alias alternate_persona -> fictional_persona

Posted under Tags

BUR #6399 has been approved by @nonamethanks.

create alias alternate_persona -> fictional_persona

I think we don't need any of these tags, because someone can just search for original + their copyright of preference, but I'll take the milder route of merging them for now.

The wiki descriptions are a bunch of buzzwords and the two concepts are indistinguishable for our purpose.

Previously mentioned in topic #18440.

alternate persona also has the issue that it can be mistaken for "this character from X anime is behaving out of character".

Updated by nonamethanks

Those two look like complete messes, I don't even know what to use them for. Alternate persona gets slapped on alternate "personas" of a canon character too, as you mentioned.

Personally, I'd rather if alternate persona is nuked (the name is confusing), and then fictional persona renamed to original player character and has its "scope" reduced. All the other non "player character" examples can be removed and just be tagged original. IMHO the current fictional persona tag tries to do too many things at once.

The Shindan Maker examples can just be tagged Shindan Maker and original.

If we need a convenient umbrella tag to make it easier for people to find artist OCs with a single tag search (instead of needing to rely on repeated original + copyright searches), then maybe an umbrella artist OC/fan original character tag then. This mirrors the うちの子 (lit. "my kid") tag on Japanese websites, and also corresponds to the borrowed character/よその子 tag.

BUR #6402 has been rejected.

mass update alternate_persona -> original
mass update fictional_persona -> original

Well, this for me is the alternative. I'm submitting it separately to put it up to a vote.

If alternate persona goes then fictional persona needs to go too, they're basically the same tag.

I don't think an "original player character" tag would be useful. It's too broad, and as mentioned there's already a way to search for those: final_fantasy_xiv original for example.

It's impossible for us to tell whether a character is a "player character" or just a random OC.

I think the first bur doesn't work, especially since some of the alternate persona are canon, and some are alternate persona of OCs. Would an alternate persona of an OC be considered "fictional" if it's made by the same artist?

For the second BUR, how would most of the characters listed in List of Touhou fanwork tags end up tagged as?
(I wanted to make other examples, but Touhou is the only copyright with a lot of fictional personas that comes to mind at the moment)

Username_Hidden said:

I think the first bur doesn't work, especially since some of the alternate persona are canon, and some are alternate persona of OCs. Would an alternate persona of an OC be considered "fictional" if it's made by the same artist?

Alternate persona aren't intended for in-universe "alternate personalities/selves/etc.", despite the name.

Username_Hidden said:

For the second BUR, how would most of the characters listed in List of Touhou fanwork tags end up tagged as?
(I wanted to make other examples, but Touhou is the only copyright with a lot of fictional personas that comes to mind at the moment)

Any fanwork that is notable enough to get their own copyright tag shouldn't get original. Unless it's a separate OC by another artist set in that fanwork.

NNescio said:

Alternate persona aren't intended for in-universe "alternate personalities/selves/etc.", despite the name.

My bad, then +1 to the alias.

Any fanwork that is notable enough to get their own copyright tag shouldn't get original. Unless it's a separate OC by another artist set in that fanwork.

On the first point, this means that some characters that are notable enough to have a copyright tag will get tagged as original with the second bur.
On the second point, where would m.u.g.e.n characters fit in? They're made for MUGEN but aren't part of the base game.
Plus the line can get very blurry on who is part of what fanwork, or if someone is even part of a fanwork (eg. buronko).

Ultimately, i think the alias should go the other way around, to cover characters that are alternate personas of alternate personas of official content.

Username_Hidden said:

My bad, then +1 to the alias.

On the first point, this means that some characters that are notable enough to have a copyright tag will get tagged as original with the second bur.

Those probably should be gardened out later. Can be BUR

Username_Hidden said:

On the second point, where would m.u.g.e.n characters fit in? They're made for MUGEN but aren't part of the base game.

Tag M.U.G.E.N, Touhou and Original, I suppose.

For OCs that appear in an 'intersection' of two copyrights, tagging those two copyrights help tell users which copyrights are involved for the character, and the additional Original on top tells one that it is an OC.

Though I suppose one can argue that M.U.G.E.N is a bit of a special case because most of the characters are OCs, so maybe perhaps Original isn't necessary for original M.U.G.E.N fighters. Or, in other words, one can consider them to be part of the M.U.G.E.N copyright (since it's effectively an open-source collaborative work).

Username_Hidden said:

Plus the line can get very blurry on who is part of what fanwork, or if someone is even part of a fanwork (eg. buronko).

Buronko should get Touhou and The Iron of Yin and Yang (two copyrights involved), plus Original on top (she's an OC).

Username_Hidden said:

Ultimately, i think the alias should go the other way around, to cover characters that are alternate personas of alternate personas of official content.

fictional_persona -> alternate_persona, you mean?

