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Suggestion related to sports players

Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(flags)#In_sports.2C_flag_.3D_intl._allegiance.2C_not_necessarily_nationality see this discussion for the basics of this suggestion . I think we need a sports peoples section. See below

Use of flags for sports people

Their is widespread usage of flags in squads(what do Americans call them?) and listed of results . however flags should only be used where that person can (is?) represent their national team. So flag usage such as Everton_F.C.#Everton_Giants ([1]) are correct however using a national flag for Formula One teams and driver is incorrect

National team not nationality

The use of flags should only show the national team the player is/was/can play for not where they where born

Comments/Suggestions? Gnevin (talk) 09:25, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

This was added to the MoS page without consensus. It should be removed. Readro (talk) 07:51, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Then do it or better yet discuss what you don't like about it Gnevin (talk) 08:16, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

What I don't like about it is that it doesn't have consensus. It shouldn't have been added without discussion. Readro (talk) 08:19, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

No one objected. No approval is needed to make changes and WP:Be bold.Plenty of time was give for people too object and in fact they still canGnevin (talk) 08:37, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I have had consensus you are failing to understand what consensus is. No are we going to discuss what you don't like about it? Gnevin (talk) 08:39, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Discussion is required for a consensus, and discussion certainly didn't occur. You certainly should have informed the Formula One WikiProject that you were going to force them into making mass changes to their articles. Readro (talk) 09:08, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I think what Readro is talking about is the reference to Formula One. The suggestion that Formula One drivers and teams do not represent their countries is erroneous, and was added without any discussion at the relevant wikiprojects. Bretonbanquet (talk) 08:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

In what why do drivers, driving for non national teams represent their countries, F1 rivers no more represent their country have Tiger Woods represents America at the open. This guideline is relevant to hundreds of projects which can't be notified of every change. Gnevin (talk) 09:10, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Nationality has been a fundamental of F1 since it began. See List of international auto racing colors. Also we have, to name but a few, British Racing Motors, Scuderia Italia, Force India, North American Racing Team, Ecurie Belge and Ecurie Ecosse, all very nationalistic. Lastly, the rules mean that each driver has to have their national flag on their car. Readro (talk) 09:23, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Try telling an Italian that Scuderia Ferrari does not represent Italy, or an Indian that Force India does not represent India. Racing teams have always represented their countries, and all racing cars in Formula One are required to carry national flags. I must ask who or what the hell Tigger Words is though.. ?? Bretonbanquet (talk) 09:26, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

The only bit that applies here is that Lastly, the rules mean that each driver has to have their national flag on their car which is fair enough.However I still feel that throwing in a country name does not mean you represent that country but thats a other issues Any objection to re-adding removing the F1 example?,Tigger Woods is a alternate universe golfer see Kal-l and Kal-el as if you didn't know Gnevin (talk) 09:33, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no objection to the statement other than the reference to Formula One. And... I really didn't know. Bretonbanquet (talk) 09:45, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I would add that this goes beyond F1, and represents the majority of international motorsport. Nearly all results or entry lists for events include nationalities of racing drivers (based on their Licensing), and cars used in most form of motorsport carry the flag of the nation they represent. Podium ceremonies also include the display of the driver or team's national flag, and even sometimes their national anthem. You do not have to "represent" a nation for your nationality to be considered important to the sport itself as well as its fans, the ones who read Wikipedia.

I feel the fact of the matter is that, when you do not involve the sports-related WikiProjects in this discussion, especially when you specifically single out a singular sport which has its own Wikiproject, then you do not have consensus to begin with. The359 (talk) 16:15, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Gnevin, I don't think WP:Bold, revert, discuss is really the best approach for building consensus on a manual of style page. Having said that, I don't think your suggested change will work for many sports. You are correct that golfers, tennis players, race drivers, etc. usually don't compete for their nation, but nationality is still a big part of those sports. I have seen SUI next to Roger Federer's name on many television broadcasts of grand slam events. I have seen flags (and sometimes country codes) next to each name on a golf leader board (web and TV) for many tournaments. When source material uses flag icons for each of these athletes, it is natural for Wikipedia editors to adopt a similar style convention. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 16:48, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I love how on wiki you give a proposal an age and not one person objects or even takes the time to dicuss it . I gave it plenty time no one objected but never mind we are discussing it now. Gnevin (talk) 17:08, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I think you seem to think a lot of people actually bother to read these silly flag policies. The359 (talk) 19:08, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

First of all this is WP:Guideline not WP:Policy and i know people first come across guideline suchs as this in edit summary's Gnevin (talk) 19:21, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Football usage

I've removed the section per the above suggestion from its creator. The statement " Flags should be replaced by links to national teams" is simply not going to work for the Football squad templates. The flags are a very useful way of showing players' nationality and I can't see why it needs to change. пﮟოьεԻ 57 15:24, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand your objection are you saying it's not feasible? Gnevin (talk) 17:17, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree wholeheartedly. It's a quick, easy, visual marker for players' nationalities. And not all players from a country play for their national team, so it's also a bit misleading. matt91486 (talk) 16:00, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

So why do we not include the players national flag in their info box any more but we plaster it all over the club pages, all players have a national association,which could be used ?Gnevin (talk) 17:17, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

For me, that difference comes back to the main (IMO) reason for any flag icons, that of aiding navigation and browsing. A singular flag icon in an individual player's infobox does nothing useful. A list of icons attached to player names in a roster list or table helps you quickly find the exceptions, for example, such as the "import" players for the club. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:26, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

1. Ireland
2. Ireland
3. Ireland
4. Ireland
5. Ireland
6. Ireland
7. Ireland
8. England
9. Ireland
10. Ireland
11. Ireland
12. France
13. Ireland

I've not problem scanning that list or User:Gnevin/sandbox2 do you truly have difficulty with it ?Gnevin (talk) 19:34, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

If your point is that we should get rid of all flag icon usage whatsoever, as they are not helpful even for lists and tables, well, good luck with that. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 19:41, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

My point it we should get rid of unclear and ambiguous flags (see below) ,now one suggestion is my suggestion at User:Gnevin/sandbox2 to replace flags with links to national association removing any ambiguity surrounding nationality . You didn't answer my question , what's your suggestion to fix this crazy flag usage?Gnevin (talk) 19:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Nothing, as I don't think that particular type of flag usage is "crazy" and needs fixing. I don't think your sandbox version of that table is an improvment; quite the opposite, sorry. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 19:51, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Fine not crazy , how about unclear and ambiguous? Just out of interest what exactly is your issue(s) with the table  ? Gnevin (talk) 21:23, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You mean, my issues with your sandbox table? Two-fold: using full names instead of flag icons increases the "text density" in the table, and puts as much emphasis on the nation names as the player names. Second, the 24 pixel images serve as a kind of bullet, which helps delineate each entry better, especially if there are no borders between table rows. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 21:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

What's with this anti-flag campaign? The list in your sandbox looks plain ugly. BanRay 21:32, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

The "roster table with flags" is used on thousands of pages, I would guess. Clearly there is consensus for that. I think the Right Thing To Do™ is update this part of the Manual of Style to clarify what editors should do for the "problem" situations, not to create a new guideline that removes all of those flags outright. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 21:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I've asked several times people suggest a wording for the problem flags as i cant think of any Gnevin (talk) 23:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Alas, if it was easy, it would have been written long ago... — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 23:11, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Proposed text

Use of flags for sports people

There is widespread usage of flags in squads and lists of results. However flags should only be used where that person is representing a national team or country such as the Olympic games. Flag usage such as Delray Beach International Tennis Championships[2] or using a national flag for Golf players at the US Open as they are not representing a nation.

National teams

In sports where the national team in the highest level of competition such as Soccer or Rugby Union, flags are commonly used on club pages to indicate the players' national team. However this can be confusing as readers may assume the flag indicates the player was born in that country or has ties to it, sports such as Rugby league and players like Matt Gafa have loose requirement and so can declare for a chosen nation where there may be little prior ties. Flags should be replaced by links to national associations/federations such as Malta on clubs pages to indicate the national associations/federations associated with [3].

• Oppose for the reason stated above, i.e. that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the current use in football club articles. If anything a link to an association would be more confusing because some people are eligible to play for a number of associations, whereas if they haven't actually played yet, the flag just represents country of birth. пﮟოьεԻ 57 18:50, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose per Number57. It is much more useful to use the flagicons than to link to the national association, as it saves on using too much text. It is the hallmark of a good encyclopaedia to use appropriate images to break up text. – PeeJay 19:01, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose per Number 57. This is an encyclopedia, and non-trivial data which help identifying an athlete in a roster, such as his sports nationality, is welcome and reasonable. --Angelo (talk) 19:15, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose no just no BanRay 21:39, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

This isn't a vote its a discussion, please stop voting its not helpful . Nothing wrong you claim . So a IP looks up some sports sports clubs pages on wiki

1. Harlequins_Rugby_League- Matt Gafa who has a Maltese flag but is from Australia
2. Leinster Rugby - Shane Horgan who has a made up flag
3. Chelsea_F.C. -Joe Cole who has an english flag
4. Belfast Celtic- this is a right mess Tom Aherne flag of the ROI was in official in 1919? Tommy Breen flag of the ROI wasn't offical in 1912 and finally John Feenan St patricks flag never offical.
5. Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. -Mick_McCarthy no flag
6. Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. -Kevin Foley Irish U21 never senior , Irish flag
7. Leinster Rugby -Michael Berne and Cameron Jowitt both play for the same country , no wait it a tiny confusing flag i can barely see

Don't know about you but I'm confused . So this is the current guideline : Flags are the players nationality , expect when they are playing for a other country , expect when the national team spans two countries then its the national bodys made up flag, never mind the if country didn't exist use the flag anyway expect when you don't and you use a de facto flag and if all else fails use no flag. Gnevin (talk) 19:17, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Why not fix the articles in question (to use the correct historical flag) instead of looking for a single guideline to make a sweeping justification for their removal? — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 19:43, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Because some will object to them , how long do you think Branislav Ivanović would last with or Andriy Shevchenko let alone Germans from 1920–45 Gnevin (talk) 19:57, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. In my opinion, people should just use their common sense anyway. If you're making a new article or modifying an existing one, have a look at what is being done in other places, and follow that example. – PeeJay 19:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

The point is their is no clear cut flag usage guideline accross the numerous sporting code and it's confusing as hell and even people in the wiki projects don't seem to quite understand what the flag represents, be it nationality or national team Gnevin (talk) 19:55, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

If a player has played for a national team, then the flag of that team should be used. If not, then the flag of the (modern) country that the player most strongly associates with should be used. This can be determined by whether a player has declared himself available for selection by a particular country's national team, or it may just be his country of birth. Either way, there is usually a single country that a player is most associated with; it's just a matter of finding it. – PeeJay 20:41, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

The old Yugoslavian flag couldn't be used in the Chelsea F.C. article next to Branislav Ivanović's name anyway, as we explicitely say not to use flags to represent birth locations. The usage their is to represent nationality, and if a reliable source can show he is Serbian (per WP:BLP) then the flag of Serbia in the Chelsea article is fine. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 20:00, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

And will you be adding the Union Jack to the belfast celtic article? So the flags represent the national team but sometimes they don't ,i take it the user guesses which on they want . What about Andriy Shevchenko. Branislav Ivanović national flag at birth was that of , can you not see how unclear flags are here ? Gnevin (talk) 21:20, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

No, I honestly can't. I think it's much simpler, quicker, and more visually pleasing way to just quickly demonstrate nationality. matt91486 (talk) 22:21, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not talking visually here ! I am talking context and content here . Flags where removed from player infoboxes for all the reasons I listed above and more ,these reasons still stand when used in club pages .now a set of guidelines could help this area greatly.The first step would be something like the below

Suggestion 2, relating to tables

• Where possible flags should only indicate the players nationality or flags should indicate the players national squad as in many cases these are not one in the same.
• If both must used . Then it should be clearly indicate where the flag usage doesn't conform too the table header such as

example1

or

example2

• Table headers should clearly state which form of nationality is being used. Short hand such as Nat is unclear and ambiguous, Comments? Gnevin (talk) 23:20, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

  Shorthand such as "Nat" should be acceptable if and only if the table has a legend that explains all abbreviations. I don't think I want to see "International team allegiance" as a header for a column that should only be 24 pixels wide. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 23:29, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

So some thing like example3

? Gnevin (talk) 23:42, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

At the risk of me being way wrong, could the national team affiliation column header be labelled something like FIFA or IFAB as they are the governing bodies that define player elligibility for play with national squads? Or Nat'l team? Represents? Affiliation?

Or use two flags by default in team/birthplace order?

• |
• |
  Wiggy! (talk) 01:41, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Two columns would be needed to use two flags in my opinion. I like the IRB,FIFA idea alright example4 Gnevin (talk) 07:23, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no problem with asterisking situations if clarification is needed, like when a player has multiple options, but on some smaller sides, you could end up with the whole team asterisked if no one has made an international appearance, which concerns me. matt91486 (talk) 03:26, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Then do the reverse in these cases showing nationality and putting the asterisk beside the international playersGnevin (talk) 07:14, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

The word "nationality" may be confusing and misleading. Don't fix what ain't broken. Use NT flags where possible, the rest - country of birth. BanRay 14:39, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

How can you say word "nationality" may be confusing and misleading. Then claim its not broken, every sports table currently is using Nat , which is short for nationality. Gnevin (talk) 14:46, 14 May 2008 (UTC)?

