Tag: images

There Are Now Over 15 Million Media Files In Wikimedia Commons

The WIkimedia Foundation announced that on December 4, Wikimedia Commons, the organization’s free media repository, hit a 15 million media file milestone. There are now over 15 million pictures, videos and audio files, and the 15 millionth one shows Tropical Depression Seventeen-W, described as a “tropical cyclone that developed during the 1996 Pacific typhoon season.” It comes from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The last such milestone the foundation announced was 10 million media files, back in April of 2011.

“Credit is due to the Wikimedia Commons community, who is largely involved in a variety of projects, processes and negotiations that are intended to improve the availability of public domain and freely-licensed educational media content to the public,” says Peter Weis on the Wikimedia blog.

“The last two years have seen an increasing number of cultural institutions (GLAM) and other organisations providing content that would have otherwise not been freely accessible,” he adds. “Two Wiki Loves Monuments contests have also been responsible for more than 500,000 uploaded images. Moreover, constant technical improvements, such as the UploadWizard introduced in May 2011, and the new HTML5 video player, facilitate the contributions of current and future participants and encourage them to expand niches like audio and video.”

Wikimedia projects attract 480 million unique visitors per month, according to the foundation.

December 11, 2012
Imgur Launches Major Update, Looks To Rely Less On Sites Like Reddit

Imgur has unveiled its biggest update to date, seeking to make Imgur more of a destination site and less of just a place where people upload photos to share elsewhere (though this shouldn’t be a problem either).

“The upgrade means images and memes can spread even faster,” a spokersperson for Imgur tells WebProNews. “Where sharing on Facebook may elicit a handful of likes from your close-knit community, positive or negative feedback from communities where sharing is so deeply engrained, like Reddit and Imgur, can generate tens or hundreds of thousands of responses.”

“The interplay between Reddit and Imgur is interesting as well, so no doubt Imgur giving its community the ability to bypass Reddit and share images directly on Imgur will be perceived as a shift,” she adds.

Imgur gets 1.2 billion views per day, and there’s no question that a significant portion of those come from Reddit.

With the update, Imgur is bringing its image gallery to the forefront, essentially making it the homepage, and users will be able to share images directly from the site with a new icon in the navigation bar on every page. The company says the update “sharpens the company’s focus” on creating an image-sharing platform upon which anyone can share with everyone.

In the past, users have had to share images on other social sites (like Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) to get many views, but now, the company says, images will have a better chance to go viral because users will be able to discover, vote, share and discuss images on the site itself.

It seems to me like the sharing on Reddit, Facebook, etc. would make them go more viral, but okay.

“This is the biggest update we’ve made to Imgur since we launched, and we’re stoked! Our community has been asking for this and we’re committed to giving them the absolute easiest and best way to share images, and to give those images a chance to go viral,” said Founder and CEO, Alan Schaaf.

The company had this to say about image and comment sorting in a blog post:

This new gallery also allows for easier and, dare we say, better sorting. Use the header to change from new (images being added in real time to the gallery) to hot (highest scoring images) to top of the week, month year or all time. You can also sort by virality, score or time. Virality is a score that combines views, votes and time into one to give you the most popular images at the moment.

Images will still be added based on the popularity algorithm that is part of the “old gallery.” The difference is that these images are no longer considered new. They have already been shared around the web and stood the test of time, therefore they are added straight to the hot section. The “new” section you are used to is now hottest images sorted by time.

By implementing a smarter algorithm to sort comments, we hope to combat the idea that the first post will be top comment regardless of its overall quality compared to the other, later comments. Introducing the “best” ranking. Simply put, it uses lots of math to come up with a confidence score for each comment that does not factor time. When a few people have voted on a comment, you get a rough idea of its quality. A comment with 100 upvotes but 50 downvotes has a lower confidence rating than a comment with 30 upvotes and 0 downvotes, despite that it has more overall points. The algorithm will create a hypothetical situation and assume that, if everyone were given the chance to see the second comment, it would be ranked higher. We hope that this improves the quality of top comments and make your votes count more.

The update goes live for all users on Monday, October 29th.

When we spoke with Imgur earlier this year, the company indicated that we’d see mobile apps this fall. When asked about it again, we were told that a mobile app is “still coming at some point in the future, but no official word yet.”

Obviously, this new update would have a significant impact on the nature of an app.

October 25, 2012
Being a Booth Babe Can Be Tedious

As many regular convention attendee will attest, booth babes are as common as winter colds, but for most males (and some females, undoubtedly) in the crowd, their presence makes the showroom floor a much more enjoyable experience. But sometimes, being eye candy for a tech industry company’s booth isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be, at least according to some experienced models who shared their experiences in a recent interview.

The interview was conducted by Michael Kan, and it appeared in both PC World and IT World, and it paints a less-than-glamourous picture of leering attendees, long hours (8 hours is long?) and perpetual smiles. The article featured quotes from four booth babe models who don’t seem to enjoy the process anymore. Examples include 22-year-old Amanda Lin discussing long days in heels:

“They can hurt,” Lin said of her shoes. “But the work is pretty relaxed and you don’t have to do a lot in order to get paid.”

Lin also discusses the leering passers-by and those who stop to take pictures, something the author relates directly to sexism:

“I’m used to it,” she said, when asked how she felt about Computex visitors ogling her and taking her picture.

“Used to it” or knew it came with the territory, considering the position? Or did she expect men to ignore the fact she playing the role of booth babe, or are men not supposed to react? Another model, 25-year old Eileen Lee also indicates the work is taxing:

“It takes a lot of energy, because you stand for a long time,” she said. During her eight hour day, Lee stands for 30 minutes holding a product, then takes a 10-minute rest and repeats the process. “You have to look happy all day and smile, but it’s not that easy,” she said. “It gets very tiring.”

