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Microstock Photography Forum - General => General Stock Discussion => Topic started by: djpadavona on July 11, 2013, 13:56
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This has been coming on for a few years now. I think I've had it with stock altogether. The relationships with these agencies is abysmal. In the last 2 years I have had my commissions cut by iStock twice, and now with the new pricing program I barely make 50 cents per download. Bigstock turned most of my on demand sales into very low paying subs, and 123RF made a similar move. Fotolia made so many anti-contributor moves that I removed my portfolio 18 months ago and haven't considered ever doing business with them again.
Who's next? SS? DT? Should I even care?
On one hand I could keep my ports up and let the money continue to flow in at a reduced rate every month as commissions keep getting slashed. But I'm pretty much getting raped every month. I don't see the agencies I supply images to working hard enough on my behalf to justify keeping 70%, 80% or more of the profit.
Sure this is just a rant, but I'm pretty serious about it. My heart isn't in it. I feel like I'm getting swindled. I certainly can't say I enjoy "shooting stock." So maybe it is time to just be done with it and let somebody else take the abuse.
A lot of people told me a few years ago, "Just walk away from it for a while." Well I did. From January until April of this year, I barely ever checked my sales. Stopped shooting stock altogether. Only made a few posts here. Then I came back after spring and made one last go of it, and I realize now that I simply detest most of these agencies and don't find anything about stock to be interesting or enjoyable. And the commission cuts just keep coming, and coming.
Thoughts? Anyone feel the same?
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I feel your pain. I've only uploaded 11 images in the past 2 years. I'm spending my time building my main business and counting the infrequent payouts from the other agencies as "extra" money, not something that I count on.
I can say that I'm much less stressed by the changes that I read about here!
It seems to me that someone as talented and intelligent as yourself will find other ways of making money that make you happier.
I wish you all the best!
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I am not long enough in stock Dan, and I am an amateur, but I think I know what you mean. I actually got a bit of the same feeling, working so hard to shoot these images and process them and see the crap results. I like my own photos. I LOVE photography. I went to London this year to meet up with a few SS contribs. Great fun. But I am now sitting on some of the photos, not knowing what to do. Do I upload them to the agencies or not? Good images, for peanuts? Also the work that goes into processing these images and dealing with all these crap uploaders, editors, different keyword requirements, bugs, etc, it takes SOOOOO much time, and for what. 30 cents here, 25 cents there.
BUT.... ever since I have my Symbiostock site I feel the fun in uploading coming back. Uploading to my own site, and keeping my images exclusive to my site and keeping 100% royalty is a good feeling. Photography became so much more attractive again. I am doing fairly well on FAA, if I only get a few sales per month on my own site, I can drop all mid tier agencies, and just keep SS, FT and 123 as my top earners.
Honestly, stock photography became fun again because of Symbiostock.
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I don't blame you. I'm surprised there hasn't been more of this. I'd probably feel the same way, but I have a few smaller illustration agencies that keep the machine running.
I figured that at some point there would be a split between the volume stock crowd-sourced model and a more restrictive higher priced model (like a Stocksy). But, the Stocksy-type model just hasn't really popped up yet. So, I'm starting to wonder if that is ever going to happen in a more broad way. Most new start ups are more of the same buy images for nothing and get paid even less models.
I can definitely understand your frustration. I've been working to change things, but I could definitely use some help on the agency side. This summer seems to have been extra slow too, so that isn't helping either.
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I feel like I learned how to do good microstock, my acceptance percentage is high, I understand the quality standards and what they're looking for. Just about all my photos sell, some pretty frequently. I could do lots more. But the returns are just too low - spending an hour on a photo that eventually makes $3 over a couple of years isn't very motivating. I can't come up with enough big sellers.
And the icing on the cake is that commissions are only going lower, so the odds of your work ultimately paying off are even lower.
Many people seem to be pinning their hopes on SS because that company is 'successful' in the sense that it's made a ton of money for it's founder (and probably other insiders) but that isn't going to translate into higher returns for contributors - in fact just the opposite, because they just sold a boatload of overvalued stock, and new investors will be hammering on management to increase profits.
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I understand the feeling - that the agencies have become by and large entities that are no longer our partners and often our adversaries. If you read about publishers and their go-arounds with amazon, you see a similar theme. Once amazon was small and the supplicant. Now it's the massive gorilla and is squeezing its suppliers whenever it can. Microstock agencies once treated their contributors better because they needed them. Now they believe we're a dime a dozen and can be treated like salt mine laborers.
I walked away from iStock over the lack of opt out on the Google Drive scam and from BigStock because of the lack of opt out on the crappy subs deal. I fully expect SS to implement the BigStock royalty model at some point, and great though the earnings are, if SS cuts my royalties, I'll leave them too.
I shoot what I want when I have the time. I can't change the agencies, but I've decided to just end abusive relationships rather than put up with them. I'm very fortunate that this isn't a full time gig for me - I realize that gives me options others don't have.
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I had about 10 images waiting to upload to the agencies this week, and I said to heck with it. Uploaded all of them to my Symbiostock site instead. I'm not holding my breath for my own site to begin producing a steady cash flow, but at this point it's really the only connection I wish to have to stock anymore.
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I fully expect SS to implement the BigStock royalty model at some point, and great though the earnings are, if SS cuts my royalties, I'll leave them too.
I fully expect it too, and have said as much more than once since the Bigstock implementation. The U.S. has not experienced bear market in stocks since early 2009. The next time it happens, Shutterstock's shares will follow the market down. At that point, a lot of shareholders will sell in fear. Many of those who hold on to their shares will demand higher earnings to justify the increased market risk. And when that happens, SS will have two choices -
1) Ignore shareholders and let them sell, forcing the share price even lower
2) Placate them by finding ways to be more profitable.
It's almost always #2, and I think we can guess the easiest way for them to increase margins and earnings instantly.
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You're not alone. This year has been particularly terrible as far as downloads and revenue are concerned. And I agree this summer is way slower than previous ones and the way the market and economy are the suppliers are the ones that get the short end of everything. New images that used to sell right out of the gate aren't going anywhere which isn't very motivating on our end to keep going. I'm on around 11 sites of which I only upload to about 6. The others just aren't worth my time anymore.
Leave your ports and definitely start working and building on your own. I'm pretty sure that the satisfaction of building your own is far higher than the frustrations surrounding the agencies. And hopefully a lot less stress too since you only have to upload to one place. Once my situation improves I'll probably do the same. I'm also sure that there are others that have already done this too.
