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Small and with no potential for growth

In this diff [1] Radiant changed the text of the "small and with no potential for growth" section, without any prior discussion here that I can see. His edit summary read "let's not make this a strict limit of 3, per WP:CREEP and the fact that any limit is as arbitrary as the next one". Predictably, the effect of this has been the exact opposite of that intended in terms of WP:Creep, as this part of the guideline is currently being quoted in support of the deletion of categories with 7 and 26 members. In fact it is very regularly referred to in CfD debates in favour of deletions of categories with what I imagine are over-average numbers of members. I remember Radiant once suggested on my talk page 25 members as an appropriate minimum number for a category, which I would suggest is a very extreme view, not shared by most editors. I propose restoring the "two or three" wording, unless there is a consensus in favour of the new wording, or something else. The current wording uses "few" rather than the "handful" Radiant changed it to. I would suggest both are unacceptably imprecise for a guideline. Johnbod 20:50, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

  • I think "few" is reasonable and I see no need to put a definite number on it. Most people are going to understand that a category with 20 or 25 members is not likely to fall under the guideline. A category that is otherwise unsuitable based on lack of growth potential shouldn't be kept just because it happens to have four members. Otto4711 22:13, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
  • The idea behind CREEP is that rules should not replace reasonableness because rules can often be applied without reason. I also think "few" is reasonable. The number will vary in different situations. -- ☑ SamuelWantman 22:24, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Debates at CfD clearly show that without a number there will be endless arguments about what "few" means. One editor not so long ago cited this guideline in favour of deleting a category with over 54 members (some singers category I think). Otto is citing it in respect of a category with seven in the debate I linked to above. Is this reasonable? Who is to say? Radiant himself thinks 25 is a minumum number, to judge by his comment to me. Is that reasonable? Again, who is to say? What exactly does "A category that is otherwise unsuitable based on lack of growth potential shouldn't be kept just because it happens to have four members" mean? That is a circular argument - there has to be a minimum number where a "closed" category can be kept, but what is it? We had a stable policy with a number, which has now been changed to an open-ended one, which will lead to endless argument. Johnbod 00:05, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I have not offered an opinion in the CFD in question. Someone else raised the guideline, you objected based on the number and I quoted the actual numberless guideline. Otto4711 01:54, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Better than a number is clear criteria for when to delete a category with a small number of potential articles. My criteria would be one or more of the following:
  • The members of the category are obvious or trivial (like natural satellites of the earth)
  • All of the few articles listed in the category would be easy to find linked from the eponymous article.
  • The articles listed could be replaced by a "See also" section in the eponymous article.
If this were the criteria, the discussion about deleting a category with 50 odd members would focus on whether the members are easily found in the eponymous article. If a category is duplicating the navigation provided by the eponymous article, there's often nothing gained by creating the category. People wanting to keep the category should identify what is added by having the category. This could be because it completes a hierarchy, organizes the links alphabetically (and this is needed), collects the links in one place, etc... -- ☑ SamuelWantman 01:01, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I note that you are happy to consider the possibility that a category with 50 members is too small to survive, so rather undercutting Otto's argument above that "Most people are going to understand that a category with 20 or 25 members is not likely to fall under the guideline". What is "obvious and trivial" is, I would suggest, often harder to decide than what is "few", especially in transatlantic contexts. A great number of categories - probably the majority - do not in fact have "eponymous articles", and the "ease" of finding links in main articles, where they exist, also seems to be viewed very differently by many editors. I agree all of the things you mention are relevant factors, but in practice most contributors to CfD simply don't consider nominations in that sort of detail (unfortunately - & not including Otto in that). It is all too plain that many never look at either the articles in the category or any main article. Johnbod 01:37, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't disagree with your assessment of the problem. There is certainly a bit of dysfunction with many of Wikipedia's processes. There are oodles of things I'd like to change about our xFD processes. I don't think the way out of the dysfunction is to create more specific rules. That would just encourage a culture with more wiki-lawyering. As soon as there is a precise rule, people start gaming the rules to fit their own personal agendas, rather than considering the underlying principles. The only solution I see is that of encouraging the accommodation of differences, and emphasizing the importance of reasonable discussion by reasonable people. Discussions must be based on principles instead of rules. That is the essence of "Ignore all rules". -- ☑ SamuelWantman 03:11, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't know about the rest, but "3" wasn't an arbitrary number. It was determined from several CfD discussions that "4" was the minimum number for a stand-alone category. Anything less could be more easily dealt with in the articles themselves. (Top-of-the-page navigation, or see also, or even linked within the article text). Obviously more than 3 can be done that way, but that seemed to be the agreed upon number. Now if there is a "new consensus" that I've missed, please inform me : ) - jc37 17:05, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

