Shouldn't the conclusion here be "make friends with people that own Panasonic m4/3rds or nice dSLRs"? None of their example photos look like self portraits.
I just bought a remote for my camera precisely because my friends and I don't spend a lot of time taking pictures of each other. Sometime this week I'll spend the evening looking off camera like I'm having spontaneous fun with a bunch of people, when I'm actually alone, posing in my apartment, taking picture after picture trying to get my posture and facial expression just right.
Strangely enough, this strikes me as hilarious instead of depressing, and I'm actually looking forward to the challenge. I'm also looking forward to the laughter and teasing when I show off the results to my friends.
True, but you'd be surprised how many self-taken photos there are on OKC; either the notorious MySpace shot or the truly sad "self-portrait in bedroom full-length mirror".
Is the self portrait in a bedroom mirror really more sad than these photos that look like they were semi-professionally staged? In my experience with OKCupid "good" photos are often the least "accurate."
The self-portrait in mirror says to me: I have no friends who have ever taken a picture of me, and I'm so embarrassed about this online dating thing / have so little self-esteem that I can't ask someone to take a couple pictures of me, or even go outside and use the delay feature of my camera to get a decent self-portrait. Is that a somewhat harsh assessment? Yeah, probably, but it's the 0.5s reaction, which is, for-better-or-worse, how a lot of the decision is made.
And, yes, the semi-professional glamour shots can be an issue too, but in my experience they are much rarer. And at least in that case the person has enough self-esteem to try to look good.
