what the Phuck Photobucket?

DoctorC · Post by **DoctorC** » Thu Jun 29, 2017 9:54 pm

So I just noticed that a lot of pics on the forum looked like..

I scrolled through to the last pic I posted on the forum (same link as above) and saw my pics were being blocked.
I'm tired so I'll just post the explanation I found...

Quote: from http://www.hobomama.com/2017/06/photobu ... -site.html
"A few days ago, without any advance warning, Photobucket sneakily changed its terms of service to disallow third-party hosting, or hotlinking, on nearly all of its plan tiers. Most people use Photobucket explicitly for the ability to link from images on Photobucket to other locations such as blogs and forums, so this seems like a baffling move.

Until you realize the scam that's afoot: The only way to get your images to show up again is to pay Photobucket $400, upfront, as an annual subscription to its most expensive plan.

Ah, I see. It's a ransom demand......Well, at least I could get my images off Photobucket, right? Nope. You heard me. I can't get my own photos off Photobucket. A decade's worth of blog photos are being held hostage."

So...the reviews I've done over the years, some that were fairly comprehensive....
http://forums.watchuseek.com/f45/fairly ... 16149.html

pretty much shot..
Where is Anonymous when you need them...

nope not enough...

still not enough..
:lazer:

nope

sad but true..

Post by **logan2z** » Thu Jun 29, 2017 10:18 pm

That really sucks. They should at least allow you to recover your own photos. Anyway, you may want to try the Way Back Machine internet archive. The page you linked above has been archived there, along with your photos (probably not the original resolution, though, depending on how you posted them):

https://web.archive.org/web/20161216143 ... 16149.html

sierra11b · Post by **sierra11b** » Thu Jun 29, 2017 10:33 pm

Strange.

My photos are all still live. For now

Photo bucket can have my last 8years of photos. Haven't paid a dime so more power to them, but in my experience the functionality of their site has been crap for a couple years... You'd have to be a fool pay $400.

Post by **snootydog** » Thu Jun 29, 2017 10:55 pm

Same here, at first I thought it was because of some of the birthday pics I post for you guys, they remove them on a regular basis but it appears it's all of my photo's. I also got the ransom e mail asking for $399.99 per year. Not happy

mikeylacroix · Post by **mikeylacroix** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 2:35 am

Guess all my older reviews r shot now

ChuckW · Post by **ChuckW** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 3:05 am

That really sucks, guys. Never used Photobucket because whenever I would follow a link to someone's photos there, I'd get a bunch of annoying pop-ups. Been using Flickr and Google Photos, plus Shutterfly for some older stuff, but I guess it's possible for any cloud storage to screw you over at any time.

jtbenson · Post by **jtbenson** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 5:25 am

...

ChuckW wrote: ↑
Fri Jun 30, 2017 3:05 am
it's possible for any cloud storage to screw you over at any time.

truth
it's been in the fine print of any free cloud storage agreement we've agreed to since they've existed
once you upload, they "own" the content

hoppyjr · Post by **hoppyjr** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 6:01 am

I was able to copy my photos using the iOS app, but I'm unable to delete them from Photobucket.

59yukon01 · Post by **59yukon01** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 6:18 am

So what's the purpose of PhotoButt anyway? Any picture I take backs up to my gallery stored on my phone, and also to Google Photos, either of which I can upload pics to forums thru Tapatalk.

raf42 · Post by **raf42** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 6:35 am

Well this sucks. I was lazy, had been using photofuckit for the last 8 months even though it was slow and had an annoying popup on daily use (did not notice the rest of the annoying ads because of my ad blocker).

Then they invalidate all linked images w/no warning (well they did send me an email last night - JUST before they disabled linking -WTF? Nice grace period).

They want $399/yr? $399? That's the first service tier that allows embedding images? Fuck that and them. Nice cash grab try. I hope zero people sign up for that.

If I had to pay a few $/month for such a service, I'd be absolutely fine with that (and I'd pick a better service anyway), but the way they did it and the cost is way out of line. I understand you get what you pay for, that service providers have costs associated with them, and these free services exist because they have other ways to monetize them and/or they hope you sign up paid plans to fit your needs.

This is just irritating to me, and likely far worse for many others. As pointed out, things like reviews and many, many other useful posts are now invalidated and useless.

We all know when you become obsessed with a watch/whatever you might want to buy you read all the reviews, threads, posts, leading up to the buy/no buy decision - it's half the fun. Now a chunk of that (minor as it may be) is gone.

I'd just (yesterday by coincidence) started to use imgur (was tired of the popups and slowness of PB), which for me at least works fine seems a whole lot faster.

gwells · Post by **gwells** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 6:50 am

$400/year is 2/3 what i pay for every single adobe app that exists.

Post by **BSears** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 6:59 am

I typed up a long ass, profanity laced diatribe post on this same thing two days ago and never posted it. I'm not wasting anymore energy on this fucking asshats. There may be, though very unlikely, a substantial number of copyright infringement claims since we retain the copyrights to our own photos and using an online host to save and share those that is now restricting access to material I own, is a big fucking problem. I can't even see more than a thumbnail of almost all of my PB photos now. There's no rhyme or reason, unless they are purposefully blocking only pictures previously linked. So now they are basically holding property I legally own hostage in exchange for money. I believe that is called extortion.

