Noticed this on Google today: “Free! Manage your digital photo collection with Google's Picasa software.”
Interesting. I had tried out iMatch awhile back which came strongly recommended. It was definitely powerful, but my trial ran out and I never used it enough to justify buying it.
Either way, since Picasa is both free and an 'official' Google product (we all know I'm a Google-whore), I decided to give it a spin.
At first glance, it definitely looks slick (and pretty fast) but fairly basic in terms of management. Photos are organized into albums based on what folder they are in. You can add keywords, but it doesn't look like there are metadata properties.
I always have a tough time trying to organize pictures because I never can decide how to categorize them. Do I organize them chronologically? Based on location? Based on the subject(s)? This is why the iPod paradigm (which, as I've said, is where I think WinFS is, or should be, headed) works so well for pictures - there are so many 'pivots' on the same underlying data.
As part of my crusade to finally get more organized, I'm going to try this out over the next week or so. I'm also going to give iMatch another chance, I think.