I put it in my header and footer and programmed to auto link to the page it's on works perfect !!!
if they are in a gallery and they click it, links to that gallery or you can over ride it and alsway have it go to one URL and you can over ride that with the Open Graph Tags if needed
Would you mind explaining this a little more, Turbo? For instance, what is "it" referring to in various places? (added IT, put IT, etc!) The last sentence "if they are in a gallery & they click "it"... you mean the Like Button? And I'm not following the rest of the sentence. Sorry, it's late & I may be thick, but if you could clear this stuff up a bit, more of us could try it perhaps! Thanks a mil!
I understand thats your bread n butter, but still.
We're a triple-decker sandwich: Standard, Power and Pro and all types of customers matter to us, and even within the Pro set, we have some that are like you, hardcore, but not selling, yet want some pro features. Our development and releases reflect efforts that benefit all customer types.
You dont want to paint yourselves into a corner either where thats the only market thats attracted to your service, which I think you're doing.
Granted. And you def should for a lot of things. I know people here appreciate that their voices are heard. But how valuable is this feedback? I mean, how many Smuggers actually come to these forums on a regular basis to even comment or participate?? I'd guess not many in the grand scheme of things.
It's rather valuable and we get tons of great feedback from Dgrin - we also get it from our http://feedback.smugmug.com system and we get it directly at the help desk, and we get it in person at 30 SMUGs around the world and we also get it from Tradeshows and other meetings.
And like I said, at this late in the social game, should you really be asking us how to do this? Sometimes you just have to do things because they need done, not because we say its OK.
Would you mind explaining this a little more, Turbo? For instance, what is "it" referring to in various places? (added IT, put IT, etc!) The last sentence "if they are in a gallery & they click "it"... you mean the Like Button? And I'm not following the rest of the sentence. Sorry, it's late & I may be thick, but if you could clear this stuff up a bit, more of us could try it perhaps! Thanks a mil!
So how, exactly, is the Facebook "Like" button going to work (assuming you go ahead with its integration)?
I followed the "like this" link in Baldy's original post in this thread. I see the "Like" link next to a photo in a photo gallery. But I'm unsure about its implications.
What happens if I'm the owner of the Smug gallery where the picture is posted and a "Visitor" (an invited guest or just a lucky "stumbler" who happens to land on my gallery page) and clicks on one (or more) "Like" button(s) on my site?
Who sees the fact that Visitor "liked" something he or she found on my site? Does little post show up under the picture on my site that says "Visitor likes this". Do other visitors to my site see that? or Just me? and/or does the fact that Visitor liked a photo on my site show up on Visitor's Facebook page as a link that takes anyone who accesses Visitor's Facebook page direct to my site or to a specific gallery or photo on my site? If that's the case, I can see where Pros selling photos would certainly want that...but, speaking for myself (non-pro), I don't want every Tom, Dick and Harry in the universe visiting my site because they are all Facebook "friends" of Visitor.
Those of you who deal with this stuff on a daily basis have to remember that those of of who don't (deal with this stuff on a daily basis) may need to start from "the beginning" to understand what it is you're trying to do instead of somewhere in the middle with a "Hey guys, what-do-ya-think-of-THIS!?
I know it's more or less "obvious" to many of you...but it's not so obvious to me or folks like me...I have to try to wrap my brain around it first before I "get it", and I'm sure I'm not alone.
So how, exactly, is the Facebook "Like" button going to work (assuming you go ahead with its integration)?
I followed the "like this" link in Baldy's original post in this thread. I see the "Like" link next to a photo in a photo gallery. But I'm unsure about its implications.
What happens if I'm the owner of the Smug gallery where the picture is posted and a "Visitor" (an invited guest or just a lucky "stumbler" who happens to land on my gallery page) and clicks on one (or more) "Like" button(s) on my site?
Who sees the fact that Visitor "liked" something he or she found on my site? Does little post show up under the picture on my site that says "Visitor likes this". Do other visitors to my site see that? or Just me? and/or does the fact that Visitor liked a photo on my site show up on Visitor's Facebook page as a link that takes anyone who accesses Visitor's Facebook page direct to my site or to a specific gallery or photo on my site? If that's the case, I can see where Pros selling photos would certainly want that...but, speaking for myself (non-pro), I don't want every Tom, Dick and Harry in the universe visiting my site because they are all Facebook "friends" of Visitor.
Those of you who deal with this stuff on a daily basis have to remember that those of of who don't (deal with this stuff on a daily basis) may need to start from "the beginning" to understand what it is you're trying to do instead of somewhere in the middle with a "Hey guys, what-do-ya-think-of-THIS!?
I know it's more or less "obvious" to many of you...but it's not so obvious to me or folks like me...I have to try to wrap my brain around it first before I "get it", and I'm sure I'm not alone.
It sounds like you aren't very family with the Facebook Like function. When a Facebook user clicks on a Like button on any site, it adds an item to their own Facebook wall that says they Like that site and has a link to that site. Their wall is usually only visible to the people that they are friends with on Facebook, but can be configured to be visible to all. The purpose of the Like button is to have an easy way to tell your friends that you found something elsewhere on the internet that you like so they can perhaps go check it out.
The reason for you to put a Like button on your gallery is to make it easier for your viewers to share which galleries or images they like with their Facebook friends. If you don't want your friends sharing what they like on your site, then you wouldn't want this feature in your galleries. If you are trying to sell something with public galleries, you would presumably want as many people as possible to know about your galleries and come visit and this could only help increase traffic.
If a viewer of your gallery is not a Facebook user, then the Like function would do nothing for them (I haven't tried it, but I'd guess that it might encourage them to sign up for Facebook), but they can't actually Like anything without being a logged in FB user.
