This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:Manual of Style. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
In the previous RfC that led to the inclusion of WP:NOETHNICGALLERIES, the closer stated there was a "rough consensus". In this discussion there is still that consensus to oppose this repeal proposal. This has been yet another good discussion of a controversial subject and decision. Arguments are good and valid on both sides of this issue, and I find myself once again personally leaning toward repeal; however, as closer I am bound by what I see as consensus in this discussion, which is noted above. Paine 09:14, 30 June 2016 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I would like to propose the repeal of the language in this guideline which forbids the inclusion of image galleries in articles about human ethnic groups. This would bring such articles into conformity with Wikipedia's general practice of attempting to include informative image(s) in articles wherever reasonably possible. Even articles about sub-species groupings directly analogous to human ethnic groups, such as Maine Coon, include images of their subjects.
Possible counter-arguments:
Classification of people on the basis of ethnic group is offensive. -> Please see WP:NOTCENSORED.
Where no reliable sources for classification of specific people on the basis of ethnic group can be found, such classifications constitute original research. -> The original research policy specifically allows the use of original images in articles, even when visual analysis of photo content forms the sole basis for concluding that photos depict their purported subject matter.
Human ethnic groups have no biological, genetic, or other scientific basis. Therefore, there is no reasonable basis for classifying photos of people as depictions of such groups. -> This argument is flat out wrong, according to "Genetic structure, self-identified race/ethnicity, and confounding in case-control association studies" PMID15625622. This particular paper qualifies as a secondary WP:RS since the authors aren't analyzing data they collected themselves. Note also the approval of isosorbide dinitrate/hydralazine by the FDA, which would have hardly occurred if human ethnicity were not a scientifically definable concept.
The inherent uncertainty and changes over time in definitions of human ethnic groups creates a class of photos which may or may not depict a particular ethnic group. -> When depicting an ethnic group, we aim for the center, and not the edge.
Oppose repeal: First off, a link to the previous RfC should be included so we don't have to go hunting for it. Please see this RfC for the original decision.
Next, I did not vote in the original RfC but I would have support the removal of ethnic galleries if I had. For me, it boils down to the decision on who represents an "ethnic group"? Who gets to be in the gallery? Why? What about other members? Who picks the dozen or so images? What about people of "mixed" heritage? Do they get to be in both galleries? Who decides what a person's ethnicity is? Do they decide? Or do editors decide? Does it take a reliable source to say someone is white or black before they qualify for inclusion in a gallery? All of these questions together makes ethnic galleries a bad idea. It has only been 3 and a half months since the last RfC. Perhaps a little longer and an answer to all of the above questions will change my mind on the matter. But as of right now I oppose the repeal. --Majora (talk) 04:54, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Who decides about any image choices? Editors, usually acting reasonably. Your proposed method of deconstructing image choices for human ethnic group articles applies equally well to articles such as Maine Coon. Editors could object to the arbitrariness of image choices which are by their very nature subjective and exclude all other possible cats, the arbitrary number of images selected, the fact that mixed breeds of cats aren't represented, or the total lack of reliable sources describing the specific cats depicted as Maine Coons. The actual facts on the ground, however, are that none of these issues are problematic on the Maine Coon article. Is there something about articles on human ethnic groups which inherently attracts editorial vexatiousness and prohibits consensuses from being reached? DavidLeighEllis (talk) 05:15, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
That's not even a faintly cogent argument. Cat breeds are defined by and selectively bred to a written breed standard, and have no individual or collective opinion about being labeled, nor does their labeling have any socio-economic consequences of any kind (for example, Siamese cats a not a privileged class, and Persian cats are not an ethnicity of felines subject to discriminatory treatment and historical attempts to wipe them out with genocide by other cats, or by people for that matter). If you're going to make an analogy, it needs to actually be analogous in ways that pertain to the argument at hand, not just superficially similar in trivial but irrelevant ways. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:31, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Presumably the choice of which images to show would be made by the same people who choose which notable people to name in the article. This doesn't seem like an insuperable problem. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:33, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Tautology. Your argument boils down to "consensus is decided by consensus-formation processes". Adds nothing to the discussion. The breeds:ethnicities analogy fails in even more ways that I laid out already, now that you mention it: Cat (and dog, and whatever) breed images are not selected on a basis of notability, as ethnic gallery images almost invariably are, but on how closely they conform to the breed standards (which do not exist for humans, or we'd all be screwed, heh). So, even the consensus formation for breed-article images bears little if any resemblance or relation to that for making these thrice-damned ethnic galleries, other than them both being WP consensus formation discussions, which we already knew. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:21, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal. See also Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 127#RfC: Ethnicity in infoboxes. There's clearly an already-tested-and-reaffirmed consensus that our previous approach to the treatment of ethnicity on WP has been controversial and too open to PoV pushing. These ethnic galleries have been more so than just about anything else, leadings to multiple kinds of continual fights, about what groups and subgroups of people could be included, several forms of bias regarding what individuals are included, the automatic PoV problems inherent in holding up particular individuals as visually exemplary of a particular ethnicity, the conflict between the rational approach to mixed ethnicity and the irrational "one-drop rule"; original research in trying to prove that some specific person qualifies for an ethnical label under some particular non-neutral definition; and many other such problems. All of these disputes are a drain on editorial productivity, and the galleries themselves do not serve an encyclopedic purpose but are just the use of little pictures for decoration without imparting reliable encyclopedic information.
Re: the repeal-nominator's numbered points:
See WP:NPOV and WP:NOT policies. You are misinterpreting NOTCENSORED, which is about a) excluding facts from the encyclopedia because some people will find them unpleasant, b) using wishywashy, euphemistic language like "passed away" instead of "died", and c) removing images of sex organs and (legal) sex acts on the basis that some readers don't want to see them or might be younger than some parents consider appropriate for such topics. It has nothing at all to with factuality, and we regularly remove ("censor" in your terms) questionable or misleading claims, and material that is not of an encyclopedic nature.
See WP:NOR policy. You are misinterpreting the images exception, badly. The OR here is in attempting to "prove" that so-and-so person can be classified as "black", "Hispanic", "Jewish", "white", "Armenian", etc., as a documentation matter, not whether the picture is of what the uploader said it is of.
See Talk:Race (human classification) and its archives. You cannot magically resolve – and force your personally WP:CHERRYPICKed would-be resolution on all editors and all readers – by citation to a single source that is one of many thousands in a debate that has been ranging, in the real world, for several generations running (and the general scientific consensus of which actually leans against your viewpoint, considering race to be a social construct).
Nom's "answer" does not address the actual concern, which is a made-up straw man anyway. Nor does it describe actual behavior when it comes to our former ethnic galleries mess (most disputes were not about "the center" at all).
Strong repeal - I'm sorry, but what? This is the first time I'm truly shocked by wiki-policy. Readers expect to get quick understanding of what the article is about from the lead, and a selection of images is the most obvious way to facilitate this. Yes, there are going to be arguments as to which images should be included, and there is inevitably going to be a certain level of arbitrariness, but guess what? Editors are expected to make editorial decisions. RamiR07:07, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Except this is not about whether the article can have any images at all, it's about tiny icons in the infobox. So, your repeal rationale is not actually a repeal rationale, it's a rationale against an imaginary all-images ban in ethnicity articles. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:24, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but your rationale does not specifically apply to the lead. Mine specifically does (must I emphasize "from the lead"?). Putting words in my mouth does not change my argument: readers expect to see an image or collage in the lead, and due to editorial laziness we are saying "nope, not worth the effort". RamiR07:39, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
The wording in question is: "Articles about ethnic groups or similarly large human populations should not be illustrated by a photomontage or gallery of images of group members; see this RfC." This has no implications at all for whether the lead will be adequate. Readers do not expect to see a collage in the lead, or we wouldn't have a guideline against putting such collages in the lead (or anywhere; this rule is actually misplaced, and should not be in MOS:LEADIMAGE). As MOS:IMAGES says clearly, not every article needs an image, and sometimes they're omitted, especially if including one would be more problematic than useful. So it is not even true that readers always expect there to be an image at all, much less on in the lead. Our articles on ethnicities usually are illustrated, with historical photographs, and this is of more encyclopedic use than inserting a celebrity picture and asserting that Celine Dion "is" Black or "is" Hispanic, an innately PoV-pushing exercise. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:25, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
They sure are on my monitor, a big box of thumbnail images. The fact that some people want to WP:GAME the system by putting these things just barely outside the lead proper, or just under the infobox, will not avail them or fool us. See WP:COMMONSENSE, WP:BUREAUCRACY, and WP:LAWYER. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:21, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
You're talking about what the rules say, not about how they're actually applied. The real-wiki-world consequences for willfully ignoring a guideline is no different than willfully ignoring a policy, especially when the guideline is very concise on a very specific issue, as is the current case. Can you seriously imagine that local consensus is reached contrary to this guideline, and it will not become a sitewide issue? I can't. RamiR08:39, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Rami R (last time pinging you here for a reply because I assume you will check back here if you want to read replies), I've been with this site since 2007; I mention that because I'm speaking from experience, not assumptions. I'm talking about actual practice. And by that, I mean that not all of our guidelines are well followed. Most of the time, they aren't even strictly followed. There are a number of guidelines at WP:Manual of Style that are willfully ignored, and no one is sanctioned for it unless consensus is against the person and the person is being disruptive by not adhering to the guideline. Beyond My Ken (BMK) sometimes willfully ignores our guidelines, for example. He makes a case about the guideline being about guidance and why his way is a good option. Actually, for him, it's not so much about ignoring the guideline...but rather about committing to something he thinks improves the article more than the rule. He and others are allowed to do that, per WP:Ignore all rules and WP:Buro. I'm simply stating that our rules should normally be followed, but there are times when they should not be. As for the case at hand, I understand your concern. And the behavior of editors who go overboard with enforcing this guideline should be scrutinized in the appropriate forum. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 05:45, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
@Flyer22 Reborn:, please listen to Rami R. Virtually every time I encounter you lately, your primary message is "MoS is just a guideline and can be ignored." You're pushing this message in multiple places on this page alone, just because some things aren't the way you want them. This is the kind of anti-guideline, anti-consensus campaigning that recently got two editors blocked, one of them indefinitely for their recalcitrance about it. Your understanding of WP:POLICY and WP:IAR is deeply faulty. IAR is not some magic wand to wave a guidelines you don't like. It has nothing to do with guidelines in particular at all. When IAR is applicable legitimately, which is very rarely, it is also applicable to rules found in policies (except legal ones forced on the community by WP:OFFICE). Please read and absorb WP:POLICY more carefully. The difference between policy and guideline is not a difference of mandatory vs. suggested. It's a difference between the natures of the underlying concerns. Policies are about matters that, when the policy is not followed, result in the project itself intrinsically suffering or becoming malfunctional. Guidelines are about matters that, when the guideline is not followed, the content or some other aspect of the project is sub-optimal. Guidelines describe best practices; policies describe functional necessities. (In actual practice, there is some material in some policies that could move into guidelines, because it arrived in the policy by WP:CREEP and the desire to topically consolidate advice without sufficient regard to the nature of the line-item in question. We probably have no policies at all, however, that could be entirely "demoted" to guidelines without serious consequences, nor are there any guidelines that could be "elevated" to policies without a bunch of unintended, bad consequences.) — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:21, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
SMcCandlish, I did listen to Rami R. In what way is "Virtually every time [you] encounter [me] lately, [my] primary message is 'MoS is just a guideline and can be ignored.'"? If that was the case, I would not have been in agreement with you on the disruptive comma/grammar editing by Cebr1979, which was indeed recent. Never do I state that our guidelines or policies should just be ignored; I state that our guidelines are not mandatory and those who treat them like they are mandatory cause a lot of problems. I state that we can and should ignore a policy or guideline if the reason is valid. And I state that exactly because of what the WP:Buro and WP:Ignore all rules policies relay. There is nothing flawed about that understanding. You stated, "IAR is not some magic wand to wave a guidelines you don't like." Well, if you take a look at the history of my contributions, I've stated the same thing a number of times. Earlier this year, I stated, "Those who refuse to follow Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, and cite WP:Ignore all rules as though it allows them to do any and everything they want at this site are WP:Disruptive and should be called out on it. They are also lazy to boot, since they don't take the time to learn the rules. Thank goodness the world has rules, including laws and all that. Otherwise... Well, you know." In 2014, I stated, "I take it like this: I follow Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines, unless there is a valid WP:Ignore all rules reason not to do so. I point out those policies and/or guidelines to editors who are unfamiliar with them or may need a reminder on them (or simply in case a WP:Newbie comes across the discussion). If people cannot take the time to read and follow those policies and/or guidelines, they should not be editing Wikipedia. Call that WP:Wikilawyering if you must; I do not. I do not care not if those people come back, since they are one of the main problems with Wikipedia."
I've been consistent about following the rules (so much so that some editors have felt that I am too stern with them), and that we should only employ WP:Ignore rules when valid, and sparingly at that. So I don't know where you got this idea that "Flyer22 Reborn does not endorse the rules." or "Flyer22 Reborn is all for doing whatever the hell we want." Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 06:19, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
I'd like to see where, on this page, I've pushed an "Ignore MOS" attitude "just because some things aren't the way [I] want them." Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 06:39, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
Replying at your talk page, where I should have raised this in the first place, since it's off-topic for the NOETHNICGALLERIES discussion. Gist: I mean really lately, not going back to the Cebr stuff, and based on what I'm seeing here now, not a deep analysis. Maybe I'm being overreactive. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 14:46, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
I must say, the use of coon in the OP suggests a momentary lapse of judgment on the part of the proposer, given the subject. I'm a bit worried about the phrasing "sub-species groupings directly analogous to human ethnic groups", too. EEng08:38, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Followup: A quick look at the nominator's gallery at the White people article shows immediately how problematic such galleries are. Among other issues, the inclusion of Donald Trump is surprising, since he's obviously one of the Orange people. EEng15:26, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Possibly. I'd say there was more than an even chance "Maine Coon" (as opposed to the less-contentious examples "Scottish Fold" or "American Shorthair") was chosen specifically to elicit this response, so someone could say "See? You can't even mention a breed of cat without someone reading race into it!" Which might be a valid comment; I'd say the best thing would be to heed WP:AGF until someone shows they're actually race-baiting. Your comments regarding the inclusion of Donald Trump as one of the exemplars of "white people" point to a problem I cover below, in my discussion of why it's a bad idea to limit speech on wikipedia to that approved by the most people likely to object to any other opinions.
