"An open request to KniazSuvorov" Topic

Dear Mike,

The permissions on your photobucket account have changed, cutting off unauthenticated viewers (such as TMP pages like this one) from viewing the photos of your lovely work. This is a crime against humanity, and has a real impact on the quality of life of naval gamers everywhere. Please correct the issue.

Thanks,
- Ix

Hi Ix,

Photobucket is demanding $40 USD per month in order to enable 3rd-party linking (which is what TMP uses). I'm not paying that.

For the time being I'm just going to sit tight and hope that photobucket's dumb new policies fail, and they return to free full-service hosting. Failing that, I'll have to upload the pics to a different file host, or maybe resuscitate the old blog as a gallery dump.

The free internet is dead. Long live the free internet!

Feh. Sorry to hear that.

It sounds like you're actually being nice to Photobucket. The new charge was apparently a policy change made in "maximum jerk" mode, with little or no notice: link

Given the suddenness of the change and the steep rate ($40/month? Seriously?), I'm guessing this is a desperation move and the company is in trouble. I usually see customers abused like this when the ownership kicks out the last of the old management and hands over control to avaricious trolls with the mission to salvage some money for the investors. That's only a guess in a vacuum, not inside information, it just looks like suspiciously predatory behavior from a big service provider.

FlickR is still free. For now. ;-)

- Ix

The free internet is dead. Long live the free internet!

Yeah, ain't it the truth. Hopefully commonsense will prevail…

I usually see customers abused like this when the ownership kicks out the last of the old management and hands over control to avaricious trolls with the mission to salvage some money for the investors.

Sounds like an old employer of mine. Funny thing, they went under about a year ago…

The thing that really galls me about Photobucket's new policy is the "rich get richer" attitude.

I work with poor people in developing countries. Most of them finally now have internet access, as prices for basic data plans are reasonable, and old smartphones can be found for cheap. But Photobucket's pricing options essentially say "we only cater to rich people."

For sake of comparison, the minimum wage where I'm living now is about $250 USD/month. And a huge percentage of the workforce doesn't even make that, because they're reliant on paid-in-cash under-the-table work. Even the wealthier classes here would struggle mightily to pay $40 USD/month, for the simple reason that the exchange rate is so unfavourable.

The thing that really galls me about Photobucket's new policy is the "rich get richer" attitude.

I work with poor people in developing countries. Most of them finally now have internet access, as prices for basic data plans are reasonable, and old smartphones can be found for cheap. But Photobucket's pricing options essentially say "we only cater to rich people."

For sake of comparison, the minimum wage where I'm living now is about $250 USD/month. And a huge percentage of the workforce doesn't even make that, because they're reliant on paid-in-cash under-the-table work. Even the wealthier classes here would struggle mightily to pay $40 USD/month, for the simple reason that the exchange rate is so unfavourable.

KniazSuvorov have you thought about switching to another photo site?

This way you can move your pictures to the new site and people can see your pictures again.

The thing that really galls me about Photobucket's new policy is the "rich get richer" attitude.

I would bet money that this is probably the exact opposite of what is going on. This smells more like mining the customers for a last bit of cash, possibly in an attempt to temporarily boost the company's "book" value to drive up a buyout price.

No matter what the real story inside Photobucket is, ambushing users with a ransom demand will decimate their ranks and drive them away, not grow the business. Look for a new place to put your photos, this one is almost certainly done for as a free photo hosting service.

- Ix