It sounds like you aren't very family with the Facebook Like function. When a Facebook user clicks on a Like button on any site, it adds an item to their own Facebook wall that says they Like that site and has a link to that site. Their wall is usually only visible to the people that they are friends with on Facebook, but can be configured to be visible to all. The purpose of the Like button is to have an easy way to tell your friends that you found something elsewhere on the internet that you like so they can perhaps go check it out.
The reason for you to put a Like button on your gallery is to make it easier for your viewers to share which galleries or images they like with their Facebook friends. If you don't want your friends sharing what they like on your site, then you wouldn't want this feature in your galleries. If you are trying to sell something with public galleries, you would presumably want as many people as possible to know about your galleries and come visit and this could only help increase traffic.
If a viewer of your gallery is not a Facebook user, then the Like function would do nothing for them (I haven't tried it, but I'd guess that it might encourage them to sign up for Facebook), but they can't actually Like anything without being a logged in FB user.
Thanks John...believe it or not, I sorta figured it would "likely" (pun intended) work along those lines. And yes, in my case, since I'm not a pro, not selling photos, and prefer having only family an my friends viewing my galleries...I would want the Facebook "Like" functionality OFF by default...actually more than just "OFF"...I would prefer not to SEE the FB Like button anywhere on my site unless or until I opt-in for that function.
I'm one of those users who wants nothing to do with Facebook.
Whether you use facebook or not would be irrelevant. The "Like" button is so facebook users can share things through their account - you do not need to have one. I would see it a way of driving traffic to my site, nothing more, nothing less!!
There's a very simple form there that allows you to create a "like" button and doesn't require a facebook account. You're basically just making it very easy for people to share a link back to your site on their facebook page for all their friends to see.
From my research on this feature when it first came out, you do need to have a fb account.
I believe it works like this: you wouldn't need to have a Facebook account to have the button display on your site. However, there are some sites you might visit in which the Facebook "like" stuff will display differently depending whether you have a FB account/i.e. are logged into it. I tried a test on CNN the other day. First, I was logged in. CNN showed me which of my FB friends had shared CNN links recently on FB. (so CNN has something set up where it can "know" who my FB friends are, and if I'm logged in, it assumes I want to know what CNN stuff they "like" or have shared). Next, I logged out of FB (under "accounts", you can do this). Went back to CNN. There was no box showing this time, telling me what my friends have shared. There was still a "Like" button, but I think it said something like "start a FB account" or something similar, beside it.
I just tried being logged in & out of CSM as well. On there, the FB "like" or actually "recommend" button shows both times. But also, under the article there was a button saying F (Facebook) 355 people recommend this only when I was logged out. When I was logged in, it changed to: "be the first of your friends to recommend this"! SmugMug sorcerers, have fun! I do think it's usually simpler than that on non-news sites; just a small "like" button. But I can see how some people won't even want that on their pages/galleries. I will be glad for it because I want the traffic! I would like people to be able to "like" stuff though even if I don't have the "share" button displayed, because that would be a safer way of bringing traffic to water-marked, RCP photos that reside here.
There's a very simple form there that allows you to create a "like" button and doesn't require a facebook account. You're basically just making it very easy for people to share a link back to your site on their facebook page for all their friends to see.
Now that is interesting. I would like to see SmugMug support that. Since all my coworkers are on FB it would let them link to the goofy photos of them.
Now that is interesting. I would like to see SmugMug support that. Since all my coworkers are on FB it would let them link to the goofy photos of them.
My impression (assumption?) is this is exactly what SM is planning here... That site just generates a very simple iframe code. The benefit of SM doing it instead of us, is they can dynamically replace the URL in the code to link directly to a gallery or photo, instead of you creating the button that links to your front page and displaying it everywhere.
I believe it works like this: you wouldn't need to have a Facebook account to have the button display on your site. However, there are some sites you might visit in which the Facebook "like" stuff will display differently depending whether you have a FB account/i.e. are logged into it. I tried a test on CNN the other day. First, I was logged in. CNN showed me which of my FB friends had shared CNN links recently on FB. (so CNN has something set up where it can "know" who my FB friends are, and if I'm logged in, it assumes I want to know what CNN stuff they "like" or have shared). Next, I logged out of FB (under "accounts", you can do this). Went back to CNN. There was no box showing this time, telling me what my friends have shared. There was still a "Like" button, but I think it said something like "start a FB account" or something similar, beside it.
I just tried being logged in & out of CSM as well. On there, the FB "like" or actually "recommend" button shows both times. But also, under the article there was a button saying F (Facebook) 355 people recommend this only when I was logged out. When I was logged in, it changed to: "be the first of your friends to recommend this"! SmugMug sorcerers, have fun! I do think it's usually simpler than that on non-news sites; just a small "like" button. But I can see how some people won't even want that on their pages/galleries. I will be glad for it because I want the traffic! I would like people to be able to "like" stuff though even if I don't have the "share" button displayed, because that would be a safer way of bringing traffic to water-marked, RCP photos that reside here.
All of those differences you saw take NO coding from SmugMug. What you're seeing is an iframe (sort of like another webpage embeded in the middle of the page you're on) that comes from FB.
Here's a (reformatted) snippet of the code for that iframe (I just generated this for my site, using the link I shared above):
Notice how the src comes from facebook. CNN has no idea if you're logged in, they're just embedding a facebook "page" within their page. Facebook itself of course knows if you are logged in, and therefore can change the embedded page based on that. show_faces is what caused you to see which of your friends had liked a page. When show_faces is false you get the "355 people" or "be the first of your friends" message, again depending on whether you are logged in. Action lets you choose between "like" and "recommend". The other items allow a little configuration, but the main differences you saw were in those two.
