The issue with the accessory tags is that they seem to implicitly work in a very different way from the rest of the site’s tags, but this is not something that’s really made clear.
Most tags referring to something in the image (i.e. not artist/editor tags, tags about the comment sections, meta tags and so on) are supposed to be added on any given images which features the thing the tag represents, right? So if an image contains Applejack you tag it
applejack
, if an image contains a pony you tag it
pony
, if an image contains an apple tree you tag it
apple tree
, if an image contains Twilight’s old treehouse you tag it
golden oaks library
, and on and so forth, and this is generally understood as proper tagging practice.
The you have accessory tags, and in this case the way to tag them is supposed to be that you add the tag to images that contain this thing
but not when it’s being worn by the character it’s associated with. This is a rather different system from the usual, since in most situations adding a tag to an image that clearly and unambiguously contains that tag’s subject is proper tagging. There’s no real situation in which an image which obviously contains Applejack is mistagged if tagged
applejack
.
The result, and the reason why I think this issue keeps coming up, is that people assume that the accessory tags work like every other tag does; they seen an image with Sweet Apple Acres and tag it
sweet apple acres
, they seen one with Applejack and tag it
applejack
, they see one with Applejack’s hat and tag it
applejack's hat
.
Compounding the problem is that what I imagine is the most reliable way of telling most users that the accessory tags do not work in the same way as the rest of the site’s tags, namely tag descriptions, do not mention any of this. There’s no description for
applejack’s hat or
apple bloom’s bow or
trixie’s hat or
trixie’s cape or
sunburst’s robe stating anything about their intended usage, which leaves osmotic acquisition of knowledge through threads, commented sections and/or PMs the only way a given user can learn about the proper usage of accessory tags. This is not, as I think we can all imagine, a terribly efficient way of disseminating information.
The point I’m trying to make is that it’s all well and good to complain about persistent mistagging, but when the issue is that the bulk of the site’s users do not inherently understand an admittedly counterintuitive concept that they do not have any particularly convenient way of learning, perhaps we either need to adjust our tagging guidelines or actually make it possible for people to learn what the intended guidelines are with something resembling convenience.
@Background Pony #A8E1
I don’t think that
ahuizotl’s cats really counts as an accessory tag. Associated with a specific character they may be, but it’s a tag for a group of characters, not an object. They aren’t an accessory any more than the royal guard are.
@Dragonpone
Come to think of it, Trixie doesn’t really wear her getup very often anymore, does she? She certainly didn’t have it out in “All Bottled Up”; in “On the Road to Friendship” she only had it out when performing or right after a show, and in “Student Counsel” she only had it on during the Everfree scenes. She just goes naked most of the time.