Post by **BSears** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 7:00 am

By the way I appreciate the advice to use Imgur. It is way better and I wish I had switched a long time ago.

JP Chestnut · Post by **JP Chestnut** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 7:05 am

BSears wrote: ↑
Fri Jun 30, 2017 7:00 am
By the way I appreciate the advice to use Imgur. It is way better and I wish I had switched a long time ago.

Photobucket sucked sooooo bad last time I logged on.

pbj204 · Post by **pbj204** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 7:05 am

This is great news! I've always hated Photobucket and now I have the motivation to switch.

cdnwatchguy · Post by **cdnwatchguy** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 7:09 am

I switched to Imgur a few months back. Way better than Photobucket. I have been able to save my images off Photobucket though but the original resolution is not there.

mvyadam · Post by **mvyadam** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 7:59 am

Yup, this is b.s., I would have paid a few bucks a month to keep the service, but $399? Going to spend the next rainy day deleting all my photos from these douchebags, I've been on Imgur for a while,just forgot about it, going to transfer some pix now...

Weird...just went to my sales post and the pix are there now,...they weren't this morning.......

Post by **toxicavenger** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 8:09 am

Save your pictures on imgur as hidden. If not people will be commenting on your photos since they are public on imgur. Then copy the BBCcode and post it on the forum. Easy

Bradystraps · Post by **Bradystraps** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 2:20 pm

toxicavenger wrote: ↑
Fri Jun 30, 2017 8:09 am
Save your pictures on imgur as hidden. If not people will be commenting on your photos since they are public on imgur. Then copy the BBCcode and post it on the forum. Easy

Thank you for this. Works like a charm and is simple as pie.

nweash · Post by **nweash** » Fri Jun 30, 2017 2:36 pm

Back when tapatalk still had Imgur intergrated there was a lot of quality loss in linked picture vs original. Is that no longer an issue?

DEMO · Post by **DEMO** » Mon Jul 17, 2017 8:19 am

Yep, I got the alert at the top of my album page when I logged onto PB to post photos the beginning of last week. I am a PB Plus member with an annual paid subscription. I get a ton of bandwith for all of my photos posted around the web (and no ads). PB tells me I have access to post photos until December of 2018. Then I will have to pay the increase....... I'm not paying that kind of $$$ just to post photos on the web. They must be smoking crack.

I literally have thousands of watch photos posted all over the web on various forums. It is interesting when I do a Google image search how many of my photos come up. All of them will be gone when the links are broken with PhotoBucket.

I am currently looking into registering with other image hosting sites that can handle large bandwidth. Then the pain will start of switching over all of my photos.

Post by **toxicavenger** » Mon Jul 17, 2017 9:11 am

DEMO wrote: ↑
Mon Jul 17, 2017 8:19 am
Yep, I got the alert at the top of my album page when I logged onto PB to post photos the beginning of last week. I am a PB Plus member with an annual paid subscription. I get a ton of bandwith for all of my photos posted around the web (and no ads). PB tells me I have access to post photos until December of 2018. Then I will have to pay the increase....... I'm not paying that kind of $$$ just to post photos on the web. They must be smoking crack.

I literally have thousands of watch photos posted all over the web on various forums. It is interesting when I do a Google image search how many of my photos come up. All of them will be gone when the links are broken with PhotoBucket.

I am currently looking into registering with other image hosting sites that can handle large bandwidth. Then the pain will start of switching over all of my photos.

The solution to this problem is to take shitty pics like I do.

Heuerville · Post by **Heuerville** » Mon Jul 17, 2017 5:39 pm

They are proper arseholes.. so many historical threads across the watch forum world are fucked. Imagine that x10000000 across all the other hobbies across the internet.

Basically it's a scorched earth exercise, grab whatever $ you can & fuck off.

dnslater · Post by **dnslater** » Mon Jul 17, 2017 6:13 pm

Heuerville wrote: ↑
Mon Jul 17, 2017 5:39 pm
They are proper arseholes.. so many historical threads across the watch forum world are fucked. Imagine that x10000000 across all the other hobbies across the internet.

Basically it's a scorched earth exercise, grab whatever $ you can & fuck off.

This is now a huge issue when doing research on old threads on any forum. Amazing how reliant forums are on Photobucket across the web. I wonder if Imgur and others are sufficiently monetizing their sites to prevent falling victim to the same issues in the future.

tattoo chef · Post by **tattoo chef** » Mon Jul 17, 2017 6:47 pm

dnslater wrote:
Heuerville wrote: ↑
Mon Jul 17, 2017 5:39 pm
They are proper arseholes.. so many historical threads across the watch forum world are fucked. Imagine that x10000000 across all the other hobbies across the internet.

Basically it's a scorched earth exercise, grab whatever $ you can & fuck off.
This is now a huge issue when doing research on old threads on any forum. Amazing how reliant forums are on Photobucket across the web. I wonder if Imgur and others are sufficiently monetizing their sites to prevent falling victim to the same issues in the future.

Thing is, if they had done $100 a year, most people would have done it to save the million +++ threads on forums and blogs etc. But $400 was just a big fuck you to everyone. I would love to know how many are actually paying it.

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