JTDirl wrote in part:
Oliver wrote:
If the majority of experts on fauna call an animal the "Aardvark", and the majority of non-experts call it the "aardvark", then the majority of our potential *readership* call it the "aardvark". So that's what our usual naming convention says that *we* should call it, too. We shouldn't make special cases just for one particular group of people without a better reason than just because that's how they do it themselves.
The thing is, we are an *encyclopædia*. As such we should strive as much as possible for accuracy and that includes accuracy in capitalisation. [...] So we have a redirect page based on the wrong but commonly understood title, but the actual page is on the correctly titled page. So someone coming to the page is able to go away knowing the 'correct' facts, including the correct title, knowing more when they leave than when they came to it.
It's hardly been established that the downstyle is *wrong*, and we can always explain in the body of the article that many authorities prefer to capitalise (and explain who).
But I didn't come here to argue for downstyle, and I don't claim that these points outweigh JTDirl's. What I really want to do is point out the similarity of the argument to the earlier one over the naming of foreign cities and people. To paraphrase:
Oliver: People expect "Munich", so we should give them that.
JTDirl: But "München" is correct, and an encyclopædia should be correct. We can always redirect from the common but mistaken spelling.
Me (in the first paragraph above): It's not clear that "Munich" is wrong, and the article can always explain that it's "München" in Germany.
Not that this similarity should convince anybody in either case, but I hope that Wikipedians with opinions on both issues take the time to reconcile them in their own minds.
-- Toby