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• Anonymous commented  ·  June 1, 2013 11:31 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I've been a member for a number of years now. I'm thinking about jumping ship and just using dropbox. My primary use for this site is to SHARE photos...and sharing for me means allowing people to download the entire gallery.

• Anonymous commented  ·  April 16, 2013 10:22 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  is anyone from SmugMug Listening...

• Brittany commented  ·  March 27, 2013 6:35 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I would love to enable this feature to clients who purchase an entire gallery of digital file-s!!! I think it is the way many hosting sites are going and would give Smugmug a competitive edge

• John Bertram commented  ·  March 17, 2013 5:58 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I just noticed that one word in my post from two weeks ago got *****'d out, and I didn't want people to think I had used any inappropriate language. I'd simply written what I thought was a very common phrase for a "quick" divorce, with the letters "ie" added to the word "quick". I can only assume that some sort of automated deletion tool saw the word "quick" + those two extra letters, completely ignored the context, and decided the full word was being used in a suggestive, and therefore inappropriate way.

  The only reason I'm bothering to post this is that such an arbitrary and silly deletion -- something no intelligent human would ever consciously have gone to the trouble of doing -- makes me worry that maybe the only SmugMug entities actually reading these posts on a regular basis are automated censor-bots, as opposed to real live people. This would certainly explain why so many highly-requested feature threads seem to go completely un-responded to -- in some cases for years!

  Obviously I hope this is not really the case, because if it is, it means a whole bunch of us are sitting around sharing wonderfully creative ideas on how to keep a still-elegant but potentially floundering cyber-ship afloat and on course, while that same vessel's captain and top-level crew have long since sailed far away.

  But if any SmugMug officers ARE still on board -- even though I'm just a newbie here -- allow to me to suggest that it's in YOUR interest to make your presence known, to do so regularly and often, to constantly let all the passengers who've signed up for this cruise know that we're not rudderless and adrift, that you really do value what we're saying here, that you're sorry for all the ground that's been lost to other online services (especially in the whole area of image SHARING) but that you're now working overtime to implement ALL these long-overdue feature requests, and are genuinely committed to making SmugMug the apologies-free Gold Standard for Image Display, Image Selling, AND Image SHARING it deserves to become, and its very patient customers deserve to have.

  OR... you can maintain the policy of radio silence, and just keep making sure that shockingly immoral phrases such as "quick -- ie divorce" are never allowed to pollute these forums.

  Of course, if that's where this cyber-ship's communication resources ARE being directed, then there are certain to be other, similar phrases -- ones like "Bailing" and "Jumping Ship" -- which will also have to be auto-deleted, more and more. And that would be sad.

• Anonymous commented  ·  March 6, 2013 2:46 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  YES YES YES PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE LET THIS HAPPEN!!! John Bertram is right on the money here. SM has a fantastic gallery set up, which is why, for me, it's a preferred over Dropbox. Priorities for me are display & sharing. Really hope this happens.

• Magnus Becker commented  ·  March 5, 2013 1:11 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  John, I think that pretty much nails it. Thanks for good summary!

• Brian R commented  ·  March 4, 2013 8:14 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Ease of use for all parties involved is definitely key here. I currently run an FTP/web server where I upload a ZIP file of the exact same images that are in the SmugMug gallery. Yeah, it works, as would DropBox, but it's not the ideal solution. For one thing, uploading 1 GB of data twice is a time & bandwidth waster. Having it all in SmugMug would be much more elegant and seamless.

• John Bertram commented  ·  March 4, 2013 10:50 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  And if photo/file SHARING was the primary thing I needed, then Dropbox or something similar is absolutely the route I'd be taking. But, I suspect like many other users here, it's SM's very rich, gallery-based Image DISPLAY options -- most of which I'm still just beginning to explore -- that make me want to find some way to make this relationship work, and not seek a ******* divorce just yet.

  My impression is that SmugMug is an attempt to integrate three related but distinct services: Image (both photo & video) DISPLAY, Image SHARING, and Image SELLING. The Selling part is one I personally don't expect to be using (at least not for the foreseeable future), but clearly for some professionals it would be the MOST important aspect of the service.

  So everyone's going to have a different mix of priorities -- in my case the Displaying part ranks first, with the Sharing aspects coming second. But whatever the priorities, I think the main point of this thread is that SmugMug really needs to beef up its SHARING functionality in general, and make it much more intuitive, convenient, and flexible -- both for the paying account holders AND for their online visitors.

