Originally posted by normhead My forum profile says I have been a member since 2007 so going on 10 years. "Pentax is doomed." has been a common thread. It's getting a lot harder to find those threads since the K-1 was released. It covered a lot of the bases Pentax hadn't covered before, making the system viable for a lot more people. This is the actual low point of "pentax is doomed." When the D800 first came out, there was a thread complaining about all things Pentax every second day.
I started reading here in 2007 and joined when I bought a K10D just before K20D appeared. For about a year the Forum was vibrant and full of discussion of everything from elderly film cameres to how to Meter M lenses. Much of the cultural knowledge of the Forum was created by those first few thousand members.
Then Hoya started dumping lenses, dismantling Regional distribution and shelving product development.
Ricoh's Hoya's American President blogged about how fabulous his Leica was. One by one those early, curious, creative members jumped ship, got bored, changed brands to protect their businesses, died or just quit and, things got dark.
PentaxIsDoomed(tm) was a sardonic lament by die-hards ("Thank you Sir. May I have another?"), without whom we might not be here today - but today's cautious optimism is so easily reversed because Hoya truly destroyed trust in the brand.
Ricoh has much work to do outside Japan.This kind of poor journalism couldn't come at a worse time, potentially disrupting momentum dearly bought.