Family photo sharing happening on Facebook, not on Smugmug
This is somewhat related to the question about Facebook "Like" and hopefully Baldy will see it, so I thought I'd post in this thread.
I've been pondering the general question of photos in Smugmug vs. photos in Facebook and I've noticed some interesting trends in the last few months. Many of my family members have standard Smugmug accounts (courtesy of gifted accounts from me). They've been using them for years to share photos with family and friends and paying the annual fee themselves.
In the last several months, they are using Smugmug less and Facebook more in order to share photos! While Smugmug's Pro business is not in immediate jeopardy from this trend, I'm beginning to wonder if the standard account business is.
First, a little background on my observations. While Facebook has certainly been around awhile, the rest of my family has really only been on for the last 9 months or so and we have even succeeded in getting my mom on Facebook. It has served to reconnect us with family members that we hadn't seen or spoken to in many years and via Facebook and we have much more of an idea what's going on with everyone and their kids and spouses.
For me personally, I've ended up with Facebook friends in six general categories (Immediate Family, Extended Family, Fairly close friends, People I've worked with that aren't really in one of the previous categories, Classmates that aren't in one of the previous categories and business that I'm interested in follow their news on). I've created Facebook lists so I can control who I share stuff with and there are some things that are more appropriate for just immediate family that I don't care to share with classmates I haven't seen in 20 years.
So, that brings us to the observation that a number of my family members are using Facebook instead of Smugmug more and more to share pictures. We're not talking Fine Art photos here. We're talking snapshots of the family (some of them very high quality, but some of them cell phone images too). A year ago all of these went on Smugmug if they got shared. Today, most of these are going on Facebook.
I've asked myself why this is happening. Some thoughts:
If the communication vehicle for telling someone about the photos is Facebook itself, then it's just more convenient to put the photos in Facebook in the first place.
The photos are right next to the post, in the same web site and integrated seamlessly with the rest of the viewers Facebook reading experience.
If you put them in Smugmug and then need to post about them in FB, you just don't get as nice an experience, either in the visual quality of the post or in the viewing experience for the reader. Plus it's extra steps to upload them to Smugmug and then link them into FB.
For the most part, these types of photos can be appreciated at the medium size that FB offers and don't need to be viewed large. This is not universally true and is a drawback of putting them on FB.
For the most part, nobody wants to print these photos. They just want to look at them. I just don't see my family members ever ordering prints of my family photos on Smugmug.
If the photo originates on a camera phone, more and more camera phones have built in ways to get the photo shared on FB. None that I know of have a built-in way to get it shared on Smugmug (yes I know there are apps for some phones, but the point is it's not a capability that comes with the phone and the apps are only available for some phones).
So, what are the advantages of having the photos on Smugmug and linking them to FB.
You get large sizes.
You get slideshows.
You get a more advanced viewing interface (the Smugmug view).
You get a permanent record of them organized into some category hierarchy. While it's possible for people to come back to older photos on FB, I doubt many people do. They are seen in the stream on your wall and probably not referred back to much.
You can allow access to originals.
You can let people order prints.
So, despite these advantages of using Smugmug, more and more of my family members (who already have Smugmug accounts) are just sharing their images via FB instead because it's just more convenient.
I guess the first question is whether Smugmug cares - that's up to them. I will assume that they want to continue with a vibrant standard account business and aren't interested in ceding that to FB. If so, to protect their business, I think at least two things have to happen:
1) It needs to be just as easy to put your photos in Smugmug and get them shared via FB with a high quality post in FB as it is to put the photos in FB in the first place. Today, it's a lot more steps to put them in Smugmug and get them shared on FB and there are all sorts of obstacles in the way of getting a good quality post in FB to a gallery on Smugmug. This needs to be true whether the photo camera from your PC or whether it came from your camera phone.
2) The viewing experience for a FB user that you shared with needs to be seamless and demonstrably better when the photos are in Smugmug vs when they are in FB - so much so that people (both those viewing and those posting) would rather have them in Smugmug. Today the seamlessness of putting them in FB seems to trump the other advantages of having them in Smugmug.
I personally think that Smugmug's standard account business is seriously threatened by FB unless something is done to change the current trajectory. And, none of this assumes that FB improves their photo capabilities at all. If they did, the threat could be even greater.
This is somewhat related to the question about Facebook "Like" and hopefully Baldy will see it, so I thought I'd post in this thread.
Great post. We've actually been worried about this for at least two years and have been watching our numbers like hawks. There is no doubt they are eviscerating the free photo sharing sites, which have always gone out of business in great numbers, but new ones would sprout in their places. Not so much anymore.
We're not seeing the facebook effect yet, however. I don't claim to be able to see clearly into the future, but what we do see is that people who were gifted free SmugMug accounts never have stuck with us well, whereas people who got a passion for us out of their own conviction do stick unless a site like Flickr lures them away, which they're not doing so much anymore.
The reasons customers pick us are varied, but they have to do with privacy concerns (not many people trust facebook with photos of their daughters), the look of their photos--which appeals to landscape, prosumer and advanced hobbyists--safe backup (retaining full res), customizing, buying products, etc. And currently facebook's sharing model is really tough with having to friend people, etc. (but they will probably improve that). One thing we hear all the time is with facebook, photos are news. They share like crazy there like they do on twitter and sms and instant message and email, but those things have never kept people from buying SmugMug subscriptions because enough people also want a permanent home for their photos.
Your points about being built in to the Droid, etc., are true and powerful points. But we aren't after the huge numbers of subscribers they are; we are like BMW is to Ford, GM, Toyota, etc. It's true, those other car companies get the buyers, but BMW does fine. We just need a very small percentage of an enormous pool of people.
