Talk:Spam

Move to Spam (disambiguation)

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

No consensus to move. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:14, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Spam → Spam (disambiguation) — Consistent with most other pages. Hello71 20:55, 27 October 2010 (UTC)


 * What page do you plan to move to spam. We only need to use (disambiguation) if some other page called Spam is the most the primary topic.--76.66.180.54 (talk) 21:43, 27 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose – per 76.66.180.54's comment. 「ɠu¹ɖяy」 ¤ • ¢ 22:15, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose Per WP:DABNAME, "The title of a disambiguation page is the ambiguous term itself, provided there is no primary topic for that term. If there is a primary topic, then the tag "(disambiguation)" is added to the name of the disambiguation page..." In this case there's no primary topic, so this disambiguation page should keep the name "Spam". And that makes sense too, because "spam" can commonly refer to Spam (food), Spam (electronic), or E-mail spam, so there's there's no single article that would be appropriate for a primary topic. — Mudwater (Talk) 23:50, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose. No basis for move per above. PC78 (talk) 11:23, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

To avoid recentism use: Spam text
The refusal to point "spam" to article "Spam (food)" is a clear case of WP:Recentism, where the decades-old meaning of "Spam" is being trampled (by an email term popularized c.2000). To avoid disambiguation for the electronic form, I have created the redirect term "spam text" (which is not a food!). If a new hit song were recorded, with title "Albert Einstein" as a duet played by the remaining Beatles, with Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga, then there would be a push to make "Albert Einstein" a dab page. Sorry, but I think that is just plain wrong. Instead, this is how I would arrange articles for the term "spam":
 * Title "spam" would be a permanent redirect to the much older "Spam (food)".
 * Article "Spam (food)" would note: "see Spam (electronic) or Spam (disambiguation)".
 * Article "Spam (electronic)" would note: "see Spam (food) or Spam (disambiguation)".
 * Other "spam..." articles would note: "see Spam or Spam (electronic) or Spam (disambiguation)".

A recent popular meaning for a term (such as "spam") typically gets mention in the hat-notes for similar titles, but should not wiki-hijack a well-known term, which is many decades older, to become an on-the-fence dab page. It is enough, for the worship of popularity, to put the new, popular article in the hat-notes, not neutralize a decades-old term to become a disambiguation page. That is as concisely as I can explain the concept of retaining older names, without too much spamming (hehe). -Wikid77 12:29, 10 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, "Although an ambiguous term may refer to more than one topic, it is often the case that one of these topics is highly likely—much more likely than any other, and more likely than all the others combined—to be the subject being sought when a reader enters that ambiguous term in the Search box. If there is such a topic, then it is called the primary topic for that term. If a primary topic exists, the ambiguous term should be the title of, or redirect to, the article on that topic." In my opinion that's not the case here. That is, I think it's  not "much more likely" that someone would be looking for the food instead of the electronic kind.  So I think that "Spam" should remain a disambiguation page, but I'd like to hear other editors' opinions on this.  But in any event, "Spam (food)" should not have a disambiguating hatnote for "Spam (electronic)", and "electronic" should not have a hatnote for "food", because per WP:NAMB  non-ambiguous titles such as these should not be disambiguated. — Mudwater (Talk) 00:32, 11 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Again, the term "SPAM" for decade, after decade, after decade has been "SPAM" the food, not e-mail flooding. Again, if a new hit song were recorded, with title "Albert Einstein" as a duet played by the remaining Beatles, with Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga, then there would be a push to make "Albert Einstein" a dab page, not "some scientist" who died over 50 years ago. People would debate the song title as being what most readers came to Wikipedia to find. When actor, songwriter Michael Jackson died, the pageviews for "Blanket" (son's name) soared many-fold beyond the traffic for "bedspread" or "quilt" (etc.). Obviously, most people came to read about Jackson's son nicknamed "Blanket" so I set the hatnote in article "Blanket" to link an article about his son from there. It could be argued that title "Blanket" should have been immediately changed to be an article about his son, and leave the bed-covering blanket as a minor disambiguation issue. However, setting hatnotes to link popular meanings of a term is logically enough to handle popularity. We should permanently direct title "Cleopatra" to "Cleopatra VII" and not swerve away if "cleopatra" becomes a widespread form of unwanted e-mail. Merely setting the hatnote to other articles is sufficient. -Wikid77 08:45, 11 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I think I understand what you're saying, and I agree that electronic spam is more recent than canned meat Spam. But in my opinion both terms a very commonly used, and a reader is not "much more likely" to be looking for the canned meat article.  Unlike "Blanket", electronic spam is not a news topic that will decline in search popularity within a few weeks, it's here to stay.  So based on WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, I think "Spam" should remain a disambiguation page.  But I would be interested in other editors' opinions about this.  If most editors think that the canned meat is the primary topic, I'd be willing to go along with that. — Mudwater (Talk) 13:14, 11 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I do not believe that the canned meat is the "primary topic" in the Wikipedia sense, that is that its usage is greater than all the other uses combined. Both the meat and the email sense are very notable, and there are some other non-trivial meanings as well.  Disambig is the right choice.


