Flickr. Am I the only one who likes it?

[colyn]

Mine was like that. Last week. Now they all overlap. And its this way on both my desktop monitor and my laptop.

Like so:

I noticed you are using Internet Exploder. This browser has never handled very well. In fact many pages written in html5 and css3 have to have an IE fix css file in order for IE to properly render the page..

 

[mani]

I'm not either. Far from it. I'm just a regular everyday user, logging on 3-5 times a day. But I can recognize when they try to fix stuff that's not broken. The scroll and the mixed-up sets are perfect examples. If they can fix those I'd be much happier.
Just an amateur here. But I hope my opinions still count for something. Evidently not.

Well I wasn't talking about you - sorry, reading your post just set me off.

I've been trying to give constructive feedback on the flickr forums for the last week - each time it's drowned out and shouted down by (just relatively few) violently vocal opponents of the new design. If anything positive is said in the general feedback thread, several people attack you personally and question your motives - it gets really ugly.

Now, I really hate Yahoo and all they stand for, but at least they're now doing what they think is best to revive flickr after nearly killing it for the last few years. All in all I just think if someone doesn't like the new design, they're free to go elsewhere. All the tantrums and screaming don't help.

Sorry again for venting after your post: singling you out was absolutely not what I intended.

 

[colyn]

I've been trying to give constructive feedback on the flickr forums for the last week - each time it's drowned out and shouted down by (just relatively few) violently vocal opponents of the new design. If anything positive is said in the general feedback thread, several people attack you personally and question your motives - it gets really ugly.

This is why I don't go to the flickr forums. It's a few who are throwing temper tantrums and demanding we agree with them..

All in all I just think if someone doesn't like the new design, they're free to go elsewhere. All the tantrums and screaming don't help.

I agree with this.

The problem is there are those who think their opinions are the only ones that count and demand we bow down to their wishes..

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

Mine was like that. Last week. Now they all overlap. And its this way on both my desktop monitor and my laptop.

Oh, you're just a crybaby who is just seeking something negative and can't for the life of you stand change, like the rest of us.

Looks like the non-complainers about load speed have less than a 1000 photos in their flickr stream. Clearly not a bug on flickr, the problem is clearly people who have just too many photos and flickr wasn't built for that --which is why everybody gets a TB free, because nobody has more than a 1000 photos in their stream. Wait, something here doesn't make sense...

Bugs appear and disappear and reappear from time to time. But this is just the grumbling negative-seeker in me.

:sigh: the internets




* Intertoobes Disclaimer: I've experienced the same things as you.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

All in all I just think if someone doesn't like the new design, they're free to go elsewhere. All the tantrums and screaming don't help.

Yes, Customer Service isn't about listening to the customer; anybody complaining about their product should just understand "my way or the highway". It's an excellent business model. For the competition.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

One contact mentioned he averaged 1500-1700 views a day before the switch, to about 400 a day since. Others have seen similar drops. I normally don't get many views, but its been pretty meager since the change.

I think there are two reasons for this. One, everyone's most recent photo now shows up large on all their contact's home pages. Why click on the photostream when you're already seeing the most recent picture in large size? I know I haven't clicked onto more than one or two other people's streams since the switch. I can't be the only one.

Secondly, the endless scroll doesn't work. On my home page, I can scroll and scroll to see new pics from my contacts, but eventually I get to the bottom where the thing comes on and says "Loading more pictures". Then when they load, there's a gap. I have to scroll back UP to see what I've missed! It does this on all three computers I use regularly. Not being a fan of the endless scroll in the first place, its just maddening to have to scroll back up to see what I've missed. So I just don't. End result - less photo views.

I think it's pretty clear people who like the buggy new flickr aren't interested in hearing this whinny temper tantrum negativity. We should all be good chaps and nod. Flickr is without flaws and any feedback is just deep down coming from a character flaw.

OR...if I cared about my customers, I'd listen, understand the outcry, the numbers, and do something about it.

