It has been hard for me to choose among ways of sharing photos with my friends and family. I have mainly used Picasa for photo storage and sharing many photos with my family, Facebook for sharing photos with friends, and Flickr just to post photos I like most just because so many people have Flickr. I also use Photobucket to store photos that I post on the web. Picasa made it easy to share through email, which I have to do with my family because they don’t socially network much. Facebook is the easiest for friends, because they are (almost) all already there. I had a few friends on Flickr, and such good photographers use it, that I felt compelled to only post pictures there that I was proud of for some reason (either because they were good, significant, of people I love, or a good shot of me). I think I’ll probably end up using the pay option of Flickr for everything in the end. Picasa is quickly running out of storage, and I think it’s more expensive. (Funny how every week you hear me say, I use [insert Google-owned service here] because I already have a Google account and it integrates with all the rest of their services easily.)
Libraries can use Flickr to store photos from the archives, pictures of library events, or photo tours of the library. Getting a feed with pictures of new books instead of just lists might also be a fun thing to try. One wouldn’t have to have any XML know-how to upload a photo to Flickr and include a desciption, and Flickr would automatically generate an RSS feed to which people could subscribe or sign up for email updates (by using RSS to EMail tools). YA librarians could use Flickr accounts for games, like scavenger hunts, too. Take a picture of a place where a clue or prize is hidden, upload it, and they have to go find it. There are lots of good and creative ways to use photo sharing to make a more personal connection with patrons. Flickr allows people to comment and tag, as well, so someone looking at a picture of a special event from the 40s on the library flickr site might be able to comment and give more details about the photo or event if they attended or heard about it.
Here are some pictures from adventures in my new city and the surrounding area:
