Talk:Soest

Too many images
See Image policy, in particular:

Try to avoid having more than 2 or at most 3 successive images without space between them.

I removed 5 images, because "Make sure no images extend below the end of an article" was also a problem, but having an unbroken stream of images one after the other is not Wikivoyage style. Can we please select no more than 7 or so that are particularly important or beautiful? Which ones should we keep on the page? Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:56, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Agreed. At Destination of the month candidates, ThunderingTyphoons mentioned Wms-soest as a major contributor to this article. Wms-Soest, what are your favorite of the images? --Comment by Selfie City  ( talk  |  contributions ) 22:29, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Wms-soest, we're all awaiting your participation in this thread. We may need to make our own choices, but we'd strongly prefer for you to make them, since you know Soest so well. Right now, I'd say there are easily 4 times too many images in the article. And what happens when there are so many images is that it's very difficult to have any sense of what it's important to look at. In a slide show, more may be more, but in a travel article, overwhelming the viewer with a whole bunch of little images is not necessarily the best way of presenting any of them. Moreover, it's simply not Wikivoyage style. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:46, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I just rollbacked your latest edits, in the hope that you will see a notification that draws your attention to this page.
 * The obvious photos to go would be the majority of those which are elongated landscape format, which if enlarged wouldn't work especially well with the layout of our articles. I'm not a big fan of most of the night shots, either. It's worth bearing in mind that if the text content of the articles continues to grow, as I hope it will, there will be room for more photos.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 18:13, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I agree about the elongated landscape format photos. Those are too small, and like you said, we don't want to enlarge them so that they take up lots of space that's not on the right. Tiny, poor-quality photos like File:Osthofentor quadratisch.jpg should also be removed - I'll remove that one now. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:57, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I just deleted a bunch of thumbnails. There are lots of tiny, poor-quality pictures on the article. We need a smaller number of bigger, high-quality images of things that are interesting to look at, and preferably well-composed and well-framed. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:14, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * One remaining issue is, what are we looking at in this photo? It was previously misidentified in a caption as a moat, but no water is visible. What is the building we see part of? All I can say is OK, it's a springtime view, but what of? Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:18, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't know what it is, but just to say that the lack of water doesn't mean that it isn't a moat; there are plenty of dried-up moats around castles (particularly ruins) in Europe.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 07:43, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh. But if there's no water, is it a moat or a former moat? Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:57, 18 November 2019 (UTC)


 * He's just resting.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 08:22, 18 November 2019 (UTC)


 * I chuckled at that. :-) Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:59, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

WMS: Sorry, I didn't see the discussion. I understand and will add better, bigger and less photos. —The preceding comment was added by 185.41.56.25 (talk • contribs)


 * Thanks. And thanks for all the work you have put and are putting into this article! (Small request: Please sign posts on talk pages by typing 4 tildes [~] in a row at the end of each post.) Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:39, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

wms-soest: I changed the artikel: I reduced the pictures, deleted the landscape pictures and replaced them by full pictures. I can't understand the hope that the article will grow: all categories are filled in, all landmarks are described, all hotels, all city festivals are mentioned. We are a small city of about 50.000 inhabitants - even if we have an impor history.185.41.56.25 09:13, 19 November 2019 185.41.56.25 09:15, 19 November 2019 (UTC) Prof. Dr. Monika Dobberstein]


 * I just re-deleted three thumbnails I had previously deleted - why is an edit war taking place? I gave reasons for deleting them. One is a very poor-quality photo; another is one that shows cannon-fire, but the viewer really can't see much, and the third was just two ferris wheels, whereas there's a better picture of that festival, and only one is needed. User:Wms-soest, please don't reinsert the thumbnails I've deleted without a discussion here in which you explain why you want to re-add them and wait to see if you can convince a consensus to support you. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:23, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Arguing about these images is pointless as long as their copyright status is unclear and they may be deleted from Commons soon. The uploader seems not to be identic with the creator of the photographs and they all lack permission. Wms-soest seems to be an institutional account of Wirtschaft & Marketing Soest GmbH, the city marketing firm of Soest. The photos have been created by Gero Sliwa, a staff member of the municipality. He may or may not have granted the rights of use to WMS. Apart from that: While the colourful night images may be atmospheric, they are not representative, as the "Winterstrahlen" illumination festival and the All Hallows' kermess are only for a few days per year and outside these periods, the town looks different. --RJFF (talk) 10:09, 19 November 2019 (UTC)


 * You know what we should do, though? We should input thumbnails from Commons Category:Quality images of Soest. At least one of the thumbnails currently in the article, if not deleted from Commons, might be good enough to be judged to be a Quality Image if Gero Sliwa joined Commons, but many are too small to even be considered. Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:23, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Hello Ikan, you are right, Gero Sliwa is an employee of the City of Soest and we are the City Marketing of Soest, a 100 % daughter of City of Soest. So what can I do that you accept the pictures?

