One day

[Barney]

One day my photos are there next day they have gone!! FOTKI are on the move and 20% of my photos will be missing for "a month or so" and they will do "there best" not to lose any photos on their move I hate vague statements like this anyone else lost any photos for a month or so !!
Barney                                                                 

[TRAINS1941]

Just checked mine Barney.  There gone to.  Never was notified that they were moving and this was going to be a problem.

Jerry

[Don Railton]

Some of mine are gone.  Moving where?

Don

[mabloodhound]

That's why it's best to post your photos directly to this forum.   They'll never get lost that way.
But I know some of you like Fotki for whatever reason.

[Seattle Dave]

They are moving the last of their servers to Estonia, according to the notice that I received.

I dunno, but I do have a little more confidence in them now that ALL of my previously missing photos after Sandy slowly re-appeared over time.  Last time I checked, there was only a single one missing, and I honestly cannot recall if I might have deleted that one myself!

Looks like one of life's minor inconveniences....

Dave

[eTraxx]

http://journals.fotki.com/fotkicom/fotkiblog/entry/wsqbqgwrwddws/

[Chuck Doan]

They had a notice of this at the top of the screen for a month or so. I didn't believe their Hurricane Sandy excuse for the missing photos last year (six months plus to restore), BUT, they did come back finally. I think Fotki is struggling, Facebook and Instagram and all the rest of the many newer services are likely causing a reduction in customers. I still like the simple format for my pictures. Hopefully they will return again.

Nothing digital is certain. Flickr changed formats a few months back and I have yet to find a PC based browser that works well with it. Before the change I had no problems at all on the site. Smugmug has the same format, and I have no issues there. A huge fail in my opinion.

[finescalerr]

I hope you guys have backed up all your photos on disks and drives at least twice. Software manufactures keep touting the "cloud" but it would seem other people (i.e., businesses) have far less interest in preserving your stuff than you do. If ANYTHING is important (including a business), be certain you have as much direct control over it as possible. -- Russ

[Ray Dunakin]

After having two previous online photo hosting sites go belly up (the first one didn't even let people recover their pics), I vowed never to depend on any other site like that again. That's why I got my own domain and website -- and of course keep the original files + backups. Even if the company that hosts my site ever folds, I can just move it somewhere else and still keep my domain.

[lab-dad]

I have used photobucket (for  modeling posts) for years without a single hiccup.
(now watch I will have an issue)
At home I have a dual disc external hard drive.
For my photography biz I do what Ray does.
If it is important you better have several back ups! And hard copies.
-mj

[finescalerr]

Answer: Go to Costco and buy a three or four terabyte external disk drive or two. The cost is about $120 each. They plug into your computer's USB port. Back up everything on each.

But that's expensive!

Yes, so is health insurance, but if you've ever been to a doctor you know why you need it. And without it one trip to the hospital could bankrupt you.

Won't a DVD work?

Yes, but it doesn't hold much. Photos can take up a lot of space. But if your photos are low res and a few DVDs do the job, go for it.

Seems like a hassle.

Yep, but it's a worse hassle to lose everything.

Russ

[nk]

Russ you are 100% right.

[Mobilgas]

Talked to someone at Best Buy today about a external disk drive and they were saying Western Digital is a good brand has good reviews and warranty....but cost a little more at 150.00 for a 3 terabyte....to get in the 120.00 range at Costco it would be a cheaper brand??

[finescalerr]

In our area, Costco carries Seagate external drives. The tests I've seen rate them equal to WD, sometimes ahead. I have two hooked up to the computer I'm using to write this and they have worked perfectly since I bought them. I just picked up a new one to replace the older just to be sure. Costs a lot less than car, homeowners, or health insurance! -- Russ