Definitely too bad. But from the beginning, they rejected some top notch pro level stock from a few shooters I know in favour of the "contemporary" model. So photos of tatooed snakman picking his nose gets in, sustainable and excellent travel shots cast aside. Just to push the envelope a bit, I shot noodles in an old dirty pot. That made it through. My friend's steam locomotive with killer sunset did not.

I have no bias against a contemporary model, because a photo done well can sell no matter what the subject, aand I like edgy stuff, but to cast aside proven sellers from shooters with a track record not a wise idea

Seems to tell me that the industry cannot support higher commissions.  You either give the money to the contributors or use it for marketing.  Sacrificing marketing for happier contributors just may not be economically feasible. 

fred

Vincet Laforet had an interesting post today on the closing of photoshelter

link here

As far as all the 'this sucks' and 'I was hoping they'd make it' comments go, don't you people realize you had a hand in this by participating in the microstock market? You can't have it both ways.

Yes, people who have the same RF images at micros and PSC (like you I think, right?) aren't helping.   

I think the more relevant question is why are we all submitting to micros? Probably because most of us don't have the credentials to get accepted at Getty or Corbis. I think most of us would rather be making hundreds or thousands of dollars per sale and a good annual return. So that being the case I think the bigger sites had more of a hand in this by not seeing the trend earlier. They could have influenced the trend by more aggressively recruiting sub-pro photographers who could produce saleable images comparable to what's on Getty/Corbis. They started to with Istock and are now cherrypicking at Flickr. Kind of late to the party aren't they?

I've looked at the PS Archive and it seems over-priced to me.