The bulk update request #10186 is pending approval.

remove alias alt_design (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alt_form (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alt_model (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alt_style (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alternate_design (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alternate_forms (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alternate_model (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias alternate_style (0) -> alternate_form (4546)
remove alias off_model (0) -> alternate_form (4546)

Reason:

wiki says:
This tag is used when a character is redone in a noticeably different way compared to their usual appearance

A character's "usual appearance" is dependent on external information, and therefore outside the scope of TWYS. This tag should be lore.

The bulk update request #10187 is pending approval.

create alias alternate_form (4546) -> alternate_form_(lore) (0) # has blocking transitive relationships, cannot be applied through bur
change category alternate_form_(lore) (0) -> lore # missing

Reason: Second part.

Code to re-implement aliases:

alias alt_design -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alt_form -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alt_model -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alt_style -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alternate_design -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alternate_forms -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alternate_model -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias alternate_style -> alternate_form_(lore)
alias off_model -> alternate_form_(lore)

Does it need the (lore) suffix, if we're putting it in the lore category anyway? I personally think just the category change would be better.

quenir said:
Does it need the (lore) suffix, if we're putting it in the lore category anyway? I personally think just the category change would be better.

Yes. The category is specifically coded so that they need to be suffixed with _(lore) in order to be put in it.

I've noticed a few users have voted differently on this proposal compared to the aged up/down lore request. Would anyone be willing to elaborate on their views? In my mind, the logic behind both requests is identical, so I'm curious what arguments people have for supporting one but not the other.

beholding said:
I've noticed a few users have voted differently on this proposal compared to the aged up/down lore request. Would anyone be willing to elaborate on their views? In my mind, the logic behind both requests is identical, so I'm curious what arguments people have for supporting one but not the other.

SNP calls it perfectly in that topic, my reasoning for being neutral on both is the same reason we can't make crossgender a lore tag

Lore tags should be almost entirely independent of the visuals, the closest they get to visuals is characters being present, but not actually dependent on anything about the character's depiction
Crossgender, Aged Up/Down, and this all require a visual element to be considered, and do not fit into lore tags due to that

dba_afish has also already said this, which you dismissed without any argument

donovan_dmc said:
Lore tags should be almost entirely independent of the visuals, the closest they get to visuals is characters being present, but not actually dependent on anything about the character's depiction
Crossgender, Aged Up/Down, and this all require a visual element to be considered, and do not fit into lore tags due to that

incest_(lore) depends on visual elements, specifically the characters are doing naughty things with each other (on top of being related). forced_incest_(lore) requires forced_partners to be visible and incestuous_voyeur_(lore) requires visible voyeurism (these are even implications). incestuous_temptation_(lore) requires some visible temptation I imagine, not just the say-so of the artist that someone's being tempted.

watsit said:
incest_(lore) depends on visual elements, specifically the characters are doing naughty things with each other (on top of being related). forced_incest_(lore) requires forced_partners to be visible and incestuous_voyeur_(lore) requires visible voyeurism (these are even implications). incestuous_temptation_(lore) requires some visible temptation I imagine, not just the say-so of the artist that someone's being tempted.

Those things are deterministic and not up to interpretation
for the record I don't think most of those should be tags in in the first place, let alone lore tags

Crossgender is not deterministic and is up to interpretation via our "incorrect" gender tagging through TWYS
aged up/down depends on our interpretation of the character's age, can't really age up a child if we're still tagging it as a child
alternate form is a bit more wishy washy since forms are usually pretty deterministic, bot not always

Both halves of incest are deterministic, you cannot argue familial relationships against visuals or that some sex act isn't happening because of XYZ
Forced is definitely up to interpretation but I'd argue that's an outlier and was put into lore because incest is lore and no other reason
Both voyeurism and temptation should be deterministic in an ideal situation

donovan_dmc said:
dba_afish has also already said this, which you dismissed without any argument

I only said I didn't see why it would be an issue, and got no further elaboration until now. And I still don't see why this is an issue. This insistence that lore tags must be completely independent from visuals is not backed up how lore tags are commonly used in practice, as Watsit just pointed out.

The fact of the matter is that these tags already exist, and already have all the problems re: subjectivity that you are pointing out, in addition to the problems re: violating TWYS that I have pointed out. Converting them to lore at least alleviates one of those problems. The only alternative I can see is to remove the tags entirely.

