Whilst I appreciate that there are certain issues that Flickr needs to address in terms of it’s policy, the way it deals with complaints, and the behavior of its members I am relieved that they have at least taken steps to try an give some protection to those named there.

It is not a pleasant feeling to be implicated in fascist activity when anyone who knows me or my stream will know that simply is not true. I have had continual bullying, aggression, harassment and abuse from the person from a number of maliciously created accounts on Flickr, which of course there is little they can do about. This has transpired over a period of more than a year. I have a full record now, including this blog which, having taken legal advice, I now have to take to the UK Police and report as gross harassment.

So, in short, whilst you may feel you have been unfairly treated, I would plead that you consider that there are other victims here. Whilst you may agree with some of the views in the Blog I urge you not to take them at face value. It has been set up, not only to catalog Flickr issues, but also to personally attack its members based on personal vendettas.

> So when you are attacking someone who is critical of Flickr, for very good reason might I add, why do you think it’s not important to disclose that?

No. You clearly established on Aug 12 that stating one’s affiliations, if tenuous enough, are not important to disclose. I believe we also covered the subject of double standards.

As for that tenuous part…

> Are you friends with people on the Flickr staff?

No. I am NOT friends with people on the Flickr staff. In fact, I have never even talked to anyone on the Flickr staff. Oh no wait, I did once sit in the audience during a conference talk on the evolution of Flickr’s server equipment. I did not have a chance to ask any questions so perhaps that won’t count?

> What role in working with the Flickr interface are you a part of?

My role would be that of an engineering manager whose team wrote the software that interfaces with the Flickr public API. That is, we can pull an image out of Flickr, edit it, and then put it back where it came from. Just like we do with images via the APIs of Picasa, Photobucket, and Facebook, like I already stated. Since you appear unfamiliar with technology (despite http://bit.ly/a9gXC), I’ll just state that this does not usually involve actual human contact: just reading the API docs and writing code. If that is still unclear, I’m sure Kristopher can explain.

Anyhow, you have now unsuccessfully made 3 attempts to establish a sinister plot between me and Flickr so I’m starting to feel like a slacker on the ad hominem front. I did not think it would be this hard for you to grok that other people besides yourself might feel strongly enough about an issue to pursue it. Let’s just say that you have established your policy quite clearly and leave it at that, mmkay?

The product I work on (Photoshop.com) does in fact interface with Flickr.

That’s good to know. I haven’t tried that product yet. So when you are attacking someone who is critical of Flickr, for very good reason might I add, why do you think it’s not important to disclose that? Are you friends with people on the Flickr staff? What role in working with the Flickr interface are you a part of?

I did not “go anywhere”. Contrary to what you may believe, my life does not revolve around your blog, nor am I in the least phased by your insinuation that I might be a secret Flickr operative out to mastermind a grand conspiracy against the legendary TH.

I have been reading your blog for a long time, and I do respect your opinions on photographer’s rights, idiotic museum rules, gadgets, and so on. As such, I am well aware of your track record vis-a-vis Flickr and Zooomr, which was my point exactly.

My original point was quite simply just asking clarification on the disappearance of your disclaimer about being the CEO of Zooomr since you used to do that quite diligently in the past especially in relation to any postings critical of Flickr. I would call that “disclosing a conflict of interest”. Instead you chose to treat my question as an ad hominem attack, and responded quid pro quo plus upped the ante with an accusation of double standard.

OK, you asked so I’ll go first. You next.

I most definitely do NOT work for Flickr nor even Yahoo at large. I work for Adobe Systems yet I loathe to admit that – not because I don’t enjoy the company and the job – but because I explicitly do NOT speak for them since that is not why they pay me. The product I work on (Photoshop.com) does in fact interface with Flickr. However, it also interfaces with Facebook, Google Picasa, and Photobucket, to name just a few, so I would be hard pressed to qalify that as “affiliation”. In fact, on a more personal note I would very much like to interface it with Smugmug, Pbase, and Zooomr. I even tried to approach Zooomr but there was never a response.

Now, since you asked, would you care to re-state *your* true identity and affiliations?

No, I don’t mean the fake pen name “Thomas Hawk” or the Zooomr role, everyone already knows those. Your true name is easy enough to find with Google. So how about your true employer? The one that pays the bills that is. Since it is apparently in the financial industry, clients and investment portfolio would be highly relevant data points here as well. Claiming that it operates in an unrelated industry would have been awfully convenient if only you hadn’t upped that ante with double standard. And if it truly is unrelated industry, then what exactly is your point in writing under a pen name? Let alone acting as the CEO of a company that same assumed name. That would make annual reports very interesting reading, I’m sure.

Back on my original point. I never disputed the assertion that Flickr may be behaving like jerks. In fact, evidence strongly suggests so. I merely asked you to clarify what appears to be a serious conflict of interest using your widely read blog to proliferate news negative to Flickr: you stand to gain from any loss of customers from Flickr, however immaterial that may be to Flickr considering their size. Surely you are familiar with the concept of conflict of interest, coming from the financial industry?

While we’re at it, do spare us that garbage about the little guys in a garage bitching about the big guys being harmless. Google was two guys in a garage not too long ago. So was H-P. I’m sure they bitched about “the man”, too.

In the end, you are obviously free to ignore my mere suggestion to eliminate that apparent conflict of interest. I do not think there’s anything else to discuss.

I recently had some trouble with how Flickr defined something as needing to be marked as moderated / restricted as well–given that I have taken many photographs from gay public events in New York. Here’s an official reply which I find to be questionable:

[quote]
Bare chested men is fine to be marked as “safe”.
Skintight underwear/shorts/swim trunks, etc.. images need
to be marked as “restricted”.
[/quote]

By definition, this suggests that all photos taken at the beach, as well as all Olympics swimming + diving events need to be marked restricted. To which the Flickr staff replied by stating:

[quote]
Regardless of where an image is taken, it needs to be moderated.
[/quote]

Your point is a red herring and it’s a typical ad hominem attack to attack the person giving the message while not substantively addressing the message itself ala your “Michael Arrington” statement.

I don’t consider Zooomr a direct competitor to Flickr at this point. I’ve never tried for one minute though to in any way distance myself from any affiliation with Zooomr.

The fact is that I’ve been blogging about Flickr well before Zooomr and have blogged about it for years. What Zooomr does is sort of inconsequential to this entire conversation about censorship at Flickr.

And while we are disclosing things here Tapani. Who do you work for? And have you had any relationships with Flick or worked on Flickr related products for another company? You seem so eager to make some obscure point about disclosure but so unwilling to disclose your affiliations. Seems like a bit of double standard there doesn’t it Pal?

However, that does not change the fact that Zooomr’s About page continues to very prominently list you as the CEO and Chief Evangelist, complete with a mugshot and a bio blurb, with a link back to this blog.

I find that contradiction very surprising given how blog normally paints a stark good-vs-evil / jedi-vs-sith contrast between two sides of the argument. That is, you vs. security guards, you vs. museums, you vs. Flickr staff, and so on.

If you are indeed no longer associated from Zooomr, I would encourage you to make that a clean break to clear up any notions of conflict of interest. As it stands, you’re about as clean as Arrington, and that’s not a compliment.