RatCreature (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ratcreature) wrote2010-08-23 03:32 pm
ratcreature) wrote2010-08-23 03:32 pm
Entry tags:
disgruntled ratcreature is disgruntled
You may or may not have noticed (depending on whether you followed the ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fanlore comm and previous discussions and posts by other contributors), that I've been somewhat discontent with how the Fanlore wiki is handled, and the recent thing was kind of the last straw. My idea of the wiki as a group project, and the OTW's idea of the wiki are a bit further apart than I thought, and my issues with the official side are now at a point that it's been sabotaging my enjoyment of anything related to that wiki, and that's no frame of mind to contribute somewhere. This post is however only tangentially related to that.
The thing is, because I have decided to take break from editing Fanlore at least until I feel more mellow towards the mess, I didn't want to be listed in the contributor category while intentionally inactive. However that contributor category is tied to the user template that formats your user profile info, so I had to delete that, which happened to be the only thing on my user page, as I never added any text beyond a link to my website/journals and a list of fandoms. So essentially I blanked my user page.
That in turn resulted in someone making a regular article page for my pseud instead, which nobody bothered with before. That's fine too of course, I guess the idea was that there ought to be some kind of info about me in the wiki, because I appear on quite a lot of editing history or something, though it's a bit ironic that it took me leaving in a disgruntled huff from the ranks of the contributors for someone else to consider me notable enough for a regular page. I guess that profile raising is why people fandom flounce? *snort*
Anyway.
The source of my current disgruntlement is that then someone uploaded some of my fanart (and one original art piece) as eyecandy for that page. I say "eyecandy" because the page doesn't talk about any particular piece of art right now, or even links the art to other articles in its creation context (the challenges some of the pieces were made for, even though they have articles, or even just dates or anything) but just seems to be there so that something is on the page.
That may have been meant nicely, actually I fully assume it was, however in the two years that I had been editing the wiki I had intentionally never uploaded any of my own art (with the exception of some drawings for wiki templates that I made specifically for the wiki), even if my art would have fit to illustrate an article I made. And it wasn't because I'm too shy or modest to self-promote. I linked to plenty of my meta and quoted myself for example.
I also never uploaded any online art from other artists (with the exception of two challenge banners that were posted to promote challenges and intended be reposted as ads). I have an issue with online art being just uploaded to Fanlore, because I think it diverts traffic and potential comments away from the artists' chosen posting venue if people just look at the art in fanlore, especially if it posted in a decent resolution. I have said so on several Talk pages and expressed that concern (like almost a year ago here and here and here, probably in other discussions too) when there was discussion of image policies. So my objection to seeing my art reposted on Fanlore is not due to my recent break from editing, except by timing.
Anyway, I thought, no problem, I'll just mail the wiki that the uploaded art gets deleted, and just linked for discussion purposes. After all it's all online, not locked or anything, so unlike with the zine cover versions, nobody needs a copy on Fanlore to be able to see what the article is talking about. And most of the other online art I've seen reposted to Fanlore has been actually posted there with permission, or sometimes it's from vanished sites or the like, when there are screencaps like the geocities rescue project. So I did that last Thursday and thought there would be no problem. Yeah, not so much.
In the answering mail I got today I was told that they weren't "able" to delete my art (kind of weasel word like, as if there was some outside force or circumstance making them; of course the wiki admins are able to delete my art, they apparently just don't want to). I was offered instead that the uploaded art could be made smaller. See, right now some of the smaller pieces are the original size, some of the larger degraded to a reduced size but still sizes like for example 584 × 819 pixel. Obviously that is a size that could be easily be mistaken by viewers to be the screen resolution size at which someone posted (even though I posted at 900 × 1263 pixel and the true high resolution scan form which I show details in the post and that I can share on request if someone wants to print themselves a copy for example is 3492 × 4900 pixel, so you can imagine how sucky the copy archived on fanlore looks).
Also they graciously offer that they link to the original art post as source directly, when right now only my general fanart blog is given as source, so any visitor would have to search for the art if they want to see how it was supposed to look, which of course almost nobody will bother with, thinking they are seeing what I posted.
