Why your early 2000s photos are probably lost forever(bbc.com)
bbc.com
Why your early 2000s photos are probably lost forever
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20251212-why-your-early-2000s-photos-are-probably-lost-forever
73 comments
I've exported my entire photo collection from my iPad. Granted, it was on the smaller side. What I did was select all the photos, upload them to Google Drive, then download the resulting Drive folder onto my laptop. Terribly slow and hacky, and not something you'd want to do regularly, but as a one-off it worked well.
(I was getting rid of the device and simply wanted the entire collection of photos off it.)
(I was getting rid of the device and simply wanted the entire collection of photos off it.)
Messages, select user, click the user icon to get to the info page, click Photos, Edit, Select, Download -> photos are in the Photos app and you can do what you want with them.
Not the easiest operation, but hardly jealously prevented.
Not the easiest operation, but hardly jealously prevented.
yes, photos/camera roll is ok... if you mount an iphone as a usb device you get the DCIM/IMG_0000.jpg kind of thing.
But text messages are jealously guarded and not exportable. Apple does this for itself, not its users.
But text messages are jealously guarded and not exportable. Apple does this for itself, not its users.
"Probably" is doing a lot of heavylifting there. Digital backup discipline for consumers emerged way before digital cameras. We used to have backups in floppies, and then CD-R's, which were common and made physical backups very cheap. Not just data, we had to back up software too because we didn't have an app store to reinstall them from.
In the late 90's, advent of MP3 also made people focus more on digital backup strategies until Bittorrent came and people started believing that they could get things back anytime from an ethereal faucet. It wasn't so. The same happened with cloud. People thought their Google Drive was their backup. It wasn't so.
So, even the opposite could be argued: that people's digital backups got worse over the last two decades because they relied too much on third party virtual services that were not as reliable as physical media.
In the late 90's, advent of MP3 also made people focus more on digital backup strategies until Bittorrent came and people started believing that they could get things back anytime from an ethereal faucet. It wasn't so. The same happened with cloud. People thought their Google Drive was their backup. It wasn't so.
So, even the opposite could be argued: that people's digital backups got worse over the last two decades because they relied too much on third party virtual services that were not as reliable as physical media.
> … digital backup discipline for consumers …
You have a lot more faith in typical consumers than I do. I wouldn’t call any of those I knew in the 90s/00s “disciplined” with data backups, let alone the wherewithal to have considered software backups.
You have a lot more faith in typical consumers than I do. I wouldn’t call any of those I knew in the 90s/00s “disciplined” with data backups, let alone the wherewithal to have considered software backups.
Discipline not in a strict 3-2-1 sense, but more pragmatic
like “if I lose this, it’ll be too much trouble”. Everyone had a box of floppies or spindle of CDs for their backups. Backup was part of life because the cost of data loss was immense.
I backed up my photos religiously for years. From my first digital camera in like 1995. First to CD-ROMs, then DVD-ROMs, then hard drives, and I included online backups to Google Cloud (real backups via arq, not Google Photos).
My arq bot was running on my 2014 Intel Macbook Pro which would read the photos off my home server and back them up. (the server also being a local backup).
Then I got my M1 Mac and IIRC, arq didn't run there yet or required a newer version that was incompatible with the old or maybe I was just lazy. I don't remember clearly. That was 4 years ago.
Recently I thought I should really get that fixed and get my photos backed up again. My last 4 years of photos are not "backed up" to the cloud. They are backed up to my home server.
AND........ I'm starting to wonder if there is really a point. Do I really need those backups? A podcast I listen to went over how he wanted to leave his cherished books to his kids (all adults). But then he reflected that he didn't really want his dad's books and had the hard realization that his memories of his books are his and his alone and that his kids won't really want his books.
Similarly, my photos and the memories that go with them are almost all mine and mine alone and when I pass away, no one will want them. I actually scanned all of my grandmother's photo books, before she passed away. The majority of those photos have no meaning to me and she's not around to tell me what they are. Of course the ones close family are in have some meaning. Similarly, I scanned my dad's slide collection in like 2005 and none of the photos of him with friends or him with is 2nd wife have any meaning to me.
