We are currently discussing an evolving image filter proposal on the Meta brainstorming page* that would give users the option of creating personal filter lists (PFL). The structure and interactivity of these personal filter lists would be comparable to those of editors' personal watchlists.
The way this would work is that each project page would have an "Enable image filtering" entry in the side bar. Clicking on this would add a "Hide" button to each image displayed on the page. Clicking on "Hide" would then grey the image, and automatically add it to the user's personal filter list. Any image added to the PFL in this way would appear greyed on any subsequent visit to the page. It would also appear greyed on any other project page where it is included, and (given an SUL account) any page containing the image in any other Wikimedia project such as Commons itself – including Commons search result listings. In each case, the user would always retain the option of clicking on a "Show" button or the placeholder itself to reveal the picture again, and simultaneously remove it from their PFL. Of course, if they change their mind, they can add it right back again, by clicking on "Hide" again. It would work like adding/removing pages in one's watchlist. Apart from enabling users to hide images and add them to their PFL as they encounter them in surfing our projects, users would also be able to edit the PFL manually, just as it is possible to edit one's watchlist manually. In this way, they could add any image file or category they want to their PFL. They could also add filter lists precompiled for them by a third party. Such lists could be crowdsourced by people interested in filtering, according to whatever cultural criteria they choose. It became very clear during the discussions over the past few months that tagging files for the personal image filter, or creating image filter categories, was not something the community as a whole wanted to become involved in – partly because of the work involved, partly because of the arguments it would cause, and partly because it would not be possible to do this truly neutrally, given different cultural standards of offensiveness. Various people suggested that the Foundation do nothing, and leave the creation of image filters to third parties altogether. This proposal occupies a middle ground. The Foundation provides users with the software capability to create and maintain personal filter lists, just like it enables users to maintain watchlists, but it is then up to a separate crowdsourcing effort by those who want to have a filter to find ways of populating such lists. This is consistent with the overall Wikimedia crowdsourcing approach, and a natural extension of it. Even if this crowdsourcing effort should unexpectedly fail to take off, readers will still gain the possibility of hiding images or media as they come across them with a single click, with the assurance that they won't ever see them again anywhere on our projects unless they really want to. That in itself would be a net gain. Users who don't want to have anything to do with filtering at all could switch any related screen furniture off in their preferences, to retain the same surfing experience they have now. Under this proposal, the entire informational infrastructure for filtering would reside in readers' personal filter lists. The data structure of the wiki itself does not change at all, just like adding pages to a personal watchlist affects no one apart from the user whose watchlist it is. There are no filter tags, no specially created filter categories, and no one has to worry about defining, creating or maintaining them. The filter users do that for themselves. For unregistered users, their PFL could be stored in a cookie. However, they would be encouraged to create an SUL account when they first enable image filtering, so they can retain the same surfing experience even after changing computers, or after accidentally deleting the cookie. Andreas * http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Controversial_content/Brainstorming#Page-specific_.22images_off.22_button _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l