Incentive Misalignment
This week saw the release of Apple’s biggest new product. The crossbody strap! Available in 10 colours, no, really, it’s designed to allow you to fashionably sling your iPhone 17 across your body, but as I have discovered, it is also a great small camera strap, but that’s not what this newsletter is about.
Apple Crossbody strap on a Fuji X-Half camera
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I ordered the strap to test out a hunch and when it arrived I was proved correct when pairing it with an X-Half I have on loan currently from Ffordes Photographic. Having conducted science, I wanted to share my discovery with the world, so I took photos and a short video, and posted them online. Reddit seemed like a good place to share my discovery but the Reddit app does something nefarious. It encourages you to cross-post to other groups. This is where my misalignment occurred.
So excited was I about my discovery that I immediately shared it with camera groups for other small cameras that might be a good fit, think of the RX100, the G7 digicam crowd and of course, my beloved Ricoh GRIII. This, dear reader, was a mistake, and a reminder that while on the internet no one knows you’re a dog, they can still tell you where to shove it. A poster in the RX100 group immediately and bluntly took me to task.There’s more science though, because in the 24 hours since, I’ve had positive responses from the GR group I posted to and the X-Half group all using this picture so you know, maybe there’s just a nicer kind of shooter has a GR or X-Half ;)
Anyway, all I know is that next time I’ll think more carefully about whether my incentives and the incentives of the group are aligned with those of the platform holder before I push a button.
From Reddit’s perspective, crossposting is great. More content, more places, more chances you’ll stay there, especially if you’re one of the valuable few who actually post rather than consume, but as a consumer I imagine going to the cupboard for a bag of crisps and being offered a banana is annoying. A valuable lesson learned, science done, I can probably put away my lab coat for the week and get back to editing episodes.
Ali talks GAS
In between episodes, I’d encourage you to go and watch the 2 videos made this week by Ali O’Keefe. One is about storing photos on a NAS she’s recently been sent, the other is about the drive to pick up gear and how she’s processing that, partly in response to a documentary she watched. It’s a thoughtful short that spoke to something I talk about with you all a lot and I figured that if it made me think, it’ll make you think too.
The NAS one is worth a watch because I’ve also shared an approach to backing up using a NAS before and care about you not losing your photos.
A Foto walk later this month
I’m leading a Photowalk in Inverness in a couple of weeks and would love to see you there if you’re local. You can sign up here. I’ll be the guy with the green backpack :)