Commons:Village pump/Archive/2020/01

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Book Covers on Worldcat

Hi all,

I've come across book covers while adding info from WorldCat. Would those images, which are hosted on https://oclc.org, be allowed to post on WP Commons?

My understanding is that these images are generally shared by participating libraries in the oclc project. Any advice would help...

I.am.a.qwerty (talk) 13:11, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Book covers are not different from other works of art when it comes to copyright. So there is no general answer to your question. All such images need to be judged individually whether their copyright has expired or if they are even too simple to be copyrighted. De728631 (talk) 16:03, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Most caption edits are unhelpful

 Info Merged with #caption -suggested edit. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 20:00, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Punch cartoons

There are, for example, 148 George du Maurier cartoons linked from this page; does anyone have a tool or script that will pull in the larger-format images from that site? It would need to be done on an artist-by-artist basis, as some are still in copyright; but there are sufficient that are copyright expired, in the whole collection to make it worth while. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:28, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

No, it would need a customized script. It is also not obvious how to automatically scrape the artist for some images as these are nowhere (apparently) in the metadata even though their name is on the cartoon (in the given example, despite being a WW1 cartoon, the drawing happens to be in copyright). Though there are lots of keywords, these seem to be slightly pointlessly generated by an AI, as they add little to fundamental identification or copyright status. -- (talk) 14:06, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Order of categories

Would soneone please look at [1] and tell me how to make the countries sort correctly. And how do you put a link to a category page? Category:Arsons by country doesn't work. Thank you. Deisenbe (talk) 12:42, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Done. And the link works fine. --12:49, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
(Edit conflict) @Deisenbe: You can do this by setting the sort key when putting a subcategory in. For instance, if you edit Category:Arsons in China you'll see that it contains [[Category:Arsons by country|China]]. That says that in Category:Arsons by country, Category:Arsons in China should be sorted under "China". Category:Arsons in Kosovo on the other hand just contains [[Category:Arsons by country]] so it will be sorted under "Arsons in Kosovo". If you change it to [[Category:Arsons by country|Kosovo]], it should be sorted correctly. --bjh21 (talk) 12:50, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks. What's wrong with Category:Arsons by year? Deisenbe (talk) 13:11, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
If you leave a space before the sort key, it doesn't label them by, e.g. century, such that 1813 would have a heading of "1" and 2019 would have a heading of "2". 1838 arsons didn't have the space. If they need to be sorted by century, the sortcode would have to be "20", for example. Rodhullandemu (talk) 13:17, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Request: to close Categories for discussion/2019/12/Category:NDSM

Could somebody please close the discussion about Category:NDSM? Both categories which were discussed, should be kept. JopkeB (talk) 17:01, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

@JopkeB: you may close it by yourself if you think the discussion has fulfilled its purpose. Anyone can close cfd and DR so long as the decision is not controversial and does not require admin assistance.--Roy17 (talk) 22:59, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
@Roy17: Thanks for your encouragement. I think it went well (my first time to close a discussion), thanks to the instructions. JopkeB (talk) 14:19, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Duplicate files

I missed the existence of

File:Lewis Garrard Clarke.JPG (24 kb)

and mistakenly uploaded as a new file, rather than a replacement,

File:Lewis Clarke, author of a slave narrative.jpg (207 kb)

I think the former should be deleted. Sorry and thanks.

I also don't understand the rationale for

Category:Lewis Clarke

and would move the infobox but don't know how. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Deisenbe (talk • contribs) 16:06, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Deisenbe (talk) 15:53, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Doubt about duplicates

Hi.

These two files are the same picture, with the same metadata. The first was available in Panoramio in 2016 (published by "Jorge Franganillo") and the second one in Flickr in 2019 (published by "Jorge Franganillo"). Applying common sense would lead me to assume both accounts are managed by the same person. Anyway, if we delete the one from Panoramio, we lose track of the 2016-bot-license-reviewing and it may lead to future copyright claims (because of the possibility of this image being re-used in the Internet between 2016 and 2019).

What should be done here? Strakhov (talk) 14:17, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Probably link both images together with the "other versions" parameter in {{Information}}? Minoraxtalk (formerly 大诺史) 14:39, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
make the first a redirect of the second. Add the review template of the first to the description page of the second and use a link to the history of the first as edit comment in the second? --C.Suthorn (talk) 19:56, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
I agree with User:Minorax and disagree with User:C.Suthorn. Normally we only turn exact or scaled-down duplicates into redirects, not variants of the same image. - Jmabel ! talk 20:31, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks! I finally linked one to each other. Strakhov (talk) 20:47, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Images repeated

User:Magog the Ogre/PD ineligible/2016 January 12-15 have repeated images of TIM svg logo. I have attempted to delete the second image but I am blocked by the filter. Where I have mistake? --151.49.59.182 21:16, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Why are you trying to remove it? Removing it from that page won't delete it on Commons. Magog the Ogre (talk) (contribs) 22:05, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
@Magog the Ogre: I am trying to remove because it is two link to one image. One link is sufficient. --151.49.59.182 21:47, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

As original nominator for the delete action, I reversed my original decision, as by further investigation the uploader is also the photografer. The only reason I can think of to delete is digital print with his name on it. This gives the impression that it is copy violation. However as far as I now there is no WMF policy to remove these files.Smiley.toerist (talk) 18:01, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

No, sorry, I will not revert my close and I will oppose restoration if an UnDR is posted. While "XBXG" does appear on the Flickr account, we have no evidence at all that User:XBXG is actually Wouter Bregman, the Flickr user. It is not uncommon for vandals, fans, and other interested parties to open an account here in the name of a photographer in order to upload images without permission. We would not assume that an account here with the username "Wouter Bregman" was the same person, so we should certainly not do it at one level removed.

Three possibilities here:

  1. Bregman can send a message using OTRS that confirms his identity here,
  2. He can add a note on Flickr that he is XBXG here,
  3. He can change the license on selected images on Flickr to CC-BY-SA or another acceptable license.

In the absence of one of those, we cannot assume that images that are clearly marked as "© All Rights Reserved" on Flickr are legitimately CC-BY-SA here. .     Jim . . . (Jameslwoodward) (talk to me) 14:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Hello.User:SecretName101 have uploaded many pictures on this topic and they contain WantedCategories about people and there is no information about the event or people Are these pictures about an important event and important people? ديفيد عادل وهبة خليل 2 (talk) 06:54, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Help needed for author of British photo

Can anyone identify the brand of this image of Bernard Alfieri? Presumably of British origin, it was published in 1895 in London (The Photogram, vol. II no. 17, May 1895, pg. 108) and very likely PD, but for verification and historic value the photographer/studio would be helpful. It looks to me like "Ferrett & Wray" or similar. And also, is there a project or resource on Commons devoted to identifying images/photographers? A WikiProject British Photographers? A series of lists of photographers/studios by country? Thanks, --Animalparty (talk) 20:53, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Heraldric contributor requested

I want this logo, with the unicorns 🦄
(or maybe they're just horses 🐴?).

The Ta-Ching Government Bank (now the Bank of China and Mega International Commercial Bank) was a government agency of the Manchu Qing Dynasty and had its own distinct logo, however, I have not been able to find a separate image of this logo. So if someone who is experienced with making coat of arms could extract this logo for me I would be really grateful, or direct me to a website where I could attempt to make a logo myself from my mobile device if possible. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 19:48, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

If we had a high-resolution image of such a bank note, we could probably reproduce these arms. However, from what I can find online, it's not clear which heraldic components have been used there. I found something on Ebay that reveals something at least: 🐴 in supporters and a mountaineous landscape in the shield, but the crest is completely unclear. De728631 (talk) 13:53, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
@Donald Trung: Cutting out the picture would not be difficult, but the low resolution makes the usage of the final file very limited. @De728631: I believe the shield actually depicts a dragon circling around the edge with its head in the centre, mouth open and looking left, a motif that is repeated on another banknote in the category.--TFerenczy (talk) 16:55, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
Ok, that makes sense with regards to Chinese bank notes. De728631 (talk) 16:58, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
Yes, viewing it from that higher resolution image I would in fact think that it's a dragon, the logo itself looks like a combination between a typical European coat of arms and the Ottoman Empire's emblem, so recreating it using the same software that made those other files here on Wikimedia Commons. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 19:40, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
And the crest seems to be a flaming/wish-granting pearl with two sets of sun beams coming out of it. The last missing pieces would be the exact pattern on the border of the shield and if there's anything at all on the ribbon or just decoration. Making a file like this is beyond my ability however, try to open a request in Commons:Graphic_Lab/Illustration_workshop and either refer to this thread or copy&paste the necessary information and maybe someone will create the file for you. If you want to try to make a vector file in Inkscape yourself, there are some horses and dragons available in Category:SVG coat of arms elements - horses, Category:Horses in supporters and Category:SVG coat of arms elements - dragons and Ribbons.--TFerenczy (talk) 21:26, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
@TFerenczy: , thank you very much for the information, when I have the time I file a request at the vector laboratory. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 19:00, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
This section was archived on a request by: --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 10:15, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

File:The fearless girl takes on NYSE (47406406981).jpg -- kept as De minimis, at the same time used on main page

File:The fearless girl takes on NYSE (47406406981).jpg had a DR and was closed as kept yesterday with the rationale de minimis.

The fearless girl is IMHO de minimis on this picture. However it is in the category "Fearless girl", where it would not belong if it is de minimis and at no place in WM it is used as an depiction of the american flag or the NY stock exchange. It is used in a number of Wikipedias in the article "Fearless girl" and in one case in the article of the artist who created the fearless girl. In the russian wikipedia the article fearless girl was the DYK article on the main page with this very image yesterday (the article still is DYK, on russian wp these articles seem to stay on the main page for a week, but without the image on the main page, only in the article itself).

Is it really possible to keep this image as de minimis and at the same time have it on the main page as a depiction of the fearless girl?

(Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Fearless Girl, @Well-Informed Optimist, A1Cafel, and Tuvalkin: ) --C.Suthorn (talk) 05:35, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Mmmmh. IANAL, but: In none of the articles at de, en and ru, is this file actually used to illustrate the statue itself. Rather it is used to show the place where it has been put. The image would still serve the same purpose just as well if we'd replace the silhouette of the with a black rectangle. So in my very personal understanding that is exactly what de minimis is all about. --El Grafo (talk) 10:41, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

speedy deletion of categories?

User:Vinayaraj has created hundreds of categories that disrupt our established category structure. He has incorporated his own name. An example is Category:Odontoptilum Vinayaraj. I have nominated a batch for speedy deletion, but do not know what to do next. He has not replied to posts on his talk page. Can anyone help? Charles (talk) 15:57, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

You can ask for assistance at Commons:Administrators' noticeboard. Ruslik (talk) 20:22, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Deleting a photo with unwanted metadata

Hi, all, I accidentally uploaded a photo with precise geo-location in the EXIF data (more on that later, maybe). After realising what had happened, I uploaded a new version/revision with most EXIF content stripped.

Question is, what's the best way to remove the old JPEG that contains the private information?

  • Request a speedy delete for the whole page under G5/G7, then recreate it?
  • Get the first revision suppressed?
  • Is there a way to remove just the JPEG object without messing with the page revision history?
  • Something else?

Sorry if this is unclear, I don't really have a good understanding of the relationship between File: pages and their associated media objects. Advice would be greatly appreciated.

(Am editing this logged-out to try and avoid outing myself too obviously.) – "the uploading doofus" 117.120.23.40 00:28, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Follow the steps at Commons:Oversight to request that the upload be oversighted. You can upload a new version beforehand or wait until afterward, it doesn't really matter. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 00:39, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

English Wikipedia on a photo

Photographers might be able to give some useful advice at w:en:Talk:Tesla Cybertruck#Which image should we use?. It sounds like the fundamental problem is that the vehicle is hard to see in the original photo, and that the attempts to fix that problem have not been very appealing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:32, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

CropTool not working

Crop Tool isn't working for me. It takes 5 minutes then says the image doesn't exist. Editorofthewiki (talk) 15:18, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

File:SilverFast HDR Box.jpg

File:SilverFast HDR Box.jpg needs a reset. OTRS permission is most likely not for the new version --193.171.152.104 11:40, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

This section was archived on a request by: Jmabel ! talk 17:02, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Were all panaramio photos imported?

I stumbled upon this user's photos https://web.archive.org/web/20161105125628/http://www.panoramio.com/user/2328491 , but I cant find some of them in commons. If the answer is no, is it still possible to import? Or I should just download the wayback machine copy and upload?--Roy17 (talk) 22:59, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

I have no idea whether all Panoramio photos have been imported or not. Searching for images from this user on commons with the search string "insource:www.panoramio.com/user/2328491" found 120 pictures. I have put them in the new category Category:Photos from Panoramio ID 2328491. Hope this helps. --Andreas Stiasny (talk) 00:23, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Uploads by VideoPlasty on archive.org


New external links?

I try to add the category "Unidentified chemistry images" to 1mg.jpg but I am stopped.

Your edit includes new external links. To protect the wiki against automated spam, we kindly ask you to enter the words that appear below in the box (more info): CAPTCHA Security check

Why is the category a link? Alibigrap (talk) 15:17, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

This edit worked for me. What exactly did you do to get this error message? Please describe how you tried to add the category. De728631 (talk) 15:40, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
@De728631 at the bottom of the page I clicked on "(±)" and entered the category name. Alibigrap (talk) 16:23, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

Hidden advertiments?

