Draft of Image Policy for Discussion

[cordelia_v]

As Meri commented in an earlier post, we've been working on several projects in committee, and we're far enough along now to ask for your input on a few things. Today, I wanted to ask you to read and comment on a draft of our new Image Policy, which we've posted for discussion on Fanlore.



There are several areas we needed to develop clearer guidelines for, but we decided to make the image policy an earlier priority because some of you had expressed concern (rightly!) that Fanlore had no policy regarding explicit images, including those which might be triggering or offensive (or illegal to view) for some users.

It's only a matter of time before someone uploaded an image of Fenrir/Draco chan noncon fanart, mean to say. And while we'll host any art that is legal for us to host, we want to make it possible for those who find such images disturbing to avoid seeing them.

Once we started working on it, we realized that an image policy needed to address not only explicit/possibly offensive images, but also questions about uploading copyrighted images, fair use, and images that were being uploaded with the consent of the artist. So, the policy also covers all of those questions as well.

The draft we've posted to Fanlore has been vetted by the OTW's legal committee, and also relies heavily on Wikipedia's robust set of image policies. When you check it out, you'll see that it's pretty long and detailed, but please don't be put off by that!

We're going to post a link on the Editing Help and Tutorial pages to a much more streamlined "Cliffnotes" version of this policy, that contains links to get users started who don't need to read the whole policy, but just want answers to questions like: what templates should I use for art that has explicit images? or what templates do we use for images that are copyrighted or how can I filter out or avoid images that I might find disturbing?. But before we create the short version, we needed to get the full policy approved and in place.

We also wanted to ask your input on a question that is still open: how should we define "high res" and "low res" images in these guidelines? Images can be high res if they're uploaded with permission of the creator, or are in the public domain, or licensed for free distribution by their creator. But copyrighted images must be uploaded in low res, thumbnail versions in order to comply with standards for "fair use." We have our own ideas about what size a thumbnail image is, but we wanted your input about how you'd define "high res" and "low res" images for Fanlore.

OK, now that the intro is out of the way, here's the link to the full draft of the image policy. We wanted to leave this open for discussion until April 30th, and then we'll revise the policy to reflect the discussion and post a final draft to Fanlore.

ETA: a list of the various threads developing in this discussion

1. Some commenters asked whether we planned to recommend deleting already uploaded images that don't fit this policy, and my answer was no, although we hope that eventually new image summaries might be added for uploaded images that currently have little or no information. Some commenters pointed out that we do have some pages with explicit images on Fanlore already, and I responded that we'd set up a page for people to post links to explicit images that are already on the site, so that over time, those images pages could be edited to include the appropriate warning template. See the discussion here.

2. One commenter raised the question of images that might appear to be non-con taken alone, but which actually depict a consensual act in a story; you'd need to read the story to see that, and the image taken on its own would seem to be noncon. Clarification added to note that images should be categorized as explicit, non con, etc. based on what they appear to depict here.

3. One commenter made the suggestion that some images are NSFW while still not meeting the definition of explicit given in the policy. This person suggested that editors should include a note at the top of the article that it included NSFW images further down (so that they could choose not to scroll down, if they were at work), although such images wouldn't require the use of any explicit images templates.

4. There is discussion starting here about what category images depicting BDSM would fall into. The consensus seems to be that such images are possibly "explicit" but do not fall into the category of "non con," although commenters acknowledged that some readers would feel that BDSM was inherently non con. The consensus is that we should add a warning to the policy for such users, warning them that if they click through to "explicit" images, they may see images depicting BDSM.

5. A few commenters made the suggestion that we could add a warning category for extreme violence (where no sexual activity is involved) which strikes me a good suggestion, and I'll take it back to the committee.

6. There is a discussion here about why the policy addresses issues of copyright and asks for copyright tags in image summaries. Some commenters wondered whether it was necessary to include a discussion of copyrighted images in the policy.

7. There is a discussion thread here about one commenter's suggestion that instead of using warning categories and templates for explicit images, that the site as a whole should just have a click-through warning that the site contains adult comment.

8. Clarification added here that the image template for linking to explicit images of all sorts would result in a thumbnail that has a colored border around it (color coding for warnings) and not a line through the thumbnail.

