Guild Wars Wiki talk:Sign your comments

Discussion

I'm against all colours, images, smiley faces and dancing banannas. Unnecessary and distracting from the content. — Skuld 05:39, 8 February 2007 (PST)

A small sig icon really makes large discussion easier to follow as seen on some of the huge discussions in GuildWiki. When atleast two or three of the main participants of the discussion use a small sig icon it is a lot easier to see what was written by whom. I'm also against color (Sigm@s sig is a good example for what can happen) and other such stuff which are also not allowed by the proposal. --Gem (talk) 05:45, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Agree with Gem. Small images help follow talk pages. Oblio 10:55, 8 February 2007 (PST)

My preference is no image whatsoever. If others feel strongly to permit it, then I have no problem with a single small icon (no bigger than 19x19); but it MUST be accompanied by the text name as well. In GuildWiki we allowed an image if it clearly relates to the name; but I feel that it's better to treat everyone equally. I agree fully with not permitting color changing codes - those are nothing but disctraction. --Barek 08:04, 8 February 2007 (PST)

But they make conversation way easier to follow. I find image way more distractive then color and most image ain't that clear.Aratak 08:07, 8 February 2007 (PST)

No images or colors please. Use indentation wisely to follow the flow of conversation. (Plus none of the kool kids use colors or images.) S 08:08, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Then we shouldn't allow anything. One single letter for example shouldn't be allowed. It's hard to see who wrote that comment.--Aratak 08:10, 8 February 2007 (PST)

The suggestion made by me forces all users to have their full user name in the sig. Even those with a sig icon. --Gem (talk) 08:37, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Whether images or colors are allowed or not, having a full user name in sig is a good requirement to prevent confusion. --Xeeron 11:16, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Yup. And preventing colors is a good idea as was proved by Sigm@ in GWiki. --Gem (talk) 11:35, 8 February 2007 (PST)

I don't see anything wrong with the GWiki policy, actually. Rapta 11:38, 8 February 2007 (PST)

It seems silly to even talk about this. Was sigma's that crazy? (I'll grant slightly annoying) At least it didn't blink. I liked the little icons, and I didn't mind some use of color. Whatever, I'm with rapta on this, but I'll be happy with the icon. :) Oblio 11:49, 8 February 2007 (PST)

I actualy like color but if we are to prevent color we shoudn't allow picture too. With all the skill icons proliferation in the signature on Guildwiki annoys me. It's nice to be able to spot who is talking in the conversation, it's not just about following the flow of conversation but keeping track of people you are talking too. I hope people didn't find my signature to be has annoying has Sigma's.--Aratak 12:10, 8 February 2007 (PST)

I'm all for no colors or images. Colors suck because I'm colorblind. Images suck because they're huge in the editable wikitext of the page, and because when I browse this place with Lynx, I get confused. Images also look strange, even under typical browsers, when I change the default text size for easier readability. —Tanaric 12:32, 8 February 2007 (PST)

19px height doesn't kill the link breaks too much, but I wouldn't mind a no images or colours policy. — Rapta (talk|contribs) 12:37, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Tanaric: I can feel your pain with the colors and it seems like we don't need to discuss them further as 90% of the discussors don't want them. Images need to be discussed further thou.

I would not disallow images just because some people use text based browsers as so many articles need to use images anyway. Besides the sig icons don't look too weird on text based browsers. The wiki code for them isn't long either unless the image name is long, which is easily regulated. Images looking a bit weird isn't a problem really, especially as so few users change the default text size. The positive side is easy recognition of the user posting which matteres to me a lot. It's hard to spot certain users from a mass of blue links and understading the whole picture (who replied to who) is hard for me atleast. --Gem (talk) 12:43, 8 February 2007 (PST)

See, for me, the images do the exact opposite. My eyes are attracted to the comments with images and I unconsciously skip over the text-only comments. —Tanaric 12:45, 8 February 2007 (PST)

That might be a problem for some users, your correct. Maby we could compromise and allow really light colors in the icons. Those would differentiate users but not draw too much attention. --Gem (talk) 12:57, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Personally I am in the minority in that I really like both colours and images. And although I didn't mention it in my summary of the discussion with ArenaNet (and I'm not saying that this should have a bearing on the decisions made here) Gaile Gray said that she loved the many user icons on talk pages and asked if I would make her an icon.

