Flickr to Grant Commercial API Key to Competitors 58
eobanb writes "The Yahoo-owned photo sharing site Flickr has come under fire recently for the perceived 'lock-in' that their API creates. Flickr's terms of service state clearly that all photos uploaded to Flickr by users are owned by their respective users, yet Flickr's API only allows uploading, not exporting. Surprisingly, Flickr developer Stewart Butterfield posted in the thread on Flickr: "I actually had a change of heart and was convinced by Eric's position that we definitely should approve requests from direct competitors as long as they do the same. That means (a) that they need to have a full and complete API and (b) be willing to give us access." This means that users will soon be able to freely move data between different photo-sharing sites, like Zooomr (which has already implemented the Flickr API), Google PicasaWeb, 23hq, or Tabblo."
Aaugh! My eyes! (Score:2)
Re:Aaugh! My eyes! (Score:2)
Re:Aaugh! My eyes! (Score:1)
Re:hiya!!! (Score:1, Funny)
This is a respected site not some trash community site!!
Re:hiya!!! (Score:1, Troll)
-- Ravensfire
Re:Who Cares? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Who Cares? (Score:2, Insightful)
Plus, if you are trying to share photos with friends and family, it's a hell of a lot more effort to IM or email them each time they want to look at a picture then it is to just have a gallery set up. They can look at the pictures anytime they want, without hassling you
Re:Personal Web Hosting (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Personal Web Hosting (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Personal Web Hosting (Score:2)
Re:Personal Web Hosting (Score:4, Informative)
Paid hosting has terms and conditions too, sometimes as strict as these photo sites.
Re:Personal Web Hosting (Score:3, Insightful)
I consider myself a fairly quick learner, and I have no doubt that with sufficient motivation I could probably patch something together on a web server to host my own photos, maybe even something that allowed easy uploading and taggin
Can't export? Since when? (Score:5, Informative)
Umm...
Right-click. "Save As".
For those images that use "protection", I recommed the wonderful "Nuke Anything" plugin for FireFox... Just right-click the image, "Remove this object" to get rid of the transparent image over it, then you can save it.
And yes, for the "didn't read the FP" Nazis, I realize that the API does not equal the actual webpage - I just consider the distinction irrelevant.
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:3, Interesting)
I host my photos using Apache::Gallery on a linux box at home. There are no hosting charges and bandwith isn't much of an issue since only family and friends view them
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:5, Informative)
"You can construct the source URL to a photo once you know its ID, server ID and secret, as returned by many API methods."
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:5, Insightful)
I understand Stewart's reluctance, but I think people on his team have got it right, Flickr has to step up and say "We are the best, and we are going to prove it." Locking customers into your site is the sort of pro-corporate anti-user image that Flickr avoided, and won them such goodwill.
Personally, I think Flickr is still the best. It's clean, it does things well. Zooomr is OK, but it's a complete carbon copy, with some pointless added bits.
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:1)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:1)
We're talking about *commercial* APIs guys: a mass transfer of hundreds/thousands of megabytes of data a day to a competitor's site.
Seeing that the photos are owned by the people who upload them, this kind of mass transfer is completely out of the question. Unless, of course, said competitor has secured the permissions from the thousands of contributors beforehand. In which case it's probably easier to inform the world of a alternative service and hope for the best.
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:5, Informative)
What this does is to allow customers to switch easily between Flickr and/or its competitors. Let's say you have an account with Flickr and want to move to one of its competitors. The competitor would now have access to Flickr's API, so it could write a script which (with your permission, of course) downloads all of your Flickr photos and puts them into galleries in your account with the competitor. This would be easier for most customers than downloading all their files.
Because they require a reciprocal key from the competitor, this would also allow Flickr to build a script to move your images from the competitor to your new Flickr account.
Capiche?
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2)
I think you skipped a few steps there. How is a company not providing an exit strategy to customers a fault of the government? (You're being graded for the logic and comprehensibility of your answer.)
Have you finally passed the caricature-of-yourself event horizon and become a libertoonian?
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2)
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:3, Interesting)
javascript:%20for(%20i%20in%20global_photos%20)%20
{%20p%20=%20global_photos[i];%20}%20window.locatio
n%20=%20'http://static.flickr.com/'%20+%20p.server
%20+%20'/'%20+%20p.id%20+%20'_'%20+%20p.secret%20+
%20'_o.jpg';
Remove the linebreaks (inserted to get around Slashcode-enforced spacing) and you're set. Works in Safari, and I'm assuming Firefox and Opera as well.
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2)
Holy Batman, Batman!
And here I thought myself clever for the suggestion to use "Nuke Anything" to remove the transparent div.
Best javascript trick I've seen this month... Even if it just sticks an "_o" on the end, I didn't realize Flickr kept the original, I thought they downsampled everything to 400x500 (or 500x400) for the sake of space.
Thank you!
