Flickr photos have now been added to Yahoo's Image search function, granting easier access to the hundreds of millions of images from Flickr.
While Flickr thumbnail images were already included in Yahoo search, this more complete inclusion of Flickr photos speaks to the intention of Yahoo's acquisition of Flickr, and the leverage Yahoo now has by way of image search. Yahoo gives you the opportunity to search by Flickr user name, which will be included in your search results as a link to their Flickr photo stream. Search Flickr images specifically by including "Flickr" in your search query as well.
Only images filtered as "safe" from Flickr will show for a Yahoo image search. It's also important to note the key difference with Yahoo's Image search and its inclusion of Flickr photos, as these images are coming from Flickr's live photo stream feed. This gives you better search results, removes the risk of getting images that are no longer available, and allows Yahoo Image search to gain on other search engine capabilities.
In other image search news, Photobucket will soon be launching an updated version of its search plug-in. See here for more resources on photo hosting and search.
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