In a couple of days time my flickr account will be 2 years old. Two long/short years (depending on how you look at it). About 18 months longer than I thought it’d last when I first signed up. I originally signed up for flickr when it was in beta to test the waters with a free account. Knowing how much decent web hosting costs, I was skeptical at first on the whole subject of ‘unlimited’ storage and bandwidth for what seemed an unrealistic sum; A smidge under $50 for two years. Surely it’ll be dog slow. Nope. Surely they’ll have some crazy usage clause in the terms and conditions. Nope. Ok, so what’s the catch?

Well, em… Is there one? I’m still waiting to find out. Right, you can’t change or skin your site to any great degree. Sure they introduced a slight spin on the first page (that was long overdue) and a little birdy tells me they’re working on making the interface more customisable but I can only imagine that given how long it took to introduce the current layouts, full customisation is a long way off yet.

As for myself, I’ll be sticking with flickr for another 2 years for now, if only for the fact that I’ve got thousands of photos uploaded and I just can’t imagine I’d want to start uploading them to some other website, if indeed there exists a better photo sharing website… This is taking a decidedly text based approach, so how about some of my ‘most interesting’ photos from the last two years.

The unnamed waterfall

The Unnamed Waterfall, somewhere down in the valley between Kenmare (Kerry) and Bantry (Cork). October 7th 2006.

Malin Head

Malin Head, right at the northern tip of Ireland. June 2nd 2006

Gougane Barra

Gougane Barra in West Cork. Possibly one of the most photogenic places in Cork and certainly the one visited most by photographers. Everyone has been out here. September 4th 2005

IMG_2342

Lough Key Forest Park in Roscommon. A popular one with the film vs. digital people. I’ve been asked “Did you photoshop that leaf in?”. Did I hell… October 18th 2005

Inniscarra Dam

Inniscarra Dam, Cork. Back with my old (yet still going strong) 75-300, shooting through a fence gave a most unexpected yet utterly welcome effect. September 3rd 2005

IMG_2908

Last but not least, the very first photo I uploaded to flickr. EXIF reckons it was taken on June 23rd 2003 but I know for a fact it was Halloween night. Jaysus, I never really missed the old 3.2mp Canon powershot until I started looking through the old stuff… Back then the 20D was a distant dream. I suppose it shows what a few years can do..

RIGHT! Onward and upward for the next two years of flickring. As it stands currently; 4769 photos, 73444 views and 148 contacts (more than I can ever keep track of). So if you’ve visited my flickr page, left a comment, added a photo as a favorite or just generally been interested, thanks. It’s all appreciated. I’m off to find my credit card to complete the registration for another two years of this malarky.