Talk:Results of the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries/Archive 5

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SVG Map vs PNG Map

The Democratic Primary Results.png map that is the original one on the Results of the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries page is more encyclopedic that the SVG map. I proposed keep the PNG map instead the SVG map because this is an encyclopedic and the most accurate data must be included. I hope that you agree with me.

I don't agree that we should have a map that presents states as if they were "winner-take-all" rather than the actual proportional representation of delegates. But, if we must have such a map, then I support using the SVG map. First, and most importantly, using the SVG file format for political maps instead of PNG seems to be preferred according to Wikipedia's image use policy. Second, probably because of its file format, I find the SVG map much sharper and easier to read. Third, I don't see any substantive differences between the content of the two maps, but the minor differences I do see all tilt in favor of the SVG map. For example, since Mike Gravel has not "won" any states, his presence in the key of the PNG map seems only to invite confusion, requiring an additional note cluttering up the map. Also, it is not obvious whether the Democrats Abroad logo on the PNG map is blue because of a "win" for Obama or because that is the normal color of the logo. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 08:38, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
What would you say makes the PNG map more encycloedic? --Siradia (talk) 15:34, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
I see no difference in the maps and I reverted back to the SVG format because it should be used when available. In fact I like the PNG more but in the SVG map it's easier to read the state's postal abbreviations. HoosierStateTalk 21:45, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
Incidentally, SVG is the preferred format for images like this. SVGs are easier to tweak and modify. —Remember the dot (talk) 07:20, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Not sure where else to put this, so I'll settle for here. If we want the map to be truly accurate, then one of two things should happen. Either a)Texas needs to be colored entirely red, as the map shows primaries as per the title, not caucuses, or b)other states that have seperate contests (Iowa I believ springs to mind, or Washington maybe?) need to be done the same way, with half being grey if the caucus has not been held. Gelbza (talk) 04:10, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the title of the SVG map is using the term "primary" in the sense that the word is sometimes used as a coverall for all nominating events, be they primary or caucus. Texas is being treated differently on the map because it is the only state (at least on the Democratic side) to base its delegate selection on the results of both primaries and caucuses. Washington, for example, does hold a Democratic primary, but the Washington State Democratic Party ignores the results and instead uses the caucus process to select its delegates. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 10:26, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Please use a lighter blue for 2nd place

Now since 3rd place is not an issue anymore, 2nd place color may be switched to a much lighter one to make it more clear where is Clinton above and where is Obama above.Nergaal (talk) 06:34, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Agreed the contrast leaves something to be desired, but I also note that whatever decision is made in the cells post Edwards droping out also has to be made for the pre Edwards drop out. Perhaps this could be solved though by using more of the rainbow to distinguish between the places instead of confining ourselves to various shades of blue. Jon (talk) 14:12, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

In addition to the contrast between the color rankings that Nergaal and Jon mention, there are a number of other problems with the color scheme in this article's tables (and the other US presidential primaries articles). First, there is inconsistent use of color across the articles. Second, the use of color alone to convey information presents accessibility problems for various users and is therefore discouraged in Wikipedia:Manual of Style. Third, the contrast between the background colors and the text are not sufficient to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

Here are the color keys from each of the US presidential primaries articles that use color to classify their results. I have purposefully left out the green "DNC penalty" item because I think we should address that in a separate discussion.

Results of the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries:

1st place
in # of delegates 		2nd place
in # of delegates 		3rd place
in # of delegates 		Candidate has
withdrawn

Results of the 2008 Republican Party presidential primaries:

1st place 2nd place 3rd place Candidate has
withdrawn

Democratic Party (United States) presidential primaries, 2004:

1st place
(delegates earned) 		2nd place
(delegates earned) 		3rd place
(delegates earned) 		Withdrawn

Republican Party (United States) presidential primaries, 2004:

1st place
  (delegates earned)   		2nd place
  (delegates earned)   		3rd place
  (delegates earned)   		  Withdrawn  

United States presidential primaries, 2000 (no color key, but colors used as follows):

1st place 2nd place

I have created a new color key to address each of the problems listed above. I chose to use shades of blue rather than more dissimilar colors partly in deference to the older primaries articles which may have experienced more thorough vetting (this choice also addreses inconsistency between the articles) and partly because using shades of blue circumvents problems experienced by people with color blindness. To avoid using color alone to convey information, I incorporated differences in text size (big for 1st place), weight (bold for 2nd place), style (italics for 3rd place), and notation ([square brackets] for withdrawn). To avoid confusion with this scheme, I think we should replace the square brackets currently in use for Michigan and Florida with strikeout which more closely matches the meaning of the data anyway.

