:::::::: I'd like to see where that "percentage of unique names" math is documented, as well — I didn't thoroughly review the ''entire'' list of Canadian cities, admittedly, but at least among Canada's 30 largest just ''six'' (20 per cent) of them can actually claim ''uniqueness'' for their name. Those six being [[Winnipeg]], [[Quebec City]], [[Gatineau]], [[Longueuil]], [[Saskatoon]] and [[Greater Sudbury]]. And even two of those six only get it on a technicality — Quebec City is an extremely common but technically ''unofficial'' name for a city whose ''official'' name is (obviously) not unique, and Greater Sudbury is an officialism that's actually ''less'' common in the real world than the unofficial and non-unique "Sudbury".
:::::::: I'd like to see where that "percentage of unique names" math is documented, as well — I didn't thoroughly review the ''entire'' list of Canadian cities, admittedly, but at least among Canada's 30 largest just ''six'' (20 per cent) of them can actually claim ''uniqueness'' for their name. Those six being [[Winnipeg]], [[Quebec City]], [[Gatineau]], [[Longueuil]], [[Saskatoon]] and [[Greater Sudbury]]. And even two of those six only get it on a technicality — Quebec City is an extremely common but technically ''unofficial'' name for a city whose ''official'' name is (obviously) not unique, and Greater Sudbury is an officialism that's actually ''less'' common in the real world than the unofficial and non-unique "Sudbury".
:::::::: A lot of Canadian place names may ''seem'' on first blush to be more unique than they really are, because they don't share their names with any other ''significant'' places whose existence the average person is likely to ''know'' about — but you'd actually be ''wrong'' if you said there were no other Torontos, Montreals, Ottawas, Calgarys, Vancouvers, Mississaugas, St. John'ses, Trois-Rivièreses, Bramptons or Edmontons in the world (in the case of Toronto, you'd even be wrong if you said the Big Smoke was the only one in ''Canada'', because there's a small village called Toronto in Prince Edward Island, too — and in the case of Mississauga, there's a First Nations reserve near Blind River which begs to differ with the notion that McCallion Country is even the only Mississauga in ''Ontario''.) In reality, Canada most certainly does ''not'' have an appreciably ''higher'' proportion of ''unique'' city names than the US does — we might have more that get "primary topic" status by virtue of being exponentially more famous than any smaller namesake, but that's a different question entirely. [[User:Bearcat|Bearcat]] ([[User talk:Bearcat|talk]]) 17:48, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
:::::::: A lot of Canadian place names may ''seem'' on first blush to be more unique than they really are, because they don't share their names with any other ''significant'' places whose existence the average person is likely to ''know'' about — but you'd actually be ''wrong'' if you said there were no other Torontos, Montreals, Ottawas, Calgarys, Vancouvers, Mississaugas, St. John'ses, Trois-Rivièreses, Bramptons or Edmontons in the world (in the case of Toronto, you'd even be wrong if you said the Big Smoke was the only one in ''Canada'', because there's a small village called Toronto in Prince Edward Island, too — and in the case of Mississauga, there's a First Nations reserve near Blind River which begs to differ with the notion that McCallion Country is even the only Mississauga in ''Ontario''.) In reality, Canada most certainly does ''not'' have an appreciably ''higher'' proportion of ''unique'' city names than the US does — we might have more that get "primary topic" status by virtue of being exponentially more famous than any smaller namesake, but that's a different question entirely. [[User:Bearcat|Bearcat]] ([[User talk:Bearcat|talk]]) 17:48, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
Only on Wikipedia will you find such a pedantic discussion about something so trivial that it conjures such thinly-veiled insults as "are you even living on the planet Earth?" Instead of being negative, aren't there infoboxes to be filled? POV's to be erased? New members to recruit? Articles to assess? Deletion requests to be closed?
