Commons:Village pump/Proposals/Archive/2025/05

Media of the day

Hello, regarding the 'Media of the day' section on the main page, to maintain consistent quality, I suggest that all media featured there—such as the image of the day—should be sourced from the featured media list. While there may be a limited number (278) of medias (especially if we aim to display one per day), this approach could encourage more users to contribute high-quality content and to suggest it to be featured media. Regards. Riad Salih (talk) 15:30, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

Disagree, there's far too few of these files. Instead, more people can readily contribute to the featured media pages such as adding or replacing files there. Prototyperspective (talk) 15:43, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

Exactly, that's the issue. There are too few featured media, even though many existing files have the potential to qualify. Just like featured articles and featured images, featured media should showcase the highest quality content. That would be the most logical and consistent approach in my opinion. Riad Salih (talk) 15:51, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

It won't change, no need to drag other parts of the site down with it.
Improve it independently albeit it's somewhat a time-sink with not much tangible benefit. Instead of using featured media for media, people also can use MOTD via the category. Except for a few exceptions which are partly in a subcat, motd files also are highest quality content. It's not feasible and again, if some part of the site is suboptimal or not active enough, there is no need to have it drastically affect other functionalities. Prototyperspective (talk) 15:55, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

If it's no longer active and provides no tangible benefit, we close it, archive the page, and move on. Riad Salih (talk) 17:36, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

 Oppose; as Prototyperspective said, there simply isn't enough featured media to make this feasible. But it is worth discussing whether MotD is even sustainable. As it stands, it seems like the majority of the media displayed on the front page is videos imported from YouTube; this doesn't feel like a good demonstration of what Commons has to offer. Omphalographer (talk) 19:30, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

It doesn't matter that much where the file was originally uploaded. It doesn't even interest most users nor is it any problem. Lots of videos are also from elsewhere such as from studies or uploaded by users but YouTube is the most widely-used easiest way people upload their videos so it's likely that's where many of the better-quality files are from. I don't know why it feels that way for you but what matters is the file itself, not where it was first uploaded and given the low view-counts and low activity and low feedback on Commons and lack of search indexing of videos on Commons in Google & DuckDuckGo's Videos tab, it's more than understandable that people upload to YT first/only. Prototyperspective (talk) 21:11, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

Also, until recent improvements in Video2Commons, it was a lot easier even for our own users to upload to YouTube or Vimeo and from there to Commons, rather than directly from their own machine to Commons. - Jmabel ! talk 22:31, 12 May 2025 (UTC)

I completely agree. Video2Commons is quite outdated, and I hope the developers can update it from time to time. Riad Salih (talk) 23:42, 12 May 2025 (UTC)

Upload permission

When a file is marked for new file upload, it should be automatically unmarked after the person uploads, either by a bot that deletes old upload templates, or by the system itself once a certain amount of time passes. This is so that not every single autoconfirmed person can upload their own file. Anohthterwikipedian (talk) 07:43, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Add PD-algorithm

For whatever reason, while the Upload Wizard has a default tag for {{PD-algorithm}}, the regular upload page doesn’t. When added, it should have the tag Generated with AI. Anohthterwikipedian (talk) 08:23, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Separate categories for humans and people

There has been objections to put people categories under animal categories for various reasons. On the other hand, the main reason given to support putting people categories under animal categories is that humans are animals. So, to better facilitate on how things are categorized, I have proposed to have separate categories for humans and people. Here, the human categories will cover certain aspects of humans as animals (like human activities, human fossils, etc.), while the people categories will focus on the individuals in more social aspects (like people of certain gender, occupation, state/territory/region, religion, ethnicity, etc. and also people in art like paintings and sculptures). Here's the list format of my proposal for the topic X:

• Nature of X
  • Animals of X
    • different taxonomic ranks of X
      • Humans of X
        • Human activities in X
        • Human fossils in X
• People of X
  • People of X by ethnicity
  • People of X by gender
  • People of X by occupation
  • People of X by religion
  • People of X by state/territory/region

