Why I voted "no"? (Tag separation/combination) #6

Let us continue to observe lilithcat's request from the previous thread to take philosophical discussions about tag combining elsewhere.

Family -- Drama are plays about families

family drama are works where there is a lot of drama related to family

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Family--Drama

Ditto Family -- Drama

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Family+--+Drama

Drama - Family is dramatic works suitable for family viewing:

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Drama+-+Family

as is Drama | Family

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Drama+|+Family

Let us continue to observe lilithcat's request from the previous thread to take philosophical discussions about tag combining elsewhere.

I don't agree. Since the only purpose of this thread is to put forth you arguments for not combining some tags and persuade others to vote likewise, it's only fair to allow the other side to have their say.

>3 jjwilson61: "philosophical discussions about tag combining" does not mean arguments either way about a particular tag.

There are only two things that should concern us. Usage AND meaning - both, in my view, equally important though.

One member uses the tags "harlequin romance" and "harlequin romance :(". It appears that the use of the emoticon ":(" is a deliberate differentiation. I'm guessing that's a book she didn't like!

http://www.librarything.com/tag/harlequin+romance+%3A%28#combine

Austria-Hungary is used for more than just the Austro-Hungarian Empire and as such should not be combined with tags specifically about this or the time period during which it existed.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Austria-Hungary

Black Mountain School is a group of poets who all follow a certain sense of aesthetics developed by {can't think of his name} at Black Mountain College. They are not all affiliated with the College.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Black+Mountain+School

mali (empire) - history is clearly different from mali (empire) - fiction: http://www.librarything.com/tag/mali+%28empire%29+-+history#combine

>8 aulsmith:
Thanks

"Illinois Central" refers to the railroad. "central Illinois" refers to the central part of the state. http://www.librarything.com/tag/Illinois+Central#combine

"State of Illinois Center" refers to the building. It's not clear to me that "illinois state center" does; I do know that the building is never called that. http://www.librarything.com/tag/Illinois+state+center#combine

Black Mail (two words) is (amongst other things) used for a book of that title and so should not be combined with Blackmail (one word)

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Black+Mail

Okay, anyone else confused by this series of combination/separation requests?

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Lake+Wobegon

There is both a combo and separation request for Lake Wobegon and Lake Wobegon (imaginary place) -- Fiction.

>13 gilroy: Probably a case of proposing a combination, realising the thing she tried to combine it with was combined with something else and then proposing separating them out.

As to the proposals themselves, there is apparently a real "Lake Wobegon" in Florida, although I don't think the tag is used for that.

The wobegon tag is only used on Garrison Keeler works so I don't think it should be separated from Lake Wobegon.

"Turner Classic Movies Greatest Classic Films Collection. Astaire and Rodgers: The Gay Divorcee; Swing Time; Top Hat; Shall We Dance" refers specifically to Astaire/Rogers films. "tcm turner classic movies greatest classic films collection" and "turner classic movies greatest classic films collection. ast" are more general.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Turner+Classic+Movies+Greatest+Classic+Films+Col...

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Turner+Classic+Movies+Greatest+Classic+Films+Col...

"Adoption and Foster Care" are two different things

"foster care adoption" is a situation in which a foster care family goes on to adopt a child when the child is released for adoption.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/foster+care+adoption

The tags "black/white racism" and "white/black racism" are used by only one person. Where the same person uses different, but similar, tags, I think, unless it's an obvious misspelling, that we have to assume that there is an intended difference in meaning.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/black%252Fwhite+racism#combine

Probably an unintended combination:

"Catholic priests" are not the same thing as "catholic+church"

http://www.librarything.com/tag/catholic%252Bchurch

How do proposals like this get any yes votes???

> 19

How do proposals like this get any yes votes???

For the same reason they get made in the first place. Insufficient attention being paid.

"post flood" are 14 books all related to creationsim. I'm not sure what "post-flood" is, but none of the first 50 books on the list have anything to do with creationism (or floods of any kind, unless perhaps the users saved those books from a flood???)

Anyway, I would not combine.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/post+flood

The main member using 'post-flood' also has a tag 'RECOVERED/REPLACED/SAVED from flood'.

>21 aulsmith:

Of the two users using "post-flood", one uses it with apparent reference to the Katrina hurricane in New Orleans.

>23 AndreasJ: Thank you. Clearly not how Noah's flood caused the fossil record.

If you read the stuff about the earthquakes, never mind. Yep often writes SF, but not this time.

I believe that "Hide and Seek" is being used as a short story title.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Hide+%2526+Seek+%252F

It looks like Hide & Seek / is also being used as a reference to a story title

And one user has used both hide 'n' seek and hide- and- seek, meaning he/she/they would like it kept separate for whatever reason.

On the same title? Because sometimes you forget how you spelled a tag, and if you don't care too much about consistency, you won't go in your tags to find out.

I'm not saying combine them, just that the reasoning seems flawed. I'd rather say that we don't know if they meant to have both versions, and then it's a question of if you're a lumper or a separator.

>27 JerryMmm:

I prefer to err on the side of caution than to lump everything together and hear the person complain.

Charles de Gaulle is also the name of an airport (that was named after the person) so should not be combined with things specific to the person. Yes I am aware that it is already combined with things specific to the person.

https://www.librarything.com/work/123078 = a work that probably uses the tag to refer to the airport, and not the person.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Charles+de+Gaulle

>28 gilroy: You do realize that combining tags doesn't actually combine them in a person's library. That he will still have Hide and Seek and Hide & Seek in the tag fields of his books. It only combines them on the work page and for the purpose of recommendations.

>30 jjwilson61:

You bring that up every time. I'm not looking at their library. I'm looking when they look at the tag page. Then it is one item.

"Sentenced to Die" is the name of a series
"sentenced to death" is what the story is about

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Sentenced+to+Die

There are two separate historical figures called Charles Cornwallis:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Cornwallis,_1st_Marquess_Cornwallis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Cornwallis,_1st_Earl_Cornwallis

The mass of combination proposals would combine tags related to these two people together so all except the one with Cornwallis-Charles should be rejected.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Charles+Cornwallis

Before the corporation "playschool" was formed we used to have play schools (which were like toddler day care/preschools now) and we would also play school.

The Carolyn Haywood title under "Play School" is one of the latter.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/playschool

>34 aulsmith:

I am unaware of any corporation named "playschool". As the parent of a toddler I'm familiar with "Playskool", but that is not involved in this particular combination proposal.