That isn't to say we couldn't have done a lot more to integrate with facebook long ago. We absolutely should have and we're working on it now.
Great post. We've actually been worried about this for at least two years and have been watching our numbers like hawks. There is no doubt they are eviscerating the free photo sharing sites, which have always gone out of business in great numbers, but new ones would sprout in their places. Not so much anymore.
We're not seeing the facebook effect yet, however. I don't claim to be able to see clearly into the future, but what we do see is that people who were gifted free SmugMug accounts never have stuck with us well, whereas people who got a passion for us out of their own conviction do stick unless a site like Flickr lures them away, which they're not doing so much anymore.
The reasons customers pick us are varied, but they have to do with privacy concerns (not many people trust facebook with photos of their daughters), the look of their photos--which appeals to landscape, prosumer and advanced hobbyists--safe backup (retaining full res), customizing, buying products, etc. And currently facebook's sharing model is really tough with having to friend people, etc. (but they will probably improve that). One thing we hear all the time is with facebook, photos are news. They share like crazy there like they do on twitter and sms and instant message and email, but those things have never kept people from buying SmugMug subscriptions because enough people also want a permanent home for their photos.
Your points about being built in to the Droid, etc., are true and powerful points. But we aren't after the huge numbers of subscribers they are; we are like BMW is to Ford, GM, Toyota, etc. It's true, those other car companies get the buyers, but BMW does fine. We just need a very small percentage of an enormous pool of people.
That isn't to say we couldn't have done a lot more to integrate with facebook long ago. We absolutely should have and we're working on it now.
Regardless of how much of a threat FB is to the standard accounts, many will be happier if it's much, much easier to put photos into Smugmug and share them via FB.
My ideal scenario would even be that after uploading to a Smug gallery, I'd have the option of putting a subset of the images into a FB album without reupload from my computer (e.g. from Smug direct to FB). Then, I'd create a post on my wall that would have the low-res, small FB versions and a link to the better images on Smugmug and I'd decide who I share it with and what my message was. Then, I could have the best of both worlds. Easy, simple sharing and viewing on FB, but my viewers could go get the best viewing experience if they want it too and I'd have the permanent record and organized display in Smugmug. This would only work for me if I had total control over the FB post including what list I shared it with because I don't just post everything as a default post for all friends.
FYI, as I've detailed in other posts, I cannot use today's FB interface from Smug for a variety of reasons (it only links to a single lightbox photo, it picks odd metadata for the description, it won't let me use a shortcut link, it only posts to all friends, etc...). And manually adding the gallery link to a FB post won't pick up any images to use as a thumb in FB so it doesn't look like it should.
My ideal scenario would even be that after uploading to a Smug gallery, I'd have the option of putting a subset of the images into a FB album without reupload from my computer (e.g. from Smug direct to FB). Then, I'd create a post on my wall that would have the low-res, small FB versions and a link to the better images on Smugmug and I'd decide who I share it with and what my message was. Then, I could have the best of both worlds. Easy, simple sharing and viewing on FB, but my viewers could go get the best viewing experience if they want it too and I'd have the permanent record and organized display in Smugmug. This would only work for me if I had total control over the FB post including what list I shared it with because I don't just post everything as a default post for all friends.
I would even take this a step further. I also want comments and "likes" to be linked between my facebook albums and SmugMug galleries. So, if someone comments on facebook, that comment is copied to the photo on SmugMug. If I comment on my photo in SmugMug, and that photo is "linked" to a photo on facebook, the comment should show up on facebook as well. Similarly, if someone "likes" my facebook photo, that should translate into a thumbs up on SmugMug.
I realize that it's harder to go the other way around, that is, from SmugMug to facebook, because you may not have the facebook info for someone browsing your SmugMug site. I also realize my idea of "linking" photos between SmugMug and facebook may not be easy. But, I'm just asking for what I want and what I think people would expect from seamless integration, if it's technically possible.
Since I'm dreaming... I would also love to see facebook albums that are "linked" to SmugMug galleries feature some clear control options that bring the person browsing facebook easily over to SmugMug. That would be something like a button that says "view these photos in their true beauty on SmugMug." Or, maybe a "view in a slideshow" button that would immediately start SmugMug's full screen slideshow in a new tab/window.
Lastly, I just want to echo jfriend's general observations. I suspect that SmugMug will soon be losing some standard user market share if they are not quicker to adapt to facebook and social media in general. It took me a long time to get onboard with facebook. So, I can't be too critical of it taking SmugMug so long. But, now, the way I see it, if facebook maintains it's popularity, SmugMug needs to stay focused on rapidly integrating itself with facebook, or it's possible successor. Really there should be no lag between major sites like CNN adding the like button and SmugMug adding it. in fact, I think SmugMug should be leading the pack, much like they did with the iPhone and iPad app development. At the time, I thought that was short-sited and took away from development of key site features. Now I realize it was imperative and should be the example for how quickly SmugMug should react to social media development as well.
And yes, in my case, since I'm not a pro, not selling photos, and prefer having only family an my friends viewing my galleries...
I'm not a pro and not trying to sell photos either. That said, I do a lot of sports photography of games my kids play in except that I don't just focus on my kids. I shoot what the action is and then I share images with the parents/kids on the team.
In my case, even though my primary interest is sharing with family and friends, a lot of times those folks want an easy way to share certain photos (of mine) with their family and friends. Integration with FB "Like" button makes that very convenient for a lot of folks.
I know that probably isn't your case, but thought I'd chime in to point out where this is useful for non-pros.
