Epson PhotoCenter offline!
By
Mike Tomkins
(Thursday, December 20, 2001 - 11:51 EST)
Problems at Pantellic looking worse all the time as major customer announces plans to bring its photo-sharing site in-house...
IR readers Al Mark and 'AlohaBev' just dropped us a note to point out something which really does seem to hammer yet another nail into the coffin of PhotoPoint.com and parent company Pantellic Software Inc. Epson PhotoCenter, an online photo-sharing site hosted by Pantellic which has thus far remained immune to the problems that have plagued the PhotoPoint site recently, has suddenly been taken offline without warning. A note in its place reads: "Thank you for visiting the EPSON PhotoCenter. We appreciate your being part of this photosharing community and want to keep you informed of the latest developments with our site.
As you may know, Epson has been using a third-party vendor to power the site. Now, in order to serve you even better and continue delivering the features you value, Epson will be bringing the site in-house.
We are in the process of upgrading our in-house servers to support and continue service of the PhotoCenter site by January 10, 2002. Unfortunately, during this transition period the site will not be available. However, we are doing all we can to ensure that the photos you have stored in the "My Albums" section are secure and will be accessible again once we have completed the site transition. It's also our intent that all current features, including the ability to print high resolution photos straight from the Web, will remain intact.
Epson is committed to providing you with a superior photosharing service so that you can easily store, organize, share and print your treasured photographs. We apologize for any inconvenience and appreciate your patience during this transition. Please save your photos to upload and share when the site is once again available.
Sincerely,
The EPSON PhotoCenter Team" Equally interesting is the fact that the Halifax Herald, a local newspaper, found only one employee present at Pantellic's offices when they visited on Tuesday, mirroring the experiences of reader Andrew Murphy who told us pretty much exactly the same thing a day earlier. As with Andrew, the Herald staff were told that there was no comment on PhotoPoint's status.
With Pantellic Software still failing to respond to inquiries (we received a promise of info, but it has not been forthcoming yet) and the offices apparently deserted, today's news really does make it look like Pantellic has folded altogether. (We can't imagine Epson intentionally alienating customers by taking their photos offline for a period of weeks unless they were forced by the sudden disappearance of the vendor that was providing those services to them!)
Thanks to Al Mark and 'AlohaBev' for pointing out the missing Epson PhotoCenter, and to Marg Davis and Andrew Murphy for forwarding a copy of the Halifax Herald news item to us... Watch this space for more news as we get it!
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