Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Disambiguation pages/Archive 12

Article headings leading to disambiguation pages
Could somebody refresh my memory, where are the MoS guidelines on the Otheruses et alia Templates?

This comes up (for me) with Antioch. A couple of different editors independently noticed a "custom" line was used with 3 repetitions of Antioch (one misspelled), and all other useful information already in the lede of the article. We both replace it with Otheruses. Yet vehement reverts occurred. William Allen Simpson 15:41, 10 December 2005 (UTC)


 * If my memory is correct, this is no manual guideline for it.
 * The templates are listed at Disambiguation, but I don't believe there are any guidelines regarding it. Sorry this couldn't be of help.
 * Custom lines are, of course fine; I would back you in saying that the line was a bit overdone. I have shortened it accordingly.  Neonumbers 10:00, 11 December 2005 (UTC)


 * In this case the correct template would have been Otherplaces. Hatnote is under development and I implore all you fine people to help shape it into a guideline for this kind of thing.—jiy (talk) 10:11, 11 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Thank you, Hatnote is exactly what we need. I'd not seen a reference to it before. I'll note that it's listed in Help:Section and (the identical portion of) Section (sorry I didn't notice, it's been months/years since I looked at them), but not Disambiguation. William Allen Simpson 14:41, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Unclear rules when it comes to disambig pages where the meanings all point to other terms
It isn't clear to me how the rules apply to disambig pages like Bummer. I tried to follow them as closely as I could, but IMHO someone should add some content to the manual of style page about this. 65.57.245.11 03:48, 14 December 2005 (UTC) (Hixie)
 * Disambiguation covers the style of disambiguation pages. Deco 04:21, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Actually, that's a very good question.
 * In my humble opinion, the first four entries on that page (bad trip, etc.) shouldn't even be there: while they are synonyms, I don't think it is an encyclopedia's role to redirect slang words to the appropriate article. However, some will disagree.
 * If you must include them, the articles that actually have "Bummer" in them (namely, the film, etc.) must go first, because they are the more likely targets (remembering that this is an encyclopedia). The 2003 film should go first because it has an article.  The indefinite articles "a" in front of each of the other four terms do not need to be there, and they should be separated with a "Bummer can also mean:" line.
 * However, I would request that page be deleted and move the Bummer (film) article there :P. I leave it to your judgement, User:65.57.245.11.  (btw, can I suggest you get an account to distinguish yourself from others of the same IP?) Neonumbers 10:18, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

dab or not
Do we have a policy on how it's determined if a page is a dab or not? Free Presbyterian Church is the one I'm thinking of. It had a dab tag on it so I edited it as such. I was reverted and the dab tag removed. It still looks an awful lot like a dab to me. And in general? What do we do with cases like these? Tedernst | talk 19:19, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * That's clearly disambiguating, and was marked for cleanup. But one of the reasons I arrived on this talk page is the rather stark view that some have of these pages.  Some folks want them to _assist_ in locating the correct page.  Stripping all the useful information was too much!  Moreover, it may be a bit more work, but several of them already have enough information for a stub article, which would be a lot more useful than deleting the gathered information.... William Allen Simpson 21:37, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry. I'm not sure what you're referring to.  If you're referring to my specific actions on that page, that's in the past, as far as I'm concerned.  That page is not currently a dab page, which is my current issue.  How do we know what's supposed to be a dab and what's not.  If that's a dab, I'm going to edit it again, to remove unnecessary wikilinks and all references at a minimum.  If it's a not a dab, then I'm trying to understand what makes it not a dab.  Specifics about that page can be discussed there.  I'm trying to ask a more general question.  That page is just an example.  Tedernst | talk 22:23, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * If a page is concerned with one topic (eg Free Presbyterian Church's) then I get the feeling it's not a disambiguation page. Take Conservative Party. It is currently marked as a dab, but ideally it should follow format of Liberal Party. disambig is often abused by editors who don't know what to with a page, the author of Free Presbyterian Church has eluded to this on the talk.--Commander Keane 22:26, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Here's my take: it is a dab page, but it shouldn't be one, for the reasons listed above. Ideally, someone will come around to writing an article on it.  Maybe it could be put on requested articles?  I don't know how to deal with this... that's just what I reckon.  Neonumbers 00:13, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

