As a former arts student, I have a perverse interest in long-winded and incredibly specific thesis topics, which is why “A cross-cultural analysis of Flickr users from Peru, Israel, Iran, Taiwan and the UK” had me pretty darn excited. The UK authors analysed 10,000 photos and discovered that your culture affects how and why you tag, share and interact online. UK Flickrers generally used the site to connect with other photographers and hone their skills, whereas Israeli users were more interested in the social aspect of sharing their content friends and strangers. Iranians were the least represented of the five cultures studied (the site is actually banned in Iran) but they were the most prolific taggers. It seems that the default Flickr language is English – comprising almost all tags across all cultures – only the Peruvians occasionally tagged in Spanish.
