Talk:Don River (disambiguation)

Name format

Is there a policy on standard formats for named geographical features? I notice that the three entries (before my addition) were all in different formats. -- Daran 07:36, 26 Sep 2003 (UTC)

The common format in Wikipedia is Don River, Scotland. The entry Don River (Toronto) is a redirect to Don River, Toronto, but I would consider Don River, Canada to be the correct form. As for River Don, England, I don't know, if the prefixed 'river' is an inherent part of the placename. -- Cordyph 07:59, 26 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Thanks. I suppose I ought to create a stub... -- Daran 08:53, 26 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Actually, comma disambiguation is generally limited to communities (neighborhoods to cities), and parens are used for everything else, so they should all be like "Don River (Toronto)". Waterguy 00:03, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Dab page?

I was surprised to enter "Don River" and come to a dab page. My feeling is that the one in Russia is sufficiently pre-eminent so that Don River should go to that article, with a note at the top directing users to the dab page. JamesMLane t c 05:57, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

This is a sterling example of WP:WORLDVIEW. The English-speaking editors feel the world revolves around their countries, and the Sun rises in the West. Why don't they move Thames to River Thames (England), if they are so particular about it. --Ghirla^-трёп- 08:00, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Please don't make sweeping generalisations like this - all editors of the English Wikipedia are presumably English speaking, including you. I don't think you have chosen a good target in Thames (and don't forget that all the others are named after the primary one) - but I agree that the Russian river should be primary here. Pterre (talk) 10:24, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

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So, a disambiguation page that lists all examples of pages on rivers named Don, and giving them all equal weight, is 'a sterling example' of BIAS by 'English-speaking editors'; yet Ghirla (who, it seems, hails from Yaroslavl) obviously thinks the Russian river Don should be seen as more important than all the others. The words 'pot', and 'kettle', spring to mind... Swanny18 (talk) 02:34, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I concur with Ghirla. Don River/River Don should be the Russian river, and then this page should be moved to a disambig page. --Russavia ^{I'm chanting as we speak} 09:15, 7 August 2010 (UTC)(strike comment from banned editor: Swanny18 (talk) 22:29, 6 December 2018 (UTC))

Then propose a move at WP:RM. As things stand now, there is no primary topic so far as disambiguation is concerned. older ≠ wiser 12:22, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Page move

This page ('Don River') seems to be the subject of what may be one of the slowest edit wars on the project.

• It was first moved in November 2006 by Ghirlandajo to be a disambiguation page, and the Russian River Don put in its place; the move was reverted by Parsecboy two years later.
• Then it was edited (twice) by Petri Krohn and Ghirla (along with an allegation of 'bias'(!)) to put the Russian river at the top in August 2010 (rv by Bkonrad)
• It then had the Russian river bolded in November 2011 (Ghirla again; this time the disambiguation was 'silly'), and reverted, again.
• Then in January 2017 the Russian river was bolded again, and embellished, and reverted yet again)
• It was then pushed to the top in July 2017 by Afasmit (twice) and was reverted, twice;
• Now the latest episode in this sorry tale was to move the pages again (with an interesting little trick to prevent a simple revert) in September 2018 by Zanhe ( reverted by request to RM/TR)

None of these moves were discussed, and all of the changes mentioned were against our guidelines on the subject. To be clear: this page currently conforms to the pattern for a dab page where there is no Primary Topic. If you are unhappy with that, the remedy is to establish your preferred option as primary via the Requested Moves process. And (to be clear again) 'primary' in this case doesn't mean the longest, or the quietest, or the least English of the options, it means the one most likely to be sought by the readership (which, in the case of the English WP means mainly people who speak and read English; no doubt the Russian WP has the same systemic bias, and caters mainly for Russian speakers. As it should...) And it may well be that the Russian river is primary, but it's up to anyone who wants that change to prove their case, not push their opinion while throwing allegations around. Over to you... Swanny18 (talk) 02:32, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

