I know tags are important for searching for specific images, but how many is too many? Go look at how many tags are on post 3133511 for example, what the hell is going on there? Like a lot of those tags are only used once on that post. One of the tags is "two-tone mug".

Like is that just allowed?

lordflawn said:
Like is that just allowed?

Technically yes, but it is annoying. Overtagging is a problem since it makes it impossible to verify individual tags aren't being misused. Like on post #3133511, it's impossible to ensure there aren't erroneous tags. And the more that kind of thing happens, the more likely it is for otherwise valid tags to become useless and in need of invalidation for being used too broadly. And it's difficult to find which tags are too specific to keep and need aliasing, with too many aliases in turn causing problems for tag autocompletion as you'll get many autocomplete results that aren't spelled like you're typing.

Here's your culprit: https://e621.net/post_versions?search%5Bpost_id%5D=3133511

it makes it impossible to verify individual tags aren't being misused

You say that, but I can see some in that post that definitely are being misused. Like hyper and age difference. Like that first one is just wrong, and I'm not sure how you can tell for the second one.

on one hand i can admire the insane dedication it takes to tag so thoroughly

but on the other hand:
yellow_cheese (yes i know not all cheeses are yellow, but still; yellow_cheese)

lordflawn said:
You say that, but I can see some in that post that definitely are being misused. Like hyper and age difference. Like that first one is just wrong, and I'm not sure how you can tell for the second one.

It's not impossible to spot some sometimes, but it's very easy to accidentally skip over entries because they all look so similar, and miss some. To say nothing of how some are so specific, that it's unlikely you'll know if it actually applies, and need to go pixel hunting to see if it's actually there, then have difficulty getting back your position in the list and go to the next tag, which may also need pixel hunting. The fact that you were able to find misused tags for major details like hyper and age_difference increases the chance that more specific tags relating to obscure minor details may also be incorrect.

kemonophonic said:
Here's your culprit: https://e621.net/post_versions?search%5Bpost_id%5D=3133511

Whoever they are, they're a tagging machine... which is sus isn't it?

lordfawn, you're doing god's work removing some of those wrong tags

I'llkawyourmaw what the hell is your clipboard?

Sorry for being antisocial regarding use of the site. Outside a couple of dms regarding some specific sets of tags I hadn't seen much talk of the tags outside of "that's a lot of tags" and "how do people have so much time to tag posts?" and things along these lines. I think I might have the wrong idea with tagging through what I picked up on the wiki. I thought overtagging was "[product code] [item]" type stuff, like say tagging a specific model of stormtrooper blaster, or tagging a specific iteration of a model of car. With this though, I can take some time to compile and maybe search for erroneous tags to alias away, like the afforementioned mug or what-have-you. e.g. metal, wood, candle, steel, cup, fork, knife, cutlery, door, window, shrubbery, apple, fruit. A while back I noticed mixed tags as well that I've been tagging on things that are equally questionable ([sex]_[penetrating/dominating]_[body_type] and vice versa, as well as larger_[sex]_smaller_[body_type] etc)

Or if the tags like "yellow_cheese" are technically in-line, I might offer an alternative solution as whatever is the vast majority shouldn't be tagged ("yellow_cheese" being similar to the defunct "white_sclera" for example). Monotone tags I think could use this more often. monotone_claws monotone_talons monotone_eyes monotone_eyebrows monotone_nails monotone_toes monotone_fingers monotone_spikes monotone_fins monotone_frill monotone_membrane monotone_tongue monotone_gums monotone_flesh monotone_lips monotone_eyelids monotone_anus monotone_areola monotone_nipples monotone_whiskers monotone_flesh_whiskers monotone_inner_ear monotone_horn monotone_antlers monotone_antennae monotone_tendrils monotone_eyelashes monotone_eyeshadow monotone_lens monotone_bandages monotone_band-aid monotone_bird_legs monotone_scutes monotone_text monotone_text_box monotone_border monotone_sheath monotone_knot monotone_medial_ring monotone_knot_root monotone_glans monotone_perineum monotone_foreskin monotone_mandibles monotone_mouth monotone_door monotone_floor monotone_wall monotone_dresser monotone_drawer monotone_drawstring monotone_quills monotone_wattle monotone_cere monotone_ceiling monotone_comb_(anatomy) monotone_lacrimal_caruncle monotone_avian_caruncle monotone_hooves monotone_jewelry monotone_ring monotone_piercing monotone_ring_piercing monotone_cock_ring monotone_penis_piercing monotone_udders monotone_inner_pussy monotone_tuft monotone_ruff monotone_rope monotone_ear_ring monotone_ear_piercing monotone_ear_stud monotone_ear_fins monotone_ear_frill monotone_makeup monotone_eyeliner monotone_lipstick monotone_collar monotone_leash monotone_buckle monotone_belt_buckle monotone_belt monotone_belt_pouch monotone_bag monotone_fingernails monotone_toenails monotone_mouth monotone_tongue_stud monotone_stud_piercing monotone_tongue_piercing monotone_beard monotone_mustache monotone_facial_hair monotone_beak monotone_bedsheet monotone_blade monotone_blanket monotone_cloth monotone_shelf monotone_shoelace monotone_shoelaces monotone_stripes monotone_spots monotone_straw monotone_straps monotone_sniper_rifle monotone_ridge monotone_melee_weapon monotone_pouch monotone_pouch_(clothing) monotone_spear monotone_knife monotone_cuff_(restraint) monotone_cord monotone_cabinet monotone_furniture monotone_mace monotone_midriff monotone_navel_piercing monotone_gem monotone_locker monotone_pawpads monotone_wing_claws monotone_patagium monotone_scutes monotone_knob monotone_hairclip monotone_hair_tie monotone_hair_accessory monotone_accessory monotone_harness monotone_bow monotone_bow_tie monotone_pussy monotone_pillow monotone_pubes monotone_plate monotone_lid monotone_nose monotone_nipple_ring monotone_nipple_piercing

dark_text black_text white_speech_bubble white_thought_bubble light_speech_bubble light_thought_bubble pink_mouth pink_tongue light_tongue pink_gums light_gums

