Photobucket is an image-video hosting website, web services suite, and an online community. With more than 100 millions users, it was one of the most popular for such services, at least before it made some radical changes.
Launched in 2003, the image hosting service was one the well-known choice for early people of the web. From bloggers to website owners and e-commerce websites, Photobucket was the choice for many, until social media like Facebook and Instagram came along.
But still, after the era of social media took the reign, Photobucket remained popular for small businesses that sell items throughout online marketplaces.
With 2GB of free storage, or $100 for more than 100GB of storage, it was more than enough for most people.
All remained well for Photobucket, until it updated its Terms of Service (ToS) that forces users to upgrade to premium tier if they wish to hotlink on third-party websites.
As a result, billions of images from thousands of listings on numerous websites, including Amazon, eBay and Etsy, are filled with unusual error images by Photobucket. Some users can't even download their own photos out of Photobucket without upgrading.
The attempt for the change started a week in advance when Photobucket announced in a short blog post that it had updated its ToS, making it taking effect starting in June 20th. However, the post didn't mention anything about third-party hosting change, and nothing was said regarding hotlinking practice.
In order for users to find out, they had to click the link and read the fine print (ToS is usually long, and so is Photobucket's. Not that many people are willing to scroll and scroll to learn any changes).
The result is clear: many users didn't find out until they noticed their images were no longer showing up on their third-party pages.
Most of them aren't happy about this radical change, and are accusing Photobucket of extortion. Users have taken the matter to both Facebook and Twitter, as well as numerous online forums to unleash their fury.
While some image hosting providers were able to use this strategy successfully, Photobucket has been accused of "blackmailing" users because the service failed to make the update to its ToS abundantly clear.
Photobucket offers monthly subscriptions from $5.99 to $39.99 a month, users have complained that they could only choose the yearly package of $399 for linking, which for the average user, is too extortionate.