So, that gives more flexibility regarding when to consider humans as animals or people. And it impedes the necessity of explicit categories like Category:Non-human animals. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 18:35, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

• this example is just silly, bordering on a "strawman" agruement. why on earth would we need to make a category like that? HUMANS/homo sapiens are a sub-cat (several layers down) of the biological kingdom of "animalia". ANYONE who understands basic taxonomy would know that. ergo, it is AUTOMATICALLY UNDERSTOOD that animals not categorised as homo sapiens are "non-human". it is like suggesting that we would need a category for "things that ARE NOT red" (which we could create & populate, but it is not exactly necessary :P). Lx 121 (talk) 22:10, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

Any ideas about this? Or I can go ahead to implement it, although I will use Homo sapiens instead of "humans" when referring to humans as animals, as using "humans" can be confusing to end users. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 06:56, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

• no end user who is at least moderately fluent in standard english would be confused by the use of "human" as equivalent to "homo sapiens"; if anything, "homo sapiens" would be the term requiring a higher level of education to recognise (as well as being longer). Lx 121 (talk) 22:22, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

I would appreciate if you hold off. I don't see any reason to think that this being ignored here means people think it's a good idea. I'm not necessarily saying it is a bad idea, but it's presumably a large change, and should have some sort of consensus behind it. - Jmabel ! talk 19:16, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

Maybe it would be a good change but could you maybe describe what the implied / subsequent / required changes would be? I can't see that. Prototyperspective (talk) 20:06, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

@Prototyperspective: My proposal is something like this:

• Homo sapiens: Humans in biological/paleontological contexts, like human body, human life, human fossils, and also the pre-civilization history of humans.
• People: Individual humans, categorized by name, gender, ethnicity, religion, occupation, state/territory/region/country, etc. Depictions of individuals in art also belong to this category, and also generic humans.

The changes require include:

• Create "Homo sapiens in X" for each "People of X".
• Categorize "Homo sapiens in X" taxonomically (or under "Animals of X"), but put "People of X" directly under "X".
• Categorize "Human life in X", "Human body in X" and others under "Homo sapiens in X", and "Female people of X", "Scientists from X" and others under "People of X" (or appropriate subcats).

Let me know if more clarity is needed. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 05:33, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

•  Oppose as confusing.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 22:32, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

  So the main difference is that one (homo sapiens) deals with people as a species while the other (people) desls with individual people or groups of people. Is that correct? Laurel Lodged (talk) 07:15, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

•  Weak support - I can see the ontological reasoning behind this proposal... but we need to narrow this down. The 3G-Reservoir was created by "human activities", but I don't think an anthropogenic landscape change should be categorized under "Animals of China". BUT, if we use this additional tree to categorize pre-historic human activities (fossils; life reconstructions of Denisovans/Neandertals; maybe even paleo-to-neo-lithical cultures) and refrain from looping into modern-times humans, then this has merit. It makes no sense to have a loop/hierarchy from Category:Nature of California via the "Homo Sapiens" categories to Category:Actors from Hollywood, Los Angeles.
  If there is no media about prehistoric homo sapiens activity from Stratford, we don't include a category tree about genus homo, and certainly don't include Shakespeare categories. And we also do not make categories like Category:Human activities in Vernawahlshausen for single files like this. Would this be agreeable? --Enyavar (talk) 11:46, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

 Oppose we need less confusing categories, not more. Are we going to divide cats from domestic felines next? Dronebogus (talk) 21:58, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

• HUMAN is species-specific, PERSON/PEOPLE is socio-cultural (for want of a better blanket term?). i.e.:

all "humans" are "people" (debatably at least xD)

BUT

not all "people" are "humans".

- in fiction, culture, religion, under law, & other socio-cultural concepts, & we might not get non-fiction extraterrestrial sentient beings anytime soon (although the betting odds on finding alien lifeforms of some kind are getting closer), BUT the questions of AI sentience & personhood are upon us now, & in the next 10 years it's going to get way more complicated.

in principle, ALL media files depicting or about humans should be filed under some meta-category of "human". (& nominally we could have "human" as a subcategory of "people"; as in "human-persons" vs "non-human persons?)

how we treat "personhood" is trickier. until now the loose/rough default has been to use "person" categories mostly for identified individuals (people by name, notable or otherwise).

i am flexible on whether we want to use a "double entry" -type system where files get both "human" & "people" categorisations. OR we could try to hammer out a "hybrid" categorisation terminology for "human people/persons" VS "non-human people/persons".

