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News DPReview was sold to Gear Patrol
- Thread starter Smaug
- Start date
RBIV
Well-Known Member
Probably a good recovery for Amazon. Should DPR now get terrible or fail they can blame it on the new buyer.
Smaug
Well-Known Member
Amazon fully intended to close DPR, figuring it wasn't worth anything. Then, they probably started getting offers and decided to take the best one.
Instead of closing it at 100% loss, they got SOMETHING for it. They didn't realize they made a mistake, as they still divested themselves from DPR.
Smaug
Well-Known Member
I wouldn't call it a recovery, as they still got rid of it.
What's interesting to me is that while Amazon has deeper pockets than GP, maybe GP is actually willing to invest something into DPR! (Amazon wasn't)
RBIV
Well-Known Member
To be clear, I meant "recovery" for Amazon, not DPR. And probably not the right word. Yes, Amazon got rid of DPR, and now, if DPR fails, Amazon can shift blame to GP. And if GP does support them, then all well and good.
I personally couldn't care less if the original forums at DPR remain or don't remain. I much prefer this one. I think you guys are doing a good job.
I hate to say it but considering the the real dpr is not going away, this forum is probably toast. There was more activity THERE before the news about GP acquisition. The dpr interface is quite unique and intuitive and will undoubtedly draw more new people and old users than the xenforo "photo community network".Thats just my $.02.
Pete_W
Well-Known Member
My $0.02: I dislike the DPR interface. I find it unattractive, clunky and very annoying to use. It lacks basic features. I love the xenforo features - it is so much easier to use.
My view all along is that it is the news and articles at DPR that draw in the viewers, forum sign-ups and participation. So that is in their favour. But the forums were also highly combative and not always a nice place to be. In fact I'd suggest that the forums were antagonistic for many people most of the time. A net negative unless you like to argue.
I doubt that GP will have the long-term patience for the cost of running the forums nor the tolerance for the net negative impact they are likely to have on what is essentially a publishing business.
RBIV
Well-Known Member
Well... have you spent any time on GearPatrol's website? I doubt GP is going to throw that away and adopt one looking like DPR. So will they run DPR as a stand alone? Will they attempt integration with their existing site? Beats me, and I have no predictions. But I'd say there's a whole lot of unknowns here before I'd predict how DPRF comes out of the toaster.
In my opinion it is way too early to know whether dpreview will survive long term or not. It is much more important to differentiate the different parts of DPR. We have to formulate it more precisely.
There is the professional review part of DPR and there are the forums of DPR. These are two different things and most people do not realize that both probably will have a very different future. Whether we like it or not.
I follow dpreview since around 2000. The focus was always on the reviews, never on the forums. The forums were always a "nice to have" for the owner, but he never pushed them really as far as I could see it from the outside as a reader. The forums were coded originally from Phil Askey (founder of dpreview) himself as far as I know. This is why the layout, the usability is 25 years old and for the internet from the "stone age".
Gear Patrol is a very modern site. They have a totally different target group and they deliver the kinds of reviews which this target group wants to read: Short, superficial and trendy. From coffee machines to trucks. This is nothing bad. You just give what your customer wants to have and they are obviously successful with this. This mixed with the service to do marketing campaigns for these products you can review. Again, this is nothing bad, many websites are doing this. But Gear Patrol is for sure a completely different world to the origin and DNA for what DPreview stands for the last 25 years.
It is actually a very similar situation now with GP as the owner as with Amazon as the owner. Both companies are in a totally different business and bought DPR for whatever reason. We do not know what the business strategy is behind this purchase. Amazon obviously hoped for more sales of cameras. But for GP I do not see at the moment an advantage for them. I hope to see more clear if GP starts to communicate more to the DPR community what they are planning to do.
If they do not communicate about this within the next 7-10 days this could mean only 2 scenarios:
With the current information available, I just have no fantasy how they want to be profitable without changing anything significantly at dpreview. Amazon wanted to close DPR, even not sell it, because of two reasons:
This is why I am very curious how GP thinks to make DPR profitable again and which part of DPR will stay or will be integrated long term into GP. Or maybe sold to someone else. Nobody knows for sure and we are the last ones who will be informed. There seems to be a venture capitalist behind GP and this venture capitalist will make sure, that GP pays attention to the numbers. This is a sword of Damocles for dpreview.
"Quite unique" is a very optimistic formulation
The design and layout is 25 years old. This is stone age. This is not at all intuitive. Neither the posting, nor the quoting, nor uploading images etc.
Do not misinterpret "being used to a design" with modern design and usability. No web designer would nowadays code a forum as you can see it at at the moment at dpreview. DPR was designed 25 years ago and nothing really changed since then. You can see this everywhere.
Of course dpreview draws more people than DPR. That is no surprise. DPR exists for 3 months now, dpreview for 25 years. But this has nothing to do whether dpreview is better designed and has better usability than DPR. It is the other way around.
I have my doubts too. Again I do see the forum part and the review part totally independent from each other. I could imagine, that they are interested in the review part, but not in the forum part. They never had a forum at GP and to run a forum professionally needs more than just invest a little money in it.
Do not worry, we are no toast. Neither now, nor in a year. The reason for this is that I do not launch a forum just like that and close it afterwards again. If I start a new forum, there is always a long term commitment with it, no matter how it grows over the time. This is why I hesitated at the beginning to even launch DPR. I have to be sure that I stick to it even if something goes wrong. This is different i.e. to DPrevived.
