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Then you could write a book about how not to get your account disabled.

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I have to be "brutally honest": it looks like the author of the "Brutally Honest Guide to Microstock ..." lacks a fundamental understanding of the Microstock industry dynamics.

I don't understand why I'm getting personally attacked. I just put an idea out there to discuss. Perhaps it has merit, perhaps not but attack the idea, not the individual, please.

Granted, the idea sucks and is stupid. Not you, the idea.

Quote from: sharpshot on October 09, 2017, 08:45

You have to forget everything that the current sites do.  It's something completely different.  There's some really smart people developing blockchain technology solutions, I just hope some of them like selling stock images.  I can see how it would be much better than anything we have now for both contributors and buyers.

It's not some sort of magic. It's just another way to send money (and avoid taxes). Marketing, storage, uploading etc. is still relevant. Storage can of course be "in the cloud" in a peer-to-peer system, but SOMEONE must store your images, and that someone would have to be you at first, meaning if your computer is not online, your images aren't. There must always be a server somewhere storing the assets, and when you go into the hundreds of millions, that costs money.

Marketing must still be done. How will the general population know about it? Why do you think Shutterstock/iStock show up as soon as I type "stock...". Because they spend millions and millions of dollars making sure they do.

I'm not sure about avoiding taxes because there's ways to do that using the sites we have now.  Most people realise it isn't a good thing to do.  With most of the cryptocurrencies, transactions are recorded and can be seen by anyone.  Have a look at every transaction in my Steemit account https://steemit.com/@sharpshot/transfers  It doesn't cost much to get 16 TB of hard drive space.  That should store enough images to keep most buyers happy.  Using a network of those drives in many locations with constant fast internet access will cost some money but we can make our own currency, so that's not a problem.  I was skeptical about all this a few weeks ago but now I think there's something in it.  You just have to get your head around a new way of doing business that's unlike anything that's out there in the stock images indusrty at the moment.

I don't think so, if we have our own site, we all have to pay for our own hosting, like Symbiostock that hasn't really worked.  The alternative is to all pay for one site and that's never worked on a large scale.  Then there's paying for marketing and it's just another site like all the others with no USP that's attractive to buyers.  Having our own currency is a USP.  Using blockchain technology for many things, like protecting copyright, is something other sites don't offer.  It's tearing up the way things have been done so far and coming up with a different solution.

Quote from: sharpshot on October 09, 2017, 12:49

I don't think so, if we have our own site, we all have to pay for our own hosting, like Symbiostock that hasn't really worked.  The alternative is to all pay for one site and that's never worked on a large scale.  Then there's paying for marketing and it's just another site like all the others with no USP that's attractive to buyers.  Having our own currency is a USP.  Using blockchain technology for many things, like protecting copyright, is something other sites don't offer.  It's tearing up the way things have been done so far and coming up with a different solution.

Yes, but you make it seem like the servers and everything related to them are free. They have to physically exist somewhere. The only real difference here is the currency. And for regular people, that is not something positive, unfortunately. You have a currency that could change its value 50% over one day. Since people who buy stock products work regular jobs and get paid in regular currencies, there is an exchange that must happen at some point.

And is marketing free? No, you have to market where people look. Today, that's Google. They do business in USD last time I checked.

Yes, USD that seems to be losing its value all the time.  Printed by governments that have built up a massive debt and still spend more than they collect in taxes.  It's hard to get your head around cryptocurrencies and how they work but I found it impossible to understand how the banking crisis happened and how we all ended up in the mess we're in today.  There might be a time when a cryptocurrency is a positive thing for the majority of people.  I remember how weird people thought the internet was in the 90's and how most people thought it was a fad.  Things often change in time.  It might be a few years off but there's no harm in investigating it now.

"You have a currency that could change its value 50% over one day." or 100% in a few hours.....sure its been a great earner but there is a huge downside risk.

