Delete single photos in photostream

Let's get this back to basics. People want to delete single photos. They can't. They could do it on Windows 20 years ago but for some reason they can't on Apple in 2011. It's backward and it's a fault.

Ah yes, an 11000+ people have viewed this thread so clearly there is a demand for it.

mitch_san_angeles, I am glad that someone understands and agrees with, at least in part, with what I am saying and that I am not just spitting into the wind.

Yes, Photo Stream's primary purpose is a virtual pipe and temporary storage container system that serves as the upload conduit that transfers your images to the cloud, the temporarily storage facility within the cloud that holds your images until you have time or are on the device you wish to save those images to, and the download conduit that steams those images from the cloud to that device, or those devices.

While that is it's primary roll, it does have a small feature set that allows for other secondary uses that others have outlined within this collection of posts.

In those secondary functions, I agree with you, and others who have posted within this discussion, that it would be great to be able to "pre-screen" the images, either through a preference that allowed the user to set the time delay between taking an image and the time it is uploaded while on a wi-fi network, or a stream "sync" button within the Photos app, as well as the ability to delted individual photos within the stream.

All of those are great, and validly desired, additions to Photo Stream. It was never my intent to suggest otherwise. I was merely trying to clear up some confusion that seemed to be taking place as to what the primary purpose of Photo Stream was, and the mental mapping on how to use the app for the primary intent that the developers built it for- image transfer, over it's secondary presentation capabilities.

Again, as I said in a different post, I think we will all see Photo Stream evolve, with many of the features people are speaking about being added. I think Photo Stream may be in a similar state to what the original iPad was when it launched, with Steve Jobs explaining that he was not sure exactly what everyone would be using it for, and that it would develop over time as the uses, wants and needs of the users became known.

I do hope that everyone voices their opinions, and expresses those wants, so Photo Stream will evolve, but I wish they would do so in a manner that shows a bit more insight and is respectful both of Apple and the many, many developers who spent countless hours produced this feature. As a programmer and a marketing person, it bothers me when I hear people say that something is broken and demanding that it be fixed, when the issue is not the application, or an advertised feature not living up to it's billing, but that particular individual person's lack of understanding what that product is, what purpose it was meant to fulfill, or how it is supposed to be used. Unfortunately most people have realy, really weak wrists, and find it far easier to point the finger of blame on someone else, rather than bend that wrist so the finger points back at themselves, and realize that they are the ones who lack understanding, are broken and need to be fixed.

20 Years ago, hmmm Lerxt, that would have been Microsoft Windows 3.0 you are speaking of. Man, you really are wanting to talk about basics, as in very, very basic. I used that system and had friends that developed on it (tons and tons of Mac code still in the Windows OS back then, for those who programmed on the system level and had access. They had the code still in there when I saw it, which was after going golden and releasing, but they just could not figure out how to wire it all up and did not have time to figure out what they coud delete without bring the whole house of cards down around them. But that is a different topic for a diffeent day. Good times though, so thanks for the pulling back those memories).

Exactly what program were you using on Windows 3.0 to import all of those digital camera images and delete single images from an import stream? I was there and I can not recall a single digital photo stream coming into my Windows 3.0 system from the internet. Heck, most people had not even heard of the net yet, let alone the the concept of photo streaming or cloud services. What "digital camera" wher you using? I suspect that you were using a DCS 100 , IF you even had a digital camera back in 1991, as it was about the only digital camera around back then sine the Fuji was not marketed here in the states (that is making the assumption that you are here in the US). You must have felt like a king spending better than $10k for a 1.2 or 1.3 megapixel camera. Man, talk about some ugly, blurry images, but you know, you had the thing! You know it is really harmful to be breathing in those fumes when you are soldering on your motherboard!

Pardon the pun, but I think you are comparing Apples to Oranges here. The task of deleting single photos that you speak of doing on a Windows machine 20 years ago more than likely would have been deleting a scanned in image file from a directory. Apple could do that back then without any problems, so you must be speaking about a diffeent type of single photo deletion method.

MS Windows OS in 2011 can delete single digital images from an image application that stores such images on your drive, but every Mac can do that same task and has been able to do so for years, so again, you must be speaking about something else.

Windows Mobile phones do not have any such wireless, cloud based photo streaming service that syncs with all of your Windows devices, so you absolutely cannot be talking about doing that on a Windows machine. After all, how do you delete single images from a stream and product base that does not exist yet?

