Wikipedia:Why Manual of Style talk pages have so much churn

The talk pages of Wikipedia:Manual of Style (WP:MOS or MoS) and its sub-guidelines see a comparatively high volume of discussion "churn" compared to talk pages of many other guidelines. This is especially true of the main Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (WT:MOS). Sometimes this discussion isn't all that clearly connected to style matters on Wikipedia in particular (though usually not provably off-topic, either).

There are many reasons for this, and various ideas like "send everyone to WP:Reference desk/Language (RDL) if they're not talking about, and only about, editing the MoS pages" aren't really viable.

Here are some fairly detailed observations, in extended bullet-point form:

• First-off, MoS (at least its main page) is one of the most-watchlisted guidelines on the system, which automatically makes its talk page among the most watchlisted "Wikipedia talk: ..." pages.
• Major guidelines generally have a noticeboard; MoS does not, and a proposal to open one wasn't met with ethusiasm. Thus, its talk page serves as its de facto noticeboard (and is listed as such at WP:Noticeboard).
• Everyone who is reasonably fluent in English has some sense of personal mastery of the language and is apt to have at least a few strong opinions about some style matters (and may well have hundreds of them). We begin absorbing language norms in infancy, and written ones from our first year of school, yet they vary widely by location, age group, social groups, and other factors. Consequently, this inspires many people to discuss (even outright debate) style-guideline matters more than they would many other guideline matters.
• MoS covers many more points than any other Wikipedia guideline (probably more than all of them combined). This necessarily equates to a lot more things to argue about.
• People ask a style question at an MoS talk page largely because it pertains to something they're editing on here (not because they're curious about something for their high-school English paper – that's more likely what someone will ask about at RDL).
• There isn't a "clean" or certain way to separate WP/MoS-pertinent questions and commentary from random "I wonder about ..." chatter, because people often do not indicate why they're asking (or proposing, or venting, or whatever the thread opens with). It generally takes longer to probe their motivations than to just answer the question and move on.
• RDL isn't qualified to answer MoS-pertinent questions (RDL is about what the reliable sources say about general English usage, and about other language-related questions, while WT:MOS is about what MoS says about how to write Wikipedia (or, often enough, about what MoS doesn't say and shouldn't say).
• That last is important: much of the "churn" at MoS pertains to "there oughta be a law ..." demands to add some new rule to MoS, and pushback by many regular MoS editors on WP:CREEP grounds to not do it, because MoS is already over-long.
• Another frequent matter is detailed discussion of a style topic (and lots of "who's right and why") specifically because someone is challenging something MoS says (i.e., they are proposing a change to the guidelines, but doing so in the form of a rant/lecture; we can't actually control how they post this stuff). It's on-topic by definition (if sometimes of poor clarity and tone), since the place to propose changing a guideline is its talk page.
• MoS is not just about in-article content, but also covers article titles in most respects; consequently, the only policy or guideline cited more often in WP:RM discussions than MoS is WP:AT policy, and this "user base" for MoS is large, diverse, and opinionated (often in conflicting directions). The RM crowd accounts for a substantial proportion of WT:MOS churn. MoS's applicability to other reader-facing content is also a factor (category names, portal content, mainspace template content including all infoboxes and navboxes, etc., etc.).
• People do not complain about MoS itself, and its regulars personally, on the grounds that they address random style questions. Rather, the critics of MoS and "those MoS people" are angry about some peccadillo, something MoS says that doesn't match their preferred style. Or they're angry that WP has a style manual at all. Or they may just have a personality dispute with someone, most often over said someone bringing that critic's "pet" article into compliance with MoS guidelines.
• There has been some criticism of the MoS talk pages being used for general style discussion (on WP:NOT#FORUM grounds), but this is not the same criticism or the same critics as the anti-MoS crowd. That is, not every kind of criticism that has something to do with an MoS-connected page is the same thing, or with the same motivations/concerns.
