Flickr is 20 Years Old
Happy Birthday, Flickr
Joining Flickr in 2005, when the photo-sharing site was just a year old, had a profound influence on my photography and my life.
On my Flickr ‘About’ page, after spending several years there, I wrote:
I’ve been here a long time. For the first few years, Flickr was like a second university in later life to me. And not so very different from that first university experience so long ago. Plenty people around at the same time I started dropped out, as happened then.
People who seemed good to be around proved less so over time, as happened then. Interesting souls you hardly notice in the beginning suddenly grab your attention.
There have been complaints about the dean and protests against the administrators, some of which I’ve supported. Some people transferred to a smaller, ostensibly more liberal college. Most of us remained.
And so we enrol, semester by semester, learning from one another, dropping by one another’s campus rooms, leaving notes, sometimes engaging in conversations or banter, making friends for life.
And life goes on. I see those friends I’ve made getting married, having children, several becoming very successful professional photographers.
For me, Flickr is still the best…
