Nikio

On top on what I wrote here, lets see is what it is already happening now. Press agencies are often taking local photographers instead of sending their top guys on an assignment. Equipment and knowledge got a lot more accessible, so you can have a photographer on the place who is good enough and you don't need to send an American or German photographer there (to Africa, for example). This is of course a lot cheaper.

I think this will go one step further. Not only that the local photographers will contribute more, amateurs will too. I don't mean just amateur photographers who buy fancy cameras and make their own little exhibitions, I mean people who don't have a clue about photography. People like my dad who has a camera in his cell phone. These people are all around and they carry cameras along with them. They can record material that was never recorded before, simply because they are there when it happens and some PRO photographer wasn't. So why not submit that to the press? Just for the fun of it.

And just to be clear; every broken window in a local shop doesn't have to be photographed by a professional. Most of trivial news can be easily visualized by random folks who just happened to be there. But when something big happens, well, then you need the top guys. You can't send an amateur to cover the Olympics, can you? Or Obama's inauguration. Perhaps if press saves some money on trivial events with the amateur contributions, PRO's can be payed better on big stuff. That would probably call for less photo journalists.

Some other photographers took a different path. They make really good stories on their own (as freelancers) and then they try to sell it or get a grant. In Perpignan there were quite many who work this way. Ed Ou, for example, made a story about victims of radiation in Kazahstan. But I think that this model doesn't really create incentives for people to join this profession unless the rewards are great (which they aren't).

Every crysis ends up with something new invented. The old model not being fit for the circumstances anymore is the reason we got into trouble in the first place. Sometimes it takes a generation to change, but often we don't have that much time. We'll see how this turns out.