Here’s a question for you all: I’ve recently found a way to quickly post photos directly from Picasa to my Flickr photostream via Gmail. It’s great, and as an added bonus, Flickr gives me the ability to post those photos here on my blog. Since it’s so easy, I will probably be posting photos several times a week.

The question I have is whether I should have those photos show up as full weblog posts (as I’ve done in the past), or if I should just show thumbnails for the most recent photos in the sidebar (as many other people do).

There are advantages to both. If I put the photos in the blog then they’re right out in front where everyone can easily see them. However, then I run the risk of the photos dominating the weblog, which I really want to be about the things I write. Putting the photos into the sidebar clearly separates them from the content of the weblog, but it also marginalizes them (literally) and makes it easier to miss when I post a photo.

Further, if I post them in the sidebar, then if Flickr ever goes away for any reason, I don’t have all these useless weblog posts referencing flickr photos that don’t exist anymore. Also, I’m a bit worried that if I post photos in the main weblog, then I will lose motivation to make “real” posts.

Anyways, I’m going back and forth about it, and I thought I’d throw it out and see if anyone else has any feelings on the subject.

Update: I have since decided not to use Flickr. The service is great, but I just can’t get past the fact that I have no control over the server. If flickr ever went way, all my archived posts with flickr photos would be broken, and since they use their own ID number instead of filenames, it would be a huge pain the ass to update all those links. Since I’m already paying for hosting, I’m just going to start using a local photo gallery program instead.