Talk:Berliner FC Dynamo

Move

I'd suggest that this page be moved to Berliner FC Dynamo - obviously keeping the redirect from the current name. The name BFC Dynamo Berlin is tautologous - the B stands for Berliner. ArtVandelay13 20:03, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Done! Thank you for your suggestion. I am not a jelly donut and all that ... Wiggy! 20:43, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Nadia, You've cut out a ton of information without providing any explanation or justification. Or put in stuff that is just plain wrong (i.e. Dynamo's ten titles are not a German record. They are an East German or DDR-Oberliga record and to characterize them as "German" is incorrect.). It was Dynamo that led the way in seeing the championships stars policy updated - why cut all that material out. Less isn't more - please don't whitewash the article. Wiggy! 19:33, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Poor edits

Nadia, please stop making inappropriate edits to this page.

• I took the time to review each of the links you added to the page and in general they are the type of link to be avoided in that they do not reference significant new information or tend to be only peripherally related to the club. You've included links to a search engine page, shopping pages, pages that link to each other, and some that are dead or seriously out-of-date. And I'm afraid just don't understand what a page about a group of three women showing off their tattoos has to do with BFC. While there may be merit in sometimes linking to foreign language sites that include useful material, appending German language news reports to an English language page is marginal at best. The links you are adding are simply not making the page any better. Your interest in the Ultras/hooligan side of fan culture would be better served by leaving those links on the Ultras page you put together - and even then I'd comb through your links to keep just the best.

• Repeatedly removing the link to the English language site that provides a useful overview of the club, including some history, standings, logos, a table full of basic club info, etc. is inappropriate. There is probably more information about that club on that one page than there is in all the links you keep appending - and its offered up in a concise easy-to-read format. It is a useful resource, please leave it be.

• Dynamo was at the forefront of the controversy over championship stars. Including it is appropriate and in context and provides links to other aspects of German football. I don't understand why it is repeatedly being removed.

• Marking up Dynamo's titles as a "German record" without explaining what kind of record it is rather vague and misleading. A record of what? It's a DDR-Oberliga record for number of titles won. Ten consecutive titles in German first division play is a record. But it's not an overall national record as Bayern hold more titles. This was was noted in the qualifying preamble to the honours section - which was repeatedly edited out, and is now orphaned as some sort of afterthought. That preamble should have resolved the issue cleanly and simply.

• During its dominant period Dynamo was a Stasi club, plain and simple. Editing out the title of the history section describing it as such is just a whitewash. There's no reason not to leave it be.

• When an article is heavily edited and material removed its considered good form to provide some justification for deleting the material. That's not been done. I've tried to provide explanations for my edits, I'd appreciate your doing the same as its one of the most basic courtesies here. It might help me understand why stuff is getting tossed.

• Your cut and paste of famous players has left a German language header in place that needs to be fixed. It's an English page and edits and links should reflect that.

• Some useful material has been added through your edits, and I've seen you've done some good work on other pages, but this is just turning into a mess that needs sorting out. Let's do that. Wiggy! 21:24, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Some reference material re:Stasi control of BFC Dynamo

German language stuff can be run through the language tools at Google for a translation for English speakers.

• a Times (UK) article about manipulation in East bloc football
• profile of a permant exhibition in Leizig about the Stasi's role in East German football
• an essay on Berlin football
• Tagesspiele news article about questionable practice in East German football]
• a book about East German football

Repeated vandalism

Nadia, It is inappropriate and goes against established Wikipedia policy to remove relevant references and repeatedly place spam links on a page. It's clear you are a Dynamo fan, but you can't keep erasing relevant parts of the club's history and useful reference material. Please stop and put some effort into managing your POV. Wiggy! 22:44, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Non-standard formatting

Look Nadia, I'm sorry but formatting lists column-wise as you've done at Berliner FC Dynamo makes it real tough to add to items to a list and is just not as readable as a simple list. There's a place for the use of tables like that, but this isn't it. Have a look at how the English club pages are formatted by way of example. Simple rows, clear links, etc. A similar approach is used on other club pages. Column formatting just doesn't work for some header categories. I've reverted the page to using standard row formatting. Thanks. Wiggy! 17:17, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Specific concerns

Nadia please stop making inappropriate edits. You've done some good things with the various tables you've added, but a number of your current edits are inappropriate:

