Commons:Village pump/Proposals/Archive/2014/09

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Proposed criterion - unused out of scope pages by users with no cross-wiki contributions

I posted a discussion at Commons talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Proposed criterion - unused out of scope pages by users with no cross-wiki contributions. Apparently the page doesn't have any eyeballs because I received no response in the last 29 hours. Discussion there would be appreciated. Magog the Ogre (talk) (contribs) 21:47, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

"In other projects" sidebar

(Moved from Commons:Administrators' noticeboard)

A new "In other projects" sidebar will be going live as a beta feature on Wikipedia, Wikisource and Wikiquote in eight days time.

As it stands, it will only link categories to categories, and articles to galleries.

However, I have asked the developer to show links to both Commons categories and Commons galleries in the sidebar, for both Wikipedia articles and Wikipedia categories. This should be fairly possible using Wikidata properties Commons category (P373) and Commons gallery (P935), rather than the default direct sitelinks (which have to be more limited, as described at Commons:Wikidata/Commons-Wikidata sitelinks).

Update: I've pinged User:Lydia Pintscher (WMDE), who she says she needs to speak to User:Daniel Kinzler (WMDE), the technical lead developer for Wikidata, when he's back in the office on Wednesday (27), to see whether this would cause any other technical issues or complications. It's something that Wikinews are also very interested, because they would like an wiki article to link to a category of stories about a subject, rather than an individual story. Then they will see how it goes from there. Jheald (talk) 14:05, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
Update 2: Lydia and Daniel have now talked. Apparently, there are technical issues, but "It should be doable. It'll definitely not be pretty from the technical side but ok... It'll probably take a bit to get it done." Jheald (talk) 22:00, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Can we have a quick show of hands to confirm that this is what we would like? Jheald (talk) 14:00, 18 August 2014 (UTC)


Implementation details are probably best left to User:Tpt, who's the one actually writing the code. However, two possible advantages to d:Property:P373 and d:Property:P935 might be (i) their definition is precisedly the property we're interested; (ii) they are defined for both article pages and category pages, so no "if" statements would be needed; whereas d:Property:P301 is typically only defined for articles and d:Property:P910 typically only defined for categories. But really, as Commons users, it's the desirability of the functionality that we're qualified to talk about; the implementation details I think we should trust to User:Tpt's judegement. Jheald (talk) 18:53, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
True. But on the other hand, if galleries were more visible, then more people might visit them and update them. Jheald (talk) 13:59, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
  •  Support Of course. Yann (talk) 06:41, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
  •  Support Usable connection between related Commons categories and Wikipedia articles of identic item had to be one of the first things which had to be thought-out before formation of the Wikidata structure. However, every surrogate tool which help to patch this basal defect is welcomed. Galleries should be not symmetricaly linked to articles because they are not equivalents of articles (they are not designed to be unique for item), galleries are rather equivalents of files. However, I would welcome a tool which would enable to link related articles (through Wikidata item) from a file page or from a gallery page. --ŠJů (talk) 17:56, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

Strengthen license verification for UploadWizard uploads

Split to own section.

The verification tag set by UploadWizard can be easily faked, until this bug is resolved we can't enable this tool. I pinged Fabrice for a Statement, see above. --Steinsplitter (talk) 14:56, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

I have submitted a change that will classify any subsequent uploads using {{FlickrByUploadWizard}}. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 18:54, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
What matters in the end is how reliable an information we offer to reusers. Do reusers really trust manual reviewers and bots of unknown code more than an extension in version control? Isn't it better when the responsibility is "outsourced" to MediaWiki rather than taken on Commons' shoulders, even if we're confident we can do better? Bugs are IMHO more likely a source of errors than abuse. If JS is an issue, just make the check PHP side? --Nemo 19:05, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
Bot's code is open source on toolslabs. --Steinsplitter (talk) 19:09, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
Even if you check the license php-side, you need to put the source+license somewhere that can't be spoofed (e.g. a tag or through an account that is driven by an extension, like FuzzyBot. What's not working is an edit summary or file description content because that can be set to arbitrary values by scripts using the API. -- Rillke(q?) 21:44, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Seconds in metadata section

Though file metadata have times registered in seconds, the Metadata section at file pages displays only hours and minutes. I think, it cannot be difficult to display seconds too?

