Imgur images suddenly became invalid?

[FatFork]

This was the main reason for creating the TalkImg service - to stop images broken by third-party services.

That's one hell of a timing!

I was just wondering, what kind of bribe did it take for Imgur to block direct linking from bitcointalk.org IP addresses? Asking for a friend. 

[skarais]

This is really disappointing, I lost so many image in one of my stats threads on local board. I didn't realize what was happen until suddenly I had to get invalid views on all the images I posted through imgur. Unfortunately I didn't save all the image and will probably lose them forever.

Any solution? I am really waiting how this can be resolved.

Topic: [CHART] Tampilan Bulanan Aktivitas Lokal Board Bahasa Indonesia

[tabas]

All of my images for the threads and topics I made came and uploaded from imgur. I'll have to go through each of them and have it edited with a new image came from those image upload websites that have been suggested. Since most are talking about talkimg, that shall be my top choice when I've gone through each of them.

Base on your question let me said your images was written invalid in the bitcointalk because the image has been removed from imgur website. This made me to do some research on the net and I found out that Imgur to ban explicit images and delete uploads not tied to an account, then if that is the case bitcointalk forum users should use alternative mean of uploading pictures here. Images here is needed to be permanent to be viewing whenever the thread has arrived.

They should remove the tag on their URL as the "The magic of the Internet". That's no longer magical. And there seem to be nothing on their Blog and no updates at all informing their users and guests.

[acroman08]

This is really disappointing, I lost so many image in one of my stats threads on local board. I didn't realize what was happen until suddenly I had to get invalid views on all the images I posted through imgur. Unfortunately I didn't save all the image and will probably lose them forever.

Any solution? I am really waiting how this can be resolved.

Topic: [CHART] Tampilan Bulanan Aktivitas Lokal Board Bahasa Indonesia

right now you can still view the images on Imgur if you use the URL of the image(for example, this image on your thread that has become invalid https://i.imgur.com/rHTpE2A.jpg). you can save the image on your PC or phone and upload it to another image hosting service. joker_josue recently created TalkImg.com - Image hosting for BitcoinTalk, you can try using it to upload your image again and replace the broken images on your threads.

[shahzadafzal]

I have been using imgur too because I felt it is most reliable and less annoying then any other image hosting site. Plus they have a mobile app which gives big advantage to upload images more conveniently. But it seems it was bad choice after all :p

I agree with theymos there is no use of playing games here with imgur even if he finds a temporary solution to current problem another issue will rise again sooner or later. So we have to find alternatives.

One potential alternative is TalkImg.com, specifically designed for use with bitcointalk. Not only can we place trust in the administrators, who are part of our own community, but we can also easily reach out to them for any concerns or queries.

I do not believe that LoyceV's approach is a viable solution. For instance, let's assume we collectively decide to migrate all images to another hosting platform like TalkImg while retaining the same filenames and extensions. Running a database query to replace all imgur links with links to the new hosting service poses a significant risk. I will never ever recommend  such an approach, and I am sure that theymos would not approve of it either.

One potential solution could involve utilizing a bitcointalk image proxy. This would allow us to keep the image links in posts as they are, while the proxy itself would deduct imgur links and call upon the new hosting service, such as TalkImg or even LoyceV's current hosting. However, it is important to acknowledge that this solution may not be optimal. Again not a clever solution.

Ultimately, this serves as a valuable lesson for all of us to never solely rely on third-party services for online data storage. Whether it is a large organization like Google, Apple, or imgur, these services can cease operations at any given time. It is crucial to explore and utilize alternatives for personal data storage, while maintaining backups in different locations.


Submit a Request to imgur to allow image linking from bitcointalk.org:

There's no straight forward solution unless imgur allows it again. Or may be if we request imgur personally to allow image linking from https://bitcointalk.org/.

It seems that the most viable solution lies in imgur's willingness to allow this functionality once again. By personally reaching out to imgur and collectively expressing our desire for image linking from bitcointalk.org, there is a possibility that they may grant our request.

I'm sure if certain number of people request the same thing they might allow it

Here's the request form select "I have suggestion" or "My topic isn't listed here"
https://help.imgur.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

Sample request:



You can copy paste below

I kindly request your attention to the matter of enabling direct image linking on the esteemed Bitcoin forum, bitcointalk.org. I have been an avid user of imgur for posting images on this forum, but to my dismay, all of my images have suddenly ceased to appear on the forum. Despite their continued availability on the imgur platform, the linking functionality to bitcointalk.org seems to have become ineffective.

I would greatly appreciate your assistance in permitting image linking from this esteemed hosting service on bitcointalk.org. It would be immensely valuable for me and thousands of other bitcointalk users to continue utilizing imgur as my preferred image hosting platform. Therefore, I kindly request your consideration and support in enabling bitcointalk.org image linking.

Keep the subject "Allow images linking from https://bitcointalk.org/"

https://help.imgur.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

[fillippone]

The sad reality is that you cannot trust any centralized service:
As someone said on the Italian board:

“not your servers, not your images”.

