Stephen Rees's blog

This is not about flickr as an organisation, it is about my experience of it. I saw the tweet I have copied above this and it moved me to write a blog post. I can’t do this in a tweet. I may not even be able to do it in a blog post.

What I really need to be able to do is to reach out to someone. Someone I do not know in real life. But he comes from the same part of the world I do and shares at least some of the same enthusiasms. But on flickr he has decided to block me. When that happens flickr doesn’t tell you right away. You get “Contact Notifications” when someone follows you, but not when they block you. You find that out when you try to comment on their post. Or when you want to add one of their images to your gallery.

I blocked someone because they accused me of being creepy, and frankly I don’t see anything to be gained by arguing with someone who does that. I wasn’t expecting the subsequent “revenge”. But then no-one expects the Spanish Inquisition.

So why did I get blocked by someone else? Interesting that, so I have to explain a bit. I wasn’t fighting with him. I just thought the word he used to describe a municipal transportation service to be inappropriate. East Ham Trams were not a company.

Now the person I am talking about actually encourages this kind of communication. Under every picture he posts to flickr it says “If there are any errors in the above description please let me know. Thanks”

So yes, calling the Tramways Department of the County Borough Council of East Ham a “company” is an error.

So I let him know. And he blocked me!

I happen to be the Administrator of the flickr Transportation group. There are other groups on flickr where I have seen the clear message “Block the Administrator and you will be removed from the Group”. Mine don’t say that. As long as the pictures meet the definition of Transportation then I have no concerns. But, for goodness sake, say you want to know about errors and then block the people who tell you …

One other thing. Not especially relevant or important. But he didn’t take the pictures. He has been buying old photographs and then – because they are in black and white, almost inevitably – he colorises them. And does a pretty credible job. And then puts his copyright on the colorised version.

“(if you want to use it, at least credit me and link to this description!) “

So would you like to see one of his pictures now?

No?

Didn’t think so.