[colour]_areola glistening_areola

n_panel_comic

digital_sketch

I haven't made all of these, mind you. I've included relevant tags I've stumbled upon in the search bar.

i'llkogyourmaw said:
Sorry for being antisocial regarding use of the site. Outside a couple of dms regarding some specific sets of tags I hadn't seen much talk of the tags outside of "that's a lot of tags" and "how do people have so much time to tag posts?" and things along these lines. I think I might have the wrong idea with tagging through what I picked up on the wiki. I thought overtagging was "[product code] [item]" type stuff, like say tagging a specific model of stormtrooper blaster, or tagging a specific iteration of a model of car. With this though, I can take some time to compile and maybe search for erroneous tags to alias away, like the afforementioned mug or what-have-you. e.g. metal, wood, candle, steel, cup, fork, knife, cutlery, door, window, shrubbery, apple, fruit. A while back I noticed mixed tags as well that I've been tagging on things that are equally questionable ([sex]_[penetrating/dominating]_[body_type] and vice versa, as well as larger_[sex]_smaller_[body_type] etc)

To be fair, I do like that someone is tagging things a bit more specifically. Some of them are just way too specific, like all of the "two-tone (body part)" or "big (specific muscle)". Not that they're not valid or anything, I just don't see anyone actually searching for those. They'd search for "two-tone body" and "muscular".

"yellow_cheese" being similar to the defunct "white_sclera" for example

Pretty much. I'd say you don't need to specify when something is only one color, cuz that could be seen the default state for most things. You'd only need to specify when it's out of the norm somewhat. (for example, if an object usually had stripes or something.)

i'llkogyourmaw said:
I thought overtagging was "[product code] [item]" type stuff, like say tagging a specific model of stormtrooper blaster, or tagging a specific iteration of a model of car.

Overtagging is when a post has so many tags, you can't reasonably expect someone to go through and verify each tag is applicable. As it is, people have already found a number of mistags in that mass of tags in post #3133511, so who knows how many more mistags are hiding in there. There's still some questionable tags that I'm not sure are really valid; the number of monotone_* tags has me wary, since I often see them tagged for things that aren't monotone, e.g. the back (it's not monotone when there's green (scales) + brown (scars/markings) on the back) and eyes (yellow (sclera) + green (pupils) doesn't make the eye as a whole monotone), nor do I think it's fair to call something monotone when you can only see a small portion of it. Something like the mouth is also vague (to me, the mouth includes the lips, teeth, gums, and tongue, so would rarely be monotone, while some people may not consider the lips or teeth part of the mouth, making the mouth almost always monotone), and beards are typically monotone by default, so monotone_beard would be largely the same as beard, with multicolor_beard and two_tone_beard helping find when a beard isn't monotone. The light_* and dark_* tags are also vague and relativistic that depend a lot on an individual's perception of the image (what's perceived as light to someone can be dark to another, and something that's light_<object> when in a dark scene can appear dark_<object> in a light scene, when the object itself hasn't changed at all, e.g. these four cylinders are the same brightness, but the left ones appear light while the right ones appear dark).

Tags being overly specific can lead to having too many tags, but it's not just being overly specific that's a problem. Although being overly specific is generally a nono (we don't need a dozen tags describing each limb, or the specific color of their left pinky finger tip). When something can generally be presumed, we don't need to tag it either (e.g. cheese is yellow 99% of the time, so you don't need to tag yellow_cheese since that's the default expectation for cheese to be, like how we don't tag white_sclera since that's the default expectation for sclera to be. If a tag doesn't effectively narrow down the results, e.g. if yellow_cheese (when used properly) encompasses almost all the same results as cheese, it's a needlessly specific tag. Tags are ultimately there to help people find images, that given enough information you'll be able to find the desired image among the results. If a tag doesn't help narrow down the results, it's not helpful. On the flip side, they aren't intended to be able to zero-in on a specific image as the only result when you know enough details, either. If someone's searching for an image, they aren't likely to have (many if any) specific details, and are instead just going to have a few general details. You may be surprised how much a few general details together can cut down on the results and get the desired image within a page or two, without needing to get terribly specific about any one detail.

When tags have a very low use count (many tags in post #3133511 have a single or double-digit use count, for instance), that typically indicates it's not very helpful at actually finding images that have what the tag is for, so people aren't likely to use it, it's just boosting the post's tag count, and is increasing mistags. Although low use-count doesn't necessarily mean it shouldn't be used (a low count may simply mean it's a new tag that hasn't had a chance to catch on, or isn't depicted very much, while a high count may simply be a result of a single user applying it to thousands of images on their own but no one actually ever uses it for searching). Ultimately when considering what to tag, it's good to ask yourself "are these tags really going to make or break the ability for people to find this image? are people going to be able to notice and fix mistags that may be made?"

watsit said:
Overtagging is when a post has so many tags, you can't reasonably expect someone to go through and verify each tag is applicable. As it is, people have already found a number of mistags in that mass of tags in post #3133511, so who knows how many more mistags are hiding in there. There's still some questionable tags that I'm not sure are really valid; the number of monotone_* tags has me wary, since I often see them tagged for things that aren't monotone, e.g. the back (it's not monotone when there's green (scales) + brown (scars/markings) on the back) and eyes (yellow (sclera) + green (pupils) doesn't make the eye as a whole monotone), nor do I think it's fair to call something monotone when you can only see a small portion of it. Something like the mouth is also vague (to me, the mouth includes the lips, teeth, gums, and tongue, so would rarely be monotone, while some people may not consider the lips or teeth part of the mouth, making the mouth almost always monotone), and beards are typically monotone by default, so monotone_beard would be largely the same as beard, with multicolor_beard and two_tone_beard helping find when a beard isn't monotone. The light_* and dark_* tags are also vague and relativistic that depend a lot on an individual's perception of the image (what's perceived as light to someone can be dark to another, and something that's light_<object> when in a dark scene can appear dark_<object> in a light scene, when the object itself hasn't changed at all, e.g. these four cylinders are the same brightness, but the left ones appear light while the right ones appear dark).

