Shortcut: COM:VP

#	💭 Title	💬	👥	🙋 Last editor	🕒 (UTC)
1	700 terabytes of works on Commons	9	3	MGeog2022	2025-06-21 09:56
2	Bot for enwiki DYK stats	1	1	DoNotArchiveUntil	2025-06-03 11:05
3	Thousands of WLM-files risk deletion because they failed Flickr review 10 years after upload	21	9	Jmabel	2025-06-24 16:46
4	Paul Vénel (1864-1920) Q96185647	12	7	Ymblanter	2025-06-21 20:10
5	LibriVox link template needed	6	3	Koavf	2025-06-18 18:48
6	Category:00s BC	4	2	Tvpuppy	2025-06-18 22:20
7	Photo challenge April results	1	1	Jarekt	2025-06-19 03:19
8	Using generative AI to write your unblock request	11	7	GPSLeo	2025-06-20 15:33
9	Audio contributed by non-native or non-fluent speakers	10	7	Gestumblindi	2025-06-24 20:14
10	Flickr now supports CC 4.0 licenses	5	4	Sannita (WMF)	2025-06-20 08:29
11	Possible mislabel from the source	3	2	Omphalographer	2025-06-19 23:01
12	Flight information region boundary maps	2	2	Jmabel	2025-06-20 18:07
13	Cascading protection message	1	1	RoyZuo	2025-06-21 18:30
14	Can I upload a photo of a 12th century mid relief artifact from a museum	3	3	PantheraLeo1359531	2025-06-22 07:54
15	Categories for discussion has been going on for 1.5 years	2	1	Immanuelle	2025-06-22 05:46
16	Need help with conversion of CSV-like file to JSON-like *.tab page on Commons!	3	2	PantheraLeo1359531	2025-06-23 15:07
17	How to classify structures for building bird nests?	1	1	Smiley.toerist	2025-06-22 09:14
18	Postcards vs. art	4	3	Pigsonthewing	2025-06-23 15:55
19	News Paaper cutting.jpg	2	2	Pigsonthewing	2025-06-23 15:57
20	Attribution and vanished user	2	2	GPSLeo	2025-06-23 13:42
21	Photo source transparency	3	2	GPSLeo	2025-06-23 14:01
22	Hundreds of "500px photos" incategory:"All media needing categories as of 2019" need to be categorised, please	10	6	Omphalographer	2025-06-24 15:38
23	Commons:500px licensing data and Internet Archive link	6	2	JWilz12345	2025-06-25 09:58
24	sdc for generic compound concepts	6	3	Jmabel	2025-06-25 18:07

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Centralized discussion See also: Village pump/Proposals   ■ Archive Commons talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Explicitly expand F10 to include AI? (1 May 2025) Discussion on Copyright law of North Korea (16 March 2025) Categorization of SVG files (13 February 2025) Costumed character files (14 October 2024) Commons:Requests for comment/Hosting of free fonts in Commons (18 July 2024) Template: View   ■ Discuss    ■ Edit   ■ Watch

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Moved to Commons:Village pump/Technical#Bot for enwiki DYK stats

what's the community's view on audio files (such as pronunciation) contributed by users who are not native or even not fluent at all in a language? RoyZuo (talk) 12:51, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

In my opinion, this isn’t great. At the very least, a person should be able to pronounce words correctly. For major languages, mispronunciation isn’t such a big deal — they can handle it without much harm. But for smaller languages spoken by fewer than 50,000 people, it can be a serious issue. In those cases, incorrect pronunciation can actually distort the language and harm its preservation. Incall ^talk 18:46, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

They can serve as a demonstration of accents IF they are clearly marked as audio files of non-native speakers. Nakonana (talk) 19:27, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

"Not native" isn't inherently bad; there is in fact potential value in recordings of people speaking a language with a foreign accent. But those recordings should be tagged clearly to make it clear that they're atypical and shouldn't be used as pronunciation audio (e.g. on Wiktionary). That being said, "not fluent" is a more serious problem. Outside of special cases like recordings of language instruction, users should probably not be contributing audio recordings in languages that they cannot speak well. Omphalographer (talk) 19:29, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

