It is now three months or so that the flickr issue continues and for more than two months they have not even considered to post any more statement about it in the (ever growing) thread. So what I guess is that this issue is done for flickr and it will not change. So for me, flickr has abandoned their commuity and stepped back to be an ordinary Web1.0 business (as Jean-Christophe was putting it. So this was it whith that provider. What's next, then?
First of all: diversification! The incident has disrupted not my photography, but it's publishing considerably. I also have lost almost all my contacts whith whom I have exchanged comments on takes on a close-to-regular basis. Diversification will limit this risk hould another provider crack up. Additionally, the flickr web application is feature-rich and no single other provider can compete in each and every single feature. My aim for diversification lets this appear more as a feature than as a bug.
On the other hand, one has to search for an alternative regarding every single use one made of flickr before. The first step is to set up the requirements:
- From a community I expect a certain international flair. I love to see and comment on photos from overseas and als to get comments from all over the world. Because I am shooting over and over, an upload limit too narrow will not be acceptable. Those both are the reason why fotocommunity.de (with their strong German focus and 1 pic per week limit for the free account) does not even enter the race. In addition, an overdone artistic demand (deviantART) does not match my expectations because for me photography is primarily life, not art. As community does live from exchange, the web application should support sone neighbourhood concept, commenting and groups. Active notification on comments would be appreciated. There should also be something to order ones asstes (like sets) and an overly important role of the photostream in chronological order is not required. Because community is about sharing, I do not expect too much from private-flags etc. for this use.
- But there is another application to be supported: When I have been on a party or so, I enjoy sharing my takes with the others that have been there. Privacy is a point here, because not everyone likes his images spread around the world (and some pics which absolutely deserve internal publication do not really qualify for a global audience). This requirement was covered by setting up a flickr set with private pictures only and then sending out a guest pass to those who are supposed to see the images. A big disadvantage was that downloading the images was to be done on a one-by-one basis (and for time and effort reasons I did almost never upload a hires version). So the provider to choose for this has to support comfortably both bulk upload and download. As I had to learn, bulk download only comes with the need for an accout, but when it is convenient to set up, I have no problem.
- At least during this year, my main photographic project is to publish one picture at each and every day of the year. Not a photoblog - with few exceptions the takes are subject to the best creativie, artistic and technical standard I am able to deliver. Well, at least subject to... Anyway: Amongst my other takes, those should be easily identified because in their diversity, they are still forming a unity. Because I do this project mainly for me, comment option are not absolutely critical, but would be nice.
- For some takes I would really like to have some qualified feedback from both a technical and an artistical perspective. Here I need a critical yet respectful community and I am absolutely willing to return by giving detailled remarks on others takes also. Should I find it in a forum, which does not support photo-upload, I will need to find a provider who allows long-term storage of freely accessible hires pitures also.
- A remote backup of at least some of may takes would also be appreciated. Just in case something bad happens here.
- Finally, I wolud love to have a provider who let me order quality prints in Germany also... It turned out that this is very much of a problem, because many services apply some forced "enhancements" on the uploaded images. One will typically end up with overdone colors and contrast and with burnt out areas because brightness is also "adjusted". I guess those "enhancements" are tailored to optimize images straight from custom point and shoot cameras.
A lastl requirement is that I am not willing to use a service which is largely employed to distribute porn and copyright violations (e.g. bubbleshare) for any one of the above applications.
So what did I end up with?
- I will try to build a network on ipernity. No groups yet, but I hope this is about to come.
- Private sharing with bulk up- and download is almost perfectly supported by BubbleShare (no need to search for me there, all private, of course ;-).
- My Picture a Day project is at tumblr so far, but I do not know whether I will continue it there or here on vox (but how to get the 100+ missing takes up? one by one???).
- In-depth discussion I will not expect from the communities, but I will intensify my engagement in specialized forums, especially the TFTTF forum. The kick for ipernity came when they opened up 1024x1024 resolution to be seen by everybody.
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