If two images have a difference 1 minute of the time when the photo was taken, it can mean a real difference from ca 0.5 second to 119.5 seconds. That can represent 0 to 200 meters of pedestrian walking or up to several kilometers of vehicle ride. More exact data would be helpful for identification where the photo can be taken, from the sequence of photos. --ŠJů (talk) 18:08, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

It depends on your date preferences in Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering. The default doesn't show seconds, but if you switch to iso 8601 (The 5th choice) it will show the seconds. Bawolff (talk) 18:49, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Show the de facto situation for maps

I want to propose to make a rule to only show the de facto situation on maps regarding laws and location. This issue mainly came up because of the disputed Crimean peninsula. Crimea is de facto a part of Russia and follows Russian laws, Russian time and uses Russian currency. Some users choose to represent Crimea on maps as a follower of Ukrainian law due to the position of the UN, which is simply incorrect as it follows Russian law. Showing Crimea as a part of Ukraine in maps regarding law isn't only incorrect it's also an act of POV pushing as there are 15 countries and a few partially recognized states which recognize Crimea as part of Russia. Some users also choose to show Crimea as an integral part of Ukraine on location maps rather than choosing an NPOV position and showing it as a disputed region. Crimea isn't the only problem with not showing the de facto situation for maps regarding law and location as there are some breakaway regions which have significantly different laws than the country they broke away from. Despite that fact some users still choose to show them as followers of the laws of their original country which is incorrect. Showing the de facto situation is the only NPOV decision as there is no absolute de jure position that all countries agree with, and picking one side is POV pushing. --Leftcry (talk) 18:11, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

Every POV is POV. The NPOV principle supposes that all relevant POVs should be described. Thus, all maps are in scope - those depicting legal status as well those depicting a view of the occupier or invader. 40 years of East Germany state would be a better example because it was de facto recognized but legally controversial. Occupation or sovereignty which is recognized by nobody but the occupier or the self-proclaimed body has less relevancy than the commonly recognized status - but should be also depicted and described. --ŠJů (talk) 18:34, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

Leftcry -- It was decided long ago that wherever there's a legitimate dispute or point of contention, images embodying all the different points of view can be uploaded to Commons, whereupon it's up to each of the individual language Wikipedias to choose which images to use in articles. It's simply not Commons' role to make this choice for the Wikipedias, or to try to act as some kind of pre-filter. Of course, this does not apply in cases where there is not a legitimate dispute, and intentionally hoaxing images can be immediately zapped. AnonMoos (talk) 07:25, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Maps are controversial and one person's correct is another person's heresy. It is well known that if a mainstream western magazine such as The Economist publishes a map of India, it must omit it from the edition sold in India, because the Indian government looks on its borders differently from mainstream western publications. Since none of us want or, indeed, could be the judge of your de facto, we have our current policy. While it makes many people unhappy, at least it makes both sides of such disputes equally unhappy. .     Jim . . . . (Jameslwoodward) (talk to me) 14:09, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

License reviewer's noticeboard

Currently License Reviewers request other reviewers/admins' attention via AN, but I would like to propose a dedicated noticeboard for license reviewers. In this way, we could get attention of LRs, backlog notice or request for second eye on an image would be much easier. — revi^ 15:15, 13 September 2014 (UTC)(Fixed few words: — revi^ 02:54, 14 September 2014 (UTC))

 Support, good idea!    FDMS  4    17:12, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support --Krd 17:49, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 Why not? --Steinsplitter (talk) 17:51, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support good idea. Green Giant (talk) 18:59, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support. Allan J. Aguilar (Ralgis) 13:27, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
 Comment Why not just have users add Category:License review needed to the file? That will eliminate a step. To make it even easier, we might create {{License review needed}}, which would put the image into the category. .     Jim . . . . (Jameslwoodward) (talk to me) 14:15, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
Doesn't that template already exist at Category:License review needed? Green Giant (talk) 15:04, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
@Green Giant: I fixed the template to show its name.
@Jameslwoodward: I'm not proposing to change the way we review them. I'm just proposing to add a noticeboard to tell there is backlog, someone say "Can you have a look at [Image]? I'm not sure what to do..." or something that needs reviewers' attention. For example, see CAT:FLICKR, and you can see +800 files waiting for review. We can use noticeboard to tell reviewers to help reviewing them. And at COM:AN, Natuur12 was asking for help about some LR waiting images at License review needed. — revi^ 16:13, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
But I don't understand why you think we need a notice board when anyone who wants to review licenses can go to the category and do it. A notice board just adds an additional step to the process. .     Jim . . . . (Jameslwoodward) (talk to me) 16:52, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Watermark

Although this is started as a DR, now many people suggested "rewording" (or deprecating) as a solution too. So I hope this can be considered as a proposal too. Please keep all the comments on that DR. (as a single place) :) Jee 13:03, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

