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Google Cloud Data Storage

Google Photos Launches With Unlimited Storage, Completely Separate From Google+ 175

Posted by timothy from the delete-is-the-hardest-key-to-press dept.
An anonymous reader writes with a report that Google yesterday announced at its I/O conference a photo-storage site known as Google Photos. Says the article: The new service is completely separate from Google+, something Google users have been requesting for eons. Google is declaring that Google Photos lets you backup and store "unlimited, high-quality photos and videos, for free." It's a bit creepy to see all the photos that Google still has on tap, including many that I've since deleted on my phone.
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Google Photos Launches With Unlimited Storage, Completely Separate From Google+ More

Google Photos Launches With Unlimited Storage, Completely Separate From Google+

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  • that's what spy agencies do (Score:5, Insightful)

    by martin-boundary ( 547041 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @05:40AM (#49804167)

    It's a bit creepy to see all the photos that Google still has on tap, including many that I've since deleted on my phone

    That's what spy agencies do. They keep your photos for 20 years after you've already forgotten about them, and then POW. When you step out of line and vote for the wrong person or support the wrong cause, they'll dredge them back up, and blackmail you on the basis that you were sitting together in the same bar as a known bad guy one day while you were both in college.

    TANSTAAFL.

    • Re:that's what spy agencies do (Score:5, Funny)

      by MobileTatsu-NJG ( 946591 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @10:26AM (#49804861)

      Pftbt, I'd be impressed if any Google service lasts 20 years.

      • Pftbt, I'd be impressed if any Google service lasts 20 years.

        Just because they shut down Reader doesn't mean they threw the dataset away.

    • When you step out of line and vote for the wrong person or support the wrong cause, they'll dredge them back up, and blackmail you on the basis that you were sitting together in the same bar as a known bad guy one day while you were both in college.

      "Oh, yeah, that's me and Hitler. He was one angry MF, believe me, but it was kinda fun to listen to him rant, at least until he tried to take over Munich. Got any old photos? How about that one of me and Marlene Dietrich? Whaddya mean that never happened?"

  • No thanks (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 30, 2015 @05:44AM (#49804177)

    I'd rather just use Flickr or write my own little CMS. Google, you're a bloated, shitty company now. You release flop after flop and have ruined or killed all your older good products. Your social hubris has humiliated your reputation. 10 years ago I'd be excited about this news. Now I simply don't even care.

    • Amen to that (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 30, 2015 @05:59AM (#49804219)

      Try the new Google maps, when you embed it, it now only has one view onto a map (rather than one view per embed) and any selected market is lost.

      Switch between street view and maps view and the location your street view is gone.

      Stuff is hidden, what your maps? You click the cursor on search, and wait and a little menu 'My Maps' will drop down.
      Want to edit your maps? Well you have to switch to the original map then edit, and in that edit mode you lose Satellite view now.

      It's shite.

      Android they're only just adding fingerprint and multi-window, split keyboard, and USB file browsing, whereas Samsung has had these for years.
      It still doesn't play nicely with network drives insisting you store your stuff in Google spy cloud.

      Face it, they have jumped the shark.

      • Google bought QuickOffice, which has been a third party office compatable since the PalmPilot days, and reconfigured it to only load files from Google Drive. Forget about using it with the files you have on your SD card. "SD card??? What is that? You're not supposed to have an SD slot. You're just being all obsolete!"

  • Ner ner! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by simplypeachy ( 706253 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @05:51AM (#49804187)

    Backup...using a Google service? I prefer my backups to be reliable and private, thank you. Although hard drives do occasionally tell me "Hey, you've got a week to get your shit off me, ner ner!", at least they can't help it.

    • Backup...using a Google service? I prefer my backups to be reliable and private, thank you. Although hard drives do occasionally tell me "Hey, you've got a week to get your shit off me, ner ner!", at least they can't help it.

      But it IS reliable and private. It's only NOT private when you take the "Free" options. I've been using Google Photos for backing up my entire families photos (80gig and climbing) for years. It costs me a $1 and is as complicated as checking a box on each of our phones.

      If you want something else... ok write it and stop bitching.

      • Re:Ner ner! (Score:5, Informative)

        by chihowa ( 366380 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @08:08AM (#49804485)

        But it IS reliable and private. It's only NOT private when you take the "Free" options.