Unless, of course, the strategy is "let them eat cake".

 

[mani]

Oh, you're just a crybaby who is just seeking something negative and can't for the life of you stand change, like the rest of us....

Bugs appear and disappear and reappear from time to time. But this is just the grumbling negative-seeker in me.

I guess from the tone of your answer that you've made a serious attempt at constructive feedback on the flickr forum?

I personally feel sorry for the developers working on the site: it's pretty obvious that the launch-time was chosen to fit Marissa Mayer's press conference announcing the tumblr acquisition, rather than any realistic development timescale. So there are bugs and updates and changes that are probably going-on 24/7 at the moment.

A bit of patience, helpful feedback, and general understanding would be useful, imho. But tantrums and 'I WANT IT MY WAY NOW!!' are more the style on 'the internets'.

PS: Just saw your extra moan. See my answer above - and also visit the flickr forum where you'll see that the staff are addressing the performance concerns and bugs. But they're not going back to the (sad-looking) old site.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

I guess from the tone of your answer that you've made a serious attempt at constructive feedback on the flickr forum?

Despite the tongue-in-cheekness, yes, I have.

When it became obvious they weren't (and still aren't) listening, I simply, strongly yet cordially told them their lack of response to feedback has been worse than the way they force-fed this release.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

PS: Just saw your extra moan. (...) visit the flickr forum where you'll see that the staff are addressing the performance concerns and bugs. But they're not going back to the (sad-looking) old site.

More and extra moaning:

Yes, they are addressing the bugs...it took many many many complaints, though. One thing they have to understand is that the longer the customer lacks acknowledgement, the louder they'll yell.

Another thing they have to understand is that previous layout changes, despite the outcry of some, as soon as they understood their concerns, they let the option for users to go back to the former layout. This quelled a lot back then of what they've failed to quell now.

If they are "not going back to the (sad-looking) old site", then I don't understand why most other sections look like the "(sad-looking) old site". This makes the perception of intransigence even worse. And their Help Forum shows it, in that customers keep on yelling, because they feel they've run out of ideas to express their frustration.

Ignoring frustration caused on the customer simply feeds it further.

Perhaps they should hire people at Customer Service who don't think of Customers as "moaners" and provide them a Service. It goes a long way in keeping customers, not to say customer loyalty. I'd say that's my professional opinion, but apparently that'd be self-centered arrogance*.





* Disclaimer: I know you didn't say anything about that. It's a thread-relevant comment.

 

[kchoquette]

I don't like it because it eats up a lot of resources, it's cluttered and completely disregards a huge chunk of its user base. I don't mind change, but can't stand change just for its own sake, specially when it's take-it-or-leave-it when I am a paying customer and they just pulled a fast one on me.

This is pretty much how I feel. The new Flickr manages slow down my browser and when the absolutely horrible infinite scroll script stops working, images stop loading and I just get continuous gray boxes.

If they made a way to turn off infinite scrolling, I wouldn't even care about the change, but man, that is one inconvenient feature.

 

[Sparrow]

The thing about the white-ground, or where I may be able to help Flickr ...

... oddly galleries generally have white walls for a reason, well a few reasons. Firstly, it reflects light around the space to give even illumination, and the white surround to artworks ensures the viewers eyes are stopped-down which not only improves resolution but also helps with our colour perception ... the colour receptors in the human eye become less efficient as the light-value reduces.

Secondly, Completion, much of a photo's composition is often a result of the Gestalt completion effect, and if there isn't enough ground between images that effect is lost.

Lastly, Ground-Figure organisation is a necessity for recognising objects through vision, in effect without isolating something from it's surroundings it is very difficult to see it, which is why I use the bloody thing in the first place.

... there, is that constructive enough?

 

[MikeAUS]

I've had mega search strings to get rid of a lot of crap, like -HDR, -cat, -Nikon, -Canon, etc. It takes a little more effort up front, but you will get to what you want much quicker.