Tags being overly specific can lead to having too many tags, but it's not just being overly specific that's a problem. Although being overly specific is generally a nono (we don't need a dozen tags describing each limb, or the specific color of their left pinky finger tip). When something can generally be presumed, we don't need to tag it either (e.g. cheese is yellow 99% of the time, so you don't need to tag yellow_cheese since that's the default expectation for cheese to be, like how we don't tag white_sclera since that's the default expectation for sclera to be. If a tag doesn't effectively narrow down the results, e.g. if yellow_cheese (when used properly) encompasses almost all the same results as cheese, it's a needlessly specific tag. Tags are ultimately there to help people find images, that given enough information you'll be able to find the desired image among the results. If a tag doesn't help narrow down the results, it's not helpful. On the flip side, they aren't intended to be able to zero-in on a specific image as the only result when you know enough details, either. If someone's searching for an image, they aren't likely to have (many if any) specific details, and are instead just going to have a few general details. You may be surprised how much a few general details together can cut down on the results and get the desired image within a page or two, without needing to get terribly specific about any one detail.

When tags have a very low use count (many tags in post #3133511 have a single or double-digit use count, for instance), that typically indicates it's not very helpful at actually finding images that have what the tag is for, so people aren't likely to use it, it's just boosting the post's tag count, and is increasing mistags. Although low use-count doesn't necessarily mean it shouldn't be used (a low count may simply mean it's a new tag that hasn't had a chance to catch on, or isn't depicted very much, while a high count may simply be a result of a single user applying it to thousands of images on their own but no one actually ever uses it for searching). Ultimately when considering what to tag, it's good to ask yourself "are these tags really going to make or break the ability for people to find this image? are people going to be able to notice and fix mistags that may be made?"

I'm pretty sure scars aren't included in tone or color - they're not a part of the natural body color, otherwise make-up would apply to those as well. As for mouth, I was thinking it was used for the interior of the mouth, like in cases of characters like goo creatures and elementals that don't have mouth features but still have what we could view as a mouth. There's also always the case that light or dark, or even body tone for that matter depending on interpretation. It reminds me of that dress that people see as either white and gold or as navy blue and black, depending on whether you think it is in a dark room or a lit room. a color picker might say a character is blue, but it might be a white character with blue lighting/shading, so context is important, but might be vague in many images. The eyes are another matter. It's sometimes ambiguous as to whether there's pupils, irises, or sclera in pieces. Sometimes an artist will put pupils and sclera without an iris, or they'll have small irises without distinct pupils within a sclera, or sometimes there's just pupil and iris, and it can be at times ambiguous as to what is the case. If the tone includes all elements of the eyes, then eyes are usually multicolored if anatomically correct, monotone if dot_eyes or empty_eyes, and two_tone if certain animal eyes or if the artist has excluded a part of the eye in their rendition.

I would then also suggest that given the purpose of finding an image based on details, that [colour]_breasts and [colour]_moobs aren't useful as they'd be paired with matching [colour]_chest tags anyway, and people could search for that instead in combination with the breasts or moobs tag, and that there are likely many other similar instances like this as well.

Also, finding images isn't the only use for tags, and it's definitely not something I've used tags for often. I often use them to explore and find other similar images, such as finding art of a character, even if it's just someone's OC I've stumbled across that I happened to like the look of.

lordflawn said:
how many is too many?

Depends who you ask tbh, I wonder what your reaction would be if you saw some people's Hydrus galleries that are overly specific.
In my opinion, no amount of tags is too many, as long as they are correct, it helps people filter posts and that's about it, on my own personal repository, I avoid aliasing as best as I can, limiting it to different wordings/misspellings, implications (overly_specific_tag -> broader_tag) are more than welcome though.

i'llkogyourmaw said:
I'm pretty sure scars aren't included in tone or color - they're not a part of the natural body color, otherwise make-up would apply to those as well.

They would. Body paint, dyes, tattoos, etc, count for body color, just as hair that's dyed red or blonde is still tagged red_hair or blonde_hair. Painted nails or claws are tagged with the color of the paint. I don't see why scars wouldn't count since they have a color and are a feature of the character's back.

i'llkogyourmaw said:
As for mouth, I was thinking it was used for the interior of the mouth, like in cases of characters like goo creatures and elementals that don't have mouth features but still have what we could view as a mouth.

I've always thought lips are part of the mouth, since they're part of the orifice. When you close your mouth, you close your lips. Either way, it seems like an odd thing to tag as monotone since generally either you're only including the gums and tongue, which are monotone 99.9% of the time they're seen and making it redundant with open_mouth, or you're including the teeth and/or lips with the gums and tongue, which are rarely ever monotone making it suspicious to see tagged. Or the inside of the mouth is so obscured that you can see so little of it that you can't tell if it's all monotone or not.

i'llkogyourmaw said:
There's also always the case that light or dark, or even body tone for that matter depending on interpretation. It reminds me of that dress that people see as either white and gold or as navy blue and black, depending on whether you think it is in a dark room or a lit room. a color picker might say a character is blue, but it might be a white character with blue lighting/shading, so context is important, but might be vague in many images.