Maybe, since you're speaking about getting "back to basics" and thinking that you can not perform similar, single photos deletions from like processes on an Apple product, you must be meaning that you need some basic instructions on how to do perfom such tasks. It's simple, launch the Mac equivilent to what ever Windows application you were using, select the single image you want to delete, and simply hit the delete key. There is a very, very short learning curve, because it can not get any easier than that, be it on a Windows PC or a Mac.

Okay, yes, we all know that people want features, such as the ability to delete singe photos, added to Photo Stream. I have absolutely no problem with that, and would like it myself. But I also want my laptop to pop pop corn for me, but I am on a Macbook Pro and they do not run hot enoughl for that to happen, and after moving away from my Windows laptop, which would pop corn, I refuse to go back just for that popping feature of Windows. I guess I just have too much real work to do to be sitting around eating pop corn anyway!

Please note that you CAN delete single photos on any Mac, and I suspect that you will soon be able to do so soon within Photo Stream on your iOS devices as well. The distinction here is that this will be as an added feature to meet the wishes of users, but not because it was ever meant to be a part of the original funcitonality of the service.

If we are getting back to basics, and you are going to strat throwing Windows into the equation, let's at least try be smart enough to discuss like processes, you know, like deleting images on a hard drive on both systems using desktop based applications, or the iOS 5 implementaion of Photo Stream compared to the Windows implementaion of cloud based photo streaming that wireless syncs to all of those hot little Microsoft devices that people are dying to get their hands on. Oh wait, there is no such beast yet, since they have not had time to steal the concept and get it set up yet. Oh, but when they do, and you know it is coming, I'm sure you will be jumping back to that Windows Mobile phone and will just be killing it over there! Man, you're cracking me up, I want some of what your smoking or drinking!

Cheers!

Hey Lerxt,

Sorry to disapoint, and just FYI, those are total page impressions, not unique page views, so the real number people is actually much, much less. Every time that you, I or anyone else for that matter reads a page on this thread, refeshes the page, posts a reply, or navigates to the next page, the number increments by 1. Trust me on this one. If you do not believe me, hit refresh. Still not a believer, jump from page to page. I hate to burst your bubble here, but this discussion group is not all that popular, at least not yet, but it may get there. The actual number of unique visitors, i.e. people who have viewed this, which you put at 11000+ people, is probably more like 750 - 800, possibly as high as 1,000, but I doubt that high. You see, at a minimum, if you went to all four pages that are currently here, and viewed them just once (no going back and to a previous page or visitinga page twice) and posted just your two posts, you Lerxt, as a single person account for 6 page views (one for each of the four original page views, plus one for each time you post and the page refreshes after you hit "Add Reply" and submit your post. My guess is that you, like myself and most people, actually viewed the pages more than once, adding to the total page views, yet remaining just one person. If you want to start speaking of yourself in the third person, and have a multiple personality disorer, I guess we can add those personalities to the unique page visitor count, but unless you have thousands of alternate idenities, the actual number of people seeing this trhead is still very, very low relatively speaking. Sorry!

Hay, looky there- the page count is going up as I submit this. And guess what, it is going to go up again because you just came back to read this. Wow! Maybe we should adjust those estmates downward as say that 50 - 60 people are following this thread. Like you said, "so clearly there is a demand for it". I bet Apple has the developers pulling all-nighters to get that delete option added this week. Okay, maybe next week or the week after that with this kind of demand!

Write a bot that keeps reloading this thread and maybe, and maybe, just maybe an Apple webmaster will stop by to see if they can figure out why this discussion is blowing up in their stats. Just kidding, I am sure they are following this discussion with baited breath.

Cheers!

Formz, since you don't seem able to make your points without resorting to insults of one form or another to multiple people here, please excuse me if I lower myself to your exacting standards in the following.

Don't be so pompous. Of course it isn't the ONLY screensaver on the AppleTV but if it's the currently selected, active one then it might as well be. It's the only one a user of the device will see unless they change it as soon as they turn it on. Yes, you can stream other photo alliums, but there is bugger all you can do about it when...you...are...not...at...home. Was that slow enough to penetrate the highly viscous membrane around what passes for your cerebellum?

Like many long time Apple users you appear to be making the ego-inflating mistake of assuming that Apple products are only for the professional or the geek. Maybe you missed it, but Apple are trying to simplify the user experience across its devices. Even for people, God forbid, who have never used a Mac. Yes, you can ensure you set the whole thing up very very carefully with multiple logins for your store/homeshare and iCloud accounts, but the average user, and even the over confident geek, can make a simple mistake. I'm sure even you have made a few, despite your assumed superiority over the rest of the human race.

