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Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

benjaminkerensa.com

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Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#61

Post by ChuckMcM »

adamnemecek wrote: post #25
ChuckMcM wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment tugs at me. "end users won't run their own servers" The reason it tugs at me is because I can't tell if it is because they don't want to, or that they can't .

I mean can you imagine say a high schooler having to maintain a server running their facebook profile?

Yes, I can imagine a high schooler running a server that not only maintains their facebook profile but provides a chat room and runs a home grown mmo ... what I can't imagine is their grandmother running a server. She needs/wants something that is easily farmed out to minimally trained technicians.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#62

Post by jmathai »

SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #48
Gravityloss wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Openphoto works like this (among other ways): You can get [name].openphoto.me account and link it with your dropbox. You upload photos to your openphoto account by dragging them into a window - but the files actually go to folders on your dropbox account. Hence - full control, backup ability and everything. Anybody (you, the FBI, a hacker) can delete your openphoto account tomorrow but you don't lose a single pho…

But, on the other hand anyone (you, the FBI, a hacker) can delete your dropbox account tomorrow and you'll lose all your photos. This just moves the problem.

Moves the problem in such a way that if you stop trusting Dropbox you can easily move your photos to another location without any disruption of the service.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#63

Post by jmathai »

Gravityloss wrote: post #46

I've used it since summer now. It's mostly ok, but it sucks for actually viewing any photos as they are really really small and most of the screen estate is just navigation stuff. I hope at some point in the future it will be useful for its intended purpose: viewing photos. Seems to be down at the moment as well...

We're keenly aware of the UI issues and have been addressing them in the upcoming release which is about 4 weeks out. Hopefully it'll be much more useful once we release it.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#64

Post by jmathai »

adamnemecek wrote: post #4

Even though it would be cool, I think that the situation is similar to Diaspora/Facebook, i.e. end users won't run their own servers and it would not be profitable for third parties to run them either.

I think the primary difference is that Diaspora faced a chicken/egg problem which we don't. Social isn't the primary focus of what we're building so if you're the only person in the world using OpenPhoto you can derive a good deal of value from it on day 1.

I think there are other large challenges ahead of us but I don't think the Diaspora example is entirely accurate because what hurt them doesn't completely apply to us.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#65

Post by buza »

FireBeyond wrote: post #30
buza wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's one datapoint: I have 652,082 images in my account, and have downloaded my entire library a number of times using different 3rd party utilities. Haven't ever had an issue.

Even as someone who can shoot 1,000 shots in a day for a wedding easily... mind sharing, what/how you have over half a million shots of?

Most of them are screenshots uploaded via a script for an academic project.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#66

Post by Gravityloss »

jmathai wrote: post #63
Gravityloss wrote: post #46

I've used it since summer now. It's mostly ok, but it sucks for actually viewing any photos as they are really really small and most of the screen estate is just navigation stuff. I hope at some point in the future it will be useful for its intended purpose: viewing photos. Seems to be down at the moment as well...

We're keenly aware of the UI issues and have been addressing them in the upcoming release which is about 4 weeks out. Hopefully it'll be much more useful once we release it.

Thanks jmathai, that's awesome!

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#67

Post by DigitalSea »

DigitalSea wrote: post #37

OpenPhoto who? I had never heard of OpenPhoto until now, so I guess that kind of weakens the point of this article by about 50% straight up. Flickr in my opinion while having failed to stay relevant in a world of Instagrams and Facebook, it's still the best place to store your photos and from what I hear Marissa is focusing on Flickr quite heavily recently. Free might seem better than $25 per month, but $25 per month…

My bad, I've got a tight deadline due and probably shouldn't even be on HN. Yes I meant $25 per year. Even S3 could compete with $25 per month, ha.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#68

Post by berberous »

jmathai wrote: post #11

I'm the founder of the project. Benjamin is one of our community managers and I'm glad he wrote this. The value of OpenPhoto differs for many people. Benjamin stated why he uses it and even volunteers his time to help make it successful. What I'm focusing on is making it easy and useful for people to regain control and peace of mind that all their photos are safe, in one spot and enjoyable. We are doing this a few di…

How the hell do I delete my account and/or photos? There seems to be no way to deactivate my account, or delete my photos.

Also, it took like 6 hours before it pulled any photos from Facebook.

No offense, but all in all, this was a really frustrating and unhappy user experience for me.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#69

Post by laureny »

> If you have been living in a cave for the past few months then you would have missed the success of OpenPhoto

I don't live in a cave, and while OpenPhoto is promising, it's quite a bit premature to call it "a success", especially in the presence of competitors boasting millions of users such as Picasa and Flickr.

Let's talk again once OpenPhoto reaches a million users.

Re: Why OpenPhoto will defeat Picasa and Flickr

#70

Post by laureny »

> Currently Google’s Picasa and Yahoo’s Flickr lack the same openness

What lack of openness exactly? I can go to Picasa at any time and download a fully original picture (the very same picture I uploaded to Google's servers). I also have an API I can use to access Picasa and Flickr.

> With all of the above reasons in mind and all the features that are being added its going to be hard to find any reason not to use OpenPhoto.

Yeah, Linux has been using the same tired argument for a couple of decades now. The bottom line is that "it's open and free" is not enough to convince millions of users to use your product.

> Note: I’m currently a member of the OpenPhoto Team

Ah... ok, I wish I had read this first and I wouldn't even have bothered posting this.

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