I suppose you mean the picture "Osthofentor" when you talk about a picture of bad quality, but it has 280 px and I can't see that the quality is bad.

And I can understand your opion that you can't see anything at the Feud-picture. I described the Feud as Soest as follows "around 900 fans of the Middle Ages from 12 different nations - dressed in authentic medieval clothing and amour - will come to Soest for the occasion and camp for three days in the now drained moat at the foot of the city wall. When the battle for the city is reenacted, they will storm the city wall using authentic medieval weapons and cannons" and this is exactly what you see on the picture: a person in authentic clothing and amour, staying on the wall and fireing on people in the moat. But I can ad a picture with more people.

I will replace the picture of Patroklidom and search for a picture at daytime. Instead I will ad a picture of "Winterstrahlen" to the cathegory "Do". Wms-soest (talk) 15:51, 19 November 2019 (UTC)Prof. Dr. Monika Dobberstein


 * The aim of images in an article is to illustrate a place well. Photos that have been given the Quality Image designation on Wikimedia Commons had to be judged to be of good quality in order to pass at Quality images candidates. There is no reason for Wikivoyage (not me, this isn't between you and me but about what's best for the article) to "accept" photos that are tiny, unsharp, noisy, oversaturated, poorly-framed or not very clear when viewed as thumbnails if there are other photos, freely available on Commons, that are relatively large, sharp, unnoisy, have good white balance, and are well-framed and clear when viewed as thumbnails.


 * Moreover, if these images may be deleted from Commons, anyway, it makes even less sense to include them in the article. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:44, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Why did you delete the picture of Museum Wilhelm Morgner (a picture which is sharp, quiet an big enough for a thumbnail), Alls Saints Fair (a fair with 1 Mio. guests in 4 day in a City of 50.000 inhabitants, Soest is very famous for that event) and why did you ad a very ugly picture of townhall which is not a very special building? Wms-soest (talk) 12:43, 20 November 2019 (UTC)M.Dobberstein
 * Please read Image policy, and WV:Tone, and let your point of view be known in these policy articles' talk pages if you disagree with Wikivoyage policy. Thanks for adding content of quality to this article. Ibaman (talk) 12:58, 20 November 2019 (UTC)
 * The Alls Saints Fair is shown in the banner photo, so there is less value in having a similar image. I do think that the townhall phooto could be replaced. AlasdairW (talk) 15:09, 20 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry Ms. Dobberstein, those are quite legitimate questions. In addition to what Alisdair says, while the fair is undoubtedly a major event, I didn't think the picture of the fair really looked much different from pictures of other fairs in other cities, except for the surrounding buildings, which are already covered in at least one other picture. But the bigger issue is one that's been mentioned above: If the copyright status of these photos is unclear and they might be deleted from Commons, wouldn't it make sense to favor others until that question is resolved? That said, if you don't like the photo of the Rathaus, no problem to replace it with any other photo that you like better, but I'd prefer to use more photos with the Quality Image designation on Commons, at least until the copyright of the photos you're using is completely clear. Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:03, 20 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, about the museum: I thought its exterior wasn't that special a thing to look at. It's ok to disagree about that, but right now, there are still a bunch of photos bunched together, and Wikivoyage style is to distribute a smaller number of images more evenly around the article. Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:11, 20 November 2019 (UTC)
 * The other thing I want to say is a reminder to everyone: We all should keep this side issue of which and how many images are in the article in perspective and remember to thank Ms. Dobberstein and anyone else using the Wms-soest account for adding so much content to this article. Had they not done so, we wouldn't be talking about this article because there would be nothing to talk about! So once again, thank you for helping to improve this site! Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:18, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

Hello Mr. Kekek, as you know Mr. Sliwa who took the fotos is a staff member of Citygovernment of Soest, we are the City Marketing of Soest, a 100 % daughter of the Citygovernment. Of course we do have all rights of the pictures. Please look at our homepage www.wms-soest.de, the offical tourist website of Soest. There we also use all the pictures of Mr. Sliwa what, of course, wouldn't be possible when we don't have the rights to do so. So please allow me to use these beautiful pictures of Soest. When I am going on holiday I let me inspire by beautiful pictures and not of documentary pictures of landmarks and of course certainly not of discriptions of townhalls and churches. Therefore I think it is so important to show people how beautiful our city is. And I followed you in so many advices and changed almost all pictures.