Well, further size reduction and direct links are better than nothing, but not exactly what I expected when I asked the wiki not to archive my online art. I don't particularly like the idea that small degraded copies of my fanart are archived elsewhere, but I like it even less that people won't visit my page to see them because the Fanlore archived version is a click less away from the article and it's easier to just stay there coming from there, and I won't get any traffic or comments or anything.
A near universal convention in fandom as I know it is that you do not distribute someone's fanworks in public venues against the fan's wishes while they are still distributing the fanwork themselves and hope to attract traffic and comments to their own place. Etiquette differs sometimes if a fanwork is not easily available, like fans email a pulled story, copy or scan an out of print zine, and share or circulate those more or less privately. But there is no need at all to archive copies of my art on fanlore. My art is all online, unlocked, and can be seen by anyone who can access a fanlore article via a simple link. I understand the urge to have pretty pictures on the wiki and to make it most convenient, and to chronicle fanworks. And it's not like I don't love to see art that I can't get to otherwise on Fanlore, and see what an article is talking about, but referencing online art with a link all readers can click is not much less usable than posting a thumbnail readers also need to click to see it decently on the wiki, only in the latter case I won't get won't get traffic or have a chance at potential comments.
So yeah.
Disgruntled. >:(
fanlore comm and previous discussions and posts by other contributors), that I've been somewhat discontent with how the Fanlore wiki is handled, and the recent thing was kind of the last straw. My idea of the wiki as a group project, and the OTW's idea of the wiki are a bit further apart than I thought, and my issues with the official side are now at a point that it's been sabotaging my enjoyment of anything related to that wiki, and that's no frame of mind to contribute somewhere. This post is however only tangentially related to that. The thing is, because I have decided to take break from editing Fanlore at least until I feel more mellow towards the mess, I didn't want to be listed in the contributor category while intentionally inactive. However that contributor category is tied to the user template that formats your user profile info, so I had to delete that, which happened to be the only thing on my user page, as I never added any text beyond a link to my website/journals and a list of fandoms. So essentially I blanked my user page.
That in turn resulted in someone making a regular article page for my pseud instead, which nobody bothered with before. That's fine too of course, I guess the idea was that there ought to be some kind of info about me in the wiki, because I appear on quite a lot of editing history or something, though it's a bit ironic that it took me leaving in a disgruntled huff from the ranks of the contributors for someone else to consider me notable enough for a regular page. I guess that profile raising is why people fandom flounce? *snort*
Anyway.
The source of my current disgruntlement is that then someone uploaded some of my fanart (and one original art piece) as eyecandy for that page. I say "eyecandy" because the page doesn't talk about any particular piece of art right now, or even links the art to other articles in its creation context (the challenges some of the pieces were made for, even though they have articles, or even just dates or anything) but just seems to be there so that something is on the page.
That may have been meant nicely, actually I fully assume it was, however in the two years that I had been editing the wiki I had intentionally never uploaded any of my own art (with the exception of some drawings for wiki templates that I made specifically for the wiki), even if my art would have fit to illustrate an article I made. And it wasn't because I'm too shy or modest to self-promote. I linked to plenty of my meta and quoted myself for example.
I also never uploaded any online art from other artists (with the exception of two challenge banners that were posted to promote challenges and intended be reposted as ads). I have an issue with online art being just uploaded to Fanlore, because I think it diverts traffic and potential comments away from the artists' chosen posting venue if people just look at the art in fanlore, especially if it posted in a decent resolution. I have said so on several Talk pages and expressed that concern (like almost a year ago here and here and here, probably in other discussions too) when there was discussion of image policies. So my objection to seeing my art reposted on Fanlore is not due to my recent break from editing, except by timing.
Anyway, I thought, no problem, I'll just mail the wiki that the uploaded art gets deleted, and just linked for discussion purposes. After all it's all online, not locked or anything, so unlike with the zine cover versions, nobody needs a copy on Fanlore to be able to see what the article is talking about. And most of the other online art I've seen reposted to Fanlore has been actually posted there with permission, or sometimes it's from vanished sites or the like, when there are screencaps like the geocities rescue project. So I did that last Thursday and thought there would be no problem. Yeah, not so much.