 * The comment about the meat being the right choice for decades is irrelevant. It's not uncommon for there to be totally non-notable or minor topics which are eclipsed by something else eclipsing the original meaning in importance.  Wikipedia should point to the subject most often desired by readers, not the one with an age advantage.  Recentism would more apply if, say, a movie called "Spam" was coming out soon and expected to get a sudden surge in hits on opening weekend, in which case obviously a judgment should not be made immediately based on data that is likely to change soon. SnowFire (talk) 01:55, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

SPAM vs Spam
The company has maintained that the name of their product, and the trademark,is SPAM in all caps. But the article's references are all in mixed case.

There's a reference to it on their website somewhere (although I haven't checked recently) and they contrast it with lower case spam meaning UCE.

I'd rather leave it to somebody else rather than go through the entire article changing things, but it doesn't reflect what the company calls the product. Hagrinas (talk) 00:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)


 * The article should stay the way it is, and use "Spam" instead of "SPAM", because, per MOS:TM, "Follow standard English text formatting and capitalization rules, regardless of the preference of trademark owners." There are several archived discussions about this:
 * Talk:Spam/Archive 1
 * Talk:Spam/Archive 1
 * Talk:Spam/Archive 1
 * Talk:Spam/Archive 1
 * — Mudwater (Talk) 00:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Speef and Spork
Burns Foods, in Canada, manufactured similar products around 1947-8, called "Speef" and "Spork" (probably influenced by the name "Spam"). I'm sure this would be of interest to many, but I'm not sure where to include it here.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jbcurio/410913153/

http://spldatabase.saskatoonlibrary.ca/ics-wpd/exec/icswppro.dll?AC=SEE_ALSO&QF0=SUBJECT&QI0==%22BURNS%20%26%20CO.%22&XC=/ics-wpd/exec/IcsWPPro.dll&BU=&TN=LHR_RAD&SN=AUTO13572&SE=1519&RN=0&MR=20&TR=0&TX=1000&ES=0&CS=2&XP=&RF=www_Default+Canned&EF=&DF=&RL=0&EL=0&DL=0&NP=4&ID=&MF=&MQ=&TI=0&DT=&ST=0&IR=0&NR=0&NB=0&SV=0&SS=0&BG=&FG=&QS=&OEX=ISO-8859-1&OEH=ISO-8859-1   Heavenlyblue (talk) 01:46, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Where is the history section?

 * At the moment the article just appears to be a thrown together mess of facts by country. There should be a properly laid out chronology of the product in terns of history, development and period. The by nation sectioning should go. And it reads horribly like an extended advert at the moment. Irondome (talk) 04:27, 20 April 2013 (UTC)