It was cases like this that the former Category:Signpost articles could have helped. However, this category was deleted with little discussion a couple of weeks ago. Courtland 01:58, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

the glorious WP has no article about standard anymore
further reading: Standard Talk:Standard - Tobias Conradi (Talk) 23:55, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

linking back to main article
I edited Police according to what I thought [[MoS:DP#Linking back to the main article] said about bold (don't do it). I was reverted and when I went back to look it up, I found that I was wrong.  Was this changed at some point recently?  I can't find it anywhere in the history.  Am I simply misremembering?  If so, I've edited a lot of pages incorrectly.  [[User:Tedernst|Tedernst]] | talk 21:11, 16 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Well, Wahoofive wrote that section back in 2005-05-09 21:30:28, and it really hasn't changed much since then. Fortunately, you have your contribution history, and you can easily go and fix all the mistakes!  William Allen Simpson 00:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
 * There was a discussion of bolding here and a general discussion of how to format links back to the main article here. There may be more in the archives, but that's what I found in a quick pass. &mdash;Wahoofive (talk) 01:31, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the links. The first one is interesting (about bolding links in the list), but not what I'm after. The second one is much more relevant. I still can't figure out why I was so sure of myself that the MoS said no bolding when linking back to the main article, when clearly it hasn't been that way since I've been active on dabs. And no, William Allen Simpson, it won't be at all easy. Have you looked at my history?

So now the question is, should that link be bold? I think not. Tedernst | talk 16:22, 19 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, it should be bold. (No, normally I don't look at user history except in case of vandalism. Of course, since you should have clear comments referencing this MoS for every entry, and spent 10 minutes or so for each cleanup checking every link for accuracy, I cannot see why it would be difficult?) William Allen Simpson 19:38, 19 December 2005 (UTC)


 * And why should it be bold? Tedernst | talk 20:05, 19 December 2005 (UTC)


 * This issue was a trivial one in the pre-implementation discussions. There was no common already-existing practice that we could find, nor was there an ideal method we could agree on &mdash; in fact, I don't even think we could think of one.  So this is, to an extent, still open to discussion.  If anyone has a better idea than the one at present, it would be greatly appreciated.
 * In fact, I've just thought of something. How about an align-right template, say, , that just puts a box to the right saying something about the main article being there?  That way, it's out of the way, but still existent &mdash; how it should be (no-one would've gotten to the dab page without first going through the main one).  Just an idea &mdash; what do you think?  Neonumbers 04:39, 20 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Folks can also get to the page via search. Moreover, I don't like the idea of a single link back template, as the wording is so often variable depending on the subject. But maybe we should abandon the idea that there be a linkback above the "may also mean" and just go with: most likely meaning always the first item.  That gets rid of a lot of the variability, and answers this question with finality. --William Allen Simpson 12:26, 20 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree with William Allen Simpson, curiously. Tedernst | talk 15:01, 20 December 2005 (UTC)


