Interestingness

Down there at Flickr's homepage, there's this section called "Explore". (You'd know what I mean if you're a Flickrite.) I had no idea what the hell it was. All I knew was if you click on it, it'd take you to some page called "Explore" (duh), where you can spend hours browsing through tonnes and tonnes of interesting photos. Obviously, someone, somehow, keeps track of all those photos and decides if they're interesting enough to be showcased on this page. That's all I knew all these while, despite having an active Flickr account since more than a year ago.

Alright, I'm a slow learner...

But two days ago, I eventually learned more about this interestingness thingy, when I stumbled upon Big Huge Labs. It hosts a number of cool Flickr toys developed by some generous folks. And one of the gadgets, Scout, has become my favourite.

Scout: Find your photographs in Flickr Explore

it says.

At that point, I still had no idea about Flickr Explore. But I gave it a try anyway. Then, voila! It returned two results.

I... what(?)... have two photos on Explore? Now, that's interesting!

This photo which I took in Miyajima last summer was one of them.

What's more, this photo has a ranking of #57, it said.

Then, there was this other photo I posted the other day.

Mt Fuji at sunset, taken at Yamanaka Lake, one of the famous Fuji Five Lakes. And this one ranked in the #40's.

Wow, that's cool. I had to find out more.

By doing a quick search, I found out that Flickr has got some kind of algorithm that figures out the interestingness of each photo uploaded everyday. No one knows how the algorithm works exactly. But common sense tells that page views, number of comments and favourites are surely part of the recipe for the interestingness algo. So, obviously the ranking changes over time, as photos get viewed, commented or faved. I learned that my Miyajima photo was once a #8. It has slipped down the rankings over time.

As for the second photo, it now ranks at #10. I've no idea how much longer it'll remain on the front page of Explore 19 November 2008. But making it into Explore certainly meant a lot. I've been wanting to take a shot of Mt Fuji from the lakes but the weather hasn't been cooperative; sunny days on weekdays but when it comes to Sundays, it's always cloudy or rainy. When the weather forecast on Tuesday predicted a stretch of sunny days, I made up my mind about making a trip down to Yamanaka Lake the very next day after the first lesson. It cost me 4000 yen and frozen fingers (it dropped to as low as -1゜C after sunset). Of course, at first it was plainly for the pleasure I derive from photography that I took the trouble going there. Nevertheless, the fact that the other Flickrites like it is a very warm encouragement.

Though I'm very well aware that there're many other photos out there that deserve better compliments. So, let's not get too lightheaded.

Anyway, just one last little publicity.