I picked this photo from the Flickr website for a number of reasons. Firstly, I like golf. Secondly, I prefer outdoors photographs to indoor ones. Thirdly, I have actually visited the area where this golf course is at (even though I didn't actually play there!). I must admit that this photo does bring back good memories for me as visiting the "Monterey Peninsular" was one of my highlights of my trip to the United States about fifteen years ago. It's a great area for golf courses- the other famous golf course in this area is "Pebble Beach" which is actually a public golf course that anybody (with a low enough handicap and enough money!) can play.
Doesn't the fairway look beautiful and the picture of the bright blue Pacific Ocean in the background is magnificent.
Well, I have spent the last few hours "playing" with Flickr (looking at lots of photos, having a play with the maps feature, creating a "Flickr" account & posting an image to my blog) and I think that I am now ready to add my two cents worth on the subject.
It looks as though Flickr is a great tool that people can use to share photos with other people. While it does have a few flaws, it does have a lot of great features. Being able to "tag" photos with keywords is quite a useful feature as it gives the image poster the ability to make their photos easily retrievable for those who search the database. The "sets" feature is also useful as it allows the photographer to group all of the photos that have the same theme together. As far as the flaws are concerned, I didn't find the help very useful at times (maybe that's just me however!) & the advanced search was hidden for some reason (there should be a link to the advanced search from the home page in my humble opinion).
How can libraries make use of Flickr?
1. By creating a Flickr account, libraries will find it much easier to post pictures on the Internet of library activities. In other words, no html knowledge is required! How good is that!
2. I would think that Flickr is a great marketing tool- by showing off photos of previous library events you can create interest in up and coming events.
3. As I have just done, libraries and other organisations can make use of Flickr by integrating it with their blogs. Once a picture is found in Flickr that you want to add to a blog, in most cases it is as simple as clicking the "blog this" button.
4. Like blogs, Flickr can have a real community feel to it- so when new images are posted to a library's Flickr account, people should not feel afraid to add their comments. And as public libraries are there for the community this should be a perfect fit. With the publics feedback, libraries will be able to improve their services.
No comments:
Post a Comment