Despite all the other image sharing sites that have launched since I originally joined Flickr, I still love it. And having been a Pro paid member for around 5 years, and uploading thousands of photos which have recorded a frankly astounding 20,000+ views, it’s an embedded part of my life.

When I’m stressed or in need of inspiration, I always surfed the ‘Most Interesting’ photos, which has since been replaced by the Recent Photos page. It’s great to see amazing photography of all types being surfaced by other users…

But it’s such a shame that you can’t filter that page for Creative Commons images only.

There’s a work around using Advanced Search to stipulate Creative Commons images, taken after a certain time, and then ordering the results by ‘Interesting’, but it’s a pain to do that each day.

And I know that Flickr has partnered with Getty Images, which brings in revenue which Creative Commons images don’t.

But it’d be a great way to surface more amazing photos which could be shared and publicised to highlight Flickr’s amazingly talented users in a way which the likes of Instagram etc would never do.

It means I can more easily find a picture of a rock wearing sunglasses and share it:

 

Creative Commons is good for everyone:

I’m a huge fan of CC images. They enable me to share amazing images on this blog, which doesn’t make any money and doesn’t cover the cost of images.

They also tend to be more interesting than stock images, even when you’ve got a paid-up account.

And they can lead to publicity and payment for the photographers involved where the work/need is set to require it.

Any of my public uploads is always shared under a CC license for non-commercial use, and it’s meant that a quick phone image like this one:

Has ended up illustrating two blog articles around the web and  received around 1000 views.

Compared to the great photos my father used to take which are currently in a box in his loft, that’s pretty amazing to me.