Talk:Cairns (disambiguation)

Requested move 9 May 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. There is no consensus for this requested move. (closed by non-admin page mover) qedk (t 桜 c) 14:00, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

---

• Cairns (disambiguation) → Cairns
• Cairns → Cairns, Queensland

– WP:ASTONISH. While the city is probably primary by PT#1 given that readers and editors are used to seeing titles at the singular form. However this is just NC and in the real world and in other areas of Wikipedia objects are frequently pluralized such as Category:Windows, Crickets as pets, Lists of books and {{Closed stations Norfolk}}. Although unlikely, articles could be written at List of Cairns or Cairns on Blencathra. Cairn gets more views that Cairns [[1]]. The proposed title was the title until June 2011 when an undiscussed move was made but presumably "Cairns" redirected there so it wasn't controversial. The stack is probably primary by PT#2 and thus per WP:NOTPRIMARY there should be no primary topic for the plural. At Commons there is Commons:Category:Cairns, Queensland for the city, Commons:Category:Cairns (rock stack landmarks) for the stack and Commons:Category:Cairns is a disambiguation page but the stack used to be primary (until 2014). The city is named after William Cairns and the surname derives from the stack. Crouch, Swale (talk) 17:40, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support per nom - no clear primary topic. As such, the best bet would be to move the disambiguation page to the basename. Paintspot Infez (talk) 17:54, 9 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose Cairns in plural form most commonly refers to the city. Most people searching for "cairns" with an S would be looking for the Australian tourist destination. feminist (talk) 02:59, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose, this city in Australia is the most used this name. Subtropical-man (✉ | en-2) 14:17, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
• Support - City is not a clear primary topic, especially given it was named after someone with that surname and due to the simple plural of cairn. -- Netoholic @ 19:21, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
• Support, per nominator's reasonable explanation of why there is an absence of a primary topic for this term. bd2412 T 15:45, 13 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:PLURALPT. "Being named after" explicitly not a criterion of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. And when there is a separate usage of what looks like a plural form, separate titles are common (like at Wall/Walls for example). Dohn joe (talk) 16:42, 13 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose making any changes until the proposal can be better explained to all readers in plain English and not Wikipedia-ese. What do the following terms or phrases mean?
• ASTONISH (I understand what the word means, but as a standalone sentence it is nonsensical)
• PT#1
• PT#2
• "this is just NC"
• "The stack"

Chrisclear (talk) 05:30, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

• @Chrisclear: PT#1 means the 1st criteria of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, namely "A topic is primary for a term with respect to usage if it is highly likely—much more likely than any other single topic, and more likely than all the other topics combined—to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term." which would likely be the city (currently titled Cairns). PT#2 means the 2nd criteria namely "A topic is primary for a term with respect to long-term significance if it has substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic associated with that term." which would likely be the stack (currently titled Cairn).

  "this is just NC" means that Wikipedia has a rule (WP:PLURAL) that says that when a topic is known by both the singular and plural, its generally titled using the singular, while WP:PLURALPT does point out "Because readers and editors are used to seeing titles at the singular form, and can be expected to search for them/link to them in the singular form, the intentional use of a plural form by a reader or editor can be evidence that a separate primary topic exists at the plural form" WP:PRIMARYREDIRECT does point out "The title of the primary topic article may be different from the ambiguous term. This may happen when the topic is primary for more than one term, when the article covers a wider topical scope, or when it is titled differently according to the naming conventions. When this is the case, the term should redirect to the article (or a section of it). The fact that an article has a different title is not a factor in determining whether a topic is primary." In this case although out naming conventions specify that the article on the pile of stones (stack) is titled Cairn (not Cairns) we still need to take into account the likelihood of readers searching for "Cairns" looking for that article and also the topic's long-term significance for the plural to. Crouch, Swale (talk) 08:19, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

  And WP:ASTONISH refers to the Principle of least astonishment that is to say people searching for "Cairns" would be surprised to land on the Australian city if they were looking for the stack but people looking for the Australian city would probably not be surprised to land on the stack, however landing on the DAB (neither city or stack) seems like the best outcome. Crouch, Swale (talk) 16:13, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support this move 2601:541:4500:1760:AD9D:4546:8005:5CB7 (talk) 18:20, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose - I would be WP:ASTONISHed if I landed at anything other than the Queensland town if I typed this term into the search box. Certainly typing it into Google yields primarily results about that. A hatnote is perfectly sufficient for the few users who may be looking for an article about a cairn and type in the plural. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 22:14, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.