I’ve only just had the opportunity to start playing with my Flickr account (thanks again, Kartooner!). And it turns out the damn thing is amazing.
The interface is gorgeous… and not because it’s loaded up with twirling 3-D buttons, but because it’s so simple and intuitive. Uploading photos, sorting them, adding tags — all fast and easy, with a minimum of searching the screen for the right link to click or field to fill out. For a quick and easy way to get your pictures online and ready to share, it’s unbeatable.
But there’s also tremendous power thrumming away under that unassuming exterior. You can turn Flickr into the engine driving a complex photo blog, use it to stream pictures matching a particular set of keywords, and combine it with technologies like RSS and tagging to make it stand on its hind legs and bark the national anthem. In short, it’s a geek’s dream.
And here’s what else Flickr does: it unleashes the power of social networking. The designers have built in countless little opportunities for serendipity, letting you stumble upon people with intriguing ideas and ways of looking at the world. They couple that with features that let you contact each other, form groups and cooperate.
No wonder Yahoo! snapped these folks up. If you like photography, Flickr is perfect for you; if you like technology, Flickr is perfect for you; if you like people, Flickr is perfect for you. Achieving all of that in a single, integrated site is nothing less than an act of genius.
I’ll be keeping a close eye on how people put Flickr to work. And if you want a sneak peak of where the web is going, you’ll want to do the same.
