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Author Topic: Bombshell at Alamy !! New Search Options  (Read 20541 times)

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« on: October 22, 2012, 09:08 »
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On friday Alamy sent an email to all contributors telling us that from now on the image search will bring BY DEFAULT results picked from their (manually ?) edited selection while the other images will appear after the BestOf ones, that means 10-20 pages for common keywords !

There's a 20 pages thread in the Alamy forum :
http://www.alamy.com/forums/Default.aspx?g=posts&t=14107

Looks like a very cruel step taken by Alamy, this is gonna kill the business of so many photographers there, even the ones with tens of thousands images are reporting no sales since friday !

admin: edited subject to be more descriptive
« Last Edit: October 23, 2012, 01:27 by leaf »


« Reply #1 on: October 22, 2012, 09:27 »
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They should change their QC policy and stop accepting every snapshot instead of bringing new search based on someone's personal taste.

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« Reply #2 on: October 22, 2012, 09:33 »
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They should change their QC policy and stop accepting every snapshot instead of bringing new search based on someone's personal taste.

With time new bold move they basically killed Alamy as a non-edited agency.
Now for every keyword you will soon get dozens of pages of BestOf, anything else will be irrilevant and never sell as the BestOf is now the default search option.

If before it was hard to make a sale over there now it will become impossible.

« Reply #3 on: October 22, 2012, 09:39 »
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"best of" is not the default search engine. Buyers are directed to the most appropriate search engine based on their buying pattern.

« Reply #4 on: October 22, 2012, 09:50 »
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Sounds like "popularity ranking" now has its icy grip of death around the neck of another agency.   

« Reply #5 on: October 22, 2012, 10:13 »
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I saw the e-mail, but stuffed it in a folder as it didn't seem to having anything significant to say. But based on the length of the thread, it's certainly got some Alamy contributors stirred up.

I did a couple of searches just now, and the "best of" seems anything but. And as noted in the forum comments, the text at the end "End of Best Of. Everything else:" is breathtakingly bad - what were they thinking?

I guess I'm still not clear on whether something I have done in keywording my images plays any role in how things appear in this new search option.

« Reply #6 on: October 22, 2012, 10:41 »
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It's blindingly obvious that all the agencies are now drowning in a sea of poor-quality material and need a way forward. 

It would be great if Alamy could actually say "we're biting the bullet and are going to actually look at the product we sell and decide what's good and what isn't, so we can present to customers on that basis" - like any ordinary retailer does with his products.   But with 25 million unique products in stock, that's simply not possible.   All they can possibly do is fall back on some variation of popularity-based ranking -  which, as we know, is basically instant death to new images.  It results in that casino-like situation where your image has to 'get lucky' and make a couple of sales very early, or it sinks into the depths forever.

Hope I'm wrong about this and that Alamy has some new spin on an old problem - or gives us a way to re-keyword our images to take advantage of the new system.

« Reply #7 on: October 22, 2012, 10:54 »
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In regards to editing their submission of what "should be" approved and what shouldn't it's a catch 22.

Previously Alamy posted "terrible" photos that sold for 5 figures because someone out there wanted exactly that. These images would have never made it into the collection if reviewers were to pick only the "best".

To me it appears that Getty actually went into the same direction with the Flickr move. They added substandard quality images and sold them for good money although many contributors had no clue what Getty is and how much an image is "worth".

I believe it's not so much about rejecting "bad" images but rather having a very good search algorithm.

The buyers need to have options presented that filter out the crap and find exactly what the buyer wants.

Of course this includes the contributors submitting correctly keyworded images.

This is where some leverage could be applied that reported images (and reviewed to be confirmed) for invalid keywords which would lead to lower search result rankings favoring honest contributors using correct keywords.

« Reply #8 on: October 22, 2012, 11:22 »
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even the ones with tens of thousands images are reporting no sales since friday !
A weekend without sales. That sounds scary.  ::)

« Reply #9 on: October 22, 2012, 12:35 »
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It's blindingly obvious that all the agencies are now drowning in a sea of poor-quality material and need a way forward. 

It would be great if Alamy could actually say "we're biting the bullet and are going to actually look at the product we sell and decide what's good and what isn't, so we can present to customers on that basis" - like any ordinary retailer does with his products.   But with 25 million unique products in stock, that's simply not possible.   All they can possibly do is fall back on some variation of popularity-based ranking -  which, as we know, is basically instant death to new images.  It results in that casino-like situation where your image has to 'get lucky' and make a couple of sales very early, or it sinks into the depths forever.