 * By suggesting a template, the main point was that it is in a box to the right, out of the way. It still think, as a courtesy, a link should be provided &mdash; just to make things foolproof, kind of like you would include a procedure in a computer program for something that would never happen, just in case it does.  The (very concise) description of the main page may/may not go in the box with it (an allowance can be made for this, I'm sure, e.g.
 * I would support any other method to remove the linkback before the first leading line "XYZ may (also) mean:", as long as it is still mentioned on the page. It needs to be both.  Neonumbers 03:27, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I don't understand why we are mixing the two issues up. On the one hand there is a new way to introduce a secondary (if that's what I can call it) dab page. On the other hand there is the use of a template as an alternative to typing out the new introduction. Try not to mix them up. Although I am interested in a new introduction, I won't be using a template (much as I don't use the otheruses templates - they are an abstraction that takes power away from new users).--Commander Keane 05:55, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Ay? I assumed we were talking about Police (disambiguation) (even though the Police link was cited)... correct me if I'm wrong... if I am, my proposal stands in a new section... Neonumbers 03:20, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Template:Lookfrom
Template:Lookfrom was recently created, and could be useful on Dab pages, especially pages for first names, such as David etc. This template will put a link to Special:Allpages with all pages that begin with this name. Could be useful, but the template may need to be formatted to make it look better (I can't do fancy formatting so I won't try!) --Wonderfool 15:18, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I proposed something like this as an explicit link addition under See also on a dab page and it was generally rejected as being an unnecessary addition to dab page content. That was several months ago as I recall.  If consensus is to move forward with this now, it might be useful to format the template similarly to wiktionary by boxing it and setting is off to the side because it effectively leads people into a domain of Wikipedia that the vast majority will never have visited (let alone known about) and exits disambiguation proper by providing access to stemmed products of the article title.  One thing that is a disadvantage is that redirects are not distinguishable on Special:Allpages, which will be a source of frustration for many users, I believe. User:Ceyockey 04:57, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I think one place where the template (or a mutation of it) would be helpful is on pages like Xeno where the term is both a standalone word/title as well as a prefix. The usage as a prefix would be well served by adding the link to Special:Allpages, and I'll do so on this particular instance.  User:Ceyockey 17:37, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

TLAs
I thought that the format for three-letter acronym/abbreviation disambiguation pages had been discussed somewhere, but I can't find it now.

The MOS currently has examples including the following:


 * XYZ may refer to:
 * ABC may stand for:

The MOS doesn't recommend any special treatment for disambiguation pages that are three-letter abbreviations, except for using TLAdisambig. (A recent consensus was against using a wider range of disambiguation templates, such as for 2LAs, LNAs)

Some editors have been adding longer leading lines like this:


 * AMR is a three-letter abbreviation with multiple meanings, as described below:

I would suggest following the MOS examples, because:
 * Shorter is better—the focus should remain on the disambiguating links
 * A colon serves the purpose of the phrase "with multiple meanings, as described below" perfectly well
 * TLAs are often not only abbreviations, but also three-letter words; why say which at all?
 * Explaining three letter abbreviations and linking to the non-disambiguating article three-letter abbreviation is outside the scope of a disambiguation page; it waters down its function

Remember, a disambiguation page is an interface that a reader only encounters when a link in an article has failed to jump directly to an article. They serve only as an interface to find the link target, and not to explain anything or offer exploration links. Their contents should be as minimal as possible to get the job done. —Michael Z. 2005-12-21 18:55 Z 


 * Well said! Tedernst | talk 20:41, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I kind of agree. Sometimes less is more. Remember we already have so there's no real reason to have TLA in the intro as well. Shinobu 22:28, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
 * NOT WELL SAID! As pointed out several times, last by William, people can come (to) the page via search engine, or type a word directly in the browser bar. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 03:29, 27 December 2005 (UTC)


 * So how would linking to "three-letter abbreviation" help these people? The page has a stated purpose, and non-disambiguating links dilute it.  —Michael Z. 2005-12-27 08:55 Z 
 * who was talking about linking? I referred to your words
 * a disambiguation page is an interface that a reader only encounters when a link in an article has failed to jump directly to an article. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 18:00, 27 December 2005 (UTC)


 * So are you suggesting a different wording from the MOS, or just making conversation? —Michael Z. 2005-12-27 20:34 Z 

I would perfer that a uniform introduction be agreed apon, and that intro be used on all pages. Jsmethers 22:37, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Also, proper grammar dictates that a complete sentence be used before a colon. The examples given here are sentence fragments. Jsmethers 00:16, 22 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure about the complete sentence in grammar part &mdash; a colon, I'm sure, can be used before a list, which is what a dab page (in effect) is.
 * Well said, Michael. Neonumbers 03:17, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
 * A colon may be used before a list, but the sentence before the colon must still be a complete sentence. A colon is the equivilent of a period. Jsmethers 06:43, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Wow, what a nice response! Regarding sentence fragments, perhaps "XYZ may refer to the following:" would make it a complete sentence, but in my opinion just the colon conveys 100% of this meaning (or rather, the leading line plus the list of links constitutes the equivalent of a sentence). —Michael Z. 2005-12-22 05:49 Z 