Football rosters don't use "nat". Additionally, when used next to another flag, "Nat" will sound ambiguous. Ethnicity, citizenship, country of birth can all be referred to as "nationality", depending on context. BanRay 21:58, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

This is a discussion about all sports not just soccer but if we must talk soccer what do the flags here represent? Gnevin (talk) 22:05, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Nationality... BanRay 22:36, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

But i thought nationality was ambiguous.Ethnicity, citizenship, country of birth can all be referred to as "nationality", depending on context. Gnevin (talk) 07:14, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I think the current system is generally fine. The only situations where it's ambiguous is if someone has multiple options, a la Gabriel Agbonlahor and has not yet officially been capped. However, in most situations that player has declared their intention to play for one internationally, as Agbonlahor has with England, so he should just be marked that way. matt91486 (talk) 01:02, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

So now your saying the flag represent their international team alligence? Confused yet? Matt have you not seen the 7 + example i posted above. For me example4 has been the clearest on the four tables followed by 2 Gnevin (talk) 07:14, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Exactly, that's why the word nationality should never be used, especially next to another flag. BanRay 08:04, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The flag does represent international team allegiance (which is nationality as well) in roster lists, what's so confusing? BanRay 08:08, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The usage across wiki disagrees .I'm finding it difficult to quantify as their is no clear indication of what the flag represents! Gnevin (talk) 09:00, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

As far as I am concerned, flags always represent nt allegiance, where possible. If you can prove the opposite, an example would come in handy at this point, because I still fail to understand the problem. BanRay 09:44, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Always and where possible mean not always [4] , what's wrong with spelling it out as i've listed below which is the status quo but quantified, what is wrong with some guidelines here? How about suggesting some guideline for what out consider correct usage?Gnevin (talk) 10:16, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Done, scroll down. BanRay 10:20, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Break 1

Suggestion

• Flags should not be used on sports peoples player individual pages
• Flags should only indicate the players national squad or sporting nationality where the player has played for them at a competitive level or has declared for that team.
• Flags indicating national squad should not be used where a player has not played at a competitive level or declared for the teams as such use age would be WP:OR
• Where flags are used the table ,it should clearly indicate what the flag represents
• Flags should included the country names
• Flags should not indicate the players nationality in a non sporting sense
• If nationality and national squad are used in the same table the no usage which doesn't comply to the stated table usage should in clearly indicated ^*

The last two peaces of text in italic is part of the MOS already
^*= to be used if the MOS is to be ignored and non sporting nationality is to be includeGnevin (talk) 09:00, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I think the most important point here is that a flag column in a table should have a clear heading, indicating what it represents (player's nationality or team allegiance). As much as I'd like to see country names at least once per article as in the guidelines, sports articles just have too many tables with flags everywhere to see that happen. I think the header part is the simplest fix and best compromise.--Boffob (talk) 16:21, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The first two are fine, the rest are too complicated and unnecessary, sorry. BanRay 20:02, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Progress is being made trying to find common ground here, i don't think we are that far from it .

1. Flags should not be used on sports peoples individual pages infoboxes
2. Flags should never indicate the players nationality in a non sporting sense, flags should only indicate the sports person's players national squad or sporting nationality
3. Where flags are used the table ,it should clearly indicate that the flag represents sporting nationality not nationality
4. Flags should illustrate the highest level the sports person is associated with. For example if a sports person has has represented their nation or has declared for a nation then the national sport governing body's flag should be used. Where a sports person has not played at international level then the international sport governing body's (such as IRB,FIFA) eligibility rules should be used, if these rules allow a player to represent two or more nations then, then the eligibility rule that is most apt should be applied. Most often place of birth. For example if a soccer player has a Scottish grandparent but both parents are English then Image:Flag_of_England.svg should be used

Comments? Gnevin (talk) 20:36, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Point 1 - :"individual pages" should be replaced with "footballers' infoboxes", since some tables, like the ones with international goals/appearances and some others use flags; Point 2 - see point 4; Point 3 - If you can think of a decent way of doing it, without making it look crowded, I don't mind. Point 4 - What if a soccer player has one Scottish and one English parent? Or what if there's no data about relatives? Sounds rather complicated, I'd go with the place of birth. BanRay 13:05, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Point 1 done

Point 2 shouldn't change or be effected by 4 we need to make it clear that sporting nationality,the nationality the flags are showing doesn't equal passport or any other nationality

Point 3 could be done with <ref>Nat. shown here indicates sporting nationality as defined by [[FIFA]]</ref>

Point 4 removed the example, adding place of birth once 2 remains near to its current form this should be ok

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Gnevin (talk • contribs)

Sounds good BanRay 12:14, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Great! Ban can you comment on the two sections below ,the historical issue and the Flags on coaches, owners, GMs, etc. Cheers Gnevin (talk) 14:28, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion by BanRay

If you feel we really need a "formal guideline" here, I'd suggest the following:

In roster lists:

• Flags should only indicate the players' national squad or sporting nationality where the player has played for them at any competitive level or has declared for that team (source required).
• Where the player has no international experience, flags should represent the country the player is eligible to play for.
• Where the player with no international experience is eligible to represent more than one country, the country of birth should be used. BanRay 10:10, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Agree with point 1 , point 2 is vague see sports line Rugby union and league , point 3 is just basic nationality in my opinion and should be covered by 2 if we can clarify it Gnevin (talk) 10:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

These sound good for me. Points 2-3 can probably be combined into one point, I agree on that as well. matt91486 (talk) 05:21, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Flags on coaches, owners, GMs, etc.

What about the use of flags next to sports businessmen such as owners and GM? (Coaches as well, but coaches can coach national teams, so they are closer to players.) This is common in football/soccer and ice hockey article, I've noticed. Should this be encouraged? Standardized? Should flags be used for teams with owned by a holding company? – flamurai (t) 07:18, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

In roster templates, I don't see any real problem with it. It might not have the same effect as for players and whatnot, but it standardizes visually and doesn't really harm anything. Oftentimes those roles are held by former players, anyway, who would have a designated nationality from their playing career. matt91486 (talk) 14:03, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm talking mainly about infoboxes – flamurai (t) 14:06, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

My opinion has always been that a very small number (i.e. 1–3) of flag icons in infoboxes is not a terribly useful visual aid. The best usage of flag icons will always be for larger tables and lists (where the icons are aligned vertically), as a means to improve readability. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 16:01, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Unless space is limited such that the country name cannot be stated (which is an egregious case), or the flag is used as an abbreviation such as in a table of competitions, a flag icon is useless and usually misleading or distracting. —Centrx→talk • 04:45, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I think flags should be kept to tables only Gnevin (talk) 11:29, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

For me point 1 in the proposed text would mean flag usage such as outlined here and in club info boxes would no long be used. Banray is this within the spirit of what we agreed or do you feel these flags are useful ? Gnevin (talk) 14:30, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Current or Historic flag

Should the sport governing body's current or historic flag be used? Gnevin (talk) 13:05, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Any comments on this? Gnevin (talk) 07:21, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Proposed text

The following is the proposed to be added to the mos. Comments welcome

1. Flags should not be used on sports peoples individual infoboxes
2. Flags should never indicate the players nationality in a non sporting sense, flags should only indicate the sports person's players national squad or sporting nationality
3. Where flags are used the table ,it should clearly indicate that the flag represents sporting nationality not nationality
4. Flags should illustrate the highest level the sports person is associated with. For example if a sports person has has represented their nation or has declared for a nation then the national sport governing body's flag should be used. Where a sports person has not played at international level then the international sport governing body's (such as IRB,FIFA) eligibility rules should be used, if these rules allow a player to represent two or more nations then, then the eligibility rule that is most apt should be applied. Most often place of birth. Gnevin (talk) 14:26, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

The first of these flies in the face of actual practice, which in some cases is pretty much totally consistent across all non-Northern Ireland and non-stub articles in a particular sport (e.g. snooker bios). Needs much broader discussion, such as via VP or an RFC.

Removed the numbers, since other sections are not using numbers.

Second point is spot on, but I changed it to read "squad/team" for UK/US English.

Third point is borderline WP:CREEP, since it is clear from the context in most cases; moderated that one a bit.

Fourth point was confused on several levels, and I also clarified it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:20, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Disagree on the first point; that is a change to existing practice. It is now being used as a justification to remove the flags from golfer infoboxes as their nationality. Nationality is typically strongly tied to golfers (and using flags is very common practice in golf coverage); for example see the PGA Tour's list of players. Furthermore, several other places in the policy state that flags should never be used for death or birth places, since otherwise it could be confused with nationality -- a policy which makes perfect sense, but which also implies that using flags for nationality would be the only acceptable usage in infoboxes. Forbidding their use in infoboxes altogether (even for nationality) seems like a pretty major change in policy. I can't speak to all situations, but at least for golfers in particular it makes good sense to use them, I feel. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:09, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

The current text read's As with other biographical articles, flags are discouraged in sportspeople's individual infoboxes. which leaves room for the flag usage. Gnevin (talk) 21:21, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thanks, that is the way I read it originally. I may have just run into a sockpuppet on a mission from the looks of it, who was using "discouraged" as a reason to remove them. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:50, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Third opinion needed at Talk:Edelbrock#Flagicon/seal in infobox

I am requesting an outside third opinion for a content dispute at Edelbrock on a flagicon and a state seal located in the infobox. Thanks in advance for any help. Aspects (talk) 17:26, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you to Boffob and Gnevin for their third opinions in response to my request. Aspects (talk) 22:08, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Album release history

Can flags be used like this? I thought it wasnt allowed but i see so much of it. --Realist² (Come Speak To Me) 04:21, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

This is definitely a case where text would be more clear. – flamurai (t) 04:27, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Cheers, i thought as much. --Realist² (Come Speak To Me) 04:34, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Proposal for coat-of-arms used for icon images

There is a proposal at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Flag Template#Coats of Arms to support coat-of-arms images in flagicon-like size. I have replied there to my opposition to such an idea, but am also posting here to solicit more discussion as I don't think that WikiProject is on too many watchlists. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 04:05, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Two new flag templates—are they compliant?

User:Ptcamn has recently created flag templates for Tlatelolco and Tenochtitlan. Before I barge forward and nominate them for TfD or something, I'd like to get some opinions here if these are compliant with the MOS. Specifically, are they non-flag stand-ins? Right now, they are only used in two articles: Tenochtitlan – Tlatelolco relations (which has a broken infobox anyway because of a missing image) and Battle of Tlatelolco. I don't think they are really helpful in either of those articles. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 16:26, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

They aren't flags per se, but they are somewhat like coats of arms, which I assumed could serve the same purpose. They're not invented in any case. --Ptcamn (talk) 16:38, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I never assumed they were invented, but I agree with the coat of arms comparison. It's not explicitly mentioned in the section of "non-flag stand-ins" that we discourage the use of coat of arms—or logos, but that's another issue—as a replacement for an actual flag, but I think there is consensus for that. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:09, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I think anything that misleadingly implies that something is a flag when it wasn't is a problem. I'm not sure if the current usage does that. A glyph is a form of writing, not a 'symbol' like a flag. Cop 663 (talk) 18:08, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I could see these templates being useful on the List of Sovereign States in X pages, where coats of arms are already used as stand-ins for flags. They just need to have the borders taken off so people don't start thinking they're flags. Orange Tuesday (talk) 23:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I guess the key question here is do we want to use coats-of-arms as stand-ins for flags, or should those links simply have no icon? I've seen far too many pages where editors feel like every entry ought to have some sort of icon, so they use whatever is available. Coats-of-arms look terrible at 22 pixels, and serve practically zero navigational or browsing assistance for the reader. I'd like to formalize that into the MOS—we really don't want arbitrary images to be used as decorative icons. Recognizable flags only. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 23:55, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I think any modern entity which could conceivably require a flag icon already has a flag to go with it, but there are certain historical contexts where using coats-of-arms would be appropriate. Military conflict infoboxes, for example. They should be used sparingly, but I don't want to see them formally banned outright. Orange Tuesday (talk) 00:17, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

But what is the purpose of the icon-size coats-of-arms? Surely inside those infoboxes it would be purely decorational, so why bother? You might say that the reader is one click away from seeing a larger version of the image, but that would also be true if they click on the nation wikilink and see a larger coat of arms inside the infobox of that nation's article. I just don't see any utility at all in 22 pixel versions of coats-of-arms. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 00:26, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd say that in historic lists of countries (Like 1900_Summer_Olympics#Participating_nations or List of sovereign states in 1980), historic flagicons have three purposes. They show people what the flag looked like at the time, they provide navigational aid to people who can recognize them, and they decorate the article. Coats of arms do the same thing. For instance, in a hypothetical List of countries in 1200, having England would probably be more helpful to the reader than just having England, just like having France would be more helpful than France. I personally would find it more helpful anyway. They are decorative, I'll admit, but they're not purely decorative. Orange Tuesday (talk) 14:19, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Subnational Flag Icon Usage

