I used to use Dropbox for cloud backup of important files, but I haven’t in years. However, I still have the Dropbox folder and I still have important files and receipts in there, more current than the last sync to Dropbox which was many many years ago.

This is quite concerning to say the least.

roughly six months ago, Backblaze enacted a silent change that made its backup app stop uploading local data synced to "OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox, Box, iDrive, and others."

How does it know? I assume the shittiest way, by just having a deny list of path prefixes.

Uhg. Where do I go now? I really just ultimately want encrypted zfs replication...

What is an “AI storage service”?

Does that mean you just store your info in AI weights/contexts and hope it can regenerate an approximation of what you put in?

Backblaze is a service I really depend on, and one I've recommended. However they're still not profitable and investor money isnt going to keep them afloat forever.

The changes come as the company has experienced a 40X year-over-year increase in AI data stored on its servers and has increased focus on its accelerating AI business.

If this means they just want to throttle AI companies, I don’t care. Go forth and prosper BackBlaze.

If it doesn’t, statement retracted.

Just when you think AI isn't ruining something, it's ruining something.

I decided against Backblaze for server backups because they charge for certain API calls, and I ended up exceeding the quota when I was testing with the free tier. I was experimenting with encrypted backups and not sure how I exceeded it, but it really put me off that I could potentially have a surprise bill from experimenting without exceeding my storage quota. I went with iDrive e2 specifically because they don’t have API fees and it has worked fine the last couple years. My storage utilization has grown and I’ve been charged extra, which is expected, whereas API calls would be harder to predict depending on what I do in a given month. For self-hosting, I want easy, predictable pricing and don’t want to deal with surprise bills. It’s enough of a chore to manage cloud spend at work without it being a headache at home too.

Enshittification strikes again.

Thanks for the acronym definitions, it's like they wanted to report these news without really reporting it..

Well that sucks. I use Backblaze and it has saved my ass more than once.

It should be noted that this affects their BackBlaze backup client that operates alongside their unlimited personal storage solution. I doubt these issues exist with B2 storage where you can store whatever you want.

I’ve never used their personal backup plan because it’s for backing up a single machine. I have servers all over so I just use them for their S3 compatible object storage which is still a decent deal.

If you aren’t running it yourself, you’ll always be held hostage by toxic companies!

Time and time again, from account closures to account locking… if you value anything, you should really look at self hosting it. Yes it’s a learning curve, but now is actually a good time because you have claude to help, but don’t expect that to last!

I am and will only ever use the free tier of claude but even that is actually pretty useful. Just don’t reuse the same chat, create new ones, delete ones no longer needed and you rarely hit the usage limits.

I’ve used claude to get my own AI server running on a low power beelink PC and while i’m still learning, it runs pretty well so Imcan now bounce between my own AI, to claude for the few issues I can’t solve.

Basically moved 5TB away from Backblaze when they started raising their prices... greedy fucks, every one of them

I left because their support was atrocious. I literally pointed out what the problem was on their end, but they didn't give a damn and continued gaslighting me.

Fuck em'

Don’t use any of the services they mentioned anyways and nothing in this thread seems to even come close to the $99/year if you have a lot of data. Not going to be switching any time soon unless they end their unlimited backups entirely.

That's not surprising with all of the data hoarders abusing the unlimited backups to store hundreds of terabytes.

Backblaze, Shmackblaze

Darn you, backblaze. This is how you blaze your backup business. To ashes.

Once again, if they sent an email about it explicitly stating the changes, it didn't happen "silently".

It’s a bad time for this. I need to get off backblaze, but also hard drives and computers are stupid expensive.

It’s frustrating how there is no other unmetered competition in this space. Backblaze is one stool leg of my 3 2 1 backup for irreplaceable documents and family photos.