• Please don't insert your personal versions of the club logos in the articles. They are quite simply incorrect and should not be used where there are clearly better alternatives available. The logo displaying a single star and the number 10 is in use on the club website and follows the DFB guidelines set for the use of championship stars. The version you keep posting is clearly an un-sourced homemade thing. I have not seen any source that shows Dynamo's use of the East German national crest - if you have one, put it forward. I have asked you this repeatedly and you are ignoring me. Show me. Make me believe.
• The image of Mielke has been tagged as improperly sourced. You need to respect that. The caption attached to the image isn't even close to proper English.
• Replacing accurate image files with your own personalized and incorrect versions is not a particularly welcome tactic. Its unnecessarily aggressive.
• Please don't revert copy edits that are intended to clean up the English of an article. They are not some kind of personal attack, but are simply intended to make the article clear and readable. Properly translated, well written articles carry more authority and better serve users.
• Please put some effort into verifying the accuracy of your edits and managing your POV. I can't argue with stuff that's NPOV, correct, and well presented, but you're not taking that approach and it shows.
• Your talk page is knee-deep in complaints about your general conduct. Given that you often quickly edit out additions to your talk page I would guess that it is embarrassing for you to face up to on some level. This would be more fun for you and everyone else if you showed some respect for other editors and for the quality of your own work.

Wiggy! 04:57, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Get it right

Nadia, you're quite capable of making useful contibutions, so why don't you stop wasting my time and yours (and that of other editors) by posting material that is incorrect, unlicensed or POV. You added some decent stuff with the various tables you've put in place, put persist in making petty edits. Give it up and stick to the valuble stuff. It looks likes you're able to add good material but can't bring yourself to rise above this other nonsense. I think everyone would appreciate it if you would just play nice. Wiggy! 15:34, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Current logo

I'm sorry, Nadia, but it isn't clear what you are trying to say. Pepe doesn't own exclusive rights. The logo that is currently displayed is the one in use on the club website with the addition of a championship star. My own feeling is that a simple Dynamo logo should be displayed without the star, and the championship version with a star displayed elsewhere with a proper explanation of what it is. But, of course, you have a different view.

Now I have reverted your addition of the logo because the caption or explanation you have attached to it is written in poor English, it is unclear, and doesn't significantly add to the article. There is no direct connection between this logo and BFC's European Cup appearance - its just coincidental.

Wrestling over this stuff with you is getting tiresome and I really do not want to be fighting over this all the time. I'm simply interested in seeing a well-written, factual article in place. Maybe we make some peace. How about we display a basic logo (with no star) in the info box and display a championship logo (with a star and an explanation) further below? That represents an accurate up-to-date position.

And do me a favor by not adding unnecessary tags to articles I have edited. While the articles may need sourcing tagging something just because I edited it is counter-productive and is a waste of everyone's time. Go out there and be a good, productive editor. Wiggy! 14:10, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

P.S. if you have a link to current information about Pepe and the legal status of the logo (I see you've marked the item as 2007) please post it so eveyone can have a look. Wiggy! 14:15, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the references. They provide some information and I see that there is some other similar stuff out there. I haven't seen anything more current than April 2006 (about a year old) nor have I seen anything that indicates the issue has been resolved one way or another. So, besides the championship star, what is the difference between the logo at the top of the page and the one you keep posting? Note also that the caption you've put in place is still incoherent (i.e. it is not even close to proper English and so is quite confusing) and is going to be copy edited to put it into shape for use on the English Wikipedia. Some of the detail referred to there more properly belongs as part of the main body of text in the related trivia section.

As near as I can see the most definitive source remains the club web page. The team photo shows the use of the logo bearing the single championship star. Both the plain logo and starred logo appear at various places on the website. One of the references you posted indicates the club is using any one of three different logos (1966, post-70s, and championship). Help me out here. What is the critical difference that makes it so important to you to display the additional logo? Wiggy! 22:21, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Clear reference

You know Kay, there is a very clear reference in the Vereinslexikon as to the history of the name of this team and it doesn't include Spielvereinigung Dynamo. While the club was part of the larger sports association it was never simply SV Dynamo. Do you plan to apply this approach to every single club that played under the SV banner? This is perfect example of the stupidly single-minded approach to editing that repeatedly gets you blocked. Get a life. Wiggy! 15:29, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

objectivity

the article is full of ridiculous mistakes and utterly biased and even wrong info on the club. it reads like being written by someone who seriously dislikes bfc and therefore lacking any objectivity on the subject.

