Rant about Flickr

[Ronald_H]

A few days back I openend a Flickr account. People get lost in my website these days and I don't have the time or skill to improve it.

Dumped some (very random) photos in it that I like. Put some in groups, organized them a little bit. Was quite impressed how well it was thought out. Some people that share the same interests commented and all was well.

Btw, my account has been tagged 'safe' (whatever that means) and the raunciest thing you'll find there is some suggested nudity. Not a nipple in sight, nothing I wouldn't show to my mum. Actually I HAVE shown my photostream to my mum.

But now people are adding me as contacts. You tend to look at their streams and find out that they like old VW's, like me, or come from the same town. Fine... until yesterday. The last two days I have seen:

- Someone with three very poor P&S style pics on-line, showing nude girls that could never have been 18.

- Someone who is a nudist/naturist and has dozens of pics on-line that show him BBQ'ing stark naked. Including a lot of sausage if you catch my drift.

- Someone with nude pics of a fairly obese woman, without showing her undoubtedly beautiful face.

Damn, I never thought I could be so naieve at the age of 37, but there you have it.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE!

 

[dcsang]

heh.. welcome to the internet 🙂

Dave

 

[Nh3]

WHAT'S WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE!

"Human, alas, all too human!"

-Nietzsche

 

[pesphoto]

im not to up on the ways flickr but maybe there is a way to "block" certain people in your user control panel if there is such a thing?

 

[furcafe]

Yes, you can block people on flickr.

im not to up on the ways flickr but maybe there is a way to "block" certain people in your user control panel if there is such a thing?

 

[cjm]

Yes, you can block people.

If it makes you feel any better I just added you as a contact and I don't have ANY nude stuff, good or bad. 🙂

 

[kitaanat]

I think they have a mechanism to get rid of that kind of pics.
Welcome to flickr.

 

[ferider]

Hey, your account doesn't look safe to me. But I went and browsed it, as desired 🙂 Nice portraits, BTW.

Cheers,

Roland.

 

[photogdave]

I deleted my Flickr account after getting messages from random strangers who downloaded my images and "fixed" them etc.
I t didn't seem like I could make a private area for friends and family to view unless they have Flickr accounts, which most of my family don't.
I really don't miss it. Facebook is better for sharing with friends and family.

 

[bmattock]

Takes all kinds, I guess. I love my Flickr account, and I can share my photos only with family or friends if I wish - and yes, they also have to have Flickr accounts, how else would Flickr know they were my family or friends? But they don't have to pay anything.

I've also sold a number of photos through my photos being seen by random people who wanted to purchase them for a variety of things, from museum fliers to magazine covers to textbook illustrations, etc.

I also love being able to do things like search Flickr for a certain camera - somebody is sure to have taken a photo of one or with one, etc, and I can learn things. The Exif data available is great, as is the 'Camera Finder' and the GPS-based geotagging. It's just a very, very, valuable tool - far more than mere photo sharing, and therefore far more than sites like Myspace - for me, anyway.

I've had a few odd ducks 'favorite' some photos of mine that I thought weren't appropriate, given their own photostream, and a couple try to add me to their contact list who had, as Ronald H experienced, unsavory photos online. I just blocked them, end of problem.

The only real problem I've had was with one guy who made very rude comments about John McCain on some photos I took at a political rally for McCain, really inappropriate, and when I blocked him, he just logged in with a new account and did it again. I blocked him a second time, reported him to Flickr, and that was the end of it.

It's life. Overall, I've had far more positive experiences that negative ones on Flickr.

 

[furcafe]

The problem w/Facebook is that their Terms of Service force you to effectively hand over your copyright to any photos you upload.

Facebook is better for sharing with friends and family.

 

[funkaoshi]

Flickr is awesome.

I don't know if you were aware, but there is a lot of 'bad' stuff on the Internet. Such is life. The beauty of Flickr is you can block the people obnoxious enough to favourite the photographs they are going to masturbate to later.

 

[funkaoshi]

And you can use guess passes to share private photo sets. Facebook has a pretty draconian photo policy.

 

[Spleenrippa]

I deleted my Flickr account after getting messages from random strangers who downloaded my images and "fixed" them etc.
I t didn't seem like I could make a private area for friends and family to view unless they have Flickr accounts, which most of my family don't.
I really don't miss it. Facebook is better for sharing with friends and family.

Facebook also owns anything you post there. Be careful!

 

[photogdave]

I don't think Facebook's terms are that different than Flickr. They don't "own" your photos but they need the rights to host them.

 

[feenej]

You don't need a Flickr account to see somebody's photos. I just send people a link and they can see my Flickr photos.

 

[bmattock]

You don't need a Flickr account to see somebody's photos. I just send people a link and they can see my Flickr photos.

I think he meant if you choose to restrict the photos to 'friends' or 'family', they have to have a Flickr account, because the general public can't see photos marked that way, even if you email them the link.

 

[1alfred]

...ahem, is it ok to show us that BBQ- photo? Not that I`m into weirdo-stuff, I`m just more than normally interrested in BBQ`s 😉

 

[mbisc]

I love my flickr account as well, but I have had weird "invites for contacts" as well (I just ignored them..) -- I lived in Delhi for a while, and (naturally) have a fair number of pictures of "Muslim" architecture (tombs, mosques etc.), so for a while I got bizzare invites from (shall we say) fundamentalists that maybe thought I was making religious statements(?) -- I am not, and have plenty of Hindu and Buddhist-themed photos as well. Not many secular shots (except, well, forts and palaces that follow the principles of "Muslim" architecture.

If you have aver been to India, these are the kind of the photos one would take, if you are into architecture and not into street photography...

 

[markho]

I think he meant if you choose to restrict the photos to 'friends' or 'family', they have to have a Flickr account, because the general public can't see photos marked that way, even if you email them the link.

That used to be true, but isn't anymore - you can now choose whether people with a guest pass can see private photos (and specify what type of private photos they can see - those for friends, those for family, both, or neither).