The Cult of the Amateur & Commercial Photography

               In Andrew Keen’s The Cult of the Amateur, Keen accuses the Web 2.0 of enabling hobbyists to triumph over individuals with experience.  Keen discusses this celebration of amateurism specifically as it relates to Wikipedia.  This online encyclopedia allows absolutely anyone to add and edit entries, making it equally simple for both amateurs and professionals to share information publicly.  Keen emphasizes his concerns about this prominent position of the hobbyist, claiming that “by empowering the amateur, we are undermining the authority of the experts”.  In addition, Keen addresses the issue of content pricing, as free amateur content is more appealing than expensive professional content in many cases.  While I don’t feel that these ideas can easily be generalized across every discipline, I would definitely agree that these arguments presented by Andrew Keen in The Cult of the Amateur apply to the current state of the commercial photography industry.

                When the switch was made from film to digital cameras, photography became accessible to more of the general public, as images were visible without being developed by a lab and pictures could now be stored on one’s computer.  As digital cameras shrink in size and in price, this medium becomes increasingly more available, and there are also an increasing number of websites that enable users to publicly share their digital images online.  Being a creative person myself, I do understand the appeal of sharing work online, but I also believe that there are problems that arise due to this.  The specific issue that I would like to address is the creation of “professional” photography pages on Facebook.  Facebook allows any of its users to create their own page, and this has resulted in legions of untrained people with cameras setting up photography pages through which they offer services that are typically covered by trained professionals, such as senior portraits and wedding shoots.  While the difference in image quality is typically visible at a glance, the reality is that many customers are still choosing to hire these amateur photographers.  Some customers may be comforted by the fact that some amateurs have the same cameras and editing software as a professional, but this willingness to hire an amateur is often due mainly to the issue of cost.  Because these amateur photographers are often high school students or working adults using photography as a hobby, they typically have no studio costs to cover and often offer to provide their services either for much less money or for free.  Amateur photographers may also offer a higher quantity of images, often skipping over the proofing process and instead presenting their customers with a disc of every picture taken at the shoot, free of watermarks and with no usage restrictions attached.  

                The impact of social media on the commercial photography industry is similar to the impact of Web 2.0 on the encyclopedia.  The internet provides a space for amateurs to present their knowledge and imagery to the world, and I would argue that, at least in situations dealing with creative media, this most definitely has the potential to undermine the training and expertise of true professionals.  As Andrew Keen asserts while comparing Wikipedia to Encyclopedia Britannica, “fighting against free is hard, if not impossible”.  I have spoken with several professional studio photographers regarding this very issue, and each individual has discussed their increasing struggle to attract customers while maintaining prices that will allow them to make a living.  As is the case with Wikipedia, amateur photography promises to provide a higher quantity of services for a lower cost, and professional institutions have difficulty competing because of this price difference.  

Recently, however, I have noticed an additional trend relating to this online battle of amateur vs. professional photographers.  Professionals have begun to use the very same social media that threatens their businesses to fight back against the influx of amateurs into the realm of commercial photography.  By creating informational images and sharing them with the public, professional studio photographers are working to educate the general public on the differences between amateur and expert work.  These images clearly lay out differences in work, even in cases when an amateur has the same equipment as the professional.  They also work to educate Facebook users about how the cost of their work is calculated and where the money goes.  Personally, I am sympathetic to these efforts, but the ultimate reaction of the public remains to be seen.  The number of amateur photographers offering cheap services is increasing daily, and like Keen, I fear that this empowerment of the amateur will continue to threaten the institutions constructed by trained, experienced professionals.