Recently, Viltrox has been coming under a lot of pressure that they don’t deserve. Sony’s camera system doesn’t offer it the support that it does the Japanese manufacturers. And Nikon is currently in the middle of a court case with Viltrox. But genuinely, all Viltrox is doing is developing lenses to support the camera systems. The Japanese camera manufacturers are acting like Viltrox is a tenant not paying rent when in truth, Viltrox is offering value to their camera systems that otherwise wouldn’t exist. I mean, look at how people are leaving Canon for not having good 3rd party lens options. Truly, I don’t think that the camera brands should be looking at Viltrox as the enemy. The enemy, that many others have proven, is actually Trump.
In my hobby time, I play a lot of Nintendo games. And recently, Nintendo sued Trump for tariff money that the Supreme Court said was illegal to charge for in the first place. Lots of companies have also gone forward to sue Trump for this.
But here’s the thing, Managing Editor Nilofer Khan researched into which of the camera manufacturers were suing Trump. To our shock, no one sued Trump.
Yet over his time in office, we’ve covered lots of the issues he created with tariffs.
So here’s the thing I want to ask every camera manufacturer: why are you going after the tenant instead of the person who illegally took money from you and your customers?
As a journalist in this industry for around 20 years, I’m really disappointed in this. Why do Sony and Nikon have to act like a bully and pick on a smaller company that isn’t anywhere near being a billion dollar company? Of course, I’m talking about Viltrox.
You should instead be trying to get your money back and then offer it as a purchase incentive to customers who supported you through all this. That would be the right thing it do in a world where we can all just go buy really good used camera gear for much cheaper instead.
Even beyond this, I’m very shocked that Leica hasn’t gone after Trump in a lawsuit. Leica is well known as a brand that has stood up to this administration’s type of behavior during WWII Germany’s time.
Please: Canon, Nikon, Sony, Panasonic, OM System, Leica, Fujifilm, Tamron, Sigma: go after Trump in a lawsuit please.