Wikidata:Requests for comment/Sort identifier statements on items that are instances of human

An editor has requested the community to provide input on "Sort identifier statements on items that are instances of human" via the Requests for comment (RFC) process. This is the discussion page regarding the issue. If you have an opinion regarding this issue, feel free to comment below. Thank you!

THIS RFC IS CLOSED. Please do NOT vote nor add comments.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Consensus was reached to sort identifiers and a system is now in place using MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties. Andrew Gray (talk) 19:07, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

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Problem

Currently on a page of a human (instance of Q5) the identifiers look randomly sorted. It could be they are sorted in the order they have been added to the item, but for the reader no "time of addition" is shown. Even if the current sorting mechanism would be transparent to the reader, it would not be related to characteristic of the identifiers, but to editorial processes.

Under current practice editors can the order by removing an ID and then re-adding, as has been done in this example of vandalism.

Precedence

Precedence for sorting

Project	Things	Page dependency of sorting	Sort algo	Comment	Wikidata-Item-Example
Wikidata	InstanceOf, SubClassOf	page independent sorting	sorted first for their importance		Q937#claims
Wikidata	Wikipedia-Sitelinks	page independent sorting	sorted by code		Q937#sitelinks-wikipedia
other Wikimedia projects	external identifiers	page independent sorting	sorted by importance	Template:Authority control (Q3907614) e.g. d:Template:Authority control, species:Template:Authority control, commons:Template:Authority control, en:Template:Authority control have the identifiers in a fixed sorting order; en:Albert Einstein gives: VIAF: 75121530 LCCN: n79022889 ISNI: 0000 0001 2281 955X GND: 118529579 SELIBR: 184709 SUDOC: 026849186 BNF: cb119016075 (data) BIBSYS: 90053072 ULAN: 500240971 HDS: 28814 MusicBrainz: c98c325e-7277-46e8-8b44-e3517f3e041a MGP: 53269 NLA: 36582360 NDL: 00438728 NCL: 369710 NKC: jn19990002019 ICCU: IT\ICCU\CFIV\035853 BNE: XX834035 SNAC: w63g5cm3
Wikidata	external identifiers	page dependent sorting	time of addition(?)	Added here for comparison.	Q937#sitelinks

Proposal

Among the IDs one is outstanding: VIAF. VIAF is not only the most used external ID for humans, but also offers a page with links to several internationally relevant libraries and all the VIAF data is free for download. Backlinks to Wikidata exist too. So it would be nice to have VIAF easily available for the reader by listing it first or among the first.

Would it be possible to have the identifiers with the highest number of uses on instances of human (Q5) to be listed first on the item pages? Three options:

1. all IDs are sorted by overall usage on Q5-items and IDs are listed in that order in the section "Identifiers" - maybe difficult to implement
2. the top 6 most used IDs come first in the section "Identifiers" (these are all in Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100)
3. the single most used ID, VIAF, comes first in the section "Identifiers"

77.180.110.58 16:35, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Statistics

Statistics for external identifier usage on instances of human

Property	Plain name	Property number	Statements on instances of Q5 (2020-02-24)	Instances of Q5 having at least one statement (2020-02-24)	Comment
VIAF ID (P214)	VIAF	214	1592753	1569065	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
ISNI (P213)	ISNI	213	1003062	994118	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
Library of Congress authority ID (P244)	LC	244	891944	890586	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
GND ID (P227)	GND	227	684221	683211	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
CBDB ID (P497)	CBDB	497	422650	421600
Bibliothèque nationale de France ID (P268)	BNF	268	418784	417024	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
IdRef ID (P269)	SUDOC	269	418064	416143	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
Nationale Thesaurus voor Auteurs ID (P1006)	NTA	1006	396372	394711
IMDb ID (P345)	IMDb	345	343239	342535	Listed at Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100
Biblioteca Nacional de España ID (P950)	BNE	950	150731	149906

SELECT (COUNT(?id) AS ?count_id) (COUNT(DISTINCT(?item)) AS ?count_item)
WHERE {
  ?item wdt:P31 wd:Q5 .
  ?item wdt:P213 ?id .  
}

Run it!