So, then my question to myself is. Do I really need to back them up more? To go through the trouble of setting up cloud storage, getting backup software working, dealing with the maintainance of that setup. If I lost them would it really be that bad?
Let me add, they are all uploaded to Google Photos, not as backup but as access, and phone based photos are also all auto-uploaded. I'd lose the origanziation I have in my personal backups, and the quality (don't have Google Photos set to full quality).
My arq bot was running on my 2014 Intel Macbook Pro which would read the photos off my home server and back them up. (the server also being a local backup).
Then I got my M1 Mac and IIRC, arq didn't run there yet or required a newer version that was incompatible with the old or maybe I was just lazy. I don't remember clearly. That was 4 years ago.
Recently I thought I should really get that fixed and get my photos backed up again. My last 4 years of photos are not "backed up" to the cloud. They are backed up to my home server.
AND........ I'm starting to wonder if there is really a point. Do I really need those backups? A podcast I listen to went over how he wanted to leave his cherished books to his kids (all adults). But then he reflected that he didn't really want his dad's books and had the hard realization that his memories of his books are his and his alone and that his kids won't really want his books.
Similarly, my photos and the memories that go with them are almost all mine and mine alone and when I pass away, no one will want them. I actually scanned all of my grandmother's photo books, before she passed away. The majority of those photos have no meaning to me and she's not around to tell me what they are. Of course the ones close family are in have some meaning. Similarly, I scanned my dad's slide collection in like 2005 and none of the photos of him with friends or him with is 2nd wife have any meaning to me.
So, then my question to myself is. Do I really need to back them up more? To go through the trouble of setting up cloud storage, getting backup software working, dealing with the maintainance of that setup. If I lost them would it really be that bad?
Let me add, they are all uploaded to Google Photos, not as backup but as access, and phone based photos are also all auto-uploaded. I'd lose the origanziation I have in my personal backups, and the quality (don't have Google Photos set to full quality).
I have a digital archive of photos going back to the 1930s, and have physical archives of negatives and slides preserved properly. Not everything is scanned, but it will probably remain on my "to do" list permanently. B/W 114 negs from my grandfather contain many unidentified and unidentifiable people, but there are also views of where I grew up 90 years ago.
I agree with you that a certain portion of images are no longer meaningful, but it's tough to say a-priori what those are. So keep them all. The real problem is that photos often have notes on the back, but digital images rarely have any metadata.
I foresaw this problem back in 2002 and have been using a time-oriented naming convention and keeping little XML files with notes. I posted a little rant about it back in the day and made some simple tooling, which has been good enough to keep some basic notes with my photos.
https://pixtag.org/
I agree with you that a certain portion of images are no longer meaningful, but it's tough to say a-priori what those are. So keep them all. The real problem is that photos often have notes on the back, but digital images rarely have any metadata.
I foresaw this problem back in 2002 and have been using a time-oriented naming convention and keeping little XML files with notes. I posted a little rant about it back in the day and made some simple tooling, which has been good enough to keep some basic notes with my photos.
https://pixtag.org/
This is just a guess, but I bet if your grandma's photo books had some sort of narration or her personal notes, you would have valued them more.
I've sometimes passed on sentimental keepsakes, only to long for them later. What seems pointless yesterday, suddenly has new meaning as I get older and gain new perspectives. In particular, my Mom passed a few years ago, and there are questions I wish I could go back and ask now that some time has passed. There are items I tossed that I wish I had at least snapped a picture of them for reference. I didn't understand the significance of certain documents in the moment.
Maybe the answer is to pick out stories that are important and include some sort of narration. Maybe the answer is to throw away the pictures without meaning and savor the ones with meaning, and make sure that meaning is recorded for your kids.
I've sometimes passed on sentimental keepsakes, only to long for them later. What seems pointless yesterday, suddenly has new meaning as I get older and gain new perspectives. In particular, my Mom passed a few years ago, and there are questions I wish I could go back and ask now that some time has passed. There are items I tossed that I wish I had at least snapped a picture of them for reference. I didn't understand the significance of certain documents in the moment.
Maybe the answer is to pick out stories that are important and include some sort of narration. Maybe the answer is to throw away the pictures without meaning and savor the ones with meaning, and make sure that meaning is recorded for your kids.
