a.wholelottapictures

April 18, 2005 9:24 PM

Flickr Doubles the Stakes with their new offerings for Pro users. People with existing Pro accounts will have two GB of upload capacity per month, a subscription length of double what they paid for, and two free pro accounts to gift to friends.
posted by quasistoic (49 comments total)

And I bet every single flickr pro user got a message about this too, and didn't need to hear it from MetaFilter.
posted by Space Coyote at 9:33 PM on April 18, 2005

Countdown to Flickr Pro memberships appearing on eBay...
posted by dobbs at 9:34 PM on April 18, 2005

They also lowered the price for a pro account to $24.95 a year. So far, so good under Y! ownership.
posted by toastcowboy at 9:34 PM on April 18, 2005

Yeah baby. A friend hooked me up. He bought a Flickr Pro account just yesterday; he had no idea they'd throw all this in. Y'all better run and hide right now.

Space Coyote: Chill. People like to hear about Flickr.
posted by NickDouglas at 9:37 PM on April 18, 2005

Speaking as a Gallery user... I keep seeing more and more about this Flickr thing. Personally, I like keeping everything on my own (fast, colo) site, but then I'm rather antisocial. Besides the nifty social features, is Flickr actually worth the two bucks a month for anything? Or is that the whole story?
posted by dmd at 9:37 PM on April 18, 2005

A rare case of deflation actually benefiting people. Assuming they'll want their Flickr accounts for two years.
posted by me3dia at 9:41 PM on April 18, 2005

They have also upped the bandwidth-per-month for free users, which I found out just now! (10 MB to 20MB)
posted by wells at 9:59 PM on April 18, 2005

is Flickr actually worth the two bucks a month for anything?

Speaking as someone who has used gallery on their own webspace, yes.

Even if gallery wasn't so blindingly ugly.
posted by justgary at 10:04 PM on April 18, 2005

Space Coyote: You had to hear about it somehow.
posted by quasistoic at 10:14 PM on April 18, 2005

Of course, the real winners in all this are the people who held out with free accounts while their friends upgraded to pro. It's a cheapskate's dream come true.

Time to call in a favor...
posted by nyterrant at 10:24 PM on April 18, 2005

is Flickr actually worth the two bucks a month for anything?

I paid for a full account after tinkering with a free one for a single night. It's one of those things like del.icio.us - you either don't think it's a big deal, or you think it's one of the neatest things ever. I was in the same camp for a long time - I can do taxonomies, I can do galleries, what's the big deal?

It just does it all really well and makes it really easy: unlike CGI, they can do cool interface tricks to make organizing and tagging really quick and fun. And the APIs! Oh! The APIs make it transcendantly cool. And the semantic links to every else's stuff... and the tools...and....see?
posted by freebird at 10:32 PM on April 18, 2005

Space Coyote: You had to hear about it somehow.

Yeah cause im sure just like you? We come here for the great press annoucement filter posts. Im glad your excited but a shill post this be...
posted by Dreamghost at 11:19 PM on April 18, 2005

Drop me an email if you'd like to try a pro account -- especially if you're already a Flickr user that likes the service but can't really justify the beans for a pro account (struggling students etc.)
posted by nthdegx at 1:41 AM on April 19, 2005

*waves dole cheque*
posted by sgt.serenity at 2:04 AM on April 19, 2005

Of course the amusing part is that since they've increased the upload limits, everyone who was already at their limit for the month has gone ahead with uploading again at the same time, hence slowing down the site and making uploading a rather spotty proposition, and defeating the purpose of the upgrade. A temporary problem, to be sure, but rather ironic nonetheless.
posted by LondonYank at 2:30 AM on April 19, 2005

This guy kindly gave me (self link) a Flickr Pro Account. It's been a good day.
posted by sjvilla79 at 3:24 AM on April 19, 2005

People with existing Pro accounts will have two GB of upload capacity per month, a subscription length of double what they paid for, and two free pro accounts to gift to friends.

I'm probably one of Flickr's biggest fans. But that also makes me one of their greatest critics.

The drop in Pro prices and extra features is great but the "gifts" to existing Pro users are well, not really gifts. The existing Pro users paid more for a service that is now being offered for less.

Imagine if they had said they were lowering Pro prices but offered nothing extra to existing paid users. There'd be an uproar. People who bought in early would feel as if they had been cheated. So, the double length and invites are really just a compensation. Again, I'm not ungrateful, but lets cut through the marketing a bit.

The real news is that a great photo-sharing site is now more compelling for *new* users. The free account limits have been doubled. The paid account price has been lowered. Even without the diverse groups and tagging features, to be able to upload 2GB of photos a month with no storage or (download) bandwidth limits looks like a good deal to me. Lets continue to hope they thrive under Yahoo.
posted by vacapinta at 5:41 AM on April 19, 2005

further, flickr had initially promised to RAISE prices after leaving beta.

so instead of saving myself money, i'm "locked in" for twice as long, with no savings to speak of.

in fact, if memory and bandwidth costs continue to drop and they lower prices again, this "gift" could conceivably end up costing us money.

i'd much rather have the price difference refunded to me.
posted by striatic at 5:52 AM on April 19, 2005

I came in here to drop a Pepsi Blue snark, much as I truly love the Flickr, but I stayed to beg for a Pro account.

Then again, I hardly use my basic freebie account, despite how cool I think it is, so maybe it'd be better to give it to somone who actually takes pictures once in a while.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:57 AM on April 19, 2005

Prices of many products and services come down over time, especially after an initial release. So long as people know precisely what they are getting, it is up to them to decide whether or not they think it is worth it. Anyone that has bought an Apple will sympathise.