New color scheme:

1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		[ Withdrew ]
prior to contest

To get this change rolling forward, I'm going to be bold and begin applying the new scheme immediately to this article and the others listed above. For stability, I'd prefer that we discuss further changes here first before we apply them. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 07:07, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

IMHO there is no need of 3d place. Gravel is always third in the last primaries, and should be colored! And the bold on 2n place is misleading. My proposal:
1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		[ Withdrew ]
prior to contest
--Subver (talk) 08:59, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't mind having 3rd place present for Gravel. The use of <big> looks too glaring to me; I'd prefer the 2004 Democratic / Republican "bold, normal, normal, normal" scheme for "1st, 2nd, 3rd, withdrawn". I also like Subver's darker shade of pink for "Withdrew":
1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest
Wdfarmer (talk) 10:14, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
In my opinion, 3rd place color is completely useless, and if we keep it we have to color gravel when he's third. --Subver (talk) 11:39, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the input. Here's my take on each:
  • I thought about dumping 3rd place myself. A couple reasons stopped me. First, there was the desire to maintain consistency among the articles. Some of the articles listed above make more extensive use of 3rd place. Second, prior to Edwards' withdrawal there were 3 candidates that seemed to have the most likely chance of being nominated. Ultimately, the answer to the question of how many places to include (If one drops 3rd place, then why not drop 2nd place? Why not drop them all? Why not show more than 3 places?) hinges on the criteria we use to determine the appropriate number of places to highlight. I'm not sure what that criteria should be.
  • As far as highlighting Gravel's numbers, I only think that would be logical if he had won some delegates in a contest.
  • As far as the shade to use for the withdrawn candidates, it seems natural to me that we de-emphasize the numbers for candidates that are no longer in the running. As such, I think a very light shade is in order. Darker shades tend to convey greater importance in most charts I've seen.
  • Finally, the problem I see with using the "bold, normal, normal, normal" scheme for "1st, 2nd, 3rd, withdrawn" is that color is then the only difference between the 2nd, 3rd, and withdrawn. According to Wikipedia's style guidelines and also W3C web design guidelines, this is to be avoided. I really struggled to come up with non-color ways to show the difference between those places. I arrived at "big, bold, italic, square brackets" after much experimentation. However, I'm not certain that is the best way to go. If there are better ways to achieve the same end, I'm all ears. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 12:45, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
It is not written in the stone that everyone who collect delegates have to be colored. Moreover three similar colors are misleading. Even color only the 1st place could be better. Finally IMHO the bold highlight much more than "big". With only 2 colors there are no such problems. --Subver (talk) 12:59, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I actually agree with Wdfarmer's proposal. My reasons for this is:
  1. The use of <big> looks glaring.
  2. If some numbers should be bolded out, it should be the winner's first.
  3. Italics alone, looks... wrong.
  4. [Brackets] around "withdrawn numbers" makes it difficult to read what number is between. (The colour is enough to understand)
I'm indifferent in the use of 3 coulours (or what color scheme they have), but the third place should only be used when it's receiving delegates.
My proposal if <big> is to be used:
1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest
If not then Wdfarmer's proposal as I earlier stated. lil2mas (talk) 17:55, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
It is not enough to use color alone to display withdrawn or any other information. According to Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Color coding:

"Using color alone to convey information (color coding) should not be done. This is not accessible to people with color blindness (especially monochromacy), on black-and-white printouts, on older computer displays with fewer colors, on monochrome displays (PDAs, cell phones), and so on."