just a few examples:

re. nicknames:

bfc dynamo has no official nickname. fans of other teams sometimes refer to them as "stasi-club", "schiebermeister" or "bullenverein" but these are no nicks but derisive hints at bfc´s past. the club´s colours are weinrot (which would be translated as burgundy, or claret, certainly NOT wine red!) and white. yet "die weinrot-weißen" is not seen as a proper nick for the club (unlike liverpoool/the reds, or leeds/the whites). hohenschönhausen is the part of berlin where bfc´s ground is so I suppose you can rightly call them "hohenschönhausener" but that´s only an attribute (just like e.g. "hauptstadt-club", "ost-berliner" or "rekordmeister") and no real nickname. btw, the club promotes itself as "der etwas andere club" (the somewhat/slightly different club)

re. bfc´s history/the stasi:

quote: "…and would soon become infamous under the patronage of Erich Mielke, head of East Germany's Stasi (the secret police) for the various means used to manipulate the outcome of the team's games and ensure its dominance…." this sounds' like it was written by someone who has a massive chip on his/her shoulder re. bfc. there have been various books/studies on that manner in recent years and there sure were some very dodgy decisions by refs at bfc matches but so far no-one has managed to come up with facts that could actually proof that bfc games were manipulated., and in what way. the main reason for dynamo´s dominance in the late 70s/early 80s was their outstanding academy that produced stars like thom, rohde, ernst etc.. btw, erich mielke was head of the sportvereinigung dynamo which means he was actually (technically) also the boss of e.g. dynamo dresden (and countless other dynamo outfits) but of course his main “object of sympathy” was bfc (that is the club, not the real fanbase, as you can read about in: http://www.amazon.de/Stadionpartisanen-Fans-Hooligans-Wolfgang-Engler/dp/3355017442/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218245364&sr=8-1.

quote: ”...playing in the DDR-Oberliga BFC won ten consecutive titles from 1979 to 1988 assisted by crooked referees[2]", (though “crooked” in their case certainly doesn´t mean “bent/corrupt” as there was no money paid.) i repeat: albeit it is very likely that it happened in some way there is absolutely no proof whatsoever that bfc´s victories were assisted by the refs, let alone that the victories in some matches that appeared to be won through dodgy ref decisions were the reason for bfc winning the league. the link then leads us to a dw article that claims "...It was rumored at the time that the championships that led to these three stars appearing had much to do with East German Stasi head, Erich Mielke -- the club's mentor -- and his blatant yet tolerated manipulation of games.” now this is utterly pathetic as the autor a) first refers to something that, and i quote: ”was rumoured at that time” while b) suggesting – in the very same sentence!!! – a “blatant yet tolerated manipulation” of games by head of stasi erich mielke. well, mielke was a c**t of the highest order but he certainly did never ever manipulate a football match. he might have told refs to do so, but as i said before, this is yet to be proven. that aside, the whole sentence is nonsense as something is either a “rumour” or it is “blatant” (as in obvious, and therefore proven), but definitely not both.

Quote: “…unfair player transfers from other teams and assorted other unsportmanlike practices.” this must have been written by someone who has absolutely no clue about how sports in general, and football in particular, was organised in the former g.d.r.. all over the country there were so-called leistungszentren (centres of excellence) where young talent were gathered. in football those leistungszentren were the “clubs” (magdeburg, dresden, jena, lok, bfc etc.) and all the good young footballers in a particular region would be gathered at those. dresden e.g. got the good players from smaller clubs like stahl riesa or sachsenring zwickau (pilz!), magdeburg got east germany´s best goal-getter achim streich from hansa rostock (when they got relegated), bfc got players from the smaller dynamo outfits in the north and from e.g. the cottbus region. lok leipzig got players from chemie leipzig etc.. however, most of the players who were “delegated” to bfc went there as youngsters and then went through their academy which was the best in the country and the main reason for the club´s success in the late 70s/early 80s (thom, ernst, rohde etc.). of course the betriebsportgemeinschaften (bsg) like chemie leipzig or smaller clubs like union (who btw got a number of players from bfc over the years who were usually much better than the people that came through their own youth system) were disadvantaged but you can´t blame bfc (who certainly benefited more than any other club from the structure) for this nor any of the other bigger clubs as that wasn´t their decision.