I wish you the best of luck.
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I believe the IPO was to raise money to explore other markets, not sure what they meant by that. But imagine Shutterstock lowering the commissions, and contribs leave in drones. They will be replaced by shooters from the unexplored markets such as Asia, Middle East, Africa. SS has a database of 27 millions images, how many depict western culture? They dont need more of that. The photogs and images from these regions will add value to the library and are probably happy with any royalty they get. No disrespect. What I want to say is, Shutterstock is not going to lose this tug-o-war, if it ever becomes one.
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Funny thing about having your own site. You start getting real picky about which agencies you want to share your images with. The sub sites start looking less and less attractive every time you get a sale on your own site. I pretty much only contribute new images to a few (maybe 3) smaller sites that pay really well. I just can't get myself to upload to the sub sites anymore. The self hosted train has just started rolling and it is starting to pick up some steam. Eventually "self hosted" is going to start showing up in the poll results and as soon as it does people are going to start realizing that they need to get on board or they are going to be left behind. Once that happens contributors will start curating their portfolios and the agencies that don't pay a reasonable commission will start losing those images.
I don't buy the argument that contributors are a dime a dozen and for every one that leaves there are 10 more ready to replace them. As far as overall contributors that may be correct but if you adjust that to "quality contributors" then the story changes dramatically. It is the quality contributors that are going to take the time to build their own sites and are going to see positive results. When enough "quality contributors" stop adding images to the agencies or even start removing them, the agencies are going to be in trouble. Customers will start realizing that the best images are no longer with the large agencies and they will get used to looking elsewhere.
Dan, don't give up just yet... just adjust your focus. Change is coming. You are just at the forefront of it. Others will follow, it's just a matter of time. 55 new self hosted sites in 6 months is pretty impressive. I bet that number is 200 by the end of the year. I said it two years ago that "the future is in the little guys". I still believe that but I will amend it to include "self hosted" as well.
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I fully expect SS to implement the BigStock royalty model at some point, and great though the earnings are, if SS cuts my royalties, I'll leave them too.
I fully expect it too, and have said as much more than once since the Bigstock implementation. The U.S. has not experienced bear market in stocks since early 2009. The next time it happens, Shutterstock's shares will follow the market down. At that point, a lot of shareholders will sell in fear. Many of those who hold on to their shares will demand higher earnings to justify the increased market risk. And when that happens, SS will have two choices -
1) Ignore shareholders and let them sell, forcing the share price even lower
2) Placate them by finding ways to be more profitable.
It's almost always #2, and I think we can guess the easiest way for them to increase margins and earnings instantly.
They have no loyalty to the submitters who provided the assets that made them successful. In fact they have been successfully killing off their best sellers. I don't think SS is at all worried that those submitters are not happy or that they counted on those funds.
I fully expect to see them promoting submitter membership in areas where they can exploit the naivety of new submitters in low cost of living zones who will pony up the production cost's of new content just like we did. They know that if they entertain new submitters in those zones; in the longer term they can drive content prices down the furthest in those low cost of living zones. http://submit.shutterstock.com/forum/abt130174.html (http://submit.shutterstock.com/forum/abt130174.html)
I won't thank them for driving the price of our assets down, keeping the price of new assets stagnate for over 6 years and finally putting functionality in place to drive them down further via BS. They had a chance to reward HCV submitters with offset, but they chose to turn their backs on us in lieu of new submitters who had nothing to do with driving the initial growth or wealth for SS.
SS does not have to cut royalties at SS they only have to drive traffic to BS where they have accumulated pretty much the same images. I expect that large business deals will end up as BS subs.
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Exactly what I meant to say, Gbalex, but you said it better.
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Exactly what I meant to say, Gbalex, but you said it better.
We must have been typing it at the same time.
You made a very good point "SS has a database of 27 millions images, how many depict western culture? They dont need more of that."
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I'm afraid I have to agree with Dan, and the majority here. Stock isn't worth expending a lot of effort on anymore.
I used to consistently upload over 1,000 pictures a year, and that represented a lot of work for me, as a one person operation. This year I will be lucky if I manage to upload 300-400 images.
I used to get really excited when I would have new stock ideas. Now I still get new ideas, but then I think of the effort and expense of producing, processing, and submitting them, and it just doesn't seem worth it. So the new ideas remain in my head until or unless it becomes worthwhile to create them.
If I had a day job, or a skill that would earn me a decent living, I would be preparing my exit strategy.
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Funny thing about having your own site. You start getting real picky about which agencies you want to share your images with. The sub sites start looking less and less attractive every time you get a sale on your own site. I pretty much only contribute new images to a few (maybe 3) smaller sites that pay really well. I just can't get myself to upload to the sub sites anymore. The self hosted train has just started rolling and it is starting to pick up some steam. Eventually "self hosted" is going to start showing up in the poll results and as soon as it does people are going to start realizing that they need to get on board or they are going to be left behind. Once that happens contributors will start curating their portfolios and the agencies that don't pay a reasonable commission will start losing those images.
I don't buy the argument that contributors are a dime a dozen and for every one that leaves there are 10 more ready to replace them. As far as overall contributors that may be correct but if you adjust that to "quality contributors" then the story changes dramatically. It is the quality contributors that are going to take the time to build their own sites and are going to see positive results. When enough "quality contributors" stop adding images to the agencies or even start removing them, the agencies are going to be in trouble. Customers will start realizing that the best images are no longer with the large agencies and they will get used to looking elsewhere.
Dan, don't give up just yet... just adjust your focus. Change is coming. You are just at the forefront of it. Others will follow, it's just a matter of time. 55 new self hosted sites in 6 months is pretty impressive. I bet that number is 200 by the end of the year. I said it two years ago that "the future is in the little guys". I still believe that but I will amend it to include "self hosted" as well.
Wonderfully spoken +1
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I'm afraid I have to agree with Dan, and the majority here. Stock isn't worth expending a lot of effort on anymore.
I used to consistently upload over 1,000 pictures a year, and that represented a lot of work for me, as a one person operation. This year I will be lucky if I manage to upload 300-400 images.
I used to get really excited when I would have new stock ideas. Now I still get new ideas, but then I think of the effort and expense of producing, processing, and submitting them, and it just doesn't seem worth it. So the new ideas remain in my head until or unless it becomes worthwhile to create them.
If I had a day job, or a skill that would earn me a decent living, I would be preparing my exit strategy.
