Talk:Baltic

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Remark from Michael Tinkler (in the recent changes page): relinking Baltic the adjective to Baltic the Sea. Sometimes it's better to relink than to write a stub for a 'most wanted'.

That's true, but in this case, the word Baltic has more than one meaning. The use Baltic for from or of the Baltic Sea should of course be linked to the article on the sea. However, the use of Baltic for the three countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) may not be directly clear, and other countries also border the sea.

I just clarified this Michael. sjc

Yep, sometimes it's an adjective. But since Wikipedia isnt' a dictionary do we need to have links for adjectival meanings of words? When I revised Amber I de-linked the phrases 'Baltic Amber' and 'Prussian Amber' (Prussian, by the way, was there because [Amber] is a scarcely edited 1911 or even 1880 job) and instead linked the occurrence of Baltic Sea further down the entry. I suppose I don't MIND having entries that explain 'proper adjectives' (is that what they're called? I should remember - I've taught enough intro language). I can see Baltic Sea and Baltic States, but the list of countries that border the Baltic is on Baltic Sea already. --MichaelTinkler

I agree it's messy. But it does cover a lot of bases: if it was deemed to be crucial enough to need 13 or so links (to date), it's probably needed enough to get you from point A to point B somewhere else along the line. sjc

Ah, but at least 4 of those 'wanteds' really wanted Baltic Sea, and I gave it to them. If the rest of 'em want Baltic states, we could give 'em that.

I just knew you'd say that. Off you go then, quick as you can. PS Don't forget to catch all the future instances of Baltic as well :-) sjc

Well, that'll just give new folk a false sense of security, when they link Baltic *meaning* Baltic Sea or Baltic States and it works - and THEN we'll have to disambiguate them, because I don't think the software is up to the artificial intelligence job of a 'links that need disambiguating' page! MichaelTinkler

Fun, isn't it! But seriously, Michael, I wouldn't lose too much sleep about it. So long as everything points approximately in the right place it should be OK. Baltic points to Baltic States and Baltic Sea, so the disambiguation is managed at one slightly annoying remove. You and I have bigger problems in life, not the least of which being the perpetual and seemingly interminable Prussian situation... sjc

versus...

A popular mistake I have run into is people confusing "Balkan" and "Baltic". Would it be appropriate to make a note on the disambiguation page in this regard? I was just going to add the clarification but then thought I'd first solicit some editorial opinions. —PētersV (talk) 23:47, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Merge

This information is already a section on the 'Baltic' dab. Does anyone else think this is therefore unnecessary? Boleyn3 (talk) 20:32, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The consensus is clearly against this suggested move --ThaddeusB (talk) 04:34, 7 August 2009 (UTC))

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Baltic → Baltic (disambiguation) — To allow "Baltic" to redirect to the obvious primary topic, Baltic Sea. The Sea is the intended target of most of the existing links to "Baltic" (hopefully all of them now, since I've just done a cleanup job on the others). Kotniski (talk) 14:43, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose. Baltic region and Baltic states, clearly share the top spot for Baltic, along with Baltic Sea. Baltic gets far fewer views than any of them, so I see no need to move it. Normally no links should point to a dis page, though I did find one that I could not figure out an obvious target, and left pointing to the dis page. 199.125.109.126 (talk) 17:28, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. I wouldn't say that the sea is the obvious target. Baltic states is a close contender in any case. (I personally first thought of Baltic languages.) Jafeluv (talk) 20:04, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. Per Jafeluv. Baltic can refer (most obviously) to land or sea or the region in general. Admittedly there is a parallel, if "Baltics" goes to the Baltic states, then "Baltic" could go to the Baltic sea. That said, however, I think "Baltic" as it stands now is the most useful organization, I don't see any pressing need to redirect and then have to rename the dab page. VЄСRUМВА  ☎  02:54, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

But "Baltic" or "the Baltic" always refers to the sea. If you want to refer to the states or the languages, you say "the Baltic states" or "the Baltic languages" or some such phrase. We're talking about the primary usage of "Baltic" on its own, not about phrases containing Baltic. If Baltic is left as a dab page, then we're going to have to keep correcting the links that people make, assuming (hardly unreasonably) that Baltic points to an article about the sea.--Kotniski (talk) 07:02, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

For the record, I have no problem with The Baltic pointing to the sea article. Jafeluv (talk) 09:28, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

• oppose there is no single clear contender for primacy imho. Abtract (talk) 09:14, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. No clear primary topic - I imediately thought of the baltic states. Page view stats (from [1]) for June (similar for April and May) also appear to back this up with 34446 for Baltic Sea and 21554 for Baltic states. Yes there are more views for Baltic sea but in my opinion the difference is no where near learge enough for there to be a clear primary topic (I'd be looking for an absolute minimium of a ratio of 2:1). Dpmuk (talk) 09:26, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
  • I agree, although the page views don't really tell much about how many of the people who search for "Baltic" are looking for the sea and how many something else. Jafeluv (talk) 09:30, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
    • I realise that but they're the next best thing we've got as we can't get figures on how many people actually clicked through. Obviously they need to be taken with a pinch of salt and their limitations considered - thanks for pointing that out. Dpmuk (talk) 10:08, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose - no obvious primary topic. 96.243.59.151 (talk) 00:18, 3 August 2009 (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.