>35 lorax: Oh, right. My bad.

I didn't go through the whole list under playschool, but they seemed to be books by a publisher or in a series named "PlaySchool" which I mis-identified as lorax indicates. Some of the books under Play School also seemed related to the publisher/series but not the Carolyn Haywood.

>36 aulsmith: I'm not seeing that. Which books are by a publisher or in a series called PlaySchool?

>37 jjwilson61:

Favourite Play School Stories Pb: From 25 Years of Play School
The blue book; Playschool

Okay, there aren't that many. But they're not about a play school and they're not about playing school. It's a very odd set. Are they in a play school? One says TV series. Was there a TV series Play School that read books to kids?

This is why I hate tag combining. I don't know what all these taggers meant, but it's something different than what the tagger who put the tag on the Carolyn Haywood book meant.

So, everyone needs to decide for themselves if that's enough to keep them separate.

>38 aulsmith: (et al) Amazing to say that I remember this show. The publisher is also ABC books (which matches my recollection of it being on ABC).

Here's a separate book (with decent information) that isn't currently cataloged on LT.

http://www.amazon.com/Red-Book-ABC-Play-School/dp/0733305547/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&...

There's even a cookbook.

http://www.amazon.com/Play-School-Cookbook-John-Fox/dp/064253117X/ref=sr_1_8?s=b...

John Fox seems to be the author of most of these.

Okay, I know, WAY too much information, but I couldn't resist...

>39 Lyndatrue: Except that the ABC in this case (at least for the first book) is the Australian Broadcasting Corporation which I suspect is not the one that you thought of.

>38 aulsmith: Playschool seems to be another name for a pre-school and while Play School is an Australian and UK TV Series according to Wikipedia none of the 4 works tagged with Play School seem to be referring to that. So I think that the users of those tags mean the same thing and have voted to combine them.

There is a proposal to combine "Abraham (Biblical patriarch)" with "Abraham (O.T. patriarch)": http://www.librarything.com/tag/Abraham+%28Biblical+patriarch%29#combine

As a general principle, I am opposed to combining "biblical", "Bible", etc. with "O.T.", "Old Testament", etc., because in my view the term "Old Testament" refers only to a Christian Bible. The Hebrew Bible has no "old" testament.

>42 lilithcat: But surely the it's the same Abraham referred to whether its in a Christian or a Hebrew Bible.

>43 jjwilson61: We're not supposed to combine things that have a social difference. I'd say the Christian Bible and the Hebrew Bible would be a social difference.

>44 aulsmith: But the referent in this case is the person Abraham described in the Book of Genesis and the Quran. There is no social difference between the person whether the tagger's source is the Tanakh, the Torah, the Old Testament, the Christian Bible, or the Quran. In each case, the tagger seems to be attempting to differentiate Abraham the antediluvian patriarch from any other Abraham (such as, inter alia, one of the saints) rather than distinguishing between sources.

>44 aulsmith: I see your point and I wouldn't combine the tags Christian Bible and Hebrew Bible, but this tag isn't about the book it's about a the same character, historical or whatever, that appears in both books. It's like saying you can't combine the Lincoln from a pro-slavery history book and the one from an anti-slavery history book because there's a social difference.

>46 jjwilson61: You make the point much more clearly than I did in my post.

45-47: Here, I find the social difference in the tag itself, not its meaning. A Jewish person looking through tags for Abraham wouldn't select one that said Old Testament, because they would know those were books tagged by Christians. If you combine the tags, they have to do a multi-step process to eliminate books tagged by Christians.

>48 aulsmith: Three books have been tagged "Abraham (O.T. patriarch)"; all by the same user, who identifies as a Christian Baptist. 24 members use "Abraham (Biblical patriarch)" on 25 books. 628 members use "Abraham" on 844 books although about 10% of those pertain to Lincoln and a few designate other Abrahams. How does your partisan Jewish reader identify the Christian books tagged with the broader "Abraham (Biblical patriarch)" tag? Tagmashes show that there are quite a few of them: see Abraham+ Christianity (216 hits) and Abraham (Biblical patriarch)+ Christianity (10 hits).

>49 TheoClarke: They don't. But at least we haven't added to their problem.

"St. Cloud" is used primarily for the city in Minnesota. "Saint Cloud" is used only for the silverware pattern.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Saint+Cloud#combine

As the only person who uses "Coming Out (1)" also uses "coming out", a distinction is likely intended and the tags ought not to be combined: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Coming+Out%281%29#combine

There are many uses of the word "Riviera" for which "rivieraen" would be inapplicable (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riviera_%28disambiguation%29).

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Riviera

Berkshire County is a county in Massachusetts. County Berkshire is a county in England.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Berkshire+County

US State: Louisiana is a state. USS Louisiana is the name of 5 U.S. Navy ships

http://www.librarything.com/tag/US+State%3A+Louisiana

An Indian Folktale could refer to either the Native Americans or to the People of India, so I would not recommend combining it with India folktale.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Indian+folktale

>56 gilroy:

And, in fact, several uses of "Indian folktale" are in fact using it in the "Native American" sense.

I wish more people would bother to look at both tag pages before proposing combinations.

auto/bio/memoir is for three things - autobiographies, biographies and memoirs. autobiography/memoir is just the first and third of these.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/auto%252Fbio%252Fmemoir

Georgian folklore refers to the country of Georgia. Georgia folklore refers to the state of Georgia (US), et al. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia

http://www.librarything.com/tag/georgian+folklore

Tags about America and tags about the USA should almost never be combined, and ones about Folklore are no exception.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Folklore+American

http://www.librarything.com/tag/county+Essex
http://www.librarything.com/tag/county+Sussex
http://www.librarything.com/tag/county+Suffolk

The above refer to counties in England. They should not be combined with XXXXX County which are counties in 1 or more states in th US.

City of London is the historic center and modern financial district of the larger London metropolis. City - London appears to refer more generally to the entire city.

Do people read before they vote? This combination has two yes votes!

Biography - England
Biography: Lincoln

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Biography%3A+Lincoln

>64 MarthaJeanne: Has 4 yes votes now! Fortunately, the no votes are winning.

"Yorks" refers to the House of York, "Yorkshire" to the place: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Yorks#combine

>66 lilithcat: Sorry, I disagree. 'Yorks' is a common enough abbreviation for Yorkshire, as in Richmond (Yorks), the 1st Yorks (an army battalion), or the S. Yorks Police.