 * If the desire it for the shortest possible introduction, it could be simply the name of the page followed by a colon. Jsmethers 06:43, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I guess that's exactly what Neonumbers just said. Anyway, while we're all here, can someone propose a revision to the MoS incorporating these ideas? —Michael Z. 2005-12-22 06:03 Z 


 * I also like "ABC may stand for:". Generally it tend to think it's useful to name the context the TLA is used in and obviously to what it expands. Both points shouldn't be a problem based on the current MoS. Besides, as Shinobu writes should take care of the rest. -- User:Docu


 * How many times can I say that this usage is wrong before someone realizes it is wrong. Ignoring grammar for without good reason will only harm the reputation of wikipedia.
 * There must be a complete thought before the colon. It must be an independent clause. If it is not a complete thought without the list, it is not correct. Jsmethers 19:16, 22 December 2005 (UTC)


 * My Canadian Oxford Dictionary includes the complete sentence "Abbr.: CCF." That is, admittedly, a very specific usage.  Would "XYZ may refer to the following:" or "XYZ may mean several things:" be acceptable?


 * Those are all fine. The example from the dictionary is correct because the colon is being used in a definition. Jsmethers 20:24, 22 December 2005 (UTC)


 * What if the colon was left out? Would "XYZ may refer to" be acceptable on its own at the top of a list of bullet points?  —Michael Z. 2005-12-27 20:36 Z 


 * Anyway, I would prefer to avoid "may stand for", because XYZ may be both an abbreviation and a full word. —Michael Z. 2005-12-22 20:00 Z 


 * To have a standard introduction, the desired types of lists should be taken into account for parrallel construction. Most of the TLAs appear to contain lists of items, and some appear to contain complete sentences. This dictates that a complete sentence be used for the introduction to allow for both types of construction. Therefore, the following introductions seem to be valid:
 * XYZ may refer to the following:
 * XYZ may mean several things:
 * Meanings of XYZ:
 * This last one fits with the desire for a very short introduction. I also think it is visually appealing since it breaks up the left margin by place the bold at the end of the sentence, thus distinguishing it from the bold headings.


 * With the the intent of parrallel construction, the following do not appear to be appropriate introductions (notice the lack of colons) :
 * XYZ:
 * XYZ may stand for
 * XYZ may refer to


 * Perhaps we should wait a few more days for input, and then take a vote. Jsmethers 05:13, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Leading line
The nature of the leading line is an issue that keeps getting brought up and no complete satisfaction has been reached with regards to bolding, "may mean" vs. "may refer to", the use of colons, whether any leading line is required at all, etc. I would like to resurrect, at least partially, an alternative that Courtland offered a while back, wherein the leading line is styled similar Wiktionary. The basic idea is that the leading line consists of the bolded term and nothing else, eliminating contention regarding its wording, grammar, and formatting.



Tree
 * Tree, a woody plant
 * Tree (graph theory)
 * Tree (set theory)

It is not perfect in every situation, but it is something to consider.—jiy (talk) 04:09, 24 December 2005 (UTC)


 * That looks quite good. It clearly visually defines a term and list of definitions.  Here's the same thing done using wikitext markup for definition lists (";" and ":"), which is semantically more correct, and improves accessibility of the page (eg, for handicapped screen readers).  The exact visual format could be tweaked in Wikipedia's style sheet.




 * Tree
 * Tree, a woody plant
 * Tree (graph theory)
 * Tree (set theory)


 * Really, there's no call for using boldface. The complete-sentence rule is intended for prose, not tables. The colon here indicates that the continuation of the sentence is typographically separated; it's not similar to a semicolon, as it would be in formal prose. &mdash;Wahoofive (talk) 18:45, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I have lost any further interest in this discussion. Do whatever you all wish. Happy new year. Jsmethers 01:37, 30 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I tend to agree; the structure of the information is primarily conveyed visually, not in prose. It's similar to a dictionary headword and definition.  —Michael Z. 2005-12-27 20:46 Z 
 * I like these - they look very clean. Semantically I'd prefer the second, although one might say that the first looks good too. Shinobu 00:32, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
 * So what is being agreed upon here is that there should be nothing except the link on a line, correct, just the link and nothing else, period, yes? User:Ceyockey 02:49, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I prefer the current style because of its flexibility. I don't see any need to change it. —Mike 05:46, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Italicizing

