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View Full Version : Should the LF page be part of photo.net? Comments



David Payumo
15-Jul-2000, 13:47
I thought people should tell us why they think the LF page should or should not be a part of Photo.net. Surveys are good but a discussion is important. I thin k it could be a good idea because we can get a search engine. However it is bad because we would be part of that 35mm group which has a very different view. Another question I have is how would it be a part of photo.net?

M.
15-Jul-2000, 14:49
NOT! Photographers who photograph with the kind of stuff that we put up with (and sometimes even bragg about) should definitely be segregated from people in the real world. Their laughter would be just too traumatic.

David A. Goldfarb
15-Jul-2000, 16:16
The "MF Q&A" forum on photo.net doesn't seem to suffer much from being in such close proximity to the "General(ly 35mm) Photography" Q&A, so I wouldn't worry about that too much.

I would worry more about the potential commercialization of photo.net, the possibility of banner ads in the future, and such.

lee nadel
15-Jul-2000, 16:37
keep this site right here it has more of a serious involvement then photonet large format is a relgion or a way of life

Marc
15-Jul-2000, 17:43
NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!!!!!!!!!!

I'm sorry if this hurts some feelings or steps on someone's toes........but if you are to lazy to search for information and feel you need it handed to you at someone else's expense in time and effort then you aren't going to make it in large format anyway so stick with your minature cameras. Large format is a hard task master, it demands that you are faithful to it and work for your rewards. This site mirrors that need for dedication. If you really need archives, write things down, book mark, show a little sel reliance. Just don't ruin a good thing for the rest of us.

This forum, up until the last couple of weeks has been free of the whiners and flamers that abound else where. The quality and content is second to none in the forums that are available. I'll trade a site free of banners and ads any day for a little extra effort in locating information.

Altaf Shaikh
15-Jul-2000, 18:22
Yes, elitism is stupid. THe more people that know about LF the better.

William Lindley
15-Jul-2000, 18:37
NO!, NO!, NO! Please leave the LF Home page as it is. This has been my learning place. A way to talk to others and learn by what they are doing. Let's not be exclusive, but we do practice an art that has little to do with 35mm photography, thats why many of us got involved in it. Please stay as you are!!!

QT Luong
15-Jul-2000, 19:48
Editor: the poll is just was meant as a quick and cheap way to test the waters. It requires only 5 seconds of anybody's time to answer, and if enough people do so, can give an idea of where to go. Again the URL of the poll is http://tools.arsdigita.com/voxpopuli/ViewPoll?poll_id=1966 (http://tools.arsdigita.com/voxpopuli/ViewPoll?poll_id=1966).

In the future I will conduct a more detailed survey, and at that point we will discuss in depth what is desirable for the LF community, what are the possible options, and which changes should be done or avoided.

The sure thing is that the integrity of the LF contents will be preserved in any future option.

In the while, thanks to everybody for contributing to the forum.

Bob Finley
15-Jul-2000, 21:55
A search function would be welcome and I lurk in Photo Net almost as much as I do here, but I would hate to see this site intigrated just for that. Large Format has a unique character to it (because of subject, people, or moderators?) that I would hate to lose. I don't have anything against "that 35mm group" but why not keep what we have? Photo Net could add LF to it's MF and Nature forums.

Sean Billy Bob Boy yates
16-Jul-2000, 00:44
There is a search function! At least, it shows up on my browser.

Jeff hompson
16-Jul-2000, 00:48
Search engine??? Where is it?

pat krentz
16-Jul-2000, 00:53
I would vote to keep the site where and the way it is, you can call me any name you want but let's keep it seperate! If I want 35mm or MF, I know where to go and find it, the thing I like about this forum it that most of the people who use it have a brain, and respect other's as having the same, and are willing to share what they have learned. Pat

Trevor Crone
16-Jul-2000, 04:18
I can only agree with Bill Mitchell above. Trevor.

Andrew Herrick
16-Jul-2000, 08:39
I vote it stays the way it is. The quality of discussion here seems much higher than on photo.net and I would hate to see it be diluted

Chris Werner
16-Jul-2000, 10:14
I could only see moving it if there was some clear advantage to be gained and the integrity of this forum wasn't compromised. I spend a reasonable amount of time at photo.net as well (largely since I am just starting LF) but it just isn't the same. In spite of what I think are the real efforts of the moderators it's largely a place to ask insightful questions like "is the Tamron 28-200 zoom just as sharp as my Nikon 50mm prime?" (A: why do you care, you obviously aren't spending any time taking pictures ;-)) and to flame newcomers for not searching the archives or not having read a library of photography books before asking their question.

I found this site through photo.net. But if someone is concerned about its relative obscurity I would suggest asking Greenspun to put a prominent reference to this forum and the Large Format Page on photo.net as a way to encourage traffic here without losing the character of this place.

Paul Schilliger
16-Jul-2000, 11:13
This is still a nice place to visit, despite the late disruptions of some anonym ous and my vote is for the forum to stay as it is.

George Nedleman
16-Jul-2000, 13:35
Leave it alone. This site is very consistant with good advice and loads of humor in equal amounts. I have never failed getting any info I needed. George Nedleman DDS

Jimi
16-Jul-2000, 14:53
I like this site. It's thankfully free from blinking ad-banners, and the lay-out is a clean and no-frills. For me who use a somewhat dated (stone-age, if you ask me) computer, the fast loading times of the pages are a gift from the heavens. It delivers the information that I need, and the general quality of the discussions are high.

I would not like this site to be a part of photo.net, however clever and nice the Greenspun site desig

Julio Fernandez
16-Jul-2000, 14:59
No. The dilution of subject matter from the 35mm side would eventually render what would be left of LF content useless.