        [citation needed]

        From the Terms of Service [google.com]:

        When you upload, submit, store, send or receive content to or through our Services, you give Google (and those we work with) a worldwide license to use, host, store, reproduce, modify, create derivative works (such as those resulting from translations, adaptations or other changes we make so that your content works better with our Services), communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content.

        Neither that, nor their Privacy Policy [google.com] mention any exceptions for Photos if you pay for them. Where did you get this idea?

        • a) Think of everything people expect a photo hosting service to do. How to you think you can legally do them without those permissions?
          b) Nothing in there refers to public posting that the user did not request.

          • Re:Ner ner! (Score:5, Insightful)

            by iluvcapra ( 782887 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @02:50PM (#49805913)

            Think of everything people expect a photo hosting service to do. How to you think you can legally do them without those permissions?

            The demands they make are ridiculously broad, not only do they ask for the right to take anything you upload and repurpose it in whatever way they please, they even demand this on the part of their partners, "those we work with." A picture (which you thought you deleted) of you and your ex-girlfriend at the zoo appears on a Samsung phone in an ad? Covered under the agreement. Can you tell me any other photo sharing service that demands this?

            Apple's language on this point is instructive:

            2. Changes to Content. You understand that in order to provide the Service and make your Content available thereon, Apple may transmit your Content across various public networks, in various media, and modify or change your Content to comply with technical requirements of connecting networks or devices or computers. You agree that the license herein permits Apple to take any such actions.

            That's it, that's all you need.

            Really important point: someone who holds media for someone else doesn't need to obtain any kind of license. You only need a license if you want to be able to make copies of something and put them in public for your own purposes.

            • "they even demand this on the part of their partners"

              Because otherwise they would never be able to add anything that involved anyone else ever without asking for new permissions at any change and supporting all possible combinations of acceptance and rejection. Want to add an "Export to Facebook" bridge? Can't do it, no license. Want to apply Instagram filters and bring it back into Google Photos? Can't do it, no license.

              That bit of Apple's license is only good by itself if they don't interoperate with anyt

              • No they need at license to do that for any purpose. You want to send a link to someone for a picture you have in Google Photos? If someone follows that link that's a public display and Google needs a license to show the picture to them or else it is a copyright violation.

                Copyright doesn't work like that, if you send a link to someone you are the one making the copy, not Google. All of the technical operations Google performs on your behalf are copies you are making, with Google as an agent; if you distribu

        • Selective much? You missed the sentance before:

          You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours.

          and particularly the sentance immediately after:

          The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our Services, and to develop new ones.

          So no, they can't do anything they like with your content. Worst they can do is use it in an ad for the Photos service, or use it in a training dataset.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by chihowa ( 366380 )

            Did you even read my post? I was contesting the idea that paying for service from Google gets you any different treatment than using their "free" service.

            The post to which I was responding, which I explicitly quoted said:

            But it IS reliable and private. It's only NOT private when you take the "Free" options.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

            The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our Services, and to develop new ones.

            So no, they can't do anything they like with your content. Worst they can do is use it in an ad for the Photos service, or use it in a training dataset.

            And what part of and to develop new ones in that sentence you quoted are you unclear about?

            If they decided to launch a Google dating service, those photos could very well be used to help "develop" it (i.e., pre-populat

    • I prefer my backups to be reliable and private, thank you.

      Privacy is a valid concern. However...

      Although hard drives do occasionally tell me "Hey, you've got a week to get your shit off me, ner ner!", at least they can't help it.

      I've had HDDs give me warning, and I've had HDDs fail without any warning. People have gone to their backups and found them unreadable. People have lost their tape drives, bought another one, and found out that their old tape drive was fracked and creating tapes that no other drive could read. It takes a tiered backup solution to be more reliable than Google, who will almost certainly give you months of notice before they take down a service.

      • > I've had HDDs give me warning, and I've had HDDs fail without any warning. People have gone to their backups and found them unreadable.

        Absolutely agree here - a backup is only as good as the system used to validate it. But as we've seen since this service was mentioned, Google have already been found to be re-processing the images sent to it (I've seen mention of RAW images which were quite significantly compressed), so they're just as good/bad from a backup integrity point of view.

        At least one can mon

  • Until Google closes it... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by John Allsup ( 987 ) <slashdot.chalisque@net> on Saturday May 30, 2015 @06:03AM (#49804225) Homepage Journal
    The trouble with the 'backup' claim is that a Google cloud service may suffer a permanent failure upon a behind-closed-doors business decision, with potentially little warning. If Seagate, say, could instruct your usb hdd to brick itself, would you use it for backup? The Cloud is convenient in the short term, but business reality means it must be thought of as 'may fail for no reason'.