BUT for clarity, specificity, & plain old disambiguation, we need to be labeling human-related materials as "human.

& HERE is what wikipedia/en & wikidata have to say on the subject:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person

&

https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5 - human

https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q215627 - person

(& you will note that BOTH projects very clearly DIFFERENTIATE between the 2 terms.

Lx 121 (talk) 21:46, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

• i have no strong opinion on whether to use "human" or "homo sapiens" in the category names. "human" seems more compact & efficient; but whatever practical "standard practice" we use with other species nomenclature is fine with me.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION - this matter has been a "pet project" of the user Sbb1413 for some time, & across multiple discussions.

in particular this user created & then "CLOSED" (in favour of their proposal, which they went on to apply) this discussion:

Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/08/Category:Male humans - created by the user

[[1]] - CLOSED by the same user, who then went on to apply the proposed changes.

it seems to me at least somewhat improper for the same user to start a discussion, then close it themselves, declare victory, & apply the changes they wanted. especially with only limited conversation & no clear consensus supporting the proposed (wide-ranging) changes.

it is also worth pointing out that, based on the evidence, user Sbb1413 seems to have somewhat limited fluency in the english language? i am not trying to be mean in saying this, but it seems a fairly obvious point based on their own written comments. Lx 121 (talk) 22:02, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

& just to be clear  Oppose this proposal in its present form. "human" could debatably be treated as a sub-cat of "persons/people", or we COULD implement a "double entry" system where we put files into both categories, OR we could hammer out some hybrid terminology like "human-persons" vs "non-human persons". BUT "SPLITTING" human-related media files between "human" & "people/person" is just dumb, confusing, & thankless wasted effort/a hell of a lot on unnecessary work. Lx 121 (talk) 22:18, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

"Culture of", "Society of" and similar categories

Abstract categories like "Culture of X", "Nature of X", "Politics of X" and "Society of X" are now widespread (where X is a country, region, or a city). But the problem is that such categories often get messy without following a consistent definition across a given topic. So, my proposal is to define the categories as follows:

• Nature of X – non-human aspects of X, like environment, landforms, organisms etc.
• Society of X – human aspects of X.
  • Culture of X – topics of X related to arts, beliefs, cuisine, customs, festivals, philosophy, religion, science, technology, traditions etc.
  • Politics of X – topics of X related to government, elections, royalty etc.

Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 08:23, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

Nature of X – non-human aspects of X, like environment, landforms, organisms etc. — where to put human-made parks or similar aspects of landscape architecture in this case? Where to put photos of flowereds that are maintained by a city's administration? Where to put agriculturally used fields? Also, where to put human-made water canals? Or what about rivers that got altered by humans (e.g. Category:Straightening of the Rhine)? Nakonana (talk) 09:17, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I would move most what is currently in Nature of categories to the also existing Geography of categories. I think Nature of should only contain close up photos of individual plants or animals but then also if they are cultivated. GPSLeo (talk) 09:50, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I oppose hiding "culture" under "society". Not intuitive for the average end user.

I'd put royal families under "society", but probably not under "politics", as a rule (though of course ruling monarchs do belong under "politics". I think it is ridiculous, for example, to have things like the current irrelevant Bonapartist and Bourbon claimants to the French throne under "politics"; similarly, some highly collateral relation of the British royal family.