I'm not a pro and not trying to sell photos either. That said, I do a lot of sports photography of games my kids play in except that I don't just focus on my kids. I shoot what the action is and then I share images with the parents/kids on the team.
In my case, even though my primary interest is sharing with family and friends, a lot of times those folks want an easy way to share certain photos (of mine) with their family and friends. Integration with FB "Like" button makes that very convenient for a lot of folks.
I know that probably isn't your case, but thought I'd chime in to point out where this is useful for non-pros.
Jay
Makes sense to me, Jay. Now that my grandkids are approaching the age when they will most likely be participating in a variety of "team" activities, I'll probably have to face the exact same situation you described. I don't view this as a huge "non-pro" drawback...just something to be aware-of.
Prior to SmugIslands being implemented I used to see all sorts of uninvited visitor "hits" in my statistics from foreign countries, etc. Now that's almost entirely gone. I just don't want to re-open the "floodgates" to unwanted visitations again...the FB "like" button may not actually do that but, for now, I'd prefer to take a "wait and see" conservative approach to it.
Regardless of how much of a threat FB is to the standard accounts, many will be happier if it's much, much easier to put photos into Smugmug and share them via FB.
My ideal scenario would even be that after uploading to a Smug gallery, I'd have the option of putting a subset of the images into a FB album without reupload from my computer (e.g. from Smug direct to FB). Then, I'd create a post on my wall that would have the low-res, small FB versions and a link to the better images on Smugmug and I'd decide who I share it with and what my message was. Then, I could have the best of both worlds. Easy, simple sharing and viewing on FB, but my viewers could go get the best viewing experience if they want it too and I'd have the permanent record and organized display in Smugmug. This would only work for me if I had total control over the FB post including what list I shared it with because I don't just post everything as a default post for all friends.
FYI, as I've detailed in other posts, I cannot use today's FB interface from Smug for a variety of reasons (it only links to a single lightbox photo, it picks odd metadata for the description, it won't let me use a shortcut link, it only posts to all friends, etc...). And manually adding the gallery link to a FB post won't pick up any images to use as a thumb in FB so it doesn't look like it should.
I'm no sort of developer/coder, but if John's idea is in fact feasible, it sounds like it would be a prett kick ass method of sharing between the two platforms! To take it a step further, I'd like all of that idea to work with my fan page too! Typically my posts to the fan page are linked to my blog, in part because that's the landing page for www.chrisskopec.com but also in large part because I can pick which thumbnail gets displayed. The end result however is that a fan has to click through to my blog and then click through to my smugmug site.
I don't use my flickr account very often, but I do see quite a few messages in my FB news feed that say "So and So Uploaded 5 photos to flickr [thumbnail] View More" Looks like an automated notification and would be nice to have something similar as an option on SmugMug.
John, in the meantime, take a look at SmugTab, a Facebook app that creates a new tab in your profile that links to SmugMug. It's not perfect and doesn't offer up notifications, but may help pass the time until there's better integration.
On a semi-related note (speaking of phones & easily sharing), Mashable reports that Android phones are now the top selling smartphones, ahead of even the beloved iPhone. Being a firm believe that my phone should make a phone call without the need for additional hardware, I'm proud to say I've got an Android phone and would love to see an official SmugMug app for it, similar to what I hear them darn iPhones have!
[I wrote this while switching back and forth between this and work, so it may very well be rambling drivel, sorry!]
John, in the meantime, take a look at SmugTab, a Facebook app that creates a new tab in your profile that links to SmugMug. It's not perfect and doesn't offer up notifications, but may help pass the time until there's better integration.
I don't use third-party FB apps because as best I can tell, there are no privacy guarantees whatsoever with the 3rd party apps. Until FB can either fix that problem or do a better job at explaining/assuring people like me that there are no privacy risks with 3rd party apps, I'm not using any 3rd party FB apps from companies I don't know really well.
In addition, I'm not asking for Smugmug to show in my own FB page (that isn't a problem I need solved). What I want is an improved way to share (on FB) images/galleries that I've already uploaded to Smugmug with others regardless of what 3rd party apps they may or may not be using.
I don't use third-party FB apps because as best I can tell, there are no privacy guarantees whatsoever with the 3rd party apps. Until FB can either fix that problem or do a better job at explaining/assuring people like me that there are no privacy risks with 3rd party apps, I'm not using any 3rd party FB apps from companies I don't know really well.
In addition, I'm not asking for Smugmug to show in my own FB page (that isn't a problem I need solved). What I want is an improved way to share (on FB) images/galleries that I've already uploaded to Smugmug with others regardless of what 3rd party apps they may or may not be using.
I know, it wasn't really a solution to what you were asking for, but just something I thought was interesting and wanted to share. Though I hadn't considered the privacy issues so maybe it's time to rethink my own use of it.
I know, it wasn't really a solution to what you were asking for, but just something I thought was interesting and wanted to share. Though I hadn't considered the privacy issues so maybe it's time to rethink my own use of it.
At least the photos that show up on Smugfoto & the other apps are already watermarked, etc if you've done that here on SmugMug, and at least it easily transfers the person to SmugMug with a click or two. And the viewers don't need to have any app to see your photos... it just shows up as a tab along w/ your other tabs. The drawback is that people actually have to click on a tab to see it, and few people are going to go to your wall to do that... they don't even have a clue what it is most of the time. So to really draw traffic here to Smug where we want it, better newsfeed posts & much more seamless switching back & forth are still the way to go (captions, gallery titles, "like" buttons, logical thumbnail choices, no long urls, etc), and we've got to be able to do this with our fan pages (business pages) the same way we do it with our normal page. For me, that's the real clincher for all the improvements we might make. Can I use it on my photo business page?