As an early Flickr adopter, I was very happy to pay what I felt was a reasonable price for a good service that I wanted to succeed. Extending accounts of early apopters is a generous way to say thank you and much much more than they have to do given that falling prices are strictly par for the course.
posted by nthdegx at 6:00 AM on April 19, 2005

Damn i just hit 100 photos and I'm broke as shit. But yay!
posted by 31d1 at 6:16 AM on April 19, 2005

*waves dole cheque*

Steven, check your flickr account messages/mail.
posted by t r a c y at 6:25 AM on April 19, 2005

I just want you all to know that I am not above begging for a free pro account.

*please?* btw, nice post title, quasi.
posted by whatnot at 6:46 AM on April 19, 2005

Also - it'd be nice if people like me who contributed $150+ to the GNE effort in the early days were recognized with Flickr Pro accounts, but apparently that doesn't count for anything.
posted by dmd at 7:05 AM on April 19, 2005

It's amusing that Yahoo came in and dropped the prices immediately. Their predicted non-beta pricing of $60 for a year was fairly ridiculous for photo sharing. Even the discount beta price was very pricey, considering what you got.
posted by smackfu at 7:10 AM on April 19, 2005

In a staggering bout of coincidence, mere moments after I posted that, my account transmogrified to Pro.

Unless that was one of you?
posted by dmd at 7:13 AM on April 19, 2005

I'll give somebody a flickr pro account if they can send me a certain app that I've been trying to find. I'm looking for a fully functional dvd to mp3 ripper. (All the ones I've tried have limitations built in, as they are demos.) Email my old hotmail account ([e-mail]) if you're interested.
posted by thisisdrew at 7:15 AM on April 19, 2005

Begging! It's good for you! Special thanks to my lovely benefactor!
posted by whatnot at 7:23 AM on April 19, 2005

Thanks whereintheworldismichael! Thanks to him I've gone pro.
posted by brittney at 7:31 AM on April 19, 2005

I would love a donation of one of the free accounts.
posted by ValveAnnex at 8:13 AM on April 19, 2005

this broke college student aint above beggin'. I got a camera and an itch.
posted by TetrisKid at 8:17 AM on April 19, 2005

i'm "locked in" for twice as long

Oh noes! Forced to use a service you paid for again for free! Forced to realize you just got a free renewal! Forced to have the option of closing your account any time by calling them!

Any way I phrase it, I can't make it sound bad. Those who paid are now getting twice the product; they get mad props from two friends each; the friends get, well, free product and will likely come back for more in a year. Yahoo gets good PR, the public gets more exposure to Flickr, the Flickr team gets to surprise us all thanks to the added capital of Yahoo...

So you still had to find something to bitch about? Want Stephen Colbert to come interview you about your hardships?

Sorry, I'm ripping into you more than you deserve, but hey.
posted by NickDouglas at 8:24 AM on April 19, 2005

Righto -- that's my pro account invitations all spent.
posted by nthdegx at 8:29 AM on April 19, 2005

Sorry, I'm ripping into you more than you deserve, but hey.

HAHA you remind of a bad hipster impersonation. But hey keep it up. Your A-List Heros might respond to your im's one of these days.

You're like a walking cliche of wannabe internet douches...

please dont procreate.
posted by Dreamghost at 8:46 AM on April 19, 2005

Dreamghost, wtf?
posted by kenko at 8:50 AM on April 19, 2005

Oh, man, could this impoverished photjournalism major ever use a pro account....
posted by TheGoldenOne at 8:50 AM on April 19, 2005

Hey, this was supposed to be about getting me free flickr, not slamming Nick.
posted by TetrisKid at 8:51 AM on April 19, 2005

She could also stand to use spell check from time to time...
posted by TheGoldenOne at 8:51 AM on April 19, 2005

I'd like to publically thank nthdegx for being very cool with the invitations.

I wonder if all the investment and pricing changes mean that Flickr will come out of beta soon.
posted by themadjuggler at 9:00 AM on April 19, 2005

nthdegx is a cool dude.
posted by Dreamghost at 9:04 AM on April 19, 2005

I was wondering about their beta-ness as well. It's good to see them doing well under Yahoo.

Remember to give away those pro accounts by 7/1 or they expire! :)
posted by mileena at 9:15 AM on April 19, 2005

I know I'm a MeFi newbie poster so no one really knows me, but I would LOOOOOOOOVE a Pro account, if anyone reading this still has one left. I've been using Photobucket and am really really really wanting to change. If not, that's okay, I will eventually get un-lazy and switch at least to the free Flickr account - it's just that the Pro account would get me moving faster :) (my current email is in my profile)
posted by shoppingforsanity at 10:43 AM on April 19, 2005

This is very cool. I was getting ready to upgrade to pro. My photostream isn't much now, but I am getting a new camera in a couple of days, a very compact one, and plan to take tons of pictures daily, and will need the bandwidth to upload them all.
posted by benjh at 11:30 AM on April 19, 2005

Der, anyone who wants to give this soon-to-be-impoverished grad student an account will be thanked profusely.
posted by kenko at 11:32 AM on April 19, 2005

Rats! I almost went signed up for the Pro account last night. Perhaps even then it was too late.
posted by ontic at 1:27 PM on April 19, 2005

Learning photography with a new digital camera, I am not beneath begging for a Pro account invite either. ;)

dmd, as far as I know, they promised to gift all GNE pioneer account-holders and contributors with Flickr Pro accounts, all they had to do was e-mail Stewart. Perhaps your comment was treated as a delayed notification?
posted by Lush at 3:27 PM on April 19, 2005

kokogiak rocks. That is all.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 11:00 PM on April 19, 2005

So too praise for vacapinta.
posted by Tufa at 1:23 PM on April 20, 2005

routergirl rocks even harder!
posted by Lush at 12:05 AM on April 29, 2005