Flickr Video Beta Coming Soon

The news about Flickr video has slipped off at the Flickr fourth anniversary party. Yet, various Yahoo people, including Flickr co-founder Stewart Butterfield confirmed it.

Flickr, which was acquired by Yahoo in March 2005, defined the concept of photo sharing, but has been slow to extend the service into the video world, until now.

Flickr Video is not planned to replace Yahoo Video, unlike Yahoo Photos, which was folded into Flickr. The audience for Flickr is different, said Kakul Srivastava, director of product management at the company.

Flickr has been a pure photo site since by its original conception. Adding video into the mix has to be done carefully, in a way acceptable to the community. Launching a Video service primarily to compete more with YouTube would turn the community off. According to Srivastava it has to appeal, in an "authentic" way, to the Flickr community.

Flickr photo community numbers more than 23 million contributors. Flickr Video will debut in beta next month.