Re:Can't export? Since when? (Score:2)
Right-click. "Save As".
Oh, that's easy if you have maybe 10-50 images in Flickr. Try that with... oh, I guess I only have 200 photos [http] in there. I guess this is why people have the paid accounts. Otherwise, Gallery [zhrodague.net] seems to work okay, even if it misses most of the Flickr features.
Does this have anything to do with porn? (Score:1)
Re:Does this have anything to do with porn? (Score:2, Insightful)
Web 2.0, finally (Score:3, Interesting)
Here we finally see the big move happening that's the real mark between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0!
No more individual sites, where your data resides, but interchangebility between websites without all the hassles.
I think lots of other services will follow this example because the resulting freedom will definately be missed when has been tasted somewhere. In the next few weeks I expect to see a lot of other companies open up their API's to allow the same kind of data sharing.
Yes, I am very excited!
Next step will be the availabilty of this extended API for every normal user, so they have real freedom. But that will probably take a year or even longer.
Re:Web 2.0, finally (Score:2)
Good thing there are companies around that still know that you're there for your users, and not the other way around!
Great, while it lasts (Score:5, Interesting)
You may note from my URL that I run a "competing" image hosting site, and have been for years - before these new guys were all around. You'll also notice that we offer the grand total of 1mb of free storage on free accounts (although this will be increasing in the next few months for the first time in years), and yet we have over 23,000 users. But we simply can't compete with Flickr/Google/any Venture Capital backed outfit.
However, we're proudly "Web 1.0" in terms of we're backed by real money and if something is going to cost us more than it will generate to keep the service running, it won't get added. Contrast this with the Web 2.0 method of offering everything under the sun, and you may think I'm nuts. But how long does everyone really think these "unlimited" feature sites are going to be around for? When the Venture Capital finally runs out, it'll be the old Web 1.0 sites that remain. Youtube and flickr etc. are costing hundreds of thousands of dollars per week, or even day, just to maintain - and they generate no income. Some of us have been here and seen all this before.
I am sure I'll be modded down on this however, because as a user there has never been a better time to use the web. You can get whatever you want for free, people are fighting to offer you the greatest services that they can all at no cost - and now for you to be able to move elsewhere if you want to. It's also a great time to be a Web 2.0 startup and become a millionaire from venture capital. I just wonder how long all this will last
Re:Great, while it lasts (Score:1)
Flickr generates income from, at the very least, selling pro memberships. While the prints, DVDs, calendars, etc. are done by other companies, I imagine they get referral fees or a percentage of the purchase price for every user who purchases goods or services from them through Flickr.
They also have the money of Yahoo! behind them, which should provide a good day, two days' worth of emergency cash, I'd think.
tagging enables contextual advertising on Flickr (Score:3, Informative)
Because the non-pro memberships on Flickr limit users to 2 sets, users are encouraged to use tags to organize their own photos. So, Flickr has really created an incentive for users to perform data entry that Flickr can use to comme
Re:Great, while it lasts (Score:2)
Nothing to take away from your website, though, :-), just saying things aren't as black-and-white as you point out even in the Web2.0 world.
Re:Web 2.0, finally (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Web 2.0, finally (Score:3, Funny)
It's a good idea for flickr anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
The API and licence agreement war (Score:4, Interesting)
About the new commercial use for Yahoo! Maps and API (from slashgeo [slashgeo.org]):
" Yahoo! Maps now allowing commercial use [yahoo.net]. From Yahoo!: "Until today, the APIs were available only for non-commercial use unless you applied for an exception. The concept of commercial and non-commercial has gone away and exceptions are no longer necessary in most cases. We have given you explicit Usage Policies to help guide you. Whether on your business website, blog or personal site, you no longer have to ask for permission." There's also a new Official Yahoo! Maps blog [ylocalblog.com] "
But that's not the end. Starting this week, the new Google Earth licence does not allow you to install Google Earth at work at all, even for personal use. Again from slashgeo [slashgeo.org]:
"The Ogle Earth blog indicates that if you use Google Earth at work (the free version), you're in illegality [ogleearth.com]. From the site: "1. USE OF SOFTWARE The Software is made available to you for your personal, non-commercial use only. You may not use the Software or the geographical information made available for display using the Software, or any prints or screen outputs generated with the Software in any commercial or business environment or for any commercial or business purposes for yourself or any third parties. "
Oh yeah, and unrelated to the story but still very interesting, you can geocode your Picasa photos using Google Earth [slashgeo.org]. I'll stop there. See my sig to learn more
Confusion about the Google Earth versions (Score:2)
There's seem to be some confusion. A lot of people I told about the free version of Google Earth not being allowed in a business environment quickly forget the "free" in my sentence
Only a problem if you're cryogenically preserved (Score:1)
FlickrBackup (Score:2, Informative)
It's not all sugar and sweet... (Score:1)
Why Flickr Should Have an Open API (Score:2)