Hope I'm wrong about this and that Alamy has some new spin on an old problem - or gives us a way to re-keyword our images to take advantage of the new system.
[/quote.
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Exactly!  spot on!  they are basically drowning in it, poor quality, irrelevant material, spamming, etc. It really shows and in almost every search. Buyers, even if they dont care about quality must find it a nightmare. Its beginning to resemble a photography-class where all their material in hung up on the classroom wall, especially an evening class with introduction to PS elements.
« Last Edit: October 22, 2012, 12:48 by ClaridgeJ »

« Reply #10 on: October 22, 2012, 13:32 »
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Exactly!  spot on!  they are basically drowning in it, poor quality, irrelevant material, spamming, etc. It really shows and in almost every search. Buyers, even if they dont care about quality must find it a nightmare.

So what's the answer?  Wait until artificial intelligence research produces software that can judge the aesthetics and applicablity of a photo? That won't happen in 3 lifetimes, IMHO.  Other than 'popularity' ranking, I don't know what the big agencies can do, except watch helplessly as newer agencies, with more carefully curated collections, slowly eat their lunch.   

« Reply #11 on: October 22, 2012, 13:48 »
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Exactly!  spot on!  they are basically drowning in it, poor quality, irrelevant material, spamming, etc. It really shows and in almost every search. Buyers, even if they dont care about quality must find it a nightmare.

So what's the answer?  Wait until artificial intelligence research produces software that can judge the aesthetics and applicablity of a photo? That won't happen in 3 lifetimes, IMHO.  Other than 'popularity' ranking, I don't know what the big agencies can do, except watch helplessly as newer agencies, with more carefully curated collections, slowly eat their lunch.

They could first find out what most annoys their buyers :
is it heaps of similars all in a row - in which case they need to hide similars under one thumbnail.
is it anomalous spam - in which case they need to drop a bomb on the spammers.
Is it old images - automatically push the old images to the back of the search.

I think the easiest thing they could do is to start with the most popular searches and go through the first 5 or so pages of them and if something doesn't belong there move it down in the search. This could go a long way towards making the searches look good. If someone is searching back many pages then they expect to start seeing things that might not belong there.

I do agree that whatever site really gets a handle on this will move up a lot. Unfortunately from what I have seen in my very brief poking around with the Alamy edited selection they didn't do a very good job. My own sales there are sporadic enough that the fact that I have had no sales since then doesn't tell me anything.

« Reply #12 on: October 22, 2012, 14:11 »
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Exactly!  spot on!  they are basically drowning in it, poor quality, irrelevant material, spamming, etc. It really shows and in almost every search. Buyers, even if they dont care about quality must find it a nightmare.

So what's the answer?  Wait until artificial intelligence research produces software that can judge the aesthetics and applicablity of a photo? That won't happen in 3 lifetimes, IMHO.  Other than 'popularity' ranking, I don't know what the big agencies can do, except watch helplessly as newer agencies, with more carefully curated collections, slowly eat their lunch.

They could first find out what most annoys their buyers :
is it heaps of similars all in a row - in which case they need to hide similars under one thumbnail.
is it anomalous spam - in which case they need to drop a bomb on the spammers.
Is it old images - automatically push the old images to the back of the search.


Today's software could make some progress in cleaning up 'similars' although many would escape.  Software might recognize 2 head shots of the same model against the same background.  But is that fair, if one is laughing and one is crying? 

Productive, meaningful and fair editing can only be done by qualified, knowledgeable people - i.e. expensive people.   Not a pool of subcontracted, temporary reviewers with marginal English working off of checklists and paid by the numbers.

To do it right AND affordably would be a very slow, very long process. Might as well get started I guess.

« Last Edit: October 22, 2012, 14:15 by stockastic »

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« Reply #13 on: October 22, 2012, 14:35 »
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You simply can't trust this agency.

What's next ? This is unacceptable.

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #14 on: October 22, 2012, 15:01 »
+1
You simply can't trust this agency.

What's next ? This is unacceptable.

Which agency/ies do you trust and find their behaviour acceptable?

« Reply #15 on: October 22, 2012, 15:37 »
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On friday Alamy sent an email to all contributors telling us that from now on the image search will bring BY DEFAULT results picked from their (manually ?) edited selection while the other images will appear after the BestOf ones, that means 10-20 pages for common keywords !

There's a 20 pages thread in the Alamy forum :
http://www.alamy.com/forums/Default.aspx?g=posts&t=14107

Looks like a very cruel step taken by Alamy, this is gonna kill the business of so many photographers there, even the ones with tens of thousands images are reporting no sales since friday !