As to "sub-species groupings directly analogous to human ethnic groups", SMcCandlish ☺ countered the argument (see above), but as a long-time cat fancier myself, I'm aware that pharmacologic reactions vary across cat breeds in just the way the OP produced evidence that they do across human ethnic groups, which implies the existence of authentic physical differences that track with ethnic origin. It's not just African Americans, the phenomena of the alcohol flush reaction in people of Asian ancestry and favism in those of Mediterranean origin are well-documented, and in my own ethnic group, Cajuns, there's an above-average incidence of a cluster of genetic traits predisposing to hypercholesterolemia and heart disease. So it's possible to talk about those differences without race-baiting, either. That is what you were worried about, yes?
I'm not entirely at ease with the "Maine Coon" example, either, but it's still a matter of WP:AGF until an editor tips his hand and shows he's pushing an agenda incompatible with wikipedia's mission. Otherwise we're going to get into the WP:NNH issue that we're spending more time parsing an editor's statements for potentially unpopular opinions than the actual wikipedia issue at stake, which in this case is whether the WP:NOETHNICGALLERIES guideline ought to be repealed. loupgarous (talk) 15:37, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
I wasn't assuming anything about the mention of the Maine Coon breed; "coon" in that case refers to the faintly raccoon-like appearance of the cats. Neither that nor anything to do with the fact that certain genetic populations have a predisposition for certain traits, which everyone already knows, has any relevance to this RfC. It does not matter that ethnicities exist and can be identified. We obviously know this already, or we would not have articles on them. It has no bearing on whether we should festoon these articles with PoV-reeking thumbnail galleries the contents of which will do little but cause controversy among editors, and between readers and the encyclopedia project. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:01, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal. The practical inability to objectively select "representative" individuals inevitably leads to edit wars. In the specific article mentioned by the proposer, I think a gallery would be superfluous: anyone who has access to the Internet already has a basic idea of what "White" and "Black" means, is not WP's business to impose a standard image for races (e.g. "Whites" defined as generally having fair hair and blue eyes, especially in women, as the proposer suggest we should depict white people).--Anonimu (talk) 14:58, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
The proposer did no such thing. There were a number of white people in the photo gallery with dark hair and eyes. loupgarous (talk) 15:57, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Repeal I read the original RFC for that guideline, and it seemed to turn on whether or not the practice of including ethnic galleries in the article lead or infobox was WP:OR or more trouble than it was worth. I found the OPPOSE arguments and SUPPORT arguments to the RFC equally persuasive. It's possible to select images from sources which satisfy WP:RS, to be sure, but context is everything in an encyclopedia article - any editor who chose the Skull and Crossbones symbol used to denote toxicity in an article on Hillary Clinton would be vandalizing the article on WP:BLP and WP:POV grounds.
However, it's a very weak argument against repeal that 'it's more trouble than it's worth' to do anything on wikipedia. It opens the door to wikipedia being hijacked by political activists or undisclosed paid editors and either being used as a soapbox, or to suppress legitimate, NPOV discussion of contentious issues. I'm afraid that if we keep this guideline, it'll serve as precedent for more guidelines forbidding any contentious content in wikipedia and serve as a legalistic end-run around WP:NOTCENSORED. Apart from that, the narrow focus of the guideline seems to assume bad faith on the part of any editor who would wish to place photos in one particular class of article. What happened to WP:AGF? loupgarous (talk) 15:33, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal - the "possible counter-arguments" have little to do with what was actually discussed at the time. The main problem is that representatives were very arbitrarily chosen, and the galleries lead to nothing but endless edit wars. FunkMonk (talk) 16:56, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal. Proposal does not address the main reasons for this policy: the arbitrary choices needed to populate the gallery, the tendency of editors to prefer famous people to representative (average, typical) people in such galleries, and the incessant edit wars over who exactly to include. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:00, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal – Not only is it way too early to be relitigating the relevant RfC, which had a huge amount of participation, but this proposal simply does not even address any of the reasons why these galleries were depreciated in the first place. My opinions as expressed in that RfC stand. I'm quite concerned that this RfC is being used as a WP:FORUM to push forth bunk comparisons between breeds of cats and human ethnic groups. RGloucester — ☎17:05, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal This was discussed to death just a couple of months ago. These galleries are inherently POV/OR because they draw special attention to specific, usually well known, people rather than simply representative photos. They are a magnet for drama and POV pushing, any marginal benifit to the reader is far outweighed by the drama they create. JbhTalk17:19, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal—these galleries are at worst more at home on sites like Stormfront and at best just hobbled together WP:OR with political leanings, either left or right. They frequently reflect the preferences and desires of those who contribute them more than the reality of the situation, often composed entirely of 'famous' and 'beautiful' 'specimens' of whatever is being illustrated, sometimes defined entirely socially, and sometimes with a specifically western lens. Any way you look at it, these particular galleries are a problem. :bloodofox: (talk) 17:26, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal - galleries containing images of ethnic peoples is simply original research. Who is to say who is of one ethnic background and not of another? As SMcCandlish says (thanks for the ping by the way), it's far too open to POV pushing and lame edit wars followed by sprawling masses of talk page arguments that go nowhere. If readers strongly disagree with the image they see, they'll leave the article with a lesser opinion about Wikipedia. The drawbacks far outweigh the benefits. NottNott|talk17:29, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal - The strength of the original research argument is very strong, plus it seems far too soon to go back on a widely-participated RFC. --MASEM (t) 17:33, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal Seemed to cause endless drama and edit wars over which people were chosen to represent their ethnic group in the infobox. Number5717:35, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal per the original research and POV concerns previously mentioned, and to avoid edit wars over who gets chosen for what Snuggums (talk / edits) 17:52, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal as there is no doubt that relevant arguments were well fleshed out in the original RFC and there was overall wide support for it with sound reasons. The objections in this repealing proposal could all be easily addressed, but the thing is, they already were addressed in the original RFC. There is no need to rehash. LjL (talk) 18:00, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal, as the primary reasons identified in the original RfC are not addressed and have not been -- and likely cannot be -- resolved. On many pages, these galleries became an engine of non-stop dispute, with no guidance from sources possible. Where an ethnic group includes numerous nationalities, like Slavs for instance, the infobox gallery became a daily battleground over who should be included and over the placement within the group, tinged with nationalist rivalry. And the galleries themselves provided dubious value. As I stated in one of the earlier discussions, it is better to limit the images to those actually discussed in the article, where their notability and reason for inclusion are explained directly. After the original discussion, there was a second long discussion rendering the same result, and I'm not really seeing any reason why this should be rehashed yet again. Laszlo Panaflex (talk) 18:04, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly support repeal The repeat of the argument that selection of individuals for such galleries is WP:OR does not make it a cogent argument. It is not WP:OR, selection of individuals belonging to an ethnic group is based on a cite. Addition of individuals is very much part of the normal consensus building process. If we're honest a lot of people have latched onto that argument, because they're fed up with the problems they have been known to cause on a few articles. The vast majority of articles didn't have any issues. The result of this policy was negative, with a bunch of editor using this policy to expunge ethnic galleries on wikipedia and often to the detriment of the articles. Japanese people is one example that sprang to mind. The article was poorer after someone took a hatchet to it. WCMemail19:12, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal. In the original discussion, I stated my arguments against ethnic galleries, and I don't see those arguments being refuted. As I already said, articles about groups of people (i.e. ethnicity) are about groups and their group characteristics. So, images of individuals are not relevant to illustrate a group and its group characteristics. Images of individuals depict their individual characteristic, but do not illustrate characteristic of a group. Illustrating an ethnicity with a gallery of notable people is to me like illustrating an article on Colosseum with a gallery of bricks used to build it. Vanjagenije(talk)19:38, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Support repeal That some people are unable to reach consensus on images is not a reason for blanket bans like this. It is a problem with the editors which is causing Wikipedia to not include illustrative material and then they try and say there's something wrong with the material instead of with them. Could we have less of these I find it difficult to get on with my fellow editors less ban the content sort of things thanks. The whole idea of blanket suppression of information is wrong for an encyclopaedia. And arguments like that an illustration of a selection is not illustrative of all is original research and flies in the face of statistics. Dmcq (talk) 19:50, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly support repeal, although with any hope of success, because, as long as we have pages related to race and ethnicity, we have an obligation to use any reasonable means to achieve the best multimedia result. If the top of any page should stand ”on its own as a concise overview of the article's topic...” and summarize “the most important points, including any prominent controversies” (MOS:LEAD), images and more so, in this case, a collage of images, are an appropriate and dutiful way of doing business. Diverting from this line of action amounts only to arbitrary censure and hypocrisy because, what we are trying to hide at the top, is anyway discussed and represented inside the article. And if it goes to the other reason, of the necessity to prevent endless edit wars, I'd like to emphasize here that this question is an ampler one, not limited to the current topic. Whenever editors have in mind different choices, each one in some ways licit and reasonable, they should restrain themselves from wars and allow any image to be present on the page for a while and afterward to be replaced by a different one. We editors should educate ourselves to this more productive and joyful attitude instead of limiting Wikipedia and eventually making it a pauperized encyclopedia. Carlotm (talk) 21:38, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
"Comment': I don't even like galleries in the animal articles, save for very specific purposes (and usually a chart is better for those) but I do see value in a gallery in an infobox such as that at Equus (genus) where several rather-different looking animals are each representative (horses, zebras, etc.). For humans, I definitely can see the problems with POV-pushing and possible racism, but I also can see a plus to not using a single example, but rather a range of people (for example, of different ages). To me, the lead of Women in Japan perpetuates a stereotype, whereas a collage showing women young and old, traditional and modern, would be better. So it's hard for me to really !vote here because I can see each method can be used or abused. Montanabw(talk)21:48, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Repeal per Wee Curry Monster. While I understand how hard it is to come to a consensus about these images, this is a feature any other encyclopedia would include. That the task is hard should not have led to removing the galleries and I'd like to see them return. Chris Troutman (talk)22:25, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Repeal Where there is no controversy such galleries should be allowed. With a small amount of controversy, talk page discussion can reach a conclusion. The imposition of the new rule may have stopped some arguments, but it did degrade other articles by making them less illustrated and unattractive. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:34, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal Noting additionally the possibility of using such a gallery for an editorial purpose not specifically supported by reliable sources as such. And noting the fact that WP:BLP has been strengthened in the "ethnicity" and "religion" areas to make it difficult to include images of persons who have not absolutely clearly self-identified as members of a specific ethnic group, and concurrently aver that they are not members of other ethnic groups. Collect (talk) 23:23, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Support repeal per Graeme Bartlett. We don't delete articles when they create excessive disputes (think Gamergate controversy), and a collage of images provides more useful information than a huge non-neutral article about a petty internet movement. SSTflyer00:00, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal without invoking anyone's policy (and guideline) arguments other than my own in the recent RfC. If I were to do so, I'd be obliged to lay on a WALLOFTEXT here as I was constantly involved in the discussions for a month. The OP's personal, hand-picked selection of 'white people' (with descriptions) speaks volumes for the reasons such galleries were nixed in the first place and stands as a superlative example of why it should never be reintroduced again. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:06, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal - A gallery in the lead may look good for presentation, but it has no encyclopedic value. STSC (talk) 00:18, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Strong oppose repeal - These tended to be puff pieces and not informative. The vast majority included the best and the brightest representatives, those people most likely to cast a positive light on the ethnicity in question. They were hardly representative. The Greek gallery, for example, started with a marble bust of Socrates and included representations of female goddesses out of Greek mythology. --Taivo (talk) 02:42, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal Dogs and cats have kennel clubs and stud books and official descriptions of breeds and varieties. Not so humans. EEng03:11, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal. An animal breed article can show pictures that are agreed as demonstrating the "ideal features" of that breed. I have not noticed an article on Wikipedia about a group of humans who have a meaningful "ideal" to maintain. In contrast, for a representative set of images to illustrate a human classification, one would need to highlight the diversity, not "choose for the centre". White people have brown, green, and blue eyes; blond, grey, brown, red and black hair; male and female; a range of skin tones, eye and nose shapes, weight and proportionment. Since most "white people" are not famous, a representative set of less than a thousand images should not contain anyone who is instantly recognisable or famous. --Scott DavisTalk05:03, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal - The original RfC was well participated in and the consensus was clear, and I have been pleasantly surprised at the lack of edit warring that the removal of the montages has resulted in (at least judging by my watchlist). The animal breeds analogy is not a good one, as has been pointed out by several editors above and as I attempted to explain to the OP at Talk:White people#WP:NOETHNICGALLERIES. Cordless Larry (talk) 06:18, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal. After two RfCs with very good participation and very clear consensus, I had hoped for a longer break. Honestly: After two and a half months with discussion we have had just over three months pause before starting again. The arguments from the old RfCs still stand. --T*U (talk) 06:41, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal. As noted above, there are no new arguments since this was discussed only a short time ago, and there were good reasons for the decision made then. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:27, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal People aren't dogs, with pedigrees and papers showing how many drops of a particular race they have in their breed and pedigree papers. It's way more complex and nuanced than that. We should show more intelligence than this. First Light (talk) 16:23, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal per red herring. The first rationale has nothing to do with why we eliminated them. If the OP can't come up with a better first reason to reinstate the galleries, than simply inventing their own reasons which had nothing to do with the discussion in the first place, there is very little hope they have anything useful to say at all. --Jayron3222:17, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal There can be an image in the infobox, just like with animals, but something specific to that ethnic group. Look at Malays (ethnic group), two normal people getting married. From that, we can see about their religion, rites and culture. However, if we instead had a gallery, including PM Najib Razak for example, what would people learn? That Malaysia has a Prime Minister? '''tAD''' (talk) 00:38, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Repeal per WP:CREEP. Such articles should have illustrations. The selection and formatting of such illustrations is a matter of editorial discretion. On Wikipedia, this will naturally lead to petty bickering but this rule isn't going to stop that because we're still going to have illustrations for people to argue about. You see exactly the same process of argument in collages for cities like London; it is unavoidable. In the meantime, this prescriptive rule seems to have been disruptive. For example, when I check Scottish people, I find that the first image in the article is now John Wayne which violates WP:SURPRISE. Previously, the article used to have images of famous Scots like Robert the Bruce, Mary, Queen of Scots, William Wallace, Andy Murray, &c. Those images were removed in a drive-by edit by someone who has not edited the article before or since and so doesn't seem to actually care about the topic. We should not be encouraging such edits. Andrew D. (talk) 06:53, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
