But it says there in the flag box that it's a reason. Oh, are you saying that this should't be the reason to flag this?
@zaregoto Well, I think this topic that Kikimaru linked should clear this up. albert made a little decision at then end of that topic and the TOS were edited afterwards.
@zaregoto Well, I think this topic that Kikimaru linked should clear this up. albert made a little decision at then end of that topic and the TOS were edited afterwards.
I see. Also, I wasn't the one who flagged it. My question does make it sound like it. I was just confused cause I remember seeing that it was a reason in the flag box.
Most of the art that annoys me on this site isn't readily encapsulated by 'not anime-related', so I'm going to start flagging things under the more easily understood standard of 'WWW'
A Western artist working in a Western style making fanart of a Western property.
If you remove one of these legs then most of the objections to 'not anime-related' disappear and, consequently, so do mine. I think most of you know that making 'quality' the only criteria for the site is wrong-headed. There needs to be a metric.
Most of the art that annoys me on this site isn't readily encapsulated by 'not anime-related', so I'm going to start flagging things under the more easily understood standard of 'WWW'
A Western artist working in a Western style making fanart of a Western property.
If you remove one of these legs then most of the objections to 'not anime-related' disappear and, consequently, so do mine. I think most of you know that making 'quality' the only criteria for the site is wrong-headed. There needs to be a metric.
Then say something in that topic that is linked here and re-awake the discussion that albert ended there. This way, you would create flagging and approving work (and I'm not someone who is against approving this kind of art).
Part of the problem is it's very hard to determine whether a work is western-styled or not. The source or origin isn't definitive for determining this. There are plenty of American artists who can mimic the Japanese anime style well. And there are plenty of Japanese artists who bear a closer resemblance to traditional Western artists.
I'm okay with variety as long as it exists in moderation. Furry/guro art is tolerated as long as people aren't flooding the site with it. I think we can probably take the same stance with respect to western art.
My perception as a user is that it isn't a problem (yet).
Specific policy guidelines:
Don't admonish people for flagging western art. It's borderline content and therefore some people will find it objectionable. Janitors should just use their own judgement whether it should exist on the site or not.
If you consider a work too far outside the curve to belong on the site, go ahead and flag it.
I think the current uploading rules are adequate since there's no specific ban on non-Japanese art. But I will modify it to clarify that western-styled art is accepted but subject to more scrutiny.
My opinions may change in the future if the ratio switches too far into the other direction.
Appeals put things back in the moderation queue. Appeals of things already in the moderation queue are pointless. All it would do is add one more line of text and consume your appeal.
Appeals put things back in the moderation queue. Appeals of things already in the moderation queue are pointless. All it would do is add one more line of text and consume your appeal.
This is not true, since I just went to the Appeal list but since I already approved this once, I don't think I'm not qualified to approve it a second time (although I still would do it) An appeal can still work this way and it doesn't put a post back in the queue.
boy did I get here on time...so I'm guessing this is one of the many shitstorms that happen on a daily to weekly basis in the vast universe of danbooru?
fei<(guess): I'm referring to the forum thing plus this comment section not the pic.
:/. So far we have 5 or 6 approvals of this post and it still should be treated like "off-topic"? But with no quality issues with this post otherwise? Because you know that western art is put to only higher scrutiny, but not to a hard ban.
:/. So far we have 5 or 6 approvals of this post and it still should be treated like "off-topic"? But with no quality issues with this post otherwise? Because you know that western art is put to only higher scrutiny, but not to a hard ban.
Seriously OFF TOPIC???? I've seen a lot of art in danbooru that isn't even anime related at all! So why do we even bother?
The art is great! (And those people deserves the deepest part of hell for DOOM to punch around too)
So, if I get this straight, Flandre5carlet, who previously appealed this post, took advantage of being promoted to re-approve it after it was deleted AGAIN, only to have it nearly immediately flagged once more?
I'm sorry, but to be honest, this is somewhere in between being the spearpoint of what constitutes "on topic" for Danbooru collides with just plain being a running gag.
So, if I get this straight, Flandre5carlet, who previously appealed this post, took advantage of being promoted to re-approve it after it was deleted AGAIN, only to have it nearly immediately flagged once more?
I'm sorry, but to be honest, this is somewhere in between being the spearpoint of what constitutes "on topic" for Danbooru collides with just plain being a running gag.
It seems that some people are just waiting for this to be undeleted. Maybe it was flagged by a moderator, but then I'd still say that "Off Topic" is not essentially a deletion. In this case, it is "Western" art and it is written in the ToS that those posts should be held to higher scrutiny (which makes sense for an anime-oriented image board). But this flagging history does only mention that it is off topic, but not the quality in any flag. It's a bit...well...a witch hunt.
I'd still say that "Off Topic" is not essentially a deletion. In this case, it is "Western" art and it is written in the ToS that those posts should be held to higher scrutiny (which makes sense for an anime-oriented image board).
Yes it is.
Otherwise, you're allowing for the Mona Lisa or other "great classical works" to be uploaded on Danbooru (and just insert whatever artworks are your favorite in for Mona Lisa if that doesn't clear "higher scrutiny" for you), which makes no sense on an anime-related image board.
The limits have to be set somewhere, and that's kind of an obvious place to set them. For as much hate as Aceofspudz attracted for trying to set some clear-cut, consistent rules that moderators and users could all abide by, I've never seen any remotely convincing argument against it. People just want there to be no real rules on Danbooru because they think that inconsistency and a lack of clarity will allow them to get their preferred crap on Danbooru while allowing them to be biased against someone else's crap.
No, it isn't. Read the ToS. We don't mention classic art here. That is a whole different thing, like post #2427331. This is NOT western art. And there is one very precise argument for them to be held to higher scrutiny: We will run into demarcation problems. Especially because western art was always uploaded to this page and it only became subject for higher scrutiny, but not for an ouright ban.
No, it isn't. Read the ToS. We don't mention classic art here. That is a whole different thing, like post #2427331. This is NOT western art. And there is one very precise argument for them to be held to higher scrutiny: We will run into demarcation problems. Especially because western art was always uploaded to this page and it only became subject for higher scrutiny, but not for an ouright ban.
How is it not Western art?
As Aceofspudz said, it's Western art style, with a Western subject, created by a Western artist and for that matter, for a Western audience without any intention of being viewed as anime or made for anime fans.
How is this some "whole different thing" from post #2427331 in any way other than genre? (In which case, your argument allows for Impressionist paintings, because you're only excluding Romantic-style paintings at that point...)
For that matter, what am I supposed to read in the ToS that disproves what I am saying? If anything, you may want to re-read it, since it goes out of its way to say that Western-style art is discouraged. Beyond that, since the argument being made was that the ToS should be changed to make a more explicit ban on Western-style art, how is saying "read the ToS" even material?
As Aceofspudz said, it's Western art style, with a Western subject, created by a Western artist and for that matter, for a Western audience without any intention of being viewed as anime or made for anime fans.
How is this some "whole different thing" from post #2427331 in any way other than genre? (In which case, your argument allows for Impressionist paintings, because you're only excluding Romantic-style paintings at that point...)
For that matter, what am I supposed to read in the ToS that disproves what I am saying? If anything, you may want to re-read it, since it goes out of its way to say that Western-style art is discouraged. Beyond that, since the argument being made was that the ToS should be changed to make a more explicit ban on Western-style art, how is saying "read the ToS" even material?
It also says that western art is put to higher scrutiny. That is clearly no hard ban and no sign for deletion. Otherwise you can go around and delete western styled fanart right now.
As Aceofspudz said, it's Western art style, with a Western subject, created by a Western artist and for that matter, for a Western audience without any intention of being viewed as anime or made for anime fans.
So how is this any different than other DOOM pieces that remain present on the website, aside from where the artist comes from? Much like I'm pretty sure I said in that topic when the discussion was ongoing, the origins of an artist should have no factor in whether a piece should be on topic or not. Western style and Western subject, regardless of where the artist comes from. And in that case, quite a number of Overwatch pictures for example should get the shaft.
Also, I didn't "take advantage" of anything, I reapproved a post that I felt should stay based on the reasons stated in my several months old appeal as well as what I said just now. I would have reapproved this piece had I been an approver then, and would have reapproved it now regardless of appealing it in the past or not.
If reapproving this picture is somehow overstepping my rights one way or another then I've made a mistake and I apologise, but I see no particular wrongdoing in my actions.
Taken advantage of approval right would be this scenario here: Two posts are getting flagged. One child post and the parent post. Now Janitor A approves the Child version, the other one was uploaded later by a Contributor. Then both versions are getting flagged. Now Janitor A can't re-approve the child version which gets deleted. But they approve the Parent post which was uploaded by a Contributor. That has happened before and was a partial reason for some demotions. Here, this is not the case. This post doesn't have any child version and Janitors can approve what they like. So Flande5carlet looked if this post could stay and decided "yes". That is not taking advantage of anything, but the creed of being Janitor.
EDIT I forgot the other scenario: This is when you have already approved one post. Your approval gets flagged, then re-approved and again flagged. Then, in my eyes, it's pretty bad if you again approve the post. That's also the reason why I'd never approve this post again, although I highly want that it stays :(.
This discussion I feel would just open up more issues on moderation, especially if this image is deleted.
How would an image such as post #2643396 treated? While it is drawn by a Japanese artist, it most certainly using western stylized art. Should parodies such as these all be scrutinized from now on?
This discussion I feel would just open up more issues on moderation, especially if this image is deleted.
How would an image such as post #2643396 treated? While it is drawn by a Japanese artist, it most certainly using western stylized art. Should parodies such as these all be scrutinized from now on?
The current cutoff line is summarized best in this flag reason: "WWW - Western style + western IP + western artist". The post is by a Japanese artist and contains a Japanese copyright, so it's considered on-topic.
This post fails all three relevance checks, and is of lower quality than posts deleted for similar reasons, like post #2427331. (I'm surprised no one's pointed out the overall smudginess and jpeg artifacts here, incidentally; it really hinders the picture.)
The current cutoff line is summarized best in this flag reason: "WWW - Western style + western IP + western artist".
And so then that makes it okay for, say, post #2424283 to stay, the single deciding factor being the artist's origin - even though there is virtually zero way to tell in the actual artwork whether that post is by a Japanese artist while this post is by a Western artist.
Much like I said earlier, I think that's bull. It's either Western art of Western franchise goes, or Western art of Western franchise stays. Artist origin should have absolutely nothing to do with it.
I don't think the WWW really is a good reason to delete this, and just sets a bad precedent. What about artist like Setz, whose art style is western, draws a lot of western IP, and is a western artist. Should all his non Japanese IP images be flagged because it fails to meet that criteria?
How would an image such as post #2643396 treated? While it is drawn by a Japanese artist, it most certainly using western stylized art. Should parodies such as these all be scrutinized from now on?
It's not simply a Powerpuff Girls fanart given that it incorporates Touhou characters so I think this work falls on the side of acceptability.
I disagree with feline lump's "WWW" criteria because of the "western artist" part. I don't think someone's racial background should have anything to do with the judgment. And how do you know someone is Asiatic, just because they post their content to Pixiv? We can't know someone is a Western artist unless we start sending them 23andme kits. And for that matter Western has never meant white Europeans, it's a cultural classification which if we were to use that meaning would already be wrapped up into the style W.
NWSiaCB said:
Otherwise, you're allowing for the Mona Lisa or other "great classical works" to be uploaded on Danbooru (and just insert whatever artworks are your favorite in for Mona Lisa if that doesn't clear "higher scrutiny" for you), which makes no sense on an anime-related image board.
This is precisely the matter I would have brought up if I didn't read through all the preceding comments. While I really wouldn't mind see Girl with a Pearl Earring posted here it strikes me as absurd we'd house classical artworks. If exceptional quality is the criteria set for letting some Western art here and we reject some of the finest works ever produced in the Western world over the Doom pic something doesn't square right. I think Western works should have a clear Eastern influence in them at the very least to be accepted, which the presently flagged work lacks.
All that being said, should we revive the thread on the forum rather than discuss in the comment here?
So how is this any different than other DOOM pieces that remain present on the website, aside from where the artist comes from? Much like I'm pretty sure I said in that topic when the discussion was ongoing, the origins of an artist should have no factor in whether a piece should be on topic or not. Western style and Western subject, regardless of where the artist comes from. And in that case, quite a number of Overwatch pictures for example should get the shaft.
Also, I didn't "take advantage" of anything, I reapproved a post that I felt should stay based on the reasons stated in my several months old appeal as well as what I said just now. I would have reapproved this piece had I been an approver then, and would have reapproved it now regardless of appealing it in the past or not.
If reapproving this picture is somehow overstepping my rights one way or another then I've made a mistake and I apologise, but I see no particular wrongdoing in my actions.
Well, let's look at a few other Doom images on Danbooru, just taking the three most recent as examples... post #2621222 - An anime-style 4koma featuring anime characters who meet the Doomguy as a joke post #2581620 - A reference to the Doom comic featuring a Pokemon character illustrated in anime style post #2524629 - An "animafication"/"perversion of canon" image of Doom.
Not that there aren't some that couldn't fall under the same scrutiny this image has, and I DEFINITELY believe a lot more of the Overwatch images need culling/shouldn't be so readily approved, but very broadly speaking, the difference here is that most images have something to do with anime, and this image - which was the Western audience promotional art for the game, and therefore never even pretended to have anything to do with anime - very clearly does not.
The fact of the matter is, there are clearly a few moderators that DO think Overwatch or any random Western computer game somehow counts as anime, but that's not exactly something most moderators agree with, hence there's argument over the issue, but those same few moderators keep approving clearly Western Overwatch art in spite of the disagreement of several other moderators.
Beyond that, when I said you "took advantage of being promoted," I didn't mean to imply abuse of the position, simply that you made use of the position. My comment was more one of how amusement at how easily this entire argument gets resurrected... as the argument seen here so clearly proves.
Pickie said:
I don't think the WWW really is a good reason to delete this, and just sets a bad precedent. What about artist like Setz, whose art style is western, draws a lot of western IP, and is a western artist. Should all his non Japanese IP images be flagged because it fails to meet that criteria?
On the contrary, the entire reason for this was because people were trying to use it to set a very GOOD precedent, one where there are some actually established criteria to set a consistent guideline for users to follow. (Remember how the number 1 complaint in the recent poll was "inconsistency in moderation?") This utter lack of consistent guidelines just turns everything into a contest of moderator egos.
