I was asked a good question yesterday:

… how you will differentiate your subscription service from existing photojournalistic media such as The New York Times or LensCulture, as they also provide the audience with photographic documentary stories.

And another one a few days ago:

There is so much good photography out there and so many fabulous projects — what sets your website apart from the others?

Both are quite about the same, and the answer I have in mind looks simple to me, but I will try to explain in detail. That will be a useful exercise.

We do not build barriers and constraints

We are driven by the idea to provide equal opportunity for authors to feature their stories, regardless of their status, presence, or absence of previous publications, awards, and education, social status, location, gender and race. Our Members discover strong stories by both experienced or merging, not-yet-known authors that they won’t easily find on their own.

We do not write critical reviews

The newsletter allows discovering new stories or new points of view, conveying exactly what the author intends. Our foreword is there to provide context around the story but not to criticize or evaluate the work.

We do not compete with media outlets

by covering the latest news and hot trends. Our selection process is not time-sensitive. We can offer something made years ago, or in the recent days. The key criteria of selection is a clearly stated subject matter that is also well-presented via photography.

We give another perspective on the matters happening around us

through the eyes of photographers driven by passion and vocation, rather than commercial intent in “covering the truth”. We believe that there are many truths on any subject and prefer to consider various points of view, not commercially or politically motivated.

PS. Is there a single source of truth? Here’s the answer ;)

You know what to expect: a planned amount of content is delivered always on the same days

The idea of the newsletter is all about offering content on a specific topic, in a standard format with a known frequency. Here we offer you a simple format: series of photographs on a particular subject and an author’s statement accompanied by our foreword three times a week.

We offer 12 selected stories a month
Every day we look for documentary projects by independent photographers to provide our Members with carefully selected stories that they won’t likely find themselves. Sounds interesting? Read more and join!

What sets mnngful apart from other platforms on photography?