Photoshelter negotiates 38+ more hours for DRR “victims”… Hope Exists… BE QUICK!
I just got this press release from Allen Murabayashi the CEO of Photoshelter this morning. Seems like there is hope for those that have their images “trapped” on the DRR servers. Photoshelter has been in discussions with Diablo Management and they have been able to get them to extend the server “up” time for just a bit longer – YOU HAVE UNTIL 11:59 PM PST tomorrow (October 31st) to move your images off…
Hats off to Allen and Photoshelter for making this move – I’m sure that he and everyone and that industry sees that DRR shutting its doors w/o notice is not good for anyone in that (or our) industry… very smart PR move…
So move quickly… I wish you the best in throughput luck (may the data transfer gods be in your favor! I hope you all can get most of your stuff off of those servers in time!) It sure sounds like this is your very last chance to get anything off those servers..period (unless you know a judge…but I’m not going to get into that…)
PRESS RELEASE from Photoshelter:
PHOTOSHELTER CLARIFIES DIGITAL RAILROAD SITUATION WITH DIABLO MANAGEMENT GROUP:
COMPLETE DRR SITE SHUTDOWN PROBABLE AT 11:59PM PST ON OCTOBER 31
Photographers & agencies to get more time to save their work
New York, NY, October 30, 2008 – In an effort to bring some clarity to the Digital Railroad shutdown situation, PhotoShelter CEO Allen Murabayashi has engaged in multiple discussions with Diablo Management on behalf of the community of over 1,500 Digital Railroad customers. The outcome of these discussions is an understanding that more time will be provided for Digital Railroad customers to access their work. The official statement from PhotoShelter and Diablo Management reads:
“As part of the process of terminating the business operations of Digital Railroad, Diablo Management Group has informed PhotoShelter of their intent to shut down the DRR site as early as 11:59PM, PST, on Friday October 31. After this point, it is very likely that all the images located on the Digital Railroad servers could be permanently inaccessible. Given the strong possibility of this event, PhotoShelter, on its own initiative, is strongly suggesting that customers migrate their files from Digital Railroad immediately. Digital Railroad, at the present time, has no plans or resources to accomplish this task.”
Upon announcing the termination of operations on Tuesday, DRR stated it would provide only 24 hours of server access. Across the industry, this tiny window of time was deemed unacceptable. Although the extension through October 31 is brief, it will provide more time to help photographers find backup options and transition their online presence. This statement also represents the latest definitive information to be shared with impacted customers, directly from the group that is controlling DRR. Both parties stress that the situation is highly fluid and this deadline could be altered with little or no notice.
Since the announcement, PhotoShelter has welcomed DRR customers with a special 3-month free offer and ftp solution to help migrate their images. The offer can be found here: http://www.photoshelter.com/mkt/200810/drr.html.
PhotoShelter management encourages all DRR photographers to use this time extension to access their images and ensure backup using any chosen method. And, PhotoShelter calls on photographers industry wide to help contact peers travelling in the field who may not yet have heard the news.
About PhotoShelter Inc.
PhotoShelter is the online storefront and archive for thousands of serious photographers worldwide. The PhotoShelter Personal Archive provides state-of-the-art tools for image storage and protection, searchable galleries, slideshows, and ecommerce capabilities for instant online sales of prints and licenses. Photographers can create a professional PhotoShelter website in seconds using simple templates, or customize PhotoShelter to power their existing website. A true solution designed to make the business of photography easier to manage – The Personal Archive offers security, global accessibility, and advanced marketing tools so photographers can make their images work harder for them. To join our community, visit www.photoshelter.com.
All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
While I’m not affected by this, I appreciate your speed in putting this online for those photographers that will be affected by it.
Keep up the good work!
– Creighton
Vincent Laforet Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 10:56 am
You’re welcome – I’m just the messenger – thank Photoshelter.
Dear Former Digital Railroad Customer:
With the unexpected closing of the Digital Railroad business, Newscom and Mainstream Data have been receiving many calls from photo agencies and professionals like yourselves asking if there is anything we can do to help them – and do it quickly. The answer is Yes!
Mainstream provides premier hosting and distribution services, software development, and web platforms for prominent photo agencies including Thomson Reuters, Bloomberg, the European Pressphoto Agency, the German Press Agency (DPA), the Dutch Press Agency (ANP), the Spanish Press Agency (EFE), the Portuguese Press Agency (Lusa), UPI, and many photo plus video agencies like Splash News, AdMedia, Featureflash, Sipa Press, Ace Pictures, INF, and Jupiterimages. Moreover, unlike some of the other companies offering refuge for Digital Railroad customers, Newscom and Mainstream have been key players in this business for more than twenty years, are profitable, and offer you the security and functionality you need to be successful and to be able to sleep at night.
