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Talk:Pub/Archive 3

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Latest comment: 15 years ago by 21stCenturyGreenstuff in topic Reverting edit by 21st Century Greenstuff
Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3Archive 4Archive 5

Requested move

Latest comment: 16 years ago58 comments15 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. 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 proposal was no consensus, defaults to no move. JPG-GR (talk) 22:49, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Public house → Pub — in order to conform to WP:UCN (Use common name), which clearly mandates use of common terms. Pub is readily identifiable and will be the title sought after by most if not all prospective visitors to this page, which, as always, should be our priority here. — +Hexagon1 (t) 08:56, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.


  • Nominator support. +Hexagon1 (t) 09:17, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose The correct term and common name in the UK is Public House. No need for slang colloquialisms. The term pub redirects here already. If it ain't broke, don't try and fix it. If our colonial cousins wish to call their article Australian Pub, which they have, they are free to do so and I freely accept that in the antipodes pub is the common name. 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 09:24, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
    Not only do you ignore my argument and the relevant policy, but you bring up my nationality in a negative sense (as a counter-argument). Do you honestly think calling me an 'antipode' and your 'colonial cousin' is appropriate in a dispute? Next you'll be calling me a convict... +Hexagon1 (t) 11:04, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
Whoa there, take a deep breath and calm down. Firstly I am not "ignoring" your argument, I am stating mine - that is what discussion is all about. Secondly the antipodes is the correct geographical description for the location of the Australian continent, so since when did that become any form of insult? Thirdly my reference to 'colonial cousins' was light hearted banter - a joke - I was not aware you were humourless and I therefore apologise if any offence was inferred. The naming of this article has been discussed on several previous occasions in several locations and the current name was the result of concensus. I am puzzled as to why you felt the need to even raise the topic yet again.
I am neither ignoring the policy. If you read my oppose again you will see that Public House is the common name in the UK. The article is predominently about UK public houses, not American ones, or Irish, or Australian where the common name is probably Pub. 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 11:45, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
Very well, your vote was too brief to establish any kind of tone so I erred on the side of caution. I will try to lean more WP:AGFy in the future. 'Antipodes' is a term I have never in my life seen before, so I wasn't sure of the implications it carried, and I do not think it is an accurate geographic descriptor - it is dependant on the speaker's location (it is about as objective as saying 20,000 km that way) - you're all upside down from our perspective, you know. 'Colonial cousins' was something I think could be interpreted as in bad taste, but very well, I'll take your word that it was a joke. How long ago were the previous consensuses? Does not consensus change? I feel that this article does not reflect current WP:UCN policy, however if the consensus wills it to remain here I have no problem with that either. +Hexagon1 (t) 13:46, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
"Public house" is certainly not the common name in the UK. And "Pub" is not slang, see e.g. the OED. 87.114.26.10 (talk) 20:29, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't know where you get the idea that "public house" is "perfectly well understood" to mean the subject of this article, or that "pub" is not, but if it's true, it's only true in England. --Serge (talk) 04:02, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
It is true of the whole of the British Isles, it is the official term as opposed to the colloquialism, "pub" being the shortened form of "public house". Originally it migrated across to the United States, Australia and possibly New Zealand, where it became "pub". Where did you think the word pub came from? I am sorry, but officially it is still "public house" in the UK. If this were ever to be separated it would still have to be "public house" for the UK. Dieter Simon (talk) 23:43, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
Can you cite any reference for the relevance of what a topic is known as "officially", or where the name "came from", to what the title of the article should be in Wikipedia, much less something that overrides the use the most common name standard Wikipedia naming convention? I'm astonished by this argument. --Serge (talk) 00:08, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
Unbeknown to me of your entry at this spot, I entered a section at the foot of this discussion citing precisely what you are looking for, namely mostly by American dictionaries citing the usage of "public house". If they can do it even without the aid of British publications then I think we should take it for what it is, namely quite a legitimate usage of the term. Astonished or not, you really ought to make sure of the facts. Dieter Simon (talk) 00:52, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm asking for a Wikipedia reference that overrides this one: WP:NC(CN). What American dictionaries say sheds no light whatsoever on the issue of how Wikipedia titles are decided. We don't get to make up our own rules and conventions on the talk pages of each individual article, but it's now clear that that is what you are doing. Odd, that. --Serge (talk) 01:19, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
By the way, the issue is not whether "public house" is proper usage, but whether it's the most common term used to refer to the topic of this article. I don't doubt the veracity of "public house", I just do not believe that "pub" is not the term more commonly used, which, whether you agree or not, is what matters when naming articles in Wikipedia. Please read WP:NC(CN). --Serge (talk) 01:38, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Support for the moment. But maybe this reflects local dialects. If you asked the average Aussie for directions to a public house they'd have to think hard. But if you asked them for directions to the nearest pub, they'd probably be able to tell you what was on tap as well. So if we ever set up a strine Wikipedia there'll be no issue there. Andrewa (talk) 15:01, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