• Swanny18, I think this pageview chart for the last three months shows pretty clearly which article is "most likely to be sought by the readership" even in English Wikipedia, with the Russian river article being viewed on an average almost 3 times as frequently as the highest-ranking non-Russian rival. Moreover, if you try and change the scale to show, say, readership during last year instead of 3 months, the differences would become even more apparent. Additionally, in strict adherence to the criterion of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, the Russian river entry is indeed more likely than all the other topics combined to be the topic sought (50+37+21+8<139, with all other topics combined accounting for 13 pageviews per day). So, in my opinion a move request would indeed be justified. --Deinocheirus (talk) 14:24, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
• For the sake of unbiased experiment, here are the pageview statistics between the second-to-last revert (made on July 26, 2017) and the last move by Zanhe (made on September 12, 2018). As can be easily seen, the Russian river was completely dominating the readership statistics even while being tucked neatly in the middle of a long list of other rivers, streams and creeks, with approximately 2/3 of the total pageview count. --Deinocheirus (talk) 14:39, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Deinocheirus: Thank you for taking the trouble to post the request move over this, and to present a case for a primary topic here. Swanny18 (talk) 22:54, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

@Swanny18: I wouldn't call this an edit war. Like many others, I landed on this page looking for information about the Don River in Russia, but was surprised to see a dab page. I looked at the talk page and saw that several people were similarly surprised as I was, so I boldly moved the page as it didn't seem too controversial. I wasn't aware of the moves that took place more than 10 years ago. And this was a typo, not an "interesting little trick". Please remember to assume good faith and refrain from casting aspersions. After getting your ping, I planned to initiate a formal move request, but Deinocheirus beat me to it. -Zanhe (talk) 21:46, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Zanhe: My apologies if I misinterpreted your actions; they just looked to be in the same vein as the gamesmanship that had gone previously. And I appreciate you wouldn't necessarily have been aware that one of the supporting comments was from a banned editor, but the mere fact that one comment wasn't in support would have disqualified it as an uncontroversial move. Swanny18 (talk) 22:59, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Requested move 12 December 2018

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved -- JHunterJ (talk) 16:27, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

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• Don River → Don River (disambiguation)
• Don River (Russia) → Don River

– The move is requested in adherence to WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Specifically, readership rates of the entry Don River (Russia) are much higher than rates for any other entries on similarly named rivers. Moreover, its being sought by a reader is actually more likely than all the other topics combined: for the period between July 27, 2017 and September 11, 2018 the article Don River (Russia) was viewed on an average 256 times a day while all the other articles combined linked from this dab page were viewed 133 times per day. The date range is selected for the reasons described above: this is the period when the Russian river link was not highlighted in any way and remained buried in the middle of the dab entry, so that it cannot be argued that the position of the link to the Russian river entry inflated its readership rate beyond reasonable. Deinocheirus (talk) 15:23, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

As a proof of usage primacy please see readership statistics for the period between July 27, 2017 and September 11, 2018 for the most popular entries and for the rest of entries. It is harder to estimate primacy of the topic in terms of long-term significance. Neverheless it looks very plausible that one of the longest European rivers situated in a densely populated area, playing an important role in economy of a large country and having been the place for multiple historic events starting from 14th century (Battle of Kulikovo, Bulavin Rebellion, and some of the main battles of Russian Civil War to name a few) would also have a high long-term significance even for English-speaking audience. --Deinocheirus (talk) 15:23, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

