I've experienced some problems recently trying to post photos to this forum. In some cases it appeared to me as though I had done so successfully, only to find that many other readers could not see the photos.I subsequently decided to look up a specific discussion of this problem, only to find that the 'HELP' discussion of this same title, has been locked ???So rather than disrupt the particular subject thread where a problem came up. I decided to start this new thread.Basically it appears as though this forum in chooseing NOT to allow direct postings of images, and relys on linking to other websites to post an image,....BUT that supposely uses up bandwidth of the original hosting site, which might be considered a no-no. ((and of course, many have seen what happened with the Photobucket fiasco).
So where do we find good reliable, LONG TERM, sites to host our images?
Brian
My Layout Plan
Interesting new Plan Consideration
Just this morning there were some nice images added to the 'kitbash thread'. When I clicked on the 'image info' I found they were on this 'Blogger site'https://blogger.googleblog.com/
There is a lot of info to try and absorb their, and I'm wondering if anyone can give a brief summary of what this site is, or is not??Is it Google's answer to Facebook??
Brian, go the home page of General Topics, at the very top, is an article by Steve Otte on how to post photos.
It's locked so you can't add to it, as there is no need to. It's all there, along with methods and ways that several members have posted.
The method I use is by GMPullman, scroll down a ways, you'll see it. This methods works the best for me, and doesn't turn all of your text, after you post your photo, into a live link to your photo hosting site of choice.
Mike.
My You Tube
The only way to make it truly long term is to buy your own domain name and get an account with a provider that lets you use it. If my web host went belly up tomowwo, I can just move my files to a new one and, since the URL for all the photos I post are based on my personal domain name and not anything to do with the web host, all my old pics would still be visible.
Any time the links to your photos have http://<some host company> in the URL, you are at the mercy of that company. If you move to another host, anything you previously posted will be gone. Not the files themselves, hopefully, but the links will all be bad and only the things you post from your new host will work.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
mbinsewi Brian, go the home page of General Topics, at the very top, is an article by Steve Otte on how to post photos.
That is the VERY subject thread I was talking about in my opening statement,...
railandsailI subsequently decided to look up a specific discussion of this problem, only to find that the 'HELP' discussion of this same title, has been locked ???
mbinsewi It's locked so you can't add to it, as there is no need to. It's all there, along with methods and ways that several members have posted.
Perhaps you don't see a need to address the situation, but I do. I really like a lot of things about this forum, but posting reasonably sized photos is NOT one of them,...and particularly when something like the recent Photobucket action destroys MANY good subject threads on this site and many others.......all due to the subject of photo posting/hosting.
I'm going to repeat this request,...
When I clicked on the 'image info' of a recently posted photo, I found the images were hosted on this 'Blogger site'https://blogger.googleblog.com/
There is a lot of info to try and absorb about that hosting site, and I'm wondering if anyone can give a brief summary of what this site is, or is not??Is it Google's answer to Facebook??
Generally, a "Blogger" site is going to have more layout and page frame options available than a simple "photo hosting site".
Bloggers will have text and links and other sorts of information on their blog than what is needed to simply post photos to this site.
You can go back to the MR forum thread where you saw the https://blogger.googleblog.com/ attached to the photo and send a PM to the person who posted that particular photo and ask them for details about the google blogger site to see if it suits your needs.
I was a Photobucket user for better than ten years and had about 2000 photos there. I haven't closed my PB account but I'm leaving it sit since it reverted back to the "free" account status.
I had signed up for Flickr several years ago to use the site for photo storage and retrieval. Since the PB fiasco I have gone to using Flickr to link photos to the MR site. Flickr is run by Yahoo.
https://help.yahoo.com/kb/flickr-for-desktop#
It is nearly as functional as PB was, once you get the hang of using it.
IMG_0474_fix by Edmund, on Flickr
railandsailIs it Google's answer to Facebook??
It seems to me that many of the "social media-photo sharing" sites are trying to follow a "facebook" type of format. Probably to try to build a bigger user base in order to have a bigger "presence" on the web and conversely, bigger ad revenue.
There was lots of discussion here:
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/263790.aspx
about alternate photo hosting sites.
Good Luck,
Ed
It's blog site hosted by Google. Send a PM to RR_mel, they guy with the great kit-bashed/scratch built steam locos, that posted a lot of pictures on the "Kitbashed Locomotive" thread.
