Re: [Leica] Leica snobbery

["Martin V. Howard" <marho@ida.liu.se>]

At the risk of starting a flame war, I really don't understand all these
posts about people who buy expensive equipment (cameras, golf clubs,
Beemers, or whatever) and "don't know how to use them".  Who cares?
Does the fact that *other* people buy equipment affect the way *you*
use the same stuff?  If twenty fat cat tourists walk into your favourite
Leica shop and all buy M6HMs with 35/1.4 ASPH and Kodak Gold, and then
proceed to take holiday snaps, what has that got to do with the ability,
skill, craft, interest, knowledge, or hair colour of the people on this
list?  Or, for that matter, your appreciation of Leica gear ("you" in
general sense, not directed to anyone in particular).

Also, where is the line drawn?  I just bought an M3 with 50mm Elmar,
after not having a camera for 5 years.  Before that, I had cheap,
SH cameras (with the exception of a Nikon I bought new).  I'm not a
very good photographer, at least, not yet.  I cannot fully exploit the
quality of Leica cameras or glass, but does that mean that I cannot own
it?  Should I be excluded from this circle because I haven't been
accepted to Magnum, published in National Geographic, or exhibited in
the Guggenheim Museum?  Hell, I doubt the local paper would be
interested even, and they publish the most unbelievable crap sometimes.

My point being: live and let live.  At worst, they'll never appreciate
the finer points of Leica equipment and photography.  At best, they
will in time discover just that.


M.

- -- 
Martin V. Howard, Application Systems Laboratory,     | 
Dept. of Comp. & Info. Sci., Linkoping University,    | Just DOHH it!
SE-581 83 Linkoping, Sweden.  Tel +46 13 282 421,     +----------------+
Fax +46 13 142 231; marho@ida.liu.se; www.ida.liu.se/~marho