Occasionally I am asked why I speak well of a particular brand and have abandoned the xxx brand. I am asked why I am enthusiastic about brand YYY and no longer about brand ZZZ.
There is a time in life when you can be a fanboy, that is, be an enthusiastic supporter of a brand, of a product, and it is usually when you are very young.
I was a supporter and advocate of a 3D software in italy when almost no one knew about it, I created the mailing list (times long gone when forums and social were inconceivable), an almost daily blog with news, links and utilities when the concept of blog didn’t really exist, and I manually writing in html created what today is commonly called Blog, but 30 years ago almost no one had such a concept.
As with software, I have made a thousand changes even with cameras, cameras, cameras, operating systems (I have used more than thirty of which many are unknown to the masses), because I am a curious person and because I like to change and experiment, I get bored easily and I need in addition to work, to stimulate my curiosity by always experimenting with something new to tell stories.
Contrary to many people, who need the conventions, to belong to a people, to a group, to have their certainties, their way of working always the same, I like change, the stimulus not to get fossilized in habits and working methods.
So if I change brands, if I change products, it is out of boredom, or upgrades of some kind, no one has ever paid me to say that XXX is better than YYY; when I have worked for one or the other brand I have always stated it and in any case I have maintained an ethic of being honest and saying pros and cons of a product, because if I describe the weaknesses, you will believe me when I describe the strengths, otherwise it will be thought that I am one of the many smoke sellers who only show the healthy side of the apple and hide behind the rotten side.
Too often I have been told that by switching from x to y I was betraying a brand … considering that no brand has ever asked me for exclusivity, and even if it were I would not accept, the only betrayal one can do in life is to betray people’s trust, not an unconditional faith in objects, because in the end brands are still objects, nothing more than objects.
You will often find posts that start from the negative side of a product and then get to the benefits, because that way no one can accuse me of selective blindness, but above all, no stress from fanboys, no stress from fanservice articles, and more…
The perfect product does not exist, because if we talk about photo and video, one brand has the best autofocus system, the other has the best sensor lens stabilization system, the other the versatility of files, the other the sensor with more dynamics, the other better ergonomics of the camera body, the other with better working menus, another will have the best ecosystem to make the machines work with each other, the other the color science easier to manage for cinema, the other for TV, there will be the brand/sensor designed for low light, the one to work better with extreme situations of light and contrast and so on
In software you will have the one that is most popular, the one that is most powerful, the one with the best thought out interface (mmm no I can’t say that about any software today in 2023, we are a quarter century behind on desktop interfaces), the one that sucks as a workflow but has so many plugins that it makes up for the fact that the code base is 90’s, the one that is so widely used that you can find videos on youtube for every single operation, the one that costs less, the one that has better compatibility between different Os and plugins and so on…
THE PERFECT PRODUCT DOES NOT EXIST, if you think so, either you are a fanboy/girl or you are trying to sell it to me and you have the wrong nut to try it with, since in certain areas I have used and bought so much software that some people don’t even know it exists 😛
Let us conclude with the fundamental concept, as I asked one day a former student, and person I can call today a dear friend, Antonio Papa, when talking about a well-known software, and alternatives, I asked him :
Do you want to be a “software name” editor or operator?
Ask yourself this question, are you a Content Creator, trade xxx or user of a particular software/hardware?
There is nothing wrong with answering one way or the other, simply ask yourself what you want to do with your life and follow your own path.
If you then want to be faithful to something … choose one person, whether it is a or a partner, or simply a or a friend, it is the healthiest choice both physically and mentally that we can make today ;-D