• Strong Support – The Don of Russia is not only the 5th longest river in Europe, but also the most important Don River in history, known to the ancient Greeks as the Tanais, an important trade route. And it's not just significant for the history of Russia as Deinocheirus has pointed out, but also for the Ukraine, the Mongol Empire (Golden Horde), the Magyar (Hungarians), Bulgaria, Khazaria, and before all of them, the Scythians and Sarmatians. Besides page view stats presented above, its international significance is reflected in the fact that it has pages in 88 languages, dwarfing all other Don Rivers listed on the dab page. Many subjects derived from the river are highly notable in their own right, such as Don Cossacks and the novel And Quiet Flows the Don, which won a Nobel Prize for its author. -Zanhe (talk) 21:37, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support. I can't think of a legitimate reason why the Russian river shouldn't be the primary topic here. Calidum 21:39, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
• Strong Support In response to Bkonrad's somewhat implausible "There is no primary topic" second revert in 2017, I had done the page views analysis for the previous year, but got distracted with less silly things. Over that time as well, about twice as many people looked at the English wikipedia page on the Russian river than the other pages combined, without the funky spike we had on September 4, 2018 (what was that about?). Internationally, the ratio was close to 10:1. On top of that, people looking for the English rivers will likely type in River Don, which will remain a redirect to the disambiguation page. Afasmit (talk) 00:53, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Afasmit: So, ignoring the guidelines is 'less silly' than adhering to them? Swanny18 (talk) 23:06, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Swanny18: I only made a change in the order the rivers were presented. The guidelines you mention are an article titles disambiguation policy not a manual of style for disambiguation pages. That manual currently has "In cases where a small number of main topics are significantly more likely to be the reader's target, several of the most common meanings may be placed at the top, with other meanings below". Good disambiguation pages without a primary subject start with a (group of) topic(s) that is most likely to be looked for, even if it is not 5 times more likely than the next subject, as we're talking about here. What ís silly, to put it euphemistically, is for someone to waste loads of effort to point people to the rules on how to establish primacy, without following up on that very simple and quick process him/herself. It is more likely that this person did just that, didn't like the all-too-predictable results, and felt fine about keeping on annoying good-faith editors by pointing at the "rules". Afasmit (talk) 00:41, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Afasmit: Well, you made the change twice: You were bold, it was reverted, and instead of discussing it you pushed your position. There's nothing 'good-faith' about that. And it isn't up to 'this person' to prove your case for you, it's up to you. Also, I don't consider it a waste of effort to challenge gamesmanship when I see it. Swanny18 (talk) 23:48, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Swanny18: You're not going to win this argument by accusing editors of not following the letter of the "law" or accusing them of being Russian while doing an open-and-shut correction. Instead, you'll make everyone feel worse, including yourself. For my situation, you could have read my comments (succinct discussions) with those edits and you wouldn't have had to type anything. And after (or rather, well before) reverting 5 different editors on at least seven different occasions and shutting down a discussion by two other editors with the same simple assertion of "no primary topic", Bkonrad's (a.k.a. older ≠ wiser) clearly was the one who needed to support his unfounded claim. Afasmit (talk) 06:50, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

Yeah...: See, I'm not trying to 'win an argument' here, I'm trying to point out where you were wrong (which you either don't get, or won't acknowledge).

First, I wasn't 'accusing' anyone of 'being Russian'; I was stating an observable fact. And an edit isn't an 'open and shut correction' if a) the original isn't wrong (it wasn't), and b) someone objects (they did).

Second, an edit summary isn't a discussion, succinct or otherwise; and re-reverting isn't part of the discussion process either. In any case, your edit was incorrect: The page conforms to the layout for a dab page where there is no primary topic, of which there wasn't then (and until this process is finished, still isn't), so it was wrong per MOS:DAB (and, incidentally, so was the piping, per DABPIPE). So the assertion of "no primary topic" wasn't 'unfounded' at all.

Finally, if anyone was unhappy with that, all they'd had to do, anytime in the last 12 years, was request it and make the case; but you never bothered, and now you're here trying to make out it's someone else's fault. So you can patronize me all you like, it doesn't change the facts. Swanny18 (talk) 23:14, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support the Russian river is the primary topic. Khestwol (talk) 05:24, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support as per Afasmit. Systemic bias should be eliminated. Ghirla^-трёп- 15:02, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Ghirlandajo: Again, with the allegation of 'systemic bias'. All these pages have been disambiguated, from the beginning, by their location; where is the bias in that? If you felt that the one that rises down the road from where you live should be primary, then it was up to you to make the case for that. But you didn't, did you? Swanny18 (talk) 23:50, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

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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 or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.