Talk:Robert Williams (actor, born 1894)

Requested move 26 October 2021

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Moved as proposed. Consensus is clear and well-supported in policy. BD2412 T 01:23, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

Robert Williams (actor) → Robert Williams (actor, born 1894) – Ambiguous with Robert B. Williams (actor). 207.161.86.162 (talk) 05:39, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

• @207.161.86.162: Aside from the fact that he wasn't born in 1904, it's not necessary. Both articles already have hatnotes. It's easier to find each actor that way than on the Robert Williams dab page. Station1 (talk) 05:52, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

  @Station1: Whoops, that was a typo. In any case, as far as I can see, the article fails to meet the standards to qualify as the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Are you suggesting that you believe it qualifies? 207.161.86.162 (talk) 06:17, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

  No, they are two different titles, so primary topic is irrelevant. Station1 (talk) 06:45, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

  @Station1: Why does that make it irrelevant? "Robert Williams (actor)" is "a word, name, or phrase [that] may refer to more than one topic", as WP:PRIMARYTOPIC puts it. Per said guideline, in such cases, the ambiguous term should serve as the title of (or a redirect to) one of the articles if there is a primary topic. And "if no primary topic exists, then the term should be the title of a disambiguation page (or should redirect to a disambiguation page on which more than one term is disambiguated)." 207.161.86.162 (talk) 06:55, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

  As far as I can tell, Robert B. Williams was usually known with that middle initial, and that serves as WP:NATURAL disambiguation. Unless we plan to move that article to Robert Williams (actor, born 1904), there's no reason to move the 1894 actor. "Robert Williams" and "Robert B. Williams" are more distinctive titles than "born 1894" and "born 1904" (how many readers would know who is who based on birth year?). And you'd still need hatnotes anyway. Station1 (talk) 07:05, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

This is a contested technical request (permalink). Anthony Appleyard (talk) 09:03, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

• @207.161.86.162 and Station1: queried move request Anthony Appleyard (talk) 09:04, 26 October 2021 (UTC)
• Support. Clearly incomplete disambiguation. Hatnotes are irrelevant. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:37, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
• Support. While I believe that WP:SMALLDETAILS has some application here and there is a preference for WP:NATURAL and there are existing hatnotes -- while looking into cases such as John F. Kennedy (yes, not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison) - but even with an extremely well known middle initial, we still do a WP:PRIMARYREDIRECT for John Kennedy - and thus, it is completely understandable that we would need to make similar considerations for Robert B. Williams. And since neither are clearly the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC we need further disambiguation. TiggerJay (talk) 16:31, 27 October 2021 (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. No further edits should be made to this section.