From December 1, 2012, until January 31, 2013, a stylistic disagreement unfolded between editors on the English-language Wikipedia as to whether the word “into” in the title of the Wikipedia article for the 2013 film Star Trek Into Darkness should be capitalized. More than 40,000 words were written on the article’s talk page (a page for editors to discuss changes to the article) before a consensus was reached to capitalize the “I”.

Edit: I should add that I got there from this page, which I’ve been enjoying immensely this morning-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Lamest_edit_wars

The Star Trek one was definitely a favorite, but it can’t beat the edit war over the entry for ‘feces.’

Revert wars, alleged sockpuppetry, and page protection: should the article on feces include this picture of a large human turd? As of early July 2005, the discussion on this issue alone had reached 12,900 words. Someone commented “Seriously, guys. You’re arguing about poo.” Brace yourselves for a second round when the editor who contributed the ejaculation video (see above) gets the idea of a companion video for this article.

    • Flying SquidOPM
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      fedilink
      823 days ago

      I can’t imagine a Wikipedia rule less important to enforce or argue about.

      • @[email protected]
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        fedilink
        823 days ago

        Are you really a Wikipedia editor if you aren’t willing to endlessly banter about the trivialest of minutiae?

      • m-p{3}A
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        323 days ago

        When you deal with millions of articles, it’s necessary to have some baseline or else it becomes an absolute mess, but yeah…

      • m-p{3}A
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        423 days ago

        I’m not suicidal 😅