Read All The Latest

You don't hear that shout of "Read All The Latest" on the streets these days. Not in Shipley anyway. Steve is one of the true fixtures of Market Square, selling the Telegraph and Argus very quietly from the same place every single day, come rain, hail or snow. The shops all around him have gone out of business but he's still there. The news on the street is that blipfoto is going into liquidation but that need not necessarily be a cause for panic. Having given this some thought, I think it unlikely that blipfoto is going to die. It would be in nobody's interest to kill it off because the value of this community is too great. If there is any commonsense at all the liquidators will keep the site running with the aim of finding a buyer. The only real asset of such a business is its user base. I believe we represent a very valuable asset indeed. Is there any other community of people on the whole of the internet as supportive and creative and passionate as this one?

If the news is true, the saddest thing is that Joe will lose control. It will no longer be his baby. It must feel a bit like having your own child taken away from you to be brought up by a foster parent. If this is the case, it is no wonder that he's stopped blipping. And his team. I feel for them. I've never had any doubt that this rebranding exercise with Polaroid was an attempt to save the site rather than selling out. I guess the business was a lot more fragile than any of us realised. 

I've been through this very process myself, with my previous business, which was one of the very first image databases, created when digital imaging was in its very infancy, before digital cameras even. I developed a product that was reckoned to be the best in the world at the time. The trouble was that it was before its time. I started with a 50% stake, which soon got considerably diluted as we needed to inject cash to keep the bailiffs from the door. We had to give equity away very cheaply. When the dot.com bubble started to inflate we attracted 3 million into the business, but once again at the expense of a considerable loss of equity. We grew rapidly but the bubble burst and some unfortunate decisions were made by the suits who were then in charge. They didn't take much notice of the eccentric designer of the software who turned up to board meetings in his shorts! I eventually got made redundant, by which time my ownership of the company stood at not much more than 1%. I can well imagine that Joe is in a similar position.

So, although my appetite for blipping has been dented, I'm going to carry on regardless. I think the best we can all do at the moment is to show Joe what an amazing community he created and demonstrate that this place is still worth investing in, by someone. I think it's going to take a lot to sink this ship. The people here are too passionate to let that happen lightly. Without any real information I'm not sure what we can do yet, but there will be options. For the time being, at least, let's try to believe that there is still the possibility of a future for blip. We kind of owe Joe that. We didn't exactly help matters with the outpouring of angst over the rebranding! That all seems a bit petulant now in retrospect.