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== The Media Viewer severely hurts power users, people uploading high quality images and viewers of these images ==

I'm a power user that uploads lots of high resolution, high quality images to Wikimedia that are used extensively in certain Wikipedia subjects.  My experience so far with the media viewer has been very negative, as it has offered little improvements and managed to obfuscate many commonly used features.  It's easier to make a list of my problems and suggestions, so here it is:

- '''Full-size downloading needs to be clear and upfront.'''  My images are massive and saved at the highest quality JPG files, but the media viewer ruins this.  If the average person is seeing the massive image from the viewer, they're going to think that's the best image, when it's actually a lossy and smaller version of the original.  Right-clicking and saving this file also names it as the original file, giving no indication that it isn't the original.  There needs to be a very large and clear icon with text (not hover text) that says something like "download original, full size version".  This is the one of the most important aspects of Wikimedia and you guys buried it, guaranteeing almost no one will be saving the original file from the viewer.

- '''Remove the magnifying glass if it isn't going to go to the original size'''  Mostly said in the reason above, but it makes no sense that this wouldn't display the original image.  Right now it gives me a nonsensical 3000px version that is still down-converted from the original file.

- '''Media viewer removes a lot of information for no good reason'''  The idea that you would force most people to look at a stripped and dumbed-down version of files' pages while hiding the original makes little sense.  Metadata, exif info, user-created templates and more are removed and hid away where most people will never see them.  Even community-appointed templates like "valued image" are gone!

- '''Media viewer should be a tool enabled by users for galleries, not forced over everything''' It would make the most sense that the media viewer be a tool that could be enabled in galleries, and that could be controlled to create a richer experience.  By forcing it on all users as a default, it removes all of the care that went into creating gallery pages and detailed page info in all of the years up to this point.  The media viewer could be a great thing, but it certainly isn't better or more useful for much of the site's current content.

- '''Needs ability for user-created templates''' When you have images that come from certain sources, like museums or personal collections, there is usually a template or box that the institution wants on the page.  The purpose of this is to provide information about the collection and the institution and serves to enrich the user.  Also, many of the highest valued images on Wikimedia use special templates.  The media viewer removes all of this, but could be bettered by allowing a user to create a box that appears within the viewer.

- '''Don't be Windows 8''' In its current state, the media viewer is like Windows 8, which tries to bend too heavily to casual users and a "simple" interface at the cost of usability, but ends up being too obtuse for all users.  The choice of non-text icons for important features and the useless rebranding of things, where the command "go to info page" becomes the nonsensical "learn more - the free media repository" brought me to a standstill.  The old style might be seen as being scary and overwhelming to casual users, but everything is still laid out clearly on the page, where it can be found by just looking at it.  Also, the current media viewer seems intent on locking you into the viewer, making getting to the original info page very difficult.  If I have to struggle and look up how to get to the info page, then that's a massive problem.  It's not an issue of me "just needing to learn the new way."

To sum up, I find the media viewer in its current state (and being forced across the entire site) to be a detriment to Wikimedia.  If the media viewer makes it difficult to even identify and download the original image, then it's already got big enough problems that should prevent it from being implemented.  That, combined with the problems where it strips insane amounts of information from most of the images already on Wikimedia, makes it something that needs a lot of reconsideration.  [[User:Evan-Amos|Evan-Amos]] ([[User talk:Evan-Amos|talk]]) 12:39, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

:Hello [[User:Evan-Amos|Evan-Amos]], and thanks for your candid feedback. I'm sorry you are not happy with Media Viewer, and really appreciate that you took the time to clearly point out the issues you have with this tool. This level of detail is very helpful to us. :)

:Here are my comments on the points you raised:

[[File:Media Viewer - View Original File - Mockup 640px.jpg|thumb|[[mw:Talk:Multimedia/About_Media_Viewer#Proposal:_View_Original_File|Proposal: "View Original File" - Discuss it here.]]]]
:- '''Full-size downloading needs to be clear and upfront''': <br>
:We appreciate that you would like people to be able to view your images in full resolution -- and we have received similar requests from users that wanted that feature as well. To address this reasonable request, we would like to propose a new feature for Media Viewer: [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/630 "View Original File"], and would be grateful for your thoughts about it. 

:This feature would let you access the original file from Media Viewer, so you can examine it in your browser, and easily edit/re-use it. To view that original file, you would simply click on a new "View original file" button next to the image, as shown in [[:File:Media Viewer - View Original File - Mockup 640px.jpg|this mockup]].  This would open the original full-size image in the same browser window, as happens now when you click images in file description pages on Commons. Your browser’s back button would return you to the Media Viewer. In short, "View Original File" would provide the same core functionality you are used to on file description pages. It would enable you to operate on files (convert/edit them), and also give you the ability to zoom on common file types in modern browsers.  

:What do you think? Would this approach work for you? If you have a moment, we invite you to add your comments [[mw:Talk:Multimedia/About_Media_Viewer#Proposal:_View_Original_File|this discussion thread]]. 

