The most pleasant discovery for me on Flickr was the groups. I had known that it was a place to store your pictures and share them with others, but I didn't know about the groups and, most importantly, the disscussion topics within groups.
They have groups for every photography-related thing you can think of there. I have found some of the most wonderful people who have helped me immensely. I am part of the Sony Alpha A200 forum and I have learned (and now teach others) tons about the camera we have in common.
I just joined a new group that seems just as active: Alpha Strobist, a group dedicated to learning to use my brand camera with various flash units. Flickr is a great site.
I not only examined Flickr, but also Photobucket and Picassa. I like Flickr better because it is just so much bigger than the others; the community really makes Flickr what it is.
I can think right off of a couple ways to use Flickr in education. Every year I assign a project on the play we read in our textbooks, "The Diary of Anne Frank." I hadn't been as in tune with Flickr previously, but now I can recommend that they find photos on Flickr to decorate their projects as I am sure that there are photos of Anne Frank's hiding place and other things from her life.
I also know that Flickr can be a nice writing prompt. I can see students using the site to find a photo to then make up a story, or describe a scene. I am always trying to get them to use more descriptive words in their writing, so maybe if they pick the photo, they will do a better job. I think if they find the picture on their own, they will have better buy-in on the rest of the activity.
Activities such as the last one would help foster creativity and collaboration, the first of the NETS-S Standards. The fifth standard, promoting digital citizenship, is promoted as they also learn about safely using Flickr's search tools and about copyright issues involving the use of content created by others.
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