Photobucket extortion

StrayAlien · Jul 22, 2017

I just posted this over on the south bend forum but a note to all:

Just a warning all. Photobucket now wants $100 US per year to permit me to do what I was doing for free. That is, hosting pictures in threads like this:

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/v...d-history/alba-1a-teardown-inspection-318418/

Gone. I spent *ages* resizing those pics to make them large and clear and 'in the text' so you did not have to click through pics as attachments.

Sorry all, but I am not going to pay that. They can go to hell.

Admin, can I get editing rights to my posts so I can go back and make them photos attachments and not links?

Greg.

Milland · Jul 22, 2017

If you can't edit the old posts, add new posts with the pics, reference the relevant old post number in the body of the new post. Not great, but better than nothing.

Ries · Jul 22, 2017

I think the expression " There Aint No Free Lunch" applies here.
I used photobucket, but I never expected it to last forever.
The reason you and I got free photo storage was because stupid venture capital firms and Rupert Murdoch paid for it.
It was good while it lasted, but in the long run, if you want web based storage, email, or websites to be reliable, you need to pay for them.
Thats how capitalism works.
It will be a pain that the various sites I posted Photobucket links on will now show blank spaces.

JST · Jul 22, 2017

For the moment, if you want to see blocked pics, you CAN.

1). Right click the 'meter' image.

2). Select " view image"

3) Use the browser "refresh page" function as many times as needed, usually one or two. You should see the pic, AND you should see it in the original thread until caching times out.

StrayAlien · Jul 23, 2017

Thanks all, I am glad this thread didn't invite the venomous personal attacks the one over on the SB forum did. I agree re the 'no free lunch'. That for sure, if annoying. As it turns out, it is actually $399 not $99 to do the same thing.

I guess on that front what I find annoying is the scale of the charge. If it was $50 I might have even considered it. The only reason I used it in the first place was that when I joined PM that is how I saw others doing it. If I recall, adding pics wasn't as easy then as it is now.

As it happens, that Alba 1A thread was meant for other and future 1A owners. Info out there is pretty thin so that is why I created the pic thread. Like if you google 'alba 1a shaper' it is on the first page. Not much out there at all. So I created the thread I wish existed when I started tearing it down.

If I can get edit rights I should be to match the pic URLs and make them attachments. I'll be pinging the admin.

Thanks again.

Salem Straub · Jul 23, 2017

Sorry to hear that, Greg. I noticed it too when Photobucket sent me notification not long ago. Fortunately for me, I'd already moved on to other less glitchy, ad-bedecked pastures (such as Picasa/GooglePhotos/Google+, which evaporated as well.) Now I am reduced to third-party hosting images at Facebook, which hopefully will work for some time as I've not yet found a good alternative. Many of the threads I've posted in places, such as my power hammer and other machine rebuilds and knife tutorials, are for the same reasons as yours- they are the threads and information that I wished existed when I began those journeys.
It's very frustrating I know, the age of widespread free services on the net is waning and at least we benefited from it for a while...

PDW · Jul 23, 2017

Salem Straub said:
Sorry to hear that, Greg. I noticed it too when Photobucket sent me notification not long ago. Fortunately for me, I'd already moved on to other less glitchy, ad-bedecked pastures (such as Picasa/GooglePhotos/Google+, which evaporated as well.) Now I am reduced to third-party hosting images at Facebook, which hopefully will work for some time as I've not yet found a good alternative. Many of the threads I've posted in places, such as my power hammer and other machine rebuilds and knife tutorials, are for the same reasons as yours- they are the threads and information that I wished existed when I began those journeys.
It's very frustrating I know, the age of widespread free services on the net is waning and at least we benefited from it for a while...

I've said it before and it appears I need to say it again.

If you want a *reasonable* level of certainty that your photos will stay linked to the posting text, UPLOAD THEM to the forum. Do not rely on 3rd party sites (unless it's your own domain you're paying money for), because you're at their mercy.

Which is what I said years ago about Photobucket - that leaving aside the truly offensive amount of Javascript it wanted to run on my computer to see anything.

PDW

cncFireman · Jul 24, 2017

I underatand why photobucket did what they did. However the way it was rolled out and the price hike from free to 400 a year for 3rd party is rediculous. I am keeping my account open for now to see how it all pans out. A good article that I read mentioned how if photobucket gets even 1% to pay up that their profits will likely climb to sustainability. I rather wait to see if it pans out before I would ever pay to re enable 3rd party hosting. I still think that even had they asked maybe 100 or so a year they may have had a lot more people paying up to keep thier hosting.

Andy FitzGibbon · Jul 24, 2017

I have a few different web sites that are hosted by a local Web company. Roughly $70 a year gets me a domain name, tech support, and way more storage space than I'll ever use. All that is needed is a very basic FTP uploading program. There are no ads, Javascript, or other annoyances to deal with either. All of the photos I've ever posted on PM, going back fifteen years or so, are stored there and none of them have disappeared.

Andy

Chip Chester · Jul 24, 2017

I've read of a work-around in another forum. Had to do with searching for cached google pages and lifting the photo url from there and placing in the crippled thread. Of course, still bunches of work, and worthless if the threads themselves are not editable, etc.

Photobucket should have targeted its extortion at web sites, rather than individual photo owners. Some financially-successful site owners would understand the impact on their specific sites, and would act quickly if the saw a pending negative site experience for their customers.

