[colincurry]

I am pretty new at this game and learning all the time. I cringe when I look back at a lot my early snaps (and some of the current ones, too). I think that it is a natural progression to gain some expertise and to become more self critical and to cull one's own snaps in a more ruthless manner. Having said that, if I snap something new, however bad, I will keep it as record. I certainly try to be pretty selective when uploading pics to the Gallery. I just had a robin rejected that seemed quite OK to me - I now hope it was part of the culling process rather than any particular failing on my part.

I welcome the change in practice in sending an acceptance or rejection email. That is very positive. I have already mentioned in a similar the terrific job done by moderators and the amount of work this must entail. To that end, I recommended an automatic rejection slip that would involve very little effort from moderators.

In view of the changes proposed (which seem reasonable to me), I wonder if it would be possible to refine the automatic rejection slip by incorporating a code that would state the reason for rejection. Moderators have to make their decisions based on quantifiable criteria and I wonder if would be too much for them say to include a letter or number specifiying the actual criterion - particularly if it is to cull. The automatic rejection could list the cr9iteria. The moderator would have to initiate the email as now, but add the relevant letter or number. I would hope that this would not add too much to the moderators' already heavy workload, and would be helpful to us all (old soldiers and newbies); and probably encourage people to keep uploading. I am not sure how easy it would be to set up something like this. That is for others to say. It is also up others to say whether or not they would welcome something like this should it be feasible.

Colin