> when I pass away, no one will want them.
That's the point. I am lucky that I have kids and maybe they will like to take a look at some pics once in a while but certainly they won't go through ten thousands of images.
That's the point. I am lucky that I have kids and maybe they will like to take a look at some pics once in a while but certainly they won't go through ten thousands of images.
In 2006 I successfully copied all pictures off my Motorola Razr via Bluetooth to my PC in one go. Try doing that with your new iPhone Air. Who's losing old photos again?
It's actually quite simple to copy photos from an iPhone, even my mother-in-law does it regularly to save them, and prints some out as gifts.
Much easier (and faster) than the BT stuff from the Razr era.
Much easier (and faster) than the BT stuff from the Razr era.
[deleted]
Very easily.
Even without Apple software, connecting to a Windows PC with a USB cable, iPhone will present itself as a digital camera so you can import photos with the built-in Microsoft photos app or file explorer. You can also use Apple’s Windows software.
On Mac, even without iCloud, you can sync photos “the old way” just like iPod synced content used to do. The photos app will transfer photos over USB or WiFi and you can even have it automatically delete imported photos on your iPhone to free up space, mimicking the workflow of a digital camera.
The Photos app can export to plain files trivially, with a simple drag and drop.
There are also iPhone applications that automatically handle background imports (such as Ente and Google Photos). There are also numerous iPhone transfer apps that can integrate into the share sheet, the possibilities are basically endless.
There’s also AirDrop, or you can move files via the files app to any compatible cloud or local photos app.
Even without Apple software, connecting to a Windows PC with a USB cable, iPhone will present itself as a digital camera so you can import photos with the built-in Microsoft photos app or file explorer. You can also use Apple’s Windows software.
On Mac, even without iCloud, you can sync photos “the old way” just like iPod synced content used to do. The photos app will transfer photos over USB or WiFi and you can even have it automatically delete imported photos on your iPhone to free up space, mimicking the workflow of a digital camera.
The Photos app can export to plain files trivially, with a simple drag and drop.
There are also iPhone applications that automatically handle background imports (such as Ente and Google Photos). There are also numerous iPhone transfer apps that can integrate into the share sheet, the possibilities are basically endless.
There’s also AirDrop, or you can move files via the files app to any compatible cloud or local photos app.
I was surprised that exporting from Photos on iOS to an SMB share on a local network Just Works.
Wow! Thanks for cluing me in, I’m trying out “connect to server” in the files app now.
Obviously none of this is massively impressive to anyone who has used Android including myself, but a lot of the assumptions surrounding iOS and iPadOS being inflexible are somewhat outdated.
Obviously none of this is massively impressive to anyone who has used Android including myself, but a lot of the assumptions surrounding iOS and iPadOS being inflexible are somewhat outdated.
You anti Apple militants are weird man. It’s like a two click operation.
> You anti Apple militants are weird man. It’s like a two click operation.
When it works, yes.
Take photos -> connect to PC -> photos are not there -> go on Iphone photos app, look for them, look _at_ them -> connect again to PC -> they are finally there. Of course always giving the password. FY Apple.
When it works, yes.
Take photos -> connect to PC -> photos are not there -> go on Iphone photos app, look for them, look _at_ them -> connect again to PC -> they are finally there. Of course always giving the password. FY Apple.
I regularly export photos from Apple Photos on my Macbook. You just cmd-a cmd-c cmd-v. Sure its clunky but it works.
iPhone AirDrop works really well?
From a UX perspective Airdrop is super nice. I don't know if there are working implementations for other OSs. Just found this here but didn't yet test it https://github.com/seemoo-lab/opendrop (hasn't been updated in 2 years, so maybe not too promising)
I didn't find AirDrop to work very well while trying to airdrop only 1TB of photos/videos from my phone to my MacBook, YMMV. Not only was it really slow, but occasionally it seemed to freeze and there weren't really any meaningful progress indicators.
I don't think GP's 2006 Motorola Razr would transfer 1TB of photos especially quickly, either...
I somehow doubt anyone has ever experienced this problem with the 2006 Motorola Razr
Lot's not get ahead of ourselves. That's the other end of extreme opinion. Airdrop has never worked reliably for me.