It's complicated. There are no "native speakers" of Latin: all we have is a variety of non-natives. And fluency is less the issue than good pronunciation: I've known trained opera singers whose pronunciation is impeccable in a language in which they could not order a drink or carry on chit-chat. Also, for world languages like English, Spanish or French, it is less important that someone is "native" than it is clear where they are from. Québécois French is a very different thing than Metropolitan French; Rioplatense, Mexican Spanish, and Castillian are sometimes barely mutually comprehensible; "correct" English in Mumbai is a very different thing from "correct" English in Nashville, Tennessee. And surely the fluent or near-fluent non-native English of an immigrant to the U.S. from Shanghai or from Oaxaca is a thing well worth documenting, as long as it is clear what the recording represents. - Jmabel ! talk 20:19, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'd say "it depends", very much. A selection of files containing examples like "German with a French accent" or "Italian as spoken by an American" certainly has its potential educational use. And for major languages, if the aim is for example just to have a Wikipedia article spoken by a human, some accent will not be an issue as long as it's spoken clearly enough. On the other hand, we certainly don't want audio files of small languages where native speakers exist - like Romansh or Greenlandic - with bad non-native pronunciation or grammar as examples for that language (and not as examples of "Greenlandic mispronounced by someone from Japan"). For the latter case, I think deletion could be in order. Gestumblindi (talk) 20:14, 24 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Special:ListFiles/AndroidDevelopment101 User:AndroidDevelopment101 uploaded pronunciations in several languages. i'm sceptical of these pronunciations' accuracy, but i speak none of these languages. can someone native please check?--RoyZuo (talk) 21:31, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The French one in File:Fr-mourir2.ogg is garbage, I nominated it for deletion. Addendum: I'm not a native from France, but sufficiently fluent in the language nevertheless, having lived in the Département Moselle between 1993 and 2001. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 22:31, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I don’t speak French, but based on the sound, I can tell it’s definitely not proper French, no one speaks it with such a terrible accent. Incall ^talk 22:39, 19 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes. This person is less qualified to provide French pronunciation than I am, and I am unqualified to provide French pronunciation. - Jmabel ! talk 00:53, 20 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

still, recordings supposedly in many languages need to be checked. RoyZuo (talk) 07:37, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

File:Vampire laugh.oga, how about this "vampire laugh"? The low quality reduced the professional nature of the supposed sound effect. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 07:53, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

On a second thought, I'll nominate it. The audio file is of mediocre quality, that only adds to many poor quality and mediocre files that exist on Commons. Ymblanter already mentioned something about a stereotype from some Wiki users in other projects that we tend to host assorted media files of low quality and dubious usability. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 09:08, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think we should have some kind of photo source transparency tool. Of course every photo already has a source. But often it requires further research to check what kind of source this is. It would be good to have around five to ten different source types like: "governmental source", "(semi) independent public broadcasting source", "independent journalistic source (including most commons photographers works)", "photographing on invite (not payed)", "NGO source", "(non publishing) company source". These levels should be shown next to the source on the file page. GPSLeo (talk) 13:40, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@GPSLeo: Given the information you are asking for, what would you do with that information?   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 13:53, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

It would de convenient for the Wikis or externals using the photos having such sometimes very important classification of the source directly next to the source. GPSLeo (talk) 14:01, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The vast majority of the files, would be non-professional private person. Most professional photographers do not like to publish under a free license. When I see the list I see an exclusive focus on professional work, ignoring the vast majority of files.Smiley.toerist (talk) 11:19, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

We are looking for volunteers, to categorise hundreds of "500px photos" incategory:"All media needing categories as of 2019", please. These photos have been uploaded as part of a mass upload, and need now to be reviewed and categorized manually. Some experience on categorisation is a prerequisite, to do this effectively. Please leave a message on Category talk:All media needing categories as of 2019, when you reach the next round number. --NearEMPTiness (talk) 16:56, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