We seem to be inconsistent in our choice of which w:Category:First-level administrative country subdivisions deserve flag icons and which ones do not. I think one NPOV grouping could be the nations represented by United Nations member states#Current_members, the United Nations General Assembly observers, and the United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories#The list. Another one could be the previous list plus the First-level administrative country subdivisions, but right now we basically the former plus a few overseas colonies of the EU and the US, the provinces of Canada, and the home countries of the UK. The community seems reluctant to exclude the home countries, so it would seem NPOV to make room for all of the other First-level administrative country subdivisions or items of ISO 3166-2. One bone of contention might be the Antarctic Territorial claims frozen by the Antarctic Treaty. A discussion on this topic may be found at WT:WikiProject Flag Template#Coats_of_Arms & Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Flag Template#Coats_of_Arms_.28Continued.29. :)--Thecurran (talk) 11:36, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Red herrings aside, what inconsistency is there? We have flag templates for pretty much any first-level country subdivision where flags exist, and where icons are needed. Your assumed list is woefully incomplete—I suggest you browse Category:Country data templates to see the thousand or so flag templates in current usage, including subnational templates for a couple of dozen countries such as Brazil, Russia, Papua New Guinea, etc. If you are still upset that we don't have coat-of-arms icons for states/provinces/etc. that don't have flags (like the provinces of Indonesia, then that's an entirely different issue, isn't it? — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:09, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

To start off, there is an inconsistency in WP:FLAG#Use_of_flags_for_non-sovereign_states_and_nations. This is no nebulous concept. UN member states, UN Observer states, and UN Non-Self-Governing Territories are concepts that have been debated worldwide and agreed upon by the UN. The only other nations that sometimes count as sovereign are on the List of unrecognized countries. We decide instead of using a clear-cut international list to transclude in the British Home Nations, as well as briefly mentioning Quebec, and obliquely mentioning some Amerindian tribes. :)--Thecurran (talk) 03:53, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

If we were consistent, the Canadian provinces and British home nations would fall entirely under WP:FLAG#Do_not_use_subnational_flags_without_direct_relevance like the rest of the subnational flags of the world do. :)--Thecurran (talk) 03:58, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

More concrete evidence of how we seem to value the British home nations above most other national subdivisions may be found in Category:Flag templates or List of flags by country; these are no assumed lists. The former was where I sourced all of the double-brace/curly bracketed tags for our earlier discussion, Andrwsc. Basically, we have templates for most nations with sovereignty or non-self-government but also a few overseas colonies of the EU and the US, the provinces of Canada, and the home countries of the UK. This is where I find an inconsistency.

With all of the Category:Country data templates information you just mentioned, we are perfectly capable of generating flag templates for first-level administrative country subdivisions and to help clearly index the sovereignty status of these, I suggested we could follow ISO 3166-2 naming conventions, when Jeremy asked for a template, like {{MA}} or {{USA-MA}} for Massachusetts in WT:WikiProject Flag Template#Ignorant_question, by producing {{US-MA}} instead. It was your response there that subnational divisions of the US and in general were to be deprecated but your later defence of subnational divisons of the UK that highlighted our inconsistency.

Understanding that perhaps adding so many templates might bog down our computers, I also suggested that if it was not in our interests to do so, we could instead merely remove the flag templates of those home nations, provinces, colonies, etc. that unambiguously do not belong on a list of sovereign nations to country subdivison templates.

I have not yet raised the issue of Indonesian provinces here. I fail to see any of the red herrings you refer to unless I assume some deep colour of miscommunication. If that is the case, I apologize. :)--Thecurran (talk) 04:37, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

As I've pointed out, Category:Flag templates includes "shortcut" templates that pre-dated the standard {{flag}} and {{flagicon}} -based template system, but still remain for editor convenience and/or backwards compatibility. They include (almost) every ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 country code, and FIFA codes, and IOC codes where there is no conflict. These codes are familiar with people, so if you are going to choose an abbreviation for a template name, you might as well choose abbreviations that many editors will recognize. Personally, I prefer using the underlying {{flag}} template directly, as it results in more usable wikicode. For example, I've seen this sort of thing in the past: {{BTN}} <!-- Bhutan -->. Well, if you need to add a wiki-comment, why not write self-documenting markup directly, as {{flag|Bhutan}}? That's why I so strongly object to creating several hundred more "shortcut" templates for the state/province/etc. flags that we already have. Do we really need {{US-MA}}, {{DE-SN}}, or {{BR-MG}} when {{flag|Massachusetts}}, {{flag|Saxony}}, and {{flag|Minas Gerais}} work perfectly well as is? You'd require editors to "decode" a lot of non-obvious codes, when the full template name matches the main article for each state/province/etc. and is therefore much easier to remember.

Of the "shortcut" templates in Category:Flag templates, the only subnational entities that do not have ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 codes are the Canadian provinces and territories (e.g. {{BC}}). If it's consistency you want, I'd prefer we replace and deleted those 13 templates instead of making several hundred new ones!

The red herring I speak of is that you use arguments of which flags "deserve" to have flag templates based on political reasons. That's simply not true if you look at the thousand or so templates currently being managed. The only additions I object to are non-flags, such as coats-of-arms for states/provinces/etc. that don't have flags. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 05:56, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I do not happen to find any mention of the four British home nations, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales in ISO 3166-1 alpha-3. As such, they seem to be just as necessary/unnecessary as the Canadian provinces you want to remove. Guernsey, Jersey, and the Isle of Man, however, are present by special request from the International Postal Union, which has given way to the Universal Postal Union. If the shortcut templates are merely obsolete relics you deprecate and wish to decrease rather than increase, then what is wrong with removing all of those codes that do not follow ISO 3166-1 alpha-3? For the sake of clarity, limiting mislinks from typographical/spelling errors, and opening up the site to people with weak English backgrounds, may we implement {{flag|US-MA}}, {{flag|DE-SN}}, {{flag|BR-MG}}, etc.? It would be clearer and shorter when certain names are repeated, e.g., each "Distrito Federal" of Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Venezuela. :)--Thecurran (talk) 14:36, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

As I've mentioned multiple times already, including this discussion thread, "shortcut" templates exist for FIFA country codes too, and thats why {{ENG}} et. al. exist. The home nations competed independently in many different international competitions, so those templates have usage on thousands of articles. There is a balance between utility & convenience and pedantic "correctness". I see very little benefit in replacing thousands of instances of {{ENG}} to {{flag|England}} so that FIFA codes are removed from that category. Also note that some of the ISO codes are much less well-known than their FIFA/IOC equivalents, such as DEU versus GER, so there are other good reasons for keeping the FIFA/IOC codes in "shortcut template" form. Look, at this point, I think your requests are better suited for WP:Templates for discussion, so if you feel strongly about removing certain templates from Category:Flag templates, put the tfd tag on them and start the discussion. As for your last suggestion, I can't imagine any reason why you'd want to see US-MA anywhere instead of Massachusetts. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 15:23, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Our MOS still specifically gives a higher status to the British home nations. Furthermore, how can we be "complete" when we exclude Template:Country Data IT-FI, one the major centres of the European Renaissance of the 14th-17th centuries? Even if we included it without using ISO, English would ask for "Florence" and Italian would ask for "Firenze". Once again, ISO 3166-2:IT is so widespread it is used on vehicle registration plates, beyond the rule of conforming to national postal guidelines. ISO 3166 codes in general are helpful because they bridge language gaps like these, where a single place may have many different names in the Roman Script alone. Here is an incomplete list for DE (DEU):

A' Ghearmailt, Alamagn, Alemanha, Alemania, Alemanya, Allemagne, Almanya, Almayn, An Ghearmáin, Däitschland, Deutschland, Duitsland, Dútslân, Germania, Germanio, Germanujo, Germany, iJamani, il-Ġermanja, Jarumanu Vilay, Jerman, Kelemānia, Nemačka, Nemčija, Nemecko, Německo, Németország, Niemcy, Njemačka, nước Đức, Saksa, Saksamaa, S'aksamaa, Saksāmō, Tiutschlant, Tyskland, Týskland, Þēodiscland, Þýskaland, Ujerumani, Vācija, Vokietija, y Ghiarmaan, and Yr Almaen

For many people that use those above terms, the ISO codes are simpler and clearer than {{flag|Germany}}. I think you have noted how common they are among the IOC. Besides, during transwikification, information is not confused along the way as the codes are panlingual, so to speak.

Another subject where it is common and helpful to use flag icons is in the infoboxes of battles and wars. There are several conflicts where subnational divisions must be recognized (e.g., revolutions, civil wars, and incremental territory addition/subtraction). Noting this and WP:FLAG#Entities_without_flags_until_after_a_certain_point_in_time, it seems there is a gap, for which WP:FLAG#Inventing_new_flags_and_using_non-flag_stand-ins allows workarounds. When coats-of-arms exist for such entities, I think we should explicitly permit them. :)--Thecurran (talk) 15:55, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

There is no flag for the Province of Florence, so what could any IT-FL template possibly do? Where would it be used (on which pages)? How is the display of "IT-FL" in an infobox etc. more helpful to the reader than "Florence"? I think you are looking for a solution for a problem that doesn't exist, using red herring arguments like pointing out Florence was one of the major centres of the European Renaissance of the 14th-17th centuries. What does that hav to do with anything? — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:38, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

It does, however, have a coat-of-arms, as displayed on Province of Florence, which {{flag|IT-FI}} could display and follow with "Florence, Italy" on Provinces of Italy or pages that involve Italian history. You seem to contend that a pivotal turn in world history, like the Rennaisance, is less important than a sport, like FIFA. :)--Thecurran (talk)

Of course not. I contend that editors working on Italian history articles have not found a compelling need to put on their articles to identify Florence, but editors working on football articles have found it quite useful to use to identify the England national football team. I don't know how many times I have to repeat this—it's not a question of "importance" or who "deserves" a flag template; it's a question of utility. By the way, the coat of arms for the province described by IT-FL File:Provincia di Firenze-Stemma.png is completely different than the coat of arms for the city itself, so there goes your argument for using ISO codes as template names. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:26, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I thought the relationship between those two Florentine images was clear with the symbol of the city being repeated in the provincial coat with only a few surrounding addenda, including a duality. With the presence of city-states in Rennaisance Italy, like the Genoese and Venetian, I am tempted to say that the city coat is merely the dated version of the provincial coat and we do accept, direct, and mandate the use of dated flags for certain subjects.

Even in the MOS, we bring up James Joyce and how he could not be properly represented by the British Union Jack or the tricolour of the Republic of Ireland. If there were a provincial coat-of-arms, however, that would allow a proper presentation. In fact, I would be tempted to see if Saint Patrick's red saltire cross, a component of the British Union Jack along with Saint Andrew's and Saint George's, or some other symbol would be appropriate to denote his nationality.

Either way, It seems you and I are the only ones really interested in these topics and we are diametrically opposed. Instead of making up icon templates and appending them myself from the beginning, I chose to open a discussion with some presentation examples in accordance with the MOS. The Manual of Style has intimations but is still ambiguous and was built to sway with public consensus. We have both tried to convince each other to no avail. I was really hoping that by now someone else would chime so that one of us would end up conceding after a broader view of public opinion.

I am interested in finding a resolution but I am not sure what to do. I know there are some channels for resolutions, grievances, and appeals but I am worried that they might cause more harm than help in terms of personally offending you by starting such a process, and you have not really personally offended me.

I want to use and create linked icons for first-order subnational divisions that do not have flags but do have coats-of-arms. I feel that not doing so violates NPOV and you feel that doing so violates a sense of utility. What are your feelings on this impasse, Andrwsc? :)--Thecurran (talk) 11:50, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Thecurran, why not just use the flagicon image template like so: Florence, if you really feel the need to use it in an article? There's nothing stopping you from using coats of arms like flag icons when they're appropriate. They're already all over the place in Wikipedia. Check any of the infoboxes on the crusades, for instance. You can have flag icons without country data templates. The templates are just shortcuts for widely used flags, and there's no significance to which subdivisions have coats of arms and which do not. Orange Tuesday (talk) 16:10, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Orange Tuesday. I think I will do just that. It was just the kind of help I was looking for in the first place. :)--Thecurran (talk) 20:50, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Third opinion needed at Talk:Slovene language#Flagicons in the infobox

I am requesting an outside third opinion for a content dispute at Slovene language on flagicons located in the infobox. Thanks in advance for any help. --Eleassar ^{my talk} 13:04, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Language infobox icons

This is a survey/straw poll. It is not binding. In response to divergent interpretation of WP:FLAG on Talk:Slovene language#Flagicons in the infobox, I propose for a period of three months starting after a fortnight of discussion here either:

1A) that we allow flag icons in the distribution sections of infoboxes on language pages when the flag is of a "sovereign nation" and speakers of that language make up at least 5% of that nation's population, and that we allow flag icons in the official usage sections of infoboxes on language pages when the flag is of a "sovereign nation" and that nation officially sanctions use of that language within its territory, regardless of the numbers of icons involved,

1B) that we do the same as 1A) but interpreting the "long lists or tables" in WP:FLAG#Appropriate_use as requiring at least 5 elements in that particular section, ban flag icon usage for shorter lists,

2A) that we do the same as 1A) in the distribution section for any such nation that has at least 1,000 speakers of that language,

2B) that we do the same as 2A) but interpreting the "long lists or tables" in WP:FLAG#Appropriate_use as requiring at least 5 elements in that particular section, ban flag icon usage for shorter lists, or

3) that we use some other rule.

