[paulh]

I took out a one-year Flickr Pro subscription in November 2018 for $US34.99. It renewed in November 2019 for $US49.99. I clicked the link on my Flickr page to "Lock in 2019 pricing" and it is asking $US111.90 for 2 years or $US57.50 for 1 year.

Any idea why it is more than the 2019 renewal price?

I just did the same thing and my costs (US$) are $48 for 1 year, $94.39 for two years. I'm in the US, if that makes any difference.

[i_trax]

I have 26.5k photos, well over 5 million hits, cost AU$ 144.32 for two years - not bad!

[stevebrot]

Does anyone have any answers?

I dunno. It is probably enough to share that despite common misconceptions, there are expenses associated with all commercial Web sites and there is little economy of scale. Does an account, even one with precious little activity or stored resources, cost money? The short answer is yes, in the same sense that small people require similar basic resources as larger people.

A small enterprise can get by with a handful of virtual servers in a shared hosting arrangement at a single location from a single hosting provider having limited backbone/routing redundancy or back-up power capabilities. Larger enterprises require multiple locations on most continents, thousands of physical servers in dedicate facilities having significant backup generating capacity, electric grid redundancy, and connections to multiple backbone providers. In such a system, data is replicated system-wide, and load is balanced across regional server farms. Every single user account contributes to the burden of that overhead, whether they generate revenue or not.


Steve

(...lives within a few hours drive of several Amazon server farms as well as a major Facebook node...the shared resource is proximity to a very rich power grid and excellent telecom infrastructure...)

[RGlasel]

Does an account, even one with precious little activity or stored resources, cost money? The short answer is yes, in the same sense that small people require similar basic resources as larger people.

The letter from SmugMug talks about moving Flickr to AWS, which makes it much easier to operate because load management, provisioning servers, etc is all handled by Amazon, but a low capital investment in infrastructure comes with a higher cost per unit of storage and bandwidth. AWS storage is relatively cheap, but bandwidth isn't and as you point out, even inactive accounts still cost something. Multiply that by 100 million (99 million of whom aren't giving SmugMug any money) and it's pretty obvious why the service is losing money. This isn't rocket science, so I suspect SmugMug management thought they could play the charity case card to shame free accounts into converting to Pro accounts and existing Pro accounts to meekly accept a price increase. That is a high risk gambit with a low probability of paying off. They can try a different move in the next round, but the jackpots get smaller after every losing round.

[Des]

I just did the same thing and my costs (US$) are $48 for 1 year, $94.39 for two years. I'm in the US, if that makes any difference.

That's about what I thought it would be Paul. The one-year subscription I was charged last year ($US49.99) was the same as for US members. I was wondering whether anyone else had been charged the same rates as Flickr wants to charge me (e.g. was it because I had so recently renewed my sub?).

[Rondec]

What are the costs? I know there are many things. So how about for a former pro account with 500 pictures where the user has died and had the account frozen? The photos get 1000 total views a year. Would deleting these accounts free up money. Alternatively would deleting these accounts lessen the value of the Flickr community. The former is mostly tangible but the latter is pretty intangible.
Does anyone have any answers? Without them it is all guess work. I suspect with all the complexities of such a huge site it is all barely refined guess work on making a successful monetized model.

My understanding is that Flickr is using Amazon servers. I think Amazon charges 60 dollars a year for Amazon Cloud Drive with unlimited storage. Smugmug probably got a better deal from them, but surely it costs something, plus whatever IT costs they have in making the community aspect of things work.

I sort of think of it as Instagram, but with better quality images and better sharing options to off site Forums.

[paulh]

That's about what I thought it would be Paul. The one-year subscription I was charged last year ($US49.99) was the same as for US members. I was wondering whether anyone else had been charged the same rates as Flickr wants to charge me (e.g. was it because I had so recently renewed my sub?).

I had just renewed my sub late last year as well, so I'm not sure that's a factor here. I would make inquiries to Flickr to find out what's going on.

