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Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Looking Before We Leap.

For two long days this week, from Monday May 8 to late Tuesday May 9, we placed the Tampa Bay Modeling site on standby as we paused to go over information, meet, and decide our next course of action. Our web design company, Tampa Bay advertising agency EOS MediaArts, suspended services for Tampa Bay Modeling, Independent Modeling, and its sister resource sites (Tampa Bay Modeling is not affiliated with the Independent Sites, but we are allied with them and share some common advertisers and contributors). This was nothing against us, of course, but the growing agency had to organize its efforts to align with new projects and had a difficult time finding room for a few talent resource sites that it had been providing technical support for these past few years. Our staff models here at Tampa Bay Modeling were literally caught in the middle, and while the hosting had been paid for and the site would have stayed online for reference purposes, it would have been adrift on the Internet with no updates and some of the planned features forever offline. With no technical support and no easy way to update a web site format that we subcontracted out, we would have been unable to update no matter how many models here wrote and worked. We would have had to resort to going about our careers and changing the industry one professional at a time, with no mass-voice or online presence (don’t go into the talk that we could use portfolio networking sites and modeling message boards. In my opinion, they all suck, and the opinions and attacks of unprofessionals who have no clue what they are doing drown out the voices of the rest of us. That’s why they suck).
We have a state-of-the art web site here. The Tampa Bay Modeling site is an advanced Raptor Class prototype, designed to combat misinformation and unprofessionalism in the modeling industry. While it may look as if it is designed to combat model scams and make photographers lives miserable, that’s not the case. This site was never intended to attack anyone. It is optimized to attack ideas, inspire change with working solutions, and to handle a high level of controversy. It’s a battleship, with the mission of promoting professional accountability in the industry and introducing new ways of working in an outdated and often corrupt business. Sure, some of our ideas and tools are bound to be controversial; many have already been just that. There is no dispute, however, over our ideas and tools working. They all work, and everyone, including our critics, know this. Even some experiments that had a few kinks were enhanced and refined to work well as operational tools. Change in any industry is always controversial, especially when those who are against new ideas either have something to lose or are not in a position to take credit for it. We are cut out to handle controversy, and look forward to it now and in the future. This site has some sharp teeth, and would have continued to have them even if we had left it adrift. This, however, was not to be our fate. This site has a purpose, and we now have the ability to fulfil its potential.
For a couple of days, it looked as if our state-of-the art web site would have been abandoned on the Internet, and if that would have happened it would have been a tragedy for the entire modeling industry. This was made apparent by record levels of E-Mail that we received encouraging us and offering help. For a change, the complaints that we received were about us quitting. This both surprised us and inspired us to keep going.
The offers of help actually did help. They were of great use to convince our corporate sponsors that this was a worthy cause. Our sponsors reversed their position and renewed support of the sites, which not only includes this site but the Independent Sites and the upcoming Advanced Model modeling resource site. More was done than that, too. They also gave us the templates, support files, and legal use of the web sites. As of right now, we are financially and legally independent of our sponsors. Basically, what this means is that we have the ability to do updates on our own and use other sponsors if we need to in the future. By default, this also means that any potential conflicts of interest remain perceptions on the part of those who want to believe that, with no actual basis in fact.
We took some time these past few days to sit down, discuss the site, and look at our agenda carefully. We sorted out the logistics of exactly what kind of support that we needed and secured that support. We now know where we are going, and are pushing hard to get there. At this point, the only cost to updating the site is our time, as other costs have been taken care of. We are more than willing to invest the time and the hard work into helping others.
It’s good to be back. It’s also good to get back to work. Now, let’s see about getting the May Mail Bag online and that model scam section along. We can then upload some new tools, interactive tutorials, Tampa Bay geographic and industry data, and other positive tools that no professional could possibly have any problem with. Some may want to familiarize themselves with our disclaimer, too. As we finish dismantling our message boards, we had to adjust it.
We’re back. It is time to continue what we have started, and to expand our efforts in the Tampa Bay modeling industry and beyond.

~ Danielle Cooper, Editor

Tampa Bay Modeling

Clearwater Beach, Florida

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