It was briefly discussed a while back, but is there no way that CSS could be used to allow those users who simply hate colours and images to turn it off? The only workable solution I can think of is wrapping sigs in a <span>, but this would add to the length of signatures in the wiki code. LordBiro 14:49, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Then have every signature automatically contain

{{sig|blah}}

. {{Sig}} would have

<div span="class:sig;">{{{1}}}</div>

or whatever it is you wanted to use. Then we could somehow implement turning sig images on or off in preferences. Blastedt(talk)GuildWiki page 14:56, 8 February 2007 (PST)

Do we need this kind of complexity? Users are free to disable images in their browser too. --Gem (talk) 15:26, 8 February 2007 (PST)

I'm in favor of allowing both colors (although not too many different colors) and small icons if it ever comes to choose, but I'm willing to disallow one or the other as a compromise, to find some middle ground with those who don't. To me, sigs are like user pages, it's kind of a personal expression. Was the little necromancer-icon that I used previously really so distracting? Hmm... --ab.er.rant (talk) 15:44, 8 February 2007 (PST)

I am fine with whatever you decide on the sigs appearance (as long as it is not flashing neon half the size of the screen), but lets please put a limit length of the wiki code. Sigs that are longer than one line of code bloat the talk pages (while editing), especially when there are many short comments. --Xeeron 15:00, 8 February 2007 (PST)

A 150 character limit would be a good one I think. --Gem (talk) 15:26, 8 February 2007 (PST)

I wonder if we could make it a requirement that, if you choose to use images in your signature, you have to wrap it in a span like this:

<span class="sig">signature goes here</span>

Ideally there would be a preference to add span.sig img { display: none; } to the user's stylesheet. LordBiro 15:36, 8 February 2007 (PST)

This has the abysmal side effect of cluttering up the wikitext in articles. I think what really needs to be asked is, "what do colors and images in sigs add to the wiki"? They don't help the project, and, at least to some people, they cause demonstrable harm (screen readers, attracting eyes to colorful passages, text-only browsers, etc.). There is absolutely no benefit to keeping them, and there is absolutely no harm in disallowing them. If it really means that much to you to slap a colorful image next to your contribution, I think perhaps you should reconsider why you're contributing in the first place. —Tanaric 17:59, 9 February 2007 (PST)

I say get rid of the images. They aren't necessary and draw attention away from ordinary user links. Plus they keep the pages clean. It's just another vanity item. - - BeXoR 18:06, 9 February 2007 (PST)

Tanaric said: "If it really means that much to you to slap a colorful image next to your contribution, I think perhaps you should reconsider why you're contributing in the first place." If that is the reason, then we should only allow contact information on user pages, nothing more. We should also disallow any talk on talk pages which isn't related to work in the wiki. Sounds ridicilous? So does disallowing sig images. Sounds more like "I want to use a text based browser although I have the choice not to and they screw talk pages for me." Your other argument is that a minority is harmed by them, but an equal minority finds them really helpfull, the rest just don't care. --Gem (talk) 12:53, 10 February 2007 (PST)

I tend to agree with Gem. I don't use much of an unusual signature myself, but I personally like to know who is typing before I read it, so I will scroll to the end of the indentation to see who it is. If I see a Gem, or an odd little smiley face, I can see it's Gem or Bexor. And if I see a purple block of text I know it's Gaile :P

I can appreciate that some people are not keen on images and colours, but I'm not one of them. LordBiro 13:47, 10 February 2007 (PST)

Actually, Gem, when I'm on my machine that doesn't have X installed, I don't have a choice -- text-based browsers are the only choice I have. That said, and text-based browsers aside, I'm done with this discussion. If people are actually willing to make the site unusable for the handicapped just because they like fucking images after their talk comments, there's nothing I can say to dissuade them from such callous, compassionless behavior. —Tanaric 15:51, 10 February 2007 (PST)

