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August 3, 2005
Fabulous Flickr photos
Flickr has just introduced a new feature to its list of services. It is a list of interesting photos. Its automatically produced.
Flickr uses some sort of algorithm that combines the viewings of a photo with the number of people who tag it for themselves and come up with a short list of interesting photos.
The thing is people may eventually just want to check out the interesting photos - forget about cruising the tags (choose a random word and search for it on Flickr - interesting :D ) just give me the good stuff.
I had a look at it earlier and wow are there some great shots. The problem is that this will create a huge gap between photos that are listed as interesting (generating ever more views and tags) and those that didnt quite pass the muster.
Is this a good thing? Possibly. What better editorial process is there than the visceral response from seeing a photo and being able to give feedback straight away.
But the problem is that if everyone is looking at the list of 'interesting' photos produced by Flickr then who is looking at and tagging the photos from the original photosets in the first place?
Will this unwittingly create an 'elite' of photographers who happened to get in on the first (few) waves of ineterest of the 'interesting' feature leaving other equally talented photographers out in the cold simply because of dumb luck? Are we about to see an amateur photographer get jump started as a professional because someone thought his photo of a sunflower was cool?
Excellent - sunflowers, sunsets, naked girls and kittens. I'll be in my darkroom if you need me....
Posted by dottie at August 3, 2005 7:56 AM