quote: ”...the cheating was so blatant that it incurred the unofficially expressed displeasure of the country's ruling Politburo. Manipulation of the 1986 championship match between Dynamo and Lokomotive Leipzig which ended in a 1:1 draw that handed Dynamo its eighth title led to nationwide protests, but resulted only in sanctions against referee Bernd Stumpf.[3] what regards the „schandelfmeter“ i´d propose you read this article which shows the whole story as what it actually is - a myth: http://www.zeit.de/2000/33/Der_Schand-Elfmeter_von_Leipzig. The article even mentions a video that clearly shows that the penalty was actually justified. It´s much a more balanced and closer to the truth piece than the crap propaganda drivel you chose to link. (http://www.berlinonline.de/berliner-zeitung/archiv/.bin/dump.fcgi/2005/0324/sport/0005/index.html)

on the talk site here this article is linked http://www.abseits-soccer.com/essays/berlin-derby.html which was quite obviously written by someone who a) completely and utterly dislikes bfc and b) sympathises with their fiercest rivals union berlin. imho it´s not very useful to use that sort of “source” to make a point (note to paul scraton: just imagine i was taken to a match at anfield road by manu fans, and my view of Liverpool fc was shaped by that of said red manc filth, then i´d be likely to refer to your lot – probably much to your dismay – as “dirty, lazy, scrounging and thieving scouse bastards”. i suppose you wouldn´t be too amused if i manifested that viewpoint in an article. especially not when, like in said article, claims are made that are not only untrue but in large parts libellous.) first we get the usual clichés about bfc fans being ”drunk, shaven-headed, neo-nazi (allegedly) thugs” and then the author goes on to mention an incident the night before the match where a club in berlin was raided by german special police forces and where, allegedly (quote from the article): “180 'known troublemakers' were kept behind bars for the duration of the match”. which is a) a blatant lie (I know, as I was one of those ´troublemakers´ that got nicked that night) and b) one of the biggest scandals the berlin plod were involved in in recent years (and there were quite a few), in fact it was a brutal ambush on innocent people who had played a bfc football fan tournament during the day and were just having a good time with their friends (including mates from Sweden and Scotland!) and girlfriends that night.

re. the logo:

afaik its not in posession of the hells angels any more. however, who currently owns the rights - and what that means for the club - is a bit of a mystery.

re. the stadiums:

in the 70´s and 80´s (except for the 86/87 season) bfc played all their matches - not just european cup games, but also league and east german cup games (except matches against union and cup finals, which were always played at the stadion der weltjugend) at the jahnsportpark. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.247.86.210 (talk) 02:42, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

If you have (reliable) sources for your claims, by all means, please add them to the article. Like everybody else, you are most wellcome to edit wikipedia, as long as you stick to its rules. And by the looks of it, you got quite a bit to say on the subject. However, also keep in mind, as a BFC fan you can't consider yourself completely neutral. Don't go about it like a new user did yesterday, by just deleting the bit's you don't like. It will, be reverted and you will be treated as a vandal! As a first step, I would suggest, since you are debating the neutrality and objectivity of this article, add this template at the top:

After this, find some reliable sources, German or English, and start editing! It might be useful to open a user account, too, as IP address edits are not always considered very highly by user users. EA210269 (talk) 03:21, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

well, as i am a new user (and actually the one that deleted all the bile earlier yesterday) i´m not (yet) fully familiar with how one edits an article and/or adds links/sources etc.. i´ll try to get into that.

