Thread:Sophiedp/@comment-26339491-20191009202759

Hey Sophiedp,

You had a few more questions on the file pages redirect test and were still waiting for answers.

The test is meant to improve search engine rankings for pages across Fandom (meaning make them more visible on Google) and give anonymous visitors a less confusing experience. File pages are confusing for anyone who isn't familiar with wikis, because they don't show what your average anon visitor is looking for.

Google tends to rank sites lower that offer confusing user experiences and have lots of pages that barely contain anything useful. That means the file pages on Fandom could contribute to all pages having lower rankings. By redirecting anon visitors to the first article page a file appears on, we're giving those visitors more useful content, and we're showing Google that Fandom does not just consist of pages with low value. File pages are of course valuable for wikis and editors, which is why nothing changes for them.

If this is successful, and we see that this and other test communities gain more visibility in search and thus more eyes on the content you're creating, we will make the same change across all wikis on Fandom. We expect the test to run a few more months. After that, we should have a report of our findings that we don't mind sharing with users, and of course we'd announce it widely before redirecting file pages for anons everywhere.

Should an anon visitor really just want the image rather than the article, they're still getting that. They can still open the image in a lightbox via the article, download it from there or view licensing information for the image.

If you're noticing issues with the redirects, e.g. you end up on a page that doesn't actually contain the image you were trying to get to, or you see an error message, then please file a bug report via Special:Contact. Screenshots and specific links would be especially helpful!

Anons should be redirected to the first article on which a file was used. There's no manual way for editors or readers to change which article a file redirects to.

If we find that file page redirects for anons aren't actually doing any good, we would revert the changes on the test communities, returning things to how they were.

I hope this clears up some confusion! 