Surely it's not about enforcing, but using?Who exactly is going to enforce this?
People that produce trip reports can lead the way but if you use a listing programme such as Scythebill, it's not an issue at all in any of their lists so just stay away from Wiki.........Who exactly is going to enforce this?
Ok, I had another go. A brief look at the 'Your Birding Day' section here on BirdForum. 23 threads on the first page where bird species were mentioned in the posts - of these in 22 all bird names were capitalised. The sole one where bird names were not capitalised was by a young birder, under the age of 16, I believe (and who has since started capitalising bird species names).I was going to look at posts here on BF in some of the forums to see whether bird names are capitalised or not, but quickly gave up. However there is a convention on normal usage on here I believe (which I suspect parallels normal usage elsewhere) which is interesting - I would suspect that 95% + of all posts where bird names are written down they are capitalised.
I think the small sample to which Dan alluded, is telling as to what birders generally think.English has no codified way of doing things it is up to publishers to decide on language choices, punctuation and capitalization. Different publishers do things differently. There is no right way. It is not some recent imposition of lower case, this argument has been going on for at least 120 years. It does seem to be a bird thing some of the non-bird natural history sources have only recently change to capitalisation after badgering (or should that be Badgering!) from the birdy types. Wikipedia has gone the other way, have a read of the discussion thread there.
My own view is that if it is your own text do what ever you want to, if it is being published by a third party then follow their guides. Personally in a trip report I find it helpful, but bold would be better regardless of capitalisation, in a piece of narrative text I find it stylistically jarring. Despite all contrived Common Gull vs common gull examples I have yet to come across any piece of text in the wild that has such confusions.
I don't think it should be a birdforum policy that common names should be capitalised, as it would fall to moderators to tell people off for their stylistic choices and that would hardly be welcoming.
With respect I think you’ve misunderstood the thrust of the campaign. It’s nothing to do with enforcing usage on birdforum which as an Internet forum runs the full gamut of bad spelling, grammar, punctuation etcEnglish has no codified way of doing things it is up to publishers to decide on language choices, punctuation and capitalization. Different publishers do things differently. There is no right way. It is not some recent imposition of lower case, this argument has been going on for at least 120 years. It does seem to be a bird thing some of the non-bird natural history sources have only recently change to capitalisation after badgering (or should that be Badgering!) from the birdy types. Wikipedia has gone the other way, have a read of the discussion thread there.
My own view is that if it is your own text do what ever you want to, if it is being published by a third party then follow their guides. Personally in a trip report I find it helpful, but bold would be better regardless of capitalisation, in a piece of narrative text I find it stylistically jarring. Despite all contrived Common Gull vs common gull examples I have yet to come across any piece of text in the wild that has such confusions.
I don't think it should be a birdforum policy that common names should be capitalised, as it would fall to moderators to tell people off for their stylistic choices and that would hardly be welcoming.
Very close to what I was about to write.With respect I think you’ve misunderstood the thrust of the campaign. It’s nothing to do with enforcing usage on birdforum which as an Internet forum runs the full gamut of bad spelling, grammar, punctuation etc
Rather the aim of the campaign is to persuade scientific journals, wildlife organisations etc to change their style policies.
Personally I prefer capitalisation regardless of the grammatical rules underpinning it. But not terribly bothered either way.
Cheers
James
Quite definitely not!!! There's no way any of us would do such a thing.... we'd be correcting spellings next LOLI don't think it should be a birdforum policy that common names should be capitalised, as it would fall to moderators to tell people off for their stylistic choices and that would hardly be welcoming.
As a non-native speaker: the birds stand out more in a text if the names are capitalised and it seems to be the preferred way for birders. I see no need for tight regulation though. Choosing for lower case may be preferred if you are writing for people who are not birders and who may find it distracting.Crossed my mind earlier that this could be largely a native English vs non-native English speaker/writer issue to some degree (on here at least)? Depending on what convention you are used to and thus what appears correct? This was based solely on the observation of opisska's post #9 being 'liked' by international BF members from Estonia and Poland (a small sample size) yesterday evening. Interesting? Thoughts?
Example of standardized French names (generic in bold):In French, usage seems to be split between either uncapitalised or only the first word (e.g. on wikipedia), but hardly ever on all words (quick on-line check).
Wikipedia, boullchite √10⁰⁰⁰⁰⁰⁰(e.g. on wikipedia)
It's really a shame that all this effort isn't directed to something that actually matters, unlike the cases of letters.
In French, usage seems to be split between either uncapitalised or only the first word (e.g. on wikipedia), but hardly ever on all words (quick on-line check).