while i´m at it (and because i forgot to point that out yesterday): bfc have no official "fanfreundschaften", not even with hertha and/or bochum. some bfc fans have friendly links with some fans of hertha (but there are also many bfc who can´t stand the "old lady", and vice versa) and bochum (and aberdeen, malmö, göteborg, leeds, even st.pauli...) but these are personal contacts/friendships of certain people/groups at bfc and those clubs are certainly not seen as "friends" or "allies" of bfc by the majority of the bfc fanbase. the usual point of view of bfc fans is "us against everybody". i remember a bfc scarf from a couple of years ago that read "bfc fans - hated an feared". it´s a siege mentality that bfc fans adopted over the years (quite similar to that of fans of e.g. leeds united). the general attitude is that bfc neither wants nor needs friends/allies. many bfc fans revel in the hatred of other clubs´ fans and use the bad boys image the club has to distinguish themselves from the "opposition" (just like fans of leeds united wear the "dirty leeds" tag with pride) but on a personal level it´s often quite different and much more relaxed (there are even bfc fans who are friends with fans from union, believe it or not). what regards the "enemies" you could say that nearly all fans of the old g.d.r. clubs detested bfc (for a plethora of reasons) but a) you wouldn´t call that a "rivalry" (im many cases it was completely one-sided) and b)this has changed quite a bit over recent years. these days fans of e.g. magdeburg (their firm and that of bfc have btw been on friendly terms for years), lok leipzig and dresden send fan teams to the annual bfc fan tournament (while other fans of said clubs continue to hate bfc). many bfc fans these days dislike tennis borussia for various reasons, but mainly because a) they´re a direct opponent in the league, b) because a former bfc president switched sides and joined tebe and c) because bfc fans as a whole have been constantly vilified as "nazi thugs" by certain quarters of tebe´s fan base (and also that of babelsberg.). turkiyemspor are not seen as rivals (esp. not now as they´re a league above bfc), they´re disliked by certain parts of the bfc following but not by the majority (who just don´t care), let alone all bfc fans. the only real rivalry bfc have these days is that with union. tebe (and babelsberg) are disliked, but generally not considered important enough to be real rivals of bfc. --Berlinwhite (talk) 09:56, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't think wholesale deletion of the material you are disputing is the way to go. The club's connection to the Stasi is an unfortunate, but genuine part of its history, and needs to be included. The article includes a few, but not sufficient citations, so maybe I'll get down to tacking some of those on in order to properly substantiate whats here.

Some of the points you've made are worth discussing, but I gotta say, while you may not like the article, your own remarks show also clear bias. Please note that this article was previously the target of an editor with a strong POV and was a various times little more than a fan page glorifying the communist regime. That's certainly not the way to go either and I'm not enamoured with the idea of it being whitewashed again or being bent out of shape by an apologist for the old regime. I think other editors here have some understanding of football in the old East Germany that includes an awareness of excellence centres and all the rest. However, political manipulation of sport, including football, was a fact of life in the DDR, and BFC Dynamo was a clear example of that. Its something that cannot be ignored and has to be reflected in the article. Wiggy! (talk) 11:34, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I await your editing of Dynamo Dresden and Union Berlin, who were also run by branches of the DDR government. You have fallen for cliches and biased opinions of BFC Dynamo hook, line and sinker. This is a sporting club, and its article should reflect that and not the hatred for the old East German State which many clearly display here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.43.227.18 (talk) 07:27, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

some valuable points here, wiggy. of course the club had connections with the stasi and it would be moronic in the extreme to deny that fact (although the normal fans in their majority had nothing to do with it. the bfc hardcore were - as most football fans in former east germany - in their vast majority against the state, many of them cut out the "d" of the club crest to show their resentment against their "patron", some even did time and/or left the g.d.r. before the fall of the wall. you can read about all that in "stadionpartisanen" as well as "bfc-der meisterclub"). the question, though, is: did the stasi really force officials to referee in bfc´s favour, and if so, how did they do that? and, most importantly, is there serious proof for that? and furthermore: did these (alleged) decisions make a difference when it came to bfc winning the league? even the staunchest bfc haters admit that most of the time the bfc team was so much better than the opposition that there was absolutely no necessity for help from the refs (just read the article on the "schandelfmeter" i linked above, which was published in "die zeit", a quality newspaper that is anything but fond of the old g.d.r.)

bfc were part of the east german sports system, as were all other clubs including (alleged) anti-state clubs like union. all sports in the former g.d.r. was financed and regulated by the state (or regime, as you put it. of which i am certainly no apologist, i´m just trying to have a more balanced view on the subject) or some of its institutions/companies. bfc undoubtedly benefited more than any other football club from these structures but the club (officials, players, fans etc.) can not be hold responsible for those structures as they were clearly not of the club´s making. the paragraph about "unfair player transfers from other teams" is therefore utter nonsense. talented youngsters were sent to the "centres of excellence" of which sc dynamo berlin/bfc dynamo was one (strangely enough that argument is never heard when it comes to clubs like magdeburg, dresden, jena, lok leipzig etc. who also got the prospects from their respective regions). the vast majority of said players joined bfc in their teens and then excelled in the academy, and those who were "delegated" at an older (but still very young) age like e.g thomas doll (who came from then relegated hansa rostock) were certainly not forced to join bfc but wanted to play there as it improved their chances to win titles and to play internationally (with both bfc and the g.d.r. national team)