That's interesting, and before I was a CfD regular. In reply to Sam - this is not about 'creating more specific rules' as the old version had been in place for as long as I can remember, and without causing any problems that I was aware of, or have ever seen anyone complaining about. Nor is it all all clear what principles would guide whether, for example, 7 is "few", or is an appropriate number of members for a particular category. But in any case CfD is not really the sort of forum where that issue can be explored at an appropriate length anyway. Johnbod 02:16, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
And you do not have a group until you have at least 3. Doczilla 22:29, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
In my experience, people who feel the need to invoke "Ignore all rules" generally do so (a) rather than learn the rules or (b) because they can't logically defend their positions any other way. Doczilla 22:01, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
Not generally true, though often true of those who are just beginning to learn Wikipedia's ways : ) - jc37 (talk) 17:53, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
  • I still don't like it because, as I noted on Wikipedia talk:What Wikipedia is not, I think it's not a very clear statement of why we don't like categories. I think all the examples listed in that section fail for reasons that would provide a stronger philosophical basis for deletion -- two are relational categories, categorizing people by their relationship to someone else; the third (Catalan-speaking countries) is I think better thought of as a non-defining attribute (categorizing countries by language). But some small categories without growth potential might be otherwise needed, to fill out a logical and sensible category tree; e.g., some division of monarchs by era. --Lquilter (talk) 19:40, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Question about Ocat/Small

Sorry I missed the above discussion, but I have a question/comment. What, exactly, are categories for? Me personally, I thought they were "groupings of related pages". So what's the deal with categories with one article in them? Is this really necessary, even if it's "part of a wider scheme"? This seems to be a cruel joke. (Click here, reader, and we'll show you other articles related to this one. HA! Sucker! There aren't any!) I know, the "wider scheme" argument. Still doesn't make sense. Categorizing one article by itself makes as much sense as creating empty categories because it's part of the "wider scheme". Is there any way we can add something so that a category should have at least two articles? Two is a grouping, one is not. ok, rant off --Kbdank71 16:11, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Categories are not only for navigation from the bottom up (article to category), but also as a means of organizing and dividing information from the top down (large grouping to smaller grouping). It seems only because of the latter that there would ever be a good reason to create a category with a single listing, and only because it makes the organization clearer. The archetypal example of this is albums by performer. With a prohibition of single member categories, there would not be subcategories for many of the performers, and someone navigating the category from the larger grouping would probably not understand the why all the groups with only one article were missing, nor would it help the process of navigating. So in these cases nothing is really lost by adding the category, but there is something gained. -- ☑ SamuelWantman 11:16, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Performances by performer

Example: Films by actor (2006 April 3), Films by actor (2006 November 13)
Avoid categorizing what a performer has performed. This is better suited to a list.

I split this off from Performers by performance, since, as shown, it was the reverse. It's essentially categorising an actor's filmography. However, it occurs to me that this is not supported as such a general rule. The best example would be Category:Songs by artist. So this seems that it should be renamed, at least. Or perhaps just removed, to be more of a case-by-case basis? - jc37 18:55, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

There is a case to be made that songs are poorly organized in their current categorization. It seems sensible to organize songs by their composers and lyricists, however it doesn't make sense to categorize it by everyone who has covered the song. This would be much better handled by a list tacked on to the end of each song article. Likewise, it would make sense to have lists of songs for each performer. Some songs, like Blowin' in the Wind were covered by hundreds of performers. Currently, that article is only in four artist categories. This can lead to the problem of deciding which categories it gets included in and which does not. I don't see an easy fix for this, other than listifying all the categories. This certainly isn't a battle I want to take on! -- ☑ SamuelWantman 04:24, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Performer by performance - general to specific

May we please exercise a little WP:SENSE and leave in the sentence about not categorizing people by the broader project when a category for their specific role in the project would not be retained? It should be pretty much a no-brainer that, if we don't characterize a performer by their performance in a creative endeavour that we sould not categorize them under the endeavour either. That rather defeats the purpose of the consensus against such categorization. Otto4711 (talk) 18:37, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

A couple of problems with this page

I was directed to this page as part of a recent CfD discussion with User:Lquilter. I'd like to mention a couple of problems I see with the guidelines here.