Furthermore, an issue with a company tweeting a exploitative image of one of their booth babes has caused her to reconsider this kind of work:

“I’m very sensitive to these kind of things, and I really want to leave this career,” she said. “The industry is now moving towards making models show more skin,” she said. “People will look at you, but do so in a way that’s more sexist and sexual. There’s no respect.”

With that in mind, how should conference attendees look at these models, especially if the audience is largely male and the models are female, who, in some cases, are dressed like the two models who lead this post? Are the attendees supposed to ignore the models, regardless if they are dressed in bikinis or in cosplay outfits?

Negative aspects aside, the booth babe “industry” is booming with many women looking to join up. Says model Ashley Hsu:

“It seems like more and more young women want to do this kind of work,” she said. “It’s easy to do, you can make money. You just need to talk to people and get your picture taken. I’m seeing a lot of people wanting to do this part-time.”

If showing too much skin is the issue, not every booth babe is dressed like she’s at the beach:

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But then again, maybe some get uncomfortable if they’re asked to dress like this:

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It’s almost a no-win situation, but the pay isn’t too bad, with models earning around $100-$170 for an 8-hour shift.

[Lead image credit]

June 7, 2012
Wreck-It Ralph Looks Like Disney’s ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’ But With Video Games

In 1988, a movie released which helped to spark mainstream interest in animation again, the movie was titled ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit‘. All sorts of various studios across the medium banded together to provide cameos for various animated characters, who would show up in the movie. It was a resounding success, with both critics and movie-goers alive. Now, enter Wreck-It Ralph, which looks as though it will be the spiritual successor to this idea but with video game characters instead of the animated variety.

Disney, just go ahead and take another wad of cash from my hands. It wasn’t enough to get my hard earned money for The Avengers, but now you are really hitting home with a 3D animated movie, based around a group of video game characters. Many of which I really like and grew up with, based on what has been shown in the teaser image below.

I want this image as a poster.

(Click to Enlarge)

Here’s the official synopsis for the movie…

Walt Disney Animation Studios and Emmy®-winning director Rich Moore (TV’s “The Simpsons,” “Futurama”) take moviegoers on a hilarious, arcade-game-hopping journey in “Wreck-It Ralph.” Ralph (voice of John C. Reilly, “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” “Step Brothers”) is tired of being overshadowed by Fix-It Felix (voice of Jack McBrayer, “30 Rock”), the “good guy” star of their game who always gets to save the day. But after decades doing the same thing and seeing all the glory go to Felix, Ralph decides he’s tired of playing the role of a bad guy. He takes matters into his own massive hands and sets off on a game-hopping journey across the arcade through every generation of video games to prove he’s got what it takes to be a hero.

On his quest, he meets the tough-as-nails Sergeant Calhoun (voice of Jane Lynch, TV’s “Glee”) from the first-person action game Hero’s Duty. But it’s the feisty misfit Vanellope von Schweetz (voice of Sarah Silverman, “The Sarah Silverman Program”) from the candy-coated cart racing game, Sugar Rush, whose world is threatened when Ralph accidentally unleashes a deadly enemy that threatens the entire arcade. Will Ralph realize his dream and save the day before it’s too late?

If you clicked on the image above and looked further into the details of the image, you’ll notice a few things. Beyond the obvious Q-Bert and Street Fighter characters in the foreground.

First, if they’re going for the glorious arcade days, then Mario and his friends wouldn’t be too hard to imagine showing up in the movie. In fact, below you can see what looks to, perhaps, be a Koopa. We know Bowser is showing up. If so, there’s a strong possibility we might get a Mario cameo in Wreck-It Ralph.

Moving to the right a bit, we see yet another Capcom staple with M. Bison from the Street Fighter series. If Capcom is throwing in on this, then there are all sorts of amazing possibilities for cameos.

Freaking Burger Time, are you kidding me. Even I forgot all about this gem from the heyday of arcade titles.

Along with Capcom, Konami looks to be another developer/producer who will be providing possible characters. Proven by what looks to be a portal to ‘Dance Dance Revolution‘.

The movie will follow core characters, so established properties will be provided by cameos, which is perfectly fine. Below are the images for Sergeant Calhoun and Vanellope von Schweetz, each from hardcore FPS and sugary sweet kart games, respectively. I like both FPS’s and kart games, so consider me signed on for these side characters.

I really like the director choice, Rich Moore, who has worked on both The Simpsons and Futurama. For a movie such as this, you need someone who has a finger on the pulse of pop culture. The “Will NPC in FPS 4 food” sign made me chuckle. In fact, everything they’ve announced concerning this movie has me sold.

What do you think? Do you like the idea of a video game based Disney movie, which looks to feature cameos from a wide list of developers?

June 5, 2012
The Importance of Effective Images

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Never is this more true than in the world of ‘internets’. Everything from social media to blogging to e-commerce benefits from an effective photo campaign. MDG has shared with us this infographic, that highlights how an image can influence a company’s business, branding, search, and social media.

The first thing you will notice is the impact the Pinterest can play when sharing online content. When an image is all you have to go on, it is truly important to select one the conveys all of the messages you want as concisely as you can. The accompanying line in the description can bring the whole thing together.

A key figure to remember is that an article with an image can bring 94% more traffic than one without. Articles that cover news, politics and sports particularly benefit from relevant images.

In the realm of press releases, the general rule is that the more multimedia content you can include, the more effective the campaign will be. Total online views are directly related to the number of multimedia elements.

