I read a lot of blogs, for a lot of different reasons.   I’ve got about 300 different feeds coming into Google Reader at the moment and most days, when I wake up, I’m faced with over 1,000 new articles to read.  That may be why I don’t leave comments on other blogs as often as I should – I’m often so busy trying to get that counter down to zero that I read the content but don’t stop to think about if there’s something I might leave in a comment.

Some blogs that I definitely won’t comment on are some local Hong Kong blogs that seem to be in a battle over which one gets the most page loads.  But I also won’t names names or give links.  These web sites are commercial endeavours, one of which offers what they believe are humorous takes on the day’s news, several of which are positioning themselves as guides to what is hip in Hong Kong.  (Yes, I know my participation in BC Magazine may make my commentary on those sorts of sites suspect – so sue me.)  I don’t consider any of them to be very good.  They’re good at marketing themselves and probably attract more eyeballs than my modest little corner o’ the web.  But every time I come across a post along the lines of “such and such dot com claims they get 20,000 visits per month but we get 30,000!”, all I can do is roll my eyes and wonder if anyone really cares.

Also, again without naming names, with only one or two exceptions (Siu Yeh and Cha Xiu Bao), all of the English language HK blogs that focus on food seriously suck donkey balls.  I realize that many of them are written by people for whom English is a second language, but even if one wades through poor grammar, most don’t provide even basic information about the restaurants and dishes they purport to cover.  I still remember one of these sites reviewing a restaurant and saying, roughly, that you know the prawns are fresh by the freshness of them.  I mean, come on, that’s not even trying.  They’re so busy trying to turn themselves into commercial endeavors, so busy with Twitter and Facebook fan pages that they don’t seem to have time to come up with decent content.

By far the biggest sin is the quality of the photos.  Some of these sites – and I’m talking about sites that run advertising – have photos that look as if they were taken by 5 year old mobile phone cameras in paper bags.   Rather than single any of them out, here are some examples of what I consider to be great food photography.  (I’d love to include Cosmopolitan’s blog photos here but he seems to be inactive web-wise lately.)

Eating Asia.  Photos by an actual working photographer with decent equipment.

SkyBlueSky.  David Hagerman, who does the photos for Eating Asia, has this separate blog to further promote his excellent photography.

Asia Flavors.  I don’t know anything about the author/photographer or what he/she does for a living, but look at the quality of the pictures.

Austin Bush.  A photo-journalist based in Thailand. (Though the photo below comes from a recent Hong Kong trip.)

What do those images have in common?  Sharp focus, good lighting, colors that burst off the screen, photos that make you want to run out and eat those dishes NOW.  I love these web sites not simply because they offer great photos but they offer challenge and inspiration to me.  I know I’m not as good as these guys are.  And I know that’s where I want to get.  And I think, examining my photos from a year ago against things taken more recently, I’m showing marked improvement, not merely standing still.

Compare the photos above to a recent photo I grabbed from a HK food blog.

This is not something from OpenRice.  This is something from a blog 100% devoted to food. Jeez dude (0r dudette, as the case may be), if this is important to you, spend a few bucks on a halfway decent camera.  Doesn’t have to be a DSLR, there are plenty of offerings from Canon or Panasonic that would give you better results with your eyes closed.

Am I just in one of my typical grumpy morning moods?  Maybe.  But my hope is that some of the people who blog about food see the above and take it as a personal challenge to do better.  That’s why I’m not naming names or linking links.  I simply want people to challenge themselves, to do more, to do better, to wake up.