alexguerra

I think that's a very good idea. I can see something like a given different theme for each week, under which photos could be submitted to and chosen to take part in such a discussion. Not the usual categories that are already available, but more specific themes like for instance what already happens in the 'No Words' forum. Though this time there would be words as well! BTW very nice folder Will.

Hey Nicholas lighten up man! ! ! :D <b>

I don't think there would be any competition about who is the best because IMO, the best photos in the site generally aren't even from the members which usually get higher ratings. There's a lot of high quality stuff out there from many people which don't care about ratings or visibility competition.

Ellis, you know for sure far better than me what such an enterprise implies as I have no experience whatsoever with it. With my very little knowledge, I can only say that regarding the copyright payments to the photographers, perhaps the majority of the owners of the photographs in here wouldn't mind having them displayed in such a book with no charge, just for the exposure that it would bring to them (and why not for the honor!). Regarding to who would be the market, I guess that photo.net community itself with its many thousands of members and even more visitors could be a great starting point. Anyway, I am really glad you think that at least it could be doable and something worth to consider.

First and since I have never done it before, I would like to thank to

the administrators of this great website for making it THE place to

be. Now the idea that brought me here:

 

What do you guys think about editing a photography book containing

some of the best photos ever from photo.net? Each day browsing

through photo.net I find gems that never stop to amaze me and it

feels that I can only see a drop in the ocean of the many thousands

of great shots displayed in this website. I'm sure that with such

abundance of quality, there would be loads of excellent material to

publish a great book of photography. I would certainly buy it! Do you

Brian & company think that such a thing could be possible in some

near future?

<div></div>

Ben, there is so much yada-yada in this forum about improving the system, but very few really put anything in practice, so I can only cherish you for such initiative. I already comment as much as I can (or as far as I'm technically able), but I will gladly join this idea too. Hope many more will commit!

"Wade and Joe, you two must have been seperated at birth." LOL

 

It is interesting that the ones who most complain about the fairness of the system are also the ones who think that it is perfectly ok to abuse from it. Joe, so that means that the '3/3 guy' does not like nudes? ;)

 

"Most of people complaining about clasifications would probably be better off spending more time taking pictures." Keith ditto.

Walter, I can't believe how can people be so pathetic. I can't say that I'm too surprised by reading what you say about emailing to friends to rate their photos in queue. Since my relatively recent discovery of the professional mate rating clubs, that none of those schemes seem to surprise me as much as how ridiculous some people can be. I guess that socially speaking, photo.net is just a reflection of the real world and that scares me!...

This is a very good idea. I would see gladly a photo contest taking place regularly, for instance once per month under some thematic subject. One of the most interesting points could precisely the anonymity of the thing, unlike the TRP.

"what,s the easyest way to get people to comment on your photos"?

 

1. take and post good pictures

2. accept any kind of comment and not only the praises

3. return the favour by not leaving pseudo-sarcastic comments on other people's portfolios

 

It may also help not to answer your own questions immediately.

""honest" feedback" is what I look for whenever I post a photo, so please you'd be very welcome to my portfolio too, if you have the time. Thanks and I wish that looking at my photos won't make your migranes worse =)

I truly believe that all this endless whining about ratings is merely a problem of egos, as Brian pointed out "numerous studies have shown that most people consider themselves above average." I can tell from my experience on photo.net during over one year now that it never occurred to me that the ratings I was getting from 1 to 3 would come from one mean guy or from some bots, until recently discovering the endless threads on this matter. I have always looked at them meaning simply that some other people didn't like my photos which is perfectly NORMAL. In fact, as a complete beginner, ratings have indeed helped me to develop a self-critique eye, forcing me to look at my own pictures and wondering what have I done bad that could have been improved. I believe that one is one self's best teacher and often we just need a call to reality (weather by ratings or helpful comments) to realize that and open our eyes. Having this said, I too find that the current suppression of 1s and 2s makes the system odd and I would happily see them back. Enlarge your horizons, look at the good side of numbers and give them credit only for what they are. Exchange competition for self full filing, otherwise you will probably live frustrated most of the time.

