Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (Macedonia)/Sources

Improvements: news organizations in a separate section
To somewhat reduce clutter in the media section and avoid the need for 'reproductions' (that tend to die fast anyway) we should create a section similar to the Reference books and website and attempt to describe the usage by that particular agency, such as:

Xinhua predominantly uses "North Macedonian" for state-associated entities  + other links, although sometimes "Macedonian" is used (links). The possessive North Macedonia's is also used often (links).

The only problem that I envision is the fact that some news agencies, such as AFP don't publish the news on their website (or do that for a limited amount of time), but rather they distribute it through internal news wire. We could solve that by linking some of the notable media outlets (ex. Yahoo! News) that published a particular AFP story.

What do you think? --FlavrSavr (talk) 18:56, 24 March 2019 (UTC)

OK, WP:NEWSORG clearly states that ''Multiple sources should not be asserted for any wire service article. Such sources are essentially a single source.'' I'm proceeding with this, starting with the big three agencies: Reuters, AFP and AP. --FlavrSavr (talk) 10:22, 27 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for keeping up with the good job that you have been doing in keeping the repository fully updated. I'm sorry that I haven't been able to help, because I've been really busy at work in the last couple of weeks. I agree 100% with all the changes that you have done in the repository, especially with creating separate sections for WP:NEWSORG. I've also noticed the issue with AFP, but I think that the best way to stay coherent is to cite France 24, which is a partner of AFP and publishes all their newsletters. As for the next steps for organizing the repository, do you think that it is too early to create sections for perennial sources like BBC News, Al Jazeera, Financial Times, etc? --Argean (talk) 11:58, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Actually this was going to be my next suggestion. I doesn't make any sense to jumble The Guardian with MaltaToday. The best and the fastest approach for now would be to subsplit the Media reports that use X into Major media outlets (featuring green and yellow perennial sources) and Other Media featuring all the rest. --FlavrSavr (talk) 14:20, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I would argue that this is a good plan in general. My only concern is that the list of sources in the WP:RSP is a partial one, and some well trusted international media such as Deutsche Welle or Euronews are excluded, while the list of the yellow ones include the Russian RT and TASS, whose neutrality and verifiability are being questioned from time to time. I don't see any reason for the latter being weighed above the former. Maybe starting only with the green ones seems to me like a better idea. --Argean (talk) 09:35, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * From what I see from this request to include VOA in the WP:RSP the list only features sources that are repeatedly discussed and there is a consensus from those discussions that they are reliable. Bizzarely, this may mean that if a major medium is super-reliable (hence nobody ever disputed it), such as Deutsche Welle, it will not be included in that list. :) So I accept the proposal to add only the green ones, to start with, but I don't see why we can't add DW or others in the future if we all agree that they are (a) major and b) reliable. --FlavrSavr (talk) 10:33, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I see, this certainly explains why some media are not in the list. Well, I don't think that anyone would argue against Deutsche Welle and Euronews being trustworthy sources. All other major ones I can think of are already in the WP:RSP list (well France 24 is missing too, but they mostly reproduce AFP, and I may forget a few others right now). I think that we can already include at least those two I mentioned above in the Major media sub-section, provided of course that noone has objections. --Argean (talk) 11:25, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm not a big fan of Euronews after this piece which is poor journalism at best (ask a question, makes zero effort to answer it) and bigotry at worst (look at the photo mish mash of poverty and kitsch). It is a major media outlet, however. --FlavrSavr (talk) 12:45, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Hmm, I was not aware of that. Well, it's obvious that this is a poorly written piece - it's short, but still manages to contain factual mistakes and doesn't avoid being controversial as well. I don't think though that this defines the verifiability of the media, because it is an opinion piece and per WP:NEWSORG these are considered less reliable compared to factual reports. I don't know if you are aware of this article by BBC and the amount of backlash it caused in Greece, including a letter from the Greek ambassador to the UK. Some of the reactions were -well, to say the least- exaggerating, but the piece did contain some factual errors and BBC had to make a few corrections. Still this does not devalue the reliability of BBC in general. Anyway, since more concerns about sources not included in the list may be raised by editors, let's stick to the green ones for now and we can decide if we want to add more in the future. --Argean (talk) 13:28, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * To clarify, I don't oppose including Euronews media reports since those reports that we have are not controversial, but if something like this comes up again - no, please. :) --FlavrSavr (talk) 13:33, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Sure, we are capable of judging if an opinion piece is neutral and reliable. By the way, it looks strange to me how the BBC report I mentioned above is still listed in the sources, although I'm sure many Greeks would question its neutrality. Ironically it is listed under "North Macedonian" for referring to a North Macedonian republic, while the explanation on the corrections subsequently made to the article added a Macedonian constitution reference that we have ignored so far! --Argean (talk) 13:50, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I know. Antondimak took offence that I mentioned the irony, and I appologized. We can either (a) delete it completely since or b) add it to both sections. --FlavrSavr (talk) 14:48, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh sorry, I missed that. Well, let's add it to both sections then, seems like a more neutral approach than deleting it, if other editors have already argued for including it... --Argean (talk) 15:54, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

