Talk: Leningrad

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In English, if you say Leningrad, you're going to think of St Petersburg, not of Leningrad Oblast. If you look at the links, virtually every one of them is for St Petersburg. We only use a disambiguation page if the different topics have roughly equal importance (in English, for en.wikipedia.org). -- Walt Pohl 15:41, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

"Leningrad" is no longer used by anyone to refer to Saint Petersburg, not in English and not even in Saint Petersburg. So it is not like everyone who types "Leningrad" expects to be redirected to that city. On the contrary, they are likely to want to see precisely the explanation of when this name was relevant, not buried deep in the Sait Petersburg page. Also, since "Leningrad" is still currently the name of a Russian region, Leningrad Oblast, it makes sense to link to that to. Anyway, this is my opinion, but I won't engage in an edit war - I won't be reverting "Leningrad" any more, so please think carefully before you blank it and replace it by a redirect. Nyh 20:16, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

In a disambig. page the information should be as concise as possible. Then the user makes a choice and sees the detail in the respective article. And, have you heard about the Find feature all browsers have? The user will search for 'Leningrad' in the respective article and will find what it needs. Even my grandmother knows this. --Cantus 22:50, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

People, when they hear Leningrad, they will think of Soviet-era St. Petersburg. Leningrad oblast, on the other hand, is pretty obscure. I never heard of it before today, or example. -- Walt Pohl 21:58, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I think Cantus's "concise" version is less clear than the previous version, which looked more like something you'd expect to find in an encyclopedia. Besides, repeating one line of relevant information on Wikipedia is not a sin - "wiki is not paper". Hypertext (the concept behind wikipedia) and "the find button" are conflicting concepts, and we shouldn't rely on the Find button where links do a better job. And though Leningrad Oblast is "obscure", it certainly exists, while a city called "Leningrad" no longer does. Ok, that has been my opinion. But I will shut up now :-) Nyh 08:48, 23 Mar 2004 (UTC)