We provide both Internet FTP push delivery and hosted web portals for delivery of your photographs to subscribers, and we also operate the largest multi-agency marketplace for digital media in the world (Newscom).
Our managed FTP service is called MediasFTP; it is our automated FTP distribution system that reads the IPTC data out of your photographs, categorizes the photos for delivery to groups of users, and then simultaneously delivers the photos to your partners, customers, and agents at very high speeds. Our customers for this service include Sipa Press, AdMedia, Featureflash, Ace Pictures, and Splash News; they use this system to insure that their photos arrive first at their customers, for, as you know, speed is everything these days!
To replace the hosted photo website that Digital Railroad has provided, we also offer what we call, ‘Newscom Minisites’, using the same technology that more than 5,000 newspapers, magazines, broadcasters, and web sites depend upon every day to license images for their publications. You may already be familiar with Newscom as the one-stop digital media marketplace where users have instant access to almost 25 million rights-managed and royalty-free photos, graphics, illustrations, news stories, and features created by the world’s foremost publishers.
What you likely didn’t know was that more than 150 content providers use Newscom to reach a secondary market for sale of their content. Newscom is the digital media marketplace of the future—today.
A Newscom Minisite provides functionality similar to the Digital Railroad web portal in that we provide your customers password protected access to your photo archive where they can search, browse, and download photos and other multimedia content. We can also provide some customization of the front page of your Minisite by using your logo and contact information.
We would love to tell you more about our services and show you a demonstration, including a WebEx Internet broadcast in the next few days for those who have interest.
Don’t jump out of the Digital Railroad frying pan only to find yourself in the fire because you have chosen yet another unstable vendor.
To find out more about how Newscom and Mainstream can help, please send us an email at drroffer@newscom.com. Alternatively, please feel free to call one of us at the numbers provided below:
North and South America and Asia
Greg Weeks
Vice President, Mainstream Media Services
u.s.a. | work: +1.801.584.3989 | mobile: +1.801.915.2768
Bill Creighton
Managing Director, Newscom
u.s.a. | mobile: +1.703.850.5711
Europe, Middle East, and Africa
Richard Buckler
European Sales Director
u.k. | work: +44.1293.561120 | mobile: +44.7711.717935
Thanks, and we look forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
Your Friends at Newscom and Mainstream
Dear Former Digital Railroad Customer:
With the unexpected closing of the Digital Railroad business, Newscom and Mainstream Data have been receiving many calls from photo agencies and professionals like yourselves asking if there is anything we can do to help them – and do it quickly. The answer is Yes!
Mainstream provides premier hosting and distribution services, software development, and web platforms for prominent photo agencies including Thomson Reuters, Bloomberg, the European Pressphoto Agency, the German Press Agency (DPA), the Dutch Press Agency (ANP), the Spanish Press Agency (EFE), the Portuguese Press Agency (Lusa), UPI, and many photo plus video agencies like Splash News, AdMedia, Featureflash, Sipa Press, Ace Pictures, INF, and Jupiterimages. Moreover, unlike some of the other companies offering refuge for Digital Railroad customers, Newscom and Mainstream have been key players in this business for more than twenty years, are profitable, and offer you the security and functionality you need to be successful and to be able to sleep at night.
We provide both Internet FTP push delivery and hosted web portals for delivery of your photographs to subscribers, and we also operate the largest multi-agency marketplace for digital media in the world (Newscom).
Our managed FTP service is called MediasFTP; it is our automated FTP distribution system that reads the IPTC data out of your photographs, categorizes the photos for delivery to groups of users, and then simultaneously delivers the photos to your partners, customers, and agents at very high speeds. Our customers for this service include Sipa Press, AdMedia, Featureflash, Ace Pictures, and Splash News; they use this system to insure that their photos arrive first at their customers, for, as you know, speed is everything these days!
To replace the hosted photo website that Digital Railroad has provided, we also offer what we call, ‘Newscom Minisites’, using the same technology that more than 5,000 newspapers, magazines, broadcasters, and web sites depend upon every day to license images for their publications. You may already be familiar with Newscom as the one-stop digital media marketplace where users have instant access to almost 25 million rights-managed and royalty-free photos, graphics, illustrations, news stories, and features created by the world’s foremost publishers.
