Facebook closing the gap on Flickr

[IABoomer]

We're increasing the size of the photos stored from 720 pixels to 2048 pixels on the largest edge, for an 8 times increase overall. I'm really excited to be launching this feature. To see the quality of these pictures, you can view National Geographic's "Top-Rated Your Shot Photos (September)" album or Sports Illustrated's "Football Across America" album. Download high-resolution photos by clicking the "Download" link.

More Beautiful Photos | Facebook

I am curious as to if they've stored your older files as larger images so the scaling will be retroactive, or if you'll have to upload new high-res images. Something tells me the latter.

[OsmosisStudios]

Facebook still has a rights grab clause in their TOS

[dakwegmo]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

Facebook still has a rights grab clause in their TOS

Which part would you consider a rights grab?

[IABoomer]

Originally Posted by dakwegmo

Which part would you consider a rights grab?

Probably the part in the TOS that says:

Originally Posted by http://www.facebook.com/#!/terms.php?ref=pf

For content that is covered by intellectual property rights, like photos and videos ("IP content"), you specifically give us the following permission, subject to your privacy and application settings: you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook ("IP License"). This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account unless your content has been shared with others, and they have not deleted it.

[vsa]

Great. Now you can see your drunken ass 8 times bigger from a point and shoot with built in flash.

....I'm sticking with my 600px wide shots.

[Chaotic Beds]

Originally Posted by IABoomer

Probably the part in the TOS that says:

...aaaaaaand, now I have removed most of my photos from Facebook.

I guess now that I'm taking photography more seriously, I should seriously start reading those more closely. Or in this case, go back and read through it now that I'm posting my photography there.....

[Jim Poor]

First, I'm not a fan of FB and privacy issues, however, the part of the TOS that most people tend to miss when reading them is "subject to your privacy and application settings:

It's not quite a monstrous as the hype makes it out to be.

[OsmosisStudios]

Originally Posted by Jim Poor

First, I'm not a fan of FB and privacy issues, however, the part of the TOS that most people tend to miss when reading them is "subject to your privacy and application settings:

It's not quite a monstrous as the hype makes it out to be.

The portion you bolded for emphasis only pertains to where Facebook can show the images, not the fact that it now owns them. it just means that if you have your images set to private, they cant be showing them willy-nilly on the site just anywhere, but if they're public they can. THey still own them.

[Jim Poor]

Actually, if you look at the grammar, no it doesn't. It states that all the permissions following that particular clause are subject to your privacy settings.

[dakwegmo]

Originally Posted by Jim Poor

First, I'm not a fan of FB and privacy issues, however, the part of the TOS that most people tend to miss when reading them is "subject to your privacy and application settings:

It's not quite a monstrous as the hype makes it out to be.

Exactly. That particular clause makes the "rights grab" essentially useless since you can change your privacy settings to keep anyone but you from viewing particular content. Add that to this one "on or in connection with Facebook" and well, you really aren't giving up much.


As to the OP's original question, you'll probably have to re-upload everything. Given the aggressive compression they use and the previous image size limits, I suspect the previous photo system was designed to save as much space as possible. Keeping an original file likely wouldn't have fit into that plan.