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Talk:Victoria (state)/Archive 1

< Talk:Victoria (state)
Latest comment: 10 years ago by AussieLegend in topic The State of Victoria
Archive 1 Archive 2

First talk

Latest comment: 20 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

After a jurisdictional problem wherein a corps was discovered within the Murry ( between NSW and Victoria ).. it was decided that the Murry waters when on the boarder between NSW and Victoria would be NSW Territory.

There are still cases about crimes and things... like what if evidence was on teh south bank ( vic ) , but it errodes and falls into the river??

This page has a little info on the case.

http://www.surveyorsboard.vic.gov.au/guidelines.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.12.60.120 (talk) 06:26, 3 February 2004 (UTC)

Requested move (2005)

Latest comment: 18 years ago15 comments8 people in discussion
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

The initiator of this move feels that Victoria, Australia is better than Victoria (Australia) as per naming convention.

  • Oppose. See my comment below. – AxSkov (☏) 08:45, 16 August 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Same. Xtra 09:16, 16 August 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Ditto. — Felix the Cassowary 12:14, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

It was requested that this article be renamed but there was no consensus for it be moved. violet/riga (t) 10:32, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Discussion

I always thought the brackets made the pipe-trick nice and easy to do.. -- Chuq 10:29, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Victoria is its own jurisdiction and is the official name of the place. It is not just a location within a country. The need for the brackets is for dissambiguation purposes alone. As such Victoria, Australia is an incorrect name. Xtra 11:47, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

I also prefer the current name.
Apropos the name of the jurisdiction, in historical documents it's often seen referred to as the Colony of Victoria and in post-federation documents as the State of Victoria (in contrast to the Commonwealth of Australia). The 'Colony' and 'State' are capitalised, and it makes it look they're a part of the name. Is and has always been the name actually title-less, merely: Victoria, or was it historically the Colony of Victoria and then the State of Victoria? Perhaps someone here knows.
Felix the Cassowary 12:38, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
It is interchangable. But I think that the name is "Victoria". Xtra 12:49, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
I prefer the current name too. The state is generally called 'Victoria' by most people; the (Australia) part is just to dab it from the other Victoria's in the world. – AxSkov (T) 05:18, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

I prefer the new suggestion as that is in keeping with other articles such as towns, i.e. Bendigo, Victoria isn't Bendigo (Victoria). Also, people searching for the article are going to type in Victoria, Australia over Victoria (Australia) and at the moment that means being redirected. In my opinion. --Silversmith Hewwo 08:50, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, but Victoria's not a town, and which other state is at Statename, Australia? "Victoria, Australia" sounds odd to me. (Anyway, if Bendigo weren't at 'Bendigo, Victoria', it'd be at 'Bendigo', because there's no disambig needed.) The (Australia)'s just a disambig, same as anything else. — Felix the Cassowary 09:33, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Victoria (Australian state), maybe? After Georgia (U.S. state). - Randwicked 19:16, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

That is really the same as the current name; which should be kept for purposes of accuracy. Xtra 02:22, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
I disagree. The bracketed text really should be a short descriptor, vis-à-vis Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Topic_page_naming. The current version suggests to my pedantic self that Victoria is a type of Australia. But that's just me. - Randwicked 12:23, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
I think Victoria (Australian state) would be better here. — Trilobite (Talk) 10:40, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Selective deletion

Latest comment: 18 years ago2 comments1 person in discussion

I am about to delete from the article history those revisions whose content and/or edit summaries libel Xtra, per Wikipedia's libel policy. Selective deletion requires full deletion followed by selective restoration. Therefore this article will be deleted for a very brief period of time. Snottygobble 04:40, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Complete. Snottygobble 04:41, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Proposed move to Victoria, Australia

Latest comment: 17 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

Please refer to discussion at Wikipedia:Australian Wikipedians' notice board#Victoria -- Longhair 22:22, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Conversation was archived to Wikipedia:Australian Wikipedians' notice board/Archive 21#Victoria. I don't see a consensus to move. --Scott Davis Talk 14:59, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Where is Victoria?

Latest comment: 17 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

The history of Victoria here is all wrong.

Yes, the colony of NSW existed but ended near Yass. Past that it was referred to as 'The Wasteland' not New Holland. 'Wasteland' has a meaning other than the obvious. Its political as well as nomenclature. What about 'Terre Napoleon' that went to 36th parallel, also Neutsland, etc. Also New South Caledonia? The boundary was to be along the Murrumbidgee and all below that was Port Phillip. The Brits actually declared this. The aussies wanted it south of the Murray. Guess what the aussies did. They moved the Murray. Easy. Then it matched what the Brits had declared. When south of Yass opened up, there were three NSW (which in those days also included current day Vic.), districts, North, Middle and South with South, Port Phillip.

Do you have any reliable sources for any of this? It'd be an interesting bit of trivia if it were true. Although even if it were the case we couldn't say that the victorian boundaries are not where they have been marked on maps. I dare say that common law would dictate that the boundaries are where they are commonly agreed to be, and that this has been confirmed by numerous subsequent interstate agreements between the Vic and NSW Governments on such issues as resource and river management. The fact that the Vic Gov't hasn't attenpted to exercise jurisdictional authority outside its boundaries for over 150 years would have something to do with it too. -- Adz|talk 06:44, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Population density

Latest comment: 17 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

The intro has Victoria as the most densely populated state in Australia. The box lists it as second. Does this need an update?

No contradiction. The box ranking includes territories as well. Victoria is second to ACT.
Further on this topic: Densest state I'll grant, but most urbanised? How is this measured? - ҉ Randwicked ҉ 04:40, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
here's a citation, from 2001. Victoria and New South Wales are equally the most urbanised states (both 89%). Does anyone have a newer reference? - ҉ Randwicked ҉

New Projects!

Please note that they are new state based projects - it is well worth getting behind the Victorian one - to join in and improving your state project !08:56, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Political parties

Latest comment: 17 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Hi all

Somebody lumped the DLP and Greens in "Other". To be fair to all parties I have expanded the chart out to show all the parties and Independents that have representatives in The Victorian Parliament. I also changed the Greens color to Green (makes sense) and changed the National's color to light blue although arguably I could have used the same color blue as the Liberals. I had no idea what to use for the DLP so they got purple.

Pberrett 07:39, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

List of Premiers

Latest comment: 16 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Someone compiled a table with a list of Premiers. Such a table already exists on Premiers of Victoria, and includes links to articles about all the Premiers, as well as their political affiliation. It seemed to me the list on this page duplicated that information and added far more detail than required for a general page about Victoria, so I removed it. --Michael Johnson 00:23, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Regions ?

Latest comment: 15 years ago6 comments4 people in discussion

I think the article would really benefit from a region map of Victoria. Victoria has some very distinct regions (ie. Mallee, Gippsland, Goldfields etc and these aren't clearly defined in the article. --Rulesfan (talk) 06:02, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually no it doesn't. These regions are really ill-defined, and governments have many different regions for different purposes. No two boundaries are the same. It would be really difficult, and not much assistance as these regions don't really mean much. --Michael Johnson (talk) 06:56, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
Perhaps it might be worth creating an article similar to Regions of Queensland and Regions of Western Australia, which could discuss the various regions, however ill defined they may be. Ill-defined or not, there is no denying that there are regions, and that Bairnsdale is not in the same region as Bendigo. It's just a suggestion. I don't really have time to work on the article at the moment, but I thought I'd put it out there. -- Adz|talk 04:13, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Where the Western Australian one exists is exactly the point that Michael is discouraging about - there are so many forms of regional division - from different authorities and that is why exactly the article exists - to see how the local government, and other departmentes make a mess of it all - so as for meaning much is the whole point for in the end an article of regional messups in each state SatuSuro 00:55, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Well that is something different. An article describing regional boundaries for different authorities might be quite useful. But that is different from trying to draw some lines on a map, plonking it in this article, and saying that is the Mallee or the Gippsland region. The trouble is these "regions" are more concepts than realities. --Michael Johnson (talk) 01:19, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Sigh, tell me about it - tourist promo authorities are the worse at that as well creating tourist regions with admin powers under their acts or regs but nowhere else - we have in perth 'sunset coast' blah SatuSuro 01:27, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

