This page is documenting a discussion about a policy or project proposal that was REJECTED by the community by a vote of 5-1-9. Any additional information may or may not be listed at the bottom of this page. THIS DISCUSSION IS NOW CLOSED, so please do not edit here. Thanks.

This page is for discussing a policy related to the Mass Effect Wiki that may or may not be passed by the community. The Form below serves to describe the Policy and what it is about, or what it will modify.

Policy: Putting a limit on personal images that are uploaded to the site.Edit

Other Notes Edit

Ok I know I've been a few references for this, but now it's official. There have been instances in the past were non-ME related images have surfaced, but most of them are deleted. Under this policy, people would be allowed to upload images for personal use, but only up to the limit.

A few of the rules that will govern this policy:

1. Images that are uploaded for personal use have to be uploaded with a summary along the lines of "This image is for the personal use of (Insert link to User Name here)."
   1. If uploading multiple images for this purpose, then the summaries can be added afterward.
   2. However, the images must be marked for personal use, otherwise they will be put up for deletion.
2. If a user goes over the limit, then they will be notified of it, and they will have to pick which images they want, and the one(s) that are not selected will be put up for deletion.
   1. If contact cannot be established or the user refuses to pick one, then the most recent image will be put up for deletion. Users are allowed seven total, no exceptions.
3. These images one uploaded, will be considered the property of the user that uploaded them, and if anyone wanted to use them on their own user space, they must have permission from the user that uploaded the image.
4. These images may not be put into articles unless they meet the guidelines for images being put into articles. If they do not meet the guidelines, they will be removed from the article.
5. If a user already has images that fall under this heading, then they will have to be modified to bring them up to this standard. This can be one by just adding the summary from point one above.

So if there are any questions, concerns, whatever comments you have, then please direct them below, and don't forget to vote.

Voting Edit

For Edit

1. As proposer. Lancer1289 20:27, June 12, 2011 (UTC)
2. Support. -- Commdor (Talk) 22:16, June 12, 2011 (UTC)
3. Support. Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem 23:10, June 12, 2011 (UTC)
4. Support, we can't have people uploading 20 Alice in wonderland photos again. Vault 815 23:10, June 12, 2011 (UTC)
5. Support --Morinth's Lover 09:09, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Neutral Edit

1. I'm not overly fussed--Bluegear93 16:13, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Against Edit

1. For two reasons, expressed below. SpartHawg948 05:52, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
2. Against - See below --Snicker 06:36, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
3. Against. The Illusive Man 08:09, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
4. Following SpartHawg's reasoning -- Dammej (talk) 12:15, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
5. Same here. I can't fully agree with it. --kiadony 13:17, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
6. After reviewing the proposal and the discussion, I'm against it. See Spart and Snicker's reasoning. Arbington 13:23, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
7. Against. -- Direct Control 18:29, June 13, 2011 (UTC)
8. For the same reasons below. — Teugene (Talk) 03:00, June 14, 2011 (UTC)
9. I now agree with kiadony. A.J. two 04:00, June 14, 2011 (UTC)

Discussion Edit

This is a very reasonable idea - just to make clear that this doesn't count for images being used in Sandbox pages, though, correct? --Snicker 21:16, June 12, 2011 (UTC)

Yes it does. You get seven personal images period. No more. Also your vote as of now isn't valid as you need to use a # before your vote. Sandbox pages are still part of your user space and as such, the limit applies. Lancer1289 21:27, June 12, 2011 (UTC)

I've fixed Snicker's vote so it displays properly. -- Commdor (Talk) 22:17, June 12, 2011 (UTC)

Does this policy only apply to images that are unrelated to Mass Effect or images in general on a userpage? The Illusive Man 01:07, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

This applies to all images. Any image that is uploaded for personal use, which includes ME and non-ME related images. If a low quality image is uploaded that is ME related, and not tagged for personal use, then it will be put up for deletion as any other images like it would be. Lancer1289 01:11, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

