Question: Avatar dimensions

I have a concern about the avatar dimensions for staff. I've noticed that all staff get huge (larger than Tier 6 supporter) avatar dimensions, which is not how it used to be. I find this unfair to members and supporters, as members have a fair limit of 130x130, Tier 3-5 supporters have 150x150, and Tier 6 supporters have a limit of 170x170. For supporters, these are reasonable limits.

What I don't understand is why being staff somehow entitles a person to practically unlimited avatar restrictions. It especially bothers me when certain staff upload avatars so big that it stretches the postbit, and I find that particularly annoying.

As a proposal to make it fair to those of us who donated for our perks, I suggest a 150x150 limit for moderators and 170x170 (or 175x175) limit for H-Staff (with the exception of Steve, who knows better than to stretch the postbit). This is more than fair in my opinion. What do you think?

Zach told me via VMs that staff get 190x190 avatar sizes which is not that bigger than T6 Supporters but still it can be big enough to break the postbit. I'm okay with 150x150 but the thing that really bugged me was the 100KB filesize limit, essentially meaning I can't use fancy GIF avatars unless if it's a Pokemon sprite or something.

And if I recall correctly, regular mods also had a 150x150 default size prior to this change, but given the GIF avatars I saw a lot with in the past they clearly had a filesize default bigger than 100KB. TwilightBlade if I recall correctly did have a fair share of big avatars ever since she was smodded almost a year ago, and there was that one avatar that Andy aka Shining Raichu had last year (I think it was that one of Charlize Theron in the movie Young Adult) that was quite bigger than T6 default size to me.

I've seen people with huge avatars at EGC, another forum I sometimes go on. Staff members and certain donator levels get access to some quite big ones so it's not the first time I've seen something like this.

But yeah I do agree with you that the new mod avatar size default is too big.

in all honesty this just seems like a 'wah wah staff get a perk that i don't :(' post

by no means am i a fan of the staff but really...they do a lot of work and an extra privilege or so on their behalf isn't going to end the world

They're perks, and we work towards earning them, which isn't unfair at all. And as for the new staff avatar size, it's actually 240x240, but as a courtesy, no one on staff has gone up to the max yet.

240x240, thanks for correcting me Zach. I kept forgetting that lol

But yeah, that's actually bigger than the default size for profile pics for T4 Supporters, which is 170x170. And that's quite small when you compare it to the default profile pic size for T5 Supporters which is 400x400.

I do think Zach is onto something there, it's something the staff worked towards, along with having the ability to get customized usertitles, something which not even supporters get.

Well, while staff worked to get the perks they have (a few of which are staff-exclusive, such as HTML usertitles), supporters pay money to get their status. In a sense, both have earned their status some way or another.

And paying a hundred USD to get a 170x170 avatar compared to getting an insane whopping 240x240 for being a mod is beyond me. Why? Cause they work hard? So do we. We worked to pay for our supportership.

One thing that's worth noting is that the 240x240 limit isn't advised - if people are using avatars that big then I certainly think that's bad. The idea of increasing them was to have different dimensions available for use, not to all have huge avatars; it's just down to how sensible staff are with choosing their sizes which in some cases could definitely use some work. I may be wrong with this, but I'm pretty sure 240x240 was just a random choice so that longer avatars could be used (someone correct me if I'm wrong!) and I don't think it was intended to be used at the full size.

One thing I would mention though is that a lot of the avatars are designed for use with the Legacy postbit theme (you can change in your user CP if you wish to try it out), so if you're getting stretching that could be a factor. Not that I'm saying you should have to change your postbit to stop it, just suggesting the reason behind it haha.

AlexTheRose said:

Well, while staff worked to get the perks they have (a few of which are staff-exclusive, such as HTML usertitles), supporters pay money to get their status. In a sense, both have earned their status some way or another.

And paying a hundred USD to get a 170x170 avatar compared to getting an insane whopping 240x240 for being a mod is beyond me. Why? Cause they work hard? So do we. We worked to pay for our supportership.

Click to expand...

As a side note, I'm completely okay with supporters getting these 'perks' too, if you can call them that, but the perks that supporters get for donating are just a "thank you" for supporting the site rather than paid services so it's not an entitlement or anything just because money is being handed over haha. But I'm all for having more perks available if it increases donations; I've always wanted to see the supporter tiers carrying some extra "thank you" weight.

Huuuge avatars lately are annoying in the postbit in Standard format which a lot of people (if not a majority) uses. I guess the admins just didn't think it was that big a deal. And in terms of "omg why does staff have perks!", I'll just be quiet because I don't use most such perks anyways :p

The problem is that as long as Standard is a thing, huge avatars are annoying and unnecessary imo. Is there a way to add an option to automatically resize the way all avatars look for you to 100x100 or something? For people like me who don't really like them bigger than that. Gifs might break and whatnot but.

240x240 is the new mod avatar size while higher staff still have 180x180. Personally, I thought 180x180 was still pretty huge. I think 170x170 should be standard for all mods and tier 6. If you want a vertical avatar, make a vertical signature...

