Template talk:Intelorgofwor
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Most of countries have more than one intelligence agencies. What kind of agency this template aims for? External or internal or just the biggest? For what criteria will an agency be put in this template? This tem is too ambiguous. @pple 08:06, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
[edit] SIS vs MI6
In order to avoid continuing our revert battle @pple, I suggest we thrash the differences out here. I do not believe that it's correct to use the term MI6 when referring to the Secret Intelligence Service. Unlike the Security Service, which was officially designated MI5 for a period and which actually uses "MI5" to refer to itself (see their FAQ page), the SIS was never officially designated "MI6" and it refuses to refer to itself officially by that term. Indeed, the SIS website has a fairly extensive explanation on this. Now while MI6 may be a popular way to refer to the SIS, thanks to things like the Bond franchise, it is not official and thus should not be used in an encyclopedia in place of the correct name. — Impi 17:20, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
- According to your reasoning, only official name has the rights to appear on wikipedia, so you are barking up the wrong tree. MI5 is not an official name, it's just an interchangeable name for Security Service. The Security Service uses MI5 to refer itself doesn't lead to the fact that MI5 must, or will become the official name. MI5 is formerly MO5 and then renamed to Defence Security Service and finally became Security Service. MI5 may be an official name for a period (1916-1929) but not now. If we just strictly use official name and official name only, MI5 can't be used for title now. The same case is applied to MI6. According to the official website, "MI6' has become an almost interchangeable title for SIS" but "fell into official disuse years ago", like MI5. However, my argument is not based on whether the name is official, but purport that the name which is more common in use and more easily recognized by general community can be used on Wikipedia. Wikipedia allows to use common names for articles, so no way shouldn't be applied to template as well. MI6 is a more popular name and is still widely used by writers and journalists. Thus it's entirely eligible as a reference to Secret Intelligence Service. @pple 09:50, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
- Not so, rather the policy on Wikipedia is for the most popular name to be used only when the official name is seldom used and not commonly known. An example is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, which is referred to as North Korea because it is by this name that it's almost universally known. I understand your reasoning that the same applies to MI6/SIS, but I'm skeptical. Whereas the Security Service (as I said previously) explicitly encourages the use of MI5 as its acronym (likely because using SS may be controversial), the SIS does seem to actively discourage the use of MI6. Furthermore, increasing numbers of journalists are beginning to refer to it as SIS, while security analysts almost exclusively do so already. I do admit though that MI6 is still quite popular, so I'm willing to leave the table as is for the time-being. Perhaps in a few months, if more journalists begin writing SIS rather than MI6, we can revisit it and insert the correct name. — Impi 18:10, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
- You should notify me of your reply. However, I'm tired of continually reverting now and I accept whatever names. But beware, MI6 is still very popular, as I see Tenet still used it normally in his recent memoir. :) Just a name! @pple 16:42, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
