Ph0t0bucket Ransom Demand!

24

Comments

  • msg
    msg Posts: 9,308
    edited July 2017
    Lots of articles popping up. I just read a funny comment on PC Mag or something. Someone said,
    "Whose dumb idea was this?!? And who approved it?!?"
    @voltz - "Vogons?"

    Appropriate image for the situation, yes?
    Vogon_poetry2.jpg
    image from Wikipedia (side note - do your part to support donation funded services where possible)
    I disabled signatures.
  • pitdogg2
    pitdogg2 Posts: 24,478
    txcoastal1 wrote: »
    Sounds like to me, people/companies need to start a media up roar, or even a class action

    Most are lemmings now a days. Most couldn't stand up if you shoved a stick up their rear end.
  • mhardy6647
    mhardy6647 Posts: 32,926
    We can go back to ASCII graphics, if need be...

    einstein-ascii.jpg
    source: https://valentinaguo.wordpress.com/2014/09/17/ascii-art/
  • tonyb
    tonyb Posts: 32,902
    txcoastal1 wrote: »
    Sounds like to me, people/companies need to start a media up roar, or even a class action

    I don't see how Ron....any company is free to charge what they like. Your free to pay it, or move on. From what I gather, once you use a third party site to store pics, YOU are no longer the sole owner of those pics. Same goes for any info you want to put out on the web. Once in the public domain, your control is limited. It's a tricky area for sure.

    Sounds to me, like they need to raise cash to bolster their financials....so they can sell it. In any event, if PB is the only place you store your photos.....who's fault is that ? You must have thought at some point in time you'd lose access to them for one reason or another. If you haven't thought about it, with anything on the web, you might be putting too much faith in things that are temporary.
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  • DarqueKnight
    DarqueKnight Posts: 6,760
    tonyb wrote: »
    txcoastal1 wrote: »
    Sounds like to me, people/companies need to start a media up roar, or even a class action

    I don't see how Ron....any company is free to charge what they like.

    They are free to charge what they like within certain legal boundaries. I have received several refunds and extended warranties over the years as compensation for companies price gouging. Those extended warranties and refunds were the result of class action lawsuits.

    I haven't investigated the legalities of PB's business practices, but it seems that inviting people to use your service in a particular way, then abruptly changing the terms of service in order to make them subject to high fees for using the service exactly the way you encouraged them to, ought to be legally actionable.
    tonyb wrote: »
    Your free to pay it, or move on. From what I gather, once you use a third party site to store pics, YOU are no longer the sole owner of those pics.

    I would think that web hosting sites are subject to the same rules as any storage facility. It's fine if PB decides they don't want to provide free hosting service any longer. It's not fine for them to sucker punch people and hold their content for ransom, all the while justifying their attempted larceny by claiming "excessive use" and "unauthorized 3rd party hosting".
    tonyb wrote: »
    Same goes for any info you want to put out on the web. Once in the public domain, your control is limited. It's a tricky area for sure.

    Nothing tricky about it at all. People retain copyrights to their original photos no matter where they are hosted.
    tonyb wrote: »
    Sounds to me, like they need to raise cash to bolster their financials....so they can sell it.

    This is what some are thinking.
    tonyb wrote: »
    In any event, if PB is the only place you store your photos.....who's fault is that ? You must have thought at some point in time you'd lose access to them for one reason or another. If you haven't thought about it, with anything on the web, you might be putting too much faith in things that are temporary.

    Of course. Forums come and go, as do picture hosting services. I stopped posting technical articles on the PS Audio forums because past threads would be deleted whenever the forum software was upgraded or changed.

    There is always the possibility of a service going out of business, changing their terms of service or having a catastrophic data loss. In all three cases, there are ways to handle the situation that does not insult the user and cause unnecessary hardship.

    Proud and loyal citizen of the Digital Domain and Solid State Country!
  • F1nut
    F1nut Posts: 49,708
    Eff them, just deleted my account.
    Political Correctness'.........defined

    "A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."


    President of Club Polk

  • DarqueKnight
    DarqueKnight Posts: 6,760
    Awwwwww man...you could have waited until the end of next week to see if they were going to come out with a $1.99/month special for third party hosting (with a generous discount for longtime members, of course).