• The entire Wikipedia:Reference desk system has come under fire by the community, for WP:NOT#FORUM, WP:NOT#ADVICE, WP:NOR, and WP:NOTHERE reasons. It's reasonably likely that it will be shut down or moved to Wikiversity (i.e., shut down as far as en.WP is concerned). So, programmatically shunting discussion to it would be like intentionally leasing a house that's already on fire.
• The answers given at MoS talk pages often do have some level of consensus-based legitimacy (more so than RDL ever could) because they are grounded in what MoS (our hardest-negotiated and most often re-negotiated guideline, ever, by orders of magnitude) says about how to write Wikipedia, frequently backed up by direct citations (in the discussions) to off-site RS that support the consensus that was reached on whatever the nit-pick in question is.
  • As with everything on this system, the discussions only attract editors who care to comment in them. WP just doesn't work any other way. There's no mechanism to compel people who only care about Spanish horror films, or guinea pigs/cavies, or international relations topics to come and weigh in on style matters. (We'll probably only hear from them if something changes at MoS that affects "their" content in particular, or if it has not been compliant for a long time and someone notices and starts to clean it up.)
  • The consensus level at any such page is always somewhat limited, at least compared to something like an RfA, or one of the WP:VPPOL discussions that attracts hundreds of !voters. But it's not non-existent, and it's not "too low"; otherwise things like wikiprojects, WP:FAC, WP:DYK, and the narrower-participation noticeboards would have no legitimacy of any kind, either, and no ability to come to a consensus decision and act on it.
  • Where frequent MoS editors think broader input is needed, they open RfCs at VPPOL or at least advertise them there. (And that's more transparency than is usual on this site – when's the last time you saw any wikiproject post a notice there to attract input from uninvolved editors into a topical deliberation? Have you ever seen it happen?)
• Numerous "regulars" use the MoS talk pages and post there; we can't really regulate them (and "we" basically is "them"). Like a busy wikiproject (e.g. WP:MILHIST), it's not an organization with rules, it's semi-random individuals with shared topical interest, sometimes at cross purposes to one another, and thus not likely to respond well to requests by peers and some-time opponents to just zip it.
• Yes, there's also lots of rambling, but it's still geared toward "What does MoS say/mean and what should it mean?" and "How should X be done at article Y?", not random off-topic stuff, like "How does Ozark English diverge from Cajun English?" or whatever (that's RDL).
• The MoS talk pages, per WP:TALK, are primarily for improvement/clarification discussion. But all talk pages of WP:P&G pages are and always have been used for "How does this apply to ...?" compliance/enforcement/scope/interpretation matters, and that will never stop (nor should it, there being no other appropriate venue).
• Due to its scope (both in level of detail and breadth of application), MoS will always get more of these questions than just about any other page, and many of them will not be very distinguishable from general-interest English-language style questions.
• Refusal to respond to pertinent questions at MoS talk simply leads to disputes about style trivia being hashed out and rehashed, often in increasingly "unproductive" tones, at article talk pages. One of the principle rationales for MoS's existence is preventing circular, tiresome, re-re-re-debate of the same style-trivia matters at article after article. And MoS and its talk page are subject to "contentious topic" designation (CTOP), which keep the civility level of discussion hosted there within reasonable limits (mostly). Individual article talk pages are rarely subject to CTOP that specifically address talk-page decorum, and so are ripe for "style warrior" flame-fests.
• All that said, MoS talk page regulars do sometimes refer such questions to RDL, to other guideline or policy or process pages, to specific wikiprojects, to administrative noticeboards, and so on, when questions really clearly have nothing to do with MoS.

See also

• Wikipedia:Manual of Style/FAQ
• Wikipedia:Manual of Style extended FAQ
• Wikipedia:Why Manual of Style discussions are so awful
• Wikipedia:If MOS doesn't need a rule on something, then it needs to not have a rule on that thing