    But this article is almost exclusively about pubs in the UK; readers are referred to Australian pubs for pubs in Australia; this makes usage in Australian English less important for choosing the article title. --Rogerb67 (talk) 15:33, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
    I note the almost. The current article structure is a bit messy, frankly; The lead to this article doesn't say it's only about UK pubs, nor is there a hatnote to Australian pubs. And from the discussion above and the current article lead (usually known as a pub), English English usage may well be the same as Australian. So no change of vote for now. Andrewa (talk) 16:00, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
    No disagreement that the current article structure is messy! Perhaps the non-UK content should be moved and a hatnote added pointing readers to the various articles for other locations (this might also make "public house" a better name, for disambiguation purposes, since it appears to be almost exclusively UK usage). --Rogerb67 (talk) 11:13, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose Pub is too ambiguous. The top Google hit for the term is Singapore's Water Board - not the same thing at all. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:52, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Strong support. I am English, 27 years old, and I have never heard anyone say "public house". I have been to many in my time! In my Concise OED, the main entry is at "Pub", which it says is "derived from Public House, in 19th Century". The entry for "Public House" merely says "Formal term for pub". Wikipedia uses Common Names, not Formal Names. 87.114.26.10 (talk) 20:29, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
    • That's certainly still the official policy. But I've suspected for some time that it's gradually changing. The arguments given here seem to support that view. Note that the policy at Wikipedia:Consensus reads in part Policies and guidelines document communal consensus rather than creating it. But no change of vote. Andrewa (talk) 19:15, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Strongly Oppose My 2007 Collins English Dictionary calls "public house" formal, and an encyclopaedia or dictionary, although it will mention "informal" versions, still deals with the formal aspects of language more than anything unless it is a slang dictionary. Also as I mentioned before, a judge or magistrate in a court of law in Britain will almost certainly use the formal version "public house", and is bound to ask you to clarify your statement as to a "pub". Dieter Simon (talk) 01:02, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose The term pub while being the common usage among the public and even licenced victuallers is a contraction and not the precise and correct term to use in relation to the establishment. Deckchair (talk) 01:39, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose - this is where the boundary of common name is crossed to colloquialism. We don't title telephone phone. 71.106.172.173 (talk) 18:46, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose - or automobile by using the title car. 199.125.109.99 (talk) 00:30, 20 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Support - In the U.S. (FWIW), a "pub" is a drinking establishment typically of English or Australian style. A "public house" is unheard of. And pub wins hands down in google searches.
Results 1 - 10 of about 408,000,000 for pub
Results 1 - 10 of about 2,820,000 for "public house"
I mean, that's a ratio of 200:1. Not even close. --Serge (talk) 03:01, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Ratio isn't the point. The point is whether you are talking about the official term in the British Isles or whether you are talking about "pubs" in the United States, Australia and New Zealand. The ratio you are talking about is mostly about those countries, not about Britain. Please, bear in mind that this is an encyclopaedia, and in line with all encyclopaedias and dictionaries we indicate colloquial terms but use the slightly more elevated language all reference books use. We are not only talking about abbreviations but also the terms of where these abbreviations come from. Dieter Simon (talk) 23:43, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
    Yes, ratio (in terms of common usage) is the point. The subject of a Wikipedia article should be "the most common name of a person or thing that does not conflict with the names of other people or things". When an abbreviation is more commonly used to refer to the subject in question than the term it abbreviates, then the abbreviation should be the title. That's why, for example, IBM is at IBM and not at International Business Machines, and why Jimmy Carter is at Jimmy Carter and not at James Earl Carter Jr.. Wikipedia may be different from other encyclopedias in this respect, but that's the way it is, for better or for worse. It's hard to believe this is even being seriously debated by anyone at least somewhat familiar with Wikipedia naming conventions. --Serge (talk) 00:01, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
All well and good, but it is flying in the face of the facts. We still have to give the facts. Why do you think such an American institution as Merriam Webster state under the keyword "public house": chiefly British: a licensed saloon or bar
dictionary.com gives 1. British: a tavern 2. an inn or hostelry
American Heritage Dictionary: noun Chiefly British A place, such as a tavern or bar, that is licensed to sell alcoholic beverages
WordNet: noun tavern consisting of a building with a bar and public rooms; often provides light meals.
All these referring to "public house". So we in Wikipedia have to be different and ignore the traditional usages? We just say, no there is no such thing as a "public house" because we abbreviated the term and want to talk down to the reader?
I don't think so. Dieter Simon (talk) 00:38, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
See above. --Serge (talk) 01:19, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
Dieter, I disagree with you. See the Concise OED, probably the most prominent British dictionary. The principal entry is under "pub", not "public house". The OED does not say that it is slang or colloquial. It says "pub" came from "public house" in the 19th Century. (Yes, it may have been slang 200 years ago...) Possibly Americans use "public house" to give an "olde worlde" charm. Wikipedia doesn't need that. 87.113.66.79 (talk) 09:00, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

