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Commons:Picture of the Year/2008/Preparation

< Commons:Picture of the Year‎ | 2008

Third Annual Wikimedia Commons Picture of the Year

(Preparation) · (Translations) · (Discussion) · Organising committee · (Issues / Help)

Introduction & dates · Voting · Round 1: Galleries · Round 2: Finalists · Results · Download

Discussion edit

Just adding a header so the TOC is in the right place.... don't mind me. :) J.smith (talk) 22:36, 5 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Let's start -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 12:46, 14 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • A couple of considerations from last year contest's comments:
    • The voting process format. It is different from on-wiki process because it's "secret". There was concern on how this was not compatible with wiki processes, but there are also concerns about how feasible is to handle voting on wiki when several hundreds of people participate. So the technical question is: can this be done in a more transparent way but with still some sort of automated vote counting and checking?
    • A possible "special jury prize". I like this idea a lot. Pick up some FPC regulars, maybe from Commons:Meet our photographers?, and have a separate prize. It wouldn't be "the" Picture of the Year, but it would have Main Page honours (Joaquim, como se traduz "menção honrosa"? :D) Patrícia msg 22:03, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I was the one who opposed the secrecy, mainly because it takes almost all the fun from contesters and voters. That really hapened last year and IMO the whole process was a bit boring. I would recomend to keep the voting process exactely as it was (it ran smoothly last year) but complement it with period information on the results. For example, I believe it wouldn't be too hard to automatically maintain a list of all pictures with the corresponding votes, as well as a gallery with the 100 best (or whatever), updated twice a day (or whatever). I don't find relevant the access to the individual votes but even that shouldn't be too diffficult to obtain. As for the special prize of the jury (não sei, Patrícia ;-)), remember that most of the people from Commons:Meet our photographers will be deeply involved in the contest. A third point: maybe it is time to also consider (that was discussed last year) some thematic prizes (one for each category?) -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 22:48, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I completely agree with Alves here. If that is impossible, we should announce the winner exactly at midnight GMT to add to the fun. Last year I would refresh constantly all day to see, and the results were 14 hours late. I think that they should be published almost instantly if not displayed live along the process. If we have sockpuppets etc. to check for, we can probably do it during the vote. Another idea (that half of Commons would probably kill me for) is to get a corporate sponsor to sponsor the jury award (i.e. Zeiss, Sigma as their lenses are quite compatible across many mounts). What do you think? If we move quickly to contact a sponsor and agree on the terms, it would be really cool if we could achieve something with that. What do you think, Freedom to share (talk) 16:29, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I feel that the secrecy is one of the best things (secrecy on who voted what, not on what image received how many votes). It helps people choose what images they genuinely want rather than those elections becoming a means to make friends, enemies or try to end personal conflicts. Freedom to share (talk) 16:37, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • From my point of view the most of informations should be public as soon as possible including individual votes. I do not see anything unnatural on fact, that another people will see my votes. Why not? And I believe that is quite normal to give a vote to my own picture, if I think that it is really good. I believe, that most of us are normal adult poeple voting decently without creation of some sockpuppets etc. But to avoid this type of behaviour I do not like the idea of sponzoring. First of all, it seems to be against the idea of Wiki and second - the possibility of getting something material for the first place can lead some poeple to try illegal tricks. --Karelj (talk) 18:34, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • My idea of sponsorship is that it would be chosen by a jury, which is quite an impartial process. Yes, the jury could be biased, but without the possibility of anonymous messaging (through talk pages) in Commons, I do not see it as much as a problem. You might consider the sponsorship concept to against the GFDL and wiki ideology. I personally feel that it would support it. The primary reason for POTY is to encourage more image submissions. If people see that there is real material goods to be earned through giving a free license to their content, they will be more likely to give. Some people would probably give their images away if they had a chance to win Jury's Choice POTY. Imo this does not conflict with the free nature of Commons. Freedom to share (talk) 21:40, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've nothing against finding a sponsor for the jury's prize. But also have no idea on how that could be done, or if it would be allowed by the Wikimedia Foundation and the present Commons rules. I agree it would be nice to have the results permanentely updated but maybe that is not possible with the present software. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 23:11, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • How the pictures will be sorted in the candidate page? I'm asking that question because there is a lot of candidates, and I think first pictures on the page will probably be seen often than others. Is there a possibility of random sort each time a user open the page? or can we display pictures depending on their vote counts, but pictures that have less votes before? --sanchezn (talk) 09:19, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Technical aspects edit

