Best non-Flickr Collaborative Photo Sites?

March 21, 2008 7:44 AM

Do you remember a global online photo project where individuals took pictures of themselves in their room? If it's still out there, I need to find it, as well as other examples of collaborative, possibly community-building blog-style photo sites that aren't Flickr.

My Google-fu has failed, although I did find some neat things along the way (laundry swapmeet, tabblo). Help me, o hivemind!

I am trying to convince my somewhat skeptical big'n'traditional employer that two work teams, separated by distance and culture, could possibly feel a bit more connected if they had access to a corporate-sponsored place pooling voluntarily shared images and a bit of explanation about why a particular poster is offering up a particular shot. I'm looking for models of intriguing & inspiring but work-safe topics, clean and thoughtful presentation interfaces, and any administrative best practices you can share from experience. Thank you in advance for your help as I try to give some good people a chance to get to know each other better!

posted by clever sheep to computers & internet (6 comments total)

Did you come across Voicethread in your travels? I love the idea - a global collaborative photo project site where you can add commentary in your own voice to the photos that you upload. It seems like it has a very easy interface too.
posted by iconomy at 8:06 AM on March 21

Well, only some of the pictures are taken in people's rooms but The Mirror Project is a pretty good example of this kind of thing. Super clean UI, and it's been around forever so it's a good example of something of this type that is sustainable.
posted by littlerobothead at 8:18 AM on March 21

I'm interested in why only photos? Is there a language barrier? I ask only because I've site-administered password-protected sites on which groups have been allowed to share photos, post messages, embed YouTube videos, etc. The more ways in which you give a group to interact, the more interaction you tend to get - at least in my experience.

A couple of years ago, I was working for National Geographic Channel, and we wanted to promote a week of programming on the network that showcased what Americans might think of as unusual customs in a stunt we called "Culture Shock Week." In order to promote it, we held a contest where people submitted photos from their travels through different cultures -- this included non-Americans submitting photos of things they'd seen in the U.S. that intrigued them -- along with a short explanation of the photo. The contest is a few years old, but it still draws enough traffic that Nat Geo's kept it up. You can see it here. The web's come a long way since this, so there's something much nicer you could do these days. The pictures are miserably small, but the idea is similar.

I've also been really impressed with what Pentax has done at their Pentaxian site. Probably a little towards the other end of the extreme in terms of what you need from a site development standpoint - but inspiring nonetheless.
posted by mrkinla at 9:14 AM on March 21

Actually, my bad. I was thinking more of the Pentax photo gallery site.
posted by mrkinla at 9:17 AM on March 21

I like the one where you upload your photo, and people guess how old you are (mostly because, yay, they guess I am younger than I really am), called The Age Project.
posted by misha at 12:16 PM on March 21

...for a blog style photo site, check out buzznet... I've seen people do similiar postings over distances and toward similiar projects, communities etc.
posted by xpix at 1:52 PM on March 21