It looks like at least some of the images could at least be nominated for deletion due to lacking meaningful descriptions, being extremely low quality, Etc. Etc. There's no point in categorizing images that could (or should) just be deleted though. --Adamant1 (talk) 17:18, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Indeed: "Delete and/or categorise" should be decided case by case. Howwever, a category does not protect a file from being deleted. NearEMPTiness (talk) 18:59, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I doubt some can acturately be categorized. I've seem some 500px images with incorrect coordinates, categorized under the category of "Location A" when in fact, the image was taken in and depicts, "Location B". For example, this 500px image was long thought to depict the city of w:en:Bais, Negros Occidental, but after my inspection, turned out to depict the city of w:en:Dumaguete (within the same province but located south of the claimed location), due to the presence of American colonial-era Silliman Hall. While 500px images may be good enough, categorizing several by location may be a struggle due to unreliable coordinate data. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 21:40, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I also suspect that many (if not all) 500px imports are not their original/highest resolutions. See, for example, File:500px photo (58562974).jpeg which turned out to be a lower resolution duplicate of File:TPLINKHQ.jpg. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 23:02, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I would oppose deletion but I think they might stay uncategorised / poorly described for a while. For instance, I just categorised File:Munich Josephsburg U-Bahn station 500px photo (215251323).jpg: it would have been hard to identify it just based on the description (it says nothing about the location), but having been to U-Bahn Munich in the real life definitely helped. Similarly e.g. File:Dsc 0095 Jpg (169263395).jpeg can be easily identified by a person who had been at that station, but for me it doesn't look like any station I have been to. Maybe in a few years AI will get better and will be able to identify all of them... — NickK (talk) 23:43, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Tonight, I categorised 115 photos into the Category:Sea kayaking, which was comparatively easy by searching for the photographer, after noting that he had taken several photos about this topic. I think that all photos should have at least one category and, ideally, a better title, but I do not want to oversimplify the categorisation by just entering 'unidentified men' or 'unidentified women'. NearEMPTiness (talk) 23:57, 23 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'm mainly working on the 2021 uncategorized files lately but will take a look -- that being said I've done a few passes at these already awhile back. Gnomingstuff (talk) 19:23, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I've been trying to categorize any pictures in the group and I developed an odd feeling; I was doing somebody else's task. I very strongly think that uploaders should take due care of making their uploads meaningful by stating what their files are about. And I've found that some of the uploaders are still around here uploading.
From this point, I find two ways to go. One is deleting anything that cannot be reasonably identifyable. Another one is to inform uploaders this is going to happen.
I have looked some files at random and I've found that they have been uploaded by two users, @Rodrigo.Argenton: and @DarwIn: , to whom I respectfully ask whether they would mind to kindly inform us about the contents of the files they uploaded, so they could be categorised. B25es (talk) 07:51, 24 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'd support that. The educational value of a lot of these images is questionable anyway. I'm not sure I agree that they should be dumped in the most generic category someone can find just so they are categorized either. That's a bad way to categorize images in my experience and it doesn't really resolve the scope issues or lack of meaningful descriptions. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:11, 24 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The educational value of a lot of these images is questionable anyway. Agreed. 500px is/was a photography site; the majority of photos were uploaded to the site because they were visually interesting "art photos", not because they were clear, effective depictions of a subject. Some of these photos may happen to be usable anyway - but a lot simply aren't, and should probably be deleted. Omphalographer (talk) 15:38, 24 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Omphalographer The ones uploaded were already screened as probably useful. The vast majority of them, if I well recall, are landscapes and photos of events, which would be generally on scope. Darwin ^Ahoy! 02:29, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@B25es It's indeed my fault that the curadory of that batch stayed incomplete till today, mainly because it was uploaded in a kind of an urge to save those archives. I've seen you have speedied a lot of those. I believe a number of them can be saved, though, I'll have a look and in case I restore some for a proper curadory, I can ping you afterwards (in case you want to be notified of that). Darwin ^Ahoy! 02:28, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Let me offer a final summary of my perspective before stepping back from this discussion. These points have been offered by myself and others many times:

First, "deletion" on Wikimedia Commons is not erasure; it is hiding. The file remains on our servers, but the public is prevented from accessing it. This is the opposite of our mission to disseminate knowledge and have zero gain for us. Arguments based on "bad quality," "missing information," or not being "in use" are flawed because they prioritize tidiness over our fundamental goal of being a free media library with the sum of all knowledge.

Second, this brings me to collaboration. The idea that someone "was doing somebody else's task" is a fundamental misunderstanding of how a wiki works. It overlooks the fact that when an image is freely licensed, it belongs to humanity. And that this project was a community-requested preservation effort, not a personal hobby. The daily notifications I get of images being categorized and linked to Wikidata are proof that the collaborative process works. Arguing for deletion is an argument against this process.

Furthermore, deleting files for "missing information" is a short-sighted approach. This data is often discoverable—a location might be two clicks away on the author's Instagram. More importantly, technology is making this a temporary problem. AI is rapidly evolving to identify locations and add context, meaning we would be taking a "permanent" action for a problem technology will likely solve tomorrow.

Finally, the criticism directed at the volunteers who did this work is unfair. They manually filtered hundreds of thousands of images for import. Mistakes were made, as we are not all experts on every country's "freedom of panorama" laws. However, seeing comments like "the educational value of a lot of these images is questionable anyway" and others "agreeing" is both aggressive and untrue.

This endless, circular discussion is why my energy has waned. It reveals a deep misunderstanding of our mission to create "a world in which every single human can freely share in the sum of all knowledge." After years of seeing the same people expend so much energy fighting the same battles, I have to ask: why do you dedicate that immense effort to demolishing our collective work, instead of improving it?---- Rodrigo Tetsuo Argenton ^m 04:57, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

My excuses to @DarwIn and @Rodrigo.Argenton, no intention of offending anybody. I've refrained from speeding any more files.

As for "why do you dedicate that immense effort to demolishing our collective work, instead of improving it?", I don't.