What is 'SEO for amazon' comment doing in File:Wuppertal swebebahn 2009 14.jpg and 'Augustine Ihechi Michael (Mr Aimz)' in File:Metrolijn B Steendijkpolder 2019 4.jpgSmiley.toerist (talk) 15:55, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

Exif and time zone

I have many thousands uploads of my own photos, and my camera(s) I use(d) are using my local time (Amsterdam, GMT+1, currently UTS+1). This is different from the local time at the place I am taking a photo, and can even have a different date - for example, if I take a picture in California 1 July 5 pm local time, it is 2 July 2:00 my time, and this is how it is shown in the EXIF, When I upload a photo, EXIF is automatically taken by the wizard to the file information as the time when the photo has been created, and I never bothered to correct it - I thought every sane person would know that 2am is not the time one can take daylight pictures in California. Now, recently there was some (generally very useful) bot activity - Rudolphous's bot was adding files co categories such as Category:Netherlands photographs taken on 2019-12-28, and Multichill's bot was adding structural data (including the date the photo was taken) based on the file information. However, the discrepancy I mentioned can introduce systematic errors. In the first case, I have all my photos in these categories already (which I added myself and which are correct), and I asked Rudolphous to blacklist my uploads on this ground to avoid duplication. Concerning the second problem, the wrong EXIF date only applies to a tiny share of my uploads (Canada, US, South Korea, China, and Japan), I changed manually yesterday file info for some of my Canadian uploads. Generally I am willing to curate my own uploads when necessary, but this is not always the work I like, and I do not feel going through all of them to manually edit file info to adjust to the time zone is the best use of my time. Also I am presumably not the only user with this problem. Should something be done about it? Is it a serious problem or a bogus?--Ymblanter (talk) 08:27, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

  • I long ago suggested having a template to indicate the amount of discrepancy between EXIF time & local time, but no one seemed interested. (Same thing happens for me when I travel.) - Jmabel ! talk 08:39, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
    Now it becomes really important, to make sure we do not have wrong categorization. I do not have a slightest idea how such a template could be written but it probably should be written and incorporated into the upload wizard.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:54, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
    I wrote {{DTZ}} for my own uploads, to allow describing the timezone. I just add it manually on each upload, but I also used a script to set the time on old uploads (since I knew the timezone setting on the camera, which I never change, and the dates of the photos that were in different timezones). The difficulties with doing it generically are that a) the camera timezone setting isn't generally recorded in Exif, although it may be possible to get it from GPS information if present b) obtaining the location and mapping it local time may be tricky. --ghouston (talk) 09:14, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
    Thanks, this is really useful though I am wondering how bots would handle this template.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:30, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
    The same way they handle any other weird date-time formats that they don't recognize, I guess. My plan was to map the dates into structured data at some point, but Wikidata can't yet handle date-time values with timezones. --ghouston (talk) 09:32, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
    The template just adds the timezone indicator: I'm assuming that the normal thing is to display the time in the local timezone. E.g., on File:Vasco_da_Gama_at_Burnie_20191228-001.jpg, the local time is 15:03, the timezone is +11 (Eastern Australia daylight saving) and the camera time is 04:03:34. But working this out is a bit tedious since you have to do the timezone calculation manually; I'm thinking it may be possible to convert my old script into a tool with a web interface on the tool server. --ghouston (talk) 22:46, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • I don't know how to easy fix the issue when the files are already on Commons, but the best way is to change date/time before uploading them. It's trivial. I suggest exiftool, but there are other software: https://petapixel.com/2012/11/05/how-to-fix-your-timestamps-if-you-forgot-to-update-your-camera-for-daylight-savings/. --jdx Re: 11:48, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
    • The average Windows or Mac user is not going to find the use of any command-line-based tool on their computer "trivial". Most literally never open a command window. - Jmabel ! talk 18:05, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • It's still trivial with Lightroom (as shown in the link posted by Jdx) or ExifToolGui. If that's still not simple enough, there's even a dedicated ExifDateChanger for Windows (Although I must admit: in order to find that one you need to know how to find Google on Lycos and then enter "date photo change"). --El Grafo (talk) 13:10, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Commons:Photo challenge December results

Weather vanes: EntriesVotesScores
Rank 1 2 3
image
Title Maritime weather vane at the east coast
of the island Bornholm, Denmark
Woodman Point, Western Australia Weather vane witch in
Sainghin-en-Mélantois Nord (Fr)
Author ThomasLendt Calistemon Pierre André Leclercq
Score 22 16 13
Long Exposures: EntriesVotesScores
Rank 1 2 3
image
Title Long-term exposure at the Ellerberg
in Franconian Switzerland
Torrente in Val di Mello. Le rapide Blitze beim Funkturm
Author Ermell 66colpi Linie29
Score 27 15 15
Eye Care: EntriesVotesScores
Rank 1 2 2
image
Title Through my eyes. Applying saline solution to a dog's eye Slit lamp and
binocular microscope
Author Roumpf Tulumnes OKJaguar
Score 13 12 12

Congratulations to ThomasLendt, Calistemon, Pierre André Leclercq, Roumpf, Tulumnes, OKJaguar, Ermell, 66colpi and Linie29. -- Colin (talk) 19:24, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

 Thank you. Colin. Happy new year 2020 to you and every animators of "Photo Challenge". Best regards.--Pierre André (talk) 22:21, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Edit notices on full protected pages state page is semi protected

I've just noticed that on pages with full protection, the edit notice states the page is semi protected and can be edited by autoconfirmed users. See Commons:Welcome, Commons:Oversight etc.

Is this something that could be changed?

~~ OxonAlex - talk 11:16, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

I see the correct notice although my case may not be relevant as I can edit protected pages. Ruslik (talk) 19:06, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Unfree file autoprotected: can't nominate

Hi all. I saw File:Sultan Haitham Swearing In.jpg, wanted to nominate it (can't believe this is own work, looks rather like a sverrnshot), but can't as it's autoprotected. The reason: it is included on the main page of the French Wikipedia. So... how can we solve this? Trijnsteltalk 21:23, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

One of the pictures where body parts are visible

This category with news photos about the plane crash in Iran contains several pictures where human remains and blood are recognizable, maybe they are candidates for speedy deletion? Behanzane (talk) 17:23, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

COM:NOTCENSORED. --A.Savin 17:37, 10 January 2020 (UTC)
At the end of that paragraph: "However, the statement "Commons is not censored" is not a valid argument for keeping a file that falls outside the normal permitted Commons scope." I think this pictures are certainly falling outside this "not cencored" definition. Behanzane (talk) 18:35, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
How would such a picture be "outside the normal permitted Commons scope"? It is a picture related to an obviously encyclopedic topic. - Jmabel ! talk 18:55, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
This are pictures of human remains of people who died at his accident. Not pictures where you have to zoom in to recognize something, but very clear close-ups of the various body parts. Behanzane (talk) 19:39, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
First, it's not an accident but a crime. Second, pictures of human body parts are still notable (we have categories for that), and especially if the pictures are related to a notable event. So please stop wasting community's time, it's useless and unwelcome. --A.Savin 20:35, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
@Behanzane: Yes, it is clear that is what it is a picture of. How is that out of scope?
@A.Savin: I hope that your remark that it was a "crime" is just an off-topic statement of your own opinion, rather than something that you think is Commons' business and that such a category would be relevant. As far as I can tell from pretty much all sides, it does not appear that the Revolutionary Guard deliberately targeted a civilian airliner, but that this was the result of hair-trigger stupidity, pretty much exactly what happened when the U.S. shot down Iran Air Flight 655 in 1988. As far as I know, we have no categories referring to that as a criminal act. - Jmabel ! talk 01:28, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
Not sure what you want from me, as Negligent homicide is by all means a crime, even if only one is killed. --A.Savin 08:17, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
For your information (not for the faint-hearted): Category:Human corpses. --HyperGaruda (talk) 14:35, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Featured videos

Hello.

I've discovered yesterday this page : [2].

It's very interesting.

Regards.

--ComputerHotline (talk) 10:11, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Bird's-eye representation: is this a "map"?

I've placed File:Lake Union, Union Bay and Lake Washington, looking north, ca 1912 (SEATTLE 2006).jpg in Category:Incorrect maps. It's not exactly a map, but I don't see any other more appropriate category. Any suggestions? (See description on the file page if you are interested in what is inaccurate about it.) - Jmabel ! talk 17:41, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

What about starting at Category:Aerial photographs? Wouter (talk) 19:50, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
Category:Bird's eye view maps of the United States I think is what you are looking for. Jheald (talk) 21:08, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
I have Category:Bird's-eye view on it; I think that's more accurate than calling it a "map". Perhaps I didn't express my question clearly: my problem is with whether I can improve on Category:Incorrect maps. We need to somehow mark it as not being an accurate reflection of any reality, but we don't seem to have a category that covers this for something that is more an artist's rendition than a map. & I'm not sure this is really in any sense an "aerial," I think you could get a position not far from this (insofar as it reflects the physical geography at all) from somewhere on north Capitol Hill. - 21:59, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
I would definitely categorize it as a birds-eye map, inaccuracies and all. Perhaps Category:Artist's impressions and/or Category:Architectural visualisation drawings as well? Pi.1415926535 (talk) 22:18, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
It's certainly not an architectural visualisation drawing (it's not even an architectural drawing) but I think Category:Maps of proposed entities may be on the mark. - Jmabel ! talk 03:50, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Museums in Paris release 100.000 scans of CC0 images

This might be of any interest. (Source; link) Veverve (talk) 11:34, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

See also http://www.parismusees.paris.fr/fr/actualite/open-content-plus-de-100-000-oeuvres-des-collections-des-musees-de-la-ville-de-paris-en . It's a partnership with Wikimedia France and they're working on getting the content on Commons too. Multichill (talk) 19:08, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Interaction ban proposal

Commons:Administrators' noticeboard#Propose 6 month interaction ban

Raising notification here as this would benefit from a wider consensus than would be expected from the readership of the admin noticeboard. The proposed interaction ban involves the behaviour of an administrator, so opinions and scrutiny from non-administrators would be beneficial to assess community consensus.

Thanks -- (talk) 12:21, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

John Laing Archive

Historic England and the John Laing Trust have today launched (announcement) an online archive of pictures of buildings and construction works by John Laing.

As usual, there is no sign of an open licence, but some of the images are from 1948/1949 and by anonymous photographers (example}.

Can we upload them, or are going to hit a "first publication" issue? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:19, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Interestingly, some of the images (like this one) are Crown Copyright which expires after 50 years. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:27, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Category redirect

I have created Category:Géza Kádas with the name as in the English WP. The native form of this personal name is Kádas Géza. Therefore I created a category redirect Category:Kádas Géza following the info on Category:Category redirects. There is mentioned “Use {{category redirect|correct category name (without the "Category:" prefix)}} to put categories here.”. I checked a few but they contained the Category prefix as for example {{Category redirect|Category:Digit 0 in heraldry}} The problem I have is that on Category:Géza Kádas the empty category Kádas Géza is mentioned. Wouter (talk) 15:41, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

A null edit solved the problem. Ruslik (talk) 16:15, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks! Wouter (talk) 16:23, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Incorrect Species Determination

Hello Village pump. I believe the scientific identity of this image and this image is wrong. I believed the link information when downloading, but the specimen originates from the Pacific Ocean. For those who do not understand, there are two similar species: in the Atlantic Ocean is M. zebra; in the Pacific Ocean the species is M. cervinetta. If the collection data is correct, the species is wrong. Mário NET (talk) 11:27, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

If you're confident that your new identification is correct, you can use the "Edit" link at the top of each page and replace the species name wherever it appears. You'll also need to edit the captions and the depicts (P180) information on the "Structured data" tab. Finally, you can request that the file be renamed using the "Move" link in the "More" menu. If you're not confident about the new identification, you could remove mention of the precise species and just categorise it under Category:Macrocypraea. --bjh21 (talk) 13:00, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. I can do that. Mário NET (talk) 13:20, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Check out Commons:Bots/Requests/EatchaBot 2 and find. Problems with the bot's edits

Hi Everyone,

I am identifying languages used in the file description, but we do not have enough humans to check the edits (I am checking them using third party APIs) but humans are required to check them no matter what I do. If you think you found something wrong just drop a line on the BRFA page. If you think it's working fine, you may drop something too. Thanks for reading this message. -- Eatcha (talk) 11:41, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Creative Commons book

Creative Commons have published a new book: "Creative Commons for Educators and Librarians" (which is openly available under a CC by licence!). A number of other formats are freely avaialble, and hard copies can be purchased. It will be very useful in outreach work. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:44, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Neue Strategy Liaison für deutsche Sprache

(This text aims to raise awareness for the final phases of the Wikimedia Strategy 2030 in german language)


Anfang 2017 begann, mit Auslaufen der alten Strategie, die Feststellung des Bedarfs und die Entwicklung einer neuen Strategie für die Wikimedia-Bewegung bis 2030. Jetzt, nachdem viele Einzelpersonen und Arbeitsgruppen Vorschläge erarbeitet haben, die immer wieder durch Feedbackrunden überarbeitet wurden, werde ich euch nächste Woche darum bitten, die finalen Vorschläge für die Strategie Wikimedia 2030 durchzuschauen und zu diskutieren. Meine Rolle in dem Prozess, der bis Juni andauert, wird es sein, eure Rückmeldungen zu sammeln und weiterzugeben, Chancen und Risiken sollen aus euren Antworten sprechen. Außerdem bin ich jederzeit für Hinweise und Fragen verfügbar, von „was ist überhaupt eine Strategie“ bis zu „wie wird mich das im Fotografieren und Veröffentlichen von Dateien beeinflussen“. Jedenfalls freue ich mich schon auf euch und wünsche mir eine fruchtbare Diskussion. Weitere Infos wird es hier sowie auf Meta und Wikipedia:Wikimedia2030 geben.--CJackel (WMF) (talk) 10:55, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Checkmark This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. --Ciell (talk) 15:36, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Category:Ogg sound files

It seems that Category:Ogg sound files and all of its sub-categories are being removed, after a deletion proposal that had no discussion whatsoever. Was this proposal announced anywhere else? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:00, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Probably not besides Commons:Categories for discussion/2019/11/Category:Ogg sound files. Categories for discussion tends to be a wasteland of stale discussions, some dating back to 2013. I don't think people commonly watch categories themselves. --Animalparty (talk) 23:33, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
So are these deletions legitimate? it seems not, to me. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 19:24, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
While I'd not in favour of intersecting filetype categories with content categories, I don't think Category:Ogg sound files should have been deleted. I do pay attention to CfDs, but I somehow missed this one. - Themightyquill (talk) 08:54, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Flickr2Commons appears to be broken

meta:Talk:Flickr2Commons#Although I authorise through OAuth Uploader, Flickr2Commons does not allow me to use it. Anyone know whom to get hold of? - Jmabel ! talk 04:11, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

The iasue is reported, at the above page, to be solved, but for future reference: https://bitbucket.org/magnusmanske/flickr2commons/issues?status=new&status=open Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:30, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Inclusion of an 1885 photo in an article

I purchased the second of the stock photos from the firm (Alamy) indicated in the following reference.

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-french-painter-paul-lon-jazet-in-his-paris-studio-photograph-by-edmond-113154839.html

It was originally photographed around 1885.Can I insert it into an existing Wikipedia article on Paul Leon Jazet? BFP1BFP1 (talk) 14:55, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

Hey BFP1. Since the photograph is by Edmond Bénard who died in 1907, his work would have entered the public domain in 1977. You can upload it here on Commons using {{PD-old}} for the licensing.
On a side note, sites like Alamy and Getty Images are pretty notorious for trying to charge people for public domain images. I would recommend caution before purchasing historic images from them in the future. In essence, you just paid for an image that is free. GMGtalk 15:05, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks GMGtalk BFP1BFP1 (talk) 18:02, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
Could you explain how to carry out the upload process, is it via the Upload Wizard? BFP1BFP1 (talk) 19:04, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
@BFP1: Yep. You can just use the upload Wizard. If you want I can look at it and tidy it up after you upload it. GMGtalk 19:06, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
I have now uploaded File:Paul-Léon Jazet in his Paris studio (c1885).jpg Is the upload OK? When I reply do I need to always add BFP1 and the 4 tildes? BFP1BFP1 (talk) 20:19, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
@BFP1: Looks good to me. I did a few tweaks here and there. GMGtalk 20:44, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
22:05, 15 January 2020 (UTC)~~Many thanks. BFP1BFP1 (talk) 22:05, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
@BFP1: And, just so you know, when you sign a post you only need to type 4 tildes. Your user name will be included automatically along with the date and time. Otherwise your user name will be duplicated, as seen in your previous posts. It's the same as in Wikipedia. Cheers, --Animalparty (talk) 06:33, 16 January 2020 (UTC)Thanks -AnimalpartyBFP1 (talk) 14:09, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
I have uploaded some of my own photos to Commons, as PD, and now Alamy offer them for sale. Guess what proportion of the income they pass on to me? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:34, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Wiki Loves Folklore

Hello Folks,

Wiki Loves Love is back again in 2020 iteration as Wiki Loves Folklore from 1 February, 2020 - 29 February, 2020. Join us to celebrate the local cultural heritage of your region with the theme of folklore in the international photography contest at Wikimedia Commons. Images, videos and audios representing different forms of folk cultures and new forms of heritage that haven’t otherwise been documented so far are welcome submissions in Wiki Loves Folklore. Learn more about the contest at Meta-Wiki and Commons.

