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January 5[edit]

Category:Robber barons[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: DELETE. For the record, I absolutely discount entirely John Pack Lambert's contribution. -Splash - tk 19:31, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Because Robber baron is a derogatory "title of disdain", The Robber barons categorization confers its association on the subject categorized. It isn't much different than calling the person a crook; or their gains, ill-gotten.—John Cline (talk) 23:42, 5 January 2014 (UTC) —John Cline (talk) 23:42, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per nominator. The title is non-neutral, and while this stigmatising terminology was widely used, it amounts to a POV category. There is a already a list at Robber baron (industrialist).
    Note also that the term is ambiguous. Robber baron is about medieval barons, but this category consists of late-19th/early-20th century American industrialists. If kept, it should be renamed to clarify its scope. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:02, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per Wikipedia:POV. GenQuest "Talk to Me" 21:52, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete, slightly reluctantly. The category seems rather indiscriminate - was the first in it Herman Ossian Armour (Armour Meats) really one of these? Johnbod (talk) 10:05, 7 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • delete This is a sour grapes term coined by those who were not as good at running businesses.John Pack Lambert (talk) 00:31, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • Wow. JPL's oppose is every bit as POV as the category itself. By that logic, we'd keep a POV category if it was a term of adulation invented by other businesspeople :( --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:16, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - in theory, I have no problem with this, but it would be very hard to maintain any semblence of coherence. Bearian (talk) 23:46, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Island rivers of Oceania[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: REDIRECT to Category:River islands of Oceania. -Splash - tk 19:32, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Rename. This category is for islands in rivers, not rivers on islands. All other categories within this tree are in the form "River islands of...". Grutness...wha? 23:32, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Baptists in the United States[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: RENAME to Category:Baptist Christianity in the United States. -Splash - tk 21:03, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: This is constantly polluted with biographical articles which should be in Category:Baptists from the United States. This category is part of a tree about more generalized topics, not individual biographies. As long as it's named this way, individual biographical articles will be added ad infinitum. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:28, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • As category creator, I would support renaming if the right name could be found, but I'm not sure the proposed new name is the right one. This category is parallel to categories Category:Methodism in the United States, describing broadly defined denominational families. The word "Baptists" is what's used elsewhere in Wikipedia to cover the topic of various Baptist groups; I'm not aware that the various different Baptist groups belong to a discrete "Baptist movement" (unlike the Latter Day Saint movement). --Orlady (talk) 23:26, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Further comment: As it happens, most of the biographical articles in this category are (redundantly) in both this category and Category:Baptists from the United States, but don't belong in either category. These are articles about politicians and other people notable for something other than their religious activities; in most cases their religious affiliation isn't so much as mentioned in the article (although it sometimes is listed in an infobox). Merely being affiliated with a particular nomination some time in one's life if not generally considered a defining characteristic for purposes of categorization, so most of these people don't belong in any "Baptist" category. --Orlady (talk) 01:36, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Note I have just removed 18 biographical articles from this category. In 16 cases they were either already in the sub-Category:Baptists from the United States, and the other two were moved to that sub-cat. If anyone reckons that any of these pages don't belong in Category:Baptists from the United States, feel free to remove them. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:18, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
That's in addition to the 42 articles that I removed from the category a little while earlier. I checked each article to see if there was any indication that they belonged in a "Baptist" category; I left a few of them in either "Baptists from..." or "Baptist ministers from..." --Orlady (talk) 02:21, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • (ec) Tentative support. I agree that the current title is ambiguous, and that a clearer name is needed. The other subcats of Category:Protestantism in the United States use "Fooism", which is unworkable in this case, because "Baptism in the United States" would have a much broader meaning than intended.
