Photo resolution and jpeg size

Back in the early days of iWeb 1.0, there was a problem with uploading large (file)sized photo and the corresponding slow loading times for visitors to your site. If you used your original sized photos on a photo page, they would be displayed at 800px x 600px and could easily be over 500kb. The original photo, if memory serves me correctly, was still uploaded to the iDisk and acted as a drag of the whole website. Thus, the solution was to reduce all photos to 72dpi and size the photos for the photo page at 800px x 600px in Photoshop or a similar program. It also meant creating thumbnails for my blog page entries to be dropped into the placeholder photo box (reduce transparency to 0 - the thumbnail would appear properly on the blog summary page) and use a pre-sized photo for the blog page itself.

My question then is the optimal size for photos. Can one use original sized photos in iWeb 08 or does it make sense to continue to pre-process photos, reducing resolution and size? I guess this would not make sense for photos that you plan to make downloadable.

This discussion about color management I find extremely valuable, as I was always disappointed about how my site looked on Windows machines.

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5249784&#5249784

Since I'm going to have to re-process the color balance of my photos when I rebuild my site in iWeb 08 (I believe its not possible to update my current iWeb 06 site for reasons I mentioned in another post), I wonder if I could use the original sized photos as is or whether I should reduce their size and resolution (most of the photos I've shot digitally are at 300dpi, I have also scanned all my old analog photos at 300dpi). Thanks!