No, I am not making up my own rules. I am just citing what is out there among the dictionary community, more than what promoting an informal term is doing. Even Collins English Dictionary as recent as 2007 is stating that "public house" is the formal term and "pub" is the informal term. Your assertions that we should adopt the informal term has really no basis in fact. To change terms and ignore facts is almost like doing your own research and renaming the article by adopting the informal term is creating a new basic term. (WP:OR). Dieter Simon (talk) 22:12, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. 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.

Continued discussions

(ec - this discussion was closed literally mid-discussion - I had an edit conflict with the person closing the discussion!)

Dieter, if I'm understanding you, you are essentially arguing that a dictionary citation overrides a Wikipedia naming convention in deciding what the title of this article should be. So far as I know, no Wikipedia policy or convention agrees with that, so, unless you can find one that does, that's making up your own rules.

No one is disputing your dictionary citations. I'm disputing their relevance in overriding Wikipedia naming conventions. You say there is no basis in fact in my assertions. Are you seriously questioning the assertion that "pub", informal or not, is the most common name used to refer to the subject of this article... pubs? And the basis in fact for adopting the most common name is here. Have you read it yet? This is Wikipedia and that reference is official Wikipedia policy. That's not only basis in fact, but it's relevant basis in fact. What you have, again, is nothing more than unchallenged irrelevant (to naming Wikipedia articles) dictionary citations. Your argument that adopting the current actual most common name PER WIKIPEDIA POLICY used to refer to the subject of the article in question is "creating a new basic term" (just because it's "informal") is patently absurd. That's the basis of your position for naming this article Public house rather than Pub? That doing so makes pub a "new basic term"? I'm sorry, but that's absurd. --Serge (talk) 22:56, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

