- 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:Conservation and restoration; move everything art-related from the new category to
Category:Art conservation and restoration; open up a
requested move on
Conservation-restoration to
Conservation and restoration. GOF and others frequently say that categories should match article names wherever possible. Well, in this case the category does match the article name, but the article name is not backed up by Google or any other method I could determine. RichardMcCoy is right that
people in the field sometimes refer to themselves as "conservator-restorers" but
the hyphenated "conservation-restoration" is far less common. So the proper course of action is to attempt to change the article name. If RichardMcCoy crosses his arms and stands in the way of that, because he says he knows so much more about this subject than anyone else, then that will be apparent to the closing admin. (It is certainly apparent to me.)--
Mike Selinker (
talk)
16:30, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Propose renaming
Category:Conservation-restoration to something
- Nominator's rationale: Rename. I have a feeling that this is result of an out of process emptying of
Category:Art conservation. The new name is completely ambiguous. So one could argue that a return to the old name is justified. However, what is the most common name here. Is adding 'Art' to the current category names all that is needed? If it looks like a consensus forms here, the subcategories will need to be added to the nomination.
Vegaswikian (
talk)
22:03, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Rename probably to
Category:Art conservation which was both created and put up for deletion by the same editor. Note that there is a
Category:Conservation that is for
conservation biology and the
conservation ethic. --
Alan Liefting (
talk -
contribs)
22:18, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Very Speedy Keep! I really don't know what you are doing with all of this and am a bit frustrated. In the past few days, I have spent considerable effort cleaning up the categories around the field of conservation-restoration and trying to make sense of them. It's a little off putting to have this so hastily re-worked. This is stated profession, my areas of expertise, and what I've come up with in consultation with other
Conservator-restorers. It would be counterproductive to name this back to Art conservation! To be clear:
Conservation-restoration relates to the conservation of art, artifacts, and in general cultural property. If you are to consider re-working all of the things I've spent time and invested my expertise in please don't do it willy nilly like this. Do some research into the profession on an international scale, and consider these English terms globally. The names for these categories have been made specifically so that they will work for English speaking people, not just Americans. Or just leave all of the conservation-restoration categories I've painstakingly re-worked and remove those title art conservation. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
22:39, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Is art conservation (a less succinct term) better to use that conservation-restoration because it is in more common usage? There is a similar issue in my field of expertise. Often people will use the term
ecology to describe
environmentalism or ecologist to describe an
environmentalist. --
Alan Liefting (
talk -
contribs)
23:10, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- art conservation is a fairly U.S. specific term. Most other English speaking countries will call themselves conservator-restorer or a restorer. Having the name in the middle like conservation-restoration allows for all sides to be understood (clearly considerable editing needs to be done on many of the articles in this category, but I first wanted to bring them together). There actually is a difference between conservation and restoration. Conservation being the act of keep and preserving something. Restoration be the act of restoring something to a previous or better state. We do both of these, depending on the project. Agreed on your ecology point, too. It gets even more silly when it gets to the term
conservationist ... --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
23:20, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- (ec)Did you follow the process for moving category contents? Did the new names you selected conform to the naming for categories? Is this name unambiguous? By removing art, you created ambiguously named categories. Even if you are following an article name, that does not mean the category would or should use the same name. We can't leave what you created since it is ambiguous. It may be unambiguous within the art world, but this is not the art world, it is an encyclopedia. Conservation and restoration happen in/for houses, trains, marine vessels and other areas outside of art!
Vegaswikian (
talk)
23:12, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- I don't even know what your point or questions are here, nor do I know if I followed the process correctly, but I do believe that I've made the categories correct and that they now have the capacity to take on all cultural property, include "art" and non art things. That was the point of what I did. I'm not sure what your confusion is; perhaps it is because the articles are not all written well. There seems to be little reason to spend any more time debating this point. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
23:20, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- To answer the question, you did not follow the process. So when the work you do seems to create a problem you should expect to have it questioned. Based on your explanation, it seems like the old categories might need to be restored and a new parent considered. However we tend to avoid including two activities in a single category. You could make the point the conservation and restoration are so closely replated that they should be categorized together? Is that true or are they different things? So is this the parent for art restoration and art conservation along with the raft of others like house restoration and the like?