  • The page makes inappropriate use of the concept of notability. For instance: In general, categorize by what may be considered notable in a person's life, such as his or her career, origin and major accomplishments. I understand and agree with the sentiments, but the Wikipedia concept of notability cannot be used as a scale to rate aspects of a person's life (and the word "notable" in the sentence above is linked to the page on notability, exacerbating the problem). Here is a similar use with a similar problem: In general, the winners of all but the most notable awards should be put in a list rather than a category. On Wikipedia, notability is a binary concept: something meets the notability criteria, or it does not.
  • There are some weasel words that need fixing. For instance: In general, categorize by what may be considered notable in a person's life, such as his or her career, origin and major accomplishments. In contrast, someone's tastes in food, their favorite holiday destination, or the number of tattoos they have may be considered trivial. In the second sentence, "may be" are weasel words. If those things are generally considered trivial, we should say that; otherwise, we need to find better examples.
  • Generally, the page needs to do a better job of linking to discussions that document the consensus behind the principles it elucidates. For instance, the discussion linked to in the "Award winners" section (Miss Virginia Teen USA) provides only an example of a very specific reason for deleting a specific "award winners" category, rather than illustrating the more general consensus for limiting the number of "award winners" categories. Each type of undesirable category should be linked to one discussion, or a few discussions, with cogent arguments as to why this kind of category is generally undesirable.

Please take these suggestions in the spirit in which they are offered -- as suggested improvements. I don't mean to criticize, but to help users who are more experienced in this area improve this page. On that note, I'd like to say that the reason for my last bullet point is that I think a page like this does well to carefully document, for editors new to the area, what the consensus is and where it comes from. --Tkynerd (talk) 00:30, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think this is helpful, and Tkynerd is quite right -- there should be better examples linked. (In fact, I would love to see more documentation of CFDs in each example. Maybe this has been proposed and rejected before?). --Lquilter (talk) 18:35, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, actually. It was decided that too many examples tends to crowd the page, making it more difficult to read. (I had added quite a few examples to Performers by performance at one point : )
That said, there are several sections that could probably use a few more examples, and some more current examples would also be welcome. - jc37 20:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Incidentally, I note that the lead post seems to be describing mostly the award winners and trivia sections. We're discussing the Award winners in a section below. I placed a comment on the trvia section around when this page was first created saying: "This section could really use some cleanup for concise clarity." Suggestions are welcome : ) - jc37 20:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Bad use of good categories

A related but distinct phenomenon is the application of overly general categories, such as filing a writer directly in Category:Literature instead of in the appropriate national and/or genre subcategories of Category:Writers. With rare exceptions, this type of general categorization should only be used as a temporary measure where either an appropriate subcategory does not exist or the editor is having trouble locating it due to unclear use of naming conventions. The article should almost always be diffused as soon as possible into the most appropriate subcategory.
Again with some rare exceptions, articles should not normally be filed in duplicate categories, either. That is, if an article is filed in Category:American literary magazines, do not also file it in Category:Literary magazines or Category:American magazines.

I'd like to suggest that this page should also add a subsection for the type of overcategorization that occurs when people misinterpret the purpose of a category that is otherwise valid. The example I most commonly encounter is the addition of a highway category such as Category:Interstate 75 to specific towns or cities that happen to be located on that highway. The category itself is valid for other purposes, such as bridges on the highway route, 3di spur Interstates, local names such as Mill Creek Expressway where those are significant enough for separate articles, and on and so forth — but applying it to individual cities on the highway route is pure OCAT.

Another example that I come across often is the addition of a tangentially-related thematic category, such as filing a writer in Category:Parachuting on the basis that they once wrote a book about skydiving. Bearcat (talk) 02:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

This would seem to be beyond the range of WP:OC. It sounds like more something that might be added to WP:CAT or perhaps even its own page. (In other words, it's not overcategorisation, it's mis-categorisation.) - jc37 17:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Award winners

Discussion

Award winners
Example: Miss Virginia Teen USA
In general, the winners of all but the most notable awards should be put in a list rather than a category. It may be useful to note the awards in the recipients' article. If an award doesn't have an article, it certainly doesn't need a category (and not every award that has an article needs a category).

I attempted a re-write per the concerns above.

Award winners
Example: Miss Virginia Teen USA
If there is no article for an award, then recipients of the award should not be categorised (and not every award that has an article should have a category of recipients). In general (though there are a few exceptions to this), recipients of an award should be put in a list rather than in a category.