Image eligibility edit

From this we could deduce that images going into contest were FPs from 1 Jan 2007 to 30 Nov 2007 but Commons:Picture of the Year/2007/Voting says it was all of 2007 FPs. Can anyone confirm this? One thing we could start straight away is to arrange this year's FP into galleries. Patrícia msg 22:27, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • This was discussed last year and, as far as I remember, there was no strong justification for not considering all the pictures of the year. I agree with that. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 22:36, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • All FPs from 2008 should be included. It wouldn't be fair to exclude those promoted in December. Sorting into galleries straight away is a good idea. Shall we start with the same galleries as last year, and see if we need to create some more or merge some? Pruneautalk 20:38, 18 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I've roughly split the January-August 2008 FPs into categories: User:Pruneau/POTY 2008 categories. I started with the same categories as last year plus an Astronomy category. Pruneautalk 14:41, 19 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Nice work! Yes, I think it will have to be something like that. Of course, we'll have to manipulate the final categories so that they all have more or less the same number of pictures. Smaller galleries tend to have more attention. For the Jan-Aug pictures, maybe we should split the "arthtopod" gallery and merge "Objects" and Miscellaneous". Also, I'm not sure we should create a "pano" gallery. Maybe it should be more rational to distribute all panos by the corresponding thematic categories. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 15:28, 19 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I think we should have include FPs from all the year (from January 1, 2008 up to December 31, 2008). Second option is to include pictures of December 2007. First option is easy to understand by people, but second is more fair, and I think voting would start faster in 2009. What do you think? --Sfu (talk) 13:07, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • It was my understanding that in the end, POTY 2007 included all 2007 FPs, including those from December. We should be doing the same thing this year. Pruneautalk 14:12, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • It might be worth having a separate "historical images" section, as those tend to be judged by different criteria. --MichaelMaggs (talk) 09:37, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I support MichaelMaggs's proposition! -- MJJR (talk) 18:28, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • While I like the idea, it depends on whether "historical images" can be defined or not, e.g., non-digital camera or B/W film, {{PD-old}} and its variants, of a subject that no longer exists, taken prior to a certain date, etc. My point is that it may take months to obtain a consensus on what constitutes "historical images". Since technology has improved continuously, it may be argued that the criteria for judging a photo taken in 1950 should be different than for 1900 or 1850. One way forward may be to specify a definition in the proposal and ask people to comment. My suggestion is to restrict the category to pictures taken prior to 1950. That includes the important period of WWII and restricts the material to mostly B/W. Also, that was a time of rapid change in the technology of photography and printing. Walter Siegmund (talk) 19:09, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry to pop in here and spoil the fun for everybody, but I completely disagree with you all :) (as usual). I don't at all think that the definition of a historical image should stop at 1950. Until when do most history textbooks write about? The period from 1989-1991, a time of perestroika, the end of the Cold War, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the last turning point in modern society that redefined our politics and society once more. I think that 1989 should therefore be the cut-off point for what constitutes a historical image. Freedom to share (talk) 21:37, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • No doubt that defining what a "historical picture" is would take us to an endless discussion. Maybe the very concept of "historical" is ambiguous and should be abandoned. What about "journalistic pictures", assuming that we have enough to create a category? All pictures that, though being "historical" (here, I mean "old"), could not be considered as journalistic (for example, the portrait of my grandfather) should be put in the other categories ("people", in particular) -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 22:25, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • What about "Newsworthy"? We could define that in an objective manner. "Pictures of subjects (events, things or people) that have been specifically reported on by national news sources" --J.smith (talk) 21:22, 5 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Commenting without having seen all the pictures :) do we have that many justifying such a category? Patrícia msg 12:22, 7 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Prizes edit

POTY 2008 and runners-up edit

Special price of the juri edit

  • Just to start the discussion. Assuming that some group of users has been chosen to integrate the juri (they could be the members of MOP/MOI plus some regulars [chosen by election?], summimg up to about 20?), it seems obvious that the object of the voting cannot be the whole set of pictures. Two ways to solve the problem: (i) limiting the voting universe to the finalist pictures; (2) having a preliminary phase, in which all members of the juri choose a set of n pictures (depending on the number of members), and then proceed with the voting with the selected images. I prefer the second option, as there are less chances of acumulation of prizes. The voting should be secret and sent by email to a secretary. The winner will be the first picture to gather more than some percentage of votes (absolute majority?). Of course, there will be as many voting sessions as necessary. Also, a wiki discussion between members should be carried out, just like in the pope's election. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 10:57, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Two further proposals/thoughts:
  1. The special prize of the juri should be restricted to users' pictures and exclude reproductions of artworks, maps, etc. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 14:41, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. After sleeping over the subject, I think that the juri should be chosen by election. We will start by defining the number n of elements and then there will be a poll with a list of candidates. The n candidates with more support votes (or a better ratio support/oppose, or whatever) will be chosen. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 14:41, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thematic prizes edit

