.

.

Pretty soon most people will be carrying DSLR quality phones in their pockets. I've seen some pretty impressive photos from ordinary people using phones. Buyers have openly said they want fresh unstaged photos. Contributors that produce nice clean smiling happy lifestyle images are saying their sales are tanking. Have buyers dried up? Or have their buying habits changed?

Their buying habits have changed. Clearly, if these large agencies are willing to take phone uploads and sell them. I had a few images rejected by istock because they "looked like snapshots (but were really fresh, unstaged photos)." Now, they WANT those snapshots!

Quote from: mlwinphoto on March 12, 2014, 17:47

Quote from: tickstock on March 12, 2014, 15:49

I asked the question because I don't think Getty is known as the company who used predatory pricing to gain market share...snip

Read what you just wrote....if they weren't known before as a company who used predatory pricing to gain market share they sure are now....free is pretty cheap, don't ya think?  And, it is being done to gain market share.

It's not really free

They're charging people now?

Some links to "history of Getty Images" articles, some of which have quotes or comments that look interesting now.

http://www.mactribe.com/news/features/feature50.php

http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/getty-images-inc-history/

http://ethix.org/2003/06/01/under-gettys-images-brand-values-and-leadership-principles

http://photobusinessforum.blogspot.com/2009/10/getty-images-business-fantasy-update.html

From the last one above, some comments from Jonathan Klein on the importance of subscriptions (and Getty has clearly failed, thus far, to build the industry leading subscription business)

"2. Build the market-leading subscription business

Subscription is a fast growing part of the market, and an area where we have had a long-standing gap in our product portfolio. Jupiterimages Unlimited brings a very good base from which to start, but we will create an entirely new subscription business that builds upon it. This new subscription product will be a major initiative, with significant marketing support. It also represents a major collaboration between Getty Images and iStockphoto. We may not be number one in subscription � YET � but we know how to get there and will get there."

There's also a mind-boggling quote from the ethix.org article about trust - not that I disagree with what's written, but I have a hard time squaring that with the behavior of the company:

"This brings up an interesting point about ethics. Our unusual industry is based on trust. For example, a photographer comes and signs a contract with us. We take the photographer�s images that we want and contract to market them, agreeing to pay part of what we will get if someone uses the image. We send the photographer a monthly report which says how the image was used and what money was paid. But the photographer relies entirely on us. They don�t really know if People Magazine paid us eighty bucks or eight hundred for their image. It is based on trust."

Quote from: Shelma1 on March 12, 2014, 18:10

Quote from: tickstock on March 12, 2014, 17:58

Quote from: mlwinphoto on March 12, 2014, 17:47

Quote from: tickstock on March 12, 2014, 15:49

I asked the question because I don't think Getty is known as the company who used predatory pricing to gain market share...snip

Read what you just wrote....if they weren't known before as a company who used predatory pricing to gain market share they sure are now....free is pretty cheap, don't ya think?  And, it is being done to gain market share.

It's not really free

They're charging people now?

It's not free in the same way that sites offer a free image of the week for example.  There are lots of restrictions attached to the images.  Most importantly they have to be used in the embed player but they can't be used for commercial purposes, they can have ads placed over top of them or maybe even in place of them, they aren't guaranteed to be there the next day.  It's a very restrictive 'free' use.  I'm sure you can see the difference between this program and what most agencies say free images.  One place that comes to mind is dreamstime's free offering http://www.stockfreeimages.com/

They're not charging people to use them. Therefor they're free. All agencies place restrictions...that's what licensing is. But they charge money for the usage, so they're not free.

And of course, iStock gives away free images as well. Odd that you'd use Dreamstime as your reference.

BTW the 4th result on google for 'predatory tactics' comes up with this
http://www.ibtimes.com/amazoncom-retail-predatory-pricing-bully-tactics-squeezing-competition-retailers-small-business
an article about Amazon and predatory pricing.

Thanks for posting that link. Good read, quite eye-opening. Should be mandatory reading in all schools.
In the near future, we might be reading a similar story about such bully practices in another industry.

Jo Ann those are interesting even the ranting one at the end but I'm not sure what you are trying to show with them.  Serious question.

Having described Getty as predatory, I thought I'd try to provide some specifics to back that up (for anyone who hadn't really looked at the origins of the company and its path from there to here.

Most of the art directors I know consider Getty a bully and a quasi-monopoly and wish they had more competition. They don't have a very good reputation among their customer base.

.

It's an option on upload, something like "if this image is not accepted do you want to send it to the free section?" There was some confusion as to the default, send or not to send but that was because the uploaders didn't read the info by the click box. You can set the default to go or not go and they don't take even everything that isn't accepted. There aren't that many images there. It's a way of sending viewers to the paid site and they have similar paid images displayed under the free images that click through to the main site.

.

.