VICTORIAN BUSHFIRES

Latest comment: 15 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Is it appropriate to have the paragraph on the February 2009 Victorian Bushfires in the History section? The fires are still occurring and casualties are still being counted. The entry also contains several spelling mistakes and poor grammar. Would it be more appropriate to temporarily have the information on the bushfires in it's own section until the event is over & then move it to the history section once all details are known? Swampy 121.216.3.222 (talk) 12:35, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

August Melbourne Meetup

Latest comment: 14 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

A new Melbourne Meetup is being organised for Sunday 9 August, 2009. The chief programs officer for the Wikimedia Foundation, Jennifer Riggs will be in town and is looking forward to meeting some of the local wikipedians. So, please check out Wikipedia:Meetup/Melbourne 14 and sign up if you can make it. Cuddy Wifter (talk) 07:28, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Peculiar graphs

Latest comment: 14 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
  •  
    The climate of Victoria's capital Melbourne, which is located on Victoria's central south coast, as measured and recorded at the Regional Office (altitude 31.2m).
  •  
    The climate of Mildura on the Murray River on the north-western border of Victoria as measured and recorded at the Airport (altitude 50m).
  •  
    The climate of Wilsons Promontory which constitutes the southernmost tip of Victoria and the Australian mainland as measured and recorded at the Lighthouse (altitude 88.7 m/291 ft).

This is very odd in the body of an article. I've removed them. No one could possibly read the information without clicking to high-res: they look like some kind of motherboard. The information needs to be expressed in proper graphs made for the purpose. Tony (talk) 01:46, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Requested move (2010)

Latest comment: 13 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. 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.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:52, 15 May 2010 (UTC)


Victoria (Australia) → Victoria (Australian state) — "State" should be included at the end according to article guidelines like Georgia (U.S. state) and Washington (U.S. state). ApprenticeFan talk contribs 14:08, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. 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.

Requested move 3

Latest comment: 13 years ago20 comments16 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. 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.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Reverted the earlier moved based on the WP:SNOW here. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:36, 15 May 2010 (UTC)


Victoria (Australian state) → Victoria (Australia) — The reason given for the previous move was spurious. There is no guideline for the naming/disambiguation of Australian states, or sub-national entities in general. The only examples given were two US states and no reasons were provided as to why the US situation was in any way applicable in Australia. The new name is more complex, more difficult to find for a reader unfamiliar with Wikipedia naming guidelines and does not provide any additional information that is not in the very first sentence in the article. It is an unnecessary complication in a disambiguated name that does nothing of any benefit other than add key-strokes and confusion. In addition the claim for consensus given for the previous move was based on a sample of two. This is not evidence of any sort of consensus worthy of being called such. Mattinbgn\talk 06:33, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

  • Support Four issues: 1. "Australian state" is an unnecessary level of disambig as "Australia" is sufficiently clear. There is no other Victoria in Australia. 2. (U.S.) in brackets is confusing; (Australia) is not. Hence what is needed in one situation may not apply in another. 3. No policy or MOS issue was raised to support the original move. 4. The consensus claim is bogus. Orderinchaos 06:40, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support. Let's keep it simple and not strive for a false 'tidiness' in the guise of standardisation. It was already unambiguous and the move, made without reference to the Australia project, was unnecessary. Maias (talk) 06:49, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support per all three comments above. --Bduke (Discussion) 07:12, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support as the renaming to Victoria (Australian state) was flawed as, no one from the projects which this affects was not notified, this is an article about a state of Australia but Victoria (Australian state) is too confusing and really not needed as Victoria (Australia) worked well, using the US naming for a state of Australia is wrong and lastly there was no clear consensus. Bidgee (talk) 07:14, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support as per the reasons above. Grey Shadow | Talk 07:21, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support As above - All good arguments. Umpteen thousand articles link to Victoria (Australia), high use templates such as {{Infobox Australian place}} will need modification, entire category trees will need renaming. This was not a simple page move and it should have been brought to the attention of the project, especially in the case of a top importance article like this, where agreement between one semi-retired editor and an IP is really insufficient to declare consensus to move. --AussieLegend (talk) 07:26, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
Support There is no other "Victoria" in Australia. The 2 American examples cited, Georgia and Washington, both have unique issues in relation to those two states ( confusion with Washington D.C. and the entirely unrelated country of Georgia ) which do not apply here. The custom of superfluously adding additional geographical categories to place-names is mainly a peculiarity unique to American English.Eregli bob (talk) 07:34, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support, for the multitude of reasons outlined above. Lankiveil (speak to me) 07:42, 15 May 2010 (UTC).
  • Guys, that RM was open for a week, nobody participated, and half an hour after closing another one gets opened? Victoria is not "an Australia", and looking at similar entries suggests that it's either the current title or Victoria, Australia, (that being the general pattern for dabbing geographic entities of varying sizes), given that parenthetical titles should usually be a common noun (no reason to make an exception here) and the other Victorias are not state-level entities. I also don't buy the idea that (U.S.) is somehow "more confusing" than (Australia). I also reject the idea that this is somehow an Americanism. Arguably the "state" is useful, since not all immediate subdivisions of Australia are states. Incoming links won't need to be changed - we've had redirects since the earliest days of phase3. I reject the idea that there is impropriety because somebody wasn't notifed. The RM log is public, and you've got watchlists. I notice that no policy or MOS issue has been raised in support. Given there are hundreds of thousands of user accounts, I fail to see how two apparently can't be "consensus" while eight can. I'm not seeing any compelling reasons to revert the move here. 81.111.114.131 (talk) 08:47, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Comment Where to start on this? Firstly, I am unsure what 'Victoria is not "an Australia"' means, can you clarify? I think you are trying to make some point about common nouns - not sure why it is relevant. Secondly, using US alone as a disambiguator for Washington and Georgia is not sufficient, this does not apply in the case of Victoria. That is why it is more confusing, whether you "buy" this or not. Thirdly, "Guys, that RM was open for a week, nobody participated, and half an hour after closing another one gets opened?" And your point is? I asked the administrator who closed the move discussion how to go about getting his decision reversed. This was his advice. Your argument of basically "you snooze, you lose" hardly seems in the spirit of consensus as is generally applied here on Wikipedia. "Consensus can change", it is said - sometimes quite quickly it seems Fourth I note you mention redirects, but fail to address the point about category trees and all the other items that someone will eventually decide need "tidying". Fifth, eight (to date) is at least four times more representative a sample than two - regardless of the large population size. Sixth, "I notice that no policy or MOS issue has been raised in support" I did not see one raised in the initial move discussion either. There was reference to a non-existent guideline but I hardly think that counts. Seventh, "given that parenthetical titles should usually be a common noun" There are literally hundreds (thousands?) of counter examples, starting with Fitzroy River (Queensland). Fitzroy River is not a "Queensland", is it. Even if argumet was actually supported by evidence (which it isn't), you then should be arguing for a name like "Victoria (state)", no? Lastly, the whole rationale for the original move was based around some sort of vague desire for consistency with the US practice, with no consideration given to whether this practice was appropriate in this case or even necessary. I have been consistently opposed to over-elaborate or non-necessary disambiguation (esp. in category names) and my objection to the existing name is based on this. Victoria (Australia) is entirely unambiguous (can you give an example, please?)and as such there was absolutely no reason why the name needed to be changed. -- Mattinbgn\talk 09:26, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
    • Parenthetical disambiguators are, by and large, common nouns. Apart from odd cases involving titles, "A (B)" usually mean that "A is a B". I notice your counter-example is also in Australia. In the rest of the world, the preference has been to use a comma for geographical disambiguation (we have "Town, County", "Town, Country", "Town, State", etc.), as can be seen with the various articles ending in ", France" or ", Italy" (most are documented in WP:NCGN). Consistency is a good thing, especially for the readers, and there should be some compelling reason for making an exception - "that's how we've done it in this project" is an excuse, and a poor one at that. We don't usually identify people by their birth date, though there are a handful of cases where this has been done because two people share a name, a profession and a locality. Your attempt at an explanation as to why "(U.S.)" is somehow confusing fails miserably, both on facts and on logic. For what it's worth, the Georgia issue is also not a matter of American practice - that particular argument dragged on for weeks, and involved users from all over the place, and most American editors preferred that article to be simply "Georgia". Again, I say that there is no NC or MOS issue raised by the support voters here, hence I find it hypocritical to suggest that a lack of reference to the NC is fatal to request above yet not to their own "support" comments. So, I'm going for the answer which looks most correct according to our naming rules and existing practice, which is move to Victoria, Australia - with a comma, not parentheses. 81.111.114.131 (talk) 10:35, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
This is a spurious argument. If this was valid, you would have "Paris, France", "London, England", and "Alberta, Canada" under those titles. The "A,B" form is where the places are normally refered to or referenced as A,B as the normal naming, which is not the case for those places ( except for Americans ), and not the case for Victoria.Eregli bob (talk) 16:27, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
      • In case anyone is not happy with the lack of policy being mentioned here, I notice that the comma form is endorsed in WP:NCGN, both in the general case ("the tag is normally preceded by a comma") and in specific cases for Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, India, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Phillipines, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Switzerland, UK and USA. It notes that this applies mostly to settlements and administrative divisions, not so much to features such as rivers and mountains. 81.111.114.131 (talk) 11:00, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support —Aaroncrick TALK 08:53, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support. Timeshift (talk) 09:02, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support - Bamborough (talk) 10:11, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Support - no need for disambiguation within Australia; the state is Victoria, nothing else, as far as we are concerned- outside Australia there is one in Canada, apparently, so we have had to adopt minimum dab for that reason. Georgia (United States). Washington (state) would be more correct for the divisions in another country in the other hemisphere; just needs two of us to agree (Crusoe8181 (talk) 10:34, 15 May 2010 (UTC)).
  • Support should never have been moved, Victoria(Australia) is concise. Gnangarra 14:49, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. 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.