I hope you are not too worked up about this, Tanaric. Having re-read the discussion I do feel that coloured text is inappropriate on usability grounds; it's not fair if someone can't make out the page properly. As far as images go, I'm still not persuaded. As far as I'm aware, screen readers will read out the alt attribute of an image if it is inside an inline tag, i.e. <p>, won't they? LordBiro 16:16, 10 February 2007 (PST)

Sorry about the outburst. It was inappropriate. Do as you will. —Tanaric 16:23, 10 February 2007 (PST)

Biro I think that's part of the problem. You are drawn to the signatures you recognise, at risk of ignoring the comments of those who you aren't familiar with or who have ordinary looking names. I believe your name should be enough. Is it that important to scream to the world that the comment is yours? It's the actual comment and what it says that's meant to be important. - BeXoR 17:23, 10 February 2007 (PST)

(reset indent) For what it's worth, together with the user policy, I think some of you guys are trying to turn this wiki into something very impersonal for the contributors. You don't want to allow any form of self-expression, and deny contributors to get that little "homey" feeling. As for text-based browsers, should we remove images from mission and quest pages as well? since they disrupt anyone reading the walkthrough. And given the rising levels of antagonism against images in signatures, I am willing to give way and restrict plain default text for every single user. Since we're all about appearing to be no different from any other user, I'm going to take another step and push for a uniform signature template: Similar dashes, username must be the signature name, date format, and either talk pages must be linked or talk pages must not be linked. --ab.er.rant (talk) 20:30, 10 February 2007 (PST)

BeXoR: Do you really claim that you never care who wrote something? In a large discussion it matters a lot which people are discussing and which comments belongto the same user. Ab.er.rant: No need for that, I'm sure. ;P

I made minor changes to the policy page, adding a note to avoid bright colors in sig icons. --Gem (talk) 00:58, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I believe that the value lies in what a person says, not who has said it. And yes, comments have never meant more or less to me depending on who said it. I am worried about new users who contribute to a discussion, and write maybe one line, which gets overlooked because everyone sees a little gem or something. And recalling my experiences as a new wiki-er, I believe that having those things makes you look like you know what you're doing, which makes others lend weight to your opinion. I know that when I changed my signature to have a picture, people started considering me as something different. I didn't sign up for any wiki to make friends or have fun - my interest is in documenting a game and finding the best way to do that. If I make friends along the way, or have fun, it's not because we had pictures in our signature or anything else. I don't understand why this is necessary and every conclusion I come to doesn't reflect well on the people wanting it... The bottom line is, your name should be enough to identify who you are. - BeXoR 01:10, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I didn't say that I give more weight to comments by people who have sig icons. See Karlos or Stabber for example. Neither of them has ever used a sig icon but I (and everyone else) takes their comments just like mine or yours. The sig icons really don't cause some peoples comments getting more weight, it's just a means for easily separating people from eachother. --Gem (talk) 01:16, 11 February 2007 (PST)

My point is that you read the name first/know who said it and then the comment. You identify the user before you even read anything they have said. - BeXoR 01:21, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I always try to look at the sig first before reading the comment. A sig icon or other differentiating feature makes the process a lot faster and saves me from a headache in longer discussions. --Gem (talk) 01:24, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I agree with Gem there. For people that like to rant and write four-paragraph responses (like me), I try to browse down and check who is speaking; it helps me weigh what they say with what I already know about that user. And, after sorting down through four paragraphs of text, an off-colored word isn't going to stick out at me; an image will, so I know who it is that much faster. Also, my image always linked to my talk page... a useful tool, since my name always linked to my userpage. If the image serves a purpose, why disallow it? -Auron 01:41, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I hope you would read the comments made earlier, specifically regarding accessibility. The images may serve a purpose, but if it is to a detrimental effect, then they shouldn't be allowed. Should we always bow to ego rather than be sensible? - BeXoR 01:57, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Read Gem's response to that. Mine is the same. Should we gimp the entire Wiki for the benefit of the "accessibility" of a few? If the images serve a purpose, but inconvenience a few people, we should disallow them? Think, now. That doesn't make sense. -Auron 02:35, 11 February 2007 (PST)