Activate Flickr option in current UploadWizard to all users

Upload wizard with "Share images from Flickr" button

Recently I noticed that "Share images from Flickr" button available in Special:UploadWizard is not activated for all users. According to Commons:Upload_tools it is restricted to admins and image reviewers only. I found this tool to be the easiest way to upload images from flickr and I think we should encourage its use (by documenting it for example) by all users, instead of forcing them to do it by hand or use other tools, like flickr2commons, Flinfo, F2ComButton, etc. which are available to all users. Other tools should stay but I find Special:UploadWizard interface to be the most friendly and I do not see a reason why regular users should use non-standard tools. --Jarekt (talk) 14:02, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

 Support in general but  Oppose for technical reasons: 1) OPS has not agreed yet, AFAIK, 2) AFAIK, the verification tag set by UploadWizard can be easily faked. The feature - as currently restricted to a group that can be probably trusted not to fake these tags - gives at least some certainty about the uploaded work's licensing information. -- Rillke(q?) 14:27, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
At Wikimania I talked to @GDubuc (WMF): about this. It seems there is less of a technical blocker than I thought. Gilles, would you confirm/weigh in on the technical aspects of this? Jean-Fred (talk) 14:31, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
Ping: @Fabrice Florin (WMF): ^^ --Steinsplitter (talk) 14:01, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
I don't see any technical blockers. Some development work might be required, but it's small. I'm not familiar with the verification tag, but I imagine we can make that configurable (i.e. it could be turned off for regular users, turned on for trusted users, etc.). I doubt that Ops would disagree to opening that feature to everyone, given that a subset of users already has access to it. It'd just be a matter of informing them so that they keep an eye on server load.--GDubuc (WMF) (talk) 05:43, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
FWIW I  Support the principle of easing Flickr uploads, but  Oppose doing it in UploadWizard - I think we're aiming to have a separate tool for Flickr transfers sometime within the next year or so, pending some better technical infrastructure surrounding front-end uploading. --MarkTraceur (talk) 14:43, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support I don't understand why this was not enable a long time ago. IMO we would get better metadata if users upload images from Flickr this way, rather than manually and copy paste description, license, etc. Regards, Yann (talk) 06:39, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
Per rillke.  Oppose for now because the verification tag set by UploadWizard can be easily faked. --Steinsplitter (talk) 08:31, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support There should be a well-supported, well-documented tool for uploading Flickr images. The current state of things is less than ideal, because Bryan's tool was decommissioned, and although Magnus's tool is pretty good, it isn't adequately publicized, and the user interface can be a little intimidating for first time users. (And even though I've used it a lot, I still manage to click on the wrong button by accident fairly often.) Whenever the issue comes up, the official answer seems to be "We have great support in Upload Wizard... but you can't use it", which isn't a very helpful answer. If you're not going to enable it in Upload Wizard, then you need to better maintain and document the existing tools. --Ppelleti (talk) 12:44, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
A big +1 to this comment. It's very frustrating for me to see resources being allocated to work on tools such as MediaViewer (which nobody asked for) rather than improving upload tools (which plenty of people have asked for). --MZMcBride (talk) 13:58, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
Note, Commons:Upload Wizard feedback#WMF plans for 2014-15. --Nemo 14:06, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
+1. We've only been waiting for fear of abuse, but I don't think the risk is so high, or rather it's low enough that we can give it a try and restrict it again if needed. Given the assassination of Toolserver by WMF, the first concern should be the necessity to compensate the decrease in functionality. --Nemo 14:06, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support If we suddenly get a dinosaur sized pile of Flickr-powered-fertilizer, it will be easy to spot and we can switch it off again until better safeguards are in place. I favour proceeding with good faith towards contributors, unless the process gives demonstrably sucky results, it seems the nice thing to do. As a licence reviewer, I actually had no idea this was not standard already, I am sure I have told people that this was available during editathons (oops). --Fæ (talk) 14:28, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
 Support Excellent feature, only has one or two 'bed bug' (misspelling intended), have used it for over 10 months now, its actually more reliable than Magnus tool with only 2 problems being unable to upload more than 50 images at a time and editing of description can freeze and kill browser..excellent for small/limited uploads and is spot on on licences so I'm not sure how this feature can be abused..--Stemoc 14:32, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
On that page, Darkweasel94 makes the suggestion that Upload Wizard should just tag the photo with {{Flickrreview}}, just as FlickrToCommons does. I didn't see an argument on that page for why that shouldn't be done. So why hasn't it been done? That would solve this problem fairly easily. --Ppelleti (talk) 00:57, 21 September 2014 (UTC)
  • Thanks for pinging me.  Oppose as long as UploadWizard works the way it does now. Flickr2Commons has the advantage that it even has a double license review: the fact that the upload log entry is tagged with something like "OAuth Uploader", and the fact that it will be reviewed by FlickrreviewR. UploadWizard actually has no license review at all as the check for a compatible license is done on the client side, not the server side (as was pointed out by Zhuyifei1999 in the aforementioned discussion), and it doesn't have a distinctive tag that can't be faked; and of course it doesn't use a flickrreview template but something that, in essence, the original uploader themselves adds. The license check should be migrated to the server side, UW Flickr uploads should have a distinctive tag that can't be faked on the client side, and it should add a {{Flickrreview}} template instead of the template it adds now. Then we can do this. Not before – the current UW leaves way too little evidence (and I mean that in a legal sense: evidence usable in a court) behind that the file was actually under a compatible license. darkweasel94 07:36, 21 September 2014 (UTC)

