Download link changing

[Ethan D]

So for the last about month the download for my game has been working fine but yesterday instead of clicking on it making it download it takes you to mediafire's homepage and no way to download the game.  I fixed it but I don't want to have to go and check it every single day to make sure people can still download it.

Any idea why this would happen?

[Matti]

Well, every host handles uploaded files differently and deletes them after a certain time period. I don't know mediafire, but maybe you should use some other site?

[Leon]

According to Mediafire:

There is currently no time limit on how long uploaded files will be stored as long as you access your account (i.e. login to your account) at least once every 60 days OR at least one of your files is accessed (i.e. downloaded) every 30 days. If your account is not accessed within the time limit, then the files in your account will be cleared.

But as I understand, the file has been downloaded in the last 30 days? The link is back to the original? Might it be a downtime of Mediafire? Since it's a free service, they don't guarantee any accessibility. So maybe the server your file(s) were on went down for some time?

[Ethan D]

That definitely makes sense.  I'm working on getting a website as well as some space to host the game so I shouldn't be running into this problem for to much longer.  Thanks for the responses though.

[monkey0506]

Personally I loathe RapidShare/MediaFire/etc.-esque sites that limit how much I can download from their servers without paying them for access. They have no right to the files, they're just taking advantage of the fact that they're hosting it for you and thereby limiting who has access.

If you're looking for web space, I would honestly recommend you try and find a decent paid host. However I have had two different free hosts that have stood the test of time!!1 and actually continue hosting files even when I haven't logged into their site (or had any content access for that matter; at least per their stats) for months (sometimes even a year or more) at a time.

Brinkster.com and 110mb.com

Brinkster as far as I know hasn't offered free hosting in years. 110mb I switched from because they brought my site down for quite a while during a server replacement. Both I've found though have files from years ago. Brinkster is very picky about hotlinking, no script support, etc. But from what I recall 110mb was pretty good until the server transition which impaired my hosting.

Currently I am using x10hosting.com which requires a log in to the forums at least once every 2 weeks (which could very well be the reason you might see my avatar break every few weeks or so... :). At least they're lenient about their suspensions.

[Ethan D]

Yeah, I am definitely going to be using a paid host, since it would be hard not to go above the bandwidth allowed by free hosts if people are downloading from my site, especially on any month that I would release a game.

[Ultra Magnus]

MediaFire's always been good to me.
The only times I've seen files deleted were when they had been reported for copyright infringement.

Otherwise, they generally get good speeds, files stick around for as long as they keep being accessed (for instance, my game's demo is still where I left it 18 months ago - and I never signed up for an account), and contrary to what monkey_05_06 said, they've never made me wait between downloads like RapidShare or MegaUpload do.

The only drawbacks I've encountered personally with MF are that they don't allow more than one simultaneous download per IP (but virtually nowhere does without charging for it) and they have a limit of 100mb per file, so big stuff has to be put into a split archive.

So MediaFire's always been my go-to hosting site, save for the occasional glitch.
Or SendSpace for the bigger stuff, if I can't be bothered to archive it.