A supporter of the House of York was a Yorkist, but if the House of York was to be abbreviated it would be to the title, York.

Yorks seems to be used in a variety of ways. Exactly what is meant in each case is hard to tell. But certainly it is not just/always an abbreviation for Yorkshire, and therefore should not be combined.

"Ethan Allen" is an American patriot and a furniture store. The others are just the patriot.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Ethan+Allen

I suspect I'm the only person here who thinks that the social difference between home schoolers who can't spell and people who can is worth preserving, but for what it's worth, I voted no on:

http://www.librarything.com/tag/forth+grade

"euro" is used for a wide range of things (indeed someone seems to be using it for any books by a European author), whereas "The Euro" is used exclusively for books about the currency

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Euro

genre fiction (no demarkation) is a way of noting books that are of specific genre designations like mystery, science fiction, fantasy, and romance.

genre: fiction(with demarkation) covers anything that is fiction, inclusive of literary, classical, and just general fiction that has no genre attached.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/genre+fiction

I would see Oct 08 as October 2008, whereas Oct 8 would be more likely to be 8th October.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Oct+08

I was going back over some older combinations that are close to passing which I had previously voted undecided on and came across this one:

Apaches is the name of a group in a series of books by Lorenzo Carcaterra. From descriptions and reviews it seems to bear no relation to the Native Americans - they are described as "a renegade crime stopping unit". The tag is used for this purpose in https://www.librarything.com/work/1505273 and https://www.librarything.com/work/124720.

Thus it should not be combined with Apache Indians.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Apaches

>74 kuuderes_shadow: There is also a social difference in the US between people who use just the tribal name for particular groups of Native Americans and those who add the word "Indians" to the name.

>75 aulsmith: I didn't know this; what is the social difference?

> 74: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apaches_%28subculture%29

>77 Nicole_VanK: I noticed it was tagged as "non-fiction" but didn't know anythiing about the context, which is why I just focused on the book itself. Thanks for providing that link, though.

---

https://www.librarything.com/tag/British+folklore

^ a complete mess of combinations there which would see various related but different things all connected together. The "british isles" one certainly should not be combined, but to be honest I voted no to all of them.

Britain is usually used to refer to the UK, the UK minus overseas territories and dependencies, or the UK minus these and Northern Ireland.
Great Britain is an island, and thus does not include the Hebrides, northern isles, isles of scilly etc.
British Isles is an archipelago, including the whole of Ireland and the Isle of Man (which are not part of the country), and possibly also Jersey and Guernsey.
"British" could be used to refer to any of the above - although usually one of the first two.

>76 henkl: When US scholars started using Native Americans (instead of "Indians," which is clearly confusing), a number of Native American activists remarked that this was still a Western name for them as a whole and that they never had the concept of being one people in that sense. Many activists asked to be identified by their tribal names instead.

So people using Apache Indians are using a very old model of nomenclature uninformed by the current political situation where people using just the tribe name are more informed and likely to be reading a more modern set of books.

(Of course, to be really respectful, we should all use the tribal name in the tribal language, but my spelling ability falters on most of the tribal names in the Northeast. Maybe now that LT does tag prompts I could go in and change them and hope to keep them correct in the future.)

>78 kuuderes_shadow: I thought Britain was the island and Great Britain was the political entity of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. But I agree totally with your conclusions that none of these should be combined.

On a more general note, there seems to be a consensus that the folklore of a people (say Russian) is the same as the folklore of a nation (say Russia), when Russia contains many different "folk" with unique folklores. I personally have voted no on all of these, but there were so many, I didn't have the energy to post them here.

>79 aulsmith:

Thank you for your information.

>80 aulsmith: there seems to be a consensus that the folklore of a people (say Russian) is the same as the folklore of a nation (say Russia),

Yes, the folklore of Russia is exactly the folklore of the people of Russia (that is, the Russians), and Russian folklore could mean folklore of Russia, anyway. One could cut it until Russian folklore was meaning the folklore of the Russians, exclusive of non-Russian folklore, but that's pretty narrow cutting. Given that a book of Mari folklore is likely to be tagged Russian folklore anyway, keeping the tags distinct does nothing to keep the underlying ideas distinct.

Great Britain is a legal construct (of 1707 I believe, but I could easily be a year wrong). British Isles existed "forever".

83

The OED has a quote regarding Great Britain from 1604: Proclamations of James I, 24 Oct) - 'King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland'. The Act of Union did happen 1707. So the idea of Great Britain happened a century before the actuality. Sometimes, the term 'South Britain' ws used for England and the term 'North Britain' for Scotland. 'West Britain' as Ireland was only used humorously or polemically. There is also some early use of 'Little Britain' or 'Britain the Less' as refering to Brittany. There is a small use in LT of North Britain as a tag (usually with history), but not of South, West Britain or Britain the Less. Little Britain is sometimes used as a reference to a TV show, but not to Brittany.

There is a proposal to combine cuisine epices with spicy cuisine.

I have two concerns. First, spicy has two meanings in English (using lots of spices and spicy-hot) and may not translate well. Second, google translates "cuisine epices" as "kitchen spices", not "spicy cuisine". Google may certainly be wrong. If someone who speaks French says this is a good combination I'll change my vote.

"Julia Margaret Cameron" and "Julia Cameron" are not the same person. The former was a Victorian-era photographer; the latter is an American artist and writer.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Julia+Margaret+Cameron#combine

western history" is history from a Western (European) viewpoint
Western - history seems to be used for the history of the United States "Wild" West

http://www.librarything.com/tag/western+history%22

>87 aulsmith: Also the two combinations here

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Western+%3A+History

>88 MarthaJeanne: Thanks

The fossil record is relevant to more subjects than just geology.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/fossil+record

>88 MarthaJeanne: While I think I agree that Western History and Western - History are different, I don't know why would you consider Western - History and Western : History to be different.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/prisoners+of+war

"Prisoners of War" (with quotes) refers to a specific short story title within a book.
Prisoners of War (no quotes) refers to various instances of prisoners of war throughout history.

Okay, I didn't really vote "no", but I must say it's tempting to keep "higgs bosom" separate from "Higgs Boson", and "fiendship" separate from "friendship"!

