Talk:Miles O'Brien

Disambiguation debate
Discussion moved here from Talk:Miles O'Brien.

Not to insult Star Trek fans, but shouldn't Miles O'Brien, the CNN on-air personality, be the primary page for "Miles O'Brien." He is afterall a real person, and quite better known in the mainstream population. BigGuy219 18 Aug 2005


 * Better known in the mainstream population? The mainstream American population, maybe. But if we're talking the whole world, the fictional Miles O'Brien is better known. ShutterBugTrekker 21:56, 18 August 2005 (UTC)


 * If the journalist was called "Homer Simpson" we wouldn't be having this discussion. The fictional character would get the better page title (the one without a parenthetical) because he's much better known. In this particular case, it's my feeling that the fictional Miles O'Brien is better known, but I don't have any statistics to back this up.


 * Also, deliberately given a page a long parenthetical is just deplorable. Anton Mravcek 23:44, 18 August 2005 (UTC)


 * The journalist Miles O'Brien hosts American Morning on CNN, one of CNN's flagship shows. Internationally, CNN is still the #1 news network. Respectfully, Star Trek cannot even keep strong enough ratings to stay on the air. As for Homer Simpson, The Simpsons have won multiple emmy awards and are the most recognizable cartoon in television history. Miles O'Brien the journalist is more known (and real) than a character from a syndicated TV show that has been off the air for years. Now, I realize this is the internet where all sci-fi is universally beloved and worshipped, but this is an academic website...the CNN journalist is much more important. BigGuy219 19 August 2005


 * Star Trek has won Emmys as well, and has been on the air far longer then The Simpsons. ConnertheCat 15:28, 21 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm a Trekkie but a fringe player like Miles should not be the primary default IMHO. As much as I dislike him, the CNN blowhard should be the default... --Fluppy 11:50, 15 March 2006 (UTC)


 * The first two results for "Miles O'Brien" on Google are for the CNN reporter, the next three are about the Star Trek character. After that, it's tough to tell which one has a bigger share of the search results pie. Cromulent Kwyjibo 17:59, 19 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Have you ever Googled yourself? You might find yourself wondering "Why is that the first result?" Robert Happelberg 20:29, 19 August 2005 (UTC)


 * The simple solution is a disambiguation pag. BigGuy219 19 August 2005


 * I agree. I could argue for days that either one is more important. Miles O'Brien the journalist may have worldwide reach, but most people are "news illiterate". Miles O'Brien the fictional character was an important recurring character on a show that TV Guide has rated among the best shows of all time, and was a main character on a show that didn't make that list.


 * How can you make a statement like "most people are news illiterate"? BigGuy219 20:41, 19 August 2005 (UTC)


 * The disambiguation parenthetical for the fictional O'Brien should be "(Star Trek)", while for the real O'Brien "(reporter)" might be preferrable to "(journalist)". Robert Happelberg 20:29, 19 August 2005 (UTC)


 * ...I moved it back to (journalist), largely on the rationale that reporter is often considered a separate class from news anchor; O'Brien is both, and may now be better-known as the former. Journalist includes both classes. Samaritan 05:34, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Did anyone bother to look at Special:Whatlinkshere/Miles O'Brien? As part of cleaning up the massive mess left by the move war here (several articles had their histories split up among several pages), I happened to do this, and discovered over 100 articles linking to this disambig page, which nobody had bothered to fix. In other words, anyone clicking on the link to here in another article would have wound up at a dab page, not the target - a big no-no on Wikipedia.

Even more egregiously, almost all (except like one or so) were to the Star Trek character. I fixed the few that were to the journalist to go to his page (including the ones that were already correct, he has only about 10 incoming links total). I also fixed the ones that weren't facially (i.e. obvious from the article title, you don't need to go look at the page) to the Star Trek guy to go to him. The rest I'm going to leave, and 'fix' by the simple expedient of turning this into a redirect to the Star Trek guy - I'm going to move this new disambig page to Miles O'Brien (disambiguation). Anyone wants to revert that, all you have to do is fix all those 100 pages.

AND UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES EVER MOVE A PAGE BY CUT AND PASTING THE CONTENTS. Noel (talk) 20:11, 9 September 2005 (UTC)


 * I had never heard of the American journalist, until 'random page' brought me here - but then I'm not American. A disambig page is the best solution, that and people checking that they have made their wikilinks properly, ie. not assuming that a new wikilink points to the right place just because it's blue. DuncanHill 21:46, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Duplicate Disambiguation
At the moment Miles O'Brien and Miles O'Brien (disambiguation) are seperte disambiguation pages. This should be changed. I don't have a strong opinion about what the final settelment should look like so I've just slapped merge tags on them for people to consider. Eluchil404 20:59, 4 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Strong agree pointless having two pages doing exactly the same thing. DuncanHill 21:43, 4 October 2006 (UTC)