    "Baptist movement" conveys the right scope, but is it established terminology? Or a neologism? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:51, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding the proposed "Baptist movement" nomenclature: It's not currently in use in Wikipedia, AFAICT. The main article for the category is entitled Baptists in the United States and is related to the article Baptists and Template:Baptist. --Orlady (talk) 01:36, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Would "baptist churches" or "baptist christianity" work? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:47, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
"Baptist churches" wouldn't work for this parent category. "Baptist Christianity" might work, but standard protocol says we shouldn't change the category name unless and until the names of the articles Baptists and Baptists in the United States are changed. --Orlady (talk) 02:18, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Standard protocol is regularly set aside when a category name is ambiguous. This is clearly one of those cases. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:04, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@BrownHairedGirl: "Baptist churches" could mean the physical structures, the local congregations (like First Baptist Church of Missoula), or an individual body (like the Southern Baptist Convention). That would be more ambiguous and prone to miscategorization. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:01, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Also, Category:Baptist churches in the United States already exists as a subcategory of this one. The "churches" category is used for local churches/congregations. (That's why I said it wouldn't work.) --Orlady (talk) 15:35, 7 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Koavf: fair point. So how about my other suggestion: "Baptist Christianity"? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:40, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@BrownHairedGirl: It certainly works. I don't know that I have a strong preference. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:42, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Smith/Carington family[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename to Category:Smith and Carington family. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:08, 17 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: WP:SLASH. If this can be intelligibly written without a slash, then it's preferable for technical reasons. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:18, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:People from Naples, Maine[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: MERGE as nominator'. -Splash - tk 19:49, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Per WP:SMALLCAT. Has only 3 entries ...William 18:25, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Magnates, moguls, and tycoons of the world[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: DELETE. -Splash - tk 19:34, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: * Ill-defined category; we already have categories with objective criteria, e.g. Category:Billionaires.
  • Peculiar list of people, including Johannes Gutenberg and Jimmy Wales, all added by the definer of the category, User:John Cline -- is this intended to be a list of "influential" people?
  • Main article is said to be Magnate, but none of the people in this list qualify by that article's definition. Macrakis (talk) 15:16, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. Undefined and wildly subjective category. I have no idea why Gutenberg is here. He actually was never successful economically. He was a skilled artisan who set up one business and rather quickly went bankrupt. If this remains, we might have categories like Category:Wild and Crazy Guys of the World.;-) Ecphora (talk) 17:43, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete -- Far too much POV is involved in any potential inclusion criteria. The creator may have major business people in mind. We might have merged with a businesspeople tree, but they are probably mostly in it already, and merging with the root category would be disruptive. Peterkingiron (talk) 19:41, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • (edit conflict) If you disagree that a particular subject belongs in a category, remove that subject from the category; I never intended to war over it. I ask that this not become a discussion on content.

    Regarding objective criteria, that: Category:Billionaires, for example; would not entail, I disagree. The Magnate is "a person of great influence, importance, or standing in a particular enterprise or field of business." magnate Many examples in history would not segregate using billionaire as a criteria.

    It is little wonder that we don't have any objective list class articles on the subject whereas, we do have quite a bit on billionaires. I think the category is useful, of course, and loathe editorial desecration which favors wp:xfd over collegial discussion! I hope the last part wasn't muffled.—John Cline (talk) 20:32, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. See the previous discussions; Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 March 13#Category:American business tycoons, Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 April 24#Magnates, Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 June 12#Category:Wealthy fictional characters, Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2012 May 7#Category:Oil magnates, Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 April 24#Magnates, Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 April 4#Category:Cable magnates... There are more examples of previous discussions if anyone wants to try and list them all. Vegaswikian (talk) 20:50, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Made-up and non-encyclopedic. Johnuniq (talk) 21:07, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Too subjective, and many like it have already been deleted. Jackmcbarn (talk) 21:14, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per numerous precedents as far too WP:OC#SUBJECTIVE. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:19, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    User:BrownHairedGirl, if you think I needed those templates, I would say something uncivil, directly to you! As far as the community doesn't want the category, you've shown that to perhaps be so. Cheers.—John Cline (talk) 21:32, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    @John Cline: Huh? I didn't use any templates or mention any templates. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:52, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete — no reliably sourced criteria for who makes it into this category and who does not. N2e (talk) 21:28, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I will voluntarily cease adding this category until this discussion closes.—John Cline (talk) 22:15, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Seeing this category added to an article on my watchlist did make me laugh, but for all of the wrong reasons. Edwardx (talk) 22:18, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    You've got my interest; I could use a good laugh.—John Cline (talk) 22:23, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - Inclusion criteria are entirely subjective and therefore unsourceable. – PeeJay 22:28, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - I don't see a workable definition. Either it would be all business people notable enough to have a Wikipedia article, which would be redundant, or we would have to invent the concept of some people being "more notable" than others to justify inclusion in this category, which would be too subjective. – Wdchk (talk) 02:39, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    These people would be the pinnacle of their era, within their field. It would surpass mere notability, and many times is directly sourced. But I am gathering the consensus that says it does not belong on Wikipedia. I thought it did, when I wasn't able to find anything that was. Now I understand why; because if someone tries, apparently it's quickly deleted. Good luck to you when trying to find that guy's name, who was a magnate of the aviation industry c. 1945. Oh hey, let's go build an encyclopedia now.—John Cline (talk) 03:11, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • If you are looking for an article about someone who was a "magnate of the aviation industry c. 1945", but can't remember their name then you would probably remember their nationality and hence could find their article in a category such as Category:American aviation businesspeople. DexDor (talk) 21:00, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that would have worked; thank you.—John Cline (talk) 23:55, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - By the way, I envisioned this category becoming the main "container category" after sub categories were devised to become "magnates by field" or even by "country and field". But again, I see others have tried; I'm just beside myself that this enlightened community doesn't see a reason to segregate people by who was the pinnacle of the era, by field, throughout history. Perhaps there's not the enlightenment I'd envisioned either? I believe that is what happened.—John Cline (talk) 03:28, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • John, it's a pity that you appear not to have engaged with the reasons why this sort of category gets deleted.
      I for one would love to have more categories which grouped those at the top of their fields. The problem lies in the lack of an objective definition for what counts as "top" ... because without an objective definition, good faith editors end up in unsolveable disputes about the inclusion of articles in a category. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:17, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I hope it holds as something a bit more than pitiful; but you are right, I missed the discussion. Anyway; the consensus is pretty clear and I don't object to seeing this closed speedily.—John Cline (talk) 23:55, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • delete subjective inclusion criteria.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:31, 8 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Far too subjective for a category.John Pack Lambert (talk) 00:33, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Again, in theory, I have no problem with this, but it would be very hard to maintain any semblence of coherence. Delete. Bearian (talk) 23:47, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:County Commissioners in York County, Maine[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: KEEP. -Splash - tk 19:40, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Per WP:SMALLCAT. Has only one entry. County Commissioners are usually not notable also. ...William 14:48, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep for now per WP:SMALLCAT as part of a series under parent Category:County commissioners in Maine and grandparent Category:County commissioners in the United States. I see that the other by-county categories in Maine are similarly small, so there may be a case for upmerging them all to state level, but I see no case for singling out one such category, nor for deletion rather than merger.