I have uploaded my whole portfolio of 900 images in 4 weeks, I will be adding the last 30 tomorrow. I couldnt wait each day to get home from work and just get stuck in. I changed all titles, added keywords, worked on SEO, each and every image got done that way. I feel really good about it. If I now see a download of 30 cents on DP, I am laughing like a farmer with a toothache (Dutch expression, not sure what it is in English, I think its like laugh on the wrong side of the mouth). In the mean time I have put all agencies on hold. And I will only continue with SS, 123 and FT in one month. I had a sale through SYS and it immediately became my 4th earner, leaving GL, DP, CanStockPhoto and PD behind. If I get a few sales per month on SYS, its worth to drop the middle tier, do away with the agony of it all, and be a happy shooter.
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Dan - No, you're not alone in this - but you're not "trapped" either. You have your own symbiostock site so focus all your energies into that. Promote yourself, sell yourself as a brand. Work on your blog, write about your personal life. (Example - I didn't know Ronnie James Dio was your dad. What was it like growing up with him? Check out the site Dangerous Minds. They are currently doing a series of articles on "My dad was in a band" Here's one: http://dangerousminds.net/comments/new_on_my_dad_was_in_a_band_my_dad_is_dee_snider (http://dangerousminds.net/comments/new_on_my_dad_was_in_a_band_my_dad_is_dee_snider) So submit a story and link to your website and what you do now. Who knows? With each new element, you'll get your presence known more and you could get more freelance work in the future.)
And where do you live? How may advertising agencies or design studios are in your city/town? Magazines and newspapers? Spend some time and sell yourself to them, print up some postcards offer to meet with them for an interview and view your work, etc. A little footwork can go a long way for freelance.
Unfortunately I hear of people who are just stopping with their uploading of images, and I think that's a bad move. At least you can keep building your portfolio and if you have to go independent, the better for you. Don't just stop working! You've got some great stuff.
Just remember the Old Philosopher - Play and repeat: The Old Philosopher - Eddie Lawerence (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKkazr8M-n4#)
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Sounds like a solid plan Ron :)
And I love your expression of laughing like a farmer with a toothache! We don't have any comparable expression, that I know of, but I still understand exactly what you mean. It gets the message across very well :D
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Totally hear you Dan. Motivation comes from positive things like seeing sales growth and being rewarded. When all the positive go away money is the only motivation. When the money goes away, well, what's the reason to keep going?
Maybe you should look into other methods of selling your work and you might get that spark of drive back.
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Just remember the Old Philosopher - Play and repeat:
That is so fun. Well worth 3 minutes to listen to it. Thanks, ArtPuppy, for sharing!
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Been doing this full time for 3.5 years now. Quit not a chance, can't think of another job I would like more! I love the changes at iStock and am glad I stayed exclusive. If you love something it never feels like work.
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The job is being a photographer, I dont think Dan doesnt like photography anymore.
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I'm afraid I have to agree with Dan, and the majority here. Stock isn't worth expending a lot of effort on anymore.
I used to consistently upload over 1,000 pictures a year, and that represented a lot of work for me, as a one person operation. This year I will be lucky if I manage to upload 300-400 images.
I used to get really excited when I would have new stock ideas. Now I still get new ideas, but then I think of the effort and expense of producing, processing, and submitting them, and it just doesn't seem worth it. So the new ideas remain in my head until or unless it becomes worthwhile to create them.
If I had a day job, or a skill that would earn me a decent living, I would be preparing my exit strategy.
I don't dare waste any time on the kind of fun, isolated, stocky type things. As I upload my existing work and see minimal sales, I can't see a reason to.
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Hi Dan,
I don't know a lot but I know one thing, change is a guarantee. Adapt or die has been hard wired in us from day one. If you can find a way to treat photography as something you love and look at the cash as an added bonus or not at all, then hopefully you will nurture back the passion you once had. I have been on top of the mountain and tumbled all the way down so I get it, took me four years to enjoy shooting again. It is sad but not uncommon to hear a person lose their passion for something by making it their job. Best of luck I hope that some day you can enjoy that art of creating images without the worry of income being part of the equation.
Best,
Jonathan
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Hi Dan,
I don't know a lot but I know one thing, change is a guarantee. Adapt or die has been hard wired in us from day one. If you can find a way to treat photography as something you love and look at the cash as an added bonus or not at all, then hopefully you will nurture back the passion you once had. I have been on top of the mountain and tumbled all the way down so I get it, took me four years to enjoy shooting again. It is sad but not uncommon to hear a person lose their passion for something by making it their job. Best of luck I hope that some day you can enjoy that art of creating images without the worry of income being part of the equation.
Best,
Jonathan
I DO shoot what I love, and benefit from it Jonathan. I've been doing more and more event photography the last 2 years. It hasn't built up to my stock earnings yet, but the work is a lot more rewarding and interesting. It's an opportunity to be an artist again. And of course, I only offer my services at prices which allow me some self-esteem.
Never would have guessed it several years ago when I was shooting NCAA football, but my new love is modern dance photography. I work with one of the foremost dance studios in NY State. They are brilliant, and provide me with all the inspiration I need to shoot. It's a challenge and a pleasure to capture their art and do it justice.
;)
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I'm not a believer in divine intervention, but I just checked my Alamy account and noticed I got $245 sale two days ago. So I can continue to concentrate my efforts with them, at least until that relationship becomes tenuous too. They've been a Top 5 contributor for me with only 1/2 my portfolio.
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Alamy has been cruel to me. Once in a great while, I get a sale for a significant amount - just often enough to preserve the illusion that something might happen. Then, weeks go by. Then, a sale that nets me $3. The intervals between sales get longer.
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Man, I hear ya. I've been in stock for over 20 years and was truly enjoying it until the first of this year when iStock started going south for me. With the collections change, the slashing of prices for our files, the pitiful royalty percentages, and the perceived (real?) disdain iStock has for non-exclusives it has completely demotivated me to contribute there any longer. I'll keep my port there on the off-chance that I'll make an occasional sale but that's as far as it goes from here on out.
However, I recently signed on with Macrografiks and am finding a renewed enthusiasm for macro photography and the agency/contributor relationship. Sure, it's in its infancy and sales are slow but it feels right to be there. So nice to be treated with respect and to have open communication. It will take time before knowing how well MG will do but I actually look forward to shooting and uploading again, something that was lost when I was working with iStock.
There's something out there for everyone, just have to find it....don't stop looking.
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I put quite a few on MacroGrafiks and I hope they go somewhere. If I ever sell anything there, I think I'll get interested in doing more.