9. A suggestion here that we add an alt text field to the template, to make Fanlore more accessible. I agree.

10. A discussion here about just putting all explicit images on subpages in articles.


ETA 2: You've all contributed a lot here, in terms of pointing out some things that need to be added or clarified in the draft. But I've got to go tend to RL stuff, since I've been responding to comments now for seven hours with very few breaks! I'll respond to any new comments tomorrow or later in the weekend.

Comments

[morgandawn]

my thinking on high res/low res - anything that falls under the 150 kb mark should be fine. It is not the size of the image that should govern but the resolution (ability to make prints/copies). In most cases the actual pages show only thumbnails anyway, with the option to click to see greater detail (very important for the sight impaired or those who are older and are having problems with small print/images). It seems from the wording that Fanlore is thinking of adopting a policy of only allowing thumbnails too small to see the art/cover details.

Also, will the image changes be made retroactive - will Fanlore be deleting any image that does not fit the new guidelines. We were able to obtain a lot of fanzine cover scans from ebay sellers and website under certain guidelines (ex proper credit, size constraints etc). In two cases we obtained over 2000 images - if Fanlore adopts a policy that conflicts, then the committee will need to identify and remove all the images. Or re-negotiate. Come to think of it, most of the Star Wars and Star trek fanzine cover falls into these areas.

[damned_colonial]

I suspect the thumbnailing decision is based on a well known case involving Google Images, where the courts found that thumbnails linking to the image's site of origin were fair use. I don't know the exact details of the case but I know it affects me at my dayjob too, and my employer's decision was to allow images up to 150x150 but no larger as fair use. I imagine the OTW's legal team are following a similar chain of reasoning.

[cordelia_v]

Size does matter, as they say. :-) But there's a long checklist according to which courts evaluate whether or not the use of a copyrighted image is "fair use." Just as important as size, according to the Legal Comm folks we consulted, is that the copyrighted image is being used in some context in a discussion: e.g., you're using an image of Snape or Draco to illustrate a particular approach to depicting that character, etc.

[cordelia_v]

We were thinking about a 150 KB size for low res, too. A copyrighted image is evaluated in terms of being "fair use" according to several criteria, and size is only one of them. Just as important, according to the Legal Comm folks we consulted, is that the copyrighted image is being used in some context in a discussion: e.g., you're using an image of Snape or Draco to illustrate a particular approach to depicting that character, etc.

If the image is under a license for free use, or uploaded with the permission of the creator, etc., then it can be uploaded in high res size.

We had no plans at all to delete images that didn't fit the guidelines. Rather, we wanted these to apply to images uploaded in the future, and we hoped that as folks had time, that they/we would go back and flesh out the image summaries on older images, so that they contained the information (and copyright tags) suggested in the policy. It would take a long time to bring all the images already on Fanlore into compliance, certainly, but we wouldn't want to delete any that are already there.

As far as any of the comm members know, there are no images on Fanlore currently that need warnings, but of course we can't be sure. Our priority, in terms of editing image pages already on the site, would be to encourage gardeners and other editors to change the image templates and image summary templates for explicit images that we find or know about on Fanlore in order to bring them into compliance (which would thus produce the warnings that would then appear in the articles that link to these explicit images).

If we obtained fanzine cover scans under agreements that allowed a larger res, then of course we'd want to keep them at the larger size. Going back and editing the image summary template for those fanzine covers would be a much lower priority, sounds like, since they already do have information crediting the source, etc., on their image pages.

[ratcreature]

As far as any of the comm members know, there are no images on Fanlore currently that need warnings, but of course we can't be sure.

There are quite a lot that are sexually explicit but not non-con/underage.

There are some that are possibly non-con in the sense of that sexual slavery is depicted, but these are usually not that graphic. I'm not entirely sure how that is considered on the "sexual assault" scale, because usually the picture itself does not show how the moment the character is assaulted, this is usually more a "naked in chains" kind of thing, but of course depending on your view the whole state of affairs in those stories can be seen an ongoing sexual assault.
Examples are the pictures on this page:
http://fanlore.org/wiki/Boys_in_Chains (obviously NSFW)

As for underage, we do have scan of TPM that is described as chan eg:
http://fanlore.org/wiki/Beginnings_%28Star_Wars:_TPM_zine%29
Some of the images on that page definitely have Obi-Wan fairly child-like even for manga-style as far as I can judge that, and not over 18. I'd point to the second image of the first gallery on that page. I mean, whatever Qui-Gon does to him there is sort of covered by the robe's cloth, but that is a naked kid that is fondled my a much older adult as far as I can see from the thumbnail.