Discussion

• I'll rather see the list sorted on alphabet, easier to search that way. Sjoerd de Bruin (talk) 09:56, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

  User:Sjoerddebruin that is different from the treatment of instance of (P31) and subclass of (P279) which are listed on top for their importance. Maybe it could be done for all but VIAF or all but the top 6. With alphabetic sorting for all the most important (VIAF) comes somewhere at the end for users of the English-language interface. 78.55.205.137 11:56, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

• I believe the wikidata UI already has a mechanism for setting up sorting, you would have to specify the properties in order somewhere, but it should be possible to do this. I don't believe it's possible to have it automatically sort by frequency of use, though - that would have to be generated separately and applied to the sort list. Another good simple default might be to order by property P number... ArthurPSmith (talk) 00:22, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

  Display order is defined at MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties. --Marsupium (talk) 09:39, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

• I would also prefer alphabetical sorting. If you're interested in VIAFs, you would very quickly get used to seeing VIAF at or near the bottom of the page. The useful thing is consistent placing, rather than necessarily being at the top. Jheald (talk) 07:07, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

  Probably alphabetically by English label, right? --Marsupium (talk) 09:39, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

  Local language, would be some software adjusment. Adding all properties to the mentioned system message seems troublesome. Sjoerd de Bruin (talk) 10:48, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

  BTW: Reasonator displays and sorts by English label. --Marsupium (talk) 00:54, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

• I would have proposed this much earlier on MediaWiki talk:Wikibase-SortedProperties if I wouldn't think ordering by time of addition has its advantages as well. --Marsupium (talk) 09:39, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

  Marsupium, of course it has benefits, every methods has some benefits. But it is not even transparent to the user. 77.179.112.1 09:01, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

  What advantages? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:11, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

  User:Pigsonthewing - the only one I can see is to see what was added earlier and what was added later. But that relates to editorial processes and I see no precendence for Wikidata showing that on iten pages, e.g. sitelinks or sections (the external ids section itself) are not sorted on the page by time of addition to a page. 77.179.112.1 10:26, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

  One “can see is to see what was added earlier and what was added later” – exactly! Also statements for one property and qualifiers for one statement are ordered by time of addition. --Marsupium (talk) 04:55, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

  Marsupium, but you didn't provide the relevance. It seems to be relevant to you, but is it to readers? Wikipedias don't do it that way. "Also statements for one property" - very ugly too. On person pages the children are not sorted by date of birth, but by time of addition of the statement to Wikidata. Disgusting. 77.179.61.171 21:28, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

  @77.179.61.171: Yes, that both points are right! Now I’d like to have back the times when it was possible to sort the statements manually. --Marsupium (talk) 18:47 and 19:01, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

• If technically possible, sorting by the most common properties of items with the same instance of (P31)/subclass of (P279) (and breaking ties alphabetically) would be the most intuitive option IMO. Even better, providing the user with the option to choose between different sorting methods (creation order, frequency, alphabetical, P number, curated order from MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties, etc.) --Waldir (talk) 14:42, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
• I've two thoughts here -

a) I don't think we should do this just for Q5 items. It would probably be easiest to have a uniform sorting order for all items - of course, as most identifiers are for people, and most people identifiers are only for people, this won't make much of a difference.

b) Any system would be fine as long as they're consistent, but I think a flexible system where we get the order from a list (like we have for normal properties with MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties) rather than a firm "always sort by most common" or "always sort by label" would be best.

There's a number of identifier properties that naturally group together - for example, the various national biographical dictionaries (ODNB, ADB, DNZB, etc), or the various gallery identifiers for artists. In my own work (UK politicians) there are a handful of common identifiers - P1614, P2015, etc - and it would make a lot of sense to have these always next to each other.

Maybe we could start out with a general rule of "most common IDs first" and then adjust that list so that there's some more natural grouping? New properties can then be tacked on at the end or inserted at a natural position in the sequence. Andrew Gray (talk) 21:50, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

•  Support Agree to both a) and b). The IDs that are part of VIAF could also form a first group, the six first above at #Statistics are all part of VIAF I think. --Marsupium (talk) 14:44, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

• Added example where VIAF went down on a page due to vandalism [1] Vandalism was found because the next edit of of that person turned a valid ISNI into an invalid one, catched by tracking category on English Wikipedia (en:Category:Wikipedia articles with faulty authority control identifiers (ISNI)). 2.247.26.14 11:09, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

  @Marsupium: See Q690790, where a vandal managed to move VIAF down, due to ordering by time of last addition. 2.247.26.14 13:53, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

  That's yet another valid point against the current system! :) --Marsupium (talk) 14:46, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

• I think identifiers should be sorted alphabetically on all items. Importance or usefulness of identifiers is subjective and I don't agree with promoting some external datasets over others by deliberately putting them first. - Nikki (talk) 09:32, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