Local search for local business also benefit from a good image. 60% of consumers are more likely to go with a business that has images in their local listing. Getting an inside peek at the establishment and/or the products that they feature make for a more open and friendly online business front. If you are selling items online exclusively, a detailed quality image of the product for sale is imperative. With the large amount of competitors offering this feature, you would be hard-pressed to remain viable without.

And finally, is the strong relationship between a quality image and social media campaigns. Whether this is for your personal page, or a company page, it should be given that people will be more likely to identify with people and places that they can see, and not just read about.

May 25, 2012
Olympics Committee Says Its Okay to Post Images

Olympic Organizers are now saying spectators are allowed to upload photos from the London games, after originally saying that it was not okay to do so.

The terms on an Olympic ticket read:
“Images, video and sound recordings of the Games taken by a Ticket Holder cannot be used for any purpose other than for private and domestic purposes and a Ticket Holder may not license, broadcast or publish video and/or sound recordings, including on social networking websites and the internet more generally…”

And the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) internet guidelines says:

“Participants and other accredited persons can post still photographs taken within Olympic Venues for personal use. It is not permitted to commercialise, sell or otherwise distribute these photographs.”

These instructions clearly say that images cannot be broadcast, published, or otherwise distributed. That pretty much eliminates social media posts.

But The @London2012 official twitter account posted these messages a few days ago:

@London2012
London 2012(1 of 3) Social media info: anyone attending @London2012 events is welcome to take pictures in venues… 5 days ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

@London2012
London 2012(2 of 3) …& it’s ok to share pics from venues on social media as long as it’s not to make money. We’re keen to see & share them!… 5 days ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

@London2012
London 2012(3 of 3) …If you want to find out more about the @Olympics and social media, have a read of this: http://t.co/BIrMbTt6 5 days ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

Which clearly say it is okay to post photos on social media.

In reality, neither of these rules matter, because IOC officials will have no way of policing every attendee for pictures posted on their social media accounts.

It would, however, be easy to find a person who is posting on a third party blog or online news publication, and that is what they are trying to prevent. People trying to make money by selling or distributing photos of Olympic athletes.

The Twitter posts are most likely a PR move from the Olympic Committee, who realize along with everyone else, trying to prevent people from posting pictures on the internet is an impossibility.

Besides, everybody knows NBC owns the Olympics and anything that happens while they are going on. No one is allowed to report the Olympic Games except NBC and their affiliates, who would like to own the media for the rest of eternity. Thank you.

(I wonder if it’s okay to post that insignia for the London games? It’s also interesting to note, any image you see of the Olympic logo always has NBC’s logo above the Olympic Rings and is always much larger.)

[Source: paidcontent]

May 1, 2012
Exclusive: Adobe on CS6, Creative Cloud, and New Focus

On Monday, Adobe made some big announcements including the next version of its professional design software suite and a new cloud service for syncing, sharing, and storing files. Although there is always excitement surrounding news from the leading company in digital experiences, this week’s announcements were especially intriguing since they included 14 new products and 4 new Creative Suite additions.

What do you think of Adobe CS6 and Creative Cloud? Let us know.

Heidi Voltmer, Adobe’s Director of Product Marketing, spoke with WebProNews and told us that Adobe focused its efforts on 4 main areas with these products. As she explained, the company emphasized speed and performance, improving features in its tools, making sure that the content produced in CS6 is ready for devices, and enhancing the user interface.

In CS6, Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign are all powered by Adobe Mercury Graphics Engine, which will dramatically improve the performance of the tools. Voltmer told us that Adobe wanted to make it “really easy for our customers to use our products and to focus on what they’re doing creatively in the tool… and not so much about where they have to find a particular item in a panel.”

Photoshop CS6 is, of course, one of the big draws to the application bundle, and it is particularly noteworthy since this version is the first completely new release in 2 years. The increased performance it enables lets users receive near instant results in their editing.

“Now, when you’re editing images or making changes, you’ll actually see them appear just really quickly on the screen instead of having to wait for it to redraw,” said Voltmer.

Although the Creative Suite would have single-handedly been big news from Adobe, the company also announced Creative Cloud in which users can access its suite of desktop tools – normally $2,599 for a full license- for $49.99 per month. The cloud offering also adds online services for sharing and publishing content created through CS6. As a result, customers have much more flexibility using the software.

This subscription-based service is also useful for customers that only need the software for a certain period of time. It also gives them access to all the updates Adobe makes to avoid having to buy the newest version every time it rolls out.

“It’s not just like today, where you buy a single box and you don’t see anything new from Adobe for 12-24 months,” said Voltmer. “With the Creative Cloud, you actually get those updates on an ongoing basis.”

Last year, when Adobe announced CS5.5, Scott Fegette, Senior Product Manager on the Creative Suite Web team, talked to us about the company’s first attempt at a new pricing model. The company wanted to give customers both long-term and short-term options.

After listening to the customer feedback from last year’s pilot attempt at changing the pricing model, Voltmer told us that Adobe decided to take the model further this year.

“We evolved the model to lower the price, first of all, and second of all, to add in additional value,” she said.

In terms of video, CS6 includes major improvements to both Premiere and Flash. Incidentally, after a long battle with Apple over Flash’s significance on mobile devices, Adobe announced in November that it was re-positioning Flash for use, primarily, in premium video and hi-end gaming. While CS6 does include updates to Flash, Voltmer told us that Adobe really wanted to help bridge creators from Flash to HTML5.

“We’re really trying to help our Flash customers to transition into animating and creating interactive activity with HTML,” she pointed out.

With this greater emphasis on HTML5, Dreamweaver also received several improvements for incorporating HTML5 animations and more.