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I put quite a few on MacroGrafiks and I hope they go somewhere. If I ever sell anything there, I think I'll get interested in doing more.
Time will tell but from what I've seen so far it's worth the effort. Glad you hopped on board.
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I put quite a few on MacroGrafiks and I hope they go somewhere. If I ever sell anything there, I think I'll get interested in doing more.
Good luck, that was one of only two new starts announced here that I've had any interest in.
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This has been coming on for a few years now.
Thoughts? Anyone feel the same?
I sympathize. However, you have put in a lot of time in the field. If working with those agencies is difficult, consider just supporting the smaller ones that pay better. If they change their tune, then leave them too. There's always someone playing fair and they can make a difference if we support them. 8)
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I'm not a believer in divine intervention, but I just checked my Alamy account and noticed I got $245 sale two days ago. So I can continue to concentrate my efforts with them, at least until that relationship becomes tenuous too. They've been a Top 5 contributor for me with only 1/2 my portfolio.
Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in
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Dan needs a break. Must be fine after that. We chose where we are. Again we all have choice to continue or make other choices. I feel a good break will make him feel better.
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Alamy has been cruel to me. Once in a great while, I get a sale for a significant amount - just often enough to preserve the illusion that something might happen. Then, weeks go by. Then, a sale that nets me $3. The intervals between sales get longer.
Last year I was getting regular sales from them and it was looking good, bringing in hundreds a month, even though the actual sale price was falling. The last three or four months have been awful. So far this month, I have got 50c commission. The problem with Alamy is lack of sales volume and consistency. I know I might get a $500 sale tomorrow but it's equally possible that I'll get to the end of the month with nothing more.
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I fully expect SS to implement the BigStock royalty model at some point, and great though the earnings are, if SS cuts my royalties, I'll leave them too.
I fully expect it too, and have said as much more than once since the Bigstock implementation. The U.S. has not experienced bear market in stocks since early 2009. The next time it happens, Shutterstock's shares will follow the market down. At that point, a lot of shareholders will sell in fear. Many of those who hold on to their shares will demand higher earnings to justify the increased market risk. And when that happens, SS will have two choices -
1) Ignore shareholders and let them sell, forcing the share price even lower
2) Placate them by finding ways to be more profitable.
It's almost always #2, and I think we can guess the easiest way for them to increase margins and earnings instantly.
I believe this will happen ( and will happen) when to many contributors will reach $ 0.38 . Considering that SS is a SUBSCRIPTION based agency.
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Agree totally Dan,
Lost interest a year or so ago, got motivated again and uploaded a bit, another cut came and I went away for a while, uploaded sporadically. Got interested again a few months ago and uploaded. Poor sales in may really lost interest, Alamy's changes hurt me a lot this year. Just a long line of being hurt by best match changes and commission cuts. Also realised that I dislike the agencies and I just cant be bothered (standards have risen and I'm not interested enough for images to sit at the back of a search :).
Even struggling for motivation to set up symbiostock site (I'm halfway through uploading). Logged in here and stock sites today, first time this month :) (I remember checking ss multiple times a day years ago :)
I'm going back and watching photography videos and doing stuff for myself, its nice being able say 'yep its has no commercial potential and is iso 800+ but is still nice'. Getting back to having fun :) exploring new stuff.
I'm lucky enough to have good day job that pays well, my stock can sit in and bring the income it does (still significant, but only a fraction of what it was), I cant see myself uploading to a stock site again :)
Phil
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I put quite a few on MacroGrafiks and I hope they go somewhere. If I ever sell anything there, I think I'll get interested in doing more.
Good luck, that was one of only two new starts announced here that I've had any interest in.
what is the other one? cheers
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I put quite a few on MacroGrafiks and I hope they go somewhere. If I ever sell anything there, I think I'll get interested in doing more.
Good luck, that was one of only two new starts announced here that I've had any interest in.
what is the other one? cheers
The geo one, as an idea - probably mostly because the only image buyer I actually know would really love the precise locations; but I thought the macro one had a better possibility of generating reasonable sales, if they kept going.
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I'm going back and watching photography videos and doing stuff for myself, its nice being able say 'yep its has no commercial potential and is iso 800+ but is still nice'. Getting back to having fun :) exploring new stuff.
Same here Phil, thanks for the input. Most of my dance photography is done under very low light conditions, with a shutter speed requirement of 1/400s or faster. So I spend a lot of time at ISO 1000-1250. The first batches I processed 2 years ago, I was appalled at the background noise. Then I start getting feedback from the buyers, and they were thrilled with the images. And it reminded me of how ridiculous the standards are for selling images for 38 cents.
These days, while I would love to minimize noise where possible, I care about color, composition, and as much focus as I can get on people hurtling through the air in low light. The results are many times very pleasing. That's really all that counts, and the proof of that is in the sales I am generating.
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Funny thing about having your own site. You start getting real picky about which agencies you want to share your images with. The sub sites start looking less and less attractive every time you get a sale on your own site. I pretty much only contribute new images to a few (maybe 3) smaller sites that pay really well. I just can't get myself to upload to the sub sites anymore. The self hosted train has just started rolling and it is starting to pick up some steam. Eventually "self hosted" is going to start showing up in the poll results and as soon as it does people are going to start realizing that they need to get on board or they are going to be left behind. Once that happens contributors will start curating their portfolios and the agencies that don't pay a reasonable commission will start losing those images.
I don't buy the argument that contributors are a dime a dozen and for every one that leaves there are 10 more ready to replace them. As far as overall contributors that may be correct but if you adjust that to "quality contributors" then the story changes dramatically. It is the quality contributors that are going to take the time to build their own sites and are going to see positive results. When enough "quality contributors" stop adding images to the agencies or even start removing them, the agencies are going to be in trouble. Customers will start realizing that the best images are no longer with the large agencies and they will get used to looking elsewhere.
Dan, don't give up just yet... just adjust your focus. Change is coming. You are just at the forefront of it. Others will follow, it's just a matter of time. 55 new self hosted sites in 6 months is pretty impressive. I bet that number is 200 by the end of the year. I said it two years ago that "the future is in the little guys". I still believe that but I will amend it to include "self hosted" as well.
Great post. When I started out there had been many arguments to have a real Agency in your back...all illusions sadly of the time being.
In 2005 I thought:
1) They may be better able to handle a proper payment system and protect me against fraud, processing problems etc.
