Fleeting Image - a site a made many moons ago - was just featured in the excellent Web Zen in their The Return of Photo Zen issue. In 2002 I thought that almost everyone had little folder of fascinating images on their computer and I wanted to see them. But I didn’t want those photos to immediately become mundane internet hasbeens, so I made a web interface where anyone could share their interesting photos, but the catch was the photos could only be viewed in a purely random order with no back and forward navigation. There is only next and exit. Once you have moved beyond a photo, if you really want to see it again, you’d have to start with a new random assortment. One thing I enjoyed about Fleeting Image is it’s technical simplicity. Images are uploaded to a single directory, each assigned a numeric name one higher than the previous upload, and the directory then become the data structure for building the random array. There is no database to break, no RSS feed, heck there’s hardly much code. And if you were to wget the whole directory, well then … you wouldn’t be the first.

People have been quietly uploading photos for years now and it’s still serving it’s purpose. See what you see now. Or you can just keep reloading this page and on the right you’ll see another Fleeting Image, but the experience is better at the site.

It’s funny, a lot of people assume the idea for Dogster and Catster came from Friendster. In fact on Wikipedia I was repoerted to have started Dogster after my dog got kicked off Friendster, which is funny, because I didn’t even have a dog. After Fleeting Image was up and running I thought “people also likes to click on dog pictures … I should make a dog verison.” Of course if I was going to do dogs I should let people post their names, breed and age. And if I was going to do that, I should let them post more photos and bio info and make a fun interface of course …. and the idea just kept getting funnier and funnier, and I knew I had to make it.

So it’s pretty cool seeing Fleeting Image being remembered. It’s a nifty little weblet, still just doing it’s thing, and it’s really what changed my life so much for the better.