and it certainly isn´t helpful when, in order to illustrate bfc´s somewhat shady past, it is done by using factually wrong info (e.g. that about the disputed penalty at leipzig, which has since been proven absolutely justified and regular by leipzig-based!!! public tv station mdr), or linking stories like the one by paul scraton who is only repeating old clichés about both the club and its fanbase)

my advice would be to take the very well written/researched and much more objective/neutral german wiki-article on bfc as a blueprint for the english version, erase the obvious mistakes (nicknames, ownership of logo etc.) and change the general style of the article(which so far is defined by a clear resentment towards bfc dynamo). --Berlinwhite (talk) 13:54, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Totally agree, this article is little short of a disgrace. Using clearly bias or unscholarly websites as sources is hardly evidence, and as Berlin White states, most of the claims of cheating have either been disproven completely or are highly dubious. The fact was that Dynamo were the clear best team in the old DDR Oberliga, simple as that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by God Save the Tsar (talk • contribs) 05:27, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Logo 2009

FYI: The official Logo: de:Datei:Logo BFC Dynamo e.V. 2009.png reached WP by OTRS. --ST ○ 07:43, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Excellent. Thank you. Wiggy! (talk) 15:19, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Predecessor sides: SG Dynamo Berlin and SC Dynamo Berlin.

I think the section on predecessor sides is slightly confused, but I could be wrong. The section states that SG Dynamo Berlin was renamed SC Dynamo Berlin in 1954. I am not sure that was the case. I thought that SG Dynamo Berlin and SC Dynamo Berlin were to separate clubs, that SG Dyamamo Berlin was formed in 1952 and renamed SG Dynamo Berlin-Mitte when SC Dynamo Berlin appeared in 1954. I also thought that SG Dynamo-Berlin Mitte was later merged with the reserve team of SC Dynamo Berlin to form the SG Dynamo Hohenschönhausen, and that SG Dynamo Hohenschönhausen was later merged with the football section of SC Dynamo Berlin to form the BFC Dynamo. Does anyone know what is correct? Best regards. /EriFr (talk) 13:10, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

"Large majority skinheads, with right-wing and far-right political views"

I doubt that this is balanced:

"The Dynamo fans are well known to be in the large majority skinheads, with right-wing and far-right political views. Since the 1970s and '80s, they have been known to have the strongest hooligan element in the country."

"Large majority"? And what exactly does "fans" mean here? Well. I haven't done any research, and I know that also in my country, BFC Dynamo is rumored to be a "right wing-club" and notorious for having violent fans with far-right political views, but the above sentence is quite categorical. I think it needs to be checked. The only source provided is: "To My Kibice, Winter 2014 No.4(46) p.38-39". What is "To My Kibice", a Polish football supporter magazine? Is "To My Kibice" a reliable source? If I read the above sentence in a magazine, I would honestly suspect that I was reading a magazine that is fascinated by hooliganism and far-right politics in football. /EriFr (talk) 14:56, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

History years?

The periods chosen for the history seem a bit arbitrary, is there some reason why said dates were chosen, and not say one general history article created? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 05:03, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

@CaptainEek: Hi! The article had a general history section, but I expanded it so much that it had to be moved to separate articles. The time periods represents different eras in the history of BFC Dynamo: The time period 1978-1989 represents the "Golden era" (including the 1988-89 season), the time period 1989-2004 represents the era from the fall of Berlin wall until the insolvency (this is clearly a separate era in the history of BFC Dynamo) and the time period 2004-today represent the era from the end of the insolvency until today (this is also cleary a separate era in the history of BFC Dynamo as the club had to rebuild itself from the ground up after the insolvency). I am focusing on the 1978-1989 period at the moment, but intend to write a short general history section before summer. Kindest regards. /EriFr (talk) 18:05, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

@EriFr: I see that the History section in this article comes out tosomewhere north of 300kb (i.e. three entire articles on its own). If you incorporated these into their own separate articles, might it be possible to just summarize them here in a couple paragraphs and refer to the main articles for them? The article is insanely long, is the reason I ask. jp×g 09:34, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

@EriFr: I see that your recent change added a giant history section to this article. That section seems redundant to the individual articles that were previously linked -- in fact, it seems like much of the content is copied from those articles. The article after your change is simply too large; it can't be comfortably read. It also doesn't render correctly, because it exceeds some of the template limits that WikiMedia has. In particular, footnotes and references aren't appearing in the article. Is there a strong reason your change shouldn't be reveted? It seems like there was concensus for having separate history articles here in the past, and in that state the history could be freely expanded and the article rendered correctly and was reasonably readable. -- Mikeblas (talk) 15:05, 18 July 2023 (UTC)7

