Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

Jay Fienberg points out an additional capability of Flickr's new sort-by-camera feature:

Additionally, each view may be filtered using a conventional controlled vocabulary, which is available via a drop down menu, and that has options like: portrait photos, night photos, landscape photos, etc.

One of the things that's neat about this is that the data that drives this system comes, in large part, from the cameras themselves. With each photo, each digital camera records some data about itself and about how the picture was taken (e.g., at night, in landscape or portrait position, etc.), and the Flickr team has mapped this data into the hierarchical structure through which the photos can be browsed.

In another post, Jay reminds us that the way we sort information depends on what we're trying to do, so becoming a champion of a single way of sorting is like becoming someone who insists on only using a saw. Important to keep in mind. But it's also important to recognize—as Jay does—that with the advent of the digital, we're now all able to use whatever tools we want on the same pile of scrap wood, simultaneously.