I'm fine if we settle on some other scheme, but whatever scheme we choose should not use color-coding alone. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 21:59, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
WP:COLOR, which is also part of WP:MOS by being a subarticle of WP:ACCESS, isn't quite as demanding as Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Color coding. If we ensure that the contrast between the colors is distinctive (per the tools cited at WP:COLOR), I think we could use a scheme such as the one I proposed above. Wdfarmer (talk) 11:43, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Hmm. The first bullet point on WP:COLOR says "Ensure that colour is not the only way used to convey important information." To me, that sounds like the same sentiment as the quote above and in that case some of the scheme you proposed wouldn't fit the bill. Also, these Wikipedia guidelines are designed to support in a larger context the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 1.0, Guideline 2), the U.S. government's Section 508 (subsection 1194.22(c)), and similar guidelines in other countries. It's generally considered good form in web design to adhere to these standards. I did, by the way, check the contrast using a tool similar to the ones cited at WP:COLOR and found the ones being used on the 2000 and 2004 primaries articles met the WCAG formulas for contrast, but the ones used on the 2008 articles didn't. That was one of the reasons I chose to use the color scheme from the 2000/2004 articles. What do you think about the Subver's idea of simply highlighting 1st place alone? That would eliminate much of the concerns voiced here. See my next comment below for more on this. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 16:03, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
In my enthusiasm to look for support, my eyes skipped right over that first point in WP:COLOR. Looks like you've done your homework. I like your proposal below. Wdfarmer (talk) 06:00, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Subver, I agree that it's not a must to highlight everyone who earned delegates. However, I do think that candidates who didn't earn delegates should not be highlighted. I also agree that it might be a good idea to highlight only the 1st place. That would certainly simplify the color coding problem. We could avoid using big text and square brackets in that case. We could use bold and blue for 1st place and perhaps use italics and pink for withdrawn. Do you think such a scheme would also work on the other primaries articles? --Bryan H Bell (talk) 22:42, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Personally, I prefer Bryan's proposed schema above, but also with the requirement that to get a 3rd (or 2nd) place color, the candidate should have won at least one delegate in the state or territory. Basically this would mean that Edwards would continue to have the 3rd place color in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina while it would be unused in the rest of the states so far. And also in that small territory that Obama swept the delegation with aprox 90% of the vote, Clinton wouldn't get the 2nd place color either. Jon (talk) 18:46, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me that even if we don't do any big/bold/bracket, etc. we aren't using "color alone" to convey information. There are numbers in the boxes which are the real info. The colors are just for quick reference assistance. I think we should do some additional form to assist users in that quick reference, but not at the risk of making it look poor. I personally am not a huge fan of including the "big" in the table. I think bolding and italics look OK. --Siradia (talk) 20:07, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I see your point, but it means you're essentially saying that people who are color blind or who are using black & white displays (or printouts or cellphones or PDAs) shouldn't have the opportunity of quick reference. They'll just have to study the figures more closely to figure out what others can do by merely glancing at the table. I agree that using "big" might not be ideal in terms of appearance. I just can't think of a better way to indicate "1st/2nd/3rd/withdrawn" other than "big/bold/italics/brackets" and I don't think mere appearances should trump easy access to information. I think we should either think up a better scheme that still avoids using color alone or perhaps eliminate our highlighting of 2nd and 3rd places. I remember when I first visited this article that I found all the different colors a bit confusing. Perhaps we should simplify. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 21:27, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