    AFAICS, the role of County Commissioners is similar to that of County Councillors in the UK and Ireland. I both cases there is no presumption of notability per WP:BIO, but some of them may be meet the WP:GNG threshold of notability. If we have articles on people who held that role, I can see no reason not to categorise them, as part of the record of local govt in that area. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:33, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Commissioners of Crete[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: RENAME to Category:High Commissioners of Crete. -Splash - tk 19:40, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: The two holders of the post were "High Commissioners", not simply "Commissioners". Constantine ✍ 11:06, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Tentative rename per nominator. Both of the articles (Prince George and Alexandros Zaimis) describe the post as "High Commissioner". Only the article on Zamis has a ref for this, but it is offline; however it says that the Greek term is "Ipatos Armostis", which appears to translate as "High Commissioner". I would prefer that we had an English-language source to confirm the title. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs)
No, in modern usage, it is always used to translate "High Commissioner", for instance the UNHCR is Ύπατη Αρμοστεία του ΟΗΕ για τους Πρόσφυγες, and the Cypriot High Commission to Australia is likewise an Υπάτη Αρμοστεία. Ditto for the Greek High Commissioners in Smyrna and Allied-occupied Constantinople after WWI. Constantine ✍ 19:59, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

San Francisco, California sports players[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: MERGE and DELETE as per nomination. -Splash - tk 21:23, 1 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Propose deleting all and upmerging back to Category:Sportspeople from San Francisco, California and the appropriate sport category for California (example - Category:Boxers from California). In the past we have intentionally not created city-specific, sport-specific categories (see past CfDs for Portland, Oregon and Chicago, Illinois) with the thought that this would be over-categorization. Splitting these now would set the precedent for sport-specific, city-specific athletes that I would expect would be played out to the end (imagine "Archers from Canton, Ohio"). Additionally, in some sports (like basketball), the State category serves as the citizenship/occupation category (example - "Basketball players from New York" is a sub-category of "American basketball players"). To split further away from the parent category here would be more difficult for editors from outside the U.S. Please read the linked CfDs for Portland and Chicago for more detail on past precedent and reasons behind it. Rikster2 (talk) 01:50, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep all. I think the concerns of "Archers from Canton, Ohio" is a bit of an overconcern, but more importantly — while I acknowledge that overly detailed categorization is a concern, a countervailing concern is that overly large categories are not useful. Wikipedia has grown over the years, and Category:Sportspeople from Los Angeles, California currently has over 1,000 articles and will only get larger and larger over the years. Remember that California is a huge state in terms of population — it's the most populous state in the United States, which in turn is the second-most populous primarily-English-speaking country in the world (after India), at over 38 million people — so, given that this is an English Wikipedia, California categories are going to be the ones that get most overpopulated, in general, of all second-order categories, and the largest cities in California (of which San Francisco actually isn't the highest on the list — Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Jose are larger) will get large categories of that nature. I myself believe that any category of this nature that gets over 200 in size begins to be of diminishing usefulness. (Obviously, overly specific categories also have problems with their usefulness, which I acknowledge.) And those are the categories that I'm looking at diffusing — the ones larger than 200. Certainly you're not going to see me diffusing Category:People from Del Norte County, California, for example (until and unless Del Norte County gets a huge population influx, which I'm not going to see in my lifetime). If the concern is about over-diffusion of small sportspeople categories, the answer would be to put in a policy not to diffuse categories that are smaller than a certain threshold (doesn't have to be 200; 200 is my own threshold when it comes to American categories and is certainly arbitrary), not to say no diffusion at all. At least, when in the conceivable future when the Los Angeles category might grow to 5,000 or larger, it's going to be such a mess that no one will find it useful, nor would it be humanly possible to clean up properly within a reasonable timeframe. (It should also be noted that Category:Baseball players from California is currently at 2,161 in size (not counting the 30-some that I moved into the San Francisco category until I stopped pending deletion nomination by Rikster2). Again, I understand the rationale as to the Chicago and Portland basketball categories, but I think those discussions ignored the problems with overly large categories — in other words, there are two competing problems on the opposite end of the spectrum, and those discussions looked at one end while missing the problems on the other end entirely.