What you likely didn’t know was that more than 150 content providers use Newscom to reach a secondary market for sale of their content. Newscom is the digital media marketplace of the future—today.
A Newscom Minisite provides functionality similar to the Digital Railroad web portal in that we provide your customers password protected access to your photo archive where they can search, browse, and download photos and other multimedia content. We can also provide some customization of the front page of your Minisite by using your logo and contact information.
We would love to tell you more about our services and show you a demonstration, including a WebEx Internet broadcast in the next few days for those who have interest.
Don’t jump out of the Digital Railroad frying pan only to find yourself in the fire because you have chosen yet another unstable vendor.
To find out more about how Newscom and Mainstream can help, please send us an email at drroffer@newscom.com. Alternatively, please feel free to call one of us at the numbers provided below:
North and South America and Asia
Greg Weeks
Vice President, Mainstream Media Services
u.s.a. | work: +1.801.584.3989 | mobile: +1.801.915.2768
Bill Creighton
Managing Director, Newscom
u.s.a. | mobile: +1.703.850.5711
Europe, Middle East, and Africa
Richard Buckler
European Sales Director
u.k. | work: +44.1293.561120 | mobile: +44.7711.717935
Thanks, and we look forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
Your Friends at Newscom and Mainstream
Allen Murabayashi sounds like a good guy! He obviously cares about photography. This whole thing creeps me out… like a “countdown to failure” meter on your backup drive. I had a drive fail once and was unprepared – that won’t happen again.
I hope not to offend anyone by saying; the internet is not a “real” place. As a returning college student, I had the pleasure of going to school with people who were ten years younger than me. The generation gap was HUGE – none of them can remember a time where the internet failed to play a major role in there life – more than 40% of them (a “loose” figure from a survey I conducted on campus) have never paid for recorded music of any kind, and don’t see any reason why they should – If something exists on the web, it’s for the taking.
From what I’ve seen and heard, PhotoShelter is a great company. But I am leery of online storage as sole backup method. If you love it that much, make your own copy.
I apologize for the rant on today’s youth. I recently shot a concert and had some issues with the “subjects”. The guitar player decided to make some modifications to my finished photo for his facebook page… Either I wasn’t clear enough, or anything goes on the net?
Grr…
Not affected, either, but passing along. Thanks Vincent!
Oddly, when they put photoshelter.com back up, they put it up as it was… offering incentives to join. The account-signup pages are still there…. I can get a Pro account for just $49.99/month. Whoppee!
NOT
Vincent Laforet Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Jeffrey – do the math on what a good RAID setup costs you per month – once you realize that it 3-4 years is it’s lifespan… then add setup, repairs, and power not to mention huge AC bills to keep the room cool 24/7 – $50 a month – or even $1,000 a year or so for 1 TB of storage is a STEAL… honest – I’ve done the research…and I pay for it for a reason… you can always look at Amazon and other services (SmugMug is worth looking into as well) – but you can’t send them a hard drive….so you have to upload for days/weeks to get Terabytes of data up on those servers…
Vincent Laforet Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 11:04 am
its – not it’s
Nikita Pavlov Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
6000$ a year for 1 TB at photoshelter? What are you speaking about? EVERYTHING is cheaper.
Allen Murabayashi Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Nikita, 1TB is $1000/year for geographically redundant RAID.
Jeffrey Friedl Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
The basis for my “NOT” comment was having gotten dyslexic about Photoshelter vs. DDR, and thinking that someone who had gone out of business had republished the still-in-business site. A totally stupid mixup on my part, sorry! $50/month for good backup is cheap peace of mind.
This is GREAT…thanks Allen.
However, I just tried downloading and FTP’ing and it is not working.
Maybe if you’re a photojournalist, and you’re transmitting from a mountain somewhere, on a dial up modem, I could understand not having backup, but what is the deal with this freak-out about the server shutting down?
Who, in this day in age, with so many stories about failed drives, would have their ONLY copy of something on a third party server?
Hello, people. Wake up.
Back up your stuff. Not once. But twice. Drives will fail, (and companies will fail).
Mike MacLean Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
Ditto on that!
Matthew Ashton Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
Im having the worst month ever
Last month one of my back up drive in the office went down and now DRR has gone down. If you were a member of DRR about 2 years ago when they have a system melt down, Im sure you would have been mightily impressed with their back up service – I certainly was which I why I stayed loyal and jumped ship.
In a world where Getty rules the world, my agency has grown over the past 3 years and next year was the year to start promoting our own brand on our own site. DRR has been fantastic for us as we have grown.
I am awake and do have a back up but after constantly re-captioning and added keywords for clients for over 2 years I think Im entitled to a copy of my endeavours.