I'd put parks both under "nature" and (indirectly) under "culture". - Jmabel ! talk 18:44, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

 Comment - any ruling/reigning dynasty would still belong under the politics of that country/-ies (i.e.; not just the monarch, but line of succession, other involved family members, etc.). SAUDI ARABIA & the house of saud is a brilliant working example of this, but so, in their own way, are the british royal family (with their set of "working" royals). any "aspiring" dynasty with any serious political history would also qualify; in the country's "historical" section at least, & i do not see any particularly good way to "split" a royal family category btwn those members who are politically relevant, & those who are not...?

i have no problem with multi-categorising parks, & i could think of a few cats more to add there...  :) Lx 121 (talk) 11:28, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

@Jmabel: Yeah, I confused royalty with monarchy, and the latter is a form of government. Regarding "culture" under "society", although I see how unintuitive it might be to put "culture" under "society", I know that separating the two is not always a good idea for the follwoing reasons:

• Culture refers to shared aspects of the society of a given region.
• Having two categories separately can confuse people. Especially categories like "ethnic groups" and "religion" would be put under both "culture" and "society" if they are categorized separately.

A better compromise would be to have a unique sortkey for subcats like "culture", "economy", "people", and "politics" under "society", so that they don't appear "hidden". Plus, a navbar can be used to access the important categories, albeit being "hidden" by larger categories. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 04:48, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

Please remember, this is more about helping people find things than about ontology; the latter is more of a Wikidata concern. If people won't think to look for "culture" under "society", then it does not matter how ontologically correct it is. And there is nothing wrong with having a fair number of categories be under both, it's not like it has a significant cost. - Jmabel ! talk 19:43, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

As an aside: it's important to avoid excessive generalization in "TOPIC of PLACE" categories. An example of how this can be taken way too far can be seen at Commons:Categories for discussion/2025/05/Category:Cultural history of New South Wales, where a relatively small number of photos, mostly of grain silos, got spun out into dozens of effectively unrelated categories like Category:Cultural history of New South Wales. Omphalographer (talk) 20:21, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

Alternative proposal

@Jmabel, GPSLeo, and Omphalographer: Considering the navigational aspect of categories, I have now made an alternative proposal to have the following categories as top-level ones:

• Architecture of X – buildings, structures and the art associated with them.
• Culture of X – topics of X related to arts, beliefs, cuisine, customs, festivals, philosophy, religion, science, technology, traditions etc.
• Economy of X – economic aspects of X.
• Geography of X – landforms, maps, subdivisions etc.
• History of X – events, monuments etc.
• Nature of X – environment, organisms etc.
• Objects of X – buildings, structures and other objects.
• People of X – individual humans.
• Politics of X – government, elections, politicians etc.
• Science in X – science, technology, engineering etc.
• Society of X – certain aspects of X that involve human interactions, excluding culture, economy, politics etc.
• Views of X – panoramas, skylines, aerial photos etc.

Feel free to comment on this proposal. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 18:43, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

I'm not certain it makes sense to try to apply a single category hierarchy to all location categories - trying to enforce one appears to have been one of the factors that led to the New South Wales mess I mentioned above. If the only media we have of a region is photos of grain silos (for example), it's better to have "grain silos in some place" as a direct subcategory rather than building out a whole hollow hierarchy of "objects in some place", "buildings in some place", "storage buildings in some place", etc.

With regard to specifics:

• "Objects of X" seems overly broad and generic. Given how common photos of buildings are, a dedicated category for that might be more generally applicable.
• "People", "Politics", "Culture", and "Society" seem like they'd overlap a lot. Is there some better way to draw dividing lines between these topics?

Omphalographer (talk) 19:01, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

I agree with Omphalographer that we want to impose too much uniformity on smaller places where the materials we have may be quite narrow, but something like the above would work well for countries, provinces, and substantial human settlements. Anything we have here should be a loose guideline: "this is normal, but if there are good reasons to go a different way, feel free."

I think it is probably OK that some sub-categories would come under more than one top-level heading. For example, transport probably belongs under both "economy" and "geography", "organizations" under both economy and society.

I don't love "objects" as a top-level heading, though I understand why you want it for completeness.

Conversely, given the nature of the content we have and what people are likely to be looking for, "architecture" should almost certainly be top-level (with "buildings" directly under that).

Where are you proposing to put aerial photographs? panoramics? videos? other categories that are about the type of content?

"Things named after X" is common and useful.