However, in looking over Category:Award winners, I am doubting that this is accurate. Especially since I recall that (for some time) this section didn't even have any actual CfD examples. (I found the current example after some searching.)

This seems to be something that should be discussed on a case-by-case basis at CfD. Especially in terms of whether the award winners should be grouped as a list or a category (or both). - jc37 18:16, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The category Category:Award winners (and Category:Medalists which should really be merged) have for the most part not been pruned. Most award-winner categories that go to CFD are listified and deleted. I'm basing this on about a year's worth of watching CFD, so perhaps someone else has greater history with it than me. There definitely need to be better examples and better wording, though. --Lquilter (talk) 18:37, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Both categories seem ripe for a group nom to determine naming convention. I seem to recall that we had a previous consensus of:
  • X laureates
  • X medalists
  • X recipients (but only if the category wasn't more accurate as one of the above two names.)
If this is done, then laureates and medalists would be subcats of Category:Award recipients (the more accurate name, though "award winners" should probably be kept as a soft-redirect). - jc37 18:46, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Group nom for naming convention is the right way to go; I just did one for Category:Medalists, but please speak up & I/we can amend the nom to broaden the discussion as needed. I don't see the need for the subcats, myself, but definitely group discussion would be helpful. --Lquilter (talk) 21:03, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I'll be happy to nominate (or you can, if you wish), though help with the tagging would be welcome (know anyone with a bot/tool who could help?) - jc37 22:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
No, sadly; lack of a mac-bot is one of the things that's held me back from some mass category cleanups. --Lquilter (talk) 03:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • On another subject, I don't think this needed to be removed from the front while it was being rewritten. Despite the flurry of responses to the awards I proposed, I don't think we can conclude (certainly not from in-process discussions) that consensus has changed and the OC guidance on award-winners categories is no longer valid. The comment above correctly pointed out some issues that need clarification and I think it can be improved, but I think it can be done while the text is in the guideline. --Lquilter (talk) 03:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
    I'm not necessarily saying "Consensus has changed", I'm saying that I don't think that there ever has been consensus. I'm even noting that even the example I found concerning Miss USA is a poor example, since it was merely deleted because it duplicated (!) another category. With no references to CFD discussions, this section just doesn't meet the page criteria. - jc37 06:16, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • If I recall correctly, this was not a controversial proposal. I'll add more to Otto's list below; it will help us pick better examples. My sense (and we'll see if I'm right) is that top military/civilian awards, top science prizes, and top arts awards of various sorts have survived, and lots of others have been deleted. --Lquilter (talk) 22:30, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Some examples

proposal please

Summary of CFD archives on award-winner categories:

  • The anti-award-winner policy started taking shape in late 2006 / early 2007.
  • "Nominees for awards" categories are always out so far as I can tell.
  • Honorary citizenship categories are always out.
  • Honorary degree holders categories are out.
  • Top-X list categories always get deleted.
  • American ethnic or heritage intersections with award-winner categories always get deleted, although national subcategories of some major award-winer categories (e.g., Nobel laureates) are kept.
  • Other award-winner categories are a subjective call -- even fairly significant ones (Springarn) sometimes get deleted, while others are retained. Grey-area distinctions are hard to call or guess at and current policy provides little clear guidance.

All CFDs that I could dig out relating to award-winners are above (in the "show/hide" green section). There are scores of them, and I summarized my sense above. Can we please get some consensus on whether this should be in or out of WP:OCAT (I think clearly "in") and what language to use? (I was fine with the earlier language although I think it can be written more beautifully and needs a better example.). If you think it should not be in WP:OCAT, please sing out and explain your thoughts. --Lquilter (talk) 03:22, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