This proposal is only meant to be temporary and should not be enforced beyond its originally intended period, which would violate WP:NPSD, as this is merely an experiment, as per WP:BOLD, to gather consensus, as per WP:CON. :)--Thecurran (talk) 17:42, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Can you clarify, i've no idea what your proposing here Gnevin (talk) 18:40, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm really opposed to setting any arbitrary numbers or percentages of speakers for flag usage. The Kickapoo language isn't somehow less associated with the United States than Tewa just because the former has a bit less than 1,000 speakers and the latter has a bit more.

IMO flags should only be used in the official usage sections, not the distribution sections at all. The distribution sections refer to countries (or subdivisions) simply as geographic regions, while the official usage section directly involves states. --Ptcamn (talk) 19:06, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

The criteria for including a nation in the "spoken in" section is a different topic than the one for distinguishing flag lists. I agree with Ptcamm on the former. As for the latter, five as the cutoff point seems like a workable idea as a temporary measure so I'm in favor of it. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 18:58, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Use of multiple flags for sportspeople

Is there a way to show multiple flags for a single player in a team template? Take the case of Ben Gordon and Template:Chicago Bulls roster. The template currently shows Gordon's nationality as British. He was born in England, and is on the shortlist for Britain's 2012 Olympic Basketball team, so I understand the reasoning. However, Gordon moved to the US when he was a child and has American citizenship. He represented the US at the 2003 Pan American Games and currently plays in the American NBA. In addition, he has said that he would probably play for the US in the 2012 Olympics if Team USA invites him.

I don't think it's fair to only associate Gordon with a British flag. Is there any way of displaying a British flag and an American flag? Zagalejo^^^ 00:14, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Flags should illustrate the highest level the sportsperson is associated with. For example, if a sportsperson has represented their nation or has declared for a nation, then the national sport governing body's flag should be used so he should use the US flag Gnevin (talk) 04:25, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, what if he eventually does represent Britain in the Olympics? The guideline is unclear about what to do then. Zagalejo^^^ 05:40, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest that the British flag be used as the Olympics is the highest level of competition but we should cross that bridge if we get to it Gnevin (talk) 16:07, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Why not plan ahead? Gordon's situation is complicated, so some discussion would be nice. Note that even if Gordon does play for Britain, he's on record saying he would have played for America if given the chance. [5] So, it seems simplistic to just use one flag or the other. Zagalejo^^^ 16:22, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

If he ever presents Britain at the Olympics then we should use the British flag in my opinion Gnevin (talk) 15:48, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

This odd case is more a matter for consensus at the article in question, and changes to the infobox or other templates in question if technically required. Many people would sharply disagree that Olympic basketball is the pinnacle of the sport, that being, rather, the NBA, with Olympic b'ball being an entertaining diversion every 4 years. This guideline should not be trying to determine matters like that. The wording also did not account for other cases, and I've twiddled with it a bit to be more flexible. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:16, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Overuse of flagicons in sports articles

• I'm requesting this RfC because I have both 1. tried to reduce the amount of flagicon overuse or proposed to do so and 2. have failed due to resistance from other editors. The main argument in favour of always placing a flagicon next to the country's name was that it would be easier for people who do not know English. I strongly believe that this is not a valid argument since this is the English Wikipedia and that flagicons are still largely overused, especially in sports articles, in spite of MoS advice to the contrary. An example can be found here. Please consider that I am no arguing against flagicons in principle. The MoS doesn't say anything against instances where they serve a distinct purpose by codifying the nationality where it isn't of primary interest (see e.g. here for an example of imo legitimate or at least tolerable as non-redundant use). Everyme (was Dorftrottel) (talk) 20:11, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Wow, the even have little soccer ball icons for goals! Yeah, sports articles overuse flag icons like crazy. But even with the MoS, it's hard to clean this problem, because it's so deeply ingrained. Honestly, because the task is Herculean, I don't know how to do it.--Boffob (talk) 00:57, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

The most difficult aspect by far is to convince people of the huge stylistic disadvantages of such redundant flagicon overkill. I'm hoping that a consensus of informed editors here may help persuade users in individual articles to agree to the much needed cleanup. Everyme (was Dorftrottel) (talk) 01:49, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

• The specific flagicon usage instances on that page are also used on thousands of other football (and other team sport) articles. There are specific templates used to help render that format (e.g {{fb}} and {{fb-rt}} to left-align and right-align the images) so that they help readers browsing that page. For example, it is slightly easier to scan a linear list of match reports looking for the results of a specific national team by using the flag images. That usage is entirely consistent with this MOS page. Why exactly is this an RfC now? Is it because this current-event article is being edited by folks who have never looked at any other WP:FOOTY articles before now? I hope we don't go through the same debate when the Olympics are the flavor of the month for August. There is very longstanding consensus for those usage instances. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:24, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

  So would you argue amending the MoS to reflect that consensus? Everyme (was Dorftrottel) (talk) 22:19, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

  What amendments are needed? I don't see anything that contradicts this MoS page as currently written. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 05:51, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

  E.g. Wikipedia:MOSFLAG#Help the reader rather than decorate says:
  

  Flag and other icons are commonly misused as decoration. Adding a country's flag next to its name does not provide additional encyclopedic information, and is often simply distracting (example). Wikipedia generally strongly eschews the use of images for decorative purposes, preferring those that provide additional essential information or needed illustration.
  

  And Wikipedia:MOSFLAG#Using too many flags:
  

  Flag icons are often overused. When added excessively, they clutter the page and become redundant [...].
  

  Also, I don't know why flag icons are necessary or useful as visual aid in the section mentionied. There's the country names, after all. I for one don't look for some flagicon in many cases, e.g. World Cup games where nations participate whose flag I'd first have to memorise. Also, the argument that a bad habit is spread over a wide range of articles has no merit imho, as it doesn't make the bad habit any better. Consider e.g. the ridiculous redundancy and totally gratuitous display of the winner flag e.g. in UEFA Euro 2008#Final. Granted, that's how they did it in all of those articles — but it should be changed for increased 'encyclopedicity'. Everyme (was Dorftrottel) (talk) 11:59, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

  I don't want to sound offensive, but I'm sure there are plenty of users who know the flags and don't need to memorize them. Flagicons provide a useful navigational aid and save plenty of time when looking for clubs, players, national teams etc. BanRay 14:38, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree flags can be useful for players and clubs (when compeating internationaly) ,however for countries they aren't helpful if the country isn't in a huge list such as the euro 08 examples aboveGnevin (talk) 15:41, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not generally opposed to flagicons, but people are overdoing just a little bit. I suppose that is also the reason this guideline mentions the issue and advises against flagicon overuse. I merely want to clarify this for the case I quoted above, which is exemplary for many sports articles. Everyme (was Dorftrottel) (talk) 07:02, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Rather late to this convo, but take a wander through most of the articles on Football clubs and the owners and managers of the team will more than likely will have the flag icon for their country listed next to their name in the team's infobox. I generally don't make appearances on FC articles, but I have Seattle Sounders FC on my watchlist and it got hit by a user trying to add the US flag next to the owner's names. After I removed the flag, the user appeared on the talk page saying it was that way on most FC articles. When I spot checked a few teams, sure enough, little flag icons next to the owners and managers. Heck, beyond that {{Football squad player}}, which is used on almost all FC articles, actually violates this MOS and shows only the flag icon, which results in the ever enjoyable situation where you're presented with a list of players and just a flag icon in which to identify what nationality the player is. As an example, the roster for Toronto FC has players from Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Wales, Honduras, Bermuda, Côte d'Ivoire, and New Zealand and I'm sure I'm not the only one that can't tell what country those represent without mousing over the flag. I even know what some of those flags are, but due to the small size and similarities to the flags of other countries, I couldn't distinguish them prior to the mouse over. --Bobblehead ^(rants) 17:34, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Any comment here would be appreciated. --Eleassar ^{my talk} 13:32, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Flag icons in weapon infoboxes.

I would like to suggest to restore flagicons in weapon infoboxes. They serve a purpose to make the infobox more strait forward. The flag icons allow the reader to simply look at the flag rather than read the name of the country saving time and allowing the reader to concentrate on the rest of the article. Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 10:32, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Our readers are able to read and using flags in this way causes far more problems than it solves. --John (talk) 11:41, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Reading a word takes the same amount of time as looking at a flag. Cop 663 (talk) 12:26, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't agree. Looking at the flag takes much lower amount of time than reading the name. The flag serves as a special character that is recognizable and is related to a specific country. If you're still wondering than tell me what takes less time to read, one word or one letter? Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 13:06, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Proficient readers can read a word in the same time as a character. You might try Simple English Wikipedia, where your idea may well have some merit. --John (talk) 13:13, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Singular flag icons by themselves in any infobox are never useful. Flag icons are most effective as a means to help browse through lists or tables. Therefore, I'd advocate removal of flag icons when attached to a single nation name as the "Place of origin" in the weapon's infobox, but support their use in the list of nations in an "Operators" section of the article. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 15:36, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

While we're on the subject I was trying to restore flag icons in T-34 operators but my edits were reverted as were Koalorka's who also tried to restore them. On every other list of operators the flags are ok but in T-34 article someone keeps on having a problem with it. Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 17:22, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't see that having a flagicon next to the country of origin and the country's that use it does any harm. It dosnt clutter it and as some articles have it and some don't it does make it a bit inconsistent. Ive been though many articles where some have flagicons next to the country names and some don't. There is a need for a consistences in this respect to this. I personally don't see that it does any harm a flag next to the origin and a flag next to the country's that use it. Breaking the country's up with
to form a list otherwise it does start to look messy. Ill accept that we should either add them to all or remove them from all but i think we need a set of rules for this subject. Wonx2150 (talk) 02:04, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

List of pages that need de-flagging

Have you found an article with a large number of unnecessary flags that would take ages to remove? Would you like to do it yourself but are too busy? If so, list it in this section. Maybe someone more zealous than you would enjoy the work. If you are such a zealous person, please remove the article from the list when you've finished. Cop 663 (talk) 22:43, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

• List of islands by area

The best thing to do in my opinion is to add the templates to AWB's find and replace to yeild something like this [6], however their is over 380 of these so would need help building a complete list Gnevin (talk) 23:49, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, I think there is far more usage of the standard {{flag}} template than there is for those "shortcut" templates, mostly because the templates like {{USA}} only exist for the nations that have ISO 3166 country codes. Many of those articles also use flags for individual US states, French regions, etc. so the generic flag template is used for them (e.g. {{flag|California}} or {{flag|Brittany}}. There are over a thousand of those flag templates. Even worse, there are thousands of instances where editors used MediaWiki image syntax directly, instead of using a flag template, so you need additional AWB strings to search for those.... Every few months I go on a run converting flag icons to use the templates, but there are a lot left. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 00:22, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

• Captivity (film) (not a particularly arduous task, but I can't be bothered to edit the article on such a crappy film). :) Cop 663 (talk) 01:53, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
• 2007 in film - Stars & Stripes overload for no real purpose. Cop 663 (talk) 19:42, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
• MapleStory - Take a look at the infobox. What the heck are these: .--Boffob (talk) 17:45, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

These flags can now be tagged with {{Icon-issues}} Gnevin (talk) 22:50, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

flagcruft on sister cities lists

See this edit that is adding the flag of the sister city, in addition to the flag of the country that the sister city belongs to. That means 22 different addicional flag icons added to this article. This same IP is doing the same changes on other articles, like this one.

