Richard Anderson wrote a very good piece over on Sanspoint about nerd elitism today. The article makes some good points about taking the time to step back and recognize that we needn’t look down on those who don’t share our obsessions. However, this line stuck out to me:

The camera on my iPhone 5S is more than good enough for the few photos I take of my life.

I understand the feeling that our phones currently take pictures that are good enough, but I doubt we’ll look back on these photos as great in 10 or 20 years time. Even looking back at photos I took with my iPhone 4 just 3 years ago, I’m already seeing the cracks in the flaws in those images. I have pictures of my wife and I that don’t look that great anymore. Almost all of the images of us from the first few years we were together were taken with smartphones that were considered “good enough” at the time.

It was then that I decided to get in on the fancy camera game. I thought of the coming years when I will have a baby who I will want to photograph non-stop. I don’t want those photographs to look dated in just a couple years’ time, I want them to last forever. So I bought a camera that has all of the fancy specs that my iPhone doesn’t have[1]. My reasons for buying it were very human, not technical.

Yes, there are folks who will argue that one brand is better than another and that only a fool would buy another device, but you see this in all walks of life. The worlds of sports, fashion, tools, and limitless other hobbies have the same passion and faux vitriol thrown around just the same. That’s just a part of the fun.