  • How about something like In general, the winners of all but the most notable awards should be put in a list rather than a category. People can and do win a number of awards or honors through their lives. Categorizing by every award or honor will lead to category clutter. While there is no bright-line rule for what qualifies as "the most notable," a good rule of thumb is to consider whether, upon being introduced, the person would be likely to be identified in terms of winning the award. "Nobel laureate" is likely to meet this standard. "Kids Choice Award winner" likely does not. Considering whether the award has an article is also a useful guideline. If an award doesn't have an article, it certainly doesn't need a category (and not every award that has an article needs a category). Otto4711 (talk) 18:35, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Well, I like the example (obviously), and in general you've phrased it well -- I particularly like the acknowledgment that this is not a bright line situation. I might tweak the wording to:
In general, the winners of all but the most notable awards should be put in a list rather than a category. People can and do win a number of awards or honors through their lives. Categorizing by every award or honor will lead to category clutter. While there is no bright-line rule for what qualifies as "the most notable," a good rule of thumb is to consider whether, upon being introduced to a general audience, the person would be likely to be identified in terms of winning the award. "Nobel laureate" is likely to meet this standard. "Kids Choice Award winner" likely does not. Considering whether the award has an article is also a useful guideline. If an award doesn't have an article, it certainly doesn't need a category (and not every award that has an article needs a category).
My edit in bold. --Lquilter (talk) 19:07, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Good addition. Otto4711 (talk) 19:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
JC37, the editor who took it out, had said that they weren't sure if there had been consensus, and had indicated that in searching the archives all they could find was the Miss Virginia Teen USA AFD. Unfortunately, that editor hasn't edited since the 21st, so we haven't heard back as to whether the concerns were satisfied. In light of the scores of AFDs I listed above, I think it's sufficiently demonstrated that there is consensus on AFDs, and that the text should go back in. Unless there's a good objection in the next day or two, I think we should put it back in. It doesn't help readers to come to this page & not see "award-winners" on the front, when there is such strong evidence that AW cats get deleted at a high frequency. --Lquilter (talk) 12:44, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
JC37 is back from wikibreak, so will hopefully be able to look at this soon. --Lquilter (talk) 12:58, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
As I noted on your talk page, the list is impressive : )
I'm having a hard time keeping count, would someone be willing to help list what's left after all the discussions above? (In other words, which award recipient categories currently exist.) - jc37 22:30, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Are you asking for a list of which ones have survived CFD? The current categories are at Category:Award winners and subcats, although of course not all of them have gone through CFD. --Lquilter (talk) 14:21, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
So can we honestly say that that grouping/listing is a group of the "most notable" (whatever that means), or are we saying that we're actually suggesting deleting the "least notable" (whatever else that may mean), as overcategorisation? - jc37 21:44, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

[undent] (1) (r to Jc37's question) I believe we are saying that if categories are not "defining", they are deleted as overcategorization. It appears to me that categories that are defining to a general audience (the Nobel) are definitively kept. Do you have some proposed different wording, or can you spell out the section that you think is ambiguous? (2) Also, again, I note that from CFD it does not appear to me that consensus has changed on this issue; by far most award-winner categories that go through CFD are deleted. There have been another ten or a dozen that completed since I finished the list and, if I recall correctly, virtually all were deleted citing this guideline. It needs to be put back in. Jc37, do you agree? --Lquilter (talk) 14:31, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Restored

I've merged and "edited down" the various versions of above, and restored the section to the main page. I didn't add any examples from the above, since there are so many, and probably should be discussed at this point. - jc37 11:10, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
Man, I wish I'd noticed this back in February. What's included in the guideline is incredibly different from what's been proposed here, so different that it does not reflect IMHO any sense of having been "edited down" so much as "created from the whole cloth." The existing guideline as written gives very little guidance, as evidenced by a number of current and recent CFDs with comments along the lines of "the Nobel Prize is too high of a standard to set". I don't believe the version as written reflects consensus and I do believe the proposed wording (with modification for I hope added clarity) does. So I would propose that the existing guideline be replaced with:

In general, many award winners should be put in lists rather than categories. People can and do win a number of awards or honors through their lives. Categorizing by every award or honor will lead to category clutter. While there is no bright-line rule for what qualifies for categorization, a good rule of thumb is to consider whether, upon being introduced to a general audience, the person would be likely to be identified in terms of winning the award. "Nobel laureate" is likely to meet this standard. "Kids Choice Award winner" likely does not. Considering whether the award has an article is also a useful guideline. If an award doesn't have an article, it certainly doesn't need a category (and not every award that has an article needs a category). Reliable sources that attest to the prestige or notability conveyed by receiving the award may also bolster the case for categorization.

