Wiktionary talk:Votes/pl-2018-04/Image policy

Rationale

New, added later: Make it clear there is an express agreement on having images both in English and non-English entries, and regulate certain cases that recently appeared in the mainspace and are being removed, including diff. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:05, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Old: The proposed section does almost nothing, admitted. Nonetheless, it lays ground for restrictions to be added later should we be able to formulate such restrictions. Furthermore, the vote will hopefully supply objective verifiable evidence that there is a broad support for images both in English and non-English entries, and the vote will be linked from CFI via the ref technique, as we do.

Why CFI: The possible future restrictions concern inclusion of images, not their format or placement. Therefore, CFI seems to be a fine place.

--Dan Polansky (talk) 09:20, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

I do think this is a matter of WT:EL.--Zcreator alt (talk) 12:30, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Does this section do anything at all? Does anyone want to add irrelevant pictures? Does anyone want to prohibit adding pictures to either English, non-English or lemma entries? What part of this proposal is controversial?__Gamren (talk) 15:13, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

The section codifies the common practice concerning images. It codifies what seems obvious to the English Wiktionary, but is controversial to the Czech Wiktionary; there, some people want to have no images at all, and some people want to have them in Czech entries only.

I recently removed an image I found only marginally relevant: diff. There are more images like that. The vote does not handle the case, though; it merely lays ground for future addition of regulation concerning the case. I think we will eventually need to provide at least counterexamples, examples of images that should be excluded.

--Dan Polansky (talk) 18:00, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Okay. I agree that the picture of Orwell was irrelevant, but that seems like something to be sorted out on a per-case basis. If you think you can prevent more irrelevant images from being added in the first place, though, that's fine.__Gamren (talk) 18:09, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

The case can be addressed by a regulation. The regulation can say: "Not any marginally relevant image should be included. For instance, the newspeak entry should not contain an image of George Orwell." People can come up with better text. This vote is only a stepping stone toward having that kind of regulation. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:37, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

It seems to me that the purpose of CFI is to govern which words (or word-like things) are allowed to have an entry and which ones aren't. So I agree with Zcreator alt that CFI is not the right place for the proposed section.

Also, this proposal strikes me as a solution in search of a problem. Have there been any disagreements or controversies about images in the past that would be addressed by this vote? If not, why bother with it? —Granger (talk · contribs) 21:30, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

For CFI vs. EL, I responded in #CFI vs. EL below.

Why bother: The vote is a stepping stone for addressing diff. It does not address it; it is only a stepping stone. In a response to Gamren above, I gave an example of a regulation, "Not any marginally relevant ...". --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:40, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

The issue with the newspeak photo seems to have been resolved easily—I don't think a policy change is needed to address it. As for the "stepping stone" concept, I don't see why that's necessary—if you want to add a substantive new policy, just start a vote to add that policy. Having another vote about an additional "stepping stone" policy seems like a waste of energy. —Granger (talk · contribs) 13:02, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

If it is a waste, it's a waste of my energy. People can read the proposal, see that it causes no problems and that it accurately describes the current practice, vote support, done. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:21, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Well, reading through the vote, thinking about it, voting on it, and implementing the results does take time. But I think what I'm really trying to get at is that in general we should avoid unnecessarily lengthening our policy pages, because the longer they are, the longer they take to read and the more overwhelming they feel to new users. So if we're going to implement a substantive policy change after this, let's just go ahead and have a vote about that instead of doubling the administrative load with an extra vote. If we don't implement a substantive policy change, then the effect of this vote is just to unnecessarily lengthen the policy page. —Granger (talk · contribs) 15:28, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

@Granger: I entered a specific regulation for images of people into the draft, in diff. The vote is no longer a mere stepping stone. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:13, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

I simplified the text further, in order to make sure the reader has to do as little reading as possible. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:17, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm now leaning "abstain" (or rather, I would be if this were about EL instead of CFI). I still question whether this is something we need a policy for, though. Someone added the image to newspeak and you removed it—problem solved. If this isn't an ongoing problem, why do we need the policy? —Granger (talk · contribs) 00:17, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Why vote: to have stronger evidence of consensus. Why policy to be placed into a policy page: while having more text to read is a burden, there is convenience for newcomers in having one place where to find what was agreed on. In the absence of policy, a newcomer has to go by the common practice, which is often inconsistent, and if it is consistent at one point, new editors wishing to try something new make it inconsistent. The newcomer has to do a research into a common practice; they have to extrapolate from examples. There is a balance between too little policy and too much. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:02, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

CFI vs. EL

I do realize that CFI is mainly about telling which entries should be included. However, CFI also says that the pages should not contain encyclopedic content; thus, it regulates what sort of content can be in definitions. The reason I picked CFI is the word inclusion. EL is about layout; it is about where to put things and under which headings, and what hierarchical order the headings should have. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:40, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I see what you mean about the section about encyclopedic content, but it's still about what kinds of entries Wiktionary has (dictionary entries rather than encyclopedia entries). WT:EL says that it "includes what sections are allowed and what contents are expected to be found in them", which seems like a better fit to me. Another alternative would be to create a new policy page specifically about images. Anyway, I don't think this proposal is necessary or useful, so unless I'm convinced otherwise I will probably oppose it no matter which policy page it's about. —Granger (talk · contribs) 13:02, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Let me ask: would you support a specific proposal that actually has an impact?

If more people think it should be in WT:EL and let us know, I can change the vote. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:19, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Above in a previous section, Zcreator alt thinks it should be in WT:EL. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:24, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I might support a proposal that actually has an impact, depending on what the impact is and which policy page is involved. —Granger (talk · contribs) 15:28, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I renamed the vote and changed it to specify no location. Instead, editors are asked to state the location. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:56, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

This quite clearly belongs in WT:EL. Let's not complicate the vote by requiring voters to specify extra information. --WikiTiki89 18:13, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Vote updated: we now have 3 people supporting WT:EL as the location. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:16, 25 April 2018 (UTC)