Vegaswikian (
talk)
23:26, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Please don't make this about you winning an argument. If you want to prove I didn't follow a process, then that's okay, but stop making a fight when it's not necessary.--
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
03:08, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- This is not about winning an argument. It is about maybe fixing some categories that were effectively renamed out of process. Exactly what about the new names makes them less ambiguous and more specific then the old names?
Vegaswikian (
talk)
06:35, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Comment. My rule #1 of Wikipedia: never assume anything is "common sense". The moment you do something based on what you think is "common sense", another user will come along and disagree with what you have done. Anyway, it looks pretty much like an out-of-process move. Absent a consensus here that the move was ultimately a good thing, everything should be moved back to ‹The
template
Cat is being
considered for merging.›
Category:Art conservation.
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
21:02, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Huh? A "consensus"? That's funny. There is one person here that has complained about something in a nonsensical way. There hasn't been any common sense here at all, so I don't know how your rule applies. Look, there isn't even a discussion here in which anyone has actually done one bit of research or even made one attempt to actually learn about the topic at hand. Further, Good Ol'factory, you haven't even done your work to see what was actually moved out of ‹The
template
Cat is being
considered for merging.›
Category:Art conservation. Practically nothing. You're just adding your two cents in a discussion you haven't even bothered to get educated about. Yes, I'm being harsh, but this is totally ridiculous and exactly -- I mean exactly -- why Wikipedia is losing editors by the day and why it is not a place where experts actually want to contribute. People have to be held to these non-discussions and to gatekeepers of nonsense. Second of all, no one actually contributes anything to any of these articles about
conservation-restoration, so why do you even care? Leave it alone and move on. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
03:38, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Yes, a "consensus":
WP:CONS. You seem to assume quite a bit about what I know, what I have done, what my knowledge background is, what I care about, what my actions lead others users to do, etc. I don't think they warrant a detailed reply because the extreme nature of your comments speak for themselves.
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
05:41, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- I have assumed little, just going by what's actually been done here and commenting on it. Vegaswilkan put up a marginal and uninformed argument here, and now has walked away from it, and you walked in to oddly substantiate it without any facts to back it up. This proposal should be closed quickly as no one has come up with a reason to substantiate it. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
12:32, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- It's time for you to back away from trying to own this discussion.
Mangoe (
talk)
14:03, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Main article naming problem here All this dates back to a 2008 article rename by a short-lived SPA as can be seen
here. If you go by the GHits, this naming is quite questionable: "conservation-restoration" gets 965K GHits, and a LOT of them are about ecology; adding "art" knocks the count down to 792K. Furthermore, a quick sample shows that the two words tend to appear in a lot of different patterns in the pages thus found. By contrast, "Art conservation" gets 1,460K GHits, and "art restoration" gets 2,510K GHits. Taking out quotes pushes numbers up by an order of magnitude. My impression is that "conservation-restoration" is not a universally accepted term-of-art, and that these are two separate but closely related subjects. The deep problem here, as one can see in the history and in the talk page of
conservation-restoration, is that
User:RichardMcCoy is one of a set of three professionals in the field who have consistently owned the article(s) for years. In particular there are signs of a struggle between McCoy and
User:Ron Barbagallo over the scope of the two fields. I'm willing to be advised by experts, but I sense there's something else functioning here besides our ostensible ignorance.
