Here’s the caption from the BBC News Web site:
A huge Lego toy has mysteriously appeared on Zandvoort beach in Holland. Nobody knows where it comes from.
Any of our readers from The Netherlands know something about this?
(Thanks to readers Sharon and Cynthia for the link!)
Recent events have put the issue of image hosting in the spotlight. There are a lot of choices out there, from popular sites like Brickshelf and MOCpages to newer sites like MOCShow and BrickImage, and even commercial, non-LEGO sites like Flickr. All of these sites provide an invaluable service to the LEGO fan community – a place to host your images.
The LEGO Ambassadors would like to ask fans for your input on what you would want from your image-hosting site. Questions include:
I want to be very clear about this: Asking everyone for feedback isn’t intended to start another debate here on The Brothers Brick about which existing site is better (though I suppose comparisons are inevitable). As fellow LEGO fans, those of us who are Ambassadors are simply asking you for your thoughts and ideas about the viewing and showcasing of your LEGO creations.
Unlike many of the other ideas and opinions I hear from you, I won’t be forwarding these ideas to The LEGO Group, who have publicly and clearly stated that they will not own nor run such a service. However, your comments will be available on this post for others in the community to view, and hopefully use, in building and improving image hosting Web sites.
Andrew Becraft
LEGO Ambassador
EDIT: *bump*
BrickJournal editor Joe Meno has announced that the Web site for the magazine has been officially launched. Here’s what Joe has to say:
I’m happy to announce that the BrickJournal website has been launched:
Issue 8 is online and available for viewing. Issue 7 is also uploaded but is only available to web subscribers. I am uploading other issues and hope to have all archived by the end of August.
Issues will be uploaded quarterly to coincide with releases. What the website will offer is an interactive approach to reading the magazine, with links to related subjects and also web-exclusive materials, such as video. This will become an archive for the magazine and related materials as time goes on, and with the event calendar tied in, this will become something of a timeline for the community.
Subscribers will be able to access all the archived content for use. Public visitors will only be able to view the current issue and what is designated as public, such as instructions and news. With a news page, BrickJournal will be able to report faster on events and also be able to include more content, such as photos that were submitted, but not used in the magazine, for future issues. For a limited time a subscription to the webpage will be $20/year.
Future plans for the website include establishing an image bank for BrickJournal photography (thank you Didier), a page for sellers, and a couple of other surprises! Plans are also underway for a print version of the magazine!
Many thanks to Joel Bush, Brian Flannery, and Brian Sykora of Near-Time, the webservice I am working with on this ongoing project.
Comments and feedback are welcome!
Head on over to the site and check it out! I’ll be sure to pass on any comments you have to Joe if you leave any on this post.
Joystiq has broken the news that the rumored LEGO Indiana Jones video game has been confirmed. Watch the trailer right here on The Brothers Brick:
Thanks to reader David for the tip! (And check out the Official Web site.)
Yesterday was the second birthday of this blog, but I was too busy reading the adventures of a certain young wizard to post anything. ;-)
Let the long-winded and self-satisfied post begin! (Read last year’s anniversary post here or with original comments on the old blog.)
The big changes to this blog since last year:
Here are some possibly interesting statistics about all of you, our faithful readers:
Finally, taking my queue from Technorati founder David Sifry‘s “State of the Blogosphere” posts, here’s a quick summary of how things have changed in the LEGO blog world since last year:
Head on over to LUGNET to read Kevin Loch’s explanation for what’s been happening with Brickshelf.com over the last six days.
A new message has graced the top of Brickshelf.com:
Notice: Brickshelf will not be shutting down!
We will be offering “featured” accounts for $5/month shortly.
We have received hundreds of supportive emails in the past few days including many who said they would like to contribute financially but did not know how. This has had us rethink the practicality of charging for enhanced features.We plan to do this without reducing current functionality for free users. Thank you for your enormous show of support.
IMPORTANT: do NOT try to download the entire site, it causes major problems, slows things down for normal users and you will be permanently blocked. We will make older folders public again after we see the crawlers go away.
UPDATE (AB 7/19 PM): IMPORTANT: Brickshelf.com is apparently not going away after all. Kevin Loch has asked everyone to stop trying to download everything, so please respect his request and suspend the efforts described in this post.
As we indicated in updates to an earlier post, a coordinated effort is currently underway to “rescue” as many of the images on Brickshelf.com as possible before they become unavailable after July 31.