    In any case, my original intent is to look at the county level to see what counties may have overly large categories throughout California, but San Francisco is a fluke in the sense that the city is the county (it's the only city in California that has that dual-nature). As far as confusing editors about what city is in what state, I don't see that as a concern; finding out what state a city is in is generally just a single click away on Wikipedia. I seriously doubt that any regular user of English Wikipedia, no matter what country he/she is from, would be unaware that San Francisco is in California, and, again, assuming that he/she is unaware, the answer is a single click away. --Nlu (talk) 02:16, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Couple comments - First, even if you would exercise restraint in keeping these types of categories to major metro areas, other users see the standard and you cannot blame them for applying it. After all, we started with "Sportspeople from" categories only from major metro areas and now these are at the level of Category:Sportspeople from Norwalk, Connecticut and Category:Sportspeople from Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Once the structure is created, it takes on a life of its own and is difficult to legislate. My other response is that you might be surprised how many European, Asian and African editors we have working on sport articles (especially for world sports like basketball and soccer). This isn't America's Wikipedia. My concern isn't San Francisco or New York City, it is the inevitable creep these categories would see. Rikster2 (talk) 02:26, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • I do still think you underestimate the editors' abilities to figure out where things are. Certainly I didn't think I had too much problem doing geographic diffusion when it came to French regions, German states, and Poland voivodeships, and I've never been to any of those countries myself. --Nlu (talk) 03:47, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • I'm not undrestimating when it comes from experience with just the difference between things like "American basketball players" and "Basketball players from Idaho." Sure people can figure it out but is that the point of categories or should they be easy to decipher? Rikster2 (talk) 03:51, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy delete. We've driven down this road before, twice to be exact. See the previous CfD's linked by Rikster2 in the nomination. Over-categorization. Jrcla2 (talk) 04:46, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment I think the fact that neither of those discussions even considered the problem of overly large categories means that those discussions are of questionable relevance here. The issue of overly large categories deserves discussion. Consensus is changeable, and where a problem that the prior discussion didn't address is present (as is the case with San Francisco people and certainly will be more so with Los Angeles, New York, &c.), it deserves further discussion. --Nlu (talk) 05:55, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per previous CFDs. We've been down this path with Chicago and Cincinnati at least. If you think there are a lot of Sportspeople for San Francisco, check out Chicago....William 11:25, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • "Compare with Chicago" as a response, assuming that my argument has validity (which you don't have to agree that it does), would be a call to also diffuse Chicago, not to stop from diffusing San Francisco. --Nlu (talk) 15:58, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge all to Category:Sportspeople from San Francisco, California and the appropriate Category:Fooers from California. I understand the interest in splitting large categories, but no matter what the size of category, a split assists navigation only if it is based on a relevant intersection. I see no evidence that coming from SF rather than LA or San Diego is a significant factor in the career of a racing driver or a tennis player ... and unless the split is directly relevant to the occupation, it simply divides a category into effectively random chunks. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:39, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • The diffusion is really from the other angle; distinguishing the types of sportspeople who came from San Francisco, not to distinguish basketball players from San Francisco rather than from Los Angeles or San Diego. Again, I am not seeing (although one does not have to agree with me) how a very large "Sportspeople from San Francisco" category is useful to anyone; to remain useful, it has to be diffused into smaller categories. If "by sport" is not a meaningful way to diffuse (and I don't agree that it isn't, but obviously it's up to a consensus discussion), then what would be a meaningful way to diffuse? --Nlu (talk) 15:58, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • You are working from a belief that categories that are big are not useful. This assumption is not universal. I think a 2000 person "Baseball players from California" category is certainly useful for anyone looking to browse baseball players from California (which in my mind is the main way people use categories). If the category is the right one, I don't believe size is an issue. For example, Category:Major League Baseball catchers is over 1,700. Sure you could diffuse it to "Detroit Tigers catchers" and the like, but why? Rikster2 (talk) 16:13, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Perhaps it should be diffused that way. In that case, it would actually be useful to see the group of catchers who had played for the Tigers. But that's a different issue for a different day. The question is whether a category like Category:Sportspeople from Los Angeles, California has its usefulness hampered by its size. I believe that it does. --Nlu (talk) 16:43, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
          • And what is that based upon other than your opinion (which is not universally shared)? How do people use categories in your opinion? Rikster2 (talk) 16:58, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
            • As I understand, they look in a category when they believe that they are looking for particularly notable individuals with a certain characteristic, for further reading. In fact, this is what WP:CAT says about the issue (and I had nothing to do with the drafting of that language, none):
              "The central goal of the category system is to provide navigational links to all Wikipedia pages in a hierarchy of categories which readers, knowing essential—defining—characteristics of a topic, can browse and quickly find sets of pages on topics that are defined by those characteristics."
              A category of 2,000+ is not going to be useful for that purpose at all, because a reader cannot "browse and quickly find sets of pages ... defined by those characteristics." (Italics added.) A person looking in the subject of what sportspeople might have come out of Sunnyvale (a sizable suburb of San Jose/San Francisco) can look in that category (Category:Sportspeople from Sunnyvale, California) and see a small group of individuals and would be able to see what might interest him/her out of that group. A person looking as the group of sportspeople of San Francisco cannot — as currently undiffused — use it for that purpose, which, again, according to WP:CAT, is the purpose of having categories at all.