I may be late about this, but anyway... I assume the preferred sort-order will vary for people from different backgrounds. For an American, searching for the Library of Congress will be as obvious as for a Englishwoman to search for the British Library. A preference for VIAF is only suitable for member-countries, making it unsuitable in the German-speaking area for Austrians, since the Austrian National Library is not a member. Alphabetical order is less confining than the solution suggested currently. Yotwen (talk) 00:23, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Yotwen, Austria is currently regarded by some as a German-speaking country. https://www.obvsg.at/katalogisierung/gnd/ 78.55.43.91 07:51, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Discussing - using MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties

So far the only technique presented was ordering via MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties. That means

1. impossible to sort alphabetically by user-language
2. impossible to sort based on instance of/subclass of or any other properties of the item where the ID appears
3. difficult to sort many/all

Some IDs are restricted to a specific domain, e.g. ISBN (books), ISIN (securities), ISAN (audiovisual works), ISWC (musical works), ISNI (person), DOI, PubMed... At Wikidata:Database reports/List of properties/Top100 seventeen occur on more than 500000 item pages:

PubMed ID (P698)	17026971
DOI (P356)	13240130
PMCID (P932)	4108331
GeoNames ID (P1566)	3467183
Global Biodiversity Information Facility ID (P846)	1981754
Encyclopedia of Life ID (P830)	1375495
Freebase ID (P646)	1259903
Entrez Gene ID (P351)	1232579
IRMNG ID (P5055)	1205853
VIAF ID (P214)	1205757
ISNI (P213)	973414
China administrative division code (P442)	742822
GND ID (P227)	618950
Library of Congress authority ID (P244)	580562
IMDb ID (P345)	568573
ITIS TSN (P815)	522258
RefSeq Protein ID (P637)	510276

GND is Germany-centric and LCCN is US-centric but each not restricted to items related to Germany or the US. They will probably see resistance if they appear on top. VIAF on the other hand is a cooperation between various institutions from various countries and can be considered more neutral.

@Marsupium, Waldir, Pigsonthewing, ArthurPSmith, Andrew_Gray, Sjoerddebruin: What do you think about starting with VIAF which should only affect item pages about persons and works. It will not be perfect, but hopefully better than the current order, which is by time of addition of the property to an item, which any vandal can influence by deleting a property, if it is re-added it will be on the end of the list. There are more than 400 new external-ID-systems since 2018-01-03 [2]. 77.0.203.210 17:17, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

•  Support using MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties - no real opinions on what sorting order we use, we can figure that out as time goes by and discuss it seperately. For the time being, VIAF or ISNI being first would seem fine to me.

I don't think we really need to worry about specific sorting algorithms by user language - we don't support that for the main properties and they're probably more visible. In practical terms, we won't really need worry about type of item either - the identifiers found on people or species or buildings or books are so completely different that there won't be much overlap and so each one will effectively have its own sorting order, as a subset of the main list. Andrew Gray (talk) 20:00, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

•  Support for VIAF first. (As sub-part of this discussion also support for ISNI second. I think we could indeed take the first six most used simply in that order: VIAF ID (P214), ISNI (P213), Library of Congress authority ID (P244), GND ID (P227), IdRef ID (P269), Bibliothèque nationale de France ID (P268).) --Marsupium (talk) 00:47, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
•  Support VIAF first, per Marsupium and Andrew Gray. Would also support ISNI second. Fine with having the six as listed by Marsupium. But for humans/persons nothing further for now. 77.0.203.210 01:26, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
•  Neutral I'd still rather see the list sorted on alphabet. Even if it was only sorted on the English label, that would still give a single consistent ordering for all users across all external ID statements on all objects. According to User:Lea Lacroix (WMDE) (diff), it should be possible to make the ID statements sort according to their labels in the user's own language without too much overhead on either client or server-side, however it would take some development work, with no indication of when that might be schedulable. Jheald (talk) 15:59, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

  Jheald, "I'd still rather see the list sorted on alphabet." - but that is not available. Or do you suggest sorting by English using MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties, i.e. adding 2800+ properties there and update the edit protected page each time a new externalId property is created? Or do you see any other available option? 2.245.56.30 19:08, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

  I wouldn't see a problem in doing that, inflating MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties.