With all these developments, Voltmer told us that Adobe ultimately wants to streamline complex workflows for creative professionals. The company recently combined its digital media group with its marketing group in an effort to support this goal.

“By bringing those two pieces together, we offer a much more broad and integrated solution that not only sells to say, our customers in a creative department or an agency, but also people on the business side,” she said.

According to Adobe, the new products will be available 30 days from its announcement on April 23, but the company is accepting pre-orders now.

April 28, 2012
Imgur: iPhone, Android Apps Coming This Fall

Imgur is a hugely popular image hosting service, used a great deal to share images on sites like reddit, Twitter, Facebook, Digg and various blogs, forums and message boards (especially reddit). The service has been around since early 2009 and gets 15,372,253 monthly uploads, which attract 29,392,887,388 monthly views, yet the service still doesn’t have official mobile apps. That’s about to change.

Imgur Director of Communications Sarah Schaaf tells WebProNews, “There are mobile app plans! We have plans for both Android and iPhone apps and hope to have them ready by fall.”

There are other apps out there designed to lend to the mobile uploading of images to Imgur, but nothing right from Imgur itself. It remains to be seen just what the official apps will have to offer that the unofficial ones don’t, but don’t expect too many fancy bells and whistles.

Imgur tags itself as “the simple image sharer”. Considering that Instagram was just bought up by Facebook for $1 billion, it wouldn’t be surprising if more image services looked to do more interesting things, but clearly Imgur’s users like it the way it is. A simple look at the reddit front page will tell you that. It doesn’t sound like Imgur is looking to rock the boat too much.

“Our main goal is to keep things simple, so we don’t want to add anything that compromises that logic,” Schaaf tells us. “We continually work on changes that make the user experience easier and take suggestions from users as to what they’d like to see on the site. Those are reviewed and implemented as they are received.”

“Our current goals for the future are based around the community aspect of the site, which encompasses the gallery and the Imgurians who interact with the images and other users,” she adds.

I’m sure “Imgurians” will appreciate that.

April 20, 2012
Obama, Uhura Tells Us To Live Long, Prosper

The picture in question has hit its “viral” stage popularity, and considering the people in it, as well as the subject matter, it only makes sense. It’s not often we get to see the Leader of the Free World and the best communications officer in the galaxy together, sending a message of peace and prosperity. Clearly, the planets have aligned, bringing us the following gem:

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With President Obama is Nichelle Nichols, otherwise known as the original Lieutenant Uhura (sorry, Zoe, but Nichelle still rules), and they are offering the universal sign for goodwill and long life, made popular by the Vulcan race, most notably, Commander Spock.

The image was posted on Nichols’ twitpic page, and while it was taken at the end of February, the image was posted 14 hours ago. At this point, the image has already amassed close to 200,000 views. None of her other images have eclipsed the 10,000 views plateau, which is great indication of the image’s viral popularity.

Considering the fallout after Obama slashed NASA’s budget, he clearly needs all the intergalactic assistance he can find. Good thing for him, Lt. Uhura was willing to comply.

In light of the image, it’s hard not wonder what Obama’s approval rate is among Star Trek fans.

April 4, 2012
Fallen Iraq War Vet’s Photo Used Unwittingly On Dating Sites

When a photo is put on the internet, we all know how easy it is for that photo to be taken and used in a variety of ways – many ways that aren’t compatible with the original intent of the poster. The parents of one fallen U.S. soldier know this all too well.

They have filed lawsuits against two online dating sites: PlentyofFish.com and True.com for using their son’s photo to advertise their dating services.

Lt. Peter Burks was killed in 2007 in Iraq. The Bronze Star recipient was returning from a mission in Baghdad when a roadside bomb exploded under his vehicle. Four years later, one of Lt. Burks’ friends was apparently browsing PlentyofFish.com when he saw the Lieutenant’s photo in a pop-up ad that read “Military Man Searching fo Love.” He said the photo in the ad was taken just a few days before he was killed. According to Burks’ parents, the photo was one of their son that is featured on his memorial site.

Click on that pop-up led you to True.com.

“These websites are using the photo of a fallen hero simply as a means to make money and that’s just plain wrong,” says attorney Rogge Dunn of Dallas’ Clouse Dunn LLP, who represents Lt. Burks’ parents. “This has caused a great deal of pain to those who loved Peter – his family and fiancee – and has reopened old wounds.”

This story is reminiscent of another incident involving photos being used for nefarious purposes. Earlier this month, high school girls from a Boston Vocational school learned that their Facebook photos were being used on various porn sites. In that case, it was unclear as to what prosecutors could do – the sites were outside of U.S. jurisdiction plus there’s the whole thing about Facebook photos not really belonging to the users once they post them.

In this situation, Alan Burks says he “just wants these companies to admit what they did is wrong and to stop doing it.”

They’ve said that any money received from the lawsuits will go to support the troops.

February 27, 2012
Super Bowl XLVI As Told By Lucas Oil Stadium

So you say you’re going to Indy for the Super Bowl? As you already know, Indianapolis is the capitol of Indiana and the big game is proudly being held at Indy’s Lucas Oil Stadium. Lucas Oil opened August 16, 2008 and the stadium owns the largest retractable roof in the NFL. The stadium itself covers 1.8 million square feet and in 2009 was named Sports Facility of The Year. In the picture below you can see Lucas Oil from a bird’s eye view.

In the images below you can see the development of Lucas Oil from early beginning construction to the nearly done stage. To build the stadium it cost 720 million dollars and surprisingly took little time to build.

