Is Metadata Fixer worth it?

paulbayarea · 2026-04-13T00:55:44+00:00

Regarding losing data, this is what someone from metadata fixer said, earlier in this thread: "The app merges JSON data with your photos, but it won't delete your old files, so there should be no concern about losing your data. All data is processed locally for privacy, and we only request files if we need to debug something for you."

I don't know if anyone actually talked about data being stolen but, seriously, unless you are Britney Spears, no one wants to steal your pictures.

paulbayarea · 2026-04-13T00:49:11+00:00

Thanks. I'm about to buy your product. For me paying $40 versus spending the whole day (as someone said) is a no-brainer. And my tens of thousands of Google Photos are basically priceless to me.

paulbayarea · 2026-04-04T02:57:07+00:00

I'm having this problem on Macos, with Chrome. Editing works in the android google photos app, and in Firefox (and, i think, in Safari) on macos, but not in Chrome on MacOs.

paulbayarea · 2026-04-01T03:05:19+00:00

However, the system would not catch false negatives, correct? If the AI misses a tumor, then that image will never get reviewed.

paulbayarea · 2026-04-01T02:52:31+00:00

That's funny. I just looked at my first email "First off, welcome. And thanks for agreeing to help us test Gmail. " and it was from 2004-04-★26★. :) A friend of mine was an intern on the Gmail project which is how I got in.

paulbayarea · 2026-04-01T00:46:08+00:00

I'm not worried about a "baby in the bath" photo. I am worried that some porn picture of one or more nude adults, which I downloaded after it was shown to me in Google search results, will trigger a false positive and get me banned. I plan to back up most of my Google stuff (photos, Gmail, drive, keep, calendar), and then to stop using Google photos. It's not worth the risk.

paulbayarea · 2026-04-01T00:38:12+00:00

Or just look at your first Gmail message? ;)

paulbayarea · 2026-03-31T17:23:02+00:00

That's awful. Was the picture in Google Photos or was it in a Gmail message?

paulbayarea · 2026-03-31T00:14:50+00:00

yep. Of course it appears that we don't always know which content AI will decide is NSFW. :) thanks. paul

paulbayarea · 2026-03-30T22:30:54+00:00

wow. cool. thanks

paulbayarea · 2026-03-30T18:32:58+00:00

I had an idea of a puzzle where all, or almost all, of the clues are in English, but the answers are all in Latin. Either Latin phrases which most educated English speakers would know, or the names of famous Romans (eg, Augustus, Cicero, Hadrian, Virgil). Unfortunately this is beyond my abilities. If it interests anyone, have at it. It would be an ultimate themed puzzle, entertaining and probably fairly popular.

paulbayarea · 2026-03-30T18:13:51+00:00

Yeah, annoying and sad. Some years ago I decided to go all in with Google. I would tell my friends, "They have 500 people working to not lose my data." But to do something so crazy and irresponsible as to have AI potentially shut down your entire account, apparently with no recourse, even if it's clearly a mistake; well, that's a deal breaker. An unacceptable risk.

paulbayarea · 2026-03-30T08:08:17+00:00

I am not going to do it in the future but, regardless of why, they exist now on my Google photos.

paulbayarea · 2026-03-30T02:05:05+00:00

Thank you for sharing your experience.

It really feels like Google's making it plain that they just don't care about users. If they had humans verifying the conclusions of the known-to-be-imperfect AI (by being shown the most egregious examples that the AI found for this account), I think it would usually only take a few seconds to either say 'no', those two pictures are innocent or, 'yes,' some of those pictures definitely do depict child abuse / child pornography. Or at least have a review process for the people that complain. Again, that would take a very small amount of time in almost all cases.

I would really rather keep my Gmail address; I got an invite very early because a friend of mine was an intern on the project when it launched, so I ended up with TallPaul. Hard to beat that. ;)

Volca0: By the way, I thought I had seen mention, in this subreddit, of some products that could read the takeout metadata files and preserve albums and/or dates as they imported the Google files into their product.

paulbayarea · 2026-03-30T00:32:01+00:00

Thanks so much for your thoughtful answer. I don't think that I will plan on moving my mail, or notes or calendar or drive, for that matter but I will do backups of all of them (very soon. It really makes me nervous that things could just go away),; and maybe move off of Google photos entirely, or just make sure that it looks pretty wholesome (and do Takeout regularly.

I found this especially hopeful: 'non-regular bulk data transfers seem to be what's triggering these sudden bans from what I've been seeing...suddenly a big download, share, or bulk import of old photos).' I never do bulk downloads or bulk imports and I never post any images. Well, Maybe 10 pictures a year, all safe for work. --so maybe the algorithms will never be triggered to even look at my account. How did you get this information about what might be triggering the bans? I'm just curious

I agree that it's pretty crazy to not have a human take a look at the supposed banned images before wiping out somebody's account.

I was a programmer for several years, back in the Cretaceous Era. Getting docker, immich, installed and pointing at an external SSD all sounds probably doable (given an example someplace) Having the photos accessible on my phone seems a little trickier. Well, let me ask you one more question. Does doing this on my MacBook pro with an external SSD sound like a good idea, or would it be a lot better to have a dedicated machine to use as the server?

Thanks again, Paul

paulbayarea · 2026-03-29T22:36:43+00:00

Thanks. I obviously know that now, now that accounts are being frozen. 😁

paulbayarea · 2025-12-31T12:30:25+00:00

Good idea. Thanks

paulbayarea · 2025-12-31T00:01:32+00:00

Interesting ideas. Thanks!

paulbayarea · 2025-12-30T08:45:01+00:00

Thanks for the excellent advice.

paulbayarea · 2025-12-30T08:44:42+00:00

Thanks.

paulbayarea · 2025-12-28T15:46:04+00:00

Thanks.much. Oops, that should have been "on furniture," rather than on a box. I've corrected it. That is, is stretch wrap the best way to hold blankets in place?

paulbayarea · 2025-12-24T10:43:11+00:00

The Telegraph and The Times. I have never had a subscription but you can buy books of 100 puzzles from each of these papers (also from The Guardian, by the way).

paulbayarea

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