[Re-resolved] Imgur images not displaying

[kschmidt 6,223]

Imgur picture links on simtropolis no longer working due to maintenance, database error´s, site conversions ? Since my move to Imgur some 1 1/2 year ago everything have been transvered to this site ! Recently somehow randomly due to cache some appear lot not, but refreshing last CJ links wich got corrupted I aswell see these corrupted within no time, what is the matter ? Maintenance of simtropolis has trippled last year due to the site new site version or does it be to crowded, some ellements on the mainpage I may believe makes loading times take too long. Reeditin all content I will not do so any one who want to see of my work I liket to point to the two gallery´s Mayon Province and ANNO Europe as these contain most of these CJ series pictures. Long as this issue is around I will update the last two CJ, more may be deleted due. Hope we will find the cause of this issue !

Sincerely yours,

kschmidt

[kschmidt 6,223]

Imgur not displaying 02 !

Today continued my invastigation. Imgur seem fine as recently updated CJ displayed for some time ! Web browser aswell not the cause of this strange behaviour . Inspecting the links element with firefox a clear link to Imgur is found so erased links isn´t the issue. Addblock maybe the cause external links won´t work! Hope there will b some light !

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

After investigation and subsequent findings by @_Michael, it has come to our attention that Simtropolis has been blocked from hotlinking Imgur hosted images. As a result those posted anywhere on the site will no longer be displayed with a "403 Access Denied" status. Viewing the images directly and the images are intact at the source URL.

For example in Firefox using the network inspector:

Initial correspondence with an Imgur support representative has revealed this is due to an apparent breach of their Terms of Service. However as far as we're aware, Simtropolis remains compliant because we don't use them to serve elements of our site such as banners or logos. These are hosted locally on the ST server. It could potentially be due to the sheer quantity of images in CJs and posted in the forums, causing us to be auto-blacklisted. At this stage though, details remain unclear.

Out next step will be to seek clarification on the precise reasons for the block. Hopefully that will determine what steps may be required to reach a settlement, or establish whether this has occurred by mistake. Understandably images play a key role in our community, and this is something which we'll endeavour to resolve as best we can.

[Propfam 2,305]

Relevant to the site, our site gives error when I post my reply. More specifically, it throws "no such file or directory" error. It's temporary but annoying for users who post their replies in that time.

Thanks.

[Tyberius06 12,267]

Since the begining of the last year, imgur pictures haven't been showing up for me as well (at least on first tries, but after a little trick, I could watch them apart from a few exceptions), but it was due to a technical error in the Vodafon UK broadband network, which is still standing. The problem was about something that the imgur generated an infinite loading loop with the Vodafon network, therefore the Vodafon built in a blocking system which prevented the happening of the infinite loop, but with this they were blocking the imgur site too... For example after doing a little trick, I could manage to load in most of the player's pictures (I could force the "system" to make me allow to see the pictues after I went trough on a process and  refreshed the simtro page), but I couldn't manage to load in any of @korver's pictures from his CJ. But it happened only on Vodafon  UK broadband.
Now, with @nycsc4 recent pictures, the previous trick doesn't work, I got the 403 error message, and his pics don't show up after I refresh the page.

[_Michael 2,681]

I’m not aware of that particular issue, but my contact with Imgur confirmed to us that, as @Cyclone Boom said, ST has been blocked, and that is the cause of the current issue. 

 

As for korver, I had a similar issue on my phone, and it was due to the way Dropbox images links work. Chrome on a desktop worked fine for me. 

[madhatter106 3,931]

Ugh I just shunted everything in my BAT thread from Photobucket to Imgur last summer...

[catty-cb 4,412]

23 hours ago, madhatter106 said:

Ugh I just shunted everything in my BAT thread from Photobucket to Imgur last summer...

I think there are going to be more issues with pictures this year, got an email from Flickr a couple of weeks ago

Quote

We’re excited to announce that Flickr has agreed to be acquired by SmugMug, the photography platform dedicated to visual storytellers.

SmugMug has a long history of empowering people who love photography and who want to improve their craft, making them a perfect fit for Flickr and our creative community. With SmugMug, we’ll continue to focus on you, the Flickr members who inspire us all with your work.

Nothing will change immediately with regard to your Flickr account. You will still access Flickr with your current login credentials and you will have the same Flickr experience as you do now. We will continue to work to make your Flickr experience even better.