Lucas Oil seats over 67,00 fans while boasting a spectacular view of downtown Indianapolis. The stadium, while being a multi-purpose facility, is home to the Colts football team. The surface of the field is made of FieldTurf, which was ranked best field surface in both 2009 and ’10.

It was stated earlier that the stadium is a multi-purpose venue and it truly is. It not only hold NFL and NBA games, but concerts, national conventions, trade shows, IHSAA (Indiana High School Athletic Association) finals, band competitions and countless other events as well. The stadium consists of seven levels and contains more backstage space than any other stadium in the NFL. It contains 7 locker rooms, 11 indoor truck docks, 44,000 square feet of exhibit space and 12 large meeting rooms. If the weather is nice enough the large north facing window can be opened for a breathtaking view of downtown Indy.

So you’re sitting in the nosebleeds and can’t get a good view of the players, well don’t let that stop you. Lucas Oil sports 2 HD video boards more than large enough to see all your favorite players. A cool addition, the 360 degree ribbon board can be seen lighting up all game long advertising and sending the audience messages to “get loud” and “please be quiet, offense at work”. Receiving nearly, if not over, 1 million visitors per year, Lucas Oil is the perfect venue for any event and in this case even Super Bowl XLVI

Lucas Oil stadium replaced the RCA dome in 2008 after the stadium was finished. The stadium was designed by HKS of Dallas, Texas and, as mentioned earlier, cost 720 million dollars to build. Much financing came from the state of Indiana and the city of Indianapolis with an addition of 100 million dollars made by the Colts. The stadium is operated by the Capital Improvements Board pf Managers of Marion County. Since inception of the stadium, it was projected that Lucas Oil”s generated revenue upon completion and opening, would hit or exceed 2.25 billion dollars over the course of ten years and, in addition, create 4,200 new jobs for residents.

Some fun facts about construction

It took 130,00 cubic yards of cast-in-place concrete to build.

16,00 tons of steel was used in construction.

700 pieces of structural precast concrete were used.

1,440 pieces of architectural precast concrete were used

9,100 pieces of exterior glass were used as well.

February 2, 2012
Vancouver Newspapers Release Riot Photos To the Public

Remember those Vancouver riots from last summer? Remember how the police said they would make use of various social media platforms to track these ruffians down and punish them appropriately? Well, apparently, the social media sting didn’t net the kind of fish the Vancouver police were looking for.

Thanks to a local judge, The Vancouver Sun and The Province have been ordered to hand over all of their Stanley Cup riot photos to the police, but before they complied, the newspapers in question released these same images to the public.

And that’s just what they did.

In fact, the news service released over 5000 photos to the public, but their reservations in doing so remain:

“We will reluctantly turn over the photos and videos to police, but remain concerned that the production order turns journalists into evidence gatherers for police,” said Harold Munro, The Sun’s deputy managing editor.

“Police should only make such demands on the media as a last resort,” he added. “In this case, they have many thousands of photos and videos from the public that are still being reviewed.”

As indicated, the media outlets released “some 5481” images to the public, the same ones they will be turning over to the police. While The Vancouver Sun is complying with the judicial ruling, the newspaper’s legal team asks that pictures with innocent citizens in them be destroyed.

While the chaos of the riots made the topic a popular trend, perhaps the most famous item to come from the Vancouver riots was the image of the couple kissing:

Of course, this kind of image is not what the Vancouver police are looking for, unless they’re wanting to issue a Public Display of Affection citation.

No, these are the kinds of images the police are interested in:

And:

The next question is, how does this kind of ruling make you feel? Should newspapers be compelled to release such images in order to assist with police investigations or should the police, well, find their own damn images? Let us know what you think.

January 20, 2012
Wayne Gretzky’s Daughter No Longer Uses Twitter

First, we have a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader getting kicked off of Twitter for unknown reasons, and now, the daughter of the best hockey player to ever lace up skates has abandoned Twitter as well. What’s going on? Are attractive females who have attachments to sports become an endangered species on social media platforms like Twitter?

Much like Melissa Kellerman’s disappearance, the reason for Paulina Gretzky’s departure from Twitter are uncertain. The Associated Press weighed in, and speculated the elder Gretzky didn’t appreciate his daughter’s “friendly” approach with her Twitter followers. You see, unlike the Dallas Cowboys cheerleader, who didn’t really say anything warranting a removal — apparently, Jerry Jones wants his cheerleaders seen and not heard, or, at least, un-tweeted — the younger Gretzky used her now-defunct Twitter account to post images like the one leading this article.

The Big Lead has more of her Twitter pictures, if you’re interested in further investigation.

There may be more to the story than just a dad not wanting his daughter to post such images, however. According to a story quoted by WithLeather.com, a potential business deal may be what motivated her Twitter removal:

Paulina’s Twitter feed has been discontinued, and the Toronto Star is speculating that her father’s involvement in a potential purchase of the Toronto Maple Leafs might have something to do with it.

According to the Star, before shutting down her feed, Paulina tweeted, “Having a nice sit down dinner with my dad about social media..haha #SIKEEE.” She then signed off on Saturday, writing, “Taking a break from Twitter for a bit. Happy Holidays!!! xoxo.”

So, is this a case of a mad dad not wanting his daughter revealing her partying ways on Twitter or is this case of the elder Gretzky trying to protect a business deal by hiding the fun-loving behavior of his daughter? To be honest, both postions make sense, but considering Paulina’s Twitter account survived her previous image postings, one begins to lean towards protecting a business deal.

If you’re interested in seeing a collection of the images we’ll be missing now that Paulina has stopped tweeting, make sure to check out the following slideshow. So long, Paulina. Your liberal approach to showing skin will be missed, especially by the sports blogs, and the Associated Press.