  Best would be to let the user have the choice … --Marsupium (talk) 20:09, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

• I would support adding them to MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties using the English label for now, plus a ticket asking for it to be made possible to sort using the interface language in the future. - Nikki (talk) 09:32, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

  Nikki, the above three supporting votes, refer to start with adding VIAF to MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties. Could you clarify if you would support that? Note that Andrew wrote : "no real opinions on what sorting order we use, we can figure that out as time goes by and discuss it seperately". Also if only VIAF is added, then there is no sorting. Adding VIAF would just mean to start the process of giving the IDs a common order, an order which cannot be altered by a vandal via removing a property, which when re-added is at the bottom. 78.52.253.226 20:27, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

  I'm opposed to only adding VIAF, see my comment in the previous section. - Nikki (talk) 09:50, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

  Nikki, i.e. you mean instead of trying out if MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties works on identifiers by adding one element, all current Identifier-properties should be added in one step? Could you compile a list for that? 77.179.6.85 13:01, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, it's easy to do with SPARQL, see this query. That also means we can easily update it in the future. - Nikki (talk) 16:16, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

•  Support for VIAF ID (P214) first. --Epìdosis 11:27, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
•  Support for VIAF ID (P214) first, but not any other ranking. Which identifier is next in importance can vary by occupation. Well-known authors of literature may have a useful ISNI, but if the person is a specialist in plant taxonomy (for example) then the IPNI ID will be of next greatest importance. If the person is a musician or composer, then a musical database may be of next greatest importance. Part of the problem with ISNI is that we have bad or incorrect values even for some persons of significance. See for example Sophocles (Q7235), where I removed the two values that were listed [3] because one did not link to a record at all, and the other linked to a record for the wrong individual. And this is for one of the great Classical writers that anyone with a bit of education anywhere in the Western world should have heard of, if not actually read. We have NO good ISNI values linked for him. We have lots of good VIAF links, but our ISNI listing are both sorely lacking and are not currently useful. So I favor promoting VIAF to the top of the list, but not doing anything else for now. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:30, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

  EncycloPetey 1) You said "if the person is a specialist in plant taxonomy (for example) then the IPNI ID will be of next greatest importance" - how do you know that VIAF is more important than IPNI, but ISNI less than IPNI? And how will you sort on beeing "specialist in plant taxonomy", if having an IPNI does not imply that? And even worse, a specialist in plant taxonomy could also be a specialist for something else for which there is also an "important ID", how do you know which specialization is more important on a per person basis? 2) Wrong values in Wikidata are not limited to ISNI. Do you have any proof that ISNI, as bad as it is, is worse than VIAF regarding correctness of values in Wikidata? 78.55.43.91 07:11, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Final decision

I think there is enough consensus to proceed with VIAF ID (P214) as first identifier in items having instance of (P31)human (Q5); I don't know if it is possible to use MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties, so I wrote to development team. --Epìdosis 17:08, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

 Done here. --Epìdosis 15:45, 3 December 2019 (UTC)

Epìdosis, thank you for showing that MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties is technically possibly by trying with VIAF. 78.55.43.91 07:56, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Discussing - using MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties - after VIAF done - ISNI review

@Marsupium, Waldir, Pigsonthewing, ArthurPSmith, Andrew_Gray, Epìdosis: after it has been shown, that sorting technically works also within the identifier section, what do you think about adding more? There is also Wikidata:Requests_for_comment/Sort_identifiers but that is not restricted to humans, and whilst there are a lot of votes to support sorting, they are not for a specific implementation and not restricted regarding the types of the items.

In the above section some people also supported ISNI. It is culturally quite neutral and is used on more than 1 000 000 items about humans and on only few other items, probably organisations (1002814 humans and 1103857 total)

Several of the libraries that support VIAF also support ISNI, so they are closely related. 39935 items have ISNI but no VIAF, of these 6653 are humans [4] - I tested the first and could actually find a VIAF. Any reader seeing ISNI on top and no VIAF on a human item, would be encouraged to verify if a VIAF exists. It seems ISNI second could improve the VIAF coverage in Wikidata.

What do you think about having ISNI after VIAF? 78.55.43.91 08:47, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

I would support the ordering with ISNI at the second place, after VIAF. Just a precisation: MediaWiki:Wikibase-SortedProperties can technically manage also identifiers, but it cannot distinguish between classes of items, so it isn't possible to make VIAF or ISNI appear first only in human items, but it is necessary to do it for all items. So VIAF apperas first in all items, and I support it, and I would support also ISNI second in all items. --Epìdosis 09:35, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

User:Epìdosis, you wrote "it cannot distinguish between classes of items, so it isn't possible to make VIAF or ISNI appear first only in human items" - thank you, of course. ISNI appears exclusively on human items and organisations, so there is little interference. VIAF also exists for other types. 77.13.210.177 13:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

VIAF items will also be of top importance for published works, not just for humans. We have not had as big a push for them, but VIAF does have entries for published works, and where such items exist they are now being added to Wikidata. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:09, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, this discussion is about humans. 77.11.117.120 15:57, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

