Problems with PhotoBucket deleting my photos in many of my posts.

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Hi All,

As many of you may know "Photobucket"  has changed their rules and no longer allows adding pictures stored on their site to the web or to forum posts, unless you pay them $399.00 per year  to subscribe to them.  This was done with no meaningful warning, and I cannot afford their high price to allow you to access the photos.  It is almost like blackmail to me.

As a result I am sorry to inform you that "PhotoBucket"  has now deleted all my photos in the many posts I have made using their site.  This has finally hit my post at the top of the Large Scale Forum entitled: "Big Hauler Set instructions, plus Radio controlled sets. 4-6-0 Repair Tips"   The only part affected was the part on the Radio Controlled set instructions.

I found a new site, and will no  longer use "photobucket" to illustrate posts. The R/C instructions are now back up, but the photos in many of my other posts are not.   I will try to get to them when I can.

Thanks for your understanding on this situation.

Loco Bill

Edited to show R/C instructions are back up.

[J. S. Bach]

What other service are you using? I know of "Flicker" but have no experience with them. I closed my PB account when this started. Note that your photos may still be on Photobucket, just not linkable.

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Hi J. S.,

A friend recommended IMGUR, so I tried it and it did everything Photobucket did and is free and relatively easy to you for an Old Fart like me.  I tried Flicker but was not happy with it, and it did not seem intuitive to me.

Photo bucket did not delete my pictures from my account, just made them unlinkable like you said.  Rather than grandfathering my existing links, they went in and deleted the links almost without warning.  They wanted $399 per year to keep my links intact which was a non-starter.   I will soon delete my account with them in protest.

Anyway, just Google IMGUR and create a free account and give it a try!!

Bill

[Plow_Bender]

I too am not impressed with Photobuckets recent change.  I've used them for years and now they pull something like this.  I too was taken by surprise considering there wasn't even any notice that this update was going into effect on such and such a date.  The big kick in the pants though is that they sent me a lovely little email telling me how much they appreciate me as a user and want to offer me a discount on my first year membership.  Yeah right...

Sadly a friend of mine over in the UK lost over 20 years of forum posts and blogs thanks to this recent change.  I'm fortunate not to have that problem myself, but I should look into making a new account on another site incase I ever need to post photos on here again someday.  I know there's no law agents making a profit, but Photobucket has literally screwed themselves out of a lot of faithful users, not to mention their reputation...

-Rusty

[armorsmith]

Some day folks will come to the realization that 'Free' ain't free. What Photobucket has done to folks is effectively 'Ransoming' their photos, although if one reads the T's and C's of usage, Photobucket effectively OWNS anything you place in their storage....that is the HOOK to the free storage. Personally I find it difficult to understand why folks continue to look for a 'Free' service when the Photobucket scenario is only one of several services that were free and went pay for in the past and that will follow into the future.

I pay nominally $11.00 per month (a little over $130 per year) for my Godaddy web hosting services, guaranteeing my continued services so long as I pay the bill. I know what, when and where things are going to happen on my service, not to mention it is backed up religiously by Godaddy. I also maintain a multitude of CD/DVD and thumb drive backups of all my important photos and documents.

FWIW,

Bob C.

[mickeykelley]

I'm reading the same thing at a number of other forums like OldWillys, classic car forums, etc.

[Loco Bill Canelos]

What Bob says about "free" programs is correct.  Even the program I just switched to makes no promises about the future.   Even when you use a program that is a pay service, there is no guarantee they will stay in business.  Your own backup is critical no matter what you use!

As for my older posts using Photobucket, my policy going forward is that I will try to replace the images when a forum member tells me a post with the missing pictures is important to them, or of general overall interest. 

Bill