As soon as you have images, then the issue of choice arises. Someone adds an image, someone adds another image and then pretty soon you're back where you started. The stylistic issue is the use of galleries and that's just a technical way of handling several images. It is quite improper that this technical issue should be used to grind a political axe. Andrew D. (talk) 07:59, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
I'm not grinding a political axe. My argument against these galleries has always been based on a concern about their inherently OR nature. Cordless Larry (talk) 15:44, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Cordless Larry's concern is unconvincing. He has edited the article London and its talk page but rushed straight past the equivalent discussion about that page's montage of images to discuss politics instead. We have numerous types of topic with montages of images - see Physics, for example. These are ignored and all the fuss is being made about those related to identity politics. This is not a matter for the manual of style, which should be above such things per WP:NPOV, WP:CENSOR, WP:GAME and WP:SOAP. Andrew D. (talk) 20:27, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
I don't see what my desire for the date of the new Mayor of London taking office to be correctly reported in the London article has to do with this. I can't participate in each and every discussion on Wikipedia about the use of montages, I'm afraid, but that doesn't stop me from being able to discuss basic factual material about elections! Editing about politics and grinding a political axe through editing are different things. Cordless Larry (talk) 20:32, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
It is natural and reasonable that Cordless Larry should be selective in his interests and activities. But the Manual of Style should not be selective in this way because it applies to all our topics as a matter of style not semantics or spin. If there's an issue with OR in the selection of images then this should apply to all topics, not just a narrow one. Andrew D. (talk) 20:39, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Thanks for your understanding, Andrew. Just to make sure everyone is aware of the history, the original RfC wasn't about the Manual of Style - incorporating the outcome of that RfC here was the outcome of a second RfC. Perhaps the MoS is not the best place for this guidance, but I do think the rational behind the guidance is sound. Cordless Larry (talk) 20:48, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Good grief, I find that I participated in the original RfC myself; I had quite forgotten. The problem there was that the discussion was closed with a supervote which claimed a consensus where there was clearly no such thing. It is not surprising that the matter continues to be disputed again and again. What we have here is a nonsense; a claim that to have an image of people like William Wallace representing the Scottish is wrong and that we should have John Wayne instead. This is absurd to the point of being lame and so will not stand. Andrew D. (talk) 22:28, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
There will always be some editors who disagree with a given consensus, but the support for this one seems quite strong judging by this discussion so far. By the way, I don't think this edit was particularly wise. Not only does it go against the consensus to add the montage, the images selected are very male-centric. Cordless Larry (talk) 23:00, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
John Wayne was 100% male and so it's a move in the right direction. That's the trouble with single images; it is harder to get a reasonable balance. Andrew D. (talk) 23:09, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
We can do better than that, and I will open a discussion on the article's talk page. At least he's not the first thing that people see when opening the page, though, unlike the infobox montage. Cordless Larry (talk) 06:59, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Maybe there will be a time where the billions of human beings will look much, much more similar to each other and pages like this will be simply incongruous. But we are not there yet. For now we have to keep track of reality and produce good multimedia pages, with the lead made by a binomial set of word and image, or for pages involving a variety of types, a collage of images. This is a “must”, where images are pertinent and illustrative. Editors who don't like images, who consider any selection an OR, should limit themselves to pages where images are not necessary. Editors who consider their stance an expression of their absolute mind, uncompromisingly rigid with respect to others' vision, should renovate their effort to be open and willing to find solutions for the selection of images as they do for the selection of words. Where, for words, legitimacy comes, also, from sources, for images, common knowledge and common sense lead the path. Carlotm (talk) 23:15, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
@Carlotm: I think you're misunderstanding what the original RfC and this RfC are about. No one is objecting to the use of multimedia to enhance understanding concepts dealt with within the body of articles, nor the use of relevant images in sections per WP:PERTINENCE. What the original RfC addressed was the use of galleries of notable people with some form of relationship to an ethnic group in the infobox per WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE. The infoboxes were being used to create galleries of notable (i.e., not ordinary, but extraordinary) people as representatives of millions - well, hundreds of millions of people if you consider how long these ethnic groups have existed, lived and died - in any given ethnic group to show the best and brightest, as well as a battleground for POV editors who wanted to introduce the most infamous notable people to demonstrate how evil they are. The article WP:TITLEs are not "Notable people of X ethnic group". "X ethnic group" articles are broad scope articles dealing with the history and culture of an entire people. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:23, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
@Iryna Harpy, you misunderstood what you read of mine, which was that there is no valid excuse for excluding the rightful presence of images, collage of images in this case, from the introductory section of a page. Carlotm (talk) 06:51, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
WP:PERTINENCE states: "Strive for variety. For example, in an article with numerous images of persons (e.g. Running), seek to depict a variety of ages, genders, and ethnicities." So, replacing an image of the single DWM John Wayne with an image showing a variety of people is recommended. Got it. Andrew D. (talk) 07:12, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
@Carlotm and Andrew Davidson: A) The infobox (repeating: see WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE) is not the introductory section of a page. B) Take a look at the Running article. It doesn't have an infobox because it doesn't need parameters for stats about how many people and other animals run; what languages people who run speak, or any other parameters that would assist in understanding what running means as a concept. The fact that 'running' is given as the example in WP:PERTENENCE is merely that: it's an example of a subject and could be replaced with a plethora of other concepts that don't have infoboxes (because an infobox is redundant), and certainly don't need galleries to illustrate the subject. I'm trying to imagine what a gallery for screaming would look like, and how it would inform the reader better than text. One, two, five or five hundred images of notable people who happen to be/have been members of an ethnic group (plus living in the diaspora, with numerous examples of people who are at least one generation down and/or of mixed descent) does not even begin to describe the influence or impact that a million people from that ethnic group have had in any given diasporic region. If we rephrase your comment, your argument is that a collage of people 'being Scottish in America' is better than one person 'being Scottish in America'. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 22:28, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
This has nothing to do with infoboxes. They are another can of worms and there's no consensus for them either. As for screaming, a single multimedia file is not obviously enough. That page encompasses a variety of sounds such as shouting too and we would want a mix of photos, art and sound files. (See right). In conclusion, I am not persuaded that a hard rule makes any sense and we should judge each case on its merits. My !vote stands. Andrew D. (talk) 23:00, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Yes, it started off that way... but it didn't stay that way. The current advice prohibits having " gallery of images of group members" anywhere in the article – even, for example, in a section on ==Traditional clothing==. The word infobox does not even appear anywhere in NOETHNICGALLERIES. Perhaps this could be resolved by adding that limitation to the guideline. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:51, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
It doesn't mention infoboxes, WhatamIdoing, but it comes as part of a list prefaced with: "Advice on selecting a lead image includes the following". I therefore don't think it applies to subsequent sections of the article, such as on clothing. Cordless Larry (talk) 14:36, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
It is certainly being used in this way. I replaced the absurd image of John Wayne with a more sensible collage of Scottish Americans in the body of Scottish people and was reverted, citing this MOS guideline. This is the WP:CREEP in action. What starts out a a sensible concern about sprawling galleries turns into a draconian prohibition of any kind of sensible image. It's out-of-control rule-making contrary to WP:NOTLAW. See Wikipedia is basically just another giant bureaucracy. But our policy is WP:NOTBURO and so we should throw out all this political prescriptivism.Andrew D. (talk) 18:41, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
You somehow forget to mention that you at the same time inserted a collage into the infobox, in direct contradiction to the current guideline. That would be the main reason for reverting while "citing this MOS guideline". If you want to replace John Wayne, you might just propose it in the TP and try to create a consensus... I, for one, would be quite happy to support another example than him, though not necesasarily a collage. --T*U (talk) 19:12, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
@Andrew Davidson: To go wa-a-ay back to "As soon as you have images, then the issue of choice arises. Someone adds an image, someone adds another image and then pretty soon you're back where you started." – Except that NOETHNICGALLERIES prevents this going all the way back down the rat-hole. People may argue about an image here or an image there, but it prevents the formerly continual problem of multiple disputes at once over a large number of images. Incremental improvement is still improvement. How best to illustrate these articles is still open for discussion, but we have clearly ruled out that a "ethnic gallery" is it. The rotting roadkill is no longer on the potential breakfast menu, and we can instead see what's in the refrigerator. Where to go from here is worth exploring under separate cover (I would start by proposing that no BLP subject be used to illustrate ethnicity articles, for starters; a Village Pump RfC recently removed the ethnicity parameter from {{Infobox person}} specifically because sourcing individuals' ethnicities is difficult and fraught with PoV and OR problems.) — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:21, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal. I see no reason to overturn consensus established in a thorough and well-conducted RfC a mere three months later. All of the nominator's points have been addressed in multiple discussions leading up to the previous RfC. Additionally, per multiple editors, the nominator's phrasing and lack of link to previous RfC is concerning, at best. Frankly, Even articles about sub-species groupings directly analogous to human ethnic groups, such as Maine Coon comes across as trollish, even if well-intentioned. Regards, James (talk/contribs) 12:55, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal—Nothing has changed. But I want to reinforce two problems, one with content and one with editing process. These galleries of notables tend to push one or another subtle point of view and inherently emphasize the X's are really important idea. In the proposers example we have five fashion models, six heads of state , three actresses, two religious leaders, and four scientists. These roles are unrepresentative of white people as a whole [who are far more likely to be cashiers, cooks, or waiters than any of these professions], and tempt editors to emphasize one or another trait: beautify, social power, scientific rationalism, imperialism, whatever. There's no way to adjudicate or come to consensus on what trait to emphasize, and that gets to process. You can have endless substitutions with no way of reaching consensus. A second process issue is the steady size creep in these galleries, which mostly began as nine-image squares and now have become a lengthening filmstrip of image cruft (28! images in the example). Likewise the captions, which are wholly uninformative to the topic of the article, quickly become text cruft (e.g., "American religious leader and founder of Mormonism and the Latter Day Saint movement Joseph Smith").--Carwil (talk) 16:01, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Again two specious excuses, Carwil. 1: It would be a boon to have a living collage where one or more images are getting changed every week. 2: Why do you want to eliminate collages altogether instead of limiting the number of images to 16-18-24 or whatever number is deemed visually justifiable? Carlotm (talk) 18:57, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal. The original argument of OR and the argument of how little it adds to the article are still strong, and I have seen no good reason why to repeal it. This has long been discussed and so far I have only seen an improvement in ethnicity-related articles as a result of it. Bataaf van Oranje (Prinsgezinde) (talk) 16:49, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal The gallery the nominator linked to is a perfect example of the issues of bias this type of gallery inevitably raises: why are there fewer women than men, and why are half of them actresses and models, while none of the men are actors? Why eight Americans and only one Russian, and why is Putin that Russian? Why no Hispanics? Where is the source saying that Agnesi was "white"? And Beethoven almost certainly wasn't "white." Why do we have to cause more frustration and alienation among editors by inviting such petty and ultimately fruitless debates, time and time again? I made the following argument in the original RfC: Human uses photographs of anonymous people to demonstrate what they look like, and there's no reason why articles on ethnic groups can't do the same. Cobblet (talk) 23:46, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
'Comment The 'white people' gallery is truly terrible and it is difficult to see how it could not be so, unless all the famous were excluded and a wide range of ages, nationalities, occupations etc. were employed. Ditto 'men' 'women' and other enormous groups. I have seen 'national group' galleries which were interesting and informative and which succeded in implying pictorially the range, history and diversity of achievement of that group. Others become meaningless and detract from the text. Neutral in the end. Pincrete (talk) 11:58, 5 June 2016 (UTC)
Strongly oppose repeal - This was already discussed to death and the consensus was quite clear, Including them causes more trouble than what it's worth. –Davey2010Talk00:25, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
Repeal on philosophical grounds. We shouldn't ban editors from doing things that will improve an article because it's hard for us to get them right. ("Causes more trouble than it's worth", "cause more problems than warranted" and the like more-or-less concede that it would be worthwhile (at least to some degree) to have these, but that our own inability to deal with them is a difficult problem. FYI, I'd have no problem using only non-famous people as I think that would come at no cost (actually a benefit to the reader as we'd be focusing on the topic-at-hand rather than anything else) and help with some of our problems. Hobit (talk) 10:59, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
This rationale, though, could be used to repeal all WP policies and guidelines that are in the nature of a best practices rule rather than a legal or technical requirement, which is to say, it would be the death of nearly all of them. So, obviously, it's not a rationale that the community accepts, or all those rules would be toast already, and would never have arisen in the first place. A whole lot of our P&G are along the same "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions" lines. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:21, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
Repeal as I felt the original decision was made with an undue emphasis on certain Eastern European ethnic group articles and the problems a very narrow clique of editors were experiencing there and expanded into a blanket ban enforced largely by this clique, although obviously with approval from many others during that RfC as a means to deal with a handful of their own individual situations rather than with the best interests of Wikipedia in mind. Support repeal on those grounds if none other as I personally find this unacceptable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:100B:B111:34A9:BD87:E5D0:8ECD:22BD (talk) 05:23, 9 June 2016 (UTC)
Oppose Repeal - Inherently an Original Research/POV problem. Axes are ground and fights ensue over an absolutely unnecessary form of illustration. Carrite (talk) 16:35, 10 June 2016 (UTC)
Strongly support repeal - While the web is becoming more and more visual, wikipedia is strangely moving the opposite way. In my opinion these articles are losing their informative value if this rule is used. Those images add to the readability of the article, if these galleries begin to be removed, nearly all images of any person in the article will be as well, and that is just going to lead to more confusion and edit warring. Walnut77 (talk) 00:27, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
The problem with slippery slope arguments is when the slope isn't that slippery...or a slope. The policy has been in effect for a little over half a year at this point and these doomsday predictions that our articles on racial groups would be devoid of images, simply black text on white screen (as if that's the worst thing that can befall our encyclopedia), haven't panned out. Wugapodes[thɔk][kantʃɻɪbz]13:49, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
Indeed. Walnut77's scenario is outright counter-factual, actually. More WP articles are illustrated every day (literally), plus more of them are given multimedia every day (probably, but there may be a few days here and there when nothing A-V gets added), while the number of articles being totally stripped of images is very close to zero (usually stubs with one image, which turned out to be a noob's copyvio). — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:21, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal. What you want is a way to link to an entire commons category of images so that there is no need to make fine-grained choices concerning who is in the gallery. Plastikspork―Œ(talk)22:59, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
Oppose repeal section of which images best conform to one person's views of what an ethnic group's members should look like is pure original research at best or stereotyping and worse.... Carlossuarez46 (talk) 19:47, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
Extended discussions
Please keep the pro/con comments section, above, short and readable.