Kind regards,
Wiki Loves Folklore International Team
— Tulsi Bhagat (contribs | talk)
sent using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 06:14, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

"Speedy keep" frivolous requests for deletion?

Does policy provide any way for this to be done?

To wit, a file that I uploaded was recently proposed for deletion with a rationale that, according to the EXIF data, it was created by "PolyView" and thus it's unlikely to be my own work. I did indeed take the photograph myself, and as any Google search would tell you, PolyView is a shareware photo editing program which in this case I used to adjust its brightness, contrast, color saturation etc. levels before upload.

Furthermore, the user who requested deletion has been warned repeatedly, as documented on his talk page (example, example, example, and there are likely quite a few more; I didn't go back very far into his archives) about proposing content for deletion for spurious reasons.

I feel that this RfD is a waste of admins' time, and that there's no valid reason why we should need to wait seven days to close discussion on it when the outcome is a foregone conclusion. Please advise.

Also, my apologies if I've placed this on the wrong page, and please move if necessary.

-- Andre Carrotflower (talk) 17:09, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

@Andre Carrotflower: There's nothing to stop an admin closing the request early, but non-admin closes are only permitted if everyone agrees that the request was mistaken, which I don't think is the case here. --bjh21 (talk) 17:45, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
✓ Done. Thoughtless nomination lacking even basic due diligence. Rodhullandemu (talk) 18:34, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
@Rodhullandemu: Thank you, I appreciate your attending to this. I wonder if you or another admin might be willing to also close the discussions for File:Lunar Eclipse 2017-08-07.jpg and File:PumpkinTower.jpg, which were RfD'd for the same spurious reason. -- Andre Carrotflower (talk) 21:26, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
@Andre Carrotflower: ✓ Done File:Lunar Eclipse 2017-08-07.jpg but File:PumpkinTower.jpg is my own image. Rodhullandemu (talk) 21:29, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
✓ Done Sebari – aka Srittau (talk) 23:47, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Not only that, but the EXIF actually says "PolyView® Version 4.45 by Polybytes". Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:52, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
  • It would help if you uploaded your unedited image from your camera first so we get the camera exif data, then uploaded the cropped version after. All contemporary images missing camera data are rightfully suspicious. RAN (talk) 04:00, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Duplicates

Sometimes the same picture can be uploaded twice accidentaly (but with different ligth and colours settings):

The older uploaded version is the better version (in my opinion).Smiley.toerist (talk) 12:08, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

I have an solution with renames with the suffix '.orig'. The files will be together.Smiley.toerist (talk) 17:57, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
If you want one of these deleted & turned into a redirect, we can do that. Otherwise, just link them with {{Other version}}. Or if you want one renamed, use {{Rename}}. - Jmabel ! talk 18:34, 15 January 2020 (UTC)
Problem solved: I use my own link 'other version' with a thumb image of the other version. example: File:Lage Zwaluwe stoptrein in sneeuw.jpg Smiley.toerist (talk) 11:57, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
Please see the small edit I made on these the first pair, introducing the normal template. - Jmabel ! talk 17:38, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks. Could a similar system be used in Category:Duisburg Sint-Joris-Weert SNCV where 'before' and 'next' is used. Example File:Duisburg Neerijse 14.jpg.Smiley.toerist (talk) 10:03, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
Not readily, because these are really previous/next, not two versions of the same image. However, if you want to rework it, you might consider {{Previous}}, {{Next}}, possibly as captions in the gallery already there. - Jmabel ! talk 17:19, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Template LOC-pchrom

The use of the Swiss licensing template is confusing as this is not an image of Switzerland, but of France. I have added an PD-France licence.Smiley.toerist (talk) 11:43, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

As far as I remember, in the context of copyright the country a photograph was taken in matters not so much as the country where it was originally published? I'm more confused by the statement "Reproduction by Photoglob AG, Zürich, Switzerland or Detroit Publishing Company, Detroit, Michigan" in the source section - the given source does not mention Photoglob/Zürich at all, only Detroit Publisheng ... --El Grafo (talk) 14:04, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
As a slight tangent, where we see examples like this cable railway of the colours being visibly played around with compared to the original archive, these are not valid digital restorations but are damaging the archive original. The image has been restored to the same colour palette as exists at the Library of Congress original. If someone wants to play around with faking colours and "enhancing" images based on their personal tastes, they should always create a separate file and make it clear in the description and the filename that this is not original. -- (talk) 14:34, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

After further review of how the template is used, Commons:Deletion requests/Template:LOC-pchrom has been raised. -- (talk) 14:53, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

In this case the template is not needed: PD-France PD-1923 are sufficient and based on the postcard data (library of congress is irrelevant). It may be printed in Switzerland, but it would certainly only be sold in France.Smiley.toerist (talk) 09:57, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Images

Hello - Im new here :) Im working on a new website and I need images, can I use images from wikimedia commons and download them to my new website? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Inshanti (talk • contribs) 21:34, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Tool to filter uploads by date

Hello. Is there a tool with which we can filter files in a given category, by a given date? For example, to get a list of files uploaded between 1 January 2018 and 30 June 2018 in Category-X? Rehman 03:20, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Yes, Petscan can do this. You can enable Petscan in your preferences (Gadgets, Tools for categories). In Petscan "Page properties" give last edit dates and check "Only pages created..." box. MKFI (talk) 08:16, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, MKFI! I shall give it a try. Cheers, Rehman 15:22, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Should the Foundation call itself Wikipedia

There is a RfC at Meta: Should the Foundation call itself Wikipedia From the reasoning of it:
The m:Communications/Wikimedia brands/2030 movement brand project plan states as a foregone conclusion that the endpoint of its process will include calling the Foundation and affiliates by the name Wikipedia, admitting, among other obvious issues, that "Wikipedia France," will likely be confused with the French Wikipedia. The community consultation it cites in support apparently did not clearly include this information when it was put to its respondents, and therefore it is not representative of authentic community sentiment on the question. To the extent that the question may have been implied, community agreement with the proposals did not achieve majority support.
Feel free to take part in that RfC. Grüße vom Sänger ♫ (talk) 15:17, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Finnish description

I can't create this page with {{Potd description|1=[[w:fi:Etiopian ortodoksinen kirkko|Ortodoksinen pappi]] pitää Etiopialaista ristiä [[:Category:Abba Pentalewon Monastery|Abba Pentalewonin luostarissa]] [[w:fi:Aksum|Aksumissa]], [[w:fi:Tigray|Tigrayn osavaltiossa]] [[w:fi:Etiopia|Etiopiassa]].|2=fi|3=2020|4=01|5=20}}. Can anyone other user create that? --Jnovikov (talk) 16:27, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

✓ Done BTW, you need autopatrol user right in order to create POTDs/MOTDs. --jdx Re: 16:45, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Category:Stephen Guernsey Cook Ensko

Why can't I get an infobox to form at Category:Stephen Guernsey Cook Ensko? RAN (talk) 16:49, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

@Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ): You hadn't sitelinked the category. As there's a gallery that's linked to from Wikidata, I've created Stephen Guernsey Cook Ensko (Q83280738) as a category item, and the infobox should now appear. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 17:36, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
I see, it has to do with having one slot for commons, either the category or the page ... Thanks! RAN (talk) 17:38, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
Mike Peel fixed it, the commons link was switched away from the category link, so he created a Wikidata entry just for the category. RAN (talk) 21:02, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Creator template display copyright information of oeuvre

Can we have the Creator template display the copyright information of oeuvre of the person? Wikidata now stores that information. See Hendrik Verschuring. Instead of writing it out in prose as we do now: Category:Photographs_by_Ira_L._Hill RAN (talk) 21:00, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Wikimedia 2030 community discussions: Influence our shared future!

From today on to 21 February, the last facilitated round of movement discussions on the Wikimedia 2030 recommendations will be held. I created a dedicated page: Commons:Wikimedia Strategy 2018-20. These conversations offer the opportunity to review the movement strategy draft recommendations, and discuss how Commons community would be affected as well as how well they align with the strategic direction.

Wikimedians across the world have been shaping the 2030 strategy since 2017. The first phase was aimed at establishing a shared strategic direction: that by 2030, Wikimedia will become the essential infrastructure of the ecosystem of free knowledge, and anyone who shares our vision will be able to join us. This vision of Wikimedia’s future is shared by all of us, irrespective of background (such as home wiki, culture, etc.) or contributing model (some of us don’t edit, and yet, do take part in fulfilling the Wikimedia mission).

Wikimedia 2018–2020 is all about recommendations that answer the question: what systemic changes in our worldwide movement are needed to advance this vision? These new draft recommendations are intentionally broad and focused on long-term impact. However, they will inevitably be familiar to many of you. Your previous feedback was taken into account, and the recommendations are based upon both 2017 and 2019 discussions reports.

Since July 2018, a group of more than 90 volunteers from across the Wikimedia movement have worked to produce various drafts of recommendations to support this change. This effort is now reaching its final stage, and we invite you to review and discuss the new strategy recommendations. This final set synthesizes all previous drafts, and will offer a clear and condensed product for your review.

After the discussions, the recommendations will be finalized, and presented at the Wikimedia Summit in Berlin. Soon after that, the implementation phase will begin.

You can learn more about the process of forming these recommendations and the next steps in the Signpost’s text by Risker, and in a dedicated FAQ on Meta-Wiki.

SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 21:57, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Life Magazine August 4 1964

I found a scan of Life Magazine on https://archive.org/details/YUkEAAAAMBAJ/page/n17 declared as Public Domain Mark 1.0. All pages (including the advertisements) bear a watermark as Copyrighted material. Is this a bad joke or a good source for commons? (PD-US-not renewed ?) Mutter Erde (talk) 15:56, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Archive.org is a less reliable source than Commons in many cases; all the anonymous/pseudonymous uploads, none of the checking of Commons. Works from 1964 didn't have to be renewed, and there's a clear copyright notice below the table of contents.
(While you're there, take a look around the Magazine Rack, the section that's filed in. Awesome collection of mainly geek/nerd magazines from the '70s, '80s and '90s. No chance most of them are in the PD.)--Prosfilaes (talk) 06:44, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much. I have thought until now that archive.org is a serious source. Regards Mutter Erde (talk) 07:53, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Problem uploading a photo of a painting via Upload Wizard

I can't get past the first step of uploading the file Le Billet de Logement. Oil on panel, signed and dated P Jazet 1879.jpg. On clicking the photo, the jpg name comes up but the actual photo does not. And the LH box still says 'Browse'. On clicking the jpg title name the whole folder comes up with 7 photos. I can then select the photo and open it but can't upload the file for it. The size is about 500KB. I have completed all the steps on Wizard but I can't upload to Commons presumably because the file is not uploading correctly. BFP1.BFP1 (talk) 16:28, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

After about 30 minutes the page changed and it was indicated the the file had not been uploaded. There was a button to click saying 'upload' whch I pressed, and the file was uploaded! Something similar has happened to me before. A delay in uploading the file followed by the option that works later. BFP1 (talk) 17:32, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
@BFP1: You seem to be using some kind of special English Wikipedia uploading tool. You might want to try the Commons UploadWizard. Multichill (talk) 19:50, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Multichill. I have saved the page for future use.BFP1 (talk) 10:10, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Commons Mobile App generating wrong categories

I've just filled a bug for the wrong categories that Commons App is currently generating, through the template {{According to EXIF data}}: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T243303. In case it is duplicated, please merge it with the appropriate task. Thanks, -- Darwin Ahoy! 18:13, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Is this Lev Parnas category actually public domain?

I uploaded all these media in good faith and now am not sure if the media are PD. They were published by the US House of Representatives. I got them all here: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/see-all-the-new-impeachment-evidence-relating-to-lev-parnas

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Lev_Parnas

Victorgrigas (talk) 21:30, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Hey Victorgrigas. Unfortunately the answer is probably no. The video was taken by Parnas, and so he would own the copyright. The screen shots have two problems. In as much as the text is copyrighted (arguable maybe due to short length), the program itself is likely non-free and so the image is non-free too. As to the group photos, it's not at all clear who actually took those, but there doesn't seem to be any attribution to suggest it was an official duty of a US government employee. Without that we can't keep it. The official US government correspondence is likely okay, but where they are mixed in the same file, would need to be separated from other media. The rest of the files probably need to be deleted. GMGtalk 22:12, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
Can someone else weigh in, and then feel free to tag for deletion what needs to be? Victorgrigas (talk) 22:24, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
File:HMKP-116-JU00-20191211-SD9011-photos.pdf is from PBS and I don't think PBS is considered a government agency, but a nonprofit organization which would have its own copyright. Just because the House publishes it doesn't mean the original copyright is removed. Each item would belong at English under fair use but I'm having a very hard time finding these acceptable for Commons. However, each item needs to be analyzed separately. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 00:01, 22 January 2020 (UTC
I don't believe Lev Parnas has ever been an employee of the Federal Government. Nobody at PBS is a Federal employee either, although its parent company receives federal funding. Thus, {{PD-USGov}} is bunk. --Animalparty (talk) 00:11, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Correctly representing, but not promoting, "racial theories" used in Nordicism and Nazism


Photograph of a Swedish woman currently incorrectly and offensively promoted on Commons as being of "Nordic race A" as if this were a factual description. Sourced from Encyklopedia Powszechna PWN

It is proposed that categories, filenames and media descriptions must always distinguish "racial" theories such as Nordicism which views the "Nordic race" as an endangered and superior racial group as accurately being debunked archaic theories. Especially where photographs of people are being used, this must be given sufficient context or warnings in the description and categorization so that there is no doubt that the person is being misrepresented in the original outdated source by the "racial" language and terms being used.

Examples of recently created "racial" categories on Commons were raised yesterday at Commons:Administrators' noticeboard#Scientific racism as categories on Commons (e.g. "Cromagnoid race", "Nordic race" and "Lapponoid race" categories), which highlights that Commons has no clear guideline or consensus on how best correctly to represent this media on Commons. By blithely using the terminology that might be used at outdated sources of media like the Meyers Blitz-Lexikon or the Wielka Encyklopedia Powszechna PWN to create categories or filenames, this risks misusing Commons to promote racist theories used by white supremacists and other groups for race hate. Categories such as Category:Meyers Blitz-Lexikon exist without needing to create sub-categories using the meaningless or anti-educational "racial" terminology.

