Stockmaniac, take a deep breath and look through the DT site.  One thing I like to do is read between the lines and see what's going on.

1) Have you seen the thread announcing the new reviewer?
2) Have you seen the thread THANKING the reviewer that resigned in the off topic section?
3) Have you seen the busiest photographer list lately?  Most of the folks that are on that list have a lot of images online and are high volume producers.  Have you seen that Iofoto is on that list?  Clicked on his portfolio?  That's over 3,300 images uploaded in the past month.  There are others that are moving there portfolio there as well and the rate of images going up is unprecedented since the time I've been on the site.

Review time is a dynamic thing.  I've had iStock take 2 weeks in the past (when I contributed there) and I've had DT review in a matter of a day or two.  If it makes you feel any better, I've had Canstock review in a matter of minutes.  It's all an elastic process.

I hate to say this but if your images are getting stale over the course of 2 weeks, then your submitting the wrong types of images to sell as stock.

eendicott:

No, I haven't seen those threads.  I don't hang out there as much as you   Thanks for the heads-up.  I will go and check them now.

One of the first threads that appeared on the DT forums about this very topic (http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_7106) had the same basic reply from Achilles:

"Do you realize that editors sleep at night, right? "

Achilles later in the thread responds to a submitter with the following statement (meant to ridicule him):

"We receive hundreds of thousands of submissions monthly, how many do you have there?"

It would have been nice if Ellen or DT admin would have stated the facts that you are presenting in a nice way.  But instead of saying that they lost a reviewer and are hiring a new reviewer, they come up with lame excuses and try to ridicule submitters.

I'm sorry, but my take on this is quite different from yours.  For one thing, Ellen is very busy and really doesn't need to spend time on our little forum promoting DT.  She could just as easily concentrate on the DT forums or some other place.  And, I like the fact that we have someone directly addressing us here--coming to us with advice.  Really, she doesn't have to do this; DT has plenty of contributors and a growing database of quality images.  Her presence here makes it clear that they are interested in improving the quality of their images and their relationship with contributors, which is why they hired Ellen in the first place--to help with marketing and market position.  And, frankly, it suggests to me that DT values our forum and believes we have quality photographers here.  That's not an insult; it's a compliment.

I honestly am not sure what has irritated you so much.  Her comment about Easter and sleeping is a reminder to her contributors that the reviews are performed by people, people with needs that must be respected.  Personally, I won't contribute to a site that won't allow down time for reviewers.  The work is hard and doesn't pay much.  While the reviewer has a choice to work or not, that reviewer should nonetheless have decent working conditions.  You might bear that in mind.

As to asking you for your DT name, I think she's simply being friendly.  My guess is that she wanted to review your portfolio to understand why you think your images go stale so quickly, and to give advice about how to improve the shelf life of your images.  At least, that is what I would have done.  She has nothing to gain by publicly insulting and misdirecting a photographer; it seems illogical to me to assume she is doing so.

The comparison between microstock and macrostock is apt, and it is useful.  And, by the way, she may be understating the difference:  I've heard anecdotes about photographers waiting months to hear back from traditional agencies.

The delay in reviews shouldn't really frustrate you.  If you keep a steady stream of images under review--I wish I had the ideas to do that!--you'll be getting daily notifications about the review process.  It's a bad idea to submit a big batch of images and then sit around stewing until the images are reviewed.  Submit 'em and forget 'em.

Quote from: sharply_done on April 09, 2007, 16:16

StockManiac: The Director of Content and Business Development asks to look at your portfolio. Your response: Question her motives and insult her. Way to go. Smooth move. Real smooth.

She writes a blog that many users access on a daily basis (who wouldn't?). You may have received free publicity. You may have been able to bend her ear so that she could influence the DT powers that be to address your concerns. She may have been a valuable resource to this forum. Furthermore, she's very new to this site, and this was only her second post here - I'm sure she feels very welcome now.

Yes, she might have been able to do all of those illustrious things, but instead here is how she responded to this thread (which was about the large inspection queue at DT):

- She first stated that reviewers have to sleep and take the Easter holidays off.  A useless statement as I said before, especially since the queue has been this large for a long time before Easter weekend.

- She compares microstock to macrostock.

- She asked to look at my portfolio.  Once again, something that has nothing to do with this thread.

If you don't understand her tactics, it is to take your eyes off of the original issue and try to focus it elsewhere.  From your comments, it seems like it is working.

If she really wanted to do something about the issue, she would have asked for more comments and stated that she would bring it up with management.

