Yesterday was the hottest day this year with a temp of 109°F. Today, will break another record forecast to hit between 110-112. To borrow a line from an old stage play, "It's been a long hot summer".
I am sick that the big two think that they can randomly select pictures in whole or in part. Yes, they say that they have permission when you agree to their terms and conditions. That's a half truth. Microsoft and Google are the two biggest offenders. They are building assets portfolios of all our pictures, and when I say "our pictures" I am not speaking totally of this blogs copyrighted images, files, but yours as well; just waiting for the copyrights to run out and then they have a very, very large collection of images they can now use for more profit or to boost their overall net worth, It's sickening. It's thievery sanctioned by our own government because they do not set copyrights for life and transferring to family to do as they wish. They have quiet frankly, taken my rights that I worked hard to build and bypassed my families or some selected university or trust from having that use. Oh! they will argue that point to no end with the least bit of what is right.
Yesterday, I got fed up with Microsoft holding my images hostage until I signed up for cloud storage. I just average about 7 years on a computer before it goes to happy computer land. The beginning of August my computer that I used died a happy death. I went to Micro Center to get a new one with better features and larger display screen---the whole nine yards. Excellent price as the school sales were on.
My last three computers have images stored on the hard drives. I had planned to either buy a server or to transfer them to a multi T-storage system larger than the one that I use currently. Martha died before I had gotten to that point. Close. But no cigar. I stopped buying cards and would load to the computer, then reformat the old card and used it again. But, I do have all the old cards that I did not reformat.
Long story short. I had 20 years of indexed images at my fingertips that I used on the blog and in e-mails to friends and family. When I tried to move the images to the new computer, Microsoft kept butting in and I realized early on in the process that they had hijacked my images. Sure enough, after a week of running test and searches I located about a third of some 50,000 images.
Yesterday, I amplified the search and found the confirming hijack with all my indexing gone--no more--basically. Without the indexing, the images are worthless to me to use as I had been doing with efficiency. Then, Microsoft popped on the screen with an offer to gain access to my images for a flat fee per year or I could take it on a monthly basis. Since there is methods to my madness (I don't get mad, but I sure as heck do get frustrated at thieves). So, I signed up for the monthly fee that can be refunded in 30 days if I am unhappy---imagine that. Bingo! There came all the new camera images plus some going back to 2014 but a big gap between 2019 and the new camera of this August to date.
The organization---I should say disorganization---that Microsoft wrecked havoc with---was a nightmare. My numbering system that ID my image exclusively and the chronological order of date shot was also missing, but later showed up in the side bar of shooting information such as date and time and camera make and model, settings etc.,etc. The problem there is it is with each individual image so to go looking for the day shoot information of that day in history, I would have to look at each individual image to see the details that I had made of that days shot schedule. The thing with the side bar was that I already had that on my old camera images which I used when and if needed. The indexing was a whole different matter---but also at my fingertips. I have always said. "I don't mind doing work once, but I sure as hell hate having to do it twice, especially when some incompetent fool tries to re-invent the wheel."
Trying to send an email to my brother with an image (just to see how it would differ from others) took a full hour before the email was ready to send. I later said to my brother in another email that I could have sent him 100 of those in the time it took to send that one email using Microsoft's great 365--which I had dumped already my web host had switched to.Their "get more done" mentality is so flawed.
So, with excessive heat warnings issued by the National Weather Service for Dallas the next 3 days, I plan to be inside trying to save what I can until the weather breaks.
The down side of that is I will loose valuable shoot time to go see the IT guy and get the images off the hard drives then add the files that I have on chips before 2014. What a mess.
On a political note. Yesterday, again, I was watching CBS Good Morning or what every it is with Gayle King and the Governor of North Dakota was being interviewed since he is running for President in the over crowded field for 2024. At the end of the interview---which I found interesting and promising, I realized that this is the man that I will support for President. My gut feeling about such things have always been on target except for Trump--I missed that on big time. I was right about Carter, Clinton-both Bushes- and Obama. Now, I don't have to worry about that anymore until the election unless the guy goes off the cliff with some odd ball thing---which I don't see happening, but as Sophia always said (from the Golden Girls Series---"You never know").
I am going to try to add an image there today, just to see if I can. If no image appears.....there will be better days ahead. Thanks for being patient--understanding--and not flooding my mailbox with worthless clutter unrelated to this blog. And to the thieves---you are being watched---or so I hear. Apply the Sophia line here.
What must Mr. Wood Duck be thinking seeing that section of his tree on the dock and not knowing what to think?
Momma Wood Duck is collecting the brood at the banks edge under the dock which Pappa has been watching a water snake stirring. He will watch out for the rear as Momma takes the kiddos for their first swim search for food. That image is in an old format.
