Complaints have been aired recently about the fact that some non-professional MF photographers, or even non-MF photographers, have been posting on threads some would like to see kept for pros only.
I can fully understand the sentiment, one of the reason accounting for my own departure, years ago, from the BJP Forum as was. But there's a diffence: the BJP magazine used to sell itself as the voice of the professional, and certainly, for many years, only pros seemed to care enough about it to buy it, not least for its equipment reviews (excellent) and its sits. vac. columns that gradually became thinner and thinner. As a magazine, it was pretty dry, and focussed on the pro life. And that's why we bought it. As time progressed, there entered into play a sort of editorial change, with undue interest being focussed on 'students' and their accidental exposures made when loading film; a dilution of the professional concept, a fishing for new innocents.
Then came the Internet and the BJP website, where the forum was inevitably open to the world and its best-hidden secrets, some of whom now flooded the space with nonsense and, yes, abuse, the likes of which LuLa has never seen. Realising there was no control ever going to be implemented, simply out of the need to keep sales alive and, hopefully, grow within a wider maket as the pro one steadily shrank, I saw the pointlessness of keeping my voice there, so I voted with my mouse.
Now, LuLa has a different rôle to play than did the BJP, not least because it began life from the efforts of a photographic visionary, a man who not only wrote the words well, but also knew about walking the walk. And commerce was clearly not reason number one for existing. Thank you for your efforts and for your images, Michael. We all owe you.
Therefore, is it realistic to expect LuLa to provide key-entry sections today, so soon after the culture shock of the change from free to subscription? In the original scenario, the only question affecting the viewer was whether the twelve bucks represented or did not represent value to that person. Some issues occurred about copyright concerns, but I think they were resolved. Were Lula, today, to introduce more areas still closed to some viewers, I think it would not be seen in quite the same easy manner: you mean, one would pay, but still be barred access to the whole place? Really? Anybody about to eat that one?
In essence, if anyone thinks that a website open to all levels of photographer is not for him, then the challenge, surely, must be for him to start his own professionally exclusive website, not change somebody else's.
Rob C