Improvements: split Perennial sources into separate subsections of Media reports + couple the reports from the same source
As per 's proposal above, I propose to split the perennial sources (green and yellow) from the rest. By doing this, we will have, for example, the section 'Media reports that use 'Macedonian' for people subsplit into 'Major media outlets' and 'Other media outlets'. I also propose to somewhat lose the chronological order by coupling reports coming from the same source. This will reduce clutter even more. Please everybody state whether you support or object this... --FlavrSavr (talk) 21:37, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Support but including only the green ones as previously explained. Support the idea of coupling the reports by the same source too.--Argean (talk) 09:43, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Support including green ones first and yellow ones second. GStojanov (talk) 12:14, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

OK, I'm starting this. I'll start with the green ones, we can discuss the yellow on case-by-case basis. I think that we should probably include them - we're just recording usage of "Macedonian" or "North Macedonian", not getting much deeper into analysis. --FlavrSavr (talk) 21:38, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

First wave of changes, didn't manage to do the coupling but I do that tmrw What is immediately apparent is that we also need to include Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Business Insider and BuzzFeed. Please confirm if there's any problem with this Also we need to lose the reproductions of media sources, like for example Taiwan News reproducing Deutsche Welle. --FlavrSavr (talk) 23:38, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * OK, there's no input on this so far, but I think RFE/RL definitely should be included, although it's not in the perennial sources list, it's very prominent and reliable. Business Insider and BuzzFeed are in the yellow and I'll wait additionally to discern their reliability. I'm also getting rid of reproductions, these don't seem to serve any purpose right now. --FlavrSavr (talk) 11:44, 30 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm also requesting the addition of The Globe and Mail into 'Major media'. --FlavrSavr (talk) 12:30, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

I think we should reconsider Euronews after this false report: 1. Tsipras did not meet Ivanov, nor was that part of the agenda - he met PM Zaev, 2. there never was a territorial dispute between the two countries and 3. name of the products was not on the agenda. --FlavrSavr (talk) 15:44, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

Trending of the two adjectives on the search engines
I think we should also look at how these two adjectives (Macedonian / North Macedonian) are trending on search engines:

Here is a comparison on Google.com:

https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%203-m&q=Macedonian,North%20Macedonian

I think we should include a section on the main page. GStojanov (talk) 18:55, 27 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Actually search engine test are one of the methods described to determine a WP:COMMONNAME: A search engine may help to collect this data; when using a search engine, restrict the results to pages written in English, and exclude the word "Wikipedia". When using Google, generally a search of Google Books and News Archive should be defaulted to before a web search, as they concentrate reliable sources (exclude works from Books, LLC when searching Google Books. Search engine results are subject to certain biases and technical limitations; for detailed advice on the use of search engines and the interpretation of their results, see Search engine test. I support it but it needs to be done right. Is there some way on Google Trends to exclude those instances of "Macedonian" that are "North Macedonian"? --FlavrSavr (talk) 19:50, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * We also need to be aware of the limitations and also exclude references to "Macedonian language", "ethnic Macedonian", "ancient Macedonian" etc. --FlavrSavr (talk) 19:52, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I'd also like to specify that I consider the Google test to be inferior to the other methods on this research, however, putting it at the bottom section wouldn't hurt, I think. --FlavrSavr (talk) 20:00, 27 March 2019 (UTC)


 * If the results come up very close, we will know that we can't use the search engine test. But if they come up decisively biased one way or the other, than this test will have value. I will open a section: "Search Engine comparison" at the bottom of the page. GStojanov (talk) 20:38, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry, but I undid your edit, let's wait at least for 24 hours to see if there are objections or possible improvements. Also, we don't need the Republic of Macedonia vs. Republic of North Macedonia comparison, it's just not part of the debate right now. --FlavrSavr (talk) 21:21, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Ok. GStojanov (talk) 23:40, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * After waiting 24h + I added the search engine test. The link is dynamic so you can drill down and check how these two adjectives juxtapose on a country by country bases. You can also expand / shrink the time period to get the sense of the trending. GStojanov (talk) 16:10, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Improvements: Prespa agreement as a subsection
People not acquainted with the Prespa agreement may be perplexed as to why this section structure exists. Although it's a primary source, I think that we should include relevant excerpts in the bottom part of every section. It won't hurt... Thoughts? --FlavrSavr (talk) 21:22, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Support. GStojanov (talk) 12:55, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Improvements: Minor sources in a subsection?
I'm somewhat concerned that minor sources such as SeeNews, Emerging Europe etc. are giving WP:UNDUE weight in the discussion, creating an impression of widespread use of certain terms. I'm thinking of spliting the section in to Major/Medium/Minor or Major/Other/Minor sources. The question that could potentially arise is "what is a minor source"? I think that a good rule of thumb is that sources that don't have their own English language Wikipedia pages should be considered minor. I know it's not perfect, but it makes sense. Thoughts? --FlavrSavr (talk) 12:35, 24 April 2019 (UTC)