Mangoe (
talk)
14:03, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Basing an impression of the name of anything on web hits, not accuracy of terminology, is not sound logic. It would be helpful to this discussion if you would research the profession on an international scale. Researching web hits has little if any benefit. Are you trying to write an encyclopedia that relates to what people think it should be or what they type in Google? Come on. Encyclopedia are based on truth and facts. Personally, I'm for the later. If own any part of this discussion it's that I'm only one of very few that actually care to edit it and strive to improve it. If you're telling me and the others to back away from it, then you are foolishly telling the only people that have actually done any work in it to stop working! That's absurd and wrong headed. There is a tiny, tiny, tiny number of people interested in this topic. To marginalize us because of our interest and expertise is insulting and wrong headed. The only advise I've given and want to give is for you to research the topic (and not web hits). Seems simple and friendly to me. If you throw other stuff at me, then, well, I'm left to get frustrated. Think about it. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
14:32, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Shall we review the first paragraph of
WP:V? It includes this sentence: "Verifiability, and not truth, is one of the fundamental requirements for inclusion in Wikipedia; truth, of itself, is not a substitute for meeting the verifiability requirement." Mangoe's comment was clearly an attempt get a rough idea of how terminology is used in other sources. Like Mangoe, I'm getting the sense that there are other issues at work here, mostly involving topic ownership and topic battles. This only reinforces my opinion that we need to back things up to how they were previously and seek a wider consensus on these issues.
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
23:50, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
What else is at work here, then?
Seeing what turns up in Google simply is not a any kind of attempt to understand terminology. Come on now, "Mango," you're not really suggesting that as actual research, are you?
"Mango," and "Good Ol' Factory" please don't leave your opinions about what's going on here as just sly suggestions; verify them, will ya? I don't appreciate your line of accusations. Unless you have anything productive to say based on something other than Google results, please close this discussion, and delete the two art conservation categories. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
03:47, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Comment in resp. As Mangoe has stated, edit histories reveal a bit of a history of struggling between you and other users over the scope and meaning of art restoration vs conservation-restoration. Looking in detail at the
edit history of
Conservation-restoration and
your edit history demonstrates that. This isn't a prosecution of you and I'm not going to set out "evidence against you" in detail, but it's not hard to see when one looks. (I don't think the discussion is going to be shut down on your request on the grounds that you find others' comments wanting. I for one am interested in what other users think beyond the five who have already commented.)
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
04:05, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Of course I have had discussions with people over this article. What is you point for bringing this up? This is common. If "Good 'Ol Factory" and "Mango" are going to have the guts to bring an accusation like this up -- no matter how veiled it is -- they should have the courage to stand behind it. Don't leave it a thinly-veiled personal attack. Either stand behind it, or remove it. I really don't appreciate your tactics here. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
12:22, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- No, I'm not just referring to regular discussion about a topic to improve content. Other users can have a look and make up their minds. I think overall it's a distractive issue from the main one being discussed here: should the out-of-process rename be reversed, or is there consensus that the move should be ratified? For that reason, I'm not particularly interested in entering into an extended discussion about the background issues. I felt them worth mentioning in passing but don't see it as centrally important to the underlying purpose here.
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
21:43, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Right, and I've called you out and asked you to explain why you feel they are worth mentioning? You've not said why. It seems your tactic here is not to deal with the issue at hand, but try and smear another editor. I'd appreciate a prompt and productive end to this, and one that you actually stand behind your thinly veiled accusation. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
02:25, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Why I have felt to mention it above: (1) because Mangoe mentioned it, and I was voicing agreement with his observation, and (2) because I see a similar sort of the same behaviour being exhibited here that I have observed elsewhere via some of the history of your edits—domination of the discussion; dismissal of the views of the others; appeals to the expertise of self accompanied with dismissal of other views you deem to be less informed; general belittling of the comments of others with phrases such as "absurd", "wrong headed" "contrary to common sense"; unwillingness to seek consensus of the community; and so forth. There—now you know and hopefully it's ended. I certainly don't feel any need to dwell upon it longer as it is unpleasant to me.
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
02:36, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
I'm glad that you owned up to to your veiled insults. It may feel like I'm dominating this discussion to you, but think about it: I am absolutely correct and justified to dismiss an argument like yours and "Mango" because what you presented as research is only (and this is really important) what you typed into Google. No one should have much respect for that in creating an encyclopedia! That kind of effort is "absurd," "wrong headed," and "contrary to common sense." I'm totally willing to stand behind that, and you should too. I'm also willing to seek consensus, but there is no "community" seriously interested in this topic. It's disappointing that this has gone on this long without any actual research or action, and that I've been put on the hook for it.