:- '''Remove the magnifying glass if it isn't going to go to the original size''':<br>
:The magnifying glass is an experiment we did last week to see if it would address the issue above. We developed this [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/588 Simple Zoom Link] as a quick hack, for discussion purposes; and the intent of the 3000px version was to prevent people from opening gigantic files that might crash their browsers. But we agree that this implementation provides a poor user experience in its current form, and plan to remove it from Commons on Tuesday. We also considered a [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/504/ Basic Zoom] and a [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/167/ Full Zoom] features. But these implementations require more development time than we have right now. So we hope that the "View Original File" option can support your needs, without requiring a major development.

:- '''Media viewer removes a lot of information for no good reason''':<br>
:The goal was to remove some of the visual clutter that makes current file pages overwhelming for the 500 million readers whom we serve. Most of these readers do not want that much information, which is why we selectively picked the most important items and included them in the metadata panel. We also provide two prominent links to the file page on Commons, where users can read more if they like. This approach has been well received by [[mw:Multimedia/Media_Viewer/Survey|over seven thousand survey respondents around the world]], 70% of whom find the tool useful, on average. Over time, we are prepared to add more information into the metadata panel, but would like to get more user feedback before we overload it with more data than casual users need. 

:- '''Media viewer should be a tool enabled by users for galleries, not forced over everything''':<br>
:Best practices in user interface design are to provide a consistent experience, that works the same way in a variety of settings. Users are likely to get confused if Media Viewer opens when they clickon some thumbnails, but not others. The goal here is to avoid that confusion and provide a consistent viewing experience across our sites.

:- '''Needs ability for user-created templates''':<br>
:We appreciate that museums or personal collections wish to provide information about their institution. That information will continue to be available on the file description page. If they wish to include it in Media Viewer as well, one possible option would be to add it in the description, as a special paragraph. We are also considering adding [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/281 this partnership information] in future versions, which could be used for this purposes you describe. But it doesn't seem practical to require Media Viewer to display any template a user might want to create. As we start to implement structured data on Commons in coming months, we recommend focusing on the most important templates for tools like these, and aim to migrate data from lesser used templates into shared fields, to provide better database support. More on this later.

:- '''Don't be Windows 8''':<br>
:I'm not convinced that your Windows 8 analogy is accurate. While the Media Viewer is not perfect in its first implementation, [[mw:Multimedia/Media_Viewer/Usability_testing|extensive usability studies]] so far suggest that Media Viewer provides a better experience, right where people expect it. They tell us they can see the images more clearly, without having to jump to separate pages -- and that the interface is more intuitive, offering easy access to images and metadata. We provide two separate links to the file info page, both [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/226 above] and [https://wikimedia.mingle.thoughtworks.com/projects/multimedia/cards/270 below] the fold, and only a few users have reported the types of issues you describe, out of thousands of feedback posts we've reviewed to date.

:Evan-Amos, I hope that over time, you will come to appreciate the value of this new tool, which already provides a better experience for the majority of users we've heard from. While you are correct that Media Viewer still has flaws, we are working hard to address the most critical issues (e.g. the "View Original File proposal above"). And as more improvements are made in coming months, we expect that the benefits of this richer multimedia experience will outweigh the temporary discomfort which you are experiencing right now. Thanks again for your patience, and for your courteous and thoughtful observations, which we will take to heart as we continue to improve this tool based on your feedback. Be well :) [[User:Fabrice Florin (WMF)|Fabrice Florin (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Fabrice Florin (WMF)|talk]]) 00:12, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

::I will concede that there is a use for the media viewer, but I will state that it hurts more than helps in certain places.  Some users have spent hundreds of hours uploading and working on content for Wikimedia, being the relatively few who provide a lion's share of the site's content.  The media viewer guts a lot of the information that these users have spent much time and effort producing, so that their work can be reduced to a picture and a caption.  To say it chaffs is an understatement.

::If there was any one thing that I'd like for the media viewer, it would be the option for it to be disabled on the page level to all users.  For instance, I would be able to add to my Wikimedia gallery page (mediaviewer="off"), so that when people view images on my page, it doesn't initiate the media viewer.  Right now the media viewer wrecks the design of my Wikimedia gallery, on my own userpage, and would require a massive overhaul to compensate for it.  I could put in all of that work in the future, but until I do, I'd like to be able to present the work as it was designed before the media viewer was implemented.  I'm sure that many people with extensive personal collections would like this option as well.  [[User:Evan-Amos|Evan-Amos]] ([[User talk:Evan-Amos|talk]]) 17:32, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

*I have to agree with Evan on this one. I sometimes upload 50 megapixel architectural panoramas, and there should be a mid-way between thumbnail view and 40 megabytes of image file (especially when the user is on a slow connection).  Looking at the [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page#mediaviewer/File:Pont_de_Ceps%2C_Roquebrun%2C_H%C3%A9rault_01.jpg Commons POTD], it appears that this image supports viewers much more than editors. There's nowhere to change categories, for instance, and the side-bar for uploading new versions or for cropping or deleting (or pretty much anything) is covered up. Yes, we can do all these things by clicking the (tiny) Commons symbol, but why make us have to click twice for something we can do with one click now? I hate Flickr's new design, and this mimics it way too much; I'll be sticking with the original design.[[User:Crisco 1492|Crisco 1492]] ([[User talk:Crisco 1492|talk]]) 08:39, 24 May 2014 (UTC)
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