We think you are going to love Flickr under SmugMug ownership, but you can choose to not have your Flickr account and data transferred to SmugMug until May 25, 2018. If you want to keep your Flickr account and data from being transferred, you must go to your Flickr account to download the photos and videos you want to keep, then delete your account from your Account Settings by May 25, 2018.

If you do not delete your account by May 25, 2018, your Flickr account and data will transfer to SmugMug and will be governed by SmugMug’s Terms and Privacy Policy.

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

Images Restored!     

I'm pleased to confirm the fine folks at Imgur have reviewed our case and ruled in favour of removing Simtropolis from their blacklist. This means all existing and subsequently posted Imgur images on the site will now display as normal, and without the need to update any links.

Following email correspondence with an Imgur support representative after an internal investigation, Simtropolis was deemed to be fully compliant with their Terms of Service. The block had been triggered automatically, seemingly due to an erroneous classification with how Imgur images are distributed on our site. By being set for our domain name, the images themselves were denied from loading on any site page. However now it's been lifted, they are viewable intact as they were before the block was enforced.

Thanks everyone for your patience during the downtime, and we hope this was simply a one-off blip which doesn't happen again.

-The Admins

[kschmidt 6,223]

On 17-5-2018 at 5:57 AM, Cyclone Boom said:

Images Restored!     

I'm pleased to confirm the fine folks at Imgur have reviewed our case and ruled in favour of removing Simtropolis from their blacklist. This means all existing and subsequently posted Imgur images on the site will now display as normal, and without the need to update any links.

Following email correspondence with an Imgur support representative after an internal investigation, Simtropolis was deemed to be fully compliant with their Terms of Service. The block had been triggered automatically, seemingly due to an erroneous classification with how Imgur images are distributed on our site. By being set for our domain name, the images themselves were denied from loading on any site page. However now it's been lifted, they are viewable intact as they were before the block was enforced.

Thanks everyone for your patience during the downtime, and we hope this was simply a one-off blip which doesn't happen again.

-The Admins

Thank you, !

Sincerely yours,

kschmidt

[AndisArt 2,068]

On 17.5.2018 at 5:57 AM, Cyclone Boom said:

Images Restored!     

I'm pleased to confirm the fine folks at Imgur have reviewed our case and ruled in favour of removing Simtropolis from their blacklist. This means all existing and subsequently posted Imgur images on the site will now display as normal, and without the need to update any links.

Following email correspondence with an Imgur support representative after an internal investigation, Simtropolis was deemed to be fully compliant with their Terms of Service. The block had been triggered automatically, seemingly due to an erroneous classification with how Imgur images are distributed on our site. By being set for our domain name, the images themselves were denied from loading on any site page. However now it's been lifted, they are viewable intact as they were before the block was enforced.

Thanks everyone for your patience during the downtime, and we hope this was simply a one-off blip which doesn't happen again.

-The Admins

The images in my BAT thread are not restored. All that is left is empty image names, no link when in editing mode visible. Can you help?

[CorinaMarie 29,894]

17 minutes ago, AndisArt said:

The images in my BAT thread are not restored. All that is left is empty image names, no link when in editing mode visible. Can you help?

We are looking into it. I've found this post that shows image names, but no picture. If you could post links to other specific posts it'll help.

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

@AndisArt

On your BAT thread, it appears these images are hosted on another imaging site named: postimg.org

Attempting to visit any of them results in a "Server not found" error, which means no connection could be established at all. Basically that server is no longer operational and so is unable to handle any inbound requests. A bit of research and I came across this topic explaining how back in March they switched their domain over to postimg.cc instead. Now it seems they've transferred over and their new site is located at: postimages.org

Thankfully the images appear to redirect when adding the .cc to replace the .org from the old links.

For instance from the post Cori linked and also confirmed working elsewhere:

Old:
https://s14.postimg.org/3l6j2myin/NORTH_ingame.jpg

New:
https://s14.postimg.cc/3l6j2myin/NORTH_ingame.jpg

 

Are there any other examples of broken ones which instead refer to Imgur? Checking a few and I don't see any errors for those.

For these postimg.org ones, the good news is I've just done a batch find & replace on all matching items in the database (967 posts in total). They've now been successfully converted to the correct working URLs, making the images display again without them needing to be manually fixed up.

[korver 27,686]

On 5/16/2018 at 10:57 PM, Cyclone Boom said:

Images Restored!     