Turns out they pass that risk along to us. Chargebacks are our own risk. We do not get any compensation for stolen material. Not from the Agency nor from the thieve. Nowadays there are many payment processors out there who seem to provide a better service and are accessible to everyone.
2) They are able to do proper advertising for my material.
Truth is, a good SEO and a generic script like WP is more effective than the sums any Agency may spend on Advertising. Otherwise the symbiostock material would not rank so high in the image searchesEven if a Agency spends 200.000 $ a month on, lets say, Google adwords, and the Agency has 200.000 Contributors (which the hue agencies have), then they spend exactly 1 $ on promoting your material, I can do this myself. I can even spend ten times more if you wish (10$) and I doubt many agencies spend more then 2.000.000 a month on ads. Plus: I do not promote any free images.
3) They can handle the technical part….I got no Idea about that.
Truth is, if you ever installed Symbiostock, Ktools, CMSaccount etc you will find out that it is actually just a few clicks. To be honest, in most cases this may usually be followed by 2 days of frustration of some problem which is finally solved easier than you thought. But thats it then. No life long frustration with any abusive behavior of a Agency. Just a couple of clicks and maybe helpful forum posts.[/b]
4) How can I, as a small individual, compete with the big boys…
See number 2. If you use a well done SEO script you have the power of thousands and millions of sites in your back, since the code is something well accessible for the Bots. No single Agency, no matter how big, can integrate so well in the invisible structure of the indexed internet. Beyond that: you will have to compete anyhow. Weather your competition is distributed amonst the whole net or within your Agency. It is there and your success depends to a certain degree on the search engine/best match. You just have more control about it without a agency in the middle.
5) They protect my material from being stolen.
Truth is, they do not seem to care too much. In fact, they became more a security risk by themselves with shady deals like IS/Google drive or Bigstock/Zazzle. With those deals they devaluate our work or force us to compete with ourselves or give up on them.
In most cases of real theft the Contributor himself points out an abuse and many times he files himself a takedown request. I havent heard yet of any department on SS or IS which scans the net for illicit use by themselves. They only react - sometimes - on request of us.
Honestly, who needs a abusive middleman anymore? We can be independent, and even if we sell less in the beginning we will not feel like bloody losers being spit on…
Dan, I think it is a good time to take some time off. In two years everything may look different. I totally understand and respect your situation....
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5) They protect my material from being stolen.
Truth is, they do not seem to care too much. In fact, they became more a security risk by themselves with shady deals like IS/Google drive or Bigstock/Zazzle. With those deals they devaluate our work or force us to compete with ourselves or give up on them.
In most cases of real theft the Contributor himself points out an abuse and many times he files himself a takedown request. I havent heard yet of any department on SS or IS which scans the net for illicit use by themselves. They only react - sometimes - on request of us.
Honestly, who needs a abusive middleman anymore? We can be independent, and even if we sell less in the beginning we will not feel like bloody losers being spit on…
Dan, I think it is a good time to take some time off. In two years everything may look different. I totally understand and respect your situation....
istockreseller.com - Scam site
http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/scam-site/50/ (http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/scam-site/50/)
Infringement is OK by Shutterstock
http://submit.shutterstock.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=131248 (http://submit.shutterstock.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=131248)
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Tror ~
Your points are all valid, but I have a point 6, which is not being able to do anything like adequate customer service. A lot of the time I'm out of phone contact, even quite near home, far less internet; and I'm sometimes weeks out of phone/internet contact, even more out of secure internet access. Customers nowadays demand virtually instant, or at the very least next day, answers to enquiries. How do you deal with that?
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Tror ~
Your points are all valid, but I have a point 6, which is not being able to do anything like adequate customer service. A lot of the time I'm out of phone contact, even quite near home, far less internet; and I'm sometimes weeks out of phone/internet contact, even more out of secure internet access. Customers nowadays demand virtually instant, or at the very least next day, answers to enquiries. How do you deal with that?
I don't really have that problem, but I guess you'd have to hire someone, ask a friend, or partner up if you can't do it.
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Tror ~
Your points are all valid, but I have a point 6, which is not being able to do anything like adequate customer service. A lot of the time I'm out of phone contact, even quite near home, far less internet; and I'm sometimes weeks out of phone/internet contact, even more out of secure internet access. Customers nowadays demand virtually instant, or at the very least next day, answers to enquiries. How do you deal with that?
You got a valid point here, although I have to say that I am almost 24h connected. Yesterday I wrote two emails from the beach, and first thing in the morning as well as last thing of the day is looking on the screen.....
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Tror ~
Your points are all valid, but I have a point 6, which is not being able to do anything like adequate customer service. A lot of the time I'm out of phone contact, even quite near home, far less internet; and I'm sometimes weeks out of phone/internet contact, even more out of secure internet access. Customers nowadays demand virtually instant, or at the very least next day, answers to enquiries. How do you deal with that?
I don't really have that problem, but I guess you'd have to hire someone, ask a friend, or partner up if you can't do it.
Do you mean you don't have many customer enquiries?
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And one thing we all know by now is that - without a doubt - things will only get worse. The future with these agencies holds nothing but more commission cuts, more forced participation in subscription plans, more Google Drive deals. And the other jaw of the vise is: more rejections for LCV, 'similiars', more demands for higher resolution, and more use of half-baked bots to screen for 'focus', white balance etc.
Why invest effort in building a portfolio at one of these companies - given that it's really a bet on the future? A sucker bet, in this case.
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Do you mean you don't have many customer enquiries?
I meant that I'm usually connected, but there aren't many inquiries either. I didn't have to answer any emails last time I went on vacation, but I make sure I can.
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Tror ~
Your points are all valid, but I have a point 6, which is not being able to do anything like adequate customer service. A lot of the time I'm out of phone contact, even quite near home, far less internet; and I'm sometimes weeks out of phone/internet contact, even more out of secure internet access. Customers nowadays demand virtually instant, or at the very least next day, answers to enquiries. How do you deal with that?
I don't really have that problem, but I guess you'd have to hire someone, ask a friend, or partner up if you can't do it.
That would be 'hire someone', so probably I'd be even more quids out, and I'd probably be paying them for really little actual work. Finding someone I could trust to deal with financials ... big risk.
At the moment, I'm at home virtually all the time as we've got a huge garden project, but this is extremely unusual, especially if I were out and about shooting. Luckily the death of new files at iStock has coincided with this project, so I don't even feel I'm missing anything by not shooting stock.
