Here are some pointers I've put together after seeing certain things come up repeatedly. They're not rules, just recommendations for folks wanting to know specifics. As usual, post any questions or suggestions and I'll try to keep this up to date.
Anime, General or People:
- If it's depicting anime or manga, or is done in anime style, it belongs in Anime.
- If it contains a photo or photo-realistic art of a person, it belongs in People. Cosplayers also go here (they're apparently human).
- Everything else goes in, you guessed it, General.
SFW, Sketchy or NSFW:
- This isn't so much about what's safe or not in your or any workplace. It's more about broadly dividing up how explicit images are (and upsetting everyone).
- If an ass is technically clothed but more or less bare (usually when thongs are involved), make it NSFW.
- Men with bare chests are not Sketchy. We're all for equality but man boobs just aren't the same as lady boobs. Blame the patriarchy.
- About tag purity: the rule of thumb is that tags are not flagged based on whether or not the term itself is offensive in some way, but on the walls under it. This means that a tag with mostly NSFW walls is itself NSFW, regardless of the name of the tag. Users can probably tell how offensive a term is at a glance, but can't know what the walls under it might be like.
Reports:
- Do report if something breaks the rules (be sure to actually read them first), is wrongly categorised, or to alert staff to meddling kids.
- Don't report if you find something offensive unless it also breaks the rules (or violates US law, which is also kind of a big deal).
- Duplicates: make sure that you're reporting the more recent upload unless you have a good reason (e.g. if the watermark was removed), and that the resolutions are identical or essentially identical (e.g. 1920x1200 vs. 1920x1280). If the resolutions are different, report it under Other and ask for it to be grouped. Also remember to actually include the ID/URL of the original wall (yes, this is something people don't do).
Putting new tags in the right category:
- Artists can go in Artists, not in Art & Design. Artists also includes individual musicians, but bands/producers/acts can go in Music, unless they perform under their own name (Bob Dylan).
- Specific buildings can go in Locations, not Architecture. The same goes for natural sites like national parks, instead of being in Nature.
- Fictional characters, including non-human ones, can go in the category just for them in People instead of wherever in Entertainment.
- If a franchise spans multiple mediums (like comic books and movies), the tag can go in the relevant category of the original work (The Hobbit in Literature).
- If a character is also the name of a franchise, count it as such and put it in the relevant place (Superman in CB&GN).
- Fictional creations like fantasy races, vehicles etc. can go in the same category as the work they're from (Batmobile in CB&GN). We'll add Fictional Places eventually, but same goes for them too for the time being.
- Branches of armed forces (US Air Force) can go in Military & Weapons.
- Companies & Logos includes websites, magazines, etc.
- The root of People should be for generic things like body parts and similar (piercing), postures (lying down) and occupations (model). Named individuals should go in one of the subcategories. Remember to use the official or most common names people go by according to sources like IMDb.
- Demonyms (Japanese for Japan) can go in Countries because it can apply to things other than people.
- To keep them all in one place for now, Pokémon can go in Fictional Characters. Bite me.
- Vehicle manufacturers can go in Vehicles instead of Companies & Logos.
Why we're strict about official spellings:
On most sites, tags are just strings of text so consistency is less important. On WH, every tag exists in a database, and since we want users to find things, it makes sense for everything that can go under a single tag to do so instead of being spread across several different ones. Since there are usually several ways to shorten/refer to something, it's easier to just go for the original/official spelling, which you can find straight away in a web search anyway, so we have just The Lord of the Rings instead of 'lord of the rings' and 'lotr' as well. Of course people aren't going to search for the full title, but that's what aliases are for.
What aliases are for:
Think of it as the 'also known as' field. Don't put in the series a character is from or any random relevant words that come to mind. Use it for terms that could be mistaken for the one in the tag, like spelling mistakes or alternative names ('Daenerys Stormborn', 'Dany' and 'Khaleesi' are all aliases of Daenerys Targaryen). Note that aliases are not case-sensitive and that searching for one (should) return the relevant tag.
Tags for different things sharing the same name:
Use brackets to describe what something is if it's likely to be confused with something else, e.g. kiwi (fruit) and kiwi (animal). Be consistent and use (movie), (TV series), (character), etc. When it's even more ambiguous, like characters with the same name but from different franchises, use the franchise name, e.g. Kaga (KanColle). Don't add brackets for the hell of it.
Other tag stuff if you don't hate me yet:
- Don't put hash tags before the actual tag, combine multiple terms into one tag ('women beach sexy girls bikini'), or otherwise behave like you're tweeting.
- science fiction is best used when it's actually a wall of a work of science fiction. futuristic is fine the rest of the time.
- Sun is the name of our star, so anything you'd call 'a sun' should be tagged stars. Sun should also probably be reserved for images specifically of it in space, since you can use sunlight in most other cases.
- universe isn't a fun tag to throw at any space wall. Please use it for walls that actually depict the universe.
- Breed names for dogs and other animals are proper nouns so don't need to be pluralised (German Shepherd).
- Don't just slap abstract on anything that looks arty or neat. It means 'not representing real or physical objects', mmkay?
- Simple doesn't equal minimal. Seriously, look up minimalism. It's, like, nothing. Most walls can just be tagged #simple but only some minimalism.
- topless is for ladies, as you've surely noticed, and shirtless is for dudes. It's a bit inconsistent but people tend to think of women going topless and men shirtless.
- Illustrations are images that accompany text, usually in a book. It's not a fancy word for artwork, so please don't piss about with illustration.
- Don't tag a wall of an actor with the name of a film or series they're in unless the wall actually depicts it.
- Do use accents (like é) and other diacritics if a word is supposed to have them (Champs-Élysées). To be safe, add the tag with normal characters as an alias.
- Vehicle models should be in full and include the manufacturer's name (BMW M5) to make searching and sorting easier.
- Only use fantasy art for actual examples of the fantasy genre. Fictional doesn't equal fantastical. It also doesn't mean weird or arty.
- Don't tag descriptions of the format of the image, such as 'HD' or 'widescreen' as they're redundant. multiple display is the exception because it has a use.
- Don't tag photos with the device that took them. It doesn't mean much and the tags are better used for images of the actual device.
- Portrait photography and photos of people in general can use closeup rather than macro.