 * 5000 sources after, these hardly bring any value to the research. I'm removing SeeNews as a source. As of writing, it is generally Prespa compliant: avoiding adjectives for companies, and using "Macedonian

" for the stock exchange (which is the official name). --FlavrSavr (talk) 22:07, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

Pausing the Nationality research?
Given that our new policy explicitely states that the majority of reliable sources refer to the nationality as 'Macedonian' and this is confirmed by real trends, isn't it time to pause the research there and focus on the adjectival usage? I mean, there will be 'North Macedonian(s)' from time to time but the trend is 'Macedonian' and it doesn't seem to go away... Let's think about this for a while. Also, I'm going to add bits and pieces of the new Wikipedia naming convention to explain why we're not doing research, on say, ethnicity, language and culture. This might seem confusing to an outsider. --FlavrSavr (talk) 15:50, 13 May 2019 (UTC)

Some sources need update
I've been going through the list of the sources and I'm discovering that some of them need to be updated because they have changed the terminology they use. Some examples below

For people:
 * The Swiss Federal Council now uses the term nationals of North Macedonia instead of North Macedonian nationals
 * The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Estonia) doesn't use the term 'North Macedonian' anymore
 * The U.S. Youth Exchange and Study Programs now uses the term Macedonian students instead of North Macedonian students
 * Also the OSAC link is now dead.

For state-associated entities
 * The Council of Europe now uses authorities in North Macedonia instead of North Macedonian authorities
 * The Government of Croatia now uses Macedonian border instead of North Macedonian border.

A few additional official/governmental sources can be added too:
 * from the European Council (Donald Tusk) Macedonian friends
 * from the Embassy of Sweden in Skopje Macedonian citizens
 * from the UK Government Macedonian authorities
 * from the German Government (Angela Merkel) Macedonian Prime Minister
 * from the Government of Croatia Macedonian Prime Minister
 * from the Polish MFA Macedonian Deputy Prime Minister, Macedonian Government
 * from the Polish Government North Macedonia’s top officials
 * from the Hungarian Government & MFA North Macedonian Deputy Prime Minister, North Macedonian Cabinet,Macedonian Prime Minister, Macedonian accession negotiations, North Macedonian border, North Macedonia's southern border
 * from the Slovenian MFA North Macedonian prime minister, North Macedonian border, etc
 * from the Qatari MFA Macedonian government, etc
 * from the Government of Sweden North Macedonian Prime Minister
 * from the Romanian MFA Macedonian official, Macedonian counterpart
 * from the Georgian MFA Macedonian colleague
 * from the Lithuanian MFA North Macedonian counterparts

Cheers, --Argean (talk) 22:36, 23 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks, ! I will update the sections, I've been mostly updating the news section which is the easiest, I didn't really had the time to check all the international and government organizations. Please feel free to add and correct the research directly, it's meant to be a collaborative effort. :) --FlavrSavr (talk) 12:36, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Dictionaries and style guides
I'll be adding several dictionaries that have noted the name change and changed their terminology. I found this BBC Style Guide with new guides on terminology. It would be very helpful if we did a comprehensive research on this matter, so feel free to add updated dictionaries and style guides of important news agencies/newspapers. Note that I'll be only adding updated dictionaries and style guides that clearly noted the country name change. --FlavrSavr (talk) 20:47, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Yellow sources from RS
I've been adding yellow sources (from the reliable sources perennial list) in the major media section, the primary reason for this is that we're gauging terminology usage here, not some nuanced political or other view that needs the consensus of the entire Wikipedia community. Red sources are out of the list, of course. However, if anyone objects, I'll put them back in the 'Other media' sections. --FlavrSavr (talk) 13:31, 8 August 2020 (UTC)

Still not entirely sure this was a good decision. Ping --FlavrSavr (talk) 13:31, 8 August 2020 (UTC)