It's official, the RG fora will be for paying customers only, non-subscribers won't even be allowed to read .
The wealth of knowledge in the archives, contributed by generous pros, has been part of the deal.

Read the forum FAQ for details....

You be the judge, can a message board, which is run unlike any other lively and successful internet community, be of any future interest ?

I'm more than irritated that they see the old content as an asset and will start charging for it too. This input was given for free from former members on a free forum and now it should be sold as a product? Strange ethics...

But once you start to read the old successful threads on the MF forum where some of the experienced and popular members like JRussell, MTucker and others participated, it is now like walking across a graveyard or even worse, all their postings are made anonymous and say "Former member, account closed". They leave the information but won't even tell who gave it for free. It is a shame really.

RG and his moderator were - being the owners - free to procede as they liked to, but I actually think that this was a big mistake.
The contributors was the real value to RG, and by treating some of them like a teacher would treat a "bad pupuil", they litterally chased them away, it doesn't surprise me that this all came to an end quickly.

I personally won't pay for the forum in the future.

regards, Bernie

Perhaps the new forum owner should look at rectifying those anonymous postings?

How much weight will be given to lots of anonymous comments by those considering paying for access once their trial period elapses? Does knowing the identity (and industry/professional standing) of the various users impact on the authority of their statements?

Particularly from the new financial viewpoint of the relaunched RG forums, you'd think they would want to maximise their 'asset value'?

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Whether he does or not (I wont read it then because I will not pay, I must say that I did not like the censorhip and the way the change was handled), the real pity is that the forum as it existed for months is now gone. Many posters who made the attractivity of RG MF forum will not go back there.

A lot of non - posters (like myself) but even several of the regular posters that had to - or chose to - leave said that it was a very special place that is not easy to rebuild somewhere else on another site.

Hopefully there will be similar places in the future.

Bernie

Everyone agreed it was Rob and Mike's house and they could paint it any color they wish.

The problem is they painted it pink and yellow and then put it on the market.

In reality, what is the worth of that forum now to a new member, even at a nominal fee of $25?

It just becomes a club of like minded individuals which loses the benefit of open, thought provoking discussion.

Not to be negative, but I personally think the damage is done and the value of that forum is highly diminished.

I thought about writing and asking if they could delete all of my posts, but thinking about it now, once they move to a locked down pay for view model, it will probably have the same effect.

There was a lot of talk about advertisers pressure and as I have stated, none of us know if that was true.

Still, it's a loss to the manufacturers not to have that type of open, passionate and sometimes heated discussions, because that form of opinion backed by experience can quickly bring out the positives and negatives of the tools and methods we use.

The manufacturers may not have liked some of the public comments, but I bet they read every one of them.


IMO

JR

Roland, as far as I know JamesR. left by himself, only M.Tu. seems to have been banned. However as far as I have seen, he and Mark are friends, and I'd not want to stay in a forum where a friend is banned in a "school boy" manner, and not either want to be offered an "amnesty". Jesus, those people participated greatly to the value of this community, why should they need an amnesty to give their information for free?

Also I doubt that a normal adult person who hasn't made stupid mistakes would go back to such a place. I wouldn't and I dont expect M.T. and J.R. and Guy Manusco, and a few others to do so. Except of course if the present owner of the forum changes the policy that the past contents (given away for free of course) are not readable for non-subscribers and maybe contacts those members in a very polite, decent and tactful way by making clear that he follows a different style. However the first deletions on the new forum dont point in this direction.

Unfortunately!

regards, Bernie

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Roland,

Yes, the new owner will have to handle this. I won't comment more on this, because I haven't really been part of the active posters on RobG forum, so I am only indirectly concerned. However I hope that the people who were on this forum find a way to go on with their very educating debate and discussion. Maybe they will find/ create a new place as has been suggested by someone already.

I just was one of the silent readers of RG who - probably much like me - followed the discussions on the MF board regulary and with great interest, as there was so much to learn (for free) about new digital technology and the photographic business in general. Quite a change from dpreview where the usual noise dominates.

regards, bernie

Does anyone of the currently homeless Rob Galbraith contributors know Q.-Tuan Luongs largeformat forum at http://www.largeformatphotography.info/lfforum/ ?

It is of course only interesting if you use LF cameras and shoot film but it shows exemplary how a non-commercial successor of the RG forum could look like.

Personally I would very much prefer to make donations for such a project instead of subscribing to the new RG forum.

I have suggested setting up a new MF oriented forum

I have experimentally set this up on www.smartgroups.com

I have called this group "d64 group" with reference to the f64 group of the last century.

This is an unmoderated group and currently invitation only We can discuss later whether we should make it more open. If we keep it closed then we can talk more freely about inside / industry knowledge than if it was searchable by google. But its a matter we can discuss.

Members can invite new members who they know are interested in MF digital.