              Keeping categories undiffused just because we might be concerned that categories may become overly diffused — which is certainly a valid concern, but not as far as I can tell, an overriding one — misses the forest for the trees, because, again, why do categories exist at all? They're not for the categories to become huge, huge containers where things go in and never come back out. --Nlu (talk) 17:33, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
                • At issue are "defining" and "browse quicky" - which in my opinion I just flat out disagree with you in this case. I will also say that the citizenship issue is a major one for me as a basketball editor. We already see overapplication of "American basketball players" when the state categories are sub-cats. I think going down two levels from the actual country of citizenship is too far away and would cause quite a lot of confusion with editors around the globe. English Wikipedia is used by many editors for whom English is a second language or where intimate knowledge of the US is not present. In my opinion, being "citizen of a city" is not significant enough to cause this issue (whcih would result in my opinion). At any rate, you clearly are interested in changing/expanding guidance around category structure and this issue is somewhat ancillary. I put a link to the discussion at Wikipedia:Categorization to try to get wider input. Rikster2 (talk) 17:46, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • The folly of these increasingly fine intersections of location and occupation is nicely illustrated by the example cited above, of Category:Sportspeople from Sunnyvale, California. I just checked the first 5 articles (Baicher, Banta-Cain, Bennett, Bontrager, & Brown) ... and of the 5, only Bontrager's career is tied to Sunyale. Even in his case, the significance of Sunnyvale in his career is as the location of his manufacturing basis rather than of his sporting achievements. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:16, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • That would be a reason to prune (as I am trying to do with the San Francisco categories even though I'm running into some resistance), not a reason not to diffuse. That having been said, I would in fact support (if someone proposes it) upmerging all sportspeople categories in the individual Santa Clara County cities (other than San Jose) to Category:Sportspeople from Santa Clara County, California, and that should be the solution; get rid of truly overly fine categories, rather than to generally not diffuse very large categories. --Nlu (talk) 21:41, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • There remains a fundamental disagreement here about the purpose of diffusion. I strongly oppose diffusing any occupational category by an irrelevant geographical attribute, regardless of the category's size. Other editors appear unconcerned about the relevance of the intersection :( --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:01, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete and upmerge per nomination Tewapack (talk) 16:44, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment Has anyone made a convincing argument — or indeed, any argument at all — that these large categories are useful? So far, all the arguments I am seeing are "this is over-diffusion!" Again, that's a valid argument — but aren't we back to the situation where we are stuck with non-useful overly-large categories? Shouldn't that be thought about and considered? If that remains the case, then diffusion of some kind is necessary, if not by sport, then by other criteria. And so far I am seeing nothing being offered on that front. None. --Nlu (talk) 15:55, 7 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment - they aren't particlarly "un-useful" is what I would say. If I am browsing baseball players from California I simply don't think it is a big deal to scan a few pages of results. Frankly I'd have to do the same thing clicking the sub-categories anyway. Given the ssues with diffusing citizenship categories too far and what would inevitably create a category structure that breaks down (like "Sportspeople from City X" has become, I just don't think the enhanced "usefulness" is worth it. Rikster2 (talk) 16:06, 7 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge, but only because we don't all of the little child categories to find people; a category with fewer than 100 entries often doesn't need to be diffused. We definitely need to do this type of diffusion for the Los Angeles category, because it's way too large for convenient navigation. Nyttend (talk) 13:21, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • May I ask for a clarification, then? San Francisco's category was a lot larger than 100. So are you saying that it in fact needs diffusion? --Nlu (talk) 15:47, 10 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment - Chicago, New York and LA are the only ones I could see justifying such diffusion due to sheer size.Hoops gza (talk) 22:35, 10 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete The categorization of sportspeople by city creates too much category overlap because too many people are from multiple cities and play multiple sports. It is better to have large categories than to have people in an unmanageable number.John Pack Lambert (talk) 16:53, 24 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
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