Free images

[melastmohican]

I wonder why all site want us to donate images for free? Should not they pay us for the right to donate them?

[cardmaverick]

I wonder why all site want us to donate images for free? Should not they pay us for the right to donate them?

It's a simple promotional tactic. They won't give away good commercial images, just the dinged up ones... and then taunt you with the the nice ones in a secondary search results box that you have to pay for.

[PaulieWalnuts]

It's bait. An attention getter.

Sites are hoping people looking for free images will find their site. And they're hoping that if the person can't find what they need for free that they'll remember their site to come back and buy.

I'm sure some freebie hunters do end up buying but I'm guessing most of them go to all of the sites so they can build up their free image inventory and rarely buy.

[cardmaverick]

I'm sure some freebie hunters do end up buying but I'm guessing most of them go to all of the sites so they can build up their free image inventory and rarely buy.

I dunno man. I've taken a look around at the freebie stuff. It's really not that great. Keep in mind, that not only are they offering essentially "rejects", but the search engines for these sites BLOW. The first reaction everyone has to them is "WHAT! FREE IMAGES!?", but they always fail to really investigate the buyer experience. They are getting more than just low cost images when they pay, but also search engine creature comforts.

[PaulieWalnuts]

I'm sure some freebie hunters do end up buying but I'm guessing most of them go to all of the sites so they can build up their free image inventory and rarely buy.

I dunno man. I've taken a look around at the freebie stuff. It's really not that great. Keep in mind, that not only are they offering essentially "rejects", but the search engines for these sites BLOW. The first reaction everyone has to them is "WHAT! FREE IMAGES!?", but they always fail to really investigate the buyer experience. They are getting more than just low cost images when they pay, but also search engine creature comforts.

A lot of designers primarily do websites and they don't need great quality. They can get away with 200px sizes or smaller which can be crappy quality and still usable. So they visit the freebie sites and places that offer high quality "daily free downloads" to stock up. Novice designers may only be charging a couple hundred dollars to do an entire website so they get whatever free crap images they can pass along to their frugal customers. Professional web designers and designers doing print advertising probably don't bother wasting their time with free stuff.