Now I feel like I have to write a book with Higgs Bosom in it somehow, just to justify the no. :)

>93 lilithcat: >94 gilroy: Did you notice that the title of bosom book was Massive?

>79 aulsmith:

It's also possible that people are using "Apache Indians" to disambiguate from, say, Apache helicopters, or the Apache Software Foundation.

The question of what nomenclature to use in general to refer to the peoples inhabiting the Americas prior to the arrival of European colonists is somewhat fraught; there are many contexts in which such general terminology, as opposed to referring to a specific tribe or tribes, is necessary and useful. Many activists use "Indian", or "American Indian" when the former is unclear. The latter is also what the American Indian movement and the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian, which had extensive input from people of many American Indian tribes, use.

In other words, the use of the word "Indian" in this context is not necessarily uninformed, and the belief that it is generally deprecated in favor of "Native American" when a general reference is necessary is not necessarily correct. Informed opinions on the matter differ. While "Apache Indians" other than as disambiguation is a bit odd, "Indian" in general is not an uninformed usage.

>96 lorax: Thanks. I mostly interacted with members of the Iroquois Nation, who are definitely on the "tribal name" side of the fraughtness. I made the unwarranted assumption that their opinion was universal.

Time Travelers and Travelers Through Time are the names of two different series (the latter is only used for this purpose) and thus should not be combined.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Time+Travelers

Not all fiction is novels, so historical fiction shouldn't be combined with historical novel.

> 99

Again? Why do people keep doing that?

Sf and science fiction is also up again in spite of being an example of what should not be combined.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/sf

>100 lilithcat: Because all some people read is novels and they are unable to see beyond the end of their nose? Or not understanding the difference because of a language bareer.

>101 MarthaJeanne: Oh come on. Not again. Can it be a German thing (looking at her catalogue) where sf as a german tag cannot mean anything but science fiction (and not understanding that in English it has more meanings, it is easy to make a mistake)?

>102 AnnieMod: Her tag Erzählungen means (short) stories, so I assume she doesn't only read novels. But she obviously didn't read the guidelines.

And it can't just be German. Another person making lots of bad suggestions is from England.

There are more Tolkiens than just J.R.R. Tolkien (most obviously his son, Christopher Tolkien).

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Tolkien

Also from the same person, YA can stand for more than just Young Adult, and is certainly different from Young Adult Literature.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/YA

>104 kuuderes_shadow: There are more Tolkiens than just J.R.R. Tolkien (most obviously his son, Christopher Tolkien).

Also most obviously, there's one work on LT by Christopher Tolkien that's not primarily J.R.R. Tolkien's work, and The Saga of King Heidrek the Wise is not tagged Tolkien. Final Witness is tagged Tolkien four times; I'm doubting you can find another 18 off-brand uses to make the 0.1% mark. That's the level at which authors named French (e.g. Diary of a Wombat and In the Woods) get "french" used for their books, instead of French works.

>104 kuuderes_shadow: Yes, but I think it's safe to say that someone who tagged a book just Tolkien that they mean J.R.R. If they had meant C. Tolkien then they would have added something to distinguish it somehow. There are some people, like William Shakespeare and Abraham Lincoln who are so famous that you just have to assume that if someone just uses their last name that you still know who they're talking about.

I usually don't get picky on combination proposals, however Northwest Pacific and Northwestern Pacific are not used to refer to the same thing. Northwestern Pacific is used for the railroad of the same name located in northern California, whereas Northwest Pacific is used for books with some connection to the area stretching from Oregon into British Columbia. Link: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Northwestern+Pacific . One could make a better case for combining 'Northwestern Pacific' and 'Northwestern Pacific Railroad'. The rather lengthy Wikipedia article on the NWP is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwestern_Pacific_Railroad .

The other combination on http://www.librarything.com/tag/Northwest+Pacific, North-West Pacific, is also questionable as it seems to be refering to the ocean as such, and not the land area refered to in >107 vpfluke:.

In the US the GI Bill usually refers to the programs passed after World War II to give returning GIs access to educational benefits.

The GI Bill of Rights aren't, as far as I know, a single law, but a collection of rights for military personnel collected from multiple sources.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/G.I.+Bill+of+Rights

>109 aulsmith:
"The Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944—commonly known as the GI Bill of Rights"
See http://www.benefits.va.gov/gibill/history.asp

Also see the book tagged GI Bill of Rights in which that phrase is used interchangeably with GI Bill.
https://books.google.com/books?id=cfhneJPcD38C&printsec=frontcover&sourc...

>107 vpfluke: How about combining Northwest Pacific and Pacific Northwest as they both seem to refer to the same region. The types of books are different though, with Pacific Northwest is dominated by fiction that takes place in that region of the US. But then with only 18 uses the books tagged Northwest Pacific are bound to be eccentric.

Not all books about the "Holocaust. Jewish (1939-1945) -- Netherlands -- Amsterdam --." are "Personal Narratives": http://www.librarything.com/tag/Holocaust.+Jewish+%281939-1945%29+--+Netherlands...

>112 lilithcat: I can see what they were trying to do, but the combo box proved too small to combine them.
I just tried to combine the two personal Narratives tags, but the box stopped at Pe

"Yale School" refers to a "post-liberal school of theology", so-called because it arose primarily at the Yale Divinity School. "school: Yale" appears not to be used that way. (Based on the fact that only one person uses the latter tag, and he uses "school:name of school" a lot, it's pretty clearly not the school of theology that he means.)

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Yale+School#combine

While at present "Heisei" is only likely to be used for the current period, upon the death of the current emperor of Japan (and thus the ending of this period) "Heisei" will become the emperor's post-humous name. Thus I am loth to combine Heisei with Heisei Period.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Heisei

>110 eromsted: My bad. Didn't look closely enough at the usage.

IPCC is also the abbreviation for the Independent Police Complaints Commission. It's not used for this at present but it wouldn't be unlikely for it to be used that way in the future.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/IPCC

Another repeat appearance:

"John Dee" is the alter-ego of Doctor Destiny, a DC Comics character (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Destiny), and is used for this purpose in this book: https://www.librarything.com/work/9347622

Yes, the tag "John Dee" is already combined with several other tags which are specific to the historical figure, but that just means they want separating, and certainly not combining with more such tags.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/John+Dee

edit: made separation proposals. Hopefully if the existing combinations are removed then we can make a separate place for things that are specific to the historical figure to be put together and thus reduce the chance of this proposal coming up yet again.

