The iPhone losing market share as a Camera phone? Maybe it's just Flickr
The NextWeb observes that the iPhone is losing dramatic market share in Flickr. The problem is unlikely to be due to the iPhone however.
The number of iPhones is still growing fast. However a few things are affecting the number of pictures uploaded to flickr. Namely Facebook and Twitter. And maybe...Youtube
- The new Facebook app is better built for picture shooting and uploading. I am sure a large numbers of iPhone users have started to switch their usage pattern to Facebook
- Most Twitter app now integrate picture shooting: 100% of those pictures are not going to Flickr but to services like Twitpic or Yfrog. I believe there is a strong overlap of users uploading to Flickr and using Twitter. Although i don't have the exact details. What we know though is that Twitpic is gaining momentum in audience vs Flickr (See google trends here)
- Finally the new iPhone 3Gs gives a new alternative to picture shooting: video recording. Many users will prefer in a few cases shoot a video...and upload it to YouTube.
Soon Flickr will aggregate iPod nano now able to shoot pictures. I anticipate that added to the iPhone "Apple Market Share" will recover and maybe will get even bigger
ps: one reason i put aside..flickr could also have some issues in their own data backlog...but it is unlikely and still the reasons above would make sense
