Ally Pally from Air 1930

Comment by Simon Attfield on April 3, 2015 at 11:18

Hi Hugh

I really love seeing old photos of the area like this. Something I really like about Harringay online. But the watermark ("From a collection curated by Harringay online") is distracting. Can I ask if it's necessary?    Thanks

Comment by Hugh on April 3, 2015 at 11:39

Thanks Simon. I hope it's not too obtrusive. I can understand if someone were to want to print and frame a picture it might get in the way, but my hope is that just to look at them and get a sense of what a place used to look like, the watermarks are discreet enough so as not to get in the way too much. Have I got that wrong?

Comment by Simon Attfield on April 3, 2015 at 12:13

To be honest I do find it spoils it a bit. I wondered whether it was to promote HO's stirling work or to protect intellectual property... and whether these could be achieved differently. I also had a v. quick scan round at digital libraries with photo collections to see what they do. I looked at one... here is a photo of an Aleut family in a collection owned by the University of Washington. http://digitalcollections.lib.washington.edu/cdm/singleitem/collect... . They add a caption at the bottom and it looks like this is to provide some sort of protection.

Comment by Hugh on April 3, 2015 at 12:45

The University of Washington has gone the route of providing small size low res pictures and no watermark. I post images at the best available size with a watermark. Personally, when I'm looking at historical pictures of places, my preference is to have access to the detail you only get from larger images (which you can get on many images on HoL via the 'View Full Size' button). That's why I've chosen the route I did.

From time to time people do ask for unwatermarked copies of pictures and whether it's the Smithsonian in Washington looking for exhibition material, a member of the House of Lords looking for images to illustrate a lecture, or local residents looking for pictures to frame, I'm generally able to make arrangements appropriate to the situation. 

My primary focus is to give local people access to their local history, rather than having everything shut away in private collections or in rarely visited archives. I think it's fair to say I've done that. Before HoL and my work on Wikipedia, Harringay's history existed only as a mention in chapters about Tottenham or Hornsey. Although the idea has sat in my 'to do' tray for the past four or five years, I've never got round to collating into a book the huge amount of history and images I have posted on HoL and Wikipedia over the past eight years. However, until I get round to doing so all my stuff, along with the many valuable contributions added by others (for which I am always very grateful), is all there for the willing! And after years of nobody taking much notice of our history, what's been happening on HoL did apparently spur the publication of a coffee table booklet about Harringay's Victorian development a few years back.

One of my personal favourite moments of online local history gold was when the the descendant of the Georgian builder of Harringay House joined HoL to post a never before seen picture of the house's builder Edward Gray. A Tottenham resident also joined up to comment on the picture, sharing her common history with the original poster. It turned out that her ancestor in Jamaica had been owned as a slave by the poster's antecedent! 

Comment by Simon Attfield on April 3, 2015 at 13:18

Amazing story!

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