Author Topic: Interesting figures on Getty and Shutterstock (Read 6234 times)

lisafx · « **Reply #25 on:** May 01, 2012, 18:41 »

Quote from: PaulieWalnuts on May 01, 2012, 17:54

The point is... that when everybody felt screwed by the big Istock changes the response was "let's destroy IS and support Fotolia!". A week later when everybody got screwed by Fotolia it was "let's support 123RF, they've never screwed us". Then 123RF screwed everybody. Then it was "Let's support Shutterstock. They would never screw us. Jon is the most amazing wonderfulest person". And now it looks like Jon might be lining his pockets with an IPO and possibly putting the contributors in a position to be screwed. Not sure if anyone is paying attention, but there's a pattern here.

I don't know who you're quoting Paulie. Most of it doesn't sound familiar to me. Can you link to some of those quotes? I think most of us who were screwed by Istock took a pretty skeptical view of other sites as well. With the possible exception of Shutterstock. Which, to be fair, is only floating an IPO. They haven't screwed anyone yet.

gbalex · « **Reply #26 on:** May 01, 2012, 19:55 »

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 17:05

Anyone planning to buy shares?

It could be wiser to buy stock in a company that is setting itself up to grow and increase its profits, than it would be to spend our hard earned resources and time producing revenue generating images, illustrations and video for a publicly traded company. It is pretty much a given that a publicly traded SS, will be under pressure to divert revenue obtained from our hard work and financial investments to its new shareholders.

"Shutterstock, which competes with stock photo leader Getty Images, generated close to $100 million in revenue in 2011, another source close to the company said.

The company OWNS a library of photographs and illustrations that customers can license and download through subscription deals."

jamesbenet · « **Reply #27 on:** May 01, 2012, 20:04 »

When iStock was being squeezed by creditors, Bruce came into the forums and actually asked for opinions. I remember telling Bruce how an IPO was going to kill IS because the control will be lost to a board and earnings reports that always want better numbers each quarter. He agreed with my point and others views; then other options were explored.

Then he did his visit with Getty and he moved forward with a Getty acquisition. We all know what that turned out to be...

The only way Shutterstock wont morph into just another publicly run company will be to retain that 51% voting rights internally and just do a segmented IPO to gather cash. Somehow I think that won't happen.

Many believe Microstock is imploding and for SS management its a great time to exit. In the end artists will always stay holding the bag because that is how the business model is structured. We don't make decisions we just accept or deny the terms of agreements.

I hope this IPO doesn't destroy the good will the company has earned with artists and buyers.

In the end the capitalist system breeds small companies into midsize then blows them up in the market when they are ripe. We shouldn't be surprised that a growing company wants to follow what is an established guide to corporate prosperity.

jsnover · « **Reply #28 on:** May 01, 2012, 20:16 »

I think the mood is more dismay than surprise. And we all (I think) retain that childlike wish for a happy ending...

cthoman · « **Reply #29 on:** May 01, 2012, 20:20 »

Quote from: jamesbenet on May 01, 2012, 20:04

Many believe Microstock is imploding and for SS management its a great time to exit. In the end artists will always stay holding the bag because that is how the business model is structured. We don't make decisions we just accept or deny the terms of agreements.

I don't know if the microstock can implode. The content and demand are still there. Some site will pick that up if another one dies. You just hope it's a better site.

lagereek · « **Reply #30 on:** May 01, 2012, 23:56 »

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 17:05

Anyone planning to buy shares?

I would not buy shares in any creative corp or service, waste of time. I once bought shares in one of the worlds most prominent AD-agencies, sold them six months later, waste of time. When depression hits the globe, the"creative-world", is the first one to bite the dust.

gallofilm · « **Reply #31 on:** May 02, 2012, 00:02 »

Getty is overrated and overvalued. A company that sells stock at higher prices and offers lower quality than any microstock agency should not be able to buy microstock. It should have been IS to but Getty. Obviously their interest is to kill the microstock market.

Noodles · « **Reply #32 on:** May 02, 2012, 00:03 »

Quote from: lagereek on May 01, 2012, 23:56

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 17:05
Anyone planning to buy shares?

I would not buy shares in any creative corp or service, waste of time. I once bought shares in one of the worlds most prominent AD-agencies, sold them six months later, waste of time. When depression hits the globe, the"creative-world", is the first one to bite the dust.

Getty seem to be doing alright! Can't get much more creative than Apple either! Wish I had bought a few share in that company for sure.

lagereek · « **Reply #33 on:** May 02, 2012, 00:15 »

When I say creative, I am ofcourse thinking of creative-services, typical of Ad-agencies, photo-agencies, etc. Not as in Apple or Microsoft.

Further! to me it doesnt matter who sell my stuff, RM, RF or micro, if they want to kill off micro, so what? as long as the others will sell! micro has hit the roof and no doubt it will fade away, sooner or later, thats why we are beginning to see adjustments everywhere. As long as I have various outlets for my stuff, I couldnt careless.