I have only just now started setting up my photo page on FB, but from what I hear their API doesn't allow you to interact with pages, only profiles. :-(
Yes, but it costs $10 (I think). Dan Plumer (another DGrinner) set his page up with it.
Yeah, I knew SmugMug Tab costs to put on your business page. (not for personal page tho). But what I meant was "are whatever goodies SmugMug rolls out in terms of integration, etc. going to work with our business pages?"
Yeah, I knew SmugMug Tab costs to put on your business page. (not for personal page tho). But what I meant was "are whatever goodies SmugMug rolls out in terms of integration, etc. going to work with our business pages?"
Gotcha! I should stop reading & replying while at work... Too distracted to fully understand what I just read!
mrcoons, if you see posts #13 & 14 in this thread, they're talking about this stuff and where it goes. I'm not sure where the part in post #13 goes. http://www.digitalgrin.com/showthread.php?t=173530&page=5 Hope you can figure it out. I haven't tried yet. I'm not sure if this is the exact box you're trying to get to show up, either.... it appears there are different ones.
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I followed the "like this" link in Baldy's original post in this thread. I see the "Like" link next to a photo in a photo gallery. But I'm unsure about its implications.
What happens if I'm the owner of the Smug gallery where the picture is posted and a "Visitor" (an invited guest or just a lucky "stumbler" who happens to land on my gallery page) and clicks on one (or more) "Like" button(s) on my site?
Who sees the fact that Visitor "liked" something he or she found on my site? Does little post show up under the picture on my site that says "Visitor likes this". Do other visitors to my site see that? or Just me? and/or does the fact that Visitor liked a photo on my site show up on Visitor's Facebook page as a link that takes anyone who accesses Visitor's Facebook page direct to my site or to a specific gallery or photo on my site? If that's the case, I can see where Pros selling photos would certainly want that...but, speaking for myself (non-pro), I don't want every Tom, Dick and Harry in the universe visiting my site because they are all Facebook "friends" of Visitor.
Those of you who deal with this stuff on a daily basis have to remember that those of of who don't (deal with this stuff on a daily basis) may need to start from "the beginning" to understand what it is you're trying to do instead of somewhere in the middle with a "Hey guys, what-do-ya-think-of-THIS!?
I know it's more or less "obvious" to many of you...but it's not so obvious to me or folks like me...I have to try to wrap my brain around it first before I "get it", and I'm sure I'm not alone.
The reason for you to put a Like button on your gallery is to make it easier for your viewers to share which galleries or images they like with their Facebook friends. If you don't want your friends sharing what they like on your site, then you wouldn't want this feature in your galleries. If you are trying to sell something with public galleries, you would presumably want as many people as possible to know about your galleries and come visit and this could only help increase traffic.
If a viewer of your gallery is not a Facebook user, then the Like function would do nothing for them (I haven't tried it, but I'd guess that it might encourage them to sign up for Facebook), but they can't actually Like anything without being a logged in FB user.
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Thanks John...believe it or not, I sorta figured it would "likely" (pun intended) work along those lines. And yes, in my case, since I'm not a pro, not selling photos, and prefer having only family an my friends viewing my galleries...I would want the Facebook "Like" functionality OFF by default...actually more than just "OFF"...I would prefer not to SEE the FB Like button anywhere on my site unless or until I opt-in for that function.
Whether you use facebook or not would be irrelevant. The "Like" button is so facebook users can share things through their account - you do not need to have one. I would see it a way of driving traffic to my site, nothing more, nothing less!!
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http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like
There's a very simple form there that allows you to create a "like" button and doesn't require a facebook account. You're basically just making it very easy for people to share a link back to your site on their facebook page for all their friends to see.
I just tried being logged in & out of CSM as well. On there, the FB "like" or actually "recommend" button shows both times. But also, under the article there was a button saying F (Facebook) 355 people recommend this only when I was logged out. When I was logged in, it changed to: "be the first of your friends to recommend this"! SmugMug sorcerers, have fun! I do think it's usually simpler than that on non-news sites; just a small "like" button. But I can see how some people won't even want that on their pages/galleries. I will be glad for it because I want the traffic! I would like people to be able to "like" stuff though even if I don't have the "share" button displayed, because that would be a safer way of bringing traffic to water-marked, RCP photos that reside here.
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Now that is interesting. I would like to see SmugMug support that. Since all my coworkers are on FB it would let them link to the goofy photos of them.
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My impression (assumption?) is this is exactly what SM is planning here... That site just generates a very simple iframe code. The benefit of SM doing it instead of us, is they can dynamically replace the URL in the code to link directly to a gallery or photo, instead of you creating the button that links to your front page and displaying it everywhere.
All of those differences you saw take NO coding from SmugMug. What you're seeing is an iframe (sort of like another webpage embeded in the middle of the page you're on) that comes from FB.
Here's a (reformatted) snippet of the code for that iframe (I just generated this for my site, using the link I shared above):
Notice how the src comes from facebook. CNN has no idea if you're logged in, they're just embedding a facebook "page" within their page. Facebook itself of course knows if you are logged in, and therefore can change the embedded page based on that. show_faces is what caused you to see which of your friends had liked a page. When show_faces is false you get the "355 people" or "be the first of your friends" message, again depending on whether you are logged in. Action lets you choose between "like" and "recommend". The other items allow a little configuration, but the main differences you saw were in those two.
This is somewhat related to the question about Facebook "Like" and hopefully Baldy will see it, so I thought I'd post in this thread.
I've been pondering the general question of photos in Smugmug vs. photos in Facebook and I've noticed some interesting trends in the last few months. Many of my family members have standard Smugmug accounts (courtesy of gifted accounts from me). They've been using them for years to share photos with family and friends and paying the annual fee themselves.
