So I recently concluded the first year of my master’s program at Chungyuan U. I’ve learned quite a bit, and it’s been a fascinating change of pace in general, but I’m not gonna lie; it’s also been a bit of a slog, not only rushing to catch trains back and forth from Zhongli several days a week, but at the same time teaching the community college photography course as well as the university photography course, working my day job and other gigs, and also Rambler gigs, all at the same time. I really need to cut down on all of this somewhere if I’m going to keep up this pace. However, I do now have, including the required courses for the second year, more than enough credits to graduate (with, if I may say so myself, a pretty damn high GPA), so next I just need to get working on my thesis, album, and performance, all of which are going to be difficult enough without having to worry about other classes.

The community college course concluded last week, after I had some great online discussions with my friends and excellent photographers Blake Andrews and Nikita Teryoshin about my students’ work this semester. Well, besides the meeting with students to discuss their photobooks yesterday. And online meetings with other students that should happen this week. Then it will have concluded (I think).

Our latest album, Jug Band Millionaire, having been nominated and not winning a Grammy, was also nominated for a Golden Melody award, thanks to the inspiring work of our friends at Onion Design. Stuff I’ve worked on has been nominated a few times over the years, and the first time the Ramblers were nominated, for Medicine Show, I thought it would be fun to do the whole red carpet thing. And it was, but it was a little awkward as we didn’t really know anyone, the chairs were uncomfortable, and we didn’t win. So the next time we were nominated for Tiger, I thought: Meh, maybe skip it. And then we actually won. So we all went again this time, and things weren’t nearly as awkward as before, possibly because over the intervening years we’ve met and know more people in those circles, and also just one of the few perks of getting older: Just not giving a fuck.

We met up in the hot sun outside the Taipei Arena, feeling odd to be dressed up with no instruments, and then went down into the backstage area where police were leading sniffer dogs through the long crowded hallway that leads to the stage. Presenters were getting makeup done, and various groups

milling around in various regalia. The chairs in front of the stage were much more comfortable than last time, nice and padded. They put us in a luxury van to drive us around the block so we could get out and wait to walk the red carpet. As we set out, I was just about to say something snarky like, “And now cue the awkward silence as people try to figure out who the hell we are,” when actual applause and cheers came from the crowd, surprising me. In addition to my ever-present Leica, I was also modeling my equally well-worn Taiwanese Wotancraft messenger bag, not out of any sense of fashion, but rather simply a lack of space anywhere backstage to put stuff. At the interview spot I couldn’t help but take a photo of the wall of photographers opposite, many of whom made the de rigueur peace sign in response.

Inside the arena, the sound and light shows were much more intense than I recall from last time, and I had to don sunglasses and air pods to make it through the show without being overwhelmed. As it turns out, we didn’t win, but the show was fun, there was witty repartee in some of the speeches, and it was nice to see some old friends.

Our next show was last Saturday night on the tiny stage at Craft House,  a tight fit as we were joined not only by violinist Moses, who is leaving for the States soon, but also Andrew, who is our incoming saxophonist. The show was raucous as only a Ramblers-With-New-Members-Figuring-Shit-Out can be, but also a lot of fun. Amazing to think we’ve been doing this for 20-very-odd years.

So, as classes and things are wrapping up, I am, to be honest, kind of burnt out. My mind resists thinking about things I have to do next; I haven’t even looked at the photos I’ve taken since February FFS. I need a break, some time and place to rest and recharge before everything starts up again in the fall. In the past I would have loved to just take a solitary trip to Japan and just space out there for a week or so, to regain my mental footing, but circumstances are different now; I’m going to have to be creative in making this happen somehow. There’s supposed to be a ferry from Keelung to Ishigaki starting in September, but that’s not soon enough (I am still interested in that, though). I do miss riding the crazy bike along the riverside paths as I did back in the day; I need to dig it out of the depths of the garage and take it for a spin. Not immediately, as the first typhoon of the season, Danas, has us in its rear view mirror at the moment, having taken an unusual path up the Taiwan Strait, and providing us with hopefully enough water to make it though at least part of the summer without a drought. But the trails might be a bit of a mess right now and need some time to recover. I can relate.

During our photography class last Friday, Chenbl made the unusual move of slipping out of the classroom, leaving me to navigate his computer while we were looking at students’ photos. He had hinted to the students about a “special secret guest” coming to the Rambler gig I had the next day, and I’d wondered if it might possibly one of Chenbl’s mysterious alter-egos, a la Captain Chaos but Actually Fabulous, but when he came back I was surprised to see he’d brought our old friend Junku Nishimura with him. Junku was our gracious host when we visited Yamaguchi in 2017. I greeted him with a friendly WTF? and introduced him to the students, some of whom knew him from the BME workshop we’d done in Taipei several years ago.

