Maria Callas in Medea, P.P. Pasolini.
Coming back home - 2
Coming back home - 1
Christmas 1966. Exclamation Mark marked.
Thoughts about elites, Flickr, and chipmunks - another comment
After people stopped complaining about Flickr is not being taken seriously by the art world, the complaint has now changed to the following:
It’s futile to attempt to stereotype a community as large as Flickr. There are thousands of photographers that are working in the fine art and documentary genres. It’s not all ‘vernacular’ or “sleek, surface-based” photography. I’m constantly amazed that intelligent people make such flippant comments without really understanding the variety of communities that are using Flickr. […]
Of course, neither in my nor in the follow-up post was anyone “stereotyping” Flickr. The problem with these kinds of complaints is that instead of reading what people write and them responding to them in an adult way, they’re basically cherry-picking some bits and then complaining about those (note the “It’s not all ‘vernacular’ or ‘sleek, surface-based’”), adding all kinds of characterizations of the people who dared to write about Flickr (“such flippant comments without really understanding the variety of communities”), even if those people actually use Flickr “ALL THE TIME” (that’s a an actual quote from the first response to my original post).
Thing is, part of why so many people indeed ignore Flickr is because if you go to the discussion panels there is just so much of that stuff - and, really, why bother having an argument with something like that?
It seriously reminds me of how resentment and pseudo-debates derived from that are more and more being used in American politics. In this case, it’s not so much about discussing Flickr, it’s about denouncing those people who dare to question Flickr as elitist or, in this case (a variant), as people who just don’t (what is really meant is: don’t want to) understand it. This is not much different from how people like Bill O’Reilly, Shaun Hannity, or Keith Olberman operate: Instead of engaging with a debate, carefully push those buttons that you know will make your real audience react.
Ha. Now I’m like Bill O’Reilly. Awesome. You can judge for yourself. I think I was rather straightforward in my response, merely making the point that there is this tendency to stereotype Flickr as nothing but kittens, sunsets, and chipmunks. And for the most part, the people making these comments haven’t invested the time to explore the various groups and communities that have developed there.
