I could see keeping something like myproject.thripp.com for 100 years, but myproject.com might not last more than 10.

The other problem is that most content management systems aren’t designed to span multiple domains, so you can’t keep a consistent look between sites. They basically become islands. Also, your search rankings are fragmented.

If you want a collection of islands instead of a cohesive whole, single-purpose domains are fine.

How many individual website should a photographer have? I don’t think I’ll get carried away, but I believe focusing the visitor’s attention on a specialty is a good plan.

Mark

I like the way a good one can be found (like street art or guerrilla performance) and many people never even know who created it.

I’ve definitely played with them a lot in my recent work.

Rosh

People are always very quick on ‘categorizing’. In fact, they love to do it.
They arrive at a site , look at the first images and – depending on the type of images that come up first – categorize you …

Ahhh … a nude photographer … or a wildlife photographer … ah, ‘only’ black and white stuff … or portrait … or wedding … or whatever …

And, of course … ah, a lot of commercial thingos … s/he cant be a serious artist …

If you run some sort of stats (website) you will find out that most people take a look at 3 to 5 (on average) images only before they leave. So, maybe, you like to be selective what comes up first.

Of course, things are a bit different when you are a brand already.

However …
sorry for bad english .. I’m not a native speaker

Best, Reini

But there are SEO implications, so there’s a careful trade-off between the presentation and the traffic sources. If you have a plan for getting visibility for this which doesn’t rely on search, it’s definitely the way to go. That means you have to have other sites or means of creating buzz for your project.

And while I agree that search is getting better, there are two fundamental SEO issues, that are not a question of time or will likely not go away: search engines consider age and trust in a domain. If you start with a brand new domain name, many search engines will take a wait and see approach. You can eventually overcome this, and if your timeline to market the project is long-term, rather than short-term, you’re ok as long as you have no inflated expectations. The second issue is that search engines consider how often the content of a site is getting updated – a freshness factor. If your project is part of a larger site which gets regular updates, no problem. But a micro site that gets created and then is likely a read-only piece of content, will as a whole rank poorly on freshness. That may not help it with search engines.

So there are pros and cons to either approach, but I wouldn’t underestimate the headwinds you face on the search front.

Otherwise, having a separate site named for a book is basically the online equivalent of a press release or BLAD. To make the site successful, you’ll need to sweeten the pot so with some reward you won’t get anywhere else. The da Vinici code’s “Quest Challenge” comes to mind. Anyway, Zuckerman has done this well but if we hadn’t heard about it from APE…

I was just thinking about how you might have a very specific body of work that you really own the market on, like for example you visit the same fly fishing lodge every year and have all these incredible photos of this one specific thing. Then why not make a page picturesoftheTKflyfishinglodge.com and set it out there so when people are looking for pictures of flyfishing lodges, or want to scout that lodge or someone wants to show their friends the best lodge they’ve ever been to, there it is. It might lead somewhere.

I agree with Timothy that potential clients/PEs probably like to see things on 1 site, BUT if you have a separate project site that starts generating buzz/getting viral, then you’ll probably attract people who never would have found your site in the first place (obviously linking back to your site is important).

It is important to get yourself in front of as many people and audiances as you can and this definitely helps. Thats one reason so many of us have blogs. I also have to say I really like the multimedia aspect of these sites. We hear over and over again about its importance on the web and its becoming undeniable. These sites are a form of self-publishing in themselves.