See c:Category:Paymogo: 700 km drive and my wife and I took the photos. Last week we improved c:Category:Villahermosa del Río, c:Category:Montán and other places. c:Category:Balazote was in 2022. And we do it ourselves, quality isn't great by if you want to know how is Housing project at 8-20 Archiduque Carlos street, Valencia like you can because we have gone there. And we have clearly stated that the thing is that thing. B25es (talk) 06:15, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

It reveals a deep misunderstanding of our mission to create "a world in which every single human can freely share in the sum of all knowledge." Commons:Project scope "Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content." That's obviously not "the sum of all knowledge" and the educational value of any given image is greatly reduced by users not knowing what it is about, the location, Etc. Etc. Of course that information can be added by someone at some point but that's not really the point. The images were uploaded in 2018. That's plenty of time for the uploader or anyone to add the information. I don't personally think keeping uncategorized files of unknown origin, subject, Etc. Etc. indefinitely really serves the goals of the project though. That's my prerogative. People are allowed to have different standards of what makes something educational on here (or at least they should be allowed to). --Adamant1 (talk) 07:20, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I understand the argument but most of these photos are generally within scope -- they're fairly high-quality photos of things that people might want to illustrate with freely-licensed images. The solution to keeping uncategorized files is to categorize them. Gnomingstuff (talk) 19:25, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The image at right is titled "Untitled" and has no description on 500px. Clearly something is happening in this photo, but I have absolutely no idea what. Any ideas to help categorize it?? Nosferattus (talk) 05:27, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The photographer's web site identifies the subject as the cinematographer Thiago Arraes. He's mentioned tangentially in a few Wikipedia articles, mostly about music videos, but doesn't have an article or Wikidata entry. And that still doesn't explain what he's doing in a swimming pool with some sort of flaming liquid... Omphalographer (talk) 07:25, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Maybe it's a new spa treatment for removing body hair? As we don't have a category for men jumping into flaming swimming pools I've added Category:Men in swimming pools and Category:Men with fire, Jokulhlaup (talk) 08:12, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The sign in the background says "Life is short / Stunt it" so perhaps a subcat of Category:Stunts would also be appropriate? Sam Wilson 08:55, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

how to describe this in sdc? depicts=? sculpture? but how to convey that it's specifically a sculpture of swan? qualifier main subject (P921)=swan? RoyZuo (talk) 06:11, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

also i dont know where the line between sculpture and statue is. RoyZuo (talk) 06:21, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

smallest ones are statuettes, medium are sculptures, large=bigger than adults are statues. So in this case d:Q860861 Greetings from Germany, --Mateus2019 (talk) 11:23, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

No, as a native English speaker, that last is not quite right. "Sculpture" includes reliefs, statues, three-dimensional abstracts, and busts, as well as more specialized things such as figureheads of ships. A "statue" is free-standing (in contrast to a relief) and representational (though it may be somewhat abstract); busts are normally not considered statues. Something with multiple figures might or might not be considered a single statue, I think usage would vary among native speakers (though a single person on a horse can definitely be called either an "equestrian statue" or an "equestrian sculpture"; oddly, one would never use that term for a statue/sculpture of just a horse, English can be insane). A "statuette" is simply a small statue, usually less than 20% of lifesize. - Jmabel ! talk 18:01, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The photo depicts two sculptures; the sculptures each depict a swan. - Jmabel ! talk 18:03, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Special:Diff/1048883299 should cover it. - Jmabel ! talk 18:07, 25 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I would have gone with garden ornament (Q28597527) as they are quite small and look mass produced...Jokulhlaup (talk) 08:32, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Is advertisement really necessary on this photo? EugeneZelenko (talk) 13:59, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Can anyone figure out if we have a category for this photo studio, or a Wikidata entry? --RAN (talk) 01:55, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Convenience link: File:Aram Andonian (1919).jpg. @Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ): , surely you have been active on Commons long enough to form an internal link. - Jmabel ! talk 03:13, 26 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I want to connect d:Q135098821 and Category:Hongu-jinja Yohaisho of Kasuga-taisha but I cannot figure out how to do since the ui here only allows connection to wikipedia. How do I do it? Immanuelle ❤️💚💙 (please tag me) 00:36, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Immanuelle: Add Commons category (Q24574745) to the item. Then at the bottom under "Multilingual sites" add Commons along with the name of the category. Then you can add "wikidata infobox" to the category and it should connect everything and add an infobox. --Adamant1 (talk) 00:40, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Adamant1 okay I think I get that. But what is the purpose of the property when there is the multilingual sites thing on it too? They seem redundant Immanuelle ❤️💚💙 (please tag me) 00:43, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Immanuelle: I'm not totally sure but I think the infobox uses the Wikidata item while other projects connect to the "Multilingual sites" link. --Adamant1 (talk) 00:51, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Also, the “Multilingual sites” link can only link the category to one wikidata item, while multiple wikidata items can add the same “Commons category” property. Tvpuppy (talk) 00:56, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

And that last is very useful in cases like Manhattan (Q11299) and Category:Manhattan (Q7469772) - Jmabel ! talk 01:59, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

While checking for undeclared AI-generated content in new uploads, I often encounter logos which are unused, and which are poorly identified or entirely unidentified. (It's not uncommon for these logos to also be AI-generated, but that's not the issue at hand here.)