In a beautiful, touching sign of how a community can come together in a time of crisis, members of Classic-Castle Forums, Classic-Space Forums, FBTB Forums, and Forum 0937 are showing a remarkable amount of cooperation and cross-collaboration. In addition to saving their own galleries, members are also attempting to ensure that the best LEGO images are saved — especially those originally posted by members of the community who are no longer active or who have since passed away.
If you’d like to participate, you can check out one of the threads on these four forums:
If you know of other efforts underway, please let us know.
UPDATE (AB 7/19 AM): Eurobricks is also participating:
Lowlug’s Mini MOC Madness is upon us again! The theme this year is weather, and there are already some great entries. Check out the gallery, and click “Lees meer” to see bigger pictures of each entry. A few of my faves:
(Thanks for the tip, Martin Jaspers! I’d link to your gallery like I usually do, but it won’t exist on August 1, so I’m minimizing future broken links. :( )
EDIT: Sorry about the broken images — I’ll fix them later.
おそらく日本のレゴ ファンの皆様は既にご存知ですが、 Brickshelf.com （通常「棚」）が７月３１日後利用できなくなります。大変遅れてしまいましたが、このブログの日本の読者様にも一応情報を伝えておきたいと思いました。
「棚がなくなる！」ことは明らかに大問題ですが、問題を解決する三つのソフトウェアがあります。
はくしゃくさんのトコでご覧になられたかもしれませんが、ダウンロードツールの日本語版が発行されました。ダウンロードはこちらです。
Bob Kojima さんの英語版に挑戦してみたい方は、こちらからダウンロード。izzoさんの記事をお勧め致します。
マックをご利用の皆様は Jim DeVona さんからのターミナル（Mac OS X のみ）で走らせるコマンドライン・ユーティリテイ が使えます。
（日本語は最近あまり書いていませんので、言語能力が落ちているような気がします。下手な日本語で申し訳ありません。）
Brickshelf is now accessable through http://www.brickshelf.com/ or https://www.brickshelf.com/ (you may see a certificate error). At the top of the page in red text reads:
Notice: Brickshelf will be shutting down on 2007/07/31.
Please save your files to your computer.
Everyone who hasn’t backed up their files already, DO SO NOW.
EDIT (AB): Bob Kojima has created a tool that can back up files from Brickshelf. You can download the Zip file from BZPower (thanks for the tip, Kelly!) here (318 KB).
EDIT 2 (AB): Jim DeVona has created a backup tool for Mac OS X. You can download it and read instructions on how to run it in Jim’s post on LUGNET. You’re a lifesaver, Jim!
EDIT 3 (LB/AB): Interested parties have begun backing up important folders other than their own while they can. There are threads on classic-castle, classic-space, FBTB Forums, and Forum 0937 to do this as systematic as possible. Thanks to Bruce for the heads up. If this is happening on other communities as well, please let us know.
With Brickshelf.com currently unavailable and speculation still rampant about what this means for the future of the worldwide LEGO fan community, the mass migrations to other image-hosting sites have already begun.
The “Recent Folders” page on Maj.com (owned and operated by the same person who ran Brickshelf) is now full of LEGO. MOCpages now has image-hosting capabilities. Many of my Flickr contacts have upgraded to Pro accounts and have uploaded all their old pictures originally on Brickshelf. There are also several discussions underway to create new, LEGO-specific image-hosting sites.
However, I would strongly caution everybody reading this from making a decision now, without knowing what’s going on with Brickshelf itself. I’m concerned that, without a coordinated effort, premature migrations will result in unnecessary fragmentation of the community.
Perhaps asking this of tens of thousands of people is futile. Nevertheless, please, let’s hold off making any rash decisions until we know all the facts and can come up with some sort of coordinated effort.
—————–
EDIT: We now have confirmation that Brickshelf will be gone for good after July 31, 2007. My heartfelt thanks to Kevin Loch for the service he’s provided to the LEGO community over the years, and for giving the LEGO community this opportunity to back up our files and create a historical record of builders who are no longer with us in one way or another. Kevin: Thank you.
A word of caution for everyone, however: I don’t believe that a mass migration to Maj.com would be the right move, given that the same thing could happen there at any time. Personally, I’ve liked Flickr for more than a year and a half, but I understand that many people still want something free (an unfair requirement, I think, given how expensive bandwidth is for such a large quantity of images), they prefer something LEGO-specific (yes, that would be nice), and some people find Flickr to be slow (I’d suggest trying a newer or different Internet browser).
I’ll post something more comprehensive weighing all the image-hosting options tonight, but seeing the two directions people seem to be going already, I would strongly suggest Flickr over Maj. I’m also encouraged by Sean Kenney’s generosity in adding image-hosting to MOCpages, so that may be another alternative to consider. More later…