>118 kuuderes_shadow:

Thanks, I'd forgotten that.

There's been more than one "Johnson administration" in the United State. Let's not forget about Andrew!

So I wouldn't combine that with "johnson (l) administration": http://www.librarything.com/tag/johnson+%28l%29+administration#combine

There are composers named Haydn other than "Joseph Haydn": http://www.librarything.com/tag/composers%3A+Haydn#combine

"kitch" is used as short for "kitchen", an apparent misspelling of "witch", and a couple of other things apparently unrelated to a misspelling of "kitsch": http://www.librarything.com/tag/kitch#combine

A manuscript is not the same thing as a book. Other than a library or J.P. Morgan, one who collects the former probably doesn't collect the latter, and vice versa: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Manuscripts+-+Collectors+and+collecting+-+Fictio...

"Levi-Strauss" is used for Claude Lévi-Strauss. "Strauss Levi" is used only for Levi Strauss, the jeans guy.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Strauss+Levi#combine

"Levi Strauss" and "levi strauss" - also the jeans guy - are currently combined with "Levi-Strauss"; I've proposed separating the non-hyphenated version from the hyphenated one.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Liberty+Party : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_Party lists five different parties under this name, not just the one being combined with.

Do people even look at what books have which tag before proposing a combining?

"Cambridge History" is a series of books on the history of a variety of different things: music, food, China, etc. "History of Cambridge" is used for the history of a couple of different places of that name.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Cambridge+History#combine'

And three people voted "yes" so that's two people in addition to the proposer who didn't bother to look.

head~desk

That member doesn't.

>127 MarthaJeanne:

I know, and it drives me crazy.

Library Tech is an abbreviation for Library Technician(s), not "technology" and used at least one time.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Library+Tech

For the same reason above Tech could = Technician

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Software+Tech
http://www.librarything.com/tag/computer+tech

"books - technology" is about the technology of books. The other heading is books about technology

http://www.librarything.com/tag/books+-+technology

There is a proposal to combine "Anne Boleyn 1501/7-1536" with "Anne Boleyn: fiction." In fact, it appears that all the books with the former tag are non-fiction.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Anne+Boleyn+1501%252F7-1536#combine

>132 lilithcat:
Thanks for catching that. I've had Firefox kill my bookmarks once or twice, and I find that the voting page is a much more effective place to spot short-term stupidities. (It's a white-space thing, I think.)

There's a proposal to combine "McKinley" with "McKinley Morganfield" : http://www.librarything.com/tag/McKinley#combine

The former includes much more than the latter, books about President McKinley, books by authors named McKinley, books about Mt. McKinley, but, in fact, I don't see anything by or about McKinley Morganfield!

The tag "McComb" is not used solely for books about "McComb Mississippi": http://www.librarything.com/tag/McComb#combine

"Lost Cause" is a term used to refer to any hopeless cause.
"The Lost Cause" refers to a specific event in US history.

The majority of books tagged "Lost Cause" refer to this same event but not all of them - for instance this book related to the 1745 Jacobite Rising: https://www.librarything.com/work/19361

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Lost+Cause

>136 kuuderes_shadow: "The Lost Cause" refers to a specific event in US history.

It may happen that all 5 books tagged The Lost Cause right now are about the US Civil War, but so are 14 books tagged Lost Cause more than once. I don't think "the Lost Cause" can only refer to the US Civil War.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/%2Ametal

Only one person uses *metal as a tag and they have their books tagged metal as well. I don't think they should be combined.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Pulmonary+Cancer

Only one user is using the tag pulmonary cancer and it is tagged on the same book as their tag for lung cancer. These should not be combined

http://www.librarything.com/tag/%22Middle+Passage%22

"middle passage" (with quotes) is the title of a specific essay within a book
Middle Passage (no quotes) is an open tag about the slave trade, the passages between old world and new, and a few other topics.

How do you not notice that the tag "Chardin" is used for Pierre Teilhard de Chardin as well as Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin?

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Chardin#combine

138

The person who tags their book as metal as well as *metal normally tags everything in their library with two tags, one with the asterisk (*) and one without. So, whatever his reasoning, I don't think you can assume there is anything but an obscure difference between the the two tags. So, they are combinable, but it doesn't make much difference whether they are combined or not.

"New Orleans" is a parish* as well as a city: http://www.librarything.com/tag/New+Orleans#combine

*Louisiana's term for a county

Most of the proposed combinations with non-fiction are good, but it looks to me as though ~non-fiction is being used specifically for works that are semi-fictional or that are difficult to classify as fiction or non-fiction. Possibly the tilde here means "roughly" or "approximately".

>144 Edward:

Easier link to the proposal:

http://www.librarything.com/tag/~non-fiction#combine

Also:

• Four out of six uses of nomfiction are for cookbooks, which I think is a pun (compare "nom" in Urban Dictionary).
• onfiction and on-fiction could plausibly mean "about fiction", and they are used for books including On Writing and How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy.

145 lilithcat:

Thanks. I've edited the links in my posts.

>146 Edward:
To each there own in terms of voting, but I looked at those and was not convinced they were anything other than typos.

I lingered the longest over nomfiction. Two of the users clearly made typos as the books have nothing to do with food. The cookbooks were entered by one user, all on the same day. That user has one other cookbook, entered on a different day and not tagged nomfiction. And though that user has tagged fairly extensively, she does not have any other jokey or internet-slang tags. So an intentional use of nomfiction feels out of character.

nomfiction would be fiction about nomming, not non-fiction about nomming, right?

>149 JerryMmm: Wouldn't that be books traveling under the name of fiction, whatever their true genre (Like nom de plume)?

nom de plume. nomfiction. Just as you chew on the feathery pen as you write, you chew on the book as you read.

There's a reason she is Cleopatra VII - there were six other queens of Egypt of that name: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Cleopatra+VII+Queen+of+Egypt+%2526+Pharaoh+of+Eg...

Even if you limit it to the musical term (which most of the tag uses seem to be about), "rock" and "rock and roll" are different things.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/rock

154: Sorry, that proposal was unintentional. Please vote No on it. I think it happened when I tried to combine rock and roll with rock "n" roll (which I've now managed to propose successfully).

Similarly, my proposal to combine rock and roll with Rock 'N was a failed attempt to propose a combination with Rock 'N" Roll.

