The Decline Continues

Maybe not.

By doing something people need. All our applications, free and not, are doing good.

Yes and it's appreciated. The dose of reality is that the audience is a few tens of thousands of enthusiasts globally, probably with an ageing demographic. I'd be interested to learn more about the age demographic, I'd guess an average age of 50 plus with very few below the age of 25.

Understood. No disagreement. But, that said, you didn’t create all those pages in an instant - it happened over years. Personally, if it was me, I’d start by simply linking to your most recent content in an intermediary page here that was under the banner “new stuff from trusted sites/ people”. Do the same for other such sites/ people. Sure, you have other stuff that isn’t “recent” that is still worth pointing out to the Community… that could go on other themed intermediary pages which - to your point - would require more effort than simply linking to most recent content. But I’m sure at least some in this Community would be willing to invest the effort.

Yes, let's being realistic and not draw conclusions in early days.

Yes! Exactly like this. The point I was making earlier was, in effect: “why is this link buried in a post or posts, instead of being on a persistent intermediary page here… along with all sorts of others… per the spirit of NCV’s post. “ IMHO, it should be. It’s not that hard. Why not “just do it”. If it fails, it can be taken down.

Just putting on my accountant's hat... not-for-profits should still aim to 'make money', not just cover expenses. A profit (surplus if you prefer) is needed because you generally need to invest in things, i.e. new software versions, servers, cloud space, equipment etc usually before that investment returns income to cover expenses. Building some capital reserves is the prudent thing to do. Start soon.

Agree. An organization risks losing its non-profit status if it persistently runs a surplus. That said, a reserve fund is a worthwhile objective. I've recommended to another photographic nonprofit that they work up to having a years worth of expenses as a reserve.

Hi Jim - regarding losing NFP status, this is perhaps country specific?

That doesn't apply where I live and work (Australia). The key difference is that in a for-profit organisation, the profit is returned to the owners/shareholders whereas in a not-for -profit organisation, profit is always retained by the organisation and re-invested. There are usually lots of other regulations about how a NFP must operate to retain its status but persistently running a surplus is not one of them. It's the only way to be sustainable.

Finally, somebody mentions YouTube. If
DPRevived is going to produce content, video content should be in the mix. Start a YouTube channel, schedule a weekly Zoom to discuss the photography-related issues of the day and livestream it.

It's another activity for the current members and may become a recruiting tool attracting new members.

Give it a year. If subscribership grows, the channel may generate some revenue to help fund site operation and content creation.

It is entirely possible that this is country specific. I question whether a continual surplus is necessary, or even desirable, for sustainability. A continual surplus would mean that reserves grow without limit. I don't see any need for, or advantage in, having reserves that exceed a year or two of expenses. After all, money in a reserve is money that, at least some of which received favorable tax treatment, that is not being spent on fulfilling the organization's charter.

In the States, there are also regulations on how much commercial activity an organization can enjoy before its NFP status is questioned. I don't know about the UK, but that's something to look into before deciding what proportion of the revenues will be derived from advertising.

How many hard back books sell 4000 copies? How many millions of people still watch TV? Is the discrepancy a reason for giving up on book publishing? An audience of 5000 people is nothing compared to peak audiences in other media, but it is a substantial number of people in a voluntary community. I feel that the influence of social media audiences is distorting the sense of what is meaningful. You don't have to be a world wide social media sensation to perform a useful function.

Youtube and video sits in an interesting space with respect to text publications.

Because it's popular, people think it's the medium that should be used. My feeling is different. To me, video offers something different when you take advantage of its features. But not many people seem to do that. YT is full of creators who think that sitting at a desk talking to camera is an adequate substitute for writing something down. It's not. In fact, it's a terrible substitute. Consuming talking head video content is appalling! These people shouldn't be allowed in front of a camera.

Video should be used for when it is better than text/still pictures. I remember years ago watching an animated flash presentation of how a 4 stroke engine works and being struck by how being able to see all the multiple parts operating in parallel was so much easier to understand than reading a text description. That was because with a moving medium it is easier to understand things that happen at the same time or in very quick sequence than it is reading a linear text description. Likewise when fancy graphical techniques are used to explain science like astronomical events and so on.

But for many other things, text is quicker and more useful because the reader controls the pacing, can easily skip back and forth, re-readthe tricky parts and so on. Watching someone slowly speak words that could be better written down is torture. I watch most video content at 1.5x.

I think a lot depends on the type of testing and the knowledge of the readers. I suspect that the type of testing that Jim Kasson or Iliah Borg might carry out would require a great deal of expensive equipment, a highly skilled technician and a very good technical writer to make the results meaningful to even the moderately knowledgeable reader. I like the type of testing carried out by Gordon Laing at Cameralabs. It doesn’t seem like it needs a vast amount of equipment, but it tells me what I want to know and is always my first stop. It would still be time-consuming, though! To gain more insight into the process, you might also consider a conversation with Roger Cicala who knows a lot about testing and who writes beautifully and intelligibly.

I wasn’t suggesting simple replication, just a look at the various methodologies available before evolving your own which is proportionate and affordable. There is also an issue of the credibility of the site carrying the review. I have recently been exploring reviews of the Leica 50mm f/2.4 Summarit. One review suggests that it is useless, simply a way for Leica to separate the credulous from their cash, another that it is close to the pinnacle of optical perfection. Obviously they can’t both be right and, as a newcomer to the Leica world, I have no idea of the credibility of the reviewers and so the whole exercise becomes pointless. Therefore there would be some reputation building needed to validate the content - once again, quite possible given the status of some of the contributors here.