I'd go and revert all those changes before other editors see them and decide to imitate him, but first I would like confirmation that this is really flagcruft and it's wrong to overload the list with so many useless flags (the city flags don't help at finding entries, since cities are already easy to find using the country flags, and the city flag adds nothing), and that I'm not being overjealous. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:46, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually, there are already editors copying the behaviour [7] --Enric Naval (talk) 02:08, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

This really is flagcruft. Cop 663 (talk) 02:17, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I find it particularly troubling that the state/province flag is only being added for cities in the USA -- strikes me as undue emphasis. To keep things consistent and neutral, the extra flag should be listed for all cities if possible, or for none of them at all; I would favor the latter option, personally, but mainly emphasize the need for consistency. – Luna Santin (talk) 12:02, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I'd dispense with the flags altogether in these lists. Failing that, Luna's point is well made. --John (talk) 12:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I removed all those flags as flagcruft, and I linked to this thread on the edit summary --Enric Naval (talk) 22:35, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Agree, that's blatant flagcruft. I could possibly see an argument for using the country flags, but nothing more. Kaldari (talk) 00:56, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Patriarchy

Check out the table near the bottom of Patriarchy. What do people think about it? I'll also ask on the talk page and ask what all the flags were actually inserted for there. --John (talk) 01:03, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

I did that and referred to this discussion. I was tempted to do what I did here, one of the best examples I've seen in a while of an over-flagged infobox. --John (talk) 01:07, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

I honestly have no clue why the flags are there. And the countries aren't linked. I couldn't guess that PNG meant Papua New Guinea just by looking at the flag. The table also has header "Image" for the flag/country, which doesn't mean anything. And the flag/countries are debatable (modern flags of modern countries for historical tribes). Definitly unnecessary flagcruft to me, and dubious hisoric/geopolicital boundaries.--Boffob (talk) 05:10, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi people, it's nice to see at least someone's taking the time to remove pointless decoration from articles. But I'm here because John kindly pointed me in this direction. I'm the guilty party with regard to the Patriarchy article. However, I think the flags do add something to the list in that context. Speaking for myself only, while I was researching the table, I didn't know who 80% of these tribes were. I was desparately looking for any handles that helped make these peoples real to me, and gave my poor brain a hook to putting them in context.

There is a summary table above the list with the flags, in that table I could keep track of things by identifying a continent. However, in the endless list of detailed quotes from ethnographers, there is no information regarding location of the tribes, other than the flag (or fortuitous reference in the quotes). Without the flags, a reader would have to navigate away from the text to know where in the world the text is refering to.

Regarding Boffob's excellent point regarding possible anachronism with regard to the flags. All societies listed are current except Chatalhoyuk (prehistoric) and Yegali (fabricated). In fact, I researched each society to ensure I knew the current relevant political boundaries. Where ethnic groups are found in more than one jurisdiction, I have supplied all applicable flags. If the whole article is examined closely it will be observed that it is only in recent times that matriarchies have been hypothesised to exist, and the list is a list of many of those alleged matriarchies. When one reads what the academic community considers to be the best sources, though, it is clear that these societies do not show evidence of women dominating social affairs at all.

The historical impression Boffob (imo correctly) picked up is due to the best academic sources going back many years in some cases. This helps eliminate any bias from western influences after contact. However, the point of the table is reliable verification (and falsification). Theories of matriarchy have been falsified by the evidence listed, the evidence can still be reproduced by contemporary anthropologists working in the jurisdictions flagged. In fact, in the case of the Nakhi, one such anthropologist living with these people has confirmed the results while contributing at Wikipedia.

Sorry for the long explanation, feel free to savage it, I won't take it personally, as long as you won't take any counter proposals personally. ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 06:24, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Concur with Boffob. Definitely a misuse. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 12:08, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Applicability of MOSFLAG to shield images in highway articles

During the recent, successful FAC for New York State Route 32, this policy was cited as a reason to remove most of the highway shield images from article's infobox and junction box. We did, and it made FA, and was on the Main Page last week.

Now some of the WP:USRD editors decided that the problem was that we needed standards covering the use of shields, and created them on the project's talk page. I wasn't notified of this discussion, which began a couple of days ago, until after it had concluded.

I am concerned that the standards created, under which an explicit condition of featuring the article was recently reverted, and I was warned not to remove them again or the article might get taken to FARC, do not in any way address the underlying issues, namely whether the shield images, as used in the infobox and junction box in addition to a road's name, are truly useful or just decorative. I also don't feel that the U.S. Roads talk page, where one editor believes MOSFLAG "doesn't 100% apply" to USRD despite the explicit statement that the policy concerns "flag icons and similar images".

Is there any input on this here? Daniel Case (talk) 06:07, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Highway signs.

The problem is that "similar" is in the eye of the beholder. The highway shields do serve a purpose; highway names are not typically expressed in textual form, only in the form of shields. Take a look at the highway signs in the image to the right. Approaching the intersection, the motorist will only see , , and . Not K-26, US 400, or US 166. These symbols are also usually displayed on maps, as well. Flags differ in this respect; while the U.S. flag is immediately associated with the United States, it isn't as commonly used as a drop-in replacement for the name of the country as shields are for the names of roads. So including the shield helps associate unfamiliar readers with how "K-26" is going to actually look whenever they actually encounter it on the road. That serves an informative purpose, doesn't it?

Another thing that I want to bring up is that in highway articles, we don't just randomly drop shields throughout the text. They are typically confined to the infobox and tables of intersections. The WikiProject standard that was recently created (read for yourself at WP:USRD/STDS#Shields) actively discourages including shields in running prose.

I should also hasten to mention that this isn't the first time this has been discussed: see one and two. —Scott5114↗ [EXACT CHANGE ONLY] 07:56, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

You say "highway names are not typically expressed in textual form, only in the form of shields" and "while the U.S. flag is immediately associated with the United States, it isn't as commonly used as a drop-in replacement for the name of the country as shields are for the names of roads". Really? In print? Can you name a publication that uses shields instead of numbers when writing about roads?Cop 663 (talk) 11:24, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Most map publications in the U.S. at a minimum differntiate between Interstate, U.S., State (circle shield), and County (rectangle shield) highways. While we could use the generic circle shield for all state highways, I don't see the point in doing that when something closer to actual signage is available. Also, even if MOSFLAG is deemed to apply to highway shields, differentiating types of highways in junction lists is a navigation aid per the Appropriate uses section of this guideline. --Polaron | Talk 12:16, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Maps are publications, yes, but they are visual, not primarily textual. On any website that gives text directions somewhere, be it Mapquest or directions to your favorite restaurant or amusement park, text will be used instead of shields (Maybe they should, but to me it's Wikipedia's job to reflect existing practice, not reform it). Daniel Case (talk) 15:55, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

The USRD junction lists, however, are not prose. It is a table (which can be long) and the shield images are useful for quickly scanning the table. Note that the vast majority of items in Category:Lists of countries have flags beside the country name. What is the purpose of the flag if the country name is already listed? Should we start removing all flags from these lists since they serve no purpose other making the tables pretty? --Polaron | Talk 17:51, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not saying all advertisements use shields, but here is one that does use them in their directions: [8]. I know I've seen them on billboards, as well as in those books of coupons for roadside businesses (to denote the sections which pertain to each highway). —Scott5114↗ [EXACT CHANGE ONLY] 07:10, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

My take on it, is that shields are not just decoration. Most places in the United states have at least 3 systems of numbered highways in place, some more. Most "non-roadgeeks" are confused and colloquially refer to a highway as "Highway 40" or just "The 40" regardless of weather it is Interstate 40, U.S. Route 40 or New Jersey Route 40.

However, once I add shields.

Most people are still confused, but at least know that that the one on the left is definitely a freeway and the one on the right is probably a two lane road. So I say the shields do add value and are not just for decoration like country flags used for identification. I second Scott's point that virtually all maps uses shields and not text labels. I believe for this very reason.Dave (talk) 20:57, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Most people meaning Americans? Because for most people like myself who aren't the shields mean nothing, and don't offer any context,or navigational assistance.The us symbols probably mean as much to me as File:N4 national IE.png means too youGnevin (talk) 21:48, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

No need to turn this into regional bashing. I was clear in the first sentence, that I was using the situation in the United States as an example. As to your question, I was not familiar with the dark shield, but I was aware of the euro shield. Had I been driving in Ireland with either a map or GPS based navigator to aid me, having shields on the map that resembled shields on the signpost would be a great reassurance that I was on the right road. As to Daniel's point. Mapquest does used shields in the directions see this example of Reno NV to Los Angeles CA complete with interstate and US highway shields in the written directions [9] (for the record, anybody following these directions is taking an unnecessary 200 mile detour, but that's for another discussion) As for print medium, check any newspaper. Any ad for a car dealer, furniture store, etc. will likely have a map, and that map will likely use shields. They are used as a navigational aid. I don't agree with the point as highways are usually discussed with a map, if nothing else for context. Most newspaper articles about a highway would have either accompanying photos or a map.Dave (talk) 22:17, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Didn't mean to turn into a regional issue , was just trying too point out that these are very regional types of signage ,which maybe only know by a small number of people who haven't driven in these countries Gnevin (talk) 23:26, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, let's present a scenario on how this would apply to you, a non-US traveler. Say you're visiting Chicago on vacation and look up some articles about highways that you'll have to use. The article you're looking at says that the highway ends at "US 40". Fair enough. So you go and try and find US 40...only to find that US road signage uses some unfamiliar symbols that don't really help you out much. You have no way of knowing whether you should look for or , or even . Or should you expect ? Hopefully, you will only have one route numbered "40" in the area and thus know that's the 40 you're looking for, but Oklahoma has a and a that are within a mile of intersecting. But if Wikipedia had included a shield, you would have known right off the bat that US 40 = "", since the shield is right next to the name, and can cheerfully carry on about your business. —Scott5114↗ [EXACT CHANGE ONLY] 07:25, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

This guideline was obviously meant to apply to very different topics with very distinct (political) issues involved, compared to road articles and their accompanying context. Even ignoring this, this guideline was created to combat off-topic and politicized use, neither of which are a factor in the road articles. Even disregarding that, the first two sections of "Avoiding flag problems" seem to indicate that the use in the road article is the appropriate use. Taken together, I can hardly fathom how someone would consider the shield icon usage in the road article to be problematic according to this guideline. Vassyana (talk) 05:47, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't know what the best answer to this U.S. road shield discussion is, but I agree it seems helpful to establish that it doesn't seem to fall under this flag use guideline.

Although this topic addresses more than just flags, issues like unnecessary decoration, politics, size and non-identifiability of icons do not seem to apply to shields—shields carry their own identification. The main point of overlap would seem to be restricted to interruption of written text. That seems to be a serious issue without a clear consensus as yet. I could see a good case for a shield in brackets after a textual designation, like specifying asterisks (*) or elipsis (…) and other diacritical marks as per many manuals of style. However, I could also see a good case for avoiding even this in formal writing style. Replacing textual designation with icons seems out of the question, but I don't see anyone proposing that.

Best luck with the discussion, people, I think both sides have a case and it is probably worth being patient and working things through to a new guideline specific to the issue, backed by a consensus that is likely to form faster if people remain as calm and cogent as they are at the moment.

Cheers Alastair Haines (talk) 06:31, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, none of us are advocating including shields in the main running prose of articles. In fact, the road project's own guideline actively discourages including shields in the middle of paragraphs. Shields are typically only used in tables of intersections and in the infobox. —Scott5114↗ [EXACT CHANGE ONLY] 07:10, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

At least this discussion is finally happening. Over a year ago, I tried to get people involved with (in my view really over-)using highway shields in article prose to work with the editors here to gain some kind of consensus, got yelled at for it, and then had one or two of them show up here to make highly unproductive comments and leave. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:10, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

G8

The article about the G8 incorporates a wikitable and flags are posted as a quick graphic device to distinguish amongst the 34 summits which have been held since 1975. This use of the flagicom-template is helpful; but I do not know whether it will be perceived as consistent with the guidelines for flags. If not, why not? If the flags are used in some non-standard or arguable disputable manner in this article, what is the process for avoiding any future problems before they arise? --Tenmei (talk) 23:30, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

The table in question would be considered appropriate because it's a list in which the flags are useful for navigation. The way to avoid future problems is simply to read the guidelines (and discuss the matter here if you don't like them!) Cop 663 (talk) 23:40, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. This seemed like it might be a grey area; and since I had an extra moment, I was thinking it was worth the small investment of time involved in looking for confirmation that this use was probably within the broad ambit of the guidelines.

G8 summits

At present, there are 36 articles about serial G8 summits. The most recent was 34th G8 summit. As new information becomes available about the prospective events, additional material is posted about the 35th G8 summit next year in Italy and about the 36th G8 summit two years from now in Canada.

Flagicon-templates are used in the succession boxes at the bottom of each of these pages. I don't see any specific guideline which would inform me that this use has been considered one way or another. They are literally useful for navigation. If there is a guideline which is conventionally construed in a way that suggests a problem I didn't recognize, this posting may help to avoid a complaint in the future. Do you see a potential problem?