If I simply forget to turn off Photostream one day and someone picks up my phone off an office desk and photographs their <<insert body part / embarrassing moment here>> that photo, if the phone is on the workplace wifi network, is on my family tv within minutes where my kids can see it if the last screensaver/album used was Photostream. I trust my judgement as to what is suitable content to upload over Apple's any day. And certainly more than yours.

There has already been one story on this forum about a screenshot of a booking for a surprise weekend away being synced to another iPad and the surprise was ruined. Whether that tale is true or not is not important, it is the sort of thing that can happen if a basic error is made by the user. And most of us (present company excluded) are simply human and do occasionally make mistakes.

Yes, Apple did not say the primary use for this was viewing your photos. They did however advertise it as a use for Photostream. Many people would probably have preferred an option to select which photos are uploaded to the stream rather than a blanket upload all approach. The opportunity for error is there and that is not normally Apple's way.

So, if you can get your head out of your crevice long enough to see what the people who go outdoors occasionally and talk to real people are saying, maybe you'll see that it's you with the weak wrist from overuse over the years, and that maybe the rest of us aren't as broken as you seem to think nor is anyone willing to share anything that they are smoking.

Apologies to anyone other than Formz who may have been offended by this post, but they were getting right on my last nerve.

formz

Let's get back to basics once again. Yes Windows 3.1 could delete files 20 years ago, IOS 5 in 2011 can't delete photos.

By the way, no one is reading your verbose posts, make them shorter. If you can clear your thinking up enough to do that you will see that you are making excuses. You are also deconstructing/fantasizing my post. I am not trying to be tricky but I a making the following point that makes Apple look ridiculous, I.e.

" why is it that 20 years ago I could delete a photo ( or anything else for that matter) from my device (at that time a desktop computer) but with Apples most-advanced-operating-system-in-the-world I can't."

Surely you are not too confused to understand the simple irony in this?

Great debate people just a bit lengthy and trying to simplyfy it....

I want the ability to be able to delete / chose which photos make it in to the photo stream and which don't. I also want to be able to delete images / files from the photostream and have it sync over all devices. It's really that simple and while currently it may serve some purpose for a few of the users I reckon that probably 99% of users will require the same features.....

I also think the roll out of IOS 5 has been very very very poor but hey life goes on....

Whoa! It sounds like someone has some anger management issues. What happened to the "happy" in HappyTrucker?

Simmer down big fella'. I do not see where Formz insulted you. I see where he, or she, said the smart money would go with the Apple developers knowing the purpose of what they had developed more than you would, but that is about it. I think Formz is right, that is a safe bet. I do not think he meant to rattle your cage. My guess is that almost 100% of the people reading this would agree that the Apple developers knew the purpose of Photostream more than you do. That is not to say that they accurately predicted every feature that the millions of users would want.

Maybe the way Formz explained it did not appeal to you or others, but it sure helped me understand what photostream was really about. From reading through this discussion group, it looks like some others here also agree. I get it now! The pipe and temporary storage concept makes sense. Formz's writing style may not be for everyone, but I think he/she is spot on here. There is a primary use, and then there are added features, with other features hopefully coming soon. I too want to be able to delete single photos, and hope that comes along, but now that I know how to use it properly, I am happy.

Just my $.02 worth.

Look, Photostream does it's purpose pefectly. I think we can all agree to that. Not being able to delete photos has nothing to do with the purpose of the feature, what it has to do with is privacy and security. Lets look at a few examples.

1) I take a picture of something copyrighted. Can I delete this to stop myself from infringing on someone elses rights?

2) My child takes a picture of him/herself naked. Is Apple hosting childporn that can't be deleted for 30 days?

3) If I lose my phone, not only are all photos i've taken availble, but also all photos that i've deleted. (This wouldn't be acceptable if it was phone calls, emails, documents, etc... why are photo's an acception?).

Again, this has NOTHING to do with the purpose of photostream. Even if deleting the offending photo took some effort (logging into icloud.com or something), it would help with the extreme cases of privacy and security.

A Gun's safety doesn't have anything to do with the purpose of a Gun. But it's a make or break feature for people who care about safety.

HappyTrucker, my apologies to you, and anyone else, who felt that I was resorting to insults or calling into question their intelligence. That certainly was not my intent, and I am a big enough person to apologize to all, including you, without having to single out individuals as you seem to see fit. No need to include me in your little apology list. It is not like I am loosing any sleep of worrying what your opinion are.