The picture of All Saints fair: about the all saints fair you said: while the fair is undoubtedly a major event, I didn't think the picture of the fair really looked much different from pictures of other fairs in other cities, except for the surrounding buildings. But this realy make the difference, the city is so small and the big carousels fly only a few cm along the half-timbered houses!

One more point: I set links to some virtual tours in our churches (St. Maria zur Wiese, St. Maria zur Höhe, Petrikirche) and museums (Museum Wilhelm Morgner, Gründsandsteinmuseum, Burghofmuseum). I hope the tourists will enjoy that.Wms-soest (talk) 21:15, 23 November 2019 (UTC)Prof. Dr. Monika Dobberstein


 * Ikan Kekek isn't my personal name, just a screen name. Of course if it were up to me that personally, I would just take your word for it and approve keeping the photos on Commons, but that's not how it works. Commons requires particular procedures to be followed. It's a different site, and you all have to deal with them.


 * About virtual tours: they're not about travel, but rather, something to do at home. Therefore, Wikivoyage doesn't allow links to them. See External links.


 * I take your point about the fair. It's not a problem to have a good picture of it, but as I've mentioned, having several photos in a row and then a section with none is not Wikivoyage style, and last I looked, there were still too many photos in a row in a couple of places. It's fine that you'd prefer for articles to be copiously illustrated, but if you want Wikivoyage to host an article with an unbroken chain of pictures on the right side that goes up to and past the end of the text, you need to make an argument at Wikivoyage talk:Image policy. Please understand this. Every travel guide has its own style and feel, and this is not Eyewitness Guides. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:26, 23 November 2019 (UTC)


 * Images uploaded to Wikimedia Commons must be released under a "Creative Commons" licence, meaning that everyone is free to use them for any commercial or non-commercial purpose. This is different from Mr Sliwa permitting your company to use the pictures on your website. If Mr Sliwa agrees with releasing his photos under a free licence to everyone, please ask him to write an e-mail to permissions-commons@wikimedia.org, he may use this text module, where he only has to enter his name and description of the files.
 * I agree that a travel guide should whet travellers' appetite for a certain destination and therefore use images that focus on the attractive and worthwhile aspects of that place rather than bland or undistinguished ones. But presenting mostly pictures from an illumination festival that only lasts 10 days of the year, is somewhat misleading. Visitors who arrive on the other 355 days of the year may be disappointed because they will not find the town illuminated like this. And I think that, e.g., the architecture of St Patrokli cathedral is impressive enough, even at daylight without illumination. --RJFF (talk) 09:22, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page is missing permission
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page is missing permission information and may be deleted: You can see the details at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 02:06, 21 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Osthofentor Sonne.jpg


 * User:Wms-soest, please take note of this. If this isn't taken care of on Commons according to the procedures required there, all the discussions about the photos you've put thumbnails of on this page will have been pointless. Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:10, 21 November 2019 (UTC)


 * The instruction on how to provide a proper permission for the files can be found here. --RJFF (talk) 08:54, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

Town or city?
The German word Stadt translates to "town" or "city". Intuitively, I would only use "city" for places with more than 100,000 inhabitants, which Soest is not. However, I am aware that in Britain, "city" is also applied to places of a certain historic importance, even if they are quite small. Should Soest therefore be called a "city"?

Even though German is my native language, too, and I probably make similar linguistic mistakes, the description texts strike me as clumsy word-by-word translations from German. The article would certainly benefit from some copy-editing by a native English speaker. --RJFF (talk) 11:39, 21 November 2019 (UTC)


 * In the U.S., a place with about 50,000 inhabitants would be considered a city with no controversy, though "town" could also be used loosely and there are states or counties where "city", "town", "village" and even "hamlet" are purely governmental designations (this is true, for example, on Long Island, New York), regardless of the population (and we don't care much about such official designations on Wikivoyage when they have a negligible effect on travelers). I don't really see the issue in that regard. I agree about the descriptions, though. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:00, 21 November 2019 (UTC)


 * The answer is right here: "The German word Stadt translates to "town" or "city"." - town and city are more or less interchangeable here, so we shouldn't worry about picking one. It is correct to use either, or indeed both.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 19:59, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item is missing permission
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item is missing permission information and may be deleted: You can see the details at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 05:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Soest Germany Banner.jpg
 * It looks likely that this file will be deleted, so I have changed the banner back to the old one. AlasdairW (talk) 12:30, 9 February 2020 (UTC)