Actually, I feel pretty much like the OP, but for me I don't see 'going it alone' as an option. Of course I realise other people have different circumstances. 3G is notoriously spotty and dead slow here, and 4G non-existent out of big cities (I'm out in the boonies).
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Tror ~
Your points are all valid, but I have a point 6, which is not being able to do anything like adequate customer service. A lot of the time I'm out of phone contact, even quite near home, far less internet; and I'm sometimes weeks out of phone/internet contact, even more out of secure internet access. Customers nowadays demand virtually instant, or at the very least next day, answers to enquiries. How do you deal with that?
I don't really have that problem, but I guess you'd have to hire someone, ask a friend, or partner up if you can't do it.
That would be 'hire someone', so probably I'd be even more quids out, and I'd probably be paying them for really little actual work. Finding someone I could trust to deal with financials ... big risk.
At the moment, I'm at home virtually all the time as we've got a huge garden project, but this is extremely unusual, especially if I were out and about shooting. Luckily the death of new files at iStock has coincided with this project, so I don't even feel I'm missing anything by not shooting stock.
Actually, I feel pretty much like the OP, but for me I don't see 'going it alone' as an option. Of course I realise other people have different circumstances. 3G is notoriously spotty and dead slow here, and 4G non-existent out of big cities (I'm out in the boonies).
...don`t be afraid of a project like this. I do not have a stock site yet, but I work with various other projects which require support. I was VERY nervous about those issues first too, but it is not much usually and no big deal. Maybe you find a partner which is in the same situation as you or some photographers will join and share such a project (actually a cool idea :D ). There lies opportunity in everything....
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To Sue and anyone else curious about the support aspect of running your own site, this is just my personal experience. I started out selling independently over four years ago experimenting with various scripts, and never really had a problem. When I got more serious I ran a CMS Account site for two and a half years (that got steady small sales) and averaged less than one email per month, never posted phone info.
I have an active Ktools site that was one year old last month and I just checked, my support emails for the year were 16 total, and that site averages a dozen or so sales per week. I'm hoping my Symbio site will be bigger but I don't anticipate a lot of support time either.
People who are shopping online for images seem to be pretty self sufficient these days as long as the system is intuitive. I've never posted a phone number on personal stock sites and never had anyone ask for a number. A contact form seems to be sufficient.
Not sure if that makes any difference, but it might be good to know for someone on the fence. To me being independent really makes the difference. I'm currently super happy to be working on a series of illustration I plan to only upload on my symbio site and clipartof (honest people, with a small fair agency) and I'm very excited to see how sales go. I haven't felt that way with the iStock's of the world in years.
I hope everyone in this thread finds some inspiration again, best of luck!
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Eventually microstock sites will realize that they lost all good talent, while only amateurs are left to contribute. This will make them rethink their contribution payout model. I have been with microstock for some time, but my portfolio is very small, because microstock has never been my focus. It pays for my daily coffee habits, but I've been long enough with microstock to see overtime how they have evolved. Fotolia is the worst in terms of algorithm experiments. I can't tell you number of times they would tweak it causing some of my images go from 1 page to 300 page on specific search terms. Where you are with specific search terms matters as much as contributor rate.
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Eventually microstock sites will realize that they lost all good talent, while only amateurs are left to contribute.
This should be embroidered on a pillow in the office of every CEO of a major microstock company. You have perfectly summed up the situation.
The people running most of the major agencies really don't seem to see beyond the numbers of contributors to the quality of the portfolios.
As the top producers drop out because all the royalty and price cuts make it unsustainable (yeah, there's that word) the content they never upload isn't going to be adequately replaced by enthusiastic amateurs.
Even newbies aren't as enthusiastic about micro anymore. They can see from the top producers that there isn't the future in it that there once was.
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Eventually microstock sites will realize that they lost all good talent, while only amateurs are left to contribute.
This should be embroidered on a pillow in the office of every CEO of a major microstock company. You have perfectly summed up the situation.
The people running most of the major agencies really don't seem to see beyond the numbers of contributors to the quality of the portfolios.
As the top producers drop out because all the royalty and price cuts make it unsustainable (yeah, there's that word) the content they never upload isn't going to be adequately replaced by enthusiastic amateurs.
Even newbies aren't as enthusiastic about micro anymore. They can see from the top producers that there isn't the future in it that there once was.
There is a point in there. I am happy that I am an amateur uploading crapstock as my work is considered to be. At least I dont have any significant overhead, and I dont have any costly image productions. Just me and my cheap camera, shooting crapstock. I guess its good enough for the agencies. I cant imagine producing all these costly superb images for 15-30% royalty or 38 cent or whatever. I see 123 and BS and FT selling images for 16 cent. Honestly, the images are so undervalued. We are all suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome.
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There is a point in there. I am happy that I am an amateur uploading crapstock as my work is considered to be. At least I dont have any significant overhead, and I dont have any costly image productions. Just me and my cheap camera, shooting crapstock.
Ron, I hope it didn't sound like I was trashing newer members or amateurs. Most produce very good work - not crapstock at all - or they wouldn't have qualified for the agencies.
What I meant was just what you said about not wanting to invest time and money in expensive shoots, nor producing a large volume of HCV images.
Five years or more ago, a lot of us who started out as enthusiastic newbies saw the top producers doing very well and knew that with hard work and talent, we could be similarly rewarded. Now I don't think a lot of newbies feel that way, and for good reason.
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There is a point in there. I am happy that I am an amateur uploading crapstock as my work is considered to be. At least I dont have any significant overhead, and I dont have any costly image productions. Just me and my cheap camera, shooting crapstock.
Ron, I hope it didn't sound like I was trashing newer members or amateurs. Most produce very good work - not crapstock at all - or they wouldn't have qualified for the agencies.
What I meant was just what you said about not wanting to invest time and money in expensive shoots, nor producing a large volume of HCV images.
Five years or more ago, a lot of us who started out as enthusiastic newbies saw the top producers doing very well and knew that with hard work and talent, we could be similarly rewarded. Now I don't think a lot of newbies feel that way, and for good reason.
No no no, I wasnt thinking that you said that. :) I truly meant MY work is considered to be crapstock. I have been told in not so many words by several members on the SS forum.
I dont even see the rewards as being fair for what I produce. But I can live with it to some point as I have no cost. Just hoping that the buyers do like my work and buy from me directly.
I just cant wait to get the 6D and get on with it. :)
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The people running most of the major agencies really don't seem to see beyond the numbers of contributors to the quality of the portfolios.