Huh? I’ve been backing up my iPhone photos to my home server (running ZFS) since my first iPhone back in 2011. And Linux was my primary OS too. Not sure where that iPhone Air comment comes from.
Keep in mind bitrot is a real thing if you roll your own storage. While most cloud storage solutions store multiple copies of your data I'm not sure if all of them have a system that checks for and fixes bitrot.
I love my ZFS server as it handles all that transparently but that's really not an option for everyone.
I love my ZFS server as it handles all that transparently but that's really not an option for everyone.
I think I have some bitrot in my photo collection, there are a few pictures that seem to be broken, but it's far less than 1%. I'm fine with it. I could probably restore most of those images if I tried.
After I got my server going I transferred all my photos over and ran a utility overnight to check them for corruption, the name escapes me but it was an open source cli program. A small number of images were corrupted and the majority were replaced with thankfully pristine backup copies. The rest were restored with minor visual glitches.
Sad, really. My high school years were all on MySpace and I haven't seen them since. It did make me get more serious about personal data preservation as an adult though, so it's not all bad. And maybe some of those haircuts were better left to history.
Same here. I wish I could get the MySpace photos back. Alas, login has been scrubbed on their site
[deleted]
It's sad that Flickr doesn't get a mention in that story. The photos I have from that 2000s era are still around purely thanks to that site.
A bit too much drama for nothing - storage was never reliable, HDDs were dying since forever. So anybody serious with backups did multiple physical copies, which is a strategy relevant also today.
With that, nothing is lost unless facing a proper clusterfuck. Just checked my photos from 2004 trip to US where I bought my first digital camera, yepp all good across few older and one new HDD.
With that, nothing is lost unless facing a proper clusterfuck. Just checked my photos from 2004 trip to US where I bought my first digital camera, yepp all good across few older and one new HDD.
The article's point is that nobody knows this, which is true. This was a non-event for me too, as I just moved my entire dataset as I upgraded disks (and had backups) but I had multiple disks and was meticulous with having my data in one place, two things that basically no non-techie will do.
I've got plenty of pictures from that era, all carefully copied from disk to disk. Analogue pictures instead are more scarce (were costly to produce) and harder to archive
Analog pictures are really easy to keep in good shape. I have a family album that is more than 100 years old now, those pictures are still fine. The first color pictures from the 60s got a weird tint though. But nobody knows how good the colors were in the first place.
The digital photos are not my issue. Especially in the early 2000s the files were really small, super easy to copy. I've always moved them to a new laptop, I guess I have at least 8 copies lying around in different places.
More problematic are the first analog videos from the 80s, the magnetic tape now starts to rot, and it's not that easy to copy those.
I also have film from the 60s and 70s, this is slowly becoming an issue too. But honestly I don't care that much about those past memories from my parents and grandparents.
More problematic are the first analog videos from the 80s, the magnetic tape now starts to rot, and it's not that easy to copy those.
I also have film from the 60s and 70s, this is slowly becoming an issue too. But honestly I don't care that much about those past memories from my parents and grandparents.
Somehow I still have them all! Fun to revisit high school and some of my first PC builds. Lots of Jinx stickers, l337 hax0r cringe, WRT54G abuse… so glad I still have it all.
I've very carefully hoarded photos. I don't miss the photos, but I really miss the meta-data, more-so for scanned real photos. I loved photography back in the day, and so took a lot of film photos. Even having scanned them in I've ended up with meta-data around the scan or import date, rather than actual data.
And, anything from a digital camera will be missing things like GPS location, which phones include and I think is great. I've used location search so many times to find photos. I can't always remember when we went somewhere, but pretty often someone will ask about a photo from a trip to X place, and then location search finds it easily.
Photos themselves have bounced between iPhoto, Aperture, Photos, etc but largely remained intact.
The library is backed up to the usual 3 places: a local server (nightly rsync to a ZFS array), stored in iCloud, and in Backblaze, so hopefully safe. And of course, all are on my laptop too.