I will note, however, that the only one I see hurling insults here is you. Please let me know where in my post I stated slinging insults, questioning your intelligence, or asking you to pull you head out of your crack? I don't see any such remarks in my post, but I do see plenty from yours... including these juicy tidbits:

lower myself to your exacting standards

Don't be so pompous

Was that slow enough to penetrate the highly viscous membrane around what passes for your cerebellum?

you appear to be making the ego-inflating mistake

despite your assumed superiority

most of us (present company excluded) are simply human

get your head out of your crevice

go outdoors occasionally and talk to real people

it's you with the weak wrist from overuse over the years

Any you say that I am the one resorting to insults. Your comments would be laughable, if not for the fact that they are clearly the comments of a sad, angry little man! And yes, just so you can properly identify what an insult is in the future, THAT was meant as an insult.

I will agree with Radlac, it seems like you have some anger management issues. Maybe it is time to get back on your medication.

Your highly rational argument and powers of supreme persuasion (yes, humor intended) failed to dissuade me from my opinion that the odds are that the Apple developers knew, know, and will continue to know more than you did, do, or ever will know about their products and programming. As I said then, and still believe now, I think that is a safe bet. I think your "pompus", "ego-inflating" and "assumed superiiority" insults more aptly fit you, HappyTrucker, who seems to be arguing that you smarter than the team at Apple for calling me out on that bet. Man, I only can wish to be that smart some day, but I'm not, and know I never will be.

If you are smarter than the development team at Apple, and know better than they do what the purpose of the product they developed is, I beg of you, please, please, please take a development position within Apple and fix these things that you see as broken. I and the others on this list would welcome those fixes and additions.

I have never said that I am or that I believe I am any smarter than anyone else on this site. I have only stated that I think I have a fundamental understanding of what Photo Stream is about, what functions it was meant to perform, and was trying to help others who were having issues understanding how it fits into their workflow or lives. If you think that I have super-human intelligence for figuring this out, that is your prerogative, but understand that it is you, not me, who is making the assumption that I have "superiority over the rest of the human race". While your elevation of me to such high status is flatering, I know it not to be true. I am just a simple person, trying to help others. If I failed, I at least failed trying.

Lerxt,

I hate to keep taking you back to the basics that you keep refer to, and point out the obvious here, but YES, iOS 5, like every iOS before it, can delete photos. Just go to your camera roll, click a photo and then hit the little garbage can icon in the lower corner.

Now, knowing that iOS 5 itself CAN delete photos, we can dispel all that craziness and talk about the fact that certain features, and apps, cannot delete photos, which is something totally different.

Since your referencing Windows, let's keep it within that realm and compare the photo storage, deletion and syncing on Windows Phone and the iPhone :

Windows Phone can take pictures and saves those images to the Camera Roll in the Pictures Hub app. From the Pictures Hub you can delete individual photos from camera roll.

iPhone can take pictures and saves those images to the Camera Roll in the Photos app. From Photos you can delete individual photos from camera roll.

Okay, so both perform the exactly the same function, leaving us dead even.

Both phones let you tether and sync your photos to your computer via a USB cable, so we are still dead even up to this point. However, here is where the iPhone really starts to pull away:

Windows Phone wireless syncing and streaming of photos: NOT AVAILABLE

iPhone wireless syncing and streaming of photos: Built in, FREE Photo Stream*.

Also, just FYI, so as to avoid confusion and clear up any misconceptions... iOS 5 is not "Apple's most-advanced-operating-system-in-the-world". That would be OS X Lion, which is far more robust and capable, and which, by the way, can delete single photos (or anything else for that matter). I am not too confused here, nor do I see the simple irony you speak of?

Dude, why start throwing out insults? If you do not like what I am writing, just stop reading it and skip to the next post. Honestly, it will not bother me one little bit! You state "no one is reading your verbose posts", yet you can somehow try to tell me where I am wrong in almost every sentence that I write. What great powers of divination you must have to be able to do that without reading my "verbose posts". Your replies tell me otherwise, and I can almost guarantee that you will read this. Talk about simple irony, and yet you call me confused. Again, just skip my post and go to the next. I promise not to get my feelings hurt.

Hey charlesfromcedarcity, I see what you are saying about privacy and security, and like I have said all along, it would be nice to have the option to delete single images, but it is just that- an option, and unfortunately it is not an option that has been added yet. Hopefully it will be soon and this whole topic will fade away to just a memory. I like your examples, but have a couple of questions and/or comments;

1) In your first example, the short answer is No. Deleting a photo will not stop you from infringing on someone else's rights since the act of taking the picture itself violated the copyrights of the owner, and there is no application that can reverse time. Anything that you do beyond taking that picture is just additional violations of the owner's rights. Deleting the picture only prevents you from committing additional violations.