No, Serge or Borne2cycle, whoever you are, I am not arguing that any old dictionary usage is overriding Wikipedia usage, far from doing so, I am talking about citing sources which has been one of the important things impressed upon us since Wikipedia came into being. I have given you sources as to the formal (and informal) uses of "pub" and "public house", you have given me nothing, no sources as to what you base your assumption on. All you are saying is "look at "Wikipedia Policy". I am fully aware of the "Policy". But what is the basis of your assumption that more people in the UK use the word "pub"? Can you cite sources that say "so many percent of the population use the word "pub""? Or "by far the greater number of the people in the UK go to pubs rather than public houses"? What about formal discussions about public houses or pubs, what would a serious commentator use about the habits of British public in a serious discussion, call it scientifically, or not? Would he/she necessarily say "pub" or "public house".
Just one example of the policy you love quoting at me: I, myself, wanted to find out all about "cash machines", you know what I came up with in Wikipedia? Automatic teller machine. Now I wonder how many people are saying in the course of the day, "I must pop down to the Automatic teller machine to get some money out"? You see, it's all relative, really.
In order to make any decisions (or changes) as to "pub" or "public house", you will have to cite sources to that effect. Perhaps I can refer to one of Wikipedia's policy pages in my turn, such as Wikipedia:Citing sources. And it will be no good just saying, "it is so obvious that so many people use the word "pub". This is about a possible rename of an article. Bear in mind this is an article that we would like to be consulted by all people, officially and unofficially, and it's no good saying "everybody is saying "pub" even in serious discussions. We are striving to be a serious publication. I am not trying to impose anything on anybody. Dieter Simon (talk) 00:10, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Let me ask again. Are you seriously questioning the assertion that "pub", informal or not, is the most common name used to refer to the subject of this article? Seriously? There is no need to source the blatantly obvious, and I thought that fact certainly qualified. I mean, I suspect any English speaking person can find scores of English speaking adult friends, family and colleagues who have never heard of the term "public house", but none that have not heard of "pub". So, are you seriously questioning the assertion that "pub" is the most common name used to refer to the subject of this article? If so, that was the point of the google test results above, which you dismissed. By the way, google test results are a bonafide method for determining usage. Have you read WP:UCN yet? --Serge (talk) 03:18, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:Naming Conventions Policy page contain a section called "Use the most easily recognized name". This section contains wording that is little altered since it was introduced back on 6 May 2002 as such it is a very old policy. This year we have introduced an important qualification to the policy, namely to tie it in more closely to the more recent content policies such as WP:V. To this end we have introduced the following sentence "Wikipedia determines the recognizability of a name by seeing what verifiable reliable sources in English call the subject." to the policy section "Use the most easily recognized name]]".

Usually this does not cause a problem because reliable sources and unreliable sources use the same name, but sometimes there can be a divergence between the two. It is up to the editors of pages like this to decide whether in reliable sources "pub" or "public house" is most common and to consider the quality of the sources that use the term. For example does the The Law Times Reports: Containing All the Cases Argued and Determined in the ... of 1899 carry more weight than the Evening Standard London Pub Bar Guide 1999?

Also don't believe the raw numbers returned by a Google search. For example a Google book search appears to return "26,071 on "pub" Bar." but go to the 40th page (the last returned) it say "391 of 391 on "pub" Bar.". The last page returned by public-house bar gives "326 of 366 on public-house bar" so a simple search of books (using "bar" to remove many of the false positives) does not show such a large discrepancy between the two.