    If only 5% of their 100 million users signed up for that, it would bring in $119.4 million a year. That, along with ad revenue and whatever other scams they manage to come up with, should have them living well for the foreseeable future.
    Proud and loyal citizen of the Digital Domain and Solid State Country!
  • DarqueKnight
    DarqueKnight Posts: 6,760
    Interesting prophetic-like article, about the demise of free photo hosting services. Article posted on 3/16/17:

    "What Happens When Imgur Goes Out Of Business?"

    https://neosmart.net/blog/2017/what-happens-when-imgur-goes-out-of-business/

    Quote:

    "Today, it is far more likely that users recognize the names of once-behemoths PhotoBucket or ImageShack not from their years of glory but from coming across images like this, the fossils that remain from the time when these two beasts ruled the image hosting world and roamed the interwebs unopposed:

    5hwzdombte5f.jpg3x18p69394wx.jpg

    Don’t let the text in the photos deceive you – chances are, when you see images like this it’s not because someone messed up but rather because these sites that once burned through venture capital money like there was no tomorrow raced to conquer the web, heedless of the costs it would run them once they gained dominance and the chickens came home to roost. Faced with insurmountably-growing costs and left footing massive bandwidth bills as the size and sheer quantity of shared photos skyrocketed, these giants turned against their users, blocking images hosted from other sites and deleting free content hosted with their services.

    A few years back Almost a decade ago, we realized the danger of hotlinking images and went back and cached every image we were hotlinking or inlining with a script that crawled through our site and found all references to external domains like ImageShack and Wikipedia then saved the contents on our own servers for future-proofing and posterity. But we’re a tiny site without much user-generated content or hotlinked images. The picture is drastically different for social media sites like reddit or even other, smaller fish, as is the magnitude and scale of the undertaking. While the relationship between Imgur and reddit took a turn for the worse around mid-2016 when reddit finally launched their own image uploading feature around the same time that Imgur decided it had enough of being someone else’s lapdog and decided to go full-on social, the fact remains that Imgur is huge and the lives of everyone online would change, decidedly for the worst, should it suddenly go offline or block hotlinking like each and every “free” image host has done in the past."

    Apparently, there has been several years of speculation about Photobucket being on the verge of bankruptcy and of them being bought out by another company or abruptly shutting down.
    Proud and loyal citizen of the Digital Domain and Solid State Country!
  • msg
    msg Posts: 9,308
    Side note - hotlinking images is still a bit of a nuisance when a user decides to purposely delete an account, resulting in valuable context images come up with the "missing image" placeholders. I get it from a user's perspective, having more "complete" control over their images and how their used, as opposed to uploading to a forum's image repository and being unable to adjust/remove at a later time, but I've seen some cases of people becoming "disenchanted" with a particular forum and killing all links to take their toys and go home. That's annoying.
    I disabled signatures.
  • DarqueKnight
    DarqueKnight Posts: 6,760
    Sadly, our pictures are in danger of disappearing no matter where they are hosted. If we upload directly to a forum's picture repository, the links will be broken when and if the forum moves to another hosting company. Case in point: all the broken picture links when Polk moved their forum to Vanilla's servers. If Polk decides to move to another hosting company in the future, all the pictures currently hosted on Vanilla's servers will be lost, unless the time and effort is taken to copy all pictures to the new server and rehome the picture links.

    If we use an external hosting service, we run the risk of the company going out of business or eventually holding our pictures until an exorbitant ransom is paid.

    If we host our pictures on our own server, we run the risk of the forum shutting down, or moving to another server with another URL, which means all of the former picture links will be broken.

    No matter what we do, we're gonna get got.
    Proud and loyal citizen of the Digital Domain and Solid State Country!
  • EndersShadow
    EndersShadow Posts: 17,517
    I just got my "Ransom Demand".... Too bad...
    "....not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." William Bruce Cameron, Informal Sociology: A Casual Introduction to Sociological Thinking (1963)
  • BlueFox
    BlueFox Posts: 15,251
    Was it also $400?
    Lumin X1 file player, Westminster Labs interconnect cable
    Sony XA-5400ES SACD; Pass XP-22 pre; X600.5 amps
    Magico S5 MKII Mcast Rose speakers; SPOD spikes

    Shunyata Triton v3/Typhon QR on source, Denali 2000 (2) on amps
    Shunyata Sigma XLR analog ICs, Sigma speaker cables
    Shunyata Sigma HC (2), Sigma Analog, Sigma Digital, Z Anaconda (3) power cables

    Mapleshade Samson V.3 four shelf solid maple rack, Micropoint brass footers
    Three 20 amp circuits.
  • EndersShadow
    EndersShadow Posts: 17,517
    BlueFox wrote: »
    Was it also $400?

    Nope. 399.99 ;)
    "....not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." William Bruce Cameron, Informal Sociology: A Casual Introduction to Sociological Thinking (1963)
  • mhardy6647
    mhardy6647 Posts: 32,926
    BlueFox wrote: »
    Was it also $400?

    Nope. 399.99 ;)

    Dang. A sale.
  • billbillw
    billbillw Posts: 6,163
    They locked me today. Good riddance photo₽hucket!
    For rig details, see my profile. Nothing here anymore...
  • billbillw
    billbillw Posts: 6,163
    edited July 2017
    Although, I should mention, I seem to have access to all my photos when I log into PhotoBucket. They just sent the email and now my images show the ransom demand link. Not that it really maters since I have local originals for all the photos.

