I just spotted that I now have 20,075 photographs on Flickr. The image above is the latest, and it was posted on April 20. I posted my very first image on Flickr on July 20, 2005. It was the image of downtown Pomaria that you see below:
That works out to nearly 2,500 images per year for the nearly eight years I’ve been doing this, or just about 200 images per month. That comes in fits and starts, though. I uploaded 236 photos just from our last paddling trip.
Not all of those images are available to the public. I keep some locked away, or a few that are only visible to identified friends and family on Flickr, usually photos of kids that the parents may not want available to just anyone. Not all of those images are photographs, either. Some are screen captures that I use in blog posts here and elsewhere, and in tutorials. I generally keep those out of the public view so that they don’t clutter up my photostream, but they are visible when I share them on other websites.
According to Flickr statistics and as of this writing, my photos have been viewed 886,135 times by someone other than myself. My top two most popular photos to date are the ones below, in order:
The “Feed and Lead” photo is also my most pilfered – I find uncredited photos of it rehosted all over the web, usually on lists such as the “10 Worst Church Signs.” I’ve had people question its authenticity, and ask if I used one of those sign generator apps to create it. I usually point them to another photo that shows the sign in context.
I got a Flickr account specifically to hold images for this website. I didn’t really intend it as a photography showcase or portfolio. Therefore I’m not as selective as some Flickr users, and tend to dump lots of stuff out there. While I enjoy artistic photography, I’m more into documenting the world in which I live.
Flickr has had its ups and downs – mostly downs. It started off as a strong community, but languished when bought out by Yahoo. Other image-sharing and social network services such as Facebook and Google+ took the spotlight, and Yahoo seemed to be leaving Flickr with few, if any, updates to compete. In the last year or so that seems to be turning around…slowly. Flickr has come out with a few improvements, but it still has the same clunky user interface it’s had for the past 8 years.
Even with its clunkiness, the site still has some good features, and it still does what I need. It’s still an excellent bargain compared to some other sites. With 20K+ photos on the site, I’m very much invested in its continued well being. However, I do keep my options open. Moving all of my photos to new locations would completely disrupt any links and would wreak havoc here, but it’s doable. Let’s just hope Flickr can keep things going for a few more decades, and I can see my numbers rise to 100, or even 500K.