I have noticed a lot of people are using Pinterest in the US, many Websites encourage to share the content on Pinterest. Next to the Facebook and Twitter buttons there is a Pinterest button on many US websites. So I have signed up for this social network to try it out myself.
I must confess I was a little bit annoyed because I had to subscribe to five boards before I could do anything else on the Pinterest webpage. I like the mobile version on my smartphone a lot better, it is also more intuitive – at least for me.
I have created my first board now. You can see it on Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/ralpe/impressions-from-dickson-tn/ Nice? But I use Flickr for photo sharing (maybe I am too old fashioned) so I created this set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ralpe/sets/72157634898152082
It is a lot easier to share content directly on Facebook, so try out this album post: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151654056793411.1073741826.553593410&type=1&l=512d701923
And don’t forget Tumblr: http://tmblr.co/ZXwuOur7uR8e
Each network has advantages and disadvantages, I like the intuitive use of Tumblr but I dislike that a photo post is limited to ten pictures. Flickr is good for geotagging, attaching licenses and setting privacy options, Facebook is very easy to use – and Pinterest: I was forced to enter a description for each photo.
You can look at the results of the same pictures on Flickr, Facebook, Tumblr and Pinterest. The presentation is different, sometimes more like an album, sometimes more like a post but it is the same pictures after all.
I am a bit clueless: I was using Flickr before Facebook, recently I started my Tumblr blog, and now Pinterest? Do I duplicate (or better: quadruple) photo content in the future. Is iftt.com the solution for the future so I don’t have to do the quadruple upload manually?
Or have I simply not understood what Pinterest is all about and what to use it for?
I am a bit clueless – who can help?
NB (Update Aug. 2): Someone told me on Twitter that Pinterest’s main use is to share pictures already published on the web – and not to upload pictures to Pinterest.
Why didn’t I get that idea from the Pinterest website? Or did I simply overlook it? At least, Pinterest was not self-explanatory to me.
Now Pinterest makes a lot more sense to me. It is good tool to share info graphics. I installed the Pinterest “Pin it” button on my browser to make pinning more easily. I wanted to share a graphic from a facebook post and got this message:
Pinterest could be a handy tool if it were a bit more usable.