Again, I appeal to Mango or any other adminstrator to close this discussion and delete the categories
Category:Art conservation and
Category:Art conservators! --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
12:17, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- My concern is that you have renamed a category out-of-process. I have not advocated for one particular name as being correct based on google or on anything else.
Good Ol’factory
(talk)
20:56, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- I'm glad that you have decided what the outcome of this discussion is. However even your own comments in this discussion make it very clear that restorers and conservators are two related but different occupations. That alone is a justification for a split. In addition, you seem to have blinders on about how these terms are used. They are not specific to art and hence if the categories are art related, the category name needs to reflect that. I suspect that you are so focused on your view that you are not able to comprehend the arguments and logic offered by others. You really need to read
WP:OWN,
WP:AGF,
WP:ILIKEIT and probably a few other policies, guidelines and essays. This discussion will be closed when it is time. It will be closed based on the facts presented and their relative strength. Likewise it will not be closed based on who insists on having the last word.
Vegaswikian (
talk)
00:15, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
So, you're going to hold this thing up because I didn't follow the process? That's chasing good energy with bad. I suggested this topic be closed because no one has actually done any research to prove anything against what I've done based on the knowledge of the terms used internationally among a variety of professional organizations. I don't want to own this discussion, but at the same time I don't want a couple of misguided Google searches and a few erstwhile drop in editors to decide this important topic. I think this topic would be better suited for arbitration.--
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
12:13, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
Please list the facts that have been presented other than what was typed into Google. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
19:28, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Equally you have provided no references at all to back up your assertion that this is the appropriate name. The term is certainly not familiar to non-specialists. Your moves were clearly out of process, and you have yet to set out the case for them properly. The onus for that is on you. It may not be too late to do that instead of huffing and puffing. I have to say that, based in the UK, your argument that "art conservation is a fairly U.S. specific term. Most other English speaking countries will call themselves conservator-restorer or a restorer" doesn't seem right to me - museums in my experience all use "conservation", and people call themselves "conservator" - see the British Museum
Department of Conservation and Scientific Research, the National Gallery has a
Conservation Department, the
British Library has a
Centre for Conservation], and the professional association is the
Institute of Conservation. "Restorers" are more likely to be found in the commercial sector.
Johnbod (
talk)
13:11, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Weak keep The main article
Conservation-restoration should I believe be tackled first if the name really should change. That article does look like a proper main article for the topic and category. If the name of that article is changed then it would be much easier to move this as well, but at the moment I really think I should oppose any rename. As it is I see no mention of this discussion on that articles talk page. At least a note has now been put on the visyual arts project talk page. This discussion should really have been initiated at that article's talk page or the project page I think.
Dmcq (
talk)
13:20, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Rename to
Category:Art conservation and restoration. Google searches show that the rather ugly hyphenated term is not at all common outside Wikipedia
[1], but the two terms are very often used together, much more often with "and" than a hyphen, and cover over-lapping areas it would not be sensible to split into
Category:Art conservation and
Category:Art restoration. Also see my comment 4 edits up. The main article should be be renamed accordingly, and merged with the stubby
Art restoration.
Johnbod (
talk)
13:34, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- I'm sorry you've not taken the time to read the previous discussion here, "Johnbod": your point has already been raised about Google. But since you brought it up, please explain how searching this terms comes up using a Google search is preferable to doing actual research among conservation-restoration associations and organizations that use English? I think at best this is a terrible and dangerous way to determine the names for much, and I've never seen a good explanation otherwise. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
16:38, 17 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- See my comment 6 or so up.