Keep the subject "Allow images linking from https://bitcointalk.org/"

Done.

[LoyceV]

I lost so many image in one of my stats threads on local board.
~
Any solution?

The only sure fix is editing all your posts with images, and uploading them elsewhere.

I do not believe that LoyceV's approach is a viable solution. For instance, let's assume we collectively decide to migrate all images to another hosting platform like TalkImg while retaining the same filenames and extensions. Running a database query to replace all imgur links with links to the new hosting service poses a significant risk.

I'm pretty sure Admin can work some of his magic if he wants to. I'm not sure though if there will be legal consequences for changing the link, especially when it comes to copyright.
"Doing nothing" means we lose the images for sure.

Ultimately, this serves as a valuable lesson for all of us to never solely rely on third-party services for online data storage.

Personal websites are more likely to be abandonded than large image hosts, so long-term, that means all links will be dead.

Progress: I have 170k JPG, 271k PNG, 2k JPEG and 9k GIF downloaded so far 89 GB

[jokers10]

...
Running a database query to replace all imgur links with links to the new hosting service poses a significant risk.
...

Forum settings usually have an option of replacing one exact text with another exact text. So for replacing the url theymos doesn't need to change anything in database, just to create another line for that option. Another option is to do it in the code manually, it doesn't need database changes as well, but is less recommended.

[DaveF]

Does anyone have a link to a PHP script that functions in a way similar to Imgur?

I mean something that I could drop an image on and it will do the resizing and the link creation and everything else automatically. I'm sure there are dozens out there, I've just never looked for one. I figure if there's a recommendation here I could throw it up on my own personal website.

Although I do appreciate what others are doing to help the community in creating their own sites to do this. At this point, I think I am just going to host my images myself. I could probably set something else up for the community, but with other people already doing it it's

1)not going to be worth my time since it's going to be 1 of many
and more importantly
2) be another thing I'm going to have to worry about not working / crashing and having to deal with everyone asking what happened and when will it be back.

Heck, I'm hosting an explorer for a just about abandoned shitcoin and when it went down overnight last week I got about 15 messages asking about it. Can't imagine what would happen if everyone's images went offline when I was sleeping.


-Dave
 

[pawanjain]

Sadly many secondary images on other posts will be lost forever... But I can't go on each of them recovering the images manually.

Allow me to quote myself here:

It would be really cool if someone could write a program to move all of the imgur images to talkimg instead.  I guess that would require superuser access to the board though.

I'm currently downloading about 800,000 images from imgur, using 3 4 servers (and 1 second delay between requests). According to logfiles, I have 3 days, which won't be enough. If I get a substantial number of pictures, and if joker_josue wants to deal with ~200GB, I'll ask if theymos can update all imgur-links to talkimg.com. It would be nice if the forum doesn't lose that many images.

Server #4 is downloading without a delay in between requests, and is currently downloading 9400 images per hour. I only have unedited imgur-links, and some are messed up (for now), but at this rate, I'll manage to preserve most images before they're deleted forever.
Restoring the images is beyond my powers, but at least it won't be gone.

Is there anything we could do to help you achieve this faster. If all of us work together on this we can download all the images in a day or may be less.
Unity is the key. We would just need a way to connect our device to the internet so that we can increase the processing power to download more images in parallel.
If not if we can contribute by sharing our computation power like how miners use a mining pool then may be can download all those images faster.

[decodx]

Does anyone have a link to a PHP script that functions in a way similar to Imgur?

You can try https://picsur.org/

You can find their GitHub repository at https://github.com/caramelfur/picsur. It's an open source script but I'm not sure if it's in PHP or JavaScript (or both). It might be worth checking out.

[joker_josue]

I do not believe that LoyceV's approach is a viable solution. For instance, let's assume we collectively decide to migrate all images to another hosting platform like TalkImg while retaining the same filenames and extensions. Running a database query to replace all imgur links with links to the new hosting service poses a significant risk.

I'm pretty sure Admin can work some of his magic if he wants to. I'm not sure though if there will be legal consequences for changing the link, especially when it comes to copyright.
"Doing nothing" means we lose the images for sure.

Honestly there is not a big danger for BD. There are specific commands to do this in databases.

Would it work in 100% of cases? No. Furthermore, it will only be possible if part of the path remains the same. Which honestly, I think it will be difficult to do, based on the information I have so far.

Progress: I have 170k JPG, 271k PNG, 2k JPEG and 9k GIF downloaded so far 89 GB

Are you sure that all this is what was on the forum and there is no image coming from elsewhere?
That will be the first thing to evaluate. In addition, there are copyright issues, copying from one server to another may not be that simple.

Do you happen to be able to identify the images temporally? The ones that were posted the longest in the forum and the ones that are more recent?

[aylabadia05]

is it just me or posted images that were uploaded on Imgur, copied the BBcode in order to post here suddenly became "invalid"? this might be a dumb question, but anyone has any idea what was the reason for it?