In Setz's case, most of what I see of his work is with anime (or at least, Nintendo) IPs. (I also am not entirely sure Setz has a "Western" art style, either. It seems to be more of a very rough version of a hybrid style, and some of his works, like the Splatoon stuff, are basically just a more "sharp-edged" version of the official style.) If, ultimately, a few of one artist's original IP works are clipped, I don't think that's a terribly steep price to pay to actually bring about some clarity and consistency in moderation.
Provence said:
It also says that western art is put to higher scrutiny. That is clearly no hard ban and no sign for deletion. Otherwise you can go around and delete western styled fanart right now.
The fact that some moderators take "generally NOT approved" to mean "It's totally cool to approve everything gaiz!" is exactly the point of contention, here. The argument being made, once again, is that this narrow tolerance for non-anime art is being heavily abused to the point that the rules need to be clarified, and the best way to do so is to turn the ToS into having an outright ban on some standard that shows some things are clearly out of line.
sweetpeɐ said:
I disagree with feline lump's "WWW" criteria because of the "western artist" part. I don't think someone's racial background should have anything to do with the judgment. And how do you know someone is Asiatic, just because they post their content to Pixiv? We can't know someone is a Western artist unless we start sending them 23andme kits. And for that matter Western has never meant white Europeans, it's a cultural classification which if we were to use that meaning would already be wrapped up into the style W.
This is precisely the matter I would have brought up if I didn't read through all the preceding comments. While I really wouldn't mind see Girl with a Pearl Earring posted here it strikes me as absurd we'd house classical artworks. If exceptional quality is the criteria set for letting some Western art here and we reject some of the finest works ever produced in the Western world over the Doom pic something doesn't square right. I think Western works should have a clear Eastern influence in them at the very least to be accepted, which the presently flagged work lacks.
All that being said, should we revive the thread on the forum rather than discuss in the comment here?
And trying to separate out the "Western Artist" criteria was exactly the argument I made in the forums 5 months ago, but the only result of it was that when other people trying to argue for the "WWW" standard argued back with me, the status-quo faction just used the lack of a unified front against them as an excuse to quash all discussion so that they could keep the waters muddy. Having one extra rule that will probably be met when the other two are met, as well, isn't necessarily a significant detriment to the policy, regardless, and I think that "do they have a pixiv page filled with Japanese (Or Chinese/Korean/whatever) or a DeviantArt page in English?" is a sufficient standard for "Western", for however murky the actual name may be.
I'd only bring it back up in the forums again if you really want to try pushing for actual reform, which in turn means mustering support for a consistent standard that significantly outnumber the status quo faction. If it's just throwing in your two cents, there's no point reopening a forum thread that didn't go anywhere just to make it continue to go nowhere.
@NWSiaCB You seem to be way too hardline on the whole anti-"Western" thing.
That lacks any substantive argument.
Besides, considering as you literally don't care anymore, and are the prime abuser of this "loophole", perhaps you could stand to start paying attention to the line?
Besides, considering as you literally don't care anymore, and are the prime abuser of this "loophole", perhaps you could stand to start paying attention to the line?
1. Wow, way to bring up a line from 2 years ago. Classy. 2. There is no loophole. Western artists, copyrights & styles have been on Danbooru since its inception. You don't like it, go to Gelbooru.
I still don't see the hard ban. It is always about rules. And the rules mention that those posts should be put to higher scrutiny. That's what's written there. But I know that this is not the final phase of judging rules, because we also have always to look at the goal a rule is trying to achieve. And that is interpretation, because opinions will inevitably fall apart here and I think that this is more the problem here. We all can read the rules and say "Yeah, that's written". That is also why there was a Janitor who said that it's breaking the rules. The verb "believe" isn't there for fashion or because albert (or whoever) didn't find another word. It fits perfectly here. And then we discuss here if western art is absolutely disallowed or not to which I say: That should be up to the Janitor who is approving these posts. Now this is a bad argument in that case, because 6 or 7 Janitors have been objected. So what does this mean? This means that the flaggers have another thing in mind when they look at this post. But is this really alright if seven queue masters approved it before? I'd say yes, because that is how the flagging system works: If there is another user, then it gets flagged. It is pretty much the most democratic device we have on Danbooru. So we should ask what these approvals or flags would achieve. And here on this point I start to think that an approval is justified. That's where our thoughts of what Danbooru should be takes actions. I think that it should be as open as possible. That is why we have a higher scrutiny sentence paired with western art in the ToS. And sometimes western art might be too classical, even for me (which is why I mentioned this post above). That is too much for me. But here we still have something that is influenced by more fantasy: We have monsters which are clearly stylized and out hero in shining armor. That is in my eyes nothing compared to this classic post above. So this post definitely falls into a non-realistic part of Danbooru which is a good point for it, because cartoon but also anime doesn't really strive for realism. So that is how I seperate those posts from each other. We can have a talk about realism later, maybe. And while this post belongs to a western copyright, I don't really see anything that resembles cartoonish artworks, like Donald Duck or else. I mostly see here monsters, orcs and creatures you'd find in your typical JRPG like Xenoblade. The character himself looks...well, how a guy in full_armor looks like. So yeah, this rejection can't be based of the content of the image other than the copyright and that in my eyes is a fatal mistake, since it only diminishes the artistic variety of Danbooru within acceptable territory (imo). That is what this rule should express: Artistic variety to a certain extent. And this extent ends if there won't be one Janitor left to re-approve the post, either due to many flags or because there wasn't one to begin with. That's why I'd consider it as sad if a post gets "lost" because of these flags which don't even mention the quality. But that's how this rule is to be read in my eyes: Let the Janitors decide in the end and not "Let's keep Danbooru save from any western art under any circumstances". Because the latter will turn into witch hunting for certain posts, while the other sets a certain standard and no one will be afraid of posting one certain western art, because they know the Janitors will treat it fair in their point of views. This way, we only diminish these opinions but achieve fairly nothing.
1. Wow, way to bring up a line from 2 years ago. Classy. 2. There is no loophole. Western artists, copyrights & styles have been on Danbooru since its inception. You don't like it, go to Gelbooru.
I could come up with quotes from 7 years ago to 7 days ago, you have shown quite consistent behavior. The fact that that line is one of the few negative feedbacks that haven't been scrubbed from your record probably implies that even the admins that have been all-too-lenient on you feel the same.
Besides, your argument essentially amounts to telling the people charged with applying the rules (or guidelines as the case may be) that the rules shouldn't be applied... at least, when it comes to you. That is a farcical argument on its face. You don't even make any substantive arguments for why this should be, or any meaningful reason why it's limited to art style, you're simply complaining that any rules apply at all... and if that's the case... shouldn't YOU be the one going to Gelbooru? I mean, the simple fact that you bring it up implies you've have it said to you enough times it's ingrained in you by now...
Provence said:
I still don't see the hard ban. It is always about rules. And the rules mention that those posts should be put to higher scrutiny. That's what's written there. But I know that this is not the final phase of judging rules, because we also have always to look at the goal a rule is trying to achieve. And that is interpretation, because opinions will inevitably fall apart here and I think that this is more the problem here. We all can read the rules and say "Yeah, that's written". That is also why there was a Janitor who said that it's breaking the rules. The verb "believe" isn't there for fashion or because albert (or whoever) didn't find another word. It fits perfectly here. And then we discuss here if western art is absolutely disallowed or not to which I say: That should be up to the Janitor who is approving these posts. Now this is a bad argument in that case, because 6 or 7 Janitors have been objected. So what does this mean? This means that the flaggers have another thing in mind when they look at this post. But is this really alright if seven queue masters approved it before? I'd say yes, because that is how the flagging system works: If there is another user, then it gets flagged. It is pretty much the most democratic device we have on Danbooru. So we should ask what these approvals or flags would achieve. And here on this point I start to think that an approval is justified. That's where our thoughts of what Danbooru should be takes actions. I think that it should be as open as possible. That is why we have a higher scrutiny sentence paired with western art in the ToS. And sometimes western art might be too classical, even for me (which is why I mentioned this post above). That is too much for me. But here we still have something that is influenced by more fantasy: We have monsters which are clearly stylized and out hero in shining armor. That is in my eyes nothing compared to this classic post above. So this post definitely falls into a non-realistic part of Danbooru which is a good point for it, because cartoon but also anime doesn't really strive for realism. So that is how I seperate those posts from each other. We can have a talk about realism later, maybe. And while this post belongs to a western copyright, I don't really see anything that resembles cartoonish artworks, like Donald Duck or else. I mostly see here monsters, orcs and creatures you'd find in your typical JRPG like Xenoblade. The character himself looks...well, how a guy in full_armor looks like. So yeah, this rejection can't be based of the content of the image other than the copyright and that in my eyes is a fatal mistake, since it only diminishes the artistic variety of Danbooru within acceptable territory (imo). That is what this rule should express: Artistic variety to a certain extent. And this extent ends if there won't be one Janitor left to re-approve the post, either due to many flags or because there wasn't one to begin with. That's why I'd consider it as sad if a post gets "lost" because of these flags which don't even mention the quality. But that's how this rule is to be read in my eyes: Let the Janitors decide in the end and not "Let's keep Danbooru save from any western art under any circumstances". Because the latter will turn into witch hunting for certain posts, while the other sets a certain standard and no one will be afraid of posting one certain western art, because they know the Janitors will treat it fair in their point of views. This way, we only diminish these opinions but achieve fairly nothing.
OK, once again, I have to ask, "How is this different from post #2427331"? Because you haven't given that a clear answer. (And frankly, that image has clearly better quality.)
The best case that can be made for why the rules leave some wiggle room is that there are borderline cases when things can be anime-influenced art without really being anime style. (I.E. someone on DeviantArt influenced by anime but clearly taking some Western influences as well.) (Well, that or the inability of those responsible for the ToS to keep actual hard-line rules about anything...) Again, you're misconstruing the ToS if you think the section of the rules that says "we heavily discourage the following" can be read as "it's totally OK to upload tons of this stuff, gaiz!"
Beyond that, it again brings up the question many people in this thread and the forum thread have brought up - why NOT classical art? Doesn't denying classical art just as much "diminish the artistic variety of Danbooru"? Simply saying "too classical" is not a meaningful argument.
Danbooru's ToS explicitly states Danbooru prides itself in what it excludes. It explicitly contrasts Danbooru with Gelbooru based on that distinction, and how Kikimaru is so quick to use it as an insult shows the general attitude as to why Danbooru does this. Danbooru is an anime-related art site. JAV stuff was uploaded once, but was taken down because it was decided Danbooru should be an anime site, not just Pornhub with an admin that likes Japanese stuff in particular. Definitions are meaningful not in what they include, but by what they exclude. Danbooru is an anime-related image site only because it excludes non-anime art. If it did not, it wouldn't be an anime-related image site, just an generic image board. You, yourself, came to and stayed on Danbooru because it is a repository of anime images... because if you weren't looking for anime, you wouldn't look here.
The only thing this image being approved by a smaller number of moderators than have chosen not to approve this image means is that there isn't a consensus among moderators on this topic; that lack of consensus is what this whole argument is about. And consensus, as I've expressed in the forum thread, is best achieved by having a set of concrete rules guiding behavior, rather than the wishy-washy whims of a couple people. If you're holding up the flagging process as democratic in nature, then the fact that this image has been flagged so often, and so many people have argued against it probably holds at least as much meaning as that there have been some people defending it.
Besides which, even if the flags themselves don't mention quality, that doesn't change that the quality of this image can be judged separately, and people in this thread have mentioned it's really not that great in quality. Have you hit full zoom on this image, yet? You, yourself, have flagged images for less sloppy linework or "brushstrokes" than this, especially the background.
And even if deleted, this post is as "lost" as an approved post would be. It still sits in favorites and can be searched with just the addition of a single tag. Hell, being deleted seems to make it more visible, since it just makes the possibility of it rising from the grave to trigger this same argument once again a few more months down the line. Whether something is deleted or not shouldn't have to do with whether you want to keep the argument it sparked, that's not the purpose of moderation.
And if you claim that applying a certain set of rules that might require flagging older art is a "witch hunt"... well, what are all these anatomy flags you are either throwing or at least defending on older artworks? Does that argument not apply to those flags, as well? After all, bad anatomy is listed as "generally rejected," exactly the same way as Western artwork is listed as "generally rejected" under howto:Upload. Why is it fine to enforce that set of rules strictly, and not this one?
If you're simply sitting behind the judgement of individual janitors as criteria, then the fact that, again, these janitors' judgement is being contested by other janitors probably holds a lot more meaning. A *LOT* of Apollyon's uploads are being flagged recently, and you sure seem to be arguing for those flags, and Apollyon is a moderator, so you obviously don't think a moderator's judgement alone is inviolable, so why does this not extend to three or four moderators? How many grains of sand make an inviolable pile?
And that really brings me back to my main argument 5 months ago: The entire problem is that letting Janitors decide doesn't set a "certain standard", and only setting a certain standard by making a rule sets that standard.
Understood - sorry for wrongly taking offense to that particular formulation ("taking advantage of"), in that case.
I'd like for you to adress the particular post I brought up in a comment, though: post #2424283. There is virtually no difference in art style nor in source material between this post and that post. Neither is anime themed or inspired, both are of the same copyright, in a similar "western" style. Why should one stay solely based on the artist's origins? I'm all for having clearer guidelines, but implicating artists' origins in it is the absolute wrong way to go about it as far as I am concerned.
@NWSiaCB I have 2 negative feedbacks in all my time here. Nothing has been scrubbed, don't know how you could even come to that conclusion. And I'm telling you (or anyone else offended by these "Western" arts) to fuck off to Gelbooru, because their mods are xenophobic enough to cater to your Japan-only whims. Enjoy the Japanese furry art while you're there.
I'd like for you to adress the particular post I brought up in a comment, though: post #2424283. There is virtually no difference in art style nor in source material between this post and that post. Neither is anime themed or inspired, both are of the same copyright, in a similar "western" style. Why should one stay solely based on the artist's origins? I'm all for having clearer guidelines, but implicating artists' origins in it is the absolute wrong way to go about it as far as I am concerned.
The argument made for why we should allow "Eastern" artist's "Western" art is that, while any English-speaker can easily navigate DeviantArt, it's more difficult for them to browse Pixiv where everything uses Kanji or other unfamiliar alphabets. That is, English-speaking people come to Danbooru to see stuff they couldn't otherwise see just browsing DeviantArt.
