Photo agency director Neil Burgess knows how to kick a horse when it’s down. In an essay on the Editorial Photographers UK site, he writes on a grim topic – the end of photojournalism. In his 25-year career he’s watched the evolution of photography, from blossom to bust. And now, he sees “no photojournalism being produced.” Sure, there are still photos being taken to accompany stories, portraits commissioned, that sort of thing, but he claims media outlets “no longer fund photojournalism. They no longer fund photo-reportage. They only fund photo illustration.”

As everyone knows, media outlets just don’t have the money to fund serious, substantive photojournalism — they barely have money to fund the newsprint anymore. With the rise of citizen journalism and the democratization of cameras, there’ll be plenty of photos, to be sure. But, as Burgess says, “what about the guys who produce stories, who cover issues rather than events?”

It’s a digital world, we’re just living in it.

Read the whole essay on EPUK.org