An Insta-Famous Photographer Collected, But Didn’t Deliver
Ryan Shorosky, photographer and long-haul trucker, built a significant Instagram following while driving a semi around the country. We he made some of his scenic images featuring his signature technicolor skies available for sale, many of his fans jumped at the opportunity. But as the months went by, and the excuses piled on, people started to get suspicious. VICE tracked down some of the victims and Shorosky himself. Is it a case of fraud, or unexpected success coupled with an itinerant life that made fulfillment difficult?
Also on the show: Ken Light published a new book documenting an “empire in decline,” Twitter bans a PhD researcher for posting an image of Bree Newsome taking down a confederate flag, a stunning photo of Simone Biles and other Olympic photos, and who says NYC is a cold, heartless place???
We mention the following photographers, articles, and websites in this episode:
- An Instagram-Famous Photographer Promised Beautiful Skies, and Left a Trail of Angry Fans (via VICE)
- Photojournalist Ken Light sees an America in decline (via WashPo)
- Ken Light’s Course of the Empire
- Kolina Koltai’s tweet gets her banned
- Adam Anderson’s photo of Bree Newsome removing the Confederate Flag from the Statehouse in Columbia, SC
- With ‘Napalm Girl,’ Facebook Humans (Not Algorithms) Struggle To Be Editor (via NPR)
- Moderation Won’t Fix Social Media’s Big Problems (via TIME)
- Going for Gold: Sports Photographers Tweet Photos From the Tokyo Olympics
- Lindsey Wasson photographing for Reuters, slow shutter Olympic coverage
- Irish photographer Bryan Keane captures Simone Biles in a spin
- China Furious at Reuters for ‘Ugly’ Pic of Weightlifting Gold Medalist (via PetaPixel)
- And finally: NYC ain’t so bad! https://twitter.com/gregkb/status/1419730807040749574
