Paul Jacobson

The vivacious Victoire has posed a question on her blog.  Should she upgrade her free Flickr account to Pro or stay free?

i was uploading new photos last night, when i suddenly noticed my photo sets disappearing to my dismay! one minute they're there, the next, they're gone... along with all the photos that were in the sets. naturally i suspected foul play, and that my photos had been deleted somehow. nope, apparently that's not the case at all. since i only have a free account, and i had reached the 200 photo mark, my older photos were hidden on purpose by flickr. unless you have a pro account you can only view 200 of your photos. so either you delete some photos or you upgrade to the pro account. i tested this theory by deleting some photos, and voila! one of my sets came back, along with 5 photos.

In my mind there is no real choice.  Unless you post a couple photos a month and have no need for more than 3 photosets, it makes sense to upgrade to a Pro account for $24.95 per year.  There are other benefits to having a Pro account.  Take a look at this list from the Flickr FAQ:

Can I pay to keep more of my photos on Flickr?

Absolutely! Upgrade to a Pro Account for just US$24.95 a year. Here's what you'll get with a Pro Account:

• 2 GB monthly upload limit


• Unlimited storage



• Unlimited bandwidth


• Unlimited photosets


• Permanent archiving of high-resolution original images


• The ability to replace a photo


• Ad-free browsing and sharing

Compare that to what you get with a Free Account:

• 20 MB monthly upload limit



• 3 photosets



• Photostream views limited to the 200 most recent images



• Storage of smaller (resized) images