Microbius · « **Reply #34 on:** May 02, 2012, 01:08 »

Anyone else thinking Getty could well be in the market to buy out the competition yet again? This is their track record, acquiring any company that looks like it is serious competition when it comes on the market.
Hellman & Friedman could actually be the break here, if they have made a loss with IStock and learned their lesson (but who knows, maybe they consider it a great success?)

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #35 on:** May 02, 2012, 01:45 »

Quote from: jamesbenet on May 01, 2012, 20:04

.

Many believe Microstock is imploding and for SS management its a great time to exit.

I think many people believe that microstock as a good source of earnings for artists is imploding. Being a microstock agency is a very different thing altogether - paying less to suppliers while selling more and more products is not a characterstic of an imploding business model.

nataq · « **Reply #36 on:** May 02, 2012, 02:07 »

Microstock in general didn´t hit the roof and it won´t anytime soon.
It´s us contributors who hit the roof because demand doesn´t grow nearly as fast as supply does.

It won´t take long until revenues won´t pay the costs for shootings and most "professional" contributors will lose interest. But there will always be people who are happy getting the investment of their camera back. And in fact there´s nothing really bad about that, we can´t blame them can we? Most of us would act the same way.

I wished getty buyed shutterstock (awaiting your attacks now). If they kill microstock - well, why not. If there is no supply for cheap images, people will pay more and eventually make professional setups with paid models worth wile again. Would they screw contributors? Sure they would, but so would other shareholders as soon as they realized that growth is never exponential forever.
Mentioning Apple - we´ll see what happens if Apple returns to a more regular growth. Their problem will be that they just had been too successful in very short time. That´s never a good idea in the time we are living in as strange as that might sound. Shareholders will demand the same exponential growth forever, or they´ll be disappointed. That´s just plain stupid and the company should be really happy with a 10% loss over the next five years too because that´s still very very high level. Just the people that invested their money to proliferate it without ever adding a single idea or workhour won´t be and demand cost reduction. Which means screwing employees and suppliers. That´s the way it is.

In a perfect world there would only be one Stock agency, paying their contributors good money and having a lot of well paid and satisfied employees. The photographers will pay their models a fair fee and buy new equipment produced by people that are getting paid well. Models and stock agency employees would buy fair trade food and goods. The well paid farmers on their end would buy fair produced products in factories that care about the environment,... In the end everybody would be happy and live a comfortable life. Sounds like real communism, does it? But this is never going to happen because humans are never satisfied with the things they have. They always want more, even if they can never ever spend the money they have. Am I different? Perhaps a bit - but not really.

gbalex · « **Reply #37 on:** May 02, 2012, 11:43 »

So when do you think the new window dressings and promos will go out preparing for the IPO?

lisafx · « **Reply #38 on:** May 02, 2012, 12:23 »

Quote from: nataq on May 02, 2012, 02:07

In a perfect world there would only be one Stock agency, paying their contributors good money and having a lot of well paid and satisfied employees. The photographers will pay their models a fair fee and buy new equipment produced by people that are getting paid well. Models and stock agency employees would buy fair trade food and goods.

Sorry, I'm confused. When has a monopoly ever produced a fair trade environment? If there were only one stock agency, or if GOD FORBID, Getty bought Shutterstock, then there is no incentive to pay contributors well. As the only game in town, (or in the second scenario nearly the only one) they can pay contributors whatever pittance they can get away with.

lagereek · « **Reply #39 on:** May 02, 2012, 12:36 »

Quote from: lisafx on May 02, 2012, 12:23

Quote from: nataq on May 02, 2012, 02:07
In a perfect world there would only be one Stock agency, paying their contributors good money and having a lot of well paid and satisfied employees. The photographers will pay their models a fair fee and buy new equipment produced by people that are getting paid well. Models and stock agency employees would buy fair trade food and goods.

Sorry, I'm confused. When has a monopoly ever produced a fair trade environment? If there were only one stock agency, or if GOD FORBID, Getty bought Shutterstock, then there is no incentive to pay contributors well. As the only game in town, (or in the second scenario nearly the only one) they can pay contributors whatever pittance they can get away with.

Amen to that! we might as well embark on something new, count our losses, smile, bow and put up with it. I wont, I dont have to.

RacePhoto · « **Reply #40 on:** May 02, 2012, 12:36 »

Quote from: lisafx on May 02, 2012, 12:23

Quote from: nataq on May 02, 2012, 02:07
In a perfect world there would only be one Stock agency, paying their contributors good money and having a lot of well paid and satisfied employees. The photographers will pay their models a fair fee and buy new equipment produced by people that are getting paid well. Models and stock agency employees would buy fair trade food and goods.