With an effective guideline accepted on Commons, it will be easier to request similar guidelines to be implemented on Wikidata.

Why not just just name categories like "Person where X says the person would belong to race Z"? --GPSLeo (talk) 15:48, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
There is no evidence that we need sub-categories around this offensive 'racial' language, the numbers of files are exceedingly small so the source publication title is sufficient. With regard to "X says", this would be an excuse to create categories like "People Trump has called 'a bad person'" because some external source was once published saying these things, when Commons categories should be about understandable repeatable factual qualification rather than defamation or abusive terms. Right now, despite having a host of categories based on offensively 'racial' terminology from it, we don't even have a category for Encyklopedia Powszechna. There are fewer than 100 such relevant files so these images would hardly be lost if put in such a parent category. Keep in mind, these terms cannot be used outside of reference to the source publication. If a contributor were to start adding "Nordic race" to the descriptions of photographs of people generally, they would be considered a vandal. -- (talk) 15:54, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
If there are just one or two pictures then there should be a category like "Picture used by X to explain his race theory" and the description should contain more information. But this information is definitely important. I think there are frequent people looking for these images to explain these racist theories to show that they are bullshit. --GPSLeo (talk) 16:59, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
Yes, this proposal is setting a guideline for accuracy, not deletion or obscuration.
It is important that we gain a reasonable consensus on this. I know the subject puts folks off from writing anything or putting in a !vote, but we need a guideline to avoid having a "racial categories" discussion again just simply to move or delete categories or filenames like "Nordic race", which actually damage this project's educational value by reading as if we support 1930's style racist theories. -- (talk) 22:08, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
  • There's a difference between a picture of some racist stuff from centuries ago, and the implementation of anti-scientific, right-extremist, white-supremacist bullshit like those categories here. Those cats are have no real purpose, they could as well be sorted just under the categorie of the book they were taken from, if necessary with sub-cats for chapters or such. They should have no place in real scientific cats, if there ain't some top-cat "Debunkt racist bullshit" (perhaps in more polite words). There is no "Nordic Race", so there should no be any category with that name. If somehow necessary (which I can't think about any real purpose for), it should be named something along Category:Files about the false racist concept of... or such. Grüße vom Sänger ♫ (talk) 13:41, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
  • The source that the picture was scanned from is not the defining category here. For example (I checked just one picture) File:01975 Lapponoid race L.jpg was originally credited to w:Herman Bernhard Lundborg taken in 1930. Lundborg was the leading race biologist and eugenist in Sweden in the 1920s. In Poland it was also used as an example by w:Jan Czekanowski in his book Człowiek, jego rasy i życie (google translation: Man, his race and life) in 1939 (Lviv school?) and pl:Bronisław Jasicki, and pl:Paweł Sikora (antropolog) in book Zarys antropologii in 1962 (Krakow school?). (source: https://antropologia-fizyczna.pl ; I can't read the Polish language so I used Google translate). So even if stay just in Sweden and Poland there are least three distinct uses for demonstrating the Lapponoid race which would be noteworthy in Wikipedia or Wikidata as they can be sourced as historical (superseded) scientific theories. For Commons the image was scanned from the Polish dictionary (w:Wielka Encyklopedia Powszechna PWN) which used it thirty or forty years after first publication. There is clearly information that should be told to the user via using categorization and description etc so the historical context would be clear and for doing this the solution will be more complex than flattening the categories to category:this is deprecated racistic shit. --Zache (talk) 18:03, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
I agree with Zache. I  Support naming or tagging these categories to make their scientific status clear (e.g. "Category:X (debunked race)"), but  Oppose flattening or wholesale deletion. Also, I don't think there's any reason to categorize photographs of people in this tree in either case, unless they are specific photographs that were historically used in conjunction with the theories; since it is widely agreed that the race doesn't exist, nobody belongs to it. – BMacZero (🗩) 22:13, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
  •  Support Commons should not be sorting people by race. While it is entirely in line with Commons' purpose to preserve these images and make them freely available for reuse, the project should not in any way buy into the unscientific theory of humans being divided into races. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:18, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
Agreed, Commons should not be sorting people by race but where we are dealing with historical examples like this Commons should not be obfuscating what the intent was at that time. They were sorting people by race. No matter what we think of these theories and practices now, they were widely accepted at the time. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 22:48, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
I'm sure there's a way to do that, to indicate what the image's purpose was, without ourselves sorting people by race. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:48, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
@Donald Trung: Would you feel the same way about a subcategory called Category:Homeopathic cures for cancer? I think there's a difference between having Category:Eugenics and categorizing images according to particular theories of eugenics. - Themightyquill (talk) 13:29, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Can the people who are defending this category, with its current name, tell me how this would differ from having a similar Category:Untermenschen for those whom the Nazis described as such? Or are you saying that would also be OK? - Jmabel ! talk 05:36, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
  •  Support Right now, the category name implies that there is something known as the Lapponoid race, and such a category includes all files of people of that race. Better to just put them under the book they were scanned from, or at least a category named something like "Images used as examples of the Lapponoid race", which limits the range of the category and distances Commons from the concept.--Prosfilaes (talk) 06:37, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. This is a sensible response to an unreasonable fear that editors will start categorizing images into debunked racial categories. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 16:10, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
We have Category:Rutherford model, which is also as unscientific as these race theory is. Why not categorize these images under Eugenics race theory or something like that ? The present categories gives me impression that "commons sorts images of humans based on ancient theory". Redirect these or delete them, whichever you find easier. -- Eatcha (talk) 14:29, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
The difference between Category:Rutherford model or Category:Homeopathy and these eugenics categories is that these categories affect real people, not objects. The photos of and data for "races" were considered inferior were collected in abhorrent ways and used as the basis for even more nefarious purposes such as forced sterilization, the atrocities of the Holocaust, etc. Some of these people are still alive today that are in these photos, while almost all of them have relatives that are. For the communities that have been subjected to this, it is a collective trauma that I don't think we should be contributing to, no matter how "factual" it was to the eugenics bunch and the neonazis of today. -Yupik (talk) 09:36, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
  •  Support The use of "Images used as examples of the Lapponoid race" as a category name just perpetuates the idea that there may be such a race. It has become apparent from discussion elsewhere that race theory is still being taught in some school systems, but that doesn't mean we have to perpetuate it. Would we be so complacent if the Westboro Baptist Church decided to start categorizing images according to their own "truth"? Would we let government officials in Uganda come in and start chucking people into categories like "Known homosexuals in Uganda" knowing what it would lead to? -Yupik (talk) 09:36, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
See also, Category:Racial type portraits and Category:Anthropometry as similar categories. Anthropometry is most neutral category name so far what i have found. --Zache (talk) 12:19, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
The categories, possibly further renamed to avoid asserting that "racial portraits" are factual, may be useful for collating pre-WW2 mythical race-theory publications. A problem occurs when the old photograph scans are remixed into new collages, or individual photographs are extracted and described or given filenames which promote the concept of specific racial claims against the person or is used to make a race claim against an apparent ethnicity or cultural identity. For example File:Collage of illustrations from 'Man, Past and Present' (1899) by Augustus Henry Keane.png is clearly a full scan of a table of photographs from the 1899 book. However, we need to be alarmed at the unnecessary breakdown of that table into individual photographs which are visibly titled in the photograph as Hottentot and Negrito, even though these terms are not added as Commons categories.
Somewhat obsessively these have then been pieced back together as the original table and used in this complex way on articles like lv:Ekvatoriālā rase, which gives a false impression for the crops being wide cross-project usage. Breaking down the source scan to individual photographs verges on unnecessarily promotional for these individual race myths unless robust educational rationales can be put forward for their specific need compared to simply referencing the original outdated document or a page from it. Again this is not suppressing the original and potentially historically educational source material, but how best to make it available and accessible without accidentally promoting any hateful race myths in a potentially harmful way. -- (talk) 12:51, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
  •  Support Thank you for bringing our attention to this issue. I am in favor of keeping all the historical images which were used as examples of different races. I like Prosfilaes idea of categorizing them into categories like "Images used as examples of the Lapponoid race". I am against categorizing any new images into such categories. By the way, I modified description of File:01975 0022 Portrait of a Swedish woman.jpg using {{Photograph}} template, which has more fields helpful in cases of biased historical material. --Jarekt (talk) 13:23, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

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


Identify American President

Who is the rightmost person

Please identify the rightmost person who should be a US president. Is he Jimmy Carter? I am categorizing the file, and I want to know if I should add it to Category:Caricatures of Jimmy Carter. Thanks 4nn1l2 (talk) 18:56, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

Terrible resemblance, I can see the confusion! RAN (talk) 03:49, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
Doesn't resemble Obama as well. Minoraxtalk (formerly 大诺史) 13:12, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
Agreed, US Presidents chronologically backwards from Trump, left to right. Some not caricatured in standard ways of US editorial cartoonists, but recognizable. -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 05:59, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Î.Hr.

I'd appreciate if a native Romanian speaker could record a file that indicates how "Î.Hr." is pronounced. (For anyone wondering, it's the Romanian equivalent of "B.C." or "B.C.E." in a date.) Similar files would also be appreciated for anything else -- in any language -- about how common abbreviations are spoken when encountered, whether they are simply spoken as letters, whether people always speak the words instead, etc. - Jmabel ! talk 18:08, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

If you just want to hear it, use Google translate. Select Romanian and listen to the sound. Wouter (talk) 17:02, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
@Wouterhagens: I'm pretty confident that what was there is not accurate. I'm pretty sure it was just a bot of some sort, presuming that the abbreviation is pronounced phonetically as written, which I suspect it is not. Or are you saying that you are a native or near-native speaker of Romanian, and you assert that Google Translate is correct on this? (For what it's worth, I have decent foreigner's Romanian, but I'm not really fluent.) - Jmabel ! talk 05:49, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Creator redirect

Do we have a creator redirect when we have duplicate creator templates, the way we do for categories? RAN (talk) 04:40, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

They are templates, so {{Template redirect}} should cover it. --ghouston (talk) 05:43, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
@Ghouston: Can you peek at Creator:Julius Cornelius Schaarwächter, I don't think I formatted it properly. I want it to redirect to Creator:Julius Schaarwächter the now fully populated version. RAN (talk) 16:12, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
@Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ): I've fixed it, using the same manner for creating articles or page redirects. I don't know if it's "the right way", but it works, and I think it's how Creator templates redirect automatically following moves. --Animalparty (talk) 01:34, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Movement Learning and Leadership Development Project

Hello

The Wikimedia Foundation’s Community Development team is seeking to learn more about the way volunteers learn and develop into the many different roles that exist in the movement. Our goal is to build a movement informed framework that provides shared clarity and outlines accessible pathways on how to grow and develop skills within the movement. To this end, we are looking to speak with you, our community to learn about your journey as a Wikimedia volunteer. Whether you joined yesterday or have been here from the very start, we want to hear about the many ways volunteers join and contribute to our movement.

To learn more about the project, please visit the Meta page. If you are interested in participating in the project, please complete this simple Google form. Although we may not be able to speak to everyone who expresses interest, we encourage you to complete this short form if you are interested in participating!

-- LMiranda (WMF) (talk) 19:00, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Category

As specified here and here the Category:Palazzo Molin (San Polo) is wrong. That builiding, is the Palazzo Donà delle Rose, not Palazzo Molin. Correction is necessary. --93.34.228.189 10:50, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

@Abxbay: @Jmabel: In this page you can notice that Palazzo Molin is located in San Polo 2514 (Palazzo Donà delle Rose is 2515) and in this pdf (page 8) there is a image of Palazzo Molin. --93.34.228.189 08:27, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
  • So I was correct with the Google Maps Streetview link to what I believed to be Palazzo Molin. I don't think we have to wait for Abxbay, this should be cleaned up. Unfortunately, at least one picture has been (incorrectly) used in several places, and I only have a few minutes right now, but I'll follow up later if no one else beats me to it. - Jmabel ! talk 17:40, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
  • I've done my best to sort this out, but I still am afraid I may have made some mistakes. If someone with more knowledge of Venice than I wants to check on what I've done, please feel more than free, and no offense taken if you undo my work. - Jmabel ! talk 01:02, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
@Jmabel: are you searching for someone with more knowledge of Venice than you? Why? The sources I have linked are not enough? --93.34.228.189 08:14, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
I would call the sources probably strong, but I usually hesitate to make firm judgements of source quality in areas where I am not an expert. - Jmabel ! talk 17:25, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Open call for Project Grants

Greetings! The Project Grants program is accepting proposals until February 20 to fund both experimental and proven projects such as research, offline outreach (including editathon series, workshops, etc), online organizing (including contests), or providing other support for community building for Wikimedia projects.

We offer the following resources to help you plan your project and complete a grant proposal:

With thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 18:38, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Splay vs. Window recesses

I recently created Category:Splay (see d:Q1520848) and then realized that there was Category:Window recesses already. I need some linguistic advice in order to understand what to do now. Splay refers also to doors. Apart from that, are "splay" and "recess" synonyms? Thank you. --pequod ..Ħƕ 20:53, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Sodatal illustration wanted.

I want an illustration for Sodatal. Since it is a pretty anonymous-looking substance, the only picture I have found with any clear connection was a labelled wooden box, which I suppose would be better than nothing. ( https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/dupont-dynamite-explosives-1939-wood-139293724 ) Unfortunately it is from 1939. Does anyone have anything better or older or any contacts for publishing permission? JonRichfield (talk) 15:15, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

It's an American box; there's nothing copyrightable on the box, and if there were, it had no copyright notice. I'm slightly worried about the photograph, given that the box is 3D and the writing on the box is textured.--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:00, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Looking for "still life" pics with objects of gold, silver and brass (all 3)

Hi! Do you know how I can find? Or perhaps someone can upload some? Pictures similar to these photos:

// Zquid (talk) 15:07, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Look at Category:Still-life photography. Wouter (talk) 15:28, 24 January 2020 (UTC)
@Wouterhagens: I have looked in that category (that’s how I got the pics in the gallery), but I don’t find so many still life pics of gold, silver and brass objects (together). // Zquid (talk) 23:41, 24 January 2020 (UTC)
An option is to take separate images of gold, silver and brass objects and combine them yourself in one image with Photoshop. It all depends on what you want for what purpose. Wouter (talk) 10:12, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Which dash are we standardizing on?

