I thought this was a very interesting excerpt...
EYES ON A FAST WORLD,
THE WORLD PRESS PHOTO CONTEST 2004,
By ELISABETH BIONDI.
(Aperture magazine, winter 2004)

… the most obvious and dramatic development, of course, is the widespread use of digital photography. This year (with some notable exceptions, such as Luc Delahaye, Alexandra Boulat and Stanley Greene), photojournalists transmitted their images directly from Iraq, making this the first “digital war”. The increased speed makes for a fundamental change in the way photojournalists work-for better, and sometimes for worse.
One advantage of digital technology is obvious: images can be seen, edited, and printed almost instantaneously. News media and audiences now receive instant photojournalism. Also, digital cameras make the technical process easier and can produce technically more “perfect” images, as well as offering great latitude in low-light situations. And the photographer has the freedom to see, store, and dispose of images immediately.
The drawbacks are less obvious. The digital process places new demands on photographers, especially in conflict situations. At the end of each day of shooting, often in life threatening conditions, the photojournalist must transmit pictures-with captions-back to the publication or the agency that awaits them. This is a time consuming and often frustrating task that can add up to six hours to the photographer’s workday. There is little time for careful editing, and perhaps no time at all for old fashioned story weaving. The photographer is deprived of the valuable process of reflection. Every night, instead of thinking ahead and planning the next move, the exhausted photojournalist must begin the tedious job of archiving the day’s images. James Nachtwey puts it bluntly: “The digital cleanup interferes with the journalistic process.” Additionally, there is a curious backward-looking mechanism to digital picture-taking. Instead of focusing on the next image, photographers may be tempted to glance down at the image just taken-and thus may easily miss the ensuing “moment.” Photojournalists have words for this: a “chipmunk” photographer instantly edits while shooting-a process called chimping-allowing little room for composition or thought. How conducive is this to producing lasting images?
Finnish photographer Ilkka Uimonen, who received a prize in the Spot News category, is one of the few who successfully straddles digital and nondigital media. He was on assignment in Iraq for eight weeks and, like everyone who worked for newsmagazines, transmitted his digital images home nightly. But he also carried a rangefinder camera and shot black-and-white film, “on the periphery,” as he says. His are not the only memorable pictures from Iraq, but they are particularly powerful. By allowing himself the freedom to work at his own pace, Uimonen made photographs that are introspective, lyrical, and elusively seductive.
It became evident in Amsterdam that certain events were covered by a great number of photographers; consider the thousands of images of the fall of Saddam’s statue. The process of “embedding” journalists was intended to control (at least to a certain extent) images sent back to the media; and indeed, in the first weeks of the war it did considerably limit photographers’ access. Perhaps, too, the shortage of time to develop and plot out a story contributed to the numbers of photojournalists all covering the same situations.
The new speed and technology, and strictly delimited photographable terrain, have made it particularly difficult during this conflict for a photographer to preserve an independent personal vision. A few have managed to maintain a strong visual “handwriting” in both digital and nondigital images. Some, such as Simon Norfolk, have purposefully chosen the slower, nondigital process of large-format cameras; others use black-and-white film, casting a “slow eye” on a fast-paced world.
As the use of digital photography expands, and as a new generation of photographers falls in love with the ease of this new technology, we can expect yet greater floods of images. No doubt the submissions for the World Press photo 2005 will be even more copious than they were this year. Photography is constantly evolving, and with improving technology, photographers will surely test new creative limits. At the same time, there are and always will be others who choose to let their images stand out from the digital masses by allowing time to work slowly for them. We saw some exceptional photographers by these new “mavericks” at the World Press 2004. They will surely be there next year as well, and I hope the one after, and the one after that.

(Elisabeth Biondi has been the Visuals Editor of the New Yorker magazine since 1996. Previously, she held the position of Director of Photography at Germany’s Stern magazine and at Vanity Fair, was Picture Editor at Geo, USA. Biondi headed the jury of this year’s World Press Photo contest).
(My notes: Alexandra Boulat is one of my favourite photographers and I have been eagerly following her stories. Jan 2005 issue of the National Geographic magazine carries her pictures for a story on Berbers of Morocco).