European settlement

Latest comment: 13 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

Is there contradiction between the statements in the lead and the section History regarding European settlement? Lead says; "European settlement in Victoria began in the 1830s as a farming community." History section says; "The first European settlement in Victoria which was established in October 1803 under Lieutenant-Governor David Collins at Sullivan Bay, Victoria on Port Phillip Bay." Bleakcomb (talk) 08:01, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Looking further, the Portland article says; "By the early 1800s, whalers and sealers were working the treacherous waters of Bass Stait and Portland Bay provided good shelter and fresh water which enabled them to establish the first white settlement in the area." Bleakcomb (talk) 08:06, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it is so much a contradiction as something that needs clarification. The whaling settlements were temporary arrangements and the 1803 settlement was abandoned in 1804. The 1835 settlements at Portland and Melbourne managed to endure. -- Mattinbgn\talk 09:24, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Settlement of melbourne began around 1824 - 1825 with both John Pascoe Falkner and John Batman (Batman was searching for new grazing land on behlaf of a consortium of wealthy investers) establishing settlements; the reference to 1830 would most likely be the time at which the commenwealth reclaimed, divided and sold off the land. [unable to reference this as my sources are in Australia and I am not - sorry] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.76.55.214 (talk) 17:37, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Strike throughs

Latest comment: 13 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

What gives AussieLegend the right to make this page illegible? Perhaps an editor has been banned, but the opinions should stand or fall on their own. In coming up with a final decision, the fact that he has been banned needs to be taken into account, certainly, so I can understand a struckthrough "vote", but in me deriving my own opinion, it's completely irrelevant [retracted with apologies]. —Felix the Cassowary 16:22, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Apparently the answer is Wikipedia:BANPOL#Edits_by_and_on_behalf_of_banned_editors. —Felix the Cassowary 16:32, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
Well, not quite the answer. The vast majority of the strike-throughs in the move discussion were not made by me at all,[1] they were made after a proposal at WP:ANI that "leaving the comments in place preserves the sense and continuity of any discussion, but the strikethrough alerts a closer who might be unaware of this thread that the comments should be given no weight in the closng."[2][3] I just caught the ones that he missed although, as you've now discovered, WP:BANPOL endorses complete removal. --AussieLegend (talk) 16:42, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
I made the initial strikethroughs above, for the reasons given by AussieLegend, who I thank for completing what I inadvertantly left undone. Policy allows that a banned (not simply blocked) editor's contributions to Wikipedia can be deleted on sight, but my feeling was that doing so in these move conversations would make them virtually impossible to understand. For that reason, since some (at least) appeared as if they were going to left open, I went with striking through the comments. That they make the page messy is unfortunate, but the alternative was incomprehensibility. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:23, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Requested move - Victoria (state)

Latest comment: 13 years ago103 comments21 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. 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.

The result of the move request was: page not moved: closed "no concensus" after discussion in Talk:Victoria (Australia)#Close this discussion. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 06:55, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Victoria (Australia) → Victoria (state) — 1) If a name of a state is ambiguous, then the normal way is to use the disambiguation term "(state)". This goes well with most official state names, that have a name like "State of Victoria" - i.e. often it simply means incorporating a part of the official in the article title. 2) Additionally the current disambiguation Victoria (Australia) is ambiguous, since there is another Victoria in Australia: Victoria (Western Australia). 3) Specifying an outstanding feature (here: to be a state) separates the topic better from other topics, e.g. there are other locations including the string "Victoria". Details below. --TopoChecker (talk) 14:22, 17 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor

@ 3) Disambiguation term - Outstanding feature vs. location

@ 2) Entities that include the string "Victoria", found via http://www.geonames.org/search.html?q=victoria&country=AU Victoria Lake, Victoria River, Victoria Park, Victoria (hill), Mount Victoria (Australia), Lake Victoria (Australia), Victoria Point...

@ 1) General patter for disambiguation of states in WP Disambiguation seems to follow the same pattern for all but two:

The only ones not fitting are Washington and Victoria. TopoChecker (talk) 14:22, 17 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor

  • Support Most precise and concise. walk victor falk talk 20:05, 17 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Comment The proposal has some merit but some of the arguments raised by the nominator need some examination. "Victoria (Australia)" is unlikely to be confused with any of the places that are not actually called "Victoria" but "Lake Victoria". I fail to see the ambiguity here. Victoria (Western Australia), created immediately before this move discussion is an entirely non-notable geographical feature and is now up for deletion at AfD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Victoria (Western Australia). Geographical features in Australia are almost never given just a plain name such as "Victoria" without a descriptor such as "Mount", "Lake" etc. and I suspect that anyone who actually refers to this hill at all (which is doubtful) would call the feature "Victoria Hill". -- Mattinbgn (talk) 20:36, 17 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Agree with everything, except 1) the desire for deletion - I would like to have every location from GeoNames inside WP 2) the nonexistence of ambiguity. Technically if the hill is called "Victoria" there would be ambiguity. Please, understand me right, I really only mean technically, no proof anyone outside GeoNames before today ever called this hill Victoria. And I who did, don't know whether there even really is a hill at that location ;-) TopoChecker (talk) 21:56, 17 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • Support: To be honest, I don't think it is any consequence whether or not there is also a hill in Australia named "Victoria". If those were the only two things in the world named "Victoria", the article on the state would be at [[Victoria]], and I doubt anybody would be calling it ambiguous. Having said that, I agree that sticking to convention used in similar cases is best, and I'm confused as to why they wouldn't all use the same to begin with. Nightw 23:07, 17 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Support per precedents cited by nominator. Donama (talk) 23:38, 17 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Support as if one looks very closely into the archives of the Victoria article - there are victoria's in other places that pushed the change of the usage of Australia into the title to please the outsiders - the convention given here looks good - but it would be good to see what other WP Australia users say. The issue of Victoria Hill is a complete furphy SatuSuro 02:20, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Can I have a bit each way? Yes, this Victoria is a state, and it's in Australia. Both pieces of information are useful. Can we call the article Victoria (Australian state)? The proposed change throws away one piece of useful information to replace it with another. Yes, I know it would be non-standard, but I like coming up with ideas from left-field. Maybe it could the start of something big. HiLo48 (talk) 02:40, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Comment Nice left-field suggestion but clearly rejected last year at Talk:Victoria (Australia)#Requested move 3 for the very good reason that it is not consistent with WP:PRECISION "When additional precision is necessary to distinguish an article from other uses of the topic name, over-precision should be avoided. Be precise but only as precise as is needed." The use of "Australia" or "state" is sufficient to disambiguate the article. The use of both together as "Victoria (Australian state)" is over-precise and potentially misleading - it appears to indicate that there are other states called "Victoria" is places other than Australia. I am not sure which way I am leaning on this change yet but I do know I oppose "Australian state" -- Mattinbgn (talk) 02:54, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • That's cool. I understand your point about over=precision. HiLo48 (talk) 03:15, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • It would be ambiguous for Salzburg (Austria) - could be the town, Upper Nile (Sudan) - could refer to water. Washington (United States) - the city. Etc. The only term that is very good to separate the topics is "state" due to the fact that there are not that many states in the world. TopoChecker (talk) 15:09, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • There are even fewer "Australias" in the world. --AussieLegend (talk) 15:45, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • What would matter if one wants to count is the combination: How many Victorias are there in Australia? The combination Australia/Victoria can refer to a lot, the combination Victoria/state only refers to one thing, the State of Victoria. It is not Victoria of Australia. TopoChecker (talk) 17:25, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • Victoria (Australia) refers to only one thing. We're a pretty lucky country, we don't have people who are so poor they can only afford one name and geographical places are always named appropriately (Lake Victoria, Mount Victoria, Victoria Hill etc.) Changing to "Victoria (state)" doesn't make anything easier, it just creates a lot of unnecessary work. --AussieLegend (talk) 17:38, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • That kind of luck was not given to the 7 things in Australia named Mount Victoria. If you don't like to work, I am happy to do it. That work needs to be done shall not prevent WP from getting better. Early fix, less work. TopoChecker (talk) 18:15, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • There are a lot of places in Australia that share names. The state of Victoria is not one of them. There is only one of those and changing the article's name to "Victoria (state)" will not fix the multi-naming issue with the Mount Victorias, nor is it relevant to this article. As for your "early fix, less work", I will reply with "no fix, no work" and remind you that Victoria (Australia) hasn't been a problem during the years that this article has existed, except for those seeking to make a mountain out of a mole-hill. I'm afraid that nothing you've said, or re-said has convinced me that there is any need, or anything to be gained from renaming this article. It just seems to be creating a lot of work for no reason at all. In fact, I'm seriously considering changing my vote to "Even more strongly oppose". --AussieLegend (talk) 18:30, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • OMG it would be ambiguous here and there, just like that current convention, which sucks. Not a very strong argument against. Hesperian 22:41, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Strong oppose As I pointed out at the last RM,[4] umpteen thousand articles link to Victoria (Australia), high use templates such as {{Infobox Australian place}} will need modification, entire category trees based around "Victoria (Australia)" will need renaming and so on. This is not simply a page move; people need to look at the big picture. --AussieLegend (talk) 05:16, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
I don't think it's being proposed that "Victoria (Australia)" should redirect anywhere other than this article, so no such problems should exist.--Kotniski (talk) 09:55, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
This is exactly why I said people need to look at the big picture. In order to maintain the naming consistency that this proposal is trying to achieve, categories with "Victoria (Australia)" in the name, such as Category:Victoria (Australia), its multiple subcats and numerous articles shall need to be renamed to "Victoria (state)", otherwise the single inconsistency that precipitated this move proposal will be transferred to god knows how many categories and articles. That will then necessitate other changes, such as to {{Infobox Australian place}}. It shouldn't be up to redirects to fix a problem that doesn't currently exist but which will if the article is moved. My father taught me that you should do a job properly or not at all, and that's what we should do here. If one article is renamed to make it consistent with others, we need to rename all related categories and articles to make them consistent, otherwise this move is just introducing a lot more inconsistency than it's removing. --AussieLegend (talk) 11:15, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
Bots and editors will fix this easily. Esp. for templates it's only a little bit of editing, and for category changes there are bots. TopoChecker (talk) 15:09, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
Sure. Of course they will. It's just a snap of the fingers. I doubt bots will come into it because of the number of categories involved. It's really not worth the effort to get a bot to do it and yet it's still a significant amount of manual work. Since the article moves will not be uncontroversial, most will have to go through a renaming proposal. I think you greatly underestimate the complexity of the task. Renaming the article doesn't automatically mean that everything will happen. There are procedures to follow and a lot of follow-up work. People underestimating the effort involved is why we have situations like {{Expand}} still existing and {{Infobox skyscraper}} and {{Infobox building}} not having been merged more than six months after the discussion finished. --AussieLegend (talk) 15:36, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
I guess merging of infoboxes is less of a standard task than category renaming. For category renaming a bot will be found fast. As for other articles - which others would need a move? For changing templates I offer my help. I would clean them up. TopoChecker (talk) 15:47, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
As I said, there aren't enough categories to justify use of a bot and in any case, renaming of the categories isn't automatic. It's something that will have to be discussed first. (Yet more effort from other editors.) As for the articles, you can start, as I've already indicated, with those in Category:Victoria (Australia) and any that may be in its subcats. The required effort is just much as, if not more than, merging two infoboxes. --AussieLegend (talk) 16:00, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
Bots will do the work depending on how much edits would be needed otherwise. It does not depend on how many categories do need renaming. Either a lot of changes related to categories are required and that is what you suggested in the first place, then there will be bots, or there are only few changes and it can be done manually. Categories follow article names, it is not that existing category names override judgement of editors to what is the best article name. TopoChecker (talk) 17:36, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
Yes, you keep saying bots will do the work but that's not necessarily true and bots can't do all of the work anyway. A lot will still need to be done manually. There still has to be consensus to change the names and that involves discussion. Bots can't discuss. --AussieLegend (talk) 17:46, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
And I have evidence, WP:CFD talk confirmed the categories will be changed by bot after they went through CFD. Seems they even have their own one, so not even any bot request is needed. TopoChecker (talk) 15:49, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • Mild support, seems slightly more natural and consistent with what we normally do, though I wouldn't mind "(Australian state)" either (like Washington (U.S. state)), and in fact would probably most prefer simply Victoria, as primary topic.--Kotniski (talk) 09:53, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
Notice that the state of New York is at New York, despite manifestly not being the primary topic for the phrase "New York", on the grounds that the true primary topic has a natural disambiguator (New York City). If that argument holds there, then it must surely hold even more strongly here, since the queen certainly has an equally natural disambiguator (Queen Victoria), and it isn't clear that the state isn't anyway genuinely primary for the phrase "Victoria" (people searching for the queen are, I think, far less likely to search for her under plain "Victoria" than those looking for NYC are to do so under plain "New York").--Kotniski (talk) 11:05, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
1) the "U.S." for Washington will likely be removed per WP:PRECISION 2) New York could be fixed too. Only because it is broken there, it does not need to be broken in other places. Same for Talk:Chihuahua#Requested move - Chihuahua (state). TopoChecker (talk) 15:09, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
"Likely" is not really a statement you can make only a day or so into the discussion. to do so is WP:CRYSTAL. --AussieLegend (talk) 15:39, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Oppose
@1 The list of articles following the (state) pattern (about 34) is quite small in Wikipedia terms, and thus the casual reader is unlikely to recognise this as a common pattern of disambiguation. Disambiguation for geographic articles overall is most commonly by a higher level of geographic hierarchy.
@2 I believe Victoria (Australia) is not readily confused with Victoria Lake, Victoria River, Victoria Park, Victoria Hill (Western Australia), Mount Victoria (Australia), Lake Victoria (Australia), Victoria Point etc.
@3 (Australia) is arguably a more outstanding feature than (state). In the list of disambiguated places, most do not list what type of geographic entity they are, but it is evident for all where they are.
I'm just not convinced by the reasons given for such a massive change, which would supposedly be carried through the very extensive category tree, as "Victoria (Australia)" was some time back. Melburnian (talk) 11:40, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • @1 a) - The reader does not need to see a pattern. In case he would like to see one, then he could see it within the 34 using "(state)" - and they may wonder why Victoria (state) is not in the listing but uses it's own naming.
  • @1 b) - Disambiguation for geographic articles is frequently done by feature type. Mississippi River, New York City, all the counties called XXX County. The first try mostly is to use the type, only if that fails, then higher level entity is used. TopoChecker (talk) 15:35, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • @2 - Might be. But for Victoria (state) we can be sure.
  • @3 - Outstanding means that there is only one state called Victoria on planet Earth. But Victoria (Australia) could, for the uninformed reader - refer to the name Victoria as used in Australia. Search geonames.org for victoria+state and for victoria+australia - the tighter result set one gets with "state". TopoChecker (talk) 15:25, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
@1a If the "reader does not need to see a pattern" why advocate one?
@1b Mississippi River (Ontario) is disambiguated by province, New York City is a commonly used alternative name, XXXX County is often the name of XXXX County.
@2&3 Victoria (state), for the "uninformed reader", could be anywhere. You are assuming that this uniformed reader knows that it is a state when he or she is searching and that it is the only state of that name on Wikipedia. If, for instance, a reader has heard the news about flooding in Victoria in Australia, and subsequently searches for information on Victoria he or she may not know whether it is a city, local government area, region or state. Melburnian (talk) 23:17, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
@1a for the readers that want to see a pattern, for those that like consistency. For those reading several articles on states.