Quote from: increasingdifficulty on October 09, 2017, 13:59

Quote from: sharpshot on October 09, 2017, 13:49

There might be a time when a cryptocurrency is a positive thing for the majority of people.  I remember how weird people thought the internet was in the 90's and how most people thought it was a fad.  Things often change in time.  It might be a few years off but there's no harm in investigating it now.

Yes, there might. Currency is just an agreement between people. Instead of trading a chicken for one night on my couch we can use this thing we call money. The most important thing is how many are part of that agreement. All currencies are of course made up, but a currency 1 billion people agree on, compared to 20,000, will be a heck of a lot more stable and useful.

I'm not against these currencies, I'm just saying that a stock site using cryptocurrencies is not that different from any site today. It's mainly just the currency. A currency that TODAY is a huge gamble for anyone.

In order to make any significant money selling stock photos you need a few million potential buyers.

No, it's something completely different. All the value of the business is in the currency and there's no owners or shareholders to pay off.  Anyone can buy from anywhere in the world without PayPal or all the other alternatives with their high fees.  Everyone can be their own bank, get their money almost instantly and not have it stolen.  There's no returning money for credit card fraud or charge-backs.  A developer paid 10,000 bitcoins for 2 pizzas in 2010 and that would now be worth over $48 million dollars.  So it isn't as simple as it being a huge gamble for everyone.  Some argue that keeping money in dollars is the gamble now because bitcoin has limited supply and dollars can be printed off whenever a government wants to, we will see in a few years time.  I know this isn't something for right now but it's sparked my interest.

It could easily be a limited supply of something nobody wants or needs....you have to have government currency to function. Past price history is no guide to future price...how much is a Black Tulip now? I could easily be wrong of course but its a huge gamble.

Quote from: Pauws99 on October 09, 2017, 16:00

"You have a currency that could change its value 50% over one day." or 100% in a few hours.....sure its been a great earner but there is a huge downside risk.

Yes, but you have to consider the risk with the traditional currencies too.  While almost everyone can see the risk with cryptocurrencies, the major fiat currencies aren't doing well.  What used to be called devaluation is now called quantitative easing.  The gold standard has gone, there's nothing backing the currencies up now.  Gold might be a good option but that's not easy to buy goods with on the internet.  People used to exchange shells and stones before coins and paper came along.  Maybe we will look back at this time and think how funny it was that governments printed our money, built up huge debts and never paid them off?

Yep but I'm not going to swap my money for gold or try bartering at the supermarket .....we have to have government based currency to live a "normal" life so there is a floor unless we all go to hell in a handcart...no one has to have a Bitcoin.

With most of the cryptocurrencies, transactions are recorded and can be seen by anyone.

How does that benefit the average seller or buyer?

Having our own currency is a USP

But not a very good one. Having a talking dolphin as your CFO is a USP, but it's not one that's going to make people form an orderly queue to start buying. 

Using blockchain technology for many things, like protecting copyright, is something other sites don't offer.

How does it protect copyright though? Copyright laws protect copyright, individuals and lawyers pursue cases of copyright infringement, and licenses make sure everyone knows the rules and what they can and can't do with an image. How would blockchain technology change that?

All the value of the business is in the currency and there's no owners or shareholders to pay off.

Well, the value of the business would be in the currency and also the business itself. Then you've got two things that can fail... the currency, or the business itself. Wouldn't it be better to ditch the currency and then the business can succeed or fail on its own merits. Would be a shame if a great site was brought down due to it not being a great currency.

Anyone can buy from anywhere in the world without PayPal or all the other alternatives with their high fees.

Doesn't cost me a penny when I use Paypal to buy stock. They want $100, I transfer $100, they get $100 and it has cost me $100. Sure, currency conversion is slightly different.

Everyone can be their own bank, get their money almost instantly and not have it stolen.

That's debatable! I think losing it would be the main concern though.

There's no returning money for credit card fraud or charge-backs.

So no protection for genuine buyers?

