Flickr releases interestingness and clustering

Oh dear. As if I need any new Flickr goodness to distract me from catching up after returning from BlogHer. Flickr has gone and released interestingness, which uses an algorithm full of "a whole bunch of secret sauce" to analyze user behavior around photos and present the most interesting in a given time period. For example, check out the most interesting photos from the past 24 hours.


As if that weren't enough, they've also introduced clustering, which is a new way to explore some of the finer distinctions within tag clusters -- e.g. the nature cluster is broken down into sets such as:

• water, lake, river, reflection, rain, bridge, view, boat, drops, window
• tree, trees, sky, sunset, blue, clouds, leaves, leaf, forest, sun
• flower, flowers, green, macro, landscape, yellow, red, garden, spring, plant

In other words, what was already way too many tag/set/group/contacts/etc. pathways to get lost in has now been bumped up to ludicrous speed. You people are lucky I'm even able to finish this blog post. I mean, what's the game here, Flickr folk? Are you aiming to bring all productive work to a grinding halt, or is that just a happy byproduct of all your infinitely curious ludology?

[Via danah boyd]

Tags: clustering, flickr, interestingness, news, photos, tags