I have recently been getting emails from Photobucket saying that I need to pay for their service now or they will delete my photos. There is no option to download my photos without paying. If I want to access them at all then I must pay.
I don't know what to think about whether this is right or wrong but it sure feels scummy. It also makes my worry about what might happen when bigger internet companies are down on their luck.
> There is no option to download my photos without paying
If I was going to target something here to fix, it would be this. Holding your data hostage feels much more legally suspect than just deciding to no longer run photobucket and deleting your data outright (before, for instance, selling the hard-drives to recoup costs).
In fact, I think the GDPR may already have fixed this for people protected by it? If you have photos you care about you might try sending a GDPR data request and see what happens (even if you're not covered by it, there's no harm in trying).
I don't know what to think about whether this is right or wrong but it sure feels scummy. It also makes my worry about what might happen when bigger internet companies are down on their luck.