Techcrunchies points us to some illuminating stats from the world of new media. The bit that interests us the most is the ranking of the top photo sharing sites on the web. Leading the pack by a pretty big margin (3.8 billion photos) is Facebook - not Flickr or Photobucket, the major image repositories that one might think would be owning this market. Their standings:
1. Facebook : 10 billion photos
2. Photobucket : 6.2 billion
3. Flickr : 2 billion
Why is this happening? Perhaps it’s because people want to do more with their photos then just store and share them online. While Flickr lets users tag their photos and organize them in more than a handful of ways, the community around the photos is undefined - sometimes tight knit (members who only share their photos with their families), and other times nonexistent (those who post for the general public to see). When users upload to Facebook, they’re giving their photos a context and bringing them into their social worlds. The photos, in some sense, become units of social capital. Users post photos onto Facebook not just to share them with others, but to serve as an extension of their online identities, as an element of the narrative they want to tell about themselves to their friends and network. On Facebook, the value of a photo (even a hastily posted mobile upload) is in its ability to crystallize a moment in a user’s life to be shared, recorded and filed into the annals of his/her (and their friends) social history.
[via Techcrunchies]
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It makes sense, FB is a platform on which value is created (eg the apps), whereas Flickr is an application trying hard to create a platform.
October 21st, 2008 at 1:50 pm
I think this touches on a larger concept, being the study of anthropologic and sociologic relations in the cyber age. A photograph is worth a thousand words but FB has adapted and transformed this old adage. Photos have been morphed into a form of spending time and a tool to deepen relationships with people who are not present in our daily, non electronic lives. People can now create a sense of identity and reality around these visual glimpses through tagging and personal comments. The applications of this phenomena, which is of a somewhat recent nature, I believe have yet to be explored to their fullest business potential.
October 21st, 2008 at 6:37 pm
If you love to snap photos, but have no time for organizing or sharing them, check out Snaphappi’s handcrafted photo processing. Their photo editors can sort through your photos and pick your best shots, then enhance and prepare them for printing or sharing on the web. Their designers can also turn your photos into beautiful photobooks - a wonderful keepsake and the perfect gift for family or friends. Learn more at: http://snaphappi.com.
December 16th, 2008 at 1:58 am