I fixed the problem of not being able to see the thumbnails. Not sure this is the best overall long term solution, but it works now
I added this line to the php.ini file.
allow_url_fopen = On
I found the file not on the server under etc [this site is hosted on media temple, you might need to contact your own host if you cannot find it]
Here is the complete file that I uploaded. There was a php.ini.sample. I copied it to edit locally, added the line, then uploaded back
php.ini
; Rename this file to php.ini and uncomment or add directives.
; For a complete list of valid directives, visit:
; http://us2.php.net/manual/en/ini.php
[PHP]
; We highly recommend that you leave this options enabled
cgi.fix_pathinfo=1
; Increase maximum post size
;post_max_size = 20M
; Increase execution time
;max_execution_time = 300
; pull in EGPCS [Environment, GET, POST, Cookie, Server] variables as globals
;register_globals = true
; For performance reasons, (mt) does not load all of the modules that are available
; into PHP. You may uncomment any one of the following "extension" lines to enable
; the desired module
; Salblotron XSLT
;extension=xslt.so
; save in local tmp
session.save_path=/home/133267/data/tmp
allow_url_fopen = On
I had found this related answer about the php.ini which you can see for further details https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3694240/add-allow-url-fopen-to-my-php-ini-using-htaccess