  • Last year we discussed the possibilty of having thematic prizes but it was not implemented for lack of consensus. I think we should go ahead with the idea this time. The simplest way would be to automatically attribute the prizes among the finalist images, without the need of having a separate voting. How many categories? They could match the categories of the voting galleries or not (maybe not). Any proposal? -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 10:57, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Here are some issues which need discussion:
    • Should reproductions of artworks (paintings, drawings, maps, sculptures,…) be eligible to the thematic prizes?
      • I think not, because it would be near to impossible to separate the value of the artwork from the value of the reproduction, this last one being the only relevant to the contest. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 14:32, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • You can only do it, if you have a separate theme "reproductions of art" and if you only consider the technical qualities of the reproductions, apart from the artistic qualities of the reproduced objects which are indeed not relevant for the contest. In the same way, you can have a separate theme "historical pictures", where also the technical qualities of the reproduction (and eventually the cleaning up or restoration) are considered. -- MJJR (talk) 18:49, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • We're limited in the number of prizes we can give. Throw us restorationists and researches a bone. Adam Cuerden (talk) 03:00, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • Should the themes subject to prize be created to cover all pictures (except maybe the artworks referred above)?
      • This is a difficult issue because it won’t be possible to create homogeneous categories, each of them with more or less the same number of pictures. Either we leave some of the pictures behind (because their themes are less representative or more difficult to classify) or we will have to accept non-homogeneous categories, in terms of subject and number of pictures. Since the first solution is hardly acceptable, I guess we will have to do our best with the second. Here is a possible solution (notice that the themes do not necessarily coincide with the categories of the voting galleries):
  1. Nature: Plant life
  2. Nature: Animal life (all animals except arthropods)
  3. Nature: Insects & etc (arthropods)
  4. Nature: Land and sea
  5. Constructions & urban views
  6. Nature: the Universe (pictures of the sky, planets, etc.)
  7. People & human activities (the least homogeneous theme)
  8. Diagrams & animations (excludes artwork)

This is only a weak example. Just wondering what people think of this concept. Pbroks13 (talk) 17:34, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Barnstar edit

There will need to be a new barnstar or logo, as the current one is for 2007. Will there be a whole new one, or will the "2007" just be replaced with "2008"? Pbroks13 (talk) 06:07, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since this is an Olympics year maybe we can bring a bit of Olympic feel to the barnstar? Maybe not.. it's been done to death. J.smith (talk) 22:39, 5 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that could work. I was thinking also that maybe we could have a competition-type thing. Sort of like Wikispecies:Logo Concepts? Pbroks13 (talk) 16:43, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That would certainly bring some awareness to the PotY2008. J.smith (talk) 20:10, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It would be nice to come up with a mini-competition for the logo, but I feel that would take too long. How about if we just ask someone to make a new one? Patrícia msg 12:37, 7 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Patrícia's suggestion seems wise to me. Walter Siegmund (talk) 16:25, 7 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
User:Someone, get at it! :) J.smith (talk) 00:22, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(reset indent)  Info - Previous barnstarts have been designed by our offical illustrator, LadyofHats (see here). I'm sure she will be glad to make these too. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 08:00, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

LayofHats is apparently too busy (as she says in her user page), so I just changed the "2007" ones to say "2008":
I think this should work, unless someone can make new ones relatively quick. Will that work? Pbroks13 (talk) 02:23, 16 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Voting edit

I've created the voting page. However, it is not yet complete. There are still a few things that need to be confirmed.

  1. Questions:
    • Before when does a user have to have registered in order to be eligible for voting?
    • How many edits do they need to have on their Commons account? (The norm is usually 200.)
    • Will the voting register be kept public? (I assume so, but am just making sure.)

Any suggestions? Elucidate (parlez à moi) Ici pour humor 15:14, 1 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Technical blaba edit

Are we still using my software from last year? If so, what should be improved? Or are we switching back to wiki based voting? -- Bryan (talk to me) 21:46, 7 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, use your software. Just be sure to show who voted for what, at least from what I'm seeing from the widespread comments.
By the way, is there a possibility for me to be added to roles and the project on stable? --O (谈 • висчвын) 03:51, 11 November 2008 (GMT)

Organising committee edit

As to Commons:Picture of the Year/2008/Committee I created yesterday. Please sign there as members or assistants.

