Popular photo-sharing website Flickrannouncedon Thursday that it had surpassed the 6 billion photos, reaching the milestone in just under seven and a half years. Flickr says that over the last five years, uploads have increased 20% year-over-year, a respectable growth rate. The company is quick to point out that its tagging, camera data, groups, comments and favourites make the photo sharing website unique, perhaps in light of its small footprint compared to other photo sharing websites....

Back in January, Flickr teased that it was developing dedicated applications for Windows Phone 7 smartphones and Windows 7 tablet devices – today they haveofficially launched. The new apps offer many of the Flickr features you have come to know and love, optimising the experience on touch-screen devices to help users upload, view and share their photos. The Windows Phone 7 app is available via the Zune Marketplace, whilst the Windows 7 tablet application is available to download via theFlickr website....

Flickrtoday announced that it hasimplemented a change to its policy on deleted accounts, saying it will keep photos and associated content for 90 days before erasing them for good. Previously, Flickrdeleted your photos immediately, making the decision to close an account irreversible. Though the move will likely bring out the privacy activists, Flickr says that all data will be made private and kept secure, and this change of policy only exists to help users protect their photos, and gives them the option to reverse their decision....

Flickrrecentlyrolled outa new slideshow photo-viewer for the iPad, enabling users to flip through image galleries similar to how it’s done on the desktop. Prior to these improvements specifically designed for the iPad, users were limited to using iPad applications to browse through photography in a full-screen mode. To active the new feature, users are required to select an image then touch the magnifying glass icon. While in the slideshow, the images are browsed by using a swipe gesture on the iPad’s screen....

Now that the Mango update for Windows Phone is available to theplurality of WP7handset owners, companies that previously developed applications for the platform are updating their wares to support the latest upgrades to the mobile line. In other words, apps are going Mango. Flickr, the ever-popular photo sharing and hosting service, today announced that the second version of its Windows Phone applicationis now available. In its blog post on the matter, Flickr noted that the update itself took advantage of Mango’s new capabilities, including: “background uploading, faster performance and fast application switching....