consumer

Adobe building

Adobe Faces Financial Penalties Due to an Ongoing FTC Investigation

It has been a busy week for Adobe, for good and bad reasons alike. In addition to recording record revenue, yet again, and being sued by a Dutch data watchdog for alleged illegal data collection, Adobe is also under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for its disclosure and subscription cancellation practices.

Conglomerates or Camera Companies?

In the corporate world, diversification is a way of life. As multinational conglomerates like PepsiCo can tell you, spreading out business over multiple sectors protects a company from economic shocks to any one industry, and opens up access to more markets.  A quick peek at SEC filings for some of the most prominent camera manufacturers reveals that many of them have made a strong effort to put this concept into practice, and you might be surprised at how small a role consumer photography plays in their annual sales.

Blast from the Past: Photos Captured 125 Years Ago with the Kodak No. 1

It could be argued that consumer photography didn't begin until 1888, when Eastman Kodak made his Kodak No. 1 (the followup to the Kodak Box) available to the public at large alongside the now famous slogan: "You Press the Button, We Do the Rest."

And thanks to the National Media Museum, we now have a small gallery of sample photographs that show what photos taken 125 years ago with the Kodak No. 1 looked like.

Beware Counterfeit Memory Cards Being Shipped From Amazon Warehouses

Check out the two memory cards above. One of them is a counterfeit card while the other is a genuine one. Can you tell which is which? If you can't, we don't blame you. Japan-based photography enthusiast Damien Douxchamps couldn't either until he popped the fake card into his camera and began shooting. The card felt a bit sluggish, so he ran some tests on his computer. Turned out the 60MB/s card was actually slower than his old 45MB/s card.

While it's not unusual to come across counterfeit memory cards -- it's estimated that 1/3 of "SanDisk"-labeled cards are -- what's a bit concerning is how Douxchamps purchased his: he ordered the cards off Amazon -- cards that were "fulfilled by Amazon."

Nikon to Announce the D5200 within the Next Few Weeks

Nikon has done quite a refresh of its DSLR lineup so far in 2012. It released the D4 as a flagship camera and the D800/D800E as a high-megapixel camera for pros, the D3200 as an entry-level camera for consumers, and the D600 as a more-affordable full-frame DSLR. The company isn't done yet: Nikon Rumors reports that within the next few weeks, Nikon will be announcing a fifth DSLR: the D5200.

Photographs of Deep Fried Gadgets

Brooklyn-based photographer Henry Hargreaves teamed up with food stylist Caitlin Levin on his project "Deep Fried Gadgets", which -- as its name indicates -- shows various electronics deep fried. The purpose of the project is to highlight the wastefulness of consumer culture and its rapid consumption of the latest gadgets.