The vast majority of people who take photos have always been very casual users, and a high percentage of even very fancy DSLRs (and mirror less) are still used for basic snapshots - if we're honest, a lot of the images on here are not exactly masterpieces. And some are magnificent.

It's probably not unreasonable to suggest that anyone even vaguely serious about their images - and serious doesn't necessarily mean they produce good results, just that they have enthusiasm - does some work on their images.

Now let's compare the total number of sales of image processing software units vs the total number of camera equipped phones and we'll find that the serious users represent the tiniest, minutest fraction of image producers.

My father would have been a classic example. He had a very expensive & fancy (at the time) Zeiss Ikon rangefinder. He took photos occasionally of landscapes, but 95%+ of his photos were family snapshots. Today, he'd be a phone user.

More serious is this:. Before phone cameras, the cost of higher end equipment was held down by the volume of cameras sold. Effectively, mass sales were sponsoring sales to the more serious folks, amateurs and professional alike. That sponsorship is evaporating rapidly, and camera companies will either have to raise prices to stay in business or go to the wall.

This is further exacerbated by the incredible image quality now available to phone users. In our little closet, we can be as disparaging as we want, but there are some incredible photos being taken with smartphones these days - and there's been spectacular technical progress made in the last few years with much more to come.

You see this same effect in every field - bulk sales to casual users support sales to serious users. If the casual users go away...