Working overseas in covering major sporting tournament, Im too busy to be sitting in front of a computer all the time making copies here and copies there.
I think you are missing the point here – Digital Railroad were a hosting company with THREE backups. The chances of losing everything were millions to one. They did not create a production line and have stopped producing goods, they have simply sacked staff and ceased trading.
Photographic work authored by some of the worlds finest photojournalists is just about to be wiped like an art gallery set on fire or something.
The reason DRR users are angry is that there is still insufficient time to backup everything and we are getting NO replies from anyone. Its very frustrating.
We are not selling to anyone, no one is making any money, we just want our material back.
If they delete the lot I have prepared a statement from a few photographers here in the UK which we plan to circulate to our friends in the media and rubbish the lot of them.. including DMG.
If these uncompassionate, totally irresponsible people who claim to be great at dealing with crisis delete everything or totally deny access then myself and others are going to declare war on them through our friends in the media.
Hopefully the PR team at DMG will understand what the repercussions could take place should the Financial Times in London print a story about media outlets in the UK and Europe not have access to photographic material because of the brains of a total moron in an office in the USA. The credit crunch is big news in the UK and this is an excellent story not only highlighting it but what a company who is supposed to manage another companies assets do to authors of amazing photographic work.
Burned Before Reply:
October 30th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
With all due respect, I don’t care if a company has forty sets of backups — it’s YOUR responsibility as a working professional to have at least one set of backup in your own hands. These tiny FW pocket drives are cheap, and travel well. I just don’t get it.
The upside to this DRR thing is that everyone will now see that they must take responsibility for their own work. Life is not fair. Cover your ass. Even when you’re paying someone else to do it as well.
I learned the lesson; everyone learns the lesson, sooner or later.
Matthew Ashton Reply:
October 31st, 2008 at 7:40 am
HI Burned Before, You are totally correct – you don’t get it !
I dont feel you know what an actual archive is.
Its not a case of making a copy of a raw file, its the actual collection of pictures as a whole.
An archive is a living breathing collection of data. Its not a case of the actual pictorial images contributed by a photographer or photographers , its the input by picture researchers, clients and other who add in suggestions like keywords, re-caption images etc so that they can be found.
In 20 years I have yet to meet a photographer who has all the skills of a librarian and a sales manager. Anyone can take a decent picture. But its not anyone who can get it published in Sports Illustrated and more importantly its not every photographer who is a picture researcher and sees the potential in images that the author of the image may not have seen.
Whats more worse deleting an image or not being able to find in amongst a collection of 50,000 or a client ring you up for a picture, you know you have something suitable but can not find it!
Your point about being up a mountain is in fact quite valid as I have some images of soccer players on my archive that have been re-keyworded by a Korean photographer whilst I was in Moscow once and then on another occasion a Dutch colleague keyworded some Dutch soccer players with alternative Dutch surnames which as an English speaking person I was not even aware of… this actually resulted in a few sales a few months later.
Attention to detail is everything in a successful business. Im sorry I did not individually download every re-captioned image.
Perhaps this is a separate topic for Vincent on what an archive is and how you manage it – how clients add their input on things a photographer or a sales person may never entertain –
so THIS Is the reason I feel so let down as this is what I have lost.
Burned Before Reply:
October 31st, 2008 at 9:21 am
Matthew,
I stand corrected, and I’ve learned something. In the future, is there a way that you could set up software like Synchronize Pro X or ChronoSync to auto-down batches of images every week, so you always have current versions of images? Surely there is a way. Again, I don’t trust anyone. Sure, people are for the most part truthworthy, but let’s face it — shit happens. And when we’re dealing with something that is my life’s work, (and my life’s income), then for damn sure, the only copy of it is not going to be in someone else’s hands. To me, it’s just about being a professional, but also just knowing how life works (and business works). Good luck with the retrieval process. I hope you get your most current images.
Thank you Vincent! With only 3 hours sleep, I just am about finished in migrating my archive to PhotoShelter by re-uploading–the servers were jammed yesterday, so I finally decided to just upload from my hard drives.