    EDIT: Eff it. I deleted the account. I'm not waiting for them to realize it was stupid. Even if they took a softer approach, they'd probably still want the minimal account to 3rd party link/host.
    Post edited by [Deleted User] on
    For rig details, see my profile. Nothing here anymore...
  • daddyjt
    daddyjt Posts: 2,305
    I am reminded of one of my favorite lines from the movie Rounders: "You can shear a sheep many times, but you can only skin him once..."

    I wouldn't pay $30 a year, but I'm sure a lot of people would - but $400?? That plan was doomed from the start.
    "Conservative Libertarians love the country, progressive leftists love the government." - Andrew Wilkow


    “Human beings are born with different capacities. If they are free, they are not equal. And if they are equal, they are not free.”
    ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

  • gimpod
    gimpod Posts: 1,793
    There losing money because more people are doing what I'm doing, I now host all my pics here on my site which runs me $10 a month with 2 gig max storage & unlimited bandwidth per month and for another $10 a month I could up the storage to 100gigs, There a well known hosting service that's been in the U.S. since 2004 and the nice thing is I own the domain name as long as it gets renewed it every year (it's part of my hosting package) and I keep my site structure the same the server (mine or Polks) can change anytime and it won't dump my pics. So why spend $400 a month when $10 a month gets you the same thing with more flexibility.

    The only problem around here is like @DarqueKnight posted we can't edit our own posts so we have to try and get one of the 2 Ken's to do it for us!.
    “The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.” ~ Mark Twain
  • billbillw
    billbillw Posts: 6,163
    edited September 2017
    gimpod wrote: »
    [sic] So why spend $400 a month when $10 a month gets you the same thing with more flexibility.

    The only problem around here is like @DarqueKnight posted we can't edit our own posts so we have to try and get one of the 2 Ken's to do it for us!.

    BTW, it was $400 a year, not per month, but it was lump sum payment due. Your way is definitely cheaper.

    The biggest issue is all the educative forum postings (all around the web) that have been ruined by this money-grab. I had stuff at a dozen or more forums. All gone now. I see the same thing at the various car forums, computer forums, you name it. Many forums don't let you edit old postings and even if they did, who has the time to go back and edit hundreds of posts to update links?

    Photobucket has ruined the internet!
    Ok, perhaps a little dramatic, but it sucks.
    For rig details, see my profile. Nothing here anymore...
  • SCompRacer
    SCompRacer Posts: 8,350
    edited October 2017
    FWIW, there is a Chrome extension that adds a download button to your Photoshop albums. Photobucket Album Downloader, a free version and unlimited version for two bucks. Works great if you have a lot of albums/photos to download.



    46w2yn7o8a5a.jpg
    Salk SoundScape 8's * Audio Research Reference 3 * Bottlehead Eros Phono * Park's Audio Budgie SUT * Krell KSA-250 * Harmonic Technology Pro 9+ * Signature Series Sonore Music Server w/Deux PS * Roon * Gustard R26 DAC / Singxer SU-6 DDC * Heavy Plinth Lenco L75 Idler Drive * AA MG-1 Linear Air Bearing Arm * AT33PTG/II & Denon 103R * Richard Gray 600S * NHT B-12d subs * GIK Acoustic Treatments * Sennheiser HD650 *
  • BlueFox
    BlueFox Posts: 15,251
    So, how are they doing after this price increase? Still in business?
    Lumin X1 file player, Westminster Labs interconnect cable
    Sony XA-5400ES SACD; Pass XP-22 pre; X600.5 amps
    Magico S5 MKII Mcast Rose speakers; SPOD spikes

    Shunyata Triton v3/Typhon QR on source, Denali 2000 (2) on amps
    Shunyata Sigma XLR analog ICs, Sigma speaker cables
    Shunyata Sigma HC (2), Sigma Analog, Sigma Digital, Z Anaconda (3) power cables

    Mapleshade Samson V.3 four shelf solid maple rack, Micropoint brass footers
    Three 20 amp circuits.
  • nguyendot
    nguyendot Posts: 3,594
    anyone tried to use their app? It crashes constantly.
    Main Surround -
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  • mhardy6647
    mhardy6647 Posts: 32,926
    SCompRacer wrote: »
    FWIW, there is a Chrome extension that adds a download button to your Photoshop albums. Photobucket Album Downloader, a free version and unlimited version for two bucks. Works great if you have a lot of albums/photos to download.