That said, I do agree with your argument, and have argued it myself, but those who want to push for rules have to reach some sort of consensus among themselves if they're going to have something to push for, and having some rules is worth making a few compromises to get them. It's a relatively small number of edgecases that the carve-out of "Eastern" artists making "Western" art about "Western" subjects would include, regardless.
while any English-speaker can easily navigate DeviantArt, it's more difficult for them to browse Pixiv where everything uses Kanji or other unfamiliar alphabets.
that's not entirely true...the only language I speak is english and yet I use pixiv more then DA becouse its easier to run into other artists that would normally be buried under other, more greater, artists on other art sites such as DA.
You, yourself, came to and stayed on Danbooru because it is a repository of anime images... because if you weren't looking for anime, you wouldn't look here.
that's also not entirely true...I come to danbooru simply becouse its easier to browse for images here then it is on other art sites, image dumps & other boorus.
honestly NWSiaCB....I see you're point of view on this subject as selfish and small-minded...if danbooru started accepting western art wouldn't that make the site much more popular among a much larger audience then there is for an anime only image site?...catering to only one specific art style can only take this site so far before the time comes to start accepting something new...before its time for a change in perspective...to put it in your point of view...a sacrifice in order to secure the longevity of this site...sometimes you need to accept that which you don't want in order to continue enjoying that which you have gained...its a simple lesson of life...change needs to happen in all walks of life...its a part of evolution...and so...if the time has come for this site to accept change via broadening its horizons by accepting a new style of art into its art collection then so be it...let it happen...you either have that choice or else this site will eventually be replaced by some other, younger, booru as the most successful booru there is.
OK, once again, I have to ask, "How is this different from post #2427331"? Because you haven't given that a clear answer. (And frankly, that image has clearly better quality.)
The best case that can be made for why the rules leave some wiggle room is that there are borderline cases when things can be anime-influenced art without really being anime style. (I.E. someone on DeviantArt influenced by anime but clearly taking some Western influences as well.) (Well, that or the inability of those responsible for the ToS to keep actual hard-line rules about anything...) Again, you're misconstruing the ToS if you think the section of the rules that says "we heavily discourage the following" can be read as "it's totally OK to upload tons of this stuff, gaiz!"
Beyond that, it again brings up the question many people in this thread and the forum thread have brought up - why NOT classical art? Doesn't denying classical art just as much "diminish the artistic variety of Danbooru"? Simply saying "too classical" is not a meaningful argument.
Danbooru's ToS explicitly states Danbooru prides itself in what it excludes. It explicitly contrasts Danbooru with Gelbooru based on that distinction, and how Kikimaru is so quick to use it as an insult shows the general attitude as to why Danbooru does this. Danbooru is an anime-related art site. JAV stuff was uploaded once, but was taken down because it was decided Danbooru should be an anime site, not just Pornhub with an admin that likes Japanese stuff in particular. Definitions are meaningful not in what they include, but by what they exclude. Danbooru is an anime-related image site only because it excludes non-anime art. If it did not, it wouldn't be an anime-related image site, just an generic image board. You, yourself, came to and stayed on Danbooru because it is a repository of anime images... because if you weren't looking for anime, you wouldn't look here.
The only thing this image being approved by a smaller number of moderators than have chosen not to approve this image means is that there isn't a consensus among moderators on this topic; that lack of consensus is what this whole argument is about. And consensus, as I've expressed in the forum thread, is best achieved by having a set of concrete rules guiding behavior, rather than the wishy-washy whims of a couple people. If you're holding up the flagging process as democratic in nature, then the fact that this image has been flagged so often, and so many people have argued against it probably holds at least as much meaning as that there have been some people defending it.
Besides which, even if the flags themselves don't mention quality, that doesn't change that the quality of this image can be judged separately, and people in this thread have mentioned it's really not that great in quality. Have you hit full zoom on this image, yet? You, yourself, have flagged images for less sloppy linework or "brushstrokes" than this, especially the background.
And even if deleted, this post is as "lost" as an approved post would be. It still sits in favorites and can be searched with just the addition of a single tag. Hell, being deleted seems to make it more visible, since it just makes the possibility of it rising from the grave to trigger this same argument once again a few more months down the line. Whether something is deleted or not shouldn't have to do with whether you want to keep the argument it sparked, that's not the purpose of moderation.
And if you claim that applying a certain set of rules that might require flagging older art is a "witch hunt"... well, what are all these anatomy flags you are either throwing or at least defending on older artworks? Does that argument not apply to those flags, as well? After all, bad anatomy is listed as "generally rejected," exactly the same way as Western artwork is listed as "generally rejected" under howto:Upload. Why is it fine to enforce that set of rules strictly, and not this one?
If you're simply sitting behind the judgement of individual janitors as criteria, then the fact that, again, these janitors' judgement is being contested by other janitors probably holds a lot more meaning. A *LOT* of Apollyon's uploads are being flagged recently, and you sure seem to be arguing for those flags, and Apollyon is a moderator, so you obviously don't think a moderator's judgement alone is inviolable, so why does this not extend to three or four moderators? How many grains of sand make an inviolable pile?
And that really brings me back to my main argument 5 months ago: The entire problem is that letting Janitors decide doesn't set a "certain standard", and only setting a certain standard by making a rule sets that standard.
Please read the ToS correctly (once again). I might even quote it completely, because maybe you are referring to an outdated version.
The following may be uploaded, but will be put to a higher level of artistic and qualitative scrutiny than normal, and (if applicable) you must tag them with the corresponding tag. Please do not upload more than 20 a day of these works:
Western: Drawings of characters from non-Japanese comics, games, and other properties.
What we have here is clear to read: "The following may be uploaded" means that this stuff is allowed. "But will be put to a higher level of artistic and qualitative scrutiny than normal" means that there is a distinction between japanese and western art and western art is put to higher scrutiny. That also means that there is no hard ban (i.e. off topic it is not). "Please do not upload more than 20 a day of these works" means that the 20 is an arbitrary threshold. It's hard to verify if we really have 19 or 22 or 21 or .... The statement is that we shouldn't flood Danbooru with these posts. And that makes sense. We are still an Anime Imageboard on our main focus. Here: Main focus which that there might be posts that do not fall under this focus. Meaning if you think that it doesn't meet your scrutiny that you can use "Break rules".
As to why I flag anatomy and that stuff: Well, why not? We are still a high quality imageboard. Besides I don't know why you mention Apollyon here, but here is the thing that nobody here is "inviolable" to use your words. Moderators are also users who can upload stuff etc. So they should always fall under the same scrutiny as anyone else and if there are too many flags then even they receive a demotion (i.e. losing permissions). Or in other words the moderator level is not bound to the Contributor status or the Janitor status. Albert said so himself. That's why he removed the Contributor and Janitor status and made them into "Permissions". So in short: That comparison looks not right to me.
At least now the flagging section did indeed work on the flagging reason. It now has a qualitative part and if it gets through now, then I surely won't have a problem with its deletion, because it got deleted because of quality issues.
And now this classic-western post: It got flagged, but with two reasons in one: 1. A quality check + a possible off topic check. At least that's how this flag should be read. So we have still a quality check for a maybe looking off-topic post. It did not pass the mod queue (and that was during a time where Not One Of Us was still around). This post did pass the mod queue multiple times now, because some thought it still shows enough quality. The other four posts apparantly not (off course you can re-approve them if you think despite the subject that the quality is still good enough). Flags are no hard-deletions.
Please read the ToS correctly (once again). I might even quote it completely, because maybe you are referring to an outdated version.
Once again, the entire argument is about how the ToS should be changed. Trying to repeat the ToS to people who are lobbying for its change is fundamentally missing the whole topic of conversation.
The reason WHY people want the ToS changed to set more clear and explicit lines is because, clearly, some people either don't understand, or just read what they want to read when someone says "we will admit some of this thing under some narrow circumstances, but we heavily and explicitly discourage their upload" to mean "DOOR'S OPEN, BOYZ!" And frankly, your continued argument along those lines just further and further proves the point I and others have been trying to make as to why simply discouraging Western art isn't enough, and that we need a clear line drawn.
Because I don't think you get it unless I spell it out extremely literally, let me try this again:
I am not saying that there is a hard ban in the ToS right now.
I am saying the ToS NEEDS to have a hard ban because lack of clarity creates these conflicts.
After all...
Provence said:
The statement is that we shouldn't flood Danbooru with these posts. And that makes sense. We are still an Anime Imageboard on our main focus. Here: Main focus which that there might be posts that do not fall under this focus. Meaning if you think that it doesn't meet your scrutiny that you can use "Break rules".
Except by not setting any actual agreed-upon metric for judgement, there is no consensus upon what those rules to be broken even are. And if nobody agrees on how much is too much, then you just create a free-for-all where people will simply pile on to try to outmass the people they disagree with using raw numbers while devolving into shouting ad hominem attacks since there is no real basis of argument or discussion... which is exactly what this image perfectly illustrates.
Provence said:
As to why I flag anatomy and that stuff: Well, why not? We are still a high quality imageboard.
So... since you're not willing to apply these standards to whether things are anime or not, are you saying Danbooru isn't an anime imageboard?
Danbooru is an Anime Art Gallery first, and a high-quality gallery second. Only anime-style art will be accepted. Art which are done in other styles are highly likely to be rejected.
That sure seems to me like they are asking for even stricter judgement based upon whether something is anime or not than whether something is quality or not...
And I have to ask why it is you are comfortable making anatomy-based flags? Anatomy is something that is concretely knowable, and allows people to make their own judgements through their own criteria... You seem to enjoy having a clear, definitive line drawn when it involves anatomy, since it gives a clear metric by which you can judge for yourself whether something passes or fails without relying upon other people's judgement...
So why are you so resistant to having a similar set of clear, intuitive metrics for what constitutes on- or off-topic as to what exists for anatomy?
Provence said:
Besides I don't know why you mention Apollyon here, but here is the thing that nobody here is "inviolable" to use your words. Moderators are also users who can upload stuff etc. So they should always fall under the same scrutiny as anyone else and if there are too many flags then even they receive a demotion (i.e. losing permissions).
I mention it because you are appealing to the fact that some number of janitors have approved it before to say that we shouldn't question their judgement... Which is clearly not a position you actually hold, as you just argued why people should question their judgement.
In the absence of declaring that we should just trust in and abide by the judgement coming down from on high, having a coherent and consistent set of rules and guidelines is critical to keep this whole thing from turning into nothing more than an interpersonal pissing contest. Rules, once again, form consensus, and consensus means that people can trust in one another's judgement. The highly fast-and-loose everyone-can-interpret-as-they-choose set of rules you're defending, here, just encourage everyone to disregard everyone else's judgement, and just try to mob down anything they don't like for no reason other than that they don't like it.
Again, I haven't seen you agree that any post is "off-topic" except post #2427331, which was just kinda-sorta "too classical", which, again, would only apply to troll-level uploads of classical art and nearly nothing else. IS that your limit? What IS your standard of judgement of what is and isn't off-topic? I keep asking this, and I haven't gotten a clear answer. You haven't even committed to saying that an outright page scanned straight from a Western superhero comic is off-topic. As someone who is supposed to be tasked with passing judgement on this specific issue, and whose judgement is supposed to be both trusted and understood by the users, how are they supposed to infer from this what is and is not permissible to upload onto Danbooru? Because so far, all you've said is that it's cool to upload literally anything that passes anatomy checks so long as it's less than 20 per day.
And, frankly, your argument can be extended reductio ad absurdum to say that if someone doesn't like a mod, hey, nothing stopping them from flagging everything they upload under false pretenses by abusing indistinct criteria for judging the "rules", just to try to get back at that person!
Provence said:
At least now the flagging section did indeed work on the flagging reason. It now has a qualitative part and if it gets through now, then I surely won't have a problem with its deletion, because it got deleted because of quality issues.
Why?!
Just a year or two ago, the only reason most people put in flags was just "quality". Because janitors and mods are expected to use their own judgement on the works in question.
A couple different users put into the comment how they felt it wasn't a very good work on sheer quality grounds before, but you argued then that there was no reason to flag it just on "off topic" grounds because it had good quality... but as soon as it IS spelled out in the flag, suddenly, your opinion of its quality has changed?!
Provence said:
The other four posts apparantly not (off course you can re-approve them if you think despite the subject that the quality is still good enough).
What other four posts?
Provence said:
Flags are no hard-deletions.
This is a terrible way to argue about policy. Especially in conjunction with your previous "don't accept the judgement of the moderators or anyone else" argument, it's basically an open declaration that nothing can ever be settled and everyone can fight over this same stuff forever as contesting new users can rise up to re-flag, re-appeal, and, as janitors are lost to attrition, re-approve the same image over and over without anyone ever finding an actual consensus position to settle the argument.
Again, you should be trying to attain a consensus. The attitude you express here is one that openly invites more conflict.
Let me just say that, personally, I feel the quality arguments in the current flag sound very nitpicky for the sake of finding something other than "off topic" to complain about. On top of it I don't think an image with "noticeable sketchy brush strokes and artifacts" to the point of being deletion-worthy would have been approved this many times by this many different janitors.
NWSiaCB, please try to be less aggressive. If you still have a problem with how I see things then contact me once again, but I've already told you everything. I think we won't find any consencus here, since you have already don that. If you still think that there is no difference between these posts, although I've given you one explanation, then I can't do anything more for you. So sad as it is, but maybe reading the last sentence helps. And about this Doom post, again. If you don't trust me, then maybe you ask someone who you trust more:
I don't see a problem with the current status. I look at one of the properties in question here like overwatch and the majority of it is not objectionable. That Doom image. Not objectionable. The real problem isn't Western art. It's low quality art in general. That's what we should be focusing on.
It's important not to get hung up on one or two exceptions that crop up from time to time. Perfect is the enemy of good enough.
With regards to flagging, if you think something doesn't belong on this site then flag it. You're limited to 10 a day so use it wisely.