Socialize Wikimedia Commons

Hi! I would like to share with you a draft I have just submitted for an IEG. I would like to write a report on the differences between Wikimedia Commons and the most famous social media platforms to understand why, while many people is used to share lots of multimedia items on-line everyday, just a small amount of them consider uploading them into Wikimedia Commons or even is aware of the possibility of doing so. Just to note that the number of items in Commons is currently less than 10% of the items that are shared in a single day using these platforms. I hope that you agree that, even taking into account those that are not educational, this imbalance represents a great deal that could be formally addressed. Feedback and endorsements would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a lot! --Jey86 (talk) 17:03, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

That "G" in "IEG" strands for "grant", I guess, right? As in, a fraction of the money the WMF gets from donations, is that so? -- Tuválkin ✉ 21:07, 18 September 2014 (UTC)
As in, the money growing on trees, is that so ? Pyb (talk) 22:56, 18 September 2014 (UTC)
Very helpful, thank you. Let me reciprocate: The extra space you typed before the question mark, well, it should have been typed after the wiki-text colon instead. -- Tuválkin ✉ 12:41, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
Quote from Meta: IEG = "Individual Engagement Grants support Wikimedians to complete projects that benefit the Wikimedia movement. Our focus is on experimentation for online impact. We fund individuals or small teams to organize, build, create, research or facilitate something that enhances the work of Wikimedia’s volunteers." --Túrelio (talk) 09:46, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for the clarification. -- Tuválkin ✉ 12:41, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

Your proposal seems to take it as a given that if being more social-media-like would result in more files that are realistically useful for an educational purpose, then it would be a good thing to be more like social media. I'm not sure that necessarily follows. I think there's a lot more to what makes commons special than just "It has lots of cool files", even if that's arguably the most important parts. I think such a report, in order to be useful would have to not only consider what is to be gained by following in the footsteps of social media giants, but also what is to be lost. The situation is complex, and well there may certainly be a lot we could gain from looking to others, it's important to look at it from both prespectives (imo). Bawolff (talk) 17:09, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

I also have a thing or two to say about (against, really) this project. But better centralize that in the relevant talk page. -- Tuválkin ✉ 19:30, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
I agree that it is a complex issue. And I find it interesting to open the debate and have someone takeing note of ideas and draw the conclusions in a systematic way. --Dvdgmz (talk) 07:57, 23 September 2014 (UTC)
Hi Bawolff I will try to answer your concerns in the talk page. Thanks for your feedback. --Jey86 (talk) 11:33, 23 September 2014 (UTC)
See meta:Grants talk:IEG/Socialize Wikimedia Commons#most_results_of_this_extremely_expensive_report_might_be_foreseeable. This looks to me like wasting 4600 Euros for nothing, therefore i  Oppose this. Money should be spended for important software improvements but not for such things. --Steinsplitter (talk) 12:02, 25 September 2014 (UTC)
I posted a comment on COM:VP so that moor users can see the IEG thing. --Steinsplitter (talk) 12:23, 25 September 2014 (UTC)
Checkmark This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. Steinsplitter (talk) 12:23, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Disambig/Redir excluded from "Unused categories"

Would it be possible to exclude disambig and redir pages from Unused categories? Currently most (almost all) hits are not unused ctgr, but disambig & redir ctgr. It would be much easier to control unused ctgr, if this would be possible. Regards, --Klemen Kocjančič (Pogovor - Quick response) 11:26, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

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