MicrostockGroup

Exactly. They've become as successful as they have just by keeping it simple and sticking to the original principles of microstock. All images are priced the same, the site works flawlessly with just the right amount of functionality and they've never tried to shaft their contributors. Slowly, slowly catchee monkey.

I've run my own figures backwards again and, if my portfolio is still as average in performance as it ever was relative to the greater library, they suggest that Shutterstock now has annual sales in the region of $150M. That doesn't include Bigstock either.

Unfortunately that's your job not theirs! All they can do is provide a fair platform for the content they receive, which I think they do admirably. I think 'the cream' has a fairer chance of rising to the top on SS than any other site, helped enormously by the sheer volume of sales. I think my monthly sales on SS nowadays are usually higher than my sales on IS, FT, DT and BigStock combined.

I guess that's my point. I'm just not sure the sub platform is fair or sustainable to the contributor. I'd much rather sell 10 times less and get 20 times more.

Me too, but I'd rather sell one picture for one million and then just shoot what I like for the rest of my life. 

Alamy still pays best for me, but it's not micro, so for people who shoot micro style and subjects, it's not going to work. On the other hand, since I don't shoot apropos Micro stuff, I'm the other side and I get piddly downloads. I will say that after some brief burp this Spring SS suddenly jumped back to life and IS went to sleep. I think it may be a matter of IS not just smelling bad, it's decaying and dead.

So with that, I'll say - SS Exclusive for a small pay increase or search bonus. I'd drop all the rest of the RF sites and go sub on SS. Only one place to upload, on place to play the ED caption game, keywords are only for one site, not multiple versions depending on what they like or don't like. Yes, One Micro Site that's for me. (I might do it anyway)

They make the most income/sales and somehow (except for support tickets) are the most in tune with users. And speaking of support tickets. One of the complainers who was pounding the keyboard every three days, listed his ticket numbers, it shows something interesting. His ticket numbers are in the thousands per day, one day 9,000, another over 10,000. You know what that means? Someone has to read those 10,000 support tickets? 70,000 a week! Small wonder with people writing over and over about the same thing, it brings the whole system to it's knees.

Anyway, SS Content Exclusive or better yet for me, RF contributor exclusive. I'm In! 

Great idea.  I've had customer comments and requests from iStock, Dreamstime and Deposit, but not Shutterstock.  Have you made the suggestion there?

possibility to create a "favorites" collection like 123RF has, with effect on search positioning. Also possibility to display this collection on the above mentioned contributor info page.