Please consider to be a core member to organize POTY2008, at the same time.As of today there are no core members for POTY2008. POTY2007's core members are too busy to be "core" this time, though they would help POTY2008 if possible. Thank you.--miya (talk) 07:49, 12 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]


Date edit

When can the voting start? The POTY2007 dates were "ROUND 1: 10-17 January 2008" (from Thursday to Thursday) and "FINAL: 20-24 January 2008" (from Sunday to Thursday). --miya (talk) 07:49, 12 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

To do edit

  • The software, announcements and sitenotices, which are listed here, still need to be translated into most languages. This mainly means copy-pasting from last year and changing "2007" into "2008".
  • Ideally, all captions should be translated in as many languages as possible, but I don't think it's realistic to hope to get all 499 images in 20 languages as such short notice. At least, we sould make sure that all the finalists get their captions translated.
  • Assuming that the software is ready, I think that's it: we could launch POTY next week. Pruneautalk 17:20, 14 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Is the voting procedure (i.e. requesting voting tickets) the same as for last year? /Lokal_Profil 17:16, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So... edit

So what still needs to be done to get this show on the road? I'm only a casual commons user, more active on Wikipedia, and don't know many languages aside from a little french and russian, but I've been seeing this notice that voting will start soon for a week now, and I was just wondering if there's anything I can do to help.-Runningonbrains (talk) 17:58, 24 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Voting is open now!?　See Commons:Picture of the Year/2008/Voting.--11:11, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
It is! Adam Cuerden (talk) 13:11, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

To do (for 1st round) edit

As voting is open now, let's make an announcement on:

  • Sitenotice of each wikis.
  • villagepumps on on each wikis
  • Commons' villagepump of each language.
  • Mailinglists of each languages.

Is it all right? --miya (talk) 14:14, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

And maybe Commons:Picture of the Year/2008/banner for each languages.--miya (talk) 14:32, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

 

Interested in honouring the best of the best? Vote in the Commons Picture of the Year competition 2008
Voting to select the finalists is open from 2009-02-12 until 2009-02-26.
العربية · čeština · Deutsch · English · español · فارسی · suomi · français · Gaeilge · magyar · italiano · 日本語 · 한국어 · Bahasa Melayu · Nederlands · norsk · polski · português · русский · српски / srpski ·> svenska · 中文（简体） · 中文（繁體） · +/−

I tried to translate even to the languages I don't understand, there may be mistakes especially around the date.--miya (talk) 16:26, 16 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Global notification edit

meta:Global notifications/requests may be a good means to announce POTY. Is anyone who knows how to make a request there?--miya (talk) 15:34, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Already done. I set it up a couple days ago, and it was approved. Not quite sure what the effect of that is. Maybe Wikipedias grab things from there. Adam Cuerden (talk) 19:08, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you.--miya (talk) 16:26, 16 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

By the way edit

For the reord, we do need to decide how we're going to give out the awards for each of the POTY categories. Should we make special logos for each of them? What template should we use - a modified assessments template, or a new template? Adam Cuerden (talk) 19:13, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How about adding some letters to Image:POTY ribbon 2008.svg under "POTY 2008" letters?
For example "Nature views No.1", "Nature views No.2", "Nature views No.3", "Nature views honourable mention", or like that (Sorry I don't know adequate wording. I can't handle svg files, either.).--miya (talk) 16:26, 16 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Something like File:POTY ribbon 2008 Nature views test.svg? That's quite easy to do and it's at least something. It would be great to have something more fancy, but I wouldn't know how to do that. Pruneautalk 16:48, 16 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I think it'd be better to make it more visual: The text isn't going to be readable in any of the dozen other languages participating. I also don't think we should use the same really fancy ribbon as we'll be using for the overall winners, otherwise, how will you tell the overall winners from the category winners? Adam Cuerden (talk) 18:47, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, all agreed, but we now need somebody to do it, urgently! Lady of Hats is busy. I think. Are there other volunteers or at least someone whose are we can twist?

This is what we have already:

and we now need logos for the sectional prizes in round 1. These need to be less impressive than the overall winners, above, and for each we need 1st, 2nd, 3rd and honourable mention logos. Best not to use text, as that may put off non-English speakers.

  1. Emblems and Diagrams
  2. Non-photographic art and historic maps
  3. People and human activities
  4. Objects and outer space
  5. Cities, architecture, constructions, and related
  6. Nature views
  7. Panoramas
  8. Plants and fungi
  9. Arthropods
  10. Birds
  11. Other animals

Also, although not yet discussed, it might be nice to have an honourable mention logo for the final, eg that we can use for the 4th to 10th places (there will be 50 images in the final, in total). --MichaelMaggs (talk) 16:22, 28 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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