St. Clair is primarily being used in reference to people with that last name. Saint Clair is only used once, but I believe it is in reference to a saint of that name. The "Chiara" in the book's title is probably Chiara Offreduccio, follower of St. Francis and also known as Saint Clare (or Clair) of Assisi.

Pittsburgh is a city in Pennsylvania
Pittsburg is a city, town, village, county, etc in a lot of other places.

The fact that people don't know how to spell the first one doesn't make the others any less real.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Pittsburg

Aul of aulsmith, a native of Pittsburgh.

Tag combining on LT can't make anything more or less real. But, yes, on close inspection 2 out of 48 uses of Pittsburg refer to Pittsburg Landing, site of the battle of Shiloh. All of the rest are confirmably people who can't spell Pittsburgh.

Combining in obvious misspellings is one thing, but if the misspelling is itself a valid tag, it is a different matter.

>160 MarthaJeanne: My point better stated.

St. Claire refers to an author by that name, while Saint Claire refers to Saint Claire of Assisi. And Sainte Claire is a mixed lot.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Saint+Claire

As there are indeed books tagged Spring Green that are not also tagged "Wisconsin", I voted against combining it with Spring Green (WI).

AC

Does voting on items that have reached the threshold help librarything or just pump up your numbers.

If you find things that shouldn't be combined but have managed to reach the threshold anyway and vote no to them then that's hugely helpful, as it can push the item back below the threshold again. It's far easier to prevent something being combined in the first place than to remember it, wait for the combination to take full effect, and then try to get it separated again.

On the other hand there are times when people will vote down things that probably do want combining - sometimes long after the proposal passed the threshold and thus also passed off everyone's radar, or even for no apparent reason at all (to take an extreme example there's one person who has shown up about half a dozen times since I started participating in tag combination voting who literally goes down the entire list voting yes-no-undecided-repeat for every single proposal no matter what the proposal in question may be), and so voting yes helps give the things a buffer against such things.

So voting either "yes" or "no" on items that have reached the threshold is definitely helpful to the site.

(this is assuming the items have passed the yes threshold rather than the no one - things that pass the no threshold are usually accidents or things that are quickly posted in these threads after they are proposed. Obviously if it had passed the "no" threshold then they would be the other way around)

"Long Goodbye" is the title of a poem which is included in the book that has this tag used on it. The user in question also tags this same book with the titles of all the other poems in the book.

Thus it does not want combining with "The Long Goodbye", which is never used for this purpose and obviously isn't the title of the poem in question.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Long+goodbye

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Dolores+Ashcroft-Nowicki

Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki is a non-fiction occult author.
Dolores Jane Umbridge is a fictional character from the world of Harry Potter.

Well, here it is again. A proposal to combine "Dr. John Dee" with "John Dee": http://www.librarything.com/tag/Dr.+John+Dee#combine

See: http://www.librarything.com/topic/188642#5132543

>168 lilithcat:
Well, look who proposed it.

Carole Mathews was an actress.
Carole Matthews is an author.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Carole+Matthews

"Rastafari" is an alternate name for Haile Salassie, a sacred being to the Rastafarians. If is not the name of the religion itself

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Rastafari

>171 aulsmith: I would agree with you if the tag was "Ras Tafari".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rastafari_movement

>172 MsMaryAnn: Okay

But a religion is not the same as the people who believe it. Christianity is not the same as Christians. Islam is not the same as Muslims... so I still don't think that Rastifari should be combined with Rastafarians.

>174 MarthaJeanne: Oh, that explains why the article was called the Rastafari Movement! I knew I should pursue that more but I didn't have the time.

Thanks.

>174 MarthaJeanne: >175 aulsmith: I will not sleep tonight unless I change my vote!

>174 MarthaJeanne: >175 aulsmith: That makes sense.

Quick question: Is it better for a member to edit a tag on their books or request a tag combination? Like this http://www.librarything.com/tag/Schirn

If she's the only person using the tags, I'd say "edit", particularly in this case as many people will see them as different, or simply not have sufficient information and vote "undecided" (as I did).

>179 lilithcat: I agree. If you're the only user and you don't have a really strong need to have the tag read one way or the other, edit your own.

One of my general rules is to assume a difference if the same person uses both.

>181 MarthaJeanne:

I agree, though in this case it is the person who uses both tags who proposed the combination.

>182 lilithcat: Maybe they don't know they can combine them within their library?

I'm sort of fine with retold vs. retelling, but a folk tale isn't necessarily a fairy tale.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/folktale+retold

184

This was my mistake -- I'm surprised that 4 people have agreed with my proposal. However, 19 have voted against it.

"Richelieu Armand-Jean du Plessis" is the man commonly referred to as Cardinal Richelieu.

"Armand Emmanuel du Plessis duc de Richelieu 1766-1822 1er ministre 1815-18 & 1820-21 is not.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Richelieu+Armand-Jean+du+Plessis#combine

>185 vpfluke: Don't worry about it. It happens. When I reported the numbers were in favour of combining though.

>184 Nicole_VanK: Didn't we just have a vote on combining those two base tags recently?

"Rocky Mountains" should not be combined with "Rocky Mountains (USA)" as the Rockies extend into Canada. http://www.librarything.com/tag/Rocky+Mountains#combine

>188 gilroy: If so I didn't notice. Sorry.

Thanks to lilithcat for bringing this proposal to my attention - I've only been voting on them intermittently recently so there have been a lot slipping through the net.

Anyway,

LaLa is the name of a shoujo manga magazine, and the vast majority of the tag's uses refer to this, and thus it should not be combined with La-La.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/LaLa

landmark series - most but not all of the uses of this tag seem to be in reference to the American Landmark Series, which is a completely different series to the Landmark Ancient Histories series that S-The Landmark Series is used for.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/landmark+series

The tag "Cambridge Ancient History" could be (but isn't currently) used to refer to Cambridge in ancient history or the ancient history of Cambridge. "The Cambridge Ancient History" could only plausibly refer to the books.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Cambridge+Ancient+History

"Politics and culture in modern America" could be used on any book with this as a topic, not just the series of that name, as could "Pivotal Moments in American History".

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Politics+and+culture+in+modern+America

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Pivotal+Moments+in+American+History

"oyalty" could just as easily be used as a typo for words like "loyalty" as "royalty"

https://www.librarything.com/tag/oyalty

http://www.librarything.com/tag/österreicher

Österreicher is the (male) person. Austrian could be the person, but is more likely to be an adjective.