Johnbod (
talk)
16:55, 17 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
I've neither huffed nor puffed, "Johnbod". Please keep your personal attacks away from me. I'm not sure which line of your arguments I'm to respond to here ... In short, and I've stated this above, conservation includes the act of restoration, and as I've stated above it's absurd for me to be held hostage to prove known facts by folks that are relying only on Google to answer questions. If you all want to punish me for not following your rules to a T, fine, but don't knock yourself out doing it. My question to you was why Google searches validate your reasoning? I think, like a few here, you're more interested in winning an argument than thinking about what's being said. You've stated that the category should include conservation and restoration. Why must it include just "art" and exclude the rest of things that professionals in this area work on? --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
19:16, 17 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- Funny how this "process" works. I had assume that by following the process here editors would have produced facts and used logic to substantiate opinions. Does anyone care to say how you are going to deal with the part of the conservation-restoration category that you are excluding by just making it about "art"? --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
11:45, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- REname certainly, but to what?. However (unless the category is to be purged),
Category:Art conservation and restoration is not the answer. Not all the subjects are "art" and some are being preserved, not conserved or restored. We have historic buildings; archives; and a host of other things in the category. The only thing that I cn find in common is that all the subjects aree artefacts. The converse is conservation of the natural environment. One answer might be to rename it
Category:Conservation and restoration and make conservation of the natural environment a subcat;
Category:Art conservation and restoration would be another subcat (into which some of the presnet content should be moved, but there will probably be a residual category of subjects that are not "art" or "nature". Where do we place the conservation of the Mary Rose, or a Bronze Age boat? of non-illuminated historic manuscripts? etc.
Peterkingiron (
talk)
14:55, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- I personally don't think buildings belong in the same category, as we all are or might be doing things to conserve or restore our houses (yes those window-frames really will get painted this year), but books, documents and archaeological objects obviously do. I probably wouldn't object to something like
Category:Conservation and restoration of cultural heritage but the way Richard is refusing to make his case properly makes such a resolution unlikely now. The vast majority odf the articles in fact relate, or could relate in the case of techniques, to art, and a category note explaining the wider scope will do for now.
Johnbod (
talk)
15:25, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- This debate has been going on for a fortnight withgout reaching a conclusion. Please relist.
Peterkingiron (
talk)
14:55, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
Finally, some sound thinking from "Peterkingiron"! Thanks! "Conservation and restoration" works because it allows for sub categorization and might allow for specializations in the field to be nuanced (though this is really unlikely, because much of the same process is applied to an "artwork" as applied to an "artifact"). The categorization of the object does not necessarily reflect the way that it is treated by a conservation-restoration professional. I can only read "Johnbod's" lack of interest in including the conservation and restoration of historic structures as a personal aside that fails to reflect the reality of the profession and the importance of preserving the built environment. Of course it's possible for a homeowner to undertake a similar project as a historic house museum. In fact, this is why there needs to be good articles in Wikipedia about conservation-restoration, so people know the information! --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
15:50, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
Post-close discussion
Uh, what? Why can "Mike Selinker" close discussion despite the fact that there was no consensus? This is absurd. If he had bothered to read the discussion, he would have noted that there was some decent discussion brewing around it and clear considerations not to do what he just did. He would have also noted that one editor asked for the discussion to be re-listed. What gives? This is a joke. Also, this action is exactly what people complained that I did .... Seems like there ought to be a policy against this kind of thing.
--
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
17:10, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
- First, my name is not in quotes; it is my name. Second, I am following exactly what you agreed to in the final comment:"Conservation and restoration" works because it allows for sub categorization and might allow for specializations in the field to be nuanced" Third, your personal attacks on everyone are growing tiresome. I have, after reading and considering all arguments, made my decision. If you have a problem, bring it up on DRV. But please do it with some class.--
Mike Selinker (
talk)
17:23, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
Uh, then why have you added "Art", Mike Selinker? This was clearly rebuffed if you had bothered to read this discussion, and no one every came up with any kind of reason why this decision should be based on your Google search.--
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
17:25, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
You didn't actually read the discussion and now you've created a huge mess. Please explain how you are going to categorize articles that are both about "art" and not about "art" but are both about conservation-restoration? Simply deleting them all out of conservation-restoration and moving them to "art conservation and restoration" doesn't get it. Sorry you didn't read that. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
17:32, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
Based on this logic, explain how you're going to categorized
Save Outdoor Sculpture!. This project deals with "art" and not "art". But it always deals with
conservation-restoration. You've changed it to now be something that only deals with "art". This is wrong. --
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
17:38, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
reply
Uh, Mike, that was an example. How are you going to decide with all of the rest of the mess you've made?--
RichardMcCoy (
talk)
17:45, 18 March 2012 (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.