One last point "Editors are strongly discouraged from editing for the sole purpose of changing one controversial name to another. If an article name has been stable for a long time, and there is no good reason to change it, it should remain."(Wikipedia:Naming conventions#Controversial names --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 10:35, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I'll go along with that, the article has been under its present name since 25Feb 2002, when it was first created. To change the name, yes, you do need substantiation that the formal version "public house" is no longer recognized in Britain as its proper formal name, "blatantly obvious" or not, Serge, because it is a big step to take. I agree with Philip Baird Shearer for the reasons he adduced. Dieter Simon (talk) 14:15, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Whether "public house" is now or has ever been "the formal version" recognized in Britain for the subject of this article is irrelevant to the question of what the title of this article should be. The rationale for this is explained here, but I'll copy/paste it here since it's so relevant.
Names of articles should be the most commonly used name for the following reasons:
  • We want to maximize the likelihood of being listed in external search engines, thereby attracting more people to Wikipedia. For example, the pagename is Jimmy Carter and not "James Earl Carter, Jr."; the string "Jimmy Carter" in the page title make it easier to find: search engines will often give greater weight to the contents of the title than to the body of the page. Since "Jimmy Carter" is the most common form of the name, it will be searched on more often, and having that exact string in our page title will often mean our page shows up higher in other search engines.
  • We want to maximize the incidence that people who make a link guessing the article name, guess correctly; people guessing a different name may think there is no article yet, which may cause duplication.
  • Using a full formal name requires people to know that name, and to type more.
  • We respect our readers and name our articles as they do, just formulating their collective needs.
Following the section explaining the rationale is a section illustrating examples of article names in which the common name was used instead "of a more elaborate, more formal or more scientifically precise version". --Serge (talk) 21:51, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Philip, I recognize that we need to take into account reliable sources when deciding whether "public house" or "pub" is more common, but I just don't understand what the reliable sources are that indicate it's "public house" and not "pub". At books.google.com I get "Books 1 - 10 of 9,070 on public-house" and "Books 1 - 10 of 1,140,600 on pub". That ratio is 1:125, a difference of two orders of magnitude in favor of pub. If the number of references in books is not a "reliable source" for determining what term is used to refer to the subject most often, I don't know what is. As to the bug at books.google.com that results in a different number when you go to the last page, that's about a bug there, not this discussion. The point is if you do apples/apples searches for "public-house bar" and "pub-house bar" you get 1,493 and 30,390, respectively, a ratio of 1:20; Searches for "pub drink" vs. "public-house drink" produce similar results. No matter which "reliable source" you reference or how you do the search, the results are consistent: pub is much more frequently used than is "public house". As far as your last point, I simply note the "and there is no good reason to change it" clause. There is a good reason to change: according to reliable sources, pub is clearly the much more common term used to refer to the subject of this article. --Serge (talk) 21:38, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
For crying out loud, the opening sentence of the article concedes the point that Public House is not the term most commonly used to refer to the subject of the article: "A public house, usually known as a pub,..." And that has been in there, apparently without objection, since 2002. The stable language in this article itself is a reliable source for the point that this article's name is blatantly in violation of Wikipedia naming conventions. --Serge (talk) 22:26, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Any further discussion is acamedic. The decision of the survey was "No Concensus" and by default no change will be made. Could I suggest you both move on and expend your extensive energies elsewhere on other topics. 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 23:44, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Quite so, have slightly changed the first sentence of the article to take account of what has been said about formal versus informal name. Dieter Simon (talk) 23:54, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
21st, the decision to close the discussion was premature. And Dieter, are you normally in the habit of changing the facts when they don't support your argument? Unbelievable. --Serge (talk) 00:04, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

I have said all along that "public house" is the formal version of the informal term "pub". And I do believe the discussion is not going to lead anywhere. It has been wound down by other contributors. Dieter Simon (talk) 23:36, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Serge in response to your search "I get "Books 1 - 10 of 9,070 on public-house" and "Books 1 - 10 of 1,140,600 on pub"" please see what I wrote above:
Also don't believe the raw numbers returned by a Google search. For example a Google book search appears to return "26,071 on "pub" Bar." but go to the 40th page (the last returned) it say "391 of 391 on "pub" Bar.". The last page returned by public-house bar gives "326 of 366 on public-house bar" so a simple search of books (using "bar" to remove many of the false positives) does not show such a large discrepancy between the two.
For example a Google Book search on just the word pub includes in the first three one about public house and two others that are both false positives: [1] and "Oklahoma Pub. Co. v Kendall (1923)"[2]. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 12:52, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Dieter, I'm not disputing the assertion that "pub" is the informal term for "public house". I'm simply pointing out that per WP:UCN the informal term is preferred for the article title when it is the most common term used to refer to the subject of the article.

