Questions and Answers

1. What is Flickr?
2. Why use Flickr?
3. Is Flickr difficult to use?
4. What equipment do I need?
5. Will it take time?
6. What will be in the Guide?
7. Why do I have to join Yahoo?
8. Can anyone join the Biss Meadow Group at Flickr?
9. Why do the photographs have to be described?
10. What happens if I don't describe my photos?
11. Is there anything else to know?
12. Is there anything not in the guide?

1. What is Flickr?

Flickr is a web based service for storing and sharing photos. It is a free service with additional paid for facilities but the free basic service will be sufficient for Friends use.

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2. Why use Flickr?

Flickr makes the storing and contributing of photos to the Friends web site much easier:

• Friends can add their photos as and when they wish, without having to wait for the Web Master to add them.
• photos can take a lot of computer storage space and then make heavy demands on the web site server and communications lines. Holding them at Flickr potentially avoids Friends of Biss Meadows group having to pay a bandwidth or storage penalty charge.
• Flickr allows web sites like the Friends of Biss Meadows site, to integrate the photos so they appear to be part of our own web site.
• Flickr has ready made facilities for categorising the photos. This allows different parts of the Friends web site to display relevant photos. For example, the page on flowers will show photos of the flowers on Biss Meadows.
• Flickr has facilities for private groups whose members can make comments and discuss the photos' subject.
• Flickr allows some of the administration to be shared. Designated Friends can be made joint administrators or moderators.
• there is an enthusiastic and helpful group of Flickr users.

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3. Is Flickr difficult to use?

The basics are straight forward and are explained in the guide. This should be sufficient and there should be no need to read any manuals. Never-the-less there is on screen help at Flickr as well as the Flickr user forums where experienced Flickr users are willing to help. The Friends' Web Master / Flickr Administrator can also help.

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4. What equipment do I need?

You will need:

• either a digital camera or if you have a film camera then a scanner.
  • some film processors (e.g. Truprint) give the option of also receiving you photos on a CD for a small extra charge and this avoids needing to scan the photos.
• a Personal Computer (a Mac should be OK) .
• you may use either the Microsoft Internet Explorer or Firefox browser.
• an internet service provider (ISP) account with a broadband connection
  • or you could use a PC at an internet café, community centre or a library.

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5. Will it take time?

There are some initial steps that must be undertaken once. This should take about 20 mins. They are listed in question 6.

Preparing, uploading and defining 6 photos to the pool should take about 40 minutes, less when practiced.

Full details are in the Guide.

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6. What will be in the Guide?

There are step by step instructions for the once-off activities:

1. Joining Yahoo
2. Joining Flickr
3. Joining the Biss Meadows Group

Once these initial steps are done then you are ready to begin to submit your photos. There are instructions for:

1. Preparing Your Photos
2. Sending Your Photos to Flickr
3. Describing Your Photos to Flickr
4. Adding Your Photos to the Biss Meadow Group Pool

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7. Why do I have to join Yahoo?

Because Yahoo own Flickr and they use the same log-in. The guide tell you how to opt-out of Yahoo's marketing. You don't have to use any other Yahoo facility.

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8. Can anyone join the Biss Meadow Group at Flickr?

No. Only members of the Friends of Biss Meadows Country Park can join and only they can discuss the photos in the pool.

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9. Why do the photographs have to be described?

Giving a short descriptive title helps people to find the your photos and find out about Biss Meadows Country Park and the Friends.

Tagging the photos means they appear in the Gallery page and eventually on the relevant topic pages. Tagging allows visitors to the Gallery to select photos on a particular subject, a valuable facility when we have hundreds of photos. Click here for the tag list.

Setting the Date Taken, even if approximate, helps us to build a picture of the way Biss Meadows is changing over the years.

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10. What happens if I don't describe my photos?

They will not appear in the Biss Meadows web site, only within the Flickr Biss Meadows Group Pool.

The Administrator will ask you to describe and tag your photos. He is able to help you learn how to do this.

11. Is there anything else to know?

Just a few things:

• you retain legal ownership of all the photos that you submit to Flickr unless you change the permissions. This should inhibit stealing or passing off of your photos, but not all people keep to the law and in many countries enforcing copyright is difficult and expensive.
• only those who have been accepted as a Friend and have given the Secretary their contact details will be able to join the Flickr Biss Meadows Group and submit photos.
• Friends, and only Friends, can make comments about your photos. The Moderators will amend or remove any inappropriate comments. We expect Friends to be friendly!
• the Administrator maintains the right to correct any errors or remove any inappropriate, excessive and similar photos and to remove any anti-social member. Friends can always appeal to the Chair.
• only 10 photos can be submitted per day to the Flickr Biss Meadows Group. That's to encourage quality and tagging.
• the free Flickr account is limited to 100MB per month. That is the equivalent of 200 photos of 500K each or 100 of 1MB each. Keeping the size of photos to under 1,000K (1MB) makes photos display faster as well as inhibiting copyright infringement for commercial gain. Digital cameras photos are typically 2MB or more so you may have to reduce them in size.
• the free Flickr account is limited to displaying your last 200 photos. To see the older ones you will need to upgrade to the Pro account at $24 per year (or open another free account but see the next point).
• if you do not log-in to your Flickr account for 90 days then your account is deleted and you will loose all your photos.
• any Flickr member can make comments on your Flickr photos but the Guide shows you how to restrict that to particular groups.

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12. Is there anything not in the guide?

We've kept this guide to the basic minimum. So you will have to look elsewhere for information on:

• managing photos from your digital camera or mobile phone.
• using your scanner to scan photos.
• sending photos directly to Flickr from your mobile phone, via email, by using a plug-ins or using any 3rd party software installed on your PC [the Guide covers using a browser method only].
• using your own or the Flickr online photo editing software [normally there is no need to use this].

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