That quote is from albert. I guess I don't need to break down what the content of his statement is. He has no problem, because these posts are strongly regulated. First by the ToS (only one certain amount) and then by us Janitors (who filters posts out that don't meet OUR scrutiny). As you can see the amount of these posts will never turn Danbooru into this so called "Deviantart". There is no clarification problem. As you can see: This Doom post is not objectionable by its content per se. Now there is a flag because of quality issues. That means that someone thinks that it should be deleted because of this. What I've been saying earlier is that the flags are all missing the qualitative part. I think it is there. But if it gets deleted now, then we all can say that it good deleted, because it didn't meet our standards. That is like this: I approve a post, it gets flagged and deleted. Then I've to accept that, even though I (still) think it's good quality. Don't see any problem here. On the other things, especially the last paragraph: You are overexaggerating. And that is not good. Off course you can flag a post 100 times. But before that happens, one should call to an admin who settles things once and for all. That didn't happen in the past, but it might happen here. I think Admins have to power to lock a post's status. As for this classic post: I might have been to fast with my judgment here in the first comment I've written. But as I said: This post was flagged for deletion. It was asked if it meets the qualitative scrutiny, because it looked like it should be meeting higher scrutiny. So yeah, in short the only distinction between this post and the Doom post might really be the flag reasons. Now this most recent flag reason mentions the quality which is perfectly fine with me. So in short: I don't really think that both can be described as off-topic anymore, but both things are evaluated by higher scrutiny :3. And that I've been to fast on my judgement in the first comment I mentioned there. Because as I said: You run into demarcation problems. But not everything is allowed, and that's why there is a threshold in the ToS for these posts. Same with furry. There is also a hard banned part in the ToS off course.
Let me just say that, personally, I feel the quality arguments in the current flag sound very nitpicky for the sake of finding something other than "off topic" to complain about. On top of it I don't think an image with "noticeable sketchy brush strokes and artifacts" to the point of being deletion-worthy would have been approved this many times by this many different janitors.
That's just the eternal paradox of flags. If you use a generic reason, you get people complaining about the lack of detail, but if you include too many specific details, you get "why are you being so nitpicky?". Hard to navigate gut reactions sometimes.
Nevertheless, my broader rationale for the flag is this:
The initial debate involving this picture was over whether the hard ban on off-topic posts should be lifted in the case of high-quality posts. The flaggers at this time were advocating in favor of a hard ban, while appealers and approvers argued that high-quality posts are an exception. The TOS was thus reformed to the appealers' liking. Now this post has been brought up again after a dormant period of 5 months. Re-evaluating it under these new standards, it actually doesn't stand up as well as various deleted posts (mainly for picture quality reasons evident in the full res), so I think something should be done about it.
I am aware that there are other off-topic posts that are not flagged at this moment.
However, I think that isn't reason to defend off-topic posts that are flagged, nor is it a reason to attack those that flag it.
Given that the spirit of the site is Japanese art, with a focus on anime-styling. This means western-looking art of western properties are okay if its from a Japanese artist. I don't think that this is an arbitrary distinction.
I look at off-topic art and see if it has remotely anything to do with anime if it is not from a Japanese source, and if it isn't, I flag it.
In this case, doom is pretty solidly off-topic, especially if its official art. For me, quality is irrelevant since the spirit is focused on "Cambodian Wood Carvings" and not just quality art.
I'm not wanting to sound pedantic, but that's just my mental process.
This sort of debate is ageless and unending, and it really comes down to which side is more persistent.
This should have its own status: forever pending for approval. lol
Anyways, as a former approver of this picture, I'm starting to understand more about the other side of the argument. Danbooru is essentially an Anime Imageboard, so having a western art of a western franchise done by a western artist (assuming) in a western art style does seem out of place. It's like having a museum that clearly stated it's an Egyptian themed one but has Aztec artifacts on display. Both are equally interesting, but the Aztec artifacts should be reserved for some place else. Of course, this leads to asking should the ToS be changed, and I'll give my yes vote right here right now and that we should get right on to it. Both sides obviously have strong opinions about the matter, so why not first settle the most basic questions?
NWSiaCB, please try to be less aggressive. If you still have a problem with how I see things then contact me once again, but I've already told you everything. I think we won't find any consencus here, since you have already don that. If you still think that there is no difference between these posts, although I've given you one explanation, then I can't do anything more for you. So sad as it is, but maybe reading the last sentence helps.
There is a difference between criticizing an argument or a viewpoint and simple name-calling. To challenge and question the arguments someone else makes, including by trying to use other parts of their own rhetoric against them to show logical inconsistencies or fallacies is not personal attack, but the basics of debate.
I have no expectation of getting you to completely see things my way, and I'm not trying to make personal attacks, here. (You can contrast this with the clear ad hominem attack comments that are downvoted...)
I'm making the argument to show how your own logic is internally inconsistent, in a hope that you might try to think a little more critically about your own internal thought process, here.
Provence said:
If you don't trust me, then maybe you ask someone who you trust more:
That quote is from albert.
Again, why do you try to use the authority of mods or the admin to defend your position, when you also say that the opinions of mods are not inviolable (to use your words using my words,) and that it would be fine if someone like Apollyon were demoted for having too many of their works deleted. (And I can't help but notice there's someone awfully hard at work trying to flag pretty much everything that Apollyon uploads nowadays...)
If you show you aren't convinced by someone simply having a higher arbitrary rank than yourself, why do you think you can then turn around, and in the same post try to lord that kind of authority over others?
Again, your argument is that, because some people with arbitrary power have decided something, it should be beyond question... except,
Provence said:
Flags are no hard-deletions.
You defend flagging by saying that it's all just some ongoing process where nothing is permanent, and nothing is settled in stone.
Again, do you not recognize the inherent cognitive dissonance, here? Where is the standard, or the rational consistency?
Either people have their own ability to form judgements and make arguments and question the judgment of moderators and janitors, or we are to take their judgements as inviolable, and you have to pick one of those and stick with it if your argument is to have any credibility. Choosing one whenever it's convenient for that sentence, then immediately taking the opposite side in the same argument just undercuts the basis of your own arguments.
So far as I go, I firmly believe in the ability to question the moderators, and the fact that Albert said that is undercut by the fact that people are still deleting a lot of his early uploads for being off-topic to this day, and there are tons of JAV stuff he at one point uploaded. Albert has largely delegated most of the day-to-day work on the site for a variety of good reasons, and he's been pushed into changing positions when enough people create an outcry in the past, so why is a single quote referring to a single state of mind from a person who changes their mind when pressed or presented with good evidence to the contrary any reason not to press or present good evidence to the contrary? Taking that stance then means I have to actually keep applying it even when, say, a mod like Saladofstones comes out backing up my argument at least so far as this one case goes, by not attributing any undue weight upon it.
For that matter, I'll point out that Albert personally approved this image, and made that statement afterwards, and the post was re-flagged and eventually deleted for several months until Flandre5carlet re-approved it... so apparently, Albert was willing to accept that someone else's flags combined with a number of janitors not re-approving the image could overrule him rather than trying to declare his word was infallible.
Provence said:
He has no problem, because these posts are strongly regulated. First by the ToS (only one certain amount) and then by us Janitors (who filters posts out that don't meet OUR scrutiny). As you can see the amount of these posts will never turn Danbooru into this so called "Deviantart".
Except they're not heavily regulated at all. Again, your own arguments demonstrate how meaningless "extra scrutiny" actually is, because you use it to justify literally anything Western without any mention of any higher standard at all. For that matter, neither does Albert's statement that he simply feels "Overwatch is fine", which doesn't imply he had any higher standard in mind, either. I have not seen any evidence that "extra scrutiny" is anything but a code word for "I'll approve what I like, but flag things other people like," which just encourages infighting in a system with the, as you put it "democratic" elements of anyone being able to flag.
Further, the scrutiny of the janitors is frequently undercut by having just one janitor outvote all the rest unless you want to get into a flagging fight, which is far rarer, and creates far more drama and arguments to the point that it's extremely difficult to do very many of them. Simply having two or three janitors that don't apply "extra scrutiny" means BOTH of your hypothetical regulations don't apply at all... And again, you don't mention any higher scrutiny or hold to any limits as to what isn't allowed.
The conclusion you attempt to make after that (which also implies you don't even know what DeviantArt is, even after approving many dozens of images from DeviantArt) is therefore completely unsupported, if not overtly contradicted by your own statements and actions.
Provence said:
There is no clarification problem.
This claim is utterly unsubstantiated.
You have presented zero evidence that there is any kind of clarity as to what actually IS off-topic in spite of my repeated requests that you actually provide ANY kind of guidelines as to what you actually believe IS "off-topic" in any way with any clarity greater than "too classical".
Seriously, give me even ONE set of guidelines you actually WILL follow and enforce as to what constitutes "off-topic".
And because that brings this up:
Provence said:
If you still think that there is no difference between these posts, although I've given you one explanation, then I can't do anything more for you.
What "these posts" are you talking about? You have only talked about one other post... and in THAT post, you went back on your own explanation, so you don't have one for that one, either!
Provence said:
As you can see: This Doom post is not objectionable by its content per se.
Clearly false by the simple fact that such a large number of people (mods included) have objected to it for such a long period of time.
Provence said:
Now there is a flag because of quality issues. That means that someone thinks that it should be deleted because of this. What I've been saying earlier is that the flags are all missing the qualitative part. I think it is there. But if it gets deleted now, then we all can say that it good deleted, because it didn't meet our standards. That is like this: I approve a post, it gets flagged and deleted. Then I've to accept that, even though I (still) think it's good quality. Don't see any problem here.
That is not what you should be doing as a janitor. You are supposed to be judging whether a work fits the criteria for Danbooru on your own. The reason in the flag is just there to help point out things that may not be obvious, but it's almost entirely optional to most janitors.
For that matter, you don't feel constrained to only talk about whatever flaws are in the flags in other posts, where you will bring up flaws not in flags as reasons not to re-approve something, so trying to argue this now makes no sense. (And to be clear, I'm saying what you're doing in that other post is completely fine, even if I don't agree with the particulars, I am simply stating that this argument you are making now is not how anyone expects janitors to behave, there is good reason for them not to behave that way, and it is not how they behave, yourself included.)
Provence said:
On the other things, especially the last paragraph: You are overexaggerating. And that is not good. Off course you can flag a post 100 times. But before that happens, one should call to an admin who settles things once and for all. That didn't happen in the past, but it might happen here. I think Admins have to power to lock a post's status.
First of all, those are two mutually exclusive ideas you are arguing in consecutive sentences. Either you say it's great to have an endless cycle of flags and appeals or you say there should be some final arbitration that nobody can appeal again.
Seriously, pick one argument, and stick with it.
And how am I exaggerating? (Or "overexaggerating"...) I'm saying that your (temporary) endorsement of unlimited flagging without any sorts of hard rules, just the sheer whims of janitors opens the doors to a post being flagged hundreds of times... and you then go and argue that, "Off [sic] course you can flag a post 100 times." Do you not understand the argument I was making? Or the argument YOU were making?
Provence said:
So in short: I don't really think that both can be described as off-topic anymore, but both things are evaluated by higher scrutiny :3. And that I've been to fast on my judgement in the first comment I mentioned there. Because as I said: You run into demarcation problems. But not everything is allowed, and that's why there is a threshold in the ToS for these posts. Same with furry. There is also a hard banned part in the ToS off course.
And this, right here, proves what a mistake it was to open the floodgates by changing the ToS to allow those things in "with higher scrutiny".
You now go back on the one image, which I honestly still think was put up as a trolling image to make fun of Western art being allowed if they are "higher quality" artworks, and say that's just fine.
You say "not everything is allowed", but WHAT isn't allowed? You've gone back on the ONE thing you were willing to say wasn't allowed. (Oh, and you approve furry posts, too, so you can't use that as an example of things that aren't allowed, either...)
Again, name ONE thing that isn't allowed by your idea of what is "On Topic" you won't subsequently go back on.
So far you're proving there IS no standard for these things, at least so far as you are concerned, and that's clearly abusing the tiny wiggle room that the admin added into the ToS to make things less than an absolute hard line ban against non-anime things.
---
The problem I am trying to highlight is how the utter lack of any clarity or rules will inevitably make moderation nothing more than personal whims, and arguments inherently become personal contests. Combine this with janitors and mods being able to be demoted if enough of their uploads or approvals are deleted, and you have a prime breeding ground for flags motivated by nothing but personal animus for the purpose of demoting people you don't like or whose tastes are different from yours, not any substantive critique.
I contrast this to the fact that having clear anatomy is one of the few guidelines that is actually consistent, and which you clearly rely upon and support when you flag things. Having actual objective guidelines, even if there is some leeway with them to be a little subjective prevents things from being purely about trying to piss on other people's tastes. Having works deleted because they don't meet some sort of objective standard also means that you don't have to rely upon the credibility of the janitor or mod who made the choice, you rely upon the rules, themselves... (Which is something you clearly like being able to do with how much you try to refer to the ToS, even if you deliberately misinterpret its intention.)
I've stayed out of this discussion for a couple of reasons, but now I feel like I've got to say something. As one of the people who pushed for the conditional language for the ToS, here's my view.
Nothing in this discussion will change the fact that this is a community, and communities are evolving and transforming all the time. Their minds change, and sometimes it's the leadership who changes, or the common users as a whole. Sometimes people who have certain opinions leave, and new people come, and sometimes people disappear only to come back at a later time.
The first person who flagged this was D'Eye, whose arguments were structurally not too different: His concern boiled down to not wanting this site to become a "Mass Effect Wallpaper gallery." I can see where he was coming from, but that concern was indeed baseless. Now he's gone from the site, and thus the actual initiator of this debate isn't even in the picture. However, his arguments resonate because there was a problem they revealed, when invoked, that our policy differs between what the community wants, the mods want, and what the ToS actually does to attempt to adjust for everyones views and combat deviations that don't add value to the site.
I'm noticing the anti-western arguments favor a certain element from this, that the non-clarity of the rules requires changing to a strict model for the sites constitution to solve this argument and to maintain site consistency. Meanwhile, those of us on the other side have been quick to defend the rules as they are now crafted to defend the status quo and prevent a shift as drastic as the expulsion of non-anime artworks, but also ignores that the opposing side has procedural merit.
Personally, I think NWSiaCB is right about one thing: Many pro-western arguments here and in the forum, including some of mine, do lack rigor and are indeed ignoring flaws of the writing of the ToS. I think we can all generally agree, and thus build a consensus that the ToS language on exceptions of art uploading need improvement. The lack of straightforwardness in the subject at this point in time does tend to lead to unnecessary battles and fights over the uploading, approval and flagging of arts which aren't even properly cleared for any form of enforcement.
As the site rules thus are not ironed out, real changes to the enforcement of policy will either be stricter or looser as certain personalities take over. There's in my mind supposed to be room as as to not stifle the community, but there is indeed a need for a finalization of these rules so that the whims of individuals do not override the desires of the dozens and hundreds of people who use the site every day.
My personal solution is to invoke a response to the community of active users to ask if there can be a vote using the same tool used for the recent survey to ask what the general attitude of the community actually is. The rules should serve the userbase, and we need to know what the userbase feels to achieve that.