That's fairly callous towards people with disabilities. - BeXoR 02:41, 11 February 2007 (PST)

To be fair, video games themselves aren't very accessible, and this is a wiki about a video game. I don't think we should ignore accessibility completely, but it is rather silly to think that a lot of blind people are going to be reading huge chunks of a wiki about a highly visual video game. Let's talk about how much we're actually inconveniencing the token blind user (as most of us here have an incomplete point of reference, at best) before we go further to decide what should and shouldn't be done to fix that. — 130.58 (talk) 02:48, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Tanaric, could you give an example of how colored text or other kinds of formating break screen readers, &c. for those of us who never use them? For example, if User:Example decided to make his sig green, what would it do to a screen reader? — 130.58 (talk) 02:19, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Better yet, how does the text reader work with the GuildWars client? --Rainith 02:55, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Is it a requirement that editors play the game? - BeXoR 02:59, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Are there any editors who have never played any of the GuildWars series of games? Now of those people who raised their hands, how many are blind (or close enough that they use screen readers)? --Rainith 03:04, 11 February 2007 (PST)

What about people who have degenerative eye diseases and can still see, but wont for long? Are we cutting them out of the picture too? There are too many possibilities to say if you aren't able to do this, too bad. - BeXoR 03:08, 11 February 2007 (PST)

We are not Wikipedia. It makes sense to have a rule against pictures in a signature on something like Wikipedia, where anyone is likely to contribute. It does not here, where in order for this wiki to even interest them, they would need to have the video game as a point of reference. A game that requires people to be able to see graphics on a screen and interact with them. I am not trying to shut out the visually impaired (my eyes are bad enough that I'm nearly considered blind myself), but the suggestion that a bunch of blind people are going to be upset by pictures in signature is ridiculous. --Rainith 03:14, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Bexor, are you being SERIOUS? That's the most far-fetched thing I've ever heard! At first, I thought you were defending the disabled, but now you're just being ridiculous. Let's stop with the one-in-a-five-million chance what-if games and come back to reality. -Auron 03:17, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Also, if it's just an issue of having your machine barf out a little extra "Rain-ith underscore sig dot Jay Pee Gee" every time it hits the end of one of Rainith's comments, that hardly makes the wiki unusable. Which is why I'm honestly asking: do colors and images cause problems beyond that? — 130.58 (talk) 03:19, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Is bringing up possibilities that ridiculous? My eyesight is degenerating, and you can't rule out accidents. I think accessibility is something that ANet would be concerned about. Accomodating all users. I am just saying it's something that should be considered. - BeXoR 03:21, 11 February 2007 (PST)

See below (both immediately below and the topic I added to the bottom of the page). — 130.58 (talk) 03:40, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I fired up the ol' Lynx. Indent-heavy pages look really stupid in my 80-character terminal, but Gaile's little color trick was just fine (ditto for people with little icons in their sigs, as long as they were semi-intelligibly named). Two biggest issues were that the main page didn't have alt text for the campaign logos, and that Blastedt's signature kinda blended together into one incomprehensible word (since the name and the link to his Guildwiki page looked the same next to each other). That first issue should probably be fixed. Other than that? Meh, not that bad.

Then I fired up Links, which doesn't have colors or whatever. No problems, either (some of the layout was, mysteriously, better than in Lynx). Editing text boxes was weird because I don't know anything about Links, but any issues with that would be a MediaWiki problem rather than a formatting policy problem.