After class we met up in Ximen and went to a stir-fry place to catch up while enjoying plates upon plates of various meats and other fried things before I had to catch the last train back to Xindian.

Saturday was the first time the Ramblers have played in a while, and to be honest things haven’t been the same since our beloved Paradises left our fair island for the dubious wilds of the Floridian panhandle. Our latest album, Jug Band Millionaire, having failed to win the Grammy it was nominated for, is now up for a Golden Melody award, and we plan to be at the ceremony. It will be my second time walking that red carpet, and should be fun.

On Saturday, however, we were playing for a graduation celebration of the Art Department of Fu Jen University. Soundcheck was supposed to be at noon, but as Ramblers will Ramble, we only got started at around 12:40, after a bit of hand-wringing by the staff. Chenbl and Junku showed up, Junku armed with (he claimed) the required traditional bottle of Shaoxing wine necessary for such events. It was a traditional show, and I sang Four Seasons of Red (四季紅) with, according to Chenbl, a bit more stridence than the song merits. “It’s like you’re worried that people won’t understand your Taiwanese pronunciation,” he told me afterward.

“But I am,” I said.

“Your pronunciation’s fine; don’t let that get in the way of actually singing the words!” Now, as Chenbl can SANG sang, this is no doubt good advice and something I need to work on.

I won’t be able to make the next show due to having class out in Zhongli that day, so I left the washtub bass stick for David, and headed out into the Plum Rain-soaked avenues with Chenbl, Junku and several students. We took the metro to the Songyan Cultural Park, where Junku bought a film cannister-adorned belt-hook, and then out to Xinzhuang, because Junku wanted to see some place with “old streets”. He was staying at that one old guest house in Wanhua because Of course he was.

It was raining even harder in Xinzhuang, but we braved the wetness and walked down the old street, lined with traditional shops, exploring alleys and temples and stopping for snacks along the way. I’d been pulling all-nighters trying to get homework done so I was rather tired, but some coffee jelly did the trick. Night fell, and the students bade us farewell, after which Chenbl followed his nose into an alley where we found an old-style restaurant, its walls yellow and cracking from decades of cooking smoke, adorned with signs forbidding the consumption of alcohol on the premises due to “that one time”. Nonplussed, Junku pulled out a green bottle of “medicinal” spirits he’d purchased. I could smell it from across the table (“Minty, not mediciny!”).

But it was getting late, I was tired, and the rain relentless. We parted ways back at Ximen Station, where Junku and I performed the traditional farewell ceremony of Photographing Each Other from Opposite Subway Trains.

Today, it’s back to the pleasantly forested campus of Chungyuan amid the last of the rainy season, before Dragonboat Festival and the arrival of spectacular summer heat. Classes are ramping up as we approach the end of my second semester; my digital music production class is even requiring me to reacquaint myself with my old nemesis, the bass clef (odd thing for a bass player to say, I know, but in my defense, I never use sheet music for Rambler bass lines). Also, my video production class is delving into the uncanny valleys of AI, and my other classes have so much homework that I’m no longer able to audit the second-year classes I’d been enjoying up to now. Last weekend my recording class took a field trip out to Yuchen Studio, where we recorded Millionaire; it was good to see Andy and learn a bit more about the place’s functions and history. Apart from the photography class, however, my own photos have just been piling up on my hard drive for the last few months, and will likely continue to do so until the end of the semester.

But, you know…so far so good, actually. It’s fun being a student again, interacting with interesting new people, including both my professors and follow students, and I have yet to tire of taking the train to and from Zhongli, though regretfully I have not yet been able to explore that fascinating mess of a municipality as much as I’d like to. Perhaps I’ll have more time during this summer break, though I really need to figure out what I’m going to do for my master’s thesis projects. You’d think I’d have plenty of time to plan that during the hours I spend on the train; in all honesty, I just like to sit and look out the window while munching on a hurriedly-purchased station bento lunch and sipping enough coffee to get me through my afternoon classes. It’s become a kind of necessary meditation amid all of the hustle and bustle of my life these days.

To wit: One day on the train, the rhythm of the sunlight, bouncing as it was off the passengers lost in their dopamine delivery devices, gathered up the previously distinct concepts of imagery and music in my mind, coalescing them into the idea that time is a far more profound aspect of our reality than we recognize. That is to say, photography and music are really both just variants in the expression of time, and the effect they both have on our consciousness and subconscious takes us to very similar places. Perhaps that might explain why music and photography coexist in the lives of so many artists.