As it is unmoderated it will rely on the membership to keep it basically on track and about MF digital. If its quality is good, then it will attract good posters. So it sinks or swims by self moderation. No idea if it will work.

Also, if another forum emerges which is better, no problem, we can gravitate there.

To join it please email me at

paul AT architecturalimages DOT co DOT uk

(replacing the words by punctuation of course)

I will then send you an invitation (5 already invited).

I am out shooting for the next 2 days, so it may take a couple of days to get started, then we should be in business.

This will be a co-op group. And won't be the property of a single member.

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News to me (no one has contacted me from the site). Being a "banned user" I have no way to communicate with the new people there (I can't find an email). I did a search(about the only thing you can do as a non "member) and find that I had posted 2543 posts. I'm not at all happy about the new owners referencing these posts to people who pay for this new site. Even if I was invited back (that's a BIG if), I'm not sure I would go back and I would demand all my old posts be removed since I'm just against the idea that info I freely posted is now only accessible to paid members. This just rubs me the wrong way.

I have no record of the original terms of use but I'd be surprised if there was anything that said RG owns what I wrote. Or he could transfer those posts to someone who is essentially selling them to make their own profit.

Considering photography and copyright issues, I'm actually shocked that these new owners would even consider such a move but maybe they are green about how professional photographers make a living (we sell usage of images, not the images themselves) and copyright is key to this.

Invite me back. OK maybe. But sell the archives; that's a deal breaker.

Hello Roland,

I have seen your post, but unfortunately can't post a reply at RG's, being banned and all ...

I have to disagree with your comparison, online magazines, and even more so scientific ones, take a very different approach to communicating knowledge than a message board does, imho.
An internet forum gains its value solely by member contribution, be it day-to-day postings or searchable archives.
Take away even only one of those, and you get an incestuous coffee klatch.
It has been mentioned before, restricting (read) access to a forum also isolates it from the rest of the internet , as noone can link or otherwise refer to the content of such an insular community.

I'm quite familiar with online fora, as moderator, former owner and dedicated user, the issue of a forum with high traffic volume running out of funds for bandwidth isn't uncommon.

There are several ways this issue is normally dealt with:

- Sponsors, who can run their own sub-forum - which doesn't necessarily lead to censorship; or who are allowed to run ads and such in a sales forum.

- Ads, didn't seem to work for RG.

- A call for voluntary donations. Trust me , in a really popular forum this works almost every time, when the alternative is a close-down. Should have been a great success in a forum frequented by a comparably wealthy audience .

The expenditure of time can be minimized by appointing voluntary moderators, shouldn't be much of an issue to find people ready to oversee a crowd as low-maintenance as on RG's.

However, it was decided to make a quick buck by selling the archive and possible 'high-tier' member base - or what remained of it after the recent cleansings - to the next best buyer.

Time will tell if the formerly high standards can be retained, and if the precious members from the industry will find it worthwhile to further contribute in such a restricted group.

deleted.

Plain and simple, that circus has left town. It was wonderful while it was here, but what now? Maybe someday another circus will come.

We can waste our collective energies trying to convince the new owners to see things our way or better yet focus our efforts into creating something new that serves our purpose. I applaud Paul for taking steps toward this direction.

I don't mean to make this sound "rah rah" (toss a cheerleader up into the air, anyone?) but think of this analogy:

If the MF Forum at RG was like a group of friends sitting around a table in a cafe having a drink then why can't we simply move the party on to the next cafe?

Get over your anger, open up the next door and pull up a chair and ask,
"Who's chipping in to buy the next pitcher?"

Mark Tuttle

Because of people like you being banned--I am not sure I would find the forums of any value. If you (and others) don't go back (and I'm assuming not--to be truthful), then---I won't either. I'm sure others feel the same. I spent time in the RAW, color mgt., PS forums more than the 1D---5D forums (where I could find similar info elsewhere)--and I admit to being a 'voyeur' on the MF forum where I learned a lot.

I'm planning to wait and see how the forum works out. For now, I've found other places to find what I want for the most part though it takes more time.

Archives--I have strong reservations about them.

Diane

I think that things are well on their way to having this place be the next cafe. I'll buy a pitcher if anyone's willing to stick around.

Happy to contribute $25 to the tab, since I don't plan on spending it at the redecorated RG bar.

Steven

Cool ... I absolutely agree.

Considering that people like Andrew and others make their living from teaching and writing, there arises an interesting IP issue with posts on public forums being sold, not to mention the fact that the owners of the information in those posts being locked out and can no longer reference their own comments.

Put simply "You own your words" and selling those words without the permission of the owner is a simple breach of IP, which we as photographers take very seriously.

Are there published terms and conditions on the RG site - I never saw any but I am happy to be corrected. If not then the new owners should tread carefully.