Sorry, I'm confused. When has a monopoly ever produced a fair trade environment? If there were only one stock agency, or if GOD FORBID, Getty bought Shutterstock, then there is no incentive to pay contributors well. As the only game in town, (or in the second scenario nearly the only one) they can pay contributors whatever pittance they can get away with.

While I agree 100%, don't they already pay us a pittance and get away with it?

It could only get worse.

ARTPUPPY · « **Reply #41 on:** May 02, 2012, 13:22 »

Quote from: lagereek on May 01, 2012, 23:56

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 17:05
Anyone planning to buy shares?

I would not buy shares in any creative corp or service, waste of time. I once bought shares in one of the worlds most prominent AD-agencies, sold them six months later, waste of time. When depression hits the globe, the"creative-world", is the first one to bite the dust.

I would look into buying shares. It certainly is a company on the rise and may lead to a future buyout. Also as a shareholder you will be have access to the annual reports which would be interesting to look at. What would be the costs be in running this kind of business? It's interesting to hear people complain of gas prices or bank fees yet do not buy shares in any of these related companies when they make record profits. As to buying shares of a creative company, Warren Buffett made some good coin buying a few advertising agencies back in the day. Holding a stock for six months is too short a time to gain any value. Sorry to hear you got burned but don't close the door on it.

Would Getty buy into this? Maybe. But I get the image of a very fat man in a restaurant with the waiter saying "Sorry sir, but your credit has been declined..."

cobalt · « **Reply #42 on:** May 02, 2012, 13:25 »

another article. nothing really new.

isn´t it great that our work can be used for large loans to pay off other debts...instead of investing in our marketing or infrastructure?

http://www.pehub.co20097790m/141056/hellman-friedman-with-380-mln-dividend-from-getty-images-makes-back-nearly-all-of-its-money/

jsnover · « **Reply #43 on:** May 02, 2012, 13:34 »

The text on this from Reuters says in part that they expect growth to slow in iStock - see here.

The part I didn't know about before today was that they'd paid a second round of cash to H&F mid- March. So that might explain closing contributor relations phone support and dropping PNGs and other cost cutting measures.

Funny thing is that if you expect growth will slow and so you cut back on spending anything on developing the business, you've created a self-fulfilling prophecy, no?

And Jasmine's link didn't work - but the article's here. I think that's the same one

cthoman · « **Reply #44 on:** May 02, 2012, 13:43 »

Quote from: RacePhoto on May 02, 2012, 12:36

While I agree 100%, don't they already pay us a pittance and get away with it? It could only get worse.

LOL. That's what I was thinking. The competition thing hasn't worked out so great either.

cobalt · « **Reply #45 on:** May 02, 2012, 13:48 »

Thanks! Sorry for the broken link.

Quite depressing to read. How much more could they have made if they had grown the business, especially the community side of it. Considering what has just been paid for Instagram and the market seems to be ready to (over)pay for Facebook?

luissantos84 · « **Reply #46 on:** May 02, 2012, 14:50 »

Quote from: sjlocke on May 01, 2012, 14:06

Well, I guess this shows they're all *insult removed*.

eta: oops, sorry

naughty boy, what have you said?

luissantos84 · « **Reply #47 on:** May 02, 2012, 14:51 »

Quote from: lagereek on May 01, 2012, 23:56

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 17:05
Anyone planning to buy shares?

I would not buy shares in any creative corp or service, waste of time. I once bought shares in one of the worlds most prominent AD-agencies, sold them six months later, waste of time. When depression hits the globe, the"creative-world", is the first one to bite the dust.

all world is crappy already (USA, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Spain and many other) and contributors/agencies keep on collecting..

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #48 on:** May 02, 2012, 17:05 »

From Cobalt's link:
"Based on preliminary, unaudited financial statements, for the three months
ended Dec. 31, 2011, Getty's revenue decreased 0.7% on a currency neutral
basis"
I seem to recall the late, unlamented COO telling us that the bulk of earnings for iStock (and presumably Getty) came in the last quarter.

traveler1116 · « **Reply #49 on:** May 02, 2012, 17:22 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on May 02, 2012, 17:05

From Cobalt's link:
"Based on preliminary, unaudited financial statements, for the three months
ended Dec. 31, 2011, Getty's revenue decreased 0.7% on a currency neutral
basis"
I seem to recall the late, unlamented COO telling us that the bulk of earnings for iStock (and presumably Getty) came in the last quarter.

Wouldn't this be comparing to the last quarter of the year before? The link isn't working for me.

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Author Topic: Interesting figures on Getty and Shutterstock (Read 6234 times)

lisafx

gbalex

jamesbenet

jsnover

cthoman

lagereek

gallofilm

Noodles

lagereek

Microbius

BaldricksTrousers

nataq

gbalex

lisafx

lagereek

RacePhoto

ARTPUPPY

cobalt

jsnover

cthoman

cobalt

luissantos84

luissantos84

BaldricksTrousers

traveler1116

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