I love Flikr. I can spend hours looking for images, and I’m easily distracted by all the shiny new art I can find there. In particular, I find the absurd and surreal groups quite engrossing. What I didn’t know was that Flickr culture is so interesting.
One of my students showed me this page, which is simply titled Flicr: Panda, but I think we can all agree that it is pure AWESOMNESS! Come on, a panda that spews rainbows and a constant stream of “interesting photos”.
But how is the “interestingness” of a photo determined?
Enter the Magic Donkey. This is the term that refers to the algorithm that Flickr uses to determine if a photo is interesting enough to appear on the photos that appear on the home page. My impression is that many hard-core Flickr users would like to appear on the home page of the site. (Perhaps it would help with traffic, I don’t know.)
I enjoyed this explanation of it, for sure, and if you want to learn more, I’m sure the “secrets of explore” group can help.
