Maklay62 / Pixabay
Flickr.com has announced changes to its accounts policy. It said on its official blog that starting January 8, 2019, Flickr free accounts will be limited to 1,000 photos and videos. If you need unlimited storage, you’ll need to upgrade to Flickr Pro.
The Flickr team blamed Yahoo saying in 2013, “Yahoo lost sight of what makes Flickr truly special & responded to a changing landscape in Online photo sharing by giving every Flickr user a staggering terabyte of free storage. This, and numerous related changes to the Flickr product during that time, had strongly negative consequences.”
Here’s what the post says:
First, and most crucially, the free terabyte largely attracted members who were drawn by the free storage, not by engagement with other lovers of photography. This caused a significant tonal shift in our platform, away from the community interaction and exploration of shared interests that makes Flickr the best shared home for photographers in the world. We know those of you who value a vibrant community didn’t like this shift, and with this change we’re re-committing Flickr to focus on fostering this interaction.
Second, you can tell a lot about a product by how it makes money. Giving away vast amounts of storage creates data that can be sold to advertisers, with the inevitable result being that advertisers’ interests are prioritized over yours. Reducing the free storage offering ensures that we run Flickr on subscriptions, which guarantees that our focus is always on how to make your experience better. SmugMug, the photography company that recently acquired Flickr from Yahoo, has long had a saying that resonates deeply with the Flickr team and the way we believe we can best serve your needs: “You are not our product. You are our priority.” We want to build features and experiences that delight you, not our advertisers; ensuring that our members are also our customers makes this possible.
Third, making storage free had the unfortunate effect of signaling to an entire generation of Flickr members that storage—and even Flickr itself—isn’t worth paying for. Nothing could be further from the truth: there is no place like Flickr to share, to discover, to learn, and to interact around photography. And because storing tens of billions of Flickr members’ photos is staggeringly expensive, we need our most-active members to help us continue investing in Flickr’s stability, growth, and innovation.
A press release issued by Flickr said the new Pro account has:
In addition to unlimited storage, Flickr Pro also now includes:
- Ad-free browsing, letting both photographers & their visitors focus on what matters.
- Advanced stats on what photos are trending & which have performed best over the life of a user’s Flickr Pro account.
- Premier product support, Flickr Pros now receive priority assistance.
- New 5K photo size optimizing images for any screen from smartphone to jumbotron.
- Increased video playback, increasing the time video playback from 3 minutes to 10 minutes (coming early 2019).
Source: Flickr blog