Right, which gives them very questionable utility. If some people interpret a thing as being "light" and others "dark", then anyone searching light and dark things can't rely on those tags since the tagger could've had the opposite opinion, making them pointless to have.

i'llkogyourmaw said:
The eyes are another matter. It's sometimes ambiguous as to whether there's pupils, irises, or sclera in pieces. Sometimes an artist will put pupils and sclera without an iris, or they'll have small irises without distinct pupils within a sclera, or sometimes there's just pupil and iris, and it can be at times ambiguous as to what is the case. If the tone includes all elements of the eyes, then eyes are usually multicolored if anatomically correct, monotone if dot_eyes or empty_eyes, and two_tone if certain animal eyes or if the artist has excluded a part of the eye in their rendition.

The issue has come up before, but ultimately the way I see it is, there is no other term to distinguish the whole eye than "eye". When I see monotone_eyes, I'm expecting something like this where the whole eye is a single color tone, not this where the eye is comprised of yellow sclera and red irises. <color>_eyes refers to the color of the irises, and would be better named <color>_irises, but <color>_eyes is how people typically refer to iris color since sclera are presumed white and pupils are presumed black. Regardless, if "monotone_eyes" refers only to the iris, then it applies to 99.99% of eyes making it more redundant than white_sclera and shouldn't be used, while if it refers to the whole eye, then it doesn't apply if the iris/sclera/pupils are different colors as they often are.

i'llkogyourmaw said:
Also, finding images isn't the only use for tags, and it's definitely not something I've used tags for often. I often use them to explore and find other similar images, such as finding art of a character, even if it's just someone's OC I've stumbled across that I happened to like the look of.

Right, where the more detailed tags aren't going to be useful anyway. In that way, I'll be searching something more general like transformation or a particular character like link_(wolf_form). Tags like "dark_table" or "black_belt_pouch" still wouldn't be useful there as they're unnecessarily descriptive.

Incidentally, looking at what you did with post #4026340 is a prime example of why tagging too many things is bad. So many incorrect tags like [dark/black/monotone]_flesh when that's neither black nor flesh (it's fine grey fur), bulge (where?), after_masturbation (he's still holding his penis for masturbation, it can't be both masturbation and after_masturbation), black_areola/arms/body/butt/chest/claws/ears/eyebrows/face/feet/fingers/flesh/fur/head/legs/neck/nipples/penis/tail/toes when that's all grey not black, the butt isn't visible, there is no visible tail, amazing_background is definitely not applicable, neither is alternate_form, hyper_serratus, or hyper_trapezius. monotone_brick... seriously? Picking through all that, one tag at a time for just one image (that's part of a three-image set that have been given similar tag_panic treatment), is not something people should be expected to do to ensure good and proper tagging. tag_panic isn't something to strive for.

Overtagging isn't a thing, the issue here is inventing unnecessary tags.

dripen_arn said:
on one hand i can admire the insane dedication it takes to tag so thoroughly

but on the other hand:
yellow_cheese (yes i know not all cheeses are yellow, but still; yellow_cheese)

I undertand what you mean, but there are plenty of valid redundant tags like this,
red_blood pink_tongue fur

However, it would be perfect to not add tags like these by hand, they're unnecessary.

I think the main issue here is that e621 has never thought about implementing a tag limit. Users are required to add a minimum of 10 tags when uploading a post, but why not add a restriction as well?

I’ll be honest, I have also done crazy tag edits before (sometimes going over 200 tags), but giving people practically a playground to create redundant tags just makes things go way out of hand. Nobody is going to specifically search for dark_belt_pouch, glistening_apple, or monotone_table (and that’s just a few of many tags).

Perhaps e621 should implement a limit of about 100 / 150 tags per post and urge users to just use simple and generic tags.

zenith-pendragon said:
I think the main issue here is that e621 has never thought about implementing a tag limit. Users are required to add a minimum of 10 tags when uploading a post, but why not add a restriction as well?

I’ll be honest, I have also done crazy tag edits before (sometimes going over 200 tags), but giving people practically a playground to create redundant tags just makes things go way out of hand. Nobody is going to specifically search for dark_belt_pouch, glistening_apple, or monotone_table (and that’s just a few of many tags with under usages).

Perhaps e621 should implement a limit of about 100 / 150 tags per post and urge users to just use simple and generic tags.

Nice suggestion. Let's make a tagging system that will automatically ignore any relevant tags past 100.
What about content-heavy posts like comics or animations? Get that crap out of here, 100 tags is already enough.

zenith-pendragon said:
I think the main issue here is that e621 has never thought about implementing a tag limit. Users are required to add a minimum of 10 tags when uploading a post, but why not add a restriction as well?

I’ll be honest, I have also done crazy tag edits before (sometimes going over 200 tags), but giving people practically a playground to create redundant tags just makes things go way out of hand. Nobody is going to specifically search for dark_belt_pouch, glistening_apple, or monotone_table (and that’s just a few of many tags with under usages).

Perhaps e621 should implement a limit of about 100 / 150 tags per post and urge users to just use simple and generic tags.

I'm willing to support your idea, but first we would need to invalidate a few tags that do get implied by many other tags. For example, fur, feathers and scales. Otherwise, you effectively drop this limit down to 80-130, as the redundant implicated tags are added to the post(s).

thegreatwolfgang said:
Nice suggestion. Let's make a tagging system that will automatically ignore any relevant tags past 100.
What about content-heavy posts like comics or animations? Get that crap out of here, 100 tags is already enough.

I wasn’t saying that 100 tags has to be the limit. It was just an example. If it is too low, then the limit should be higher. If possible, anything uploaded as a video or gif can have more tags.

If a tag limit is impractical, we might as well just scratch the idea. But as I said before, nobody is going to search for overspecific tags that are only used in less than 100 posts. Some sort of meassure needs to be implemented to not only prevent overtagging, but also prevent the creation of unnecessary tags

zenith-pendragon said:
I wasn’t saying that 100 tags has to be the limit. It was just an example. If it is too low, then the limit should be higher. If possible, anything uploaded as a video or gif can have more tags.