  While I've already got a long list of Display features I'd like to see added, expanded, or made more accessible, I'm also seeing a lot of nice potential I want to explore using even just the current SmugMug toolset. On the Sharing side meanwhile, I simply want SM to start making up for all the ground they've lost to services like Dropbox (+ countless others), and am still scratching my head for a reason why they seem to have let this particular aspect of their product languish so shamefully for so long.

• David Barnes commented  ·  March 4, 2013 8:30 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Gents - I've got one word for you - it's the service all the pro's and picture-desks in the UK are using - Dropbox - it offers all the features you're looking for

• John Bertram commented  ·  March 2, 2013 10:00 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Thanks Magnus for mentioning the other thing I meant to but forgot -- some way to give Visitors a convenient Size option for their Downloading as well, instead of only for their Viewing. Just makes sense.

• Magnus Becker commented  ·  March 2, 2013 3:35 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I know and it's appreciated, I just don't want to wake the thought in the SmugMug team (?) that this is a feasible way to go on a broader base.

  PS: Just took a look at phanfare.com, they offer a download gallery button as well. You can choose between high and low rez pictures. In addition they offer a download button for every single picture. A pity it does not offer some of the other features that I need. :/

• Gregg Le Blanc commented  ·  March 2, 2013 3:18 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I know, just trying to help.
  700+ days of waiting and workarounds sometimes leads to something worth sharing.
  Didn't mean to waste anyone's time.

• Magnus Becker commented  ·  March 2, 2013 3:09 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Gregg, I appreciate your effort to share with us this workaround and your experience, but I don't want to have to use workarounds for basic functionalities and unfortunately for my purpose it doesn't do, since I need a button right in my gallery.

  Actually I'd love to have an even more advanced download button where the user can choose the size of the images. Not everyone of my users needs/wants the full quality. In combination with the suggestion from John, where you can choose the pictures you want to download, this would be the perfect solution, but for the start I'd already be happy with a simply download all that downloads all pictures of one gallery in a size defined inside the gallery settings.

• Gregg Le Blanc commented  ·  March 2, 2013 2:50 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Yeah, I just use SkyDrive for this now. It offers these features for free. Except where you waste your time doing things twice.

  You can even make SkyDrive look like it comes from your Photography domain - If you set up your domain properly (which is free) at domains.live.com, you get free storage and photo gallery functionality there. People can then download all your photos as a Zip file.

  And email support... if you want.

  The Sharing Features are all way improved now and SkyDrive has apps on every mobile platform. And you get free Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote via the Browser...

  Others use DropBox, but this way I don't have to keep the files locally... when you set up your domain on SkyDrive, you can give yourself extra users (with separate SkyDrive accounts) and share that way.

  I thought Cubby.com might be another way to do it, but that doesn't seem like a winner. Box.com could work for some. And maybe GDrive or something (I haven't tried it).

  The Live Domains will give you free email with good spam protection if you want (you can make that optional). It does take a little configuration at your DNS host if you do all that. But there's no need to go that deep.

  The caveat is that the Mac Mail apps will never natively support Outlook's Mail protocol (Outlook 2013 for Mac may - if it ever shows up...) but the iPhone / iPad / Android / Windows Phone devices do great with native support for contacts, calendar, and mail folders via Exchange ActiveSync.

  Mac Mail just does POP3 support... which is terrible. And you get no Contacts or Calendar items.

  Just want to be full disclosure if you try it...

• John Bertram commented  ·  March 2, 2013 2:15 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Of course what I'd really like to see in this regard -- beyond the obvious "Download All as Zip" function -- is an owner-controlled option to let visitors choose MULTIPLE images (in a non-contiguous, Cmd-Click sort of way), and then click a nice friendly "Download Selected" button. But I guess that's dreaming in Technicolor. Sigh.

• Michael Allie commented  ·  March 2, 2013 3:25 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I posted asking for this feature when I first signed up. In fact, having my visitors be able to download entire galleries was my sole purpose for wanting an account somewhere. I know some people have said they will leave over this, but honestly, folks, I haven't found anywhere else that had that functionality, and in so many ways, I think SM is a great site.

  In reality, after getting over my upset about this feature missing, I gave in and just generated a link for myself and emailed it to people. It really worked out fine. There was a single case in the last year where the person didn't go to do the download until after the link expired and I had to re-do it, but that was one time in a year. Not really a big deal.

  I, too, wonder if anyone really reads these, but I look at what SM has done in terms of their iPad application, etc., and determined that I can suffer through this missing feature, but it sure is irksome. For a site that is so rich with features, it is hard to understand why they would leave this much-needed feature off of their list.

• Magnus Becker commented  ·  March 2, 2013 12:27 a.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I'm waiting for this feature now for two years. It's horrible how SmugMug implements the download options. Many of my users are complaining about that. Last month I had to extend my membership and I seriously researched if it makes sense to jump the boat and I really much wanted to because of all the complaints.