 * [Section, & its initial contrib, reformated for clarity. --Jerzy•t 07:04, 30 December 2005 (UTC)]

[Editor Jiy begins by citing this talk page's MoS page (and adding emphasis) as follows:]
 * There is no need to emphasize the link with bolding or italics, although book titles and the like may be italicized in conformance with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (titles).

[Jiy continues by commenting on that passage as follows:] Based on this, editors often italicize like so:
 * Avalon (album)

This doesn't seem right. Titles of major works are italicized, but "(album)" is not a part of the title of the work; it has been appended for janitorial reasons and does not exist as part of the title outside of Wikipedia. Some editors, then, italicize using piping, like so:
 * Avalon (album)

This is more correct, and at the very I think least the Manual needs to be clarified so that if italicizing is to be used, this is how it should be done. Personally, though, I never italisize because disambiguation pages are not articles and so editorial formatting required for articles, such as italicizing titles of major works, is not required. Additionally, simply leaving italicizing out eliminates complicated piping and issues of consistency. —jiy (talk) 01:20, 22 December 2005 (UTC) [The immediately preceding signed contrib has been interrupted with clarifying notations by Jerzy•t 07:04, 30 December 2005 (UTC)]
 * A change in the manual to specifically recommend Avalon (album) would be fine by me. (Its removal altogether would not.) Neonumbers 03:14, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I'd thought that such a change had been added. It would be useful to add if it is not there; it would also be useful to propose exact wording here so it can be hashed out for consensus (wars can start over single words that are seemingly innocuous).  Note that such a guideline addition does not seem to be specifically supported by the Naming conventions policy that I can see, which is unfortunate; if a naming policy can be cited to support the addition, that would be good to include (for instance the section on ship names which does include mention of italicization).   As an aside, I'd say at least 10% of the edits I've made from something like Avalon (album) to  Avalon (album) get reverted by editors who don't like the change (for a variety of reasons). User:Ceyockey 04:47, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I've been doing this for a while, and I don't remember any reverts. It's not necessary, but it does make the page typographically neater.  The reason it's not in the general MoS is because the disambiguation part is practically always hidden in articles, but it is explicitly revealed in disambiguation pages.  I would support adding a recommendation for this technique, or at least a mention that it is acceptable.  —Michael Z. 2005-12-22 05:57 Z
 * The page is a list of links. If the Avalon (album) was italicized in the article title, then it would be OK to do so in the link.  (But it's not.) Sometimes, folks seem to spend more time tweeking than actually producing anything useful.... William Allen Simpson 13:42, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Huh?—jiy (talk) 03:25, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
 * The page title is not italicized for stylistic consistency and/or due to technical limitations. In most other cases, the titles of major works are italicized. —Michael Z. 2005-12-24 18:28 Z 
 * _ _ A Dab page is not what WAS implies above. Rather, it is our means of doing two things:
 * getting a user to an article on (or at least related to) the topic the user had in mind by asking to display a page with the Dab page's title,
 * avoiding surprising the user with the title of the page they go to.
 * Slavishly imitating the title of the article as to presence or absence of emphatic typography like ital, bold, underlining, or the liberties Knuth took in naming TeX, is irrelevant to both those goals. Going to Doomsday (film) from a lk that renders as Doomsday (film) is far less surprising than the utterly routine experience of doing so from a lk Doomsday, and no problem whatsoever, except for the most literal-minded and Wiki-naive user, whom we have no hope of satisfying in the short run. On the other hand, the italics where a title is intended help the user Dab more speedily by visually separating the events and fictional characters named Doomsday from the works of fiction named Doomsday.
 * _ _ (In fact, BTW, Dab pages are neither lists of lks, as WAS states, nor lists of WP article titles, as he assumes.
 * _ _ (It is true that reasonably often the list within a particular Dab page is indistinguishable from a list of lks. But a Dab-page entry may merely include a lk to an article. It often amounts to either
 * a lk followed by other material needed to usually ensure Dab'n, or
 * raw text, reiterating the title of the Dab page, and a grammatically qualifying appositive or adjectivial phrase that actually contains the lk.