A lot of these logos are uploaded for draft articles or Wikidata entries which are deleted soon afterwards, either because they're unsourced and/or nakedly promotional. Others are uploaded by users with no other edits on any project - possibly because they started an article but never saved it, or because their only intent was to dump their company's press kit onto Commons. Many can't be easily resolved to an identifiable subject at all, either because the name and description of the logo don't contain an unambiguous name, or because the subject isn't described in any publicly accessible sources (like an entity with no public online presence, or one which hasn't officially launched).

Regardless of how they end up on Commons, the lack of clear identification on these logos makes them effectively unusable - even if the entity that the logo is associated with is notable, it's no use if nobody can find it.

In practice, the outcomes for these images tend to be:

• Speedily deleted as F10 (personal content) or sometimes G10 (advertisements), for clearly promotional images.
• Speedily deleted after 7 days for no permission, for logos clearly above TOO. (Evaluating TOO can be difficult, as there's often no indication of what country the logo was created in.)
• Deleted through DR, typically with no discussion beyond the nomination.
• Left indefinitely uncategorized, or lost in a catch-all category like Category:Logos. (This is, unfortunately, probably the most common outcome.)

Is there any more expedient way we should be handling these files? Perhaps some sort of new "delete if not identified in N days" process, like we have for lack of source or permission?

Omphalographer (talk) 04:28, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Omphalographer: Perhaps calling them "unfindable" or "uncurated"?   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 12:51, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Commons:WMF support for Commons/Upload Wizard Improvements/Logo detection#Reports on logos detected by the tool might be interesting. RoyZuo (talk) 17:19, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

See: File:Thaddeus Stevens.png where the thumbnails never formed properly, what can be done? RAN (talk) 17:33, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

No idea. I tried doing a different compression on it, but it has the same problem. - Jmabel ! talk 18:49, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

It looks like it does now, at least for me --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 18:58, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

• @Jmabel: It looks like what you did worked, it just must have taken a bit of time to show up. Did you just download it, open and resave, then upload? --RAN (talk) 16:22, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
  • @PantheraLeo1359531: Yes. Used GIMP. And it seems fixed for me now as well. - Jmabel ! talk 18:56, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

    Perfect. Yes, sometimes some rare conditions or used techniques cause these errors. But well done as it is gone :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 19:04, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Dear Wikimedia Community,

The Community Affairs Committee (CAC) of the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees assigned the Sister Projects Task Force (SPTF) to update and implement a procedure for assessing the lifecycle of Sister Projects – wiki projects supported by Wikimedia Foundation (WMF).

A vision of relevant, accessible, and impactful free knowledge has always guided the Wikimedia Movement. As the ecosystem of Wikimedia projects continues to evolve, it is crucial that we periodically review existing projects to ensure they still align with our goals and community capacity.

Despite their noble intent, some projects may no longer effectively serve their original purpose. Reviewing such projects is not about giving up – it's about responsible stewardship of shared resources. Volunteer time, staff support, infrastructure, and community attention are finite, and the non-technical costs tend to grow significantly as our ecosystem has entered a different age of the internet than the one we were founded in. Supporting inactive projects or projects that didn't meet our ambitions can unintentionally divert these resources from areas with more potential impact.

Moreover, maintaining projects that no longer reflect the quality and reliability of the Wikimedia name stands for, involves a reputational risk. An abandoned or less reliable project affects trust in the Wikimedia movement.

Lastly, failing to sunset or reimagine projects that are no longer working can make it much harder to start new ones. When the community feels bound to every past decision – no matter how outdated – we risk stagnation. A healthy ecosystem must allow for evolution, adaptation, and, when necessary, letting go. If we create the expectation that every project must exist indefinitely, we limit our ability to experiment and innovate.

Because of this, SPTF reviewed two requests concerning the lifecycle of the Sister Projects to work through and demonstrate the review process. We chose Wikispore as a case study for a possible new Sister Project opening and Wikinews as a case study for a review of an existing project. Preliminary findings were discussed with the CAC, and a community consultation on both proposals was recommended.

The application to consider Wikispore was submitted in 2019. SPTF decided to review this request in more depth because rather than being concentrated on a specific topic, as most of the proposals for the new Sister Projects are, Wikispore has the potential to nurture multiple start-up Sister Projects.

After careful consideration, the SPTF has decided not to recommend Wikispore as a Wikimedia Sister Project. Considering the current activity level, the current arrangement allows better flexibility and experimentation while WMF provides core infrastructural support.

We acknowledge the initiative's potential and seek community input on what would constitute a sufficient level of activity and engagement to reconsider its status in the future.