As for the discussion at hand, I am indifferent. On one hand, it's nice to have consistency and I agree that having, e.g., "Sudbury, Ontario" might be more specific and preferable for internationalization. It's also good to be consistent. On the other, I do think simplification and minimalism is preferable in a place where there is already overwhelming information. Additionally, the majority of people who will be searching for it will already be familiar with its context: they may have picked up on it from an acquaintance or the media; they will not be randomly searching for "Kuujjuaq" because their cat stepped on their keyboard. And even if they did, the infobox there would provide them with more precise information.
In the end, isn't easy navigation, not standardization, the goal? The vast majority of people searching for "Ottawa," for example, will want the capital, and others may use the disambiguation page and/or hatnote. I doubt that people, even those unfamiliar with Canadian geography, will be looking for "Ottawa, Ontario" or even "Ottawa, Canada" when they come here. - <span style="font-family:Mistral,'Brush Script MT','Segoe script';text-shadow:gray 0.1em 0.1em 0.3em;">[[User:SweetNightmares|<span style="color:#FF003C">Sweet</span>]][[User talk:SweetNightmares|<span style="color:#400e36">Nightmares</span>]]</span> 15:54, 15 June 2015 (UTC)
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Unannounced student project
I've just come across several articles, one of which includes an edit summary "McGill University: Hist 334 Final Edit". It appears that students in this McGill University class were required to choose an article to improve. There was no announcement on WP that I know of, no instructor page that I've been able to find, and no edits by the students outside their respective assigned/chosen articles. I think we should review these articles, because such unannounced projects tend to produce essay-like articles more often than not. Mindmatrix14:44, 27 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
So....I was quickly perusing entries in Education Program:University of Ontario Institute of Technology/Critical Race Theory (Winter 2015), and it looks like some students have put in a decent effort (and others not so much, or none at all). The student sandbox articles replicate some articles currently on WP, and we might be able to merge some content, but these definitely appear to be more essay-like than encyclopedic. It also appears that this particular project is over, and none of the articles have moved out of userspace (though I've only checked a few). I haven't checked the other project, or found others related to my original post in this thread. Mindmatrix12:32, 23 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
2 IP's that keep editwarring
So we have 2 IPs that have been editwaring for months. We need to have this stopped asap. 99.233.25.49 and 46.233.116.121 see here for an example of the problem. I am not sure who /what version is best as its been done so many times. Looking for help here in reviewing the edits. -- Moxy (talk) 16:25, 28 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I looks to me that user User:99.233.25.49 is also UnbiasedVictory or Cm7 smcs (A banned user). They all do the same type of edits ...with the same pattern...they edit info boxes for flags and links and outcomes - never leaving an edit summary or add sources for the changes. UnbiasedVictory is a bit different and he may not be associated with this but Cm7 smcs and the IP have edited the same pages.-- Moxy (talk) 17:05, 4 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
About User:UnbiasedVictory- I have noticed as have others (by all the reverts) that we have an amateur historian making lots of guess work edits. For e.g this edit to the numbers of people involved. Any search would find that only 320 of the main force were actually involved ....yet we have the numbers changed without a source. I am very concerned that this guess work is happening all over. Not many edit summaries or sources for all the changes with some edit summaries referring to other Wiki articles as the source. In a small amount of cases a web site is used for a source....over real publications...this is what is leading me to believe we have someone not familiar with the scholarly community on this....never seen a real book used by this editor. I think we need to take the time and review most of the edits. Some are ok...as guessing sometimes you get it right ...but overall we need to look at the edits closely as our scholarly publications on the subject are never referenced. -- Moxy (talk) 16:41, 7 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