I might have more to say later, but that's what I have right now. - Jmabel ! talk 20:10, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

"Architecture" - or perhaps "structures"? Either way that's a good point; there's plenty of things which humans build which aren't precisely "buildings" - bridges, dams, towers, and so on. For general images of an area not focusing on any particular subject, like panoramas and aerial photos, how about "Views of X"? Omphalographer (talk) 20:48, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

@Jmabel and Omphalographer: By the way, I don't think "Architecture" should be a top-level category, as it comes under "Visual arts" (or "The arts"). Of course, "Geography" is already considered as a top-level category, so "Architecture" can also be a top-level category. However, there are certain aspects of architecture that can also come under "Visual arts" (or "The arts"). Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 02:54, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

What Jmabel and I are getting at here is that photos of buildings or other structures are likely to make up a substantial portion of the photos of a place, so having the appropriate categories easy to find is important. "The arts" is not a place where users are likely to look for pictures of buildings, no matter how much art is (or isn't) involved in their design - regardless of whether this is technically accurate, it's not intuitive. Omphalographer (talk) 03:33, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

@Omphalographer: That's why I have put "objects" as a top-level category, which can be used to put any artificial stuff. "Structures" (or "architectural structures", as the "structures" category is due to be renamed) can directly come under "objects". To be honest, even "structures" can be a top-level category separate from "objects:. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 03:55, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

I'd be OK with "structures" though I think you will find that at the moment the vast majority of such categories have "architecture" or "buildings" at top level, which suggests a certain measure of de facto consensus. What is important to me is that building, people, and subordinate named places be very easy to find. I think that is what the largest number of people are likely to be looking for in the category tree.

I do remain skeptical, though, of any effort to impose uniformity. The people working in a given area of Commons are likely to be very invested in what they've already done, and I'm not sure that in this case the value of uniformity outweighs the value of people feeling ownership over their work. - Jmabel ! talk 04:14, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

I know that vast majority still uses "architecture" or "buildings" rather than "structures" or "objects". But I still think that at least "structures" can be a top-level category along with "objects", with "architecture" covering the art aspects of different structures (for example Category:Greek Revival buildings). Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 04:23, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

Currently, "structure" is handled like a sub-category of "architecture" instead of the other way around as you suggest. See for example, Category:Architecture by color by country or Category:Architecture of Afghanistan. (It just so happens that I had recently asked a question about this myself: Commons:Village pump#Difference between "architecture" and "structure"?. And tbh, I'm still not quite clear on what's supposed to be the difference and which one of them should be the parent and which the child category. However, I think that limiting "architecture" to artistic stuff might be problematic, because "art" is too subjective. For some people, a generic square building is "art" - especially if it was designed by a renowned architect. So where would we draw the line? And would our definition of "architecture" still be the same as the common definition of architecture? To me, bridges, dams, towers etc. are all elements of "architecture", and there are likely also architects involved in building those "structures", so why would they not be categorized under "architecture"?)

What I've seen is that architecture is often a sub-category of culture. I think that's fitting. Nakonana (talk) 16:13, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

Well, considering that "construction" also comes under "architecture", I think the better thing would be to consider "architecture" as the top-level category instead, as "art" (or "the arts") categories should be restricted to artists and artworks. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 04:34, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

Standardizing "location categories" is overall not a bad proposal, however I think that "Maps" should not be hidden under "Geography". Yes, it seems evidently logical to place maps as "geographical", and many categories are already organized that way (while many others, aren't), but for easier navigation I would suggest making "Maps of X" a top-level category directly under "X".

Many maps (election maps, transport maps, political maps, history maps) don't place much focus on geography; and especially if "X" doesn't already have a geography subcategory, I'm not in favor to introduce an otherwise empty "geography" node that "maps" have to be located under.

Similarly, "Symbols of X" (typically flags, crests, pins, coats of arms...) are often hidden under "Society" or "Culture". These too could be lifted to the top level, in my opinion.

