Yahoo may shut down Flickr, other unprofitable business units

astroNikon · Feb 9, 2016

here's an interesting article to read from December
the big gorilla is it's stake in Alibaba which if sold may hold it liable for billions in US taxes ==> Updated: Now is the time to break up Yahoo and sell off the bits | ZDNet

Overread · Feb 9, 2016

"Scale down" generally translates to "Shut down in slow staged steps to avoid panic" for most companies. A couple manage to keep things scale down and limping on in some form; but in general when something scales down its functionality in a market where there are other viable options what happens is people jump ship and new commers stop appearing.

So what they will then do is "review" flickr's status and close it later.

For me I've got all my flickr photos, what I will miss are the contacts and the fact that my photos are linked from flickr all over the net (well all over the bits I'm on at least). That would be the most major blow. My blog has everything flickr-hosted however since I've not updated it in years it won't be a worry for the threads to vanish.

Rehosting will be a pain mostly in picking somewhere new. 500pix appears to be more commercial in its approach to things; whilst photobucket has a VERY messy interface and screen and is somewhat sluggish these days.

bhop · Feb 9, 2016

I've been using flickr since 2006. I never got into 500px, or other photo sites. Flickr has always done what I want it to. I really hope they stay online, I have all my photos backed up, but I do use flickr to reference back to things sometimes. "I need to find this one pic.. *looks for it in the flickr album* *looks at date uploaded* *finds file on hard drive*.. etc." I guess I could do it like that on my computer too, but it's so much more convenient to do a flickr search and scroll down till I find it.

SquarePeg · Feb 9, 2016

I just recently started posting pics on Flickr, mostly to use as a host site to post my pics here and on some other sites I like to hang out on. Yes I can find another host site like photo bucket but what I'll miss is the ability to follow others whose work I enjoy and to show my appreciation of their art with likes or comments.

I'll also miss one of my favorite pastimes while watching TV - exploring Flickr by subjects or destinations I'm interested in.

nerwin · Feb 9, 2016

SquarePeg said:
I just recently started posting pics on Flickr, mostly to use as a host site to post my pics here and on some other sites I like to hang out on. Yes I can find another host site like photo bucket but what I'll miss is the ability to follow others whose work I enjoy and to show my appreciation of their art with likes or comments.

I'll also miss one of my favorite pastimes while watching TV - exploring Flickr by subjects or destinations I'm interested in.

Its not gone yet!! lol.

astroNikon · Feb 10, 2016

Overread said:
Rehosting will be a pain mostly in picking somewhere new. 500pix appears to be more commercial in its approach to things; whilst photobucket has a VERY messy interface and screen and is somewhat sluggish these days.

Other sites are more commercial.
They have to be. Who is paying for the lights, servers, salaries, etc. Sooner or later the Venture Capitalists / investors / stock holders / other divisions / mgt are going to balk at having to put more money into a business operation with no future profit in sight. Of course, I don't think they ever had a good plan on how to make money either.

Thus sites have to figure out how to make Revenue whether it's like Shutterfly, or Smugmug, or 500pix. Drive revenue from content (shutterfly) to bring people in from the outside and try to drive revenue by ads & licensing like 500pix.

If the organization isn't profitable or close to it, what is it worth ?
Like Flickr and many other yahoo services, a negative value.
How do you sell a service that has a negative value .. it should be interesting.

Overread · Feb 10, 2016

Thing is I used to pay per year for flickr - then Yahoo did away with that and never really added the advertisements to the site. At least with a free subscription I never saw any. So it was really great, no ads and free hosting of a boatload of data. But yeah I was wondering where the income was coming from! Free only lasts so long and often only when something else is holding it up.

nerwin · Feb 10, 2016

I've been paying PRO for years.

shefjr · Feb 10, 2016

@nerwin or anyone else who knows the answer. How do you know that someone bought one of your photos? Couldn't they simply DL it and print it as they please? If they bought it through flickr did flickr give you a cut of the sale and is that part of being "pro" on flickr?

nerwin · Feb 10, 2016

shefjr said:
@nerwin or anyone else who knows the answer. How do you know that someone bought one of your photos? Couldn't they simply DL it and print it as they please? If they bought it through flickr did flickr give you a cut of the sale and is that part of being "pro" on flickr?

