Perhaps we could disable images in the BA and SQ forums then.

I am hipotetically speaking, don't even know if that feature exists, I just think it would be cool

Besides,if such a thing could be developed,a feature to turn it off should be also created

Firmly agree with NickB and AJLondon, above. Less is definitely more. FT has perfected the balance IMHO. I would prefer that the content is presented without the distraction of avators and garish emoticons.

Yes - need to have a way to turn off. I see similies/avatars similar to the annoying ads (before FT premium became an option) - horrible.

Sometimes logging into FT from very slow connections (from memory the connection in Lahore, for example, was glacial), so anything that slows it down is not good.

My thoughts exactly.

I don't think anyone is in favor of garish, animated emoticons, but I could be wrong. Like I said, I am perfectly happy with the emoticons we have, but am also open to other people's ideas.

Would it bother you, alanw, if there were a permanent country flag that you could pick out yourself, permanently attached to your profile?

How about personal head shot photos attached to your profile?

Obviously, whether it be an avatars or images attached to profiles, participation would be optional, and it would be optimal to have an on/off switch for any feature.

I'm happy to look at smilies.

I'd be extremely wary of avatars. I don't think people will refuse to use FT because of not being able to upload avatars but I think we might lose members if the interface starts becoming visually disruptive. Personally, if I find a site which is too visually annoying, I'll spend less time on it and I don't believe I'd be alone in that view, but am listening to views. I'm also very concerned at the opportunity for misuse as well.

For those of you who want to see horribly annoying signature lines, just go to www.disboards.com. Keep in mind that these signatures now comply with rules instituted just recently. In the past, a person could make their signature take up an entire screen if they wanted to. Now it's down to a quarter, and they have jumping smilies, countdown clocks and various other animations that are nothing more than distractions.

I would like to see a few more smilies, and one less - the sarcastic smilie [] for no other reason that it's interpretation is variable.

As for avatars, no thanks. I can only imagine the photoshopped images that would end up there. The mods don't need to police avatars too, and I suspect they would have to.

If it had an on/off switch, jenbel, where do you see the visual problem?

How do you feel about the option of adding a country flag or a head shot photo to one's profile?

If the guidelines for peronal head shot photo avatars were clearly written and automatic suspensions were given for any violations, do you really think that there would be much abuse?

Agreed. As a community we have already failed to deal with much less intrusive UBB features. I can only imagine what kind of loaded gun enabling Avatars would provide.

Some members still don't understand they don't need to see signatures... I think ensuring that all members know they could turn off such things is an impossible task.

I have the normal British person's usual aversion to flag waving. It's not something we like to do that much

And what's an automatic suspension? There is no way to automatically suspend someone - it needs a mod or an admin to go in and do it. And how long would you consider appropriate for an avatar infraction? What if the infraction was minor (we'd specified head shot, and they included head and upper torso for example?)?

I'm fine with a country flag. I'm also OK with an avatar...anything that ads a more memorable characteristic to a (sometimes not very descriptive) name is a good thing. People can always turn the nonsense off from day one if it's really that offensive to them.

With respect to load times, I can assure you that smileys don't significantly impact the experience. On FT, all the <img> tags that refer to smileys use the propert alt attribute as well, so all modern browsers render the page fully before loading the smiley images. The same would hold true with regular images and avatars in posts...a placeholder appears as soon as the text is loaded, and the browser will then and only then retrieve the images while the user is free to go about their browsing experience unmolested and undelayed (note this is dependent upon correct implementation of the image tag, which I have no doubt IB is capable of).

See? The problem has already been solved.


Edited to add: People, you do understand that your avatar can only be put there by you, right? It's not like someone else can go uploading photoshopped images to your profile or something. And again, speaking as a moderator on both this board and others were avatars are allowed, I see no risk.

I think it's a bit disingenuous to suggest that FT is somehow unable to make people understand they can turn that feature off if they want.

Nevermind, the more I read, the more I realize we are just asking for trouble

We are like monkeys, give us a new tool, and we are going to find a way to mess it up

Remember reputation

IIRC, birdstrike , the abuse of the reputation feature only occurred when the abusers thought they were getting away with it in secret. Once the names were turned on, I thought the abuse stopped. Is that not correct?

Has there been extensive abuse of the ability to post photos in Trip Reports? If so, I haven't heard about it. Actually I do have a good amount of faith in my fellow human beings and their ability to conduct themselves in a civilized manner.

I would suspect, and sincerely hope, Jenbel, that folks would exercise good judgment, both in selecting photos to post (whether it be as an avatar or within one's personal profile), and in evaluating the appropriateness of the posted photos. If only head shots were specified in the guidlines and a member posted an otherwise perfect acceptable photo that also included shoulders, I would sincerely hope that they would be asked to crop it. If their reply was that they didn't know how, I would sincerely hope that somehow we could manage to do that for them.

It is all about good communication exercised in the spirit of good will. Given that premise, anything can work.

If that were true, the feature would still exist.

It didn't add anything to Flyertalk.

Not that I have heard of, but then the moderators are so efficient that I rarely get to read the juicy discussion comments before they are disappeared.

Given that premise, no posts would be removed and no one would ever be suspended or banned.

I have a tasteful avatar that I use on other Fora. It is not a "head shot" and I would not post a "head shot" if such a restriction was placed on the feature.

We already have a FlyerTalk Photo Gallery. Members can place images there and link to them in their .sig if they really want to do that.