When was the last time you printed a photo?
We are collectively taking more pictures than ever before in history. We all carry our camera everywhere we go!
Yet, 67% of us store our photos SOLEY on a computer or phone.
There is concern in the photo industry that our current generation of kids won't have a way to look back and see past vacations, holidays, family get-togethers, distant relatives. Technology will foil us, and the data will be lost.
"It's in the Cloud!" you cry. Maybe so, for now.
I started as a professional photographer in the 1990s. Way back then, as we moved from film to digital, I (wisely) backed up all my files on CDs, then DVDs. Computers were rapidly improving, but a CD was forever. Right?
I still have those 600+ CDs and DVDs on a shelf in my basement. For as long as they've been sitting in plastic sleeves, I don't know if they're even readable. The files therein include families, weddings, newborns, dogs that are no longer with us . . . a gambit of meaningful things. And I've got to fess up: I don't have a working DVD reader.
Early 2000's, I switched to external hard drives. I still back up my photography files this way. Maybe you do, too. Have you ever looked into the failure rate of external hard drives? The first year, it's 5% (manufacturer defects). It levels off at about 1% a year, until a hard drive is 5 years old. Then the failure rate shoots up to 11% per year. Eventually, every single one will give out.
You think your phone is backing up to a cloud somewhere, but what happens when you drop the phone in the toilet? Lose it and never see it again? What happens if your cloud goes out of business?
IS THERE A TECHNOLOGY OUT THERE THAT WE CAN TRUST???
Yes! PAPER. A printed photograph has stood the test of time. A printed photograph is not vulnerable to changing technology.
This is one more reason I sell final products, and not digital files (Here's more reasons I won't sell digital files).
Below is a video by my colleague Bryan Caporicci, who says it better than I.
Photography is best enjoyed in print
Remember the floppy disk? ... Neither do I! That's what we'll be saying about discs in 10 years. Photography is best enjoyed in print.
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