Well, one of the issues with alternate persona is that the name is misleading, causing people to mistag alternate personalities/selves of a character with it.

Updated by NNescio

As I had discussed in the previously mentioned topic, fictional persona is, in effect, a failure of a tag because it was born out of an unnecessary need to distinguish fictional self-inserts from reality-representing self-inserts, something which basically everyone ignored, until it got appropriated for MMO purposes and altered to fit its new purpose.

For all intents and purposes, I personally agree with just nuking both, rather than aliasing one to the other, because it returns it to the status quo where its use was ambiguous and purpose even less clear than it is now.

For fictional persona, having an overarching tag for original player characters seems like something people would not search for (notwithstanding whether there is a Pixiv tag for 'em). Rather than nuking outright, I'd propose an alternate solution I had made in topic #18615 in the context of those MMO race tags:

The only viable alternative, in my eyes, is creating player_* (or player_character_*, but the former has precedent; alternatively, avatar_* also has precedent) tags for each relevant MMO and turning the race tags into gen tags. That way, you can pair that tag with either a race tag or a class tag in order to narrow down your search (this would also help with some of the complaints I've heard about Monster Hunter tagging and its current method of character tagging).

That still wouldn't change the fact that many race tags are, even with tag gardening, going to be tagged with meta knowledge, canon tagging (same with class tags).

Having such chartags would effectively fill out the gap fictional persona would have and would unambiguously reveal what that character's status is, without necessitating someone to check the gentags, especially given how the distinction between "player character"/random OC is a bit arbitrary, because artists would likely touch up their player character in art to make them more representative of what they truly want said character to look like. Once said chartags are made and fictional persona gardened, it can be safely nuked.

On alternate persona, I do still think there's a use for a tag with its concept, as I said in the last topic;

...we don't have general tags that collect together things such as fursonas[, OCs by folks who don't draw themselves,] and the like that would go under a tag with that definition, and you can't put it under artist self-insert because the art could also be commissioned, thus theoretically belonging to borrowed character despite that being for artists drawing another artist's character.

I think there's a place for such a tag on Danbooru, though what sort of name it would have is another question entirely (maybe just invoke the fannish term sona by itself, but that isn't broad enough a term for our use).

The fact that we're for some reason discussing IP-derivative not-player OCs in the context of either tag, when to my knowledge neither tag was ever used for such characters due to being obscure and useless tags, goes to show their failings just as my examples in the last topic had.

Updated by Damian0358

Damian0358 said:

On alternate persona, I do still think there's a use for a tag with its concept, as I said in the last topic;

...we don't have general tags that collect together things such as fursonas[, OCs by folks who don't draw themselves,] and the like that would go under a tag with that definition, and you can't put it under artist self-insert because the art could also be commissioned, thus theoretically belonging to borrowed character despite that being for artists drawing another artist's character.

I think there's a place for such a tag on Danbooru, though what sort of name it would have is another question entirely (maybe just invoke the fannish term sona by itself, but that isn't broad enough a term for our use).

The fact that we're for some reason discussing IP-derivative not-player OCs in the context of either tag, when to my knowledge neither tag was ever used for such characters due to being obscure and useless tags, goes to show their failings just as my examples in the last topic had.

I'm partial towards fictional avatar myself. With definition "A fictional representation of a real-life person, usually used as a personal extension of said person in the literary or digital realm". People talk about "fictional avatars" all the time when critiquing fiction, both in "laymen"/fan discussion of fiction, journalist reporting and even academic papers. And you'll often see the word "avatar" thrown around when discussing the term "OC", "original character", "self-insert" and "Mary Sue"/"Gary Stu", but almost never "persona"/"-sona" unless it's a furry/fanfic-centric community.

Meanwhile "persona" and "sona" requires knowledge of the furry community (and some fanfic communities that borrow said terms), and knowing that it is being used in said context. Otherwise "*_persona" just invites endless confusion thinking it refers to a character's personality or alternate self (and sona makes people go "huh?" and think it's a mislabeled chartag). "Fictional persona" for one is often used in the context of a fictitious user that is the target of a marketing campaign or UI design proposal. And that is the main results one will get if you search for "fictional persona" online.

Whereas if you type "fictional avatar" you'll get a lot of pertinent discussions straightaway at the top of the results list. (Most of the noise being "fictional Avatar..." talking about the Airbender series or the Avatar film.)

Updated by NNescio

nonamethanks said:

Went ahead with the merge because now it's become routine for alternate persona to be mistaken for dark persona, and there's no real usefulness in distinguishing between "fictional" personas and "alternate", still fictional, personas.

And now the tag itself has become ambiguous and useless once more, returning to its previous state. They should've just been nuked.

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