OvermodThe difference there is that the original posters were willing to go through and edit all the post links to new and better servers; one poster changing something like 734 separate links (and of course uploading each linked image to hosting first).
I'm not sensing the same desire to replace the lost images here. Has anybody gone to that trouble? I've thought about doing it but I'm not sure that the time and effort required would be worth it.
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
hon30critterPerhaps the real question is "Do we need to spend the money to restore photos to old posts?". I'm not seeing any requests to re-post photos from old threads.
That's contrary to the experience on the Trains and Classic Trains forums, and of course to the somewhat different situation at RyPN restoring lost photos in their articles section. The difference there is that the original posters were willing to go through and edit all the post links to new and better servers; one poster changing something like 734 separate links (and of course uploading each linked image to hosting first). I will go on record as saying I'd like to see every one of those photobucket images eradicated from posts here, to the point where we might begin to forget there was ever so wrongheaded an exercise. (If unwilling to repost all the images, at least link to a placeholder that indicates why the images are actually missing ... I'll bet there are some pretty good memes out there that get the message across.)
Yes, paying Photobucket anything for anything that will appear in posts here, considering the alternatives, is a waste of everything but the time spent doing the one-time -- what was the phrase from 'Word Processor of the Gods' -- deletion from our lives.
Sheldon,
I pay around $ 120 per year to an internet host for unlimited bandwidth and all kinds of bells and whistles. I host three sites there including my train site. There are reliable hosts that charge much less than mine does, I had to go with the premium package to get certain advanced options that most users wouldn't need.
Hosting pictures on your own site would certainly be more work than PB, but not an insurmountable project once you have figured out how you are going to deal with the FTP software/code on your site.
I like the way MRH handles this with free server space on their site to host pics posted in their forums.
My PB pictures are still visible in posts - they haven't cut me off yet. I'm wondering if they aren't changing their mind and are leaving stuff up so they won't be known as the company that broke forums across the web (a little late for that).
Guy
see stuff at: the Willoughby Line Site
ATLANTIC CENTRALNo matter about my use of photobucket or any other site, every photo I have is on my hard drive and backed up several other places.
I have done the same, so all it takes is time to post the photos to the forums again.
Perhaps the real question is "Do we need to spend the money to restore photos to old posts?". I'm not seeing any requests to re-post photos from old threads. That would seem to make paying Photobucket to restore the images a waste of both time and money.
Little Timmy So ... Your wife cheat's on you, you get divorced. She get's all your railroad stuff ( even though you've had it before you met her ) Then she "play's nice", and says ... "For $100 you can have me back." ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR ____-_____ MIND ??????????? There are NOT enough bad word's in the English language to cover this "Dispicable" act !!! Photo bucket is DEAD ! I pity the fool's who would go back. Just look up ANY thread from a year ago and tell me what you see. You think my response is "Hostile" ? I would rather have my teeth drilled while waiting in line at the D.M.V. than go back to Photobucket !
So ...
Your wife cheat's on you, you get divorced. She get's all your railroad stuff ( even though you've had it before you met her )
Then she "play's nice", and says ...
"For $100 you can have me back."
ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR ____-_____ MIND ???????????
There are NOT enough bad word's in the English language to cover this "Dispicable" act !!!
Photo bucket is DEAD ! I pity the fool's who would go back.
Just look up ANY thread from a year ago and tell me what you see.
You think my response is "Hostile" ?
I would rather have my teeth drilled while waiting in line at the D.M.V. than go back to Photobucket !
So, going by your analogy, who in their right mind has there only copies of their photos on a photo hosting site? To be lost when they fold up shop or charge too much?
No matter about my use of photobucket or any other site, every photo I have is on my hard drive and backed up several other places.
The real loss is wasted time.....
Sheldon
DigitalGriffin Well Sheldon, That depends on locale. You can buy a cheapo server $300 and pay about $100/year for a static IP and dns entry. Then depending on your internet connection. Where I am 100 mbit/sec is ~$200/month. But I would imagine that would handle all model railroading enthusiast needs. In an area where they offer fiber it would be a lot cheaper and faster.
Well Sheldon,
That depends on locale. You can buy a cheapo server $300 and pay about $100/year for a static IP and dns entry. Then depending on your internet connection. Where I am 100 mbit/sec is ~$200/month. But I would imagine that would handle all model railroading enthusiast needs. In an area where they offer fiber it would be a lot cheaper and faster.
Thanks Don.
We have Fios fiber, 50 mbit/sec, $65 a month. We could get faster for about $100.
So to host my own photos I would have to spend $400, spend more per month, learn a bunch of stuff I don't know much about, invest a lot of time I don't have?
I understand it would do other stuff - stuff I don't need/want to do.
OR, I can struggle with learning some new free site, again wasting time I don't have, which may or maynot remain in business, or may start charging as well (still not sure how they make money?).
Or I can pay photobucket for their service which for me has always been reliable and easy to use........
