Photobucket?

[Donde]

I haven't been able to open Photobucket for a while now. Is it down for the count?

 

[AQS]

Other forums would seem to say that both tinypic and Photobucket are closed, others not.

When I try to access it, it won't load. So maybe it is down.

 

[Soocom1]

Photobucket was taken over by Fox interactive media group, then Ontela.

Ontela made the changes that everyone is complaining about including the per fee use, 500GB limit and high price.

Your best be is to find another outlet.

 

[TWX]

Any forum that I participate on that allows for native uploads to the forum, that's what I do. Always have. I've never trusted that third-party photo hosts will remain up or will continue to serve photos forever.

Sometimes that has meant uploading almost comically low-resolution or small-file-size pictures in order for the site to accept them, but an old thread on a technical matter with small pictures is still better than an ol thread with no pictures.

 

[Overread]

Photobucket basically dug themselves into an unprofitable mess and it seems are still suffering even under new management. I don't know what the current state is save that I've noticed some of their image links work and then sometimes they don't - so I'd wager even if they aren't dead they are in troubled waters.

That said youtube and flickr are also in trouble. The problem is the use of many free services grew so fast that their weight of use actually blew past their profit making ventures. Flickr is using a subscriber model but according their last community letter they are still not making profits - though there's more of an attitude there to preserving the site in a functional state and keeping it going rather than abandoning it (Smugmug bought them out and they appear to have a good handle on the concept of the site and what users want from it). Youtube is - eh - being a bit of a mess because they are trying to automate all their moderating which, from what I can gather, isn't working at all.


Anyway Photobucket bit the nail a while back and broke a lot of sites; many moved on, those that didn't much have held out; but in general its not good times. I tend to use imgur for my "random not photo" image hosting needs.

Of course the other option is to look into setting up your own website; the only downside being that most cost based on how much you use them, which is in part influenced by how many people access your content. so in theory if you become super popular (we can all dream) your costs go up.