The Impact of Digital Photography

The NYTimes has a piece on the impact of digital photography on professional photographers: bottom line, good and/or lucky amateur photographers using digital cameras are cutting into their livelihood, as is the decline of magazines (the fewer ads, the fewer pages, the fewer slots into which to sell one's photos.).

An economist wrote a book on "the winner take-all economy" a while back.  His argument was that modern technology meant the very best talents got the lion's share of the compensation and crowded out other slots.  For example, in the old days every medium-sized town and city had its own opera house, which provided opportunities for many singers.  Then came the phonograph, and radio, and CD's and those niches were killed off--stars like Callas came to dominate their field.

That thesis has always interested me, though there are counter-arguments.  Reading the Times photography piece suggested another pattern of the impact of technology on arts, the wholesale destruction of economic niches, leaving only a handful of experts plying the trade.  Maybe it's something like buggy whip makers or sword smiths--there must be a few such people still out there, who perhaps produce a better product than anyone in the past.