The tag "Augustine" is used only for the saint. "St.Augustine" is also used for the city in Florida.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/St.Augustine#combine

"Sam Phillips" appears to be used for people in addition to "Sam C. Phillips", such as an arts journalist and an early American educator: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Sam+Phillips#combine

Samuel Huntington (with no middle initial) was American jurist, statesman, and revolutionary leader (1731–1796) and it is also the name of WWII ship.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Samuel+Huntington

>196 MsMaryAnn: There were already a lot of Samuel Ps in there so I have suggested the separations.

>197 MarthaJeanne: Thank you! I'm still trying to master voting.

"sand stone" seems to be referring to the two things separately, "sandstone" is a type of rock.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/sandstone

"Sakhalin" is the name of a Russian Oblast which includes more than just the island of that name.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Sakhalin

While I understand English speaking people associating Blitz wit The Blitz, the word simply means lightning in German.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Blitz

>200 Nicole_VanK:

True, and at least one of the books tagged "Blitz" probably has a discussion of lightning: http://www.librarything.com/work/45409 (and I note that it has other German tags as well)

If I were to see the tag "savings and loans" my first thought would be that it is a book about... well... savings and loans. Admittedly this may be partly because I have never heard of a "savings and loan institution" before in my life and don't even know what one is, and as such I don't know if the tag is currently used for these institutions or not, but that's irrelevant when there is such an obvious potential usage which does not relate to them (and the tag is only used by 3 people).

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Savings+and+loans

Aren't US savings and loans institutions the equivalent of UK building societies? (Not that I'd advocate combining the tags!)

>202 kuuderes_shadow:

I suspect this is a case where there's a strong distinction between US members older than, hm, 35? and everyone else. For anyone in the US who was aware of the news in the late 1980s, "savings and loans" immediately calls to mind the S&L crisis and thus the institutions involved. (I'm at the low end of the age range that would have this association, but it's strong enough for me that I would never use the phrase for anything else - it seems like an extremely odd phrase to come up with independently. Nevertheless, whoever tagged this work seems to have done so, so I'm not going to support the combination.)

My first thought upon seeing "Savings and loans" would be "ah, thrifts and the thrift crisis during the 1980s when savings and loan institutions were failing, and the government tried to help the situation by inducing good thrifts to buy failing thrifts and be able to count the "goodwill" in savings requirements thus allowing them to use this "virtual" money as if it was "real" money sitting in the bank vault (they needed a set level to be a set size) thus allowing the thrifts to grow that much larger. Then in roughly 1990 the government took away the right to use goodwill in this way and many institutions started collapsing again because of that. Since they were resting on "virtual money" that no longer existed. So they sued. And mostly won."

But then, I did legal work in the thrift lawsuits. In the 2000s. So, if you were someone that read lots and lots of legal stuff, you might have seen it on your own in the 2000s (and in the '90s, the first cases started in the '90s). Course it also gets brought up with each new financial crisis that occurs.

>203 Cynfelyn: Since there are savings and loan banks, and thrifts, and many varied other types of financial institutions, I'd be leery of attempting to equate them with non-specific institutions "elsewhere."

I looked it up on wiki just to make sure my brain wasn't mixing something up when I thought of savings and loans. And it didn't. But I mention because the wiki says that thrifts are similar to the UK building societies and trustee savings banks.

"Bible en hébreu" is used for Bibles written in the Hebrew language, while "Hebrew bible" is used generally for the Tanakh, or commentaries on it, in whatever translation.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Bible+en+h%C3%A9breu#combine

Most of the suggestions on the http://www.librarything.com/tag/Hebrew+Bible page are questionable because it is hard to know which is meant. I would guess that http://www.librarything.com/tag/bible+hebrew means the language.

About half the uses for "Light and Shadow" are for the series "Wars of Light and Shadow". Meanwhile half the uses for "shadow and light" are for the series "A Pattern of Shadow and Light". Thus I would posit that, similar sounding as they may be, their uses are different.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Light+and+Shadow

There are 2 Lonnie Johnsons catalogued. One was a jazz musician, the other an inventor.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Lonnie+Johnson

Gothic Lolita Style is used for a book on how to draw gothic lolita characters.
Gothic Lolita Fashion is used for a fashion mook.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/gothic+lolita+fashion

The tag "Alsace and Lorraine" is used only in reference to the separate regions in the historical period up to the formation of the Alsace-Lorraine region. Alsace-Lorraine, as you would expect, refers to this region after its creation.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Alsace+and+Lorraine

Granted that it's not currently used this way, but the term "settlor" has a very specific legal meaning: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Settlors#combine

One of the two books tagged "Shamens" appears to refer to a rock group: http://www.discogs.com/artist/7297-Shamen-The

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Shamens#combine

While I generally go along with @kuuderes_shadow's suggestions when it comes to Japanese terms, I have to vote "no" on combining "ukiyo-e" with "estampa japonesa". Ukiyo-e is a specific genre from a specific period of Japanese art, while "estampa japonese" means simply "Japanese print" and can include contemporary and other works as well.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/estampa+japonesa#combine

The children's book awards are the Newbery, with one "r". That tag should not be combined with "Newberry" (two "r"s), which can refer to people with that name, the Newberry Library, said library's book sale, etc.

The proposed combination of "Newberry*" with "Newbery" should be voted down. I have also proposed separating various forms of "Newberry" from "Newbery":

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Newbery#combine

It's a shame we can't get a combine never list for tags like we have for authors.

That doesn't actually prevent combinations, just gets them off the suggested list.

It would still be a start to keep from seeing the same suggestion voted down five times.

Fraud Sigmund

This is the kind of unique, jokey tag, I don't like to see combined.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Fraud+Sigmund

>219 aulsmith:

I don't think it's meant that way. The user has another tag, "Sigmund Freud - fiction", that is used appropriately, and doesn't seem to have any other "jokey" tags. I think this is a simple case of misspelling.

>220 lilithcat: To each their own. I figured because he could spell it correctly on the one tag that the other was deliberate. I too didn't find another joke, but I only have about 10 jokes in my 26000 tags, so I'm not inclined to give that a lot of weight (unless you went through all of them, which I did not.)

