The economic downturn - in pictures

[Papa_Complex]

Quite the good, short photo essay on the wreckage left behind.

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/07/05/magazine/20090705-gilded-slideshow_index.html

[shmike]

Cool pics.

I was kind of disappointed in the number of locations he touched on.

Are there more to be found elsewhere?

[Papa_Complex]

Unfortunately there aren't any more that I could find on his personal site, but perhaps The Times will show more, or Martins will display them on his own site: http://www.edgarmartins.com/

[marko138]

Good pics. Thats a telling essay for sure.

[derf]

Those properties are gonna be worth big money one day, as long as someone is willing to hold on to the property for a few years and possibly maintain the homes.

[marko138]

Those properties are gonna be worth big money one day, as long as someone is willing to hold on to the property for a few years and possibly maintain the homes.
Well, they've already failed on the 'maintain' part.

[derf]

Yeh I seen that, but if you could buy 20 of those (peak price) half million dollar homes and sell them for 300k each you would make a pretty decent return. But again it is an investment without any guaranteed gain and it will probably require alot of time before the market jumps again

[Homeslice]

Those properties are gonna be worth big money one day, as long as someone is willing to hold on to the property for a few years and possibly maintain the homes.

This assumes there will be jobs within reasonable commuting distance.

[derf]

Look they were looking at ATL, and Phoenix, industry is greatthere

[goof2]

While those pictures do tell a story to me they don't have the same impact as the depression era photography we have probably all seen.

I believe the Vegas development secured new financing to finish the project a few months ago.

[Gas Man]

No shit... fuckers need to roll thru this area. Everything is fucking closing around here! SCARY SHIT!

[Adeptus_Minor]

Looks like I missed it.

Editors' Note: July 7, 2009

The pictures in this feature were removed after questions were raised about whether they had been digitally altered.

[fasternyou929]

That's disappointing.

[Riceaholic]

Looks like I missed it.

Me too. I get the point though.

[Papa_Complex]

It's a pity if they were digital creations rather than actual captures though. I don't like invented photos.

[marko138]

It's a pity if they were digital creations rather than actual captures though. I don't like invented photos.
Shitty.

[EpyonXero]

It's a pity if they were digital creations rather than actual captures though. I don't like invented photos.

They looked real enough to me, Im not sure what could have been done to alter them.

[goof2]

The reputation of the New York Times continues to drop in my mind. I'm waiting for an Enquirer style headline that Bush is bat boy.

[HurricaneHeather]

They looked real enough to me, Im not sure what could have been done to alter them.

:werd:

There wasn't anything that was too outlandish in those pics to me to make me think they would have been altered. Weird.

[Papa_Complex]

The reputation of the New York Times continues to drop in my mind. I'm waiting for an Enquirer style headline that Bush is bat boy.

I don't see why. They apparently pulled the shots based on the possibility that they had been "digitally altered" when they were called into question. They paid a photographer for a photo essay and if he created the images rather than taking them, then it's on him.

At this point we still don't know why they were taken down anyway.

[Kaneman]

I didn't think the pictures were anything special. I wish the Times would pay me to go out and photograph some unfinished houses. Easy money.
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[unknownroad]

There were only a couple that looked unusual, the first one and one of the casino project pictures. Very strange lighting effects.

[goof2]

I don't see why. They apparently pulled the shots based on the possibility that they had been "digitally altered" when they were called into question. They paid a photographer for a photo essay and if he created the images rather than taking them, then it's on him.

At this point we still don't know why they were taken down anyway.

The editors charged with verifying content seem to have little interest in actually verifying content. Between Jayson Blair, the alleged McCain/Iseman affair, and this apparent incident the Times appears to be willing to publish stories with insufficient verification.

[Papa_Complex]

The editors charged with verifying content seem to have little interest in actually verifying content. Between Jayson Blair, the alleged McCain/Iseman affair, and this apparent incident the Times appears to be willing to publish stories with insufficient verification.

This isn't a story, it's a photo essay. A fluff piece. When you pay someone to do a specific job, you expect them to do that specific job.

[goof2]

This isn't a story, it's a photo essay. A fluff piece. When you pay someone to do a specific job, you expect them to do that specific job.

For someone as in to photography as you are I'm surprised to hear you marginalize the impact of the medium. I have read about the depression and understand how it affected people, but emotionally the more powerful message for me is delivered through photographs from that period. To dismiss this as a "fluff piece" is, in my opinion, naive.

A newspaper is ultimately responsible for what it publishes. That is why they have editors who are supposed to verify and vet stories before they are published. The Times has seemed in recent years willing to abdicate this responsibility to their readers in favor of mopping up incorrect stories after publication.

[Papa_Complex]

For someone as in to photography as you are I'm surprised to hear you marginalize the impact of the medium. I have read about the depression and understand how it affected people, but emotionally the more powerful message for me is delivered through photographs from that period. To dismiss this as a "fluff piece" is, in my opinion, naive.

A newspaper is ultimately responsible for what it publishes. That is why they have editors who are supposed to verify and vet stories before they are published. The Times has seemed in recent years willing to abdicate this responsibility to their readers in favor of mopping up incorrect stories after publication.

Was it news? No. Therefore it was a fluff piece to them.

[Papa_Complex]

I found some information about why the shots were taken down. Yes, they were doctored:

http://www.metafilter.com/83061/Ruins-of-the-Second-Gilded-Age

[goof2]

Was it news? No. Therefore it was a fluff piece to them.

I agree they don't view it as news. My belief is they view it as photojournalism recording history. This is what Life magazine used to do. They presented minimal narration and told the story through photographs.

I think it was anything but fluff. Just because it isn't what you consider "news" doesn't automatically make it "fluff".

[Particle Man]

Editors' Note: July 8, 2009

A picture essay in The Times Magazine on Sunday and an expanded slide show on NYTimes.com entitled "Ruins of the Second Gilded Age" showed large housing construction projects across the United States that came to a halt, often half-finished, when the housing market collapsed. The introduction said that the photographer, a freelancer based in Bedford, England, "creates his images with long exposures but without digital manipulation."

A reader, however, discovered on close examination that one of the pictures was digitally altered, apparently for aesthetic reasons. Editors later confronted the photographer and determined that most of the images did not wholly reflect the reality they purported to show. Had the editors known that the photographs had been digitally manipulated, they would not have published the picture essay, which has been removed from NYTimes.com. ruh roh

[Kaneman]

I still don't see what was so special about the pics...they didn't strike me as special at all. They were simply average pics at best.
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