Just over a year ago i upgraded to a flickr pro account. That gave me more control over my images and allowed me to upload to my heart’s content. So how many photos do i have on flickr and how often are they viewed?….
Well, that image above is my 1,800th upload to flickr. I first joined flickr.com in November 2007 so on average i upload about 2 images per day although i’ve only *really* starting getting the most out of my flickr account over the last year or so… (i’ve uploaded 1600 images in the last year!)
In total, my images have been viewed 18,937 times which is on flickr only… of course they’re viewed a lot more than that on my blog here but flickr only count ‘views’ as views on flickr.com.
For most people, choosing an image host means choosing between flickr (owned by yahoo) and picasa (which is owned by google). I just chose flickr because at the time there were more apps and plugins available for it. Most importantly there was a wordpress plugin called ‘Flickr Photo Album‘ which i’m still using to this day on this blog.
Once you sign up and start using one, it’s very difficult to switch and it only becomes more difficult as time goes on. It’s like switching bank. Nothing at all stopping you only ‘hassle’. And if you’re happy with one service, it takes a lot to entice you over to another.
For me, flickr is still king. It’s just my ‘go to’ site for looking at photos. If i’m looking at a hotel, i’ll search flickr. If i’m looking at an area, i’ll search flickr. That said, picasa is probably easier to use for an average user who just wants to upload and share photos. The enthusiast will chose flickr because of it’s ‘groups’ feature which allows people to build up a bit of a fan base and community. Flickr have also made a bit of an effort to improve the user interface and experience though recently…
If you are on flickr and want to switch to picasa, or vice versa, there is a great little tool called ‘migratr‘ which transfer all your photos from one account to the other. Needless to say i think you should be uploading your photos online… doesn’t really matter what service you use.
You and i both know that matter where you store your images and how many times you back them up, when it comes to searching for photos from that trip 10 years ago, you’re not gonna be able to find them. Do yourself and everyone else a favour… name, tag & describe as many photos as possible and then upload them where others or at least yourself can find them online.
Think “20 years from now”, “50 years from now”… get in to that habit. It’s always best when organizing stuff. If you don’t have that much time left, think ‘children’, ‘grand children’… we all take photos & video, now more than ever. It’s important they don’t get buried or lost.
Actually, because flickr is owned in Yahoo is the main reason I will never sign up there, if I ever want to go looking for a proper picture host somewhere.