Hi all, Do content policies still get discussed on this list? I'm a bit out of touch.
Anyway, I seem to keep running afoul of the "image use policy". Several galleries that I've added to articles have been removed. (And see this response to my second attempt to gallerise one article: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Stevage&action=edit§ion=236 ) The key parts of the policy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:IG#Image_galleries) are: * "Articles consisting entirely or primarily of galleries are discouraged, as the Commons is intended for such collections of images." -- it's not clear whether this includes articles that currently lack text (as opposed to articles that could never be much more than a gallery) * "However, Wikipedia is not an image repository. A gallery is not a tool to shoehorn images into an article, and a gallery consisting of an indiscriminate collection of images of the article subject should generally either be improved in accordance with the above paragraph or moved to Wikimedia Commons." -- It's not clear what "moving...a gallery...to Wikimedia Commons" means. It sounds like this was intended for cases where the images existed only in Wikipedia itself, rather than being linked from Commons. On the other hand: * "The images in the gallery collectively must have encyclopedic value and add to the reader's understanding of the subject. Images in a gallery should be suitably captioned to explain their relevance both to the article subject and to the theme of the gallery" So, here's my thinking in response to the above: 1) "Wikipedia is not for images, Commons is for images" is just bad logic. Commons is a dumping ground for *all* images. Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, and should illustrate its articles with as many or as few images as appropriate. (It's not like duplicated storage is a problem.) 2) The Commons links are incredibly obscure, and I don't think the average punter ever sees or visits them. It's like telling someone to ring the hotline for more information - they just don't. The link doesn't give any indication whether there are 2 images on Commons on 200. 3) Galleries let you illustrate a much wider range of the subject matter than by simply placing images in the margins. For example, in the contentious [[Lamington National Park]], we could illustrate all the waterfalls, most of the important flora, fauna, and geological features. 4) An image of captioned animals under a section entitled "fauna" (and likewise for flora etc) seems perfectly in keeping with the guideline under ("on the other hand") above. Thoughts? Comments? Am I on the fringe? Are guidelines like this still subject to debate and change? Steve _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