So yeah, we do have images like that in the wiki now.

[ratcreature]

So all already uploaded images need to have this copyright info added? There are over ten thousand or so images uploaded by now. Will we have a volunteer drive or something to go through them? This would have been much easier (well with less backlog anyways) if this legal stuff had been laid out in 2008. *sigh*

That aside, I'm a bit confused about what to put into copyright thing for zine covers. I mean, that guideline talks about books with ISBNs and what not as sources, but I don't know how to transfer that to zines. Does a zine cover copyright belong to the artist or the publisher? And what if we know neither, but only info like the title and from which zine seller we got the scanned image?

And I understood this right that for example a website or ebay seller or some such where you obtained a cover scan would not be a "source" but info about the zine regardless of where the scan comes from?

[cordelia_v]

Well, in theory we'd love to have the new image summaries added to the image pages that are already on Fanlore (esp. if the image pages currently had no info at all on them about the source, creator, etc.). But we're realistic, and we realize that it might be a very long time before the gardeners or other editors had time or interest in going back and doing that.

But we wanted to have these guidelines to use, going forward, for new images uploaded to the site. We especially wanted to get these in place before someone uploads that hypothetical Fenrir/Draco chan noncon image . . . it's only a matter of time, we thought. And then someone else would see the image and be triggered by it, and we really don't want that to happen.

As far as any of the comm members know, there are no images on Fanlore currently that need warnings, but of course we can't be sure. Our priority, in terms of editing image pages already on the site, would be to encourage gardeners and other editors to change the image templates and image summary templates for explicit images that we find or know about on Fanlore in order to bring them into compliance (which would thus produce the warnings that would then appear in the articles that link to these explicit images).

Regarding your question about the copyright tag for zines. The zine cover copyright could belong to either the publisher or the artist, depending on the arrangement made between the two of them at the time the zine was published. You often can't know. But the image summary template asks you to put in either "the copyright holder of the image or URL of the web page the image came from," so if you don't know, you can put in the URL. A zine wouldn't normally have an ISBN, so you can't put that in, obviously. In general, if the information isn't known, then you can't put it in the image summary. You'll just have to put in the information that you DO have.

I'm not sure I understood the last part of your final question. If you got a zine cover image from a website, then that is the source you'd mention in the image summary, yes. Is that what you meant?

[ratcreature]

But in the policy draft you said: "Again, "source" refers to the source of the underlying image, not the source of the scan or digitization. This statement should be part of the image summary that you should include under the image itself, on the image page."

So if for example I come across a website from someone that is "The scanned covers of my fanzine collection" at an URL. The draft policy says that the source is not that website, because that website is the source of the scan, not the source of the image. Now you seem to say something different.

[frogspace.livejournal.com]

I really appreciate that there is finally going to be an image policy and putting this together must have been a lot of work, so I thank you for that. :) However, there is a lot here that probably needs to be changed to make it practicable.

For one, the policies are far too formal (and I don't mean the wording). Fanlore is not Wikipedia and yet you treat it as if it had to deal with the same kind of challenges. The problems we face here are of a different nature than in a professional wiki. We have zine covers, screenshots, banners from websites, online fanart, pictures people take of something they want to sell on ebay, etc. A lot of rules we need are actually the otherwise unwritten rules of fandom and not the ones that come out of court decisions. For example, how do we treat fanartists fairly? What's in the best interest of everyone involved? What kind of content should not be linked as a thumbnail and only as a text link? On all pages or only on those where one would not expect such content? etc.

Adding an image description and the source should be easy. All the other information and licenses? Not so much. My answers for most of the images would be don't know, don't know, I have no idea, where am I supposed to *get* that information?. :(

Whatever the final policy is going to be, I really hope we are not supposed to implement it retroactively because there is no way we can add these templates to the 10,000 images that have been uploaded to the wiki.

[cordelia_v]

You're right that the full version of this policy is somewhat formal. The shorter versions we'll link to off the help pages will be phrased in a way that we hope are more accessible and immediately useful for editors. But we do need a full version of the policy that is formal enough to provide guidelines that could stand up to potential court challenges by copyright holders (although certainly we hope that never actually happens!).