As part of the process, we shared the decision with the Wikispore community and invited one of its leaders, Pharos, to an SPTF meeting.

Currently, we especially invite feedback on measurable criteria indicating the project's readiness, such as contributor numbers, content volume, and sustained community support. This would clarify the criteria sufficient for opening a new Sister Project, including possible future Wikispore re-application. However, the numbers will always be a guide because any number can be gamed.

We chose to review Wikinews among existing Sister Projects because it is the one for which we have observed the highest level of concern in multiple ways.

Since the SPTF was convened in 2023, its members have asked for the community's opinions during conferences and community calls about Sister Projects that did not fulfil their promise in the Wikimedia movement.[1][2][3] Wikinews was the leading candidate for an evaluation because people from multiple language communities proposed it. Additionally, by most measures, it is the least active Sister Project, with the greatest drop in activity over the years.

While the Language Committee routinely opens and closes language versions of the Sister Projects in small languages, there has never been a valid proposal to close Wikipedia in major languages or any project in English. This is not true for Wikinews, where there was a proposal to close English Wikinews, which gained some traction but did not result in any action[4][5], see section 5 as well as a draft proposal to close all languages of Wikinews[6].

Initial metrics compiled by WMF staff also support the community's concerns about Wikinews.

Based on this report, SPTF recommends a community reevaluation of Wikinews. We conclude that its current structure and activity levels are the lowest among the existing sister projects. SPTF also recommends pausing the opening of new language editions while the consultation runs.

SPTF brings this analysis to a discussion and welcomes discussions of alternative outcomes, including potential restructuring efforts or integration with other Wikimedia initiatives.

Options mentioned so far (which might be applied to just low-activity languages or all languages) include but are not limited to:

• Restructure how Wikinews works and is linked to other current events efforts on the projects,
• Merge the content of Wikinews into the relevant language Wikipedias, possibly in a new namespace,
• Merge content into compatibly licensed external projects,
• Archive Wikinews projects.

Your insights and perspectives are invaluable in shaping the future of these projects. We encourage all interested community members to share their thoughts on the relevant discussion pages or through other designated feedback channels.

We'd be grateful if you want to take part in a conversation on the future of these projects and the review process. We are setting up two different project pages: Public consultation about Wikispore and Public consultation about Wikinews. Please participate between 27 June 2025 and 27 July 2025, after which we will summarize the discussion to move forward. You can write in your own language.

I will also host a community conversation 16th July Wednesday 11.00 UTC and 17th July Thursday 17.00 UTC (call links to follow shortly) and will be around at Wikimania for more discussions.

-- Victoria on behalf of the Sister Project Task Force, 20:56, 27 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Could anyone provide an summary?--Trade (talk) 14:41, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Not sure what your question is. The above is the summary. Ymblanter (talk) 16:46, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

A useful exercise will be to see, if/when Commons gets evaluated using the same method, would the conclusion be that it is fully aligned with the Wikimedia mission. Not that I am afraid that we are eventually getting shut down, but I think it would be better to get this discussed now and not when we have conclusion aldready drawn.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:50, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

How can Commons possibly violate the Wikimedia mission? Trade (talk) 01:41, 29 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I know that some people from other projects have very strong opinions about Commons, and they would probably be in a better position answering this question, but I can imagine it being along the line that Commons has a lot of files and media, mostly of very low quality and hardly potentially useful, too few contributors, and therefore disfunctional (simple questions such as renaming categories can take decades to resolve). Whereas it looks like a fixable problem it is not (in the same was as Wikinews would probably work if it had thousand of regular contributors instead of five, but it does not). Ymblanter (talk) 07:33, 29 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Partially agree to some extent, with respect to "Commons has a lot of files and media, mostly of very low quality and hardly potentially useful." To add that many of the imports from some external media archives (like 500px and Flickr) as well as the hundreds of still-unidentified logos remain either uncategorized or categorized in "general" or non-specific categories, reducing their utility and making most of them hard to find.

It seems that one point many Commons users overlooked is one of the observations from WMF's SDeckelman, that "the primary focus of the Commons community is the collecting of free content, rather than its dissemination." While that response indeed garnerned mixed responses from many fellow users here, it is becoming evident through overemphasis of archiving media with varied chances of being disseminated, off-Commons. Being uncategorized or left in "dump" categories like "Unidentified logos" only lessens the chances of those files (as well as freely-licensed imports) being used and/or disseminated outside Commons. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 08:05, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

It looks like a general sentiment here is that we are immune from any WMF decisions (presumably because Commons hosts files used elsewhere), and no discussion is needed. This is fine with me. Ymblanter (talk) 11:06, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I see that there are double categories such as Category:Male people wearing hats and Category:Men wearing hats. Is there a policy to replace al men en woman categories with male people and female people? For conservatives this looks very woke and may cause problems in political climate in the US.Smiley.toerist (talk) 08:20, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Here’s some links to the relevant discussions:

• Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/08/Category:Male humans
• Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/08/Category:People performing sexual activity
• Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/10/Category:Female humans' health
• User:Sbb1413/Men and women

Tvpuppy (talk) 09:50, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

"Male people" includes male people of all ages (men and boys), while "men" is only for adult males. Nakonana (talk) 14:46, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

If we want a consistent naming across all age classes we should adult male person instead of men. As there are many age classes without gender specific terms. But it is also possible to define that for Commons categories men is a synonym for male people independent of their age. GPSLeo (talk) 15:06, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

We have Category:Young men, Category:Middle-aged men , etc., but I guess Category:Young adult male people might work, too. I'd prefer "male people" for an age independent category over "men". Nakonana (talk) 20:31, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The problem is "men" is the simple intuitive term and "male people" is the more exact term, so we will always have people using both and it will always be confusing. My advice is to delete all gender categories as they are mostly useless anyway except for sports. Nosferattus (talk) 05:38, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

That's my opinion also. Gender based categories are totally pointless in most, if not all, instances anyway and "male people" just sounds needlessly clunky. Know one looks for images of men that way. The same goes for most of the age based categories. --Adamant1 (talk) 05:46, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Isn't it overly confusing that Commons:První kroky and Commons:First steps/cs lead to two different pages? - Jmabel ! talk 16:39, 28 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

The first one seems to be a very old version (from 2004 / 2006). IMO these pages should be merged and Commons:První kroky should be redirected to Commons:First steps/cs. @Mormegil and Matěj Suchánek: — Draceane ^talk_contrib. 07:10, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I would certainly be good with that. @Draceane: do you think we need to do a DR, or we can just make it a redirect without going through that? - Jmabel ! talk 18:58, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Potentially it is, but it is no different from, e.g., German Commons:Erste Schritte and Commons:First steps/de. --Matěj Suchánek (talk) 20:41, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Krd @The Squirrel Conspiracy @Lymantria:

Please be notified that there is a request for comment on Meta that you may be involved with, at m:Requests for comment/Should paid editing as a CU be allowed. You can voice your concerns regarding the topic.

Please do not reply to this message. 〈興華街〉📅❓ 04:58, 29 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hello. I would like to ask if it's possible for you to spare some time to check whether File:240902 Kim Hye Yoon (김혜윤).png, File:240925 Kim Hye-yoon (김혜윤).png, File:240604 Kim Hye yoon(김혜윤).png, File:240608 Kim Hye Yoon (김혜윤).png and File:240902 Kim Hye-Yoon (김혜윤).png are AI enhanced. The complexion seems unusually smooth and different from the still in the video. I'm still a pretty new user so there might be some disagreement if I were to point it out. And also, are AI enhanced images suitable for infobox (to be more specific Kim Hye-yoon)? Resurehtonatsuj (talk) 08:31, 29 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

This is already being discussed in your thread at Commons:Help desk#Image AI upscaled. Belbury (talk) 09:09, 29 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

There's currently Category:Record labels for record label companies. There doesn't seem to be a specific category for the labels on vinyl records though since a lot of them are uncategorized and I can't find one. Something like Category:Record labels (stickers) seems kind of nonsensical but I'm not sure what else to go with. It's either that or create Category:Record companies and make Category:Record labels purely about images of vinyl record labels. So does anyone have any ideas or know about a good exiting category to put the images in?--Adamant1 (talk) 00:08, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Perhaps Category:Vinyl record labels? Tvpuppy (talk) 00:16, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

And do note that most pre-1950s records are not vinyl. -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 00:31, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I agree that "record labels" meaning companies or brands, while commonly used, is problematic as it is a metaphorical name, and there are actual things that are record labels, paper labels on disc records, that I've sometimes wished to categorize. I'd rather given up on that fight - I'm not discouraging you if you wish to try to address it, but know you'll be continuously facing people who want to use the phrase to mean a corporation rather than a literal label. -- Infrogmation of New Orleans (talk) 00:31, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

We need some help please, to categorise the 34,400 files in the Category:All media needing categories as of 2019. We started on 20 January 2025 with 50,500 files, but now it is getting more difficult, as the low hanging fruit have been harvested. I recommend that you either "Search by keyword" or choose a letter in the table of content, to avoid that all us of start on the same page. Please leave a note on the discussion page if you reach the next round number, to check the progress. --NearEMPTiness (talk) 09:20, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Some of the files may not need categorization, though. Either reverse image search or inspection of dubious EXIF metadata will do. Example: Commons:Deletion requests/File:22y.jpg. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 12:52, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

i wanted to add Commons:WMF support for Commons/Upload Wizard Improvements/Logo detection to a supposed info page on logos (something similar to Commons:Video), but turns out there's no such page, and com:logo is about something 2 decades ago.

