Are there any photo / image websites (similar to flickr.com) that allow the user to manipulate (i.e. edit) the uploaded images, similar to running Gimp or Photoshop but as a web application?
I was thinking about this functionality for Wikimedia Commons, so I'm seeking some inspirational examples to look at. Are there any?
Hoi, There is a big problem with people going about changing pictures in Commons. People use the license as an excuse to have their "anything goes" attitude vindicated. This has already led to a big row with several prominent people from the Dutch wikipedia community to have anything to do with Commons.
The idea of making it even easier to change pictures would make this situation worse.
There were several issues involved.
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about. *There is a lot of resistance to websites that use Wikipedia material commercially without them making due reference to the original site an original author. This resulted in the inclusion of watermarks that were then deleted.
The first issue is a big NONO, the second requires a more proactive stance of the foundation and its chapters. But my message to you is NO !! DO NOT CHANGE PICTURES !!
Thanks, GerardM
On 10/11/05, Lars Aronsson lars@aronsson.se wrote:
Are there any photo / image websites (similar to flickr.comhttp://flickr.com) that allow the user to manipulate (i.e. edit) the uploaded images, similar to running Gimp or Photoshop but as a web application?
I was thinking about this functionality for Wikimedia Commons, so I'm seeking some inspirational examples to look at. Are there any?
-- Lars Aronsson (lars@aronsson.se) Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
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GerardM wrote:
Hoi, There is a big problem with people going about changing pictures in Commons. People use the license as an excuse to have their "anything goes" attitude vindicated. This has already led to a big row with several prominent people from the Dutch wikipedia community to have anything to do with Commons.
The idea of making it even easier to change pictures would make this situation worse.
There were several issues involved.
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about. *There is a lot of resistance to websites that use Wikipedia material commercially without them making due reference to the original site an original author. This resulted in the inclusion of watermarks that were then deleted.
The first issue is a big NONO, the second requires a more proactive stance of the foundation and its chapters. But my message to you is NO !! DO NOT CHANGE PICTURES !!
Well, if you won't let us change a picture, how can you claim that it is free?
What I think you are talking about is image protection. Drop me a list on my commons talk page and I'll gladly protect them.
- -- Alphax | /"\ Encrypted Email Preferred | \ / ASCII Ribbon Campaign OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613 | X Against HTML email & vCards http://tinyurl.com/cc9up | / \
On 10/11/05, Alphax alphasigmax@gmail.com wrote:
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GerardM wrote:
Hoi, There is a big problem with people going about changing pictures in
Commons.
People use the license as an excuse to have their "anything goes"
attitude
vindicated. This has already led to a big row with several prominent
people
from the Dutch wikipedia community to have anything to do with Commons.
The idea of making it even easier to change pictures would make this situation worse.
There were several issues involved.
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A
photo
reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about. *There is a lot of resistance to websites that use Wikipedia material commercially without them making due reference to the original site an original author. This resulted in the inclusion of watermarks that were
then
deleted.
The first issue is a big NONO, the second requires a more proactive
stance
of the foundation and its chapters. But my message to you is NO !! DO
NOT
CHANGE PICTURES !!
Well, if you won't let us change a picture, how can you claim that it is free?
What I think you are talking about is image protection. Drop me a list on my commons talk page and I'll gladly protect them.
Hoi, First of all I can protect pictures if I want to because I am an admin of commons as well. Second it does not help if it is admins who do the changing. Third, if you use the fact that a picture is free as an excuse, then you do not address the issues raised. The fact that you are allowed to use a picture and make changes does not mean that it is good or wise to do so. When you want to change a picture, save the revised picture elsewhere and do not trouble the world with in your face esthetic notions.
The point of a picture being free does not mean that it is good form to replace a picture. Yes it is legal, it is also bad manners.
Thanks, GerardM
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GerardM wrote: <snip badly quoted mess>
Hoi, First of all I can protect pictures if I want to because I am an admin of commons as well. Second it does not help if it is admins who do the changing. Third, if you use the fact that a picture is free as an excuse, then you do not address the issues raised. The fact that you are allowed to use a picture and make changes does not mean that it is good or wise to do so. When you want to change a picture, save the revised picture elsewhere and do not trouble the world with in your face esthetic notions.
I agree. Overwriting existing images with "better" versions (unless it is eg. a photo taken by the uploader) is BAD.
The point of a picture being free does not mean that it is good form to replace a picture. Yes it is legal, it is also bad manners.
I agree. I should have made this a bit clearer in my original reply.
Of course, it would a whole lot easier if image deletion wasn't quite so instantly permanent...
- -- Alphax | /"\ Encrypted Email Preferred | \ / ASCII Ribbon Campaign OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613 | X Against HTML email & vCards http://tinyurl.com/cc9up | / \
GerardM wrote:
The idea of making it even easier to change pictures would make this situation worse.
If you want to reference a certain version, you should be able to reference that version. The same goes for the text of an article.
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about.
The same goes for the text of an article. Don't change the facts only for the purpose of making the lines rhyme. But if the text is wrong or the picture was taken with the wrong exposure, this can be corrected afterwards. Images have talk pages, just like text articles. Revert vandalism, but allow improvements.
Perhaps a "diff" function for images is the first function we need, so versions could be compared against each other.
The first issue is a big NONO, the second requires a more proactive stance of the foundation and its chapters. But my message to you is NO !! DO NOT CHANGE PICTURES !!