Some Facts:

• Larger portfolio owners get their reviews done a lot quicker. I have been keeping a log of them.
  Larger portfolio owners have stacks of non selling images
  Larger portfolio owners get preference over the types of images they submit, you submit them and get stupid rejection reasons only to find someone else get virtually the same type of image accepted after your rejection
  DT NEEDS TO EMPLOY A LOT MORE REVIEWERS ... not just ONE.
  Shutterstock review times for me average 12 hours - DT 3 weeks!
  DT needs to learn about professionalism in business, and consistency
  DT needs to answer their emails and they would not get criticised in open forums
  DT needs to employ someone with better English speaking skills to monitor the forum instead of their current stack of rude idiots

I think you need to get your facts straight.  I too had the very same concerns you have and I addressed them directly to Serban a few months ago (he did answer the email).  I can assure you from Serban's response that the agency is very transparent with relation to what they do.

The reason you suspect that the larger contributors get faster reviews is because they upload via FTP, then go back and enter keywords, categories, etc. at a later date.  When a file gets uploaded, it gets assigned an image number.  Reviews are then sorted by image number.  Say you upload 500 images tonight, then come back a month later to keyword them.  Your images will be at the top of the list a month from now - and will get reviewed within hours of hitting the pile.  That's how the system works - it's been addressed in their forums.

DT has many reviewers - not just one.  However, one can affect the work flow.  There are reviewers all over the world but many work in Romania.  Easter is a Christian holiday celebrated all over the world and (gasp) I even stopped uploading images and sending CDs over the weekend so I could have the weekend off.  Friday was also a Muslim holiday - I am not Muslim but I think it had to do with the birth of Mohamed.  Have you noticed that B & H and Adorama didn't take orders for the sale of equipment last week and will resume tomorrow?  They are observing Passover - again business ceasing to celebrate the holiday.

If you'll notice in previous threads, Becky (Envisagephotography) was monitoring the forums.  If you've read through past threads, you'll learn that she was born and raised in Montana, currently lives in Las Vegas, and is a native English speaker.  Reyna is in Texas - north of Dallas - another native English speaker.

Sometimes it is tough to communicate but I will tell you that the reviewers will respond to you with time, and Serban will provide thoughtful responses to your questions.

...and since we are comparing - have you ever re-submitted an image to Scout at iStock?  Took me 4 months to get a response when I was a contributor.  I've gotten responses to my questions about refusals within 24 hours at Dreamstime - that's the norm when you don't blast the reviewers, call them names, or question every refused image.

I may not agree with everything they do or how they go about doing it, but I still believe they are one of the fairest micro agencies around based on my experience.

http://www.dreamstime.com/Iofoto_info[/url]) has 3,385 images.  According to their portfolio, they joined on 02/04/2007 (which was 64 days ago).  DT has a daily upload limit of 40 images.  If they uploaded the maximum of 40 a day since they joined AND 100% OF THEM WERE ACCEPTED, that would total 2,560 images.

So how did they get 3,385 images online?

Easy, the announcement was made on March 13...

http://www.dreamstime.com/archives.php

According to this thread, the upload limit was set to 40 back in 09/2006:

http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_1832

Remember that this assumes that he had 100% of his images accepted (which I highly doubt could ever happen on DT).  If he had 80% of is images accepted, then that would only bring the total number of images allowed online to 2,336.

I can easily see how someone as noteable and experienced as Ron Chapple would be very close to getting 100% acceptance. I'm very new to this game, and my acceptance ratio at DT is almost 90%.

So, are some submitters getting better treatment than others?

Why not? If it was my site and someone like Chapple came along I'd certainly remove any barriers. Furthermore, it's not out of the realm of possibility that he was invited there - perhaps by the same person who was unfairly treated earlier.

According to this thread, the upload limit was set to 40 back in 09/2006:

http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_1832

You are correct, then it was re-set when they caught up again and things slowed down.  In March, they had to change it again.  As I mentioned above, the queue is very elastic - things change all the time at Dreamstime just like they do at iStock.

the issue is about DTs ongoing inefficiency, ongoing lack of consistency, and ongoing failure to do what they promised: rid the site of non-selling images.

As StockManiac pointed out, despite the "one-off" success of IoFoto, it is hard to believe that one person could possibly have had that many images approved when most of us have stuff in the line for weeks and weeks, and are lucky to get 5 looked at a week.

A lot of us took this upon ourselves.  I've deactivated 63 of my own images that had been there longer than 1 year but had not sold.  I am re-thinking my decision as I'm sure DT is - the average life of an image in stock is upward of 5 years.  I'm willing to bet that Ellen, as the new content director, is evaluating the situation prior to making the decision for all contributors.

With relation to Ron - take a look at his work, take a look at his web site.  He's a high volume producer with a team of 10 people working under him to make sure his images are edited tightly, keyworded, etc.  His success isn't coincidence, nor chance.  I wouldn't be surprised if Ron sent over 5,000 images to start.  He has them available and ready.