This individual continues to add and change information without referencing sources. Numbers being changed without a source is especially problematic. Some of it may well be true. Willy nilly changes such as these do affect the credibility of WP. I don't think there is malicious intent. I think this is a relatively inexperienced editor who doesn't understand the importance of proper referencing. If there are more serious infringements, I would take this to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. BTW, real books aren't necessarily the "best" sources; I have come across errors in books, and many Web sources are scholarly and accurate.--BCtalk to me21:54, 8 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Will watch over the edits closely ..... I also agree that some web pages are ok... my concern is that not one Canadian historian has ever been used for a source...thus this indicates to me a lack of familiarity of the subject. . -- Moxy (talk) 14:56, 9 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
User:UnbiasedVictory is now globally locked...but I think its for the wrong reasons.. Looking at all the 2,107 edits ....I will have to slow down on the reverting..as I have found that I have reverted some good edits. Could I get some help here.--
I've been following many of his edits and have started to ignore most because they seem legit. I'm only reverting the addition of material or changes to content that are likely to be challenged such as changes in stats, numbers, etc. since this stuff should obviously be cited. However, it is a lot of work to fact check his edits even if the edits aren't "likely to be challenged". I'll go back and check any reverts when I get a chance.--BCtalk to me18:44, 26 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
@User:Brian Crawford could you also watch over 99.233.100.189 they are also a guess work editor (some believe the same editor). As seen here ...they are mixing up the Red River Rebellion and the Red River Campaign. Then we have others like here more guess work Chesapeake Affair was 1863 while the "Capture of the USS Chesapeake happen during the war of 1812. Just need more eyes on this pls. Again some edits are good ...but its clear its all just guess work.-- Moxy (talk) 04:35, 23 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed..some edits are okay, but in the long run this editor is causing headaches. I also believe it's the same editor. I'll keep an eye out. -- BCtalk to me05:38, 23 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I am inclined to agree with Mindmatrix on the outcome, anecdotally, I know that there are two Portuguese clubs in Oshawa, one north and one south. They are north and south Oshawa, not Portugal, however that is more of a locational distinction, not a political distinction.--kelapstick(bainuu) 17:17, 12 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oshawa certainly has northern and southern ends, but only in the cardinal direction sense and not in the sense that there's any specific area of the city whose proper name is "North Oshawa". Apart from two links intending the "UOIT campus" sense of the term which were added by this redirect's creator at the same time as he created the redirect, the only existing redlinks to this term were from Oshawa's federal and provincial electoral districts. And any contextual value they could have provided there would have been entirely dependent on there actually being a distinct article about "North Oshawa" rather than a redirect — so I'm just about to unlink them both in Twinkle. I'd agree that if this redirects anywhere, it should be to the city rather than to UOIT — but I also wouldn't object to simple deletion, since I don't see how it's a particularly likely search term in its own right.
Similarly, the "North Oshawa Campus" of UOIT isn't called that per se — it's the main campus, so while "North Oshawa" is sometimes used when it's necessary to distinguish it from the smaller downtown campus, again that's just a geographic clarity marker rather than a proper name as such. But again I don't actually see it as a likely search term in its own right — neither the "North Oshawa" nor downtown campuses of UOIT really need their own separate articles independently of the main one on the institution itself, and neither campus is likely to be expected or used by any Wikipedia users as a direct search term in its own right. So I don't really see any particular value in creating "North Oshawa Campus" as a new redirect to UOIT, though I have no objection if somebody really feels strongly that we should do that — but "North Oshawa" without the word "Campus" attached to it, redirecting to UOIT instead of the city of Oshawa, is definitely, wrongoliciously wrong. Bearcat (talk) 22:03, 14 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
So, when a news article that I use as a source says that something is in Langley BC, I should be able to link Langley, BC and have the link work properly. I should not be pointed to a disambiguation page. Only those who actually live in the Vancouver area are aware there are two different entities, and most news articles written elsewhere don't make the distinction. It is completely inexcusable for Langley BC to be a disambiguation page when both of the "ambiguous" Langleys are essentially in the same location. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 15:31, 21 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