November 30, 2011
Cool Halloween Stuff From Around the Web

All Hallow’s Eve is quickly upon us, and the denizens of the web are quickly gearing up for their annual dress-up games, evoking memories of video games, movies, memes, and, well, sluts. I’ll deal with the “slut” aspect later on in this post, but before that, there have been some awesome Halloween-related posts popping up all over the web, and thanks in large part to Reddit.com and Imgur.com, they’ve been assembled in a couple of places for you to enjoy.

First off, this post is going to address the some of the more unique costumes I’ve come across during this search. Sorry, but the scantily-clad costumes won’t be appearing in this section, but they are coming up, or, at least a comment or two about them. This first stop is simply called “Fantasy Football,” and it’s a creative way to get your Halloween on:

This next one is apparently what happens when Angelina Jolie adopts you:

Next up is something that belongs in the “Father of the Year” category:

That’s just incredible. Ever wonder what a bottle of hot sauce might look like as a Halloween costume? Wonder no more:

It should be noted I’m working hard to limit the costumes I’m including because there are just so many of them out there. You could literally spend all day looking at them. With that in mind, here are a few more:

Courtesy. There’s this gem what was lovingly called “the worst zombie costume ever.” Come for the bad costume and stay for the incredible comment underneath it:

Next up is an exercise in incredible use of special effects makeup for Halloween purposes. It’s a tad disturbing, but it’s still awesome as hell:

It’s also important to remember your history, especially in regards to Halloween costumes. If you’re a child of the 70s, you’ll remember these gems quite well:

As for the slut aspect of Halloween dress-up, if you dress like this:

I’ll enjoy it, but these other two pieces of web content were made just for you:

And the incredible Jenna Marbles, who’s actually defending your choice to dress slutty. Keep in mind, the language is NSWF:

Now for some kick-ass pumpkins, all courtesy of Imgur:

And then there’s this incredible creation, the Flamethrowing Jack-O’-Lantern:

There’s video of it in action, too:

Here’s the tutorial for those of you who are interested, but I doubt, however, the neighborhood parents would appreciate the creativity. Also, a word of warning to those of you who are thinking of making an awesome pumpkin:

Sounds about right.

In other news, if you’re interested in making a Google Places Jack-O’-Lantern, there’s a pattern for that. Oh, and for those of you who are thinking of scaring the crap out of your trick-or-treaters, keep this little public service announcement/rage comic in mind:

And with that, all of us at WebProNews wish you a safe and Happy Halloween.

October 28, 2011
Nightmares Fear Factory Has The Best Flickr Photostream Ever

There’s no denying the awesomeness of Flickr in relation to the cornucopia of images Flickr visitors are privy to, images of all kinds of variety. In fact, considering the never-ending growth of its index — earlier this year, Flickr reported its 6 billionth image upload — it would be an exercise in impossibility to categorize them all. That being said, every so often, some photostreams stand above the rest, and deserve to be acknowledged.

Such is the case with the Nightmares Fear Factory‘s index of images. What we have is a haunted house in Niagara Falls taking pictures of its visitors right as they are being spooked, and posting them to their Flickr account.

The results, as you can see in the lead image, are simply fantastic. In fact, I’m having a hard time coming up with a more impressive use of Flickr’s service, although, I’m sure someone will correct me if necessary. In Nightmares Fear Factory’s Flickr stream, there are 20 pages of images to pick and choose from, and you won’t be disappointed with any of the offerings. However, to entice you even further, here are a few more examples of what you can expect:

As I was saying, this is perhaps the best use of Flickr’s photostream technology, maybe ever, and as you can see, I’m not the only one who thinks that way:

@DiggPOW
Paul Bauerbest flickr account ever : pics: @NightmaresFear You guys made the front page of reddit… http://t.co/Myq2skT2 Holy influx of custom… 5 hours ago via twitterfeed · powered by @socialditto

@NightmaresFear
NightmaresFearRT @sarahamil: The @NightmaresFear Flickr stream is hilarious and makes me want to go http://t.co/tpBAG7Aa #greatidea 20 minutes ago via HootSuite · powered by @socialditto

What other Flickr accounts are you most fond of? Is there one that’s even better than Nightmares Fear Factory? Let us know what you think.

October 7, 2011
Flickr Android App Channeling Instagram?

Did Flickr essentially release an Instagram clone? And if so, is there something wrong with that? Considering imitation is the highest from of flattery, and Flickr’s undeniable popularity, copying such a popular app, especially one that focuses on images — Flickr’s lifeblood — only makes sense.

The Flickr Android app promises photo sharing, filter enhancement, and the ability to share these creations across multiple social network platforms, which is pretty much what Instagram does for the iPhone crowd. The Android app shared its debut with another Flickr launch, a service called Photo Session. According to the Flickr blog, Photo Session allows users to:

… flip through photos with your friends from anywhere in the world. Just create a Photo Session, invite your friends and browse photos together in real-time. When you move to the next photo it moves for everyone else too. While you’re all browsing, have fun chatting and drawing on your photos using the built-in tools.

Unlike the Instagram imitation, Photo Session is supported by the iOS family, so you can use it on your iPhone and iPad. There’s a video of Photo Session in action, and it too takes some cues from Instagram, especially with the filters and the sharing:

The difference being, Photo Session is more like a Google Hangout, while the Flickr Android app is more a direct descendant of the Instagram application. Is that, however, a bad thing? Or is the iPhone family the only device that should be allowed such capabilities, especially if the Instagram developers show no interest in cross-platforming their application? Over at International Business Times, one idea was offered about the Android app:

While Flickr boasts 68 million registered users of its own, the platform is likely jealous of Instagram, which has amassed a whopping 10 million users in less than a year since launching.

