A previous post highlighted a couple of newer Flickr search tools that have come out. The intent was to share some resources that teachers (and their students) could use to locate copyright friendly images. I was especially intrigued with Compfight, a nice tool that provides a series of search filters. One that I like allows for a search that would filter out inappropriate images. And it does . . . up to a point. But probably not safe enough for direct student use. (Though I still think it’s very useful for teachers who are looking for images to use as part of instruction.)
I wrote the creators of Compfight to ask more questions about the SafeSearch feature of the their site. Portions of their response is posted below. The good news is that they are discussing the idea of a true school-friendly search tool and would like your ideas. Post a comment or two and let them know what you’re thinking.
Compfight was originally intended for the advertising community so safety wasn’t a big concern. It was just annoying that any search term including “tack,” “paperclip,” and “stapler” seemed to produce something weird showing up on our screens.
I looked into the issue today because we had also been asked if we could make a site that is “safe only” making it safer for schools to use.
Right now our “safe search” is no “safer” than the one on the actual flickr site as we are using their rules to determine what is safe or not. A lot of what you’re seeing is people saying their photos are safe when in fact they are not.
We have some ideas on how we might be able to pull off a more bullet proof solution considering we have the power to limit what our site is asking flickr for and I’ll discuss that with my partner. As this was a basic non-profit side project for us, I am curious to know your take on a tool like this for education. If we made a site specifically for kids do you think there would be much interest in this? Besides making it as safe as possible, is there anything else that might help you guys out on the site?
A later email:
We had an initial discussion today about the possibility of making a school oriented site.
The general idea is that we can block “loaded” search terms using a known blacklist and then combine that with the safest level of access to Flickr. If done correctly it should completely block 99% of the problem as kids won’t be able to ask for anything inappropriate.I’ll keep you posted on our progress.
Let ‘em know what you’re thinking. Post a comment or contact them directly via the link under the About button at the bottom of their site.
Thank you for initiating this. I am sending them a letter directly.
Here are the guts of the letter I sent:
For the elementary students I work with the ultimate Flickr search engines would have the following attributes.
* Light, not resource intensive because schools often have old computers and slow networks.
* Basic interface, Comfight is brilliant because it is such a clean interface, nowhere for the children to get lost or distracted. Kids are instantly successful.
* Large enough thumbnails that children can see them well; 8 and 9 year olds tend to like words and pictures on their screen to be big. They make their fonts size 18 and put extra space between words to make them easier to see, not just to fill the page. Comfights are a good size. FlickrCC is a bit small. I’d include fewer images to make the thumbnails a bit bigger.
* Split screen effect like FlickrCC. On one side we see thumbnails of the hits. On the other side, we see an individual image, it’s URL, photographer’s name, and links to the other sizes of the image. I like FlickrCC but it is missing a key feature, the name of the photographer. According to Flickr, to use the CC images, you need to credit the source by listing the name of the photographer and provide a link back to the image. FlickrCC lacks that and as a result, my wee ones are having to navigate through multiple pages. That is really tough for some of them. Being able to grab URL and photographer’s name off one clear page before they go to get a larger or small size of the image would be much easier for them.
* Open links in a new tab. If a child needs a larger size of the image and follows that link, it should open in a new tab so that after they download the image, they can close the tab and they are right back at the search engine.
* Safe Search. No filter is perfect. Some photographers are wily in how they tag their photos. However, one that blocks 95% of nudity, sex, and violence would be great. A second grade girl who types in kitties doesn’t want a screen full of sex kittens. Naked toddlers, victims of floods standing amdist the ruins of their home with only rags on their body aren’t the problem. It is the art photos of nudity and the pornographic ones that are making our searches problematic. We haven’t had a problem of accidentally pulling up pictures of violence in Flickr, but we don’t want to start having one either.
* And of course, free. I am currently working overseas at a private school. I have a budget and could pay for this feature. However, most of my career has been in the public schools in the US and then it was only me on a teacher’s salary paying for things we needed. I could do it because I don’t have children of my own, but many teachers couldn’t pay anything.
Hopefully we’ll see something useful come out of this! Thanks for writing.
glennw
Awesome! I use this all the time and always thought it would be great to have something like this as a safe search for schools. My experience working with developers in this capacity is that they are very happy and willing to work with educators. Good luck and please keep us posted.