  I was considering going to Zenfolio. The website is much better in this regard, as well as the way they offer to manage your pictures is far ahead. Overal it seems currently in regard to cost/price the best alternative I could find.

  However, for now I stayed with SmugMug because of three other important that Zenfolio doesn't offer:

  1. In a SM gallery the user can choose the size in which he gets the image shown.

  2. You can use 1. to be able to choose the size in which you can download the picture. Nevertheless, unfortunately you have to do a right click and choose "Save Image" for that.

  3. In SmugMug you can offer a user without a SM account to upload pictures to your gallery and you can protect that with a simple password. It's a feature I'm really glad they implemented, but like this one here it was for ages on the feature list.

  As soon as Zenfolio implements 1. and 2. I'll turn my back on SM, yet will really miss 3.

  So my plea as well towards SmugMug is: please implement decent download options for users. Please, this is really an important feature. John, I share your pain!

  Cheers
  Magnus

• Eric commented  ·  March 1, 2013 9:49 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  I think you're are completely accurate in your assumptions, John. The fact that they have a download paid option which they take a cut out of confirms they want to oversee and limit the ease of SmugMug being a file sharing site. Maybe it has to do with bandwidth versus lose of sales through the print labs they are partnered with or a combination of both. However, as you mentioned it is a beta simplest function that has obviously been decided against. It would be nice to know that reason, or hear a response from the top on this one. There are just too many good features SmugMug has for me that keeps me from jumping ship, however, I have weighed the pro/cons and as soon as the competitors step up their game, I foresee a lot of people jumping ship due to little annoyances like this. All I can say is vote up this suggestion are much as possible, hopefully enough to see a change or at least a response.

• John Bertram commented  ·  March 1, 2013 9:25 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  Sorry -- accidentally just posted before signing my name: John Bertram

• John Bertram commented  ·  March 1, 2013 9:23 p.m.  ·  Flag as inappropriateFlag as inappropriate  ·  Delete

  After nearing the end of a 14-day trial, during which I created an initial batch of Categories, Sub-Categories, and Galleries, I signed up earlier today for a one-year "Power" membership.

  Have I just made a terrible mistake???

  The FIRST major interface help message I sent -- figuring I must be missing some obvious way to do this -- was on this very question. The response I got was speedy, alright -- but has left me completely gobsmacked. Not to mention feeling like I just got suckered.

  Is there some high-minded design philosophy, or obscure technical reason, why SmugMug has elected to be THIS limiting in terms of default download options available to visitors, or "activate-able" by its paying customers?

  ONLY allowing visitors to download one image at a time? NO option for visitors to select and download multiple images AT ALL?

  And requiring paying users to manually create a zip file, manually share the link to that file with their visitors (and/or having to manually post that link in each gallery)? And presumably requiring those same paying account holders to then have to re-create that zip file all over again EVERY TIME a change is made to any of the images contained in that Gallery? And all of that just to simulate the kind of numbingly-obvious "Save All" feature which has been a taken-for-granted default option offered in so many other photo and file-sharing services for so long now?

  Sorry to rant on -- but this is hardly a "niche" feature -- this is VERY basic functionality. There has to be a reason for this -- however misguided.

  Has SmugMug deliberately decided to emphasize its Photo-Displaying and Photo-Selling features, by intentionally crippling its Photo-Sharing abilities? Does SmugMug simply not want to be seen as a "Photo-Sharing" service at all? Please tell me if I'm missing some basic idea here.

  Or have Visitor-friendly (AND Owner-friendly) basic photo-sharing options simply not YET been implemented -- perhaps because so much attention was being focussed on other, more flashy parts of the interface?

  Whatever the reasons -- or excuses -- may be, if SmugMug HAS made a conscious decision not to make it easy for me to make sharing my photos easy for my visitors, then all its admirable customization options stop looking all that impressive, and the "ugly", bare-bones free sites (the ones I passed over in favor of what I thought would be a "full-featured" service like SmugMug) start looking a lot more functional.

  BTW -- do the SmugMug people really even look at this feedback? Or is this just here to make us feel like they actually want to improve the service? Because this kind of meat-and-potatoes functionality is not simply one of many possible upgrades desired by some users. It is basic, fundamental, don't even-bother-releasing-a-Beta-version-without-it ESSENTIAL. This forum demonstrates it is achingly and embarrassingly overdue, and needs to be implemented as soon as possible (as in, oh I don't know -- maybe a couple of years ago, at the latest!).

  As Wallace Shawn declares in Princess Bride: "Inconceivable!"