FYI: I think I recall that there is a Wiki-group which focuses on succession boxes; and in that venue, I plan to post a general query like this one. In my view, it seems better to try to grapple with any difficulties in advance, if possible.--Tenmei (talk) 00:47, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Those ones are less useful because they actually obscure information: people have to recognise the flag to understand the meaning, and not everyone will instantly recognize, say, the Italian flag. This is an example of where words are better than flags. See this guideline. Cop 663 (talk) 00:56, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, that presupposes that a flag-only template would be used there and thus cause such confusion. It seems to me rather boneheaded to do misuse a flagicon taht way, so why would we presume succession box creating people would do that? I'm sure it's happened here and there, but I've seen plenty of cases where it hasn't, and both the flag and its country (or whatever) name appear (and yes, just name alone, to which I certainly have no objection). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 12:05, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Flag on project page

Hi everyone. I recognize that the flag on this page is part of one of the userpage templates listed there, but it seems inappropriate for it to be displayed on a project page. Any thoughts? – SJL 01:42, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't see anything inappropriate there. What is your concern? — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 16:45, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

The giant American flag behind the Wikipedia logo. I thought it was nationalist vandalism at first. Aren't decorative flags supposed to be restricted to user pages? – SJL 22:46, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, wow, I didn't even notice that at first. I thought you were referring to the wavy flag of Spain as an icon for the Spanish language. I agree that the US flag does not belong up there. I would ask User:The Transhumanist about why he added that to Wikipedia:User page design center/Menus and subpages/Menu16, as that is his work alone. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 22:54, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I figured you most not have! lol I left a note on his user page. – SJL 15:33, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Use of the Olympic Flag

I have no idea what the general consensus is on the use of the Olympic Flag, , within athlete pages. Fabio Casartelli, for example, won a gold medal, and his list of wins uses this image. Which of the three would be most acceptable for athlete profiles? :

• Olympic Road Race Championship

Flag use

• Olympic Road Race Championship

Rings use

• Olympic Road Race Championship

Gold medal use

• Olympic Road Race Championship

No image

CB (ö) 04:41, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I think "no image" is the best choice for that page. We tend to avoid using the Olympic flag for purely decorative usage on en.wikipedia, and a solitary icon (of any kind) really doesn't add usefulness whatsoever to the bulleted list in that article. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 04:56, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I would also favor "no image" as none of the images really adds anything useful to the article, IMO. Kaldari (talk) 21:31, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the responses. CB (ö) 07:23, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

A further one: I hear what the others are saying, but I think many people would find the Oly. flag usage to be a helpful scan-and-instantly-comprehend aid, while the use of the medal icon is pointless and confusing. I've seen about 5 different kinds of attempts to come up with and implement medal icons (mostly sporting, but Nobel Prize as well) and they just really don't work. I would bet most people's first half-thought when seeing that is "Why is there a coin there?" — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 12:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

'Four provinces flag' for Ireland

Does anyon know if this 'Four Provinces Flag' is a legitimate symbol for the whole island of Ireland, or is it just something made up by Wikipedians? Cop 663 (talk) 01:49, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Off the top of my head, I recall some sport-related usage in real life (saw a photo on a website once), and the FOTW (Flags of the World) website has information about it that pre-dated Wikipedia's existence, so we didn't invent it. It seems to be used in a broader sense on Wikipedia than in real life, however. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 05:11, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The IRFU use something similar it has their logo in the middle of it [10] as do the GAA as so the FAI is memory serves. Basicly it's a wide spread de facto flag to present the Island of ireland Gnevin (talk) 10:43, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your help, Cop 663 (talk) 12:59, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Looking at the "what links here" list, it seems as though most of the usage is rugby related, and that is because the IRFU flag is non-free so the four provinces flag on Commons is the next closest thing. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 16:23, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I first noticed it here: Celtic nations.Cop 663 (talk) 16:53, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Undoubtedly because someone would have found it offensive or inappropriate to use the tricolour to refer to the entire island. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:11, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I've removed all the flags in Celtic nations they are just decoration Gnevin (talk) 22:22, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Where that comes up, I would suggest using the all-Ireland shamrock banner (from rugby, mostly). The provinces one is very hard to distinguish from random specks at icon size. In the few all-Ireland cases that have arisen in snooker, I've used the shamrock one (in tabular data and with names, mind you, not all over the place and not just flags, heh). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:57, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Is the not Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(icons)#Inventing_new_icons and Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(icons)#Do_not_repurpose_icons_beyond_their_legitimate_scope ? Gnevin (talk) 14:31, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

The shamrock thing seems to be used generically. While I think it started in rugby, I've seen it in other cases (off-WP, I mean). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 22:48, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

The only other similar usage I'm aware of is the Irish Cricket team ,do you have any examples off hand? Gnevin (talk) 19:14, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Use of flags in Infobox Company

Is there any received opinion on the (currently pretty widespread) use of flags in the location/headquarters parameter of Infobox Company? Many users (myself included) remove flags from these infoboxes, but since there are others who add them in just as zealously it might be a good idea to establish a consensus view as a reference point. Gr1st (talk) 22:46, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

My view would be that their just decoration and should be removed like the flags for Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Video_games but the flip side is Template_talk:Infobox_Television/Archive_2#Flag_usage where removed but you'd really need too discuss it at the template talk Gnevin (talk) 07:30, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

They should not be used in company infoboxes. Template:Infobox Company shows every country name in a wikilink and nothing using flagicons. They are sometimes used merely as decoration when there is a wikilink to the country, but quite a few do not even have the wikilink to the country. I made quite a few edits removing them today with links to WP:MOSFLAG#Help the reader rather than decorate for those first cases and the general WP:MOSFLAG for the later ones because they do not exactly fit the decoration because they are not being placed next to the name of the country. But then I had them quickly reverted by someone who did not understand what I meant. (Even had a biographical flag reverted when it was linked to WP:MOSFLAG#Not for use in locations of birth and death.) Aspects (talk) 14:02, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Copied from this talk page ...

Third Party Comment - I have also been looking into this action with concern, since it at least initially appeared to be disruptive, perhaps to a wp:point (not accusing ... just wondering). I found some points that may have triggered the opinion that flag icons should be removed from infoboxes. Some excerpts...

• If the use of flags in a list, table or infobox makes it unclear, ambiguous or controversial, it is better to remove the flags even if that makes the list, table or infobox inconsistent with others of the same type where no problems have arisen. see - MOS:Flag - Not in prose
• Flags are visually striking, and placing a national flag next to something can make its nationality or location seem to be of greater significance than other things. Emphasizing the importance of ... nationality above ... other qualities risks violating WP:NPOV. see MOS:Flag - Good reason
• When a flag icon is used for the first time in a list or table, it needs to appear adjacent to its respective country (or province, etc.) name, as not all readers are familiar with all flags. Use of flag templates without country names is also an accessibility issue, as it can render information difficult for color blind readers to understand. In addition, flags can be hard to distinguish when reduced to icon size. see MOS:FLAG - Include country names.

Note that the last point does not justify outright removal of a flag icon from an infobox. In any case, would like to see justification and reasoning for bulk removals. Thanks! --T-dot ( ^Talk/contribs ) 14:07, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Addendum - I would also counsel that having a short discussion with one or two other editors at the Talk page is not necessarily sufficient justification for a unilateral action to eliminate all flag icons in corporate or other infoboxes, since they are not specifically banned (yet) on the Project page. You need to think about getting buy-in from the community, and changing the MOS itself, so you have a policy or guideline (as it were) to point to, rather than just a short discussion amongst editors. Thanks again! --T-dot ( ^Talk/contribs ) 14:18, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Addendum to the addendum - Please understand that I do not really care if we have national flags in Company Infoboxes. But saying that Company Infobox templates do not affirm the use of flag icons does not justify their sudden removal either. That said, many major coporations are global, and may have a main administrative headuarters in one place, additional bureaucratic regional headquarters elsewhere, and major manufacturing operations still elsewhere - which flag is chosen could also start nationalistic arguments. In any case, I do care about following the rules of engagement on consensus and avoiding wiki-disruptions. If the community consensus is that flag icons should NOT be used in Company Infoboxes, then this MOS needs to clearly state that flag icons should "never" be used in company infoboxes, and the company infobox template needs to also state "avoid using flag icons". Once it is stated so, and clearly established with community consensus, and then the flags may be removed without significant dispute. Thanks! --T-dot ( ^Talk/contribs ) 14:42, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't think the Manual of Style should say "never," but it should probably discourage the use of flag icons. As for everything else, don't forget wp:bold. I don't think anybody's edits here were a disruption. In fact, Aspects and Urbanrenewal have spurred more involvement in this discussion, and I think that's a good thing.   user:j    (aka justen)   15:00, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I would not object to the removal of flag icons from company infoboxes, once the issue is further discussed here and once the Manual of Style is modified to discourage their use in such situations. They do seem to me to be more decorative than anything. Every company has its headquarters in one particular country, of course, but many if not most large companies today are really international, if not multinational entities... Take a company like Aflac, for example. It's headquartered south of Atlanta, Georgia, but two-thirds of its revenue comes from its business in Japan. Nearly half of Apple's revenue comes from outside the United States. These aren't exceptions. They're mostly the rule. Listing the headquarters, with a city and state (and country) is obvious. Tacking on a flag is decorative, even if well meaning: the country is already listed, and the flag provides no additional context in almost any case.   user:j    (aka justen)   14:38, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment / Disagree: I don't spend much of my time on Manual of Style issues and at first glance this does not seem to be the most critical issue of all time but I do spend a fair amount of my time on comapnies and infoboxes and this seems to be a major change in the approach taken to infoboxes. Infoboxes are supposed to provide a quick snapshot of the company, person, etc. Nationality / headquarters are important items and the purpose of including flags in those places is to provide the reader with an instant visual identification, same as with a logo or picture. If the flag in an infobox is purely for decoration, then I cannot imagine a place where it is more justified including the "appropriate uses". I came across this whole movement when some of the companies and infoboxes I have worked on were edited. I only add infoboxes for informational purposes and this is just one element of it. I would agree that excessive flag usage is probably something that needs to be curtailed in infoboxes (i.e. I don't need to know a company is headquartered in the UK, serves the UK market, was founded by Britons, etc. but a single flag next to the company's headquarters seems perfectly appropriate to me at least.

I think the proponents of removal would (and this is only my opinion) (i) be in a minority of wikipedians overall who are probably not even aware of this discussion and (ii) be wasting a lot of their own time that could be better used in other areas of the project. Most importantly they have not discussed any of this with the people who spend their time on companies and on infoboxes. If those people are brought into the discussion, I would think that they would have a less doctrinaire approach. I would encourage those editors that have gone and made some of these changes already to be more cautious before they start dramatically changing infoboxes everywhere as you have not yet gotten the buy in of enough people to make such wholesale changes.|► ϋrbanяenewaℓ • TALK ◄| 15:38, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Not using flags infoboxes is standard, excluding a relatively brief period a while back where all and sundry flags were inserted on Wikipedia. This guideline has been around for quite a while, and flags are removed by many people, without objection across all fields in the encyclopedia. I think these issues are covered in this very styleguide, but: 1. Of course, the country name is already stated. 2. The flags of only a handful of countries are obvious; mostly they do not provide a quick snapshot of a company. 3. In most cases the country is actually rather irrelevant to the company, let alone a patriotic decoration. 4. Flags are useful, for example, in situations where there is insufficient space to list the text name of the country, but in general they are not justified for an encyclopedia. —Centrx→talk • 15:56, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. Quoting myself from a previous discussion on this: I can't imagine that there is a class of Wikipedia reader who will be genuinely assisted in finding out the nationality by seeing, for example, " Paris, France" instead of simply "Paris, France": the country name is right there in, er, blue and white. Flags can be perfectly useful in situations where there is a great deal of repetition, where a country is explicitly being represented, etc. Here it just looks like shoving in a flag because we can. (As a footnote, it's probably worth mentioning that a consensus decision was taken to remove the flags from the BAE Systems infobox during its successful featured article candidacy). Gr1st (talk) 17:00, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I would certainly go along with such a consensus, and it seems to establish a precedent. As I tried to establish elsewhere, I am generally neutral on the issue of including Flag Icons in company or other infoboxes. I think they might have originally been intended for tables and lists, where many such flags and different ones might be used, but that is uncertain. In any case, I would suggest (or maybe insist) we reach some form of consensus before deleting the flag icons in-bulk, thus changing an arguably long-held status quo, which is (or was) to include them. In the process, we should make it formal MOS "policy" or rather "guideline" as it were to generally exclude them in this kind of usage. That way we would have something "solid" to point to, if and when the fit hits the shan (as it did earlier today), other than a short discussion that originally included only three editors, and comprised three paragraphs on a talk page that hardly anyone else even noticed, until the stuff started getting slung around and the protests and reversions arose. Thanks! --T-dot ( ^Talk/contribs ) 20:22, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

There's no such thing as "MOS policy", and the fact that this discussion is now contemplating making simple stylist best-practices that have a little bit of buy-in (finally) into a "policy" with which to force people into doing one thing or another is a strong indication that this discussion has gone off the rails into left field, if I may mix train and baseball metaphors. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:40, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

WP:FLAG and lists of bands

I can't believe that I forgot to mention this here, but I started a discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) to clarify whether or not flag icons should be allowed in lists of bands. Please discuss here: Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#WP:FLAG and lists of bands. Thanks! Wyatt Riot (talk) 02:14, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I think you might be missing the point. It's not "does WP:FLAG forbid flags in "X" article type", it is "does the guidance in WP:FLAG suggest that flags will be legitimately useful in this particular implementation?" — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:15, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't see much of a difference, quite honestly. Yes, WP:FLAG covers situations where the icons can or should be used, but it follows that their use outside those situations is inappropriate. At least that's how I see it.

