Users of soon-to-close Picplz will be spared the inconvenience of downloading each of their photos individually, after the soon to close app revealed it has built a dedicated archive to allow each user to access their images in bulk before September 3.
Initially, the one time Instagram rival, which officially closes July 4, stipulated that its users must download each photo separately. However it later revealed it would launch a more complete option and has now unveiled the archive system that allows users to download all of their content — including the original images and those with filters — from one place.
The company says it will contact users from June 14 to notify them of the archive, and the fact that they have just over six weeks to download the content.
The initial decision to make users download each photo raised questions as it made life difficult for dedicated fans that had uploaded considerable numbers of photos to the service. As our own Drew Olanoff pointed out, just because a service fails, doesn’t mean that users who put faith in it should suffer.
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Picplz was the center of recent controversy discussion after Facebook announced a deal to buy Instagram in April. The New York Times accused investor Andreesen Horowitz of “fumbling” its investment in Instagram after the firm opted to back continue to back Picplz over Kevin Systrom’s service.
Principal Ben Horowitz came out to clear the air, explaining that the firm made its decision based on the fact that it had backed Picplz first, at a time when Instagram was called Burbn and was not focused on the photo sharing space.
After Burbn’s pivot into Instagram, which brought it into direct competition with Picplz, Andreesen Horowitz made an ethical decision to stick with their first investment and decline to invest further funds into the new rival.
The VC firm made a hugely impressive $78 million from its $250,000 investment in Instagram, but came forward to clarify the decision after it was reported that incompetence saw it miss out on millions more.
Image: Flickr / marcogomes
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