can we move com:logo to a more specific and clear title, so that the generic title becomes available?--RoyZuo (talk) 17:49, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Sure. Move it to COM:Wikimedia Commons logo? - Jmabel ! talk 18:57, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

 Support moving the current COM:Logo page to Commons:Wikimedia Commons logo. New policy page on logos will be at Commons:Logos (in accordance with the naming convention of the likes of Commons:Derivative works and Commons:Flickr files). After that, redirect "COM"Logo to Commons:Logos. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 08:58, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'm going to take the bull by the horns here and do at least the first step, moving COM:Logo to COM:Wikimedia Commons logo. - Jmabel ! talk 19:00, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Next step is that someone needs to go through Special:WhatLinksHere/Commons:Logo and change links accordingly. @RoyZuo and JWilz12345: is one of you willing to take that on? - Jmabel ! talk 19:04, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Category:Wikipedia books (incorrectly categorized books) what's all this? since they seem to have been created according to the same format by different users, they probably have a common origin? RoyZuo (talk) 17:49, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

These pages were created by mw:Extension:Collection, which is (inexplicably) still enabled.

This functionality is almost entirely useless on Commons - Commons galleries are not encyclopedia articles and do not translate well to print. I've opened a discussion at Commons:Village pump/Proposals#Disable the Collections extension on Commons to have it disabled. Omphalographer (talk) 19:07, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

I've deleted all files and the category. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 21:20, 30 June 2025 (UTC)Reply

Aladythatwrites has uploaded 2-3 dozen images. I've reviewed several of them and I have nominated them for deletion as they almost certainly have the wrong license attached to them e.g., college wordmarks are not likely to have been placed in the public domain, images downloaded from a school's website are not likely to be CC licensed. I do not have the time to review the remainder of their uploads but I strongly suspect they are all incorrectly licensed and should also be nominated for deletion. ElKevbo (talk) 03:05, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Strong warning sent. However, I believe that most of what you nominated for deletion are simple text logos, which can be kept. - Jmabel ! talk 05:50, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

thank you, all. I'm new to this, so I appreciate others' work on this. Aladythatwrites (talk) 15:04, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I have an image of a Czech composer here. According to this source it seems like it's a reproduction of an image in 1894, which would be {{Pd-old-assumed}}. This reproduction is in 1996. Is it copyrighted or is it free to upload on Commons? WafflesInvasion (talk) 03:47, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Wait, I think this is supposed to belong in Villagepump/Copyright. Sorry! WafflesInvasion (talk) 03:49, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I assume, that it would be eligible per {{Pd-old-assumed}} (or any similar license). Pinging @Gumruch, Harold, and Jklamo: — Draceane ^talk_contrib. 07:00, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

In the EU there is no copyright to mere reproductions of public domain works. Herbert Ortner (talk) 19:41, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

In June 2025, 1 sysop was elected. Currently, there are 180 sysops.

• User:ChemSim was elected sysop (25/5/1) on 6 June.

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Edited by RoyZuo.

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Commons Gazette is a monthly newsletter of the latest important news about Wikimedia Commons, edited by volunteers. You can also help with editing!

--RoyZuo (talk) 11:06, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Category:HistoricImages I added a category for these watermarked press photos for sale from the company "HistoricImages", they are all watermarked and eventually there will be better software for removing the watermarks. They buy press images from defunct newspapers. If we find a better version without a watermark we usually overwrite the image. Any idea what the parent category should be? Or what a better category name would be to describe the images. We probably have 50 of these but no way to find them. RAN (talk) 16:09, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Should just be a hidden maintenance category, in any case, and I'd call it something more like Category:Images from HistoricImages. - Jmabel ! talk`

• How do I make it a maintenance category? --RAN (talk) 19:46, 1 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Would introducing something like en:Wikipedia:Proposed deletion on Commons be helpful?

For anyone who's not familiar, editors on enwiki add a template to a page (there an mainspace article, here a file) proposing it for deletion, with a reason for deletion. Anyone can remove the template if they disagree, and the page can't be re-proposed after that. If the template stays up for a period of time (there a week or so, here probably longer) an admin reviews the page and decides to delete it or not. Editors and admins also have the option of converting it into a regular deletion request if they feel that it needs discussion. This is generally intended for stuff that doesn't meet the speedy deletion criteria but opposition wouldn't be expected on a deletion requests.

One motivation for this is the large backlog of deletion requests, but I can think of other ways it could help. This isn't quite a proposal yet, I just want opinions. Apocheir (talk) 02:21, 2 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Commons deletion requests generally default to "delete" so long as the nominator makes a valid policy-based argument for deletion and the file isn't in use, so I'm not sure how much of a difference a PROD-like process would make. Omphalographer (talk) 03:15, 2 July 2025 (UTC)Reply