MicrostockGroup

As I understand it, istock was (and maybe still is) expected to be Getty's big earner in the years that followed the sale. Some Getty projections from a few years ago indicated that management expected istock to surpass the regular Getty collection in terms of revenue. Maybe all of this (Agency, Getty Editorial, etc) trickling down to istock is just Getty's way of putting more of their existing content in the most popular place for current buyers. If buyer activity is shifting to microstock, put more of your collections in your microstock properties.

Although eventually this makes your microstock products less "micro", but maybe that doesn't matter. And of course the major side-effect for contributors is that with all of this content being funneled into istock, it's a hell of a lot harder to make a buck there.

She just doesn't stop, does she? Wow. She's off in a different stratosphere or something.

well you micro guys are responsible for all this, don't blame getty too much, i would do the same in their pants frankly speaking.

None left!

Looking at the London 'lypse images, it's clear that people spend a lot of time, effort and money shooting 'iconic' locations such as the London Eye, British Museum, Parliament, the Gherkin building and famous underground stations for the editorial collection.

Wonder how they'll feel when - tomorrow - images of these same locations start flooding into the collection.

Guess this will be one of those rare occasions at iStockphoto when things are done bang on time, rather than being delayed by months and months with zero communication.

(Intentionally meaning to quote myself this time!)
I see Sean has raised this very issue on the iStock thread.
I guess the Username could be EdStock, but the correct copyright could be assigned, just as at the moment you can have Username: SillySausage but copyright: Joe Bloggs.
Interesting how the Username thing goes. Does that mean they'll be able to shoot up the RC rankings super fast, whereas we are not supposed to be in groups or pairs (we are often told) but there are several couples/groups allowed.
I'm sure they wouldn't like it if we formed alliances with others (with a legal agreement) to zoom up the RCs.

Oh, yes; this will have been stacked up for months just ready for the button to be pressed. Look how they jumped the gun with the %age cut for Vetta. Yet is seems they still can't transfer files over to TS for those who actually want that to happen, and there are delays in having Vetta files transferred to Getty, as promised.
Same old, same old. 

Not stealing: you can regard it as 'posting it there on my behalf' (but with a lot more clout  )

That's true.  But there will probably be a best match advantage to that single user from having a lot of files, with plenty downloads and a 100% acceptance rate.

Anyway, that's probably academic because the files will enjoy a strong best match boost.  Otherwise known as 'files scattered in with every search'.  Remember what we were told when Agency was introduced:

In search and Best Match the images will be weighted fairly and will not have a heavier weight than any other file. In other words, you won't find the entire agency collection at the front of every search. You will find some agency collection files scattered in with every search, just the same as you see now for Vetta and exclusive plus files.

For a long time I've had the feeling they wanted to increase profits short term (by cutting commissions) to make the site look attractive to potential buyers ("look at this chart how our profits have skyrocketed over the past year") - But it seems more and more likely they want to kill the site (and microstock altogether) and get buyers back to Getty. I'm really confused and right now I've no idea how this is going to end. Aren't they aware of the alternatives, such as Shutterstock, Dreamstime and Fotolia ? Maybe they're only interested in buyers willing to pay macro-prices and the rest, the "poor" micro-buyers who switch to other sites, are "good riddance" anyway ?

Well, who is this Ed Stock, and does he get to keep the royalties?   

Interesting someone has noticed that the EdStock membership was created back in April.
Well, I guess we shouldn't be surprised. Of course this was the intention all along, and I'm sure we're still only at the thin end of the wedge.