Flickr decided to change the system compression of images for all thumbnails, without any prior notice to its users, which led to grumblings from the more observant.
The whole affair started when some users have complained to Flickr for a reduction in the quality of the photos they have uploaded.
This has led the PetaPixel blog that deals with photography in general, to make an in-depth exploring the whole situation, which yielded some interesting results.
First of all, a few basic facts: when uploading a photo to FlickrThe service, εκτός από την αποθήκευση της αρχικής φωτογραφίας στους διακομιστές της, δημιουργεί επίσης και επιπλέον εικονίδια σε διάφορες αναλύσεις.
The technical approach of PetaPixel was to take one of the previous photos that had been uploaded to Ficker a few years ago and to upload it again today, with Ficker's current parameters.
As a result, there was a lower quality for all icons, but the original photo was the same as the one they had previously uploaded.
The changes made to the Fickr algorithm apparently only affect thumbnails, sometimes reducing their file size by up to 50%, but this does not seem to bother too many of its users, as most of the who have not yet noticed the change.
The original photos are stored untouched and Fiickr still offers 1TB free storage for all users.
Ficker's response to the PetaPixel survey was as follows:
FIickr does not compress the originals If you download your originals, the files you receive will be completely identical. Like most applications for photos, we've created different thumbnail sizes for quick presentation of images on the web and mobile phones.”