I also thought there was something wrong with my region's internet network causing problems with posting pictures.
I tried to look at the uploaded image posts on several topics, the same display appears that says invalid image.

Like it or not, all important image posts that I have uploaded to remain visible must start editing using other services without the need to care about the imgur service, which may no longer want bitcointalk users to use their services.
ImgBB, postimages is a good service for uploading images, but I will try to use TalkImg initiated by @joker_josue

[NotATether]

The problem is probably from imgur. Their site now automatically redirects from the old domain imgur.com to imgur.io

Not sure why the did this but yes indeed the images with the imgur.com link are not showing in the forum.

Imgur is starting to purge all unregistered images not just NSFW images, but don't worry - that's why Talkimg exists

[LoyceV]

Progress: I have 170k JPG, 271k PNG, 2k JPEG and 9k GIF downloaded so far 89 GB

Are you sure that all this is what was on the forum and there is no image coming from elsewhere?

I'm sure. I took the links from my posts archive.

That will be the first thing to evaluate. In addition, there are copyright issues, copying from one server to another may not be that simple.

That's why I don't want to host it I wouldn't know how to handle this.

Do you happen to be able to identify the images temporally? The ones that were posted the longest in the forum and the ones that are more recent?

I took the links from the (unedited) posts, so I know which ones are the most recent. But that includes quotes (there are many duplicate links). For now, I'm just downloading whatever I can (581k files, 112 GB). Sorting out what to do with it comes later
I could even sort them based on who posted them, so if imgur is gone, users can still download their own images and upload them elsewhere.

[skarais]

~~~

right now you can still view the images on Imgur if you use the URL of the image(for example, this image on your thread that has become invalid https://i.imgur.com/rHTpE2A.jpg). you can save the image on your PC or phone and upload it to another image hosting service. joker_josue recently created TalkImg.com - Image hosting for BitcoinTalk, you can try using it to upload your image again and replace the broken images on your threads.

Really, it must be really troublesome because I have to recycle all those invalid images and post them with another hosting service. But maybe, I'll try to maintain some important images that should be featured in my post. But anyway, great advice.

Right now I need to spend some time editing it manually. Really, I regret it.

~~~

The only sure fix is editing all your posts with images, and uploading them elsewhere.

Thanks for this advice too, it's the same as @acroman08 explain to me in the previous post.  

[roksana.hee]

is it just me or posted images that were uploaded on Imgur, copied the BBcode in order to post here suddenly became "invalid"? this might be a dumb question, but anyone has any idea what was the reason for it?

sorry if the thread is unnecessary.

Instead of copying BBcode from Imgur, you can try using TalkImg to upload and post images directly on the forum. This might help avoid any issues with invalid code and make the process smoother for you.

Here is the original post link of @joker_josue. He wants to help BitcoinTalk.org's users.
Regarding your concern to get the link to read. TalkImg.Com
Here is another promotional post for TalkImg.Com

[decodx]

Instead of copying BBcode from Imgur, you can try using TalkImg to upload and post images directly on the forum. This might help avoid any issues with invalid code and make the process smoother for you.
<...>

Just to clarify, TalkImg is actually a service that's quite similar to Imgur or Imgbb. It's not actually connected to Bitcointalk, and you can't use it to upload images directly to the forum like you suggested. Instead, you'll still need to use bbcode to display your images in your posts. I think what might have happened is that you got a bit confused, as TalkImg was actually created by a member of this forum specifically for use on Bitcointalk. But again, it's not directly linked to the forum itself.

[Synchronice]

Do you happen to be able to identify the images temporally? The ones that were posted the longest in the forum and the ones that are more recent?

I took the links from the (unedited) posts, so I know which ones are the most recent. But that includes quotes (there are many duplicate links). For now, I'm just downloading whatever I can (581k files, 112 GB). Sorting out what to do with it comes later
I could even sort them based on who posted them, so if imgur is gone, users can still download their own images and upload them elsewhere.

@LoyceV and @joker_josue
Is it possible to do something like this? Listen:
This is an image: https://i.imgur.com/bk8XuD2.png
You can parse the whole forum and download all the images. If you download an image and save it with the name that I have made bold and underlined and upload images that way on talkimg, then theymos should be able to change absolutely every url https://i.imgur.com/ with any url we wish, for example with: https://talkimg.com/imgdb/ and then all the images on this forum will be restored. If you two are capable to do so, of course.

[LoyceV]

@LoyceV and @joker_josue
Is it possible to do something like this? Listen:
This is an image: https://i.imgur.com/bk8XuD2.png
You can parse the whole forum and download all the images. If you download an image and save it with the name that I have made bold and underlined and upload images that way on talkimg, then theymos should be able to change absolutely every url https://i.imgur.com/ with any url we wish, for example with: https://talkimg.com/imgdb/ and then all the images on this forum will be restored.

That's the plan, with a few limitations: I can't just "parse the forum", that would take months. I have to rely on what I have already (so images added by editing a post won't be included). If the rest works, depends on theymos.