As I stated in my reply to the correspondence where this was first brought up, I'm opposed to point 3, namely that "These images one uploaded, will be considered the property of the user that uploaded them, and if anyone wanted to use them on their own user space, they must have permission from the user that uploaded the image." Images uploaded for personal reasons are fine. But saying that they can only be used by the uploader or persons who have received express consent strikes me as asinine. Other than that, I like the proposal, but point 3 is a deal-breaker for me. SpartHawg948 05:54, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Commdor, but I'm changing my vote to against, only because I feel that if you limit the sandbox, you prevent people from creating excellent site overhauls when they must use placeholder graphics or are working with sub-standard stuff that they are planning on replacing before making their page live. With ME3 coming out, I see a lot of sandbox usage in the future. --Snicker 06:38, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

A good point, to be sure. I was leery from the get-go of setting the bar too low on how many images are allowed. Originally, I proposed 10. That suggestion seems to have been discarded in favor of seven. And Snicker is right. Seven is too few. Ten should be the minimum considered, in light of Snicker's sandbox argument. SpartHawg948 06:42, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Spart: unless the images are protected by copyright and belong to the user, I see no reason that others wouldn't be able to use them. Also, a question - if an image contains inappropriate content, would it be deleted? --kiadony 06:44, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

I would assume so, but it isn't specified. Kiadony's comment leads me to another question - can we limit image use to the uploader and people who have received express consent from the uploader? And note, when I say "can we", I don't mean "should we". I literally mean "can we", as in: is it permitted for us to do so under Wikia policy? We (admins in particular) have learned lately that Wikia isn't too keen on people asserting any sort of ownership over images, due to the whole Creative Commons thing. I think that, even if this passes, we'd need to take it up with Wikia to see if it's even permissible for us to implement that part of the policy. We don't want to give the people who already bad-mouth this wiki to the Wikia staff more ammunition, do we? SpartHawg948 06:49, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

There are licensing options when uploading images to the Wiki such as "I took this photo myself" and "It's copyrighted, but the use is permitted by the copyright holder". But yeah, seems like we don't really have rights to disallow the image usage by others. However, people can add watermarks and suchlike to their pics. --kiadony 07:15, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

The answer to 'can we' is pretty much no. By uploading an image to the wiki, you're releasing your copyright on the image into the public domain (if it's yours to release in the first place), or you're asserting that its usage is allowed under the Fair Use clause of US copyright law. I am not a lawyer, but I don't think we (or the original uploader) would have any legal grounds to then go back on that license.

For my part, I think that any policy on images should really be 'no personal images'. And by that I mean, no images that are not related to the subject matter of this wiki, or which cannot be used in articles. The wiki isn't a hosting space. If you want images to be used on your user page, upload them to one of the billion image hosting services out there, then link to it! Mediawiki is smart enough to replace external links to images with the image itself, so it would work just the same. Then we don't have to mess with the bureaucratic headache of counting how many personal images someone has and then chastising them when they go over some arbitrary limit: You just remove images that aren't Mass Effect related, and keep those that are. Cut-and-dry. -- Dammej (talk) 12:15, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

I'd say, allow images with Shepard for personal space, since people may want to showcase their characters, and maybe fanart, but yeah, no completely unrelated images. As for the amount limitation, I agree that it should at least exclude sandboxes. --kiadony 13:15, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Wow lots of discussion, and I feel that I have to respond to a few things.