If a tag limit is impractical, we might as well just scratch the idea. But as I said before, nobody is going to search for overspecific tags that are only used in less than 100 posts. Some sort of meassure needs to be implemented to not only prevent overtagging, but also prevent the creation of unnecessary tags

Your issue is with over-specific tagging, not with the total number of tags in a post.

If you looked up absolutely_everything, absolutely_everyone, tag_panic, or even just tagcount:>150, you can easily find basic images (not comics or videos) surpassing the arbitrary limit you had set.

Overtagging is not against the rules. If you want to see less of a specific tag, requesting an invalidation and discussing about it would be the way to go. Not by suggesting systems to prevent people from adding tags.

thegreatwolfgang said:
Your issue is with over-specific tagging, not with the total number of tags in a post.

If you looked up absolutely_everything, absolutely_everyone, tag_panic, or even just tagcount:>150, you can easily find basic images (not comics or videos) surpassing the arbitrary limit you had set.

Overtagging is not against the rules. If you want to see less of a specific tag, requesting an invalidation and discussing about it would be the way to go. Not by suggesting systems to prevent people from adding tags.

Understood, but you have to admit that there are a lot of tags on e621 that are completely pointless or they’re just underused

Yeah, probably should have been more specific in the title. But the extremely specific tags are the thing that makes it too many. (Or to say that there are too many pointless tags.)

got half a mind to go wipe out all the anthro fellating from that post, but I wouldn't wanna get slapped for vandalism or somethin

I like TheGreatWolfgang's sarcastic reply, haha. There already is a tagging-per-hour limit, and some rare galleries have say, 151 Pokemon, which just happens to be 1 more than 150. Perhaps have a warning if creating a bunch of new tags - oh wait, already doing that too. A warning for more than 50 tags though might make sense.

This is a crash course to my tagging philosophy. For people who know what they can tag but not what they should. I typed this, something productive, to spare everyone my visceral reaction that I actually want to say.

Think about other people. The users. The laypeople. They are your PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITY as a tagger. What do they need? What helps them? What doesn't help them? This should guide all of your tagging.

Some of these principles are at odds with each other, mainly tagging for greatest effect vs knowledge checks and unique things.

Color tags are, collectively, probably the lowest value tags on the site. They do next to nothing for people looking at the art, and they require no tag proficiency (but people here are actually pretty bad at identifying colors, so...?). They are only really good for finding full versions of cropped images or perhaps identifying characters or species from other art. Is it worth decently tagging the colors on 10K posts (50K+ tags) to help one person a year find one of those posts? Like, no, lol. Color tagging is more helpful for AI data sets scraping e621 than actual users!

I do tag the color of anatomy that make characters distinct (eyes, hair, claws, pawpads, etc). I rarely tag fur/scale color because a lot of furry art has vanishingly little fur/scale detail and it just doesn't do much for multi-colored fur/scales.

Overtagging impedes all of that^^^ because normal users--the people we are serving--cannot read those tag lists and they do not use those tags. Overtagging is actually destructive. "Helping" so much with incredibly low value tags that you frustrate everyone and do more harm than good. Isn't it ironic how quantity of information is inversely proportional to usability? This post is a perfect example because I had to section it off to salvage its readability.

alphamule said:
A warning for more than 50 tags though might make sense.

uhh
i exceed 50 tags on my posts p regularly
is
is that bad?
am i the problem? oh shit

abadbird said:
Give higher priority to what is strongly represented in a post and proportionally lower priority to things that are weakly represented. 3 small spots vs 50 spots. Which post would someone searching spots want to see? This scales with a post's complexity. For example, correctly tagging body part positioning or clothing has higher value with fewer characters. One raised arm or one thighband matters little on a post with ten characters. This is common sense, but overtagging does not follow common sense.
...
Tags are also useful for explaining what is happening in a post. For example, a tagger can spend a few minutes considering the physical orientation of characters and the viewpoint in a confusing post, adjust tags accordingly, and other viewers can read the tag list for a quick explanation instead of performing the same mental gymnastics as the tagger. Moreover, tags are treated as authoritative statements by less knowledgeable users and users who otherwise do not feel empowered to make tag changes. Which gender? Overweight, pregnant, inflation, or vore? Users trust tag lists too much, and taggers have a responsibility to them.

I disagree. If it is there, you should tag what you see. Not purposefully ignore the detail because it is too insignificant in the grand scale of things.
That is why we have tags like ambient_* or barely_visible_* , just because you can barely see it does not mean it should be ignored.

If you enter the mindset of tagging for the sole purpose of removing incorrect tags, then it is expected that you would experience the same mental gymnastics that the original poster had.
Users do not need to go through every single post on the site just to tag it to suit their own tagging checklist, that is just unnecessary stress on their part.

If you spot a tag that should be there, then you add it.
If you spot a tag that should not be there, then you remove it.

That is how posts get fixed when there is a bad tagging.

Some of these principles are at odds with each other, mainly tagging for greatest effect vs knowledge checks and unique things.

Color tags are, collectively, probably the lowest value tags on the site. They do next to nothing for people looking at the art, and they require no tag proficiency (but people here are actually pretty bad at identifying colors, so...?). They are only really good for finding full versions of cropped images or perhaps identifying characters or species from other art. Is it worth decently tagging the colors on 10K posts (50K+ tags) to help one person a year find one of those posts? Like, no, lol. Color tagging is more helpful for AI data sets scraping e621 than actual users!

I do tag the color of anatomy that make characters distinct (eyes, hair, claws, pawpads, etc). I rarely tag fur/scale color because a lot of furry art has vanishingly little fur/scale detail and it just doesn't do much for multi-colored fur/scales.

Overtagging impedes all of that^^^ because normal users--the people we are serving--cannot read those tag lists and they do not use those tags. Overtagging is actually destructive. "Helping" so much with incredibly low value tags that you frustrate everyone and do more harm than good. Isn't it ironic how quantity of information is inversely proportional to usability? This post is a perfect example because I had to section it off to salvage its readability.

