Today I received a notice that Picturebug is going out of business. Who is Picturebug? I’m not sure. I had never heard of them, but apparently they are a picture service similar to Shutterfly or Snapfish.

My email contained a link to their website which confirmed that they have discontinued their service and users will no longer be able to order prints of any photos stored by the service. I guess if I had used the service this would be a bummer. I do use online photo services for both printing needs and as a backup photo storage method to my PC and backup discs. Now I will rethink that strategy.

According to the Picturebug email:

“For customers who need access to their photos, we will provide them to you on a CD for $19.95 including shipping & handling. Please email us atxxxxxxx@digibug.com to request your CD. We will provide you with instructions on how to order your CD. Please allow 2-4 weeks for processing.”

Really? So anyone who actually used the service is now out $20 just to retrieve their photos.

If that isn’t bad enough, folks visiting the Picturebug website are directed to a “Partners Page” where you are told that while they can no longer fulfill order requests, “The services listed below are among the best in the market for sharing, prints and online photos. We highly recommend you try several of these services to see which ones work best for you!” I was not surprised to see that the dozen or so links to other photo services were affiliate links.

So let me recap. Users of Picturebug are out of luck, unless you want to pay $20 to get your own photos back. And for every “Partner” service you sign up for, Picturebug will get a minimum of $13 on referral commission. I guess this is a great way to make some money if actually processing photos doesn’t cut it.

Does anyone here use Picturebug, anyway?