Otto4711 (talk) 09:41, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'm not sure how one is that much different than the other (except to be perhaps more "wordy" : )
I don't strongly oppose it's inclusion, if it can be made a bit more concise. - jc37 18:37, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

More thinking

Working with awards and award-winners and CFDs -- and now TFDs! -- all this time it occurred to me that perhaps the best solution is a single compressed template. So, I drafted Template:Awardwinners; other editors' thoughts would be appreciated. Maybe it'll work, maybe not, but I thought I'd at least ping some other folks involved in award-winner discussions for their opinions and thoughts. --Lquilter (talk) 19:19, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Examples

Repeating my request from above for some discussion about which examples to use. - jc37 22:34, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

See also my proposal above to expand the guideline to offer more guidance, which includes Kids' Choice Awards as another example. Otto4711 (talk) 09:49, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

CfD about years in Ireland

There is an ongoing CfD at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 January 30#Years in Ireland. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:23, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Populating primary categories

Please see Wikipedia talk:Categorization#Populating primary categories (a place for central discussion following Wikipedia:VPP#Some thoughts on categories and User talk:Betacommand/20081201#Over-categorization). More opinions are needed. Carcharoth (talk) 07:17, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Categories by association

Lquilter makes a very good point during this CFD discussion about how "performer by performance" categorization is a problem because it "is roughly the equivalent of "people by association". It's not a good model for categorizing people, because each person hias many, many associations, with other people, entities, and so on, and the nature of the association itself is not specified by the category, leaving it altogether too vague." This statement helped me crystallize my current dissatisfaction with the categorization system. "Categorization by association" is endemic, and a deterrent to a more rational and useful system. An egregious example that jumps out at me is all the "People from..." categories. Categorizing people by where they were born, where they died, when they were born, when they died, etc... is Categorization by association. There is nothing inherently notable about these categories, and they can proliferate like a cancer. It is hard to police the removal of categories when so many categories like these that have been the foundation of our categorization system. Most of our "fooian fooer" categories are categorization by association. For a good number of occupations, nationality is irrelevant.

On the other hand, these association categories are very popular, and many people find them useful. I doubt that support could be mustered for their wholesale removal from the project. There is an alternative middle path that was hinted at by a comment I saw recently by Carcharoth (I forget where). It is possible to create pseudo-categories for these associations. The pages could have a link to the "what links here" tool that would generate a list. For example, instead of Category:People from California there would be People from California. I've mocked up People from California as an example of what I am proposing. Here's how it would work. Instead of adding the "People from California" category to a page, we would add a link to People from California whenever a page mentions that a person is from California. For example, in the article about John Steinbeck it might say "Steinbeck moved briefly to New York City, but soon returned home to California to begin his career as a writer." This adds the link to People from California from the article. When you follow the link to People from California you would find something that looks like a disambiguation page, but with the addition of a link to the "what links here" tool.

The big problem with this idea is that the "What links here" tool is not alphabetized, and doesn't have a table of contents. This has been a long standing problem with the tool, and maybe if there is support for this idea, the developers can be persuaded to upgrade the tool. Perhaps in the interim, this scheme for replacing categories could be use to replace small categories (less than 200 members?) so that the larger groupings can be repopulated (see the section above this one about repopulating categories). I previously suggested some other upgrades to "What links here" which you can see here. -- ☑ SamuelWantman 21:55, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree absolutely that Wikipedia:Link intersection was a great idea. Please try and find a friendly developer to do something with it and make "what links here" more useful. Carcharoth (talk) 23:45, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
  • If you do talk to a developer, post here -- I'll be happy to join in. What links here is sadly underused and most editors don't even know about it. But it could provide an enormously useful navigation aid. --Lquilter (talk) 14:41, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
  • I also want to add that the people by birthplace, people from X, and X births are -- in addition to "by association" categories -- basically database categories, which violate another longstanding and frequently quoted rationale "Wikipedia is not a database". This is tricky because wikipedia is a database in some form, but what most editors meant, I take it, is that wikipedia articles do not have fielded content. User:BrownHairedGirl tried to define and explain this tenet for use as a rule but there was insufficient consensus. But, there's no question that the categories Sam mentions don't really live up to WP:CAT's "defining" and do seem like WP:OCAT's "overcategorization", but they're often kept because of the need for some kinds of fielded content. --Lquilter (talk) 14:45, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Please take a look at the proposals at WT:CAT

Please take a look at the discussion about repopulating categories mentioned above, and related proposals, especially this one which proposes creating hidden categories along with repopulated parent categories. This could have a radical effect on categorization policy and potentially reduce category clutter and make overcategorization much less of a problem. -- ☑ SamuelWantman 09:52, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Automobile awards

I was reading how "In general (though there are a few exceptions to this), recipients of an award should be grouped in a list rather than a category." I noticed Category:Automobile awards which has five sub-categories:

