opinions are like... Everybody's got one and they all stink. 

Interesting, these are some of the points that were made and some of the same points often discussed here. The 3 buyers in this discussion were from different types of companies - fashion, magazine and book publishing. The podcast is worth listening to -

-fashion and magazine buyers want quality, book publishers want cheap
-fashion buyer thought microstock people pics were cheesy
-book publishers have low budgets, don't want extra cost for use for other platforms
-book publishers love microstock
-book publisher on panel downloaded 7,500 images in 6 months from shutterstock
-didn't know about "free" images or may use flickr for free images since those contacted via flickr will be happy to give their images away
-don't care if image is RF or RM, will only use an image once, just want one price
-will pay more if image is exclusive
-like specialty agencies with fewer pics
-fashion/magazine buyers will only pay 20 to 50 pounds per image, don't want bother of different types of licenses
-large buyers expect discounts
-rights-ready is confusing
-think agencies should cull their collections and not accept everything, too much out there to wade through
-don't like google images but can see how it might evolve
-don't want one or two big sites, they will never be able to find anything and then prices will increase
-they acknowledge that as lower prices are sought, quality suffers
-book publisher is not as concerned with quality if image serves purpose
-industry is forcing photographers out, can't compete with prices so low, production costs high
-digital technology has brought production costs down
-same images on different sites at different prices is devaluing photography and gives agencies bad rep
-photogs are driving down their own prices especially if their images can be purchased at different prices on different sites and/or with a subscription
-new crop of buyers today may not know where to look or what to get, need training on what a good image is with no attention to quality
-flood of imagery gives ability to negotiate, drive prices down
-want metadata on lo res because they download comps to present and they do not use lightboxes

Same old tea cups philosophy.

Interesting list Cuppa __ thanks for providing it.

I didn't quite understand how the book publisher managed to 'download 7000 images in 6 months' as that works out at 41 images per day ( assuming 7 days a week). I guess they could have had 2 subscriptions running together. I wonder how many of those images will ever actually be published though?

Quote from: cuppacoffee on August 25, 2010, 23:30

-fashion buyer thought microstock people pics were cheesy

Funny - I think most "fashion" pics are terrible.
http://www.benjaminkanarekblog.com/2010/06/26/fly-moon-harpers-bazaar-china/

I'd agree. I suppose a great many microstock images are 'cheesy' in that almost by definition they are horrifically cliched and lacking sublety. But that's simply the market speaking because contributors tend to produce what is proven to sell and the default search orders reflect the buying habits. If buyers choose to download 'cheesy images' by the bucketload, which they do, then that's what they will be mainly presented with. If they didn't then they wouldn't. Ultimately it is the buyers that steer both the producers of images and the search engines.

It is interesting getting the buyers perspective.  I wonder if they understand how little commission we make from some sites?  They will continue to want higher quality and lower prices and we will want to get paid a reasonable amount.  If buyers and contributors got together, that might be achievable.  While we only make 20%-50% commission, that doesn't seem possible.

I hope one day that someone comes up with a successful way to sell images without having to pay so much for an agency.

Another thing that was mentioned by one of the participants - they are beginning to use PicScout to find out if they can get an image cheaper elsewhere. I thought it was too slow and cumbersome but it appears that big buying houses may be training their people to look for "bargains". If you listen to the podcast the 2 "higher end" buyers went on and on at the beginning about how they want quality images and will pay for them, then at the end said they will only pay 20 to 60 pounds per image. That's not a high price for what they purport to say they want. They did admit that because of this they might be a major force in bringing down prices to the detriment of the industry. One participant even mentioned that today "anyone with a digital camera" could provide usable content.

They also didn't like it when agencies combined or were bought out by larger entities. They said that made it harder to find what they wanted, more images to wade through and they lost all past search history when this was done. They professed no love for Getty.

Yes, this was only 3 buyers from the UK but some of their comments seem to be universal from both the buyer's and seller's perspective and shouldn't totally be discounted. Time will tell.

"Quality" is anything. "Exclusive" almost certainly means the right to exclusive use of the image in a given territory for a certain time, so a rival cannot come out with  the same image.

From the summary, it seems to me that what they are really saying is they want every possible benefit of top quality and exclusive rights at virtually no cost. Hardly surprising but not very encouraging for us.

Quote from: cuppacoffee on August 25, 2010, 23:30

-fashion buyer thought microstock people pics were cheesy

Funny - I think most "fashion" pics are terrible.
http://www.benjaminkanarekblog.com/2010/06/26/fly-moon-harpers-bazaar-china/

Ha!ha! Well done. Even you see now on fashion magazine lots of on camera flash with ugly shadows that would not make IStock reveiw. But is done by designers with quality of phonecam. If not, it mostly oversaturation and is call new style photography glamour.
It same copy style of soft porn . All bad focus . But for soft porn no one is looking for composition except eyes on
vital parts. h@ha!

This is really very interesting to know.  Thanks Paulie and Cuppa for posting about it, and for the excellent summary.  

Unfortunately, the following did not surprise me:

If you listen to the podcast the 2 "higher end" buyers went on and on at the beginning about how they want quality images and will pay for them, then at the end said they will only pay 20 to 60 pounds per image. That's not a high price for what they purport to say they want. They did admit that because of this they might be a major force in bringing down prices to the detriment of the industry.

Great stuff - thanks for the legwork to summarize it.  Helpful insights.

- Chad