I thought it was supposed to be a discussion about data identifiers. My mistake. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:13, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, indeed, it is not about identifiers in general, but about those for humans. Why did you speak about published works? 77.11.117.120 16:34, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

I cannot support ISNI as the next item. Many well-known people seem to have multiple identifiers or bad data. The Classical poet Tyrtaeus (Q316094) has two values entered for him, one of which is a bad link, and the other leads to a mish-mash of data that has not been scrubbed by anyone. The ISNI database is not as useful as the databases of major libraries such as LCCN and GND, and our links to it are in poor shape. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:12, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, you found one error - there are more than 1 000 0000 ISNI in Wikidata. Do you have any reliable evidence that ISNI is worse than VIAF in Wikidata? 77.13.210.177 13:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

In a check pulling out random names of authors, 50% had such errors. I gave Tyrtaeus as my example because it was the second name I checked and the first error I found. VIAF, by contract, constantly corrects errors that are found, and we have many editors here working to ensure errors are found. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:07, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, 50% is quite high, but can happen if you only test few. How many items did you test? 77.11.117.120 15:57, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't have any strong opinion on the sort order, but it would be nice to be relatively consistent. I think also having the most common identifiers earlier makes sense. From Wikidata:WikiProject Authority control, if I understand what's presented there, the most common ones in Wikidata after VIAF seem to be DNB (GND ID (P227)), LC (Library of Congress authority ID (P244)), then ISNI. So having DNB and LC before ISNI might be reasonable. Of course the counts may have changed recently too. ArthurPSmith (talk) 20:20, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

ArthurPSmith, on humans ISNI come before GND and LC. 77.13.210.177 13:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Why? --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:10, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, why do you ask why more human items have ISNI than GND/LoC? 77.11.117.120 15:57, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

That does not explain why it should be placed higher in sequence. Do you have evidence that the data is good data, and that we have correct data, and that the data is more useful to users of Wikidata? "There's a lot of it" can just mean that someone spammed us with a bot. You haven't shown that the data is intrisincly better or more useful. I also maintain that LCCN and GND are better because (a) their data is not limited to names of people and (b) it has gone through more human checking over a much longer period of time. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:13, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey the question was "why do you ask why more human items have ISNI than GND/LoC?" But your answer reply, seems to indicate you don't care about the quantity, because it someone could have spammed with a bot? Why does it matter whether values came here via bot or not? Do you have any evidence that GND and LoC and VIAF have not been added by bot? Regarding: "it has gone through more human checking over a much longer period of time" - VIAF has gone through zero human checking, it is automated - but you supported it. Your reasoning is not consistent. Last but not least, ISNI does not only store names, this is a false claim by you. 77.11.117.120 16:32, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

If you are not going to answer my questions, then don't reply. Posting replies that don't answer questions aren't helpful. Also, what makes you think the International Standard Name Identifier does not store only names? --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:36, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, RE "If you are not going to answer my questions, then don't reply. Posting replies that don't answer questions aren't helpful." - there are more because on human items 1003062 (ISNI) > 891944 (LoC) > 684221 (GND) for quantity of statements and similar numbers for quantity of items. 77.11.117.120 16:52, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

EncycloPetey, RE "what makes you think the International Standard Name Identifier does not store only names" - you claimed "LCCN and GND are better because (a) their data is not limited to names of people", but that is true for ISNI too. I don't think that an "identifier" itself stores a name, but the related data set does. And take care, ISNI is not an identifier for names, but an identifier for public identities. https://www.iso.org/standard/44292.html 77.11.117.120 17:06, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Given that there's an active discussion at Wikidata:Requests_for_comment/Sort_identifiers, and it isn't possible to have a specific sort order for humans (which was a bit of a problem with this RFC), I think it would make sense to keep discussion there rather than reopening this one. Andrew Gray (talk) 23:25, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Gray: As I wrote here to the IP, I perfectly agree about using the new RfC and not reopening this. --Epìdosis 09:36, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

@Epìdosis:, but you give no reason. The other RfC is not restricted to humans, people do not vote about a specific implementation, but about dreams what could be, e.g. alphabetic sorting. This was done here already for humans - the option does not exist. This proposal here is about something that does exist, can be done, can be useful instantly. Why do you want to hinder progress? 77.11.117.120 16:02, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Gray, Epìdosis:, as written in the intro of this thread 1) ISNI almost exclusively appears on human items, the only other are organisations. 2) The other RfC has no clear proposal, people are voting for "support sorting" but differ on their opinions how to do it, there is no single proposal presented for voting. Have you seen how long it took until VIAF was put first? And several people already supported ISNI second, but that was not done. 77.13.210.177 13:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.