Flickr To Abandon Early Adopters

An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet's Steve O'Hear opens old wounds for Flickr veterans. 'An email dropped into my in-box yesterday from Yahoo. Titled "Flickr: Update for Old Skool members", the message went on to explain that Yahoo was discontinuing the old email-based Flickr sign-in system and that from March the 15th, all users will be required to have a Yahoo ID to sign-in to Flickr. It was one of those déjà vu moments when I thought, hang on a minute, haven't we been here before?. And of course we have.' Yahoo tried to pull this stunt almost two years ago, after it first acquired Flickr. So why open up old wounds? Yahoo say it is to make the service easier to manage as they add new features, such as localization. Many users are calling this BS, saying it's all about Yahoo marketing its other properties to Flickr's user-base. Much of the criticism is being lead by a prominent user named Thomas Hawk who also happens to be CEO of Zooomr, a direct competitor to Flickr."

Comments

Zoomr?

[BandwidthHog]

I’ve been a fan of Mike Hawk’s photography for a while now, but man, Zoomr couldn’t really be a more blatant clone of Flickr if it tried.

Prominent user, eh?

[hpa]

Much of the criticism is being lead by a prominent user named Thomas Hawk who also happens to be CEO of Zooomr, a direct competitor to Flickr.

Am I the only one who finds it strange that the CEO of a direct competitor would be a prominent user of Flickr?

It's a drag.

[Kadin2048]

One of my biggest problems with Flickr is that it requires a Yahoo ID.

It's just obnoxious; it makes signing up for it into a much bigger deal, than making a one-shot account (like on Slashdot, or any other discrete service). It just makes it feel like more of a commitment.

I can't tell you how many times I've had people ask me how they can comment on my Flickr photos, and I have to tell them that they need a Flickr name, and they look into it, until they realize it's going to mean getting a Yahoo ID, and that's a big turn off. (My entire family falls into this category; none of them want to get a Yahoo ID. Probably because they're confusing it with Yahoo Mail, but it doesn't matter. The point is people don't want one.)

I always wished that I had got on to Flickr before the instituted the Yahoo ID requirement, because I can never remember what my idiotic Yahoo ID is (it's not the same as my Flickr username), and thus I really only ever use Flickr from computers that have it saved/cookied.

Basically: Yahoo ID's are a drag. I don't want to "build a relationship" with Yahoo. I don't want any of their other crummy services. I just want Flickr, and so do a lot of other people. They've shot themselves in the foot with this requirement -- as I said, I personally know quite a few people who've decided not to touch Flickr because of the mandatory Yahoo ID -- and now they're going to make the hole a little bigger.

Awe-inspiring

[aftk2]

The gnashing of teeth over these decisions is simply awe-inspiring. Basically, the points of contention boil down to:
1. Flickr wants you to signin with a yahoo account.
2. Flickr will limit you to 3000 contacts.
3. Flickr will limit the number of tags on your photos to 75.

That's it. In response:
1. Jesus. Just get a Yahoo ID. Can't find your precious flickr ID on Yahoo (since Yahoo has a mizillion members)? Just take your ID and add "flickr" at the end. It'll probably be available. You can still get email updates at whatever email address you like, and this change doesn't change anything about your nickname on the site! This is LITERALLY a change to the login process, and ONLY the login process.

2. I suspect this measure is probably the first move in Flickr announcing some other social networking features (Friends or some such, some other data type), that will allow you to do much the same thing you do with contacts, allowing contacts to be, you know, PEOPLE YOU FUCKING CONTACT!

3. This move is great. Using the Flickr API can get downright stupid when you attempt to browse a tag and the same damn pictures come up, because some unattractive lady has tagged her picture with a million different keywords. Stop tagspam.

Seriously...what a pathetic display of whining (the vast majority) and opportunism (Mr. Hawk)