Before the last meeting, I submitted a question regarding whether Primfeed plans on adding curated groups like Flickr's and, unfortunately, I was unable to make it to the event. When I saw the readout for Dec. 1st's meeting, I was dismayed to see that the only mention of groups was: ---------- Groups vs Tags: Debate over groups vs. hashtags as organizational tools, with a preference for hashtag-based discovery with search. The audience agrees that groups from Flickr aren't the best way to handle this. ---------- I do not feel this should be an either/or situation. Tags are useful, yes.. but curated groups also have their uses and overlooking this is, in my opinion, not the best decision. I wanted to point out that an incredible amount of people on Flickr don't bother using tags at all. Most don't understand HOW to use tags, much less their importance. They do, however, understand how to use groups (more often than not, at least). I manage an event and have worked with bloggers for quite a long while at this point and I am forever trying to explain how to use tags to them. Most that didn't understand tags in the first place still don't bother using them even after it's been explained in great detail how to use them and why they're important... but they DO understand how to add an image to groups fairly quickly because it feels more like they're making the discoverability of their images someone else's responsibility.. and who doesn't enjoy having to deal with less responsibility? Groups are also an easy and fun way to meet like-minded individuals and people who appreciate certain topics. There are hundreds of SL groups on flickr with thousands of members because it's such an easy way to find things and, usually, know that everything in THIS GROUP is curated and managed so that if you're looking in THIS GROUP you only see photos meant to be in THIS GROUP, whereas anything can be tagged as anything and no one is policing what's being tagged. I could tag a pornographic photograph #teddybear but if I try to submit a pornographic photograph into a Teddy Bear group that is curated by moderators who approve each new photograph it will most certainly be blocked from entering that group. Another example for those of us who've been in SL for a long while is the chocolate bar that showed up in Every Single XSL search because the creator had backloaded it with a massive paragraph of any kind of tag you can imagine at the bottom of the listing. Or all of the sexual nonsense that shows up even today on unrelated searches due to poor tag management or the creators just dumping all sorts of tags into their listings in an attempt to get more eyes on their sad prim genitalia from 2011. It also gives people a bit of a thrill to be allowed into a curated group for quality imagery or for a specific group of individuals. I curate a group on Flickr for Androgynous Avatars, for example, and I've been told numerous times how excited people have been to find a photo of theirs was invited into my group. I would love to do the same here for people who enjoy that aesthetic and others. Such groups are also fun for people who aren't submitting photos directly to them as many people enjoy following groups simply because they enjoy the aesthetics of the photos submitted by others... whereas following hashtags is, again, not only less reliable but more prone to inappropriate use. So again, I ask you to please consider implementing curated groups into Primfeed.