Category:Nils Bielke (1706–1765) with the long dash or Category:Nils Bielke (1644-1716) with the short dash for categories? or no standard? RAN (talk) 01:23, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm partial to the en–hyphen-em—dash myself. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 03:18, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
In categories, we tend to prefer '-' (the "short dash" above) because it is ASCII and easily typed. - Jmabel ! talk 07:46, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Commons:Categories#Category_names says "Basic English characters (ISO/IEC 646) are preferred over national variants or extension character sets (for instance, 'straight' apostrophes over 'curly'), where reasonable." --ghouston (talk) 09:51, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Threshold of originality

I have some questions regarding a few book covers made by the Real Academia Española, I am not sure if either pass the threshold of originality:

What do you guys think?--Plank (talk) 19:59, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Both of those are sufficiently complex (i.e. involve enough creative choice) to be above the threshold of originality, and thus, copyrightable. If it was just the text, with no leaf or fist designs, that would be a different story. --Animalparty (talk) 21:30, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Japanese tea house photo

There is a CC-BY image here[3] that would be useful for an article I'm writing, but it is very low-res. The author, Flickr user "TANAKA Juuyoh (田中十洋)", has taken many photos which are on Commons, but I can't find this one anywhere. If anyone can upload a high-res version, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks! HLHJ (talk) 22:47, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Using Google Image search I found a slightly larger image from this page. --Animalparty (talk) 23:49, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Unwanted tabs

I just started getting two tabs on images that I don't particularly want: "license +" and "license -". Any way to get rid of them? - Jmabel ! talk 09:02, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

It is probably some gadget. Ruslik (talk) 12:15, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Are you using specialised settings of any kind or do you get Beta features earlier? Because I am not seeing this on any file myself, though I do use Commonsβ. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 21:33, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
@Jmabel: You added User:Majora/LicenseReview.js about 9 days ago. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 02:37, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
Ah. And it did nothing at the time, when I needed it, and then showed up a week later. Thanks! I'll get rid of that. - Jmabel ! talk 03:33, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Move image from Wikipedia to Wikimedia

Export to Wikimedia Commons

I would like to import this image: [4], so that I can use it in an article on Wikipedia in other languages. I'm sure this is described somewhere, but I haven't found the right page. Can anyone help? Thanks in advance, Dwergenpaartje (talk) 10:19, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

You should save this image on your computer and then upload it to Commons. Ruslik (talk) 12:17, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
thx! Dwergenpaartje (talk) 12:31, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
@Dwergenpaartje: You could also try commonshelper. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 12:51, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
@Dwergenpaartje: Or, you could do the right thing and click on "Export to Wikimedia Commons" (see image) --C.Suthorn (talk) 13:43, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Doesn't the af:Template:PD-SA tag say it's against license to upload it to commons? DMacks (talk) 18:18, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
@Dwergenpaartje: Not all Free content on various Wikipedias can be hosted on Commons. Commons policy requires media to be free in both the United States and country of origin, so always take time to verify a work is acceptable at Commons before transfer. Various language Wikipedias set their own policies (even though as far as I know the servers are all the same), and so English Wikipedia can host British works that are Public Domain in the U.S. but still under copyright in the UK. The "Export to Wikimedia Commons" tab mentioned above is a Beta Feature in Preferences called FileImporter. Another tool is the Move-to-commons assistant, AKA commonshelper. --Animalparty (talk) 21:26, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you all. Conclusion, it is technically possible, but not allowed because the image is not free according to US law. Unsatisfactory, but I’ll have to accept. Dwergenpaartje (talk) 11:51, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Can I upload a photograph from a Ph D thesis that was a museum photograph?

The photograph is https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/eedd/95ae0f904ef32644b98bca1eb9ff5dd47148.pdf on page 178 of the thesis. Presumably I would have to edit it to remove the caption (how to do this?) and replace it with one of my own? BFP1BFP1 (talk) 10:21, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

I have now edited out the caption and just a png image(from a screen shot) remains. Could this museum photo be uploaded to Wikimedia?BFP1 (talk) 15:06, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
What do you mean? Do you mean that a PhD candidate has taken that photo? Do you mean that they used a photo that somebody else took? Do you mean that they used a photo that museum staff have taken? ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 15:18, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks Gone_Postal. I would presume that, as the museum is mentioned in the caption in the thesis that somebody connected with the Victoria and Albert Museum took the photograph an unknown time ago. If the photo could be uploaded I would name the file William Oliver Williams’ watercolours of Giotto’s Virtues: Temperance, Justice, Faith from the Arena Chapel, Padua (c.1854–55) 27.6 x 15.7 cm (largest) Victoria and Albert Museum, London mentioning the museum. This sort of image seems to have been uploaded to Wikimedia before.BFP1 (talk) 15:39, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Ok, there are many factors, and I can only say what I think about it, hopefully I will cover most major points, but you should do further research. It is not clear if you are talking about page 178 of the electronic document, or page 178 of underlying thesis. I will start with page 178 of thesis (pdf page 186). Here at the top we have a scan or a photo of a public domain work (figure 64). Something like that can definitely be uploaded, as a long-standing policy on commons is that a 2D representation of a public domain 2D work is itself public domain, you mark it with {{PD-scan}}. On the same page at the bottom you have a photo of a 3D work of art (figure 65), and that is still copyrighted in most countries. You will have to get a licence release from whomever has taken that photo, of from the museum if that was a work for hire, or maybe from the PhD (I assume that this thesis has resulted in granting of that degree) if that was their own photography. Now let's move on to page 178 of the pdf (it is marked as a page 170 of the thesis). Here at the top (figures 57 and 58) I see photogaph of a photograph of a 3D architectural work. The dates given mean that the architectural work is definitely in public domain, and taking the photo of a photo would be public domain... if we can show that the first photo is already in public domain. Can we? It looks old enough to me, and together with the dates for the architectural work I would be ok with making an assumption that it was published 120 years ago, so {{PD-old-assumed}} should apply. And finally two engravings at the bottom. I cannot from them even guess how long ago they were made, so I would ask who is Fioravanti Penuti and do we know when he died? Also if the engraving was published long ago, there were different copyright laws, and the work may have expired due to other reasons. So, the answer is: It is difficult. But I do believe that at least some things can be used here. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 17:58, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for your detailed response Gone_Postal . I apologise if my directions were ambiguous. For clarification, I was referring to figure 65. It is actually a watercolour work and therefore a 2D work. I must admit that it is so well painted that it appears 3D. Therefore with this knowledge and applying your comments appropriately, I have now managed to upload the image to Commons. Your help is much appreciatedBFP1 (talk) 20:30, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Just so you know, Category:Cappella degli Scrovegni (Padua) - Allegories of Virtues contains the original versions of these three plus more virtues. With a bit of template coding, you can create essentially the same composition, but with better resolution. --HyperGaruda (talk) 09:36, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Sergeant Stubby

Cropped version

There's a cropped version and I eventually found the uncropped version.. But it's a photo of the photo as projected by a beamer at a presentation. And at https://doggymom.com/2013/04/24/sargeant-stubby-a-wwi-tribute/ I found the photo, but low resolution.. "Photo courtesy of Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History"

Where does this come from? - Alexis Jazz ping plz 00:59, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

@Alexis Jazz: https://www.loc.gov/item/2016886207/, now File:John J. Pershing holding his dog Sgt. Stubby, as Robert Conroy, wearing suit, stands behind them.jpg --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 01:46, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
Beautiful, thanks! - Alexis Jazz ping plz 09:03, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Add image from category to WD item

Hi there, is anybody aware of a tool that easily allows me to add an image from a category to the associated Wikidata item? In best case it would be a gadget which allows this from the category page itself. Or, maybe there is an external tool for this. Thanks in advance, --Arnd (talk) 10:26, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Please review photo of a driver license

See File:2016 Drivers License Front 01.jpg. A driver license is a legal ID. I am concerned that the image was uploaded maliciously. I do not see why an individual would upload their own driver license. Should this image be deleted? Downtowngal (talk) 01:20, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

This also brings up issues of privacy and security. Regardless of whether the uploader is the person represented in the ID, posting unredacted sensitive information on Government Issued IDs, including birth dates, identification numbers, etc. greatly increases risk of identity theft, fraud, and invasions of privacy. Does Commons have a policy regarding sensitive, personally-identifiable-information like this? Commons:BLP only considers photographs of people, with no discussion of sensitive information (which, in today's social and economic environment, is essentially the same as identity, and can wreck much more harm on a person than a reused photo of their face). Do we have a "first do no harm" rule that overrides any "but it's public domain" argument? --Animalparty (talk) 01:40, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
If you ignore identity documents, then how do you vet someone claiming to be the subject of an entry demanding a change? Anyone can claim to be someone else and create an email that looks official. Why would you ignore a piece of evidence? That doesn't make any sense. I can see not storing the document for security reasons, it should be examined by OTRS and used to make an informed decision, then discarded. 17:39, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
  • @AntiCompositeNumber and Eatcha: This is not totally correct. We do have people that send in drivers licenses and passports etc to OTRS for the purpose of verifying their account, specifically when they are blocked for potentially impersonating a well-known figure. However, all that can be done is verifying the account. For the purposes of Wikipedia, an OTRS ticket cannot satisfy en:Wikipedia:Verifiability, because it is still private and privileged information available only to OTRS agents. GMGtalk 17:42, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
  • So...two problems here. We have content that may be in-scope and not qualify for deletion, but which could also qualify for COM:OVERSIGHT, and this may. So pinging @Rama and PierreSelim: for their opinion on that front. Second, this image may not actually verify anything, because we may not be able to verify whether it is authentic, and for Wikipedia's purposes, this probably even isn't as reliable as a Facebook post, because at least with Facebook, we have a verified account posting the content. GMGtalk 15:11, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
Hello, and thank you for the notification. I have oversighted the file in question, as well as another by the same user that had the same issue. People do sometimes upload themselves images that disclose personal information; this is typically when they have no notion of the potential risk, and thus it remains our role to protect their privacy and inform them.
Thank you again and good continuation, Rama (talk) 17:10, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

PNG version of French flag

File:Flag of France.png is still used on a number of pages. Upgrade to File:Flag of France.svg is strongly needed. Is there a bot to do this? --2001:B07:6442:8903:B4C3:29EE:D8C4:C738 17:01, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Speedy deletion request formatted incorrectly

Hello all, I know deletion requests aren't ideal here but I probably formatted the speedy deletion incorrectly (as an uploader <7 days since upload), and I don't know if it notified the admins or the deletion bots properly. Can someone with the rights to do so please speedy delete this image? Thank you. Rauisuchian (talk) 03:09, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

✓ deleted by User:Túrelio. Sebari – aka Srittau (talk) 08:26, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Valued videos?

I have an interest in contra dance, a type of social dance, so I was interested in nominating a video I took as the valued image for the scope of contra dance. My reasoning is that given that, as you might imagine, the movement in dance makes it better illustrated by a video than a photo, I think a video would better meet the "most valued illustration of its kind" criterion than an image could. The valued image page currently says that videos are not allowed, though, and I don't think my video is high-quality enough in a technical sense to be a featured video candidate. So: Is there anywhere else I would want to take my video, and if not, would we want to consider introducing such a place or amending the valued image guidelines? Sdkb (talk) 09:41, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

@Sdkb: "valued images" are a bit.. well.. I don't value them over non-valued images per se. It's generally a matter of "can someone be bothered to nominate this" and it's rather common for photographers to nominate their own pictures. I have uploaded several images that are probably eligible for VI.. but I can't be bothered, and (nearly?) nothing I upload would be considered for VI. To call VI a circle jerk goes a bit too far, but I can't say it didn't cross my mind. So, in my opinion, don't worry about it too much. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 23:29, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Number of files in a category and sub-categories

Hello all,

I'm wondering how I could get the number of unique files included in a category and its sub-categories. My goal is to compare the number of pictures uploaded for WikidataCon 2017 and WikidataCon 2019 :) Of course I want to avoid counting several times the files that may have several sub-categories (eg by photographer X/on Saturday).

After some prior research I understood that it's actually not an easy task, and couldn't find any tool doing it, but maybe you now about a special script or tool that could help.

Many thanks in advance! Cheers, Lea Lacroix (WMDE) (talk) 10:03, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Lea Lacroix (WMDE), maybe the search helps: https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?sort=relevance&search=deepcat%3AWikidataCon_2017&title=Special%3ASearch&profile=advanced&fulltext=1&advancedSearch-current=%7B%7D&ns6=1 --Arnd (talk) 10:42, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Edit conflict
@Lea Lacroix (WMDE): . If I understand correctly, then I think you can just use PetScan for this − see petscan:15165325 (2017, 1508 files) vs petscan:15165326 (2019, 951 files)
(in case there are some files that might be in both categories that you would like to exclude, you may use “Negative categories”).
Hope that helps, Jean-Fred (talk) 10:44, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Jean-Fred, do you know why this search only returns 88 results compared to Petscan with 951? --Arnd (talk) 15:34, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
  • (Edit conflict)@Lea Lacroix (WMDE): , unless you specify depth (of subcat levels to count), this could be an undefined question. Of course, the two mentioned categories seem to have only three subcat levels (with one (partial) exception being four-deep), but simply adding the population numbers for each is not enough, as there’s repeated entries in the dump list (f.i., this one file should be counted once yet it is a member of three of the subcats considered, while this one is not). Furthermore, should, say, Category:WikidataCon 2017 - Advanced Lua tutorial (depth=2) be one day added as a parent cat for Category:Open source interstellar colonization (because of a seminal paper released there or maybe the conference was secretely contacted by the Galactic Assembly, whatever), a million of (directly) unrelated astronautics maps and diagrams would be counted in as being “under” Category:WikidataCon 2017, unless depth is carefully tailored (capping blindly it at 3 could exclude things that are still related but at a deeper level). I think you found readily these two problems — runaway subcategorization and reduplication of subcategorized elements — but I add it here for context. F.w.i.w., I don’t think this is a bug, but just a feature: Counting subelements of a given node in a non-hierarchical tree is not a simple problem with a simple answer. -- Tuválkin 16:11, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks all! FYI a colleague also sent me to GLAMorous where I got the same numbers as Petscan. Lea Lacroix (WMDE) (talk) 19:19, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
  • I have actually requested for such a tool to be built into Wikimedia Commons itself, it would be really handy if we had a "show all" button on a category that would also show all images in all sub-categories and present the number of files in total. If someone has the technical skills to make this it would benefit a lot of people reading/watching and editing Wikimedia Commons, it's both beneficial for editors and re-users as well as general statisticians. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 19:58, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Community round table regarding VideoWiki

For those that are unaware, m:VideoWiki is (in my opinion) a neat little proto-sister-project that's been developed, where users can make collaborative videos using content from Commons, and then upload the resulting video back to Commons for use across projects.

After some discussion here on en.wiki, a few people suggested that there should be a place for community discussion here on Commons.

Looks like a few issues have been identified that probably need ironed out.

First, the files are currently attributed manually, by pasting long lists of collapsed content on the file descriptions. Compare the attribution for File:Wikipedia-VideoWiki-Dengue fever.webm. This is fairly unwieldy and likely prone to error and oversight, especially if/when the project becomes more mature and starts to generate a lot of content by a lot of different users. One idea I pitched was to use a standard template to link back to an attribution page at VideoWiki, where VideoWiki would then link back to the content on Commons that was used in the video. See for example:

Extended content

User:Jameslwoodward suggest that it may be possible to transclude an attribution page from VideoWiki to here. I don't know what the technical challenges are to doing that, but I'd be interested to hear what others think who are more tech savvy than I am.