Making that into a thesis, though…might need a few more trips.

Back in the day I used to indulge in verbal sparring with spammers who would call me on occasion, usually involving strange women claiming they’d met me in some random drinking establishment where I’d apparently left my card or some other BS, but they’ve left me alone for the last several years. I thought surely they’d learned their lesson and moved on to more fruitful pursuits such as life coaches or just Not Being a Jerk. Alas, as I get older I might be once again in their sights, because I got a call this morning on my way to work from an unlisted number. Usually I ignore these, but hey, I was enjoying a moment of calm in which I wasn’t scrambling to get homework done before it was due, so I answered.

“Pardon me, is this TC Lin?”

“That depends, who’s asking?” I answered, daring to hope some 2015-era Hamilton-esque shenanigans might ensue.

“This is the pharmacy at Taitung Veteran’s Hospital,” they said, dashing my (admittedly unlikely) bar-related hopes. “Someone came here with your ID card looking to pick up some medicine, so we decided to check by calling.”

Now, I am seldom in Taitung (alas), and I’ve never been to that hospital, so this was already fairly unlikely. But I decided to play along with the bit. “What meds, exactly?”

“Anti-depressants, that kind of thing.”

Ya know, I could use some of those, I thought of saying, but…no. “What did this person look like?” I asked instead.

“Middle-aged, a little thick, short hair.” So far, so good.

“Was he, uh, ethnically Chinese?” (“Huaren” 華人, which doesn’t really translate in English, it just denotes the ethnicity of most Taiwanese people rather than political designations.)

A pause. They probably don’t get this question a lot. “Well…yeah?” he said.

“Couldn’t have been me, then. I’m not ethnically Chinese.”

“So are you saying that it wasn’t your ARC?” I had to admire how quickly the scammer adapted to the new circumstances, my ID card was now an Alien Resident Certificate simply because I said I wasn’t ethnically Chinese.

“I don’t even have an ARC,” I said. Checkmate! I thought. But no, they kept going even as we went further off script.

“Ah ha! So you’re an illegal alien then?” I couldn’t help but laugh at this sudden accusation, and the caller became indignant, his tone harsh.

“How can you laugh at a time like this! Why don’t you answer? What are you playing at?” I could ask you the same thing, I thought, but this was getting boring, so I hung up. Looking back, I probably shouldn’t have spent even the little time I did on the line with the scammers, and hopefully they will put my number on their Do Not Bother With This Dude’s Ish list, but these times are full of change and woe and sometimes I just need a laugh.

The new semester has begun in earnest. Although all of my courses are in Chinese, I’m taking two courses that are more language-intensive than the others, one on lyrics and another on educational theory, that require quite a bit more involved levels of the language than the other courses. So while last semester I was either at the top or near the top of all my courses, this semester I’ll just be glad to get a passing grade in all of them. I’ve been so busy that I haven’t even had time to properly explore Zhongli, as I recently lamented to Josh, whom I’d run into near campus when I was having dinner between courses.

It’s also becoming even clearer just how much I don’t know about music production (spoiler: a lot). Our production professor, who is tele-teaching from Beijing, is assigning actual song production this semester whereas last semester we were just going over the basics of the software (Cubase, which I find difficult to use, but oh well, that’s what we’re using). I took the professor’s melody (which he came up with seemingly on the spot using the number-based scoring that is popular in Asia) and composed what I thought were some pretty cool chord progressions, but when I heard what the other students had come up with, it was obvious that I need to up my game. I’m also realizing how much I have hitherto neglected the art of percussion in music, something that I really need to brush up on, and listening to the drum parts of many of my favorite pieces has been a revelation. My reluctance in this respect probably comes from years of sitting right in front of the drum section in band; it’s hard to enjoy drums that are constantly banging away inches behind one’s head, and I suppose I just learned to tune it out.

Things will get even busier next week when not only are the Ramblers getting ready for some springtime gigs, our photography course is also starting up. Being so busy with the master’s program coursework, I’ve pretty much been letting my photos pile up on my hard drive. And in any case posting photos online these days feels frivolous in light of the United States’ ongoing self-inflicted implosion into a well-armed tinpot oligarchy, the other world powers jockeying over who will take the place it has abandoned. But art is needed even more in such times, so I will keep making it as best as I can.