Neither of these posed a usability problem for me. I don't have a screen reader, so that's why I'm soliciting someone else's comments on what that does to pages. — 130.58 (talk) 03:14, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Just a little post so you can use me as an example :D --Snograt ^{talk here} 03:24, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Lol. Is there even a name for that shade of yellow? -Auron 03:32, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Er, orange apparently. I vaguely remember "borrowing" the style from a wikipedia user - lookie [[User:Snograt|<span style="color:orange">Snograt</span>]]''' ''^{[[User talk:Snograt|<span style="color:green">talk here</span>]]} I have very little understanding of how it works, just that it does. :)-Snograt ^{talk here} 03:38, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Lynx (text browsers) renders this: "--Snograt talk here" (with "Snograt" and "talk here" as individual links). Fangs (screen reader emulator) renders this: "dash dash Link SnogratLink talk here". Because, unsuprisingly, both just strip formatting. If anything, my sig is worse than yours, since Fangs dumps out "one-hundred thirty point five eight" as my username. — 130.58 (talk) 03:46, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Damn - usage of "sup" has been banned. Better edit me sig :( --Snograt talk here 04:50, 11 February 2007 (PST)

:( --Snogratwhisper 05:11, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I've actually read through this humorous and sometimes ridiculous discussion. It realy is amazing what some people will come up with to prove their point. Colours and images in signatures don't bother me. I doubt I'll be using it myself, but if there are people that think it'll help identify them or just think it's pretty - then who am I to deny them that possibility ? I can respect the fact that some users think it's annoying and doesn't add anything, but to me that's just a matter of taste. How can you discuss taste ? --Erszebet 12:04, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Coloring your comment itself, not just your signature

User:Gaile Gray has begun making all her comments appear purple. I find this incredibly disruptive -- far more so than images and colors in signatures themselves. I believe this policy, or some other policy, must including something on excessive stylization of talk comments. —Tanaric 18:02, 9 February 2007 (PST)

I definitely wouldn't want to see non-Anet staff members using it, but it does help to distinguish her comments from everyone else's. That being said, I don't necessarily think anyone should use it at all. In discussions where opinions are meant to be weighed equally having any excessive embellishment on your comment will draw attention to it. - - BeXoR 18:06, 9 February 2007 (PST)

Agreed with Tanaric. With all due respect to Gaile Gray, I really see no good reason to colour every word she says purple all over the talk pages of the wiki. "But she is Gaile" doesn't qualify as one, at least not in my book. Something tells me that nothing she'll say is going to slip by unnoticed anyways, so there's really no reason to use such disruptive ways to highlight her posts. Also, from what I see, there's plenty of ANet employees registered here as users. If Gaile gets the purple colour, should Izzy (the skill balancer) get the blue one? I strongly believe we should keep this clean and not make any exceptions of this kind on the matter. (Nothing personal, madame!) --Dirigible 18:19, 9 February 2007 (PST)

Agreed, all for one and one for all :) --ab.er.rant (talk) 09:05, 10 February 2007 (PST)

This reminds me of another disturbing habit which is pretty new in the GuildWiki. Some users started to use colored tables on their talk page in which all comments should have been placed. Although I think that users are allowed to modify their talk page, I don't think that that should be allowed. The user page policy might be more suitable to prevent that one though. --Gem (talk) 23:17, 9 February 2007 (PST)

That feels more appropriate in some sort of conduct policy or guidelines, something similar to YAV and NPA. --ab.er.rant (talk) 09:05, 10 February 2007 (PST)

User page guidelines are separate from this page, and should be discussed by the burgeoning user page policy. —Tanaric 15:52, 10 February 2007 (PST)

I went and found a screen reader emulator...

Using Fangs, a Firefox extension that fakes the JAWS screen reader, I went over to a page full of formatted stuff: User talk: Gaile Gray. It's definitely a pain in the ass to read, but that's not because of the colors.