With all due respect, but we should all cut the IP crap. For all we know the website could be run from China, in which case I wish anyone good luck with no matter how many US (or Ozzie) authorneys. If you offer any kind of information to the internet, you have to accept that it can, and most likely will, become public domain.

Your protection results from the fact that the value of information is inversely proportional to its speed. Considering the timeframe of internet information, there really is no informational value in your previous posts. If you really think there is any value, I would like to present exhibit A: the countless times I've seen the "experts" answer the same old questions over and over again.

In fact, that is probably what makes them experts to begin with; the fact that they have the patience to do so...

Speaking for myself, I've written enough on photographic forums to fill a number of books. But much of the stuff I've written is ill-informed and incorrect. I'd like to collect all that stuff as a record of my photographic development, but I'm not going to insist that it remain on archive as a valuable source of information.

I've thought about doing a search on all my posts, in this forum and Rob Galbraith's, and printing the results, but I haven't done so yet. I tend to think it would be an exercise in vanity.

Speaking of pitchers.

I am willing to donate domain name, hosting space, bandwidth, forum setup services and technical support for the idea of a new, professional, digital medium format forum.

Being one of the big klients of an hosting company/i own a web design company/, i have access to significant ammounts of free hosting space and bandwidth, also i'm qiute familiar with setting up, administration and moderation options of Invision and PhpBB forum boards. The team of programmers in my office should back me up in case of trouble.

If you guys think that is a good idea - i'm ready to kick it off. It will be a good idea to act now, while people are still searching for separate suitable space for MF specific discussions. Gathering them together will be more difficult with every passing day.


p.s.
I hope that this offer does not violate LL forum rules...

p.p.s.
Being a moderator/administrator of an big, free, art oriented forum, listing about 6000 active members - i'm aware that such a forum will require significant efforts and time on my part, but i'm prepared to face them.

Relax.

No-one is suggesting suing anyone and of course from a practial perspective it would be foolish to even contemplate such a course of action.

OTOH, IP is hardly 'crap' as you so bluntly put it. It is a fundamental part of the creative industy's business model and has been fought for long and hard.

RG is based in Canada. Canada has stringent IP laws like the US and Europe and any violation of them needs to be brought into the open so people can be made aware of what is happening so they can make an informed decision about the situation.

Fair enough, and I may have stated it somewhat more harshly than necessary, but providing information to the internet, especially in the form of answers to questions, is not protectable by law in a genetic sense. Trying to make laws to do so, or trying to apply existing laws, is equivalent to killing oneself (as a society).

Instead you should (simply) increase the speed of expansion. That is, believe in our ability to keep creating, more and more, preferrably in consistent form. You either believe in your ability to create, or you believe in your ability to protect. The latter is the surest way to loose a dominant position in the realm of globalization and will eventually lead to demise. Whereas creating in consistent form is not easily replicated, and undeniably your signature, thus your IP if you will.

I would really like the "experts", self-proclaimed or otherwise, to keep that in mind. It is their participating that is relevant, not their contributions. Yes, "you own your words", but you don't own the information behind those words, no? It is the way that they share information, in a positive, patient, constructive, unselfish matter, that makes their "words" valuable. It is very, very counter-productive if these people start running in negative mode, like lawyers need to do for a living: thinking about everything that can go wrong, instead of thinking about everything that can go right.

end-of-rant

oscar, i'm afraid you don't get the point.

first of all, dealing with copyrights is the basic idea in profesionell photography. you take pictures, own the copyright and sell the usage rights for a fee. may be you're business is not based on this idea, but almost all art and intelectuell content business are function this way.

second, as you stated before: the knowledge in the rg forums archive was placed to public domain. absolutely right. and that is what it is all about. to keep it public!!!!

third, maybe you should read some of the post in the medium format section of the rg forum. really valuable information way beyond the "which zoom is better"-discussions or pixelpeeping in general.

at least, i learned quite a bit about business as well.

regards

heinrich

I agree. It was a very educating read. And although as a passive reader mostly I am not personally involved, I dont understand what keeps the new owners from keeping the archives open, except to earn money with other people's advice and information. Which is not a good thing. I still think the owner would loose nothing in making reading free and only posting bound to membership.

THose who like the forum will pay even if they can read for free, and potentially more people will join, however in the current planned model many will not join to read what was free before. Therefore the owner will loose.

Just my opinion
Bernie

But the reason they hire you is because of your style, not because of your protected content. Ultimately that is what drives your business. There is plenty of competition, in most any business including photography as well as consultancy.

However, I admit that I'm less familiar with the content of the RG MF forum. I am more familiar with the ColorManagement forum, and frankly, that place became somewhat of a caricature. even so, I still think that within 6 months time, no one will turn their heads back to the information in either forum, because such is the nature of the internet. In addition, it takes little common sense to see that the rate of change in MF will now accelerate to what 35mm has done in the past years.