At least this long, cold winter shows signs of abating. I’m so very glad that I finally installed heat in the Water Curtain Cave, as this winter has been brutal. The cold just seeps into the bones of these concrete structures and lasts well into spring. But this weekend has been lovely. Yesterday I went with Chenbl and his parents to the Fo-An Temple, located in an alley off of Minzu West Road, where they were celebrating the birthdays of both Ji Gong and the local land god (Ji Gong was apparently ok with moving his birthday to that of the land god because Ji Gong is just cool like that), and the group of devotees there were nice enough to give us some of the bao they’d prepared for the celebration. Afterward we had some tasty pig’s feet for dinner at a place across Minzu Road, as other temple celebrations, including stage dancers and a vast feast, had been set up along the roadside. Occasionally a jet would fly overhead before landing at the nearby Songshan Airport.

This morning I went to tai-chi practice at the park for the first time in a while. I’ve been rather lax about going in recent months due to other obligations, weather, and, to keep it a buck, just wanting to sleep in on Sunday mornings. But I nearly always feel better after tai-chi practice, and it was nice to go through the empty-handed form as well as the sword form a couple of times. As it happened, a bunch of tai-chi elders were having a get-together lunch nearby, so quite a few of them came by to say hi to Little Qin, who is now the leader of our group. They ranged in age from 70 on up to over 100. “I was practicing here in the park ages ago,” one of them told me. “When did you start? I’ve seen you around here for at least 20 years.”

“I first came to watch tai-chi here in the summer of 1989,” I said. He just laughed and called me a newbie, which…fair, as he was here in the 1940’s. One of old guys wanted to practice push-hands with me, which I did with some hesitation, not just because I hadn’t practiced in a while, but also because damn this guy was old. He probably could have sent me flying, but still.

After practice and our usually discussions about politics, history and culture, I bade Little Qin and the others adieu and walked towards the North Gate to see if Kyomachi No. 8, a nifty jazz cafe with the nice music and tasty quiche to be enjoyed with the view to historic buildings on both sides, was open as Google Maps intimated. Alas, it was not, so I had brunch nearby before returning home.

Now it’s time to knuckle down on this homework.

So, after gathering up all the funds I’ve accumulated over the years from online gift certificates, etc., I recently managed to snag an Osmo Pocket 3 as a Christmas/Birthday present to myself. I’ve been looking at instruction materials and making test videos, bringing it along in my bag when I’m out in case I happen across anything to film. The Pocket 3 is a tiny 1-inch sensor cleverly integrated into a portable gimbal  with a handle, resulting (in the right hands) in butter-smooth video but not taking up much space. One of the many criticisms leveled against my previous videos is how choppy and vertigo-inducing my camera movements can be as I waved whatever Canon Powershot I happened to be using like a slingshot. The Pocket’s camera is basically stuck at f2 and can only zoom in 2X, but the image quality isn’t half bad, better than what my phone can do anyway. I’ve gone back and forth on what frame rate to use: Both 30P and 24P are nice, but 24P (at 1/50) feels nicer. I might even manage to finally upload a 4K video one of these days, and y’all will finally see that yeah, honey, it’s the years and the mileage.

I took the Pocket out to Keelung one sunny afternoon last week, just walking around and making whatever vapid remark that came to mind for the camera, testing how did in various lighting situations, angles, etc. I hadn’t been out to my favorite dysfunctional port town for a minute so it was nice to walk those gritty streets again. I also had a chance to enjoy some tasty dessert and coffee amid the comfy jazz-infused atmosphere at Eddie’s Cafe, something I’ve been wanting to do for a while now. Eddie grew up with the son of the late Keelung photographer Cheng Sang-hsi, so he knows all about the scene there. The cafe is 15 years old now, which is impressive, especially in that relatively out-of-the-way spot in the old market across the train tracks.

A couple of days ago I took the train out to Shanjia, a little station between Shulin and Yingge, that has always piqued my interest, even back when I was taking the train back and forth to our army base in Miaoli. A former mining community, Shanjia doesn’t seem like much of a going concern these days; I walked around the old houses lining the midge-infested canal that runs beneath the station, crisscrossed by small bridges that lead to an old mine that is now a laundry spot/tourist attraction. Further up the hill is a large modern apartment complex that feels glaringly out of place amid the older mine buildings featuring old slogans like “Unify China” on them. I continued past the modern public library and walked up the road into the mountains a bit, but it was cold, cloudy and not a little spooky, so when a local orange cat suggested that I head back down the mountain, I listened.

Yesterday, amid once-again brilliant weather, I ventured up to Dihua Street, which is of course jam-packed with tourists and revelers as we approach the Lunar New Year holiday. I lasted about 10 minutes in the crush before bailing to the other side of the Yongle Market where I often enjoy stretching my Taiwanese capabilities with the elderly owner of the bitter tea stall there, chatting as I sipped my tea and watched the people walking by. I then escaped further to the riverside, paying my respects to the temple where I once took a photograph that ended being cover art for a Picador Press book, and just sitting in the afternoon sun and looking across the wide waters over at the jumbo jets wafting in over the towers of Sanchong.

