5 ms·

The Flickr API is a national treasure

66 points by davewiner 14y ago

newishuser 14y ago
This seems clearly more as a tongue in cheek way of telling Yahoo! how important the flickr API is than a genuine petition of the US Government.
zaidf 14y ago
Declaring property belonging to someone else as a national treasure is a highly contentious issue that is often litigated. It is an odd model to follow when I think the author really just wants to convince Yahoo! to tread very carefully with a product feature. The problem with his post is that it doesn't even attempt to point out what's in it for Yahoo!, the owners of Flickr. You can hold the position that there doesn't need to be anything in it for Yahoo! to declare this a "national treasure", but then you are fundamentally for redefining the internet and putting in a control body to dictate API versioning just like we have a local control body to dictate what is considered historic. May be I am taking this analogy too far but that is my point: analogies without explicitly stated boundaries are almost meaningless in communicating your position.
- cube13 14y ago
  Usually, it's done well after the creator(s) are dead, and with the blessing of their estate. I just don't see that happening with software.
- tobyjsullivan 14y ago
  They do specify Yahoo's benefit on the actual petition: "It's a win-win. We get to keep building and Yahoo can say they're the first tech company to have one of its creations declared as an official national treasure."
apineda 14y ago
Let's get the government to force a private company to do something that is potentially extremely expensive and perhaps not even possible because well, because the API might break 'apps'. You're argument is terrible.
- rbn 14y ago
  I though it was a joke.. Was it a joke?? I mean really.. Whitehouse petition for an API.
  - sp332 14y ago
    It's not exactly a joke, there is a real petition https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/declare-flickr-api-national-historic-landmark-requiring-it-be-maintained-yahoo-open-resource/9gR8kML5 https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/declare-flickr-api... but I think it's more to cause a PR problem for Yahoo than to actually have the government step in.
    - davewiner 14y ago
      It's not even slightly a joke.
cjreyes 14y ago
The government should spend its resources on building a death star
PaulHoule 14y ago
I can do a hell of a lot more parsing the HTML...
- brokenparser 14y ago
  Until an invalid token ruins my day.
biot 14y ago
Their product is a national treasure that you enjoy the benefits of at no cost. Want to show them how much you value it? You could always start a petition to give Yahoo actual treasure in the form of API access fees, similar to Google's Adwords API.
- davewiner 14y ago
  Actually Flickr is not free if you use it more than a few pics a month, which I do. I've been paying for Flickr Pro since 2006. Here's the doc that explains the difference between the free version and the for-pay version. http://www.flickr.com/help/limits http://www.flickr.com/help/limits
  - biot 14y ago
    How does Flickr free vs. Pro relate to API continuity guarantees? Flickr could turn off all API access and you would lose none of the advertised benefits of Flickr Pro that you pay for. If you want guarantees around the API, my initial suggestion of offering to pay Flickr for such an SLA still applies.
  - eloisius 14y ago
    What kind of message would that be sending to future service providers? "Don't give people access to your data for free, because if they like it too much they'll come back with guns and demand it forever." What if Apple eventually discontinues touch devices and iOS. Should iOS developers have a right to demand iPhones be made a national treasure so that game developers can still use the platform? Sorry you invested so much into Flickr's API, but you had every chance to decide for yourself whether you should build on their platform.
jspthrowaway2 14y ago
> If we didn't do this, the city where I live, New York, would have a freeway running down the middle of it. And it wouldn't take six days to get from one end of Manhattan to the other. (Edit: That was a joke, if the downvotes are originating from this sentence.) If we're talking about LOMEX here, I don't think historical markings had anything to do with it being shot down. Residents of a couple neighborhoods in Manhattan were annoyed that half their neighborhood would be demolished to build it, as I understand.
- ojbyrne 14y ago
  I believe he was referring to petitions.
  - jspthrowaway2 14y ago
    Oh, yeah, that makes more sense. I guess that interpretation is more likely than the one I walked away with. Thanks for replying instead of downvoting.
- tobyjsullivan 14y ago
  Since when do we down-vote instead of discuss? Save that button for spam, like it was intended...
salman89 14y ago
I'm always wary of an API that I don't pay for, less likely of a financial motivator for an API provider to maintain status quo.
trotsky 14y ago
