MicrostockGroup

Do they still got this special title requirement?

yes, be VERY careful about the dateline, and even punctuation.  i eben had one rejwction because i wrote N0v 10 rather than November 10 [that one did appear to be an overzealous reviewer as it was correct5ed]    problem is -- rejections often say "not suitable for editorial or something similar when really it's just the caption that needs re working

otoh, the editors there spend a lot of time in answering questions and helping get everything right.

ss doesnt break out ed vs rf, but for sites that do, about 30-40% of my sales are ed, while o nly 10-20% of my portfoilo is ed.  that's certainly a reflection of my subject matter, but it's been worth it thus far


steve

Although my editorial went very well at SS, and still does, I stopped uploading editorial there. The special caption line is not that difficult, but like BigStock very recently started to do, they only take Editorial in the narrow sense of "newsworthy", discarding all cultural, educational, ethnical and other "interesting" stuff. Translated: they want headshots of Obama.

My last Editorial reject on SS was this one:

Description:
Pelaez , Claveria, Mindanao, Philippines - JUNE 2: public pork meat sale in a local neighborhood of a small inaccessible community in the Bukidnon mountains during the annual fiesta on June 2, 2009.

The reviewer that rejected it said the description was unclear: what is a "fiesta" and "why do they sell meat"?
Well, an annual fiesta is an annual fiesta, and guess why they sell meat? (why does SS sell photos?).

I can't write a background novel in just 200 characters, especially since the time line takes a lot of space. So I gave up submitting editorial to SS, and if DT didn't accept most of it, I would retract it from microstock altogether and try RM.

Well in that respect there is bad news. The days of the colorful ignorant tribes in exotic faraway countries from National Geographic is long over. In the most remote corner I've been (on a motorbike over rocks), they all wear baseball caps, T-shirts "I love NYC", playing Celine Dion and txting on their cellphone. 
Most "ethnic" stuff in 2010 is fake, I suspect. There is more fauxtography around than one suspects.

But I did shoot Obama 

no, that's not so if it' s time, epixx. i've had my editorials review almost same day when i contacted them to say it's timely.  there is a note in the editorial submit page that tells you to send a PM to editor if it's timely so they won't take the usual route.

as for my own editorials. well, i haven't done much editorials lately, but my best seller is actually an editorial image that sells two or three times each year for the same event it was shot originally.
i like editorials because it's human interest, but in my new city, there isn't much things happening here worth reporting. it's a great sleepy town, lol.. but i'm not complaining.

So the question is: Say I'm at an event and I shoot like Jimmy Olson and get the scoop photo. Rush back to the Daily Planet darkroom, or my computer. Edit and upload to one of the above sites, SS most likely, as news/editorial, properly punctuated with the caps in the right places. Wow, someone buys it.

Am I supposed to be thrilled by being paid 25 cents?  Editorial and news should NOT be be priced as subscription and micro prices. People who buy this would pay a reasonable price and the agencies would have more people out trying to shoot real news and current events. But not for 25 cents!

I guess I'll add that to the Crapstock family of websites. CheapNewsPhoto.com. I'd have a corner on the citizen news market paying photographers $2 and selling photos for $10. Newspaper from around the world would pay $8 for a news photo? It's like having 20,000 stringers, everywhere! (yeah I know Scoopt failed, but they didn't review photos, were slow getting them posted and basically put cell phone photos in a dark closet as a way of nurturing them. I'm saying real photos and quality, not smudged 1MP snapshots.)

My last scoop was in 1982:
http://www.warrenpricephotography.com/2008/12/18/motocross-photography-the-source/

I'm way overdue.  But, I could use an agent, just in case.