1. Sandbox Issue: First, the reason sandboxes aren't excluded is because what if someone created a sandbox page that was just an image gallery with thirty images? Since sandbox pages, which by definition could be anything with Sandbox in front of it, then they could keep all thirty images and there would be nothing we could do about it. That is why sandbox pages are not excluded under the policy, nor do I think they should be. Now if there was an article overhaul going on, my first question is why wouldn't you upload new images that are ME related for that? Article overhauls are handled through the Projects Forum and since the overhaul would be something that is on the wiki, I really don't see why the policy would apply there. The question asked above was vague and not clear so there was confusion. You need to be specific and asking if article overhauls, which end up in the projects forum was not asked, just sandbox pages in general is what was asked, and a sandbox image gallery with thirty images would be excluded under the policy and again, there would be nothing we could do about it. So sandbox pages for article overhauls are excluded as new images to replace old once for (insert reason here), is fine. However, sandboxes that are just image galleries will not be, this is why specific questions are needed. This also stems from research I did. I went looking around at other wikis, and there was one that stood out, but I cannot for the life of me find what it's name was. They had a similar policy, but it excluded the entire sandbox, meaning both the wiki's sandbox and personal sandboxes. So not one, not two, but three users created sandboxes as personal image galleries with fifty images. Now by the policy at that time, that was allowed, but one of the admins deleted them, so they went and complained to the b'crats, and the pages were restored, and the b'crat that did the restorations, also opened a page in their equitant of their policy forum to add the sandboxes to the policy, while excluding article overhauls and wiki improvement projects, which were determined by the b'crats and admins. Needless to say the sandboxes were taken down, but this is why the policy does not exclude sandboxes. However if it is an improvement project, then that is excluded, and from my experience with this, images are usually the last thing to be updated, usually right before a project page is opened. I can elaborate further on this issue if necessary and again, this is why specific questions need to be asked as under the policy if it excluded the sandboxes, someone could do the image gallery thing, and under the policy, there would be nothing we could do about it until another policy adding that exclusion to eliminate the images and pages.
2. Number of Images: The notes I have say one for five, one for ten, and two I don't have an opinion. So I split the difference and rounded down. If it is such a hang-up, then the policy can be modified to ten. When I did my research, I saw everything from three to fifteen, so I felt seven was a good middle ground. Again it can be raised to ten, and again I can elaborate if necessary.
3. Personal Property: This is one where it was two for, one neutral, and one opposed. However, there seem to be other issues attached to this, including things from Wikia, so that point can be removed.

If this looks like it took a while to write, please do note there is about a 40 minute travel time between my house and school in there. So thoughts and opinions on these modifications? Lancer1289 15:48, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Can't we just forbid creating galleries, as in, pages that contain images and little to no text? --kiadony 16:04, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

We could, but again this is the result of not being specific enough with a question. However, the decision about that on this should rest with the admins as someone could upload images for an article improvement project, and just not have the text in yet, and they intend to work on that afterwards. Lancer1289 16:10, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

I also noticed that there was no time limit posted, and that was another error. The time limit is the same for everything else, one week for the user to pick which images they want to keep, or for them to respond to a message about this from an admin. Lancer1289 16:20, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

(To a previous comment) So basically, if you see a person uploading images, you ask him/her about their goal, and if it's reasonable, you'll let them do what they're aiming for, right? Then maybe you could suggest that people always specify the purpose of the uploaded images in their summaries, at least when it clearly isn't for the articles. --kiadony 16:24, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

If they go over the limit, then yes we could leave a message. However, if they don't go over the limit, then there would be no reason to leave a message, and if an improvement project develops then the limit will be removed. However if it turns out to be just a sandbox of "here's my images and here's something about them", then the limit would be imposed. It would be nice if people always left summaries when uploading an image, but as we know that rarely happens, both with images and with article edit summaries. Making it a requirement to leave a summary would be a different matter entirely. Lancer1289 16:33, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I understand it now, and you'll specify it in a policy, right? I'm not against the idea of limiting the amount of images, so the only thing left is the personal use only issue, and once it's resolved, I'll revise my vote. Sure, I don't really like the idea of allowing literally any personal images (including photos of pets and/or kids) to be added, but I think I'll be able to live with it. --kiadony 16:44, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Yes it will be added once I hear some other opinions, and Spart's in particular as I seem to have agitated him, and I'd rather get that resolved. He should be on in a few hours. If I don't hear anything by the time my lab is done, in about three and a half hours, then I will add the time limit, remove point three, and add a point about sandbox image galleries, and how they are not allowed. Lancer1289 16:52, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and one other thing, I would add that images that are clearly for the purpose of vandalism, again at the discretion of the admin team, still retain the right to be deleted instantly and the user banned. Lancer1289 16:54, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Okay, but I'll leave in about an hour, until tomorrow (timezones, why do you ever exist?!). I hope the voting will still be ongoing. --kiadony 16:58, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

