AOL stops providing a wide range of services

AOL announced to all users of online photo storage service AOL Pictures about a shutdown later this year.

AOL Pictures important notice of service suspension

However, users can still access the archived image in 2009 through AOL's image service partner Pixum. The Xdrive and Bluestring services are also not out of fate.

AOL Pictures is an online service that allows users to create galleries from their images, categorize images by description, search or share photos with relatives. In 2006, AOL Pictures added advanced tagging, management and sharing functions to users, becoming one of Yahoo's major rivals Flickr.

The "departure" of AOL Pictures service is the first move of the strategy to focus on increasing revenue from online advertising services instead of online registration services. Thus, AOL Pictures users will be transferred to American Greetings PhotoWorks or Pixum, AOL's online photo hosting service.

"AOL redirected into a web-based advertising company, so we reviewed the services being offered and decided to restructure and re-manage the subscriptions for use because they "It's not our long-term business orientation," the AOL spokesman said.

Two services Xdive (online data storage) and Bluestring (data sharing) also followed AOL Pictures's fate to cease operation later this year.

AOL recommends that users perform the conversion of images from AOL Pictures to partner services from now on. The three options are: download all the images in your account to your computer, print it to DVD and send it to your home (for a fee) or transfer the entire image to a new service using a support tool. After December 31, 2008, users with AOL Pictures accounts will not be able to access their images on AOL Pictures website.