And, anything from a digital camera will be missing things like GPS location, which phones include and I think is great. I've used location search so many times to find photos. I can't always remember when we went somewhere, but pretty often someone will ask about a photo from a trip to X place, and then location search finds it easily.
Photos themselves have bounced between iPhoto, Aperture, Photos, etc but largely remained intact.
The library is backed up to the usual 3 places: a local server (nightly rsync to a ZFS array), stored in iCloud, and in Backblaze, so hopefully safe. And of course, all are on my laptop too.
I have a stack of old burned CD-Rs and DVD-Rs with old files, some of which are family photos. Success with pulling files off of them has been mixed. Some of the discs have visible pinholes in the reflective layer and others visually look fine but have scratched up surfaces.
Tooling and documentation for recovering damaged discs is sparse, which doesn't help matters. I've been meaning to try going to a local retro game shop to get some of the discs resurfaced but I'm skeptical that it'll make much difference.
As far as I'm aware those discs contain (or did contain) the only copies of a bunch of those files. There might be some old hard drives or CF cards kicking around the family house but I doubt it and even if there are, they've either since been wiped or have succumb to bitrot.
Tooling and documentation for recovering damaged discs is sparse, which doesn't help matters. I've been meaning to try going to a local retro game shop to get some of the discs resurfaced but I'm skeptical that it'll make much difference.
As far as I'm aware those discs contain (or did contain) the only copies of a bunch of those files. There might be some old hard drives or CF cards kicking around the family house but I doubt it and even if there are, they've either since been wiped or have succumb to bitrot.
"You" here being people who held digital assets themselves and didn't bring them into the future as their NAS was rebirthed across disk generations.
I am aware of in-filestore corruption of my files including images, and I know I have holes but the curation failure is more in 1984-1990 than after digital cameras entered my life and a scanner is rectifying some of that. But it's a road of tears regarding metadata.
More worrying is the failure inside cloud. Takeout from Google suggests some bitrot lurks in the assets there too.
That 1200bpi reel of tape, and the pre DLT tape cartridge are a worry: media may be OK, readers are rare and services doing recovery charge significantly more than "photo memories of granny" costs.
I am aware of in-filestore corruption of my files including images, and I know I have holes but the curation failure is more in 1984-1990 than after digital cameras entered my life and a scanner is rectifying some of that. But it's a road of tears regarding metadata.
More worrying is the failure inside cloud. Takeout from Google suggests some bitrot lurks in the assets there too.
That 1200bpi reel of tape, and the pre DLT tape cartridge are a worry: media may be OK, readers are rare and services doing recovery charge significantly more than "photo memories of granny" costs.
It's a BBC article, for a general audience.
Hard problem to solve as I guess people dont like the idea generally of spending $100 a year or so on an online backup plus have a physical backup.
Even though back in the day you would spend that on film and development as a light photo taker.
Even though back in the day you would spend that on film and development as a light photo taker.
I have all my photos back to my first digital camera in 2004. (Plus digital photos a few years further back - I used to use a service that developed and printed your film rolls and also delivered files on CD-ROM). The strategy of keep copying files to newer hardware remains undefeated.
Still, there are big gaps due to prevailing photo-taking habits. Unless you were seriously into photography, people took way fewer photos. Lots of posed pics of family and friends on special occasions, fewer of everyday life. I have like 2 pictures of my undergraduate projects.
Still, there are big gaps due to prevailing photo-taking habits. Unless you were seriously into photography, people took way fewer photos. Lots of posed pics of family and friends on special occasions, fewer of everyday life. I have like 2 pictures of my undergraduate projects.
If I wrote a similar article, its last paragraph would be a call-to-arms to save M-Disc, which the industry is - absurdly - abandoning.
M-Disc is the only real solution to preserving data a whole lifetime. It is the both the longest-lasting storage medium, and the most compatible.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC
M-Disc is the only real solution to preserving data a whole lifetime. It is the both the longest-lasting storage medium, and the most compatible.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC
I have some M-Discs and a writer and a I have written maybe two DVDs up to now (that's a lot of images, anyway). Let's see if their promises hold up.
From the Wikipedia page I can't see that the industry is abandonign the format. For sure it's not the mass market but Verbatim are still producing the discs, it seems.
