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In relation to collaborative production, the Flickr concept can be distinguished from many other forms of online collaboration as individuals maintain full ownership of their work.

 

Much theory has been focused upon collaborative work where individual input online is co-operative and is producing a single textual medium. The most prominent example of this online is Wikipedia, where individuals become editors of a single piece of text, offering their own knowledge to the piece and building the text via numerous sources. This process is founded upon a number of concepts which are therefore inapplicable to Flickr - included externalisation and internalisation, accomodation and assimilation (see Cress & Kimmerle 2008), and explicit and implicit coordination (see Kittur & Kraut 2008).

 

Whilst Flickr involves collaborative production, it can be identified as distinct from many other forms of collaborative online work in that it allows producers to maintain full control over their own content, whilst still encouraging group collaboration in terms of specific interests.

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