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Due to a family matter I am out of the office for a while. However, my colleague and friend Adele McAlear of 99directions has kindly agreed to be my guest blogger for B(abble)log in my absence. So, without further ado, here is Adele...

Yesterday, Yahoo!-owned Flickr took the plunge into video. Now before you think that they plan to go head-to-head with Google-owned YouTube, there are some key differences that say it’s not likely.

Firstly, Flickr Video is only available to Pro users who already pay $25 per year for the photo service. But more importantly videos are limited to 90 seconds with a maximum file size of 150MB. Those criteria will eliminate many people more inclined to use YouTube’s free service to post longer clips.

So what is Flickr trying to do here? They’re recognizing that many people take quick videos with their digital cameras and camera phones and they are offering a way for users to easily upload and integrate them with their photos. By calling videos “long photos” and limiting the length to 90 seconds, Flickr is trying something new, differentiating themselves from the onslaught of video services that are springing up lately. And they are also appealing to their Pro members, already heavy users of the photo service, to try something new at no extra cost. (Flickr also doubled the size of photo files to 20 MB.)

At events I will often take short video clips at the same time as stills and I love the idea of integrating all of these images in one spot. As for functionality, it is much the same for videos as for photos; you can apply tags, geotags and descriptions to your clips to make them more searchable. You have the same privacy options that you use for photos, allowing you to make your clips public or private and you can apply Creative Commons licensing attributes. Last December, Pro users were given access to stats on visitors, views, favourites and comments on each item in their Flickr account, and now those analytics include videos.
 
Flickr Video has some different functionality from photo management as well. One great feature is the ability to play the video from the thumbnail so that you don’t have to navigate away from your search results. And of course, you can embed publicly shared videos elsewhere on the web or link them to your blog. The player is clean and streamlined and I found that the file loaded quickly and played back without buffering or lag issues.

It will be interesting to watch how Flickr Video evolves over the next 12 months with the release of their API allowing developers to build tools to integrate other applications and services. Also, to see whether Flickr succeeds in finding traction with their Pro users growing their paid service as a result.

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