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

Posted by timothy on 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.

5 of 175 comments (clear)

  1. Re:oajds by Whiteox · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Read the fine print. They can use the pics anyhow they want.

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    Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
  2. that's what spy agencies do by martin-boundary · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

  3. Re:oajds by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's stupid anyhow. These days you can buy a 128GB USB flash drive for like $30, which should hold a lot of pictures at full quality.

    But it can't be (easily) automated. And USB flash drives are EVIL for backups - you should buy a HDD for that. With the auto-upload you have the photos backed up (and also ready to be sent to someone through any channel) in matter of seconds, without the need for any action you can forgot, delay, or whatever. A good backup solution doesn't require any activity from the user. And this is especially important if you want to backup your grandma's data.

  4. Until Google closes it... by John+Allsup · · Score: 5, Interesting

    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'.

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    John_Chalisque
  5. A Data Point by localroger · · Score: 5, Interesting
    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.

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