The Psalms are numbered differently in Catholic/Orthodox and Protestant Bibles. Psalms 1-8 are the same. Psalm 9 for Catholics/Orthodox is Psalm 9 and 10 for Protestants. After that they're all one off.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Ninth+psalm

Catholics today are mixed today on psalm numbering, some using the traditional Catholic/Orthodox numbering and others using the Protestant/Hebrew system. Here is a link to the differences: http://www.swartzentrover.com/cotor/bible/bible/OT/Poetry/Psalms/A%20Comparison%... . Note the two systems come back together for Psalms 148-150. But then Orthodox may add a Psalm 151.

But both Psalm 9 and ninth psalm are equally ambiguous.

>222 aulsmith:

Yes, but neither of the tags specifies which ordering they're using, so while that's interesting trivia it doesn't mean that "Psalm 9" and "Ninth Psalm" aren't equivalent.

It doesn't make any difference. If you look up Psalm 9 you may not find what you are looking for. If you look up Ninth Psalm you may not find what you are looking for. In any case, Psalm 23 and 23rd Psalm are combined, and I don't think it makes a whole lot of difference that in some Catholic bibles Psalm 22 is used. My 1970 Catholic bible uses the Hebrew numbers (i.e. Ps 23).

"2008" is clearly a lot broader than "2008 " Amazon": http://www.librarything.com/tag/2008#combine

https://www.librarything.com/tag/%252FFranz+Ferdinand.+Archduke+of+Austria+%2818...

is an unused tag, and even if it were used the tag would make more sense to be referring to Gavrilo Princip than the Archduke himself.

I proposed the combination which I believe was the intended one instead.

South Sudan is a country
Southern Sudan is the southern part of Sudan, which has been a different country for the last 3 years now.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Southern+Sudan

ETA: I assume https://www.librarything.com/tag/Sur+de+Sud%C3%A1n also does not refer to the country.

>229 kuuderes_shadow:

At least one of the instances of "Southern Sudan" seems to refer specifically to what became South Sudan.

That said, they shouldn't be combined, particularly as "Southern Sudan" could refer to the geographical region (the southern parts of the Sudan) rather than any country.

According to Wikipedia, Sur de Sudán is the French equivalent to South Sudan. i.e. it refers to the country.

Tim plans for LT to officially support entering movies and music (Proposal: movies and music in LibraryThing). I think this means that we shouldn't combine first in series with First Book on a Serie, and that the other book-specific tags should be separated out from first in series.

Biko is the name of a track on Bloc Party's album "Intimacy", which is one of the things that has this tag used on it.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Biko

"Sheet music" should not be combined with "sheet music/songbooks". Songbooks are a different thing from sheet music, and the fact that one person lumps the two together under one tag doesn't justify the combination.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/sheet+music#combine

The tag "Fifty Cents" is used for a book containing a short story by that name. 50 cents isn't (probably what people paid for the books).

http://www.librarything.com/tag/%22Fifty+Cents%22#combine

Once again, someone has proposed combining "sf" with "science fiction": http://www.librarything.com/tag/sf#combine

Also, a "presentation" is not the same thing as a "visualization": http://www.librarything.com/tag/data+presentation#combine

>236 lilithcat:

Once again, someone has proposed combining "sf" with "science fiction"

Isn't that the canonical example of what not to combine? (Rhetorical question. I know that it is.)

Well, the proposal is to combine "data presentation" and "data visualization" not "presentation" and "visualization", so whether a presentation is a visualization in the general case isn't the issue here. But as someone who uses both tags, they aren't the same thing in this case either.

"Damar" apparently has something to do with silver, so it should not be combined with "Damar (imaginary world)" or "Damar (place)". I am also proposing the necessary separations.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Damar#combine

I think that Damar, Turkey is/was the location of a silversmith active in the twentieth century.

Anyway, imaginary world cannot be combined with place, and there do seem to be meanings that are neither.

To clarify: I was not arguing against lilithcat's proposals; merely explaining why '"Damar" apparently has something to do with silver'.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Knights+Templar

is used to refer to both the historic order and the masonic organisation. It should thus not be combined with Order of the Poor Knights of the Temple of Solomon, which only applies to the former.

---

ETA:
Given that Paleontology is itself a subject that deals with history (or prehistory), it seems inappropriate to combine "paleontology - history" or any similar tags with "history of paleontology". One of the tags at least (http://www.librarything.com/tag/history+-+paleontology) does not appear to be used in the sense of the proposed combination.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/History+of+Paleontology

"Spherical Trigonometry" (with quotation marks) is used only for a short story of that title, whereas spherical trigonometry is used only for books about mathematics.

One of the books listed under http://www.librarything.com/tag/Newford+Book is a short story collection, therefore this should not be combined with Newford novel

http://www.librarything.com/tag/%27Water+Lilies%27 refers only to the painting.

Animal "habits" are not the same as animal "habitats": http://www.librarything.com/tag/Animal+habits+and+behavior#combine

Since LT has author pages for both Lee Harper and Harper Lee, I don't think the tags should be combined.

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Lee+Harper

There are more Thomas Cromwells than just the 1st Earl of Essex:

http://www.librarything.com/tag/Thomas+Cromwell#combine

To Let is a novel that is part of Galsworthy's Forsyte Saga. "to let" is apparently the name of a ghost story: http://www.librarything.com/tag/%27to+let%27#combine

There's more than one Thomas Burnet to whom the tag could refer (there's a theologian and there's also a judge who wrote extensively): http://www.librarything.com/tag/Thomas+Burnet#combine

Although the tag "Tony Morrison" is currently used for books by Toni Morrison, there are, in fact, multiple authors with the name Tony Morrison on LT. So the tags should not be combined: http://www.librarything.com/tag/Tony+morrison#combine

"A Trojan horse, or Trojan, in computing is generally a non-self-replicating type of malware program containing malicious code that, when executed, carries out actions determined by the nature of the Trojan, typically causing loss or theft of data, and possible system harm"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trojan_horse_%28computing%29

Somehow I doubt that the person who tagged https://www.librarything.com/work/41997 with "Trojans" was referring to the citizens of Troy.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Trojans

> 252

Nor are "The Trojans" (of Troy) likely what the tagger of this work had in mind! http://www.librarything.com/tag/The+Trojans#combine

>252 kuuderes_shadow: Do you suppose the person tagging this work http://www.librarything.com/work/5840947 was referring to malware or the citizens of Troy?

We also have this https://www.librarything.com/work/3121483 -astronomy

See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trojan

This thread is getting long. Continuing it . . .