THE FUTURE OF THIS FORUM - PLEASE READ

[Erik The Viking]

I do not understand the talk about photo.net being intolerable becuase you simply do not have to visit those General or Archived or Nature or Medium Format sites if you do not want to. The Large Format site remains exactly as it is if it is hosted by photo.net. Are you all accessing the discussion forums at photo.net differently from the way I do? I type in www.photo.net/bboard in the URL and I get directly to the list of forums. I click on the forum I wish to click on and I do not have to look at the rest. Somehow there is the misconception that being hosted by photo.net means losing our good moderator Tuan. Nothing can be further from the truth. Each forum has its own moderators and they do not cross over to control the other forums. So you have nothing to fear from the likes of Darron, Bob, Russ, Don etc. in the LF Forum.

[Altaf Shaikh]

If it matters we took a peek and it will not be much trouble to port over the archive. Usefilm.com is a heck of a lot more than just a chatroom. Take a peek and decide for yourself. The tone of Usefilm.com is distictly about becoming a better photographer by actually TAKING pictures. The photo projects are there for those who wish to participate. Discussing techniques and equipment will always be some part of photography which is fine. They both can happily coexist together.

I've read this forum for a long time and been a large format photographer for much longer than that. Large format should not be an elitist secret. It should be a wonderful avenue to try and practice Photography in the traditional sense. There is no greater joy than seeing that first big polaroid come out of a large format camera and have it not come out blank.

I want to expose as many people as possible to the joys of large format and alternative processes so I made the offer to host the forum. I will still be a member at this LF forum no matter what.

[Erik The Viking]

Reply from Philg (presumably) copied from Pentax 67 Forum:

Hey, I'm not dead yet... But seriously the easiest thing to do with photo forums is move them into photo.net. The site has a full-time staff. For the rest of the greenspun.com stuff, I'm not pulling the plug immediately. But I want to make sure that the services are rebuilt in a way that is sustainable. I've already told Steve that we can move his forum onto photo.net and redirect seamlessly from old greenspun.com bookmarks.

-- Philip Greenspun (philg@mit.edu), December 07, 2001.

[james mickelson]

Interesting. But I question the feeling that somehow this forum will become diluted by joing usefilm.com. We large format shooters over there have our own page complete with archives and a large base of other serious photographers to draw from. And Q is my choice for moderator if he so chooses. I'm sorry but I feel PN sucks as far as navigating and options and it isn't always up and running. I frequently have to back out and try over again. I went there because of the options that existed over there. Like other lf photographers who put there images up for critique and comment on mine. And the chat room has rooms you can go to where you can talk serious photography while looking at the image in question. I hope you will come visit us and have a chat with us about what we offer. As for PN, I choose the better option. I've already been there and it wasn't usable. James

[Erik The Viking]

No, James, I disagree with you. PN does not suck. It is not perfect but it does not suck. PN remains the most informative archive of photography knowledge on the Web. It has been helpful to many since its inception. PN does not suck.

[james mickelson]

Sorry Eric X but "in my opinion" it sucks. There is more current information on usefilm then on the archives on PN. I spent a lot of time on Photo.net and all it was was a bunch of bickering and techwars. So I don't buy it. This site is a class act and usefilm.com is just as good. That is why I have invited those that want a great photography site with it's own LF page to come over and experience it for themselves. And PN is hard to navigate. Go where you want but having been here for a very long time and having used usefilm I will never go back to PN. Period.

[Mike Mahoney]

PhotoNet is not all that bad, but it is down from time to time, and it?s not the easiest site to move around in. It would be a consideration if were are unable to maintain the site as is, or with some changes as to fees or funding if required.

Deans' point about critical mass is a good one. Usefilm.com is a good site among many good sites - and all photography sites are constantly looking to increase their traffic/memberships. Altafs? offer is kind, but I?m sure we would be welcomed at other sites as well - the important thing here is to maintain our critical mass, and to try to continue with the forum in it?s current form, or as close as possible

[james mickelson]

that's what we are trying to do keep all the information together and keep all the participants together we don't want to dilute the page with other formats and agendas and usefilm offers other options as well that PN and here don't james

[David F. Stein]

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I don't know I'd give a vote to this site:



MEGA-SITE with PLENTY FOR LARGE FORMAT<!--SELECTION--><!--/SELECTION--> </BODY> </HTML>

[Kaatharine Thayer]

Some thoughts on the options:

I've been to usefilm and found that I can't access it because of an incompatibility between the site and my browser, so I'm not interested in that option. (And please, don't tell me to change my browser. The whole genius of the worldwide web was that the markup language was designed to make all sites compatible with all hardware and software combinations (including palm pilot, webTV, etc); I have little patience with the argument that because an incompetent web designer has created a site that's inaccessible to my browser, I should change my browser. I don't THINK so. Of course that's one of the many great things about being with Greenspun, is that he understands that whole idea of accessibility and practices it as well as preaching it.)

As for yahoo-- I'm in a yahoo group, and I think someone here said there's no ads on yahoogroups, but that's not my experience. We get an ad at the bottom of almost every message. Many have graphics that take a while to download. I put up with it because it's my brothers and sisters and it's an easy way for us to keep in touch, but for a professional group, I hope we could do better. And we didn't join yahoo voluntarily, by the way; we were on egroups, which was better, but we were sold to yahoo like so much furniture.

Given the manpower requirements Tuan has outlined, it seems unlikely that Steve Simmons would be able to follow up his polite request for information about our requirements with a definite offer to host the forum. He can speak for himself, of course, but it seems unlikely to me that it would be cost-effective for him to take this on.

As for paying a fee to maintain the forum as a standalone on its own server, has anyone worked out how many subscribers at what fee it would take to maintain a server and a person to manage it? People are used to free discussion groups on the net; I'm not sure how many would be willing to pay for the service. I'm not sure I would, myself. I expect what you'd end up with would be a core group of a few people, but not enough to pay the bills.

I think probably Phillip is right, that photo.net makes the most sense because it has a staff already, and the interface is familiar. If the forum can maintain a separate existence there and keep its present tone and usefulness, that would be tolerable. One potential problem I can see is it may be more visible to people who enjoy joining groups purely to create dissension, who wouldn't have known about our group in its present location, but that might be a risk we'll have to take, if we can't find a way to continue as we are.

This may be a dumb question, but I guess I don't understand the difference between the two sites, greenspun.com and photo.net, as far as the software. The forum format looks quite similar; is the software totally different?

I don't think we need a feature for uploading images for critique. Once in a while it would be useful to be able to show a problem with a camera or something like that, but critiqueing work isn't what this forum is about. I lurked on one critique group for a while and was rather taken aback by the arbitrary and even bizarre advice people were being given on how to "improve" their photographs. When I found it harder and harder to restrain myself from jumping in to yell "Run for your lives!" to the hapless participants, I unsubscribed. That's a longwinded way of saying, "No critiques, please!"