Caterina Fake, founder of Flickr

^Sarah Romero: What was the main reason to develop Flickr? Why create Flickr? Caterina Fake: We actually started the company to build a massively multiplayer game, Game Neverending. When back end development was 6 months behind front end development we did a lot of side projects. One of these was Flickr! We tried to build both of them in parallel, but we were a very small company, and only 6 people at the time. So at some point we needed to stop work on the game.

S.R.: The name Flickr has some special meaning for you? What means Flickr? C.F: We wanted a name that meant light and motion. I'm glad we didn't pick a name with "Foto" or "Photo" in the name -- there are so many photo sites out there with names like that. We also wanted to have room to grow and evolve.

S.R.: How many people developed the original software and how many are working nowadays? Was hard (in money terms) to turn up the idea? C.F.: We started out with 4 people in Vancouver -- one of the developers works in New York and still does to this day. There weren't any investors when we started the company in 2002 -- it was after the tech crash, and no one was investing at that time. It was good though because I think that constraints are necessary for creativity.

S.R: Flickr is one of the "social web"´s tools. Other software like Myspace or Youtube belong also to this Hall of Fame of the Internet, but many others have failed along the way. A common point between Flickr, MySpace and Youtube is that the user has the control and the ability to interact. Is this a key point of the web 2.0? C.F.: So much of what is important on these sites is their sociality, making it easier to connect to other people. Communities have to be carefully built and tended, and it is important the sites create real societies online.

S.R.: In your opinion, what is the key of Flickr´s success? C.F.: It is hard to say what single thing it was, when it was probably hundreds of different things. But one thing that helped it spread was that most of the photos were public. This was a new idea for a photo sharing site -- previously photo sharing sites were all private. This came out of blogging.

S.R.: In another interview months ago you were talking about the "Culture of Generosity" as a real key in the internet. Can you explain to us this idea? C.F.: The internet has always been about people putting up recipes, pictures of their cats, essays they've written -- all kinds of great information that they contribute to the world for no other reason than their generosity, and desire to connect with other people. I think that this was obscured during the dot com period of the internet, and that what we're seeing in the so-called Web 2.0 is a return to the roots of the web.

S.R.: How many photos are stored in Flickr at the moment and which is the daily/weekly growth rate? C.F.: This info is not public...

S.R.: (Time's magazine april 2006 information: "About 130 million photos have been posted by some 3 million registered users in Flickr so far").

S.R.: Can you tell us what new features will Flickr´s users enjoy in the near future? Will geotags (available now in proaccounts) be available in the basic service? C.F.: This also is not public.

S.R.: Will we have Flickr in another languages soon? C.F.: We are working on some, yes, but unfortunately for Spain, Asian languages will likely come first.

S.R.: The International Academy of Arts and Sciences gave last May the Webby Awards, the oscars of the internet and Flickr won two awards. What meant this for you? C.F.: It is always an honor to win awards.

S.R.: To end this interview I´d like to expose a thought. Flickr is the best example of a well-thought product that after it reaches worldwide popularity is then bought big a big company. But Flickr isn't the only one in this category. In a relatively short time we have seen many other acquisitions: Ebay buying Skype, del.icio.us - Myspace, Truveo - AOL... etc. Do you think this will be a common trend in the future? Do you think small companies will be able to survive or reach success only if they are backed - and bought- by a big name behind them?

C.F.: It is hard to say. I think there will always be companies that start out small and grow bigger and bigger rather than be acquired. It is only a matter of time before we see the next one.