There is no reason anymore for the existence of DPRevived. They do not forum management as a business. They are simply dpreview users only. The whole work they wanted to to with individual programming etc, just does not make sense anymore, because nobody will finance this in the future. Even less likely now than it was already before.
DPRF is different. We can relax. We know what we are doing. We have a long breath. We are professionals in forum management. We are able to finance this for years and we are committed to do this and grow DPRforum year over year. And in case DPreview will be sold again or the forums get closed and/or get unattractive for dpreview users, we are here for them.
In the mean time, we grow organically. Growth will be not as fast as at the beginning, But we will grow constantly.
There is the professional review part of DPR and there are the forums of DPR. These are two different things and most people do not realize that both probably will have a very different future. Whether we like it or not.
I follow dpreview since around 2000. The focus was always on the reviews, never on the forums. The forums were always a "nice to have" for the owner, but he never pushed them really as far as I could see it from the outside as a reader. The forums were coded originally from Phil Askey (founder of dpreview) himself as far as I know. This is why the layout, the usability is 25 years old and for the internet from the "stone age".
Gear Patrol is a very modern site. They have a totally different target group and they deliver the kinds of reviews which this target group wants to read: Short, superficial and trendy. From coffee machines to trucks. This is nothing bad. You just give what your customer wants to have and they are obviously successful with this. This mixed with the service to do marketing campaigns for these products you can review. Again, this is nothing bad, many websites are doing this. But Gear Patrol is for sure a completely different world to the origin and DNA for what DPreview stands for the last 25 years.
It is actually a very similar situation now with GP as the owner as with Amazon as the owner. Both companies are in a totally different business and bought DPR for whatever reason. We do not know what the business strategy is behind this purchase. Amazon obviously hoped for more sales of cameras. But for GP I do not see at the moment an advantage for them. I hope to see more clear if GP starts to communicate more to the DPR community what they are planning to do.
If they do not communicate about this within the next 7-10 days this could mean only 2 scenarios:
- They have no idea what they want to do with DPR. This would make me worry about the ability to survive for dpreview long term for both, the review part and the forum part.
- They have specific plans, but do not want to talk about it in the fear to get a shit storm, because users might be disappointed. That could be that only the review part will be kept and the forum part archived and frozen or the forum part will be changed that much, that most user will not like it anymore.
With the current information available, I just have no fantasy how they want to be profitable without changing anything significantly at dpreview. Amazon wanted to close DPR, even not sell it, because of two reasons:
- Amazon did not make enough money with it
- Amazon did not believe, that anybody would be willing to pay money for it, which gives us an indication, how expensive it was to run dpreview compared to the potential income.
This is why I am very curious how GP thinks to make DPR profitable again and which part of DPR will stay or will be integrated long term into GP. Or maybe sold to someone else. Nobody knows for sure and we are the last ones who will be informed. There seems to be a venture capitalist behind GP and this venture capitalist will make sure, that GP pays attention to the numbers. This is a sword of Damocles for dpreview.
"Quite unique" is a very optimistic formulation
The design and layout is 25 years old. This is stone age. This is not at all intuitive. Neither the posting, nor the quoting, nor uploading images etc.
Do not misinterpret "being used to a design" with modern design and usability. No web designer would nowadays code a forum as you can see it at at the moment at dpreview. DPR was designed 25 years ago and nothing really changed since then. You can see this everywhere.
Of course dpreview draws more people than DPR. That is no surprise. DPR exists for 3 months now, dpreview for 25 years. But this has nothing to do whether dpreview is better designed and has better usability than DPR. It is the other way around.
I have my doubts too. Again I do see the forum part and the review part totally independent from each other. I could imagine, that they are interested in the review part, but not in the forum part. They never had a forum at GP and to run a forum professionally needs more than just invest a little money in it.
Do not worry, we are no toast. Neither now, nor in a year. The reason for this is that I do not launch a forum just like that and close it afterwards again. If I start a new forum, there is always a long term commitment with it, no matter how it grows over the time. This is why I hesitated at the beginning to even launch DPR. I have to be sure that I stick to it even if something goes wrong. This is different i.e. to DPrevived.
There is no reason anymore for the existence of DPRevived. They do not forum management as a business. They are simply dpreview users only. The whole work they wanted to to with individual programming etc, just does not make sense anymore, because nobody will finance this in the future. Even less likely now than it was already before.
DPRF is different. We can relax. We know what we are doing. We have a long breath. We are professionals in forum management. We are able to finance this for years and we are committed to do this and grow DPRforum year over year. And in case DPreview will be sold again or the forums get closed and/or get unattractive for dpreview users, we are here for them.
In the mean time, we grow organically. Growth will be not as fast as at the beginning, But we will grow constantly.
It appears you wish for a GP/DPR failure in order for this forum to thrive. That is sad. After visiting all the member forums of the photo-community network, I don't find them exactly bustling with activity. As for the DPR site not being intuitive , I believe thousands upon thousands of users would prove you wrong. I agree that these cardboard cutout forums- that everyone and their dog has are designed so that simpletons can easily navigate. The threaded view is a feature that puts DPR way ahead . As far as the ads and reviews go on DPR, I rarely read a review on a camera or gear that I did not have or had any intention of owning. I simply used the forums which no other forums come close.It is a good thing it is back along with image storage and challenges.