/dev/null/kevin

Flickr launched its new video service today (Tuesday 08 April).  For me this is awesome because I already use flickr for my photos.  Like most people, my digital camera also takes decent quality videos and it is very nice to have them in the same stream as my photos.

There are two features that really make flickr better for personal video clips over YouTube.

1. Better image quality - See below.
   


2. Can download the original - I liked Google Video for this same reason.  It's very valuable to have off-site backups of your photos and videos so now I have both in one place.
   

Of course, with only a 90 second limit, YouTube, and other services, are still better for longer and professional vids.

Compare the quality of the same video uploaded to both YouTube and Flickr.

YouTube:

Flickr Video:

Update: Found one strike against Flickr: The embedded video doesn't appear/play in Google Reader. If you don't see the Flickr video window try here.

Update 2: According to Kellan of Flickr, this is a known problem.  You can work around the Google Reader problem by subscribing using the RSS feed and not the Atom feed. 

Is there any real value in flickr collections?  Please tell me what I'm missing.

A flickr set is a group of pictures.  I can view a set together, make a slide show, and edit the set together.  It's a very useful feature.

A flickr collection is a group of sets and it provides some organizational structure for sets that are related.  I can add or remove sets from a collection, as well as add a description.  The collection also gets a special mosaic badge made up of images from the various sets. 

However, other than those very basic features (which I admit, have some value), it seems that collections should allow me to  do so much more:

• No collection tools - With a set I can perform multiple actions on the whole set, but there are no actions for a collection.
• I can't view the whole collection as a slide show.
• I can't edit the whole collection.
• I can't add tags to a collection.
• I can't view the whole collection as a stream.
• I can't load a collection into the flickr organizer.
• Collection mosaic icon is useless.
• The mosaic's URL changes if I edit the mosaic (select different images) - This means I can't use the mosaic for anything like a thumbnail for a link to the collection's page.  If something exists, but I can't use it, does it have any value?
  
• The mosaic icon doesn't even appear on the collection's own page!

I probably won't be blogging over the US Thanksgiving holiday, so an early jab at dumb people.  The first dumb person is ...

• Me - For not buying Google stock, even at the "ridiculous" price of $100.


• Google's Calendar Team - Great system, except for one huge flaw.  They've been "working on a fix" for months now.  Careful guys, that might cut into your $500 stock price.
  


• Dave "Mega Pixels Don't Matter" Pogue - OK, I'm being harsh calling him "dumb" but a tech reporter for the New York Times should know better.  This guy took a 13 mega-pixel image, down rezzed it twice to 8 and 5 MP, and then blew up all three images into 16 x 24 inch prints.  Then on the streets of New York, where photography experts constantly roam the streets, he tried to find people who could tell the difference.  Read the comments for lots of good explanations why he missed the point, but it was fairly obvious (to me) that resampling a 13 MP image down to 5 MP would produce a superior image than that taken by a 5MP camera to begin with.  Dave needs to look up the term anti-aliasing.

Dave is correct in that the average person does not need a 13 megapixel camera (or even 8 MP), but that's like saying the average person doesn't need to live in a castle.

Happy Thanksgiving, all!

Tags: google, calendar, photography