    • The trouble with the 'backup' claim is that a Google cloud service may suffer a permanent failure upon a behind-closed-doors business decision, with potentially little warning. If Seagate, say, could instruct your usb hdd to brick itself, would you use it for backup? The Cloud is convenient in the short term, but business reality means it must be thought of as 'may fail for no reason'.

      wtf are you talking about? Name any other backup scheme that wouldn't suffer the exact same potential disaster? Even if you set it up yourself in your own house on your own network that could happen. The difference is Googles far less likely to have that sort of problem than the NAS you bought off Newegg did.

      If you REALLY wanted to protect your data, you'd back it up to both your house and google.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by itzly ( 3699663 )

      Good thing this is only used for photos, and not anything critical.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      When had Google ever shut down a service with little or no warning? They always give you plenty of time, typically a year, to move somewhere else. It's annoying, for sure, but it's not like a HDD dying and taking all your bits with it.

      I have maybe 100GB of photos. I could upload that lot in a couple of nights, or less than one day. As it happens I don't rely on Google to back my photos up, but if the encrypted cloud service I do use went down it wouldn't be a problem to move to a different one. It's only cr

  • unlimited, free? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MobyDisk ( 75490 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @07:12AM (#49804363) Homepage

    Hello! I am a company offering unlimited storage for no cost, and with no strings attached.

    Umm... no. Frankly, I'd rather pay someone just because then, at least there is a chance, that it is an honest deal.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hawguy ( 1600213 )

      Hello! I am a company offering unlimited storage for no cost, and with no strings attached.

      Umm... no. Frankly, I'd rather pay someone just because then, at least there is a chance, that it is an honest deal.

      Then pay them, they have a paid option too.

      • Then pay them, they have a paid option too.

        And do you think that paying them will stop them from killing this service too, when they get the urge? I say STAY THE HELL AWAY!!!

        • And if you think paying ANYONE is a promise against the service shutting down for business, legal, ethical, or just pure financial reasons, then you have obviously not been around long enough.

          Services come and go all the time, (payment means nothing).. so still keep some local storage around for when the inevitable shutdown, or price hike that scares you, or the terms of service you don't agree with, etc.. I think people forget that google (like all companies) are not doing these things out of the kindness

    • Which definition of "unlimited" are they using. The one where they start charging you after a certain number of GB? The one where they slow down your internet service after a certain number of GB? The one where they automatically stop you at a certain number of GB? Or is "unlimited" 15 GB, as I have seen elsewhere in this article? Surely it can't be the original use of "unlimited", meaning literally "without limit", which is no longer in use in the business world.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by itzly ( 3699663 )

      Umm... no. Frankly, I'd rather pay someone just because then, at least there is a chance, that it is an honest deal.

      Because dishonest tricksters never take money...

    • Oh hello, this is Google. No problem, I see you give value to the idea that a payed service gives you some control. No problem, I will also make available a paid service where all you get is that warm and fuzzy feeling (in disguise). Hopefully you now feel lots better G

  • What is on there already (Score:5, Interesting)

    by blackest_k ( 761565 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @07:41AM (#49804427) Homepage Journal

    I just went to the site and Its already got photo's of mine from yesterday to 2009. I'm sure most of those are only good for the bin. However it could be a good thing in some cases. Say you photographed something sensitive like the police using excessive force, well that can't be deleted from your phone now.

    on the other hand there are some terrible photo's such as when you accidentally click the shutter..

    you might want to check to see what you're sharing with google already.

    • Deleting most people's photos could be considered a feature, not a bug.

    • What the hell are you doing with your stuff? I've got an Android phone. I've got a Gmail account. I've got a 2 YouTube accounts. I take photos with my phone all the time, all of which are still on said phone. I have videos uploaded onto both YouTube accounts. I use Picasa on my PC to organize and tag photos that I took with both my phone, and my more expensive camera.

      I just checked Google Photos. Squat. There's nothing there. All my photos are safely restricted to my phone and computer.

      What the heck

      • well some of them are picasa web albums , there is also an autoback on android which works in the background. Google has its dropbox folder on each account and thats not picky over what it backs up i think i had a linux distro on one microsd card and most if not all the icons (around 1000) ended up in there.

