talk) 15:52, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

Added Very long tag
Even though the article is indeed quite long, I disagree with the notion that it may be too long to read and navigate comfortably. In particular:


 * The various subheadings provide appropriate breaks during the reading, while also allowing the reader to easily find (from the lateral table of contents) a specific subtopic they may be interested in, being discussed in detail within its own comprehensive chapter.


 * The interconnection between the various chapters also allows for quick recalls and redirects to other sub-sections, so that the reader can expand on related aspects in their own comprehensive chapters, without the need for unnecessary repetitions.

The most straightforward way to split the article would be to move the "History of cannabis in Italy" section into its own article, however:


 * A large number of the cited sources are used in both halves of the current article, and these would therefore need to be replicated in the new article, thus needlessly increasing the combined size of the two separate articles.


 * The historical sub-section covering the Republic of Italy would be relevant in both articles, which would also result in needless repetition, as well as abrupt interruptions during the reading, depending on the eventual location of the split.

I therefore see no reason for splitting the article at this time. Best regards, ItaMatt (talk) 17:55, 28 June 2023 (UTC)


 * On second thought, as more and more text was being added, I came to agree with the notion that the article was becoming too long to read and navigate comfortably. As a result, I moved the historical section to the new History of cannabis in Italy article, in accordance with the Splitting guidelines. ItaMatt (talk) 19:01, 28 October 2023 (UTC)