Could we get some examples of where image galleries have been used to push some sort of POV? I can certainly see it happening, but I'm having trouble seeing how the lead images in Woman or Japanese people are any better. Curly Turkey🍁¡gobble!21:11, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
Oh, yes. Apologies, Curly Turkey: I see what you mean. Yes, the use of individual images (as with "Japanese people") was one of the issues discussed. Since then, some articles have had images snuck in without consensus (including flags!). The use of individuals in some form of 'national' dress, etc. was brought up in the original RfC where this discussion was alluded to. I'm going to go bold and remove the image as there was no consensus to use it, nor has it been discussed. As regards the "Women" article, I'd consider that to be flouting the rule by introducing images that don't truly meet with WP:PERTINENCE by shoving them up to the top of the article instead of using pertinent images within the body of the article. I don't see that they add any value to the article, but are as self-serving as a gallery would be. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:39, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
I sympathize with the idea that no one—or even a handful—of images can really represent a whole people (from the POV of a mongrel Canadian with half-Japanese children), but I would still assume an article on ethnicities would be well-illustrated with photos of people of those ethnicities. The Japanese people article certainly is not. I'm sensitive to the issues involved, but I have to wonder how NOETHNICGALLERIES solves them. Curly Turkey🍁¡gobble!04:16, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Outside-the-box idea: what about a randomized gallery? Load a random image of a person from the ethnic group based on Commons categories. It seems a big part of the issue is picking which pictures to show in the finite amount of space. But computerized stuff isn't limited by dimensions. This isn't a printed encyclopedia. I envision some kind of "widget" that shows a random image, lets you click to load a different image, and also provides links to the relevant categories. --71.110.8.102 (talk) 18:34, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
It's also overlooking the point. How do pictures of notable people (who are notable because they are extraordinary rather than ordinary... and even stranger without links to the articles about them) help to inform a reader about the ordinary people who make up an ethnic group? The issue of whether this is an encyclopaedic resource or a "My First Reader" was discussed at length in the earlier RfC (plus multiple related discussions and RfCs taking place fairly much simultaneously). Without exploring the theme of experiential scales, I suspect that it's plausible to assume that the average reader has been around long enough to know what a human man is, what a human female (AKA woman) is, and what people look like. In fact, I'm prepared to wager that all readers will know about the idea of 'race' and that not all human beings have the same colour skin... and that there are even variations on how particular facial features look. If that isn't recorded in an article on an ethnic group, and the reader is really confused, they have access to the internet (otherwise they couldn't access Wikipedia in the first place) and can use Google's image search to find a truly random and diverse array of people from any given ethnic group. The body of the article is where images meeting with WP:PERTINENCE belong. If traditions, festivals, costumes are important enough to display they belong in the relevant section within the article. In that manner, we are making full and non-stereotyped use of the fact that Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopaedia. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 03:50, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Iryna Harpy—sorry, but I thought the discussion was about image galleries rather than images in general? You appear to be arguing against images in general—as demonstrated by your removal of the lead image from Japanese people. I'm having a hard enough time follow the arguments against image galleries without having other concerns mixed in. Curly Turkey🍁¡gobble!22:59, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
Apologies for causing you more confusion, Curly Turkey. There were several issues surrounding infobox images tackled over the period lasting over 2 months, all of which were related. This included the use of more generic uses of infobox galleries and images to represent human groups (men, women, white people, black people, asian people, teenagers [who are, as the gallery in that infobox would have had it, all attractive Western teens who look like they've all been selected from generic stock photos], etc.) as being WP:POV and WP:OR. Convoluted, I know: but there was another RfC, the outcome being that such things were not down to editor discretion, and was contingent on the same arguments presented for WP:NOETHNICGALLERIES. I'd have to track down all of the projects and Wikipedia talk pages I frequent to find this, and I've not been feeling the best for the past few days, so I don't really have the energy to find the precise RfC at the moment. I'll try to find it a little later to get you up to speed. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 03:59, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
Possible middle ground
A great deal of objection to the repeal of NOETHNICGALLERIES seems to center around the difficulties of classifying people according to fine-grained groupings visually. I would suggest, therefore, that we allow image galleries for ethnic groups at the highest level, i.e. White peopleWhite people, Black people, or Asian people, but continue to disallow them for low-level subgroups, i.e. Slavs. DavidLeighEllis (talk) 21:58, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
Um... Wanna reword that? (Hint: Do not say you're proposing a "final solution" to the problem.) EEng22:10, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
Reworded to clarify that I am speaking of "highest level" in terms of largest groups of people, and "low-level" in terms of smaller sub-categories of people, not something else entirely. DavidLeighEllis (talk) 22:13, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
I'm not sure your revision was completely successful in eliminating the original problem. EEng22:33, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
It should be, since I'm clearly using "level" to denote breadth of classifications, and not as a statement of valuation as you are insinuating. DavidLeighEllis (talk) 23:03, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
I'm not insinuating anything, other than that you employed a stupendously poor choice of words. Just take your trouting like a man, and be comforted by the fact that you've injected much-needed amusement into this dreary discussion (even if unintentionally). EEng23:14, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
Your implicit assumption that it is meaningful to "classify people visually" into ethnic groups, and that the only difficulty is how to make finer-grained distinctions in such a classification, is already offensive and wrong. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:28, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
This is a simple recognition that NOETHNICGALLERIES was proposed and adopted against an actual background of content disputes, mostly involving relatively small groups of people. As for your claim above that we can't visually classify people into ethnic groups at all, all image use choices involve arbitrary choices of photos, valuation schemes such as "famous people" or "visually attractive photos", and can and have attracted edit wars. Your argument proves too much since it can be made against almost any article's illustrations. DavidLeighEllis (talk) 22:49, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
How many more convolutions of POV WP:BLUDGEON are you planning on? "Higher level", "lower level"? WP:COMMONSENSE says: "You what?" This obsessive attempt at brokering a personal deal is getting embarrassing. What is this compulsion to present the average reader with 'pictures'really about? --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:06, 12 June 2016 (UTC)
No.White people's gallery has been wracked by disputes, peacock choices (look how impressive white people are), and the problematic question of when the term originated (many RS regard it as a racial term whose relevance was nonexistent before 1500, but we've had pre-1500 people in the gallery). Likewise, we've had disputes, peacock choices, and boundary problems (see Talk:Mariah Carey) at the almost-as-high-level African Americans. The problems still apply to "high-level" ethnic groups.--Carwil (talk) 11:27, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Extended
@Paine Ellsworth: Given how vocal your opposition was at the original RfC, I consider you to be too INVOLVED (even though you're not a sysop) to close this RfC and conspicuously leave your own notes as to your POV in the summary. Such a reading of the outcome smacks of being strategically placed to further undermine PROCESS simply because it doesn't actually or genuinely represent 'rough' consensus. The dominant consensus was that the RfC was an attempt by an editor to try to override recent consensus for their own personal reasons. I'm not interested in discussing whether it was even valid or productive to question good faith on behalf of the proposer, as it became a moot point very quickly. With all due respect, what is significant is that there were no additional quality arguments made in favour of the use of such galleries and this backlash against a recent decision was met by SNOW not, as you would have it, interesting and constructive discussions/arguments and rough consensus. The balance is held by NOR and NPOV: that is, by policy. It would have been better to have leave this to stand sans closure as it didn't merit closure. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 01:37, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
In the name of Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and all the Saints and Apostles, can we just let this reanimated zombie stay buried now? No one cares about dicta in the closing comments. The status quote ante stands, and that's it. For fuck's sake, everyone go edit something. EEng04:54, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
I do worry that the (mis-)characterisation of the consensus as "rough" could be taken as reason to open this debate up again I a few months. Cordless Larry (talk) 05:56, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
I, too, would like to see this subject put to rest. Yet somehow I get the idea that no matter what, no matter who closes, no matter if I were to mention how I would like it to end, it will continue on and on and on. The good side in my humble opinion is that it continues here, on this talk page, among editors who have a longstanding knowledge of Wikipedia and its style, rather than on nuumerous talk pages of nuumerous articles among editors, some of whom were unable to argue amicably in a civil manner. All those contests have become centralized – here – on this talk page. And if they do continue, then at least they will be centralized, civil and sapient. I know in my heart that you must be right, Iryna, Double E, Cordy and Bloo Fox, but then, so am I. Wikipedian Sign LanguagePaine09:18, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
RfC on expanded use of quote templates with "giant quotation marks" visuals in them
An editor is seeking to delete almost all images from an article. Because - as he said in his last edit summary - in his opinion they are "unnecessary photos."
The article is about Olympic athletes from a country who performed in an Olympics.
Illustrated the "bus factor" metaphor, got reverted by IP
Will the project fail if this member is hit by the bus?
I think the Bus factor article severely lacks illustrations (none as of now).
The "hit by a bus" cliché is not familiar to most English-as-a-second-language readers, and in software ("bus factor" is software jargon) "bus" usually means "information bus" or "serial bus". The picture illustrates what is behind the metaphor.
This isn't the right place for this discussion, but the tone of the image+caption just isn't right for an article. (It would be great for an project-space page, though.) The article should simply explain in a straightforward way the notion of key team members being hit by a bus as a project risk. (BTW, in my day we talked of someone being "hit by a beer truck.") But please don't respond here. This belongs on the article talk page. EEng04:04, 13 October 2016 (UTC)
Since we've banned using montages and galleries to illustrate articles about ethnic groups, the new trends are to illustrate them with flags (like this) or individual images of people (like this). What are people's thoughts on these approaches? Kaldari (talk) 02:31, 14 January 2017 (UTC)
Hi. I recall in the past two rules for image placement that I don't see any longer. First, I recall a rule that left flush images should not lead a section, which I believe was something to do with MOS:ACCESS. Second, a rule that photos of people should be placed such that the person appears to be facing towards the center of the article. I did see a comment in the talk page archives suggesting that be removed a few years ago, but nothing about it actually being removed. Are these not policies that we follow? – Muboshgu (talk) 00:19, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
And yet now that I have been asked about it after moving a left flush image to the right, I can't find any evidence that it was a rule at all. I'm sure it was, at one point. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:39, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
There used to be a technical issue with the flow of text when left images began a section, or maybe just a level-3 section. That was overcome years ago, so now there is no restriction. The centre-facing one still applies, as a general rule, just because they often look odd otherwise. It should be in a guideline...somewhere. Johnbod (talk) 02:35, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
Current text reads:
It is often preferable to place images of people so that they "look" toward the text. (Do not achieve this by reversing the image, which creates a false presentation e.g. by reversing the location of scars or other features.)
Hey, let's have an RfC on whether the above should be be extended to animals too. It's been a while since we've had all the old gang together! EEng03:02, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
Why not also bicycles, cars, trains, trams, trucks, ships, and any other object for which there is a front and a back. And what about staircases? Is the bottom landing or the top one the front of such structures? And what about a lying person? Is their head the front side, even though they look the other way, or their feet? OMG. We need a new category for all these absurd appendages: Kafkaesquia. Carlotm (talk) 09:45, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
Calm down! Yes, in some cases all of those. But, as I say, most people don't need to be told, since they are unconsciously so familiar with the conventions from other published stuff laid out by professionals. I'm not suggesting changing any guidelines; I leave that sort of thing to EEng & others. Johnbod (talk) 12:29, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
You mentioned lying people, and that raises an interesting point worth noting. If they're bald-faced liars, then their bald face should be toward the text. But if they're lying their ass off, then their ass should be toward the text. However, that general principle can lead to some difficult cases, as in the image seen here. EEng12:55, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
Humour aside for a moment, is it reasonable to say that "preferred" here is just that? A preference? I'd think it better to have a wrong facing image than no image at all (assuming an image is warranted). Also, it seems to me that left-aligned images are less preferred and typically only done after a right-aligned one is above it in a given section. EvergreenFir(talk)04:27, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
It's certainly true that people used to be advised to alternate images to left and right, in the days when it was assumed that most people used similar-shaped screens. That advice is (I think) no longer there, as the shape and size of screens, devices, settings etc proliferated, & it was realized that it was no longer feasible to make assumptions. People used to be asked to alternate images at FAC; that's long gone. Of course a wrong facing image is better than no image at all, and often someone will come along & switch it eventually. Johnbod (talk) 17:08, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
Can I request that this guideline add information about official emblems? Pages using city, county, state, national, or company seals, flags, banners, logos, or other symbols should use the version prescribed by the institution when available. These are preferable to amateur creations of similar quality, including photographs of physical representations of such emblems.
This has been a precedent-based standard on Wikipedia for a long time, however with users recently challenging it, this should be written into a rule. If the same challenge was raised on the US Flag or Presidential Seal article, I don't think it would be heeded the same way. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)02:24, 20 February 2017 (UTC)
After no comments for over a month, I'll add this. Further discussion should be held here, if there are any concerns. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)20:49, 24 March 2017 (UTC)
Encyclopedia, parental control
This Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, so images should be encyclopedic. Pages about states contain rather sweet images than pictures of victims. But this Wikipedia isn't a tourist guide.
