Searching for folf should find basically the same results as searching for wolf fox hybrid, i.e. characters that are hybrids of wolves and foxes. (Ignoring cases like three characters in a post where one is a wolf, one is a fox and one is a completely different hybrid.)
Searching for folf currently finds **any** hybrid because it is aliased to hybrid. That seems unhelpful. wolfbird -> hybrid is another example.
It might be that you consider folf and wolfbird not to be distinct enough of a species to have it be a separate tag. But both of these do have wiki-pages (folf wolfbird) explaining them, so it seems like an oversight.

Dumb imaginary hybrids don't get their own species tags, only real-world hybrids do. If you want fox wolf hybrid then search those terms.

"dumb" is a bit harsh, but yeah, simpler to throw in all the fictionalized species into one tag instead of having unique tags for every single fictional hybrid, or choosing favorites between them.

ratte said:
Dumb imaginary hybrids don't get their own species tags, only real-world hybrids do. If you want fox wolf hybrid then search those terms.

That seems very arbitrary. Does gryphon count as non-imaginary?
If yes, based on what? Gryphons don't exist in real life.
If no, gryphon is not aliased to hybrid.

strikerman said:
[...] instead of having unique tags for every single fictional hybrid[...]

Maybe, but then again, wolfbird alredy has a somewhat fleshed-out wiki page that explains in detail what it is. So it does not seem like a tiny niche thing.

Edit: In any case, it would be helpful to be able to search for these concisely. e621 does not have a way of saying "these tags should apply to the same character in an image".

mononatriumglutamat said:
That seems very arbitrary. Does gryphon count as non-imaginary?
If yes, based on what? Gryphons don't exist in real life.
If no, gryphon is not aliased to hybrid.

Gryphons are a mythological creature found in various mythologies and lore in the Old World with hints of such dating back to ~5000 years ago. The same cannot be said for generic rainbow canine hybrid #8958498. We humor the former, not the latter.

You ever notice that people don't realize that imaginary species names where people actually take the time to come up with a name for the species instead of combining two words together don't get aliased away because someone actually put forth an effort

versperus said:
You ever notice that people don't realize that imaginary species names where people actually take the time to come up with a name for the species instead of combining two words together don't get aliased away because someone actually put forth an effort

Ligers and Tigons.

demesejha said:
Ligers and Tigons.

Yakalo, wolfdog, wholphin, humans are uncreative.

demesejha said:
Ligers and Tigons.

Those are real.

versperus said:
You ever notice that people don't realize that imaginary species names where people actually take the time to come up with a name for the species instead of combining two words together don't get aliased away because someone actually put forth an effort

versperus said:
Those are real.

And they have wiki pages and they are not aliased to hybrid. Your argument is void.
Not that it would have been a particularly great argument. With liger and tigon I immediately knew what they are from reading their names. Would you know that a khonorik (also not aliased to hybrid, btw.) is a hybrid between a polecat and a mink just from reading the name? No.

mononatriumglutamat said:
And they have wiki pages and they are not aliased to hybrid. Your argument is void.
Not that it would have been a particularly great argument. With liger and tigon I immediately knew what they are from reading their names. Would you know that a khonorik (also not aliased to hybrid, btw.) is a hybrid between a polecat and a mink just from reading the name? No.

khonorik is a made up name by furries for a real species that was never called that to begin with. Polecat also isn't a species, but more along the lines of a genius so it's pretty vague to call something a hybrid between a polecat and mink as it could be one of 8 different animals.

Tigon, liger, and khonorik are real-world hybrids so they are not aliased away to hybrid. It's implicated, as it says on both their respective wikis as well as the hybrid wiki. Please actually look at the wikis you cite.

strikerman said:
Yakalo, wolfdog, wholphin, humans are uncreative.

Yes, this was the point I was trying to make. The argument above was that the name Folf was stupid, but its completely in line with a standard portmanteau naming convention.

versperus said:
khonorik is a made up name by furries for a real species that was never called that to begin with. Polecat also isn't a species, but more along the lines of a genius so it's pretty vague to call something a hybrid between a polecat and mink as it could be one of 8 different animals.

Alright, let me explain my point:
I was trying to find names of hybrids where, as you call it, "people actually take the time to come up with a name". I figured, the wiki page for hybrid would be a good place to find such names. Since Ratte established that "it's a well-known hybrid" correlates with "it has an implication (as opposed to an alias)", I looked at the tags that imply hybrid Those are:hybrid_taur, chimera, liger, zebroid, tigon, wolfdog, mule, coydog, coywolf, pumapard, grolar_bear, wereliger, sheep-goat and khonorik. Of those I tried to find one that is not too well-known. chimera is too general. mule is quite well-known, khonorik I have never heard of, so I picked that.
Bad example, I guess. So just re-read my comment and mentally replace khonorik with mule.

ratte said:
Tigon, liger, and khonorik are real-world hybrids so they are not aliased away to hybrid. It's implicated, as it says on both their respective wikis as well as the hybrid wiki.