This post is ridiculous, please check your facts then maybe you won't spread wrong information.

Ed

« Reply #16 on: October 22, 2012, 18:22 »
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I'm cursed with a degree in English with a specialization in creative writing....my interpretation of the "best of" portion of the email was different....

Quote
Best of This option is specifically designed with the creative picture buyer in mind and is where Alamys creative imagery will stand out.  This sort function combines the edited selection with customer data this means images previously selected by our customers for that specific search. These Best of images appear first and are then followed by the remaining images in relevancy order.

Our editors will continue to review the collection and as images are added and purchased, the idea is that the Best of option will evolve.

Based on my read, "best of" is a combination of images selected for "best of" as well as images that have been previously licensed by agencies based in the "creative" market.


lisafx

« Reply #17 on: October 22, 2012, 18:28 »
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On friday Alamy sent an email to all contributors telling us that from now on the image search will bring BY DEFAULT results picked from their (manually ?) edited selection while the other images will appear after the BestOf ones, that means 10-20 pages for common keywords !

There's a 20 pages thread in the Alamy forum :
http://www.alamy.com/forums/Default.aspx?g=posts&t=14107

Looks like a very cruel step taken by Alamy, this is gonna kill the business of so many photographers there, even the ones with tens of thousands images are reporting no sales since friday !


This post is ridiculous, please check your facts then maybe you won't spread wrong information.


Could you clarify what is the "right information".  I either didn't get the e-mail or it hit my spam filter.  This sounds pretty worrisome to me.  If you can offer clarification, Equus, it would be helpful. 

Ed

« Reply #18 on: October 22, 2012, 18:34 »
+1
Lisa, here is the email....


« Reply #19 on: October 22, 2012, 18:39 »
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As someone else has said, the BY DEFAULT  is not correct. The search will in fact bring different results to different buyers, depending on their profile.
Also, someone JOKINGLY said that they had no sales since the new search came in, that is on Saturday and Sunday, so the new search wasn't working, but of course there are almost no sales at the weekend anyway.

lisafx

« Reply #20 on: October 22, 2012, 18:48 »
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Thanks Ed, for posting that, and Equus for further explaining. 

Reading it over, it doesn't seem like Armageddon has hit or anything.  Buyers can choose which of those searches they want.  It didn't seem to indicated that any of them would be the default, but I assume it would be relevancy unless specified otherwise. 

I don't know if any of my stuff will qualify as "best of" but for those who are submitting the most creative imagery, that will be quite a boost in sales, I would imagine. 

« Reply #21 on: October 22, 2012, 18:53 »
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It's not necessarily alarming in itself but hints at increased use of popularity ranking - in one form or another - in the future, as an attempt to replace 'junk' with files that at least have sold in the past.  And also the start of a higher-priced collection, and the temptation to push it in the search.

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #22 on: October 22, 2012, 19:01 »
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As someone else has said, the BY DEFAULT  is not correct. The search will in fact bring different results to different buyers, depending on their profile.
Also, someone JOKINGLY said that they had no sales since the new search came in, that is on Saturday and Sunday, so the new search wasn't working, but of course there are almost no sales at the weekend anyway.

As sales seem to be reported at 02:30 BST iyou can have a sale recorded on a Saturday (from Friday). However, that same contributer claimed to be having sales coming in during today. I've never found a sale other than that 02:30 timing. (I don't mean I wait up every night. Sometimes I'm up anyway, and find the odd sale come in then. I look each morning if I wasn't up late. I've never noticed a file come in later in the day. I've heard others say the same, but also I've read that person talk about sales coming in during the day before too. Another Alamy mystery.

@Lisa: James' Video: http://www.alamy.com/blog/contributor/archive/2012/10/18/5162.aspx

Incidentally, I've noticed a few of my 'test searches' are cleaner on 'relevant' today.

I see no difference in many searches between the creativity of many of the 'creative' files, nor can I see why James' special editors handpicked many of the images to be the alleged 'best'. Maybe that's just the searches I picked.

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« Reply #23 on: October 22, 2012, 23:54 »
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if you're not logged in, BestOf is the default option.

« Reply #24 on: October 23, 2012, 01:09 »
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Best-of?  its going to be interesting to see how they do this. Are they themselves going to chose whats "best-of" in every category or are they going after picture sales, i.e. downloads? cause in that case creative photography wont stand a chance.


 

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