@Mikeblas:HI! I've been working on this history section for months and everything (except maybe a sentence or two) is written specifically for this history section. I tried to summarize the three history articles, but it obviously got completely out of hand.... One problem I experience is that there is a lack of English-speaking sources that summarize the full history of the club. The German-speaking sources I have used are often very detailed. That has driven a high level of detail. Plus, my inability to sift of course.... Something I've been thinking about is moving the sections on support and rivalries to a separate article and then writing a shorter section on support (and just link the section on rivalries to the new article for now - see seasons section). The rivalries section is currently more of a subsection of the history section, as the rivalries are currently not active (but very important parts of the club's history). That would remove enough text from the article for the references to reappear. But I know the history section is still way too big. (However, I believe that the division of the history section into four subsections, for different eras, is broadly correct. It is the content under each subsection that needs to be summarized.). Kindest regards. /EriFr (talk) 10:12, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I see. The current state of the article is untenable: it's fundamentally broken, because the article won't render correctly. What is your plan for addressing that? After your explanation, I'm also wondering why you didn't rewrite the referenced articles instead of writing so much mostly new material. Is there a reason the new content wouldn't be immediately merged with the existing sectional articles? -- Mikeblas (talk) 20:30, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

@Mikeblas: There is no new information in the new history material (the new history section), compared to the section articles. All information in the history section is also available in the section articles. My idea was that the new history section would be a summary of the sectional articles. (If I find new information, I always start by adding it to the section articles.) I see two solutions: 1) move the sections on supporters and rivalries to a separate article and write a summary of the supporters sections, or 2) start a massive summary of the history section (perhaps using the history section of the German article as a model?). I probably think option 2) is better. The history section can't be this big. It has to be shortened sooner or later. Kindes. /EriFr (talk) 11:25, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

FAR TOO LONG

This article is so long that it is broken and will not display correctly. References and templates do not display correctly. I think the best thing would be to reduce the excessively long history section - there are multiple articles about the history and this article should only therefore have a very brief overview. DuncanHill (talk) 10:53, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Even if the template issue is overcome the article is going to be massively overlong. I suggest reverting the article to before the new history section was inserted. It needs to be aggressively cut back and worked on, and then can be reinserted into the article. Having the article in a broken state for over a month really isn't acceptable. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 13:43, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

I fixed some of the no target errors resulting from the use of {{sfn}} templates, but that just resulted in adding the article to Category:Harv and Sfn multiple-target errors as well. It would appear that an attempt is being made to fix the article by converting {{cite book}} and other cite templates into {{sfn}}, but this won't fix the article. There are to many templates in the article and conversion to {{sfn}} just replaces one template with another, it does not reduce the number of templates in the article.

Fundamentally the only way to fix this article to to reduce it in size by splitting a large part of the text off into other articles. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 20:22, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

I can't even see which refs have errors! DuncanHill (talk) 21:19, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm just going from the formatting mistakes. The ones I fixed were trying to link with a refname, which isn't supported. In addition it appear many have been created with "karas" when the authors last name is "Karas", which is the classic "computers are dumb" issue (they can't tell that karas and Karas are the same word). Unfortunately the {{cite book}} for Karas appear 20 odd times, so correcting them will just create an equal amount of multi-target errors. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 22:05, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh goodness! I suppose replacing all the {{cite book}} that contain Karras with {{sfn}}, and the same for the ref names using Karras would be the way through that, but without being able to properly preview edits and see the results it will be rather hit-and-miss. DuncanHill (talk) 22:20, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

It also wouldn't help, the article would still be completely broken afterwards. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 12:18, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

Split

I've boldly split the history section to History of Berliner FC Dynamo, and the Supporters and Rivalries sections to Supporters and rivals of Berliner FC Dynamo. This article is still bursting at the seems, but it at least functions correctly now.
I'm in the process of correcting the issues caused by the splits, first here, then the history article, and then finally I'll do the Supporters and Rivals article. Once that's done I'll get round to trying to fix the pre-existing no target and multi-target errors. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 16:52, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

Having split the article, and fixed the resulting issue and re-existing errors (big thanks to DuncanHill), it's apparent that the part of the issue is a very bad case of WP:OVERCITE. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 19:17, 18 August 2023 (UTC)