Here's a snapshot of the "I've noticed you've taken to using purple" topic as a user with a screen reader would more-or-less experience it:

left bracket Link edit right bracket I've noticed you've taken to using purple... So I made a Link template for you so you don't have to type it out each time, have fun!! colon D LinkGraphicImage colon BlastedT.jpgLink BlastedtLink GuildWiki page thirteen colon forty-two nine February two thousand seven left paren PST right paren Definition list of zero itemsequals I made a few mistakes, but promptly fixed ;P LinkGraphicImage colon BlastedT.jpgLink BlastedtLink GuildWiki page thirteen colon forty-six nine February two thousand seven left paren PST right paren Definition list of zero itemsequals Would someone also like to fix the colors on this talk page? I think she just forgot a few end tags somewhere or made a typo or two, but I wont bother to look for the mistakes. dash dash Link Gem left paren Link talk right paren thirteen colon fifty-five nine February two thousand seven left paren PST right paren Definition list of zero itemsequals Just missed one Tag colon P All better now LinkGraphicImage colon Kaya dash Icon dash Small.png fourteen colon five nine February two thousand seven left paren PST right paren List endList endList end

Bleh, huh? Note something, though: all of the fancy signatures and stuff add only a few words to the list. Far more obtrusive are parens, all the list bullplop MediaWiki uses to format the page, and DATES. Overall, I don't see the few extra little words as being particularly obtrusive when compared to all the other stuff that's being generated. (For the curious, you should also know that screen readers read fast... I've worked with systems set up to read OS output, and the synthesized voice would rattle of words faster than an auctioneer whenever any kind of message popped up.) — 130.58 (talk) 03:39, 11 February 2007 (PST)

So that's not a good reason not to accept images. --Gem (talk) 11:37, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Correct. Unless it has a really really long filename or something, an image isn't any more of a problem than stuff like the date or some usernames (e.g. mine, which is annoying if pronounced in long form by the reader). — 130.58 (talk) 16:52, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I've just pointed lynx at Meta's article on images, especially the section on "embedding" images, and if the image has an alt tag specified it appears as though it were text.

Therefore I recommend that we make it mandatory that all signature images should have the alt tag set to the user's name. LordBiro 17:07, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Just making your sig icon something intelligibly named after you also serves that purpose. Which is already being discussed here. Giving non-informative images an alt tag of " " is also not a bad idea. (If your sig is an icon+name.) — 130.58 (talk) 17:12, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I agree with the name for the most part, but looking at Gem's talk page on GuildWiki in lynx, Gem's sig looks like this:

-- Image:Gem-icon-sm.png (talk) 07:34, 1 February 2007 (CST)

When with a proper alt tag it would look like this:

-- Gem (talk) 07:34, 1 February 2007 (CST)

I agree with the blank alt tag for images + sig. LordBiro 17:17, 11 February 2007 (PST)

We're totally on the same page, then. I think the overall point is that, whatever your sig is, it should be recognizable and minimally-cluttered in any form. — 130.58 (talk) 19:50, 11 February 2007 (PST)

New header for discussion

Let's continue the discussion here. Everything else in the policy seems to be okay for everyone except for the signature icons. The reasons to oppose them have been limited to drawing attention from posts to users. Their harm for people with screen readers is minimal opposed to other wiki formatting and they don't look too bad in text based browsers when considered that most wiki articles also include images. Their attention drawal has also been limited by asking for light non-disturbing colors. The users opposing them seem to be BeXoR and Tanaric, the users supporting them are numerous. --Gem (talk) 11:49, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I oppose images in signatures for the reasons above. I'm not fully against images, but I don't think any of these should appear in signatures: Skill icons, profession icons, or any guild-wars related icon, icons with great color ranges (i.e. more than three distinguishable colors) and any other icon which is not unique to your wiki-account. Anything below that would be within my personal "OK"-range, and I think that'd be a sound compromise. ~ D.L. 12:59, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Fair enough. I stand by my original P.O.V. (bottom of 1st discussion section) - colours and icons allowed. The only restrictions I'm ok with are: no bright (as in 'unreadable') colors and disruptive mark-up. In other words, the policy as proposed now but with signature coloring (phew :p ). --Erszebet 13:16, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Signature color tags have allready been disallowed after discussion, as most users seem to be against them, but sig icons are still under discussion. I would accept 19x19 sigs with no bright colors allowed. --Gem (talk) 14:27, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Sounds reasonable to me. --Dirigible 14:31, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Most users against color? Well that didn't stand out. Well my points of view is image is more annoying and no light color isn't something you can define. So I'm against icons mostly because people use skill icons and I hate that.Aratak 16:36, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Maybe I'm skimming too much, but I didn't actually observe a strong antipathy to colored text in signatures above. — 130.58 (talk) 16:54, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Yea, most seem to be opposed to images. The problem with colours only comes up if they use multiple colours. Tanaric seems to have given up trying to convince people to give up images though... this is kinda depressing. We're arguing about such trivial things. Imagine putting up the guidelines on S&F and then arguing about each minor detail... let's decide if we should just go with the majority or to accomodate and accept the preference of the minority. --ab.er.rant (talk) 17:29, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I'm against colours and images because they are frivolities and are uncessary. The arguments to leave them do not outweigh the arguments to take them out. I think it's pandering to our egos to demand these things. But I can recognize a battle lost. How do you define a list of acceptable colours? Limit it to the 216 web safe colours? Really bright colours or multiple colours or background colours are all problematic, but someone could just as easily say your light blue colour makes my eyes hurt! I noticed that people didn't like someone's orange signature. I thought the colour was okay. And personally any light green colour is irritating. Dark colours only? What is dark? And I still don't think images are okay, but if they are allowed then 19 x 19 and only one image. - BeXoR 20:16, 11 February 2007 (PST)