@1b and first the Mississippi River has the feature type included. First it reveals it is a river. That is what is true for most things Mount Victoria, Victoria Hill, XXX County, New York City, they get added the type. On Victoria except for Gallic Empire and Australia every link says something about the type.
@2&3 And Victoria (Australia) could be anything, which is much more than for something to be anywhere. Victoria (Australia) could be a type of meal from Australia. Victoria (state) reduces the possibilities of what the article could be about much more. Of cause it does not tell how many people live there or what the capital is, or who the president (do they have one?), and not where it is located. But it reveals one feature of the State of Victoria, namely to be a state. TopoChecker (talk) 04:54, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
In my opinion, not as significant as the feature of Victoria, Australia that it is in Australia. Victoria has existed as both a state and a colony, but has always been in Australia. Melburnian (talk) 01:15, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Neutral for now Oppose, I've never really like Victoria (Australia) but I'm just not convinced with Victoria (state) however I wouldn't support Victoria (Australian state) per the reasons raised by Mattinbgn. Bidgee (talk) 11:58, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
So what do you support? How about my suggestion of plain Victoria?--Kotniski (talk) 12:32, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
With so many humans named "Victoria" it would fail the first paragraph of Wikipedia:Primary_topic#Is_there_a_primary_topic.3F TopoChecker (talk) 15:41, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
No, I don't think so (at least, not obviously). Many other people and things are called Victoria this and that, but if somebody types "Victoria" into the search box, are they likely to be looking for any of those things? They might be, of course, but I don't find it particularly likely - they would more probably be typing "Queen Victoria" or "Victoria Beckham" or "Victoria Station" or "Victoria Falls" or whatever.--Kotniski (talk) 17:22, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
Agree for Victoria Station, maybe same for Queen Victoria. But then, I would expect "Victoria" to be about the name. I wouldn't expect that people around the world would expect the state page to pop up. And what would people in Australia expect? I don't know. Would they mostly add "state" as you and me would expect other people to add "Queen" or "Station"? Victoria lists first the name. I really thing that people that are not interested in geography and that never have been in Oceania, would when searching for origin of the name just type Victoria. TopoChecker (talk) 18:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
At this stage I support keeping Victoria (Australia) rather then moving it to "Victoria" which is a highly common name. Bidgee (talk) 01:43, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
Me too, I would not support the proposal to move to just Victoria. TopoChecker (talk) 04:30, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
Virginia is also a common name, but the article on the state still carries the unqualified title. If someone's looking for an article on someone called Victoria or Virginia, they're not going to just type the forename into the box, are they? Unless they're looking for the article about the forename itself, which I would say is not a very likely topic of interest, compared with a state of a major country. --Kotniski (talk) 08:46, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
While I agree that there is a good argument that the Australian state is the primary topic for Victoria, it has zero chance of being accepted as such, not least because of the existence of Victoria, British Columbia. -- Mattinbgn (talk) 09:06, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Support; identifying it as a state is more useful than identifying the country of origin, especially so since Victoria is a human name. Powers T 13:41, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
...which, I guess we should all remember, is how the state got its name in the first place. HiLo48 (talk) 17:04, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Comment Based on page views, Victoria (Australia) would seem to be the correct location for this article:
  • Uh, yeah -- because people tend to link to the current title rather than to a redirect. Powers T 19:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Page views also indicate what people have searched for. Clearly, "Victoria (state)" is not what readers are looking for. --AussieLegend (talk) 19:58, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Even http://www.google.com/search?q=victoria+state brings readers to the old title, these view stats do not show what people type. And also, it would still be a redirect. Maybe with the term "state" included WP could outperform some of the states own pages that do include the term "state" in the title. TopoChecker (talk) 20:21, 18 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • No, they don't. Page views are just page views. Most page views come through internal links, but we don't know how many by just looking at pageview stats. It could be that 40,600 of those views came via internal links and only 78 through searches; we don't know. Powers T 22:06, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
This discussion of State vs Australia google hits is spurious. They are disambiguators, that's why they are within parenthesis, to mark they are not part of the name proper. We could have our own internal conventions, like Victoria (864) where 864 is a code for "federal state of a monarchy in Oceania". The point is to decide not which is more likely to be associated with Victoria, but whether "state" or "Australia" has the maximum preciseness and conciseness per wp:precise. walk victor falk talk 01:43, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
I would highly oppose having "Victoria (864)" or even using "codes", who is going to know what 864 means? Joe Blow or Jane Doe will not. Bidgee (talk) 01:48, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Bah. If we wikieditors can fully master WP:OMGWTFBBQ, what's a couple thousands disambiguation codes for them luser plebs? walk victor falk talk 03:17, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Oppose for now Been watching this discussion patiently and with interest. Learnt quite a bit. Some good arguments for the change, but AussieLegend's concerns about its impact elsewhere seems valid. Until I see a concise response eliminating that as a matter of concern I will have to oppose the change. HiLo48 (talk) 00:46, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Would be nice to see what really the problems are. Since I like to work on WP, I am happy to help with the clean up. The 108 templates that I found, I can likely fix within 2 hours time. I will also look to collect category name and post them to WP:CFD, it can go via speedy after the page is renamed to Victoria (state). Speedy needs no extra talk, after 48 hours the renames are performed. So lets say within 96 hours most stuff is done. The plain links can stay and change over time. As Mattinbgn said below, it does not need to be done overnight. But the most important stuff will be changed within maybe 4 nights. TopoChecker (talk) 05:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • Mild support Ok, if precision is the primary goal, I'll go with the change. Interestingly though, I just looked up Georgia in the USA (one of my favourite ambiguities because so many Americans don't even know that other Georgias exist) and found it under Georgia (U.S. state), which is kinda what I suggested earlier. Oh well, I guess it's not precise. HiLo48 (talk) 05:34, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Mild support No better reason than "I think it sounds better" (re Victoria (state)). It's the only state of Victoria in the world. Mild oppose The only concern at my end (echoing AussieLegend), which is a significant one, is that if it does change, fixing the links will be a nightmare as there's just so many of them, also bringing category systems and so on into line. (Edit: Each one of those, btw, went through a move discussion to get to its present name so wouldn't be eligible for speedy.) Orderinchaos 02:07, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • I compiled a list of templates below. There are 108. I could maybe do it within 2 hours time. I like to work for WP. If the result is a better WP, I am happy to work on it. I really like to work on WP. It's a pleasure. :-) TopoChecker (talk) 05:00, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • The bigger issue is all the categories which are named [...] Victoria (Australia) to be consistent with this article - there could be quite a few. Orderinchaos 06:07, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • I asked for clarification at WP:CFD talk and got it confirmed that a bot will do it. Seems they have their own for that. See here. The person that answered also said it may go through CFD speedy. TopoChecker (talk) 15:45, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • Mild oppose I don't have any specific objection to the use of "Victoria (state)". It is clear, concise and precise. However, it is no more clear, concise and precise than the current term "Victoria (Australia)" The use of "state" is consistent with the disambiguation convention for other sub-national units, which is an advantage. The amount of work in fixing links, categories, templates etc. is a bit of a red herring in my opinion. If the rename is an improvement, then we should not allow the effort of implementation to dissuade us, especially as it doesn't have to be done overnight - an "eventualist" approach is quite a reasonable one. What sways me towards a slight preference for "Victoria (Australia)" is giving consideration to what a reader would expect. If a reader was looking the article on the Australian state of Victoria and understood that "Victoria" is the name of a lot of topics - what would he or she think was the natural attribute of the place that separates it from the others, that would be used to clarify the topic. My opinion, based on no evidence than my own thought process, is that people would associate Victoria as being part of Australia more than associating Victoria as being a state. Hence "Victoria (Australia)" to me is the more natural disambiguation term. -- Mattinbgn (talk) 03:24, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks for addressing the rename work "issue". Me too I think this is a none issue, esp. since the old name will stay as a redirect. For the thought process: Everyone living in Australia and having a girl-friend named Victoria would likely think of the state primarily to be a state, and not as something like his girl-friend being in Australia? Also what do you think if you see: Victoria (Gallic Empire)? Is it a place? Something to eat? Victoria (state) reveals it is a place, and not a kind of meal from Australia that is named "Victoria". "(state)" reveals much more about it's nature than only the location. What is Gallic Empire? A computer game? Something that really existed? That can be asked for Australia. Australia is a second proper name next to the first one. While state is an English language word. If one sees Victoria (Australia) and one knows that Australia is a country, then the topic is not very specific still. It is Victoria (motorcycle) and not Victoria (Germany). To use a feature, described with a word is more precise, isn't it? Except for the Gallic Empire and for Australia every article title (correct me if I am wrong) on Victoria reveals something about the nature of the topic. TopoChecker (talk) 04:26, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • A person looking for an article on Victoria "the place in Australia", knows that the place is in Australia, but may not know it is a state. On the other hand, a person looking Victoria "the state" may not know it is in Australia. Hence, "Australia" in my opinion is the term most useful to assist in leading a person to the correct article - remembering that not everyone will get there via a disambiguation page. Also, it is important to remember that the purpose of disambiguation terms is not to reveal the "nature of the topic" but to guide people to the correct article. I think "Australia" does this marginally better than "state" - although both work well. -- Mattinbgn (talk) 04:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Agreed, purpose is to disambiguate. I don't understand your first conclusion: (Australia) reveals location, (state) reveals type, why then is (Australia) better? If one has the task: "Find the state of Victoria"... "Find Victoria in Australia" one will find the article irrespective of article title, since the redirect will still exist. So that point is neutral. Toponyms mostly get disambiguated by type. Mississippi River, New York City, Buenos Aires Province (like almost all provinces, except for cases where the word "province" wouldn't be sufficient), all the states listed above. Only for cities and towns feature type is mostly left out, since it often does not help much, there preemptively location is used. But for things in Category:country subdivsions that are states, provinces, counties, districts, departments... the choice number one is the type. The only outside I know of is Victoria. The issue will pop again and again, because other people will find it out of place to use a different way for Victoria, despite the standard way, namely Victoria (state) being feasible. I guess if we would have to name the article today from scratch, while knowing the other subdivisions all use "(type)" as first choice people would more agree to use that way too. TopoChecker (talk) 05:42, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
Oppose. Victoria (Australia) is more useful than Victoria (state). It seems more intuitive. –Moondyne 06:33, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Oppose. while it appears to be consistant with other articles IMHO its those other articles which are the problem disambiguators should be readily recognisable so as to help viewer/reader to find the topic they are looking for. The disambiguator of state does nothing to assure the reader is heading the right direction, Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(geographic_names)#Disambiguation says Places are often disambiguated by the country in which they lie, if this is sufficient.. State is not a clear disambiguator because state itself is an ambigious term as such provides no clarity so as to distinguish what the reader is looking for. Gnangarra 18:24, 21 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Support. Personally I find (state) more intuitive than (Australia) because we normally disambiguate with what something is e.g. (band). I know for geographic places we do normally disambiguate with the next highest entity but this is normally for settlements rather than higher units so I'm unsure how much that applies. Essentially whether people like one or the other comes down to WP:ILIKEIT argument which is far from ideal. Therefore I'm largely supporting on the ground of consistency. The amount of work this may create is a complete red herring. If it improves the encyclopaedia it should happen even if it creates a lot of work. Its not the end of the world if this takes a little while to happen - slightly misnames categories isn't a big problem and we're have a redirect for links. Dpmuk (talk) 13:04, 24 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Oppose. I am more convinced by the oppose arguments than the support arguments. Victoria (Australia) is just clearer. --Bduke (Discussion) 21:39, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Nominator blocked as a sockpuppet of banned editor