Basically, this boils down to "too much tags make my eyes water and brain hurt."
Your, or rather the "normal users", discomfort of seeing a vast tag list should not supersede the need for having a full and comprehensive tag list.
A properly-tagged post will help in searching and greater functional use for crops or character search. An insufficiently-tagged post will lead to loss of search-ability (ever had that "Why isn't this tag added?" moment when you tried to find an image from memory).

Of course, you wouldn't expect the average site user to use all of these tags, that's why they would stick to the ones they know/used most.
If the average user wants to learn proper tagging, then they would have to take it step-by-step or follow the tagging checklist guide.
As for the rest, it is only a matter of whether the experienced tagger would want to include these tags into their own tagging checklist.

If the issue is overtagging creates confusion, then topic #26928 (i.e., feature for a collapsible colour tag group) would be an ideal site feature to have.

thegreatwolfgang said:
If you spot a tag that should be there, then you add it.
If you spot a tag that should not be there, then you remove it.

That is how posts get fixed when there is a bad tagging.

Key words being "if you spot". Posts with too many tags guarantees people will not be able to spot tags that shouldn't be there (you may spot some, but statistically speaking, the more that's tagged, the more likely there's some left uncaught), and makes it that much more likely people won't spot an obvious tag is missing if it's not a common blacklisted tag, And when a post has a lot of tags, people are much more hesitant to try to clean up improper tags from the post, out of fear that they may accidentally delete a technically valid tag as collateral damage and get a spanking for it.

thegreatwolfgang said:
Basically, this boils down to "too much tags make my eyes water and brain hurt."
Your, or rather the "normal users", discomfort of seeing a vast tag list should not supersede the need for having a full and comprehensive tag list.
A properly-tagged post will help in searching and greater functional use for crops or character search. An insufficiently-tagged post will lead to loss of search-ability (ever had that "Why isn't this tag added?" moment when you tried to find an image from memory).

Too many tags also increases the likelihood of misused or missing tags, resulting in tags becoming functionally useless due to too much incorrect use, or leaving obvious tags untagged due to not noticing it's missing, which in turn diminishes the search functionality rather than enhancing it. If it's a choice between having monotone_eyes be actually useful at describing something relatively uncommon instead of being effectively a replacement for the invalid eyes tag, vs leaving posts without glistening_apple, green_fingers, and dark_belt_pouch, I'll take the former. Quality over quantity. It's a lot easier to notice and go "Why isn't this tag added?" or "Why is this tag here?" if you didn't have to scroll five to ten times more past the image to get to the bottom of the tag list. Or to notice a common mistake with <object>_grab vs holding_<object> if they weren't buried in the middle of an oversized list.

thegreatwolfgang said:
If the issue is overtagging creates confusion, then topic #26928 (i.e., feature for a collapsible colour tag group) would be an ideal site feature to have.

A collapsible colour tag group won't help in situations where the colour tags themselves are a significant contributor to overtagging. In fact, overtagging often goes hand-in-hand with needlessly excessive color tagging, basically ensuring it won't help. I'll point to the fact that a post with a generic furry character in a generic pose in a generic setting was tagged black/dark/monotone_areola/arms/body/butt/chest/claws/ears/eyebrows/face/feet/fingers/flesh/fur/head/legs/neck/nipples/penis/tail/toes (where the color was wrong, as it wasn't black, and some of those body parts weren't actually visible, and the applicability of monotone to many of them was questionable at best).

Dark_* and light_* tags are all useless and should be aliased away imo. Too ambiguous. If you guys agree, i'll make a BUR about it.

cloudpie said:
Dark_* and light_* tags are all useless and should be aliased away imo. Too ambiguous. If you guys agree, i'll make a BUR about it.

+1 from me.

cloudpie said:
Dark_* and light_* tags are all useless and should be aliased away imo. Too ambiguous. If you guys agree, i'll make a BUR about it.

Only if you unalias dark_[color]_* and light_[color]_* tags first. There are posts where the character is visibly a dark gray which cannot be described other than dark_fur because black_fur is likely not the correct tag to apply either.
See https://e621.net/forum_topics/37483
And here are two examples of two characters sporting dark gray fur. Should it be tagged grey_fur or black_fur?
post #3996348 post #3916255

wolfmanfur said:
And here are two examples of two characters sporting dark gray fur. Should it be tagged grey_fur or black_fur?
post #3996348 post #3916255

Dark grey is still grey, just as dark_green is still green. If it appears more black, tag black, if it's more grey, tag grey. If it's difficult to tell, make your best guess.

wolfmanfur said:
Only if you unalias dark_[color]_* and light_[color]_* tags first. There are posts where the character is visibly a dark gray which cannot be described other than dark_fur because black_fur is likely not the correct tag to apply either.
See https://e621.net/forum_topics/37483
And here are two examples of two characters sporting dark gray fur. Should it be tagged grey_fur or black_fur?
post #3996348 post #3916255

I'd call both of those black. They're offblack because using pure #000000 black would conflict with the lineart. In general it's best to use #000000 and #FFFFFF pretty sparingly unless it's a black-and-white piece.
Edit: I agree with Watsit, it's just that my best guess for these two in particular is black :)

cloudpie said:
I'd call both of those black. They're offblack because using pure #000000 black would conflict with the lineart. In general it's best to use #000000 and #FFFFFF pretty sparingly unless it's a black-and-white piece.
Edit: I agree with Watsit, it's just that my best guess for these two in particular is black :)

it's all wrong. Artists can and have used pure black and pure white to draw a character's fur, here's an example. Same is true for that cartoon Mao Mao: Heroes of pure heart and Changed where respectively features a fully black character and a fully white character. lastly, an outline doesn't have to be black it can be another color if the character themself is coal black, or for stylistic reasons.

watsit said:
Dark grey is still grey, just as dark_green is still green. If it appears more black, tag black, if it's more grey, tag grey. If it's difficult to tell, make your best guess.