It sounds like you should write an new article that is an overview article covering both the two Langleys, since the two current articles would not cover each other. We can do that by converting the disambiguation page into an overview article, with two prominent subheaders for each Langley and {{main}} attached to point to their articles. -- 65.94.43.89 (talk) 20:00, 21 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Alternatively, you can read the news article you want to use as a source and work out in which sense they are referring to 'Langley'... Pyrope22:59, 21 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
An overview article is not the answer. A consolidation of the city and township into is not the primary topic. That very thing happened with North Vancouver, which was largely unsourced and mostly original research before finally being converted to the dab that it originally should have been. Possible solutions? Lobby the local media to start distinguishing between the two in their coverage. Lobby the city and the township local governments to amalgamate. Obviously these solutions are in jest. In the meantime, it is what it is. Hwy43 (talk) 01:41, 22 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Like most such articles, it says "a facility in Langley BC", with no other details, since it's not an article about Langley. If most sources don't treat it as ambiguous, we shouldn't either. I lean towards Langley BC going to the city - just like Los Angeles goes to the city, not the county. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 02:44, 22 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
We can't ignore facts. There are two Langleys. It's not up to use to decide whether we "lean" towards one or the other. The media is ambiguous about a lot of things - media shortcomings don't dictate changes to Wikipedia policies. It is possible that one of the Langleys might be found to be the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC (like Los Angeles), in which case it would qualify for the Langley, British Columbia title, a hatnote would be added to the top of the primary topic article, and the other article would either be disambiguated or (if possible) renamed. But in order to do so, one would need to initiate a discussion (ideally through WP:RM), provide notice at the relevant talk pages, and then demonstrate how one subject is the primary topic (it's not enough to say one leans towards one or the other) and achieve consensus for the move. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 17:17, 24 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Whether you like the fact or not, there are two distinct places which have the same name. An incorporated municipality is a class of topic that should always have an independent article of its own, rather than being smooshed together into a "two things with the same name" combo article — so the only valid question is how the two articles about the two Langleys should be named.
We have a process in place whereby you can propose a change for discussion — but I suspect that it would be difficult to establish a clear consensus either way. I recognize that "the city should automatically take WP:PRIMARYTOPIC over the township, because city" is a potential argument — but so is "the township should take primary topic over the city, because it's four times larger by population". And if the media are really that poor at distinguishing which Langley they're talking about, then media usage isn't going to answer the question very effectively either. But it's not Wikipedia's role or responsibility to pretend that Langley City and Langley Township aren't two separate things just because they happen to have the same name — they are two separate things, and therefore must have two separate articles. Bearcat (talk) 18:28, 25 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
How to best display Chinese in pages of Canadian persons of Hong Kong origins?
Only Traditional Chinese, since Hong Kong continues to use Traditional and not Simplified. If they don't speak Mandarin, it's NPOV-bias to place Mandarin pronunciation in there. Cantonese-only should be the default situation, since Hong Kong pre-1997 was Cantonese, and continues to be Cantonese. Simplified is NPOV-bias, since it isn't used by the person. There's a separate box available for all that stuff, stop stuffing it into the person infobox. If they have no strong links to Mandarin, Mandarin should not be indicated. If they didn't reside in a Simplified using jurisdiction, then that should not be indicated as they are not strongly linked to it. -- 65.94.43.89 (talk) 06:13, 24 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Canadians: This old AfC submission will soon be deleted as a stale draft unless someone takes an interest in it. It needs some attention from someone familiar with the geography of this part of the country. All populated places are notable, but this may be another name for a place that already has a Wikipedia article. Can any one shed light on this?—Anne Delong (talk) 16:57, 24 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I have seen these articles. Do you mean that there has never been a place in the NWT called Echo Bay? Or that there was, and it is now called Port Radium? If the latter, this can be merged and redirected. —Anne Delong (talk) 04:49, 25 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I found one reference for Echo Bay, Northwest Territory (here) at the same location as noted on the Port Radium page (for Port Radium). It appears that Port Radium was called Echo Bay perhaps during the later mining operations at the site by Echo Bay Mines. It also appears that Cameron Bay located nearby (here) was also called Port Radium for a time (according to the Port Radium page).-- Kayoty (talk) 05:35, 25 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