  • Comment Worth noting the initiator and key protagonist of this piece is now blocked as a sock of a banned editor (something I'd actually been keen to find out about but never got into - seemed weird that an account started on 1 January would have such familiarity with Wikipedia processes), and that the "ambiguous" article was deleted at AfD today. Orderinchaos 07:23, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Procedurally, how does this affect this nomination? As the puppet master was actually banned,[5] and not just blocked, anyone is free to revert any edits made by the sock. Pages created by banned editors are eligible for speedy deletion; surely the same effective process applies to discussions initiated by a banned user. ie the nomination itself is eligible for reversion. This applies to several pages, not just this one. --AussieLegend (talk) 08:45, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
    • Well given the amount of discussion this one has got it would seem silly to revert. Edits by banned users are liable to deletion / reversion, they don't have to be. In this case doing so would appear to be process for process sake and a bit pointless. If any of their move requests have no comments then I'd probably revert but given the number of supports here it's obvious other's feel the same way so we may as well see what the consensus is now. Dpmuk (talk) 09:09, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
  • The thing you have to look at is that by continuing with the discussion we're effectively endorsing edits made by an editor in defiance of a ban. Because the editor was banned, the original nomination should never have been made and if it hadn't been, we wouldn't be having this discussion. This particular editor has been making these edits since 2007 and will continue to do so while his edits are being given credibility. If the outcome of the discussion is move, those who support the move have helped the banned user achieve what he set out to do, effectively becoming his meatpuppets. --AussieLegend (talk) 09:38, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
Yes, I agree with this, the nomination is invalid and the present discussion should be closed without prejudice to a new nomination and rationale being subsequently provided by a good-faith editor. Melburnian (talk) 10:21, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
AN/I thread started to try to get some uninvolved input on this. Dpmuk (talk) 10:59, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
I don't see any issue with closing this discussion and giving the banned user a clear indication that his editing in the defiance of a ban will not be tolerated. At the moment there are 9 supports and 9 opposes so no consensus exists in either direction. --AussieLegend (talk) 14:06, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
All of the move discussions initiated by TopoChecker have now been closed. Only this one remains open. --AussieLegend (talk) 16:44, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. 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.