I thought one skin resized avatars, but the name escapes me.

TwilightBlade said:

240x240 is the new mod avatar size while higher staff still have 180x180. Personally, I thought 180x180 was still pretty huge. I think 170x170 should be standard for all mods and tier 6. If you want a vertical avatar, make a vertical signature...

I thought one skin resized avatars, but the name escapes me.

Click to expand...

I agree with this totally, or perhaps have h-staff and regular staff at 180x180 for the max. And the name of the style you're thinking of is Modern, which resizes all avatars in Standard postbit, but keeps them normal in legacy.

240x240 is a little big for my tastes as well and there usually isn't a need for someone to have an avatar that large. I'm all for 170x170 maximum as that gets mostly anyone enough space even for vertical/tall avatars (if that's their preference).

I'd be all for a staff standard of 170x170. And it'd be a great idea to increase file size limits to allow GIFs and APNGs. :)

AlexTheRose said:

I'd be all for a staff standard of 170x170. And it'd be a great idea to increase file size limits to allow GIFs and APNGs. :)

Click to expand...

I'm all for this, it would allow staff to have a decent size without breaking postbits too much. Also, a filesize limit increase would be something welcome especially to supporters because the 100KB filesize limit for avatars I have right now has always been bugging me.

I honestly don't find myself bothered by the bigger staff avatars; particularly when they don't even have a signature. Yes, I use standard postbit on top of the post and I don't see it as a big deal.

Quite frankly I've been thinking: "Well it's about time the staff got something more perk-ish" because that means other perks can trickle down to supporters. Honestly I think they're not really an issue, the postbit is always going to be plenty big no matter what you do, and most of it is empty space.

I think I'm okay with it. They do a lot of work and are entitled to a few extra perks. As for the 'well we pay $100 too and that is our hard earned cash so we work for it too' thing - doesn't matter. Most sites don't even reward donators with as much benefits as this one does. Plus, those that donated that much aren't likely to do so just to earn a stupid perk but rather than to support the site they've come to love. The work that moderators do cannot be compared to 'hurr durr we donated money', imo. They do it on a daily basis without any monetary compensation or anything whatsoever. I'd say they earned their rights to have perks that not even T6 people do. Just my two cents.

240 IS a little too big, though, I'd agree. 200x200 at max, it should be. That gives plenty of space.

Also, umm, why is the limit lower for hstaff? Shouldn't they have the same limits, at least? I can guess the reasoning behind the decision but I'd still like to confirm. Or not, if you guys aren't cool with discussing it. Either way, was just curious.

When you give money to PC, you're making a donation to the site of your own freewill. It's not something staff or anyone begs members to do. The perks given to PC Supporters aren't a right; you're giving a donation not buying something. They're a gift and a way of saying "thank you" for supporting the site.

It's no different for staff. What we have are just perks of the job, they're not a demand we can just make. Actually, just to make it clear, moderators never requested for the avatar size to be increased. That was an unexpected (but totally welcomed) surprise for us. However, it is fair to say that we work for what we have. But like donating, it's a nice way of saying "thank you" for the work we put in for maintaining the forums we moderate.

Derozio said:

200x200 at max, it should be. That gives plenty of space.

Click to expand...

...and enough to make a good vertical avatar too!

I'll agree that 240 x 240 is quite excessive, but I haven't seen anyone on staff use an avatar that large since the recent increase. I'd be okay if 200 x 200 was the universal size limit for the staff as a whole though. That's a considerable amount of space for a basic square avatar or vertical avatar.

Derozio said:

Also, umm, why is the limit lower for hstaff? Shouldn't they have the same limits, at least? I can guess the reasoning behind the decision but I'd still like to confirm. Or not, if you guys aren't cool with discussing it. Either way, was just curious.

Click to expand...

A few mods asked for larger avatars, manually uploaded since they were bigger than the default size, (so the quality wouldn't get butchered) so Shawn just made it so that they could add the larger ones themselves and increased the size default, is all. It was just a spur of the moment thing, nothing super deliberate or debated at length.

I don't see how 240px avatars are any more annoying than ridiculously large signatures that are 350px tall and are usually double or triple the content that a post usually includes. I don't think 240px is too excessive vertically even in standard mode, but 240px is definitely way too much in width because it stretches the postbit in legacy mode. 190px is the limit on how large an avatar can be in width before it does that for most styles, so I think the width of any usergroup's avatar limit should reflect that.

edit: Also, I think these would make for good avatar limits: regular members - 170px, Tier 3 Supporters - 190px, Tier 6 Supporters and staff - 190px by 240px (width by height). Though, perhaps that would be too generous.

I wouldn't mind changing the width limit to be as little as 170px as long as we can keep the current height limit. I love vertical avatars as I use legacy.

God, look at the train I started. XD

But seriously, I think that a vertical limit of 240px is very reasonable, however on most standard vBulletin styles, 175px is the width that fits snug as a bug. Who says the dimensions have to be square?