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Comment by smartis2812 | Hacker News Reader

If we hadn't enough things destroying our environment, no we have to bring back obsolete things too..

The only reason to "save"* the environment is so that people can keep peopling. Think of the waste in making a movie -- to me 100% dead weight (I have no interest in movies) but to other people definitely worth it. Who am I to decide what's a waste, in this regard?

* the environment will do just fine if we make all the vertebrates extinct. We just happen to feel otherwise.

I'd be curious to know if this is a fair comparison. A brief search revealed little.

I can see either side of the argument, and probably the result would change based on bounding conditions; for instance, how many more people have 'cameras' in their pocket today compared to 20 years ago?

And a lot of chemicals in photo processing are reused over and over to develop rolls of film – maybe it's more efficient to have one central lab processing photos than a billion phone batteries going into landfill every year?

nobody is going to get rid of their phone though... they're just going to have a phone and a disposable camera

Actually I have slowly been moving off my cellphone and there's a growing number of young people who are doing the same.

Also: "Five billion phones to be thrown away in 2022"

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-63245150

A growing number? Double nothing is still nothing.

I've a Kodak Ektar H35 which is ostensibly a half-frame reusable disposable camera w.r.t. specs and price.

Because it's half-frame it also takes twice as many photos per roll of film

Obsolete things attract hipster influencers and from there on it just snowballs.

Indeed, but probably less damaging than buying a digital camera that only got used once.

Practically everyone now-a-days has a digital camera in their pockets, a cell phone.

Dedicated cameras aren't purchased nearly as often because you need a pretty substantial jump in quality to compete with cell phone cameras at this point.

You could argue the rate of cellphone disposal is no good.

I'd be willing to bet there are more cellphones disposed of each year than rolls of film developed.

The former's market is almost certainly an order of magnitude larger than disposable cameras.

A disposable film camera isn't a replacement for a digital camera, it's a replacement for a potato with analog film and the bottom of a beer bottle as a lens grafted onto/into it.

Wait until you see how much plastic is used one time and then thrown out as packaging for parts in manufacturing plants.

Exactly. There's no point stopping unnecessary and wasteful practices until all other unnecessary and wasteful practises have ceased first.

Does it really need saying? We know it is terrible, we know there is microplastics almost everywhere.

At this point it feels like little Timmy playing with fireworks next to the forest fire. Everyone and everything involved is terrible. Timmy still needs a scolding for being a moron.

I am sure you have some type of hobby or passion that uses resources in a wasteful or "obsolete" way. cast your environmentalist critique in meaningful ways and stop diluting its punch by targeting kids and their consumptive practices. just because you dont "get it" doesnt mean its catching forests on fire, and doesn't mean its "obsolete". i have pictures from disposable cameras that carry unbelievable sentimental value to me and my family, and those pictures were taken alongside some on my fancy mirrorless camera and my wifes iphone. guess which photos live in the cloud and which adorn our bookshelves? am i supposed to feel responsible for rising sea tides because i bought a four dollar camera and documented a beach trip?

Justifying doing something wrong by stating that someone else did equally bad or worse is not a valid argument.

By this reasoning, some random EU country could raise co2 emissions, stating that China is even worse. Problem is: the Planet does not care about artificial, man made boundaries.

To your last question: Yes, you should feel responsible. Who else could be? The point is to be conscious about what you do. Not everybody can be the best version of oneself, all the time, me included. However, denial is probably the worst of all reactions to this problem.

This is a silly argument made by environmentalists for decades now, often to promote failed policies; plastic recycling, ethanol subsidies, and most egregious the prevention of progress around nuclear power.

Not only does moralizing often backfire, it has an embedding effect that prevents actual progress.

The other end of the spectrum to moralizing is completely negating any personal agency over resource consumption that each of us has. And unlike for things like "flight shaming", there is an alternative here.

Also, quite often non-disposable objects feel much more pleasant to use: Cutlery, glasses vs. plastic cups etc., just to name a few, so promoting reusable products over single-use plastic crap is a win-win in my book.

I'd definitely add film cameras to that list.

its... wrong to use a disposable camera?

Yes you should feel responsible.

Think of the electricity you're wasting just by using this website and browsing the internet for entertainment purposes.

> cast your environmentalist critique in meaningful ways and stop diluting its punch by targeting kids and their consumptive practices

All of these can be true at the same time: Changes to individual consumption habits will not save the planet alone; these changes can still make an impact in aggregate; it can still feel nice to use a film camera while at the same time considering the environmental impact and maybe limiting their use to moments that really matter and not just a novelty thing.

And if people really (re)discover their love for film: Buy a used film camera! You'll get infinitely better results than from a disposable camera and will be able to resell it for practically no loss in value.

I've bought a couple of vinyl records of bands/records that I really like, but would feel quite bad about buying every record that I like that way, since producing them and shipping them around the world does seem like a pretty big resource expenditure for something that a file on my computer can achieve in much higher fidelity.

> guess which photos live in the cloud and which adorn our bookshelves?

You're aware that photo printing exists, right?

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