Acceptable
Acceptable
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
Why you should not “geotag” your photos using Flickr
Geotagging photos has become increasingly popular over the last years. For those who are not familiar with geotagging (or geocoding), this is the process of adding geographic information to a photo. In my world there are three ways to add geographic information to a photo all resulting in the same thing: GPS coordinates end up in a photo’s EXIF where they belong:
- At the time of capture GPS coordinates are injected into the image (common among mobile phones with GPS receiver like iPhone, Nokia N95 etc)
- GPS coordinates are injected afterwards using geotagging software and a GPX file. The GPX file is generated by some kind of GPS tracking device
- You manually add GPS coordinates to your photos using geotagging software and a map
Flickr offers the possibility to place uploaded photos on a map. There seems to be some misunderstanding that by doing this you are geotagging your photos. What you’re actually doing is tighing a geographic layer to your photos. In no way do you inject GPS coordinates to your photos by placing them on a Flickr map. What’s the big deal? When you download your photos they will not contain any GPS coordinates (try it!). When you move your photos to another online photo service they will not contain any GPS coordinates. No matter how cool, the placing on a map feature at Flickr is a Flickr thing only and the geographical information will be gone once your photos leave Flickr.
This is not good. You don’t want to be dependent on Flickr. That’s why you should geotag your photos yourself in one of the three ways I described above before you upload them to Flickr. When you later download your geotagged photos the GPS coordinates will still be there. Like most online photo services, Flickr reads your photo’s EXIF during upload and will automatically place geotagged photos on a map.
For the same reasons you should add title, description, contact and copyright info to your photos before uploading them to Flickr. You and not Flickr should own that data.
Trailguru for iPhone
I had a chance to try out Trailguru on my iPhone today. Trailguru is an application that constantly tracks your location. For this it uses the iPhone’s GPS receiver. It’s a nice app with a clean interface and most important very accurate. Uploading your tracks to the Trailguru website gives you all kind of exciting possibilities. You can get back your data in a GPX file which you for example can use to geotag your photos. You can also share your tracks with friends or embed them on your website (see below).
The big problem for Trailguru on the iPhone is that using the GPS receiver sucks hard on your iPhone battery. After an hour of tracking, your iPhone’s battery will be about empty. Another problem is that tracking requires you to leave the Trailguru screen open. In other words, you dedicate your iPhone to Trailguru once you start tracking. Both of these problems aren’t really Trailguru’s fault, but annoying nevertheless.
I will keep Trailguru on my iPhone a bit longer. It might come out handy some time, but it is not an app I will be using very often.
Gott!
Gott!
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
Scratching
Scratching
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
Do you like this?
Do you like this?
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
My 3 Reasons to Consolidate Microblogging Services
2008 was an exciting year on the web. I tried out many different services and joined a lot of social networks. Now, at the end of the year, it’s time to evaluate and possibly adjust my web activities. First out are the microblogging services. These are Identi.ca, Jaiku, Kwippy, Plurk and Twitter. I want to consolidate these to one microblogging service and here is why:
1. I want to be unique
If I had the time and energy I would like to produce unique input at every single microblogging service I’m a member of. I would like to maintain little community of people at every one of them. I don’t have the time nor the energy to do this. Instead I’m using Ping.fm to microblog the same thing to each service. This just doesn’t feel right. Besides “repeating” myself like a parrot, upsetting Google and others, I’m also generating a lot of noise at my aggregators.
2. I want to keep it simple
With all these microblogging services in combination with Ping.fm it’s easy to lose track of what ends up where. The flow is complex and hard to manage. There are obvious risks for loops.
3. I want the fittest to survive
Looking back at 2008 gives me an idea of which microblogging services are here to stay and which are going to disappear. Especially in tougher times like these. Not only do I want a reliable and robust service with a large community to be my primary microblogging service, I also want it to be my only microblogging service.
It was actually an easy decision. From the 1st of january 2009 I will be using Twitter as my only microblogging service. I will remove the others from my aggregators like Friendfeed and Lifestream.fm. I will keep my account at the other services, but they will become inactive. I might be able to skip Ping.fm as well.
I’m curious to know what your favorite microblogging service is. That’s why I created a little poll below.
Loading ...Photowalk
Photowalk
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
A break
A break
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
Not much left
Not much left
Originally uploaded by Rutger Mobile
My Latest Photos at Flickr
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