The other issue is that we kindof need to carve out an exception to COM:OVERWRITE specifically for VideoWiki. These are designed as a video version of a wiki, and so they may be updated many many times. Even correcting a typo would require the upload of a new version of the file. Long story short, if we make these upload a new file every time, instead of overwriting the older version, we're going to make a lot of work replacing usage on sister projects, and were just going to end up with a bunch of different versions of these files, most of which are useless and out of date.

Besides that, interested to hear any additional community input anyone has. GMGtalk 18:40, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

User:GreenMeansGo the files are not attributed manually but automatically by the tool. One of the attributions was removed by a human. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:27, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Ah @Doc James: I think I understand. I was trying to run a test upload but it looks like the program isn't uploading currently. Is this tracked anywhere on phab? GMGtalk 20:08, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
User:GreenMeansGo can you send me details of what you were trying to do? Ie what video you were trying to upload? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:59, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
@Doc James: I tried to upload the video I started yesterday just as a test, to be deleted afterward. It exported the video, but never got past 0% for the upload after about three hours. GMGtalk 22:13, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Sure will look into it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:54, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
I don't have any special expertise, but I have thoughts: (1) I don't think it's appropriate to link out to another site for attribution, but presumably we already do this a bit for recordings of Wikipedia articles. I'd hope that the system that uploads new versions of a video could also edit the file page appropriately. (2) There's already an exception in COM:OVERWRITE for files intended to be kept current, and I think extending that to files tagged with some VideoWiki-specific template would be fine. I'm not sure if it needs an update to COM:OVERWRITE itself, but I don't think it would be controversial if one were needed. --bjh21 (talk) 19:09, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
I'm not totally sure who it is that is taking the lead on programming for this. Maybe James or Lane know. GMGtalk 19:23, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
The developer is user:Pratik.pks. Be mindful that this project is a pilot organized by a few people, and as such, has a goal of scoping the concept, collecting issues, and estimating impact to readers as a measurement of usefulness for further development. Since this project is not publishing videos at scale, the right path for the few videos in circulation is manual attribution tagging and not software development. The total financial investment in this project over the past 5 years is less than $10,000, so in the context of the Wikimedia Foundation's US$120,000,000 annual budget, there are ways to get attention to video in other investment streams but the volunteers presenting this project are not connected to those other resources.
Wikipedia has matured to the point where Google and YouTube staff regularly attend Wikipedia events in the context of ongoing video partnerships, and Mozilla has made software contributions to Wikipedia for video publishing, and Wikipedia is in the network of all tech companies and resources everywhere. Consider using this video project as a model and conversation starter for the way things could be, and what Wikipedia ought to have and how things would work if the Wikimedia community put forward a proposal for regular funding over years. We are getting close to a time when either the Wikipedia community will scope out projects for development, or the Wikimedia Foundation staff will be doing that.
I think this VideoWiki project is great but it is modest and supposed to help conversation, not go into production at scale. Between this project and production, probably there would need to be several hundred issues made at GitHub and a serious talk about introducing multiple people in multiple organizations for collaboration over years.
For Commons especially, a productive conversation to have might be copyright of massively remixed works, like annotated images, datasets with copyright hosted on Commons but not Wikidata, online edited videos, or dynamically generated slideshows like art gallery videos. It is challenging for me to even imagine what general policy is the umbrella of this kind of content, but I think that video of the sort VideoWiki produces is only part of it. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 21:06, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
I do realize it is still being piloted. But the kinds of things we're tossing around as ideas, I just have no idea if they'd be super easy to implement in a way that wouldn't even be a burden, or of they would just be completely prohibitively difficult. Certainly switching the license to 4.0 (which should be done) would be easy enough. GMGtalk 21:10, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
If people want the attribution provided in a nicer template and if people want each of the files used in the video to also be tagged with such use happy to do so. The later would make clean up easier, such that if a file used in a video is deleted it would be easier to figure out which video needs to be deleted. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:32, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
"Look, matey, I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now"

I don't think it is worth Commons community discussing something that even the boldest supporters have failed to participate with since last Summer's Wikimania. More people have walked on the surface of the moon than have ever edited and published a VideoWiki medical video. The project has a number of problems, some of which I outlined at WP:NOTYOUTUBE.

  • Despite the "video" bit in the name, the project does not generate novel video content, but merely an animated slideshow of existing content extracted from Commons. A different approach to that would have been some Javascript & HTML that played the content in sequence to the user (we already have fancy slideshows for categories on Commons). There would then never had been any need to involve Commons or require careful attribution and other licence issues. Commons would not need to revise any rules nor become concerned by Wikipedians edit warring over their transcript text and which order to display the images, etc.
  • Despite the "Wiki" bit in the name, the software is difficult to use and doesn't quickly or reliably publish results. The robot narration is so awful to listen to for more than a sentence or so, that folk are being encouraged to supply narration soundtracks. But wait a second you say, if someone records spoken text, how will it get wiki quickly updated when I change a word or two. It won't.

This is a project that hasn't been thought out. Despite the videos being displayed on two dozen high profile medical articles on Wikipedia, not a single reader has ever edited one of them. -- Colin (talk) 08:20, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Mass DR of sexuality

We have another mass DR of nudity/sexuality images in the making. I'm sure it's shown up on some of your watchlists, but I wait to link to it once the user gets around to making the DR itself. It says "We already have enough, more educational examples of these kind of pictures, thank you." This makes Commons feel like a warzone, where we constantly have to fight against censorship. On one hand, many of these images are in use. On the other:

Category:Penile-vaginal intercourse is one of the most interesting subjects to humans. There are many, many pictures published every day in print magazines on the subject, and w:List of sexology journals demonstrates of quite a bit of interest purely academically, too. Excluding art categories, there's about 120 images in this category and subcategories.
Category:Tower Bridge in 2013 has about 175 images in it and its subcategory. Did anything happen to the Tower Bridge in 2013? Not that Wikipedia mentions. Are there academic journals of bridges? I find this list of journals of architecture, but none of them seem to be on bridges specifically, much less the Tower Bridge. CatScan isn't working for me, but eyeballing Category:Tower Bridge by year says there's at least 500 images of the Tower Bridge in the 21st century on Commons, and given Category:Tower Bridge has 338 files in it directly, I'm comfortable saying we're well over a thousand images of one bridge.
Category:Unidentified Lepidoptera specimens has 12,000 files directly in category, giving Category:Unidentified Lepidoptera tens of thousands of images. They're all basically out of scope, because we can't use them if we don't know what they are, and even if we could identify them, what are the odds we don't already have better, properly categorized pictures of them?

I've just pointed you to a category with tens of thousands of images that could probably be deleted in mass, no loss to Commons. I've pointed you to a thousand images of one bridge; surely we could delete 90% of that, no real loss. When an in-use image from a category of great importance with 120 images in it gets proposed for deletion on the grounds that we have "enough images" already, maybe that's not the real reason.

(As for the other two: yes, stop uploading pictures of the Tower Bridge or any other monument that we have a thousand pictures of. Stop uploading pictures of animals and plants that you don't know what they are or whether we have good pictures of them already. But deletion sprees cause stress, and cleaning out those categories via DR aren't something that I feel is worth the time or stress, mine or that of my fellow editors, to do.)--Prosfilaes (talk) 18:54, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Why, have you even *read* my DR and look at all the individual images, or are you just jumping to conclusions and creating the fight? Geez. Ciell (talk) 18:59, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
No, I hadn't read your DR, because you took forever to put it up. I said that at the top of this message, if you bothered to read it. (I bet you didn't bother reading my response to your DR before posting this, just because I hadn't finishing writing it yet. Geez.) I have looked at a couple photos; they're in use (which you don't mention in your DR) and thus in scope. I am incredibly tired of looking at all the images in a large DR because some editor can't be bothered to recognize that in use mean in scope, and such files shouldn't usually come up in mass DRs without identifying them.
"In use" is "in scope". Educational use rules don't apply; COM:SCOPE says they're in scope. Why do I have to explain this to an administrator?
I've now read Commons:Deletion requests/Nudity from Flickr by Avril1975, and you claim that "the accounts are mostly behind an 18+ account on Flickr (which should be a sign not to upload to Commons),", i.e. Commons should be censored.
It's same crap over and over and over. It's a fancy way of getting around COM:CENSOR, and not even a very good one.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:47, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
Let's take just one: File:Nude woman with niqab.jpg. A work by Peter Klashorst, an artist who has Wikipedia pages on 13 different Wikipedias, and it's in use on two of them (vi and ru), plus fr.Wikibooks. None of which is noted in the DR page. Why should I look at even one more image on a DR that includes such a work?--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:54, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
+1 to this DR being at the tendentious anti-pron warrior level, including many obviously in-scope files, some which have survived previous DRs which seem to not be taken into account, and the nominator's comment of being "respectful to the women" raises red flags as to motivation. Thanks for creating this notice so the wider community can express a view. Seriously Ciell (talk · contribs · logs · block log), you are an administrator on this project, why would you ever think this was a good idea? "Sexuality" is a very important topic to illustrate LGBT+ culture, including partial nudity or images that some might find kinky, it's a really bad idea to encourage pot-shot deletion requests against sexuality in general. -- (talk) 20:09, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
I looked at all uploads by one user: if I wanted to be "anti-pron warrior", I could have deleted them all in one go.... And yes, I am an admin, but that doesn't mean I know all the rules and legislations of Commons (for Commons not being my home-wiki), that's why I chose to create a DR. I never even mentioned "sexuality" Fae, let alone that there's anything wrong with it. But I do think we should be careful with pictures of people that are put on Flickr nude and we don't have consent of. Ciell (talk) 20:25, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
Honestly, stick to what you do know. Both the areas of model consent (or invasion of privacy) and the extent to which Commons:Photographs of identifiable people may be considered relevant, are areas of many long and divisive deletion discussions. You are an admin, and unless you want to hand back the mop, your actions on this project will be taken by others as having the authority of that role and not someone who is unsure of the rules. -- (talk) 20:53, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
@Ciell: "if I wanted to be "anti-pron warrior", I could have deleted them all in one go...."
If you had done that, we'd quite likely be voting on a desysop now. Yes, you have the buttons, see how far they will take you. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 23:17, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

The other day on the Wikimedia-l mailing list, someone was talking about images which they found offensive. They said this:

The rationale on Wikimedia Commons will default to the faux anti-censorship trope of 'if there is one Wikipedia that uses it, we cannot delete it'...

I can't help but notice that this is exactly what happened in the deletion discussion. Both Prosfilaes and used the "in use" argument several times. Fae even added a handy chart of which files were in use and by how many projects. It might not be clear that inclusion on user pages like this gallery of nude women is included in the count. Even with this broad definition, it looks like only a quarter of them are in use anywhere. I don't think that Ciell's request was very well thought out, but it did highlight the "faux anti-censorship trope" that the mailing author was talking about. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 04:27, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

@World's Lamest Critic: funny you should mention it, since it would appear that it was Fae who made the "faux anti-censorship trope" comment you linked. It's a fair point about anti-educational content being protected by a single project using it, but unless the policy at COM:INUSE is changed, that's what we should abide by. clpo13(talk) 17:31, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
@Clpo13: There's no way of knowing that the Fae on the mailing list and the Fae here are the same person. I wouldn't want to suggest that they are in case I run afoul of COM:OUTING. And obviously if they were the same person, that would make it seem like Fae is a huge hypocrite who games the system to suit their own ends. And I'm sure that can't be true. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 20:51, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
That's a lie, pretty much every word. You did suggest that they are the same person, and you implied that Fæ is a huge hypocrite, but you chose to do so in a way that's insulting and smarmy to everyone here.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:04, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
World's Lamest Critic is the same account banned by oversight due to using outing to make personal attacks on English Wikipedia. @Primefac and Majora: in the light that a related unblock on Commons was conditional on not repeating these outing behaviours diff, yet here they are openly trolling others by using threats of outing which directly breaks that promise, please consider reinstating the block. Thanks -- (talk) 21:12, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
I haven't made any "threats of outing". If you see threats of outing in what I wrote, you are mistaken. I was blocked on English Wikipedia for outing someone with an obvious conflict of interest during a discussion about that conflict of interest. It was not for personal attacks. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 21:24, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
What I see is hostile opposition research, giving the impression you are stalking my off-wiki activities. It is threatening and you are using off-wiki information to bully others. You appear to be unable to change an entrenched behaviour of using outing and the threat of outing to harass others, so you should not be on this project. -- (talk) 21:30, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Again, you are saying "outing and threats of outing" as if it were true and not just something you are alleging in an effort to get me blocked. In my time here on Commons I have seen you try to get your "opponents" blocked rather than having a reasonable discussion about your disagreements. If anyone violated outing, it was Clpo13 who said that you and the Fae on the mailing list are the same person. As for "stalking your off-wiki activities", you linked to the Wikimedia-l discussion here. I don't think any sane person would call following your link "stalking". World's Lamest Critic (talk) 21:42, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
You're being disingenuous, and obvious about it. "There's no way of knowing that the Fae on the mailing list and the Fae here are the same person. I wouldn't want to suggest that they are in case I run afoul of COM:OUTING." You would have been more discreet about it had you called out by name what Fæ posted on the mailing list, yet here you are saying "I think this would be interpreted as outing Fæ, so I'm going to do it, while making a big fuss about not doing it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:42, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Let's be frank. In the past couple of weeks I have seen Fae try to get two different users blocked with patently false accusations. While you are able to state that Fae here is the Fae from the mailing list, if I were to say that, I have no doubt that Fae would try to get me blocked. So he's trying to get me blocked for "threats of outing" even though I made no threats or said anything that a sane person could take as a threat. Fae wants to remove people who disagree with him rather than discuss the underlying issues. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 16:17, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Everyone wants to be the chef, no one wants to be the waiter. This idea that we are first and foremost a repository for works for the other Wikimedia projects is written into scope, but wouldn't it be more fun if we got to delete whatever images we wanted, even if they think those files are the best uses?
Only a quarter were in use anywhere. Cool, so it's okay if I delete every image we have of Acanthurus tennentii, as long as I put them in a DR with another 20 files? I can even make those other 20 clear copyvio. A mass DR should not include works in use, or if necessarily, should label those in use. It is not cool to force other people to dig through your DR for "in use" files.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:00, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Furhtermore, a quarter is a pretty high ratio. I'd guess that in general less than 10% of Commons content is used on other WMF projects. Does anyone have a more solid number on that? - Jmabel ! talk 00:57, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
The DR is closed already @Tuvalkin: , and the link was mentioned in the text above by Prosfilaes. Ciell (talk) 17:16, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Here's the link again, it is a bit buried; Commons:Deletion requests/Nudity from Flickr by Avril1975. I suggest folks consider this case closed. There's no benefit to be had by hashing it out further. Hopefully, the next mass nudity or sexual images related DR will be staged more carefully taking the policy-related points made onboard. -- (talk) 17:34, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Let's take a moment to talk about the policy related points, specifically being "in use". Both you and Prosfilaes used "in use" as a defense against deleting those images. @Clpo13: says above "unless the policy at COM:INUSE is changed, that's what we should abide by". Let me quote part of COM:INUSE " that an image is in use on a non talk/user page is enough for it to be within scope". Your chart of where images were used included user pages. That made it misleading. If you make similar charts in the future, please exclude user and talk pages to better reflect what COM:INUSE says. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 21:02, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
I could have sworn that used to say "not enough for it to be in use". Never mind. I am wrong, you all are right. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 21:19, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Well it seems to me that that phrase that an image is in use on a non talk/user page is enough for it to be within scope does indeed exclude user and talk pages. If that is not the intended meaning, then it should be clarified because it's ambiguous. In fact, it should be clarified in any case because it can be read two different ways, ie either (1) non-talk or user page or (2) non-talk/non-user page. Which is it supposed to be? Gatoclass (talk) 13:46, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Of course, the second one. File:Hot pants.jpg which is only used on a userpage is not in use and may be eligible for deletion given a convincing rationale. 4nn1l2 (talk) 19:04, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks, Gatoclass. That explains my confusion. It would be nice if we can clear this up before the inevitable next mass DR. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 19:10, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
@4nn1l2: I don't think so. That's a photo by Peter Klashorst. While artworks/photos from unknown artists tend to be out of scope, Peter Klashorst isn't unknown. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 22:50, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
That's beside the point, Alexis Jazz. The point is files used solely on userpages are not automatically within Commons scope. They may be within scope because of other reasons such as being taken by a notable photographer. But that's another story...
Maybe File:Nackt 06.jpg is a better example: the photo of an unkwnon woman taken by an unkown photographer, not used anywhwere but a German Wikipedia userpage. 4nn1l2 (talk) 23:04, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
@4nn1l2: you see, I like good examples. This was my plan all along! - Alexis Jazz ping plz 23:28, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Actually it's a terrible example because it's most likely a photo of a porn star taken by a professional porn production company. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 23:34, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Are users who do nothing but upload other people's sexual content welcome on Commons?