DRR might not be the ones forcing the time frame at this point, and I am sure if they could they would allow us more time to migrate, but the DRR people are responsible for letting things get out of control and having to let go. Why is PhotoShelter the one giving all the updates?! DRR’s former CEO should be working all day and all night right now to help everyone and sending out updates. He should have suggested in a mass email 2 weeks ago that we all begin migrating to PhotoShelter. I really don’t understand him. He seems to have gotten embarrassed when he learned of his own company’s implosion and ducked out the back door. The fact that he let down VII, Redux, Grazia Neri is despicable. It is ok to run out of money. I can understand that in this current economy, but not to be up front and inform everyone is grossly irresponsible. Even the short email to us: “To our valued members and partners” seems disrespectful. If we are valued members then why didn’t you properly inform us and why are you shutting down the servers so quickly? It’s as if they really don’t take us seriously.
Davin:
Couldn’t agree with you more. I have noticed a few people making excuses for the DRR founders – that this move to shut down without notice was out of their control. But they are the ones who created this situation. If they really cared about the photo community as they claimed – then they could have given their customers ample notice.
50 a moth, or 1000 a month…you should still manage your own data as well. Back in the film days (remember?) people kept the negs in their studio, or maybe if they were smart, in a fire safe storage facility, but there was only ONE copy. Now with digital, you have no excuses. The other day I bought 6TB of 3.5inch sata drives – i plugged them into my sata mounter, copied all of my work and they are now at my parents and inlaws, at opposite ends of the country. That was cheaper, and makes more sense to me than giving some company my money, and my property.
Not only a great PR move from Photoshelter, but a great move for all photo storage players.
If only Lehman Brothers had a Photoshelter for them 🙂
EXCLUSIVE NEWS TO THE READERS OF THIS BLOG
After some discussions with DMG, they have been calling me and being very honest about the DRR situation..
they have just issued this statement…. I am sorry but I do not know or have any other details but its looking better that it did 2days ago for the long run.
I must also point out that DMG were very honest, very nice, open and totally cool about the whole affair and I must commend them on their communication with me after I slated them and DRR the other day !
—————————————
To Digital Railroad Members and Customers;
Digital Railroad (DRR) has been attempting to keep its servers up and running for as long as possible. However, given DRR’s current cash position, it can no longer keep these servers operational. Therefore, as early as midnight EST, October 31, 2008, the DRR website will be closed and the images located on the DRR servers will be inaccessible. DRR apologizes for difficulties and inconvenience that this creates, however, without additional capital investment, DRR has no other recourse.
These images will be preserved on the existing hardware in anticipation that at a later date they can be retrieved by their owners.
Digital Railroad has received a letter of intent (LOI) to purchase the assets of DRR, specifically its hardware and application software used to store and retrieve images with the desire to continue providing services to DRR members and customers with as little disruption as possible. The Intellectual Property (IP) stored on these servers and owned by members would in any case be preserved. After the completion of an asset purchase agreement, the acquiring company will contact owners of the images to determine their disposition. The acquiring company will have no right to sell or distribute these images without the owner’s prior approval.
The company that has submitted the Letter of Intent is a twenty-year fixture in the industry with ongoing close relationships with the preeminent players in the worldwide information business. It owns a multi-agency digital media marketplace composing more than twenty-five million images, news stories, and video clips which it licenses to five thousand customers who purchase content on a daily basis for insertion into the world’s most prominent newspapers, magazines, web sites, and broadcast services.
Please check the Diablo Management website http://www.diablomanagement.com regularly for updates.
—————————————
Regards
Matthew Ashton
First: I do the same but in a friends house i have stall a old G4 Mac no monitor no toots board just a internet line and 1# instal VPN on
the G4 2# on my Computer in the studio and 3# on my Iphone VPN software and than i can see check and upload images on
the computer at G4 my friends house.
Second: I run CoppyCloner on my main computer and he search for new file at the archive and transport it each hour to the
G4 computer at my friends hous i can check this by my Iphone. And no payments and independent to third parties Servers ?? no
one have my images no one can use it with out my permission ?? And al 35000 images the client can see on my own server at the studio
and down loading by account from me given to the clients this is on a Mac Mini and a external hard drive of iomiga 750 GB.
THIS is why you shouldn’t store all of your data in the cloud.
There’s been a strong move towards online storage, with the obvious benefit that you can access your data anywhere. The downside is that if a server dies or the company goes under or they change the terms of service, suddenly you can access your data from nowhere.
I’m not saying people shouldn’t store data online, but it should be thought of as what it is: a “light” backup that could evaporate at any moment.
Vincent,
I am the “geek” for my wife’s photography business. I have on order 2 Mark II’s and am very interested in getting into the video side of things w/ the camera. Your editing choice looks to be final cut studio among other things, of which i have very little experience. What would be your recommendation (in addition to trial and error)for training/workshops on the use of final cut studio 2?
This is a mess. I can’t believe that its happening to those photogs.