Gold. I wonder if the -cat one would work here at RFF ...

 

[Michael Markey]

Mine was like that. Last week. Now they all overlap. And its this way on both my desktop monitor and my laptop.

Like so:

Mine was like that when the new format was rolled out but now its ok .
However what I have noticed yesterday and today is that some of the pictures in my photostream keep changing order.
It doesn`t seem to be based on the number of views they`re getting ,its just very random.

 

[Michael Markey]

Just rechecked the stream and all pictures are now back in the order in which I originally posted them.

 

[hteasley]

The thing about the white-ground, or where I may be able to help Flickr ...

... oddly galleries generally have white walls for a reason, well a few reasons. Firstly, it reflects light around the space to give even illumination, secondly the white surround to artworks ensures the viewers eyes are stopped-down which not only improves resolution but also helps with our colour perception ... the colour receptors in the human eye become less efficient as the light-value reduces.

That may be great for viewing reflected light, but monitors emit light. Nothing hurts my ability to see a photo on the web more than driving all the pixels around it to white.

Secondly, Completion, much of a photo's composition is often a result of the Gestalt completion effect, and if there isn't enough ground between images that effect is lost.

I agree. Where I wouldn't agree is that the old layouts were significantly better in this regard. They too looked like a jumble of images on a page. Now the page is crowded with large images instead of crowded with small images, and I find it an improvement. It would be a sad gallery that hangs photos in a manner that resembled a flickr layout (unless that itself was the meta-aesthetic of the space).

Lastly, Ground-Figure organisation is a necessity for recognising objects through vision, in effect without isolating something from it's surroundings it is very difficult to see it, which is why I use the bloody thing in the first place.

I'd say the same thing as previous: to my eyes, the improvement in image size more than offsets the context change of lessened border thickness between images.

... there, is that constructive enough?

Yep. It's always good to disagree without ad hominem, or transmogrifying personal opinions into objective fact.

 

[jarski]

New Flicker is nice, hope they won't change anything for a while. But not freeze the development for years like with old one either.

 

[henri klein]

New Flicker is nice, hope they won't change anything for a while. But not freeze the development for years like with old one either.

Have fun!
My contacts on Flickr convinced me to move over to Ipernity (btw, it is just to easy and the design is almost the old much appreciated Flickr layout). About 30-40 (out of 60) of my contacts have left for Ipernity or another platform. Although this is only a small sample the overall drain may be substantial.

 

[Michael Markey]

Although this is only a small sample the overall drain may be substantial.

I fear that you may be correct.
Its clear that the new layout has its adherents and that is reasonable enough.

What hasn`t been helpful is the fracture that this change generated to the social interaction between contacts on the site.

Again, partly brought about by the lack of a smooth handover and partly through the disruption it has engendered to familiar navigational habits.

I know little about design so am unable to comment on the dismissal of the design chap but whoever was in charge of Change Management (or whatever name it may go under these days ) needs a rocket up the behind.

 

[Sparrow]

That may be great for viewing reflected light, but monitors emit light. Nothing hurts my ability to see a photo on the web more than driving all the pixels around it to white.



I agree. Where I wouldn't agree is that the old layouts were significantly better in this regard. They too looked like a jumble of images on a page. Now the page is crowded with large images instead of crowded with small images, and I find it an improvement. It would be a sad gallery that hangs photos in a manner that resembled a flickr layout (unless that itself was the meta-aesthetic of the space).



I'd say the same thing as previous: to my eyes, the improvement in image size more than offsets the context change of lessened border thickness between images.



Yep. It's always good to disagree without ad hominem, or transmogrifying personal opinions into objective fact.

... would you care to share the literature that supports those contentions? I'm happy to provide my references if you wish.

 

[hteasley]

... would you care to share the literature that supports those contentions? I'm happy to provide my references if you wish.

I expressed nothing but very specifically called-out personal opinion. I can write something else and cite that as a secondary source on what I think?...