Hi everyone ✌️, Walterion is here, and I'm excited to introduce you to Arcane Photos 🎴, a private and secure alternative for Google Photos. As we keep hearing about data breach news of big companies, it is harder for us to keep trusting them with our personal data. It made us think about finding a better way. We believe the best way to keep data secure is not having them in the first place. That's why we choose the server-less and encrypted solution with the help of blockchain. We worked on it for months, and now it is ready to share with you. In Arcane Photos, all the photos will be encrypted first and then stored in the storage of choice. It comes with a nice 10GB free storage by default. You can always choose another storage provider or even host your own - if you are techy or an enterprise. (Psst, it is fully GDPR compliant, so the right choice for your clients' photos). Arcane Photos is available on any modern browser, and more is on the way. Also, to hold our security claim, we released the source as open to anyone. Take a look at it in the GitHub link. We can’t wait to hear what you think. Please do not hesitate to ask me any question. “A secure home for your photos and you got the keys. Arcane Photos.” Some FAQ: - Why I need this? You don't if you don't care that much about your privacy. Right now, many services out there are processing your data and use them to sell you ads or sell them to buyers or manipulate your life. Leave alone data breaches that are happening from time to time from huge companies. - How is this different? Arcane Photos is server-less. It means no server processing, no log. All the job is done in your device, and then it will be saved as encrypted in the cloud as dumb storage. - It does not have all the features I want, so why should I use it? Arcane Photos is young, and we just launched, but with your support, we can do much! Come and join us and let us know what you want; we will take care of that for you. - How do you secure my photos? All of them will be fully encrypted with the highest security standards, and after that, it will be stored safely in the cloud. - Where are my photos? You can choose cloud storage to have fast access to them from anywhere. We provide a free 10GB storage by default for you, and more is coming with higher plans. - What is Blockstack? Why should I login with Blockstack? It is an identity for you on the blockchain. The master key to all the encryption is there, and it is encrypted too! You will get the master code on the signup, just like a bitcoin wallet, so you are the real owner. - Will my photos be forever stored on the blockchain? Can I remove them? How is it GDPR compliant? The encryption key is on the blockchain, but not your files, and you can choose whatever storage provider you want. So you are free to remove all your fills, and they will be erased entirely. - What if I lost my password/key? It will be saved just like your other social accounts, and you will get the needed info at the signup process. But as any secure vault, you should take care of the keys a little better. Otherwise, you and no one else can access them. - Could anybody else be able to access my photos? No! You are the only one with the keys to the encrypted data. All the data first will be encrypted and then leave your machine, and all the connections are secured with high standards. - What if your site goes down? Arcane Photos is a server-less app; IF our service goes down, you can host it on your system or even use another alternative because you own the files and keys. And the code is open on Github, so no worries. - Can I run Arcane Photos on my own server? Yes, you can, although you need a little tech info to do that. Contact us, and we will help you, and if you are a manger in a company, we will provide your company with additional features too. - I have another question for you. Chat with us here or contact us from the website. - I like you, how can I show you? Please let others know about their other options like Arcane Photos. Also, we love to hear you liked it, so give us a shout out, and we will be thrilled.

No search and no automatic upload? You removed the best features of Google Photos! Great direction though. I've been looking for an alternative for months. Still, the automatic upload is a minimum for me, I'm afraid...

@walterion1 - Who are you? Who is on the team? Where are you based? Thanks

Couldn’t you launch all your Arcane products once and together? Quite annoying to see them come one by one every morning🤷🏻‍♂️

google acquisition 😉 ???? @walterion1

Awesome job, team! So we will finally be able to replace Google suite :)

Congrats on the launch of your whole office suite! This is one of the most needed alternatives. I'd suggest adding additional info on your website about Gaia storage, how to change storage provider, recommended storage providers, etc. It can be hard to get into Blockstack.

Really excited to see the entire Arcane suite rollout. Another upvote for ya. Some instant feedback: It would be really good to see a comparison chart of Arcane Photos vs. Google Photos, even if it's really short and concise. You can mention the privacy and decentralized aspect for example, which would encourage users to try it for those reasons alone. Additionally, I had some questions: 1. Are there any features that Arcane Photos doesn't have that Google Photos does have? 2. How do you see decentralization and convenience coexisting? I ask this because convenience is oftent the enemy of privacy/security. So for example: For me, I really how Google Photos organizes by timestamps, facial recognition, and other metadata. This of course is terrible for privacy (and I don't use Google Photos anymore), but particularly when it comes to organizing, these features are really helpful, especially when you have a library of 50k+ photos. So do you think this will ever exist on a Blockchain-based platform like Arcane Photos? (Or does something like that already exist out there and I'm just not aware?)

I can't access the website :( I'm getting a GitLab error (404 - Doesn't exist or you don't have permission). Am I the only one?

Thanks to @aaronoleary for the Hunt ✌️

good enough

Great work – I love this, great blockchain use case.

Congratulations on the launch team, looks good on my mobile 🙏

Wow! Nice and smooth UI and plenty security features, even blockchain is included out of the box! And opensource is here as well which is very important for me.

Awesome to read about a new Google Photos alternative!!, I'm actually using Nextcloud for such purpose as well and even though it great, it's not really designed for such thing. All the best with it!, I'm looking forward to see the option to install it locally in my server but in the meantime with such security, privacy and decentralized features, is more than enough for me

I was trying to delete photos – which can only be done one at a time, a major pain in the ass, when the screen froze on one photo, displaying the icons over and over 6 or seven rows deep. I refreshed the page in my browser, and POOF! – everything gone, not even any trace of a deleted photo in the bin. Hadn't occurred to me that in October 2020 I'd be an unwitting beta tester. What a disaster this app is!

If one day. a hack org control 50% of that blockchain. Is that means all photos will then exposed to hacked to blackmail?

Really amazing work here guys!