(And a few posts of note - Nathalie Belayche at Food for your Eyes, Jonathan Worth at New Photographics, Amy Stein and Mark Feustel at EyeCurious)
The subject of these posts and tweets is of huge significance of course in the photography and publishing/net publishing world. But i think there is more significance to look at here. Personally i have never seen so much positive interaction between owners of blogs and websites, of any kind. One topic has brought so many people together for discussion that it makes me wonder why it doesn't happen more often.
There are plenty of topics people blog about that won't get the kind of attention and chat that the 'Future of Photobooks' did but similarly there are a huge number of people who have something to say and no blog in which to communicate through. I realize guest bloggers are becoming more prevalent but this is often quite an elitist selection.
A blog seems like a great place to get more than just an interaction in the comments section. It is for many people a more relaxed environment to discuss and share, away from some of the rules and 'guidelines' of a website. And so perhaps more of us should open the doors of our blogs to those with something worthwhile to say to our audience? This way we can offer others a piece of our blog while still being able to choose content and remain as a director. It would similarly be worthwhile exchanging posts with someone who has a more suitable blog for a specific post
Now i am aware that this blog doesn't have the reach or audience that the likes of Flakphoto or Resolve but i am more than happy to invite people to use 'Some Things' as a way of writing when they do not have a blog. So if anyone is interested please email me at matt@mjohnstonphotography.co.uk
And as always comments are welcome and encouraged on this post
Follow the people mentioned in this post on Twitter -
FlakPhoto - @flakphoto
Livebooks - @livebooks
Food for your Eyes - @foodforyoureyes
Eyecurious - @eyecurios
New Photographics - @jdubbyah
Amy Stein - @amysteinphoto
Written by Matt Johnston www.mjohnstonphotography.co.uk
Hi Matt,
ReplyDeleteThis is a great idea and I'm very happy to hear that it was in part prompted by the collaborative elements of our Future of Photobooks project. This idea of collaboration came up over and over again in the thoughts presented by commenters and bloggers...that just because someone CAN create a book entirely on their own start-to-finish, that doesn't mean that's the most creatively rich environment to work in. RESOLVE has always worked with outside contributors - professionals from the photo world - in fact they produce about 90% of our content. Working with other people has helped me break out of the isolation and "echo chamber" sometimes suffered by "the blogger," and I hope you find the same advantages :)
Miki, thank you very much for the comment. And for inspiring it! I certainly do hope i find those advantages and can offer others a no commitment style platform.
ReplyDeleteCheers
Matt