So my friend Brandon pinged me this evening to say that Flickr had killed the DMU group, which stands for “Delete Me — Uncensored”. The way the group worked was kind of a sadistic game. You would submit a photo to the group pool. People were then invited to comment on your photo and say whatever they felt like. Their comments were literally ‘uncensored’. After praising or trashing your photo, they’d vote save or delete. As soon as your photo received 10 saves or 10 deletes, its’ fate was sealed. If it was saved, it was moved to the Lightbox,  a collection of some of the most amazing images on Flickr.  If it received 10 delete votes, it was banished and kicked out of the group completely. In order to submit a photo, you were required to vote on 15 photos first.  You effectively bought your right to be criticized by criticizing others.  Sweet, eh?

Why would be people do this? Well, everyone is a monster inside!  Haha.  But seriously, it was a place that attracted some very talented photographers, and was a place where you could get honest feedback.  On too many sites people will praise everything, or leave pointless feedback like ‘Great Capture!’.  Participating in a forum where people were brutally honest was pretty unique.  It also made it extremely rewarding when people said nice things.  You really had to have made something special to be praised.

It’s sad to see Flickr act like this.  Too bad there are no other photo services out there that have established a strong social component.  Once I find one, I’m signing up.  Social photo hosting is far from a solved problem.