A dilemma...

For the first time, M.A.L.L. has had to refuse to approve a comment. But not for the reasons you might assume.

We received two e-mails from an anonymous source claiming to know the identity of the M.A.L.ady. A key bit of the primary evidence was that this person had written comments to that effect to the M.A.L. blog, and they had been censored. The author's assertion is that, if it had been a "false trail," the comment would have been approved to throw everyone else off as well. The author may have a point; I have seen other comments approved by the M.A.L.adies suggesting other photographers as the culprits, so censoring this one would be suspicious.

On the other hand, I have to stick to standards of legal and ethical responsibility. If I publish someone's name, and they turn out not to be a M.A.L.ady, my claiming they are would cause damage to their professional reputation. I could get sued; but, more to the point, I have to think about what it would be like if the shoe was on the other foot. If someone were to claim that I (i.e. my real identity, not "Tarzan Wilcox") was behind the M.A.L. site, it would not only be a false accusation, but also damage my standing among professional photographers in ways that might be irreparable, since there would always be some suspicion cast on me, no matter if and when the real culprit was eventually identified.

I would urge you to contact Marc Adamus directly, and reveal the name to him. But, until Adamus himself takes action, or reveals to me the suspected name of his cyberstalker, I'm not going to print hearsay suspicions, no matter how well-thought-out they might be.

By the way...if the person in question turns out to be the M.A.L.ady, I would have to backtrack on one issue: having seen some of this person's photos, I can say he's a very good photographer indeed (which is one of the reasons I remain skeptical). But, he's a photographer whose work could often be mistaken for Adamus's own, especially in terms of moody, saturated color. Indeed, when I put their two names together in a Google search, I found lots of people identifying the two of them as each being among their favorite photographers. This "mystery photographer" clearly processes his images every bit as much as Adamus, and in much the same way. In fact, he even sells Photoshop plug-ins to help others process their images with a more-vivid look! If (and I emphasize the "if") this "mystery photographer" is the chief or only M.A.L.ady, his only motivation would have to be jealousy at Adamus's success, because he has no claim to the high ground in photographic "purity."