Flickr Stats

I'll happily and readily admit that I am completely addicted to Flickr Stats.  Ever since I upgraded my account to Pro, I just can't get enough of them.  For someone like me, who always did like numbers and graphs, and is a tiny bit obsessive, they're just perfect.


Every day you get a full breakdown of how many people have looked at which of your photos, and how they got to see that photo in the first place (well, where they were referred from, on the web).  And you get a graph showing your total views by day for the last month or so.  Brilliant. 


I think the reason that I like them so much is probably about three fold:


(1) Let's face it, it's all about popularity.  And we all want to know that our photos arewell liked.
(2) It's something of a challenge, every day, to see if you can manage to beat the previous day/any other day that you choose (and you can easily compare, thank you graph).
(3) The Flickr community often throws up some surprises.  I am beginning to find that I am pretty useless at choosing which photos are going to be most viewed/popular/interesting.


Take the photo at the top of this post, for example.  This is my most viewed picture for today and yesterday (and, I only shot and posted it yesterday).  I like it, but compared to some of the other shots I managed to get from my day at Liverpool on the Waterfront yesterday (if you're really interested, see.... http://www.flickr.com/photos/ruthwareing/sets/72157624403261159/), I don't think it is altogether that good.


I'm actually beginning to think that maybe it isn't amazing, and views actually just equal curiosity.  For example, if you saw the picture above as a thumbnail, you might struggle to work out what it is.  Or, of course, it is possible that I have just tagged it so much, or put it in so many groups, that enough people have just stumbled across it, rather than actively choosing to view to view.  I think this is possibly true in the case of the shot above as nobody has left me a comment or added it as a favourite.


Whatever the answer, I'm sure there's probably only one way to work it out - more time looking at the stats!  Well that's what I'm telling myself.