Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 23

message: I see no guideline on the description of images, so if such a protocol exists, please forgive me. I notice a great disparity in the description of images on Wikipedia, and would appreciate if this matter was even loosely regulated, be it for the sake of consistency. 
Usually, image captions aren't ended with a period, however they may contain several sentences. Following are several examples of captions using commonly accepted rules.
	
As for the image summary, unique to Wikipedia, perhaps it should follow the same rule, with the image source indicated in italicized parentheses, if applicable. See the following example.
 Picture of Wikipedia's possible mascot. It is reading books and a Web site (Wikipedia)
Thank you for your input,
Grumpy Troll 21:39, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see a need for instruction creep here, jguk 21:47, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Ideally a caption should be a complete sentence that ends with a punctuation mark. See Wikipedia:Captions. These guidelines already exist; they're just recorded elsewhere. -Aranel ("Sarah") 13:30, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I thank you for your answer. Grumpy Troll (talk) 13:44, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image description guideline 

message: There seems to be something of a battle over whether to refer to U.S. usage/UK usage or American usage/British usage. I have added in what I think is correct term, which neither of the combatants were using. That is American english and British english. BTW Irish usage actually is called Hiberno-English!!! I've added it in too. That way readers of the page can go to the actual pages and find out what those darn things actually are.  FearÉIREANN\(caint) 17:41, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Did you intend to lowercase English? If so, why? Maurreen (talk) 19:45, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Reversion war

message: One point of bad style that I've seen in a number of articles is the failure to reintroduce subjects properly in new sections. For example, they might do like this:
=== Face ===
Chickoomunga's face is big. He likes to eat cherries.
=== Social standing ===
He's very elite in his society. (Better: Chickoomunga is very elite in his society, or Society has given Chickoomunga an elite position.)
The concept is that a section shouldn't really read like a continuation of previous stuff; to some extent, it should stand on its own. I don't think the use of pronouns beginning section should be strictly disallowed, but at least recommended against. Deco 21:18, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that starting a new section with a pronoun is bad writing style. Have you found others disagree with you? I don't think the point of the MoS is to detail English language "best practices". The point of the MoS is to provide guidance where there might be multiple approaches which would be "OK" in English, but where the community finds value in standardizing on a single approach.  Chuck 22:57, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, I reckon it's both.  There's a guideline in headings that basically says keep headings simple.  This is a similar concept, I reckon.  btw, I agree with the pronoun not starting a section.  Neonumbers 08:21, 1 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: My point was that the MoS is not a place to provide writing lessons, it is a place where we agree on things that may provide dispute. If Deco is finding people reverting him when he changes pronouns back to nouns at the beginning of sections, then we might need it mentioned in the MoS. If he is just pointing out a standard on which there is no debate, then we probably don't need it cluttering the MoS. The MoS doesn't, for example, discuss noun-verb agreement. Chuck 16:26, 6 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pronouns beginning sections 

message: He's very elite in his society. (Better: Chickoomunga is very elite in his society, or Society has given Chickoomunga an elite position.)
The concept is that a section shouldn't really read like a continuation of previous stuff; to some extent, it should stand on its own. I don't think the use of pronouns beginning section should be strictly disallowed, but at least recommended against. Deco 21:18, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that starting a new section with a pronoun is bad writing style. Have you found others disagree with you? I don't think the point of the MoS is to detail English language "best practices". The point of the MoS is to provide guidance where there might be multiple approaches which would be "OK" in English, but where the community finds value in standardizing on a single approach.  Chuck 22:57, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, I reckon it's both.  There's a guideline in headings that basically says keep headings simple.  This is a similar concept, I reckon.  btw, I agree with the pronoun not starting a section.  Neonumbers 08:21, 1 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: My point was that the MoS is not a place to provide writing lessons, it is a place where we agree on things that may provide dispute. If Deco is finding people reverting him when he changes pronouns back to nouns at the beginning of sections, then we might need it mentioned in the MoS. If he is just pointing out a standard on which there is no debate, then we probably don't need it cluttering the MoS. The MoS doesn't, for example, discuss noun-verb agreement. Chuck 16:26, 6 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Social standing 

message: Has a lot of good pointers. Good resource.
http://www.economist.com/research/StyleGuide/ Jacoplane 02:25, 15 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Economist style guide