The co-founder of one of the largest privately held companies in the US, very successful for some 60 years, in the fortune 500, once said "Everytime someone somewhere gets something for nothing, someone else somewhere does something for nothing - how much can you afford to do for nothing?".
There is no question Photobucket handled things poorly, but unless someone has seen there books, or is otherwise an expert on their type of business, it seems unfounded to assume you know what their profit/loss situation is.
To the earlier question of the cost of building the internet, yes it was some years ago, and yes advancements in equipment have allowed the internet to grow exponentially with only minor upgrades to the "power side".
But 18-20 years ago, as this was all starting, I wired several server hubs in the Baltimore area. One, located in downtown Baltimore, required a 3 million dollar upgade in the electrical service to an eight story office building so that two floors could be filled with servers.
This location was necessary because it is near hospitals, government buildings, businesses, banks, etc, who needed these new and upcoming services.
To provide the necessary power the incoming electrical service had to be increased from 1200 amps @ 480 volts to 4,000 amps @ 480 volts. The existing power company transformer vault under the street that fed the building was not large enough for the new transformer.
So, the basement of the building was dug out deeper. High voltage conduits were run below the new concrete floor as needed to supply new high voltage (4,160 volts) equipment in the basement and a series of transformers were installed in the basement to step the power from 4160 to 480.
For those of you not familar with this sort of thing, imagine 6" steel pipes with wires in them so big you can barely wrap your hand around them feeding into metal cabinets that look like refrigerators on steroids containing meters, fuses, switches, etc. 6-8 such cabinets bolted together in a row, and then feeding into a series of transformers that would pretty much fill up any average room in your house.
We had to unload these pieces from a flat bed truck on busy city streets, under the light rail overhead, move them on to the sidewalk, lower them into a sidewalk "hatch" into the basement, move them on dollies to their locations, rig them into place, pull wire, hook them, etc. The typical cabinet weighs 500 to 800 lbs.
Then new wiring had to be run from the basement to the floors that would hold the servers. Months and months of dangerous work in less than ideal conditons, and millions of dollars........
Repeated thousands of times around the country to prepare for the "information age".
Not to mention millions of miles of wire and fiber cable......
Another project I did - rewired one public high school to network every class room and upgrade power wiring for computers - 6 men, two years, mostly night work, much of it crawling around in 4' deep crawl space running conduit and pulling wire.
I think that project was about 2 million.........
Now think every hospital, office building, the infrastructure of every major internet provider, cable companies, the phone company............
But what do I know, I'm just a hick with a pickup, and some little trains without brains.......
Rust...... It's a good thing !
Don - Specializing in layout DC->DCC conversions
Modeling C&O transition era and steel industries There's Nothing Like Big Steam!
ATLANTIC CENTRALI'm not the sure the $99 offer is real? I clicked on the link in the Email, and tried to email the customer service email on the page explaining the new offer, and my mail was returned undeliverable. That returned mail page had an attachment I did not open........... Also, from that page, link buttons to other plans or what should have been back to the Photobucket main page, did not work at all? Is the Email a scam to get you to open that attachment on the returned mail? From the photobucket main page, if you click on "plans", you cannot find the $99 offer as decribed in the Email?
Hi Sheldon:
I had the same experience. My message to the website listed on the offer bounced back too. I decided to go to their home page to see if I could find another email address and I did. When I sent a message to that address I got a response back that said the $99 offer was legitimate. Looks like they are pretty messed up if they can't even get their email addresses figured out.
And so how much does it cost to have your own web site and host your own photos?
I ask because I know nothing about that sort of thing, and apparently a few of you do that?
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. There is no reason to go back to them.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
I deleted all my photos and deleted the account. PB still sends me emails but I have convinced my email account to dump them in the Spam folder.
Many clueless do not realize these online companies are A.I. Artificial Intelligence. Essentially no way to get to a Real Person.
Rich
If you ever fall over in public, pick yourself up and say “sorry it’s been a while since I inhabited a body.” And just walk away.
BATMAN When something is free it is customer volume that pays the bills. I wonder what the drop in customers coming through that virtual door was/is. A local oil change place went from boom to bust when they dropped the free $14.00 touchless car wash with every oil change. I don't know what the cost of every carwash was to them but they are slowly recovering by reinstating it. Still, there were loyal customers they will never get back.
When something is free it is customer volume that pays the bills. I wonder what the drop in customers coming through that virtual door was/is.
A local oil change place went from boom to bust when they dropped the free $14.00 touchless car wash with every oil change. I don't know what the cost of every carwash was to them but they are slowly recovering by reinstating it. Still, there were loyal customers they will never get back.
-Morgan
Not only that, there are potentially new customers that will not go to them following that stunt. I'm one of them.
Mike
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
Ok, you are starting to witness the teck crumble where investors are going to demand that companys be profitable, over 50% of tech companys are not. This always starts at small companys and works its way up. Some companys like the one in question shoot themselves in the foot as they try to adapt instead of having a viable long range plan without the hype.