From what I can tell, the most accurate way of looking at the situation would be that Echo Bay and Cameron Bay were distinct "neighbourhoods" within a larger entity called Port Radium, rather than either of them having changed their name to Port Radium per se. Both Echo Bay and Cameron Bay would certainly have the potential to qualify for separate standalone articles, if we could actually write and source anything genuinely substantive about them that wasn't just a straight repetition of content that we already have in the main article about Port Radium as a whole — but at the level of content and sourcing that's been provided in this draft, it should just be a redirect to Port Radium. Bearcat (talk) 16:21, 25 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I saw this red link on the dab page at Krasne and thought I'd try to create a stub for it, but... could a local expert determine whether the unincorporated area here is the location of the church here? Should Krasne, Saskatchewan redirect to Rural Municipality of Big Quill No. 308, or at least get a mention there? Or is it that the name of the church is "St. John Bohoslav Krasne Church" and the "Krasne" is part of the saint's name rather than a placename? Over to you. PamD08:57, 30 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
It is recognized as a locality, but be careful in presuming Krasne was ever a community. The locality of Krasne may have very well been only the site of a church that had no other developments immediately surrounding it (like houses, a school, a general store). The church's parishioners may have been from the vast surrounding rural area of farms. The approach to localities in Alberta is to redirect them to their rural municipality. See how these localities, with the exception of a verified former community (Windfall, Alberta), all redirect to Woodlands County. I say redirect it to Rural Municipality of Big Quill No. 308, and perhaps list all localities within the RM per the StatCan reference above as an alternative to, or in addition to, mentioning the church. Cheers, Hwy43 (talk) 04:53, 3 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry GMTEgirl, no. For non-Crown works in Canada copyright is typically extended for the life of the author plus 50 years, and most Canadian works published after 1923 that were still copyrighted in 1996 remain under copyright in the US (where Wikipedia is based).
On Alberta's election day, after the results were clear but before all polls had reported, Jim Prentice resigned. We have a policy at WP:CANSTYLE#Terms in office saying that if a politician resigns or dies after the election but before taking office, we list them as holding the office between election day and their resignation/death. Presumably, if someone resigned or died before the election, they would never take office, even if they won the election. Jim Prentice raises the interesting question of where the cutoff line is. Should we count someone as briefly holding office if they resigns/dies on election day at a time when they probably won but not all votes are counted? —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 19:19, 11 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
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The policy that the rest of the world uses certainly violates the principals of WP:NAMINGCRITERIA of Naturalness and Recognizability does it? I mean, I had no idea where Yorkton was until I found a random town in Saskatchewan for an example, on top of that I'm sure most people in the world don't even know where Saskatchewan is. The most common name that someone will type into the search bar (assuming there is no autofill), would be Workton, Saskatchewan.--Prisencolinensinainciusol (talk) 18:59, 10 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The purpose of an article title is to serve as a location for the page, and not to convey extended information about the topic beyond the minimum necessary to ensure that the page has a unique title that isn't in conflict with any other title. There are, for example, people in the world who wouldn't know what the Toronto Maple Leafs are either, but that doesn't mean we have to move the article to "Toronto Maple Leafs (hockey team)" just because the topic might not be immediately obvious to all users just by seeing the name alone — anyone who doesn't already know what it is can find out by reading the article, and doesn't need superfluous information to be added to the title.