In the alternate universe where something like this could happen, wouldn't it just result in companies being more reluctant to publish an API in the first place?
jval 14y ago
I don't necessarily agree with the idea of declaring something a national treasure but the problem of companies screwing around with APIs is a big one, and it is probably better solved by having developers group together in some way to get better bargaining power against companies who do it. The whole bait-and-switch method that a lot of large companies have employed in the past is unfair, and it usually involves companies enticing developers to pour huge amounts of resources into building on their platform, only to pull the rug out from underneath them and clamp down on API terms or ban applications (see Twitter with API tokens, Facebook with Social Reader etc). It would probably be better if developers got together and threatened to pull all their apps off an ecosystem unless companies negotiated in good faith, even if only a small subset of developers stood to get screwed over. It's a principle which works quite well for unions aside from when they take it too far. Hopefully it wouldn't skew the balance too far either way, but it would definitely make negotiations bilateral instead of unilateral and result in a much fairer deal for developers.
zaidf 14y ago
How about an independent non-profit organization that monitors and assigns grades to various characteristics of a company's API? Developers could consider that as a strong signal when deciding to commit to an API. One of the problems is that it is very difficult to anticipate the kinds of issues an API relationship would cause until it is already too late. This could help with that. Basically a BBB for APIs but ideally non-profit. The challenge would be in maintaining objectivity and conflict of interests.
mthoms 14y ago
Will someone please remind Mr Winer that the Flickr API was conceived and created (along with Flickr itself) in Canada. While you're at it, you might as well declare Celine Dion a US National Treasure (actually I'm serious... you can take her... please?)
- davewiner 14y ago
  Thanks for the reminder. It has been pointed out elsewhere. However Flickr was sold to an American company. But I'm in favor of it being a Canadian and an American treasure. Hell, make it a Lithuanian treasure. Everyone should love Flickr, but please don't break our apps. Thanks again.
greggman 14y ago
I wonder if they'll fix the API so copyright protection is not "on your honor". As it is now you ask the API for a list of images and it gives them all to you. It's then up to you to check each image and make sure it's legal to download. It seems to me they should just return the list of ones that are legal or at least have the option to filter the list rather than have to do it manually. It's worse than that though. You can't use Flickr to share your images with friends and family unless you mark the images as CC. Anything else and an app is not allowed to download them My app was banned by Flickr even though that's the use case I wrote the app for. http://google.com/?q=flickrdown http://google.com/?q=flickrdown
- sp332 14y ago
  It seems to me they should just return the list of ones that are legal or at least have the option to filter the list rather than have to do it manually. How would Flickr know?
  - wmf 14y ago
    Flickr already has licensing metadata specified by users when they upload their photos.
    - sp332 14y ago
      Right, but how does Flickr know if you're covered by the license?
      - greggman 14y ago
        Flickr's current rule is if it's marked as copyrighted it's not to be downloaded unless it's your image. They know who you are which is how they let you add, delete images through the API. Otherwise, they arguably need to add more permissions. They know who you've marked as friends and who you've marked as family. Facebook and G+ have no problem restricting access to images based far more complicated criteria.
eloisius 14y ago
Yeah, nationalization always goes well. I'm curious though, would Yahoo! be expected to host and maintain the API at their cost according to the specifications set forth by a regulatory body, or will they just be mugged and have their property transferred to a trust owned by the government?
deelowe 14y ago
It's always a good thing when the government gets involved. Let's do more of that!
chimeracoder 14y ago
While I appreciate the sentiment, some of the supporting facts are dead wrong. > If we didn't do this, the city where I live, New York, would have a freeway running down the middle of it. That's not really the reason that Robert Moses's LOMEX project failed. > There would be no Central Park. Again, 'national landmarks' are not the reason Central Park was created, nor are they the reason it still exists > The East Village would only have NYU dorms. That's kind of the way Greenwich Village is heading as it is. National landmarks haven't stopped NYU from taking over the neighborhood.
gnu8 14y ago
This is ridiculous. A corporation's product cannot be a national treasure.