Geeee, made me want to delete all my early posts... but I'll keep them as a reminder of (hopefully! !) some evolution.

<div></div>

<div></div>

Tom, I was having that same problem for a long time. If you are using IE try to change to Firefox. It worked fine for me and now with Firefox I got no problems at all with thumbs.

<div></div>

I have to agree with this change, since there were a lot of people with dramatic changes in their pages, from which many were even hard for the eyes to read due to the used colours, and some were not even readable at all! Besides that, I don't believe it is a fair thing for some people to have an extra exposure of their photos by means of marquees, while many others because of lack of HTML knowledge do not have that possibility (and they are equally payers). I had a tiny webcounter, but hey too bad. The ideal solution IMO would be to create a customized page with the same customization options for everyone, and one that wouldn't change radically the appearance of photo.net website. There could be for instance a place in the member's page to display some 4 or 5 photos that the person would like to have more feedback on.

What is exactly to "turn off the ratings"? Could you be a little more specific?

At first I thought: Oh no, another ratings thread!... But, I think this was and will always be a matter for endless discussions. And why's that? Despite everyone saying that what matters is the constructive comments and not the numbers, the fact is that this website is built upon numbers. I understand that a mechanism in order to sort out the good and the bad photos (thus requiring numbers) is needed and I believe the present system is quite fair, but of course not perfect.

 

What I think is that perhaps there is just too much 'publicity' and visibility of ratings throughout the whole site: you see the ratings in blue numbers in each photo details plus the ratings breakdown when you click on it, they appear in every category used to sort photos in the TRP (even in the comments one!), and most of all they are displayed well highlighted and centered in each member's page, with detailed information about the given and received numbers and averages showing until the centesimal values. I believe that if the ratings were not so exposed, people would probably care more about other things, such as giving more comments. Moreover, this thing of having the 'photographer's average' displayed in the front page has the perverse effect of tagging people's work good or bad as a whole. This is very deceiving and fake IMO, since the majority of people that I've seen with total averages of over 6 are due to mate-rating activities. On the other hand, people having low averages displaying in their public page are likely to have their folders ignored by someone who visits their page for the first time.

<div></div>

Baerbel, if you are using Internet Explorer now, perhaps you could give a try with Mozilla Firefox. I was getting those red "x" all the time, but after changing the browser everything's working fine.

I think I may haven't expressed myself well. For me this is not a big problem, in fact I can live well with it. What I find stranger is someone that has given money to the website, to have their ratings being considered not valid for some period of time. This was more a curiosity question than a very serious issue for me. Photo.net works great as it is and I love it, despite of some minor things. Nothing will ever be perfect!

 

Gerald, hopefully I'll find something a little better to do with my free hours, but thanks for the tip.

Michael I understand your point and though it may be polemic, I agree with it. What I meant is what are the criteria to consider a paying member having his or her own portfolio 'too new' to give ratings that count to the TRP, while at the same time others with nothing of their own to show give ratings at their will, moreover in most of the cases I've noticed, seldom leaving comments to support their often low or high ratings? In my opinion, it would be fairer if someone who doesn't have photos could only leave comments but not ratings.

 

"If people who haven't posted pictures shouldn't be allowed to rate then people who haven't rated shouldn't be allowed to post pictures." H.P., no but perhaps people who would like to see their photos rated (that is requesting them for critique) should be 'forced' to rate a minimum number of pictures in the RR queue, thus increasing the low number of RR ratings which are being given nowadays. 4 or 6 anonymous ratings are really not representative enough to make a trustworthy average of the quality of a photo.

I'm sure this is not a new subject on this forum, but I felt the need

to bring it up:

Why do people with NO uploaded photos have the right to rate? I find

awkward that this is allowed, when new members which have paid the 25

$ subscription and already have their own portfolio have their

ratings non-valid. Regards, Alex