From the Wikipedia page I can't see that the industry is abandonign the format. For sure it's not the mass market but Verbatim are still producing the discs, it seems.
> Blu-ray M-discs can be both written and read in most standard Blu-ray drives and are certified by the Blu-ray Disc Association to meet all current standard specifications as of 2019.
This is extremely interesting, I had no idea. Too bad it doesn't see more widespread usage.
This is extremely interesting, I had no idea. Too bad it doesn't see more widespread usage.
> "We totally lost all of our critical thinking skills "
This nugget was buried in the article, and seems appropriate. I don't get where the author is coming from. If one doesn't take some level of responsibility and modicum of effort to preserve and safeguard something valuable to them, then yeah, it might get lost.
I only lost photos when yahoo bought flickr and transitioned accounts. And that's where I learnt not to trust the cloud.
Not only for early 2000's, even now people routinely keep ALL their photos on their phones, without making any copies. Take a photo -> send to someone -> keep them forever -> delete when there's no space left, that's standard lifecycle, at least in my circle.
You must be extremely young.
Dude I loaded programs into ferrite cubes from perforated tapes, gtfo.
Really? Most people I know have either iCloud or Google Photos. Not that I prefer that approach, but it sure beats losing everything when you swap phones.
On the whole, I consider myself lucky to have lost data due to a badly configured 40GB HDD early in my digital life. I was so aggrieved that it inoculated me against data preservation complacency, and in the subsequent 25 years I haven’t lost a single byte.
As they say, every safety regulation is written in blood.
As they say, every safety regulation is written in blood.
Many, many moons ago I was finishing a uni. essay on an Amstrad PC that didn't even have a hard drive. The way I worked at the time was, type first, then save to a floppy disk, because the saving operation took something like 5 minutes.
The time was 10 p.m., I was done. I hit save. While the application was writing the file to disk, I decided to move the bulky monitor from one side of my desk to the other. Somehow while doing so I hit the power button (or took the power cord with me, I'm not sure). PC went off while writing operations were still on.
The file could not be recovered, and of course there was no other copy.
I spent the rest of the night recreating the essay from memory, and thinking I had been extremely unlucky.
I've never lost any file again, ever.
The time was 10 p.m., I was done. I hit save. While the application was writing the file to disk, I decided to move the bulky monitor from one side of my desk to the other. Somehow while doing so I hit the power button (or took the power cord with me, I'm not sure). PC went off while writing operations were still on.
The file could not be recovered, and of course there was no other copy.
I spent the rest of the night recreating the essay from memory, and thinking I had been extremely unlucky.
I've never lost any file again, ever.
shrug
I got my first digital camera in 2001 and still have all the photos from then as well as all the images I downloaded from the internet starting from 1991 through Usenet groups.
I scanned all of my dad's old photos going back to 1965 and have our family photos going back to the 1930's.
Everything is backed up twice and verify every file checksum twice a year.
I know not everyone is a computer expert but 1) we are on Hacker News 2) prebuilt NAS systems have a lot of these features now and can backup to another unit.
I got my first digital camera in 2001 and still have all the photos from then as well as all the images I downloaded from the internet starting from 1991 through Usenet groups.
I scanned all of my dad's old photos going back to 1965 and have our family photos going back to the 1930's.
Everything is backed up twice and verify every file checksum twice a year.
I know not everyone is a computer expert but 1) we are on Hacker News 2) prebuilt NAS systems have a lot of these features now and can backup to another unit.
> I know not everyone is a computer expert but 1) we are on Hacker News
This. Those arguing it's hard for their grandma: I can understand. Those arguing it's hard for themselves: there are probably better websites to frequent for them and I dispute their "hacker" status.
> Everything is backed up twice and verify every file checksum twice a year.
How do you do the checksum? Mine is added to the filename:
HDDs (offline and both on-site and off-site), SSDs, dedicated servers, server at home running ZFS, ...
I plan to buy used LTO tape gear too.
P.S: I still have source code from DOS stuff I wrote in 1991 so there's that.
This. Those arguing it's hard for their grandma: I can understand. Those arguing it's hard for themselves: there are probably better websites to frequent for them and I dispute their "hacker" status.