Second, and this is where I boil my defenses down to just one, I still feel western art has a place here, though small it may be. Anime art will always be the priority, but even if this and many other posts remain deleted, that's OK. To me that can mean that it didn't hold up to the higher scrutiny of the ToS's current quality rules (even if I find the most recent flag actually weak). If yet again another approve/flag cycle occurs, such is life. If the site were to grow to a solid unilateral consensus with less dissent that accommodated my views would be fine, and if it were to swing the other way and deny mine, I'd have to accept that shift. This would hold true for everyone regardless of position. The general view as it is feels up in the air because many people aren't saying anything.
As for the statement in the ToS saying, "Danbooru is an Anime Art Gallery first, and a high-quality gallery second. Only anime-style art will be accepted. Art which are done in other styles are highly likely to be rejected." This consists of weasel words and doesn't really help the pro-western arguments, or the anti-western ones either. It's useless if we can't decide on a fitting statement to replace it.
If I were to put language forth that would reflect what I interpret as the general consensus of the majority, it would be:
"Danbooru is an online art gallery of anime, manga and japanese art first, as it's the sites purpose to curate these. Works originating in non-anime styles while also originating from other nations will not be prioritized. Off-topic art should be expected to be flagged if members of the community feel that a piece does not reflect the quality consensus we aim to create here, and may even be flagged disregarding high quality, as it is still borderline."
Now I know of course this is not language supporting a hard ban. I'm still not changing my mind on that point. But if we're going to keep claiming the ToS as our defense on this, we should aim to point out that the ToS does need to actually reflect the general consensus for it to be our real policy for non-anime/non-japanese art. Whether my interpretation of the consensus is right or not also doesn't change that we need input from the userbase that is silent on whether Danbooru's user and mod consensus does reflect this, or actually favors something else like a hard ban policy.
The problem I have with this is that Danbooru's system is such that it takes *much* more effort to flag, much less get a flag to stick, than it is to approve something. (When things are not approved or flagged, they go to the moderator queue, but you get no notification about the things that are approved, so for someone to have parity in flagging ability, they need to go out actively searching for images to police... and of course, there's a reason approvers are announced, but flaggers are anonymous - there's serious blowback for someone who makes it known they flags things.) It only takes a couple mods and janitors approving crappy stuff to make the work of other approvers meaningless, especially the more blowback flaggers get. This is basically whole reason there was all that argument over Not One Of Us.
So, when you create this overt grey zone, the problem is, all it takes is one or two people treating "grey" as "white" and the rule is basically meaningless unless someone is willing to organize more flaggers to push forward a sustained effort over months to force the flag over whatever coalition is willing to keep approving the image. I mean, the drama this image has been a lightning bolt for is obviously going to be the exception, not the rule, but what does it say about the random other images that are really not "exceptional quality" Western stuff, guro, furry, etc. when people are willing to just say "the ToS only discourages all this stuff, so that's absolutely the same thing as it all being approved!" And to again point back to Not One Of Us, pretty much the only recourse for correction outside of simply convincing someone through argument otherwise (which generally gets responded to with complaints about TL;DR) is to have months if not years of drama on the forums or sustained, targeted flagging/stalking someone to "punish them" until someone has a bad enough deletion record that they get demoted. Unless someone's behavior is so radically out of line they immediately bring the whole website against them, there's no meaningful mechanical feedback built into Danbooru that will discourage a janitor determined to keep approving things others disagree with. It takes nothing short of a conspiracy of people willing to pursue an outright vendetta against someone flagging their approvals over months of likely tons of drama to actually start triggering the disciplinary action on this site, and that's not only far more effort than any set of individuals will reasonably put forward, it's not exactly the kind of behavior we should be incentivizing, either. (Survival of the most vindictive!) After all, whether this post ultimately is deleted or has a sustained approval (if it ever DOES settle down at all...) what does it really mean, what precedent is set, if the only reason one side or the other prevailed is because they were simply more stubborn than the other side, not the side that had the more convincing arguments, or actually have a consensus around a set of guidelines that actually govern approval for other images? It just means that the same argument will happen all over again for the next image people are willing to actually converge upon.
And that's why seeing these arguments really just makes me more and more convinced there has to be a hard line, because it only takes one person not accepting what "stricter standards" means to make any flag require months of drama or an organized movement to have one flag sustained.
After all, people aren't defending this or other flagged "off-topic" images as "being of sufficiently superlative quality to overcome the stricter standards guidelines", it's simply, "enh, it's as good as other stuff we approve." (Or outright dismissal that "off-topic" is even a legitimate reason to flag anything at all...)
Again, we have the exact same language in howto:upload discouraging invasive watermarks, copyrighted mangas and hard-translated mangas, banned artists, photographs, and bad anatomy as we do for off-topic, furry, and guro... and yet, the things from that first list are FAR more likely to never be approved, or have flags against them sustained as the ones from the second group (with anatomy being sort of borderline between the two). Why is it that the same language is a de facto hard line for the former group, and off-topic, furry, guro, and (semi-regularly) anatomy are de facto mere fluff? If someone flags a photo, nobody even pauses to question it, but there will be people talking about how much they hate the moderators that are cancer that is RUINING DANBOORU FOREVER when it's about anatomy or off-topic posts.
So, if you want to keep Western art's place on this site "small", how are you going to do so, when the deck is so stacked in favor of those who want to make Western art's place on this board much larger, and so stacked against those who want to keep it small? Again, it only takes a couple people coming in saying "I don't read arguments or care what reasons there are" to destroy the entire flagging system so long as people act as individuals. Unless you're going to be willing to actively assist in re-flagging questionable content and basically forming conspiracies against certain types of content, then the system is stacked such that simply sitting on the sidelines is functionally assisting those who think it's perfectly fine for Danbooru to "become a Mass Effect Wallpaper site".
Again, just letting Eternal September take place incentivizes everyone being as petty and vindictive as possible against anyone who has different tastes as themselves, because only those who sustain the flags or uploads more stubbornly and spitefully than the other side until they finally just get so disgusted with Danbooru's drama that they just plain quit will prevail. And this is why I disagree even with the statement, "If yet again another approve/flag cycle occurs, such is life. If the site were to grow to a solid unilateral consensus with less dissent that accommodated my views would be fine, and if it were to swing the other way and deny mine, I'd have to accept that shift. This would hold true for everyone regardless of position. The general view as it is feels up in the air because many people aren't saying anything." - you're basically encouragingEternal September, which is not a process by which people peacefully disagree, it's a process by which people actively ostracize the unpopular until those who disagree are so harassed that they are driven out. Think of any place with open political arguments, and how frequently they tend to turn into all-right or all-left wing boards who will descend like a pack of wolves upon those who dissent. Basically telling people they can get the chance to vote for which people whose tastes they don't like (be it a flat chest versus giant boobs war or whatever) to functionally be discriminated against essentially makes it open season to try to punish the fetish you don't like. (See, for example, Kikimaru's telling me to "go to Gelbooru", or Super Dick's comments. Being nasty and trying to drive people out of Danbooru is functionally the only way to "win" the "debate" when you make it a game of Eternal September.) There's a reason why constitutions exist in democracies - because some things, especially things that discriminate against certain groups of people, shouldn't be up for a vote. It guarantees eternal drama.
And no, it doesn't HAVE to be eternal drama, as some people are clearly resigning themselves to, you can solve the problem by simply generating actual consensus around the rules and guidelines that exists around photographs (which, again, don't have this kind of drama) for off-topic art. That means the overwhelming majority of janitors have to be willing to actively sustain flags against things that aren't something so extraordinary they actually justify that "stricter scrutiny". Again, it's just plain easier to do this when you have far stricter language in the ToS to start with for less janitors to actively hide behind functionally acting that "generally rejected" gives them all the latitude of "generally accepted".
And really, if the purpose of janitors and mods are to sustain the quality of Danbooru's image gallery, then why aren't flags given the same importance as approval in their arsenal? Janitors and mods are actively prodded if they haven't moderated things in a while, but there's never any push to flag anything. How many of you are actively looking out to flag things that clearly don't fit with Danbooru's quality guidelines as regularly as you look to approve things? At best, there's two or three people who actually try to do daily flags, and that's counting the people who actively delete sample images. The reaction many of you are likely to have to this point is, "why should they try to flag things as much as approval?" And that attitude on Danbooru is kind of the root of the problem, isn't it? Why isn't flagging (or at least, looking through approved works to find those that need flags) treated as being as important to maintaining quality standards as the approval process. (Especially when it seems like at least half the uploads on Danbooru get through on people with automatic approval privileges, and without someone going back over their stuff, there's literally NO other checks on their behavior.) That flagging is so rare, so often unsuccessful, draws so much contempt from other users, and is so generally stressful that almost nobody does it should be seen as a problem.
I mean, there are several people in this comment chain that have changed their position just through talking it out, but those who have approved this image already but now say they have changed their minds and wouldn't approve it again... but there's no "undo approval", and saying they wouldn't approve it again isn't the same thing as joining in to actively flag it if it is approved again.
(*sigh*... And here I thought I'd just fire off something small and quick when I started...)
Kikimaru said:
The thing that irks me, is flagger(s) saying this has "bad quality".
Like, where? The anatomy is full of detail & exposed muscle, the colours are used in interesting ways, and there is good focus on Doomguy.
The argument is that (especially when you bring it up to full zoom) it's full of thick, blurry, indistinct brushstrokes and lines. Doomguy has detail on him, but pretty much everything else lacks it, and has sloppy linework. (And presence or absence of exposed muscle is just irrelevant.) As I said to Provence, I know for a fact he's flagged and not approved for less than this. (And it seems he is willing to accept it being deleted on quality grounds, so I suppose that's a convincing argument to him, at least...)
I've agreed with much of what you've said - such as the need to TOS reform and the imperative of concrete rules - but do you have any suggestions of what those might be? You repeatedly asked for some of the "pro-western art" faction to provide definitions or cutoff points but can you? I have to guess you have at least some idea of what the rule might be else you wouldn't have sought another standard by which to potentially compare it to.
"But before that happens, one should call to an admin who settles things once and for all. That didn't happen in the past, but it might happen here. I think Admins have to power to lock a post's status."
that's the best thing I've heard out of all of this...why doesn't an admin just come along and sort this out?
all nitpicking and selfishness aside...this is a great piece of art...of course, its not the mona lisa of badass pics but its good enough to meet the high quality criteria when the ToS is involved...plus I've seen tons of other posts like this...so I don't see the reason why this is getting any special attention...so yes...I believe this deserves to be on this site and it should be an admin that approves it so then afterwards he can lock it's status in order to silence those who feel an uncontrollable need to express their freedom of speech on their 1st world problems.
The thing that irks me, is flagger(s) saying this has "bad quality".
Like, where? The anatomy is full of detail & exposed muscle, the colours are used in interesting ways, and there is good focus on Doomguy.
NWSiaCB said:
The argument is that (especially when you bring it up to full zoom) it's full of thick, blurry, indistinct brushstrokes and lines. Doomguy has detail on him, but pretty much everything else lacks it, and has sloppy linework. (And presence or absence of exposed muscle is just irrelevant.)
What if that's meant to be a stylistic element to draw focus to The DOOM Slayer? The background being relatively undetailed while the central elements (DOOM Slayer and demons surrounding him) are detailed. And I say relatively here because I do think it's a huge exaggeration - especially the current flag calling it poor quality.
Super_Dick said:
that's the best thing I've heard out of all of this...why doesn't an admin just come along and sort this out?
An admin did come and settle things once and for all, didn't they? Didn't albert flat out say that this Doom picture is not objectionable back when the debate was happening on the forums?
buehbueh said:
My personal solution is to invoke a response to the community of active users to ask if there can be a vote using the same tool used for the recent survey to ask what the general attitude of the community actually is. The rules should serve the userbase, and we need to know what the userbase feels to achieve that.
I can second this, I think it would be best to gauge everybody's interests. I do hope that people realise "Western" can also mean popular copyrights such as Overwatch, though.
An admin did come and settle things once and for all, didn't they? Didn't albert flat out say that this Doom picture is not objectionable back when the debate was happening on the forums?
but yet here we are...at it again...begs the question doesn't it...the question being shouldn't mods and admins be the only ones who can approve a post?...another question could be shouldn't flagging & appeal privileges be allowed for gold and platinum members only?
I've agreed with much of what you've said - such as the need to TOS reform and the imperative of concrete rules - but do you have any suggestions of what those might be? You repeatedly asked for some of the "pro-western art" faction to provide definitions or cutoff points but can you? I have to guess you have at least some idea of what the rule might be else you wouldn't have sought another standard by which to potentially compare it to.
The suggestion put forward by Feline Lump, and which I support, is the "WWW" standard of Western artstyle, Western subject matter, and Western artist, with any sort of Eastern aspect to the art (such as comic book-style Wolverine meeting an anime character with an anime art style) providing it an exception. This basically is a "it has to have SOMETHING to do with Japan, China, or Korea" standard.
Again, there's some contention about whether the Western artist part should stay, but generally, that creates a fairly permissive set of guidelines that 99.9% of art already on Danbooru follows, anyway, so that it doesn't require any sort of "mass purge" I have seen a couple people cite as their reason for trepidation with an explicit set of guidelines.
Super_Dick said:
but yet here we are...at it again...begs the question doesn't it...the question being shouldn't mods and admins be the only ones who can approve a post?...another question could be shouldn't flagging & appeal privileges be allowed for gold and platinum members only?
Approval privileges were created for a reason - there aren't enough moderators that spend enough time on Danbooru to actually go through all the posts. Until there were waves of recruitment drives that brought in the likes of Flandre5carlet and myself, people were complaining about how there were images being deleted after only being reviewed by only 2 or so moderators.
If you say that we should just have more moderators, then all that would mean is that the same people who have approval privileges now would just have become moderators to fill the void, instead.
I also don't see why you'd want to restrict flagging and appeal privileges. Appeals in particular do nothing on their own, they are just requests for moderators to reconsider, so what abuse are you trying to prevent? Flags do have some mechanical function, but again, the point is that moderators and janitors are the ones who make the ultimate decision. Also, moderators can see who is flagging, and have banned people for spurious flagging before. If someone were doing something abusive in flagging this image, like setting up sockpuppets, I would suspect some of the moderators who have made their bed on the "allow Western art" side and had their approvals flagged again would have banned them for it.