I think they should be deleted if those are the rules at Wikipedia:Overcategorization. But I tried to read the instructions at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion for deleting "group of similar categories or a category and its subcategories" and it all seemed very complicated. Is there a more experienced administrator who agrees with me and who could complete the nominations of them? I would be scared I would not fill out everything correctly. Chryslerforever1988 (talk) 23:20, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Just for the record, you are not what Wikipedia calls an administrator. All users can nominate categories for deletion but only administrators can delete them. (I'm not making the nomination) PrimeHunter (talk) 23:28, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
Okay I think I did this properly. They are all nominated at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2008_March_2#Category:Dewar_Trophy. @PrimeHunter, What I meant was "I (a new user) find it complicated, could a more experienced user (like an administrator) help with the nomination. Chryslerforever1988 (talk) 18:11, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Restrictions on talk page content

It seems quite against the spirit of Wikipedia to restrict talk page content. Also, the restriction does not seem to be followed in several comments. I removed the infobox containing the restriction. Libcub (talk) 19:16, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

You misunderstand. This isn't a talk page restriction. It's a restriction to the guideline. - jc37 18:26, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Redheads

I understand where you're coming from but I disagree with having red hair being listed so prominently as a trivial characteristic. I'm also surprised to see that the List of Redheads refered to in that category's deletion page has also disappeared. I think a category might be too much but I don't think a list would hurt, especially if it was restricted to, say, pre-20th century. There are people unaware of their African American descent that self-identify as European American (Caucasian / White). There are some people that self-identify as Asian Australian or European Australian depending on what seems right at the time. Yul Brynner was often westernized for film, but far easternized for "The King and I" and he wasn't Thai at all. What I'm trying to say is yes; people can now change their hair colour but some of our other ethnic groupings are not set is stone either. Besides, people couldn't choose to change their hair colour before last century and there is concern amongst redheads that the genes expressing red hair are being bred out of existence. Besides during adulthood, hair colour usually doesn't change naturally aside from graying and it would be quite rare for hair to spontaneously become red, but baldness does naturally occur during adulthood and it is easier to choose to become bald. I think favourite colour, zodiac signs or righthandedness are more trivial categories than redheadedness. Mayhaps, the point that hair colour can to some extent be considered subjective renders my argument useless. If consensus is that no such list may appear, that's fine but, please, remove it from this page; it is a tender point for some.

I just read further down that:

people should only be categorized by ethnicity or religion if this has significant bearing on their career.

Maybe that's why a list shouldn't exist. Children and adolescents receive different treatment if they have red hair, which may affect their development, but as adults their treatment is not especially different. That is, unless they are performers, but wigs have been around for centuries. :)--Thecurran (talk) 17:18, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

LGBT categories

The collective categories under the trunk Category:LGBT are causing some interesting situations. There's currently a discussion of LGBT people and culture categories. Cats like "LGBT writers" can be split into the obvious four subcats (gay writers, lesbian writers...), but they can also be split by location (LGBT writers from Canada, LGBT writers from France, etc) and then further subdivided into the four obvious ones (gay writers from Canada, bisexual writers from France, etc). So the discussion is whether that works or whether that leads to WP:OC#NARROW and/or WP:OVERCAT. Your participation in the discussion are welcomed. -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 03:04, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

"Death by age" categories

Please see Wikipedia talk:Death by age#Should we have these categories, where a discussion is being formed on this topic. Sebwite (talk) 18:06, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

That's no reason to revert an existing guideline. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:21, 2 October 2008 (UTC)
This guideline is based on "previous precedent at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion" so it shouldn't be difficult for you to provide a link to the CFD for such categories. The paragraph in question should not be re-added until a link is given. --Pixelface (talk) 23:34, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
CfD is difficult to search, but there is certainly a weak consensus that death by cause (with the exception of executions and suicides) is not appropriate. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:38, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
You can't just make shit up. Show me. --Pixelface (talk) 18:50, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
Per this guideline, it would be your responsibility to show consensus for inclusion. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:56, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
What are you talking about? I don't want to add anything to this guideline. You said "there is certainly a weak consensus that death by cause...is not appropriate" So cite the CFD about deaths by cause that closed as delete. And Bearcat should be able to cite the CFD prior to 2008-01-30 about age of death categories that closed as delete. You can't just claim consensus without any evidence to back it up. --Pixelface (talk) 04:48, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Category: Fictional murderers

