Facebook Event Photos Not Importing As Scheduled

[Laurie]

Help!! I signed up for Events Calendar Pro because I created a local events site. Now, ECP is importing FB events without the photos for those events.

This is critical for my site. Help!!

[Courtney]

Hi there

Thanks so much for reaching out!

Facebook recently announced a range of changes (https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/04/restricting-data-access/) to their APIs (the protocols we use to ‘speak’ to their servers and retrieve event information) which are having an effect on a number of our users.

As part of this a number of new restrictions were applied to their Events API, which is the specific protocol Event Aggregator uses in order to import events, organizers and venues. These changes went live with little notice to providers such as ourselves. At this point, it does not seem possible to reliably import any events, even if you created and ‘own’ events on Facebook and have linked Event Aggregator to Facebook using those same credentials.

This is frustrating for you, and for developers like us.  As Facebook continues to alter what it allows us to access, we will continue to pursue a path forward for Event Aggregator to import Facebook events.

If you interested in a refund, you can fill out the refund form https://theeventscalendar.com/knowledgebase/refund-policy/.

We really would like to work with you on this.  Would you be interested in a license for the remaining time for one of our other plugins instead of a refund?

Please let me know if you have any other questions!

Thanks
Courtney 🙂

[Laurie]

Courtney,

After extensive research, I chose the Events Aggregator *solely* for its
capability to import Facebook events.

I created Catskillist, a calendar-based website, with supporting social
media channels, as a way to curate all the amazing entertainment events
happening in the Catskills region. I created the site a year ago, and have
been putting in countless hours to build it, with the goal of selling
sponsorships and advertising in its second year. I have built subscribers
on the promise that my site would be the best available. I am just ready to
start approaching sponsors, etc., and all of a sudden, your plugin is not
doing what you sold it on and I’m looking at having to *triple* the
amount of time it takes me to manage the site.

The scheduled imports were what made this possible. I am not getting paid
for my time. And now, after all my hard work, you are telling me that your
plugin is now useless? That is NOT ACCEPTABLE.

Why would I want any other plugin from you when you’re not successfully
administering the one you sold me?

You say “we will continue to pursue a path forward for Event Aggregator to
import Facebook events”. Tell me what that path is and when you will have
successfully negotiated it.

*This is on you.*

I expect to hear back from you with updates.

[Barry]

Hi Laurie,

The situation is a vexing one and we realize just how frustrating this must be for you.

Imagine for one moment an alternative reality where facebook.com itself shutdown. That of course would be an event outside of our control and it would also make it impossible to use their website as a source of event data, as it would no longer exist. However, I think it would be fair to say that such a scenario would not be “on us”.

On some levels this is similar, if less extreme. Facebook arbitrarily shutdown the channels we require to be able to import events and they gave us no notice of this … a highly unusual move and not one we were able to anticipate.

That to say, while we understand the disappointment you must feel, on our side we built the Facebook component of Event Aggregator in good faith and it was founded on the wholly reasonable assumption that a major web platform such as Facebook would continue to manage a dependable range of APIs and that it would continue to facilitate the levels of access that had already been available for a number of years.

Of course, those assumptions have turned out to be incorrect. We can’t force them to undo this change (though perhaps things will be relaxed in the future, or new pathways accommodating similar outcomes will open up) and so our hands are tied to some extent.

All we can do is try to do our best by customers like you. We can potentially offer a full or partial refund, depending on when you purchased, and we can also offer you access to one of our other products.

I genuinely wish we could do more but, ultimately, that is how things currently stand.

[Barry]

This reply is private.

[Support Droid]

Hey there! This thread has been pretty quiet for the last three weeks, so we’re going to go ahead and close it to avoid confusion with other topics. If you’re still looking for help with this, please do open a new thread, reference this one and we’d be more than happy to continue the conversation over there.

Thanks so much!
The Events Calendar Support Team

[Author]

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