Wikipedia should create some type of parental control of images - to be acceptable for children. Such control would have allowed to publish shocking pictures. Rejection of shocking pictures is some kind of censorship.Xx236 (talk) 07:12, 24 March 2017 (UTC)
Hi Xx236. It's not clear from you post whether you are asking a question, proposing a change, or simply making a general comment. The relevant policy page for image use is WP:IUP so if you're concerned about censorship or the lack thereof, then perhaps you should take a look at WP:IUP#Content. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:04, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
appropriateness of using "upright"
MOS:IMGSIZE says "Only where a smaller or larger image is appropriate, use |upright=scaling factor, which expands or contracts…" I've come across articles and editors where "appropriate" has equaled "for any image taller than a square". Can some concrete guidance be added? — fourthords | =Λ= |18:16, 8 February 2017 (UTC)
IMHO the answer is No, concrete guidance can't be added, if by "concrete" you mean anything like "definite". The section you're citing gives a number of examples and considerations, but in the end it's up to the editors of each article to decide on the placement and sizing of images so that they best complement the text and assist the reader's understanding. EEng18:45, 8 February 2017 (UTC)
You'll also notice that actually few articles use upright scaling; frankly the MOS is not widely accepted on this & should probably be changed, but doing so will lead to lengthy arguments. Johnbod (talk) 03:11, 20 February 2017 (UTC)
It's because it's a newer rule that wasn't widely publicized. Consensus is that the upright form is preferred, due to its flexibility with user preferences. The more we all use it and point back to this, the more people will learn. I have changed to use upright in most articles I extensively edit. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)05:00, 20 February 2017 (UTC)
It's been in place for over five years, longer than most editors have been around. The way it works with user preferences is one of the worst problems with it in fact, but don't let's get into that now. Johnbod (talk) 18:18, 20 February 2017 (UTC)
I disagree, but only to the extent that non-intuitive doesn't even begin to describe it. "Textbook user-interface nonsense" would be more like it. More seriously, this is one thing that ought to be noncontroversial and very easy to implement (unless—and this wouldn't surprise me—there's already a scale parameter with some function now forgotten but which must be preserved for some reason). Where would we propose it? EEng17:57, 20 February 2017 (UTC)
Frankly, I'm pleasantly surprised whenever I see an image with the upright parameter. The real problem (in the light of the current MOS wording) are the countless of images where size is set in pixels. Pixel width should, according to the MOS, set only "where absolutely necessary". Appropriateness, to me, seems more lenient than absolute necessity. Whenever I see px set, I revert it to default thumb (unless there is an apparent absolute necessity I can sympathize with, such as text in the image). For upright I tend to give the benefit of the doubt. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:21, 21 February 2017 (UTC)
Am I right in assuming that so-called upright is much more suitable for cross-platform display (in particular, on mobile devices)? Such a pity it was called upright—that seems to have been a major stumbling block to widespread adoption (whether default size or not). Tony(talk) 08:04, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
It would be easy to provide an alias for |upright=; |scale= for example. However, this needs to be done at the Wikimedia level. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:34, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
Re the name of the parameter: On some MOS page, a year or two ago, I advocated for deprecating |upright=scaling factor, replacing it with |scale=scaling factor, while keeping |upright with no value. (I feel it would be important to deprecate, not keep two aliases indefinitely, as the latter would simply replace one usability problem with another one.) It was tangential to the discussion and didn't gain a lot of traction, so I dropped it. In my opinion it needs to be a formal proposal at WP:VPR, but I've had enough dismissive, change-resistant "solution in search of a problem" arguments for quite some time. The community, or that miniscule fraction who frequent VPR, is simply not interested in editing simplification and ease-of-use. I will keep my theory of the reason for that to myself, as it's unproveable. ―Mandruss☎15:55, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
Upon further reflection, |upright with no value should be deprecated too, replaced by |scale=upright. Otherwise we end up with the possibility of something like |scale=0.5|upright, which would be both confusing and ambiguous. ―Mandruss☎03:02, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
My understanding is that mobiles do things their own way, and just ignore all the desk-top formatting. That might be wrong though. Johnbod (talk) 13:33, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
While I would not agree that using "upright" for a 1x1 or taller is appropriate, I do think that if you start getting past 3x4 (where the width is < 75% of the height), that upright should definitely be used barring very specific situations. Between "square" and that point should be up to editors, what we don't want is a very narrow image without the upright scaling factor to take up a huge amount of vertical space. --MASEM (t) 13:56, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
Sounds complicated for a lot of editors. Any disadvantage in using "upright" (or a better-named equivalent) for all images? And if it's to be changed, please: a short string. Tony(talk) 01:51, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
I would have no problem changing the term to scale (with "upright" defaulting to "scale=0.7" as it is done now). And the advice to when it should be used can basically be where one has a narrow, tall image to prevent the default thumb size causing the image to run down an incredible length of page. --MASEM (t) 02:41, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
Use of icons to replace station numbers (text) in railway line articles
Hi. I wonder if editors familiar with the Manual of Style regarding image (icon) usage can comment on this situation...
In the last couple of months, a large number of articles on Japanese railway lines have had the (text) station numbers in tables replaced with icons. An example can be seen at the Yamanote Line article. My understanding was that the Manual of Style discourages replacing textual information with graphics such as icons, as this reduces accessibility. Or is it acceptable provided alt text is also provided? --DAJF (talk) 14:11, 13 March 2017 (UTC)
I think that station codes in tables of railway line articles should be text (JY04, instead of , for example), because icons cannot be searched for, and what Wikipedia users reading the section want to know is not an icon but a station number.
The icons (including alt text) have less visible information on a station code than numbers (text) have, even though they are visually beautiful. It seems to me that they are not so much station code information as station information.
@Chiro08:. Hi. Your comments basically describe my own feelings. I certainly don't see any problem with using icons as supplementary devices such as in station articles (e.g. Shim-Mikawashima Station), but I wonder about the accessibility problems introduced by replacing textual information such as station numbers with purely graphical icons, as in Keisei Main Line. I hope other editors familiar with the guidelines can also comment here. --DAJF (talk) 00:44, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
Hi. I would like to ask whether it is acceptable if icons are textual (e.g.F01).
TheMasterGabriel, the usual circumstance for doing this is that a very long infobox descends into (or even past) the first section, which causes the image for the first section to appear in the second (or even third) section for some readers. In that case, it makes sense to left-justify the image so that it will (visually) appear in the relevant section. Another common circumstance is wanting to add two images to a short section.
Some editors just personally like the aesthetics of having images bounce from left to right, and others equally dislike it. I recommend not getting too worried about it if an editor just happens to like it one way or the other. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:54, 16 July 2017 (UTC)
The "nonetheless, in such cases the caption should be clear as to what the image actually depicts" addition
Siuenti, I just noticed this and this. I'm not strongly opposed to the change, but what is the point of using an inauthentic image if we are going to point the matter out in a caption? I mean, I can understand doing so in some cases, but wouldn't this be distracting in other cases?
If we don't have an image of A, so we're instead presenting an image of B (because it strongly resembles A), we're obviously not going to leave the reader with the impression that they really are looking at A. The caption must say what's going on. I can't imaging any circumstances that would be an exception to this. EEng06:45, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
You stated, "we're obviously not going to leave the reader with the impression that they really are looking at A." But we have because of this guideline. Refer to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine/Archive 40#Image of narcolepsy? See the Narcolepsy article. I took issue with an image. And then WhatamIdoing argued, "If you are concerned about misidentifying someone as having narcolepsy (and can't find a better image, such as one that doesn't show the sleeping person's face), then try a somewhat different caption, like 'A person with narcolepsy may fall asleep in unusual places, such as at work.' And, yes, you can then take the same image to Sleep apnea and give it a new caption: 'A person with severe sleep apnea may fall asleep in unusual places, such as at work', and to Sleep deprivation with the caption, 'A person who is sleep deprived...', and to Parenting#Newborns_and_infants with the caption, 'A person caring for an infant may get so little sleep that...' The point is what the image looks like, not what the person's actual medical or social history is." I argued that "I don't think that WP:PERTINENCE allows or suggests that we call the image narcolepsy if it is not narcolepsy," but I agreed with her wording examples.
AFAICS the problems you're having come from people ignoring this guideline, which says to label things as what they are. EEng14:31, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
But those suggested captions don't actually label the image as being anything. They provide verifiable information (sleep disorders may manifest as sleeping in strange places) but they don't say what this picture is ("Here is a picture of a person who is asleep. Actually, we don't know if he's asleep; he might be faking it.") I don't think that "be[ing] clear as to what the image actually depicts" would improve the article in such a case. Consequently, I'm inclined to remove it. (I oppose telling lies; I just don't think that there's any encyclopedic point to saying "This picture shows a sleeping person, who may or may not have the exact sleep-related condition being discussed here".) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:18, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
EEng, I don't understand what you mean by "the problems you're having come from people ignoring this guideline, which says to label things as what they are." WP:PERTINENCE didn't state anything about labeling things as what they are until the recent aforementioned addition that WhatamIdoing reverted. In the first case I linked to, my issue was that a narcolepsy image likely was not narcolepsy. WhatamIdoing then pointed to WP:PERTINENCE and made a case for using such images even if the person does not have narcolepsy or similar. I am still uncomfortable with doing so in the case of a disorder and living people.
WhatamIdoing, that is what I was wondering about. I was thinking that it would be distracting to state, for example, "This person does not have narcolepsy." in the image caption. If we are going to point out in the caption that the image is not authentic, then how do we go about that? We'd want it done in the least distracting way, I'd think. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 08:11, 13 July 2017 (UTC)
It depends on the situation. In common situations, such as a picture of a sleeping person, I don't think that we should do it at all. I think that most of our (non-autistic) readers are able to recognize illustrations as being just illustrations instead of photographic proof of a specific example. In the case of a BLP, we can avoid easily recognized pictures. For example, we could show a picture of a sleeping person that doesn't show the person's face.
In some others, there are conventions for it: "This is a false-color photograph of <science-y thing>" or "This is an artist's rendition of <something>". We also commonly say "This is a famous 18th-century painting by Alexander Artiste of <article subject>". Perhaps my least favorite convention is "This is a restoration of a dinosaur" (which means the same as "artist's rendition" but sounds much more authentic). WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:03, 14 July 2017 (UTC)
In many situations, the very existence of this dilemma is a signal that the image should be dispensed with. A favorite example of mine is the image seen here [1]; this doesn't exemplify the truth-in-captioning issue, but it does exemplify an image that belongs in a children's book, not an encyclopedia. Similarly, Narcolepsy doesn't need a picture of a sleeping person (whether one with narcolepsy or not) because readers already know what a sleeping person looks like, and don't need to be reminded. If narcoleptics display some characteristic appearance that indeed is worth illustrating, then get a picture of an actual narcoleptic. And if that's not possible, you might in desperation use a picture you'd caption, "A physician demonstrating the characteristic appearance of a sleeping narcoleptic." EEng17:07, 14 July 2017 (UTC)
EEng, what value do you see from a caption that says "This is an actor, not a real person with a sleeping disorder"? Would you expect to see that kind of disclaimer on a similar image in a reliable source or in an advocacy group's website? WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:57, 16 July 2017 (UTC)
I didn't suggest the caption you just gave; as seen above, I suggested "A physician demonstrating the characteristic appearance of a sleeping narcoleptic." And that's exactly what you'd see in a responsible medical source, which would never misrepresent what the photo actually shows, nor should we. What an advocacy group would do is irrelevant.
The value of using such a caption is that we would not be misrepresenting what the reader is seeing. As usual when there's no actual article-editing issue at hand, this conversation is hobbled by hypotheticals. Are we talking about something going on in some article somewhere? EEng21:15, 16 July 2017 (UTC)
Can you provide a few examples of such disclaimers? I spent 30 minutes looking just now, and I found none.
Most scientific papers and medical school texts (the ideal reliable sources) contain no such images (which is hardly surprising, as they are intended for a scientific audience). The Sleep Foundation uses generic images without disclaimers (example). Multiple information pages from the Harvard Medical School use generic images without disclaimers (example 1, example 2). The UK's main sleep charity uses generic images without disclaimers or captions (example). I believe all of these to be "responsible medical sources", as you put it. Do you think that those sources are "misrepresenting what the reader is seeing"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:46, 18 July 2017 (UTC)
With one possible exception these images are exactly the kind of stock image that don't belong in such an article at all e.g. (from [2]) a picture of an apparently "normal" person "normally" asleep, with the caption, "The patterns of normal sleep are disrupted by narcolepsy". Such images tell the reader zero, because they already know what a sleeping person looks like. There are no disclaimers, and don't need to be, because none of these images purport to show a narcoleptic.
The possible exception is the image here [3] of a person slumped over a laptop. It has no caption, though it comes immediately after a bold section heading, Narcolepsy with Cataplexy. Is this supposed to show us what a sleeping cataplectic looks like? If so, what's special about their appearance? The text says "This causes the person to slur words, have a sagging jaw..." Well, I don't see a sagging jaw in the image, so this is probably just another stock image of someone asleep, in which case see my point above – the image has no function in the article and should be omitted. But if I did show a sagging jaw, and we used it in an article, it damn well better be an actual cataplectic-with-sagging-jaw, not someone pretending (unless the caption makes that clear). EEng09:34, 18 July 2017 (UTC)
I believe that the point of the image is to communicate that most people affected by narcolepsy look exactly like that 'apparently "normal" person "normally" asleep', to quote your words. And apparently such an image would have some important educational value, because even an educated person like yourself didn't realize that the 'apparently "normal" person "normally" asleep' is a typical appearance for people during a narcoleptic attack. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:58, 18 July 2017 (UTC)
Consistency
Hi, can we try to revise the wording of MOS:IMGLOC? Obviously staggering images left and right is usually preferable, and used on most FAs. The language on IMGLOC seems to vaguely say staggering is okay, but also contradicts it that "in most cases, images should be right justified on pages", which seems to contradict the FAs and most other large articles. It also seems to contradict another part of the MOS, the Music page, which says "they should be staggered right-and-left". Can we reword all three to match each other and provide clarity and detail into the best practice? ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)16:40, 7 June 2017 (UTC)
If there's no input on this I'll assume it's acceptable and will be bold and make the change. This is the de facto standard on articles as it stands. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)21:52, 14 July 2017 (UTC)
Ɱ, I don't think that this is really a contradiction. You are permitted stagger; you aren't required to.
The point behind staggering images is to make the images "fit" within a relevant section. Most articles don't contain enough images for staggering to be relevant. If you have a lot of text and few images, then all of them can be, and usually are, placed on the right, even in Featured Articles. Even when staggering is used, we typically only place a few images on the left. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:48, 16 July 2017 (UTC)
@WhatamIdoing: Yes I know all this, but the point is - do you honestly think it's perfectly clear wording? Can't it be way clearer? This came up as an issue because someone pointed to the MOS's "in most cases, images should be right justified on pages" as their argument that an FA I was working on shouldn't have any left-aligned images. And he's totally right to assume that, I think that MOS bit I quote can totally justify his argument. But it's not seen that way by almost all other users, and thus not really followed like that user and I can see it. The wording absolutely needs to be more clear. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)21:11, 16 July 2017 (UTC)
I'm sorry that you are dealing with that. The problem is generally someone crying, "But the MOS says that you must stagger all images!" So I'm concerned about giving more ammunition to the one that clearly has it wrong, because nobody actually wants a strict left-right staggering all the way down the page, especially when there are few images.
