I run a group for wedding photographers and second shooters on Facebook. The members come from a wide range of backgrounds including customers who are wealthy and those of little means. I've made this post a 'sticky' a the top of the page so that hopefully people are more respectful of others from different backgrounds.
Tolerate Diversity: There are people living on less than a dollar a day and people who earn what most of us earn in a year every day. There are people who can't afford a wedding let alone a photographer and people who spend what some of us earn in a lifetime on their wedding. Then there are "photographers" who just bought " a camera that takes really nice pictures" and would be a liability as a second shooter, and photographers who charge $15 000 just to shoot a wedding [prints are extra] who most of us couldn't afford to pay to second shoot for us.
Then there is everyone in between.
So don't knock someone who wants a wedding shot for $500 or an unpaid second shooter. If it's not for you then move along, we can't all afford the best and people will get what they pay for [Actually sometimes they will get more than what some people would charge them to do because there are a lot of cowboys in this business who think they are good enough to charge but don't have a clue what they are doing].
We all have to start somewhere and when I shoot a wedding I allow a new second shooter to have their first go at wedding photography [I don't even charge them for the risk I am taking] and they get profile pictures and I usually get a few pictures to add to what I supply to the couple. I've had a few bad experiences, someone who had very shallow depth of field in most of the group photos with the bride blurred because they "didn't want to lose image quality by going over iso 200 on a Canon 7D". I had another second shooter who "had lost interest in photography" in the 3 months since asking to second shoot a wedding with me, I had to ask her to take her camera out and start shooting.
So the next time someone advertises an opportunity for a second shooter to work for free [cheaper than making them pay to learn a valuable trade] don't get all excited about the fact that you are a professional photographer who charges $4000 per wedding and would never 'work for exposure' - use your brains, the post isn't aimed at you - get off your high horse and move along.