He uses Googleblog.
gmpullman I had signed up for Flickr several years ago to use the site for photo storage and retrieval. Since the PB fiasco I have gone to using Flickr to link photos to the MR site. Flickr is run by Yahoo. https://help.yahoo.com/kb/flickr-for-desktop#
Isn't Yahoo going thru some 'trying times' ?
mbinsewi It's blog site hosted by Google. Send a PM to RR_mel, they guy with the great kit-bashed/scratch built steam locos, that posted a lot of pictures on the "Kitbashed Locomotive" thread. He uses Googleblog. Mike.
I saw this posting by him over on that other subject thread,....http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/263790.aspx?page=2
I ended up making a Post on my blog for posting pictures on the Forum and backdated the post date so it will always be at the end of my posts.
It was just a quick idea. I’ve posted many pictures from my blog over the years without any problems. Also it’s a lot easier and faster than Photo Bucket and Google Photo.
Mel
railandsailIsn't Yahoo going thru some 'trying times' ?
Can't say, for sure. Internet companies— in fact all corporations for that matter — are changing hands/corporate takeovers/LBOs etc. all the time so that's anybody's guess.
If I had one of those crystal ball things I wouldn't have bought 5000 shares of GE at $31!
railandsailSo where do we find good reliable, LONG TERM, sites to host our images?
As long as I have been a member of this forum (2003), Kalmbach has required a user to link photos from a photo-hosting website for posting photos here. It would cost Kalmbach oodles of servers and server space just to store and maintain the amount of photos posted here on a yearly basis. That's the price of a FREE forum.
Railimages is a FREE site that I use but you're limited to 50MB of online hosting space. I think for a smal fee you can up that amount to 500MB or >. Other photo-hosting services are available for free or a fee. Just poke around or google reviews to find one that meets your needs and budget.
As Randy suggested, the best long term option for photo storage is to purchase your own domain and post pictures to a personal website. It's not that complicated to set up but it does require a monthly or yearly fee to maintain. The plus - as Randy pointed out - is that your pictures can travel with you if you choose another website-hosting service.
The basic service for the one I use costs $5/month and the cost of the domain is <$15/yr. Like photo-hosting sites, I'm sure there are ones with smaller fees.
Tom
https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling
Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.
tstageAs long as I have been a member of this forum (2003), Kalmbach has required a user to link photos from a photo-hosting website for posting photos here. It would cost Kalmbach oodles of servers and server space just to store and maintain the amount of photos posted here on a yearly basis. That's the price of a FREE forum. Tom
Tom,
I joined this forum about two weeks after they went online, back in early 2001.
I think "oodles of servers and server space" is a bit of an overstatement. While not quite pennies per terrabyte, storage space is very inexpensive. It's not like it costs $500+ for a ten megabyte hard drive anymore. Six tb hard drives are available for under $200 these days, for example.
Kalmbach appears to simply not want to devote any resources to their forums. When is the last time the forum software was updated? Five years ago? More? And the bugs that appeared with the last update still are not fixed. Ever look at a long thread and then see that the first three pages are listed in the top buttons as -2, -1, 0?
I'm not complaining - I live with that and other idiosyncracies, just like we all do. But it wouldn't cost all that much to allow photo hosting ON their own forum server, just as two other FREE forums I use do. If photo size is a concern, limiting the size of each photo is a common and easy thing to do.
But the attitude of "It's free, so stop whining" doesn't really engender any sort of brand loyalty.
Mark P.
Website: http://www.thecbandqinwyoming.comVideos: https://www.youtube.com/user/mabrunton
BruntonKalmbach appears to simply not want to devote any resources to their forums.
Another issue — as I recall Mr. Otte mentioning, and potentially more damaging — was the liability risk of being an accessory to hosting copyrighted material.
For a publishing company, this risk could potentially have devastating effects on their corporate reputation and financial well-being.
Lots of people re-post photos that are property of other owners on these forums. If that copyright owner wanted to press the issue, Kalmbach's servers might be confiscated as evidence, and could possibly face costly litigation.
This may be a bigger factor than mere frugality on Kalmbach's part.
Cheers,
BruntonBut the attitude of "It's free, so stop whining" doesn't really engender any sort of brand loyalty.
