I really like Flickr. It’s really easy to use. The format is great and the user feedback features seam to have created a nice community feel to the site.
Worryingly, I got a survey emailed me today from Flickr asking what I would think if certain features were removed.
These included such things as search, albums, favourites folder and profiles.
I hope they don’t let some clown in the bright ideas department ruin the site.
I thought they (SmugMug) didn't make enough changes when they took over. It was a failed platform and I couldn't see how they tried to improve it. I paid for a while but then the pricing jumped and they sounded desperate and I jumped ship.
Getting rid of those features sounds bad though. I wrote them a big list of things to improve but basically they need more compelling reasons to use it. A simple way to improve this is with themed competitions to get those group discussion boards changed from "2 posts 7 years ago" into active communities.
And monetize it with printing services - it would be so easy and profitable to hook up with a photobook company, who also do prints of various quality ranges.
And annual Flickr awards. They should be handing awards out to camera brands, photography vloggers and winners of photo competitions. Get some buzz about the platform and sponsored vloggers pushing it e.g. do those "sponsored by" ads SquareSpace do in vlogs.
