Thank You/David Shankbone

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==Six years ago I was in law school in New York City and I was broke. There I was in this incredible city, yet I could barely afford to leave the house. Then my sister bought me a camera and everything changed. == I started playing with that camera, walking around and taking pictures. And that’s when I realized: Almost everyone who does anything important passes through New York, and I can get their pictures at speeches and book stores. For free.

I didn’t stop there. I obtained press passes to film festivals, literary awards and the Time 100 Gala; I was now photographing people like Gore Vidal and Madonna alongside media professionals.

Since then, I've photographed more than 2,000 celebrities and notable figures, from Sarah Palin to Stephen Colbert; from Woody Allen to Elton John. Richard Dawkins. Billy Joel. Tyra Banks. And so many more. One of my photographs is hanging in an exhibition in the Museum of the City of New York.

Many photographers would try to sell these pictures, but I'd rather share them with you for free on Wikipedia.

I love knowing that I'm contributing to something bigger than myself. And I'd like to think that, when I’m long gone, at least a few of these pictures will live on.

None of us will be around forever. But with your help, Wikipedia can last a lifetime.

Thanks,

 &mdash; David Shankbone

''David Shankbone lives in New York, where he manages a legal department on Wall Street. He's lived in three countries, six states and seventeen cities. His photos illustrate at least five thousand articles on the English Wikipedia alone. He also contributes to Wikinews, where he’s shared interviews with around forty notable people, including Al Sharpton, Shimon Peres and three U.S. presidential candidates.''

Video Attribution: by Victor Grigas, under [//creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported], from Wikimedia Commons.

Image Attribution: by Karen Sayre, under [//creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported], from Wikimedia Commons.