I guess the only defense against adding God in Abrahamic religions to the category of fictional murderers is the subjectivity of the definition of murder, right? He did personally kill a lot of men, women, and children... but was it murder? Jwray (talk) 01:50, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Are you trying to provoke? Category:Fictional murderers and other categories under Category:Fictional characters are not for deities - unless maybe if they qualify for Category:Fictional deities. See the difference between that and Category:Deities. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:57, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Ignoring the applicability of "God" for a moment (and that sounded so odd to type), how do you suggest that we define who belongs in Category:Fictional murderers? What's the difference between killing and murder in terms of category inclusion? - jc37 03:18, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
I haven't studied the problem but Category:Fictional killers says "Fictional characters who have committed manslaughter". Category:Fictional murderers is a subcategory. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:56, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Roles by actor?

I know that categorizing actors by role is deprecated. But what about categorizing roles by actor? At the moment Astrid Peth is in Category:Kylie Minogue, but Charlene Robinson and Cammy are not. It seems to me that either Astrid Peth should be removed from the category, or the other two should be added to it, or all three should be moved to a new category Category:Characters played by Kylie Minogue, which would be a subcat of Category:Kylie Minogue. But I don't know which of the three is best practice. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 20:48, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Monty Python

A while ago, I created a page in WP called "List of things referred to in the works of Monty Python" which was subsequently deleted by the WP powers that be. But now I realize I was doing things the hard way. All that is needed is the creation of a "Referred to in the works of Monty Python" category, which would show the lot in one place, in automatically generated pages, rather than a page having to be maintained. Since the Pythons were so intellectual, they drew upon an enormous array of subjects, concepts, people in history (e.g. Otto Klemperer, Neville Shute, Spanish Inquisition, Cardinal Richelieu, King Arthur, Hegel, the Franco-Prussian Alliance, Semprini, Parrots, Llamas and Guatemala - so I feel this justifies the creation of such a category. In any case, the relevant sketch in question for most of the above has already been mentioned in its respective entry, so this is obviously something of interest to WP users. The category would provide a way of seeing just such references, rather than all mentions of Monty Python when you simply search for for "Monty Python" Johnalexwood (talk) 23:21, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

confusion over "defining"

I haven't been involved in very many CFDs, but the ones I've been in have always been plagued by a single problem: the issue of "defining". Many times people will argue that some category for a notable award should be deleted on the basis that it does not define the person. Indeed, for awards where people often go on to greater achievements, people will argue, look that certainly didn't "define" him/her right? For categories such as "Women Mathematician", someone may argue, it doesn't "define" the mathematician.

Reading this Overcategorization page, it seems clear that if something is a notable award or important part of their origin, then certainly the category for it is ok. But that's not at all clear from the usage of words like "defining". I suggest this "defining" usage be eliminated, as many people (even those that frequent CFDs) take it to mean that the category in question has to reflect something so important that it literally defines the person, e.g. person is known all over the world as being X Award winner. --C S (talk) 21:10, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Ethiopian female murderers

I don't think the Category:Ethiopian female murderers category is useful.128.83.206.192 (talk) 04:25, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

It is very sparsely populated (only 1 person), but it's a subcategory of Category:Female murderers by nationality. So, it exists to avoid over-population of the parent?
--William Allen Simpson (talk) 16:35, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Draft RfC

Following discussion at WT:CAT#Eponymous cats, I've begun drafting an RfC to determine what to do about articles with eponymous categories (e.g. should France be only in Category:France or in its natural categories as well). Input very welcome at Wikipedia:Categorization/Eponymous RFC.--Kotniski (talk) 06:11, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Disentangling race & ethnicity

We've a couple of related nominations, intended to help disentangle the many cross-categorization and category intersections that have arisen recently:

Should the first be successful, we must amend the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) and Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policies and related guidelines to clarify that "race" is not appropriate for categorization.

The second is somewhat dependent on the first. However, the inclusion of ethnic "origin" and "descent" is already against policy without notability, and these should never have been intermixed with the less contentious (more easily verifiable) nationality categories.

--William Allen Simpson (talk) 16:23, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Grouping of Delaware Museums

Delaware has 24 museum articles total. The New York state museum sub-cats were applied to Delaware with some well-intentioned editing so we now have 24 cats to group those 24 articles in, a ratio of 1:1. A discussion is occuring in the in the museum project at this link. Your thoughts would be welcome in that discussion.RevelationDirect (talk) 14:39, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

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