Don't get me wrong, I'm sure alternative forms of currency will become the norm in the future, and I'm sure they will have undeniable benefits, but my point is... why would the use of blockchain technology create a better stock site? Sure, the ability to pay using an alt-currency could be a seen as a small benefit, but I can't see anything within the technology that is going to eliminate the majority of things you need to run a successful stock site, or the money required to run it.

I see the currency like owning a slice of the company, like shares but divided between more people and not one person or entity controlling the majority of them.  The currency doesn't fail if the business is good in the same way that shares don't fail if the business is good.  I think it's a good USP because if its done right, a cryptocurrency doesn't have deflationary problems and can significantly outperform the dollar.  So anyone holding it is effectively earning money.

If you want some ideas as to how it could help with copyright protection, look at this http://blog.melchersystem.com/photography-blockchain-technology/

This is early days, I don't expect anything useful to come along for a few years and there are obvious problems but I do think it could be advantageous for contributors and buyers.

Not sure about that analogy as shares are based on a share of something tangible (though look at railway mania). A crypto currency is based on a group of people  considering  it has a value.....like a government currency but without the parachute. In the long term maybe it will work but Government are going to try very hard to made sure it doesn't as without a currency we don't have a state as currently understood. To me its more like art collection.....at the moment lots of arts experts agree that Picassos have a value and there is a finite supply. There is also a finite supply of my uncle Jim's creations but he remains undiscovered....if the art world decided he were a genius and Picasso a charlatan then the values would be reversed ;-).

There's a never ending supply of dollars.  There will only ever be 21 million bitcoins and the market cap is currently much less than any of the big banks.  If it reaches only a fraction of its potential, it seems good value now.  If it gets mass adoption and takes over from visa, mastercard, paypal etc, who knows what the price will be?  It could be another bubble but it could also be an S curve.  It's a gamble but the best investors I know diversify and don't have all their eggs in one basket.  I have no problem putting a bit of money I can afford to lose into something that's high risk.  Never understood why people either have too much fear or take too much risk?  There is a sensible way to take advantage of a situation without losing much and having the potential to make a lot.  I would fear leaving my money to gradually rot away in a bank much more.

There's no point in just having a cryptocurrency for payments, everything needs to work differently to the sites we currently use.  Here's something that might help the music industry http://opus-foundation.org/
Perhaps one day we will have something similar to try?  I know this technology is in its infancy and there's nothing out there that's earth shattering at the moment but that doesn't stop me hoping that the internet can adapt and give us better options than we have now.

Bitcoins are risky and could have a drop much more than money from a government which is backed by gold or silver. Contrary to what some people claim, the governments don't just print money as they need it.

http://www.finra.org/investors/alerts/bitcoin-more-bit-risky

"A growing number of physical establishments and exchanges allow customers to buy and sell bitcoins using cash, credit cards, money orders and other methods." If bitcoin is the currency why do they need to buy them with other methods?

We talk about "virtual" money vs "real" money, when most of our "real" money is in fact virtual, today. Banks are allowed to credit 10 times more than the physical money in circulation. So ~90% of what we consider "real", is already nothing else than bits and bytes in a server.

Even more: all money is nothing else than a product of our collective imagination, a fiction meant to facilitate trade between strangers. We often don't trust strangers as humans, but we trust their money. This is why crypto-currencies or, in other words, imaginary, virtual money can work as well, or as bad as "real" currencies. All are the same, in the end.

The only problem with the crypto-currencies is trust, the abstraction that makes "real" money work. Good (i.e. trustworthy) money has always chased away bad money, even when endorsed by local untrustworthy governments.

It might take a while before the market will trust these alternative currencies, even if free competition will be allowed.
However, this far from being the case. There are very clear signs that very powerful governments are not permiting a free currency market to flourish, in order to protect their money "printing" (or QE) monopoly.
I just read news about the US government accusing of money laundering individuals hosting crypto-currency servers, seeking their extradition and hundreds of millions of "real" money penalties.