Hey guys, I know some of you have been waiting quite a while for an answer regarding TWYS for character names, and I'm sorry it's taken this long to get back to you on that. It seems that this issue is one that even the admins are having difficulty agreeing on a solution for, so I'm going to pitch our current idea to you guys and get your feedback.

For the unaware, the issue at hand is whether or not external information (i.e. not in the image) can be used in identifying and tagging characters within the image. Case in point: Should the following image receive the "fluttershy_(mlp)" tag for having a humanized fluttershy, even though you can't really see that that's who it is: http://e621.net/post/show/304236

The thing is, when we can't tell who a character is in an image, then the image typically ends up not being tagged with any character at all. However, when this happens, it can often take a significant amount of "context" away from the pic, thereby making the picture less enjoyable or interesting.

Of course, that same argument can be made for things like tagging "herm" too; it ruins the "context" of the image if it's not tagged there. So I think if we do relax TWYS for tagging characters, then we'll have to make sure we also specify that this exception to TWYS does NOT extend beyond tagging characters or artists.

What I propose is that the TWYS rule be adjusted slightly so that CHARACTER NAMES ONLY can be tagged based on external evidence, but there still MUST be evidence within the picture itself to back up the external evidence. Example: http://e621.net/post/show/304236 By itself, no, there is not enough evidence in the picture to warrant adding the "fluttershy" tag. However, with the artist or context of the image (i.e. where the image was originally posted by the artist) saying that it's fluttershy, we can then look back to the image to see if there's any evidence whatsoever that the picture contains Fluttershy. Admittedly, there's not a LOT of evidence to suggest it's a humanized version of fluttershy, but there's not really anything in the image that says it's NOT a humanized version of fluttershy either, only that there's not enough evidence within the picture itself to be sure.

So I'd say that the off-site information used MUST be coming directly from the artist, character owner, or commissioner (so we're not relying on 3rd-party information).

Given the proposed solution above, what I'd like to hear are any counter-arguments and examples that would make this be a worse solution than what we're currently doing.

I, and I hope others, realize that this is one issue that we're simply never going to have consensus on. However, as admins, we're trying to do what we can, within reason, to minimize the daily disputes that seem to occur regarding proper character tagging. But we're not going to shove a change in policy like this down anyone's throats, so I want to hear what you have to say.

Please keep the discussion civil and on-topic. :)