Image Hosting

[ookpik]

I hate having to click on every tiny photo

I used the term "thumbnail" to express a concept. I'm not suggesting that "tiny" should literally be the size of a thumb nail. It's possible to create fairly large "thumbnails" that use relatively little data.  For instance a VGA (640x480) sized photo can be 50kB to 100kB. VGA is more than large enough to see what's in the photo and decide if you want to see more detail by clicking.

In any case smartphone screens are small. All that detail, and the large amounts of data behind it, are wasted on a 5" screen.

I like scrolling through photos like a gallery in forums.

For you it's enjoyment. For others it's tedium. And it's bloody torture when some inconsiderate idiots then mindlessly quote that stream. (IMO)

I can't believe anyone would be on a 100 MByte/month plan.

There are several prepaid plans that include only 100MB to 1GB per month. Not everyone spends $50+/month on their smartphone. Furthermore those plans are often 3G only. That's more than fast enough for general use but not for lengthy streams of large photos.

In any case even those on 1Gbit, unlimited data plans at home or in the office still have to scroll through possibly pages of photo streams to get to some actual discussion of the topic.

the 500 kbyte lmiit is already extremely frustrating for those of us who like to take high-resolution images and share them with the community

No one is preventing you from sharing 12+MP photos with the rest of the community. You can do that by hosting them on any of myriad photo sites and link to them through "thumbnails" here. That strikes me as a reasonable compromise that accommodates the needs of all users.

The result of forcing this sort of thing is that people like me are just going to stop posting photos here.

Nobody is "forcing" anyone to do anything. I'm simply expressing my point of view as someone who enjoys these photos but who (1) isn't a photography fanatic and (2) doesn't have unlimited resources. And no, I'm not threatening to stop participating in WRC if I don't get my way.