Have you ever run a popular website? Serving out a popular 2mb image is expensive. I know you want to see this as a tactic to discredit your hard work (which I think is flawed in that it discounts the effects of jepg compression)—and I’m not saying it’s not. I’m just saying that there are other reasons they’d pull the high res image. Have you called them out on this? I’d be interested in hearing their ‘reasons’. You definitely have a point to make with them. I just don’t think your explanation is the only viable one, and I hate jumping to conclusions. I believe in “truth” over “what I want to hear.”
I've called them four times and emailed them seven times when their first story (June 16) and second stort (August 21) came out. When they heard the name, "Polarik," on the phone, they declined to comment and said that, "All the information you need is on our website. Forget about the emails -- they've been trashed long ago.
There are no other reasons to change a 2 MB file into a 200K file, except to make it impossible to analyze. Fight the Smears did the exact, same thing, goping from a 1025 x 1000 px to a 585 x 575 px, which isn't even a proportional change (different aspect ratio).
Here's what is still in their article:
You can click on the photos to get full-size versions, which haven't been edited in any way, except that some have been rotated 90 degrees for viewing purposes.
They said that they have not changed a thing. Besides the obvious 90% reduction in quality, there's lots of other "edits."
To paraphrase Emily Barrett Browning, "How have I Photoshopped there? Let me count the ways." At last count, I was up to a dozen deliberate Photoshop manipulations."
What would be their excuse for leaving the same links posted, the ones that still have the original size? Didn't get around to it? Forgot to change it?
It fails the "Stink" test.