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There is the risk that a site wont make enough money to justify using them but by giving them a chance, that risk is reduced. waiting on the sidelines is going to make their task much harder and we will end up with just a few sites that pay low commissions and don't have much respect for their contributors.
The question was: Are we really doing it right? We can't know for sure. We can only look back and around and try to learn from the past, from others and from our own experience.
.... Enjoy it while it lasts. It won't last long.
There is no past you can learn from. This is a total different world, as the world was before 1985 and 1968 and 1945.
Allow me to go back in time, 1985 I guess.
I remember using the original internet. The Military version. No chat rooms or email. Using the Dot Matrix Printers.
But the discussion was started about what to do in Microstock. Only uploading to the Big Four (remember that it used to be more then four not so long ago!), or also to the "lower earners".As seen in the light of history, what should be wiser?
Quote from: Colette on November 20, 2010, 12:10But the discussion was started about what to do in Microstock. Only uploading to the Big Four (remember that it used to be more then four not so long ago!), or also to the "lower earners".As seen in the light of history, what should be wiser? Well my only point was you can't tell in advance what business model will take off. It's merely coincidence. The best stock site - technically - has always been Canstock. Duncan had some very innovative ideas (like keyword relevance) but he had to sell the shop. As to iStock, it's clear they want to get rid of the small unsustainable contributors for now, but what will happen when the financial guys sold or dumped them? Will they go back to their roots? They have some pretty good reviewers, a loyal customer base and a lot of karma left.If another model will take off, it won't be more of the same, but totally different. We don't know yet. What if Google takes over all shops with Google Images for a placement fee? What if Flickr realizes its potential? I don't know.
People might think they are losing income by neglecting sites who produce a smaller percentage of that income. However, you have to evaluate your business model. Are you spending time on those smaller sites? How much time? Could you take that time and redirect towards the sites producing a higher percentage of your income? It's similar to marketing your photography in any field. Who do you want to target? Do you want to spend your time shooting for clients who will pay you $500, $800, $1000 an hour ... or do you want to spend all day goofing around for a couple hundred bucks? My moto is leave the chump change for the chumps.
I also don't like the way the big sites have huge collections that they could easily trim down but they prefer to reject more new images than get rid of ones that are years old and much lower quality.
This is a total different world, as the world was before 1985 and 1968 and 1945. Enjoy it while it lasts. It won't last long.
Canstock, technically best?? surely you cant mean that.
Look! dont matter if its Trad-agency or Micro, an Agency is as good as its Search-engine, thats the heart of any photolibrary business. period.The CS and DT, searches lay importance on showing series of almost identical images on premiere search-pages, showing incredible lack of variety. This is regarded as one of the most derrogative aspects in any search-engine.
On DT, the dilemma is solved elegantly by switching from relevancy to downloads in the SE. You get a sort of Darwinian sorting then of the "best", as proven by sales. You won't have rows of similars either then.
Quote from: lagereek on November 23, 2010, 02:18Canstock, technically best?? surely you cant mean that.Actually I meant the contributor side of the site, years back, not the buyers side as I wasn't a buyer then.Quote from: lagereek on November 23, 2010, 02:18Look! dont matter if its Trad-agency or Micro, an Agency is as good as its Search-engine, thats the heart of any photolibrary business. period.The CS and DT, searches lay importance on showing series of almost identical images on premiere search-pages, showing incredible lack of variety. This is regarded as one of the most derrogative aspects in any search-engine.Well that's correct, and I discovered that too. As it isn't mathematically possible to do a relevant search on databases with millions of images, buyers apparently limit themselves partly to the first pages and to visual search (the majority of my DT sales is found by N/A). If there is an image "good enough" on the first pages, a jewel hidden on page xyz will not be sold. To escape that math dilemma, many sites added biasing features like N sales, karma of contributor, N views.That's what we all experience: the idiosyncrasies of a SE can make or break you.I guess that sites that have the most "honest" SE like DT and CanStockPhoto will produce the most similars on a relevancy search by necessity.Sites with a very biased SE (like the best match of IS) won't.The reason for this is that all the keywords have equal weight. SLocke made that remark here yesterday. I wrote about that 4 years ago when DT still had 300,000 images. I won't spill the beans any more by telling some sites allow their reviewers to add a rating to an image so it will popup at a more advanced position. But still, the closer you stick to relevancy, the more you risk rows of similars.On DT, the dilemma is solved elegantly by switching from relevancy to downloads in the SE. You get a sort of Darwinian sorting then of the "best", as proven by sales. You won't have rows of similars either then.
Well it seems to me that once you have an image ready to upload you have done 90% of the work.
QuoteWell it seems to me that once you have an image ready to upload you have done 90% of the work.Agree. Most smaller agencies have easy submitting.Exception is submitting at Panthermedia for example. But for me they are worth the time, I am doing well there.
Yes, the risk that they close the doors after you've done a lot of work, like my experience was at Zymmetrical. That's the reason why submitting only makes sense when it doesn't cost you a lot of time or when you are doing well at an agency. But even the bigger agencies can fail when they choose the wrong course. The bigger the ship, the difficulter (and time consuming) is the turn.
No, I am not thinking of StockXpert. They were not a new and they were not a small agency.And no, I don't think that new agencies are in for a 'quick buck'. As John Griffin from Cutcaster wrote a while ago: "I am working my butt off..."Perhaps some of these agencies are going to make it, but it's not easy money. Not for us and not for them.