    46w2yn7o8a5a.jpg

    So, this is the one I saw on Chrome for $1.99?
    It seems like it might be worth it to pull back the stuff I uploaded to those cretins... even though, somewhere, I do have it all backed up. :)

    I actually looked @ Photobucket this AM and the "download album" seems to be gone from my account now, anyway. It had stopped working a while back. On the bright side, I did actually manage to d/l the 1.1k-ish photos of the NH house under construction after the ransom notes went out. :|

    ... and (needless to say) I do need to cancel my account there -- and I shall :)
  • msg
    msg Posts: 9,308
    Every time I see the post count tick up on this thread, I think it's gonna be because someone's reporting that PB has reversed their decision and the Internet is back in equilibrium.

    But, no.
    I disabled signatures.
  • mhardy6647
    mhardy6647 Posts: 32,926
    ain't a gonna happen...
  • SCompRacer
    SCompRacer Posts: 8,350
    edited October 2017
    mhardy6647 wrote: »

    So, this is the one I saw on Chrome for $1.99?

    Yes sir, one and the same!

    My backups were spread across three computer backups so I wanted all my photobucket albums in one place. The app was a great help.

    At first I thought the app was a little buggy. It downloads the pictures in a zipped folder. You can tick a box in the app window that opens the zipped folder after it downloads. Or not.

    Upon unzipping, every now and then I'd get a couple blank icons, no pictures. So I'd go to the photobucket album, click on the pic I am missing, and get that darn upgrade to hosting image or whatever it said. The picture is gone. Click on the forward button, I get the next picture in line. Click on the previous button, get the previous picture in line. I come to work, I click on that same album and same picture I'm missing, and I get the picture and am able to download it.

    It's like they are trying to make it harder than it should be to get your images back.
    Salk SoundScape 8's * Audio Research Reference 3 * Bottlehead Eros Phono * Park's Audio Budgie SUT * Krell KSA-250 * Harmonic Technology Pro 9+ * Signature Series Sonore Music Server w/Deux PS * Roon * Gustard R26 DAC / Singxer SU-6 DDC * Heavy Plinth Lenco L75 Idler Drive * AA MG-1 Linear Air Bearing Arm * AT33PTG/II & Denon 103R * Richard Gray 600S * NHT B-12d subs * GIK Acoustic Treatments * Sennheiser HD650 *
  • mhardy6647
    mhardy6647 Posts: 32,926
    edited October 2017
    SCompRacer wrote: »
    mhardy6647 wrote: »

    So, this is the one I saw on Chrome for $1.99?

    Yes sir, one and the same!

    My backups were spread across three computer backups so I wanted all my photobucket albums in one place. The app was a great help.

    At first I thought the app was a little buggy. It downloads the pictures in a zipped folder. You can tick a box in the app window that opens the zipped folder after it downloads. Or not.

    Upon unzipping, every now and then I'd get a couple blank icons, no pictures. So I'd go to the photobucket album, click on the pic I am missing, and get that darn upgrade to hosting image or whatever it said. The picture is gone. Click on the forward button, I get the next picture in line. Click on the previous button, get the previous picture in line. I come to work, I click on that same album and same picture I'm missing, and I get the picture and am able to download it.

    It's like they are trying to make it harder than it should be to get your images back.
    First, thanks! I think even I can justify a $1.99 investment ;)

    Second: Yup, on all counts. I hope their descent into total irrelevance and obscurity is swift and painful. (and I'm not usually all that vindictive of a guy...)

    I will note that, back when PB itself allowed one to download a whole 'album', the result was a ZIP file. That is, the one time it worked for me :/

    I will also note that, when a specific photo is being held "third party" hostage, I've found that I can download the individual image (despite its being invisible, even to me via PB) and the downloaded file (JPG) is - usually - readable.

  • DarqueKnight
    DarqueKnight Posts: 6,760
    I used the Chrome app (paid version) to download all my albums. Everything downloaded and unzipped without a hitch.

    I no longer see the download option on my Photobucket account, although it was there last summer when the ransom demands began.
    Proud and loyal citizen of the Digital Domain and Solid State Country!
  • F1nut
    F1nut Posts: 49,708
    The ransom demand didn't work out well for Photobucket. They supposedly have a new management team and are now offering a yearly subscription for $19.99.

    I think they will have a very hard time getting folks to come back.
    Political Correctness'.........defined

    "A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."


    President of Club Polk

  • txcoastal1
    txcoastal1 Posts: 13,124
    They may get a surge of people signing up for $20 just to gain access to their files

    But I'm sure most will be reluctant to use their services
    2-channel: Modwright KWI-200 Integrated, Dynaudio C1-II Signatures
    Desktop rig: LSi7, Polk 110sub, Dayens Ampino amp, W4S DAC/pre, Sonos, JRiver
    Gear on standby: Melody 101 tube pre, Unison Research Simply Italy Integrated
    Gone to new homes: (Matt Polk's)Threshold Stasis SA12e monoblocks, Pass XA30.5 amp, Usher MD2 speakers, Dynaudio C4 platinum speakers, Modwright LS100 (voltz), Simaudio 780D DAC

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