Flickr is a web site/service that aims to help people share their photos and videos online. Flickr says they have two main goals: (1) to help people make their photos available to the people who matter to them and (2) to enable new ways of organizing photos and video.
For more information go to http://www.flickr.com/about/
What kinds of files can I store?
Only photos and videos.
For photos, flickr hosts jpeg’s, gif’s (but not the animated kind) and png’s. Uncompressed “RAW” files when uploaded are converted to jepg’s–hence not saved in their original format.
http://www.flickr.com/help/photos/#150488231
Many fewer people use flickr for video, though it can be done:
http://www.flickr.com/help/video/
Who uses it?
The Library of Congress publishes some 20,000 photos via flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/
So do many universities for generic campus photos and images of graduation and special guests:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/yaleuniversity/
How many files can I store? How big can they be? How much will it cost?
1 TB in all for free accounts. These are ad-supported, so ads may show up next to your content.
Photos may be up to 200 MB each. Videos may be up to 1G or 3 minutes each.
For $49.99 per year, you can make the ads go away.
http://www.flickr.com/help/limits/#150427010
How can I keep my files organized? Do the files have names–like on my computer? Is organizing the files easy?
Flickr lets you create sets and collections. A set holds photos; a collection holds sets. So it’s basically a folder structure. But collections can only go six levels deep. A set can be in more than one collection, but a collection cannot be in more than one collection.
In addition, you can tag the photos, either when you upload them or later through a special interface in the browser.
http://www.flickr.com/help/collections/
For curation purposes, flickr has also added “galleries”—up to 18 photos or videos with an introduction and discussion. Basically, these flow down the page, rather than asking the viewer to see many images at once or to click through a series of images. They may also be made up of images belonging to other users.
http://www.flickr.com/help/galleries/#957333
Who can see the files? Can I keep them private? Can I share them?
As with many such services, you can make your files: public to anyone, accessible to specific users who are signed in, or completely private–for your use only. You can also prevent sharing and embedding of your images.
You can limit the size others can download. So they could manually put your images on their site, but not make reasonable prints.
What is the legal status of public or shared images–their licensing? Can people ‘steal’ my images?
Flickr uses the Creative Commons licensing system. So when uploading (or at any later time), you can set shared and public images to: use, make derivative works & attribute, use and attribute but do not make derivative works, do not use commerically, etc.
http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/
Users can search for images by license, and so your images can turn up on web sites if you’ve so permitted.
Can I leave the file here and publish it directly to a web site?
Yes. Embedding is very robust on flickr.
Anyone who can see an image can create the code to embed it, and even choose the size. People who see your images can download them up to the maximum size you’ve specified.
Naturally, if you permit someone to see your image, and they take a copy and publish it, the cat is out of the bag.
Can I ever get them all back?
Sort of.
The account owner can download any image that was uploaded and even at the original size. But flickr has no tool for bulk downloading. Third parties have made such tools, and they vary in quality–and the better ones cost something.
What if I accidentally delete a file? Can I get it back?
Flickr has no provisions for the eventuality that you will delete a file from their site then change your mind and want it back.
