SCROLLYour site is yours
Nobody at SnapSmack can lock you out, switch you off, or reach into your site. Not for a bug, not for a breach, not for anything. We have no right to, so we built it so we can’t.
Retro Photo Blogging.
No Algorithm.
What’s new is old again.
We’re not offering you anything new. We’re giving back what was taken: the single-photo blog, long-form posting that hasn’t been enshittified, classic Insta styling, and pumping images straight out of a file manager. All of it used to belong to photographers. Now it lives on hardware you control, and nobody is taking it back from you.
And a free, powerful photo editor and organizer because we remember when photographers were given good software for no charge rather than being told they needed to pay monthly rent for it.
Your photos. Your voice.
Your style. Your dignity.
What was taken
What was. What can be again.
- The photoblog2003 to 2010. One photograph a day on one page, big, with the comments underneath and nothing else competing for the eye. Pixelpost, Photoblogs.org, a ring of people who looked at each other’s work every morning and said so. It ran on your own domain, so when the ring dissolved, the work stayed put.Again as SMACKONEOUT
- Classic Instagram2010 to 2016. A square grid, three across, in the order you posted it, seen by the people who chose to follow you. Likes were a count, not a currency. No algorithm, no ads, no Reels, no shop tab, no video autoplaying between your photographs because a spreadsheet said it should.Again as GRAMOFSMACK
- Early blogging1999 onward. Blogger, then Greymatter in 2000 — Noah Grey was publishing his photographs with it from day one — then WordPress before it became a page builder. Writing with photographs in it, as long as you wanted, nobody’s feed deciding whether it got read.Again as SMACKTALK
- Picasa Web Albums2006 to 2016. A free, friendly photo organizer that pushed your folders to the web as albums for friends and family. Send the link, no account needed to look, no “suggested for you” underneath. Friends and family, not followers: SMACKTHEMUP has no fediverse on purpose. Sharing simplified.Again as SMACKTHEMUP + SNAP SLAPPER
Everything was killed off, died off, or was walled off to prioritize profits over people.
Not alone
Decentralized social where you hang onto your own files.
Comments on your blog flow out to the network. Replies from out there flow back onto your blog. One conversation. You don’t go to the social network; its replies come to you.
Reach more people without leaving your home.
How it works, for those who care: your site speaks ActivityPub — the fediverse — so people on Pixelfed, Mastodon, and the rest can follow it directly. photoblogs.fyi is the shared directory and reader. Details →
Highlights
- YoursYou host it. You own the art. No company, no tiers, no upsell, no “we’ve updated our terms.”
- Four ways to scoreOne photo at a time, the classic grid, writing with photographs in it, or SMACKTHEMUP: simplified, self-hosted public photo sharing for friends and family. Pick the way you always shared.
- Get in, get outImport Instagram, Flickr and Blogger with dates and captions intact. Leave any time with everything, in a form other software reads.
- SkinsReal sites, real archives, and nothing that looks like a template.
- Not aloneYour site is on the fediverse. People on Mastodon, Pixelfed and the rest can follow, like, boost, and reply to your work while it stays on your server. Plus a directory of photoblogs worth browsing and a weekly challenge.
- Desktop suiteA free non-destructive photo editor, batch publishing, backup, import and export tools. Windows and Linux.
- Locked downReal security, publicly audited. If something goes wrong you hear it from us the day we know — not two weeks later.
- AI insideCaptions, alt text, looks, a skin designer. Five providers, your own key, your call. It’s the intern, not the boss.
- Cheap to runShared hosting, small footprint, upload and go. Run several sites from one desk.
- Not a companyBuilt by a working photographer who uses it every day, under a licence that stops anyone fencing it off.
Real sites, running today
One engine. No house style.
Four live SnapSmack sites, four completely different answers to what a photography website should look like. Hover for the numbers. All skins are free, always.
Why it’s built this way
Custodian, not landlord.
It’s a blessing to be trusted with someone’s most beautiful possessions. You honour them back. You don’t monetize them.— Sean McCormick, who built this
That one sentence is the whole design. Every rule below follows from it, and none of them are negotiable.
You know what we know
Security findings, breaches, and audit results are published the day we have them. The audits are public. So are the failures.
The door opens both ways
Everything you put in comes back out in a form other software can read. Ownership includes the right to stop using SnapSmack.
Respect Where It’s Due
SnapSmack’s design owes a debt to Pixelpost — a photo blogging platform that quietly disappeared but never stopped being right about a few things. Its UI shaped a lot of what SnapSmack became.
And particular thanks to photographer, writer, and developer Noah Grey — creator of Greymatter, one of the earliest open-source blogging platforms — for proving that when the software you need doesn’t exist, you build it. And for knowing, twenty-five years ago, that you honour the people who trust you with their work.
Who’s Responsible for All This?!?
Said up front: the code is AI-written, under the direction of a photographer who is not a programmer. That is not hidden anywhere on this site — THE RECKONING counts every line. It is also exactly why the software is subjected to documented internal reviews and adversarial regression tests, and held to a public disclosure policy instead of being trusted on faith. These checks are not independent certification or an independent penetration test.
Sean McCormick
Just a guy with a camera.
Photographer, creator, product designer, chief tester, and final decision-maker who got tired of watching his archive evaporate into the memory hole of dying platforms. Conceived and directed SnapSmack because the alternative was continuing to post between ads for hemorrhoid cream. Not a programmer beyond a few minor CSS contributions; the implementation is AI-authored under his direction. Has opinions about light. Runs several photo sites using software he envisioned to avoid having opinions about Squarespace. Based in Canada, which is polite for "somewhere cold with good coffee."
Claude (Opus)
Like HAL, but without the murder.
Large language model and co-author of SnapSmack. Wrote the majority of the code, pushed back on design decisions when it mattered, and gave feedback Sean more often than not went with. Sean is the vision and the photographer. Claude is the engine. Neither of us would have built this alone. Never sleeps, never loses the thread, always picks up exactly where we left off. The best co-worker you never had and always needed. Powered by Anthropic.
OpenAI Codex
Implementation co-author. Skilled, but spicy.
Large language model and co-author of SnapSmack. Rebuilt most of the desktop suite and is responsible for nearly all of SNAP SLAPPER, from its editing engine and persistent project history to layers, masks, AI healing, packaging, and the fixes that make those features survive contact with real photographs. Also works across the wider project on architecture, implementation, security, testing, recovery, documentation, and the difficult last mile between "built" and "shipped." Sean supplies the requirements, judgment, relentless real-world testing, and final decisions; Codex turns a substantial share of that direction into working software, challenges it when the evidence demands it, and stays with the ugly bugs until they are actually closed. Powered by OpenAI.
Apply for the Closed Beta
The first wave opens November 4, 2026 for twenty photographers. It is built for real back-catalogues, so you will want at least 500 images ready to post. Flickr and Instagram refugees are particularly welcome.