Accordingly, the naming convention for geographic places used by every country in the world besides the United States is that a place goes at just "place" if its name is unique (for instance, no other topic on earth could ever be located at just Iqaluit) or if it's the primary meaning (nobody would ever seriously expect the title Toronto to be about anything other than Canada's largest city) — but gets disambiguated by an appropriate higher geographical division (comma province, comma state, comma country, etc.) if it's not a unique name. Preexisting fame, or adding more information to the title on behalf of users who don't already know what the topic is, have nothing to do with it. The rule for all other topics is that any article always gets the simplest title that it can be given without creating a conflict with other topics of comparable or greater importance — and and we don't need the naming rule for geographic places to be different than the one we use for companies or book/film/television/album titles or people or other non-geographic topics. The rule has to be the same as it is for other topics: the title does not need to contain any more information than the minimum necessary to ensure that it has a unique location that isn't competing with other topics located at their simplest possible titles.
The US contingent has always had a different rule for itself, by which only the very largest US cities can claim unique name or primary topic as a valid reason to be located at just "Place", and smaller places must be at "Place, State" regardless of whether they satisfy one of the criteria that would allow them to be moved to a shorter title — but no other country has ever had any consensus to follow that rule instead of the one that would apply to any other topic.
All of that said, I'm a bit confused by this discussion. Both your title and your initial question seem to be arguing against the current WP:USPLACE convention — and thus I'm not too clear on why you would bring the discussion to WikiProject Canada, as if USPLACE (which we don't follow) had anything to do with us. Then in your second question you seem to be arguing that Canada should shift to following a USPLACE-style "comma-province disambiguation always required" convention instead of the one we currently use — thus doubling the confusion because now I don't even know which side of the coin you're arguing in the first place. Bearcat (talk) 19:50, 10 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
My post here is more of a thought experiment than anything. Of course I realize that Canadian articles don't follow WP:USPLACE. I'm trying to learn about some of the arguments why Canadian and Australia (and possibly others) have made the switch to [sic] "city, state" over the past few years.--Prisencolinensinainciusol (talk) 21:06, 11 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, it's the other way around—WP:CANADA (and other projects, such as WP:JAPAN) used to follow a similiar guideline to USPLACE. Over the years, those guidelines have been overturned virtually everywhere except for the US, and place articles have been gradually moved to their un-disambiguated versions. Curly Turkey¡gobble!21:17, 11 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry I actually meant "made the switch from "city, state" to just "city". The logic that USPLACE apologists use is assuming that the "city, state" format for most non-major cities is the most recognizable format. However this same thing could be said about nearly every country in the world. The most commonly recognized name for Jeddah to most humans is Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, even though the article titles is the way it currently is. Anyways as pertaining to Canada, do you think you could point me to some of the archived threads about this topic?--Prisencolinensinainciusol (talk) 18:27, 12 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The arguments for preemptive disambiguation of US places are extremely poor and frequently challenged. They pretty much come down to:
(a) most American places need disambiguation anyways, so let's just do them all
Most Canadian city names are unique, as are most city names of most countries in the world—this is a uniquely american issue
(b) in causal conversation, people actually say things like "Chicago, Illinois", even when they are in Chicago and are aware that Chicago is one of the best-recognized cities in the world. Why do they do this? I doubt even Americans know.
This is untrue of most other places in the world. Nobody says "Tuktoyaktuk, Northwest Territories" or "Sault St Marie, Ontario" in casual conversation, nor do they say "Dresden, Saxony" or "Nagoya, Aichi".
It's actually not true that most Canadian city names are unique — there are certainly places whose names are genuinely unique (especially if they derive from aboriginal languages, or are saint-names in Quebec which come with attached predisambiguations like -de-Litchfield or -du-Ha! Ha!), but far more of Canada's undabbed cities are just straightforward primary topics rather than names which are genuinely unique as such. And people will, of course, say "Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario" if there's a contextual need to distinguish it from the one in Michigan — while the one in Ontario is larger, the population differential between the two isn't so strong that we can credibly make a primary topic call on it. But you are certainly correct that people don't preemptively say "Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario" in every context — but I don't believe for a second that people actually do that for Chicago either. Bearcat (talk) 20:39, 13 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, the math's been done: nearly 50% of US placenames require disambiguation, while most Canadian ones are unique (apparently I chose a poor example with Sault Ste. Marie). I'm astounded that you'd assert you "don't believe for a second that people actually do that for Chicago either". It's like you live on a different continent than the one I grew up on. Curly Turkey¡gobble!07:26, 14 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I hear people say just "Chicago" without a trailing "Illinois" all the freaking time — far more often, in fact, than not. And trust me, I don't live in any alternate reality, as much as I may wish I did sometimes.
