So an odd thing happened yesterday. One of my index cards was featured in
Flickr Explore, and it was a very interesting experience ...
I first realised something unusual was going on when I started getting phone notifications for 'likes' (favourites on Flickr) at a much faster rate than usual, and from people that I didn't know. There were just 3 or 4 to start with, and my first thought was perhaps I was getting spammed. I actually had a quick look at Explore on my phone, but couldn't see my photo on the first page, so ruled that out to start with.
But the likes just kept on coming! And new followers too. So I booted up my PC, and had another look at Flickr Explore, and sure enough - there it was. Very exciting :)
Within a single day, my index card "Roses" had racked up 6400 views and 93 favourites, and I had 9 new followers. Far and away the biggest reaction I've ever had to a photo in such a short amount of time.
I checked out my Flickr stats (I believe these are only available to continuing Pro users nowadays), which showed that while I normally get 200-400 overall views per day, yesterday's views had passed 7700! 5500 of them were for "Roses", so views were well up for my other photos too.
So. That was pretty cool.
It was also great to see that this kind of activity and interaction still exists on Flickr. It feels a bit quiet there sometimes, what with the rise and rise of Instagram. So it's kind of awesome that active users are still engaging with Flickr to discover new content :)
P.S. Before yesterday, my highest number of views for a single photo was one that I took at the
Victorian Parliamentary Library, with over 13,000 views (but only 2 favourites). My most popular photo in terms of favourites was of
felt Christmas ornaments that I made in 2009, which took over 5 years to amass 9500 views and 49 likes.