Sbb, I suspect you already did some navigating on categories around the world, right? Just to put some random examples out, there is Guarulhos (with many top-level categories already in Portuguese and of local events, which seems to happen often in Brazilian categories and I'm not a big fan, but I can manage); Akita (I typically find Japanese locations well-structured, but according to a systems slightly different than yours) and Category:Lomé (many, many African nations have rather empty location categories still, imposing a uniform structure onto less than 50 media files would seem a bit over the top). Should we allow to have regional differences in the structure? --Enyavar (talk) 15:40, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

Sbb, I suspect you already did some navigating on categories around the world, right? Just to put some random examples out, there is Guarulhos (with many top-level categories already in Portuguese and of local events, which seems to happen often in Brazilian categories and I'm not a big fan, but I can manage); Akita (I typically find Japanese locations well-structured, but according to a systems slightly different than yours) and Category:Lomé (many, many African nations have rather empty location categories still, imposing a uniform structure onto less than 50 media files would seem a bit over the top). Should we allow to have regional differences in the structure?

Yes, I have looked into these categories. However, I don't think we should allow regional differences in the structure, as the Universality Principle says, "The categorization structure should be as systematical and unified as possible [...] Analogic categorization branches should have an analogic structure." However, I do allow simplifying the inner hierarchies while maintaining the top-level categories.

Yes, "maps" and "symbols" should also be top-level categories, as hiding them under "geography" and "society" (respectively) used to confuse even me. But I did not object this as I believed in ontology too much. Now I understand that the categories are there for navigation. Anyway, as we are discussing the top-level categories for country/region/city categories, should we extend this idea to the topics themselves, like Category:Maps being directly put under Category:Topics rather than Category:Cartography? Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs • uploads) 15:53, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

I won't argue here into which supercategory "Maps" should belong. But I would think that this far at the top of tree, more value should be placed upon ontology. Navigational purposes only come into play once you have concrete locations that are mapped?

As a whole, I am not sure how a consensus among even a dozen Commons editors can proscribe policy for every location category of the world. We could lead by example (showing how well it works in example cases) instead of dictating rules. Where would you like to apply your proposed structure first? All the best, --Enyavar (talk) 17:05, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

I think what Sbb1413 meant was that, within a location-based category like Category:Portugal, a category for maps of that location like Category:Maps of Portugal should be a direct child ("top-level category") of Category:Portugal rather than being buried under some non-obvious sub-subcategory like "Portugal → Science of Portugal → Geography of Portugal → Maps of Portugal". (This is not a real example.) How the real top-level category Category:Maps is handled is less of an issue. Omphalographer (talk) 17:51, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

@Sbb1413 with regards to "Architecture of X", it tends to overlap a subcategory of "Culture of X" (which is "Art of X"). Architecture, in some countries like France, is an art, so we expect some overlapping here. A complication is we do have buildings that are not really architectures but mere {{PD-structure}}-type objects, yet "Buildings in X" (e.g. Category:Buildings in Pulilan, Category:Buildings in Vladivostok) are typically subcategorized under "Architecture of X".

Or, should we treat this overlapping as normal, since the concept of buildings encompasses both architecture and structural? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 05:40, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

Plenty of structures aren't buildings:

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
  In something of a quirk of the English language, a football stadium with an outdoor pitch is not usually referred to as a "building". (belated addition 2025-06-01)

Jmabel ! talk 18:49, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

actually there is a lot of ambivalance/ambiguity in english (big surprise that is!) on useage of the word "building"; esp when you throw in regional/cultural differences. bridges & all the other shown examples 'would be formally considered as "buildings" in standard international english, whether or not they are "colloquially" referred to as "buildings" in casual conversation. Lx 121 (talk) 11:38, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

I'm quite confident that there is no such thing as "standard international English". @Lx 121: do you have a reference either for the existence of such a thing or for your specific claim about the word "buildings"? - Jmabel ! talk 18:48, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

In German there is a clear definition for Gebäude (building) building (Q41176) and Bauwerk (architectural structure) architectural structure (Q811979). I think the English term building includes some that would be a Bauwerk and not a Gebäude in German. The German Bauwerk also covers thins where I am not sure if they are covered by the typical definition of architectural structure. GPSLeo (talk) 16:21, 1 June 2025 (UTC)