The use of bold on second place makes it stand out more than big on first place, and big doesnt look right right next to the other texts in the table. Bold on first, regular on second, and italics on third is the way to go. Or at least bold and big first and leave second regular sized and bold. Joshlmay (talk) 00:35, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Let's vote on what scheme to use:
1. 1st place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest
2. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		[ Withdrew ]
prior to contest
3. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest
4. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest
5. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		[ Withdrew ]
prior to contest
6. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest
These are the proposals of Bryan H Bell(5), Subver(2), and Wdfarmer(4).
I've also modified my own(6) proposal, and added two new.
All of the above options ensures WP:COLOR is sustained, except option 4.
(Color-coding not taken into account)
I give my vote to option 4. (if not approved: option 6) lil2mas (talk) 01:02, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
i vote option 4. Joshlmay (talk) 01:04, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I vote for option 5. Actually, only option 5 ensures WP:COLOR is sustained. None of the others would ensure that a color blind person could tell the difference between the colored cells and uncolored cells. For example, in option 2 there is no text-style difference between 2nd place and a 4th place or uncommmitted cell. I would vote for option 1 if the "withdrew" cell were in italics. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 01:42, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Here's how the above vote looks without color and with a regular cell added:
1. 1st place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest 		4th place
or uncommitted
2. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		[ Withdrew ]
prior to contest 		4th place
or uncommitted
3. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest 		4th place
or uncommitted
4. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest 		4th place
or uncommitted
5. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		[ Withdrew ]
prior to contest 		4th place
or uncommitted
6. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd place
delegates earned 		Withdrew
prior to contest 		4th place
or uncommitted
Can you tell the difference between the 4th place cell and each of the others in all the examples above?
--Bryan H Bell (talk) 01:42, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I haven't seen the 4th place being an issue before. But if so, then I'd rather skip 3rd place colouring, and propose this scheme instead:
7. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd/4th place
or uncommitted 		Withdrew
prior to contest
7. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd/4th place
or uncommitted 		Withdrew
prior to contest
Anyway, it seems like we all agree on making 1st place bold, so I will just go ahead and make that change.
The only remaining issues are then: If we should change Witdrawn from [ Brackets ] to Italics? And whether we should keep 3rd place colouring or not?
I was hoping to get some input from Subver, Wdfarmer, and Jon on these issues.
lil2mas (talk) 17:48, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Now we're getting somewhere! Thanks lil2mas. I support option 7. I would also support this even simpler scheme:
8. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd/3rd/4th place
or uncommitted 		Withdrew
prior to contest
8. 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd/3rd/4th place
or uncommitted 		Withdrew
prior to contest
--Bryan H Bell (talk) 18:23, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I support option 8, and think it's the best direction to go in. Option 8's scheme is informative visually both with and without colour. Reasonably, option 3 should not be an issue either. Determining the rankings of the candidates can be achieved quite easily in one's head, and the aid of colour is more something of an added aesthetic bonus. You will also notice that the Republican primary results still have the original format scheme. I support any reasonable attempt to make an article useful for those with difficulty seeing, so long as it doesn't take away from the professional look of the article, and I think that using "big" tags is a bit of an eyesore in this regard. Further, there are diagrams in this article that make use of colour to convey the primary results that might pose a problem for those with colourblindness, but my understanding is that this is perfectly fine. And to take it a step further, a blind person would not be able to take advantage of any special formatting at all, but the information can still be listened to via screen-reading software, and then rankings determined from that. But all that aside, I think option 8 would be the best compromise. Just my two cents. CF84 (talk) 23:18, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Support Option 8, this looks best to me; simple structures are often best. ("The enginner has reached perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.") Jon (talk) 02:19, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
I support Option 6, will accept Option 7, and prefer both over Option 8 in this case, because Options 6 and 7 highlight both 1st and 2nd place. In the Democratic contest, special attention is currently being given to both of those two places because the race is so close. I think it's better to make the 2nd place entries look more like the 1st place entries, rather than having the 2nd place entries look more like the 3rd place entries. I also think that Option 7's combination of "big" and "bold" presents well visually; it looks much better to me than plain "big". Wdfarmer (talk) 09:07, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the best solution, following all the discussion, is (7 with lighter blue for 2nd):

7.bis 1st place
delegates earned 		2nd place
delegates earned 		3rd/4th place
or uncommitted 		Withdrew
prior to contest

I dislike italic for Withdrew, but brackets are worse. Then I will propose to switch from "delegates earned" to "% popular vote" to be consistent with primaries page, but firstly we have to decide on the colors. --Subver (talk) 18:05, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I think this discussion is becoming a little boring, so we have to decide. I think the 2 best and most followed solutions are 7bis (I think who follow 7 also like 7bis) and 8. So if you agree:

Votes to 7bis

Votes to 8

I applied 8. Left "white" indication on 2nd place for possible fast reintroduction of color for 2nd place. --Subver (talk) 16:58, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

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