Flickr is a great photo sharing site. Unfortunately, one of the problems it had in the past was that sharing private photos with non-Flickr friends, particularly those who are not very Internet-savvy, was a chore. Flickr Guest Passes solves this problem by providing a simple way to show private Flickr photos to all of your friends and family, without requiring any effort on their part.
Say you recently had a party, and took a few dozen snapshots. Not everyone wants photos of themselves in party mode posted for the entire Flickr universe to see, so you mark them as private. Unfortunately, you have now made it that much more difficult for your friends to see those snapshots. They must…
- Join Flickr.
- Become one of your contacts, explicitly denoted as “Friend”, “Family”, or both.
- Go back to the URL of the photo set, whose contents you have made available only to family and/or friends.
These three steps may sound simple, but they are not. Believe me. I’ve tried it. Few people actually looked at my photos.
A Flickr Guest Pass is a special URL that reveals private photos without requiring any action on the part of the visitor. Just click on the Flickr Guest Pass link, and look at photos. It’s that simple.
For those of you who may be concerned about security, Flickr Guest Passes can be set to expire after a certain amount of time. Anyone visiting your private gallery after the Guest Pass has expired will not be able to see your photos. Instead, they will receive a message explaining why the photos are no longer available.
Link via Daring Fireball.
