Introducing Photostreams!

Today we are introducing one of several large changes that will move Flickr out of ‘preview mode’ and to version 1.0.

Photostreams are a new way of saving and sharing photos. Everything you upload into Flickr goes into your stream, and you can decide who is allowed to see what. Everyone has their own view on the streams, depending on their relationship to the people doing the uploading.

As in the past, images can be public or private. By default, public images are included in your stream — but you can also choose to exclude specific public photos if you’d like. And private photos, though they still can’t be saved into others’ shoeboxes or shared by others in FlickrLive, can show up in your photostream: you can restrict viewing of private photos according to your relationship type (or still keep them completely private and they won’t show up for anyone).

Photostreams show up in many places:

• flickr.com/photos
  A random sprinkle of the most recent uploads. Each photo links you to the stream of the person who uploaded the photo.

• flickr.com/photos/friends
  The most recently uploaded picture by up to 12 of your friends. Each photo links directly to that person’s photostream.

• flickr.com/photos/ yourname
  This is the ‘log view’ – all your photos in chronological order, archived by month, with links to edit and change the privacy settings. (By the way, if you haven’t set an alias yet, now is a good time.)

• flickr.com/photos/ yourfriendsname (example)
  This is the same log view, but of your friends photos (no edit links)!

• flickr.com/photos/ name / photoid (example)
  The surf view — our favorite! This view focuses on a single image in its chronological context and includes a set of other photos that were uploaded around the same time by friends of the uploader.

More explanation of all of this is coming soon, along with several more changes!