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(See update below...!) Speaking of Flickr, I'm pretty annoyed with them right now. I have a paid Flickr account (and a paid SmugMug account - I was experimenti

(See update below...!) Speaking of Flickr, I'm pretty annoyed with them right now. I have a paid Flickr account (and a paid SmugMug account - I was experimenting with both). I was recently looking over the shoulder of a friend who was viewing my photos. After clicking the right arrow a few times, Flickr displayed an interstitial ad! On a gallery I paid for! I tried it myself in an incognito window, and sure enough, same thing. They don't show me ads when I'm logged in, but when anyone else views my photos, Flickr inserts random ads. Some of which are rather questionable - one was bordering on an upskirt shot. This is very much not OK. Sure, put all the ads you want on a free account. But on a paid account? Needless to say, I'm canceling my Flickr account and moving everything to SmugMug. I'm pretty sure they don't do this - or at least I hope they don't! Update: Well, this is interesting timing. Five minutes after writing this, I got an email from Flickr saying that my "Flickr ad-free account" is now a Flickr Pro account which includes "Ad-free browsing and sharing" (emphasis added). And I just checked from an incognito window - the ads do appear to be completely gone! So forget my complaint... :-)

delgaudm 11y ago
I thought Flickr premium accounts were so that YOU didn't see ads when logged in, not so people viewing your pics didn't see ads. Did they change that somewhere along the lines? IIUC I think anonymous / not logged in people will always see ads on your pics regardless of your account status.
- colordrops 11y ago
  Maybe that's the case, but if so it still doesn't make sense. Facebook puts ads on your content because it's a free service. If you are paying for Flickr, they really shouldn't be putting ads on your content, regardless of whether it's you or another user.
  - hsod 11y ago
    It makes perfect sense, you just don't like it.
    - Stratoscope 11y ago
      I bought and paid for something called an "Ad-Free Account". It doesn't make "perfect sense" to me that an "Ad-Free Account" would deliver ads to anyone. The name strongly suggested that the visitors to my gallery would be free from ads. That's exactly what I wanted and what I was happy to pay good money for. Sure, you could say it's my fault for not reading the fine print. But you have to admit that the very name of the account was highly misleading. I'm glad they changed it so now my visitors are free from ads as the original account name led me to believe. Still, it sucks that they used such a misleading name in the first place.
    - colordrops 11y ago
      By your logic a company should not consider anything but maximizing revenue for every single product decision. While some successful companies follow this strategy, like Comcast and 90s era Microsoft, it only frustrates and angers customers until they wish for your demise. It's also a very cynical way of looking at the world. It's possible to both profit and make the world a better place.
- Stratoscope 11y ago
  Good point, perhaps I just misunderstood the terms of the account. Also I thought I had a "Flickr Pro" account but apparently it was just an "Ad-free" account which is now being converted to Flickr Pro. So the whole thing may have been confusion on my part, but it sure caught me by surprise.
onethumb 11y ago
FWIW, you're correct, we (SmugMug), don't do this.
jscheel 11y ago
Flickr has just changed their policy on this. They are re-introducing pro accounts and will not show ads when anyone is viewing those accounts. Unfortunately, they also doubled the price of pro.

delgaudm 11y ago

I thought Flickr premium accounts were so that YOU didn't see ads when logged in, not so people viewing your pics didn't see ads. Did they change that somewhere along the lines? IIUC I think anonymous / not logged in people will always see ads on your pics regardless of your account status.

colordrops 11y ago
Maybe that's the case, but if so it still doesn't make sense. Facebook puts ads on your content because it's a free service. If you are paying for Flickr, they really shouldn't be putting ads on your content, regardless of whether it's you or another user.
- hsod 11y ago
  It makes perfect sense, you just don't like it.
  - Stratoscope 11y ago
    I bought and paid for something called an "Ad-Free Account". It doesn't make "perfect sense" to me that an "Ad-Free Account" would deliver ads to anyone. The name strongly suggested that the visitors to my gallery would be free from ads. That's exactly what I wanted and what I was happy to pay good money for. Sure, you could say it's my fault for not reading the fine print. But you have to admit that the very name of the account was highly misleading. I'm glad they changed it so now my visitors are free from ads as the original account name led me to believe. Still, it sucks that they used such a misleading name in the first place.
  - colordrops 11y ago
    By your logic a company should not consider anything but maximizing revenue for every single product decision. While some successful companies follow this strategy, like Comcast and 90s era Microsoft, it only frustrates and angers customers until they wish for your demise. It's also a very cynical way of looking at the world. It's possible to both profit and make the world a better place.
Stratoscope 11y ago
Good point, perhaps I just misunderstood the terms of the account. Also I thought I had a "Flickr Pro" account but apparently it was just an "Ad-free" account which is now being converted to Flickr Pro. So the whole thing may have been confusion on my part, but it sure caught me by surprise.

onethumb 11y ago

FWIW, you're correct, we (SmugMug), don't do this.

jscheel 11y ago

Flickr has just changed their policy on this. They are re-introducing pro accounts and will not show ads when anyone is viewing those accounts. Unfortunately, they also doubled the price of pro.