Google hates photography

Do no evil, they said. Google is one of the worst tool for photography ever to appear on the internet.

Think about it. It makes a mockery of IPTC standards by completely ignoring it . Instead of searching within the carefully inputed metatags of images, Google images only displays image results based on the text and links surrounding an image. It ignores images that have been correctly keyworded, allowing for a better introduction of an effective Orphan legislation. These thumbnails you see, generated by Google, not only rip all metadata but also destroys the original file name of the photograph, creating an orphan duplicate. Instead of being a catalyst for even better informed images, it does quite the opposite by showing that it is more than ok to ignore relevant information.

With this process, it has pushed to the surface some of the worst images I have personally seen. Since there is no quality control, we suddenly see photography at its worst, with the top images challenging each other for the most horrible composition to the most appealing quality. It is as if someone had pushed the dirt out of the bottom of a lake to make it reach the surface.

It has helped the concept of stealing. With no enforcement of copyright information, and being an unofficial infringer itself, Google perpetuates the idea that images are for free and can be used with no regards to copyrights. It literally grabs images from other sites, properly licensed or not and displays as is, with no regards to where and how to contact its owner.

It doesn’t even search the thousand of professional image database worldwide from photo agencies or photographers, completely ignoring the best of the best. Search for Corbis, Getty Images or any photo agency and you see for yourself. For an untrained individual, it seems that this is it, the whole offering of image on a particular subject.

It is not an agent of discovery but an agent of banality. Since it ranks images the same way it ranks website, by looking at how many time an image has been linked too, thus seen, it bubbles the images most used, not the best. For someone looking to find some creative novelty, there is no inspiration. Quality, in Google engine eyes, is a factor of longevity and popularity. Quite the opposite of what a good photo editor should look for.

Finally, a photograph, for Google, is the same as graphics, logo or anything saved as a jpeg. A 5 year old drawing could easily compete with great photography. Or some banner. Terrifying.

The scariest part is that most photo editors will admit they use Google image to find images. It pushes photo professional to twist and bend their websites to be Google friendly while not being so much people friendly. It makes our industry’s effort to have intelligent search engines producing the strongest relevancy almost meaningless. And it spits in the face of creative photographers by putting their work next to unqualified snappers.

Although there is no law against misrepresenting an art or profession, Google should however be summoned to question its usefulness and purpose. Who and what really benefits from the Google Image search. Because it is certainly not the photo industry.

A big unrelated PS : Brian Storm and Jessica Dimmock have created one of the strongest multimedia yet. When two great talent collide. Not easy to watch but impossible to ever forget . see it here

This entry was posted on December 12, 2007 at 9:23 am and is filed under mediastorm, multimedia, Search, keyword, google. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

| Print