Talk:List of shipwrecks in January 1918

Overlinking

My revision to reduce overlinking has been reverted by User:Mjroots, Please read this from the MoS: Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Linking#What_generally_should_not_be_linked. Are you seriously claiming that the Atlantic Ocean is not a major geographic feature, or that it is so unfamiliar to our readers that they need a link to explain it? Colonies Chris (talk) 09:43, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

No, but that's not the reason I reverted you - per WP:BTW, which is also part of WP:MOS. As it says at the very top of MOS, use common sense, which is linked to WP:IAR. IAR is policy, MOS is a style guide.

You were offered the chance to raise the issue via a WP:RFC in December last year, which you declined. You were also invited to join a recent discussion at WT:SHIPWRECK, which you also declined to do. Yet you persist in deleting valid wikilinks from lists of shipwrecks.

Let me say it loud and clear. I would expect that a list of shipwrecks would link to a water feature (from WP:OVERLINK "Specifically, unless they are particularly relevant [my emphasis here] to the topic of the article, the following are not usually linked:... the names of major geographic features and locations). I would also expect that where the loss of a vessel is due to conflict, that conflict is also linked to. Once per section is adequate linking. I would not expect World War I to be linked on every occurrence. Mjroots (talk) 10:15, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Common sense tells me that not a single reader with any interest in shipwrecks will be in doubt what is meant by "Atlantic Ocean", and therefore that not a single reader will ever click on that link. A link only has value if there's a reaonable likelihood that a reader will feel the need to click on it. The fact is useful - the link is worthless. Similarly with the world wars - is there any possiblity that a reader of this article will think "Oh, World War II, what's that?", and click on the link to find out. Of course there isn't. A much more specific link might be valuable, where relevant - for example Battle of the Atlantic or Second Happy Time. Colonies Chris (talk) 10:57, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

That is not the issue. As it clearly states in WP:OVERLINK, relevance is the issue. Are rivers, seas and oceans relevant to ships? The answer there is yes. It is the same for countries visited by ships or where a wreck occurs on the coast of said country. Where a shipwreck is due to a particular action, then that is linked too. Mjroots (talk) 12:45, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

The key point when considering making a link is simply whether it's likely to be useful to a reader. It's not about some legalistic interpretation of a guideline (and anyway I disagree with your interpretation). Why insist on creating links that no reader is ever likely to use? Colonies Chris (talk) 21:45, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

I totally agree that Atlantic Ocean should not be linked, as I just did. I agree with the reasoning used by Colonies Chris. GeorgeLouis (talk) 08:29, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

"Are rivers, seas and oceans relevant to ships?" I say only as locating where a ship wrecked, such as (excerpts from the article) "near Bône, Algeria" or "7 nautical miles (13 km) east north east of the Wolf Rock, Cornwall". These are reasonable because they are not well-known locations. To mention that these are in the Mediterranean Sea or Atlantic Ocean is informative, but the nature or general location of these major features is so well-known that a link is redundant. They are not "particularly relevant" to the article, so they do not qualify as an exception to the guidance at WP:OVERLINK regarding major geographical features. On that basis I will restore Colony Chris' edit that removed those links.

There is, however, an "overlink" issue here. Per WP:SEAOFBLUE, specific links like "Gurnard's Head (Cornwall, United Kingdom)" are preferred to compound links like "Gurnard's Head, Cornwall, United Kingdom". ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:09, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

@J. Johnson: thanks for your input. In the last example you gave, the use of brackets is not optimal. IMHO, all three links are valid. The first being a specific location, the second being a first-level division of a country, and the third being a historic country that is not the same as the United Kingdom we have today (and which is not linked in shipwreck lists except by means of flags). Mjroots (talk) 07:02, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

WP:SEAOFBLUE does say "[w]hen possible, avoid placing links next to each other so that they look like a single link", and suggests "using a more specific single link". To cite the example there, Irish Chess Championship is deemed preferable to [Irish] [Chess] [Championship]. I believe the intent is that we should link to the most specific topic. E.g., it is informative in locating Gurnard's Head to say it is in Cornwall, and even the UK, but those more general containing topics become more distant from any specific shipwreck. It is not necessary, nor even useful, to link every general topic. In particular, the distinction between the current and historical UK seems entirely irrelevant to, say, the Christos Markettos, and therefore warrants no special treatment. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:14, 5 March 2015 (UTC)