I see they've edited the original post on istock since I read it

I think you misread it, as have a number of forum contributors. It's said the same thing from the off.
There are a lot of forums comments from designers who've been perfectly happy to pay low prices for illustrations and photos but are suddenly complaining when the boot is on the other foot.

I was not impressed with the Logo's on  brandstack and It is a common reaction when something is cheap to attack quality, I think I got better quality and far better service from the specialist logo company I used than I would get from Istock or  brandstack.

David  

David seriously;

brandstack logos are much better than the ones on the link you provided. You may not agree and that's fine since we have different opinions about "what a good logo is"

brandstack and IS will be providing the best possible solution in the world. brandstack is already doing it, and IS is getting ready to join them.

I know they will become the popular way for branding. My only problem with IS is their ridiculous %50 commission for a 1 time sell out. How do they expect us to make decent money getting %50? I don't even draw a bloody line for $50!

Come one now!

Quote from: cidepix on September 23, 2009, 06:15

I don't even draw a bloody line for $50!

Come one now!

Isn't that exactly the attitude that makes it easy for others to compete against you and provide a more cost-effective service?

It's a bit like a photographer saying "I don't even click the shutter for less than $100". You can try but you probably won't get too many takers.

I would rather do one job and get $5000 for a design than do 50 jobs for $100 to get the same money. There are enough people who will go for the former.

One thing to keep in mind for those of you that are interested in this offering, is that IS is offering a 50% ROYALTY ONLY FOR THE FIRST 6 MONTHS.  This rate is a "special offer" rate to entice you to join up and build up their library.

Here is the quote from the IS text:

"iStock will pay a base royalty rate of 50% per logo design for the first 6 months. We�ll give advanced notice for the rate going forward after that."

My bet, is that the royalty rate will be reduced at some point in the future (once they have built up their library).

I'd bet that as well, but I don't think it would be a very smart thing to do.  Hopefully that isn't the plan.

Would you sell the rights of one of your photos for $50 commission?

I'd certainly consider it if it were a poor seller. It would depend on who was doing the asking too.

Quote from: madelaide on September 22, 2009, 18:06

Isn't this discussion a lot like micros vs macros?

I don't see that. To me, it is more like "spec" work.

Which is exactly what stock photography/illustration is.

Quote from: ShadySue on September 23, 2009, 11:53

Which is exactly what stock photography/illustration is.

I think the difference is that they were discussing having to modify the logo files for the buyers. I'm not sure what they will eventually decide on, but the beauty of stock is that you don't have to make changes or deal with clients.

I would be happy to deal with clients.  You get to sell them a load more stuff.  At the moment I produce stock photos and don't know if they will sell or not.

There are a lot of questions that need answers in this program.

1. The TOS clearly states that images/vectors etc can not be used as logos. How will a buyer know if they are searching for an Apple logo vs. an Apple image? Will the logos be in a completely separate section of the site to avoid confusion?

2. How does the new guarantee apply? What happens when it's discovered that the logo is using a copyrighted font? Reviewers don't have the time now to properly research possible copyright/trademark issue so they routinely reject perfectly usable images. Will the same thing happen with logos resulting in frustrated contributors?

3. Logos are locked in for 6 months. The introductory offer of 50% commission is also only available 6 months. So what will happen if I upload a logo in month 5 and they change the commission rate in month 6? Will I get the 50% or the new percentage? Will I have the ability to remove my files that are less than 6 months old if I don't agree with the commission change?

4. What does 50% of 100 credits (not dollars) equal out to in dollars? 1 credit ranges from $1.80 to $0.47. According to the IS forum thread logos will be sold for 100 to 700 credits.

For a 100 credit logo contributor will be paid between $28 and $95. (credit value X credits used / 2) You have to remember that IS sells things in "credits" not dollars, and we are not privy to see which credit package the buyer is using.

5. They are offering a $5 bonus if your logo is one of the first 10,000 accepted. Another bonus of $5 if they reach the goal of 10,000 before the program launch in January. This just sounds like a bribe and it may work for some people. Are logo designers really going to stop selling through their normal channels for an extra $5?

6. What about exclusives? The legal terms of exclusivity say that it's all or nothings. Will exclusives who design logos have to choose between selling the logos on IS to keep their exclusivity or dropping exclusivity to keep their private clients? Or is this the first "image exclusive" program and the whole concept of exclusivity will be soon changing to an image based system?

The logos thing seems like a different business and more complicated than RF stock and footage. I wonder whether it shouldn't be a different company and website.

IS is such a nice simple and easy to understand idea. The logos might have the potential to contaminate that simplicity.

On the other hand anything new at IS is always a big old fuss and thread which breaks all previous records.

And then everything calms down and it all ends up being fine.

Regarding recent massive disabling of outsourced logo solutions I think that someone made very wrong decision on Istock with giving such product as logos...

Regarding that Logo isn't child play and you need to know much more than to compose design or just draw I'd make some additional points:

1. 50% for logo is too low 'royalty' for any serious logo designer - no matter what is the price by which logo is sold.
2. Regarding logo pricing - it comes up to 'bottom feeders' territory - so any serious company will avoid this istock service. Also, any starter company will avoid this due to price and not guaranteed possibility to trademark such logo obtained on istock.
3. What I've seen there are tons of some kind of signs which never could be perceived as logos. Also, very much people as people who obviously don't have enough knowledge for logo design are creating very close or similar to already published and trademarked logos...

As a notice to such people I'd say that logo design isn't plain stock submitting as well it brings very high level of author's responsibilities while istock is washing hands from authors in their agreement. So, some authors might end up as someone who is legally charged on court while istock will turn their back to them.

If you are working on logo design be sure that you NEVER create something like logos shown here:

http://www.brandsoftheworld.com/

Good luck!

" 50% for logo is too low 'royalty' for any serious logo designer - no matter what is the price by which logo is sold."
This of course makes no sense. If the price is right then the 50% received is fine.

I've had 30 plus logo designs accepted, most take around 1 or 2 hours. I'll be happy to get $2/300 for any of them.  I'm a very experienced designer, I'm also a pretty successful istock contributor, I'm looking forward to the successful launch of the service.

Really? You think your right price is $200 - $300 per logo? Can I get your contact if you are so experienced? I know some people who can hire you for outsourcing logo designs and maybe you can earn much, much more ;-)

Quote from: vlad_the_imp on November 23, 2009, 05:26

I've had 30 plus logo designs accepted, most take around 1 or 2 hours. I'll be happy to get $2/300 for any of them.  I'm a very experienced designer, I'm also a pretty successful istock contributor, I'm looking forward to the successful launch of the service.

A 'very' experienced designer does not waste a minute of his lifetime for this kind of BS. You made 30 logos! Good luck selling them all. You will see the sore truth when you actually sell 1/10 of the logos you made. Which is going to come down to $20 per logo  

Enjoy!

Cidepix, when people understand that their work is manipulated and lowered by such 'brilliant' 50:50 deals where all risks are on authors part they will understand. It just need some time that to happen when someone sells logo and problems come up ;-)

Your points are very clever and some people will understand that logos aren't microstock images as well if other people ever understand what is the difference on micro and macro shots. Differences are fading due to some macros are dropping prices. But, there is still quite a lot of them where macro is quite different than micro. Logos are by default macro and exclusive so they can't be sold more than once. Not to mention that any of that logos should be able for buyer to trademark. And problems will come there! Regarding that, prices and cuts on istock are very funny! The more funniest thing is that now army of people who thinks that they know to draw or design trying to become logo designers ;-)