Ask around to the other large contributors about their acceptance - Photoshow, Forgiss, Webking, etc.  I'm willing to bet their acceptance ratios are above 98%.  I know a couple who have expressed this.

I don't know if any of you really watch the busy photographer area that closely.  I remember last year when Jeancliclac uploaded his portfolio.  It looked to me like he had almost 3,000 up and for sale overnight.  There aren't any deals cut in the back room that DT hasn't already mentioned somewhere in the forums.

And since I last posted (less than 20 minutes ago), Iofoto's portfolio has gone from 3,385 images to 3,409 images.  An increase of another 24 images.  This is getting quite interesting...

Have you seen his average monthly uploads?  That equates to 28.5 images per day.  The reason they aren't showing as having been uploaded this month is because they were uploaded in March - just as if you or I would have uploaded in March and would have had to wait in the queue like everyone else.

well i would agree they are new to the microstocks relativly speaking, but what they do have that we don't is experience... I mean over 10 years of shooting stock experience - this gives them more credibility when it comes to discussion stock photogrpahy.  Micro stock or macro stock - a good stock image looks the same at both places.

-and take it easy on the personal attacks.

And since I last posted (less than 20 minutes ago), Iofoto's portfolio has gone from 3,385 images to 3,409 images.  An increase of another 24 images.  This is getting quite interesting...

Iofoto now has 3,511 images online (and it seems to grow by the hour).  That is an increase of 102 images since my last post, which was less than 12 hours ago.

So this confirms what litifeta was saying (that some contributors are getting special treatment).

This also explains partially why the queue has grown so large: Certain members are allowed to bypass the normal rules (of 40 uploads a day).  My bet is that these "special" members are also bypassing the normal inspection queue and getting their images reviewed as a priority.  If the reviewers then have time after reviewing their images, they then work on our photos (which are at the bottom of the stack).

So it seems that DT implemented the new 40 image/day upload limit (for the rest of us) so that they could make way for some of their "special" members.  Gives me a real warm & cozy feeling all around.

eendicott:

Thanks for pointing out Iofoto's portfolio.  It has been a real eye-opener into how DT treats the rest of us.

Quote from: litifeta on April 09, 2007, 17:12

Some Facts:

• Larger portfolio owners get their reviews done a lot quicker. I have been keeping a log of them.
  Larger portfolio owners have stacks of non selling images
  Larger portfolio owners get preference over the types of images they submit, you submit them and get stupid rejection reasons only to find someone else get virtually the same type of image accepted after your rejection
  DT NEEDS TO EMPLOY A LOT MORE REVIEWERS ... not just ONE.
  Shutterstock review times for me average 12 hours - DT 3 weeks!
  DT needs to learn about professionalism in business, and consistency
  DT needs to answer their emails and they would not get criticised in open forums
  DT needs to employ someone with better English speaking skills to monitor the forum instead of their current stack of rude idiots

I think you need to get your facts straight.  I too had the very same concerns you have and I addressed them directly to Serban a few months ago (he did answer the email).  I can assure you from Serban's response that the agency is very transparent with relation to what they do.

The reason you suspect that the larger contributors get faster reviews is because they upload via FTP, then go back and enter keywords, categories, etc. at a later date.  When a file gets uploaded, it gets assigned an image number.  Reviews are then sorted by image number.  Say you upload 500 images tonight, then come back a month later to keyword them.  Your images will be at the top of the list a month from now - and will get reviewed within hours of hitting the pile.  That's how the system works - it's been addressed in their forums.

eendicott:

Don't you care that Serban (aka Achilles) lied to you?

eendicott:

Don't you care that Serban (aka Achilles) lied to you?

I will tell you straight out that Serban has never lied to me.  I've been a contributor with DT since October of 2005.  I have a very good relationship with Serban - one of open dialog.  I can honestly tell you (not being employed by the site) that he takes these things very personally and that he knows everyone's (yes, EVERYONE's) portfolio very well.

This whole conversation tends to make Ellen's point above - are you even a contributor at DT?  It makes me wonder why someone who has their images represented by an agency call the owners names and accuse them of lying.

What's your agenda?

I second this sentiment.  One of the things that make me insane is the atrocious behavior that otherwise normal, polite individuals exhibit online.  Just because we can't see you face to face doesn't give you license to be rude.

This isn't an issue of "freedom of speech," either.  This is a private forum, where such freedoms are at the discretion of the forum owner/moderator.  It's an issue of common courtesy to your fellow photographers.

-and take it easy on the personal attacks.

I am surprised by the behavior exhibited by a few members in this and another thread.

I don't know what it is that the people in question do for a living, but it surely isn't photography, where success is entirely about networking and nurturing/maintaining business relationships. Insults and accusations - no matter what your profession - will never advance your career or standing.