Flickr off · 2006-03-29 20:49
As Tommi was coerced into adding me into his links list, I felt that I should write about something to do with mobile for once.
If you’ve been paying attention to my Flickr stream, I’ve been playing with various auto photo uploaders, transferring pictures I take with my phone directly to Flickr at full resolution. MMS often downscales the pictures; direct email can work (I can’t be bothered to set up email on my phone), but you get at most a title or description attached to the photo.
There are 4 uploaders I’ve looked at – Shozu by Cognima, Meaning by the Helsinki University of Technology & 3eyes, Context Watcher by the EU Mobilife consortium, and ZoneTag by Yahoo Research. All run on S60 (mainly Nokia phones) – I’m sure there are J2ME uploaders (just found this), but it’s all a lot easier and slicker when written natively for the phone. Installing apps is, of course, one of the great benefits S60 gives. There are also bound to be other uploaders – I have SplashBlog on my phone too, that I think does similar, but I think these 4 go beyond standard photo upload. Time for a Flickr-off!
Full disclosure: I’ve met people from all of these projects – and are friends or work with various people in some of the projects. Disclaimer: uploading large picture files over mobile networks can cost rather a lot of money. Especially when roaming. Also, many of these projects are still in the research phase and are prototypes. All have been stable enough for me to use, but don’t blame me if they eat your phone.
Each uploader has the same basic functionality (getting photos from A to B), but they offer different extra functionality, and even tiny differences in UI and interaction changes the usefulness quite dramatically. I’m going to try to highlight the differences, and what they mean.
Shozu
Shozu is the only commercial uploader of the 4 (although free). I’ve known Cognima for years – back in the days of black and white nearly-2G phones, they were trying to sync phone data – certainly ambitious, and with great technical chops.
The uploader is rock solid, with easy installation via a text message and download. You have to set up a separate account with Shozu as well as Flickr (or any of the other photo sites that Shozu knows about) – this is because Shozu actually uploads the photos to their own server, which then sends them to Flickr or wherever. This should be invisible, but once I uploaded a picture and didn’t make it to Flickr – and the app doesn’t let you upload again. The uploader is installed pretty deep in the system, and it doesn’t matter if the application itself is closed: it will pop up asking if you want to upload after the next picture taken.
It’s easy to edit photos tags, description and title – and you can also do this after upload, and it will automagically update the picture. It also offers photo rotation, which is, I think, unique. The biggest gripe I’ve heard people express is the Shozu tagline added to the description (it also adds a shozu tag, similar to all the uploaders, and I don’t have a problem with this). It’s impossible to delete it using Shozu, and impossible to turn it off. You’ll have to edit it on Flickr after the event, which is a pain.
Shozu is growing features at the moment. Recently, it added the ability to read recent comments on your photos, which is pretty nice (the mobile html version of Flickr allows this too, but only works for pre-Yahoo accounts). It can also email any videos you take either to yourself or, I guess, a video sharing service.
The odd feature out is contact-synching. When installing, it asks a quizzical question about enabling this – it basically syncs the address book of the phone with the Shozu server. You can then access your contacts on the Shozu website. Here you can also import and export from CSV files, with changes auto-synched to the phone. Now, I have to say this works really well – but it just feels odd alongside all the Flickr and photosharing functionality.
Overall, Shozu is my choice as easiest basic Flickr uploader – and I still use it when other methods have gone wrong. But, I want one thing… context. And for that we have to look elsewhere…
pluses
can upload and edit after the event
tags, descriptions and titles added easily
photo rotation
comments
deep integration
can upload to other photo sites
can be silent
handles video gracefully
minuses
no context stored
middleman server
growing non-photo functionality
branded description
Meaning
Meaning is also known as Merkitys, but I think everyone suffers enough with my mangling of Finnish, so I’ll stick with Meaning.
Meaning was the first Flickr uploader that was released publicly that had some understanding of context around a photo – where it was taken, who or what was around at the time, and what you were doing. This is included in the tags of the photo – meaning you can use these to search for other photos sharing the same context, or for use by other piggybacking services, such as geobloggers, RIP.
So, cell ID details are included (not an exact location, but can be used to infer, and also no doubt one of these days cell ID to co-ordinate databases will spring up), any event title from the phone calendar, city and location name (which your phone prompts you for at various times and then stores), GPS data via Bluetooth if available, and, most excitingly and controversially, the ID of all devices nearby that have Bluetooth on. All of these can be easily turned on or off for each photo before upload, as well as the privacy settings of the photo.