66 points by davewiner 14y ago

This seems clearly more as a tongue in cheek way of telling Yahoo! how important the flickr API is than a genuine petition of the US Government.

zaidf 14y ago

Declaring property belonging to someone else as a national treasure is a highly contentious issue that is often litigated. It is an odd model to follow when I think the author really just wants to convince Yahoo! to tread very carefully with a product feature. The problem with his post is that it doesn't even attempt to point out what's in it for Yahoo!, the owners of Flickr. You can hold the position that there doesn't need to be anything in it for Yahoo! to declare this a "national treasure", but then you are fundamentally for redefining the internet and putting in a control body to dictate API versioning just like we have a local control body to dictate what is considered historic. May be I am taking this analogy too far but that is my point: analogies without explicitly stated boundaries are almost meaningless in communicating your position.

cube13 14y ago
Usually, it's done well after the creator(s) are dead, and with the blessing of their estate. I just don't see that happening with software.
tobyjsullivan 14y ago
They do specify Yahoo's benefit on the actual petition: "It's a win-win. We get to keep building and Yahoo can say they're the first tech company to have one of its creations declared as an official national treasure."

apineda 14y ago

Let's get the government to force a private company to do something that is potentially extremely expensive and perhaps not even possible because well, because the API might break 'apps'. You're argument is terrible.

rbn 14y ago
I though it was a joke.. Was it a joke?? I mean really.. Whitehouse petition for an API.
- sp332 14y ago
  It's not exactly a joke, there is a real petition https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/declare-flickr-api-national-historic-landmark-requiring-it-be-maintained-yahoo-open-resource/9gR8kML5 https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/declare-flickr-api... but I think it's more to cause a PR problem for Yahoo than to actually have the government step in.
  - davewiner 14y ago
    It's not even slightly a joke.

cjreyes 14y ago

The government should spend its resources on building a death star

PaulHoule 14y ago

I can do a hell of a lot more parsing the HTML...

brokenparser 14y ago
Until an invalid token ruins my day.

biot 14y ago

Their product is a national treasure that you enjoy the benefits of at no cost. Want to show them how much you value it? You could always start a petition to give Yahoo actual treasure in the form of API access fees, similar to Google's Adwords API.

davewiner 14y ago
Actually Flickr is not free if you use it more than a few pics a month, which I do. I've been paying for Flickr Pro since 2006. Here's the doc that explains the difference between the free version and the for-pay version. http://www.flickr.com/help/limits http://www.flickr.com/help/limits
- biot 14y ago
  How does Flickr free vs. Pro relate to API continuity guarantees? Flickr could turn off all API access and you would lose none of the advertised benefits of Flickr Pro that you pay for. If you want guarantees around the API, my initial suggestion of offering to pay Flickr for such an SLA still applies.
- eloisius 14y ago
  What kind of message would that be sending to future service providers? "Don't give people access to your data for free, because if they like it too much they'll come back with guns and demand it forever." What if Apple eventually discontinues touch devices and iOS. Should iOS developers have a right to demand iPhones be made a national treasure so that game developers can still use the platform? Sorry you invested so much into Flickr's API, but you had every chance to decide for yourself whether you should build on their platform.

jspthrowaway2 14y ago

> If we didn't do this, the city where I live, New York, would have a freeway running down the middle of it. And it wouldn't take six days to get from one end of Manhattan to the other. (Edit: That was a joke, if the downvotes are originating from this sentence.) If we're talking about LOMEX here, I don't think historical markings had anything to do with it being shot down. Residents of a couple neighborhoods in Manhattan were annoyed that half their neighborhood would be demolished to build it, as I understand.

ojbyrne 14y ago
I believe he was referring to petitions.
- jspthrowaway2 14y ago
  Oh, yeah, that makes more sense. I guess that interpretation is more likely than the one I walked away with. Thanks for replying instead of downvoting.
tobyjsullivan 14y ago
Since when do we down-vote instead of discuss? Save that button for spam, like it was intended...