2) No, I do not believe Apple is liable here because of their EULA, although, depending on your local laws, you personally could be held liable for childporn if you decide to share access to those photos. Also, please know that those photos can be deleted at any point in time inside of those 30 days by simply going to http://www.icloud.com, signing in, clicking your name in the upper right, then clicking on the "Advanced" tab and hitting "Reset Photo Stream". Instantly the photos are deleted from Apple's server. They will still be on any device that was set up to sync to the stream, so if you want them removed from those devices, you will have to turn reset Photo Stream on those devices.

3) If you lose your phone, it's contents are subject to the same security risk as any other phone, be it an Android, a Windows Phone or an iPhone. All call logs, voice messages, emails and documents, like all photos, on a device are at risk, so do not be fooled or confused, there is no acceptation being made here for photos. The iPhone actually has a huge security advantage here over many, but not all, mobile phones in that if you set up Find My iPhone. With that setup, you can remotely wipe your phone so that all phone calls, emails, documents and photos, even those in Photo Stream, are no longer available on that phone.

I like your analogy with a gun's safety. It perfectly illustrates the point of security risk we are speaking of, and where that liability and obligation for security rests. As in your gun example, I am sure you understand that the safety and security of the device is with the owner, not the gun manufacturer. So too it is with Apple and Photo Stream. If you leave a gun laying around, especially one without a safety in place, accidents and bad things can happen. If you leave an unlocked iPhone laying around, and do not use Photo Stream wisely, someone may accidently see some bad things. It happens. But when these things happen, it is neither the gun or iPhone manufacturers fault. Both the gun manufacturers and Apple give you the means to take all of the bullets out of the gun.

Just a thought, for what little it may be worth - I would not place anything that I was worried about security on in something that has the word "stream" in it's title. Digital streams usually connotes a limited level of, or total lack of, control and security. I have a feeling that if Apple meant for this thing to be bullet-proof and locked down tight, they would have called it iVault or something like that. The fact that it is called Photo Stream should help properly set expectations. Again, just a thought.

Excellent reply. I think we can both agree that Photostream is extremely great at what it does. In response to a few of your repsonses:

1) I agree that you are still liable for infringing on copyrighted material. However, it is common practice in online infringment cases, particularly in ones where you don't know you are breaking copyright laws, for you to be given takedown notices and requests and have adequate time to react to them, obviously, how you respond to these requests are a major factor in determining your guilt and punishment. Of course in this regard, it's unlikely you will ever actually be prosecuted for copyright laws because photostream is for the most part personal. However this is hardly an excuse to continue breaking a law. I for one would like a sensible solution for eliminating illegal material from storage space that i've agreed to be in charge of. And not just because its likely i'll be liable, but because i'd like to have it easy to do the right thing.

2) You are right, it would probably be a really really cold day in **** if Apple were to be found legally liable for something their users had done, seeing as how we do agree to extensive EULA. And atleast on my part, if the photo was serious enough, deleting my entire photostream would be the only sensible solution. Additionally, quickly locating all of my devices and deleting the offending photos would be exactly what I would do. However, I think it's a reasonable complaint that I am legally responsible for content hosted by Apple that I can't easily make changes to.

3)There is a subtle difference here that I was trying to make. I agree iPhones are incredible when it comes to security. However, when something doesn't have a single delete function than the rammifications of losing a device become even greater. Lets explore this a little, suppose that I get a sensitive photo and a sensitive email from my work that has some work figures. I can view either of these sensitive articles. With the email, I have the ability to entirely remove that information from my device. The Photo however will automatically be sent to my photostream where it can't be deleted. For the next 30 days my phone will be a greater loss opportunity to me than it would be otherwise.

I think we can both agree that Photostream is good enough for mainstream use, and I think we both agree that Apple will probably add this feature in the near future.

My number 1 complain simply put. I am often put in a position where the only sensible solution is to delete my entire photostream, rendering it useless.

Also, in response to your second reply. I think you NAILED it! Why would I put anything that I really worried about security into something that has the word "stream" in it. Short answer, I wouldn't. And if I did, i would quickly want to remove it. Unfortunately Photostream doesn't have the proper controls to do so. It's SO easy and AUTOMATIC for things to get posted to the stream and yet difficult to remove them or even stop them from getting posted in the first place.

One would hope that Youtube wouldn't *need* a delete video ability, seeing as how Youtube would still include ALL of the same functionality, and youtube's purpose isn't to delete videos, it's to share them. And WHY would anyone post something to youtube that they were worried the whole world would see. But they do, and I think we both could think of a million reasons that a delete function is nice. It's kind of like that.