I think the answer is “… maybe!”

Well, this is an idea that Thomas Hawk goes into much greater depth with, but basically Flickr already has algorithms to determine popularity and relevance.  This is governed largely by the way that images are sorted and tagged and viewed by the community at large.  In fact, the community itself determines the relative importance of each photo, which in turn, has an important effect on how Flickr sorts through those photos and the order in which it serves them up if they are searched through.

Could Yahoo! learn a thing or three about this?  Sure.  And Thomas makes some great points about it, but suffice it to say, its a similar, but very different way of understanding importance.  The current model of determining relevance has to do with many different factors, but one of the principle ones involves the pattern of inbound links to a given page for given keywords.  Link structure and the evolution of that over time is what has driven how search engines do what they do.

But for results and data that are derived from social networks, like Flickr in Yahoo — its a bit different story because of the users tag, or even, internally rank (vote?) for specific photos for a given tag.

I think this introduces an entirely different dynamic, because acquiring inbound links in the World Wide Web at large seems like a very different kettle of fish than acquiring the same kind of positive ranking in the factors which matter in a social system. 

But is this an improvement over the way that Search Engines have done things?  I think the answer could be yes.  After all, Matt Cutts at Google has said that Google is trying to dabble with how humans can help the algorithm do what it needs to do.  And what are social networks if not human activity that involves adding, sorting and tagging information in ways that can be infinitely measured and quantified?

Which begs the question, of course:

If social networks can improve the search results of certain topics (and this is a huge presumption), does it make sense for search engines to start acquiring those social networks? 

Not for a content play — but so that it can examine how certain social networks *do* rank data, and so they can have access *to* that, but also, and literally, own the content of those search results?

I have no idea.  But if Google suddenly snaps up Facebook for people search, please reference me in any future posts you might do. ;)

Not Zoomr — and not these two gentlemen.

Personally, I don’t really care how long it takes to develop their next product.  It could take another month or three.  They have other concerns, strategic, financial, and otherwise.  But I really couldn’t care less.

And that’s because the product, whatever it may be, will probably be worth it.  Their past work with Zooomr is the proof of that.

But the kind of interesting thing that has rescued them from a public denouncement — after raising our hopes up?  The fact that these guys are so damn *earnest* and *personable* both through their blogs and through their live streaming feeds.

Heck, I don’t know if half of all the kind of shennanigans that are going on that are preventing the upgrade to Zooomr Mark III are true (although they probably are given the continuous live feed courtesy of UStream.TV), but their accessibility through the Zooomr blog, their transparency through the continuous live feed, and the *story* (or “brand” if you will) behind Zooomr — that of these two guys against huge Web2.0 corporations — is something that you just want to root for.

Now, that’s not to say that they would be completely immune to things — but they’ve been up front with their fans so far, and all of that has been rewarded with nothing but supportive sentiment.

I’m not sure when Zooomr Mark III is coming, but Kris and Thomas can take their time as far as I’m concerned.  I’m willing to wait for something great (and unlimited storage) — let’s just hope that it *does* pay off in a way that the community is anticipating.

(because if it doesn’t … woodshed time! — no, just kidding.)

(Or am I?)

In particular, they’re offering two important features

• Unlimited Storage — while you’re paying how much for how much space at that other place?
• Marketplace – users will be able to sell their photos and keep 90% of the sale

The official launch will be heading out within the next 12-24 hours, but Kris has released a “Launch Video” that shows a lot of the newer features.

Which is over here at Vimeo:: Zooomr Mark III Launch Demo! from Kristopher on Vimeo

Unfortunately it isn’t really annotated so here are some notes that I took that might help it go down a little easier

• Logins: You can now login with a proper email / password process that is familiar to everyone — in addition to openID
• Smart Search: you can search with some unusual features like “most awesome” and “near location” (such as “near starbucks”)
• World Through Photos: this is a feature that Kris spent a *lot* of time talking about, in that you’ll be able to use a mashup of GoogleMaps to search for place names, using their proper names. For example, hitting in “Eiffel Tower” will take you to where it is on GoogleMaps (and presumably some photos as well)
• Discover: Best Hundred — you can discover the best one hundred photos over a given time period, whether it be over the past year, past month or what have you at a glance
• Groups: Think Google groups, but centered around photos, allowing you to create messages and what not around specific photos.
• You: There a lot of slick Ajax to create a rich user interface with respect to viewing your own photos and profile
• Widgets Within Photos: Even though Kris demonstrated this, I still had a hard time understanding what he meant — perhaps that you would be able to syndicate information *within* photos through different media as widgets, such as tags, and so on. In fact …
• People Tagging: You can tag people in photos, like what is already offered in Facebook, and then send a message to them about the photo that you took … a viral feature for photos.
• Instantaneous search: Through the magic of Ajax, things look fast without loading times
• Marketplace: Kris didn’t share to many details other than it will be easy, you can charge ridiculous amounts (if the market will bear it), and there’s 90% share for users
• Comments / Messaging / Dialogue: There is a sophisticated messaging system for each photograph allowing you to have a conversation with different people underneath each photograph — it will also let the photographer know so as to include him the conversation:
• Search by color / palette: You can add in hexadecimal colors to search for different photos
• Portals: Creating a photographic link to another photograph on someone else’s photograph (a “portal”)
• Zipline: You’ll be able to see at a glance, and in reverse chronological order what your friends are doing, saying, and their photos

It looks like a fairly awesome product so I’m really looking forward to it as it looks to be entirely free. There are over 250 new features as well.

Watching the video, it looks like there are three big themes involved with Zooomr Mark III:

1. Context — being able to place photographs in context, with respect to who shot them, why they shot them, and having conversations around them
2. Network — Zooomr really looks to create a real social network for photographers and their photographs, coupled with messaging, profiles, and an easy way to share their love for this hobby
3. Rich Interface – Ajax is used aplenty to create a rich environment with quick loading times, eye catching animation and a whole lot more

Anyway, with the official release its something we’ll be able to see all for ourselves. Congratulations Kris and Thomas — this looks like one helluva product!