I suspect you say this thinking that all these flags are just from random members, but again, there are more janitors and moderators voting against (or at least, "no interest") this image than have approved it. Considering that some of the janitors have stated they had flagged it, then can you really be sure it would have made a meaningful impact on the outcome, here?
Flandre5carlet said:
What if that's meant to be a stylistic element to draw focus to The DOOM Slayer? The background being relatively undetailed while the central elements (DOOM Slayer and demons surrounding him) are detailed. And I say relatively here because I do think it's a huge exaggeration - especially the current flag calling it poor quality.
As has been argued on plenty of other posts that have been flagged and deleted, "it's poor quality as an ART STYLE" is a bad argument, and essentially a tacit admission that it's poor quality. Images deliberately drawn badly as a choice, like making some MSPaint scribbles to mock other artists or the like, are generally not approved.
Flandre5carlet said:
An admin did come and settle things once and for all, didn't they? Didn't albert flat out say that this Doom picture is not objectionable back when the debate was happening on the forums?
Albert never "settled things once and for all". He approved the image once while allowing for it to almost immediately be flagged again, because he wasn't putting his foot down about it. What he said and did amounted to little more than "enh, I think it's OK, but I won't stop others from having the final say." And you should know, you re-approved it after it was deleted, so it WAS settled as this image being deleted, not approved.
Albert also said about the whole issue of how much Western art gets approved that, "It's not a problem until it is." That is about as non-committal as one could possibly be about the whole topic, and very deliberately leaves open the possibility for him to say he saw a couple Western art images he didn't like the other day, so we're going back to strict rules against it with no forewarning. Albert has always been very reticent to make dramatic top-down declarations, which is in no small part why so much of Danbooru is essentially just consensus of the mods and janitors, with whatever rules that do exist being filled with weasel-words.
Flandre5carlet said:
I can second this, I think it would be best to gauge everybody's interests. I do hope that people realise "Western" can also mean popular copyrights such as Overwatch, though.
Well, that's part of the problem, now, isn't it? Even if those of us who are trying to explain why more explicit rules are necessary can convince people we debate long enough, that doesn't matter if there are people who just don't care to listen or engage. You're asking people who may well not even realize what they're voting on to decide... And there's no guarantee that even if you put up a lengthy explanation of the options right above the checkboxes that people won't "TL;DR" it.
Besides that, as I mentioned with Provence, saying in one sentence that admin fiat should stop all conversation once and for all in one sentence then saying in the next that you want to put it up for a vote for majority rules doesn't maintain any kind of intellectual consistency. It's the sort of thing someone says when they just want to "win the argument", but don't care why or how or what kind of precedent it sets going forward. That just tends to lead to sloppy, inconsistent judgements going forward that will only encourage the only real rules being interpersonal rivalries against whoever is "on the other side". Having actually consistent rules to follow and enforce makes things impersonal.
Besides that, should Danbooru allow yaoi/gay porn? Strictly speaking, there's nothing in the rules against it, but the Eternal September effect means that the mostly female-centric porn will ensure users who like female-centric porn come and will then upload more female-centric porn. There are people who complain about there being yuri already, so if there were any more sizable amount of yaoi stuff, with it being enough to start being all over the front page or comments section as new yaoi fans talk it up all the time, you can bet there will be vociferous complaints. A lot of futa, furry, and guro stuff would definitely get the same treatment.
I remember there being one artist, for example, where all his works were purged because he once posted an image of a razor falling and slicing into Alice Margatroid's face, and this so outraged a group of people they went and flagged everything he had made, regardless of their actual content.
Again, governments have constitutions that ensure rights of those who are out of power and prevent unfettered democracy for a reason - absolute democracy is a dangerous tiger to ride, as anyone who is ever surprised to find they are outvoted will find out. As buehbueh mentioned, that also creates a very unstable foundation where the will of the users not only constantly changes, but, because of Eternal September, is also a self-perpetuating cycle. Even if you're in the majority now, you may not be in the majority a few months from now, as all it takes is one or two "triggering" posts like the Alice razor one to cause a mass backlash. Eternal September is also not at all civil, and making majority rules and keeping a majority fully dependent upon keeping anyone who isn't part of your majority out through making them feel unwelcome basically overtly incentivizes harassment. To go back to the constitution metaphor, having some static, basic guidelines for what the site is for and is supposed to mean doesn't prevent change, but does provide some stability and also provides the sort of consensus about what is and isn't allowed to diffuse many of these arguments.
After all, if someone has a post deleted because they're told it's against the clearly stated rules, they have nobody but themselves to blame for not following the rules. If a post gets deleted because of some nebulous shift in the power dynamics of the janitors' internal political battles following a poll result most random users who don't routinely log in may not have ever seen, and find they're suddenly outvoted, they definitely have some people to blame. You can already see that in all the posts about how much people hate how arbitrary they feel flagging has been recently, and how that was the number one complaint in the (non-policy-setting) poll we just had. In fact, you could even take the explicit request for more consistency in moderation to be an implicit request for more explicit guidelines that all janitors and moderators are asked to uniformly follow.
As has been argued on plenty of other posts that have been flagged and deleted, "it's poor quality as an ART STYLE" is a bad argument, and essentially a tacit admission that it's poor quality. Images deliberately drawn badly as a choice, like making some MSPaint scribbles to mock other artists or the like, are generally not approved.
Mind, I already said I disagreed with the quality complaints as a whole, so there is no tacit admission of anything - much the opposite. I haven't claimed it to be an art style either but that it could be a stylistic effect to draw focus. The point is: is every picture that might have a somewhat undetailed background "poor quality" and flag worthy? Does a picture need to be the most absolute detailed in every possible part to be "high quality"?
Frankly, if this is genuinely seen as "poor quality" art by some then I don't know what to say.
-albert paragraph snip-
I'd say that albert openly saying "This picture's content isn't objectionable" is definitely making a clear statement about the matter.
-last paragraph snip-
Then if people don't care, they won't really bother voting or giving their opinion? I really don't see how it can be a bad thing to poll the general population of Danbooru about whether they think ToS should change in this or that way. Some people will care and reply, some won't. Either way, it's not necessarily supposed to be a hard decision-making vote but rather gain data about what people generally think regarding this particular subject; and either way, it's better than not polling anyone at all and just moving on toward something like a hard WWW ban after a months long and wholly consensus-less debate.
Mind, I already said I disagreed with the quality complaints as a whole, so there is no tacit admission of anything - much the opposite. I haven't claimed it to be an art style either but that it could be a stylistic effect to draw focus.
Again, I'm explaining why such arguments are simply not good arguments. Saying, "this is good quality," is wholly subjective, but at least the kind of argument one should make on Danbooru, provided you can throw in some supporting claims. Saying, "this is good quality for this artist's artstyle," or, "all the anatomy this artist draws is bad, so we should allow this," are bad arguments and tacit admissions of poor quality. It's alongside "there are worse" as a defense.
Flandre5carlet said:
The point is: is every picture that might have a somewhat undetailed background "poor quality" and flag worthy? Does a picture need to be the most absolute detailed in every possible part to be "high quality"?
Well, the "compromise" that was made in allowing there to no longer be a hard ban on non-anime artwork was that they would be subject to "stricter scrutiny" and "higher standards". Why are you, like basically everyone else who tries to defend Western art, speaking as though saying if something that must pass "stricter scrutiny", it means all the things that aren't declared to need "stricter scrutiny" must then be flagged?
Again, this just proves the lie of "stricter scrutiny", and why an explicit rule is necessary.
Besides that, however, in most images with forgettable or poor backgrounds, there is a clear, overwhelming focus upon the central figure(s), which take up about 80-90% of the image and basically all of the viewer's attention. This isn't the case, here, where the marine is about 10-15% of the image, and there's a clear intent for the viewer to be looking at the hoards around him... which are blurry, messy, and indistinct. (Besides, even if there's detail on the marine, it's not like it isn't rather blurry and sloppy, either...)
Flandre5carlet said:
Frankly, if this is genuinely seen as "poor quality" art by some then I don't know what to say.
It would be far from the first time someone on Danbooru thought something was at least good enough quality, only to have it deleted in the end when people didn't agree.
Flandre5carlet said:
I'd say that albert openly saying "This picture's content isn't objectionable" is definitely making a clear statement about the matter.
Yes, and it's also a single cherry-picked statement that happens to support your argument without lending any credence to any of the other statements made against Western art, like the fact that the posting guidelines explicitly LEAD OFF by saying that Danbooru is an anime imageboard first, and a high quality imageboard second. Or the sets of rules he put up that explicitly banned Western art for years, and have only recently been softened to merely heavily discourage Western art... And again, the fact that "we heavily discourage" is treated no differently from "we generally encourage" is the whole problem.
Oh, and if you want, I can also cherry-pick some arguments from the Bible that says murdering children is totally moral, too! That's why I think it's a pretty clear statement that God wants Christians to be baby-killers.
Flandre5carlet said:
Then if people don't care, they won't really bother voting or giving their opinion? I really don't see how it can be a bad thing to poll the general population of Danbooru about whether they think ToS should change in this or that way. Some people will care and reply, some won't. Either way, it's not necessarily supposed to be a hard decision-making vote but rather gain data about what people generally think regarding this particular subject; and either way, it's better than not polling anyone at all and just moving on toward something like a hard WWW ban after a months long and wholly consensus-less debate.
I didn't say they didn't care, I said they wouldn't realize what they were voting for. In fact, YOU said you were worried they wouldn't realize what they were voting for.
But again, as with Provence, I have to ask why you're stating in one sentence that we should be respecting some fiat from on high from an admin that should quash any and all further debate, then in the very next sentence, you're saying we should be having a giant, open debate where everyone is invited to vote on what the rules should be. So I'm not sure, do you believe that Danbooru is like a corporation and we the employees where we are but to follow the directives of CEO Albert, OR do you believe that this is a democratic venture where we are meant to serve out the democratic will of the people? Certainly, there are some in-between stances to take, but switching from one complete extreme to the other in the space of a single period lacks any intellectual consistency, and gives an impression that you're more interested in "winning the argument" than the precedent set or having an actual set of policies by which future disputes are resolved.
Beyond that, the forums are open to everyone. I don't recall seeing too many polls, but decisions have been made about the direction of Danbooru, regardless. The forums and comments sections, for that matter, are open to everyone to have months of debate, and in the first sentence of the paragraph, you implicitly state that if someone doesn't care, then it's fine if their opinion isn't counted. So why are those months of forum debates that previous decisions have been made upon not ways of gaining data on what people (who care enough to go to the forums) think about a particular subject? Especially when, in an actual debate (consensus-less or not), people actually interact in a way that guarantees they actually do get informed as to the ramifications of what they are "voting" for? In what way has this entire exercise, both commenting here and in the forums, not been an airing of opinions where even regular member-level users were invited?
So let me ask, as with Provence, and has been asked of me, what principles are you actually trying to argue? How SHOULD Danbooru work, how should disputes be resolved, what standards should janitors be held to and hold others to in a way where there can be actual consensus rather than incentivizing grudges, and how should those who get outvoted be treated? And, like I asked Provence, can you actually state anything that is well and truly out of bounds, or is there seriously no reason for there not to be The Last Supper or The Night Watch on here other than an apparent belief that those paintings are "not good quality"?
Jesus Christ @NWSiaCB fucking condense your answers; you're just spewing hot air & hypothetical scenarios now.
"TL;DR" is not an argument, and people not taking the time to think through the ramifications of their decisions is one of the points I'm trying to make.
The suggestion put forward by Feline Lump, and which I support, is the "WWW" standard of Western artstyle, Western subject matter, and Western artist, with any sort of Eastern aspect to the art (such as comic book-style Wolverine meeting an anime character with an anime art style) providing it an exception. This basically is a "it has to have SOMETHING to do with Japan, China, or Korea" standard.
Again, there's some contention about whether the Western artist part should stay, but generally, that creates a fairly permissive set of guidelines that 99.9% of art already on Danbooru follows, anyway, so that it doesn't require any sort of "mass purge" I have seen a couple people cite as their reason for trepidation with an explicit set of guidelines.
This really doesn't answer my question, at all. The WWW standard means nothing if you have no way to apply it. Is it a procedural check, is it a weighted score, if so which part of the check is most important, or what score makes something a Western artist?
You have to realize people are talking about very different things when they say "Western." Comic book heroes are Western sure, but is Overwatch as some say? What about other IPs closely associated with Western otaku cultures representing non-Japanese video games?
Your suggestions lack anything concrete which was a criticism you leveled at Provence.
But anyway I suggest we can narrow the scope of what we are talking about by assuming all "Western art" would answer 'no' to the following and that if the answer is yes to either than it's not western art...
1. Is the artist from East Asia? This could be changed easily to just generally from Asia. A problem I have with that is the Orient extends as far as Turkey, which doesn't exactly come to mind when I think of "anime style." Also this rule could be interpreted as the national origin of an artist; therefore Westernized Asians would be treated as "Western" and westerners naturalized in Asia could be excluded... 2. Does the work incorporate stylistic attributes common in anime and among Japanese fan artists (I.e., such as the Pixiv community); does it lack a toonish quality, such as "Disney faces"? 3. Is the work is of a Western IP; if it is are the subjects drawn in the original Western style?
If no to all of those, don't call it Western art. If yes to more than one it is suspect and it would be subject to stronger rules or janitor review.
This I believe would provide an amnesty for the popular 'western' Overwatch illustrations and those interesting ArtStation/DeviantArt artists I like so much while making more overtly western works suspect.
Another way works could be checked for relevance is generating a score based on those questions rather than a procedural check. I.e., there's a total value of three and each question is worth a point. A typical work on this site therefore would be worth 3 (Eastern artist, anime style, IP is original or anime-related). Off the bat tested works would have a maximum of 2 (non-East Asian artist), so if they are in an anime style they get a point; and if they have an Eastern IP (or an original work) they get another for their maximum of 2. If they have just the Eastern IP then a score of 1.
I'd say in general 2 scores should pass as on topic while 1 scores would have to show exemplary quality. You get the picture with 0, that would just be flagrantly off topic (no relevance to anime or Japanese culture). I'm assuming of course people are going to be reasonable and recognize other aspects of Japanese culture can be substituted for anime in terms of relevance; i.e., Japanese (or Korean for that matter) games.
The questions could be strengthened by breaking them up, i.e. making a 2a and 2b, 3a and 3b, or adding specific explanations about the different emphasis on facial/body anatomy common among anime and western artists though there should be wiggle room because of the synthesis some artists create.