Discussion - Categories

See also: Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 September 5#Victoria (Australia)

  • Exactly what speedy criteria applies to the categories? None of them as far as I can see. That will mean discussions and really, your reliance on bots to do everything is unrealistic. --AussieLegend (talk) 06:29, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • C2C says "A rename bringing a category into line with established naming conventions for that category tree". "(state)" is not an established naming convention for that tree, which was renamed for reasons athat actually had little to do with this article. --AussieLegend (talk) 16:18, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Rename the top cat under C2B "A rename enforcing established Wikipedia naming conventions and practices" and the rest under C2C. If the top cat does not go through speedy then it will go through normal process, and it takes 7 days or so. What the heck is the problem with 7 days? TopoChecker (talk) 17:47, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • The problem is not with 7 days, it's that the situation is not as straightforward as you seem to think it is. Presently, all of the categories are consistently named and use of "Australia" seems to be appropriate for all categories. However, "state" is not appropriate for all categories. It is far more logical to use the location (Australia) in many of the cats than it is to use the entity type (state), since the location is more descriptive. As has already been pointed out, "state" can be anywhere, while "Australia" can only be one place. Picking just one at random, Category:Visitor attractions in Victoria (Australia) is more appropriate than Category:Visitor attractions in Victoria (state) since anyone looking through that category can immediately identify the geographical location of those visitor attractions. Category:Visitor attractions in Victoria (state) doesn't provide any precision. There is likely to be significant resistance to changing many of the cats and the expected result with be that some of the cats will end up staying "Victoria (Australia)" while some will change to "Victoria (state)". This goes back to what I said very early on,[6] "this move is just introducing a lot more inconsistency than it's removing". --AussieLegend (talk) 08:51, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
  • @precision: Since there is only one state named Victoria it is more precise in most cases. Not for visitor attractions, where it does not matter, but e.g. for the top category: "Victoria (Australia)" - what is that, a restaurant chain from Australia? TopoChecker (talk) 18:03, 20 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • What is "Victoria (state)"? A state of matter called Victoria? See, I can be silly too. There is also only one Victoria in Australia. Even your attempt to create a second one didn't work because you called it Victoria (Western Australia) Your argument holds for both state and Australia so it's really a non-issue. What does matter is that regardless, this move is really only achieving inconsistency and making work where none is needed. It doesn't achieve anything other than that. That's why it's insupportable. --AussieLegend (talk) 18:32, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
  • What may Victoria Hill think if you tell her there is only one Victoria in Australia? TopoChecker (talk) 17:28, 21 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • I wanted to make it more obvious to people like you that there are other things called Victoria that are located in Australia, assuming these people could deduct that Western Australia is located in Australia. Furthermore I didn't had the time to check whether there are other hills named "Victoria" in the world. And that is the difference: I know there is no other state called Victoria. I am concerned about accuracy and consistency. The naming you defined is not consistent, with naming conventions for other states. There exists a name that is consistent and is accurate, namely Victoria (state). TopoChecker (talk) 17:22, 23 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor
  • The point you are missing is that there aren't other things called Victoria. The woman called Victoria Hill is not just Victoria, she is Victoria Hill. Similarly, the hill is called Victoria Hill, not just Victoria and it was incorrect to name the article as you did, which is why it has been moved. Your attempt to create an ambiguity simply to demonstrate a point failed because it was easily fixed by moving the article to the correct name. I have trouble believing your stated concern for accuracy and consistency after you deliberately gave an article an inaccurate and inconsistent name. You've been arguing that "Victoria (state)" is more precise than "Victoria (Australia)", so why is "Victoria (hill)" not more precise than "Victoria (Western Australia)"? You can't have a bet each way. Your admission that you know there is no other state called Victoria destroys the opening claim of your nomination; ie that the name is ambiguous. Clearly it is not. --AussieLegend (talk) 18:01, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
  • I don't know what you're on about here - we don't have to change every template to bypass the redirect. And the categories are named weirdly anyway - just because it's been decided that the article title needs disambiguation, doesn't mean that every category needs disambiguation in the same way - like "History of Victoria (Australia)" - surely this is the primary topic out of anything called Victoria that might have a history category, and we can just call it "History of Victoria"? --Kotniski (talk) 08:39, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • You'll note that I've said nothing about templates, so I don't know why you've raised them. I was specifically talking about the misconception that categories can be speedily renamed in the post you've replied to. However, my earlier reply to a comment that you made explains "what I'm on about". This proposal seeks consistency but if we don't rename related categories and articles to make them consistent with the new name this move is just replacing a single perceived inconsistency with a lot of actual inconsistencies. Calling this article "Victoria (state)" but calling the category "History of Victoria (Australia)" is inconsistent. Calling it just "History of Victoria" would be wrong, unless this article was called "Victoria". --AussieLegend (talk) 08:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
  • @Kotniski I agree with you entirely but have a look at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 September 5#Victoria (Australia). The smart-arse comment in the close gives you of the heat in the discussion. -- Mattinbgn (talk) 09:10, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

@AussieLegend - I agree with you (The first time on that page, I think.) that all categories that are subcategories of the state category, and that currently have (Australia) in their name, should be renamed, after the rename of the article has been done. I asked at WP:CFD talk and got it confirmed that a bot will do the rename. Seems they have their own, so no further bot request needed and therefore no delay. TopoChecker (talk) 16:12, 19 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor

They can say that happens, but as I found out earlier today, it doesn't necessarily actually happen--I found redlinked cats on an article (United States Senate special election in Washington, 1983) where the cat had been deleted (per a rename) more than two years ago. I've also previously found redlinks on templates from other non-mitigated category renaming. EG 76.121.3.85 (talk) 04:56, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
  • So you mean WP:CFD should not exist, categories NEVER been renamed? TopoChecker (talk) 18:04, 20 January 2011 (UTC) comment by banned editor