I'm pleased to confirm the fine folks at Imgur have reviewed our case and ruled in favour of removing Simtropolis from their blacklist. This means all existing and subsequently posted Imgur images on the site will now display as normal, and without the need to update any links.

Following email correspondence with an Imgur support representative after an internal investigation, Simtropolis was deemed to be fully compliant with their Terms of Service. The block had been triggered automatically, seemingly due to an erroneous classification with how Imgur images are distributed on our site. By being set for our domain name, the images themselves were denied from loading on any site page. However now it's been lifted, they are viewable intact as they were before the block was enforced.

Thanks everyone for your patience during the downtime, and we hope this was simply a one-off blip which doesn't happen again.

-The Admins

Unfortunately it looks like imgur links are once again being blocked, at least from my end. Only a small handful of my CJ updates are displaying proper imgur links, everything else seems to be broken yet again - and I'm also noticing that just about every other imgur picture on the site isn't showing up as well.

[kschmidt 6,223]

1 hour ago, korver said:

Unfortunately it looks like imgur links are once again being blocked, at least from my end. Only a small handful of my CJ updates are displaying proper imgur links, everything else seems to be broken yet again - and I'm also noticing that just about every other imgur picture on the site isn't showing up as well.

Imgur again blocking my images ! Perhaps a kind of time lock is installed wich drops links older than a week old ?

Sincerely yours,

kschmidt

[Odainsaker 2,137]

More likely, Imgur is blacklisting Simtropolis across-the-board again.  The "Show Us What You're Working On" thread shows how Imgur links fail to load, including in very recent posts.  Militant Radical's latest images in that thread were already broken for me only a half hour after they were posted, but I can direct-paste the image addresses in my browser to load them outside of Simtropolis.  They may then continue to display back in Simtropolis as they are then already temporarily loaded in the browser's memory.

 

[CorinaMarie 29,894]

Since @Cyclone Boom contacted imgur for the previous occurrence and he has the email address of the person who resolved the issue that time I'm sure he'll send off a new message to see what's up. I'm guessing it's an automatic flag and I have high hopes for a positive outcome again.

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

I can confirm this issue again with Imgur images. The error logged from the browser console is identical (403), and it does seem to be sitewide. Any images are only accessible by visiting them directly when pasting the URL into a new tab.

I've just replied back to the support representative email making them aware. Given nothing has changed from how Imgur hosted images are used here at ST, I'm very confident this can be promptly rectified. As happened last time, it would seem highly likely this is an auto-block from Simtropolis again being misclassified.

Hopefully within the next 24 hours I'll be posting good news...

[kschmidt 6,223]

1 hour ago, Odainsaker said:

More likely, Imgur is blacklisting Simtropolis across-the-board again.  The "Show Us What You're Working On" thread shows how Imgur links fail to load, including in very recent posts.  Militant Radical's latest images in that thread were already broken for me only a half hour after they were posted, but I can direct-paste the image addresses in my browser to load them outside of Simtropolis.  They may then continue to display back in Simtropolis as they are then already temporarily loaded in the browser's memory.

 

Well, short , ST maybe  recognized as a commercial site because of the .com extension, switching to .org might bethe sollution, but that would mean that all picture links be updated. Relatively most pictures will only be watched for about some time, so image links might be there, viewing rates are relative in time. Populair threads obviously take a peak in monthly viewing rates, size of pictures as well counts, as it´s all about bites and byte´s !  Imgur aswell a community, hosting remains a costly story; yet St as well, paid hosting still remains a expensive thing, what it is worth while for !

Sincerely yours,

kschmidt

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

Images Re-restored!     

Good news everyone. I can now confirm the block has been lifted, meaning Imgur hosted images will again display here at Simtropolis.

As suspected, it turns out the block was triggered automatically by their systems due to "excessive usage". But upon re-inspection, Imgur were able to confirm Simtropolis is still fully compliant with their Terms of Service. This suggests there are no limits restricting the quantity of bandwidth sites can consume, providing this involves proper usage as ST does, from combined images linked from the forums, CJs, etc. Since each time an image is downloaded by a user, the total bandwidth adds up cumulatively.

The main thing they're concerned about are websites which use their services as a CDN. We do not use Imgur for this purpose. Therefore it seems the automatic block is meant to catch sites in violation, though image-dependent ones like ours can potentially (and unfortunately) be flagged as false positives.

In the email reply I received from Imgur support, there was reassurance this has now been reported to the service developers. Seeing as the same block has occurred within the space of a month, they say how this is "far closer" to the previous blocking from mid-May.