There does seem to be a bit of a disconnect. I think they recognize there has been an evolution in quality at their sites, but I think they may fail to recognize an evolution in expectations of the contributors as that quality has increased.
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No no no, I wasnt thinking that you said that. :) I truly meant MY work is considered to be crapstock. I have been told in not so many words by several members on the SS forum.
You have been told that only by one member who also happens to be an extreme snob. His opinion doesnt matter, forget about that crapstock thing, you have great photos.
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No no no, I wasnt thinking that you said that. :) I truly meant MY work is considered to be crapstock. I have been told in not so many words by several members on the SS forum.
You have been told that only by one member who also happens to be an extreme snob. His opinion doesnt matter, forget about that crapstock thing, you have great photos.
Its been mentioned by more people, not only him. It did put a doubt in me, asking myself if I could justify setting up my own website. I dont want to drag the work down of other shooters. I am not a professional photographer, so when someone is, telling me my work is laughable, I question myself.
But thanks anyway, its appreciated.
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I don't know...amateur photography is what microstock was founded on isn't it. Couldn't it be argued that the folks doing big costly production are selling them self short in the microstock market anyway? I have professional studio photography experience, but for microstock work it's just me and my camera. A lot of it is on the fly, fun, and experimenting. There is not enough money in it for me to pay a model or do an elaborate studio setup...anyway even though I have the experience, I consider myself a hobbiest these days as far as my microstock work goes.
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well, what did you guys expected ? it was obvious for everyone on RM how micro would first kill RM and then kill micro shooters too.
i was saying the same sh-it since many years just to get banned and called names and now you all agree with me.
too little too late.
ironically i still see some opportunities in micro for some types of imagery that dont sell well on RM agencies, micro is here to stay but it's gonna be very hard to make a living with it alone.
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besides, Yuri leaving micros is clearly a sign of the times and the nail in the coffin.
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besides, Yuri leaving micros is clearly a sign of the times and the nail in the coffin.
try again
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I left two years ago...accounts are still active (I can log into them) at a few micro agencies. I haven't looked back.
Shoot what you love and upload the images to macro agencies.
Take the attitude that if they don't accept the image, then it's their loss - here's the deal, agencies want exclusivity these days (ask anyone that owns an agency and they'll tell you this).
Don't sweat the money...just keep shooting and build that portfolio. The sales will come with time and believe it or not, other opportunities will come with time as well.
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@ dingles - I don't know...amateur photography is what microstock was founded on isn't it absolutely my friend, all these amateurs showing the pros how it's done. laughable. that said there are some * good amateurs out there that the micros gave a chance too succeed. i applaud those that took advantage of this. good job. micros though are still full of amateurs who have this amazing sense of entitlement in regards to making a living.
@ xanox - well, what did you guys expected ? it was obvious for everyone on RM how micro would first kill RM and then kill micro shooters too.
absolutely my friend. anyone who was a true professional stock shooter before the day of microstock could see this one coming. the micros started to cannibalize the RM agencies, and now it is starting to cannibalize itself. i too have been lambasted for saying the very same thing. always from the microstock crowd and never from the traditional agency crowd.
@ lisafx - Most produce very good work - not crapstock at all - or they wouldn't have qualified for the agencies. i'd say many produce good work, and most produce crapstock, and very few great work. anyone can get into the microstock agencies, there is no real barrier to do so. show me three photos and pass a ten question multiple choice test hardly qualifies as being a professional/good/great photographer. this whole lenient process of allowing almost everyone into microstock and the total lack of editing of images has flooded the market and help destroy a once very lucrative business.
@ lisafx - enthusiastic newbies saw the top producers doing very well and knew that with hard work and talent, we could be similarly rewarded. Now I don't think a lot of newbies feel that way, and for good reason. hard work and talent will still reward you. that is the difference between a hobbyist and a professional - staying power and producing lots of work using talent and hard work. trying to build a career on microstock sites is nuts, you start out by selling yourself short from the get go. sure a few people made tons of money by being in the right spot at the right time, but the ones who are talented are opting to get out of micros for the reason being the actual amount made per download is not enough. also at this time, microstock was the buzzword of the day, take photos and make millions, and always using yuri as an example. nowhere did any of these get rich quick articles for soccer moms ever say it is a full time job that requires full time effort, continual skill building, continual equipment/software upgrades etc. stock is and always has been about long hours of hard work and talent.
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...i was saying the same sh-it since many years just to get banned and called names and now you all agree with me...
I don't think anyone is agreeing with the sentiment that micro was going to kill the industry. This discussion is about microstock agencies making it impossible for artists to make a living anymore. A few years ago it was possible to not only achieve success in microstock but to thrive, to grow your income. Now it's nearly impossible just to maintain previous income levels, forget about growing income. And it's all to do with agency greed, changes to policy, rate cuts, etc.
You're talking about a completely different topic. All that stuff in the past was about penny stock, dollar stock, the "race to the bottom", microstock undercutting traditional RF, etc. It's not the race to the bottom that's killing microstock. What is happening now isn't what was being predicting years ago.
If you were predicting this, the clawbacks, cuts, SS IPO, threat of investor loyalty, referral program cuts, BigStock RC system, massive growth alongside unprecedented greed, then you've got a mighty fine crystal ball in your hands.
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No no no, I wasnt thinking that you said that. :) I truly meant MY work is considered to be crapstock. I have been told in not so many words by several members on the SS forum.
You have been told that only by one member who also happens to be an extreme snob. His opinion doesnt matter, forget about that crapstock thing, you have great photos.
Its been mentioned by more people, not only him. It did put a doubt in me, asking myself if I could justify setting up my own website. I dont want to drag the work down of other shooters. I am not a professional photographer, so when someone is, telling me my work is laughable, I question myself.
But thanks anyway, its appreciated.
After looking at your portfolio, all I can say is you have some pretty nice crap. Gives me a goal to shoot for. So ignore the naysayers, shoot away and enjoy.
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well if you weren't going to quite PP on iStock might be the final push over the cliff...
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besides, Yuri leaving micros is clearly a sign of the times and the nail in the coffin.
Just a week ago I still saw his port on DP so he hasn't left them all entirely. Only reason I know that is the monthly email and one of his images was featured.
Micro sure as hell isn't sustaining me right now. No matter what I do no matter how many images I upload the return is extremely pitiful.
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well, what did you guys expected ? it was obvious for everyone on RM how micro would first kill RM and then kill micro shooters too.
i was saying the same sh-it since many years just to get banned and called names and now you all agree with me.
too little too late.
ironically i still see some opportunities in micro for some types of imagery that dont sell well on RM agencies, micro is here to stay but it's gonna be very hard to make a living with it alone.
