The Interested Observer

Like a million other amateur photographers, I have a flickr page. I’m no Ansel Adams, but I can point and shoot pretty well and I think I have a certain point of view. So imagine my surprise and my delight when I got an e-mail from Schmap, makers of a freeware program of worldwide cityguides. For a guide to Newport, Rhode Island, they simply wandered through the Flickr “library” looking for pictures of Newport (a really good reason to tag those pix!) and e-mailed people with a share-alike commons license and asking them if they could use the photos in the guide with proper attribution. They asked me if they could use two photos I happened to be especially fond of. Of course, you don’t get paid, but this is how the Commons is supposed to work. And it’s nice to see it does and it’s especially nice to see my photos loved and adored by someone besides me.  I wonder how many other companies are making use of the huge flickr library of fabulous images?