JD, as you said below "Positive reasons for me are an interesting composition, skill behind the lens as opposed to being able to click a few Photoshop filters and doing something different." ... and yet most of the POTD pics this week are heavily - and obviously, so no excuses - Photoshopped.
You also admitted that it's hard to go through all the galleries, but I've seen far better photographs just by randomly clicking on galleries. At least two of today's four photographers are appearing for the second time in a week, and this is the second picture of that jetty, almost identical to the previous one!
As for the gallery system, I fail to see how it works. The portfolio sections says "The most popular photos will appear on the front page of the site, so get voting now!" yet there is no voting system, so how are they chosen?
To say the styles chosen are varied is a joke, when the same type of pictures and same photographers keep dropping up over and over. I don't know what the magazine hopes to achieve by this, but I know it alienates a lot of readers and leads to a very unbalanced online community.
What I think happens is that the work of friends and staff gets promoted heavily, and brown-nosers are looked upon favourably. If it wasn't for the POTY competition, this website would have far fewer visitors. The behaviour of the regulars on the forum is quite disgraceful at times, and staff are quick to block any criticism.
This will definitely be my last post on this site. You can keep your chummy little clique!