Not going anywhere. 4nn1l2 (talk) 19:04, 30 January 2020 (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 think there is a more basic question at the root of all this. There is a segment of users here who do nothing but upload sexual content, usually taken from Flickr. They generally don't participate in community discussions and may not even edit Wikipedia. Commons is quite welcoming of sexual content. No one is suggesting that Commons should not have sexual content. The fact that COM:PORN exists also shows that the community recognizes that we do not need to have an unlimited amount of sexual content. I think the question underlying this dispute is Are users who do nothing but upload other people's sexual content welcome on Commons? I have distinguished these users from the users who upload self-made sexual content, and from the users who upload all kinds of images with the occasional sexual image thrown in.

Personally, I see these users as treating Commons as their own personal image host. Some of the content they upload might be useful, but generally it is just another example of something we already have lots of. Along with that come questions about the source of these images and whether the person or persons in the images (who are almost always women) have given consent for the images to be shared. Although many images from Flickr feature professional models who have likely signed releases, Flickr is also used to obscure the origins and copyright status of images.

Discussing this question in terms of individual images or users is often problematic because it very quickly devolves into accusations of censorship. I suggest that we first agree that there is lots of sexual content on Commons and there always will be. This isn't a question of censorship. This is a question about the purpose of Commons. Is this what Commons was meant to be used for? If it is, we carry on as usual. If it isn't, let's find a way to discourage it. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 22:15, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

  •  Support Let's ban all the users who upload nothing but nudity and don't participate in community discussions.
  •  Support Also, ban all the users who do nothing but create DRs for files containing nudity.
  •  Support Obviously, ban all the users who upload nothing but images that are related to the democrats.
  •  Support And logically, all who are just here to add media related to republicans.
  •  Support And especially all users who are clearly supporting the green party and/or the libertarians!
  •  Support Users who only upload images of food are also very unwelcome. We have enough photos of sandwiches alright!
  •  Support And all the coin/stamp collectors. Those are freaks! And we have plenty of images of coins, don't we! BAN!!! - Alexis Jazz ping plz 23:08, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
I was hoping people would be mature enough to have a serious discussion about this. We don't have these same problems with pictures of sandwiches or stamps or virtually anything else because sexual images are a special case and I think we need to recognize that instead of pretending it were otherwise. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 23:53, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
You know, people have been using that line for a long time. If someone has a problem with your idea, they aren't mature enough and aren't willing to have a serious discussion. Many pro-slavery arguments started that same way; why do the abolitionists have to be so radical about things? Part of the reason why sexual images are a special case are because certain people like you make them a special case. COM:PORN goes to "Low-quality pornographic images that do not contribute anything educationally useful to our existing collection of images are not needed on Commons" (which is true if you replace pornographic with any other descriptor) and yet people continue to want to delete high-quality pornographic images that contribute something educationally useful.
Why should we respond positively to "let's block people for uploading files of a certain subject"? Maturity means starting with basic principles, like COM:CENSOR, and approaching the subject carefully. We block people for continually uploading copyvios, and I assume that we would block people for knowingly uploading revenge porn. We don't block people for uploading images that would pass a DR; that's just censorship in another fashion.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:13, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
I used the word "mature" because I found Alexis Jazz's sarcastic response to be rather immature, not, as you imply, because I support slavery. I believe sexual images are a special case because, well, most humans have strong associations bound up in sexual imagery that aren't found in most other images. This isn't a new or controversial idea. I haven't suggested blocking anyone and I don't think that would be the best way to approach this if we wanted to stop people who do nothing but upload other people's sexual images. But go ahead and cry "censorship" if you think it will be more effective than actually having a community discussion. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 03:56, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Agree with Alexis Jazz. This whole "we're not going to censor, we're just going to attack people uploading one specific subject" thing is not impressive.
I've had an idea for a while, but never any money to fund it, and likely never will have the windfall that would let me do it alone. Let's pay Abby Winters or some other reputable organization to produce a set of imagery that would cover basically all needs we might have for sexual imagery or videos, with all the careful releases. We'd have photos and videos of the sexual acts, enough for any Wikipedia, no matter how explicit, or a Wikibooks version of the Joy of Sex. If I set up a GoFundMe or the like, I suspect that many of the people who complain most about releases and such would not donate. This last DR was pretty explicit about how files should be deleted if someone thinks they could be done with less nudity.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:50, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
There's no need to go to such lengths. If you identified the content you think is missing or of poor quality, I am sure people would be willing to submit it for free. I will help publicize it. You are very wrong if you assume that I am a prude or trying to remove all sexual content from Commons. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 04:06, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Oppose strongly, but also: has anyone considered that may of those "users who do nothing but upload other people's sexual content" are likely to be socks of rather active accounts, who (for reasons that should be painfully obvious from the above) would rather not have their work related to sexuality connected to their other work? - Jmabel ! talk 01:02, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

If it matters to you at all, I wasn't calling for a vote, but a discussion. I don't know what you think it is you are opposing. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 03:58, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
I was opposing the proposals Alexis Jazz was sarcastically supporting above. - Jmabel ! talk 05:29, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  •  Oppose Commons host images for everyone to use. Not just Wikipedia. Images can be useful even if not in an article. A gallery or a category can be useful too. Wikipedia gives a link to Commons so users can go look. Somme should not delete photos or block users just because someone find a vagina, a penis or a boob a terrible thing. We should delete images if they are useless or they are copyvios. We do that all the time. First we try to talk to users who upload bad images and only if they continue we block. I think some use an alt to upload nudes so they don’t risk moral judgement from other users. --MGA73 (talk) 06:12, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • This is such a facepalm moment, when people completely forget what this project is for. Let me remind you, it is to serve as a host for potentially eduational media distributable under any of the available free licences or in public domain (ignoring GFDL fiasco). When people are saying something like "Personally, I see these users as treating Commons as their own personal image host." and do not follow it with "Which is a wonderful thing, because that is precisely what we were striving towards this whole time, for them to upload it here rather than somewhere else." we know that we have actually found somebody, whose contributions we don't really need in this community. And, although I agree with analysis of User:Fæ regarding the number of images that we need to appropriately represent sexual topics, but in this case it is not about that; the simple fact is we do not need any images on any topics. We want those images. Most of the photographs that I contribute to this project are of post offices, and although there are some interesting ones, most of them are very similar to one another. Is there a chance that we will get Wikipedia articles for them? No! Will I stop? Also no, I am actually planning some of my trips in the way where I can photograph them in remote areas. And I know, that once sexual media contributors get banned, other topics will start getting scrutinised. Fringe politics, minor hobbies, those who contribute from work, non-wikipedians, those who contribute without stating their legal name, etc. etc. etc. So, I, of course,  Oppose this. And propose that we strengthen our policy by adding a statement to Commons:What_Commons_is_not#Commons_is_not_your_personal_free_web_host stating that it can be your personal free web host if your contributions are in scope. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 06:59, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Totally off topic, but I object to the last. Matters of scope aside, there are some small but important differences between a repository like Commons and a private image host like Flickr. If you upload something to one of those hosts, it is clearly your stuff. You alone have control over content, descriptions, tags, meta data, and you can decide to delete your stuff at any point. If you upload the same content to Commons, you give up on all of that. Random people can and will edit anything including the file itself. They may decide to delete it or deny to delete things you'd rather see gone. Commons is not about "my stuff", it is not even about "our stuff", it's about "everyone's stuff". It certainly is possible to use commons like a web host if you know what you're doing. But that is not what we're aiming for, and suggesting Commons could be used as some sort of Flickr replacement by the average Joe would be highly misleading. --El Grafo (talk) 09:21, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
    • For the record, this had nothing to do with what I was talking about. Nothing in what I wrote suggested that people should have the right to delete anything that they want deleted. That is what we are trying to stop here. Yes, it is everybody's stuff, and thus is why banning a segment of users just because of the subject that they contribute should be disallowed. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 12:52, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Of course they are welcome! We want to collect to knowledge of the world and sexuality and the art and culture aground it is part of the world. I never saw discussion about users only upload images of trees. We should not make any difference.(Of course except possible issues with personality rights) That is my understanding of COM:NPOV. We can not say that some subjects have more strict rules then others because of societies and cultures where this subject is discountenanced there. --GPSLeo (talk) 10:47, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Sexuality is part of the sum of human knowledge. As said before, some accounts specialise in stamps, some specialise in coins, some specialise on a particular artist. I don't appreciate when self-described "smut fighters" take it upon themselves to make end runs around COM:CENSOR. And for the record, I also dislike false analogies between a user attempting to prevent discredited pseudoscience from receiving an authoritative voice on Commons (they also didn't call for censorship) and users calling for censorship by various means (and yes, too many Tower Bridge pics would be more pressing than too many pics of human sexuality). Abzeronow (talk) 16:38, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
    Sounds like you are talking about a certain someone I know.
  •  Oppose per GPSleo. Please stop censoring Commons by wikilawyering and gaming the system. Those who upload sexual content are still contributors. The images we have on Wikimedia projects are mostly volunteer made, they are contributions< not a set of personal images. Of course very low quality images can be deleted per COM:PORN. Masum Reza📞 18:44, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I suggest folks consider this case closed. There are no constructive suggestions or actions here in relation to the mass DR or its targeted media. -- (talk) 12:24, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Agree with its closure. This looks like a personal opinion of someone trying to impose on us and not well-thought. Not sure what is constructive about it. Masum Reza📞 18:44, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Actually it's a person trying to start a discussion, not impose anything on anyone. But it is clear that some people here prefer to argue about imaginary censorship rather than simply respond to the question I posed. World's Lamest Critic (talk) 19:06, 30 January 2020 (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.

Opinion of a native English speaker needed.

Please review description of tomorrow's POTD. --jdx Re: 19:19, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I added a couple commas, a "the" and corrected the address.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:54, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
I tweaked it a bit. - Jmabel ! talk 23:58, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Free photos

It is very likely that this is well known to regulars but on the slight chance that you haven't seen it: Paris Museums Put 60,000+ Historic Photos Online, Copyright-Free--Sphilbrick (talk) 15:58, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

One of the things I do here (and I'm sure many of you do similar things) is to try to clear cruft out of Category:Seattle and get them better categorized. I came across File:500px photo (71623297).jpeg in there. The only apparent relation to Seattle is that some 500px user titled it "Untitled [#Seattle]". As far as I can tell, they could as easily have titled it "Untitled [#lemonjello]" or "Untitled [#Porcupine]". Does something like this really belong somewhere under Category:Seattle just because "Seattle" was in its name? Does it belong on Commons at all? I mean, it's kind of pretty but I can't for the life of me think of an "educational" justification to keep a random art photograph by an unknown amateur. Or am I missing something? - Jmabel ! talk 01:01, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

@Jmabel: the 500px image page links to a user gallery titled "Seattle" featuring photos of the city, so that explains the hashtag and categorization. Based on its position in the gallery [5], I suspect it's a close-up of one of the pieces at Chihuly Garden and Glass. So, it *is* Seattle related, but it *is not* suitable for Commons because it's a photo of copyrighted art. My two cents. clpo13(talk) 01:10, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
But check out the gallery, he has some good photos that are a lot less obscure. Dankarl (talk) 01:12, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
Also, why did both the bot and its operator miss the photographer's id and list it as anonymous? Either I'm delusional or it showed as anonymous when I first looked at it, but the change is not in the history if it did.Dankarl (talk) 01:19, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
If it's a Chihuly, then it's copyrighted. - Jmabel ! talk 07:29, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Help with uploading to Commons

I would like to upload an old photo of 2 married Victorian artists. It would be titled 'Charles Stuart and Jane Maria Bowkett in their studio'. The wife died in 1891. Therefore 120 years after her death would be 2011. Therefore the image should be in the public domain. I prefer the following method of uploading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:File_Upload_Wizard rather than https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:UploadWizard. The first method has the disadvantage in that the file does not immediately upload at the first stage but seems to later when most of the subsequent details have been put in. Also Ogrebot seems to clean up any subsequent untidyness. The first option is easier to follow. I dislike the second option as, although the file is seen to upload immediately, the next stage continues with an arcane list of licence options from which it is difficult for an non-specialist to choose. Being presented with a series of unknown/unexpected questions is off-putting. Can they be seen in advance anywhere? Any help that would make the process go smoothly would be appreciated.BFP1 (talk) 15:17, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

@BFP1: I'm sure there's a better way, but when I want to see the list of options in the Upload Wizard, I just feed it a photo that I know isn't on Commons already (so it won't complain about a duplicate). The Upload Wizard doesn't actually put the picture into Commons until the very end, so as long as you stop before then it won't do anything that other users can see. Before that I think your files are in a kind of holding area called the "stash". --bjh21 (talk) 15:49, 31 January 2020 (UTC) That's a good idea Bjh21, as long as you don't get blocked part way through. ThanksBFP1 (talk) 16:36, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Funny thing. The “wizard” was created to avoid the offputting stuff, interesting that it seems to have failed its only mission. (I use Special:Upload for normal uploads, like all cool kids do; on top of its page there’s a very proeminent spam tag enticing the unaware to use the wizard instead. So chuckleworthy, so headshakeworthy. -- Tuválkin 16:05, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
That looks a possible more straightforward option Tuvalkin|. ThanksBFP1 (talk) 16:40, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

YouTube channels that uploads only freely licensed videos. Like NASA and The white house.