I know for sure you are worried that folks mistags posts and removing dark_fur will only lead to more mistaggings as folks try to figure out whether a character must be tagged grey_fur or black_fur. This won't lead to tag wars since it is not nearly as contentious as young, but this would be making things harder to tag correctly.

Hmmmmmm.....
Okay, looking through the dark_* and light_* tag lists, I can kind of see why some of the more popular ones exist now. There's some stupid ones too but I'll hold off on making the giant BUR for now.

wolfmanfur said:
I know for sure you are worried that folks mistags posts and removing dark_fur will only lead to more mistaggings as folks try to figure out whether a character must be tagged grey_fur or black_fur. This won't lead to tag wars since it is not nearly as contentious as young, but this would be making things harder to tag correctly.

Some colors are just difficult to pin down. Like cyan, which is sometimes more blue and sometimes more green. Tagging dark_fur doesn't help this ambiguity of black vs grey when dark_fur itself is just as, if not more, ambiguous (given how other dark_* tags are used, deep purple, red, or blue hues, or clearly grey fur in a relatively light environment would all be considered dark_fur, along side fur that's ambiguously black or grey).

watsit said:
Some colors are just difficult to pin down. Like cyan, which is sometimes more blue and sometimes more green. Tagging dark_fur doesn't help this ambiguity of black vs grey when dark_fur itself is just as, if not more, ambiguous (given how other dark_* tags are used, deep purple, red, or blue hues, or clearly grey fur in a relatively light environment would all be considered dark_fur, along side fur that's ambiguously black or grey).

The more I read your arguments regarding colors, the more I feel like you just want to invalidate all color tags. Nevertheless, firstly, cyan is cyan. We wouldn't have to pin down whether 'cyan is more green or blue' if cyan was still allowed to be a tag of its own. Dark_* denotes something that is a darker shade than usual. For example, here you can see here are two different shades of gray post #3996348 with one being so dark it could be confused for black in the process of tagging because it is very close to it, although the cartoony eyes of that sergal are actually black if we want to use a comparison. Lighting doesn't play a role in it, if a character is in a lit room, but has clearly a body that absorbs more light than it reflects then it should be tagged as dark_body/fur/scales/skin/feathers whichever is applicable. And to be fair, there are visual filters and lights of a certain color that make a specific color pop more. For example, looking at this, all the characters look to have a slight tinge of blue, but it is still possible to tell apart the colors that one has black fur, the other white fur etc.

abadbird said:
Tagging things that are questionably useful to very few people is generally not helpful by definition.

Lies! Think of niche categories or people trying to remember an image from only vaguely remembered details. "Oh, it was a canine on a couch. Oh, they have blue fur and a green tail." It's kind of frustrating to have Pixiv-level 'just go through 5000 images, and oh, many aren't using the exact tag you wanted but still relevant' syndrome.

Overtagging impedes all of that^^^ because normal users--the people we are serving--cannot read those tag lists and they do not use those tags. Overtagging is actually destructive. "Helping" so much with incredibly low value tags that you frustrate everyone and do more harm than good. Isn't it ironic how quantity of information is inversely proportional to usability? This post is a perfect example because I had to section it off to salvage its readability.

I hate this Google mentality. If it's not useful to at least 50% of our users, get rid of it.

As long as they're accurate, they're not "destructive", meh. No one makes you search them.

cloudpie said:
Dark_* and light_* tags are all useless and should be aliased away imo. Too ambiguous. If you guys agree, i'll make a BUR about it.

What about when you have a blue that's almost white? If you tag just blue, it's not entirely accurate. And light_blue is not a color for tagging purposes precisely because we don't need 500 variants of dark_blue, light_blue, dark_green, light_green, metallic_green, whatever Krylon paint colors, etc.

wolfmanfur said:
The more I read your arguments regarding colors, the more I feel like you just want to invalidate all color tags. Nevertheless, firstly, cyan is cyan. We wouldn't have to pin down whether 'cyan is more green or blue' if cyan was still allowed to be a tag of its own.

And forest green is forest green, sky blue is sky blue. "This color exists" doesn't work as a good argument to me for why a color should be tagged. Ambiguity between colors will exist regardless of whether cyan is allowed to be its own tag, but the more colors we have, the more ambiguity will arise between those additional colors, so there should to be a clear functional advantage for the searches people do to find things (not personal opinion that you can distinguish it when tagging and what you think people should search for given perfect knowledge of the image they're interested in finding).

alphamule said:
Lies! Think of niche categories or people trying to remember an image from only vaguely remembered details. "Oh, it was a canine on a couch. Oh, they have blue fur and a green tail." It's kind of frustrating to have Pixiv-level 'just go through 5000 images, and oh, many aren't using the exact tag you wanted but still relevant' syndrome.

It's not a question of if a detail could ever be useful to someone at some time. It's whether it's useful to enough people's searches to warrant tagging, given that there may be more general alternatives that, while maybe not as precise, can still effectively help narrow down the results given what a person is likely to recall about the image, and we don't need a 100 different tags for something when a more basic tag can suffice.

alphamule said:
As long as they're accurate, they're not "destructive", meh. No one makes you search them.

But they do make me (and many others) overlook when they have obvious errors, being more wary to correct errors since there's so many related tags and we don't want to get in trouble for accidentally removing one good one out of a dozen bad ones, leaving more posts with mistags and missing tags, which is "destructive" as it prevents people from being able to search them. It helps cause otherwise good and useful tags to become useless due to unchecked misuse, which is destructive. The more tags you try to find to stuff onto an image, the more likely you are to misuse some of them because their name superficially sound applicable when they're supposed to be more nuanced (e.g. penis_grab vs holding_penis, for a recent example I had to fix), or because you misinterpret the meaning of a tag (e.g. monotone_eyes should be for the whole eye, a prominent and interesting visual trait; interpreting it as just iris color is effectively just stepping around the invalidation of eyes, and actively harms the ability for people to search for monotone eyes), or because you end up tagging similar but mutually exclusive things (e.g. masturbation and after_masturbation for the same thing).

