Did I just miss it, or is there no avatar capability in the profile? That would definitely be cool.

Avatars are not enabled on this site. If you do a quick search you will see several links to past discussions about this (take a look here). Some people were against them because they add unnecessary overhead to the forum and can be distracting.

You are correct. As stated above, LQ does not support avatars for several reasons, some of which are:

1. increased bandwidth demands
2. slower page loading times for users
3. potentially inappropriate images (note that many people use LQ extensively at the office)
4. visual clutter and distractions

In all honesty, there is no realistic scenario that I could imagine in which avatars would be enabled here at LQ, as they add zero functional value, but do impose a variety of negatives.

Well, since this is a feedback forum, I will just drop in my 27¢ and then be on my way. The reason I like avatars, and probably most other Linux forums have them, is for their expressive value. Avatars provide a fun and effective way for me to distinctly identify myself as a individual on the forum. I can communicate something about myself or about what I believe in a way that is not easily paralleled in a profile bio or an extended ascii-text signature.

Furthermore, people are visual beings. The moment someone sees that avatar, he is going to expect a certain flavor of content in the post and it will help him sort out which posts are worth his time.

The are, of course, legitimate problems that have to be weighed, as you enumerated. The only items I will take issue with are two and four. Of course pages with more images ultimately take more time to load that pages without them. But last time I checked, if the HTML img tag specifies the size of the avatar, the browser will automatically reserve space for the image and then fill in all other text content, even before the images have loaded. So all important content will be available and properly placed immediately.

Also, to call avatars "visual clutter and distractions" is somewhat to beg the question. If users like them and find them useful, then they are not clutter or distracting, no more than the cool little distro icon that appears at the bottom-left corner of posts. (One might also ask what is the "functional" purpose of having an icon that displays an image of the user's distro when the name of the distro is already listed in text under the username.)

1 members found this post helpful.

the reason i dont like them
is i cannot read a post if the avatar is moving
and some are rude or otherwise inapproprate and thats all you need to see when you need help

I applaud Jeremy's unwavering position that there will NEVER be avatars here.....

You make some good points, but I'd reiterate that the distro icons can convey additional context to a member's post that actually is relevant to their question. Avatars on the other hand add no informational value to a post's content, and given that some percentage of them are animated, I'd disagree with the notion that they'd not be a distraction. Perhaps we can agree to disagree, but IMHO it would be impossible to consider a screen full of (for example) spinning disks, lightning flashes, or tiny little dragons spitting fire, etc, etc, as being distraction-free. To each his own, I suppose.

CoderMan, there is a compromise, I believe you can upload a profile picture to your profile, which allows you to express yourself without distracting others.

TG

titanium_geek is correct, you're welcome to express yourself via a profile pic. As stated in the past, we don't intent to add avatar's here at LQ.

--jeremy

bandwidth is the biggest reason imho . . .

The faster loading of pages especially when one has an important (to them at least) question
and is in search of an answer is way more cool !