Is it really jealously that led to the development of the similar application, or did Flickr simply fill a hole the Instagram makers were unwilling or unable to do? Sure, the app comparisons are valid, but if the demand for the application on the Android environment is there, and no one has stepped up to meet it, it sounds like Flickr merely struck while the iron was hot.

Kudos to them for stepping up where Instagram did not. The next question is, will the Flickr Android app be as popular as its iPhone predecessor?

September 29, 2011
England Riots Consume The Internet

Everywhere you turn, at least on the Internet, content from the misguided riots going on across the pond are flooding outlets of every kind. Whether it’s a site like Reddit or an actual news outlet like CNN.com, the English riots are the thing. Considering the images alone that are popping up here, there, and everywhere, it’s almost like riots and the Internet go hand-in-hand.

As reported earlier, Blackberry makers RIM offered their hand in assisting the punishment of these individuals. For these gestures of goodwill, RIM had their Blackberry blog hacked. Apparently, Anarchy in the UK is not just a song to enjoy.

It’s a lifestyle to be lived.

What else could be gathered after seeing the insane amount of content, courtesy of the bored and apparently useless youth of London? Speaking of content, as indicated, Reddit.com has been a fount of riot-related images and other materials. The same is true for Buzzfeed and Flickr. In fact, there’s so much riot-related content, to list it all would call for an article the size of a J. R. R. Tolkien novel.

Because of that, this post will only focus on a portion of it. Take, for instance, the lady who actually defied the rioters. The unnamed defender has reached “bad ass” status with the Internet crowd, and the video shows why:

Too bad she wasn’t around to defend the following person:

That’s so pathetically sad, it’s hard not to wish hurtful things on the “Samaritans” who were “helping” the guy. There’s truly a special place in hell for someone who would rob someone who was hurt/adversely effected during these ridiculous (or any) riots.

While the videos do a great job of demonstrating the chaos the London Police are dealing with, the images do so much more:

Courtesy of Flickr

Images courtesy

Over at the aforementioned Reddit, we came across this gem, which listed under the following title, which maybe the most fitting thing ever: “Stupid is as stupid does. Idiot London looter shows off on Twitter – then quickly tries to excuse her crime.” What we have is some wunderkind bragging about looting on her Twitter account.

You can tell she’s a super-genius by her awesome use of the Queen’s English:

As you can see, all the personal information has been blacked out, but over at the Imgur.com post, more information about mankind’s savior was revealed.

Apparently, Miss BARBZbabes deleted her Twitter, but some Redditors did find her Facebook.

That Internet’s some powerful stuff, ennit?

Considering her last tweet, there’s little doubt Jenna Major is reconsidering her brilliant actions, especially now that she’s been outed.

Other gems include this next photo, with perhaps the most honest caption, ever:

Food for thought, no?

However, not all of the content focused on the negative. As with just about any period of social unrest, there’s the inevitable cleanup. This makes for good Internet content as well, especially the upcoming piece of Twitter genius:

@almostalady
Eleanor Orebi GannWaterstones staff member to me last night: “We’ll probably stay open. If they steal some books, they might actually learn something.” 7 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

As for the cleanup, it appears to be going well, thanks to the power of social media:

It’s just sad dumbasses like Jenna “BARBZbabes” Major are the reason such cleanups are even necessary. That being said, the community spirit is a nice change after seeing all the misguided rioting. Clearly, these situations bring out the worst and the best in people.

Sadly, the worst part comes first.

August 9, 2011
Video and Images Dominate Google Universal Search Results

Searchmetrics has released a new study showing how universal search can help marketers in search visibility. This certainly isn’t a groundbreaking concept. We’ve discussed this plenty in the past, but the firm shares universal search data, which it has used to try and identify which sites are dominating the top 10 positions of video, news, shopping, images, and map results.

The study is based on the analysis of th top 100 search engine results displayed by Google for a database of about 28 million search terms over a four-month period, Searchmetrics says. The timeframe was February to May.

Video results appeared in over 60% of all searches where universal search results are included in the top 100 listings. Images (coming in second behind videos) appeared in 30%, followed by shopping results at about 20% and news at around 10%. Judging from the following graph, it looks like Books were ahead of news, before dropping off in April.

“For a few years now Google has been bringing specific shopping, news, image, video, blog and map-based results into the general search listings it presents to searchers as part of what has been termed its ‘universal search’ strategy – it’s intended to help searchers find what they’re looking for more easily,” said Searchmetrics CEO Dr Horst Joepen. “We found that video and images are highly visible in Google searches when compared with other types of universal search content. So it makes sense for marketers to increase the volume of video and image content they’re creating and to optimize it both on their own sites and on third party sites such as YouTube and Flickr.”

“Interesting videos and images aren’t just good for your SEO, they’ll obviously also help make your site more engaging for visitors,” added Dr Joepen.

He says marketers should be thinking about creating things like client testimonials, interviews and product demos for video content.

Google has not made things easy on SEOs over the years. They are always changing so many things, it’s hard to keep up. Add Google’s personalization into the mix, and you never know who’s going to see what in their results for any given query.

Universal search, though surely not its intended reason for existence, has proven to be something of a bone Google has thrown to websites. It’s a shortcut to from page search results. If you can rank well for videos or images, for example, there’s a good chance you will find your way onto the front page of Google’s web results for some searches.