Quality of tagging (ensuring the tags a post has are correct and effective, capturing the nuances of the image that would interest people) is far better than quantity of tagging (having as many tags as possible describing every minor detail, using any tag that may vaguely be relevant while ignoring the nuances it's intended to carry that people may care about).

alphamule said:
What about when you have a blue that's almost white? If you tag just blue, it's not entirely accurate.

That's still blue. What if you have a red that's almost orange? A green that's almost yellow? No color is entirely accurate, nor can it ever be due to differences in peoples' perception, viewing environment, computer/phone displays, etc. You pick the color it's most likely to be perceived as (which aliases help with, as you can tag something more specific and the site will use a more practical tag). If you're wrong, people will fix it, which they're less likely to do under tag_panic conditions.

In any case, there is a different between light_<color>_<thing> and dark_<color>_<thing>, and the more general light_<thing> and dark_<thing> which are too vague and subjective. The latter two is what I'm more wanting to see aliased away due to uselessness since they often don't describe the thing itself, but the thing relative to what else is in the image; a character can be considered to have light_fur in one image, dark_fur in another, and neutral in another, when the fur itself is exactly the same. And on top of it being vague and subjective, it provides no information as to the color of the thing, either.

alphamule said:
And light_blue is not a color for tagging purposes precisely because we don't need 500 variants of dark_blue, light_blue, dark_green, light_green, metallic_green, whatever Krylon paint colors, etc.

This... exactly. We don't need a bunch of variants for things as we aren't aiming to be ultra precise. We just need a useful subset that maximizes utility for users' searching needs, given the understanding that too many options can be detrimental as it creates more ambiguity and differences in opinion for both taggers and users.

lordflawn said:
I know tags are important for searching for specific images, but how many is too many? Go look at how many tags are on post 3133511 for example, what the hell is going on there? Like a lot of those tags are only used once on that post. One of the tags is "two-tone mug".

Like is that just allowed?

In my opinion, it's entirely context dependent on what the post is, and what the tags are. Some seemingly "niche" tags are good, navel cutout, mole under eye, veiny breasts, or hoop ear ring may seem "too specific" to some people, but they can be very memorable parts of a character's appearance, and things someone might find appealing, and want to search for. Having a hundred, or even hundreds of tags on a single post can be completely valid if there are enough specific identifying features, poses, outfits, costume details, objects, species, characters or actions to prompt them, the more the better in that case.

However... there's definitely a threshold for what's notable enough to be worth tagging to me. The post you referenced is maybe the worst "tag stuffing" I've seen, every single small element of the post is described with adjectives that aren't necessarily important or even accurate — the mug in the upper right corner isn't "glistening" it just has normal lighting on it, none of the characters are particularly slim or skinny, they all seem muscular or athletic, why do we need so many colour tags for every tiny part of the scene? Why are there all of these tags for an anus when the only anus in the image is barely visible? Does there need to be a dozen tags describing individual muscles as big or every part of the character's body as "countershading"?

That post really doesn't need nearly 800 tags.

abadbird has a good philosophy, if you're uploading or tagging, you have to think about the layperson, the end user. Tagging isn't about adding as many adjectives to specific body parts, and specific variations of colour as you can to make sure your post shows up in every potential search, and most people aren't going to be looking for a glistening_apple or two-tone_mug. Watsit is also right, it's about quality over quantity, the more tags you stuff onto a post, when they're only barely relevant and merely variations on the same tags over and over, the less usable the tag becomes and the less helpful the tags on the post are. The more tags the better, as long as they're relevant and quality tags.

While I feel that lots of detailed tags can be fairly useful (especially if all you're trying to find a cropped image you found online somewhere), the mentioned post really shouldn't have tags on it that it's the only post in (yellow cheese for instance). And of course the tags don't matter if they are wrong. With how time consuming it is to find correct tags, I wonder if the tagger got ChatGPT to make all these tags?

There's a certain irony to a thread based around issues with overly lengthy tags having spawned many a lengthy post

Better invalidate the pink* tags, I guess. Sigh...

watsit said:
In any case, there is a different between light_<color>_<thing> and dark_<color>_<thing>, and the more general light_<thing> and dark_<thing> which are too vague and subjective. The latter two is what I'm more wanting to see aliased away due to uselessness since they often don't describe the thing itself, but the thing relative to what else is in the image; a character can be considered to have light_fur in one image, dark_fur in another, and neutral in another, when the fur itself is exactly the same. And on top of it being vague and subjective, it provides no information as to the color of the thing, either.

As I said earlier, I'd be fine with that only, and only if light_<color>_<thing> and dark_<color>_<thing> were both unaliased first.

lugia98075 said:
While I feel that lots of detailed tags can be fairly useful (especially if all you're trying to find a cropped image you found online somewhere), the mentioned post really shouldn't have tags on it that it's the only post in (yellow cheese for instance). And of course the tags don't matter if they are wrong. With how time consuming it is to find correct tags, I wonder if the tagger got ChatGPT to make all these tags?

I don't use any AI for tagging. I'm just a bit impractical a bit when it comes to adding tags with the mindset of [colour]_[thing], and sometimes I make genuine mistakes - for instance, sometimes I'll accidentally flip between considering an orangey-yellow an orange or a yellow and will occasionally tag both for a single use forgetting to keep it consistent, but I'll often wipe out the extra tags after. I usually try to be careful with my copying and pasting - working on the Lowest Common Denominator tags, and then adding various levels of more specific tags in cases where images feature same commonalities between a single character etc. or especially if they're a part of a series of images. yellow_cheese and silver_cutlery are pretty useless levels of specificity though and I'll recalibrate from here.