Daily free-sheet thelondonpaper is currently running a competition to capture iconic images of London. However, rather than stock-pictures of the changing of the guard or Houses of Parliament, they’re looking for images that represent the true London: the one that millions of us live, work & play in. As someone who loves photography, and even chooses my phone based on how good the camera is (which is why I’m desperate for my next upgrade) I decided to enter.

Entering is pretty easy (just email them a maximum of two images with name, address, age, contact number, occupation and an explanation of why your images depict Iconic London). However seeing the other entries isn’t that easy (you have to scroll through hundreds of entries as there’s no way to see them all at once): but it could have been and entering could have been even easier – for members of Flickr. The Guardian are currently running a competition to find great images depicting the coming of spring and to enter all one has to do is enter their Flickr group.  So why couldn’t thelondonpaper do the same?

I can understand why thelondonpaper would want to limit entries to 2 per person, as it must be quite a logistical feat to wade through thousands & thousands of entries. However I’m sure that I’m not alone in having wanted to enter more than two and I think the ones that didn’t make the cut would have made just as interesting a picture of London as the ones that did, which are probably just a bit more professional looking.

Having a quick look around it seems like thelondonpaper have dipped their toe into the world of flickr but not really dived right in:I think they should. Some of the most interesting experiments in community over the past couple of years have taken place on the site, including The National Gallery’s wonderful Grand Tour, and it would (I think) make a perfect accompaniment to this competition.

With that in mind and because I’m just such a helpful chap I’ve created a group on flickr where anyone can pop their iconic images of London: please feel free to join the group and add any you think sum-up London. And if anyone from thelondonpaper is reading, I’d be more than happy to hand the group across for you to use in conjunction with the competition.And for anyone who is wondering what all these photos are, they’re some of those I thought about entering into the Iconic London competition: the two I settled on are below. Wish me luck!