[Des]

I had just renewed my sub late last year as well, so I'm not sure that's a factor here. I would make inquiries to Flickr to find out what's going on.

Thanks Paul, I did. This is their response:
"Domestic US pricing is tax exclusive (taxes are charged during checkout), while international pricing is VAT-inclusive. Some international buyers may pay in USD, but still pay the international, VAT-inclusive price.
After reviewing your account, it appears that you were grandfathered with our old payment processor, which was VAT-exclusive. Now that we are on a new payment processor, VAT will be included moving forward. Please note that that the future increased price will also include VAT."
I take the reference to VAT to include taxes imposed by other countries, such as our Goods and Services Tax (GST). But it still doesn't add up. Adding 10% GST to my one-year renewal last year of $US49.99 would be $US54.98, not the $US57.50 now offered, which is equivalent to $49.99 plus 15% tax. I don't know on what basis they apply 15% tax - do they think Australia is in the EU?

I don't really care about a couple of bucks extra, but I'm puzzled about their calculation, which will presumably affect future renewals too. The more so because other Australian members don't seem to have been charged on this basis. I have asked Flickr support to clarify. Will report back with any response.

[Paul the Sunman]

I take the reference to VAT to include taxes imposed by other countries, such as our Goods and Services Tax (GST). But it still doesn't add up. Adding 10% GST to my one-year renewal last year of $US49.99 would be $US54.98, not the $US57.50 now offered, which is equivalent to $49.99 plus 15% tax. I don't know on what basis they apply 15% tax - do they think Australia is in the EU?

I just did the 2yr update (from Australia). The receipt says:

Product SKU: ProV22Years
Product Name: 2 years
Qty Ordered: 1
Amount: 101.73 USD

Subtotal: 101.73 USD
Tax: 10.17 USD
Total: 111.90 USD
Discount: 27.98 USD

So it is the 10% GST.

[Fenwoodian]

My understanding is that Flickr is using Amazon servers. I think Amazon charges 60 dollars a year for Amazon Cloud Drive with unlimited storage. Smugmug probably got a better deal from them, but surely it costs something, plus whatever IT costs they have in making the community aspect of things work.

I sort of think of it as Instagram, but with better quality images and better sharing options to off site Forums.

Don't think of Flickr as a form of "cloud storage". I have cloud storage and I upload all of my important image files to it (JPG, TIFF, and RAWs of any size or dimensions). With Flickr, you can only upload JPG files with a maximum dimension of 6144 pixels long side.

You can upload movie files to Flickr too, including 4K, but it will not take files over 1GB (which is a very short 4K movie).

[Des]

So it is the 10% GST.

Thanks Paul. Now I feel singled out. ;-)

I asked Flickr support why they were taking 15% tax, when the GST is 10% and other Australian members have been charged 10% tax. After two attempts, this non-answer is the best I could get:
"The Pro subscription cost varies depending on the members location. Members who are registered in Australia, along with other members that fall under our International USD price, have been charged $59.88 for the 1 year plan (tax inclusive) prior to our price increase on Jan 21.
If other members were charged a lower amount, they likely used one of our expired discounts.
We would never charge someone an amount that's higher than our listed prices."

[D1N0]

Flickr has now informed me I have to either pay for two years in advance or be put on a montly subscription in November. A pity I can't sue.

[i_trax]

is getting more and more confusing.
FAQ for Pro Members on Braintree

[kernos]

I took the 2 year subscription in spite of having been a pro member for some time. I do wonder with all the confusion, chaos and pleading whether we'll need to find an alternative sooner instead of later.

[iheiramo]

Personally I think Flickr is overprising their service and therefore don't get enough paying customers. Pro version is just too expensive for what it gives for me, as most of my shots are on free site. Only my single in challenge shots are in Flickr to allow commenting on the shots. If they want more paying customers they need to weaken free membership and create cheaper option between free and pro or lower pro subscription prices. I willing to pay 10€ a year and might yield to 20€ to keep at least current service level, but without adds, in case they weaken free account.