Hoi,

- Many people no longer trust Commons to store their media files. People are more certain that their files will remain available when they upload media files to their own project. - Many media files exist on many projects waiting for transfer to Commons. It does not happen and consequently those media files are not generally available. - Media files exist on multiple wikis because they are acceptable to them for reasons defined at those wikis. Theoretically the same file is stored in many locations. - Wikidata has started its development that will "Wikidatify" much of the meta data of media files

These things are all true and typically they are seen in isolation. When the process of bringing Wikidata to Commons really gets under way, Commons will finally become usable for people who do not know English. When this process is complete, it is reasonable to expect that functionality will build upon the information that is held in this way.

It is equally reasonable that the projects who have their own media files will insist that this new functionality will be available for their media files as well. Consequently it is extremely likely that all media files will be Wikidatified.

The opportunity exist to have all this data in one "multimedia Wikidata". It would mean that when a Commons admin decides for his reasons that a file is no longer available, that a local admin can address his reasons and decide that it is available for his project. When a file is marked ad being available for transfer, it is technically only a different setting about that media file. I would not be surprised when in the technical infrastructure a file exists only once anyway.

As far as I am concerned, when people are searching for any excuse to deny the existence of an image, it is extremely similar to pushing a POV. When people find that some users are only involved in pushing such a POV, it should be obvious what happens next. This would not be a third or fourth iteration of saving one image at a time.

Thanks,

GerardM