In my FileFactory links yesterday I asked about WeTransfer. I ultimately decided to give one of their pro accounts a try. You can get a one-month subscription for something like $12 bucks. I hope you all don’t mind, but I used some of the PayPal money you gave me at the last begging.
Unfortunately, I don’t think WeTransfer will work for me.
The pricing is actually really good. You can get unlimited storage for $19/month. I’ve downloaded from WeTransfer before and their speeds have always been great. As far as I can tell they don’t spam you with pop-ups or faulty links and they don’t make anybody jump through any hoops before they can download. I played with it a little last night and the upload speeds are fast.
All of that is great, it got me excited about using them. But then I discovered the downsides.
I tried uploading an unzipped folder. The upload worked fine, but there doesn’t seem to be any way to view the contents of the folder once it is uploaded. One of the things I love about Google Drive is that if I upload a folder then you can open that folder up in Google Drive. You can view the files, even read text files and see the images. I believe you can even play a FLAC file online. All of that is super helpful in determining whether or not you actually want to download the files.
As far as I can tell you can’t do that with WeTransfer. It appears that I can’t even do that on my end, as the uploader. That sucks.
There doesn’t seem to be any sort of file management system either. With Amazon Drive, File Factory, Google Drive and every other cloud storage system that I’ve used you have been able to manage your files when you uploaded them. I could create an artist folder and then move all the shows by that artist into them. I could sort by file name, date created, or other things. This is really helpful when you’ve uploaded thousands of files.
There also doesn’t seem to be a way of sharing multiple files at once, unless you upload them at the same time and then you cannot share individual files that were uploaded in a batch. So if I upload a Bob Dylan show right now and then one in an hour and another one later today, I can’t share all three of those shows with one link. Now if I upload those three shows at the same time WeTransfer will give me one link that will encompass all three shows. But if I only want to share one of the three shows, there doesn’t seem to be a method of doing that. And those files are permanently stuck together in WeTransfer’s filing system. When I look at all of my transfers, any files I uploaded at the same time I permanently batched together so that I can’t see everything unless I click on its button.
I’m probably not explaining that well. Ultimately, WeTransfer doesn’t have a good filing system for the files I upload. That’s a deal breaker for me. I need to be able to organize the files I upload. Now, if I’m not mistaken WeTransfer has only recently developed a pro-account system. I believe that previously everything was deleted after seven days. So they never needed to develop a good organizational system. They do have something called Portals which kind of leans towards the organization, but it is really set up for companies to collaborate on projects with all of their employees, and so it doesn’t really work for what I’m doing. But maybe as they grow they will find a better way for users to organize their files.
I’ll keep an eye on them for sure.
themidnightcafe.org 
That explanation makes perfect sense. Dang!! Yes, WeTransfer seems to be great at individual file exchange – like, “Here’s one file with no fuss, no muss” and works well with no virus pop-ups. But beyond that, I can see its limitations.
It seems that you need something that shows both file structure and contains a link for download. Hmmm…
One more thought for now. I am sure you have discussed this as you’ve been going through this transition, but I apologize, I forget if you have. Have you looked into Mediafire? There must be a way for those with a special/paid Mediafire account to provide easy downloads for others **without others needing to have a special/paid account**.
I highlight that last part because that seems to be the objection to Filefactory. (Which I love because it’s the one account I pay for, and it works like a charm all day every day, for a small annual fee.)
I mention Mediafire because it can certainly be janky with the virus messages etc. But over on Expecting Rain, I see Mediafire links on posts that nobody seems to have touched in 5-6 years or more that just download immediately – click it and it DL’s – without it taking you to the usual intermediary Mediafire page where you then also click a blue rectangle and sometimes get the janky messages and pop-ups.
Here’s one example if you have an Expecting Rain account:
https://expectingrain.com/discussions/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=92194
I mention it to say Mediafire must be providing some people with a way to have long-lasting links. That could solve the “long lasting links” issue. Then maybe you could list your links maybe even in a Google Doc – some simple online method to share links – or maybe it’s best to keep all links contained within your site here.
Finally, to avoid you having to pay for a Mediafire account that gives eternal links, maybe that’s where an annual fundraiser comes in and we all contribute. Based on the Filefactory pricing, I’d imagine it to be a couple hundred dollars a year maybe? I don’t know.
Whew, that was long-winded! 🙂 I hope it makes sense what I’m saying about Mediafire.
I’ve used Mediafire in the past (before I started using Amazon Drive) and they were great. You are right about them keeping links for a long time. Some of the links I used on my blog way back when (at least seven years ago) still work even though they haven’t been available to anyone in a long time. And I never had a pro account.
The trouble with Mediafire is even with a pro account you can only get 2TBs of storage and I’ll need way more than that, and they are expensive. Those 2TBs cost $1200 a year whereas Google is only $200 for the same storage.
I may eventually ask for more money to upgrade Google Drive. Honestly, I’ve thought about dropping File Factory and uploading everything to Google Drive. I’d definitely have to regularly ask for money then and I just hate doing that.
Great points – thank you!
Hey Mat – so you’ve opened up the cafe again! Wow, that’s great. I only found out by chance. I was trying to hunt down an old favourite. I had the date wrong and the title and I couldn’t begin to remember the venue!
It turned out to be Somewhere Over The Mountains by a certain grumpy old man, and there it is in your amazing VM archive. My collection is all over the place and I’ve lost a lot of stuff. Most of the VM seems to be on amazon and those links are still working really really well from a user’s point of view. I’ve been replacing missing dates and found some amazing upgrades too. I can see you’ve had the hassle of uploading the text files separately but it certainly is really appreciated at this end. I’ve been like the proverbial in a sweet shop!
Anyway, bit off topic but I just wanted to say a big thank you and to let you know just how awesome your archives can be. Good luck finding a host. Best wishes, Tony H.
I’m very glad you found the site again. And thank you for the kind words.
As you may have figured out I never stopped uploadng shows and posting them I just moved the site into private mode. Sorry you were never able to gain access to it.
On the plus side there is now a ton of stuff for you to go through that you missed. On the negative side nearly all my links area bout to go dead. Amazon Drive is discontinuing their services soon. I’m going through all the shows I have on the drive and making sure I still have them on my physical drives. Once I’ve gone through everything I’m cancelling my subscription.
I’m still working on a plan to be able to reupload stuff. Right now the idea is to do some stuff on Google Drive and a lot of stuff via FileFactory, but that may change.
Feel free to make a reup request on any of the old posts with bad links.
Thanks for the offer and the heads up. I came across a few dead links but I’ve got more than enough VM to keep me going. Sounds like you have enough to think about without repairing old links. I’m supposed to be pruning my collection anyway, down to the stuff that I really do listen to repeatedly. Best wishes
I will be reuploading everything eventually. But obviously, there are a lot of files and that will take time. So I really don’t mind a few requests.