If you're aware of any channel that is trustworthy like government channels of democratic counties, and is not included in User:YouTubeReviewBot/Trusted, please add them. Do not add channels which have less than 1000 subscribers, they're usually not legit. Thanks for anykind of valuable inclusion in the list. -- Eatcha (talk) 17:10, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Be mindful that videos from such channels still have to be reviewed. The possibility always exists (and does happen, especially with NASA) that they may upload video produced by commercial entities or other governments. Huntster (t @ c) 19:54, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

King George's military maps

Any idea how soon we'll be categorizing these? Jim.henderson (talk) 23:41, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Flickr

If a photo is uploaded under Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication from Flickr, does it need to be Flickr Reviewed?--User19004 (talk) 02:35, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Because that not CC0 1.0 on flickr but Public domain mark which is not accepted on commons according Commons:Flickr files. --JuTa 05:05, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
@User19004: JuTa is certainly right about why some are deleted but "others" is probably too vague to specify a particular image and for anyone to tell you definitively why that image was deleted. Do you have an example (even in terms of who uploaded it and approximately when) for which you think JuTa's explanation doesn't fit? - Jmabel ! talk 05:09, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
Why are:
All pending review and based on File:2015_St_John's_Mummers_Parade.jpg likely getting deleted?--User19004 (talk) 05:42, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
I've taken the liberty of turning your mentions of files into proper links; if for some reason you really didn't want that to happen, revert me and I'll make separate convenience links. - Jmabel ! talk 16:32, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Date categorising photographs (and videos)

Hello, I have done my 5 minutes of work to help out with categorising and sorting photographs by date (mostly concentrating on countries that were untouched before, to avoid stepping on somebody's toes too much). I thought I would describe what I have done to bring some stuff to attention and maybe get some constructive comments on what to do better.

Here is how I envision we could lay it all out:

Level Global Template Local Template
Day Category:Photographs taken on 2020-01-29 {{Photographs taken on navbox|2020|01|29}} Category:Russia photographs taken on 2020-01-29 {{Russia photographs taken on navbox|2020|01|29}}
Month Category:January 2020 photographs {{PhotographsYearByMonth|2020|01}} Category:January 2020 Russia photographs {{countryphotomonthyear|Russia|2020|January}}
Year Category:2020 photographs {{PhotographsYear|202|0}} Category:2020 photographs of Russia {{countryphotoyear2|Russia|2020}}
Decade Category:2020s photographs {{PhotographsDecade|20|20|21st}} Category:2020s photographs of Russia {{countryphotodecade|Russia|202}}
Century Category:21st-century photographs Category:21st-century photographs of Russia {{countryphotocentury|Russia|21}}

There already existed two templates that categorised into this tree: {{taken on}} and {{according to Exif data}}. I have also made {{taken in}} conform to that, but it categorises into categories broader than day. I have also written User:Gone Postal/prefill.js, which fills out the template into the edit textbox when the appropriate category is opened for edit (but does not press submit).

Right now only the day categories are more or less standard, the funny part is that they all use different template, but the is little disagreement between them. Everything else is a mess of templates that do the same thing.

Of course, "the" countries (i.e. countries which start with "the") create difficulty (Category:January 2020 United Kingdom photographs is inside Category:2020 photographs of the United Kingdom). I believe an approach can be to create {{country article}} which would add articles to countries that need them when they are used as a noun in a phrase.

Any better ideas? ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 12:46, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's worth doing this right now - Commons:Structured Data should mean that you can just run queries to find the different sets of photos when the project is a bit further along. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 14:07, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Mike Peel, it would be really super if you stopped spamming each and every discussion about Commons categorization with a plug to your pet project. If structured data is so great, go work on it and leave us to work on the category tree. -- Tuválkin 15:31, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
@Mike Peel: Even if and when the Structured data project is further along, how does one "just run queries"? CSD seems like a pet project championed by (and tailored to) a small group of programmers and not the general user of Commons. Everything on Commons:Structured data seems to involve how the user can feed the beast, not how the beast can serve the user. If I volunteer my time to add a million captions and "depicts" statements, how do I or other users efficiently reap the benefits? --Animalparty (talk) 21:22, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
@Tuvalkin and Animalparty: SDC isn't a 'pet project' (and it's definitely not mine!), it's a fundamental rewrite of the MediaWiki code that Commons runs on. A key part of it is that you can search for relevant content using queries - such as "photos taken on this day". The software doesn't seem to be quite there yet (https://sdcquery.wmflabs.org/ exists but doesn't seem to be operational yet), but you can look at example Wikidata queries at the query examples to see what would be possible here in the future. But don't mind me, I'm just getting on with things. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 22:06, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
Those links and examples are helpful, but the problem with "just run queries" is that it assumes one knows how to write the relevant code. SPARQL is a language not understood by casual media users. It's like saying "just clone the DNA" or "just build a machine" or "just translate the original Egyptian". Browsing Category:Greece in the 1990s is easier than learning Greek. Wikidata is certainly useful, but until Commons and Data fully recognizes its cognitive biases and becomes more user-friendly, the fruits of Wikidata/Structured Data will remain out of reach for most users. --Animalparty (talk) 22:27, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for the reasoned reply - I agree with you. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 22:39, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
@Animalparty: You’re right of course, and definitely something the few of us who learnt their way into Sparql should keep in mind. I think the future is not in everyone learning Sparql, but in having nice front-ends which write the underlying code for you. VizQuery is one example that helps writes queries ; Crotos or OpenArt Browser help browsing artworks in a (IMO) very pleasant way. I can well imagine such tools covering 99.9% of the cases.
(and yes, for the last complicated 0.1% one might need Sparql. For what it’s worth, I have done many many Sparql workshops in the past few years, and I must say, many people quickly grasp the basics − well enough to take an example query “depicts cats in 2002” and tweak it for their needs into “depicts dogs in 2016”).
Also, many discussions (not this one) around finding things in the category tree go “just do a Category intersection/deep category traversal” − using something like Petscan is not exactly something easy either − it can be learnt of course (just like Sparql ;-) but I’m not convinced the average Commons would find that easy :-).
(Regarding “the docs are about adding data, and not about the benefits” − I had not thought about it and I think that’s totally fair, thanks for pointing it out. We definitely need to improve the docs on that regard)
Cheers, Jean-Fred (talk) 23:28, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
@Animalparty: With regards to If I volunteer my time to add a million captions and "depicts" statements, how do I or other users efficiently reap the benefits?, there's a user preference to get autocomplete suggestions using structured data. When this is selected, depicts statements appear below the usual suggestions when using the Commons search box on the top right (left side if you use the MonoBook or Modern skins; it's the search box you get when you press Alt-Shift-F). Unfortunately, those suggestions don't appear to show up on Special:Search, and the actual search query syntax used when selecting a suggestion is pretty esoteric, but it's a start. clpo13(talk) 00:12, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
I am not sure if that was the point and you aware of it or not but there's now a duplicate category tree without the for (the) Czech Republic (see Category:2016 photographs of Czech Republic, Category:2016 photographs of the Czech Republic). With the risk of opening a can of worms, some parent categories contain Czechia. :)--TFerenczy (talk) 16:11, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Yeah, I have tried threading very carefully when it comes to the territory of the Czech Republic. Another thing that I have just noticed is that Indian contributors have chosen to create categories for days, and then to map them away from "photographs on" categories, however, they still had categories for photographs based on centuries. I would want to go and change that, but I don't even know a single contributor in that area. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 12:59, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • This is a really good idea, and concerning Mike Peel's comments, I really hope that Structured Data on Wikimedia Commons (SDC) will do this, but unfortunately SDC won't utilise the existing category infrastructure so having "a dual system" with bot structured Wikidata-like data and traditional MediaWiki categories should be preferred until Structured Data on Wikimedia Commons can create its own infrastructure (or until Wikidata will better integrate with Wikimedia Commons). These categories will make things better for copyright violation hunters and those who want to categorise images based on geography. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 19:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Here are some interesting things that I can report on:
    1. I have noticed that several countries, not just India have been doing something very strange thing when it comes to categorising photographs by month. Specifially they do not add country-photo-by-month category into country-photo-by-year, but rather directly into country-by-year. Russia also does something like that (how did I miss that?). So it is probably beneficial to create something along the lines of {{Country photographs taken on|country name}} which can take place of hundreds of individually created templates. For the most part it will be a direct substitution, but in some cases a little work will need to be done.
    2. One large reason why some countries might have not wanted to use generic approach is that multicontinent countries didn't work orrectly due to a bug in {{continentbycountry}} which stopped it from generating correct output for multicontinent countries. I have fixed that bug and it now works as expected.
    3. Another large problem is the "the". However, I have edited all the templates making use of {{country label with article}}, which uses already created by others {{country label}} (many thanks to Joshbaumgartner for their work on that useful template). Unfortunately, now that this has been added in the next few hours we will have tons of pages that get recategorised, and the category trees will need to be recreated. But that is life.
    4. I have noticed that there are some prolific photographers, who have created their own templates, which are used in place of {{information}}. See User:Voice of Clam/Information or User:A.Savin/Photo. Luckily most people, who bother to create their own templates are pedantic enough to also categorise their content so that it is easier to find. Thus it is something positive. (Thanks @Voice of Clam and A.Savin: and others).
    5. Many thanks to RudolphousBot, which is helping out in some of the categorisation. However, rather than adding {{taken on}} it is manually categorising pages. @Rudolphous:
    6. German users have started categorising their photographs into sub-country categories. Personally I believe that it is way too much, and will probably not use my energy to help out with that, but it is something that needs to be taken into account, in order to not start edit wars over a non-issue. I do think that adding cat=no and then categorising is silly (@XRay: ) but at the end of the day, it is a problem with current tools, such as Cat-A-Lot, which are not aware of {{taken on}}/{{taken in}}. So I do think that it is possible that there will be accidental stepping on each other's toes, but I am carefully avoiding most of the German subcategorisation for now.
    • Hoping to hear some more feedback, and maybe ideas on how to approach diverse communities. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 05:34, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
      • adding cat=no and then categorising is silly - interesting statement. I've seen a number of attempts with the date categories and categories in templates over the years. Sorry, but I don't think my way is silly. It's a result working with less complications. BTW: IMO it's not only Germany with deeper categories, it's for example the Netherlands too. I'm sometimes support a deeper level because of too much edits of other people forcing this kind of date categories, but I always support the "... taken on ..." categories. It should be accepted to do this without templates. -- There were a lot of discussions within the last years. There are some very eager users pushing the date categories. And not everyone takes part in discussions. --XRay talk 07:17, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
      • For your further research: Please have a look to following samples Category:Present-day Grand Est photographs taken on 2002-06-21 ("taken on" category on category level, files without "taken on", see template), Category:Fire at 111 Tonawanda Street, Buffalo, New York ("taken on" category on category level, files without "taken on") or Category:Spring Station, Lexington Road and Cannon's Lane, Louisville, Jefferson County, KY HABS (same), a lot of categories around the world made like the prior categories, search for "template: insource:/taken on/ -insource:/navbox/". Try to categorize hundreds of images at a level under "... taken on ..." in a subcategory without using Cat-A-Lot or HotCat or a batch task, just with editing the files. Have fun! --XRay talk 10:35, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
I recently categorized all the photos which I uploaded (several thousands) by country/day. In addition to the above, I found two more problem: (i) complete mess with Macedonia / Northern Macedonia; (ii) I had some photos of the Faroe Island, which is a country but not independent, it is part of the Kingdom of Denmark (but not part of Denmark in any conventional sense). I created the category tree for the Faroe Islands but added in the template the category for Denmark per day. It might be worthwhile to look at similar situations (Greenland, French Overseas Territories etc). --Ymblanter (talk) 10:33, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
Concerning Structured Commons, my understanding is that WMF is not funding it since 1 January 2020 (they funded it for two years, which are over), and the project is technically speaking closed. If any of us want to develop it further we need to do it in our volunteer time. I agree that it promised a lot (in particular, I hoped that it would replace the categories which became almost useless) but in the current state has a very limited usefulness.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Another little update, so that people know what is happening:
    • {{historical photographs of country|<country name>}} has been created to make it easier to generate categories for historical photographs. I also have forgotten to say last time that I have edited all the date templates to automatically categorise all the categories as historical once the time passes. So we have 19th and 20th century, then today decades 200 and 201 (i.e. 2000s and 2010s), year 2020 is not categorised since it is current (but comes january 2021 and it will be) and then months of a year become historical as soon as they are over. I have decided to stop at the level of the month, since that is already pushing it a little, very few people will consider yesterday's photoraphs "historical". While people may argue about months, but I think that it is something that can be reasonable in many contexts.
    • There is a problem with Ireland, because the name that is used by {{country label}} is Republic of Ireland (and I tend to agree that we need to distinguish between the country and the island). But currently the whole category tree is using "Ireland", I will probably need to take some time to sit down and methodically go through the whole thing, but that will not be within a couple of weeks (I will have a trip coming up and have some things that I need to do before then).
    • I have been actively going through categories which are needed but do not exist, having written a script that helps me to search out such categories. So far I am up to the letter N. And it does take a long time to check everything and then create all of this stuff. When I am finding deleted categories, I request their undeletion rather than recreating them from scratch, I find that it is a better approach, since I am very pedantic about preserving the whole history, and if recreated, then we lose the original creation pattern. I know that it may be silly, and if somebody recreates deleted categories, I am not complaining.
    • @Crazy1880: has contacted me on my talk page about helping out with linkage of the tree to Wikidata (please do not start trolling about it). I tend to agree that this needs to be done, but I have a couple of issues, which hopefully we can figure out:
      • Currently the custom at Wikidata was to mark "Date photograph in Country" entries as "Wikimedia category". This means that it will not be possible to simply write a script that generates the whole tree for dates in Wikidata and then once the category is created, it will be automatically linked to the category. The problem is that admins on Commons tend to delete the categories when they happen to be empty, even when they are categories related to date of the media, and are emptry only temporarily (hopefully). Does it make sense to have an entry for the category that is not here? If that is ok, then maybe I am overreacting.
      • @Crazy1880: has stated that they are willing to help out with automation. I am unsure if I'll be able to deal with it before my trip.
    • Overall I am quite surprised that my overhaul has not generated any negative backlash and generally some people are even helping out. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 06:54, 7 February 2020 (UTC)
And another thing to consider is videos. Today they are categorised only into their years. I have made {{videos from country by year}} for that, in line with the current naming convention for individual countries. I will still need to edit {{taken in}} so that it detects when it is applied to a video and does everything correctly. Eventually as video uploads increase we can create a parallel category tree for videos in months and days, but I would not want to do it today. Unless there will be sufficient demand for something like that. ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 06:55, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
Also we need to consider what to do with disputed territories, or non-recognised territories (Crimea, Hong Kong, Catalonia, etc). ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 06:55, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
  • We currently organise photos into images and then images into works, we also organise videos into works. The question then becomes, should we create a category between images and works, something like visual works which represent something that you can see (as opposed to audio) or is this something that is already too much? ℺ Gone Postal ( ) 19:55, 15 February 2020 (UTC)