After putting the Pocket through its paces for a time, I’ve come to the conclusion that, while it works fine when needed (and when I know how to operate it, which is an ongoing project), I can’t just be having it on me all the time like that. My video and photography mindsets are so different that it feels like I’m switching my brain out for another completely different one. Or perhaps that is how my brain “works”, as switching languages often feels the same way; I don’t find it easy to go back and forth. So when I have the Pocket out when I’m walking around, it interferes with my usual photographic inclinations in a most unpleasant fashion.

The best way to use it, I’m realizing, is like I would use a telephoto lens, i.e. only bring it out when I have a prepared idea of what I’m going to use it for. Otherwise it just becomes a hindrance to seeing rather than a tool.

I might edit some of the test videos into little pieces to upload to my YouTube at some point, or possibly one longer one…we’ll see. My ten-year-old iMac, specced out though it was at the time, can’t run anything but iMovie these days, but that should be enough to start. Eventually I’ll probably have to upgrade to Davinci Resolve or something if I get a newer computer for school, which starts back up in mid February. In the meantime I’m going to catch up on some much-needed rest, go through the photos I’ve taken over the last couple of months, and hopefully get a leg up on next semester’s subject matter.

Next week is the Lunar New Year break. Entering the Year of the Snake feels entirely apropos considering what’s going on the U.S. these days, alas.

In addition to all of the hubbub of wrapping up both my community college and university photography courses, as well as the master’s program semester, I had an extremely annoying cold around new year’s that just had me feeling generally awful (no, it wasn’t covid, though I really should get the latest shots).

Thankfully I’ve been feeling much better recently, and after a busy Saturday running around town through the cold and rain to meet with friends here and there, I woke up to a brilliant, crisp Sunday morning. Yes, I know, I should have made a beeline for the park and tai-chi sword practice, but my lovely warm thick quilt had other plans and held me hostage until it was too late for that. So instead I had my usual breakfast of apples and celery doused in olive oil and balsamic vinegar accompanied by some bread and coffee, and then headed out. Where? Anywhere with some sun. Which was almost everywhere, and felt wonderful as I’ve been sorely missing that Vitamin D-infused warmth.

I walked past the usual group of fishers crowded around the stream grate, under the highway bridge, and then crossed the regular traffic bridge over to the new fish run, where, thanks to the recently cleaned glass one can watch the rushing water and the occasional running fish. Families gathered out by the rushing currant, fishing and getting some sun. Continuing up the river, at the park I briefly found myself wondering if the Paradises had brought little Scarlett out to play before remembering that they’d left for the dubious wilds of northern Florida. “We miss you too!” Cristina messaged back when I told them. I satisfied myself with sitting along the newly constructed stream, watching the joggers and bikers, and just soaking up some rays for a bit before walking further up the riverside, stopping occasionally to sit facing the opposite direction to balance the warmth in my body as the wind was still cold on the non-sunny side.

Eventually I reached the ritzy climes of Xiao Bitan, where the tennis players bounced around the courts in the sun. Though the weather was clear, it was getting quite cold as the afternoon wore on, so I took refuge at the Ikea there, having some salmon in the cafeteria and buying a few things before watching the sun settle into the mountains from the veranda at Xiao Bitan Station. Then it was a metro trip back to Xindian and the Water Curtain Cave for dinner while watching TV and then posting some photos to my now 20-year-old Flickr page.

I took a series of IG stories throughout my walk, but those are ephemeral, disappearing after a day; I’ve actually been toying with the idea of just making some short videos of walking around in local areas. All of my travel videos have thus far been made when I was abroad (obviously, being travel videos), but I haven’t really done that kind of thing here in my own country that much. If anyone’s reading this, what kind of videos would you like to see? Aimless wandering and general commentary? Street photography thoughts? Cultural/historic commentary about local areas? A mix of all of that? I am not in any way laboring under the illusion that such videos would ever be even remotely popular, but it seems like it might be kind of a fun thing to do, and I’m not really using my YouTube channel (also 20 years old now) for much else. I’m not even sure what language I should use for that kind of thing tbh.

On Thursday I attended the final class of my first semester of Chung Yuan University’s Master’s Degree program in music production. All my tests are done, all my projects completed. I was expecting a challenge, and I certainly got it, but it went more smoothly than I thought it might, mostly thanks to the support and understanding of the faculty and staff there. Since September I have spent three days a week riding trains back and forth between Taipei and Zhongli (made financially feasible thanks to the excellent monthly NT$1200 T-pass system), in addition to my day jobs, music gigs, and teaching photography courses at Shih Hsin University and Zhong Zheng Community College.