        As another poster said it is a tad awkward to delete on mass the rubbish.

        I really don't have 'sensitive' photo's connected to google. though so saying be careful setting up chromecasts particularly for o

        • So basically, what you're saying is: "I uploaded a bunch of stuff to Google, and now GOOGLE'S GOT IT!!!!1!!111!1!1eleventy!1!!!"

          • not really i used picasa web albums as backup a while back and google synced up a bunch of stuff, mostly junk and now its been gathered together in google photo's.

            There is nothing there i am concerned about, other people may have more 'sensitive' private images that they may not want stored on google's servers.

            on the other hand people lose phones or have them stolen and mostly they are concerned about the lost photo's of grand children and stuff like that. for them it's a life line they probably didn't know

  • Picasa again? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    What? Where did Picasa go? Oh, right everything old is new again...thanks google!

  • A Data Point (Score:5, Interesting)

    by localroger ( 258128 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @08:20AM (#49804509) Homepage
    In case anyone wonders just how teh GOOG might use your photos behind your back...

    My wife uses gmail. I don't and have never had a google account, have never uploaded a photo to them or to any other web photo service. One day my wife asked me "What's that picture with your email, the Causeway?"

    A long time ago, before Google bought them, I created a YouTube account and uploaded a couple of time-lapse videos of my commute across the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway. And my contact email for that account was my yahoo email account. So apparently, when I sent my wife an email the Google gophers went scampering for an avatar, and having nothing else took the sample still for one of my YouTube videos and pasted that at the top of my incoming email.

    I'll leave it to others to speculate on just how this could have gone wrong. I could probably fix it since my old YouTube account has apparently been grandfathered in to a g+ or whatever account now, but I'm leaving it as is to remind me never to trust them with anything sensitive.

    • What limitations had you placed on that video you posted?

      Or was it really just publicly available to everyone, so you really have nothing justify your fears about privacy?

      • The video isn't embarrassing and is publicly available, but it's not "me." There is no way I would have ever deliberately selected a pre-dawn windscreen shot of the bridge I drive across in the morning as the avatar to represent my identity for completely unrelated email. In fact, without the context of the video it's kind of a puzzle what the picture represents at all. Considering the number of reasons people upload videos to YouTube, randomly selecting a shot to use for this purpose is an incredibly s

  • Till they're not.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LVSlushdat ( 854194 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @08:28AM (#49804533)

    Google is declaring that Google Photos lets you backup and store "unlimited, high-quality photos and videos, for free."

    Thats until they're NOT.... Google has a VERY nasty habit of cranking up these spiffy services, running them for a while, getting everybody onboard
      with them, then turning them off.... Stay away!! STAY FAR AWAY!!

    • Google is declaring that Google Photos lets you backup and store "unlimited, high-quality photos and videos, for free."

      Thats until they're NOT.... Google has a VERY nasty habit of cranking up these spiffy services, running them for a while, getting everybody onboard with them, then turning them off.... Stay away!! STAY FAR AWAY!!

      Meh.

      Google shut down a raft of lightly-used and virtually unused services when Larry Page took over as CEO. Google has never shut down a widely-used service (no, Reader wasn't widely-used), and also has a habit of providing plenty of notice and options for getting your data out of every service, especially those that are being shut down.

      So what's the worst case? You get a nice service for a few years and then have to download your photos and move them elsewhere. On the other hand, if this really does en

  • Google backup storage is 15 GB free shared across all Google+ products. Google docs, drive, photos, chats etc etc. Photos below 4MP (Says 2048 x 2048 instead of 4MP dont know why) resolution does not count against the quota. Higher resolution pics count against your quota. Storage price is 2$ per month for 100GB and 10$ per month for 1 TB. Need a credit card and auto recharge every month.

    The price is not bad, but auto charge every month is a pain. I usually don't leave any active credit card number attach

  • If You Find Them Creepy (Score:3)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Saturday May 30, 2015 @08:48AM (#49804587) Homepage Journal
    If you find it creepy that they keep your photos around forever, just disable the auto-backup feature in your android settings. I'm sure it's a complete coincidence that most default camera apps I've used over the years don't allow you to specify the external SD card as the location that pictures are stored.

    • If you find it creepy that they keep your photos around forever, just disable the auto-backup feature in your android settings

      Or just delete them when you don't want them kept any more.

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