Somebody on a forum I often visit posted a link to a story that tells something about today’s media although I am not quite sure what. Here is the story on the On-line Photographer. Nick Ut produced one of the most compelling photographs of the 20th century (the little girl running away from a napalm bombed village in Vietnam). Thirty five years later to the day another of his photos ended up on the the front pages of the newspapers around the world - the one of crying Paris Hilton. It would be easy to say that this is the clear sign that the media sunk lower than anyone can imagine and photos of mediocre celebrities are the only thing anybody is interested in buying. Yet, we have always photograph celebrities: Arnold Eve photographed Marilyn Monroe and so did Elliott Erwitt; Bruce Davidson photographed Brad Pit, Paul Newman and Al Pacino; David Saymour ‘Chim’ photographed Audrey Hepburn; and Joachim Ladefoged photgraphed Paulo Coelho. I really don’t have a problem with the photos of celebrities per se, even when they border on exploitation such as the Ut’s photo of Paris Hilton. What does bother me is that we somehow came to a point where images such as those made by Capa, Smith, McCullin and many others today would not be published because they would be considered too graphic. Web made it possible to see some of that work in places like Magnum and VII web sites and on-line publications such as Digital Journalist and Blueeyes Magazine. Unfortunately, the great picture magazines are the thing of the past. Their strength was in their circulation and popularity. While there are still photo magazines dedicated to documentary photography, they are niche publications (essentially photojournalists telling stories to each other) while the public gorges on the sanitized version of the world available on the newsstands. I’m bitter, I guess...