GracieAllen
Member
I could SWEAR I asked this question in here a couple days ago, but I can't find it... And I can't imagine where it would have been moved to, so I presume I just had a senior moment. In any case...
I've been a member of a couple semi-local photography clubs for the last 20 years. And they mostly worked OK - get everybody in a room once a month to do club business then hear an "expert" do a presentation, and get together for a second in-person meeting to have the monthly competition salon where prints or slides, or later digital images, were evaluated by a non-member "judge". It was, in my opinion, a good learning tool to have someone outside the club give feedback on one's work.
Times have changed, and during Covid I believe quite a few clubs switched to virtual meetings, which I thought worked well (at least the one's I'm familiar with). Now that we've moved past Covid (at least for the time being), are there "local" photography clubs that have gone virtual permanently, or are they all heavily wedded to the old way of getting everybody into a room for meetings?
In my mind, and I'm NOT in charge of any club, nor do I want to be, it seems like a virtual club would have a lot of advantages:
I'm sure there are reasons for WANTING to have everybody in a room for meetings, but I can only think of a couple:
Thoughts?
I've been a member of a couple semi-local photography clubs for the last 20 years. And they mostly worked OK - get everybody in a room once a month to do club business then hear an "expert" do a presentation, and get together for a second in-person meeting to have the monthly competition salon where prints or slides, or later digital images, were evaluated by a non-member "judge". It was, in my opinion, a good learning tool to have someone outside the club give feedback on one's work.
Times have changed, and during Covid I believe quite a few clubs switched to virtual meetings, which I thought worked well (at least the one's I'm familiar with). Now that we've moved past Covid (at least for the time being), are there "local" photography clubs that have gone virtual permanently, or are they all heavily wedded to the old way of getting everybody into a room for meetings?
In my mind, and I'm NOT in charge of any club, nor do I want to be, it seems like a virtual club would have a lot of advantages:
- You could have presenters from ANYWHERE since they wouldn't have to be in the room to communicate.
- You could have salon judges from anywhere since they wouldn't have to be in the room to provide feedback.
- Could have members from anywhere – clubs could decide if they want members from a geographic region (within 100 miles of x), or anyone in the state of Y or anyone in the continental US or anyone in the world, or whatever way they'd choose.
- All meetings (membership and salon) would be online – Zoom or equivalent, so no lost time traveling to/from meetings or costly commuting.
- No more concern about risking people’s lives getting to meetings during the six months/year when the weather sucks in <pick state>.
- All digital – Not having to deliver prints to a location would be great (see point above about <pick state> weather).
- Many clubs (some I’m familiar with) have little, if any, in-person group activities or other significant in-person learning.
- Not incurring the huge cost per year of a meeting room. I don’t know what costs are in YOUR area, but HERE, it’s apparently around $150/hr, or somewhere around $1800 per year for 8, 2 hour meetings. Which means you have to collect a LOT of dues to pay for a room. That funding could be used instead to pay for good, expert presentations and competent judges.
- Geographically close members could get together the same as always to go photograph together.
- Geographically distant members could convene at some location to photograph with local members (to me, this seems like a huge advantage - having a local person that knows the area).
I'm sure there are reasons for WANTING to have everybody in a room for meetings, but I can only think of a couple:
- There are some people that LIKE prints and would miss them, and you have to deliver and retrieve them, so that would point to in-person meetings to me.
- One reason I've been given for the old meeting style is that "if you can get everybody in a room it's easier to "twist people's arms" into taking on responsibilities for the club (facilities, activities, run for office on the club's board, etc)".
- I figure there are probably OTHER reasons to want in-person meetings, but I don't know what they'd be...
Thoughts?