It was a rather exhausting schedule (not helped by an annoying cold that lasted a couple of weeks at the end of the year), and I’m looking forward to a break before the spring semester begins in February. But just being a student again, actually attending classes on campus and participating in discussions and projects, felt extraordinarily rewarding and brought a different level of connection with younger people than I usually hang out with as well being able to take advantage of my professors’ knowledge and experience. In the college days of my youth I might have been hesitant to ask questions in class, but these days I have no such qualms. I sit in the font row, ask any dumb thing that comes to mind, and just enjoying learning stuff I had no idea about before. I had classes in music production, basic recording, a lecture series, video production, classical music appreciation, and a fun elective about UK Culture as seen through a Taiwanese viewpoint. Our program even provides a nice room on campus where we can hang out, work on projects or just chill while looking at the view outside. I’ve been using a tiny Korg MIDI keyboard and a cheap Audio-Technica USB mic to make music for class so far using free versions of software like Pro Tools and Cubase, but I suspect I’m going to need some more serious equipment for more advanced projects going forward.

Hopefully next semester I will be able to get the lion’s share of my required credits out of the way so I can concentrate on my graduate thesis for the second year of the program, but I always enjoy being on the campus; it’s a pleasant, attractive place with restaurants and cafes, concert halls and just a cool vibe in general. Chenbl’s father was one of the first students there after it opened in 1955 (the same year as Tunghai University, as it happens), and his brother-in-law went there as well. I haven’t had time to properly explore Zhongli or any of the stops on the way there, but I might do some walks over the break, weather permitting.

One thing I haven’t done a lot of lately is blogging; I think using Substack put me in the mind frame that I needed to have a proper topic in order to write entries, whereas in the past I would just write about random thoughts or how my day went and throw it all up onto my blog. And might have been a mistake…hardly anyone reads these things, regardless of whether or not they’re on Substack or my site, so why should I care about “brand building” or topicality? None of that matters. I’ve never been an influencer or relied on any of that anyway. But I have a YouTube channel, so I might as well use it.

It’s been a full 20 years since 2005, and obviously a lot has changed. I’d been blogging for four years at that point, had just joined the Muddy Basin Ramblers the year before, and was busy filming our feature film which would eventually be titled the Kiss of Lady X. George W. Bush was president in the U.S., and Chen Shui-bian was president here; Taipei 101 had just opened and I was working at the GIO. Having moved from downtown out to Xindian a couple years prior, I bought my current apartment, aka the Water Curtain Cave, at the end of the year following an excruciating house search and a stint at the neighboring Lofty Sky Palace; now I’m close to finally paying off the mortgage. I signed up for YouTube in 2005, and also Flickr, where I’ve since posted 15,000 photos over the last 20 years, an average of posting two photos a day, every day, since I joined.

So now, as we begin 2025, this year of the world trying to come to grips with the U.S.’s recent Plutocracy Reveal Party as well as deepening commitments to willful ignorance and fascism in general, perhaps it’s time to shake things up a little. Write more random posts. Make street videos. Try not to skip so many tai-chi sessions because it’s cold and I just don’t wanna. Perhaps even take a trip somewhere; I haven’t had a proper trip abroad since 2020, and the world ain’t hanging around waiting.

So last fall I taught, as a kind of experiment, a street photography course at Shih Hsin University, at the invitation of an acquaintance who is one of the instructors there. With Chenbl’s assistance, we managed to fit some amount of instruction in the limited time the students, all seniors, could devote to the class, and had a little exhibition on campus at the end, to some small acclaim.

The folks at Shih Hsin liked what we did, and invited me back to teach in a more official capacity this year, teaching a freshman photography class as an assistant professor. During the vetting process for the position I was required to submit my education credentials, and realized that an actual graduate degree might come in handy in the future. So I started looking at graduate programs in the arts, and found to my dismay that Taiwan doesn’t really do photography majors per se. I looked at filmmaking and other programs but the timing didn’t work. So this spring I applied to a master’s program in music production at Chung Yuan University in Zhongli. To my surprise, I was accepted.

This has resulted in kind of a crazy situation this fall. Starting last week, I’ve not only been teaching the regular community college photography course I’ve been doing since 2015 (Covidian interruptions aside), I’m now teaching the university course as well. And, in addition to my regular jobs and recording our latest album and playing shows with the Ramblers, I’ve also been attending classes at Chung Yuan U several days a week, mostly afternoons. Fortunately for me, the new T-pass system means that my monthly ticket covers all trains all the way from Zhongli to Keelung, so I won’t need to spend extra money, and I’ve always liked train travel anyway. And it’s cool to be in a new place; I’ve been to Zhongli several times over the years; I quite like the vibe there, so I’m looking forward to getting to know it better.

