Flickr In Stock Photography?

A recent post on Dan Heller's (a talented and versatile professional photographer) blog has added his voice to the rumor that sites such as Flickr and Shutterfly may be considering entering the stock photography business. He asserts that the world of photography will surely get involved in user-generated content, and predicts that sooner or later, these sites will recognize the enormous potential of monetizing user-generated content, similar to what YouTube has done.

Here's a couple of Dan Heller's views:

"As I've been arguing since I got into the photography business, Truism #1 states that more people have photography as a hobby than as a profession. Therefore, the basic fundamental principles of economics make it inevitable that photo businesses will have to expand into a hybrid of consumer/pro-photo sharing/licensing models. Not doing so will be career suicide."

"It is inevitable that someone--whether it's Flickr or other photo-sharing sites--will eventually figure this out and engage in some form of business that monetizes user-generated photography."

I have so far not used Flickr despite its many advantges. The reason is that Flickr (or Yahoo, which is its parent company) requires that those who submit photographs etc agree to granting it worldwide royalty-free non-exclusive license to use these photographs...always a stumbling block for self-respecting photographers.

I expect if Heller's predictions are indeed realizable, that separate terms will have to cover the business monetization model of photo sharing. Notwithstanding, his post prompted me to visit Flickr and I must tell you that the quality of some of the photographs are just spectacular, whether travel or photojournalistic. Incredible quality...and I'm now considering joining, and to keep an eye of future developments.

Hellers' excellent article/post is here

To check out Flickr