Smaller, user-supported sites could spread the $400 over the 'dues-paying' users, which would probably amount to a buck a year or so.

Even smaller, non-profit sites could take a 'go fund me' approach and beg for money or benefactors.

Savvy ad buyers/brokers would pay the fee for the site in exchange for branding rights below every photo.

Or, one online forum trade group could be formed to buy one $400/year account and have it host all the photos for every forum in their membership, thoroughly screwing Photobucket. They'd get one $400 payment for doing everything they were doing before. Bazinga.

I do wish Milicron would selectively open old posts (by 'thread-owner' petition?) for editing if people want to change the links. It's in both his and the users' best interest to do so.

Chip

Greg Menke · Jul 24, 2017

@strayalien, I looked at your Alba thread to me it looks open for edit- see if you have an "edit post" link at the bottom of the page.

traditional-tools · Jul 24, 2017

StrayAlien said:
Thanks all, I am glad this thread didn't invite the venomous personal attacks the one over on the SB forum did. I agree re the 'no free lunch'. That for sure, if annoying. As it turns out, it is actually $399 not $99 to do the same thing.

No, you just took it as a personal attack.

If you agree there is no free lunch, no issue, either pay or host your own images.

If you want to vent because you've been storing images for free on PB for years and now they are asking you to pay, well, no sympathy from me... :nono:

Maybe we can get more threads on the costly shipping to Oz also ? I'm looking forward to more of those...

Monarchist · Jul 24, 2017

Chip Chester said:
I do wish Milicron would selectively open old posts (by 'thread-owner' petition?) for editing if people want to change the links. It's in both his and the users' best interest to do so.

Chip

Several possible "fixes" exist.

I'm comfortable waiting until his IT support team have had time to review statistics and assess the overall effect on site "value", plus the server and B/W load of various options.

There may, indeed be site <=> photobucket "programs".

They may already be experimenting and comparing.

JST · Jul 24, 2017

Chip Chester said:
I've read of a work-around in another forum. Had to do with searching for cached google pages and lifting the photo url from there and placing in the crippled thread. Of course, still bunches of work, and worthless if the threads themselves are not editable, etc.

.......
Chip

If you want to see the pic in a post, do as I stated in post #4. At least for now, it works. PB will likely block it if it becomes too noticeable.

For that matter, I have gotten lots of emails from PB , but my photos have not yet been blocked, at least as far as I know. I still see them.. and I am not going to pay.

StrayAlien · Jul 25, 2017

Thanks all. Greg, I have no edit post button on posts. The bottom of the page says I have the right to, I think that the edit button goes away after a post is replied to.

PDW, yes, lessons learned but I did it that way so as to get large images in the body of the thread and not to have the 'clickable thumbnails with popup box'.

Such is life.

Thanks again all.

Greg.

rivett608 · Jul 25, 2017

My photos are blocked, I think I have thousands on the PM mostly in the Antique section. I also know I used two separate PB accounts so that is more of a mess for me. I could have 5,000 images on there. I do believe I have backed up all of them somewhere. Many of these posts are in a sense timeless because the deal with history of old machinist's tools.

I have been out of the country with limited online access the past month so I haven't had time to study my options and or fix these threads. I do think some way of letting get in and edit old threads to correct the links might be one answer. Just adding the photos at the end won't be so great on some of those that go on for many pages. Also what will happen to some of the great contributors in the past such as AntiqueMac? I see his photos are still up hence he didn't use PB. I need to check with his family to see where they are and do what is needed to preserve them.

All I know is whatever I do it will involve a massive amount of time. Is it even worth it?

SouthBendModel34 · Jul 26, 2017

Rivett608,

Is it worth it? Are antique tools not our calling? <WINK!>

John Ruth

billmac · Jul 26, 2017

I think it would be a great loss to this site if the photos of your work are no longer visible here. It would be an even greater loss to new visitors who have never seen them, but can only read about what you have done.

On the other hand I do not have to do all the work that would be required to recreate all those links.

Monarchist · Jul 26, 2017

rivett608 said:
All I know is whatever I do it will involve a massive amount of time. Is it even worth it?

It IS worth it.

And "time" and/OR .. a substantial sum of money.

As-in, perhaps a PhotoBucket 'fee' that could allow a webhoster to gather in one-go, ALL the photos linked by its many members.

.. or a team effort, "many hands and eyes" gathering them for storage and later coalescence to get them back in-place.

In either case, it should not fall on the shoulders of the folks who have ALREADY given so generously of their time in the first instance.

Few have the time to do it all over again. Many are no longer with us.

None should have to be financially burdened for the privilege of having helped OTHERS, let alone be burdened TWICE.

_boris_ · Jul 26, 2017

I used to pay to PB, don't remember why, may be bigger bandwidth or storage.

The problem with PB is exactly extortion because 1. We had a deal 2.I can't get to most of my images anymore when I logged in, the site is unusably slow, timing out trying to access my galleries.

This type of treatmeant to go free to $400 will sour a lot of relationships as people will go somewhere else either now or when they get their photos back. That's capitalism. Temporarily their profits will soar, CEO will take a golden parachute to his next gig and in long term company will belly up with all the peons. That's capitalism too.

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Photobucket extortion

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