Philip, whatever problems may exist with google searches, it's irrelevant to the point that "pub" is clearly the most common term used to refer to the subject of this article, which was acknowledged on the first line of this article itself for years (until it was changed yesterday when I pointed this out).

The closing of the above discussion was premature because most if not all of the votes opposing the move were based on one of the following two misperceptions. (1) That being the correct formal name overrides WP:UCN in determining an article title. (2) That "public house" is the more common term used. --Serge (talk) 20:03, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Serge you say ""pub" is clearly the most common term used to refer to the subject of this article" but the question is it the most common term used in reliable sources? The search that you did did not account for false positives and where they do you have not gone to the last page returned to see what number are accessible eg page 41 "401 of 401 on pub drink.". Further many of the books returned are no reliable sources, so some sort of analysis needs to be done on those returned. If the term is as common in reliable sources or if "Public house" house and it share a similar level of usage, then it would in my opinion be reasonable to move the article to the most common name used in less than reliable sources. But to date not much effort seems to have gone into agreeing on the usage in reliable sources. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 18:19, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
It is wikilawyering to require the use of "reliable sources" to verify the fact that the most common term used to refer to the subject of this article is the one the article itself stated as being such for eight years. Using the difficulty to isolate searches for a particular use of a given term ("pub") from other uses in order to claim that it cannot be proven that among reliable sources that term is the most common term for the subject in question, when the fact in question is so blatantly obvious it is stated flat-out in the article, is wikilawerying. Please. The entire basis for defending the continued use of Public House for the title of this article instead of Pub is based upon flawed arguments and wikilawerying. We can and should do better. --Serge (talk) 20:07, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
Please, Serge, do look at the facts. You keep mentioning WP:UCN akas "naming convention". Who is going to be a busy person then? Let me immediately confront you with the first example which doesn't conform to WP:UCN at all. Cash machine or cash point redirect straight to automated teller machine. Although I know that is the official name and certainly the formal name for cash machine or point, have you ever heard anyone using the name "automated teller machine"? I haven't. And yet, there it is, the article is named "Automated teller machine". Even Google can only come up with 368,000 automated teller machine and 242,000 automatic teller machine, while it gives us 1,620,000 cash machine and 250,000 cash point (a great number more than for the term Wikipedia is using ("automated teller machine"). So what are you going to do about it, clear that up as well while you are about it?
Example no 2: Car is Googling 1,070,000,000 but go for it in Wikipedia you get redirected to Automobile (Google) 129,000,000), yes, again, "automobile" is the original and formal version, but most certainly not the most frequently used version. Yet, Wikipedia redirects to it.
Lorry is the British version of truck in the U.S. I have heard nobody speak of a truck in Britain when they meant a lorry in Britain, but there it is again lorry redirects to truck, whether the Brits like it or not. In fact, the word "truck" in Britain is a railway truck which is usually used for freight, and is doubly misleading here.
WP:UCN is the most inconsistent convention I have ever seen. I am sure if I put my mind to it, I could find a lot more examples where the most commonly used term is not used at all. So, please let us have our "public house" in Britain, whatever the convention is in the U.S. and in Australia and New Zealand. Dieter Simon (talk) 01:44, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Dieter, while all this is moot here, for now, now that this poll is closed, I'm taking the time to explain it because the more editors understand the general ideas and principles, the better. All of your examples make my point. Only when the most common name is not clear and obvious are other names used. Another good example of that is fixed-winged aircraft to which the more common aeroplane and airplane both redirect. Consensus could not be achieved on which was the most common, so they went with an alternative.