Close this discussion

Latest comment: 13 years ago11 comments7 people in discussion

Given the mess that this discussion has descended into, which includes being proposed by a banned editor and then having all his contributions struck, followed by having the discussion closed as no consensus and then reopened again, I propose the simplest thing is to close this discussion as irreparably flawed. If someone wants to propose a new discussion, then they are welcome to do so. -- Mattinbgn (talk) 22:19, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes please HiLo48 (talk) 22:51, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
My preferred option is to close it as an invalid nomination. However, regardless of the sockpuppetry it can clearly be closed anyway as a no consensus result. I would have no problem with a good faith editor renominating with their own rationale and having a new, untainted discusssion. Melburnian (talk) 00:01, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
Why should editors, who made comments in good faith, have to re-make their comments in a new discussion. Why inconvenience lots of good faith editors for no other gain. I support a normal close (by an uninvolved admin) who can take the socking into account and close as they see fit (and to me it's far from clear that there is no consensus for a move - remember this is not a vote). This is what normally happens at AfDs etc when a sock comments, why should the fact they started the request make this so different - essentially it just means their arguments at the top instead of somewhere else. Dpmuk (talk) 00:07, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
Discussions like that inevitably contain a fair bit of to-ing and fro-ing as editors respond to each others' comments and, in my case at least, as they actually make up their minds. That old discussion is also now quite difficult to read. I'd like to hope that any new discussion would be much more straightforward, with no need for changing of minds and responding to others, including the now banned editor. HiLo48 (talk) 00:20, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
(ec) I am relatively indifferent between the two names offered here. My own preference for the name of this article is "Victoria" per WP:PRIMARY but this would never be supported by most editors. Most of the heavy lifting for the "(state)" option was done by a banned editor. If a closing administrator ignores his comments as is proper, I can't see much in the way of consensus or even good argument for the "state" option, but I could be wrong. What I can see regardless of what decision a closing administrator makes, is the "losing" side complaining about how the process was compromised by the actions of a banned editor and an almost immediate second discussion. The best, cleanest and fairest option is to start again - and tolerate some minor inconvenience. -- Mattinbgn (talk) 00:22, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
(ec) @Dpmuk It is quite clear that there is no consensus, you are acting in bad faith by dismissing the concerns of those who opposed the move in good faith. I have no idea why you are trying to keep something open which is really now a dead proposal. Bidgee (talk) 00:25, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
I don't see that Dpmuk is actually opposing the close, only the wording used when closing it. What we appear to need is an admin who will close with "No consensus to move", rather than "page not moved (majority for "oppose" if banned contributor's messages are ignored",[7] which technically was correct anyway if my last count was right. --AussieLegend (talk) 01:57, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
"My own preference for the name of this article is "Victoria" per WP:PRIMARY": To me in England, the primary meaning of "Victoria" is Queen Victoria, not likely not in the USA etc. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 06:59, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
OK, now I'm not going to unduly influence a closer, I'll give my reason for thinking there may have been a consensus to move. I can quite easily see how it could be closed as no consensus and are happy with that close. The reason I queried the first close was that it seemed to suggest it was closed based on a !vote count and that's not how we determine consensus - I asked the admin involved about this and expected him to change his wording but instead he re-opened it. Anyway my reason for thinking this could have been closed as 'move':
  • I'd have largely discounted any !votes largely based on the problems it would cause - it's a long established principal that we're here for the readers and so if we decide it's better to move this title the work will just have to be done.
  • There are many !votes that seem to largely consist of ILIKEIT for one side of the other (although more the 'oppose' camp). I'd have given these little weight.
  • There are !votes on both sides suggesting one term or the other is more likely to be searched for / understood. This is a valid reason, based on policy, but a) I think the arguments about equal on both sides and b) Neither side's arguments are supported by evidence.
  • Which leaves the consistency arguments. As based on the above I think the arguments are about balanced, these IMO, leave the consensus as move.
So, no assuming bad faith. I admit I'm not "uninvolved" on this but I'd like to think I'd accept such an argument when I was on the "losing" side. Because I could see how this might be closed as move (based on the argument above) I was not happy with a close that suggested vote counting as that's not how we determine consensus. Dpmuk (talk) 08:46, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Impact of colonisation on Aborigines

Latest comment: 12 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I have changed the term "owned" back to "settled" as I have always had a real issue with Aboriginal "ownership" of Australia before the white man, as it wasn't "owned" in the sense that we think of ownership today, therefore it can be misleading. I am happy with other terms such as "settled", or "custodians" or something that gives a clear understanding that they were here before white settlement. But "ownership" can be misleading. Supt. of Printing (talk) 05:53, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Requested moves of 30+ Melbourne street names

Latest comment: 12 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Editors here may be interested in this multiple RM that I have initiated. My preamble:

These articles are all concerned with street names in Melbourne. (I would have include another 17, but the template has a limit of 30.) I do not support these moves; but I know that some very active editors do. It is time to air the matter, once and for all. Is it better to have an article on Collins Street in Melbourne called simply Collins Street, or to have it called Collins Street, Melbourne as at present? Which option serves the needs of Wikipedia's worldwide readership better? In almost all cases that I list there is no content in the destination article, just a redirect. And in almost all cases there is no Wikipedia article that very closely resembles the Melbourne-oriented one. There are, for example, no other Collins Streets with their own articles.

Your vote ("Support" or "Oppose") would be welcome, along with your reasons.

NoeticaTea? 12:44, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Issue with the Victoria portal

Latest comment: 11 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

The Victoria portal has no "News" section. Ericardo1979 (talk) 08:54, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

The State of Victoria

Latest comment: 10 years ago5 comments3 people in discussion
Main page: Wikipedia:Australian Wikipedians' notice board § "State of"....

The info box links to States and territories of Australia but neither the lead nor the body of the article informs, or confirms for, a reader that "the State of New South Wales/ Victoria / Tasmania/ South Australia..." is the proper name of those states of the Commonwealth of Australia, per the preamble to the Australia Act 1986;[8] and, while section 13 applies specifically to Queensland, and 14 to Western Australia, the other sections apply to all the states generally. States of a federal union may have different names, as in USA, and not all the constituent parts the Commonwealth of Australia are States. Qexigator (talk) 18:28, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

I may be being a bit thick living in Victoria, but I do not understand what the problem is. Victoria is a State and the article says so, linking to the article of states and territories. If you think the lede needs changing then change it and we can then discuss it if necessary. --Bduke (Discussion) 05:24, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
Agreed, is there a problem? or problems? If so: external to Wikipedia or internal? In brief (!):
  • Internal:
  • the single sentence added to the lead with ed.sum. a constituent state of Australia, see Talk, for the reasons given above, was peremptorily deleted, with ed.sum. Misinterpretation of the official name[9]
  • What should be informative text is hidden from readers by inexplicit pipe links, which may be due to failure on the part of regular editors (over-used to this device, and/or too familiar with the topic) to read afresh from the plain reader's point of view. Encyclopedically speaking, that reader's point of view (regardles of "POV") is a principal criterion for all or most articles on any given topic. In respect of the several states federally united in the Commonwealth of Australia, readers, especially outside Australia, cannot reasonably be expected at a glance to discern when a proper name is being used in respect of a location, or in respect of an entity having jurisdiction determined by public law (and acknowledged by international law) within an area whose territorial limits are defined by the law governing the greater area of which it forms part. But such a reader can reasonably be expected to need to be informed here about that, at a glance. The lead follows a standard pattern for the other states: location; capital; population; historical origin; federation (why Federation?); statehood. In the present day, those items are determined by the state boundaries given or affirmed by the federal constitution, and the proper name of the state, as given thereby, should be in the forefront, in the first two or three sentences of the lead, so that the reader can immediately see it, and can relate it to the other states.
  • External: Why is the constitutional status of the Australian states of particular interest, deserving clear and explicit wording? Well, for one thing, see the timetable at Perth Agreement, where the legislation of all Commonwealth realms is waiting for the several states of the Commonwealth of Australia to pass the legislation which will enable the federal parliament to legislate with intent to let the proposal for amending the royal succession come into effect in all realms at the same time.
  • Internal and External: Regular editors will know that inconsistencies/mistaken uses of caps and uncaps occur in Wikipedia articles, sometimes due to similar inconsitencies/mistakes in sources (including official and authoritative sources and well-respected writers): other instances are f/Federation, Royal Prerogative, Royal Assent, king/King, President/president, military ranks[14]. In any given context it is not always clear whether the word/s are being used as a proper noun, to be cap'd, or not, and good writers (or publishers) may differ. Queensland is an example as discussed at[15]. It is in this kind of borderline or doubtful case where it can be helpful to gather informed "consensus". So far, it is remarkable that no source has been offered to refute using caps to acknowledge that the proper name of a state of Australia, so constituted as a part of the Australian Commonwealth, by or after "Federation", is "the State of (Name)". Qexigator (talk) 11:51, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

To clarify statehood

In view of comments on my previous edit, I propose that the articles about Australian states would be improved by a sentence such as now added[16], and at Queensland,[17] which meets the point in a sufficiently informative way. Qexigator (talk) 16:34, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

  • Note The above discussion is being undertaken at several talk pages. Since all discussions are essentially about the same topic, a centralised discussion has been started at Wikipedia:Australian Wikipedians' notice board#"State of"..... Further discussion on this subject should continue there to avoid fragmenting the discussion. --AussieLegend (✉) 17:07, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
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