In the context of Talk:Briarcliff Manor, New York#Image placement, you might be interested in knowing that this guideline previously discouraged left alignment immediately underneath a ===Level 3=== section heading, on the grounds that it made it slightly harder for the reader's eye to find the first word of the first paragraph in this section. (It's less of an issue with ==Level 2== section headings, because they have a horizontal line drawn underneath them.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:25, 18 July 2017 (UTC)
Ɱ, regarding this bit I reverted you on, how is it not the case that images should usually be right-justified? What examples do you have? And in the case of your examples, how is this not the minority of cases? As for staggering images right and left, I usually see editors do that as a matter of style, not because it's needed, and it often leads to WP:SANDWICHING issues. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 06:38, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
It's because most big articles should and do stagger the images left-right. That's been the norm forever but the wording at this MOS didn't reflect that, and even contradicted it. And yes it can lead to sandwiching, however that's why it said "Multiple images can and sometimes should be staggered right and left. However, avoid sandwiching text between two images that face each other...". That seems adequate, no? Surely an improvement over the "In most cases, images should be right justified on pages" which seems to convince and literally has convinced editors that staggering is less than preferable. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)12:33, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
I tend to agree with Flyer22 Reborn. Staggering left and right only works in articles in which there is a large amount of text so that the images are sufficiently well separated to avoid sandwiching. In terms of the number of articles, it should be very much a minority style. What often happens at present is that staggered images get added to a short article, leading to terrible layout. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:42, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
Can't we describe it like that then? It seems the current wording is very unclear and unhelpful, and I so very prefer when the guidelines and policies provide rationale like that. I agree with you, however the current wording has led people to disfavor staggering altogether, and force that view upon others. ɱ(talk) · vbm · coi)12:45, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
Yes, it would be good to provide more helpful guidance. The logic involved seems to me to be:
the priority is to avoid sandwiching, as per MOS:SANDWICH
if there's not enough text to separate images, this means placing all the images to the same side, usually the right (where there's often an infobox), or using the gallery format, while respecting WP:NOTGALLERY
if there's enough text to separate images, left and right staggering is usual although not required
I could agree to use "many cases" instead of "most cases," and "multiple images can be staggered right and left," but I don't agree with "should." This is a guideline, not a policy, and "should" is an opinion in this case. I don't think that big articles automatically should stagger right and left. Furthermore, sandwiching happens in big articles as well because of small sections; this was the case at the Human brain article.
Isn't the reason that our lead mages are always on the right attributed to some viewing issue, and is not simply a matter of "this is how it's always been done"? Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 14:55, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
To make it easier to figure out where the first word is. It's the same problem with a left-justified image immediately under a ===Level 3=== heading (only worse at the start of an article). WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:54, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
On the question of "sandwiching", the main problem isn't having text between two images. The main problem is when you have two images both starting at the same height at the top of a paragraph. So this is bad:
(And if anyone is thinking "but it'll still squish the text between two images" – well, yes, it will, unless Paragraph #2 is really, really long. But that will happen sometimes/on some screens unless we always put all images on the same side, even if it doesn't look that way on your particular screen/font size/zoom/etc. We can't prevent it entirely, and the goal is just to avoid the worst-case scenario of having the two of two images plus the top of the paragraph all in a single row.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:54, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
Nothing should be said to discourage staggering. Editors usually add images according to whatever looks good on their own screens, forgetting that other people are reading on windows of different widths. Staggering images left and right avoids images, if always placed on the right, from bleeding into the next section when the window is wider. Even with just one image in each section, expanding the window can cause images to push lower ones away from the text they support, and into other images and quote boxes. Whether staggering is appropriate depends on the text–image ratio, section size and article size. Editors may also decide that it simply looks better. SarahSV(talk)03:11, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
But it doesn't look better if it causes sandwiching on a narrow screen, and new editors need to be informed about this issue. Editors aren't free to decide unilaterally what they think looks better. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:39, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
Agreed with the general gist of this, i.e. that we really don't want people staggering images all the time, because it causes problems, but be should be clearer and more advisory about when it works and how to do it well. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:03, 21 September 2017 (UTC)
RfC: Should png files be discouraged for photographs?
Without wishing to focus this RfC on the conduct of User:Kintetsubuffalo, he has for a long time now been making requests at the Photography Workshop to have jpg files (photographs) converted to png files. Since png files do not render well at thumbnail size I have attempted to explain why using them is usually a bad idea. Unfortunately my attempts at engaging in discussion have been largely ignored, or met with outright rudeness. Please see 1, 2, 3 and 4, in particular the message I left on his user page outlining the problem and his response.
What I'd like, if others find it agreeable, is to create an official guideline on the use of png files. Basically, I think they ought not to be used for photographs on account of the fact that they look terrible. What say you? nagualdesign23:44, 30 July 2017 (UTC)
Comment. Could you clarify if the rendering problem is inherent to the png format in general or if the problem is strictly with how Wikipedia software is handling png files? If it's the latter, then shouldn't we attempt to fix the software instead of amending the usage guidelines? And if it's the former, then yes, of course the usage should be discouraged then.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); July 31, 2017; 13:32 (UTC)
I can answer this: it's the Wiki software. And yes, it should be fixed if at all possible (there are a lot of reason why WMF may not be able to fix it in the forseeable future), but petitioning WMF to implement even very simple changes seems to be extraordinarily difficult, from what others who've done so tell me. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.13:53, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
Spot on. It's been like this for many years and I doubt that anything will change any time soon. Bear in mind also that even if the software were updated there would still be absolutely no benefit from converting a jpg to png in cases where the image is rectangular with no transparency. nagualdesign15:29, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
Support. I agree with the OP on this; we should deprecate use of PNG files where they are not necessary. That being said, this seems to be a bit of a heated point, and I'm hoping this can be a calm discussion. I can think of a few reasons why editors might want a PNG file instead of a JPG, including some that are based on misconceptions (such as that JPG files will degrade in quality over time). ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.13:53, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
Yes, the last thing I want is to get into an argument. This is more of a technical request and despite Kintetsubuffalo's unwillingness to engage in discussion I have no wish to call his conduct into question. I've been through far worse than being called a "doofus" in my time. All I really wanted from him was some sort of explanation, but since he has been less than forthcoming I think the only recourse is to set out some official guidelines. Whether he elects to ignore all rules after that (as per the banner on his talk page) is another matter entirely, but we can cross that bridge at a later date. nagualdesign15:29, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
I could understand the desire in cases where the image is likely to go through numerous revisions; for instance a greyscale image that is being colorized by two or more volunteers (a situation I've been in). Repeatedly saving the file as a jpg can seriously distort the image. But even then, any decent artist will know to immediately save the working image to a better filetype, like .psd or .xcf. It's a thing where there seems to be a lot of reasons to prefer png over jpeg, but once you start looking at each reason individually, there's always a better way.
In regards to @Kintetsubuffalo:, I've always found them to be a very polite and helpful editor, and never had any trouble with them. I believe you may have rubbed them the wrong way at some point, making them less willing to engage with you (no judgement here, I'm presuming it was unintentional). But I am disappointed at their lack of a voice here, because I would like to hear what they have to say about why they request PNGs. Its still possible that they have a very good reason (perhaps international versions of some browsers have trouble displaying JPGs or something), and it would really be best to hear them out. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.16:17, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
I've never had any trouble with him either that I can remember, and I'm certainly not aware of rubbing him up the wrong way. I assume he thinks I've been "preachy" or pedantic, judging by the "House Rules" on his talk page. When I opened this RfC I notified him of course. His response was to revert my edit. Let's just try and focus on the guidelines. nagualdesign16:38, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
MjolnirPants Thanks for your kind words on my behalf. I'm not about to engage an editor who tagbombed the Graphics Lab about me within a _minute_ of posting on my talkpage, no matter how valid they think their point is (and apparently critically important to them, vide them forcing their "why aren't you listening to me?!?" whine back onto my talkpage). This will be my only comment.--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 02:09, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
For what it's worth this is me "tagbombing" (within a minute, no less!) and we're still none the wiser as to why he insists on png files. If it makes you feel any better, Kintetsubuffalo, I apologise for being such a doofus. I'm currently nursing my cat who has a broken pelvis, and this kind of petty grievance is beneath me. Can we please just stick to formulating guidelines? Thanks. nagualdesign16:49, 1 August 2017 (UTC)
Thank you for the reply. To be clear, while png files can be compressed without the artifacts you get with jpg files, by converting directly from jpg to png those artifacts will simply be 'baked in' unless great care was taken to manually remove them all first. And although the two files will be nearly identical (at 100% zoom) the jpg will always look better at thumbnail size. The only advantage, as you say, is transparency, which looks good in certain infobox images. nagualdesign16:44, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
@WhatamIdoing: That guideline states "Photos and scanned images should be in JPEG format, though a PNG may be useful as well, especially for software screenshots when only a raster image is available. (JPEGs are a lossy image format, and PNGs allow further editing without degrading the image.)" (emphasis added) ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.18:52, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
Do you mean the part that says, "In general, if you have a good image that is in the wrong format, convert it to the correct format before uploading. However, if you find a map, flag, etc. in JPEG format, only convert it to PNG if this reduces the file size. For further advice on converting JPEG to PNG, see Wikipedia:How to reduce colors for saving a JPEG as PNG." (emphasis added)? If so, that doesn't really cover the png blurring problem. I think we need to be more explicit and say that png files are not suitable for rectangular photographs at all. I'm fairly sure that there are other guidelines on WP that say not to worry about storage space, so I'm not sure why file size is mentioned as a determining factor. Even if the new png was a smaller file the original jpg would have to be deleted in order to save space (and AFAIK files are rarely if ever truly wiped from the system). nagualdesign16:44, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
Smaller file size is not about saving disk space, which is cheap. It's about saving bandwidth for readers, which can be very expensive. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:52, 12 August 2017 (UTC)
That paragraph is not very clear: It could be read as a guideline that only applies to maps or flags, thus implying that converting JPG photographs to PNG is fine even if it increases their size. I've no doubt that your reading (that maps and flats are the only cases where converting to PNG is okay) is not unusual, but you could always see this RfC as a discussion of clarifying your reading of it. We certainly all seem to be on the same page with the "don't convert to PNG unless there's a damn good reason to" thing. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.22:47, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
My reading is that if it's not going to result in a smaller file size, then it's disallowed, no matter what the content is. My reading is additionally that you should not convert a file unless it is "the wrong format" and being converted to "the correct format", and I see no reason to believe either that JPEG photos are "the wrong format" or that PNGs are "the correct format" – and that's even assuming that we're willing to overlook the statement that the conversion ought to be done in advance of uploading, and not by posting finding someone else's uploads and asking someone to convert them from a perfectly good format into a not-obviously-desirable format. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:52, 12 August 2017 (UTC)
comment it seems, from the above comment, that no change in policy is needed, rather education of those making inappropriate requests would be handy, to prevent further disruption (unintentional or otherwise WP:AGF) Polyamorph (talk) 19:42, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
I think the guidelines might need a little tightening up first. I doubt very much that anyone will listen unless the guidelines are spelled out much more clearly. nagualdesign21:43, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
Support - All cameras use the JPG format so I see no valid reason why anyone with half a braincell would want this changed, I would suggest Kinect or whatever his name is educates himself on JPG V PNG as well as various policies here before continuing their stupid meaningless edit wars. –Davey2010Talk23:30, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
Support. I don't see the point of ever converting a photograph to PNG. Diagrammatic graphics, sure, if there's some good reason not to keep it in a vector format, but not photographs. —David Eppstein (talk) 04:53, 8 August 2017 (UTC)
David and Davey, if we add more information about this subject, do you think it makes more sense to have half the JPEG-vs-PNG information in WP:IUP and half here, or all of it over at IUP? WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:52, 12 August 2017 (UTC)
Comment: What about scenarios where the image is edited to remove a background and place a focus on a specific item in the image, like, say, a video game console? We've had a dispute over whether the pages should use images that had been edited to remove their (white) background to focus on just the subject, and saved as transparent PNGs, which generally look better on infoboxes in this context. I feel that this is an arbitrary restriction motivated by the official recommendation to not use PNG for "photographs", but when does a photograph cease to be a photograph? ViperSnake151 Talk 15:04, 13 August 2017 (UTC)
As noted several times already, if a photograph is 'cut out' so that its background is transparent and it's no longer rectangular, specifically for use in an infobox, that's fine (well, the blurring problem is still a problem). nagualdesign15:29, 13 August 2017 (UTC)
Self-created imaginative paintings (essentially fanart) of Irish mythological figures?
Both Conchobar mac Nessa and Ailill mac Máta currently include images uploaded by the artist Cormacmccann (talk·contribs), the latter with a caption explicitly crediting the artist. The editor's user page was apparently deleted as blatant advertising, but regardless of the questionable motivations for the images being uploaded and included in the articles, I can't help but feel they really don't belong for the reason I gave in the subject/headline. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 08:47, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
Historically published images would of course be preferred, but are no images better than these images? I'm not sure, they could be place-holders until something more appropriate appears. FunkMonk (talk) 11:02, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
@FunkMonk: But by that logic, could not you or I just create our own "imaginings" of any subject without an easily available image? The same rule probably applies to the majority of obscure historical figures.
I'm not much with a paintbrush but both my sisters are and would be willing to work on commission: if I'm having trouble locating a PD image of Ninigi-no-Mikoto should I just get one of them to create one? After all, he probably never existed anyway (our historical sources for him are abysmally late, like the Irish figures linked above), so my sister's arbitrary original creation 3,000 years after he supposedly lived is theoretically no less misleading, anachronistic or unencyclopedic than one produced by a Japanese artist 2,800 years after he supposedly lived, no?
Of course I'm mostly kidding. My sister's fictional imagining would not be the same as the work of a well-known artist from the whose illustration is a significant part of the historical reception of the mythic pre-history of Japan (most of our articles on Ninigi's descendants have such images). But my sister's fictional imagining is the same as Mr. McCann's fictional imagining, pending evidence to the contrary,
and the fact that the latter was clearly motivated more by self-promotion than a desire to improve the encyclopedia means it simply is not the case that they are placeholders, even if some better images might ultimately be located.