Agreed.

Some people make a good living licensing out their images as opposed to just shooting images for clients and handing over the results. That is why protecting your IP rights is so important - the whole stock photography market revolves around this.

It's about style, sure, but it's also about making your images work for you long after they were shot. Without IP/Copyright protection all your images are worthless since anyone could use them for free.

To bust another common myth - images on the internet are absolutely NOT "in the public domain". They may not legally be copied or used in anyway without permission, even if this is almost impossible to enforce. Using a pic copied from the internet is no different to scanning a picture in a book and selling it. Books are not in the public domain, they are in public view, but that is not the same thing at all.

If anyone uses my images in a clearly significant manner without my permission they will be hearing from me and will get an invoice, at the very least. I have successfully done this and been paid accordingly.

My 'protected content' is very valuable and I guard it with all the tools at my disposal, as should every photographer or creative professional.

One has nothing to do with the other. Yes, they hire him for his abilities and style. The protection is for him (the image creator) of course, not the client. Photographers do NOT SELL PHOTO's, they sell usage to use/publish the image for a limited time and place (at least pro photographers who understand how the photo business works). That's the only way they can make a living. What Drew is doing is totally against everything a pro photographer does with respect to copyright, usage etc.

If the MF Forum at RG was like a group of friends sitting around a table in a cafe having a drink then why can't we simply move the party on to the next cafe?

Get over your anger, open up the next door and pull up a chair and ask,
"Who's chipping in to buy the next pitcher?"

Mark Tuttle

[/quote]

Totally agree.
I have asked paul to be included in the d64 venture(party)

Walt Roycraft

Thank you so much, exactly, what I'm talking about...perfectly stated.

And just before the question turns up again, the whole discussion is not about the 25/35$

Regards

Heinrich

I found Melissa's email on the wedding site thanks to a tip from a poster here. FWIW, if you need to contact her (and I assume Drew:

<melissa@whitelinenphoto.com>

Sent this a few minutes ago. Be interesting to see if I get a reply and if my posts get deleted. Decided to be "nice" since I have nothing against these guys yet.

-------
Good morning. Forgive me for writing to you directly but I am unable to access the former robgalbraith.com/ forum and understand you now have control of this site. I am writing to request you delete the 2543 posts to that forum I made over the years. Since I am unable to log onto the site due to Rob and Mike locking my account, I am unable to delete the posts made under my name. I therefore request you delete each post or provide some means of accessing the site so I can do so. Some of the posts contain copyrighted material from my book. As photographers, I don’t have to tell you the ramifications of publishing copyrighted material. Thank you in advance for your assistance in this matter.

Andrew Rodney
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
--------

So what will people do now? Drew has closed the forum site, saying that they have to transfer it to the new servers etc.

and: Old content (archives) will be freely readable. So noone will have to take action etc.

As far as I see, this is kind of like half the cup: He will not make the (new) forum viewable to non subscribers, what many of the old posters have asked for.

I dont know how much it actually costs over a year to run such a place, all included, but I still think he should not close it, and - maybe I am negative - I still believe that the new owner wants to make some money with it. I guess he has not gotten it for 5k, but has paid much more, so he wants to get that back somehow.

This is of course not illegal, its not even "immoral", it just means changing the character much compared to the old site, at least as it was before march 2006.

regards, Bernie

Actually, thats what most people, and me, asked for.

Very good. I'm glad, Drew did decide this way.

Regards

Heinrich

Don't mean to sound like a broken record , but it seems RG's has gone down the drain now.

It's pay-to-read, with the magnitude of worthy contributers put off by either RG or Drew.
No way to tell how, or if, the forum is going to develop, unless you pay the fee.
Judging by the recent comments on the forum before the close-down, it's not the pros who are favorable of the new business model and willing to subscribe.

It's a pity the MF community over there is lost, but good to be done with the matter, at last....

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How can one join the group only by its name? I've tried to search for "d64", to search in every section... nothing.

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Is anybody posting :>))

Mark

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Hello to my fellow photographers, this is my first post to the LL board. I was brought here by the madness at the RG site and look forward to posting here in the future.

I just was reading Drew's post in the rolling archive section and was wondering what he meant by "paying members will vote in 30 days whether they will keep it going". Are they talking about the adding of new content to the archive or keeping the whole thing free to read?

Has anyone had their posts successfully deleted from the archive. I don't want it to come to that but if he closes the archive to free readers I will have no choice.

Not me. I emailed Drew again today asking that he delete my posts which I was able to access in the archives. If I don't see them gone in a few days, I have a letter ready to go to his ISP claiming abuse of my copyright.

If you're concerned that your posts get deleted, I'd make sure it's done before the archives are no longer accessible to non members or we'll need a mole inside to ensure they do get deleted.