Implementing these guidelines retroactively? In theory we'd love to have the new image summaries added to the image pages that are already on Fanlore (esp. if the image pages currently had no info at all on them about the source, creator, etc.). But we're realistic, and we realize that it might be a very long time before the gardeners or other editors had time or interest in going back and doing that.

And some of the information that a really complete image summary has is really hard to find out, as you point out, and might not be available to editors going back later to try to retrofit the image summary on to the already uploaded images. So it's probably not even possible in some cases, even if we had a lot of volunteers who wanted to take that on.

In general, if the information isn't known, then you can't put it in the image summary. You'll just have to put in the information that you DO have. If you have no idea whether an image is under copyright, then it would be safest to assume that it IS a copyrighted image, in most cases, and just upload a low res version.

But we wanted to have these guidelines to use, going forward, for new images uploaded to the site. We especially wanted to get these in place before someone uploads that hypothetical Fenrir/Draco chan noncon image . . . it's only a matter of time, we thought. And then someone else would see the image and be triggered by it, and we really don't want that to happen.

As far as any of the comm members know, there are no images on Fanlore currently that need warnings, but of course we can't be sure. Our priority, in terms of editing image pages already on the site, would be to encourage gardeners and other editors to change the image templates and image summary templates for explicit images that we find or know about on Fanlore in order to bring them into compliance (which would thus produce the warnings that would then appear in the articles that link to these explicit images).

You're right that we want to have guidelines that also acknowledge the norms of fandom, although I think that there is no set of "unwritten rules" that everyone would actually agree on. These guidelines try to treat fanartists fairly by saying that high res images of their work can't be uploaded unless the editor has the creator's permission.

The image templates that our comm members will design for explicit images are such that we think they can be linked in thumbnail form from any page, because they'll be very tiny, will have large red warning text below the thumbnail, and will (if I understood our Mediawiki guru correctly) have a red line running across the image in the thumbnail, so that no one could really make out any details. You'd have to click through to the image page to see anything more.

What is in the best interests of everyone involved is a broader question, and depends on the circumstances for each situation. But yes, we are and will be trying to keep considerations like that in mind, going forward.

[msilverstar]

ack, the threading is derailing this discussion: you have to repeat yourself so much it makes it hard to follow. I think you should answer the main questions in the post itself as ETAs, and include links in your comments.

[cordelia_v]

Ps: Reading over my (very long! Sorry!) response, I realized that I'd meant to invite you to expand on one part.

A lot of rules we need are actually the otherwise unwritten rules of fandom and not the ones that come out of court decisions.

I would say that we need to have guidelines that reflect the norms of fandom (which do vary from one fandom to the next, but I know what you're referring to) and rules that come out of court decisions, for example rules regarding "fair use" of copyrighted images that would stand up to a challenge.

But the rules that will pass muster with the Legal Comm are the ones that resemble Wikipedia, you're right. And we need the other sorts of guidelines that arise of fandom's practices and general expectations, too. So if you can think of any other sorts of questions we need to consider in the area of images, please do add them.

[ratcreature]

I think one issue for example is that complaints I've seen mentioned from artists on Talk pages so far were because the art was displayed too small and thus looked crappy.

So some fans may want to images showing their art on fanlore to be larger than very small, even if they do not want to release the art completely under some CC-like license, but the draft currently seems to set up only these two possiblities.

[mrs_potatohead]

I just want to say that I'm feeling really, really dejected right now. :-(

[frogspace.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

This is a draft! We are going to work it out. *hugs you some more*

[morgandawn]

me too. and I've heard from a few others who feel the same. one artist is wondering if she should just stop scanning her art altogether. I've told her to wait a few weeks, but she's so put off by the...bureaucratic maze (as she puts it).

[cordelia_v]

Adding a clarification to this: I went back and looked at the chat where the Mediawiki guru was explaining the templates she's going to design to me, and I was remembering it wrongly: she was going to design a thumbnail box for the images to appear on articles that had a red border, not a red line over the image. I do apologize for having gotten that wrong earlier, since it's clear that the second proposal is much more upsetting from an artist's standpoint.

msilverstar points out below that if we reduce the size of images that are warned for to 150 by 150 on the article page, that even that might be enough by itself to avoid upsetting users. We can test out what the images look like once the new templates are in place, and see if that's enough by itself.