I implied being against colors in signatures when talking above, too. As for colors of signatures, I propose allowing all prints ranging from #000000-#666666 and all other colors with differences of no more than #33 betweem any two part-colors (ie. #669999, #003300, #225555). Those colors are all rather dark and don't really disturb. For images, again, I suggest we limit the colors to three "distinguishable" types. (Or make it black, white and a third color to make that rule more precise.) ~ D.L. 21:51, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Of course, bold print should be prohibited, if we decide on allowing colored signatures. ~ D.L. 21:52, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Bold print yes, but be aware that if the user's signature links to their talk page, any comments made on their talk page will have the signature bolded. If you are confident in that range of colours, someone can make up a table (I can if you want) of acceptable colours. - BeXoR 22:07, 11 February 2007 (PST)

"Of course"? Why "of course"? — 130.58 (talk) 22:25, 11 February 2007 (PST)

Well, that's because I think that color and bold combined are too emphasizing. ~ D.L. 23:38, 11 February 2007 (PST)

It seemed fair to me. - BeXoR 23:55, 11 February 2007 (PST)

(reset indent) I'm sure you realize how many combinations there are in the range you proposed. I'm thinking whether you actually recognise all of them... If you said #003300 is accceptable, would you be able to tell if I used #003611 instead? I think this whole range of color thingy is a needless clarification. Either you allow colors or you don't. Either you allow one single color only or you allow 2 colors only. That's it. I, for one, don't want to bother dealing with the inevitable "Huh?" response when you tell other users, "Hey, that orange color in your signature is illegal, change it a hexcode that's has at most a #33 difference between any two part-colors." --ab.er.rant (talk) 02:43, 12 February 2007 (PST)

Yeh. Colors for most people were fine (Hyperion used gold and then light grey, Rapta's used grey for months now; nobody complained about those colors). The only problem was people with... unnecessary coloring in their signature. Using the rainbow for your sig makes little sense, but if you prefer Green over the standard blue link, I don't see why we should disallow that. Maybe a "pick one color" rule? -Auron 02:52, 12 February 2007 (PST)

People had problems with users that had a red name. Would red be allowed? - BeXoR 02:57, 12 February 2007 (PST)

I don't (generally) see a problem with allowing red, however, red usernames usually link to empty (never edited) userpages. I heard once that the color red on a screen induced some symptoms of seizure, is that what you were talking about? -Auron 03:09, 12 February 2007 (PST)

Personally, I don't have a problem with red colors. If a user wants to use red and have everyone think that he doesn't have a user page, that's fine with me. If it's red, I don't bother clicking. If I want to go to the talk page, whether it's red or not, I can still click it and get to the talk page. --ab.er.rant (talk) 03:13, 12 February 2007 (PST)

