Flickr, Yahoo!, and the CEO

For all of you who post to or are fans of Flickr, you might find this article interesting:Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer Is Making No Friends In Pro Photography | Black Star Rising

All you can do is laugh. Hey, she pissed off all her employees who were "working from home" by telling them they all have to come into the office now. Pissing off another group of people is just another day for her

Excuse me for asking, but I don't have a Flickr, or Photobucket account... but aren't those sites essentially "free"... ?????? And if so... wouldn't getting upset at what a CEO says about a group of professionals that are using basically free services seem kind of silly?????

​Do professional photographers really use "free" web services?????

She's pandering to her biggest audience, amateurs who feel they're at or above the level of most professionals. She's been tasked with reversing Flickr's rapidly fleeting membership and has calculated that all the "pro's" in the world cannot bring the needed numbers so she's now courting the unwashed masses (you so seldom get to use the phrase - unwashed masses, these days) and throwing her audience of pro's under the bus. The sad thing is now with the 1 TB of free disk space, she may not need pro's any longer as she cuts into the SmugMug, Zenfolio, Photoshelter and other's market share. For those of us who use these hosting sites, it will be a good thing since any attempt to fight Yahoo will have to include lower hosting fees.

I think it all depends on what you would define as "professional". This is a free web service and as far as i know, Corey is a pro. There have also been other "pros" on this site. You may be surprised at how many pros do use free webservices, Facebook being another one

Professional is someone that makes money from their service/product. I'm equally amused at companies that use Yahoo's email because it's free...

Yahoo initially started as an attractant to teenagers because it was free...

If you're reliant on free distribution systems to earn your living... then you probably shouldn't complain when the "free" has a cost...

Certainly, the woman is buying media coverage by sounding controversial... Her function is to squeeze some form of revenue and profit from the companies she controls... If you don't like shopping at Walmart, go somewhere else...

FredKingston said:

Professional is someone that makes money from their service/product. I'm equally amused at companies that use Yahoo's email because it's free...

Yahoo initially started as an attractant to teenagers because it was free...

If you're reliant on free distribution systems to earn your living... then you probably shouldn't complain when the "free" has a cost...

Certainly, the woman is buying media coverage by sounding controversial... Her function is to squeeze some form of revenue and profit from the companies she controls... If you don't like shopping at Walmart, go somewhere else...

Click to expand...

Oddly enough, those are all good points, Fred.

"The most revealing statement came from Ms. Meyer, “We want ALL of your images in full resolution.”

This cracks me up, I would never give any site full resolution,, heck I don't even like cloud storage sites, because when they go under,, you risk loosing your data.

Personally, I have my own web site,, that has unlimited storage, so,, I would prefer to store my photos up in my own controlled space.

Any photos posted in places like Facebook/flikr/here,, or other site,, is just a small reduced file.

I'm afraid all of this is a little more sinister than simply creating revenue by pandering to a different audience, especially if you look at all the genres and different publications and the trends of all these photo sites acquiring product markets. I think we're on the tipping point of a revolution in photography or at least certainly a redefining of a "professional photographer."

Why should a newspaper keep a photo staff when they can get free photos from the public for attribution. How many of you have heard your friends brag, " my photo was used by Channel 7!" . . . as if that validates that they're a good photographer. The trend for contests is "enter your photo and your prize is being published in the calendar." I'm predicting that the only photojournalists who will be considered "professional" will be the ones who are in a zone of danger, places where the average person with his iphone won't be found, and who has a sense of vision to capture emotional photos that will elicit a gasp from the viewer.

As for the rest of us, and I include wedding, lifestyle, portrait, etc., we'll be thrown in with the "amateurs" . . . that's why wedding photographers have been weeping and wailing for years UNLESS we change how we view this profession.

IMHO the "professional photographers" are going to be defined as those who are able to develop a body of work that accurately projects their vision. And that happens BEFORE the shutter is pressed. It's not going to be the ones who necessarily take 500 photos a day and hope to get a "body of work" out of it. It's going to be the ones who have a vision, and then create the photo.

The definition of a "professional" photographer is going to have less to do with whether you earn money, but more to do with signature works and style. Can your photos be recognized as yours because of a style you've developed?

Just sayin . . . that's the "writing on the wall" that I see.

There is far more to being a professional than making money. Any enterprising person can go out and make some money. Does it mean they are a pro? We all need to study the definition of "professional" and have a long think about it.

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I think Ms. Mayer would be better off speaking publicly on topics she actually knows something about.


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