I know that. I don't understand what you are responding to.
Versperus made the argument that names that are not combinations of the parents' species are better (not lazy) than those that are. I argued the opposite direction by demonstrating that the "lazy" names make it easier to quickly understand the parent species of the hybrid.
Versperus also made the argument that hybrids with lazy names are aliased away, while others aren't. Demesejha gave two counter-examples. Versperus did not seem to understand that they are counter-examples. I pointed that out.

mononatriumglutamat said:
gryphon is not aliased to hybrid.

That's because a gryphon isn't a hybrid. It's a bird on one end, and a cat on the other. To be a hybrid, it'd have to be a mix of bird and cat features throughout the entire body. And, then, it'd probably be called something like "cird."

mononatriumglutamat said:
And they have wiki pages and they are not aliased to hybrid. Your argument is void.

No, his argument is NOT invalid. You seem to be missing the fact that hybrids that exist in real life, do actually get their own tag and wiki, without getting aliased. It is only hybrids that do NOT exist IRL, that get their tag aliased away. And even some of those don't, provided some actual effort has gone into creating a unique and interesting name for it, some lore, etc.

versperus said:
Polecat also isn't a species, but more along the lines of a genius

Just a heads-up, but that should've been "genus." :P

mononatriumglutamat said:
I know that. I don't understand what you are responding to.
Versperus made the argument that names that are not combinations of the parents' species are better (not lazy) than those that are. I argued the opposite direction by demonstrating that the "lazy" names make it easier to quickly understand the parent species of the hybrid.
Versperus also made the argument that hybrids with lazy names are aliased away, while others aren't. Demesejha gave two counter-examples. Versperus did not seem to understand that they are counter-examples. I pointed that out.

I was speaking generally to all involved. Nowhere did I say anything about being a "well-known" hybrid, I said real-world hybrid. These are not synonymous phrases so please don't treat them the same.

jacob said:
That's because a gryphon isn't a hybrid.

That's very helpful, thank you! I did not see that gryphons are not considered hybrids.

jacob said:
You seem to be missing the fact that hybrids that exist in real life, do actually get their own tag and wiki, without getting aliased.
And even some of those don't, provided some actual effort has gone into creating a unique and interesting name for it, some lore, etc.

This does not have anything to do with the argument Versperus made. They claimed whether the tag gets aliased away depends on whether the name is lazy.

ratte said:
I was speaking generally to all involved. Nowhere did I say anything about being a "well-known" hybrid, I said real-world hybrid. These are not synonymous phrases so please don't treat them the same.

You originally said

ratte said:
Dumb imaginary hybrids don't get their own species tags, only real-world hybrids do.

I assumed gryphons are hybrids and saw that gryphon is not aliased to hybrid. You then explained why gryphon, which does not exist in the real world but is "well-known", isn't aliased away. That's why I didn't take the "real-world" literally. So that's where I was coming from.

mononatriumglutamat said:
That's very helpful, thank you! I did not see that gryphons are not considered hybrids.

This does not have anything to do with the argument Versperus made. They claimed whether the tag gets aliased away depends on whether the name is lazy.

You originally said
I assumed gryphons are hybrids and saw that gryphon is not aliased to hybrid. You then explained why gryphon, which does not exist in the real world but is "well-known", isn't aliased away. That's why I didn't take the "real-world" literally. So that's where I was coming from.

Then, to elaborate:

Real-world hybrids are allowed their own species tags with an implication to hybrid.
Dumb furry hybrids like generic canine mashup #87 do not. There is no way to streamline or standardize these and the characters rarely look like more than just a rainbow dog.
Species based heavily in real-world lore and mythology are humored for their own tags because it's still based in real-world lore and mythology. They are not considered hybrids, but their own unique species.

If there's some historical precedence for the species, and it isn't just someone on Furaffinity saying "original species do not steal", then it usually gets its own tag.

ratte said:
and the characters rarely look like more than just a rainbow dog.

harrumph, the technical term is sparkledog

strikerman said:
If there's some historical precedence for the species, and it isn't just someone on Furaffinity saying "original species do not steal", then it usually gets its own tag.

harrumph, the technical term is sparkledog

A lot of them aren't eyebleed enough to be that, they just look like a colorful dog with no distinction between species. Turns out mashing together the two most common sex object species doesn't really make anything original.

From a purely casual, "I like to talk too much" standpoint; if something is a particularly common hybridisation with a common-use (within the furry fandom, because, mind, this is a furry archive site after all) term, shouldn't it be included as it's own tag to make searching more exact? It permits the user to find an exact, specific thing that otherwise it would be difficult with mixing tags to find specific examples of, with the exclusion of appending "solo" the search. Isn't the point of the site to make it easy to search the archive of images for things?