 * Neither of these kinds of entry would appear on a list of lks.
 * _ _ (In fact, a Dab page is never a list at all, tho what follows the context-setting first line is a list, and the context that first line sets acts to guarantee that article titles are not what make up that list. There is probably still no unity, re, e.g., Doomsday, whether it may be or may mean the things that follow it, but Doomsday neither is nor means the title of any of the "target" articles. Doomsday may be or mean any of the referents of the entries listed, each such entry being a thing, composed work, peson, idea, event, etc., and (yes) the point of the Dab is to get the user to an article covering that or a related topic. As i state above, the user's quick clarity about whether lk'd article covers a composed work or something else is valuable, and the fact the words of the lk are in a context where they refer to the subject rather than the article on it rules out any grammatical offense.) --Jerzy•t 07:04, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I firmly disagree with Jerzy. (Or at least the parts that were written clearly in English.)  Any list can have additional information, and here we prefer that it be after the link.  The only important information is the links themselves.  The links in a disambiguation page should match the actual article page as nearly as possible.  I agree with Jiy:
 * the Manual needs to be clarified so that if italicizing is to be used, this is how it should be done.
 * disambiguation pages are not articles and so editorial formatting required for articles, such as italicizing titles of major works, is not required.
 * leaving italicizing out eliminates complicated piping and issues of consistency.
 * Again, a pretty link is no more informative than a page title. I opine that some folks spend an awful lot of time making things pretty.... William Allen Simpson 13:30, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Both WAF & Jyi consider such piping "complicated". I consider that evidence that they haven't learned how to cut and paste. The only simpler piping i can imagine is piping, inside a quotation, to link correctly in spite of a spelling error within it.
 * If you think italics are pretty, or the piping is complicated, don't use them, and your error will be corrected others who understand that they are simple and a form of emphasis and/or of marking boundaries. The italics in question add clarity. They are used here and in standard writing, as are quotes, because the title of a composed work is a syntactic unit whose boundaries are often contrary to those specified by the laws of grammar. The difference between
 * I wrote as I lay dying a story.
 * and
 * I wrote as I lay dying a story.
 * can be more clearly indicated by other mechanisms, so it is not the perfect example for my point. But the italics under discussion, and the analogous quotation marks for shorter composed works, are standard practice, not affected by WP's practices of displaying the article title at the top of the page (which we do not apply in a other place within the 'pedia).
 * I think i was the first to ask this question, which was answered consistently with what i've just said. I'll dig it up in the history & post it below. --Jerzy•t 07:04, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
 * _ _ See Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (disambiguation pages)/archive2, dated 2005 July 11 & 12, just after the Dab MoS went into production.  The implicit consensus was that italicizing the titles is implicit in what was already stated then, and should be obvious to anyone but a laughable and annoying pedant.
 * _ _ For some, it will be obvious, from the length of time that passed without need for (IFAIK) any further discussion, the implicit policy is correct and stated with sufficient visibility. Knowing that i am a laughable and annoying pedant, i concurred in the original consensus that no new project-page language was needed. Nevertheless, as such a person, i wouldn't find it excessive to add explicit language endorsing the italics, and support anyone who chooses to does so. --Jerzy•t 14:39, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
 * _ _ There are 3 proper responses to colleagues wasting their effort on minutiae:
 * Ignore it, and work on the larger aspects of the same things they are working on.
 * Ignore it, and work in other SP areas.
 * Ignore it, and work on something other that WP.
 * _ _ Changing what someone else has done, or proposing a change to what they have done, is essential to the many eyes principle of WP. In constrast, disparaging colleagues' choices abt what they work on is a form of non-productive effort.  The only reason for mentioning this non-productivity is that it is also a form of opposition to the foundations of WP, and thus worth discouraging. --Jerzy•t 14:39, 30 December 2005 (UTC)