salman89 14y ago

I'm always wary of an API that I don't pay for, less likely of a financial motivator for an API provider to maintain status quo.

trotsky 14y ago

In the alternate universe where something like this could happen, wouldn't it just result in companies being more reluctant to publish an API in the first place?

jval 14y ago

I don't necessarily agree with the idea of declaring something a national treasure but the problem of companies screwing around with APIs is a big one, and it is probably better solved by having developers group together in some way to get better bargaining power against companies who do it. The whole bait-and-switch method that a lot of large companies have employed in the past is unfair, and it usually involves companies enticing developers to pour huge amounts of resources into building on their platform, only to pull the rug out from underneath them and clamp down on API terms or ban applications (see Twitter with API tokens, Facebook with Social Reader etc). It would probably be better if developers got together and threatened to pull all their apps off an ecosystem unless companies negotiated in good faith, even if only a small subset of developers stood to get screwed over. It's a principle which works quite well for unions aside from when they take it too far. Hopefully it wouldn't skew the balance too far either way, but it would definitely make negotiations bilateral instead of unilateral and result in a much fairer deal for developers.

zaidf 14y ago

How about an independent non-profit organization that monitors and assigns grades to various characteristics of a company's API? Developers could consider that as a strong signal when deciding to commit to an API. One of the problems is that it is very difficult to anticipate the kinds of issues an API relationship would cause until it is already too late. This could help with that. Basically a BBB for APIs but ideally non-profit. The challenge would be in maintaining objectivity and conflict of interests.

mthoms 14y ago

Will someone please remind Mr Winer that the Flickr API was conceived and created (along with Flickr itself) in Canada. While you're at it, you might as well declare Celine Dion a US National Treasure (actually I'm serious... you can take her... please?)

davewiner 14y ago
Thanks for the reminder. It has been pointed out elsewhere. However Flickr was sold to an American company. But I'm in favor of it being a Canadian and an American treasure. Hell, make it a Lithuanian treasure. Everyone should love Flickr, but please don't break our apps. Thanks again.

greggman 14y ago

I wonder if they'll fix the API so copyright protection is not "on your honor". As it is now you ask the API for a list of images and it gives them all to you. It's then up to you to check each image and make sure it's legal to download. It seems to me they should just return the list of ones that are legal or at least have the option to filter the list rather than have to do it manually. It's worse than that though. You can't use Flickr to share your images with friends and family unless you mark the images as CC. Anything else and an app is not allowed to download them My app was banned by Flickr even though that's the use case I wrote the app for. http://google.com/?q=flickrdown http://google.com/?q=flickrdown

sp332 14y ago
It seems to me they should just return the list of ones that are legal or at least have the option to filter the list rather than have to do it manually. How would Flickr know?
- wmf 14y ago
  Flickr already has licensing metadata specified by users when they upload their photos.
  - sp332 14y ago
    Right, but how does Flickr know if you're covered by the license?
    - greggman 14y ago
      Flickr's current rule is if it's marked as copyrighted it's not to be downloaded unless it's your image. They know who you are which is how they let you add, delete images through the API. Otherwise, they arguably need to add more permissions. They know who you've marked as friends and who you've marked as family. Facebook and G+ have no problem restricting access to images based far more complicated criteria.

eloisius 14y ago

Yeah, nationalization always goes well. I'm curious though, would Yahoo! be expected to host and maintain the API at their cost according to the specifications set forth by a regulatory body, or will they just be mugged and have their property transferred to a trust owned by the government?

deelowe 14y ago

It's always a good thing when the government gets involved. Let's do more of that!

chimeracoder 14y ago

While I appreciate the sentiment, some of the supporting facts are dead wrong. > If we didn't do this, the city where I live, New York, would have a freeway running down the middle of it. That's not really the reason that Robert Moses's LOMEX project failed. > There would be no Central Park. Again, 'national landmarks' are not the reason Central Park was created, nor are they the reason it still exists > The East Village would only have NYU dorms. That's kind of the way Greenwich Village is heading as it is. National landmarks haven't stopped NYU from taking over the neighborhood.

gnu8 14y ago

This is ridiculous. A corporation's product cannot be a national treasure.