Applying either standard to this post would result in: off-topic.
So let me ask, as with Provence, and has been asked of me, what principles are you actually trying to argue? How SHOULD Danbooru work, how should disputes be resolved, what standards should janitors be held to and hold others to in a way where there can be actual consensus rather than incentivizing grudges, and how should those who get outvoted be treated? And, like I asked Provence, can you actually state anything that is well and truly out of bounds, or is there seriously no reason for there not to be The Last Supper or The Night Watch on here other than an apparent belief that those paintings are "not good quality"?
Have we finally reached the point where we need to use well known historic paintings from the Baroque or the Renaissance as examples to explain why we need a hard ban on everything WWW? The big majority of pictures uploaded here are digital paintings from the 21th century. What's with historical Japanese art? Do we now have to worry about users uploading artworks like Cypress Tree Byōbu or Three Beauties of the Present Day because they won't be affected by a hypothetical total WWW ban?
Flandre5carlet said:
And so then that makes it okay for, say, post #2424283 to stay, the single deciding factor being the artist's origin - even though there is virtually zero way to tell in the actual artwork whether that post is by a Japanese artist while this post is by a Western artist.
I fully agree with @Flandre5carlet. If we banned art by origin in cases where we compare two images with western artstyle and western subject matter, we would end up with ridiculous post confrontations like:
Much like I said earlier, I think that's bull. It's either Western art of Western franchise goes, or Western art of Western franchise stays. Artist origin should have absolutely nothing to do with it.
If we were to ban all Western style art of Western franchise and original Western style art, we would end up deleting posts like:
To better understand where the two main "antagonists" of this discussion ( @Provence and @NWSiaCB ) are coming from, I compared their uploads and favorites. There are indeed huge differences in personal preference. Judge for yourselves:
While its arbitrary to remove one bit of western-styled art and leave another because of the hailing of the creator, in the sense of having a reason related to the image itself.
However, I don't see the point of having things like this doom pictures here, honestly.
It has nothing to do with the picture itself.
As far as things that are borderline, that I am fine with. A vaguely animesque image of a western property by a western artist? I think that is permissible.
However, concept art of System Shock, though I think it has its own merits as far as design and utilizing limited resources to create a detailed model, is not going to be something that is appropriate here.
We don't need to do a sweeping ban of western media or anything, things like this image are an anomaly and end up being a flashpoint for the broader debate about the focus of the site and how to interpret rules and how much discretion versus difference people should have.
Have we finally reached the point where we need to use well known historic paintings from the Baroque or the Renaissance as examples to explain why we need a hard ban on everything WWW? The big majority of pictures uploaded here are digital paintings from the 21th century. What's with historical Japanese art? Do we now have to worry about users uploading artworks like Cypress Tree Byōbu or Three Beauties of the Present Day because they won't be affected by a hypothetical total WWW ban?
I think he was using classical paintings more as an argumentum ad absurdum. In lieu of any firm boundaries for what can and cannot be posted, one might expect that classical works would be given as an example of what can't be posted but from his view defenders of western art won't even muster that. Clearly however neither European nor Japanese great historical artwork work be allowed because they aren't anime-influenced.
I fully agree with @Flandre5carlet. If we banned art by origin in cases where we compare two images with western artstyle and western subject matter, we would end up with ridiculous post confrontations like: -
Heh heh, nice to see some of my posts used as examples on both sides (though some were sniped from image samples 😈)
Again if you read and comprehend everything he's said on the matter (quite a tall order!) he made it clear (I think!) that there wouldn't need to be a mass purge but he's concerned about blatantly western art with not relevance to Japanese culture or anime (I think!).
Not very appealing, I must say. : /
Well quite honestly a lot of those nude renderings of caucasian women seem beyond the pale in terms of their westernness to me. And probably fail my tests (score of 0 or three answers no).
While its arbitrary to remove one bit of western-styled art and leave another because of the hailing of the creator, in the sense of having a reason related to the image itself.
However, I don't see the point of having things like this doom pictures here, honestly.
I came out strongly against this concept both months ago in the forums and just a few days ago however I now see strengths in considering artist origin. Edit: forgot to finish this blurb at that the time of posting, continued next line. For one it allows for Eastern artists that primarily post using anime-styles to have style parody works. It's also more about culture and where someone grew up; for instance an artist with an English bio or that lists somewhere in Europe or the Americas as where they lived probably has had more cultural exposure to western styles and if they received high education in art probably have been primed in western styling. Also an artist born in East Asia or of East Asian heritage who was raised in the United States (Say Ken Wong or a thousand other artists here) for instance could be considered a western artist if you consider it a classification of national origin only.
As far as things that are borderline, that I am fine with. A vaguely animesque image of a western property by a western artist? I think that is permissible.
I agree with this. Not the least of which being I am quite fond of those 'animesque' illustrations and have uploaded many. This is why I think my etch of a standard determining if something is "western art" (comment #1666390) could be useful. It doesn't get to the bottom of how to assess genuinely Western art but it does give amnesty to most of the synthetic western-eastern styled art and imitation eastern styled art by western artists, avoiding a mass purge.
Also @reiyasona since I forgot to @ you in the preceding comment.
Again, I'm explaining why such arguments are simply not good arguments. -snip- Again, this just proves the lie of "stricter scrutiny", and why an explicit rule is necessary. -snip- It would be far from the first time someone on Danbooru thought something was at least good enough quality, only to have it deleted in the end when people didn't agree.
It's clear neither of us is going to budge from their position so we can chalk it up to a difference in standards, but when judging whether to approve something or not, I judge the picture as a whole. The composition, the theme, the art style, the anatomy and general quality. THEN I look at it in detail and whether some flaws I may notice affect the overall quality of the picture or not. In this case, under my higher scrutiny, I decided that no, having some parts of the backgrounds or some of the demons drawn slightly less detailed did not detract from the overall piece and also contributed to the general feel of it: the DOOM Slayer manhandling an endless horde of demons in hell.
Yes, and it's also a single cherry-picked statement that happens to support your argument without lending any credence to any of the other statements made against Western art -snip- Oh, and if you want, I can also cherry-pick some arguments from the Bible that says murdering children is totally moral, too! That's why I think it's a pretty clear statement that God wants Christians to be baby-killers.
Really? Cherry-picked? Come on. Rather than it being "cherry picked to support my argument", I think it's the fact that it doesn't support yours that seems to bother you so. Yes, albert clearly said that in terms of content such a picture was not objectionable. And yes, it was part of a slightly longer comment which generally adressed the issue with "Western art isn't the problem, bad art is the problem."
I didn't say they didn't care, I said they wouldn't realize what they were voting for. In fact, YOU said you were worried they wouldn't realize what they were voting for.
Which is why it should be explained clearly.
But again, as with Provence, I have to ask why you're stating in one sentence that we should be respecting some fiat from on high from an admin that should quash any and all further debate -snip- and gives an impression that you're more interested in "winning the argument" than the precedent set or having an actual set of policies by which future disputes are resolved.
Because there is currently a huge lack of consensus which makes this issue devolve into "whichever side can flag or approve a picture the most" regardless of each other's arguments, and that is not how this matter should be handled. The fact that this has been flagged and approved so many times clearly points at the fact that there's an issue somewhere - one that should be discussed, not handled like it currently is. As indicated by the last wave of "Western" flags including this one, there is a clear push to set a forced precedent against Western art rather than a push for consensus through discussions.
Besides that, I don't see how taking albert's word and polling people for what they think are mutually exclusive concepts.
Beyond that, the forums are open to everyone. -snip- In what way has this entire exercise, both commenting here and in the forums, not been an airing of opinions where even regular member-level users were invited?
Compare how many people voted in the last opinion poll with how many people are actually active in the forums. I'm pretty sure the vast majority of people just don't post on forums about these matters, regardless of what they think. Case and point a couple friends with accounts brought up this very DOOM picture to me, and how they found it silly that it'd be considered "poor quality." They aren't anywhere here arguing about it though, even if it's annoying or whatever, because they just aren't involved in danbooru beyond finding pictures. Which is what a lot of users do here, even despite the fact that a big complaint in the last poll was how obfuscated decision-making is.
-snip- And, like I asked Provence, can you actually state anything that is well and truly out of bounds, or is there seriously no reason for there not to be The Last Supper or The Night Watch on here other than an apparent belief that those paintings are "not good quality"?
Yes. Much like reiyasona said, you're comparing digital paintings from the 21st century relating to current-days pop culture with classical pieces. People who like anime also generally have an interest in video games and other contemporary forms of media (TV shows, comic books,...) and thus fanart from such things is completely different than classical pieces which you are bringing up.
Approval privileges were created for a reason - there aren't enough moderators that spend enough time on Danbooru to actually go through all the posts. Until there were waves of recruitment drives that brought in the likes of Flandre5carlet and myself, people were complaining about how there were images being deleted after only being reviewed by only 2 or so moderators.
and yet the same problem is still arising...this situation here is proof...so therefore the problem has still not been fixed...the only difference is that janitors & builders have been thrown into the equation.
If you say that we should just have more moderators, then all that would mean is that the same people who have approval privileges now would just have become moderators to fill the void, instead.
not unless if they have an assessment or a check/Q&A list for the recruits as to how they would deal with a situation such as this plus other situations of course.
I also don't see why you'd want to restrict flagging and appeal privileges. Appeals in particular do nothing on their own, they are just requests for moderators to reconsider, so what abuse are you trying to prevent? Flags do have some mechanical function, but again, the point is that moderators and janitors are the ones who make the ultimate decision. Also, moderators can see who is flagging, and have banned people for spurious flagging before. If someone were doing something abusive in flagging this image, like setting up sockpuppets, I would suspect some of the moderators who have made their bed on the "allow Western art" side and had their approvals flagged again would have banned them for it.
flagging should only be used by average users only...staff members should have no flagging privileges...same with appeals...this defeats my previous argument yes, but...after some time of thinking about it...I've considered a new perspective...a better one as well, in my opinion....plus I believe appeals should be held into higher consideration then they are now.
I suspect you say this thinking that all these flags are just from random members, but again, there are more janitors and moderators voting against (or at least, "no interest") this image than have approved it. Considering that some of the janitors have stated they had flagged it, then can you really be sure it would have made a meaningful impact on the outcome, here?
and that's why I've considered that staff members should have no rights to appeal or flag a post...it is the staff's job to maintain the site...and it is the users job to moan and bitch at the staff about the problems they have with a certain pic or user that's rubbed off of them the wrong way...not the other way round...here I see staff members arguing with staff members...not a very professional scene is it?...but alas, humans are humans at the end of the day...and things like this must happen from time to time in order to remind ourselves that we are exactly that...annoying humans who are too stubborn for our own good.
but as I've said before NWSiaCB...this is a good piece of art...to keep it from this site would (from a general point of view) be nonsensical...wouldn't broadening the horizons for danbooru be a good thing?...to accept the western style into the fold...wouldn't that bring to this site, a bigger audience, and therefore make this site that much more successful?
This really doesn't answer my question, at all. The WWW standard means nothing if you have no way to apply it. Is it a procedural check, is it a weighted score, if so which part of the check is most important, or what score makes something a Western artist?
You have to realize people are talking about very different things when they say "Western." Comic book heroes are Western sure, but is Overwatch as some say? What about other IPs closely associated with Western otaku cultures representing non-Japanese video games?
My mistake, I didn't realize exactly what it was you were asking for.
What I'm most heavily arguing (and you functionally argue with your list) is that there should be some sort of cut-off, beyond which something is definitely off-topic. This means, for example, that if you have Doomguy meeting an anime character, that anime character makes it on-topic, even if everything else is Western. And yes, of course Overwatch is Western. (I certainly haven't seen anyone say Activision-Blizzard isn't a Western company that makes Western-style characters...)
It was treatment of clearly Western-style Mass Effect art as though it is always on-topic that trigged this argument months ago, and it's argument over clearly Western Overwatch art being treated as always on-topic now that puts this argument front-and-center, completely throwing the notion that these works need "stricter scrutiny" by the wayside. This is more than just "letting in some off-topic things because they are high-quality," this is "there is no such thing as off-topic", and if someone says a post in the mod queue breaks rules for being off-topic, it gets approved, anyway. If you flag it for being approved in spite of being off-topic, it gets re-approved, anyway, being said "it's fine since it 'passes stricter scrutiny'". If you flag something that's an average-quality piece of Western art, people complain that you're somehow making up these rules that something has to 'pass stricter scrutiny'...
In short, there is no enforced standard as it stands. This is why I think at least having some hard line "you must pass this standard at the bare minimum" rule is needed, the way, again, we have a functionally hard ban against photos of porn actresses. Everyone at least agrees on maintaining that standard. Having some kind of weighted scoring system on top of this to deal with some of the border cases may be nice and preferable, but I think there is some case to be made for just having clear, simple, direct black-and-white rules, just because they are easier to understand, disseminate, and come to agreement upon the application of them. (To go back again to recent test-flaggings, there are janitors who will simply approve things because they think the argument for why something is flagged is "TL;DR", which is a gross abnegation of their supposed role.)
reiyasona said:
Have we finally reached the point where we need to use well known historic paintings from the Baroque or the Renaissance as examples to explain why we need a hard ban on everything WWW? The big majority of pictures uploaded here are digital paintings from the 21th century. What's with historical Japanese art? Do we now have to worry about users uploading artworks like Cypress Tree Byōbu or Three Beauties of the Present Day because they won't be affected by a hypothetical total WWW ban?
The argument about classical works, as Sweetpea says, is reductio ad absurdum. To use something else Sweetpea said earlier, if the argument you are making is one that quality, and quality alone should determine what is on this site, with absolutely no other limits, then why aren't we hosting Girl With A Pearl Earring?
That you say there should be some hard limit against classical works that clearly aren't anime is my point. (Happy to have you agree!) As you are now arguing, not having some sort of hard limits saying at least something is out of bounds is absurd. (That's what makes it reductio ad absurdum.)
In fact, that image that Provence used as the example of something so blatantly off-topic? People have been re-approving that, now. So apparently, yes, there are janitors and uploaders who would approve classical-style works.
reiyasona said:
I fully agree with @Flandre5carlet. If we banned art by origin in cases where we compare two images with western artstyle and western subject matter, we would end up with ridiculous post confrontations like:
Well, the original ToS said none of those should have been uploaded in the first place. The alternative argument to be made is that they should all go, because they're all completely Western properties and art styles.