I'd like to see where that "percentage of unique names" math is documented, as well — I didn't thoroughly review the entire list of Canadian cities, admittedly, but at least among Canada's 30 largest just six (20 per cent) of them can actually claim uniqueness for their name. Those six being Winnipeg, Quebec City, Gatineau, Longueuil, Saskatoon and Greater Sudbury. And even two of those six only get it on a technicality — Quebec City is an extremely common but technically unofficial name for a city whose official name is (obviously) not unique, and Greater Sudbury is an officialism that's actually less common in the real world than the unofficial and non-unique "Sudbury".
A lot of Canadian place names may seem on first blush to be more unique than they really are, because they don't share their names with any other significant places whose existence the average person is likely to know about — but you'd actually be wrong if you said there were no other Torontos, Montreals, Ottawas, Calgarys, Vancouvers, Mississaugas, St. John'ses, Trois-Rivièreses, Bramptons or Edmontons in the world (in the case of Toronto, you'd even be wrong if you said the Big Smoke was the only one in Canada, because there's a small village called Toronto in Prince Edward Island, too — and in the case of Mississauga, there's a First Nations reserve near Blind River which begs to differ with the notion that McCallion Country is even the only Mississauga in Ontario.) In reality, Canada most certainly does not have an appreciably higher proportion of unique city names than the US does — we might have more that get "primary topic" status by virtue of being exponentially more famous than any smaller namesake, but that's a different question entirely. Bearcat (talk) 17:48, 14 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Only on Wikipedia will you find such a pedantic discussion about something so trivial that it conjures such thinly-veiled insults as "are you even living on the planet Earth?" Instead of being negative, aren't there infoboxes to be filled? POV's to be erased? New members to recruit? Articles to assess? Deletion requests to be closed?
As for the discussion at hand, I am indifferent. On one hand, it's nice to have consistency and I agree that having, e.g., "Sudbury, Ontario" might be more specific and preferable for internationalization. It's also good to be consistent. On the other, I do think simplification and minimalism is preferable in a place where there is already overwhelming information. Additionally, the majority of people who will be searching for it will already be familiar with its context: they may have picked up on it from an acquaintance or the media; they will not be randomly searching for "Kuujjuaq" because their cat stepped on their keyboard. And even if they did, the infobox there would provide them with more precise information.
In the end, isn't easy navigation, not standardization, the goal? The vast majority of people searching for "Ottawa," for example, will want the capital, and others may use the disambiguation page and/or hatnote. I doubt that people, even those unfamiliar with Canadian geography, will be looking for "Ottawa, Ontario" or even "Ottawa, Canada" when they come here. - SweetNightmares15:54, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Montreal Folk Life Festival
Did anybody hear about "Montreal [American?] Folk Life Festival" of the 60s/70s ? They are surprisingly little mentioned in known sources (mostly here), and I'd like to verify its mention here (1969). Whrer do you suggest look? (what newspaper etc) trespassers william (talk) 23:37, 10 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Both. If it is short enough to fit on one page (and be a reasonable sized section), you can convert the list to table and use class=sortable to sort by key, and choose the sort keys (birth date, death date, surname, occupation, birth province, etc); if it is not short enough to fit on one page, create lists both ways, alphabetic sublits and topical sublists. -- 70.51.202.183 (talk) 05:37, 14 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]
