Yeah! It's been long time coming/closing but Caterina just wrote it in FlickrBlog:
Yahoo actually does acquire Flickr
Holy smokes, SOMEBODY out there is bad at keeping secrets!! Yes! We can finally confirm that Yahoo has made a definitive agreement to acquire Flickr and us, Ludicorp. Smack the tattlers and pop the champagne corks!
Actually, I can tell you that it was more a few SOMEBODIES being bad at keeping secrets - on both sides, but I guess that it does not matter anymore, does it ?
Realtime reactions from Flickr users are on FlickrCentral. It is fair to say that everybody knew it was coming since Caterina and Stewart did not deny the rumors a month ago. Though you have to admit that putting up this logo (for just a few hours), displaying all potential acquirers of the co, was very witty.
Another hint was that our favorite Yahoo bloggers, Russell Beattie and Jemery Zawodny, did not post anything - at all - on the topic.
Congratulations to Caterina and Stewart, and their team, you have set an example of "by the book" execution for an one year old Internet startup. Chapeau bas... (Hats off in English).
I wanted to congratulate Stewart when I saw him at ETech, but I took his threat (of kicking the ass of the next person who mentions "Yahoo", "Flickr" and "acquisition" in the same sentence) seriously :-).
Next question that we at Buzznet, and the rest of the industry, are really going to want an answer on: how much ?
No "official" word from Yahoo yet, though Jeremy has just blogged about the acquisition, and tells about the upcoming Flickr-ization of Yahoo:
As Caterina wrote, this isn't about just throwing millions of users at Flickr or bolting Flickr onto Yahoo! Photos. Think more deeply about it. There are many parts of Yahoo that will be Flickrized in the coming months. And with more resources available, Flickr itself will be able to grow like never before.
Personally, I can't wait. I've been really excited by the potential here for a while now. And I don't mean the sort of "excited" people say when they're expected to say it. If only you could ask the people around here that I've been taking to in recent weeks.
It's such a relief to be able to talk openly about this. There's obviously more good stuff in the works. For starters, just think about how we could Flickrize Yahoo! 360 (and it's not even out yet!). Oh, and I can finally stop pretending I don't know what my friends are talking about when they ask if there's something going on between the two companies!
And yes, to respond to questions I got via email: Act 2 was Bloglines/AskJeeves, and Act 1 was LiveJournal/Six Apart.
Update: Jerry Yang officially announced the deal during his session with Esthr, a Flickr investr, at PCForum (via Dan Farber/ZDNet). Great everybody involved can buy some vowels now.
Thanks Jeff - now read this ... but don't get too comfy ;)
Posted by: Stewart Butterfield | March 20, 2005 at 01:18 PM
No prob Dude, I am the paranoid type. But yes, we are cheering, at least a bit :-).
Posted by: Jeff Clavier | March 20, 2005 at 02:08 PM