In the last several months, they are using Smugmug less and Facebook more in order to share photos! While Smugmug's Pro business is not in immediate jeopardy from this trend, I'm beginning to wonder if the standard account business is.
First, a little background on my observations. While Facebook has certainly been around awhile, the rest of my family has really only been on for the last 9 months or so and we have even succeeded in getting my mom on Facebook. It has served to reconnect us with family members that we hadn't seen or spoken to in many years and via Facebook and we have much more of an idea what's going on with everyone and their kids and spouses.
For me personally, I've ended up with Facebook friends in six general categories (Immediate Family, Extended Family, Fairly close friends, People I've worked with that aren't really in one of the previous categories, Classmates that aren't in one of the previous categories and business that I'm interested in follow their news on). I've created Facebook lists so I can control who I share stuff with and there are some things that are more appropriate for just immediate family that I don't care to share with classmates I haven't seen in 20 years.
So, that brings us to the observation that a number of my family members are using Facebook instead of Smugmug more and more to share pictures. We're not talking Fine Art photos here. We're talking snapshots of the family (some of them very high quality, but some of them cell phone images too). A year ago all of these went on Smugmug if they got shared. Today, most of these are going on Facebook.
I've asked myself why this is happening. Some thoughts:
- If the communication vehicle for telling someone about the photos is Facebook itself, then it's just more convenient to put the photos in Facebook in the first place.
- The photos are right next to the post, in the same web site and integrated seamlessly with the rest of the viewers Facebook reading experience.
- If you put them in Smugmug and then need to post about them in FB, you just don't get as nice an experience, either in the visual quality of the post or in the viewing experience for the reader. Plus it's extra steps to upload them to Smugmug and then link them into FB.
- For the most part, these types of photos can be appreciated at the medium size that FB offers and don't need to be viewed large. This is not universally true and is a drawback of putting them on FB.
- For the most part, nobody wants to print these photos. They just want to look at them. I just don't see my family members ever ordering prints of my family photos on Smugmug.
- If the photo originates on a camera phone, more and more camera phones have built in ways to get the photo shared on FB. None that I know of have a built-in way to get it shared on Smugmug (yes I know there are apps for some phones, but the point is it's not a capability that comes with the phone and the apps are only available for some phones).
So, what are the advantages of having the photos on Smugmug and linking them to FB.- You get large sizes.
- You get slideshows.
- You get a more advanced viewing interface (the Smugmug view).
- You get a permanent record of them organized into some category hierarchy. While it's possible for people to come back to older photos on FB, I doubt many people do. They are seen in the stream on your wall and probably not referred back to much.
- You can allow access to originals.
- You can let people order prints.
So, despite these advantages of using Smugmug, more and more of my family members (who already have Smugmug accounts) are just sharing their images via FB instead because it's just more convenient.I guess the first question is whether Smugmug cares - that's up to them. I will assume that they want to continue with a vibrant standard account business and aren't interested in ceding that to FB. If so, to protect their business, I think at least two things have to happen:
1) It needs to be just as easy to put your photos in Smugmug and get them shared via FB with a high quality post in FB as it is to put the photos in FB in the first place. Today, it's a lot more steps to put them in Smugmug and get them shared on FB and there are all sorts of obstacles in the way of getting a good quality post in FB to a gallery on Smugmug. This needs to be true whether the photo camera from your PC or whether it came from your camera phone.
2) The viewing experience for a FB user that you shared with needs to be seamless and demonstrably better when the photos are in Smugmug vs when they are in FB - so much so that people (both those viewing and those posting) would rather have them in Smugmug. Today the seamlessness of putting them in FB seems to trump the other advantages of having them in Smugmug.
I personally think that Smugmug's standard account business is seriously threatened by FB unless something is done to change the current trajectory. And, none of this assumes that FB improves their photo capabilities at all. If they did, the threat could be even greater.
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We're not seeing the facebook effect yet, however. I don't claim to be able to see clearly into the future, but what we do see is that people who were gifted free SmugMug accounts never have stuck with us well, whereas people who got a passion for us out of their own conviction do stick unless a site like Flickr lures them away, which they're not doing so much anymore.
The reasons customers pick us are varied, but they have to do with privacy concerns (not many people trust facebook with photos of their daughters), the look of their photos--which appeals to landscape, prosumer and advanced hobbyists--safe backup (retaining full res), customizing, buying products, etc. And currently facebook's sharing model is really tough with having to friend people, etc. (but they will probably improve that). One thing we hear all the time is with facebook, photos are news. They share like crazy there like they do on twitter and sms and instant message and email, but those things have never kept people from buying SmugMug subscriptions because enough people also want a permanent home for their photos.
Your points about being built in to the Droid, etc., are true and powerful points. But we aren't after the huge numbers of subscribers they are; we are like BMW is to Ford, GM, Toyota, etc. It's true, those other car companies get the buyers, but BMW does fine. We just need a very small percentage of an enormous pool of people.
That isn't to say we couldn't have done a lot more to integrate with facebook long ago. We absolutely should have and we're working on it now.
My ideal scenario would even be that after uploading to a Smug gallery, I'd have the option of putting a subset of the images into a FB album without reupload from my computer (e.g. from Smug direct to FB). Then, I'd create a post on my wall that would have the low-res, small FB versions and a link to the better images on Smugmug and I'd decide who I share it with and what my message was. Then, I could have the best of both worlds. Easy, simple sharing and viewing on FB, but my viewers could go get the best viewing experience if they want it too and I'd have the permanent record and organized display in Smugmug. This would only work for me if I had total control over the FB post including what list I shared it with because I don't just post everything as a default post for all friends.