Allowing for exceptions for Eastern artists or for at least partly-anime styles while still maintaining the hard line somewhere on the far end of what should be acceptable allows for a lot more to be permitted without forcing some big purge, which seems to be what most of the resistance to having standards comes from, since there still is relatively few flagrantly Western artworks relative to the bulk of Danbooru's still mostly anime art (although that becomes less and less the case day by day).
And, well, why DO we have 3d rendered Western-style art of Star Wars in the first place? Outside of there being anime characters with some 3d-rendered X-wings in the background, those have always been off-topic, and should have always been deleted. That people are defending them is the problem.
reiyasona said:
no_humans ~scenery ~landscape
Oh, and for the record, landscapes can be done in anime styles.
reiyasona said:
To better understand where the two main "antagonists" of this discussion ( @Provence and @NWSiaCB ) are coming from,
I don't think Provence is the "antagonist", here. I probably agree with him more than most when he's going out flagging on anatomy grounds or the like, although I do maintain he should be more consistent.
It's simply that Provence was willing to stand and argue his case more than others before it made enough noise that the rest of you were willing to join in, and I'm one of the few people pushing this thing stubborn enough to still not be so utterly sick of this to still be making the case 8 months down the road.
If it were just Provence that didn't seem to have any limits on what constitutes "off-topic", it would be the relatively simple task of organizing some of the others to watch and flag his approvals to weed out the clearly off-topic ones. However, it's not just Provence that thinks that Overwatch is some exception that might be allowed in maybe if it has really high quality to justify its being off-topic, but that straight-up Disney art is always on-topic, and are willing to both re-approve those images and harangue those who flag such things in the first place.
Beyond that, I'm not sure what your point is. Yes, my interests, personally, lie with interesting 4komas and Japanese-language webcomics and translating them much more than trying to upload just another "girl showing off her boobs" pic, but I'm approving plenty more than that, and for that matter, Provence has been approving a disproportionate share of 4komas, himself.
Saladofstones said:
However, concept art of System Shock, though I think it has its own merits as far as design and utilizing limited resources to create a detailed model, is not going to be something that is appropriate here.
We don't need to do a sweeping ban of western media or anything, things like this image are an anomaly and end up being a flashpoint for the broader debate about the focus of the site and how to interpret rules and how much discretion versus difference people should have.
What I'm trying to argue, however, is that saying concept art of System Shock is simply off-topic (implicating that it is regardless of quality) is, in itself, a "sweeping" hard ban, it's just that you're not phrasing or recognizing it as such.
We agree there are limits, let's just find some place we can agree upon some explicit, communicable standard that we can tell those who want to be more permissive where those limits should be.
Flandre5carlet said:
It's clear neither of us is going to budge from their position so we can chalk it up to a difference in standards, but when judging whether to approve something or not, I judge the picture as a whole. The composition, the theme, the art style, the anatomy and general quality. THEN I look at it in detail and whether some flaws I may notice affect the overall quality of the picture or not.
I judge the work as a whole, and the thing is, the "background" is where most of the focus of this piece is, and therefore weights heavily on it. How can you "judge the work as a whole" and then consider the flaws? Isn't that saying the flaws are not part of the whole?
Flandre5carlet said:
Really? Cherry-picked? Come on. Rather than it being "cherry picked to support my argument", I think it's the fact that it doesn't support yours that seems to bother you so. Yes, albert clearly said that in terms of content such a picture was not objectionable. And yes, it was part of a slightly longer comment which generally adressed the issue with "Western art isn't the problem, bad art is the problem."
Yes, you pick the one argument made in favor of allowing Western art in without regards to quality while ignoring the tremendous amounts of precedent and words left that argue against it. That is the definition of cherry-picking.
The fact that Albert said something once while having plenty of record of changing his mind is far from the be-all-end-all word of God, as you and Provence both argue, as well.
Which brings me to this...
Flandre5carlet said:
Which is why it should be explained clearly.
[...]
Besides that, I don't see how taking albert's word and polling people for what they think are mutually exclusive concepts.
Because saying Albert said something, therefore all discussion is over is mutually exclusive with saying there should be more discussion.
Flandre5carlet said:
Because there is currently a huge lack of consensus which makes this issue devolve into "whichever side can flag or approve a picture the most" regardless of each other's arguments, and that is not how this matter should be handled. The fact that this has been flagged and approved so many times clearly points at the fact that there's an issue somewhere - one that should be discussed, not handled like it currently is. As indicated by the last wave of "Western" flags including this one, there is a clear push to set a forced precedent against Western art rather than a push for consensus through discussions.
Why should there be a "unilateral disarmament" of one side of this equation while things get sorted out? If some actions can't be taken while there is no concensus, why is it the side that approves things that can push whatever they want while claiming there is no consensus? (And that's a dangerous precedent to set, since anyone can claim anything contrary to what is commonly held to break up consensus.)
As Provence has put forth in argument to justify his own flagging, flagging and approval are roughly equal in power, and yet flagging is vastly more inconvenient and invites vastly more blowback especially personally if there isn't anonymity in the process.
I mean, will you agree to stop approving things upon which there is no consensus until there is consensus?
The fact that flagging itself is treated as an affront or heresy is itself a part of this problem.
Beyond that, yes, I do think there should be more discussion. That's why I've been trying to discuss it with people.
Flandre5carlet said:
Compare how many people voted in the last opinion poll with how many people are actually active in the forums. I'm pretty sure the vast majority of people just don't post on forums about these matters, regardless of what they think. Case and point a couple friends with accounts brought up this very DOOM picture to me, and how they found it silly that it'd be considered "poor quality." They aren't anywhere here arguing about it though, even if it's annoying or whatever, because they just aren't involved in danbooru beyond finding pictures. Which is what a lot of users do here, even despite the fact that a big complaint in the last poll was how obfuscated decision-making is.
Why I think polls are not the solution is that they're isolated and impersonal and don't invite people into the dicussion to see the other points of view, argue, and reassess what they think in response. (They also open up the possibility of just having random people who aren't Danbooru users being invited in to "stack the deck" without really understanding what they're voting for or caring what the outcome is. Your example is a bunch of guys who don't really use or care about Danbooru that much that you brought in to ask opinions about/agree with you on something they don't have an investment in...) Because discussion can change opinion and when it does so often does so towards consensus, while simply asking people from behind a double-blind to fire off their opinions without any real sense of its effect or how people responded to it lacks that quality that discussion has.
Flandre5carlet said:
Yes. Much like reiyasona said, you're comparing digital paintings from the 21st century relating to current-days pop culture with classical pieces. People who like anime also generally have an interest in video games and other contemporary forms of media (TV shows, comic books,...) and thus fanart from such things is completely different than classical pieces which you are bringing up.
Saying "nothing but anime and OK, certain video games or comic books that I like" sets some kind of limit, it's just a limit that nobody else is going to agree to because it's highly specified to your tastes. And in the absence of those kinds of agreed-upon limits, there's people who apparently really are ready to approve classical paintings if only out of spite.
And again, Western comic books are what are explicitly mentioned as what Danbooru is opposed to hosting in howto:upload.
Super_Dick said:
and yet the same problem is still arising...this situation here is proof...so therefore the problem has still not been fixed...the only difference is that janitors & builders have been thrown into the equation.
Yes, again, my argument is that this whole thing will always be a moving target that always generates more and more problems until and unless there are explicit rules. Otherwise, it's just Eternal September.
Super_Dick said:
flagging should only be used by average users only...staff members should have no flagging privileges...same with appeals...this defeats my previous argument yes, but...after some time of thinking about it...I've considered a new perspective...a better one as well, in my opinion....plus I believe appeals should be held into higher consideration then they are now.
I don't get your reasoning. Why
If anything, if we're stripping flagging away from approvers, then there should be some sort of overt "flagger" role with a mod queue like tool for checking all recently approved works created to be guardians of standards that watch the watchmen, as it were.
Again, as it stands, having someone who goes completely out of their way to explicitly look through pre-approved uploaders' uploads, which is a rather thankless, tedious task, is the only way that some kind of quality check will ever occur on those people who are pre-approved. Yes, they had to show good behavior to get there, but when you are going so far out of your way to explicitly discourage flagging, there's absolutely no reason to remain on good behavior anymore past that point.
Super_Dick said:
and that's why I've considered that staff members should have no rights to appeal or flag a post...it is the staff's job to maintain the site...and it is the users job to moan and bitch at the staff about the problems they have with a certain pic or user that's rubbed off of them the wrong way...not the other way round...here I see staff members arguing with staff members...not a very professional scene is it?...but alas, humans are humans at the end of the day...and things like this must happen from time to time in order to remind ourselves that we are exactly that...annoying humans who are too stubborn for our own good.
You think professionals don't have discussions about their jobs? They just typically do so in conferences and meetings with themselves, not out on the showroom floor.
Anyway, we're not paid "professional" staff, here. (But if someone wants to slip me a salary, I sure wouldn't mind...) The "staff members" are basically made up of all the users who are most active and have relatively clean records. That is to say, the people who argue and complain the most just become the "staff members", provided they don't have lots of deletions or something.
In fact, at the start of this whole affair, I was a regular member joining in on complaints about how the "staff" was letting their standards slip, and since then, I've been "promoted" all the way up to being "the staff", as well. Even during those arguments, the response from some of the mods was that I should just apply to be a janitor, and my response then was that being a janitor didn't matter because having approval privileges is not the same as having disapproval privileges or any other sort of ability to actually try to get others to actually get together into having a consensus about what is or isn't allowed.
And again, that's kind of the problem - it's not really THAT hard for anyone who has an interest in this site to get promoted, (I certainly wasn't trying, I in fact passed it up, before...) and once they're in, they have tremendous discretion and very little oversight to allow for anything, and invite almost anyone.
Super_Dick said:
but as I've said before NWSiaCB...this is a good piece of art...to keep it from this site would (from a general point of view) be nonsensical...wouldn't broadening the horizons for danbooru be a good thing?...to accept the western style into the fold...wouldn't that bring to this site, a bigger audience, and therefore make this site that much more successful?
No it wouldn't.
To take Zaregoto's example and run with it, that would be like if we said we wanted to "broaden the horizons" of a museum of classical art by taking away the focus on classical art and creating a petting zoo or maybe hosting some death metal concerts.
This becomes a problem because, again, there is no role for disapprovers, just approvers, and once someone gets in as a "metal concert approver", bringing in more and more metal concerts, and therefore those "broadened horizons" metal fans, they then have just as much power to ask why there's so many people complaining about all the loud noise and trying to look at paintings in their concert hall.
If you are someone who came here without liking anime, only wanting all the Western stuff that's being brought in, and wondering why people have been coming here for years to look at anime images, talk about recent animes, and look at soft-translated webcomics, and angry that those people are here, then that's kind of the problem on full display, now isn't it? Again, Eternal September wasn't just that Usenet "broadened its horizons", it's that the original users were no longer welcome, and eventually forced out of the site they had originally created, Usenet lost its purpose, and eventually withered into utter purposeless irrelevance because of it.
And to put the shoe on the other foot again, I've seen a lot of yaoi porn being uploaded by a particular user, recently, and I've gone ahead and approved the quality on-topic ones for lack of any real reason not to do so... but what happens when there's enough male-figure porn and trap porn that it starts really bothering people? What happens when it attracts enough people who want to only see porn of men and not of women to actually start mounting a fight about it with the female-figure porn stuff?
For further argument on the purpose of curation, and why a gallery is defined less by what it includes than what it excludes, I really want to bring up some of the arguments that have been going on in and about Steam, and both its admittance policies and the curator program in particular, recently. (Because I haven't provided enough reading material to everyone, already, but hey, I added some YouTube videos for people who like to hear instead of see...) I remember a wonderful argument explicitly on how curation is meaningful only by what it excludes (I.E. a curator that only deals with turn-based strategy games instead of any "games they think are good") but my Google-fu is failing me at the moment.
In any event, it seems clear I need to revive that forum thread, or outright create a new one so that this conversation can be a little more organized and it would be easier to bring everyone up to speed at this point, since I'm obviously talking to more than just a couple people at this point... but I've basically read and written for something like four hours of my weekend at this point, so not tonight.
I judge the work as a whole, and the thing is, the "background" is where most of the focus of this piece is, and therefore weights heavily on it. How can you "judge the work as a whole" and then consider the flaws? Isn't that saying the flaws are not part of the whole?
No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying I first look at the piece as a whole, the composition, the theme, etc, before going into details and whether this and that flaw are big enough to detract from how the overall piece looks. Those things are not the same thing at all. Same goes for non-Western pieces and whether some proportion or anatomy errors might be small enough to overlook and approve the piece anyway (ie. post #2652718 which I initially approved then appealed with my reasons.)
re:cherrypicking
I didn't ignore anything. If I did, I wouldn't even be responding to any of your arguments, I'd just say "But albert said this so stop arguing." Which is the exact same reason why there is no mutually exclusiveness between bringing up albert's statement while having ongoing discussions about the matter.
Why should there be a "unilateral disarmament" of one side of this equation while things get sorted out? -snip- I mean, will you agree to stop approving things upon which there is no consensus until there is consensus?
Because there is currently a status quo that allows but discourages upload of western art and holds it to higher scrutiny, and flagging art solely because they are western works directly goes against what is explicitely stated. I will agree to uphold the current status quo and terms of service until an eventual consensus might be met.
re:polls
I didn't bring anyone in to make them agree with me. Much like I explicitely said, they came to me telling me what basically amounts to "look at this shit, people think this is poor quality." The point in bringing that example up is that even if people might not hop into the discussion, they see these things, they think about these things and they have opinions about these things. Discussion can change opinion, yes, but it can still be useful to poll the general population about what they think, if only to get a general idea. The very reasons you're against the poll are specifically why I'm not of the opinion that the results should be a be-all-end-all, but rather simply a source of information and data.
Don't ask me, I did not approve it when it was in the queue specifically because of the reasons I stated. Much like I did not re-approve post #2557315 for being simply western comic book art with what is to me passable art, yet reapproved post #2643001 because the artist generally also draws other copyrights and it looks better. Though bear in mind that (unless I'm looking at the wrong place) howto:upload only states that Western art is "generally rejected".
I think you should create a new forum topic for this. And I want to add that albert didn't approve this once. The approver line is this way: buehbueh-Provence-NotOneOfUs-zaregoto-Flandre5carlet-Randeel-Nitrogen09 That matches the amount of flags :3.
But yeah, before talking anymore: I think opening a topic is pretty much the better way. This comment section is so blown up, new comments aren't even shown under the new comments :3.