The easy distribution methods offered by the internet are going to shake up many areas of production, and professional work – photography is just the one that interests me

I like to go back to how the modernist thinkers approached the same issue when photography was an emerging field, and recommend a look at Walter Benjamins ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’ http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm

An enduring favourite of mine!

Ok, I did notice that there were several day gaps between some of the posts, but you still put a lot of effort into this – so its a shame you don’t spell-check before you publish. Yeah, I know – I’m a spelling and grammar cop and completely boring, but you want to try reading the posts. You’ll shock yourself, because I know you like things to be right almost as much as I do.

Anyway, all that aside, the comment I was really going to make is about your “micro-stock versus pro-stock” discussion, which I happen to think is pretty damn important. And not least because I want to steal some of your pictures for my own site!

Since I do software rather than photos, and websites rather than stock, my point of view is different. I could – and will in my own blog (http://www.mpreston.blogspot.com) – discuss the devaluing of coding skills in the same way you talk about devaluing photographer skills and for much the same reason.

I will be honest and admit that I am using cheap and cheerful pre-built “stock-designs” such as my blog page, admittedly with a little bit of tweaking to improve it. I’ll also be honest and admit that I need micro-stock to dress it up since a cheap website is no place to use expensive pro-stock, but the fact is that it is not very good – any professional could do much better.

The same applies to micro-stock in your business. A quick look at the designs provided by Blogger is enough to show that they are amateurish (and WordPress has the very same faults, I see, though they do hide theirs better). As an example, compare the very similar – properly done – design for my homw page with my blog page. The blog is stuck to a fixed size. But change the size of the browser window on the main site and every part of it changes size with you! Blogger does not even try to do that.

Fact is, you get what you pay for. Micro-stock can only ever be a simple, pretty, but not very good photo. It simply is not worth putting all that much effort into it. Just make sure the buyers know. You are a professional and you CAN do much more than micro-stock makes worth your while.