They usually send me a email via my website asking about prints. You can disable the ability to download photos, but I have mine up as creative commons. If someone wants to use my photos on a blog or what not, that's fine with me as long as they give me credit. Sure if they are jerks, they could download it and get it printed as they please but if I catch them selling it as their own or saying its theirs...I'll have a few choice words for them.

I like my PRO account because I have unlimited storage, access to better more in depth stats, no ads, I can replace photos and there are other things that I'm grandfathered in that the "new" pro account doesn't offer. It was also sweet that I got 20% off my Creative Cloud subscription..I'm only pay $8 a month! That's soon to run out though and I'll be paying the regular price which honestly isn't all that much more.

Overread · Feb 10, 2016

I've basic account and I've not seen any ads that I've noticed. So if they are there they are very well hidden ads!

As for downloading and paying Flickr has always been generally against personal sales. You're not allowed to host images on their service and embed them into websites to sell them; nor do they much much use of on-site printing sales features. It's very much a gallery website unlike Smugmug which is the other way around.

They do have a deal with Ghetty for stock sales; but that's getting into the photo stock market which is a totally different kettle of fish (and for the casual user basically pointless if you want to make any actual money).

Pro I used to have ,but honestly I don't need more storage as I only ever stored resized web ready versions of my photos; whilst at the same time the stats were never that good on flickr (loads of views - all saying that the source is unknown). Stats might hold more value if you're networking on flickr and other websites

bhop · Feb 10, 2016

It used to make sense to be "pro" on flickr. If I remember correctly, there were huge limitations with the standard free account, such as upload amount limit, upload size limit, ads. It wasn't about selling photos and the word "pro" didn't really mean "pro" for flickr IMO, it was just a name and nothing more...

..but the thing is, when they changed the free service to get rid of the limitations and bumped up the price for pro, they lost a lot of revenue. I think people like myself were willing to pay a small fee for the stuff the pro account offers, which is money in their pockets, while after the change, the higher cost vs free account without limitations made me not willing to pay anymore.

Overread · Feb 10, 2016

Exactly; they actually lost money on that change too as basically there was nothing left for a pro user and a lot got refunds on the time left on their accounts. Basically they made everything free which was great- except it didn't pay the bills.

gsgary · Feb 10, 2016

astroNikon said:
they lump Flickr with all their other non-core business.
So I assume it's part of the "lump" that will be sold or closed

good article to read, especially the last paragraphs
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/03/technology/yahoo-layoffs-strategic-alternatives-earnings.html?_r=0
"yahoo will shed assets, cut expenses and focus on the areas of the company that are growing" (revenue & profits)

Flickr is not mentioned because it's not part a revenue/profit center from what I understand.
Thus when someone else buys it, or when they stop trying to sell it and close it, then you'll know it's future.

What do you expect for free ?

What's there to worry about they should be backed up elsewhere, I say shut it down

jaomul said:
It's a free website with loads of nice pictures, search options, ability to host for placing pictures on places like tpf. I do understand that at times the interface changed and some (including myself) might have preferred some older ways etc.

But ,if I am given a free lunch I don't mind being told at what table to sit.

astroNikon said:
article of the results ==> Marissa Mayer is racing against the Yahoo board, and she’s running on fumes

If you are worried about your Flickr pictures, I would recommend the sooner you move them to a new platform, the less you have to worry about them just possibly disappearing one day.

Sent from my SM-G903F using Tapatalk

vintagesnaps · Feb 10, 2016

I feel kinda like that at this point, shut 'er down already, geez. Seriously, I realize people do use it, so I think this announcement is a heads up to start figuring out what else to do with your photos because change is probably coming.

Here's an interesting article I read today - to me, a good example of how free on Flickr is helping devalue photography.
Free vs Paid: Donald J Trump