To answer the "hatted out" comment, I think there is a very big difference between illustrating mythological figures and historical figures. The latter will be speculative to a point where it is misleading, but fictional characters? Since they never existed, they didn't look any certain way (apart from what is specifically described about them), so as long as an illustration follows whatever description there was of this fictional character, there is little misleading to do. WP:Pertinence and WP:OI are kind of relevant in this regard. That said, of course historical artworks are preferable, but such may not always be available. FunkMonk (talk) 11:49, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
But that distinction is arbitrary, and is not relevant to any of the examples I mentioned, as all of them are both mythological and historical. The fact is that the existence of a lot of early "historical" figures is in question. Basically the earliest figures described in the histories of every culture on the planet. It's highly unlikely that either CMN or AMM existed historically, and the lead sentences of both articles explicitly refer to them as figures of Irish mythology, so even under the arbitrary distinction you make they would clearly fall on the "fictional" side. Conversely, Ninigi definitely never existed, but the same can be inferred about his physical appearance as can be inferred by his (probably historical) descendants for whom we have similarly no physical descriptions in the historical record. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 13:49, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
Concur with EEng and Hijiri88. Some random artist using WP to promote his/her/its/zir/whatever works is not what WP exists for, and it's directly misleading to readers/viewers. Even historical art (e.g. 19th century woodcuts of Arthurian figures, or Renaissance depictions of ancient Roman or Greek deities, or medieval depictions of Biblical personages) can be misleading, but they're permissible if identified as period re-interpretations, because they are part of the public Zeitgeist about that historical, legendary, or mythological figure, while a 2015 artists' work is not. Artists' interpretations of fictional literary characters are just out of place here unless they're also part of the public perception of the character, e.g. from being on the book cover, or being done by an artist whose work is intimately and at least somewhat formally/officially associated with the literary work (example: Alan Lee's and the Brothers Hildebrandt's illustrations of characters from J. R. R. Tolkien's stories are world-famous from official Tolkien calendars and such, and have directly informed the film adaptations; Lee was even on Peter Jackson's design staff for his The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit film series). But if I do a painting of my personal interpretation of Red Sonja, that should definitely not be used in our article on her, even it's a really badass picture. — SMcCandlish☏¢ >ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ< 08:37, 23 October 2017 (UTC)
Many of the plastic surgery pages have misleading and promotional images; these pictures are seen in internet searches and they are misleading to the public. On the cardiac surgery page, for example, there is a photo of the surgery -- this isn't for shock value, but to show the surgery. On the plastic surgery pages, however, there are a lot of visual sales pitches that are not accurate and do not portray information the public would need to make informed decisions about their health. Juliet Sabine (talk) 08:05, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
I seem to recall there used to be advice against placing left-aligned images directly after a section heading, but can't find it now. Am I imagining things? --Paul_012 (talk) 09:45, 13 February 2018 (UTC)
No, it used to be there, as they caused technical problems on some browsers, but the problem was fixed many years age, & it went. Johnbod (talk) 16:02, 13 February 2018 (UTC)
WP:IG on galleries begins (& has done for years): "Images are typically interspersed individually throughout an article near the relevant text (see WP:MOSIMAGES). However, the use of a gallery section may be appropriate in some Wikipedia articles..." - but anyone looking at WP:MOSIMAGES now will not find anything backing this up!
I became aware of these gaps at Megafauna, a very decent article in many ways, but an article of 95 kb where there were at that point only 2 images in the text, and 36 in 2 galleries right at the bottom (& not even any infobox or side templates). My edits to spread some of the excellent pics of big beasties around the text were reverted by the proprietor there, who, while admitting in a edit summary that "there's no rule against pictures in the main text area" (!!!), claims to be unaware of any policy or convention that our normal style in such a case is indeed that "images are typically interspersed individually throughout an article near the relevant text".
I increasingly come across articles that are only illustrated by galleries, or have a single lead image, then loads of text, then a gallery. Sometimes a gallery of only 1 or 2 images, which could easily fit into the text. I have been one of the strongest supporters and users of galleries for years, but normally only when there is no space left beside the text, because of images, infoboxes, templates etc.
Sometimes the most obvious things don't get stated, and I think that is what has happened here. I propose:
a) restoring to this page: "Because the Wikipedia project is in a position to offer multimedia learning to its audience, images are an important part of any article's presentation. Effort should therefore be made to improve quality and choice of images or captions in articles rather than favoring their removal, especially on pages which have few visuals." or a similar wording, to its old place.
b) Adding to WP:IG a statement along the lines of "Generally, available space beside the text should be used for images before a gallery is added".
SupportExample of a gallery that is basically non readable when there is 4 images or more.....note below how 2 images are normal size. galleries should be avoided at almost all instances. Many don't see galleries as intended.--Moxy (talk) 15:34, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Support. Images are indeed good but galleries are less so. Generally they seem to be either an excuse to include lots of insufficiently-relevant images or a cover for a lack of description of the same topics in the prose. So wording that favors dispersed and text-relevant images over grouping the images into galleries seems likely to be helpful. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:15, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Comment I generally support this but I think we should have more suggestions as to how to read this and use it. For example, just because you have a gallery of images and several empty sections does not mean that an available image is there for that section. And we don't want people avoiding galleries by stuffing every image they have into prose which could be messy (eg sandwiching, etc.) Also, we should point editors that if they have more than a "few" images, being 5 or more in my opinion, creating Commons pages is well suited while keeping a limited number on the en.wiki page (on the assumption we're talking fully free images. Non-frees should only exceptionally fall into galleries since galleries take the non-free out of context). --Masem (t) 19:58, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
I wanted to keep it fairly general, and the language is I hope only gently prescriptive. It doesn't encourage "people avoiding galleries by stuffing every image they have into prose", though of course many do this as it is. These are the situations where galleries should be used, but the perception that "galleries are generally discouraged" remains remarkably persistent, even though this was never really the case, but seemed to be supported by the WP:IG wording 10 years ago. Situations where there are "several empty sections" but "no available image", and yet enough for a gallery, are fairly rare I'd say, although the proprietor at Megafauna thinks that is one - I would disagree. In general (following commercial publishing experience) I think many WP editors are much too concerned with matching images precisely to the text beside them. Personally I think Commons pages/galleries are an absolute menace in most cases, if only because most were not well done in the first place, and haven't been updated for 10 years or more. I don't believe we should suggest ways of doing things on other projects here in any case. Johnbod (talk) 20:17, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Comment: We had an RfC in 2016 that resulted in the current state of the MOS:PERTINENCE section on this matter: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images/Archive 8#WP:PERTINENCE section. It now instead states, "When possible, try to find better images and improve captions instead of simply removing poor or inappropriate ones, especially on pages with few visuals. However, not every article needs images, and too many can be distracting." How does this not suffice when it comes to the text you want restored in its place? Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 20:48, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Ah, yes, I'd completely forgotten that "extravaganza of gnat-straining [which] has clearly driven everyone else away until the current editors find somwhere else to play." as I called it at the time. What a train-wreck! Happily things seem quieter here now. I don't see this contains a basic statement that images are good, and obviously doesn't address the galleries issue. Johnbod (talk) 21:41, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Flyer has emailed me to ask that I recognize that "They are often an important illustrative aid to understanding" represents a statement that 'images are good'. Well. I'm happy to do so, but I'd like a less oblique one. Johnbod (talk) 20:01, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
I like (b), but (a) is full of bloat -- what function does a platitude like Because the Wikipedia project is in a position to offer multimedia learning to its audience, images are an important part of any article's presentation serve, compared to the current text as quoted by Flyer above? EEng23:13, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
I don't mind trimming, but one of my 2 key points is that "images are an important part of any article's presentation" or similar is not actually said here, or as far as I know anywhere in the MOS at present. It's just assumed, but that isn't always enough. Johnbod (talk) 23:48, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
I made my feelings about this clear near the start of the discussion Flyer linked. If your experience suggests something along these lines will really help then I don't want to stand in the way, but please, please... short and simple! Search the string great in the discussion linked to see the fate of various attempts to add something like this. EEng23:59, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Yes, I was busy offline and told Johnbod via email that noting that images are important is still covered in the guideline, and that I would note this once back online unless he wanted to note it first. Above, Johnbod stated that "one of [his] 2 key points is that 'images are an important part of any article's presentation' or similar is 'not actually said' here." I pointed out that it is. The WP:PERTINENCE section states, "They are often an important illustrative aid to understanding." So regarding his "a" proposal, I am failing to see that any change needs to be made, especially after the extensive and intense RfC that took place for that very paragraph. I don't see how changing it to the previous wording will discourage galleries. If we want to discourage galleries with stronger language than we currently do, we should focus on that portion of the guideline. But if Johnbod wants to change "are often an important illustrative aid to understanding" to "are often an important part of an article's presentation," I'd be fine with that as long as we still make it clear why they are important. The word understanding is telling us why they can be important. Then again, in my opinion, so are the words "illustrative aid." Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 05:29, 16 April 2018 (UTC) Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 05:37, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
As explained in the proposal, I am a strong supporter of galleries (much more it seems than anyone else commenting so far), but these days I think it needs to be set out in policy that they should only be used when normal text-facing space has run out. With ever-proliferating templates, infoboxes etc, this is quite often. But people seems to be starting to use them when there is no need. Johnbod (talk) 20:42, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
Johnbod, I'm not focused on the gallery aspect, except for wondering how changing the previously debated paragraph in the WP:PERTINENCE section will help resolve the gallery matter. You made two proposals. I'm focused on that first proposal, while it seems others are focused on galleries. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 23:35, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
Support - In all honesty, I can't think of too many articles in subject areas I traverse that are enhanced by galleries. I could launch into a tirade as to why and wherefore, but will spare everyone the TL;DR. The question of how 'good' images are is, however, a POV issue. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 19:44, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
There seems clear consensus for b) above, and I will add that to WP:IG. Various issues have been raised around a), and I will try to produce a new wording. Johnbod (talk) 02:35, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
World maps to convey status by country
Countries by current metrication status:
Complete
Almost Complete
Partially Complete
Little Adoption
Participation in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
Recognized nuclear-weapon state ratifiers
Recognized nuclear-weapon state acceders
Other ratifiers
Other acceders or succeeders
Acceder which announced its withdrawal (North Korea)
A world map of countries by oil exportation, 2006.
There has been a heated discussion at Talk:Mains electricity by country#Map of voltages and frequencies over whether a world country map using a handful of colors to depict the mains electricity voltage and frequency by country is permissible/appropriate. The article contains a long table with this information for just about every country. Attempts to add a world country map to convey that info have been blocked by a couple of editors that are staunchly anti-map, arguing that the map isn't useful, it's not relevant because the decisions are political and not made by geography, and that the table gives all the information needed by readers, with one of them snarkily remarking "I look forward to a map of "Countries that have the letter 'R' in their names"".
Use of world country maps to depict certain information is common in Wikipedia articles, as I noted that:
I quoted MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE ("Images must be significant and relevant in the topic's context, not primarily decorative. They are often an important illustrative aid to understanding."), but the reply by the anti-map is that such a map is primarily decorative. I figure this is a topic that should be discussed on this guideline page and can't find anything in the talk page archives on this subject.
To guide discussion, how about considering the following question: Should world country maps that convey a discrete piece of information be considered appropriate (ie. explicitly allowed by MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE) on articles that deal with a subject that varies by country (eg. status of metrication, date of joining X organization/treaty, production/consumption/export/import of X commodity), even though the reason for variation is not strictly tied to geography and/or even where the article contains the information in a table?
I've included examples of the types of maps this topic is about at right (many appear larger on the relevant article pages, but have been reduced to standard thumb size here to reduce clutter). (Note: I'm busy in real life and it may be several days between my participation in this discussion. Also pinging all other editors from the Mains electricity by country discussion: Ben.doherty, Wtshymanski, FF-UK, Gah4, GliderMaven, DocFergus, Beland). AHeneen (talk) 04:53, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
When in doubt, I would turn to RSes to see if they use similar maps to depict the topic. If a few different RSes use maps, then it makes sense for us to use maps. Otherwise, it may be inappropriate. --Masem (t) 05:03, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
I have noted on the mentioned talk page, that if one wants to look up just one country, a table might be most convenient. If one wants to look up a group of neighboring countries, a map might be easier. Though it does require some geographic knowledge of the reader. Gah4 (talk) 05:14, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
This is an inappropriate place to discuss this issue which refers to the use of maps at one article, not the general use of maps. In this case the use of a map in question invites the reader to take note of a map which does NOT convey accurate information on the complex and non-standard Mains electricity by country and therefore should not be included. Many entries in the table are qualified and some are multiple. it is quite impossible to present this information in simplified form map which is why a tabulated form is used. This is why the article is presented as it is, and should not be changed to add prettiness and reduce legibility! Please do not continue to discuss here. FF-UK (talk) 09:29, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
Yes, this is an appropriate place to discuss this issue. The arguments that you and Wtshymanski make against the maps being inappropriate can be applied to this type of map on articles across Wikipedia, so it is appropriate to raise on this talk page to get a general consensus about this type of map rather than just comments about maps in one particular article by a handful of users. AHeneen (talk) 14:42, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
Colors being used to indicate when two legal statuses both apply.Stripes showing multiple dates of legalization.Stripes showing complex political information.
