Flickr facts for kids

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Flickr

A viewing page for a photograph hosted on Flickr in 2018
Type of site	Image and video hosting service
Available in	Chinese (traditional) English French German Indonesian Italian Korean Portuguese Spanish Vietnamese
Founded	Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, 2004; 21 years ago (2004)
Headquarters	San Francisco, California , U.S.
Created by	Stewart Butterfield Caterina Fake
Parent	Ludicorp (2004–2005) Yahoo! Inc. (2005–2017) Oath (2017–2018) SmugMug (2018–present)
Commercial	Yes
Registration	Required
Users	112 million
Launched	February 10, 2004; 21 years ago (2004-02-10)
Current status	Active
Written in	PHP Java JavaScript

Flickr (/ˈflɪkər/ FLI-kər; ) is a popular website where people can share their photos and videos online. It's like a huge online album where you can store your pictures and show them to friends, family, or even the whole world! Flickr was started in Canada in 2004. Today, it is based in the United States.

Many photographers, both beginners and pros, use Flickr to host their high-quality photos. The website has changed owners a few times. Since April 20, 2018, it has been owned by a company called SmugMug.

As of 2015, Flickr had 112 million registered users. More than 3.5 million new images were uploaded every day. By 2011, the site was hosting over 6 billion images. You can look at photos and videos on Flickr without signing up. But if you want to upload your own content, you need to create an account. Having an account also lets you make a profile page and connect with other Flickr users. Flickr also has official apps for phones and tablets.

Flickr's Journey: How It Started and Grew
Flickr Features: How You Use It
See also

Flickr's Journey: How It Started and Grew

Flickr was launched on February 10, 2004. It was created by a company called Ludicorp, based in Vancouver, Canada. The founders were Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake.

From Game to Photo Sharing

Flickr actually started from tools made for an online game called Game Neverending. The photo-sharing part of the project became more popular. So, the game was put aside, and Flickr became the main focus.

Early versions of Flickr had a chat room called FlickrLive. People could share photos in real-time there. Over time, the focus shifted to uploading and organizing photos for individual users. The chat room was eventually removed. Key features like tags, marking photos as favorites, and group photo pools were added later.

By 2004, Flickr was widely used. People shared personal photos and bloggers used it to host images for their websites.

Changes in Ownership

Yahoo! bought Ludicorp and Flickr on March 20, 2005. The cost was about $22 million to $25 million. In 2005, all Flickr content was moved to servers in the United States. This meant the data became subject to U.S. laws.

In 2017, Verizon Communications bought Yahoo!, which included Flickr. Verizon then put Yahoo! and AOL under a new company called Oath. Oath later changed its name to Verizon Media.

On April 20, 2018, SmugMug bought Flickr from Verizon's Oath. This was a big change for Flickr users.

Key Updates and Features Over Time

Flickr has often updated its services. In 2006, it increased upload limits for free accounts. Paid accounts got unlimited uploads. In 2008, paid users could upload short videos. By 2009, free users could also upload videos, and high-definition (HD) video was added.

Graph of Flickr public uploads, which peaked in 2013–2015 before the launch of Google Photos

In 2013, Flickr had a big redesign. It offered a huge one terabyte of free storage for all users. This was a lot of space! The site also got a new look for browsing photos and updated mobile apps. Many users had strong opinions about these changes.

In 2015, Yahoo! updated the site again. It added a new way to upload photos and improved the apps. A new Uploadr app was made for computers and mobile devices.

In 2019, SmugMug moved all of Flickr's data. This included billions of photos and videos. The data moved from Yahoo's old servers to Amazon Web Services (AWS).

In 2023, Flickr announced a new "Print Shop" feature. This allows photographers to sell prints of their photos directly through the site.

Flickr Features: How You Use It

Flickr offers different ways to store, organize, and share your photos and videos.

Account Options

Flickr has always offered two types of accounts: free and paid.

Free accounts: Before January 2019, free accounts had up to 1 terabyte of storage. After that, free accounts were limited to 1,000 photos or videos. Videos were also limited to three minutes each. If a free account had more than 1,000 items, older content might be deleted unless the user upgraded.
Paid accounts (Pro): These accounts offer "unlimited" storage. They also include advanced statistics, no ads, longer videos (up to 10 minutes), and special customer service.

Flickr also lets users download all their account data. This includes photo albums, contacts, and comments.

Organizing Your Photos

When you upload photos to Flickr, they go into your "photostream." This is the main collection of your photos. You can view your photostream in different ways, like a slideshow or an archive.

Titles and Descriptions: You can add titles and descriptions to your images.
Tags: You can also add tags (keywords) to your photos. This helps people find your images when they search. Flickr was one of the first sites to use "tag clouds," which showed the most popular keywords.
Albums: You can organize your photos into "albums" (formerly called "sets"). One photo can be in many albums, or none at all. You can even embed your albums into blogs or websites.
Collections: Albums can be grouped into "collections" for even more organization.
Organizr: This is a special tool within Flickr. It helps you organize your photos easily. You can change tags, descriptions, and even place photos on a world map.

Controlling Who Sees Your Content

Flickr lets you choose who can see your images.

Public or Private: You can mark a photo as public or private. Private images are only seen by you by default.
Friends and Family: You can also mark private images to be seen by specific friends or family members.
Group Pools: If you add a photo to a "group pool," its privacy depends on the group. If the group is private, only members can see it. If the group is public, your photo becomes public too.
Guest Pass: You can even share private photos with people who don't have a Flickr account using a "guest pass" system.

Many users choose to make their photos public. This creates a huge collection of categorized photos for everyone to enjoy.

Connecting and Sharing

Flickr makes it easy to interact with others and share your photos.

Following: You can "Follow" other photographers on Flickr to see their new photos.
Groups: You can join or create "Groups" based on common photography interests. Group administrators can set rules and organize photos.
Galleries: Any Flickr user can create "Galleries" of photos from other users' photostreams. These are public.
Comments and Favorites: You can leave comments on photos and mark them as "favorites."
Uploading Tools: You can upload photos to Flickr using email attachments. There are also desktop apps for Mac and Windows that let you upload many photos at once.
Partnerships: Flickr has partnered with other companies. For example, it uses OpenStreetMap for maps in some cities. Flickr also offers printing services for photos and other merchandise.

Content Filtering for Safety

Flickr has controls to help users filter content. You can specify what types of images you upload (photo, art, screenshot). You can also say how "safe" your images are.

Categories: Images are put into three categories: "safe," "moderate," and "restricted."
Searching: When you search for images, you can choose to see only "safe" content. This is especially important for younger users. Non-members must always use SafeSearch.

Understanding Licenses and Copyright

Flickr gives users options for how their images can be used by others.

Creative Commons: Or, you can choose a Creative Commons license. These licenses let others use your photos under certain conditions, like giving you credit. Flickr makes it easy to search for images under specific licenses.

Breakdown of Creative Commons license use on Flickr as of 2009

The Commons on Flickr

In 2008, Flickr launched "The Commons on Flickr." This program lets cultural institutions like museums and libraries share images that have "no known copyright restrictions." The goal is to show hidden treasures from public photo archives. It also shows how people's comments and knowledge can help make these collections even better.

For example, the White House official photographer started using Flickr to release White House photos. These photos are often labeled as "United States Government Work," which means they don't have copyright restrictions.

In 2015, Flickr added more options for public domain images. These include the Public Domain Mark (for images no longer protected by copyright) and Creative Commons Zero (CC0). CC0 means the creator gives up all their rights to the work.