My Pictures

So several months ago, our hard drive crashed. The 'click' of death as I was told....and death to all my photos. A few months earlier we signed up for an online backup service to back up our computer and hard drive. Little did I know I only had seven days to restore the files - after that, the company deleted my files (something they don't tell you so I wouldn't recommend backupright.com). Therefore, you can completely ignore my post from earlier this year. After a valiant effort by John, the files couldn't be saved.

We do have random photo CD's from my parents (thankfully, they always insisted we send them hundreds of photos of Morgan), but we did lose thousands of photos - memories I won't even know I lost. So, why am I bringing this up again?? When Yahoo photos went bust, they transferred my photos to Snapfish. I received an email from them this week that stated unless I order from them, my storage of my photos will be deleted. As this is the most complete set of photos I have since Morgan was born, I didn't ignore the email. I did notice that you can download photos from their site - YES! However, they CHARGE, $0.25 for each photo I download (Huh???). I can also purchase a photo CD - so, after $69.08, I purchased two photo CDs with MY photos. Do I hate that I had to pay to download photos that I put up there in the first place - YES (if you ask me, I should be able to download them for free). However, I was able to reclaim some lost memories which is well worth it. And thanks to retailmenot.com, I scored 20% off.

Lessons learned -
1. Back up your photos in multiple places
2. Don't waste your money on online back up services - stick with CD/DVDs. Now that we have a DVD burner, this task is much easier
3. Don't rely on electronic copies - periodically print your favorite pictures
4. Use google/picasa. Google is going to take over the world anyway, so they'll be around when you need your photos.