So, it looks like Flickr is going to release a print service.

I don’t know who started the leak, but I have it from half a dozen sources already. Make even has what appears to be a sneak peak of a poster/book that can/will be an option for photo ordering through Flickr. See below:

Derek Powazek is adding to the buzz as well. His wife works as a part of Flickr, so maybe we can be fairly sure about the news. Derek received in the mail a large print of a grid containing Flickr thumbnails – from his own photos. He notes that the quality was average and the paper good, which is good news for any photo ordering service.

Also in the mail was a lovely book with 66 pages, nice cover, matte interior – containing photos from his sets. Oh yes, I love that. Not fiddling with the stupid prints to get them into a book only to have them slide around, slip out or go yellow. An actual printed book with the photos. Kind of like the Memento service I mentioned a while back.

So, why is this extra cool? Well, it’s more than just personal photo books of memories and whatnot. It allows communities to gather and share photos in a different way – online and offline. It would encourage people to dig into tags and create sets around like-tagged images. Like creating coffee table photo books of images you love or communities you feel a part of. BlogHer, for example, could take all of the photobloggers and casual photos with the tag BlogHer and make up a 2005 BlogHer Con event memento. Great!

Also see notes from Download Squad and Social Software Weblog

Technorati Tags: flickr, photos, tagging, tags, sharing, print, digital, photography, scrapbook