Everyone knows Flickr today, one of the largest sources of pictures where literally everone can upload their favorite pictures. But Flickr has some key features, which allows bloggers to get inspiration from it.

Photo by Chaparral [Kendra]

Flickr allows users to upload their picture under a Creative Commons license, which allows us (the bloggers) to use the picture in one or more of our blogs. I’ve done it several times and everytime I visit Flickr, the pictures give me tons of ideas for new articles.

Effective usage of the Creative Commons license

I mentioned the Creative Commons license before, it allows every in the world to use a specific picture, everywhere on the internet. At least, for as long as it satisfies the demands of the specific license. There are 6 variations available of the Creative Commons license, each with it’s own demands.

• Attribution License, allows you to do nearly anything with the picture, for as long as you link back to the owner. This is the license I use most of the time.
• Attribution-NoDerivs License, allows you to use and display all the picture, but you’re not allowed to modify it. A link back to the owner of the picture is also required.
• Attribution-NoCommercial-NoDervis License, is the same license as the above but the pictures may not be used for commercial purposes. You are required to link back to the owner.
• Attribution-NoCommercial License, is the same license as Attribution-NoCommercial-NoDervis License, but you are allowed to modify the pictures before using them.
• Attributions-NoCommercial-ShareAlike License, allows you to do anything with the pictures you want, except for using it for commercial purposes. You do have to place the pictures under the same license on your own website or weblog. And you are required to link back to the owner.
• Attributions-ShareAlike License, is identical to the Attributions-NoCommercial-ShareAlike License but you are allowed to use it for commercial purposes. You do need to link back to the owner.

These great licenses give us tons of possibilities to use the pictures for our own articles. You can use them to either cheer up your articles, like I do, or use them to extend your articles.

But how do you get inspired by those pictures?

When I don’t know anything to blog about, I start browsing through the pictures that are published in a Creative Commons license on Flickr. You shouldn’t do this to much since it could be a real time-consuming work, there are thousands of pictures ready to be found (and used) and every day people post hundreds of new pictures.

When I browse through the pages of Flickr, there are always several pictures that get my attention instantly. Like the one with the row of kids, which I used for my article about internet and discrimination. Once I saw the picture, I knew I had to write an article about the feeling the picture gave to me.

Like I said, Flickr can be a real time-consumer, but because of the benefits of the site, I enjoy every minute of surfing on Flickr!

Share this article
Enjoyed this article? Share it with your friends via one of the social networks available. You want to read more of our articles? Feel free to subscribe to the Webhypes RSS-feed.