Communicating through photographs - Thing 18

I like words and I can definitely be text-heavy in everything I write. So it would be good to have photographs to fall back on in order to get my message across. That's why Thing 18, 19 and 21 look so important. One thing I'm very nervous about is copyright on images. I'm not sure I understand the whole creative commons thing (roll on Thing 19) but it can be such a minefield to get across.

Anyway, I was interested to look at Flickr and Instagram. I don't have either set up as an account but an Instagram account had been talked about in the library I work in. No-one felt the need for one, nor did anyone want to take on the responsibility for one.

I opted for a Flickr account. As I found out, I already had this account basically set up as I already have a yahoo account. Just a few extra clicks and I was ready to go. Now I haven't got any photos loaded up yet but it all looks fairly straightforward. 

Searching for people or groups was technically very easy. Just put your search term in the box and away you go! I looked for UCD Library and Libraries NI before settling on the Library of Congress. I can see from the search that some libraries opted for the Pro version of Flickr which allows you to get rid of ads from your Flickr account, get advanced statistics and save on shipping.

Library of Congress Flickr Account / Carol M. Highsmith

I was able to download the image above. I was still unsure of how to find out whether the image was covered by the creative commons licence and whether it was attributable or not. However when I looked closer at the image, it indicated that there were no known copyright restrictions. I have included the details of the image in a caption so as to highlight that the image isn't my own.

Can I see either a Flickr or Instagram account being used in my workplace? If someone was willing to take responsibility for it, then yes I can. We have official photographs of the various libraries around campus but sometimes it can be the ones taken during Welcome Week, International Students Day etc that you want to record. It's these that provide the most amusement during the rest of the year, that we want to look back on and record for future events, posts and tweets. Could we use it to show what happens behind the scenes, to capture the elusive back of house staff?  I think so - everyone deserves to be in the limelight for at least 5 mins. It's how to take this forward in the workplace that will be the interesting discussion.