(edit conflict) No I meant in regards to "acceptable" colours. Someone on gwiki had a user signature that had a red name and they were told to change it because it was unacceptable or ugly or something. I haven't heard that about red on a screen. I would think though that you'd filter the colour out in your monitor settings if you were at risk of something like that. I don't think red is as bad and something like neon green but other people obviously didnt want it. - BeXoR 03:16, 12 February 2007 (PST)

So now we are going to accept colors? Then there are no real arguments against images as the sig colors were a lot more disturbing in GWiki than sig icons. --Gem (talk) 03:22, 12 February 2007 (PST)

You mean sig colors that were ridiculous/unnecessary? I think we're failing to draw the line between "color" in the sig (i.e., green instead of blue) and an "excessively colored" sig (i.e., six or so colors, a different one for each letter in your name). Yeah, the ridiculous sigs were definitely disturbing, but by far, most people's colored sigs posed no problem. Edit: maybe we should have a no-rainbow "policy?" -Auron 03:26, 12 February 2007 (PST)

One color per link. If you have a link to your user page, and a link to your talk page, you can use two colors. I don't know if there was a discussion about putting other links in your sig (contribs or whatever), but if they are allowed then you can use one additional color for each link. Each link must be only one color, so just because you can use two colors, that doesn't mean you can alternate colors for each letter. That's my suggestion anyway. --Rainith 03:35, 12 February 2007 (PST)

That might be prone to abuse... I could sneak in a link to each of my character subpages using single letters and then color them all in different colors... a really extreme example, but my thought was one more colour in addition to black. So your sig can have black and one other color. That way you can't have users purposely picking garish mismatches of colors. --ab.er.rant (talk) 03:38, 12 February 2007 (PST)

That would only be prone to abuse if more links were allowed. The current proposed policy reads, "Do not include links to anything else than your user page, user talk page or user contributions page." so at most you would be able to use 3 colors for the 3 links. So you could if you wanted to link your sig as Ab.er.rant. --Rainith 03:42, 12 February 2007 (PST)

Rainith.... I think I actually like it... lol --ab.er.rant (talk) 03:47, 12 February 2007 (PST)

/cry. Lol. It's not too bad :P Anyhoo, how do we put it into words? "You may not have more colors than links in your sig?" -Auron 03:49, 12 February 2007 (PST)

"Signatures must include one link and may include up to three: A link to the user's page or the user's talk page is required and a link to the user's contributions page is optional. Each link must be only one color, but each link may be a different color from the others." How does that sound? --Rainith 03:57, 12 February 2007 (PST)

Sounds okay to mee, but I would also want a 'no bright and disturbing colors' added in. I'll modify the policy suggestion according to that. How about the icons then? --Gem (talk) 04:04, 12 February 2007 (PST)

My only issue w/the 'bright and disturbing colors' part is that it would be subjective. If I have just gone to a funeral, I could say that I found the color black used in a signature disturbing, that might be true, but the vast majority of people probably wouldn't think that way. I think if colors are allowed, it should be clear cut, all or nothing.

As for icons, I'm fine with them at the 19x19 pixel limit (I think that was the limit people were discussing, if not, then at whatever limit people had agreed upon before). --Rainith 04:08, 12 February 2007 (PST)

Bright and disturbing is subjective, but it should be clear that when multiple users complain about your sig colors they are disturbing. If only one is, there is nothing to worry about. --Gem (talk) 04:13, 12 February 2007 (PST)

[ec] How brigth are bright colors? What's too bright? That discussion is really going nowhere. Again, we're at a point where any agreement can hardly be called that way. I'm against that. If we don't want a quantifiable regulation, we might as well have no regulation at all. ~ D.L. 04:16, 12 February 2007 (PST)

(edit conflict) How many out of the thousands of users is enough to form a proper complaint? Keep in mind that someone could complain about UserX's signature and I could back it up because I'm a friend with the person complaining. It should require more that "more than one person complaining". - BeXoR 04:23, 12 February 2007 (PST)

Some stuff we can leave up to common sense when the situation arises. By the way, there is a technical objective definition of "brightness" but I would hate to see that used here. --Xeeron 04:30, 12 February 2007 (PST)