Image Format Advice

Given this is about usage as a quantity (not the type), one small piece of advice we recommend is to use the JPG format. Due to the benefits of increased file size compression, this maximises the efficiency of images as opposed to a lossless format such as PNG or BMP. When uploading to Imgur, maybe this could then help reduce the rate of usage and avert the auto block. Since newly posted content containing images is more likely to be viewed by a larger audience, hence tallying up the bandwidth.

This could be applied to site attachments also, since all members have a quota of 125 MB for uploading images and files. Everyone is welcome to use this as a limited storage option, with uploads manageable from your personal index page listing, and this post explains how to use attachments from the editor.

----------

In terms of the blocking, I'll conclude this post by again thanking you all for your patience (especially with this occurring at the weekend).

And again, although we'll always work towards a swift resolution in these cases, here's hoping for not another repeat of this.

-The Admins

[Haljackey 17,398]

That's great news! Glad to see things back up and running again. Maybe with two problems now, Imgur will exclude this site from their algorithm in the future?

 

Regarding image sizes, I agree. I believe Imgur can reduce the size of images on free accounts anyway, so JPG is the way to go.

I use Flickr for high resolution images since they don't reduce quality and it's free to use. I'd use it for everything but Imgur is just so much more convenient to use. On Flickr it is a little more work to do everything but you can also set copyright / creative commons licenses there too. Just a tip!

[catty-cb 4,412]

7 hours ago, Haljackey said:

.....I use Flickr for high resolution images since they don't reduce quality and it's free to use. I'd use it for everything but Imgur is just so much more convenient to use. On Flickr it is a little more work to do everything but you can also set copyright / creative commons licenses there too. Just a tip!

Hopefully the new owners of Flickr won't go making too many changes to it ... they do say it will remain free to use

[nycsc4 5,250]

It may just be me, but this appears to be happening again.

[kschmidt 6,223]

 R

17 minutes ago, nycsc4 said:

It may just be me, but this appears to be happening again.

Nothing, with me. Cleared my firefox cache with Ccleaner wich is very thorough but nothing missing ?

Imgur now do have a new adverticement page, firefox upload bad, chrome works better !

Firefox get real slow without a real good Ccleaner brush up, aswell Rogue Killer for mailware !

Image hosters now turn any peny, maybe we should swap to PDF files on google drives or Youtube movies  but

that doesn´t add to a nice community page !

Sincerely yours,

kschmidt

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

37 minutes ago, nycsc4 said:

It may just be me, but this appears to be happening again.

Checking a few Showcase and CJ entries which use Imgur hosted images, I'm not able to confirm this personally as of this post. If still persisting, could you please provide an example of the image(s) you noticed missing? It's possible the links are broken or the pics may have been deleted at the source by the author.

Hopefully we've not been blocked again as it would be the 3rd time in as many months. Let me know, and if this does turn out to be a re-occurrence, I'll promptly send Support another email so it can be re-re-resolved as soon as possible. Thanks everyone.

[kschmidt 6,223]

20 minutes ago, Cyclone Boom said:

Checking a few Showcase and CJ entries which use Imgur hosted images, I'm not able to confirm this personally as of this post. If still persisting, could you please provide an example of the image(s) you noticed missing? It's possible the links are broken or the pics may have been deleted at the source by the author.

Hopefully we've not been blocked again as it would be the 3rd time in as many months. Let me know, and if this does turn out to be a re-occurrence, I'll promptly send Support another email so it can be re-re-resolved as soon as possible. Thanks everyone.

Switching to .org .nu or .net extension might be the  only eventual sollution !

[nycsc4 5,250]

42 minutes ago, Cyclone Boom said:

Checking a few Showcase and CJ entries which use Imgur hosted images, I'm not able to confirm this personally as of this post. If still persisting, could you please provide an example of the image(s) you noticed missing? It's possible the links are broken or the pics may have been deleted at the source by the author.

Hopefully we've not been blocked again as it would be the 3rd time in as many months. Let me know, and if this does turn out to be a re-occurrence, I'll promptly send Support another email so it can be re-re-resolved as soon as possible. Thanks everyone.

False alarm!  It was just me.  When I originally wrote that, I was on my office computer which has a tendency to block out images on forums and other sites.  I only just today realized that Simtropolis was unblocked on said computer so when I saw the text links and no pictures I thought we were having the same issue.  I'm on my personal computer now and everything is there.