{"id":1469,"date":"2020-12-04T16:26:18","date_gmt":"2020-12-04T16:26:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/piwigo.com\/blog\/?p=1469"},"modified":"2020-12-04T16:26:18","modified_gmt":"2020-12-04T16:26:18","slug":"flickr-google-photos-the-end-of-free-photo-hosting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/piwigo.com\/blog\/2020\/12\/04\/flickr-google-photos-the-end-of-free-photo-hosting\/","title":{"rendered":"Flickr, Google Photos… The end of free photo hosting?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The news made a lot of noise: around November 12th 2020, Google announced that it would end free and unlimited hosting on Google Photos. What does it mean? Why this decision? What alternatives to GAFAM for data hosting?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

When the internet giants say stop to the free model<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In November 2018, Flickr, the online photo hosting and sharing service, announced an overhaul of its pricing model: free user accounts hosting more than 1,000 photos had to take out a paid subscription, after what some of their photos would be deleted. Users were screaming scandal, but from our side, we found it rather normal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read also : Why Flickr could not remain free for ever<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many users looking for an alternative to Flickr fell back on Google Photos, which offered free and unlimited hosting of your photos (in exchange of the files being compressed). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Google changed the game two weeks ago, announcing the end of its illimited free offer. Starting on June 15th 2021, you will have to pay to host more than 15 GB of data at Google (including your Gmail account and Google Drive).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It may not seem like much, but this announcement is an important signal: after years of “everything free”, the giants of the internet have decided to monetize data hosting, even for “small” volumes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The new pricing of Google hosting offers<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The true cost of online hosting<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

This decision may seem paradoxical, given that the cost of data hosting has fallen dramatically over the last 20 years. Since storage space is costing less and less, why should we pay for what was previously offered free of charge?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

First of all, even if the cost of storage space has fallen since the early 2000s, it still has a cost. Behind a virtual “Drive” or “Cloud”, there are huge machines, which consume energy. You need staff to maintain, monitor and secure them. And then there is the development and maintenance of the software, web and mobile apps used by end users to manage their files. All this is not free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read also : Where are photos stored with Piwigo ?<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

An exponential amount of data<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

While the cost of hosting has decreased over the last 20 years, the volume of data created has exploded in parallel! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let’s take a very concrete example:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2020, when you take a photo with your smartphone, it weighs an average of 2 MB. With a latest generation smartphone, it can be as much as 10 MB. Even a 15-second kitten video weighs 50 MB. This incredible GIF weights 3 Mo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n