Then you should use a no-derivates (ND) Creative Commons license, and/or lock the image from modifications. The same goes for texts. I don't see the principal difference. It's a wiki.
So, I already have the ability (Gimp) to modify an image offline and upload a new version, and I'm already encouraging people to do this for some images. I'm now looking for examples of how to design a web application to make this procedure less complicated for the average user.
The same goes for the text of an article. Don't change the facts only for the purpose of making the lines rhyme. But if the text
That's actually a fun idea. It would be fun/horribly upsetting if some vandal or group of vandals in the future did such a thing on a massive scale. "Wikipedia's a free encyclopedia / which provides you with lots of free media"...
Perhaps a "diff" function for images is the first function we need, so versions could be compared against each other.
Do you mean a pixel-by-pixel "here's what's changed", or just showing the two images next to each other for comparison?
Mark
On 10/11/05, Lars Aronsson lars@aronsson.se wrote:
GerardM wrote:
The idea of making it even easier to change pictures would make this situation worse.
If you want to reference a certain version, you should be able to reference that version. The same goes for the text of an article.
The best and only way is by not overwriting existing pictures. It is you who things there is this "need" to change images. It is best to keep "updated" pictures under a different name.
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is
BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about.
The same goes for the text of an article. Don't change the facts only for the purpose of making the lines rhyme. But if the text is wrong or the picture was taken with the wrong exposure, this can be corrected afterwards. Images have talk pages, just like text articles. Revert vandalism, but allow improvements.
Perhaps a "diff" function for images is the first function we need, so versions could be compared against each other.
The first issue is a big NONO, the second requires a more proactive stance of the foundation and its chapters. But my message to you is NO !! DO NOT CHANGE PICTURES !!
Then you should use a no-derivates (ND) Creative Commons license, and/or lock the image from modifications. The same goes for texts. I don't see the principal difference. It's a wiki.
Guess what, this "suggestion" of using ND was done to one of the people who complained about this undiscrimatory urge to change pictures. The result was that the pictures were deleted as ND licensed material are incompatible with the accepted licenses.
The problem is that replacing an existing picture with an "improved" picture is often a bad idea. The claim that pictures could be locked or that a different license could be used is against Commons policy. In your answer you do not address any of the concerns that have been raised.
So, I already have the ability (Gimp) to modify an image offline
and upload a new version, and I'm already encouraging people to do this for some images. I'm now looking for examples of how to design a web application to make this procedure less complicated for the average user.
You may encourage people to change pictures. This is however not something that is without controversy. It is better to have it a complicated thing to do than to have even more of the resulting bad blood.
Thanks, GerardM
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about.
The colours reflected in a photograph are not nessecarily the "true colour" of the object. It depends on lighting, and on the individual camera. Thus, a photo of a painting may look differently than if you were to put the painting in a flatbed scanner (not a good idea for, say, van Gogh's Starry Night).
If somebody's changes are an attempt to get closer to the true colour, or to fix irregularities in the colour, then I think it's OK.
If, however, they're changing a colour saying "Well, yes, that's the colour it is in the actual painting, but I think the painting would look better if it were this colour so I'm going to just change it".
What I mean is, colour changes such as hue, brightness, etc., are one thing; arbitrarily changing all of the pinks to reds is quite another.
*There is a lot of resistance to websites that use Wikipedia material commercially without them making due reference to the original site an original author. This resulted in the inclusion of watermarks that were then deleted.
That's one of the things that you have to deal with when you're a free content provider. While sites are SUPPOSED to make due reference, they don't nessecarily, even though that's really not lawful (I don't think). Obviously, we're not going to sue every last one of them, which would be pretty pointless since we don't lose any money when people don't view our site anyhow (except for the fact that they may not see donation banners).
We don't write "WIKIPEDIA" in between every word on Wikipedia articles, why should we do the same for images?
Mark
GerardM wrote:
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about.
In general it's not true that taking a photo of a picture reflects what it really looks like---a photo's colors depend on how it was taken and exposed (if film camera) or digitally color-balanced (if digital camera). I agree changing them arbitrarily is not a good idea, but changing them to be more reflective of the actual colors is not only a good idea by standard in professional photography. One way of doing it is by including known colors in the picture (e.g. Pantone swatches) and balancing those. But in general a photograph of a painting will have incorrect colors and needs to be corrected, either during the exposure in a darkroom, or during post-processing on a digital image.
-Mark
Delirium wrote:
GerardM wrote:
*When there is a picture of a painting; changing the colours is BAD. A photo reflects what the picture looks like. Changing the colours arbitrarily because it "looks good" is falsifying what the picture is about.
In general it's not true that taking a photo of a picture reflects what it really looks like---a photo's colors depend on how it was taken and exposed (if film camera) or digitally color-balanced (if digital camera). I agree changing them arbitrarily is not a good idea, but changing them to be more reflective of the actual colors is not only a good idea by standard in professional photography. One way of doing it is by including known colors in the picture (e.g. Pantone swatches) and balancing those. But in general a photograph of a painting will have incorrect colors and needs to be corrected, either during the exposure in a darkroom, or during post-processing on a digital image.
-Mark
Hoi, You say it well: "One way of doing it is by including known colours in the picture" this implies that only a person familiar with the picture can do this. By these words you condemn almost all "corrections" by all those well meaning persons who change picture because they can and because it is "allowed = legal" and the picture is "Free".
Lucebert said it well; everything of value is defenseless. Thanks, GerardM
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