"My interest isn't really what's in the future of photography it's in the future of the planet," said author and academic Fred Ritchin in the keynote address at Foam's What's Next workshop. "I was at the Prix Pictet earlier this week listening to Kofi Annan describing the state of the world - floods, oil spills and radioactivity. With 1bn cameras already in the world, it's clear that it's not enough to ask about the future of photography and make more images. We have a responsibility to ask how photography can help."

Ritchin gave a brief outline of how digital manipulation has been used in the media, starting with a 1982 National Geographic front cover which moved the pyramids to create a better composition. Manipulation is nothing new, he added, but digital imaging has made the public more distrustful of photographs than ever before. "To make photography credible we have to take the photographer's voice and put it there," he said, urging picture editors to use interactive technologies to roll over images and release more information than captions alone can add, including the frames taken before and after the published photographed and the photographer's thoughts on it.

"If photography lacks credibility it will be harder to say the government is wrong, the power is wrong," he added. "It's one of the reasons we're not more politically involved. Whatever we do, we will be changed profoundly because of [the change in] the media. We have to try to guide that change in ways that make sense."