FYI, as I've detailed in other posts, I cannot use today's FB interface from Smug for a variety of reasons (it only links to a single lightbox photo, it picks odd metadata for the description, it won't let me use a shortcut link, it only posts to all friends, etc...). And manually adding the gallery link to a FB post won't pick up any images to use as a thumb in FB so it doesn't look like it should.
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I would even take this a step further. I also want comments and "likes" to be linked between my facebook albums and SmugMug galleries. So, if someone comments on facebook, that comment is copied to the photo on SmugMug. If I comment on my photo in SmugMug, and that photo is "linked" to a photo on facebook, the comment should show up on facebook as well. Similarly, if someone "likes" my facebook photo, that should translate into a thumbs up on SmugMug.
I realize that it's harder to go the other way around, that is, from SmugMug to facebook, because you may not have the facebook info for someone browsing your SmugMug site. I also realize my idea of "linking" photos between SmugMug and facebook may not be easy. But, I'm just asking for what I want and what I think people would expect from seamless integration, if it's technically possible.
Since I'm dreaming... I would also love to see facebook albums that are "linked" to SmugMug galleries feature some clear control options that bring the person browsing facebook easily over to SmugMug. That would be something like a button that says "view these photos in their true beauty on SmugMug." Or, maybe a "view in a slideshow" button that would immediately start SmugMug's full screen slideshow in a new tab/window.
Lastly, I just want to echo jfriend's general observations. I suspect that SmugMug will soon be losing some standard user market share if they are not quicker to adapt to facebook and social media in general. It took me a long time to get onboard with facebook. So, I can't be too critical of it taking SmugMug so long. But, now, the way I see it, if facebook maintains it's popularity, SmugMug needs to stay focused on rapidly integrating itself with facebook, or it's possible successor. Really there should be no lag between major sites like CNN adding the like button and SmugMug adding it. in fact, I think SmugMug should be leading the pack, much like they did with the iPhone and iPad app development. At the time, I thought that was short-sited and took away from development of key site features. Now I realize it was imperative and should be the example for how quickly SmugMug should react to social media development as well.
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I'm not a pro and not trying to sell photos either. That said, I do a lot of sports photography of games my kids play in except that I don't just focus on my kids. I shoot what the action is and then I share images with the parents/kids on the team.
In my case, even though my primary interest is sharing with family and friends, a lot of times those folks want an easy way to share certain photos (of mine) with their family and friends. Integration with FB "Like" button makes that very convenient for a lot of folks.
I know that probably isn't your case, but thought I'd chime in to point out where this is useful for non-pros.
Jay
Makes sense to me, Jay. Now that my grandkids are approaching the age when they will most likely be participating in a variety of "team" activities, I'll probably have to face the exact same situation you described. I don't view this as a huge "non-pro" drawback...just something to be aware-of.
Prior to SmugIslands being implemented I used to see all sorts of uninvited visitor "hits" in my statistics from foreign countries, etc. Now that's almost entirely gone. I just don't want to re-open the "floodgates" to unwanted visitations again...the FB "like" button may not actually do that but, for now, I'd prefer to take a "wait and see" conservative approach to it.
I'm no sort of developer/coder, but if John's idea is in fact feasible, it sounds like it would be a prett kick ass method of sharing between the two platforms! To take it a step further, I'd like all of that idea to work with my fan page too! Typically my posts to the fan page are linked to my blog, in part because that's the landing page for www.chrisskopec.com but also in large part because I can pick which thumbnail gets displayed. The end result however is that a fan has to click through to my blog and then click through to my smugmug site.
I don't use my flickr account very often, but I do see quite a few messages in my FB news feed that say "So and So Uploaded 5 photos to flickr [thumbnail] View More" Looks like an automated notification and would be nice to have something similar as an option on SmugMug.
John, in the meantime, take a look at SmugTab, a Facebook app that creates a new tab in your profile that links to SmugMug. It's not perfect and doesn't offer up notifications, but may help pass the time until there's better integration.
On a semi-related note (speaking of phones & easily sharing), Mashable reports that Android phones are now the top selling smartphones, ahead of even the beloved iPhone. Being a firm believe that my phone should make a phone call without the need for additional hardware, I'm proud to say I've got an Android phone and would love to see an official SmugMug app for it, similar to what I hear them darn iPhones have!
[I wrote this while switching back and forth between this and work, so it may very well be rambling drivel, sorry!]
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In addition, I'm not asking for Smugmug to show in my own FB page (that isn't a problem I need solved). What I want is an improved way to share (on FB) images/galleries that I've already uploaded to Smugmug with others regardless of what 3rd party apps they may or may not be using.
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I know, it wasn't really a solution to what you were asking for, but just something I thought was interesting and wanted to share. Though I hadn't considered the privacy issues so maybe it's time to rethink my own use of it.
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I have only just now started setting up my photo page on FB, but from what I hear their API doesn't allow you to interact with pages, only profiles. :-(
Yes, but it costs $10 (I think). Dan Plumer (another DGrinner) set his page up with it.
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Gotcha! I should stop reading & replying while at work... Too distracted to fully understand what I just read!
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So where do you put this block of code, in the custom footer?
iframe src="http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?
href=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.musicman5photos.com
layout=standard
show_faces=true
width=450
action=like
colorscheme=dark
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mrcoons, if you see posts #13 & 14 in this thread, they're talking about this stuff and where it goes. I'm not sure where the part in post #13 goes. http://www.digitalgrin.com/showthread.php?t=173530&page=5 Hope you can figure it out. I haven't tried yet. I'm not sure if this is the exact box you're trying to get to show up, either.... it appears there are different ones.
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you might want to just wait a little bit...
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