Everyone is talking about Web 2.0 – The new, more interactive web. While some new technologies are making it possible to have a richer experience on the web, this user feels like it is getting more and more difficult to find substantive content. Think about how many sites you have visited which are simply quotations from other sites. This is especially true in the realm of consumer electronics reviews where a handful of professional reviews are linked to or copied over and over. Here are my favorite sites to find both professional and amateur reviews of photography equipment.

Professional Reviews – www.kenrockwell.com

There are a multitude of DI review sites and there are three basic problems with most of them, either 1.) They only give positive reviews, 2.) They simply regurgitate the manufacturer’s documentation (sometimes verbatim from the manufacturer’s site), or 3.) They are a copy or link to another, original, review. Most sites which make money from technology reviews are loathe to give too critical a review lest the manufacturers stop providing equipment for review. For this reason, these sorts of sites are of little use when trying to decide between similar products because the reviews will tell you little to distinguish one product from the other. These sorts of sites can come in handy when you are just beginning your research on a particular type of product because you can read about the features of a family of products on one site rather than visiting a score of manufactures sites.

My favorite place to get real, unbiased, and original review of photography equipment is kenrockwell.com. Ken is a professional photographer who buys each piece of equipment he reviews. For this reason, he is not beholden to the equipment manufacturers and is free to give as much criticism or praise as he sees fit. His site primarily contains reviews for DSLRs but also has a handful of reviews and guides on point and shoot cameras as well. Until recently, the site had a Nikon tilt but has recently begun to include more Cannon reviews. As with any single source of information, you should take each review with a grain of salt. While Ken’s reviews are generally useful and give you a strong sense of the quality of the product, there is less breadth than some sites and some apparent biases. For example, Ken favors the Apple Macintosh over the PC for what are some dubious reasons.

Amateur Reviews – www.amazon.com

While professionals can give valuable insight, the experiences of Joe User, or rather, many Joe Users can give you a breadth of experiences that any single reviewer cannot achieve. For this reason, I rarely buy any expensive electronic device, not just photography equipment, without first reading the customer reviews on Amazon.com. There are several sites which provide the same functionality of Amazons customer review without selling the actual products. While some of these sites have a good breadth of coverage, none have as many reviews as Amazon. Since you have no reason to trust any one amateur review you only get a true sense of the quality of the product by reading a large number of reviews. I tend to skim a dozen or more reviews, starting with the most positive and then the most negative. This gives me a sense of what people like and dislike the most about a product. After that, I can think about the negative aspects of the product and decide if they make it an unappealing choice for me. Sometimes, people will complain about a feature that I know I will never use and praise a feature that I consider important. I also tend to read reviews of products which cost significantly more and less than what I intend to spend. Sometimes I am convinced that spending more will get me a far better product and other times I find that I can save money and be just as satisfied.

Amazon and kenrockwell are both classic Web 1.0 sites which can help you decide how to choose that new camera or lens which you can use to build your corner of Web 2.0.