> Everything is backed up twice and verify every file checksum twice a year.
How do you do the checksum? Mine is added to the filename:
DSC_00219347-b3-7e282693a4.jpg
HDDs (offline and both on-site and off-site), SSDs, dedicated servers, server at home running ZFS, ...
I plan to buy used LTO tape gear too.
P.S: I still have source code from DOS stuff I wrote in 1991 so there's that.
Except, they're not.
They're in iCloud, backed up to my NAS at home, backed up to another cloud vendor, backed up to two different external hard drives, stored in separate locations, as well as archived on Blu-Ray M-Disc media, also identical copies, stored next to the external hard drives.
They're not exactly "great quality" most of them, us being early adopters of digital cameras (2000'ish), so 1.5 megabit, up to 3.5 megabit for our last "real" digital camera. There are some Canon EOS 500D SLR photos in there as well, but we continued to shoot our old an trusty analogue SLR cameras for years after that.
These days it's all phone pictures anyway. I don't think I have more than a handful of SLR quality photos of the kids.
They're in iCloud, backed up to my NAS at home, backed up to another cloud vendor, backed up to two different external hard drives, stored in separate locations, as well as archived on Blu-Ray M-Disc media, also identical copies, stored next to the external hard drives.
They're not exactly "great quality" most of them, us being early adopters of digital cameras (2000'ish), so 1.5 megabit, up to 3.5 megabit for our last "real" digital camera. There are some Canon EOS 500D SLR photos in there as well, but we continued to shoot our old an trusty analogue SLR cameras for years after that.
These days it's all phone pictures anyway. I don't think I have more than a handful of SLR quality photos of the kids.
> Blu-Ray M-Disc
Any brand/size of discs you recommend?
Any brand/size of discs you recommend?
I've been using Verbatim all these years, but truth be told, I'm considering stopping.
Blank media is becoming harder and harder to come by, and prices have increased to 2-4x of what they were.
For now at least, I have enough media to fill out the next couple of years, 1 year per 100GB disc, and we'll see where we are by then. My prediction is that it won't be any easier to archive to optical media by then. If you need proof, just check your local DVD/Blu-Ray vendor for latest copies of movies/shows.
I know Sony and others are working on 1TB size discs, but they're all "enterprise archiving", so probably not within price range of consumers.
Blank media is becoming harder and harder to come by, and prices have increased to 2-4x of what they were.
For now at least, I have enough media to fill out the next couple of years, 1 year per 100GB disc, and we'll see where we are by then. My prediction is that it won't be any easier to archive to optical media by then. If you need proof, just check your local DVD/Blu-Ray vendor for latest copies of movies/shows.
I know Sony and others are working on 1TB size discs, but they're all "enterprise archiving", so probably not within price range of consumers.
Back in the late noughties, my Dad had a NAS. I had a pretty chaotic life at the time and a big stash of old pics on a hard drive I knew could die at any point.
Dad offers to keep them for me. He's a sensible, stable chap. "Sure I say", and do a full backup of my old pictures and crap to his NAS.
Five years later, the HD is long dead, I'm more together and putting together a fresh setup. I recall the backup and figure I'll merge it with my current files.
He has no memory of the backup, nor ability to find it.
FML. Worst. Backup strategy. Evar.
Dad offers to keep them for me. He's a sensible, stable chap. "Sure I say", and do a full backup of my old pictures and crap to his NAS.
Five years later, the HD is long dead, I'm more together and putting together a fresh setup. I recall the backup and figure I'll merge it with my current files.
He has no memory of the backup, nor ability to find it.
FML. Worst. Backup strategy. Evar.
> As for the rest? Long gone, thanks to a dead laptop, defunct email and social media accounts and a sea of tiny memory cards and USB drives lost in the shuffle of multiple cross-country moves. It's like my memories were nothing more than a dream.
Welcome to ... backup. Now, blaming this on photos, is a bit counterproductive.
Welcome to ... backup. Now, blaming this on photos, is a bit counterproductive.
Lots of relatives lost a phone or access to an account and with it, all photos from friends, text messages to deceased loved ones, and more.
all this stuff should be exportable to multiple places for lots of backups on all kinds of media.