hmm however I think its important to point out that you learnt with a guided instructor in person which is a very different learning environment to tutoring ones self through the internet. On a first basis the internet provides comments and advice on work at random - and whilst you might get people favouring and commenting on your work on a more regular basis they are also often unfounded in how much they know about photography. You've seen this yourself in comments on the net - heck I've seen it myself in my own comments and how they have evolved as I have got a little better and viewed things in different ways (giving comments is also a good learning tool).
Thus you lack that guided structure to advice and comments that comes from a teacher.
I think that is an important difference because whilst he did not teach you about the "rules" he was able to comment and stear you toward thinking about them without realising it - whilst for the average alone learner they have to go out and read the book themselves to get an idea of what it is. Infact I would argue that its better they read the book and know the method and theory a little deeper from an acredited (writer) source rather than cobble together bits from the net and comments, since - as you say - that can lead to a bias on the method or even a misunderstanding of it.
This is all very true. The problem, I see, is that the 'Internet' generation of photographers are learning that the 'Rule of Thirds' is some magical rule that will make all of their photos better. I hear the line, 'You have to learn the rule to break it,' thrown around a lot, and while I agree to an extent, a lot of people learn the rule, but don't learn how to break it.
I'll give an example. I think this was on another board I frequented before coming here. A new poster came on and started showing some of his first shots. Most were centered, and disasters of shots. I remember giving him some good critique, even going so far as to mention that it's not a good idea to always center your subject (I hated the term rule of thirds back then also). Most of his critique was similar. He had other problems as well, but since we're talking about RoT in general, the rest of the C&C is unimportant.
I remember watching him grow as a photographer. Within a month or two, he had actually gotten pretty good. He then showed a shot of a reflection of some mountains on a lake, but he had followed the RoT. I simply stated that in the case of this shot, it might look better with everything centered. He left a very angry reply to my comment about how he always gets 'reamed' when he centers his shots, but now he's getting 'reamed' (his words, btw) because he didn't center. I tried explaining the rationale, but he never posted there again.
Sure, this is an isolated case, with someone who is being unreasonable. But it illustrates the problem I have with the RoT. People become so fixated on this so called rule, that they can't see the forest for the trees. They never place the horizon on the middle line, they never put their subject in the center. They limit themselves because they've been trained to believe that the RoT trumps all. Their creativity is limited by the fact that the subject has to be on the intersections of the 'third' line and the horizon has to be one third up or one third down. I just want to reiterate that I beleive that most shots look better utilizing the RoT.
I understand that my situation is fairly unique in these days. I had someone who could guide me to the conclusion of what the purpose of the RoT is without explaining the rule to me. I just don't like the name because it gives people the false understanding that it should always be followed. I suppose I should feel lucky that it wasn't called the Law of Thirds.
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