Google vs. Yahoo / Picasa vs. Flickr: Ready... FIGHT!
I got an email from the bauld Google telling me that 'Picasa Web Albums' would be launching 'soon', so I should 'apply for an invitation', so I did (haven't heard back yet though). It looks to me like Google, with Picasa, is going to try to take on the might of Yahoo! with Flickr in the online photo-sharing world, which seems to me like a gargantuan challenge for the dudes at Google.
Almost everyone I know who wants to share their photos online uses Flickr (with the exception of Adrian, who designed his own photo-sharing experience, colossal geek that he is), and they pretty much have the market sown up as regards online photo-sharing. Flickr has all the tools too, for things like mo'blogging and such, which from what I can see won't be rolled out by Picasa for quite a while yet.
Now, I use Picasa to organise my pics on my computer, because it's brilliant, at least far more brillianter than Windows is. I'm sure iPhoto on the Mac is pretty good, but as regards Windows and organising pics, Picasa is King in my opinion. If it was really easy to post pics online from inside Picasa, and if they rolled out blogging facilities that were as good as or (dare I say) better than Flickr, I might be tempted to change over to this new service, but they'd want to be pretty far along in their program before I do that, and I think I'll wait (even after I get an invite) until they've taken down that 'TEST' banner from the 'Picasa Web Albums' logo before I even think about telling other people to look for my photos there (how is 'TEST' different from 'Beta', that's what I want to know...).
Have any other Gmail or Picasa users (who read this here blog) recieved an invite? Anyone seen what it's really like beyond the 'Learn More' page? Let me know in the comments, if you please.
(posts)
4.21-en
Geek Support, fixing of bugger-ups, moral support, code splicing, tech. administration, whining, über-nerdery and fetching of fluffy coffees by 
Comments
I like Flickr. I looked at Picasa briefly ages ago and went with Flickr.
Flickr, interestingly, is "gamma" at the moment. I think it still means "test" but just not as "testy" as Google products tend to be.
As I use ZoomBrowser to manage my photographs, I'm not all that bothered about local photograph management. For that reason, nothing that I've seen in Picasa has invited me away from Flickr which is integrating very, very nicely with my new photoblog which I am now going to shamelessly plug http://www.dancingshades.org
Mind you, I don't have a gmail account so I was never going to get an invite anyway.
Posted by: Winds | June 15, 2006 2:12 PM
Flickr is for organising and sharing photos online, Picasa is for doing the same thing, butoffline. But now Picasa and Google seem to be trying to muscle in on Flickr's turf. Flickr is indeed Gamma, but I don't know why. What's next, Flickr 'Delta'?
I haven't seen anything that would tempt me away from Flickr, until now that is. And maybe not even now, I'll have to see what Picasa Web Albums has to offer. And it'll have to be a lot, or at least more than Flickr.
A Gmail invite is on it's way to you. :-)
Posted by: Matt | June 15, 2006 2:29 PM
I have just posted a bug in the new Picasa Web Albums software on my blog at thinkingpictures.blogspot.com. So far it seems like a great little program but they will need to fix this bug, and fast!
Posted by: Jeremiah McNichols | June 15, 2006 6:43 PM
I'm in the same position as you. I use Picasa for ALL my photos, and Flickr for those that I want to share (or "don't mind" sharing).
I'm just surprised someone hasn't written a 3rd party app to post to Flickr from Picasa!
Posted by: Gordon | June 15, 2006 10:57 PM
Me too, I mean whenever I'm posting something to Flickr I always have Picasa open so I can see where the files and folders are, so something like this, where you can just click a button in Picasa to post your photos, seems initially like a brilliant idea, but then you (or in this case I) realise that Flickr is pretty fantastic, and it will take something really special to wrest my loyalty away.
Posted by: Matt | June 16, 2006 10:03 AM
Google's doing a lot of "sending up flares" to annoy their competitors.
I love flikr, even though I don't use it, and since Yahoo! is an eBay partner and Google is teh enemy, I hope flickr wins out.
Actually I almost wish I had never coded my own photo album, that's how good flikr is. But still my album does exactly what I want, and I have a brilliant design for version 3 if I ever get time to code it. I used to monitor the flick jobs boards ...
The one thing google may have in their favour here is that a lot of people use picasa but not flickr or any online facility. They have just lowered the barrier of entry which always bring people in. And pictures are easier to monetize than videos (GV and YT are not making money ).
However what is really needed to offline and online tools to work together no matter what the site and what the tools. Picasa should work with flickr and google, iPhoto should work with them too. and .mac.
The winner of the new world is going to be those people that can seamless integrate offline apps and online apps. Calendering and email especially. Ironically Microsoft is best positioned to do this.
Posted by: Adrian | June 18, 2006 9:55 PM