Well, I'm not a Mac-user so I can't speak on that, but as a PC guy, I prefer Picasa from Google for my photo organizing. It can be a bit clumsy if you don't know how to use it, but once you figure it out I love having the huge, scrolling list of thumbnails that I can browse through.

As a photographer and graphic designer, I do use Flickr. You can upload your originals, tag them for easy reference, and access them from anywhere. There's no bandwidth limit when you upgrade to to the pro account. Of course I keep backups on DVD-R, in a folder with the corresponding contact sheet, but I access the Flickr files more often.

Your iphoto links are from 2003 and 2005, and there have been significant iphoto upgrades since. I have the 2006 version and it can organize up to 25,000 photos apparently. Not sure what you mean by ""messing up the originals"- my iphoto allows reversion to the original with one click. It has been great for an amateur like myself. I really like the "smartalbum" feature where you can easily group photos by date range, or by tags, or both.

Stacy Julian from Big Picture Scrapbooking (and scrapbookers are serious about organizing their photos) suggests filing photos first by seasons/year, then by tags . This has worked really well for me. If I want a Christmas picture but can't remember which Christmas it was, I look through my 4th quarter pictures. If I want a picture of my boy playing soccer, I look for his name tag and "sports", or just "sports". I have about 25 total tags that I use. Between the season/year and the tags, I can pretty much find anything within minutes.

That said, it took me six hours to go through 2006 (2000 photos), reduce the file to 900 photos, and tag those 900 photos with minimal editing. I have been tagging my 2007 now as I upload them, and it is much easier now that the system is set up. It only takes a fw minutes each time since I can select groups of photos and tag them together if they have similar themes.

I'm a PC user so iPhoto is unknown to me... That being said I hate what iTunes has done to my otherwise meticulously organized Windows folder structure of music. Everythin is now a complete mess...thanks apple.

I use Adobe's Bridge program to organize and keep track of all my photos. It's a fantastic way of keeping everything organized, and as it's integrated into every Adobe program it makes sense as I pretty much only use my photos with Adobe software...

Really though, the only way to organize is to develop a system (method of categorization) and start from the beginning and stick to it. Any time one tries to retroactively organize 10gb of photos one best have a free weekend and a lot of coffee...

perfect timely topic.
I want to organize both my "inspiration tray" photos as well as personal shots. Easy browsing, basic editing, secure file management/backup are important.
Although I will probably end up using iPhoto for the tags, smart folders, and fact that I already have a copy I'd love to hear about other options.
Though I love flickr I'd rather not have to go through the extra steps for every photo I want to keep and it doesn't easily solve backup issues.
Picasa was fun and interesting but I had a terrible time whenever I'd move or update anything outside.
I actually still use the Microsoft Picture Manager for quick and dirty browsing and edits on a small (<500 pics) collection at work.
Aperture, Lightroom or anything extra $$ is probably not gonna happen.

I've been extremely negligent when it comes to tagging and organizing my photos. So for the past few weeks I've been burning cds or dvds of my thousands of photos to at least get them off my hard drive and into a format that will make working with them easier. However, Aperture is definitely on my wishlist.

P.S. I use both iPhoto and Flickr. Like them both.

I'm a PC gal and I use Adobe Photoshop Elements, and I love it. I started with the free version and upgraded. It keeps the photos in cronilogical order and you can add tags.

I've found that one system doesn't work well for our household, and what I mean by "make a mess" is what iPhoto does to the file structure. Sure I can find the photo in iPhoto, but what if I want to find the actual file to edit, there's a lot of memory work involved. I don't like how iPhoto hijacks the controls.

The biggest hurdle I'm trying to overcome is finding a system or method to organize the files. We've tried by date and event, but what do you do about those photos that don't quite fit. A system isn't a system if you have to keep making exceptions.

Kelly, here's some links which may address some of your concerns.

http://www.jazzviolin.com/swf/lightroom/photo-file-management.htm
http://forums.macrumors.com/archive/index.php/t-132254.html http://justinblanton.com/2005/10/from-iphoto-to-iview-mediapro

Kelly- some suggestions from the BPS course by Stacy J. Of course, these work best for scrapbookers.

Four main categories with a few subcategories each-
"Things we do" (everyday, holidays, traditions, school, work, shop, etc)
"People we love" (extended famiy and friends)
"All about Us" (immediate family)
"Places we go" (work, school, home, local, relatives, USA, world, etc)

and a separate tag for "photos I love"

I created tags along these lines, and can pretty much fit all photos into those. I create new tags sparingly as I need them.

HTH

Kelly, I am SO with you! I switched from a PC to a Mac a couple years ago and I would never ever go back. BUT, iPhoto drives me nuts when I want to find an original. Yes, it has built in features to email photos right from iPhoto, but you aren't always looking for photos just to email them. An example - the other day I wanted to upload an image to a website - I had to find the picture in iPhoto, which wasn't too hard because I am a compulsive organizer, but once I found the picture, I had to look at its details in iPhoto, then go to Finder to seek out the actual file by following this long path of Pictures\iPhoto Library\year\month\day\filename.jpg And if that wasn't bad enough, the picture wasn't there. Seriously. It was showing up in iPhoto, but not in Finder. I finally had to search my system and for some reason, even though iPhoto shows the picture as being taken on 6/12/2006, it was in the 6/18 folder. Arrrrrgggghh! Another thing is that iPhoto is SLOW. I have 5500 images in it and if I attempt to do anything other than scroll, it bogs down. This is the one thing that I wish I could improve on my Mac. (BTW, I am using a 12" PowerBook G4)

Windows user here.

I have 2 folders: one "@d70", for all the original files, and one "@edited", for all edits.
(@ is to keep them at the top of all browse lists).

Within each folder the naming scheme goes as follows. Folders are called (i.e.) "070301 apartment decor" and are archived by month (0706) and then year (2007).

The structure is mirrored between edited and d70 folders, but content is obviously different - I don't edit all the photographs.
This way all the edits I do are stored together by date and content.

And Adobe Bridge rocks for giving ratings (stars) and designations (colors), as well as browsing by a variety of parameters.

i'm a mac user, but -- how crazy -- this program is for mac and pc! i've become a big big fan of iview. you can tag photos in mutiple ways, using colors, or dates, or words, and they're easy to call up when needed. it can also handle some basic editing functions if you don't have photoshop. when importing into iview it will search and find all your photos, where ever they are on your hard drive, and list them in easy, clear view along the side of your monitor. as a serious amateur photographer, i have found this program indispensable. it's also not very expensive which is an added plus. i kid you not. go check it out. i'm just touching upon the tip of the iceberg with this programs capabilities. you can download a free 30 day trial:
http://www.iview-multimedia.com/

I am a semi-pro photographer. I was originally an iPhoto person, and tried to graduate to Aperture, but it was just a bit much for me. I have recently tried out Light Room and it's been a bit more intuitive for me out of the gate - I like it so far.

I shoot in RAW mostly, and have about 600GB of images. I have a pretty hefty workstation, and I use Drobo as my external storage for my main library (I got the suggestion from Thomas Hawk's Digital Connect). I had about 5 or 6 external drives and consolidating to the one Drobo has been great.

Eddie