LION posts on puter of him. Him has got 10+ TB of space. Got seven puters running in my office.
ROAR
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
ATLANTIC CENTRAL I'm not the sure the $99 offer is real? I clicked on the link in the Email, and tried to email the customer service email on the page explaining the new offer, and my mail was returned undeliverable. That returned mail page had an attachment I did not open........... Also, from that page, link buttons to other plans or what should have been back to the Photobucket main page, did not work at all? Is the Email a scam to get you to open that attachment on the returned mail? From the photobucket main page, if you click on "plans", you cannot find the $99 offer as decribed in the Email? The question remains, how long will those others remain free? Nothing on the internet is free, we are all paying one way or another. Eventually, the "industry" will figure out its "best" economic model. But as an electrician who helped build the infrastructure of the internet in its early days, I can tell you that most of you have no idea how much expensive electrical infrastructure it takes for you to post on this forum........ Sheldon
I'm not the sure the $99 offer is real? I clicked on the link in the Email, and tried to email the customer service email on the page explaining the new offer, and my mail was returned undeliverable.
That returned mail page had an attachment I did not open...........
Also, from that page, link buttons to other plans or what should have been back to the Photobucket main page, did not work at all?
Is the Email a scam to get you to open that attachment on the returned mail?
From the photobucket main page, if you click on "plans", you cannot find the $99 offer as decribed in the Email?
The question remains, how long will those others remain free? Nothing on the internet is free, we are all paying one way or another. Eventually, the "industry" will figure out its "best" economic model.
But as an electrician who helped build the infrastructure of the internet in its early days, I can tell you that most of you have no idea how much expensive electrical infrastructure it takes for you to post on this forum........
Not that I don't doubt you sheldon.,but with fiber and improved hardware that same data is now pennies on the dollar. Less than 1/1000th what it was back in the day to install better copper. They just replace the copper with fiber now.
The real cost is in redundant storage, backups, hardware maintenance. That's why cloud services are so popular. You are handing your IT responsibilities to someone else.
ATLANTIC CENTRAL But as an electrician who helped build the infrastructure of the internet in its early days, I can tell you that most of you have no idea how much expensive electrical infrastructure it takes for you to post on this forum........ Sheldon
Seriously, though, in your estimate, how much expensive electrical infrastructure does it take for us to post on this forum?
Alton Junction
And- lest we forget- Photo bucket removed the active links in older forum responses so that when a reader looks up a reference to a topic, no images are there anymore, rendering many of those responses less beneficial. Photo bucket appears to practice "historical revisionism" in this manner, so why give them any more business? And as for the cost of the Internet's infrastructure, don't think that the initial investment hasn't been repaid hundreds of times since, given the high profits enjoyed by many internet-reliant companies. Given all this money being made, one would think that we could enjoy a pricing structure that cuts us a bit of slack!
Cedarwoodron
Never been there; Never will be.
Mark P.
Website: http://www.thecbandqinwyoming.comVideos: https://www.youtube.com/user/mabrunton
I was wondering what 3rd party imaging sites people were using instead of photobucket, and saw this post.
No way I would want to be a photobucket customer after what they did.
I have noticed that my photobucket images will show up when I do a Google search on various things, but of course when you visit the link where the image is you get the "Photobucket Please Update Your Account" image.
Thanks for the suggestions for the other 3rd party sites !
Ken H in OH
NO WAY!!
There are multiple free options Google, Imgur, ImgBB and more.
Gary
"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."
Paul
Modeling HO with a transition era UP bent
A snowballs chance....
Cheers,the Bear.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
In a word...."no". I am now on imgur, although I still have my photobucket acct because I have not transferred all my pictures. This has happened to me before with a couple of other sites. It is almost like bait and switch.
Bear "It's all about having fun."
NWP SWP....There should've been a "grandfather" date all photos before then would be unaffected and still viewable...
I agree that their policy change shouldn't have been sprung without warning like it was, but I had a basic paid account (about $40.00/year) and was offered renewal, on my anniversary of joining, at about $50.00, with full third party hosting. They also grandfathered my account at that rate until the end of this year.
When I attempted to renew my subscription, I learned that my credit card had been compromised (not by photobucket) and therefore missed the renewal date. Photobucket contacted me to enquire why I hadn't renewed, and when I explained, their tech guy extended my subscription until my new credit card arrived. I then had difficulty with the renewal process, and they again contacted me explaining that they were having technical difficulties and would contact me when that was cleared-up.
While I agree that their new policy was very poorly introduced, and is outrageously priced, I can't say enough good things about their support staff. They've always been quick to respond, very helpful, and very polite, too.For those reasons, I am seriously considering their recent offer, although I intend to use the grandfathered rate right to the end of the year. I get no pop-up ads, the site is easy to use, whether adding new photos (earlier this evening I put over 60 fairly large photos into a new album, all in a minute-or-so) or when adding photos here.Wayne