As you will have probably gathered from the title of this site, I’m of that boomer generation with an unhealthy interest in the early music of Rod Stewart (before he was kidnapped and replaced by a blonde preening idiot with a strangled, less soulful voice) and a penchant for punning titles and hidden lyric references wherever I can shoehorn them in.

I’ve started this photo journal thing deliberately as an old school blog using WordPress. It’s a place to post my images on my own terms and shoot the breeze about matters photographic whenever the urge takes me and without the need to keep feeding the algorithms. I don’t really care too much if anyone is reading it or not and am certainly not that fussed about spreading its reach beyond the odd fellow traveller who happens to stumble upon it.

My posts will be a mixture of journal-type records of what I’ve been up to alongside more retrospective looks at shots I’ve taken in the past that I particularly remember fondly for whatever reason. I will probably also give my two pennyworth on software, trends on Threads and even – dare I say – talk about why I like my own camera choices.

It’s been prompted by the realisation that there are so many platforms for photographers to post their work and each one of them seems to be offering validation in the form of likes, comments, quasi-“communities” or just plain competition for eyeballs which ultimately dilutes their usefulness.

I’ve tried most – Flickr, Foto, Glass, Irys, 52Frames, Substack, Instagram – you name them. None offer me the chance to just post a few shots and make my own comments and captions without necessarily expecting anyone else to reciprocate. They all have major limitations of differing kinds. What else can I do with my Lightroom catalogue and OneDrive 2TB backup of such a multitude of photos going back to the dawn of time?

I’m looking upon this blog as my direct replacement for Flickr where I’ve just cancelled my Pro membership after nearly 15 years. In the early days, Flickr was the only show in town and rightly so as it offered community, great storage options and an easy-to-use interface. Unfortunately, it’s been allowed to wither on the vine and the lack of any single killer application to replace its heyday popularity demonstrates how good it was “back in the day”. I must admit I’m not bitter – but in all that time of posting thousands of images to the Flickr world, not once did I ever get anything in Explore – but there’s me getting all competitive again which is exactly what this endeavour is meant to eschew.