How to Keep Your Photos Safe and Secure While Online Cloud Storage Services Disappear

Avoid online photo sharing shut down with HomePipe

I was surprised to receive an email a month or so ago from PhotoWorks to learn they are shutting down the site. It seems as though a number of multimedia cloud hosting sites are closing. Earlier this year, Yahoo! Video shut down as well. And sadly, there will be more.

As an amateur photographer and PhotoWorks subscriber, I had a limited amount of time to access my photos. PhotoWorks would give me a $30 certificate to buy merchandise if I transfer my photos to Shutterfly. According to the site, images not transferred to Shutterfly would be deleted. Great. I can’t buy a DVD archive of my PhotoWorks photos nor can I download them to my computer. But if I transferred them to Shutterfly, I could buy back my own images on a disc if I so choose. That’s what the $30 credit is for—to buy my stuff back!

Since January 2011, Shutterfly stopped allowing the viewing or downloading of high-res photos on the site. So I can upload my high-res photos to Shutterfly, but I am not allowed to download them again (see http://www.shutterfly.com/help/view_pictures.jsp#download). This puts a kink in using Shutterfly as my official backup plan. I can download a low-res version of my photos by right-clicking on the image, but it’s only suitable for viewing on my monitor, not for printing!

Shutterfly promises that they will “never delete [my] photos. Ever.” Ok, but that’s what I thought with PhotoWorks. I’m not sure there is a safe place in the cloud to keep my photos or videos.

Gregory Scoblete of Your Digital Life (http://your-digital-life.com), a digital media solutions site, agrees:

“...the demise of PhotoWorks is instructive: if you were counting on them to store your photos for the long-term, you’d have been disappointed. That’s why you should not ultimately rely on an online service alone to secure your photographs.”

Scoblete also brings up a very good point about online photo services—privacy (or potentially the lack there of). Every time we hand over a digital file to a service, no matter how reputable, we run the risk of that content being stolen or distributed by hackers. Let’s not forget WikiLeaks! If the government or credit card companies can be hacked, anything is possible.

So what to do? Enter HomePipe.

HomePipe is easy, fast and convenient. You never have to worry about your photos being deleted, transferring them to yet another online site or scrambling to download your files because your online photo service is closing down. You keep your photos and your memories safe and secure on your computer.

You always have access to your photos, music, videos, documents and you can share them with whomever you choose. With HomePipe, you can drill down to a specific folder to share with one specific person, group or distribution list. Now how cool is that?

And, it’s so easy to share your photos with family, friends and colleagues:

1. Once you’ve activated your HomePipe account, sign in and select the folder or file you want to share. Then click “Share This Folder” under the category “Folder Tasks.”

2. In the screen, complete the form by entering your name and the email(s) of those you want to share files with.

3. Just press the “Send” button at the bottom of the form and your email invitation(s) are automatically sent.

That’s it. It couldn’t be easier! Plus, HomePipe Lite is absolutely free for the occasional user. Sweet!

As Scoblete warns, why put your precious photos into a cloud service that may close leaving you high and dry? Choose HomePipe and keep your photos and your memories forever. Try HomePipe today at http://www.homepipe.net/web_signup.html.