Evidently the activation of the Web for a more sophisticated photojournalism depends upon the intelligence and good will of those publishing on the Web. Its inexpensiveness when compared to publishing paper-based journals encourages non-journalists and non-”brand-name” journalists to comment with their own publications, including relief organizations, school children, environmental experts, etc. Furthermore the broad spectrum linking that has been the hallmark of the Web encourages multiple viewpoints (CNN linked for a day to a Web site put up by three of our NYU students on the Bosnian conflict, something that would have been impossible were they printing a student newspaper). Also, the availability of access through homes, offices and public institutions promulgates debate both within societies and across national borders.

Certainly the providing of layers of context provides much more work, but much of the information already exists and, in this medium unlike any other, can be linked to. The idea of yesterday’s newspaper only being good for wrapping fish is no longer applicable (and not only because a digital newspaper does not use paper).

The photograph is also a remarkably effective node in a non-linear, hypertextual environment. The reader can look at the photograph as long as wanted, respond to it (or parts of the image), and use the photograph’s profusion of details and essential ambiguity as a provocative jumping-off point for further exploration. Video is more difficult to use as a node, as is sound, due to their movement. Photography’s stillness is very useful on the Web and allows the environment of the Internet to compete quite successfully with television that is less equipped for serious non-linearity.

But remarkably there are few models on the Web for how to maximize the effectiveness of photojournalism despite it being a medium that is primarily visual (who reads massive amounts of text on a computer screen?) and unlike word-based languages (French, Mandarin, etc.) generally comprehensible in a variety of cultures. This paucity of models reflects the old problem in photojournalism that most practitioners fulfill a role rather than create platforms for their own work. If they were better authors they would not so often being illustrating someone else’s text or ideas, photo credits would not run up the sides of pictures in tiny type, while picture people would be running publications as much as word people.