[msilverstar]

Thumbnails handle a lot of the issues of explicitness: what is shocking at 1200 x 1600 is nearly invisible at 150 x 150.

[cordelia_v]

You may well be right. I think that as we design the templates, we'll need to test them and see whether anything else besides the small size and the warning text below it is needed.

RPS images and copyright

[msilverstar]

Most of RPS runs on images that are copyrighted by someone else. The big services seem to tolerate it mostly, but sometimes crack down. I'm pretty sure that thumbnails would be OK.

[mrs_potatohead]

Here's an idea: If a page has images that may be potentially troublesome for folks, then that page is made with those images on a subpage.

For instance, the first page (main page) a viewer sees is just text (or text with any benign images), with a note explaining the full page complete with images/all images, is on the subpage. That way no one will stumble across images they don't want to see, and she or he will have to take the step to click into the next page, which would be it's own disclaimer. In other words, there'd be a PG-rated page (the main page) and the R-rated page (the subpage).

Good things about it:
1. it works within the confines of the structure we already have -- doesn't need any fancy coding
2. it's just one click to get to the full page and avoids one having to click on each image. This is easier for the viewer and for the person entering the information
3. it's easy enough to go back and do it to an existing record, either entered a long time ago or by someone who doesn't understand the policy, or disagrees with what's a "troublesome" image
4. this subpage idea preserves what was entered, or should be entered, and allows an article to remain "as nature intended," you know, the whole censorship thing
5. A disclaimer coupled with the the extra click to the R-rated subpage should be enough to cover any issues about minors/triggering/illegal.
6. You can do it on an article by article basis. Keep in mind, the number of images we're talking about is really quite small

Bad things about it:
1. more work for people to set up and police
2 .the potential of being insulting to the fanwork creator
3. the potential of stifling, or being off-putting, to fanlore contributors
4. hurt feelings about all the usual stuff to numerous to mention here

[cordelia_v]

First off, I want to thank you for this suggestion. It's really an interesting idea and tries to strike a balance between the needs of contributors and readers, and I'm going to take it back to the committee for discussion. I'm not sure we'll want to go this way (because I'm not sure how well or consistently this would work in practice), but it's certainly worth discussing.

But that said, I do want to ask you to consider the ways in which the functions and expectations regarding an archive are being mapped on to a wiki here, in your "pros and cons" list. Fanlore is not an archive, and we can't approach it with the same expectations and assumptions as we would for the AO3. Readers use it differently than they do an archive, it runs on very different software than the AO3 does, and contributors occupy a different position than do fanwork creators who are uploading their work to the AO3.

this subpage idea preserves what was entered, or should be entered, and allows an article to remain "as nature intended," you know, the whole censorship thing

Fanlore is a wiki, and by definition anyone who creates a page there is accepting that it can and will be edited by other users later on. There is no "as nature intended" on a wiki page, although there is the expectation that a fanwork should remain as the artist/creator intended on an archive page. So, I have to respectfully disagree that editing an image summary template is "censorship" on a wiki, although I probably would see it as "censorhip" if some admin went in and did so for the warnings, etc. on an AO3 fanwork.

AO3 will eventually accept all sorts of fanworks, including art and vids, is my understanding. And there, page creators will have much more permanent control.

more work for people to set up and police

That is a problem, yes. The committee and gardeners just don't have the resources or time to police all image pages and how they're used in articles. Fanlore already has thousands of images uploaded, and the number (including those with explicit content) is only going to grow (I hope!).

We're trying to design a policy and user interface that is fairly simple and easy for contributors to use, that produces an end result that is reader-friendly, and which will pretty much function without the committee intervening or policing much at all!

Accessibility

[facetofcathy]

Since Fanlore does not have an accessibility policy, it is necessary to include accessibility in all policies.

If I understand this correctly this is the draft of the whole of the policy covering all aspects of images on fanlore.

There is nothing that I can see here about making the inclusion of alt text for images mandatory, or even strongly suggested. Many images on Fanlore now do not have any alt text and sometimes also do not include other text description in lieu of alt text. Is this something that should be covered here, or is that covered in the how to upload an image pages that don't yet exist? Is there a technical way to make an alt text field manditory? I believe it should be if it is not.

