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Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

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Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#221

Post by flipbrad »

BugsJustFindMe wrote: post #122
Denvercoder9 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy migration to a competitor could hurt their customer retention. Why offer it at all then? At least in Europe the GDPR requires direct transfer of your data to a competitor where technically possible.

The GDPR (or some similar requirement) only appears to apply to a subset of the chosen countries.

Note that the GDPR applies to businesses established in Europe, effectively regardless of the location or nationality of users. For instance, the UK authority recognised a US resident's right to invoke GDPR, during the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#222

Post by barnabee »

azinman2 wrote: post #174
Barrin92 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

force protocols to be open would just about do it. People would trivially write cross-service applications on top and we could have an internet where people can freely move data around. Apple and Google would be delegated to the backend and users could choose the clients they want. It's honestly so trivial and uninvasive of a regulatory matter it's ridiculous. We're stuck in the 19th century railroad industry.

So, someone (who?) comes out with a standard, and then everyone just freezes capabilities then? Nothing evolves? Or if it does, it does so very unequally? Already in this announcement is the non-transfer of Live Photos because presumably Google doesn't support it. Apparently they also have a 20k per album cap, which at that point you get different behavior than you're expecting. These are just a few examples of where…

Forcing the protocol to be open and documented and free for any user that can use the official site/client to connect to doesn’t have to mean forcing a standard. You might want to require o rubies compatibility with old versions and deal with obfuscation or unnecessary changes as anti competitive behaviour, but otherwise just ensuring that anyone can create and sell or give away clients, interoperability and import/export tools, etc. would be an excellent step in the right direction. With no obvious downsides.

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#223

Post by ezekg »

Barrin92 wrote: post #151
rakoo wrote: post #144

It is a bit sad to see something as simple as "you can now take your photos and put them where you want" become a newsworthy article. This is yet another demonstration that Digital Feudalism is alive and well, and just like its ancestor, we need to get rid of it by empowering people to be their own self

force protocols to be open would just about do it. People would trivially write cross-service applications on top and we could have an internet where people can freely move data around. Apple and Google would be delegated to the backend and users could choose the clients they want. It's honestly so trivial and uninvasive of a regulatory matter it's ridiculous. We're stuck in the 19th century railroad industry.

It kind of baffles me that people really want so much regulation. We already have more than enough of it.

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#224

Post by barnabee »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #169
Barrin92 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

force protocols to be open would just about do it. People would trivially write cross-service applications on top and we could have an internet where people can freely move data around. Apple and Google would be delegated to the backend and users could choose the clients they want. It's honestly so trivial and uninvasive of a regulatory matter it's ridiculous. We're stuck in the 19th century railroad industry.

> It's honestly so trivial and uninvasive of a regulatory matter it's ridiculous. At what point do you become compelled to start transforming your web application into an open protocol?

Certainly any company that relies on “safe harbor” style protections or sells online services (alone or bundled with software) as a subscription should be required to fully open and document the protocol.

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#225

Post by criddell »

varispeed wrote: post #183
rakoo wrote: post #144

It is a bit sad to see something as simple as "you can now take your photos and put them where you want" become a newsworthy article. This is yet another demonstration that Digital Feudalism is alive and well, and just like its ancestor, we need to get rid of it by empowering people to be their own self

They were required to do this by law in the EU.

And is Google required to do something similar to help users transfer their photos to a competing service?

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#226

Post by LeoPanthera »

fungiblecog wrote: post #145

Just give us a ‘download all’ button with the ability to resume in the event of a failure. RSync has been around for a long time why reinvent the wheel for every different service. Welcome to Modern tech - constantly reinventing (square) wheel

This exists if you have a Mac. Set Photos to "Download Originals" in the settings and every photo will be downloaded to the "originals" directory in your photo library bundle.

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#228

Post by ProAm »

kall wrote: post #181
fungiblecog wrote: post #145

Just give us a ‘download all’ button with the ability to resume in the event of a failure. RSync has been around for a long time why reinvent the wheel for every different service. Welcome to Modern tech - constantly reinventing (square) wheel

I would also like this button, but I would not be surprised if a good chunk of users have an icloud photo library so large that none of their apple devices could fit it in it's (underspeced) storage.

Just upgrade the SSD

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#229

Post by jpalomaki »

rakoo wrote: post #144

It is a bit sad to see something as simple as "you can now take your photos and put them where you want" become a newsworthy article. This is yet another demonstration that Digital Feudalism is alive and well, and just like its ancestor, we need to get rid of it by empowering people to be their own self

Take Gmail as an example. They provided nice way of allowing applications to access your mailbox. Then we got data mining apps which started using this for malicious purposes (with user consent). Now the API is only available for developers willing to go through security audit ($15k-75k).

10 years ago Facebook provided a pretty nice set of APIs and way to grant access to your data (for example photos, messages, friend lists) for 3rd party apps. What we got was 1000 quiz apps using these for data mining - with user consent.

Android is another example. Initially Google put little restrictions for data applications could access - with permission from user. We all know what happened.

I’m not saying we should stop trying to tear down the walled gardens, but this is not trivial problem to solve. Some users might be even better off with their data locked in the garden managed by Apple, Google or Facebook.

Re: Apple now lets you transfer your iCloud Photos to Google Photos

#230

Post by lxgr »

nicoburns wrote: post #120
lxgr wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is different, though: Flickr used to charge for the capability to upload, Google charges for keeping the photos available.

Ah I see. To be honest I feel like paying for storage capacity is a much more reasonable pricing model.

It definitely is more reasonable for Google, and probably many users too.

But I always liked the idea of never having to worry about storage space and was willing to pay a premium for it.

I doubt that in the end I had more than 100 or 200 Gigabyte stored there, so Google would be a better deal for me even as a fairly heavy user, but I'd be willing to pay that premium for peace of mind.

If Backblaze can offer unlimited backup data for $6, I bet Google could make something similar work for a restricted domain like photos.

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