I doubt voting will close between now and then. Lancer1289 17:04, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Looks like this will be a tight one... right now it's 6-6-1, so it's a dead heat at this point. My view of this is that user pages should only have a select amount of images uploaded and posted for personal use. Even though the Sandbox issue bugs me a bit (I do believe it should have more flexibility rather than full out immunity from the change), you don't see Talk Pages having pics and User Pages typically feature one or two... any more would clutter the page.... The user who uploaded 20 Alice in Wonderland images reinforced my view... such an amount was not needed on the site. As long as photos uploaded to the wiki that aren't deemed for personal use don't fall under this proposed change, I'm maintaining my supporting vote. Just my $0.02. Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem 17:52, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Addendum: I feel however that point three should be extradited from the proposal, as most images uploaded are not for personal use and should not be deemed as user intellectual properties. Try to keep corporate practices off the site. Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem 17:56, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Just pointing out that if an image is uploaded and meets the quality for an article related image, then it is fine and not subject to this. Images that are ME related, that again meet the quality for standard images, but don't end up in articles, are not subject to this. Images that would fall under this policy are really non ME related images and things that would violate the MoS. This includes but is not limited to: fan art (if not tagged for personal use, then it is deleted), personal images of Shepard, personal images. These are the things subject to this policy, if an image is uploaded that meets the qualifications for including in an article, and even if it is removed from an article, it is not subject to the limit. Lancer1289 18:03, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

At least that's settled. Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem 18:14, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

After reading some of the new opinions added, I find myself in complete agreement with Dammej. What we need isn't a Byzantine policy where "If it's this kind of sandbox, it's covered If it's that kind, it isn't." and so forth. A cut-and-dried, black-and-white policy is, in my opinion, superior, and as Dammej also points out, images don't even need to be uploaded to be used. All we need to do is ban "personal" (i.e. non-Mass Effect-related) images, and people can link to their images. He also brings up another excellent point. How would we determine how many personal images each user actually has? Sure, they may link to them, making it easy, but they may not, or they may only link to some. The only practical way I'm seeing is to create a personal images category, perhaps even categories for personal images for each user, but even then, we'd be relying on people to add the images to the categories. We'd miss some. As such, this seems more and more like a big fancy boondoggle when there's a simple and imminently more workable solution right in front of us. SpartHawg948 19:31, June 13, 2011 (UTC)

Isn't this too much policing required for this? I'm thinking one of the reason for it because of an user posting non-ME images, which is more of an exception than the norm. The issue seems like a storm in a teacup. How many of us actually uses images in our user page? I prefer Dammej's suggestion better. — Teugene (Talk) 03:11, June 14, 2011 (UTC)

On another thought, not sure if I missed it among the discussions above, what about using official ME images in your own user page? — Teugene (Talk) 03:21, June 14, 2011 (UTC)

After reading through this, I don't think I can support it as you want it Lancer. I am not against trying to keep fan art and such off the wiki, but letting it but putting a limit on it isn't a good comprimise, IMO. A.J. two 04:00, June 14, 2011 (UTC)

I'd like to reiterate Sparthawg's comment above, from what Dammej said: "All we need to do is ban "personal" (i.e. non-Mass Effect-related) images, and people can link to their images." I think that solves the problem with the minimum of fuss. It gives a very clear-cut rule that can be fairly applied to all people without having to determine motivation (were they using it as a placeholder? Who knows?!). It eliminates any need for accounting, and gives you an instant answer to Malice in Wonderland. Simply put, it's an elegant solution. --Snicker 04:41, June 14, 2011 (UTC)