oh, btw tricksta - not having a go or anything, but the link I put in my opening comment here shows that I'm more than happy to comment on an individual picture when I think it's good.... I don't think me (or anyone else) putting negative comments on individual pictures would be either fair or morally right - hence this post. Judging by the comments both before and after your own, I don't think it's been viewed as a 'silly subject' at all - if it wasn't for the forum where else could we air these views and make positive changes for all? I've frequented this forum for around 2 years now, and was merely making a statement about the change - I totally appreciate the learning curve we ALL go through (just look at my early stuff under my original login mjshepherd for evidence!), but I also believe members should exercise little bit of 'personal censorship' by not entering too many 'snapshot' type pics - not least of all because as they DO develop, people used to seeing a certain type of picture from them may have (rightly or wrongly) already built up an opinion of that artist and decide to miss viewing their better work later on - and to me, that is what a large part of the photography gallery/forum is all about - learning and developing skills to be able to take the type of shot that you want. If you want to take shots of the dog/family/whatever, the forum is here to help you take damn good photo's of those, but I would expect that (this being an art site) people posting here would want to go further than that and develop an interest and individual 'style'. Sorry, tricksta, please don't take this as a personal rant against your comment - it's ended up being my opinion on the whole thing and what I believe it stands for...... I want everyone in the photography section to gain the experience and knowledge I have - and hopefully to put it to better use and create better images than I can!! Mike (",)