Finally Flickr implemented a feature that has been long in development; the ability to geotag, while not having to use third party tools. Ever since Dan Catt from geobloggers.com got hired by the Flickr empire, geotaggers have been holding their breath (actually far from it, since new cool tools and applications appear weekly). But now it finally got revealed. Not surprisingly they use yahoo maps, which is kind of crappy outside the US, so third party googlemaps integrations will most likely still be popular for a while. But there is no doubt that this is the right step to go for Flickr.
Maybe this is also an incentive for yahoo maps to do something about their lack of detail, and do an upgrade like skynet (read google) just did recently in Europe.
For all of us who already had a lot of geotagged photos, they made a cool but necessary import feature, which automatically imports all the geotagged photos, to the map. The location data also has various levels of privacy, so not everyone is necessarily allowed to watch the location of every picture. The tags itself are, as far as I can see hidden but now a text appear above the EXIF data, about the location of the photo, and a link to a popup map. For me this is a great thing, and I hope many more will get on with the geotagging for no greater purpose than make to holyday photos a little more interesting. The only thing i am worrying a bit about is the risk that geotagging, using yahoo will lead to very unprecise tags. Since almost no roads, other than the major highways are represented outside US, it could be very hard to tag precise locations. Panasonic >> the next time I by a lumix, it better be with GPS!!
Although, the information about the location is a very nice feature, it is actually wrong on this picture. Victoria, Hong Kong Island, is south of the strait on the picture. The picture was taken in Kowloon, Hong Kong.
Look at my flickr map here, or view my still more detailed googlemap implementation here.
August 29th, 2006 at 02:30
Actually Panasonic’s next Lumix (the FX50) will not have GPS, unfortunately. That hasn’t, however, stopped me from putting my order in for it…It’s still a great camera
I was debating if I should go for a Sony instead (they’re just too small for my huge man-hands.. :S)…mainly because of their GPS “integration”…actually their device for it looks pretty ok. Check it out at . From the looks of it, it should work other cameras (unless they crippled the software…only time will tell