I can see your arguments for why alternate age and crossgender might have subjectivity problems, but I think alternate_form is pretty objective. Can you show me an example of an alternate form post where converting the tag to lore would create a problem?

donovan_dmc said:
SNP calls it perfectly in that topic, my reasoning for being neutral on both is the same reason we can't make crossgender a lore tag

Lore tags should be almost entirely independent of the visuals, the closest they get to visuals is characters being present, but not actually dependent on anything about the character's depiction
Crossgender, Aged Up/Down, and this all require a visual element to be considered, and do not fit into lore tags due to that

I'll like to argue that if male is already on the post (referring to the character), you can't add male_(lore) (in reference to the character)

clawstripe said:
Yes. The category is specifically coded so that they need to be suffixed with _(lore) in order to be put in it.

Huh, must have never noticed that before.
Well, to me, this sees more sensible in lore. I can't see it being correctly applies without the bulk of the context coming from information external to the image.

snpthecat said:
I'll like to argue that if male is already on the post (referring to the character), you can't add male_(lore) (in reference to the character)

I assumed this was official policy and was surprised to find the wiki pages don't say anything to this effect. It should probably be stated explicitly somewhere.

snpthecat said:
I'll like to argue that if male is already on the post (referring to the character), you can't add male_(lore) (in reference to the character)

this feels like kind of an inverse case, though, there's only a handful of lore tags that currently function like that and they're still tagged based on the current lore standard. in addition there probably are a few edge case situations where tagging one of the "correction"-type lore tags might make sense when the character in reference fits a tag via TWYS; a visibly underage character lying about their age to buy alcohol or something might still warrant young_(lore), for example.

also, moving stuff like ftm_crossgender to lore would mean we have lore tags that directly imply general tags, which just feels wrong.

snpthecat said:
I'll like to argue that if male is already on the post (referring to the character), you can't add male_(lore) (in reference to the character)

I'd argue there is a specific category of lore tags, "correction" tags
They don't replace general tags, the correct incorrect information from TWYS

Thus, those tags are off on their own and irrelevant here

beholding said:
The fact of the matter is that these tags already exist, and already have all the problems re: subjectivity that you are pointing out, in addition to the problems re: violating TWYS that I have pointed out. Converting them to lore at least alleviates one of those problems. The only alternative I can see is to remove the tags entirely.

Switching out one problem for another doesn't really help anyone

beholding said:
I can see your arguments for why alternate age and crossgender might have subjectivity problems, but I think alternate_form is pretty objective. Can you show me an example of an alternate form post where converting the tag to lore would create a problem?

While not common we absolutely do mistag forms just the same as gender & age, searching for posts with locked off forms will likely yield plenty of examples

donovan_dmc said:
Switching out one problem for another doesn't really help anyone

It isn't switching out one problem for another, it's fixing one of two problems.

Again, can you provide an example of a post where an alternate_form_(lore) tag would create more problems than alternate_form already does?

beholding said:
It isn't switching out one problem for another, it's fixing one of two problems.

Again, can you provide an example of a post where an alternate_form_(lore) tag would create more problems than alternate_form already does?

it fundamentally changes the consistent standard that we currently have across all lore tags by introducing a second class of tag.

the alternate_*-type tags are based on the depiction of a character in relation said character's appearance in core canon media, all of the existing lore tags are based on artist intent, with a handful being artist intent in relation to the content of the image and how that would be tagged.

To frame this discussion another way: does alternate_form require more external information than character tags do?

If one doesn't know a character, then one can't tag the character as TWYS. Once tagged, a character can at least be verified through research (a simple image search for more popular characters or looking through sources for OCs). Identifying and verifying alternate_form doesn't seem all that different. If you know the character and can thus recognize an alternate form, then you TWYS. If you aren't familiar with the character but want to verify an alternate_form tag, then it shouldn't be much more research to find the character and see whether common depictions differ from the form in the post.

theambersauce said:
To frame this discussion another way: does alternate_form require more external information than character tags do?

If one doesn't know a character, then one can't tag the character as TWYS. Once tagged, a character can at least be verified through research (a simple image search for more popular characters or looking through sources for OCs). Identifying and verifying alternate_form doesn't seem all that different. If you know the character and can thus recognize an alternate form, then you TWYS. If you aren't familiar with the character but want to verify an alternate_form tag, then it shouldn't be much more research to find the character and see whether common depictions differ from the form in the post.

Character tags are not as TWYS as general tags, you can't apply a different standard from a different category to general

Though now i'm starting to see that changing it to lore is just changing the form of the problem. It's very unlikely that we're gonna move the cross/alt tags out of general, so best amend the wiki to state that general tags aren't all twys

dba_afish said:
the alternate_*-type tags are based on the depiction of a character in relation said character's appearance in core canon media, all of the existing lore tags are based on artist intent, with a handful being artist intent in relation to the content of the image and how that would be tagged.

