THEY CALL HIM FLICKR, FLICKR

Photo blog a hit. Check out Flickr.

Photo Site a Hit With Bloggers

WIRED NEWS
By Daniel Terdiman
December 9, 2004

When bombs went off in Jakarta, Indonesia, in September, CNN.com readers weren't the first to know. Instead, members of Flickr, an online photo service, were among the very earliest to see pictures of what had happened.

"There were photos on Flickr before even any news stories," said Caterina Fake, a Flickr co-founder. "Within the hour, three Flickr users who happened to be in Jakarta had uploaded photos."

Flickr is a new breed of photo site offered by Vancouver's Ludicorp. It takes the online posting capability offered by photo printing sites like Ofoto or Snapfish and adds a palette of features that make images easier to share. The site does not, at the moment, sell prints of users' photos.

Flickr offers users the ability to upload, store and organize digital photos, as well as to automatically post camera-phone shots to a blog. Further, users can comment on and add descriptions to others' photos, creating public or private topic-oriented groups. The site gives all members an equal opportunity to make use of each picture, no matter who the photographer is.

"It's like photo management plus social networking plus blog-friendly tools, which is a killer combo because things like Ofoto only do one part," said Matt Haughey, founder of MetaFilter, a blog that hosts discussions on emerging internet applications, among other topics. (full article)