The Conn Family Moves To FlickR and YouTube
Angie and I have finally decided to go completely digital and web based. When we first met, I used to take pictures using a 35MM camera. At the time, I thought I was cool because I would take the extra time to scan all the photos into my computer using a flatbed scanner. Eventually we moved on from 35MM cameras to digital cameras. I would say for the last 6 years we have been using digital cameras and for or the last 4 years we have been creating digital video snippets and short movies. Over the years, these pictures and videos have been stored on our various computers and CDROM / DVD backups.
Unfortunately, as our existing computers age and get older we eventually purchase new computers and the migration process of transferring our family pictures and videos over to the newer computers gets more difficult each time as the volume of the total files continuously increase. We only have partial backups of everything on CDROM / DVD and to be quite honest, our archives really aren’t too organized.
This has been creating a little bit of stress for me as I am always worried about losing our valuable pictures and videos. I really and truly don’t know if this is the best option, but it sure does seem so. I have started the process of transferring all of our family pictures and videos of 10+ years into FlickR and YouTube. I am real excited to do this, my only concern is that I am a little worried that maybe there will come a day when FlickR and or YouTube may discontinue their service. It’s hard to say what will happen in the future, but one thing is for sure… it really seems very risk for me to keep our family’s photos and videos on our computers. Anything could happen to our computers at any given moment causing us to completely lose our albums.
I am sure that there are some risks to using FlickR and YouTube, but I am hoping that these risks are a lot less than keeping our files on our personal computers. As Angie and I migrate our photos and videos onto the net, we will be organizing them and then getting the proper media backups made.
What experience do you have with all this? Do you think Angie and I are going about this process the safest and most secure way? What are your thoughts… as we are totally open to your suggestions.
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Date/Time: 10-22-2007 03:21:41 Comment #5962
Garry,
You should look into Windows Home Server from Microsoft. It will back up your computers nightly and help protect that valuable data on each computer. On top of that you can also use the Windows Home Server as a file server and store those files in one location and serve them up to any computer connected to your home network.
Date/Time: 10-22-2007 03:34:59 Comment #5963
I appreciate the advice. You are recommending this in addition to uploading my stuff to FlickR and YouTube, right? (Offline backups)
We got quite a bit of sorting out and organizing to do… but once we have a system in place we’re going to stick to it.
Date/Time: 10-22-2007 04:19:41 Comment #5967
Honestly I upload my photos to myspace.
I haven’t really worked much with Flickr, but I do have an account. You know you might try uploading them to a CD, as a back-up plan.
Date/Time: 10-22-2007 04:41:19 Comment #5968
Garry, unfortunately I’m not the sort who stores my life memories myself in any form except for the written word. But if I were you, and me being the old traditional fogey, I’d still go with offline backup in the form of CDs/DVDs and a few more copies on other forms of data storage. Like you said, if one day Flickr or YouTube goes out of fashion and business-wise aren’t worth their investment anymore, I’d be scurrying to retrieve my memories - if they were not already wiped out.
Date/Time: 10-22-2007 10:20:59 Comment #5975
YC,
Thanks man… See, that is really my biggest concern. Don’t know if you remember this movie, Escape From LA back in 1996, but at the end of the movie Kurt Russell basically uses the huge device that sends out this huge pulse energy signal that destroys everything technological. (computers, radios, etc..)
LOL!! Not saying anything like that will happen in real life… but heck, you never know! So, yes… you are right, its great to upload to the dot Com world, but it would be in our best interest to complete our off line back ups. Thanks man!
Date/Time: 10-22-2007 15:21:18 Comment #5980
I just have everything on my Seagate storage thingy that hold 350 gig. When I fill that one up I guess I will just get a bigger one.
Date/Time: 10-22-2007 20:42:37 Comment #5986
Hmmm, I’m thinking external device. Unless you really want to share them or be at risk of being shared without your permission, then maybe putting them on Flickr isn’t the way to go. Not that I’ve heard anything negative about Flickr, but the way I see it, you’re leaving your content open for the possibility of being taken.
Why not store it like DayJobNuker says and use something like Picasa?
Date/Time: 10-23-2007 06:31:05 Comment #5991
This is a great idea Garry . Even i have been thinking about it for quite some time now but the thought of scanning my old photographs keep me down. If you want to share the photos with others , then flickr is a good choice and i think you can even make your album private in flickr.
Date/Time: 10-23-2007 09:50:40 Comment #5994
You’re most welcome, Garry - come to think of it - oft-said that storage is now sooo cheap - if you reckon the photos and vids are really dear to you, I don’t see why you shouldn’t keep more than a copy of each, together with u/l them on to Flickr and YouTube. At the end of the day, you just need time to do everything
Good luck!
Date/Time: 10-27-2007 11:02:45 Comment #6056
Don’t depend on an external drive. THey are as fallable as internal hard drives. I recently lost the original versions of all my art image files that were on an external drive.
Many web hosting sites have lots of free storage. Check out dreamhost.com. You could get a domain and have no index page and just store all your files there.
My 2 cents.
Date/Time: 12-5-2007 10:13:38 Comment #6993
RE: “Hmmm, I’m thinking external device. Unless you really want to share them or be at risk of being shared without your permission, then maybe putting them on Flickr isn’t the way to go. Not that I’ve heard anything negative about Flickr, but the way I see it, you’re leaving your content open for the possibility of being taken.
Why not store it like DayJobNuker says and use something like Picasa?”
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Because I think is not a good idea.