This could be a tricky one and I'm probably going to get hate just for suggesting it, but under TWYS are we supposed to assume every image depicts the Northern Hemisphere (Southern Hemisphere aurorae are known as Aurora Australis.) with little to no in-image information proving such?

I think the natural phenomena should be moved to occupy aurora to avoid conflict with TWYS guidelines.

aurora should be split into a separate character tag, and could probably use some cleaning. As a character tag there are a good 20 or so different characters shown, not counting the eight-ish images that appear to be under the tag due to depiction of the natural phenomena, not any individual character.

or aurora would be my first inclination, if only to bypass the northern/southern issue entirely (after all, it's more a regionalism than anything).

I vote for aurora_borealis to be aliased --> aurora, and characters named Aurora to be filed under character:aurora_(artistname).

Maxpizzle said:
I vote for aurora_borealis to be aliased --> aurora, and characters named Aurora to be filed under character:aurora_(artistname).

Invert the first part and I'll be fine with it. People will continue to tag characters Aurora and if that's what the tag ends up as, they won't realize that there's a problem, or they'll try and change the type to a character.

Furrin_Gok said:
Invert the first part and I'll be fine with it. People will continue to tag characters Aurora and if that's what the tag ends up as, they won't realize that there's a problem, or they'll try and change the type to a character.

We've already got tag blending as-is. Four out of the last ten current aurora_borealis tagged images have previously been tagged aurora, though one of those was a result of somebody accidentally tagging aurora and borealis without a joining underscore, the latter apparently being by default a character tag itself.

At least if aurora splits off into character:aurora and/or character:aurora_(ownername) there shouldn't still be aurora phenomenon images in the character tag.

[Edit]

Part of what I'm trying to address though is that Borealis only applies to roughly half the aurorae on Earth, and none of the aurorae on other planets, but I don't think that's currently relevant.

You could argue that a larger percentage of the world's population live in areas the Aurora Borealis is visible and thus it will be depicted in more art, but aurora on its own is still going to be a correct tag more often.

Okay, make it aurora → aurora_(phenomenon) then. Either way, we should get rid of the plain aurora tag.

e-six, one of the few places where the fine distinction between Aurora Borealis and Aurora Australis in drawn images does matter /s

Just call it polar_lights or somethings.

"Aurora" is a name just in case, even when used for the lights.
With the logic like that, you risk ending up with character:aurora_(roman_mythology) before too long.
With proper implications. On images depicting polar lights.