In the answering mail I got today I was told that they weren't "able" to delete my art (kind of weasel word like, as if there was some outside force or circumstance making them; of course the wiki admins are able to delete my art, they apparently just don't want to). I was offered instead that the uploaded art could be made smaller. See, right now some of the smaller pieces are the original size, some of the larger degraded to a reduced size but still sizes like for example 584 × 819 pixel. Obviously that is a size that could be easily be mistaken by viewers to be the screen resolution size at which someone posted (even though I posted at 900 × 1263 pixel and the true high resolution scan form which I show details in the post and that I can share on request if someone wants to print themselves a copy for example is 3492 × 4900 pixel, so you can imagine how sucky the copy archived on fanlore looks).
Also they graciously offer that they link to the original art post as source directly, when right now only my general fanart blog is given as source, so any visitor would have to search for the art if they want to see how it was supposed to look, which of course almost nobody will bother with, thinking they are seeing what I posted.
Well, further size reduction and direct links are better than nothing, but not exactly what I expected when I asked the wiki not to archive my online art. I don't particularly like the idea that small degraded copies of my fanart are archived elsewhere, but I like it even less that people won't visit my page to see them because the Fanlore archived version is a click less away from the article and it's easier to just stay there coming from there, and I won't get any traffic or comments or anything.
A near universal convention in fandom as I know it is that you do not distribute someone's fanworks in public venues against the fan's wishes while they are still distributing the fanwork themselves and hope to attract traffic and comments to their own place. Etiquette differs sometimes if a fanwork is not easily available, like fans email a pulled story, copy or scan an out of print zine, and share or circulate those more or less privately. But there is no need at all to archive copies of my art on fanlore. My art is all online, unlocked, and can be seen by anyone who can access a fanlore article via a simple link. I understand the urge to have pretty pictures on the wiki and to make it most convenient, and to chronicle fanworks. And it's not like I don't love to see art that I can't get to otherwise on Fanlore, and see what an article is talking about, but referencing online art with a link all readers can click is not much less usable than posting a thumbnail readers also need to click to see it decently on the wiki, only in the latter case I won't get won't get traffic or have a chance at potential comments.
So yeah.
Disgruntled. >:(
no subject
"Fanlore's position is that the reproduction of zine covers and other fannish artwork falls constitutes a fair use under U.S. copyright law." as is said here:
http://fanlore.org/wiki/Fanlore:Copyright
(the wonky sentence structure with the verb waffling in the middle is not my fault, I just c&p'ed it like it appears on the policy page right now.)
Only the images made for Fanlore specifically are supposed to be licensed under a CC license (as I did with graphics I made for the wiki). Though right now you couldn't tell from most images pages which image has what license, i.e. nowhere on the art that's been uploaded is made clear that it is not under a CC license, nothing like what wikipedia does for non-free images.
To be fair, once the size is made much smaller so that it can't be confused with the art like I posted it anymore it's not really "archiving" as such. I can even see their point that it is kind of like uploading small covers to go with your book review and the like. But considering that my art is just a click away for anyone to see while reading a wiki article, I'd have really thought that fanlore would be so "fan-friendly" as to take preferences of fans into account. I just don't like small thumbnails of the whole image myself (that's why I always crop for the thumbnails in my posts in the outside cut teaser), but I like not getting the nice jolt of views/traffic stats (even without comments) even less, so I don't want big images somewhere where I don't get such stats.
From a practical standpoint I know why the uploading policy makes sense, like with the fanzines covers, in many cases there is no way to contact the artists many decades later, often the covers are quite small, like what you might see on book sellers pages, and I do understand the impulse to chronicle fandom including the pictures. And there are I think currently over 14,000 images on fanlore, most of them fanart. For good and bad there is no way this many would or could have been uploaded if permission for each had been required.
But I had really thought that if the fan objected later on it would be taken down. And after all my art is just a click away, so not that much more inconvenient for articles to talk about.