Now, obviously things like "Half-X" (half-dragon, half-demon, half-angel, so on) wouldn't be the intent, so much as very common specific hybrids such as the prior mentioned Folf.
Is there a minimum standard of notability/historical/fantasy usage commonality? If folklore and it being in the public perception beyond furries is sufficient, why is "Cabbit" not a valid tag, given the specific term dates to at least 1977 and text regarding it or at least the concept at least to 1845? Why is "rattleyote" a tag? Should Perytons qualify, given they were the invention of one man in 1957? Just out of curiosity.

Edit: A word.

Let's start off by saying. And this is assuming were saying hybrid tags like those should be aliased away. Rattleyote shouldnt be a tag either and the only reason it is is because of Bad Dragon. Not that Im going into detail on that one bc thats a whole garbage can of worms that shouldnt be opened.

None of these words should be. All of them should be aliased to hybrid regardless of the nature of their creation or origin because that opens us up to having a tag for ANY and EVERY conceivable hybrid. Thats not feasible at all.

However. Not to play devils advocate and Im not a betting woman but.

I would have to guess that if someones asking about this... its content theyre looking for but cant.

That means theres a flaw in the system.

Folf. Foon. And several others like them have been used for a very long time in the furry community to refer to specific things.

(Though admittedly most "FOLF"s are just coyotes with a tail point lets be real here, and foons are Tanuki without the big balls or any of the cuteness or historical significance)

The main issue is that all the counterarguments, about how these should stay unused. Are meaningless appeals to authority without any basis.

If were gonna argue that they shouldnt be used we have to classically define what a Cabbit, Foon, Folf, or other hybrids of the type actually are. And look like. And then say to ourselves is this visually distinct enough to have a tag of its own.

Is a jackalope a hybrid? It should be counted as such. But its not. Its a mythic "critter" of american lore like a gryphon.

What about in canon creatures like the entire swath of animal nightmares that the world of ATLA grants us? Or the creatures of the world of Gurren Lagann of a similar if not identical bent.

So whats the treatment were supposed to apply here?

The rules are arbitrary at worst and petty at best.

I think the op has a point in that they should be revisited and maybe revised. Theres a fundamental flaw in the way its treated.

Edit, post script adendum:
On that note. A species biologically is defined when a distinctualized group of creatures have separated from another group of distinctualized but related creatures. But can no longer breed 100% successfully with the original breed either through issues of attraction, physical distance, mechanical or genetic/chromosomal distance.

Thats the distinction between a Species, and a Breed.

A liger and a tigon for example cannot breed with a tiger or lion. But historically has been shown to not be completely infertile. Meaning that with a specific breeding program those creatures could become their own species.

Does that mean they are still a hybrid or are they their own species now?

The tag is fundamentally broken the moment you think about the definition of "species" and whether or not something should be a named species or tossed under a blanket term.

If use case A, states that user should be able to blacklist or find content they need to, granular tags such as folf should exist.

If use case B, states that these creatures listed are hybrids and not species they should not have their own tag. They should be aliased away into Hybrid.

If use case C, states that species are not hybrids then tagged species should never get the hybrid tag unless the image specifically contains a combined creature and not a unique species.

Use case C part 2: If it is a unique species that drags back to the issue of Use case A, and the flaw inherent in the argument presented by B.

Use Case D, the Hybrid tag is useless in and of itself outside of being an umbrella term but is fundamentally necessary for blacklisting or searching. Because any time a tag of a specific species can be used. Hybrid cannot be.

BUT if we count case D as valid. That the tag is necessary then we must also count Case A to be immutable.

Case D invalidates case B and causes Case C to have an internal argument.

Theres a problem with how the tag is used.

I do agree on many of Demesejha's points even if they were presented in a blinding wall of text. I think it is a shame that common and well recognized species hybrids are aliased away making them essentially useless to anyone wanting to search for those terms or use them as tags.

I can't help, but think this is counterproductive and discourages people from adding proper tags. Instead of cabbit, which many people unfamiliar with e621 would recognize, it is expected that people tag cat rabbit hybrid. A 6 character shortcut term that is easy to remember now balloons into 17 characters. The same goes for searching for cabbits too. The effort to simplify the handling of hybrid species has the side effect of forcing users to type out full species names when they search and tag, and the results are going to be less accurate across the board.

I realize that having a tag for every combination of species would be impractical, but keeping the most common and well recognized around would be in the best interest for everyone. This is already how fan characters are handled. Only the most well recognized get implications to fan character. Although someone felt it was practical to make the aliases to hybrid in the first place nullifying all efforts to maintain the list of fictional hybrids. It would have been equally as practical to make them implications, and less destructive

thevileone said:

I realize that having a tag for every combination of species would be impractical, but keeping the most common and well recognized around would be in the best interest for everyone. This is already how fan characters are handled.

This is what I most agree with. It also shouldnt be some sort of arbitrary decided on list of what's "acceptable mythology" either.