SmugMug acquires image and video hosting website Flickr

Photo-sharing and storage company, SmugMug has acquired Flickr from Verizon’s digital media subsidiary, Oath. SmugMug CEO, Don MacAskill, said in an interview that he plans to revitalize Flickr by teaming up with the company. After Flickr was sold to Yahoo a year later it was founded, Verizon brought it together with AOL and created a new subsidiary, Oath. Now, Oath has been selling off some of its AOL and Yahoo properties over the past couple of months.

SmugMug said that it will operate Flickr as a separate site and won’t merge any user accounts or photos. In addition to that, it is planning to provide the focus and resources it deserves to Flickr. Though the Flickr photos will move to SmugMug’s technology infrastructure, the photos will still remain on Flickr. “Flickr is an amazing community, full of some of the world’s most passionate photographers. It’s a fantastic product and a beloved brand, supplying tens of billions of photos to hundreds of millions of people around the world. Flickr has survived through thick-and-thin and is core to the entire fabric of the Internet”, said MacAskill. The deal closed this week, but the terms of the deal are not disclosed.

Flickr’s acquisition has finally ended its long and painful chapter. It won’t be turned into the next Instagram or Snapchat, but it would surely let the community of photographers to explore specialties like architecture, birds or amorous insects.