Wasn't that long ago that mags would run an entire interview where every trick wasn't a make (robbie mckinley)
Now we got one of the best skaters out there re-doing a trick within a couple of weeks due to internet harrassment
Bullying works!
Personally, I don’t see it as bullying. It’s just one of the impacts of technological advancements. Better quality video and computer equipment. Had this been shot on a hi-8 25 years ago and we were all trying to rewind and pause on our vcr’s to get a grainy still… there’d be no way to tell. People disagree on instant replay in pro football (there are obvious asymmetries between that and skateboarding). It’s just inevitable. And if you view it as a negative, then you still have to balance that against the positives (more footage, higher quality, put out faster, and easier to access).
Your point about mags running photos that weren’t makes begs the deeper question: did those illusions still help push skateboarding to where it is today by convincing young kids that the impossible (contemporaneously anyway) was possible and pushing them to outdo what they thought they saw? The science of myth, baby!