As to your examples the most common name for what you Brits call a cash machine is not at all clear. In the States we refer to them as ATMs, short for automated teller machines. They could not claim WP:PRIMARYUSAGE for ATM so they went with the long version. By the way, this example illustrates the problem with not using the most common name. Because cash machine is not at ATM another usage has claimed primary usage in that ATM is a redirect to Asynchronous Transfer Mode implying it is the primary usage of ATM. At any rate Automated Teller Machine is an example of a topic for which the most common name is not clear.
With respect to car vs. automobile again the most common name is not clear. For one thing car is often used to refer to something other than the topic of that article (like train car), so you can't go by raw google results. Also, car and automobile are arguably equally well-known among English speakers. That is, no one will end up at an article entitled "automobile" and wonder what it is about. On the other hand, myriads of Americans have no clue that public house is a pub, and that's even apparently true for some Brits if you believe the comments in our poll above. Given two equally well-known names and both very commonly used to refer to the topic in question, the nod often goes to the more precise term. That's reasonable. But that is not the case here, not even close.
As to Lorry vs. Truck that's luck of the draw when choosing between equally commonly used terms for the same topic, with each used in different dialects, as in Yoghurt vs. Yogurt, except there is no good alternative like fixed-winged aircraft. Again, that's not the case here in which pub is most commonly used for the topic of this article in all English dialects.
Your examples all make my point which is the name clearly used most commonly is almost always used when it is also clearly WP:PRIMARYUSAGE for the given topic. Your examples make this point because they are all examples in which either the most common name is not clear, or it's not clearly WP:PRIMARYUSAGE for the topic in question. For the topic of this article, clearly pub is the most common name, and it is also obviously WP:PRIMARYUSAGE (that's a given since pub redirects here). --Serge (talk) 22:03, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
I will also add that if you find an example where the clearly more common name redirects to the article (which is the case here), and there are no airplane/aeroplane dialect conflicts, or anything like that, that is by definition a candidate for a move request. --Serge (talk) 01:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Now it's "Primary Usage" is it? Well, here at this point this Wikipedian will be leaving what he thought was a "dialogue" and leave you to your "monologue", because you are not really taking part. Dieter Simon (talk) 01:46, 30 October 2008 (UTC)Dieter Simon (talk) 10:41, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand why you put an important Wikipedia guideline, primary usage, in quotes. That guideline was never relevant here because the primary usage of both public house and pub was never questioned by either side... for both it is clearly the topic of this article. I only brought it up in the context of explaining why your examples did not simply use the most common name. When primary usage cannot be claimed for the most common name, then it cannot be used for the title (which is the case for ATM, but is not the case for pub or public house, so not relevant here).
Dieter, I believe I addressed all of your points, so I don't know what else I could do in order for you to feel this is a dialogue rather than a monologue. I'm not ignoring what you're saying as I would be if this was a monologue. To the contrary. I'm reading your words very carefully, thinking about their meaning as best as I can understand it, and replying as clearly as I can. If that's not dialogue ("an exchange of ideas and opinions" or " a discussion between representatives of parties to a conflict that is aimed at resolution", per m-w.com), I don't know what is. Pardon me, but your claim to the contrary seems nothing more than blatant equivocation. --Serge (talk) 17:05, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Men and women

Latest comment: 15 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Any mention of the fact that years ago women weren't allowed in pubs? And the relationship men traditionally have with the pub as some sort of haven?--Tuzapicabit (talk) 23:09, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Reverting edit by 21st Century Greenstuff

Latest comment: 15 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

I have now reverted my own revert. I really didn't mean to change your edit and am puzzled as to how this happened. Anyway, I am sorry about this. All should be back to your entry. Dieter Simon (talk) 22:03, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

S'OK, it brightened up my evening. Mind hiccups Eh? LOL 21st CENTURY GREENSTUFF 22:21, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
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