Renaming Saigon to TP Ho Chi Minh

[Dave Rolsky]

On Fri, 21 Mar 2008, Progfou wrote:

>> Ho_Chi_Minh_City weighs in at 16. Ho_Chi_Minh, at eleven characters,
>> would be within the normal limit. (Using just the name of the person
>> after whom the city is named is something to which I'm accustomed,
>> living as I do just a mile from Washington.)
>
> Ok. Thanks for considering this change, but...
>
> The real change to do is to move to "Hanoi" instead!
> The "most populous" rule is totally arbitrary and a moving target.
> As Mr Vũ Đỗ Quỳnh said, Hanoi will soon become the new result from this rule!

The "most populous" rule is definitely not arbitrary. First of all, in 
the cases of larger countries with multiple zones, you can't pick the 
capital (the US is a good example, as are many other "wide" countries).

Also, one of the stated goals of the database is to "be robust in the 
presence of political changes". I'd assume that the most populous rule 
falls out from that, because capitols probably change more often than 
populations move.

And arbitrary or not, it's the rule, and there's no good reason _not_ to 
stick with it now that it's been in place for so long. Special-casing 
Vietnam would A) cause the maintainers a maintenance hassle; and B) invite 
everyone else to come complain that _their_ capital isn't used for the 
name, but Vietnam's is.


-dave

/*==========================
VegGuide.Org
Your guide to all that's veg
==========================*/