This is my rant/appeal to digital camera manufacturers, who feel obligated to “throw in” certain worthless “freebies” with their cameras.

Okay. I know that you expect that the average Joe Blow might someday want to go to the ol’ WallyMart and wander by the digital camera display. And at that point, Mr. Blow might think to himself “well gee willickers, wouldn’t it just be swell if I decided to take pictures with one o’ them High Falootin’ Digimital Cameras, with the TeeVee Screen on the back of ’em instead of film! And then I could just hook ’em up to muh Web TeeVee thingamabob and, well, Dadgummit, I could sell that fine Elvis Plate Set on thuh Eee-Bay!”

And then Joe Blow might smack down a hundred clams and buy himself a good ol’ Kodak EasyShare something-or-other. He cares not about CCD quality, image formats, or even megapixels (other than maybe the vague notion that more = better). He just knows it’s digital, and digital is the new black. And so he’ll rush home, open it up, jam some batteries into the thing and switch it on, ready to take pictures. The screen will brightly illuminate, only to greet him with every digital camera newbie’s worst nightmare:

“WHUT?! I gotta buy mem’ry too!?” our poor antihero will then sputter in exhasperation. After all, the whole point of a digital camera is that you don’t need to buy “film,” right?

So, dear Mister or Ms. Digital Camera Maker, I certainly understand that under some circumstances, you choose to help avoid such an uproar (and placate the uneducated end user) by throwing in the “freebie card.” You know, the low-speed, basic barebones memory card that the neophyte can then shove into the camera along with their batteries and use to take photos right out of the box.

This is a noble gesture, indeed, and I wouldn’t dream of poopooing on it, but! I must point out that not every person buying a digital camera today is a newbie. Some of use are replacing old/lost/stolen/broken equipment. Others are upgrading, moving slowly up the digital camera evolutionary chain. And quite a few are buying because they have to have the newest and greatest.

And most certainly, a newbie isn’t going to be buying certain types of cameras… in particular, they will probably shy away from the big, nobby-and-buttony big-ticket cameras, with lenses that are wider than their wide-open mouths are. Say, something like this. No, such cameras are going to be bought (and not returned) by people who’ve been around the block and have some clue as to what’s going on here. So naturally, someone buying a high end camera would realize they need to have some compatible starage handy before they even think about beginning to use such a beast, don’t you think?

Well, apparently you don’t think, Mr./Ms. Camera Maker. Because when I opened one up the other day, the first thing I saw was:

OHHHHH Look! 32 WHOLE MEGABYTES!!

Now mind you, this was in a package for an 8 Megapixel camera. Shall we do the math on this? A 32 Megabyte card holds exactly one 8MP image in RAW format. Yes, one.

Gee, thanks.

Cardmakers are aware of this fact, and so for the most part, a 32MB card is largely worthless these days. Most retailers don’t even sell them anymore. In fact, if you actually endeavor to BUY a 32MB card these days and manage to find one for sale, you’re going to get cheated out of your money, because the cards are so worthless that they actually cost retailers more to order and stock than their higher capacity counterparts. This is why if you’re stupid enough to buy a 32MB card, it will cost you more than something that holds 4 times as much data. Yup.

So I have to ask. Why? I’m just going to throw this worthless piece of plastic away, and I imagine any other person who pics up this camera will do the same. Why even bother to carry a card that holds one photo, just in case, when for just 5% of the cost of the camera (most people pay more in sales tax), they could buy a card that holds 32 or even 64 RAW images, and up to 250 decent-quality photos. It makes no sense.

So please, Mr./Mrs. Camera Maker, don’t do us any favors. How much did it cost to throw in the card, and then print up the packaging to tell me about this wonderful favor you’ve done me? And how much nicer would it have been to spend that money instead on something more worthwhile, like manufacturing a better quality lenscap that won’t scratch the lens while in transit from the factory to the retailer?