Michael S. Briggs
16-Jul-2000, 19:30
I'm not sure whether it would be good to move the LF page to photo.net. I don't think it would make as much difference as some other users think. For example, the Medium Format Digest on photo.net isn't polluted with 35 mm questions, nor with questions like "are Nikon zooms really better than Sigma zooms", as some fear would be the case if the LF pages moved there. Clearly the LF pages and the LF Question and Answers Forum would be separate pages rather than merged into the main questions section. For some reason the LF Questions Forum is much more active than the Medium Format Digest. Is the difference because LF photographers need more assistance since the format is more different from 35mm and because in-person contact with experience LF photographers is harder to come by? Because of the community that has developed? Because the Large Format Pages give the Questions Forum prominence? Would any of this change if the LF Pages moved?

Would moving ease the work that Q.-Tuan Luong does? (P.S. We appreciate it!)

Wayne
16-Jul-2000, 20:50
NO. And the (new and wonderful) search engine is at the main entry http://http.cs.berkeley.edu/~qtluong/photography/lf/index.html

Glenn Kroeger
16-Jul-2000, 22:36
It ain't broke, so don't fix it.

John Quinn
17-Jul-2000, 01:14
No. Love it as it is

Ellis Vener
17-Jul-2000, 06:29
I ts hould be part ofphoto.net the same way that the Nature and Medium Format fo rums are: there and linked but seperate from the general photography forum. The purpose of these forums is educatiuon not clique-ism.

fw
17-Jul-2000, 07:24
Well, it would be good to have a search function, and also to be able to follow the history of individuals' posts (one of the best features of photo.net), but photo.net and this forum have rather different characters. So, please leave this site where it is, but please add a little more user-friendly functionality if possible.

Robb Reed
17-Jul-2000, 11:46
I'm pretty content with the site as is. It really has taught me a ton about LF. If it gets moved I'll participate anyway unless it gets bgged down with a ton on blinking advertisements or becomes somehow diluted with non-LF information. I say keep it where it is. I say thanks to the people who make it possible and to all who participate.

rr

Ron Mc
17-Jul-2000, 12:16
I recently found this form and the format as it is now. People generally are informative and polite. This is often not the case in some other forms.

Ellis Vener
17-Jul-2000, 13:23
jeez, people. I think all Tuan is thinking about tis having the link on photo.ne t Q&A page under "community." It will help people who have an interest in LF find this amazing site faster and more directly.

Sean Quigley
17-Jul-2000, 16:41
This is my favorite site I like my own search engine its more fun this way! If it aint broke way fix it!

John Randall
17-Jul-2000, 20:06
I've noticed that since they upgraded Photo.net that the speed has slowed considerably. I just got into LF and the first thing I noticed, when visiting this forum, it is much faster than Photo.net

Malcolm Matusky
7-Dec-2001, 16:14
I like photo.net and actually found this forum from searching the large format area on photo.net. If the community of this database can be retained then what does it matter who hosts it? I use photo.net as much as this forum and would not mind if the large format section of photo.net would be improved by all of the contributors of this forum.

Jorge Gasteazoro
7-Dec-2001, 18:08
People, people, get on the ball, the greenspun sites are shutting down and David wants to know if photo.net is the best option!

the responders who voted to keep it as it is are not getting it, the site WILL HAVE TO MOVE, the question is where and how are the monitors going to go about it?

I also belong to photo.net and I went and looked at their forums, the LF forum is similar to this one, with a few exceptions:

1 no "new answers" etc. search capability. you have to look at all the post over and over.

2 no post by date, I found myself looking at posts from 1997....one guy was asking: why use LF in this modern era ?(1997)..lol.

if some of you have found other differences I would aprreciate if you post them.

OTH if you go to a comercial place...say View Camera magazine. WOuld we keep the same freedom to express ourselves? what happens if we trash a product and the manufactures calls VC mag and complains? I know some of my post have been deleted because I critizised the photography of a well know editor, since I am posting here and it is free I did not mind abiding by the monitors judgement, but happens if we have to pay? would the fact that I am paying a fee entitle me to complain about my post being deleted? Like I said I did not mind, but I did see one instance where a persons post was deleted and he kept whining about, BTW it was on one of the boards monitored by E. Buffaloe.

After thinking about this for a while I think that although having this forum as part of the VC magazine would have been nice, I think I would rather see it free from any comercial ties or pressures that may arise in the future. As such I think we have very few choices and photo.net appears to be the best.

Sal Santamaura
7-Dec-2001, 18:50
Jorge, Jorge, Jorge, get on the ball, every post except the one right before yours is from a year and a half ago. David asked an academic question back then, and the responses were appropriate to it.

Note that photo.net does not currently have a LF forum. The LF archive you saw there is simply one category of questions in the regular moderated general photography forum.

Jorge Gasteazoro
7-Dec-2001, 18:54
ah....so how do I get to the "real" forums?

kthompson
7-Dec-2001, 19:14
Well...I don't know --really--but just what is so bad about photonet?...I'll admit that at times it is irritating in a way, but when I read these posts alog the lines of LF as a way of life, or some sort of higher ethic as opposed to a smaller format?...geez, what's that all about??...it's all photography in the end....if you all want to perpetuate LF and sheet films, you're going to need to open up the club....and how is arguing about sinars and linhofs, or Caltars and Sinarons any different than the photonet type brand arguments, when you get down to it? My question is, if anyone is a newcomer to using view cameras, where'd they come from?? Small or medium format? So, what's so terrible about being on a site associated with those "sorts of people"?

kthompson
7-Dec-2001, 19:18
Ahhh...you all tricked me....stuck in the time-warp again...well, I stand by my post regardless...must have been the chemistry down here.

Jorge Gasteazoro
8-Dec-2001, 03:56
LOL....DK we both fell for the same trick....uf! I am so glad I was not the only one.....