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Friend Andrewa, perhaps when you are able to find the time, the following has given me pause. I am now perplexed by the whole NAMECHANGES policy situation, and I will not attempt to close another similar RM until I can figure this out. Please help when you can. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. put'er there 00:18, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Distressing indeed. A blatant and unprovoked personal attack didn't help I am sure. Looking at it... may take a little while as I am frantic IRL and it's now quite involved. Wikipedia is not perfect. Andrewa (talk) 10:26, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for that! Please, take your time. The problems challenges aren't going anywhere. I never seek perfection, just excellence. Thanks again, my friend!P.I. Ellsworth , ed. put'er there 10:56, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I am compelled to wonder about how to go forward. What happened here is that a local consensus at RM was not sufficient to override the WP:NAMECHANGES article title policy, and yet another local consensus at MRV did override that policy and had the article moved to the new "official" name before it has become the WP:COMMONNAME as prescribed by the NAMECHANGES section of the policy. Was I not using "common sense", as at least one editor at MRV suggested? Well, that's done and in the past, so my question now must be: how should we go forward?
Should we ignore the plural "sources" that the NAMECHANGES policy requires? That policy requires "sources" that use the new name "routinely". When I closed that move request, there had been no – zero – independent sources given that used the new name routinely. There were several primary sources that noted the name change, and there were some secondary sources before the name change that announced there would be an expected name change, but there were no independent, secondary sources found after the name change that used the new name routinely. After I closed the RM, an editor was able to produce one independent source, patch.com, published the same day, 1 July 2024, that I closed the RM, that used the new name routinely. One independent, secondary source. To date, that is the only independent source that uses the new name routinely. Our policy says "sources". I've run into editors who think there should be 10 or 12 good, independent, secondary sources that use the new name routinely before that new name becomes the common name. In the past, I've been happy with 3 or 4 of those sources. Now I just don't know. The policy isn't specific as to the number of those sources needed, it just says "sources" – plural, more than one. Yet in this case, a page was moved to a new, official name based upon only one independent source that used the new name routinely.
I should also note my respect for WP:IAR, but I've always thought that to ignore a policy or guideline, and the community agreements that built them, requires very good reason. Nobody, not in the RM nor in the MRV, nobody gave a good reason to ignore the NAMECHANGES article title policy. Yet they did ignore it. So...
I don't know how we should go forward with move requests that have proposed a title change to a new, official name when there are no independent sources, or only one source, that uses the new name routinely, when there should be at the very least two "sources" as prescribed by the NAMECHANGES article title policy. Can anyone see this dilemma clearly and give me guidance as to how we should go forward?
After rereading [this other policy] about primary and secondary sources, maybe I was being too restrictive about using specifically secondary sources that used the new name routinely? I'm still at a loss to understand how to go forward. We are still supposed to give "due consideration to the relevant consensus of the Wikipedia community in general as reflected in applicable policy, guidelines and naming conventions",[1] aren't we?
One last thought... there is no way I would take this to the next level that would follow a MRV decision with which I disagree. Not my style. Worst comes to worst, I will just refrain from closing this type of RM and hope that whoever does close them will do a better job than I have done. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. put'er there 00:18, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]