I have to say it’s quite strange, the feeling of déjà vu while wandering around a new campus, looking for the building where one’s next class is, after several decades of not doing that. I have no idea how I’m going to get through all of this (I am so lucky that Chenbl is helping out with classes), but at one point I just decided that the attempt itself is an interesting, worthwhile thing to do, regardless of whether it works out in the end. And if nothing else, it’s an interesting way to shake things up. I haven’t blogged much recently as things had settled into a  kind of equilibrium, but now that all of…this *gestures* is going on, I should have more to write about.

My first week of classes was quite surreal; some of my professors have heard of me, or at least the Ramblers or Panai or Chalaw or other people I’ve performed with over the years, or they’ve heard of my photographic work, or the books I’ve written. But there is so much I don’t know about this subject that it will be quite a challenge to get up to speed in quite a few areas as up to this point I’ve mostly contributed performances and coming up with solo lines etc. rather than being deeply involved in the actual recording process. I’m taking a recording class that requires me to learn Protools, and another one that requires knowledge of Cubase. Another class is on media editing, which I have experience in, and one is concentrated on lectures by experts in music production, which looks interesting. I’ve signed up for a heavier load this semester as I hope to get more credits out of the way so I can have more leeway later on the programs, but we’ll see how that goes.

In any case, it should be a ride. I’m looking forward to seeing how it goes.

Ever since the vast majority of users jumped from Flickr to Instagram, users have been complaining about Instagram’s lack of community, the tiny photo sizes, the lack of aspect ratios, and the dreaded algorithm; the latter especially became the target of their ire when many people didn’t see the amount of views they felt they deserved.

Several developers are now coming out with new photo apps that promise to fix the situation. And Flickr, it would seem, is their benchmark, with many promising an experience that rivals that of using Flickr back in the heady days when everyone was using it to find, show, and discuss photography online.

But they are addressing the wrong problem. First of all, Flickr is still around. You can still view good photography there at reasonable sizes. You can still join groups and talk about photography. People complain that the free version is insufficient and that you have to pay a small amount for all the usability, but then again, many of the newer apps coming out are also paid apps.

There is a salient reason why so many people abandoned a decidedly superior photo-viewing/community service in favor of a mobile app with tiny photos and very little community. The fact of the matter, despite all the engagement-farming claims in Threads posts like “I want to see everyone’s work, post it here!”, is this simple, unavoidable truth:

People seeking attention vastly outnumber people seeking photography.

This is not a recent phenomenon The number of people making and sharing photos skyrocketed when the technology made it cheap and easy to do, but their interest was mainly in using this state of affairs to garner attention. The number of people interested in making and finding compelling, authentic work, however, is a much flatter line. Instagram and the Like catered to the needs of attention-seeking users, and easily made images with strong geometric elements and colors that would stand out on a tiny screen soon dominated the genre, to the detriment of detail and subtlety. Once those users had decamped for Instagram, most everyone else followed because “everyone is on IG.” 

So what are some of the current contenders for “the next Flickr”? Not that it matters much as they’re all falling into the same trap, but we might as well talk about some of the attempts:

First up is Glass. Glass is “a paid, global community platform for photographers. With no ads or manipulative algorithms, Glass is your home for photography.” So first off, it is, like Flickr, a paid app. To its credit, photos are viewable on large screens. Though it stresses “community”, I couldn’t find any discussion groups, but then again, I didn’t purchase the paid service. The viewing experience was pleasant enough, perhaps on par with that of Flickr, so I began uploading images. Before long, however, one was deleted, and I got a warning message. It turned out to be a street photo whose frame included a small boy pissing into a street grate. I appealed and received an even sterner warning from Glass’s head honcho that no such images would be tolerated and that my account was being threatened with deletion. 

Ok, so that’s a no for me, and probably many others. What else?

There’s Foto, a much-talked-about app that is also subscription-based but promises a free version. It promises other things, too: “Reclaim your feed.” It exhorts. “Chronological, ad-free, and uncropped. Our goals are to let you see the posts of people you actually follow, to give you control of your experience within our app and reinforce that images are important and powerful.” Seems like a low bar. Also, Foto has been “coming soon” for some time now. Will it be desktop-based as well as mobile? Will there be groups? It’s difficult to see any actual improvements on Flickr at this theoretical juncture. 

I was also told to consider Lyrak, which is all about users being able to make bag from their images. But when I asked if a desktop version would be available or if it was simply replicated the tiny-image problem of Instagram, I got no reply. 

