Is popularity equals (original) content?

If you are a blogger yourself, you may ask this question from time to time. We like to receive some sort of feedback that simply tell us that we are not alone into this Web planet. Why him or her and not us? Is it because we have not been the first ones to do so? Is it my content? Is it my channel? How can we be able to break that barrier to audience posterity?

Web is a very elusive place. You may think you are part of a crowd that is shouting in every directions. But the first thing you know... it seems you are left alone without any attention. And we must add that generosity is not a first quality shared by the Internet users. So even if a small fraction of your "viewed" statistical audience, let's say 1/1000, have actually read part of your blog output, there is no real feedback from them most of the time.

It is strange phenomena that in this so-call new world of communications, it seems that interaction between humans have been so proportionally low. The demographic multitude is very misleading because over the numbers, you can sense the loneliness of many of them.

In the photographic field more and more you can see that people are in fact telling their own thoughts without really caring about what the "others" may thought of it. So the message is purely voice over by egocentrism. More and more we see content without any implication and further more questioning. It is simply reproducing the accepted norm of pseudo photo competence. But without impact, originality and provocation, all those commercially splendid pictures may vanish at a very fast rate of your memory.

Following existing formulas and subjects is not really advancement or break-through. Yes it can be sophistication at a certain level but it doesn't represent novelty in the strict definition. And that is the big trap with the search of having an instantaneous popularity. It is like to be the savor of the day, the week or the month that will be forgotten even quickly.

Original content is certainly not a strong recipe for easy success but it can be the essence of longevity of your work or craft. Somehow the two way of producing pictures (following formulas and exploring) can coexist for sure and a lot of professional (commercial) photographers are knowing this for a daily fact. But don't prevent yourself to explore, try and search again for a content that may part of your future imaging evolution.