GPS data is handled well – it caches the last good co-ordinates, realising that most photos are taken indoors and other GPS-unfriendly environments. The city and place tagging generally works well too, although it can go a little crazy wanting attention sometimes. In Finland, the app can even fire off an SMS to the network operator to get general location information.
Other photo data is more fiddly. Tags can be entered, but using colons to separate tags is a T9 nightmare, and you can only set a title that is also used as a description.
The app is pretty heavy – it’s been built on a context platform that can do far more – and it’s difficult to sometimes run more than just the Meaning app on my 6630. The uploader is also subject to failures due to cell changes or flipping from 3G to 2G – this can lead to many half uploaded photos that need deleting from Flickr, and also cost money due to mobile data transfer charges.
Despite these quibbles, Meaning is the uploader I have been using pretty much exclusively for the past few months. The rich metadata generated is worth far more to me than the few failings.
pluses
context! – cell ID, calendar, BT, GPS
GPL
intelligent use of GPS and location info
easy control of context
can upload untagged or unpublished photos afterwards
coolest icon
minuses
can be a bit heavy
some upload failures
place entry prompting can start nagging
update: Mika got in touch to let me know that the latest version should be a lot slimmer, I have now installed it, as well as reflashing my phone to clean it up, so I’ll see how I get on now
ZoneTag
ZoneTag was created by the Yahoo Research team in Berkeley. This has some similar functionality as Meaning, but the approach is fundamentally different, and this alters what ZoneTag is best used for.
Let me say – ZoneTag is only meant to be used in the US at the moment. I errrr blindly ignored the T&Cs and installed it. It works, but the most interesting functionality is currently limited to the US.
When you take a picture, the now-familiar “upload?” screen is displayed, but if you agree, a second screen is shown, asking for tags, privacy, and whether to include location tags. GPS co-ordinates can also be uploaded, if paired with a Bluetooth GPS.
The location tags are what’s particularly interesting. These are generated by the ZoneTag server, based on previous photos, their cell IDs, and GPS co-ordinates. Each uploaded photo contains links to the ZoneTag server, where anyone (with permission) can edit the location of the photo – at a city and state level. This is updated dynamically in the photo tags. So the location is fundamentally dynamic, and presumably other people adding and editing photos could influence the location tags that are attached to your photo.
This dynamicness is very interesting, and I can see more and more information being inferred from photo context. I get the feeling this is just a very early release of ZoneTag, so I’m waiting eagerly to see what else is possible.
On a practical level, the install is pretty easy, but you will need a Yahoo! ID and to register on the ZoneTag website. The app seems pretty stable, but must be run (and remain running) to intercept photos as they are taken.
pluses
context! – GPS + cell ID
dynamic location and inference
minuses
US only
unclear as to what tags are dynamic and may change
two-click upload
takes over the description of the photo with links
Context Watcher
Now, I’ll admit something – I’ve never got this one working. My 6630 has been around the block a bit, and it’s had enough alphas and betas of software installed, uninstalled, crashed, etc. that the base free storage space is miniscule (I need to flash it, update it and reset it). Context Watcher is a meaty app developed in Python for S60, so there’s some speed and memory overhead running the Python interpreter.
Context Watcher is far more than just a Flickr uploader – it’s intended to track all kinds of information, both from sensors, such as GPS, cell ID, heart rate and accelerometers, but also things like user mood and activity, plus buddy lists, messaging and presence. It’s designed for deep research into what people are doing, and can also output in other ways, such as blogging your activity, graphs, or even dynamic output to Google Earth.
They’re doing some nice work on inference, in particular cell clustering – working out which cells are nearby each other. They also maintain an accessible database mapping cell IDs to (cleaned and aggregated) GPS co-ordinates.
pluses
incredible amounts of contextual data
Python (reusable)
much more than a Flickr uploader
minuses
very heavy
Python (speed)
much more than a Flickr uploader
All 4 are exciting – I’ve wanted a Flickr uploader since getting an account, and I’ve wished for GPS tagged photo uploaders since I experimented with making my location public.
I’m glad they they developed implicit rules about how to store metadata – using the emerged standard proposed by Geobloggers for geo co-ordinates, and now standards for Bluetooth information. They realise that more photos = more serendipity.
The most controversial feature of them all is storing and publishing Bluetooth IDs. Are these personal information? Are you allowed to store this data (particularly in the EU)? It’s, well, illuminating from a privacy angle, but my take on it is that metadata is always useful. Already in Helsinki, with probably a few tens of users of both Meaning and Context Watcher, we’re seeing intersections between Bluetooth device IDs on photos: this means that a particular device/individual was nearby both ekurvine and myself when we took the pictures. The obvious benefits are that you could search for your own Bluetooth ID to get photos taken around you – such as at events, down the pub or at parties (could also be done similarly using a combination of cell ID and time).
