Note that Archive Team from archive.org is working to mirror the DPReview content.
Reviews of products by people who have been exposed to many versions of an item, through products lent by the company, will go on the decline when there is not a valued name or site behind it. Relying on Star reviews and short reviews by individuals, regardless of their good intentions and experience, is not the same.
And I really don’t want larger digital cameras as high priced and out of reach as high end audio. I think something will fill the void for neutral reviews, I hope it is good.
DPReview is/will be a tremendous loss. As noted, it is one of the few places that have genuine reviews and tests for photography gear with out being heavily biased or goal-oriented towards shoving another product/service into your face. I wonder if the archive team will finish capturing everything in time.
Amazon “reviews” are generally little more than a social media comment stream. You can glean useful details, but the engine driving and curating them has one goal: To sell product. It takes a lot for me to report anyone or anything on Amazon. I almost always contact a seller first and try to resolve things before even thinking about adding my digital post-it note to the wall, if at all. However, I have directly reported sellers and products that were actually problematic (to say the least) and usually find nothing changes. As long as the fees roll in, Amazon does not do very much to correct problems.
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Amazon has been running a highly successful and profitable Affiliate sales program for decades. In fact, it was one of the first online affiliate programs:
https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/help/node/topic/GCDWWRFEMW3Q2TE2
“However, the company isn’t the only one making a fortune. Affiliate marketers make up around 45% of the site’s market share. With over 900,000 members, it is also one of the world’s largest affiliate networks.”
I always take Amazon reviews with a grain of salt.
Agreed. That’s the reason I still take my old Kodak point-and-shoot with me on vacation. The 12x optical zoom and manual exposure settings are extremely useful in a wide variety of settings. It doesn’t have a many megapixels as my phone, but the picture quality is often much better, especially in unusual lighting conditions or over long distances.
Yep…for me instead of the Z9 and 3-4 lenses it’s just my Z7II and a 24-200…or if I’m being really light my wife’s Z50 2 lens kit which will fit in either a waist pack or some of my cargo shorts…and iPhone if I want lighter than that. Still using an XS Max but will upgrade in the fall and the 15 might replace the ‘real’ camera for all but dedicated photos trips since it shoots RAW so outside of lens reach its a really good camera.
If anyone has a connection to management at Flickr.com, maybe they could be talked into acquiring the site and continuing.
How much resources does it take to run such a site these days, anyway?
Surely it’s not so much that they couldn’t have sold it to another company to run – and even the Amazon affiliate links would remain working so they’d make money from it too.
I think he was referring to the economic attribute of capitalism and that’s how I understood the comment. You saw the political aspect. Amazon was just after more customers and sales.
There’s been another excellent photography review resource on the Internet that I’m surprised no one has mentioned yet: Ken Rockwell. His site has been around for decades (at least since 2005), still has that comforting nineties design but the best part is the content. His advice is honest and well-argumented, and he fiercely debunks the Megapixel Myth among other things. I’d say his site makes a good runner-up.
To be more accurate, he argues against the need for higher resolution; “debunks” implies that he is right and everyone else wrong, which is, at best, open for argument. IIRC, he also contends (or has contended in the past) that raw images have no advantages over jpeg.
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I wouldn’t put KR on the same plane as DPR, however I did get great info on my camera purchase there and also tips on setting it up, all one one page. It’s definitely a site I keep in my bookmarks.
Diane
KR is a great resource to be sure. However, I will note the absence of any Panasonic/Lumix cameras on his site whereas DPReview did almost everything. Over the last decade I relied on DPR heavily for decisions that led me to the Panasonic FZ series of bridge/ultrazoom (fixed lens) cameras.
(Quick technobabble side-bar:) The FZ-200 (2013) had one of the biggest optical zooms at the time and somehow maintained f2.8. The later FZ-1000 and variants were great performers where carrying and swapping lenses was not viable. I also had great success with the ZS-100, a compact (semi-pocketable) retracting lens, superzoom with built-in viewfinder and a retractable flash that used a simple spring-release system. All of these cameras featured an AE lock button that I found critical in fast changing light conditions where playing with settings often resulted in missing the shot. There are many better cameras out there, but these hit the right price/feature/design spot for us.
I asked that of a source too and while I didn’t get a solid answer, I think it comes down to the fact that when you’re at Amazon’s size, it’s not worth selling something like DPReview because it will cost more in staff time and legal fees than it’s worth, especially when you’re trying to slash costs now. Not a satisfying answer, I know!
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Folks might enjoy Maarten Heilbron on YouTube, his detailed, technical reviews don’t waste time and always clarify. A lot of Fuji (which suits me) but also Sony, Nikon and forays into video as well.
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Just to be clear, we’re talking about DPReview and photography sites here. I’m deleting everything else…
If that’s the case, I think that you missed some things posted earlier in this thread. . .
There is a Change.org petition to stop Amazon closing DPReview and it is close to the 5,000 signature goal.
I signed, and though I doubt it will reverse Amazon’s decision, the points made in the last paragraph are valid. More signatures can move this story up the news radar and increase the chances of DPReview surviving in some form under another banner.
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A few updates:
PETITION:
For those counting, the petition signatures are nearing 6,400 (as of April 10).
DPREVIEW CLOSURE UPDATE:
Scott Everett, General Manager of DPReview, posted a short update on April 7. Not entirely sure what he means by “archive”, how it may be accessed or by whom.
Dear readers,
We’ve received a lot of questions about what’s next for the site. We hear your concerns about losing the content that has been carefully curated over the years, and want to assure you that the content will remain available as an archive.
We’ve also heard that you need more time to access the site, so we’re going to keep publishing some more stories while we work on archiving.
Thank you to this community and the support you’ve shown us over the years.
Scott Everett
General Manager - DPReview.com
CAMERA DATA (SPECS):
DPReview’s data for over 2500 cameras has been ported to a new site called Digicam Finder. Lens data and a comparison feature are coming in the future. While the new site and its content are very basic at the moment (mostly specs), it is worth noting that this was accomplished in a very short time under the threat of DPReview’s closure. The site professes to be open-source and they are requesting input on features to add as time moves on.
FORUMS:
The community has also started new forums to continue what was hosted at DPReview. Confusingly, there are two competing groups. One named DPRevived and another that changed its name a few times and currently has settled on DPR forum.
DPReview’s own forums have a discussion on the two competing forums, for however much longer that lasts.
ARCHIVE TEAM and DPREVIEW TV:
I am also including Petapixel’s story on DPReview’s closure (from March 22) that discusses the Archive Team’s efforts and includes a number of potentially useful links. It also makes note of the DPReview TV team continuing their work with PetaPixel:
While DPReview is shutting down, PetaPixel has announced that Chris Niccolls and Jordan Drake, the popular pair that led DPReview TV for the last five years, will be lead PetaPixel’s YouTube channel.
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Interestingly, I saw an article in my Flipboard feed the other day from a photography site (don’t remember which one) that said recent sales figures suggest that Gen Z in general is embracing “real” cameras and not particularly enamored of phone cameras. There’s apparently even a small surge in demand for actual film cameras. If this is true and continues, it makes Amazon’s shuttering of DPReview look even more short-sighted.