The day started off late, again. We chat and comment about everything, we deal with email, breakfast, washing clothing, phone calls, and in general organize our daily activities and the meetings we have coming up.

© Pedro Meyer 2001

A truck was picking up these apparently "in good condition" machines, and just dumping them as trash. A true picture of what a society in the "first world" does with equipment that no longer is serviceable. It actually offends my eyes to see such waste, but what am I saying? Just look at what happened to my cameras.

The stupendous Canon G1 camera I have been using with great pleasure just broke down today. Inside my camera bag it somehow got banged up on the top side and now the zoom lever will not work. This is the third digital camera that I have had problems with, the first one was the Epson 3000.

We were in Las Vegas and the camera bag apparently arrived OK when it was brought up by the porter to our room with the rest of the luggage. However, when I went to use the camera I discovered to my dismay that the glass that covers the 3000 LCD screen, had been broken in transit.

My wife had a Nikon Coolpix 950, that also got banged up on a trip. It fell out of her pocket as she stumbled in the rain. We tried to have it repaired and when Nikon acknowledged that they did not have the parts to fix the camera, they chose to give her a new one.

None of these events were directly the responsibility of the manufacturers as obviously the cameras are not meant to be subjected to such "mistreatment". But on the other hand, I have owned cameras all my life, and never before have I had so many problems with all the cameras. These new digital cameras seem to be built not to last. They are all so fragile that apparently they are not capable of withstanding any form of "normal" banging about. Yes a camera sometimes falls down. They all do at one time or another. It is only now that they no longer can withstand such impacts. The trend is worrisome and nothing has been discussed in the press about this as they are rather new with little history of actual use.

It seems that most manufacturers of digital cameras are taking a lot of short cuts today in order to reduce their production costs assuming that these cameras are going to be rendered obsolete in one way or another, either by technology or simply being used to the point that they break down and will be discarded. So brace yourself my friends, apparently a new category of very expensive "throw away cameras" has been born.

© Pedro Meyer 2001

Went to see an exhibition by Steve Pike, and we decided to show his astronauts work, I am sure it will become a very interesting future exhibition for ZoneZero.

© Pedro Meyer 2001

 

 

On the way back on the "tube" (subway) I was taking pictures with the Epson camera without any shutter noise, it was interesting that no one was noticing that I was taking a picture even though the camera was pointing directly at them.

 

 

© Pedro Meyer 2001

 

On the ground floor of the building we are staying in while in London, there is a small dot.com company involved in producing web sites for publishing houses. Cleyenne, a beauty from Brazil, is their chief programmer. Such a multiethnic reality and high tech world is these days very much part of the urban landscape in London.

 

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