Hi Mark,
That was not the intention of my reply. It was merely to point out that Kalmbach has chosen from the get-go not to go that route and there are FREE and non-FREE options available for forum users for photo-hosting websites. Sorry if it came across somewhat flippant.
railandsail I'm going to repeat this request,... When I clicked on the 'image info' of a recently posted photo, I found the images were hosted on this 'Blogger site'https://blogger.googleblog.com/ There is a lot of info to try and absorb about that hosting site, and I'm wondering if anyone can give a brief summary of what this site is, or is not??Is it Google's answer to Facebook??
Sure there are LOTs of photo hosting sites, but in trying to make adecision as to which one it is more of a question as to how long any particular one will be around. You hate to make a choice of one, and put a lot of data on it, only to find it goes out of business, or changes its policies like Photobucket.
Its not only that you may lose all your photos you collected and stored there, but even more importantly all the forum discussions you have posted them in or linked to are totally disrupted,....history lost. In this ditigal age this 'history lost concept' goes a lot deeper that this simply photo hosting and forums example. Of course I likely won't be around long enough to experience the really bad effects.
On another note, how about this site 'Dropbox',...any positive or negative thoughts??https://www.dropbox.com/individual
LION uses Webmasters for the Abbey website, I use only a small fraction of the resources that my annual fee covers. 1+1 is another great hosting company. Neither of these are going to go away, but you will pay about $100/yr for them.
That said LION also runs his own server on a separate computer right near my right knee. YOUR COMPUTER CAN DO THIS TOO, it is not instaqlled by default, but by pushing a few buttons you can set up your IIS server on Windows (or your Appachee server on Linux).
It is best to get a static IP number from your ISP, and some cable ISPs will not allow you to host a server, but it can be done. You do not even need your own URL, the IP number will work just fine all by itself, after all, if you use a Domain Name, a DNS server somewhere will have to resolve it to your IP number anyway.
Of course, if you do not already know what it was I just said, then I wouldn't try it anyway.
ROAR
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
gmpullman Brunton Kalmbach appears to simply not want to devote any resources to their forums. Another issue — as I recall Mr. Otte mentioning, and potentially more damaging — was the liability risk of being an accessory to hosting copyrighted material. For a publishing company, this risk could potentially have devastating effects on their corporate reputation and financial well-being. Lots of people re-post photos that are property of other owners on these forums. If that copyright owner wanted to press the issue, Kalmbach's servers might be confiscated as evidence, and could possibly face costly litigation. This may be a bigger factor than mere frugality on Kalmbach's part. Cheers, Ed
Brunton Kalmbach appears to simply not want to devote any resources to their forums.
The simple solution for the person Brian quoted as as saying he couldn't use the Google solution is to simply store his RAW images in a DIFFERENT folder and only put the compressed ones suitable for positing in the Photos folder that Google syncs.
Seriously - is it THAT hard to figure out? The "files in transit" on my computer aren't even on my C drive. They get backed up to my server. Edited/resized/whatever files are in my photos and movies folders. No reason for Google to be syncing the huge RAW files that will fill the storage although they need to be backes up SOMEWHERE - I have Crashplan which has a TRUE unlimited backup storage.
I sound like a broken record, but owning your own domain is the one SURE way to never have what happened to many Photobucket people happen to you. No matetr who actually hosts your photos, the reference will never change, so if one source goes belly-up, you can sign on with someone else but the actual URL will always be the same, so old posts will not suddenly start showing red x's.
rrebell I love how people quote liability and have no idea of how things work,
I think Mr. Otte's point is — Kalmbach doesn't want to touch it. Period.
Product liability, medical malpractice, insurance fraud. Everyone's defensive radar is on high-alert.
Last summer I was in the local grocery store and someone in the produce department was tossing a big bag of corn husks that customers stripped off the sweet corn into a big cart to take to the dumpster.
I asked if it would be OK if I took it home to feed to my goats. "No way, no how, not now, not ever" was the response. I asked the nearby manager why this is so.
"Liability". Your goats can get sick and you would sue us because we provided the corn husks.
Everyone is afraid of their own shadows these days.
It is not that I have no idea of how "things" work. It is the fact that courts, judges and juries award huge sums of money for seemingly senseless litigation.
Happy Holidays, Ed
Agreed, Ed. Our niece's wedding, we asked for a doggy bag for our left-overs.
No way, no how. Liability.
Now at the wife's office Christmas party, at a private country club, no problem. It was our super 2 nights later.