The section on Filtering out objectionable or upsetting images certainly seems to imply that the only reason someone might wish to not see images, all or only some of them, is due to content. There are accessibility reasons to want all images turned off, or all high-res images shown smaller or all images shown only as thumbnails. The section links to a wikipedia help page about filtering images and as near as I can tell, discusses filter capabilities that Fanlore doesn't have. Am I missing something? Is there a setting anywhere that would let me turn off all images? All I can find is a setting for the size of thumbnails and the images on the image page itself, no way to block images on pages in general. ETA: Okay, I read that wikipedia page more thoroughly, and I see that they are talking about using browser settings and editing "my Javascript page" (???) to change how images are shown. I see that they are also assuming that the only motivation for wishing to block images is due to content. This does not seem to be a very accessibility-friendly or user-friendly way to approach this.

As an aside, I really don't care for the wording used there: objectionable or upsetting. There's lots of very non-emotional reasons, reasons that don't cast any aspersions (intentional or not) on either the viewer or the creators/fans of images for wanting to filter those images. Some more neutral language there would be a good thing.

Re: Accessibility

[cordelia_v]

making the inclusion of alt text for images mandatory, or even strongly suggested.

This is a very good suggestion, and I'm actually ashamed that I didn't think of this myself (since I use alt text myself when I upload images on webpages I've designed in RL, duh).

I will ask Chris C., the Mediawiki power user who's designing the templates for this, if an alt text field can be made mandatory. Chris tells me that she can in fact set it up so that all images are turned off (if I understood her correctly---I'm going to ask her to read this). And you're right that we should add language to this that acknowledges that there are also non-emotional reasons for wanting to filter images.

[elf]

I know, coming in to this very late. Might not be relevant anymore.

We have our own ideas about what size a thumbnail image is, but we wanted your input about how you'd define "high res" and "low res" images for Fanlore.

IMO (not so humble, based on 10 yrs experience in digital imaging industries), high-res is 300dpi *at original size*; low-res is about 150 dpi and under. 72 or 90 dpi, good for screen viewing, are definitely low res; a 150 dpi letter-sized page can be perfectly readable if printed out as half-letter (and is readable at 150, just somewhat pixelated.)

The problem with DPI and filesize as standards:
DPI has to be connected to original image size (measurements, not filesize), or it's irrelevant. Most people who upload images may be working with default scanner or photo settings and that'll happen on its own; digital image techies (like, ahem, me) will be tinkering with every aspect of the numbers.

A letter-sized page is 2550x3300 pixels at 300dpi. Change it to 72 dpi without resampling, and it's ~34"x46"--at the same filesize. This happens to a lot of people accidentally when they're changing settings in images; how to set for resampling instead of just changing the DPI depends on what program they're using.

Filesize limits are a problem because color is *much* bigger than B&W; a letter-sized page at 200 dpi, bitonal instead of greyscale, in PNG, is less than 50kb. And that's high enough res to read comfortably on the screen, print out without too much hassle, and even OCR. (With errors. Good OCR starts at 300 dpi; great OCR takes 400 dpi.) By dropping to 125 dpi (screen readable, a bit pixelated), an 8-page story can fit in a 200kb PDF.

This is not likely to be a common problem situation; not many people understand the difference between RGB/grey and bitonal images, and modern scanners are set to scan to JPG by default. Most of the images people will want to upload will need to be greyscale or color anyway. But the committee should be aware of the differences--150 kb of bitonal is a *lot* more information than 150 kb of color/greyscale.

And someone should be available to resize/resample images if necessary, rather than just pulling them if they're too big. (I recommend the program Irfanview; it's free, open source & cross-platform. And it runs portably.) That part probably shouldn't be official policy, which likely needs to be "images that are too big get deleted," but it'd be nice if someone could fix them instead of deleting.

Another problem with the potential 150x150 pixel limit: it works for fanzines; it's awful for other types of art. I'm scanning a lot of filktape covers; I can pack a lot more of the original into 150 pixels than a fanzine cover can. (Hmm. Which reminds me. Should upload lots of the Fanlib protest icons at some point.) Any specific measurement limitations need to take into account the size of the original.