After spending too much of both your time and mine obsessing over uploaders, I’ll tell you what I really want now – and that’s a Flickr viewer. Uploading is great, but, as always, 95% of the time you want to see what others are doing, not upload another photo. I haven’t seen a great mobile app that lets you view what’s going on on Flickr yet (though Shozu is edging towards it with the comment functionality).
Another feature that came out of some conversations recently is the ability to add people to your friend list when mobile. Whilst it initially struck me as a bit farfetched (like in this great cartoon), it’d be really nice to be able to add someone to my contact list whilst talking to them. Stops you having to remember to find them when you get back to a computer.
I can’t claim this review to be comprehensive – if there are any other interesting uploaders, please mention them. Also, to all the teams behind these apps – if there are any errors, please get in touch. But most of all: you’ve done a great job. Mobile phone cameras now have really useful features that ‘real’ camera manufacturers can’t quite seem to implement. We’re at the beginning of objects dripping in metadata, and therefore being able to find things easily and in new ways. Exciting!
comments
sorry mate, didn’t mean you to feel press-ganged into writing mobile stuff, although when you do it’s bloody useful and thoughtful content.
— Jim Hughes 30.03.06 #
Thanks, Chris – great review!
I agree that all these apps are interesting in different ways, and (with the exception of Context Watcher) I use them all myself.
As you’ve noted, our primary focus with ShoZu is on ease-of-use (i.e. making things as automatic, robust and non-intrusive as possible), and openness (i.e. supporting lots of web sites).
I thought it might be worth trying to persuade you that the ‘middleman server’ is a plus, rather than a minus. The idea is that you can upload your photo or video once only. Then, from the phone, you can send it to as many destinations as you like without incurring additional data charges for sending the image over the air. In the current version of ShoZu, this means you can send the photo to any email address stored in your phone address book virtually for free. In April we will allow other kinds of destination – for example personal blogs.
The other purpose of the ShoZu server is to make uploads much more robust than with standard http or wireless email. If an upload gets interrupted (by loss of network coverage, battery expiring etc.), ShoZu will resume where it left off, rather than starting over. Again, the main benefit is data cost savings.
The ShoZu server also enables the post-upload edits to tags, titles, descriptions etc.
We don’t store images permanently on the ShoZu server. Once they are deleted from the phone, we delete them from the server as well.
I definitely agree about the need for a good way of viewing your own photos, and your friends’ photos, on the phone, and we have plans in this area for later in the year, as well as for context-aware tagging.
Thanks again
Andy Tiller, CTO Cognima (creators of ShoZu)
— Andy Tiller 30.03.06 #
ShoZu have J2ME and Windows Mobile versions as well you know (which is handy for the k750i-tes amongst us)
I would also like to point you to Mobup an open source mobile uploader / moblogging platform for Flickr. you can shoot the photo and add tags, title descriptions, sets and groups with an optimized data transfer.
We aren’t using any posting server but uploading DIRECTLY to Flickr.
more infos (and the source code) on the Mobup site
Excellent review Chris!! I use Shozu alot since it posts to both my flickr and textamerica, but I will give the others a try.
Just a heads up to say the memory issues in Merkitys should be fixed in the new versions.
Also I belive Mika (when he gets time) will add support for commas when tagging. The colons are actually a left over from some of the other stuff Merkitys can do.
For example have you tried giving a place more than one name by using a colon? e.g.
Itäkeskus:johns apartment
Or using a colon in calendar entries to generate tags e.g.
Kiasma:Mika:John:Theo
Actually if I remeber right the colons can be used anywhere you can enter free text, like the city name, location, calendar etc.
Glad you picked up on the privacy concerns too, one of the only people to have said so.
— John Anthony Evans 1.04.06 #
> [Shozu] also offers photo rotation, which is, I think, unique.
Lifeblog lets you rotate photos. Just press 1 or 3 to rotate in the timeline before uploading.
> Tags can be entered [in Meaning], but using colons to separate tags is a T9 nightmare, and you can only set a title that is also used as a description.
Yeah, I agree! I emailed them about this, but I couldn’t convince them. To me, it seems obvious it a Flickr-app should follow Flickr’s tagging style, as that’s what Flickr users know and will expect. Also, it’s much easier to use the Flickr style than colons on a phone keypad.
I didn’t like the way Meaning moved photos to different folders and renamed them. It’d be nice for that to be configurable.
Anyway, do you lot like getting prompts after every photo asking if you wanna upload it?