August 4, 2011
Transfer Your Photos From Facebook To Google+

Having trouble getting all of your Facebook content over to Google+? There’s a Google Chrome Extension for that! Actually, the “Move Your Photos” extension, developed by Aman Kumar Jain, makes use of Google’s photo service, Picasa, which functions as a storage facility/bridge between the two social networking platforms. The simplicity with which the extension works is actually pretty ingenious.

The extension signs into the target Facebook account, scans the available photos, and then allows the user to select which ones they’d like to upload to Picasa. Once the download is complete, users can share the extracted images on their Google+ account. A screenshot shows how the extension presents the images to upload:

As you can see, the process is very simple and very effective. That is, until Facebook blocks it and other content-scraping Google Chrome extensions. The reviews for the extension are largely positive, although, there’s also an apparent privacy issue, as pointed out by Google member, Diane:

I moved over 1000 pics from FB to picasa. It took about four restarts, but it has done it. All photos now have the date stamp of the move date, not the creation date or even the date I uploaded them to FB, so that’s a bit of a pain, and of course, no comments or descriptions. But great little tool. Think I’ll uninstall now since I’m concerned about how much access it has to my data 🙁

It’s doubtful Facebook will ever overcome the fears people have about their privacy. If Google+ does reduce Facebook to MySpace status, will it be because the G+ is so much better or because people felt more secure with the service?

Nevertheless, I, too experimented with the “Move Your Photos” extension, and it does work as advertised. Granted, my Facebook account isn’t filled with images — under 100, for instance — but there were no noticeable problems concerning the downloading of my photos, nor was their an issue when they were uploaded to Picasa.

A hat-tip is order to Rick Malins of Google for pointing the Chrome extension out.

July 15, 2011
Most Popular Flickr Camera Is The iPhone 4

Flickr, like any good site that relies on user uploads to exist, keeps track of what technology is being used by its members, especially cameras. When you consider the amount of usage the service gets — Flickr received its 5 billionth image upload in September 2010 — a breakdown of the data Flickr records can be awfully revealing; again, especially when it comes to the cameras Flickr members are using. Such data gives a good idea of what people are doing with their devices, without relying on harvesting various amounts of geodata, something else Flickr keeps track of.

In what may come as a surprise, the current most popular camera used at Flickr isn’t exactly a camera. Don’t get me wrong, it has picture-taking capabilities, quite obviously, but it’s not a exclusively a camera, either. Naturally, it’s the iPhone 4, although, the device just recently overtook the Nikon D90. In relation to the surprising aspect of such data, perhaps it shouldn’t be. The iPhone is, without a doubt, one of the most popular personal devices in the United States — still — and because so many people have them, it stands to reason a lot of people would uploading images to popular photo storage services.

What is surprising, however, is the iPhone 4 is the only mobile communication device (I’m not sure “phone” is an appropriate moniker anymore) to make Flickr’s list. No Androids here. Furthermore, when measuring the popular cameraphones used on Flickr, you see Apple products representing four out of the top five brands. In regards to the rapidly-growing Android market, perhaps they will make inroads on later Flickr graphs, but then again, the iPhone 5 will be out soon.

Speaking of graphs, here’s the primary “most popular camera” breakdown. Immediately, you’ll notice iPhone’s overtaking of the Nikon D90 only happened recently. You’ll also see Ashton Kutcher’s second career — well, besides being an incessant Twitter user — represented nicely, as well:

Enlarge
The Flickr methodology is as follows:

These graphs show the number of Flickr members who have uploaded at least one photo or video with a particular camera on a given day over the last year.

The graphs are “normalized”, which is a fancy way of saying that they automatically correct for the fact that more people join Flickr each day: the graph moving up or down indicates a change in the camera’s popularity relative to all other cameras used by Flickr members.

The graphs are only accurate to the extent that we can automatically detect the camera used to take the photo or shoot the video (about 2/3rds of the time). That is not usually possible with cameraphones, therefore they are under-represented.

As indicated, not only is the iPhone the most popular camera on Flickr, Apple also rules the mobile device/cameraphone breakdown as well:

Who knew the cameraphone would make digital cameras just about obsolete? I mean, besides keeping Kelso from That 70’s Show in the forefront of pop culture, are these “specialty” devices — that is, they only perform one function — very viable in today’s world? Especially when there are phones with built-in cameras capable of multiple megapixel output, as well as the ability to take hi-definition video?

Lead image courtesy.

June 23, 2011
The State of Twitter Photo Sharing

The big news hit yesterday that Twitter will be rolling out its own native image service, powered by PhotoBucket. Users will be able to upload photos and attach them directly to tweets without using one of the many third-party applications that have performed this service for some time now.

Twitter is all about a formal and uniform experience. Earlier this year, they cracked down on third-party clients that serve to “mimic” the functionality of the native Twitter app by amending their API terms of service. This new photo sharing move enforces that idea, that Twitter wants to provide everything you need to fully enjoy the Twitter experience.

Social media monitoring company Sysomos has just released some stats on their blog that detail the currents state of image sharing on Twitter. They looked at every tweet from May 30th and found that Twitpic is the top image hosting service among users, followed by yfrog and Lockerz.

So who needs to be worried? Obviously Twitpic and yfrog, both with substantial shares of the image hosting duties currently. It’s possible the services like Instagram may stay relatively unharmed or even grow when Twitter’s PhotoBucket feature rolls out. Instagram has found a niche with its quick photo effects similar to Hipstamatic.

There’s really no telling how popular these photo sharing services will remain when Twitter’s native function is fully up and running. Will they have to adapt and add new features that Twitter’s photo sharing may not provide?

It’s important to note that photo sharing on Twitter is still a very small percentage of the total Twitter activity – 1.25% according to Sysomos.

June 2, 2011