There are others, but it seems that, while most are concentrated on getting more viewers, more income, more Likes/Favs, and more attention, hardly anyone is talking about the work itself, i.e. finding and encouraging better photography, or actually discussing it. Unless that changes, it will be more of the same. That is, until AI reaches the point where personal photography isn’t taken over by phones as many have feared, but by instant, faultless keyword-driven image generators. No longer will anyone face the risk of a “bad” photo of themselves or anything else. Clients and customers will all be generally satisfied. Everything will look fine, every time, to an audience base trained to click Like on nicely arranged graphic elements. And nobody will have to do the work, go to places or take the risks of actually observing the world and making a photographic record of it. Indeed, Google is already vomiting up AI-generated travesties in searches for famous street photographers. At that point, we won’t be talking about which photo platform is best. We most likely won’t be talking at all.

So what can we do to improve the situation, assuming of course that enough people actually want to shift the focus from the attention economy to photography (which is a big-ass-umption)? We could of course sit on our laurels as Flickr has, confident that a sufficient number of people really love genuine photography and will do the Right Thing in the end. 

Or, we could prioritize discussion and instruction that considers and elevates compelling, meaningful, emotive work over simple attention-gathering. Too many street photography “workshops” consist of leading groups of independently wealthy Western travelers with nothing but time and the latest high-end gear to “image-rich” (i.e. third-world) countries, where they are told where to stand and what to photograph in order to get those Instagram-friendly compositions. In fact, “Instagram spots” should be avoided rather than sought out, and Like/Viewer numbers should be relegated to a place below one’s own unique vision. Conversations should be shifted from the endless gear talk and rage-inducing hot takes in which we are currently drowning to what our images say about us and our ever-more-precarious connection to the world around us.

The problem with shifting the conversation back to meaningful photography is that such an enormous space has been created within the text-based attention-driven social media sphere that it now feels woefully insufficient to just allow the work speak its wordless messages into being without wrapping everything up in our desperate pleas for validation at any cost. But if photography is to have any kind of future, any reason to exist going forward, that is what we must allow it to do, with or without the latest app.

I recently came across the photobook “In Guns We Trust” by Canadian “lens-based visual artist” Jean-Francois Bouchard, published in 2019 by the Magenta Foundation, “a trailblazing charitable arts-publishing house that consistently showcases the work of talented artists on a global scale, drawing attention to under-represented and emerging artists with powerful exhibitions and a roster of impressive international publications.” The book is mainly composed of photos of white Americans, men for the most part in heroic poses holding oversized guns in front of majestic desert landscapes, interspersed with the various bullet-ridden objects, mostly foreign cars and woman-shaped mannequins, that they target at a large shooting range in Arizona.

At first I thought it must be a parody rather than a serious attempt at photographic exploration, but when I read the text by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland, it would seem that the people behind this project genuinely thought they were doing something other than simply glorifying ultraconservative white Americans’ gun fixation. There is not even the slightest mention of the dire situation and human cost created and constantly exacerbated by this obsession. Rather, Coupland bends over backward to insist, in this most ludicrous of terms, that the book’s one-sidedness is in fact a comprehensive view; those asking if this is “gonzo ethnography”, Coupland says, “incorrectly assume that Bouchard sees his subjects as being very different from himself, when in fact, he does not. It’s just that they possess a pesky 21st century one little thing that sets them apart. It seems everyone has at least one, if not more. Bouchard’s work asks the viewer, ‘What’s yours?'” This man then actually equates gun obsession with being gay, a woman, anti-vax, anti-abortion, or addicted to meth.

“The main goal of this body of work is to gain a better understanding of the impact of the military ethos in civil society,” Coupland goes on, oblivious to the fact that imagery of gun owners standing proudly in the desert next to bullet-riddled Hondas does exactly none of that. To those who see America’s gun obsession as a serious issue, Coupland suggest such people live in their own bubbles, adding “Why be so quick to dismiss something because it’s not your thing? Where is empathy? Where is nuance?” I’d actually like to know the answers to those questions, because they were nowhere to be found in this book.

Bouchard himself admits, “To be honest, I have more in common with these people than feels acceptable to acknowledge.” You think?

The shallowness of such projects echoes the disturbing trend in the media of, in an effort to court “both sides”, completely abandoning objectivity and embracing dangerously extremist views. It’s not just the New York Times, it seems to be encroaching upon many areas of discourse these days. It’s one reason I decided to make my visit to the U.S. sooner than later, as I have no idea where this road leads, but I’m afraid that light up ahead isn’t the end of the tunnel, but rather tracer bullets lighting up the remains of artistic introspection.