I was simply trying to gather opinions and see if there was anything approaching a consensus. If there were enough reasons against allowing them in lists of bands (and I think we reached that point in in the (now archived) Village Pump discussion), I was planning on proposing to tighten up the language in WP:FLAG itself. Wyatt Riot (talk) 18:41, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Per a number of past discussions, I move to clarify how flag icons should be used in lists, especially lists of bands or in other artistic contexts. Something like, "Flags should never be used in lists or tables to indicate the nationality or origin of an artistic group (such as a band or art movement) unless they act on behalf of or are officially recognized by that nation. When flags are used in a table or list, it should clearly indicate that the flags represent their official status, not legal nationality or place of origin. They should always be accompanied by their country names at least once." I personally think that this is already what the guidelines point to, but the additional text would make it crystal clear. Ideas? Wyatt Riot (talk) 18:51, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Too redundant. All that would be needed to make this point is the first sentence, or a whittled-down combination of the first two. That said, I don't believe the underlying idea has consensus yet (I don't mean just here, I mean WP-wide). For better or worse, flag icons are tremendously popular (sometimes implemented stupidly, sometimes in ways that many have argued and continue to argue are useful), and if this guideline goes too far in deprecating them without a lot more community input, it'll simply get de-guidelined or end up in revert-war hell. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:58, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

I too was wondering about this - and I still have no direct answer as it relates to music - or to be more specific - a bands origin. Someone removed a flag after a bands origin/country citing this article. In looking it over I do not see anything direct that sates a bands country or origin can not be listed via a flag icon. Maybe I am missing something.Soundvisions1 (talk) 03:18, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, one principle I think the guideline has made clear, even when it was an early draft, is that local consensus about a particular article or class of article is probably more important that some overarching (limited) permissiveness. If for some reason a number of editors want to remove a flag from an article (and aren't some POV-pushing camp), it is probably better to go their direction, at least until the overall flag-related dust settles more, all over WP. That is, in most cases it's probably better to have a more visually dull article that a vibrant one that is directly pissing people off. :-) This, however, is distinct from people who just really don't like flag icons and go around removing them every time they see them in a context that WP:FLAG doesn't give a very specific thumbs-up for. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:35, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

That still doesn't answer the core question about bands/artists/groups though. I can see, for example, if you had a list called "Swedish pop bands" that it would be redundant to also have the flag icon after each groups name. However if you had a list that was something like "Eurovision" and a list of performers for that year to me it would make sense to have a flag icon to show what country they represented. (Although, like the Olympics it does not mean they were actually from that same country) But consider this - wicki is part of the World Wide Web, so just because someone might get the band REM is from Athens, meaning Athens, Georgia in the United States, does not mean that someone else would. If the group is from "Georgia" - do we mean the state in the United States or the state in the former Soviet Union that Russia is currently invading? An example might be a list of alternative bands that contains bands from all over the world, and you list REM as being from Athens or Georgia (or Athens, Georgia for that matter) to me you could also just easy put the flag icon for the United States to show country of origin. So what would be easier on the eyes might be the issue -

• REM - Athens, Georgia, United States

or

• REM

Soundvisions1 (talk) 20:38, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the guidelines state that text and icon should always be used together. Wyatt Riot (talk) 08:44, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

And My_Bloody_Valentine would use which flag? Irish? British? American? Gnevin (talk) 19:49, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Depends on where the band formed - not where individual members of the band are from. According to their Wicki listing it lists origin as "Dublin, Ireland". Soundvisions1 (talk) 00:58, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

So if a bunch of American's form a band while in college in Ireland they would have the Irish flag? Gnevin (talk) 01:05, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Well "Country of origin" means just that - I am not sure where you are heading with this. This part of the discussion is about flag use for bands in lists. So if a band was formed, and got their start in, a certain country that would be, for the sake of a list, the bands country of origin.Soundvisions1 (talk) 06:57, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

But does it always mean "country of origin"? On a number of Talk pages (Talk:List of black metal bands, for one), you'll find a variety of explanations of what the flags are supposed to mean, ranging from "country of origin" to "the national subgenre that the band sounds like". Is the average user supposed to intuitively understand the flags' purpose, especially when the editors can't even agree? I think that's one of the best reasons to remove them, or, at the very least, make it abundantly clear what they're supposed to represent on each and every page that they're used. Wyatt Riot (talk) 08:44, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

As an interesting aside - One mainly always hears about the band Heart as being from Seattle, Washington but last night I was watching a special on the band and Ann was talking about the band and how they formed. She said her boyfriend at the time had fled the United States because of the Vietnam Conflict and was "hiding out" in Vancouver, BC (Canada). Ann went on to state that she moved to Canada and that is where the band formed. That would make their country of origin Canada. I look at the Wicki page for the band and it does say both but when you read the article it gets confusing because there is much talk about "pre" Heart and where various members played in their pre-fame bands. Clearly though if you compare the bands line up then to the bands line up now you will find Ann and Nancy are the only "original" members and Ann clearly stated the band Heart formed in Canada, not Seattle. So we go back up to what Gnevin asked and maybe a better answer would be that I think in the history of music it would be important to to have a "country of origin" rather than "country of nationality of each of the members" as far as bands go. While that is another topic it does touch on some of what is being mentioned here and that is nationality of a bands members, when/where a majority of a band formed (pre-fame days) and "sub genre that the band sounds like". I agree that as far as bands go the use of the flag should be clearly defined, which it really is not. I also think that if a band went through various line ups and name changed than the "County of origin" should reflect the line up and name that "made them famous" as it were. So as I said before, if a "bunch of American's form a band while in college in Ireland" than then IMO their country of origin should be Ireland. However if this "bunch of American's" had another name, moved to another country, got new members, changed their name and became "famous" than I think their country of origin should reflect that. (Remember I am only talking about this subtopic which, again, is about lists of bands and how the flag icon should be used.) Soundvisions1 (talk) 13:23, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

"Use of flags for sportspeople" section

I doubt that this has actually consensus outside the editors of this page (if it even has it here). The issue is more complex than WP:FLAG currently addresses. WP:FLAG appears to be thinking in terms of footballers and others who play for teams in other countries, while in the world of sports more generally this is a rather uncommon thing. I don't have any particular replacement wording to suggest, I just know that, for example, the editors in WP:SNOOKER would scoff at this. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:29, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

There was a massive discussion about this above , if something wasn't covered then suggest a change as I'm not going through a other month of teeth pulling too try and please people who only criticize but don't suggest changes Gnevin (talk) 15:38, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Right. It was a massive discussion between football fans and people who don't like flag icons at all. I suggest the section be renamed to "Use of flags for footballers" since very little in it logically applies to any other kind of sportsperson, most of whom do not "jump country". And it doesn't even cover football (soccer) very thoroughly; unless I misread it, there's nothing about team articles, only bios.

Please don't take this personally. I'm not criticizing you personally, nor asking you personally to "go through another month of teeth pulling"; you needn't be involved in the discussion at all if you don't want. I'm flagging a problem for discussion and resolution, which is what talk pages are for. Just because I have not proposed a block of text to copy-paste over the extant material does not mean I have no ideas with regard to where this should go; I sometimes find it better to raise an issue and let others comment on it first with their own ideas. There is no particular urgency here, no need to have draft replacement language right from the start. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 00:29, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd left several weeks for people to defend the extant wording, and it hasn't happened, so I've made some edits to the section (discussed in more detail at the tail end of the proposal/debate section way up above.) I think it still needs additional material to cover more than bios, such as team articles, tournament results lists, etc. The short version of the changes: #1 did not reflect consensus (deleted). #2 (now #1) needed US as well as UK English. #3 (now #2) was WP:CREEPy and needed moderation. #4 (now #3) needed several clarifications, lest it be taken far too literally (as seems to be the case already, above, with the US/UK basketballer). Also removed the numbering, as inconsistent with the rest of the document. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:31, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Needs section on similar images

Resolved

 – Addressed in very next topic.

See Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Use of nobel icons, debates in various places about the use of Olympic medal icons, and above about various things like heraldic symbols. The advice in this guideline needs to be generalized more broadly - "==Similar icons== While this guideline focuses on flags, the advice in it generally pertains to all such icons, such as of medals and awards, heraldic symbols, highway signage, and the like..." Actually I wrote such a section, maybe as long as a year ago. Who deleted it, and why? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 00:19, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Move page to include similar material

I plan to move Wikipedia:Manual of Style (flags) to Wikipedia:Manual of Style (icons) to include the kind of material being discussed at the main talk page regarding the use of nobel icons and other awards. Any thoughts on this proposed move? « Diligent Terrier [talk] 18:26, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

How about Wikipedia:Manual of Style (flags and icons)? Kaldari (talk) 18:29, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

These small flags are icons so that would be redundant. « Diligent Terrier [talk] 18:31, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

I like the idea. There currently isn't a strong enough discouragement for the use of logos as icons. Also, the bulk of this guideline is really about icon sized flags, as with larger (i.e. thumbnail) sizes, the caption and adjacent prose text is of great help. What we're really trying to say on this page (in my opinion), is that the use of tiny captionless images must be limited to instances where it is actually helpful. It just so happens that flags are the vast majority of "tiny captionless images" we use on Wikipedia, and so this page started as a guideline about flags. But really, I think it should be all about icons, of any type. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 19:04, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

There are 2 reasons I think we should keep flags in the title: 1) Like you said, flags are by far the most common type of "icon" on Wikipedia, so it's good for people who are specifically interested in flag issues to be able to find these guidelines easily (without making the logical jump that flags are icons). 2) A large percentage (currently the majority) of the guidelines here are specifically about flags, although I agree that many of them could be rewritten to be more generic. Kaldari (talk) 20:06, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

BTW, in the current guidelines list, this page is listed as "Flags & similar icons". Would Wikipedia:Manual of Style (flags and similar icons) be better? Kaldari (talk) 20:08, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict)The problem here is that there is now no completely relevant place to add the new guideline that prize icons aren't appropriate. WP:FLAG could still redirect to the new page and I could work on re-writing the current text. « Diligent Terrier [talk] 20:12, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

After further thought, I think I would be fine with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (icons) so long as there is a section just for flags which has its own shortcut. Kaldari (talk) 20:10, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm about to move the page, as discussed here and at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style. « Diligent Terrier [talk] 21:33, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

 Done « Diligent Terrier [talk] 21:39, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Works for me, but I have to say I think this was waaaaay too bold; this is a Wikipedia guideline, and a page move and a repurposing of the guideline should have at least a few weeks of discussion. I like the change myself, so I won't revert it, but I would not be surprised if someone else did. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 00:33, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

That someone would be me , as I've said this makes the page a Jack of all trades, master of none. Other icons should be spun off to a separate discussion and eventually mos if a con is achieved Gnevin (talk) 07:22, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

WP:BRD is way I was thinking of. This post just wasn't getting enough attention. Anyway, I need to know ... where should the information on the awards be added do you think? If we moved this page, it would include that. « Diligent Terrier [talk] 21:48, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest starting with an WP:Essay at WP:Logos,icons and other small images,which would basicly be a copy of this page but would diverge from their Gnevin (talk) 07:21, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I support changing the scope of this document. A great deal of the advice in it can be genericized to all of these pretty but often (not always) pointless little icons, and the flag-specific stuff put into a (major!) sub-section. The problem with having this material live in two places is that it will inevitably diverge and conflict, probably on even basic points. It will also provide an avenue for forum-shopping/asking the other parent - if cranky editor does not get his way at one, he'll try to push it on the other, and it would take extra vigilance to thwart it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:40, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I dont see how it will lead to forum-shopping as it can be made clear that for flag issues come here for other small images see WP:Small images. The flag issue is too big to combine and cover correctly.

How so? I've already said how to do it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:57, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to consider being bold again on this and move the page. I've waited several days and no one has provided a good reason to keep the current title. The information will fit in the new title, and there is no other place to put the new information. « Diligent Terrier [talk] 20:32, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

WP:Be bold doesn't work that way, the dilution of the purpose of this MOS is a good reason to keep it here , can you provide a mock up of how this new page would work ? Gnevin (talk) 21:07, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

OK since i'm on my own here , go a head a move the page Gnevin (talk) 20:56, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, I did comment that I thought the move was too abrupt. I don't think it would hurt to wait a week or so longer, or even do an RfC on the matter. That said, the version after the initial move (the one that was reverted), I would think, constitutes the kind of mock-up you are asking for (i.e., it's already in the page history). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:54, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Quite a bit of time has passed. Will someone consider moving the page? « Diligent Terrier [talk] 15:27, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Gnevin! ([11]) I'll have to work on updating the page. « Diligent Terrier [talk] 19:27, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Overhauling to include all icons

The edits, post-move, to genericize this to icons generally, not just flags, looks very good so far, from a structural standpoint. I do wish, however, that edit preview would be used more before saving, as the number of typographical, grammatical and other errors was quite high, and the small bits of new material added were not worded very clearly. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 23:13, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Moving on, I think we should specifically address road signage and medals/awards first, as the two most common non-flag issues brought here. And addressed with sensitivity to various viewpoints on the topic, including previous mediation, XfDs, etc. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 23:13, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Dealing with the road signs first. Once again I'm going to come down on the negative side of the issue in that I find all these icons cluttering. Here are my thoughts on the issue.