That is entirely your own interpretation, not the official definition of lore tags.

Help: Lore Tags says:
The main purpose for lore tags is twofold:

1.) Provide information impossible to be covered by TWYS
2.) Correct information that TWYS is providing incorrectly

As such, Lore tags are entirely outside of the realm of TWYS, and are not subject to the TWYS limitation of needing to be visually verifiable within the submission itself. Instead, lore tags are supposed to complement shortcomings of TWYS to provide information that is either incorrect when following TWYS, or simply isn't visual information at all, but still relevant to the submission.

Nothing here says the outside information must be limited to artist intent, only that the purpose of lore tags is to provide relevant outside information. This is a valid use of lore tags under that definition.

If I have misinterpreted, the admins are free to revise the official definition of lore tags to a more restrictive definition and I will withdraw my request. But currently, I see no reason why this can't be a lore tag. In fact, it precisely fulfills purpose 1).

It's very unlikely that we're gonna move the cross/alt tags out of general, so best amend the wiki to state that general tags aren't all twys

I think that would be disastrous. The TWYS policy only works because it is universal. If certain tags are exempt, that opens a whole new can of worms that undermines the policy. Which tags are exempt? Why? Do we make some sort of official marker or new category to make it clear these tags are exempt? If not, how are we to communicate to new users, "The policy is this, except when it isn't"? That seems like a lot more work than just making a few more lore tags.

beholding said:
That is entirely your own interpretation, not the official definition of lore tags.

Nothing here says the outside information must be limited to artist intent, only that the purpose of lore tags is to provide relevant outside information. This is a valid use of lore tags under that definition.

If I have misinterpreted, the admins are free to revise the official definition of lore tags to a more restrictive definition and I will withdraw my request. But currently, I see no reason why this can't be a lore tag. In fact, it precisely fulfills purpose 1).

here's a statement from Admin NMNY about this: forum #373707, I believe that that thread is the most recent time an admin had fo weigh in and clarify the function of lore tags.

also, the entire conception of lore tags back when they were implemented with NG (or even before they were actually implemented, and we were telling people to put lore_male in the description) was a concession of sorts to artists in part to reduce the frequency of tag wars.

dba_afish said:
here's a statement from Admin NMNY about this: forum #373707, I believe that that thread is the most recent time an admin had fo weigh in and clarify the function of lore tags.

The help page needs to be updated to clarify this point, then.

Regardless, this still doesn't make an alternate_form_(lore) tag unviable. If the artist says they're drawing the character as an alternate form (and most alternate form artists do), that's artist intent and is valid for a lore tag. At most, this is an argument for only tagging alternate_form where the author explicitly says it is the case. I think that would be unnecessarily restrictive, but it would solve the problems identified in this thread.

Honestly, this whole thing seems like it has a very simple solution: People can use canon for lore tags, but artist intent trumps canon. That was in fact the compromise that resulted from the thread you reference, as seen in the current definition of trans_(lore). This would avoid any conflicts with existing artist-intent-based lore tagging.

also, the entire conception of lore tags back when they were implemented with NG (or even before they were actually implemented, and we were telling people to put lore_male in the description) was a concession of sorts to artists in part to reduce the frequency of tag wars.

I think it's also worth pointing out that just because something was designed for one purpose doesn't preclude applying it for other purposes.

beholding said:

If the artist says they're drawing the character as an alternate form (and most alternate form artists do), that's artist intent

Though now there's several problems: what if artist doesn't believe they're drawing crossgender because they headcanon them as another gender?
What if it's the reverse? If they believe they're drawing the character as crossgender (but are actually not wrt the canon) because they headcanon them as another gender?

snpthecat said:
Though now there's several problems: what if artist doesn't believe they're drawing crossgender because they headcanon them as another gender?
What if it's the reverse? If they believe they're drawing the character as crossgender (but are actually not wrt the canon) because they headcanon them as another gender?

there are some edge cases that I'm not sure how we ought to deal with them, aye, but that'd likely be a problem regardless.

I think I gave the "Tailsko" example for this in one of the previous threads, which I would say is a case that does have a more definitive "right" and "wrong" answer, but stuff gets especially fucky when you start talking about characters like gracie_(animal_crossing) whose canon gender differs across localizations.

snpthecat said:
Though now there's several problems: what if artist doesn't believe they're drawing crossgender because they headcanon them as another gender?
What if it's the reverse? If they believe they're drawing the character as crossgender (but are actually not wrt the canon) because they headcanon them as another gender?

Do you believe this problem is endemic to all types of alternate form, or would you accept changing e.g. furrification to lore while leaving crossgender as it is?