If you are like me and rely on DPreview to decide on which camera to purchase then it's imperative that they review cameras that I'd want to purchase. I'm sure that it's not exciting for the reviewers to review yet another camera that doesn't do anything put take pictures when you push the "shutter" button but some of us use those cameras and rely on DPreviews. The reason I'm writing this post is because it appears that although there have been quite a few really big Point and Shoot releases (Nikon P6000, Panasonic LX-03 and Canon G10 most recently) there haven't been any reviews in 6 months. As a matter of fact there are been very few non DSLR reviews for the 2008 year. To the right I've grabbed an image of all the cameras reviewed by DPreviews in chronological order so you can see for yourself.

Like I said maybe reviewing Point and Shoot cameras are the photography equivalent to being the muffler guy at the Indy 500 or the water boy for the leading NFL team but still it's an important service that is appreciated by the long time fans of DPreview.

Another problem might be that companies like to release new Point and Shoot cameras with exactly the same specs as the last model. My new Canon SD870 has the same resolution, almost identical case and nearly the same lens as my old SD500 but I'd still like to see how it fares as compared to the competition. I've noticed some barrel distortion in the lens that sometimes seems excessive and it would be nice to have a professional opinion on it. Maybe there was a better choice in the compact wide angle category that I should have bought instead.