• I'd suggest removing these icons from infoboxes
  • If and (most likely) when this is reject. We need to highlight the extremely regional nature of these icons. American/French or what ever road signage is not going to be very well known nationally or internatioanlly
  • We need to agree a level of icon we use for example what is 20px or in I-91_(CT)
• We should make a strong push to the use of sortable table as good alternative to the it helps me skim type of arguments for all icons. CAC 40 which has been force by copyright issues not to have any icons and works very well for me.

As a side issue any thought on sister cities such as New_Haven,_Connecticut#Sister_cities? Gnevin (talk) 18:53, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Nuvola flags

I've seen flags such as from the Commons:Project Nuvola 2.0+ pop up in some places. Should the MOS say anything about them? With their "prettiness", editors will be tempted to use them when making colourful tables of sports results et cetera (sort of violating the MOS, though it seems to be tolerated with the regular flags). I fear that things may end up looking ugly and inconsistent, templates will not be useful and there won't be the historic flags necessary to replace the current set of flags for quite some time, if ever. /Coffeeshivers (talk) 20:53, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

For me their is no reason or way these should be used on wiki and i would suggest the MOS be updated to very strongly highlight this point Gnevin (talk) 20:55, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Just look at 2008_STCC_Season

I would like too proposed we add a Nuvola flags sub sections stating that

Nuvola flags

Nuvola or non standard stylized flags should never be used in the article main space. See Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(flags)#Help_the_reader_rather_than_decorate Gnevin (talk) 21:04, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with suggestion to disallow these flags for reasons of (among others) confusion, difficulty of recognition for small icons for flags with complex images like Saudi Arabia. One remarks though, perhaps this should be part of WP:FLAG. Arnoutf (talk) 18:56, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Well it's the first i've seen of them , the above is my suggestion to be added to MOS:Flag if we get con Gnevin (talk) 20:03, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Not necessary. The guideline already says to use the standard flag icons, and guidelines should not try to pre-emptively forbid things that are not self-evidently problematic already. See WP:CREEP and especially WP:BEANS. One problem with a proposal like this is that it will have to grow and grow and grow over time, forbidding more and more icon sets as people add them to Commons. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:51, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Well perhaps Standard flag should be used in place of Nuvola or non standard stylized flags where flag usage is a must? Gnevin (talk) 10:30, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Like I say, it is a WP:BEANS/WP:CREEP/WP:BROKE thing: If there's no evidence that use of the Nuvola flags is widespread, then we needn't address it, since the guideline already says to use the standardized flagicons. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:27, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

A standard for proper use of flag icons?

There seems to be a lot of debate here about the use of flag icons, so i though id add to it. Ive recently been adding flag icons to all the German armor of WWII. Only have to have them all undone later on and it made me think which is the correct way of setting out the info box?

We need a set of guide lines on which way of using flags is best. What do people think either example 1, 2 or something in between?

example 1

or

example 2

I personally lean towards example 1 as been the better approach. I feel it looks better and makes the article more complete, although obviously some people don't agree. There seems to be a lot of variation in this though, with some articles having the flags and others not. And also then you find different wars or weapons have flags and another war none. e.g. Germany not having flag icons for any of its units where France has them for all theirs. I feel in the interest of making the Wikipedia better we need to agree on how to set them out and make it a standard. So there isn't such huge variations.

Let me know your Thoughts. Wonx2150 (talk) 12:56, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Passing through here from the Video Games Project, where we dumped the usage of flags from the infobox some time ago, I have to say I prefer the second. To my eyes the flags represent splodges of colour that prevent me from getting at the main facts. Why should I bother trying to remember which flag is which when I can just read the text in seconds. - X201 (talk) 15:17, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Am sorry but that is the laziest argument i have seen ... "i cant be assed to remember what a countrys flag looks like so why should i be punished!".

The wiki is suppose to be for the layman and something which stands out and can be identified quickly such as a small graphic of a countries flag can only help.

I would not wish to see these flags removed from any of the articles regarding military battles/operations throughout the WW2 (my main area of contribution in the wiki) and i cant see how they would be of harm in articles regarding military hardware - it also lends some colour to otherwise primarly white, black and blue screen.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:33, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for totally re-quoting me and missing the point of my argument. - X201 (talk) 14:58, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Much of this guideline is written with respect to the context of flag icon usage (e.g. don't use them for birth & death locations), but in my opinion, the biggest reason for—and against—flag icon usage is the human interface. For example, I have always maintained that a solitary flag icon used to mark a country name in an infobox, such as the location of a company's head office, origin of a musical group, or manufacturer of military hardware, is just a gratuitous decoration and doesn't offer much value. However, any list (or table column) of countries is often more easily navigated with the flag icons. That certainly holds true in lists that have no other markers between items, such as an infobox list that does not use bullet characters but separates each item with <br/>. Going back to the Panzer I example, if the icon was only attached to the "Place of origin" field, I would say delete it. But I think it is useful to have them on the "Used by" list, so I would keep them for that article. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 16:47, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Talking to people about it a lot of them agree that the flags make it look better, and they feel it helps them to read the article more easy. Its also handy to distinguish the country's. Wonx2150 (talk) 04:14, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Right. Ever since the flag icons were introduced, tables of international sports data have become vastly more navigable to visually-oriented readers. If you know what the flags are, of course. Some people have a good memory for flags, others don't. Oh well. For sports with limited international competition, like snooker, this is much less problematic than for the Olymics, for example, but I've yet to see a compelling argument against them in general, only against their misuse/abuse (e.g. to imply incorrect citizenships/nationalities, etc., mistakenly or as a POV-pushing exercise). The common cry (here, not WP-wide from what I can tell; this guideline attracts flag detractors naturally, since it is the guideline for limiting flag use) is "they're just decoration!" But, well, who cares? Even if that were actually true, which for many of us it emphatically isn't, a common complaint about Wikipedia is that it is visually very, very dull, and is, as a work, consequently rather boring. I don't personally feel that way about it, because I'm a reader and a writer, avidly, but I cannot pretend that this attitude does not exist. WP:BROKE. The flags hurt nothing as long as they are not abuse or misused, and enough people outspokenly like them that I find myself having to come back here again and again to try to rein in some of the more extreme anti-flag edits (solutions in search of an actual problem) to this guideline or argue against them here on the talk page (the perennial putsch to ban them from infoboxes, which is probably their most common use, being chief among those over-the-top efforts - it's a position that doesn't even have consensus here, and has nowhere near consensus in WP at large). I am overall still happy with what WP:FLAG say, with a few nitpicks I may get back into at some point, but it seems to take a lot more vigilance than should be necessary to keep this guideline in balance. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:24, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

PS: To quote a case in point from above: "I've removed all the flags in Celtic nations they are just decoration". [sic] They are absolutely not just decoration, but are richly political, cultural, even spiritual symbols. It seems to me that only someone either completely unfamiliar with or just wholly unsympathetic to the history and socio-politics/culture of far-Western Europe could say such a thing. One can make a very strong argument that there are neutrality problems with such a usage of flags here, yes, but the argument that the flags are akin to curlicues in the corners or a textured background image is just way off the mark. I don't have any problem with editors advancing a position against the use of flag icons in this situation or that, or across-the-board, but such a position needs to be grounded, and not draw upon specious arguments like that. My theory is that whoever put those flags there is either a staunch supporter of Celtic nationalist movements or was completely unaware that some of those flags have ties to them. So, I don't disagree with their removal; it should simply be for the right reasons, or they'll just come back. "Decoration" is not a particularly actionable deletion rationale. Blatant WP:NPOV violation certainly is. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:53, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I think your unfairly adding a spin too my comments. My comment related to wiki and that particular article and was not a comment on the flags themselves Gnevin (talk) 17:27, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I must have misinterpreted you. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:22, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

I prefer example 2, personally. It looks cleaner and more like an encyclopedia article, less like a Pokemon trading card. I don't see what the flags really add other than decoration. Kaldari (talk) 17:48, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I concur. Example 2 looks much more professional and less cluttered, and the infobox is more easily readable without the flags. The flags only distract and serve nothing but decoration. --Eleassar ^{my talk} 09:45, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Concur, weakly. The flags in this case don't seem to add anything useful for most readers, but I don't think they do any harm. I don't find version 2 "more easily readable" at all; I don't read flags, I read words, and since the words were not removed and the flags are not interspersed between or inside the words making the act of reading more difficult, there is no readability change at all. The highly visual users of this encyclopedia might find the iconized version more appealing, but I don't think they'll find that version more actually useful, so there's no compelling argument to keep the icons. A big table of Olympics swimming results would be a different case, since the icons would aid in visual scanning for particular countries' results. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 23:18, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

I have one argument, and Andrwsc kind of mentioned it above: You can't use bullets in an infobox like that. The flag icons make the list more scannable in the same way that bullet points would. Orange Tuesday (talk) 01:12, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Not really with in the scope of this MOS but is Nazi Germany a place? Surely the geographic place of origin is Germany Gnevin (talk) 19:20, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Template:Slovenian elections

Hi, I'd like to ask for comments regarding the usage of flagicons in the {{Slovenian elections}} and similar templates. My opinion is these flags are purely decorational and do not help with navigation, while another user claims they are useful (see also my talk page). --Eleassar ^{my talk} 10:38, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

See also this past discussion from the archives. пﮟოьεԻ 57 12:30, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

See also:

• Template talk:National elections#Flags
• template {{U.S. presidential elections}} and its history. --Eleassar ^{my talk} 12:44, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

• I agree that they are decorational and not helpful in navigation. I believe they should be excluded from templates except when the template is about flags themselves.—Markles 13:02, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
• I disagree; they help establish context and help the reader associate the correct country. —Nightstallion 14:08, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
• My position has always been that singular flag icons (at 22 pixels wide) are not helpful as a navigational aid, whether that is when they are found in individual fields in an infobox or (in this case) as a decoration in the title bar of a navbox. Flag icons are most effective when aligned vertically in a list or table. If a flag is truly needed in this case (which I doubt, since every article on which this navbox is found starts with the word "Slovenian" in the title), then a better approach is using the image or imageleft parameters of {{navbox}}, as described on that template's documentation page. Those examples are clearly superior than using a 22 pixel icon in the title bar. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 14:20, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

That's exactly my opinion too. I mean, a list of countries in an infobox can be made more navigable when flagicons are used instead of bullets, which are often impossible to insert there. However, why would there be any need to use the flagicons to help establish context and help the reader associate the correct country when a) the majority of readers don't have the slightest idea of how does the flag of Slovenia (Cyprus, Nicaragua etc.) look like; b) the name of the country is written in the title of the navigation template; c) every article on which these navboxes are found starts with the word of the country in the title or at least in the lead section? I invite Nightstallion to further explain his viewpoint. --Eleassar ^{my talk} 15:01, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

The other thing to note is that almost all of the pages linked from this navbox have an infobox at the top with the Slovenian flag and/or a sidebar navbox with the Slovenian coat-of-arms, both of which are decently sized images. How does the addition of an icon in the navbox at the bottom of the page do anything that hasn't already been done on those pages for "establish[ing] context and help[ing] the reader associate the correct country"? — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:47, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm starting to believe User:Number 57 has a case of WP:Own towards these templates Gnevin (talk) 23:46, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Question regarding Country flags for sportspeople in pages not closely tied with nationality

MOS:FLAGS says "Flag icons may be appropriate as a visual navigational aid in tables, infoboxes or lists provided that citizenship, nationality or jurisdiction is intimately tied to the topic at hand". They are currently in use at NBA All-Rookie Team, a listing of NBA players selected each year for a placement on the NBA All-Rookie Team. Are flags appropriate on this page? It is currently nominated at WP:Featured list candidates, the nominators say that "Because of the numbers of foreign players, the nationality column and the flags can provided additional info to the readers."

Can somebody who patrols this guideline please comment at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/NBA All-Rookie Team, the page's listing at FLC, for clarification. Thank you, Matthewedwards (talk • contribs • email) 06:17, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Page header

What do you think of User:Gnevin/sandbox1 Gnevin (talk) 07:24, 7 October 2008 (UTC)?

It's not bad, but I don't think "too many" is the right way to say it (as it's not necessarily the number of icons, but how they are used). "Inappropriate use of icons" or something along those lines might be a better expression.--Boffob (talk) 12:21, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Better? Gnevin (talk) 22:45, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I think so.--Boffob (talk) 22:50, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I suggest naming the template {{icon-issues}}. Any other comments? Gnevin (talk) 22:54, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't like the link from "flags" as a redirect to this page (which has "icons" in the title), and I'm not sure of the usefulness of the link to Wikipedia:Icons. Perhaps something like: This article contains inappropriate icon or flag usage. (Also note the addition of the period at the end of the sentence.) As for the name, it should be somewhat consistent with the names used in Wikipedia:Template messages/Cleanup; maybe {{cleanup-icons}}...? — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 23:06, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Made those changes ,also I like the name . Keep the suggestions coming Gnevin (talk) 23:11, 7 October 2008 (UTC)