@FF-UK: All of the qualifications in the table with respect to voltage and frequency seem to indicate that either multiple systems are in use or that some areas use one system and other areas use a second system. We can indicate this either by drawing the map to show the areas affected, or by marking the whole country as mixed. Mixed status can be indicated by a different color, or with stripes showing both colors. -- Beland (talk) 18:08, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
This is getting ridiculous. Simplicity is what is required here, not excessive complication. The article in question, covering the entire world, cannot be adequately served in this way. A tabulated system is the right one. FF-UK (talk) 19:05, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
I have to agree that this is getting silly, and that this is not the venue to 'discuss' issues surrounding a single article. While I might be tempted to see this as WP:FORUMSHOP, I'll assume good faith and interpret it as being a case of mistaken forum hopping. Instead of cluttering this talk page (which deals with broad scope issues, not single instance issues), it would have been far more appropriate to simply inform editors who watch this page of the 'discussion' and leave it to interested parties to join in on the relevant talk page. If it is difficult to reach consensus, please follow the protocols laid out for dispute resolution rather than plaster a plethora of maps and arguments here. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 06:01, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Re-read the opening comment. This is about a broad scope issue (in bold): are world maps that summarize certain types of information acceptable per MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE. The discussion is prompted by an issue with one particular article, but the point of bringing the issue (generally, not about that particular article) here is to develop a broad consensus on these types of maps, not forum shopping for the discussion about that particular article. AHeneen (talk) 06:43, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
AHeneen (talk), if you really believed that you would not have emphasized the particular article which does not fit your general comments. If you have something to say on a general issue by all means raise it as a separate issue in a new topic, but leave this alone now. FF-UK (talk) 09:43, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
I think this was brought here because the arguments against maps in this article, if applied consistently, would mean that maps would need to be removed from most articles. But we're back discussing the specific maps to be added on the article talk page. -- Beland (talk) 19:45, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
Metaphorical lead images for articles with metaphorical names
I have seen plenty of articles like Cherry picking, about things that have metaphorical names, where the lead image is not representative of the topic, but rather is what the title means literally. In the "Cherry picking" example, the lead image doesn't show the fallacy; instead, it shows actual cherries being picked. This is not only unencyclopedic, but also misleading per MOS:LEADIMAGE. wumbolo^^^18:56, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
Agree. If the literal meaning is itself obscure, then an image might be used with a caption (and article text) explaining what's going on. Beyond that, the sort of thing shown in your diff is amusing for project-space essays, but does not belong in article space. EEng19:01, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
I agree. In main space this is a problem. (It's find to illustration policy/guideline/essay pages within reason). --Masem (t) 23:32, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
Whilst being fairly innocuous, it's a bit silly... (oooh, I iz posh!) Unless a reader thinks it's "cheery picking" (wot, there's no redirect!? Should we thrash it out?), it may be appropriate for Simple English Wikipedia, but not for Anglophones over the age of five. Beans to superfluous visual decor. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 20:50, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
Images of graves, buildings, badges, arms, etc, in biography infoboxes
It is my understanding that the parameter image in biography infoboxes (such as Template:Infobox person) is meant to contain the portrait of the subject. For example, if the subject is Jane Smith, the infobox should contain a picture of Jane Smith. I often see pictures of other things there, however. These include badges, coats of arms, castles, drawings of other people, etc. Am I wrong in believing that such images should appear not in infoboxes but elsewhere in the article? MOS:LEADIMAGE says: "Lead images should not only illustrate the topic specifically, but also be ... what our readers will expect to see. Lead images are not required, and not having a lead image may be the best solution if there is no easy representation of the topic." Surtsicna (talk) 09:58, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
Image placement for (very) wide browser windows?
I'm using a computer with a 5K resolution (5120 × 2880) display, with makes the image (and table) placement of the "Parmigiano-Reggiano" article look pretty horrible in full width windows (my preffered size), as the images and nutritional table are shifted down into the last sections, including the appendices. At perhaps two-thirds that width (roughly 3300 pixels) the article looks okay. (If someone points out an appropriate place for them, I can upload screenshots.) At what point should I start fixing image placement (using galleries, Clear templates, etc.)? A window pixel-width of 1200, 1600, or higher? And how much should I worry about excess white space because of the use of Clear templates, explicit or implicit (as in {{TOC left}} and {{Col-begin}})?
Also, may I assume that placing images directly in the appendices is a bad thing? I've found a few in "See also" sections, which I've moved to other sections. —DocWatson42 (talk) 08:07, 26 June 2018 (UTC)
Articles will always look awful in very wide windows. Layout should cater to normal window dimensions + mobile. I suppose someone will come along to tsk-tsk about images in e.g. See Also, but if there's an interesting image that for some reason doesn't fit elsewhere I don't see the harm. EEng13:34, 26 June 2018 (UTC)
Videos are feature rich and also require active interaction (clicking to play, putting on sound) and time commitment from the user, which leads generally don't require. Thoughts? Shushugah (talk) 12:53, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
Zoiks. MOS:IMG really should address this. I also just realized I never go around to doing a MOS:VIDEO DAB page like MOS:AUDIO. Does anyone know right off-hand any places where we are addressing video in WP articles (both guideline-wise and in how-to form)? — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 01:28, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
When I log in in Wikimedia Commons for uploading images,it says"You are centrally log in, Reload the page to apply the user setting". I wanna to clear this message and continue my step. What did I do when this message continually appears for uploading images? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Robin Hooke (talk • contribs) 19:46, 12 July 2018 (UTC)
Should there not be a general statement emphasizing inclusion of higher resolution images? The talk about bandwidth in this article, frankly, is amusing to me. Images are consolidated into thumbnails in most cases anyway..., if not for the fact that 6mb/s internet is standard now... Nuvigil (talk) 23:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)
Yes, in general there is hardly anything on image quality, a hangover from the very old days when the choice of images was often very restricted. A big problem with the page. Johnbod (talk) 00:23, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
We're more limited by screen sizes, not bandwidth. As WMF really wants to make sure mobile devices are included, we are still stuck with image sizes being around 300px max to avoid crowding out a mobile screen. --Masem (t) 01:04, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
"When possible, find better images and improve captions instead of simply removing poor or inappropriate ones, especially on pages with few visuals."
Regarding this, now that I think about it, shouldn't we go with "consider finding"? I state this because an editor adding an inappropriate image, for example, doesn't mean that the editor who removed the inappropriate image should try to find a suitable image to replace the removed one. There are drive-by image additions all the time, and an editor shouldn't have to replace the inappropriate image they just removed. Yes, this is a guideline, but we know that some editors strictly adhere to our guidelines. And then there are WP:Gallery cases, like this recent one, where an editor might think that all one needs to do is add so-called better images and that keeping the gallery is then fine. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 01:16, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
Johnbod, are you referring to me and/or to others who voted against a gallery in the vegetarianism discussion and this one? Or to cases like the aforementioned one where the editor wanted to add a gallery to the Vegetarianism and Veganism articles? Per my reading of WP:GALLERY, galleries usually are not needed. And and I others noted why a gallery would not help the articles in question. Do you disagree? Do you think a gallery would benefit those articles, and feel that the fact that editors would add, and add, and add is not an issue? Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 19:05, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
I think we should - this used to be a sensible way to cope with different screen sizes, but that was before mobile use was significant. Johnbod (talk) 22:31, 22 August 2018 (UTC)
I disagree. I typically see no need for two or more lead images. And the vast majority of our articles contain one if they include a lead image. I'm fine with something like what is currently seen in the Gender role article, where it's a collage of lead images. But that type of thing is now avoided for race/ethnicity topics, and the MOS:LEADIMAGE section notes this. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 16:12, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
We never agree on images; you don't seem to like them! Collages are terrible, and should only very rarely be used. Far better to spread these images down the TOC, which takes a whole screen on my pc. But not stack them right at the start. Or expand the lead, which is far too short. Johnbod (talk) 16:27, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
I think you are confusing me with someone else and I don't know why. My memory does not recall debating you much, if at all. In fact, I think we have been in agreement more than we have been in disagreement at this talk page. I'd have to check my history here. I like images; I just don't like unnecessary and/or excessive images. And I am generally against galleries, which I find to typically be unnecessary and have seen get out of hand more often than not. In the Gender role case, I think the collage is best. I don't agree that it's "far better to spread these images down the TOC." At some point, when people use that style, one or more images are no longer a lead image...but rather an image belonging to a certain section. Plus, such a style is more prone to image swapping and edit warring over images. In the vast majority of cases, I think it's best to use one lead image. I'm not stating that we should never use more than one. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 21:07, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
Too many images in a row at any point in any section causes this problem (depending on platform), and that's what we should be warning against. EEng20:34, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
There seems to be a recent increase in cropped images, particularly with politicians and military personnel. I don't see the need to have the image zoomed-in on the subject's face, and face only. Often, this is to the detriment of the subject, as it eliminates the regalia of office seen in the background, such as flags and standards, or uniforms and their accoutrements, such as medals and badges of office. Apparently anyone can crop an image on Commons with a 'croptool', but that doesn't mean they really need to. I'm not sure if the MOS speaks to this, but perhaps it should? - wolf21:49, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
Most of the time the flag is either the American flag and/or the Department of "ABC" flag. It isn't their specific department flag. You are the only person who has had a problem with this; Ivar the Boneful has reverted me saying "we want to see their face, not their suits". Makes sense, they want to see the full uniform, they can go to the person's main article page. You have been told by others that it is "up to editors of the page". It's a waste of time to even deal with you, so do whatever will make you happy. Users like you are reasons I constantly think about leaving Wikipedia. Corky22:03, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
@Corkythehornetfan: Yes, you keep saying "told by others"... others being you. The only other editor to comment there stated a preference for "uncropped", and also mentioned it was up to the editors of the page. Editors... plural. You are not the only editor, there are others. That's why articles have talk pages, so issues like this can be discussed and the community can come to a consensus. I'm not sure why you need to have this repeatedly explained to you. You will see this very type of collaboration in action on the List of Presidents of the United States talk page, where editors, like you, kept edit warring in the cropped images they just, again just like you, created on Commons, causing repeated disruption, until finally the community came to a consensus on the matter. Seriously... try discussing instead of edit warring. Most often it works. - wolf22:15, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
Images on WP are very small indeed, and the typical half-length portrait is improved by cropping the lower part of the subjects tie and midriff, and increasing the size of the face. So I strongly disagree, in most cases. Johnbod (talk) 22:44, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
@Johnbod: But one's need to see a close-up of the face is easily addressed by simply tapping or clicking on the image if one is so inclined, whereas cropping basically removes everything below the face and in the background, which can include important details and information. Why permanently alter the image when other options are readily and easily available? - wolf23:02, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
The best crop (& most recent ones now at List of Presidents of the United States seem ok) typically shows some 3-4 inches of tie below the knot in a suited male. Lower than that is not useful or interesting, except for amateur medical diagnosis. The background of official portraits in particular are typically kept clear of anything remotely interesting or important, although I was once quite interested in a White House fireplace, & I think used it it in an article - but that was a President + guest picture, with the fireplace in the middle. You're not pursuading me at all - we have far more undercropped than overcropped portraits, let alone other pictures, on WP. Actually there is an noticeable change in List of Presidents of the United States from undercropped earlier presidents (most up to FDR - vast areas of waistcoat) to about right for Truman onwards. WP thumbnails are not half-length near life-size portraits hanging on a wall, & it is foolish not to adjust for the difference in real size. Johnbod (talk) 23:17, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
That doesn't really address... anything in my previous reply. Such as the need to have the subject's face permanently zoomed in to completely fill in the image box, as opposed to just selecting the image and increasing the size to individual preference... (for those that enjoy seeing every single pore, mole and nose hair). However, perhaps we should say least establish a distinction between "suited" subjects and "uniformed" subjects. Surely you agree that the subject's uniform and what is on it (medals, badges, insignia, etc) is more important that plain business attire? As for background, perhaps importance should be determined on a case by case basis, so as to remove any boring "fireplaces", but not other details of more significance. This is where discussion on individual talk pages would be obvious benefit. - wolf23:43, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
I don't know if you edit WP on a cinema screen, but for the rest of us the average WP image is 1-2 inches high. That is very small indeed, and a totally different scale from that which paintings in particular were intended to be seen at. There is absolutely no chance of seeing every, or any, "pore, mole and nose hair" - if you want that, watch tv. You must be kidding! We obviously aren't going to agree on this. Military bios (or American ones anyway) tend to be covered with close-ups of every decoration lower down. Johnbod (talk) 00:56, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
A "cinema screen" is not required when (what is this...? The third? Fourth time I've said this?) you can simply click or tap on an image and zoom it in as large as you like. Please tell me you know this already. Please tell me you aren't belabouring this issue because you don't know how to operate your device and struggle on a daily basis to see images on Wikipedia with what has to be seriously impaired vision ("cinema screens" indeed). And if you are having such a hard time with the "1 - 2 inch high images", does cropping them within that size really make any difference? Anyway, no... I suppose we are not going to agree here. - wolf01:57, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
I would say that a crop of an image of a military person who is in their dress uniform that cuts off their medals/etc. is probably not appropriate, if we have the option. I agree that outside the military, the tighter crop makes sense. --Masem (t) 00:59, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
To add to this I agree. While I don't especially focus civilian portraits, for military portraits I agree that cropping off medals, badges, and ranks would be inappropriate. It can provide additional information at a quick glance. Maybe a proposed added text could state Official military portraits generally should not be cropped to remove rank, decorations, or other insignia? This is geared towards military position articles, and I'm not as concerned with biographies. Garuda28 (talk) 02:19, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Oh, puh-leeeze. There is ongoing disputes and disruption to articles resulting from this issue. A simple, yet obvious, effective and brief guideline add-on is proposed to address this matter, and your response is a rather snippy, and completely off-base WP:link? Thank you for your awesome contribution! - wolf03:20, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
With respect, I do believe that this is a legitimate issue, even if it is a rather specific one. Perhaps it is small enough to address on specific article talk pages though. I wanted to see what the individuals who are in this discussion thought of a specific proposal, since this is exactly what is being debated here. I believe that this is specific, but not an instance of WP:CREEP. Either way, it will not go anywhere without consensus specifically supporting it. Garuda28 (talk) 03:07, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but I'd like to see real evidence that the time is ripe for MOS to have a provision on this. See User:EEng#mossy, and I'd say 2(a) is the only prong that could apply. EEng04:04, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
New discussion at Ron Stallworth regarding use of yearbook photo
There is an RfC that has just been started at the Ron Stallworth talk page regarding the use of a high school yearbook photo for a biography in which the subject achieved notability later in life. Please visit and comment on the appropriateness of using this image on the page. Thank you. Amsgearing (talk) 15:39, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
Not sure if this has been discussed before. I'm looking at commons:Category:Exoplanet comparison graphics, which mostly contains comparisons between photos of a planet from the Solar System and a generic circle showing how big an exoplanet is. I don't think this is very useful, and would like to see some criteria for a generalized case of this situation. wumbolo^^^21:31, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
Possibly not, but these are Commons images, which we don't discuss here. We only discuss image issues on the English Wikipedia that might be relevant to what the MOS says or should say. Johnbod (talk) 22:15, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
Advice here on scaling for portrait and landscape images
The result of this edit is to qualify the advice given here as follows (with some additional tweaking of text to accommodate the edit:
"Landscape" oriented images that are particularly wide and short, often call for upright greater than 1. Similarly, "portrait" oriented images that are particularly tall and narrow may look best with upright less than1.
, for example), because icons cannot be searched for, and what Wikipedia users reading the section want to know is not an icon but a station number.
#/media/File:Hazard_T.svg){kind=link}
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Modern history#Image use is excessive. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:18, 31 July 2018 (UTC)