Your RM wisdom amounted to "we don't want competition, we don't want the world to change". You weren't the only ones who saw that it probably wouldn't be a job for life but what you are overlooking is the £100,000+ that I've shoved in my back pocket thanks to microstock (and which now yields 5% per year in interests). Your argument that we would all have been better off if you had had that 100k instead of me is a crock of nonsense. You would have been. I wouldn't.
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besides, Yuri leaving micros is clearly a sign of the times and the nail in the coffin.
Just a week ago I still saw his port on DP so he hasn't left them all entirely. Only reason I know that is the monthly email and one of his images was featured.
He hasn't left the micros. iS is still a micro and has just cut the prices of half its files to underline this. Also, his deal with iS/getty, didn't prevent his pics remaining in the PP, undeniably low-cost micro.
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besides, Yuri leaving micros is clearly a sign of the times and the nail in the coffin.
Just a week ago I still saw his port on DP so he hasn't left them all entirely. Only reason I know that is the monthly email and one of his images was featured.
He hasn't left the micros. iS is still a micro and has just cut the prices of half its files to underline this. Also, his deal with iS/getty, didn't prevent his pics remaining in the PP, undeniably low-cost micro.
Remember the kerfuffle a few years back when an iS inspector was found to have forgotten to deactivate three or four images that she had put up on Canstock? Makes yer laugh now, to think how seriously people took her vile infringement of exclusivity!
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...i was saying the same sh-it since many years just to get banned and called names and now you all agree with me...
I don't think anyone is agreeing with the sentiment that micro was going to kill the industry. This discussion is about microstock agencies making it impossible for artists to make a living anymore. A few years ago it was possible to not only achieve success in microstock but to thrive, to grow your income. Now it's nearly impossible just to maintain previous income levels, forget about growing income. And it's all to do with agency greed, changes to policy, rate cuts, etc.
You're talking about a completely different topic. All that stuff in the past was about penny stock, dollar stock, the "race to the bottom", microstock undercutting traditional RF, etc. It's not the race to the bottom that's killing microstock. What is happening now isn't what was being predicting years ago.
If you were predicting this, the clawbacks, cuts, SS IPO, threat of investor loyalty, referral program cuts, BigStock RC system, massive growth alongside unprecedented greed, then you've got a mighty fine crystal ball in your hands.
well, it's a shame Alamy closed down the old forum, there was even a "The Stock Industry" section years ago, mostly devoted to bashing microstock and with plenty of "micro is killing the industry" threads.
as for making a living, actually i blame more the oversaturation rather than the cheap prices.
saturation and over supply mean less downloads per image and that means less money at the end of the day, killing the whole "sell cheap, sell many times" mantra at the foundation of the whole micro concept.
there's just no more space for everyone in micros to stay afloat and make a good living.
and by the way, we're still having it better than musicians and writers, if selling an image for 0.50$ is a disgrace, what about selling a whole ebook or a song for 0.99$ on iTunes or Amazon ?
i've just read yesterday about that, the singer or Radiohead pulling out all their music from Spotify in protest for ridicolous royalty fees (with bands like Pink Floyd reporting a net profit of just 5000$/year !), if they can't make money with it, who will ?
Thom Yorke pulls albums from Spotify
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23313445 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23313445)
that's a sort of "strike" microstockers should try before or later while also making sure it hits the headlines of at least the major photo sites and blogs.
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@ xanox - well, what did you guys expected ? it was obvious for everyone on RM how micro would first kill RM and then kill micro shooters too.
absolutely my friend. anyone who was a true professional stock shooter before the day of microstock could see this one coming. the micros started to cannibalize the RM agencies, and now it is starting to cannibalize itself. i too have been lambasted for saying the very same thing. always from the microstock crowd and never from the traditional agency crowd.
the micro crowd had it easy in the beginning, all they could see were booming sales and the RF/RM agencies crashing and burning, they were all feeling it was the beginning of a new era and that they were at the right place at the right time.
they even coined some new words like "trads" and "macrosaurs" to joke on us, and any criticism on the micro was seen as trolling.
and now finally they're reaping what they sow, guess it will be a very hard lesson for many here.
however, as i wrote before, we're still having it better than in other creative industries, at least for a while because who knows what the major agencies have in store for the future, i can't believe the acual situation could go on forever with such cheap prices and cheap fees and there will be also a few M&As shaking the industry, maybe SS buying FT or DT or 3-4 second-tier agencies ? Alamy doing some bold move and entering microstock with millions of junk images they cant sell as RM ? we will see .. interesting times ahead but at the moment SS is the breadwinner.
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He hasn't left the micros. iS is still a micro and has just cut the prices of half its files to underline this. Also, his deal with iS/getty, didn't prevent his pics remaining in the PP, undeniably low-cost micro.
That's true for his micro archive, but as far i understood for his new stuff he's only focusing on Getty and will give to micros only some leftovers.
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Xanox, your problem was you trad guys had had it too easy. You bragged about your professionalism but you weren't able to compete with a load of amateurs because your stuff wasn't good enough (not you, personally, whoever you are, I've no idea, but your private club of people allowed into traditional agencies).
You wanted to run a closed shop and keep it secret from the world that most of you weren't really doing anything very special. And we broke it for you and you had to share the money with people you despised. Well, hard luck, that's the way the world works.
Whether or not microstock is sustainable has got nothing to do with it. Jobs for life went out of the window a generation ago. We all have to be able to adapt to innovation, at least enough to keep ourselves fed.
Those of us who didn't listen to the carping of you and your ilk a decade ago have done very nicely, thank you, and made a big pile of money we wouldn't have had otherwise. The boom may be behind us, and a lot of people are looking at ways to adapt to microstock being a dwindling income source from now on, but that's just the way things go, it doesn't mean that you were giving us good advice in the early noughties.
All you guys ever cared about was yourselves and your comfy little earner, and we spoiled it for you. Now you want to wallow in glorious schadenfreude over life getting tough for microstockers. Well, sorry, chum, it's not a big shock for us. We're still making some pretty decent cash and we've known for a long time that one day we would have to adapt to a flooded market.
Now, if you're a real professional, go and shoot something remarkable that I can't do and then you can sell it for a pile on Getty or Corbis or do something for one of the many major corporations who no doubt hire you on a huge day-rate.
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Xanox, your problem was you trad guys had had it too easy. You bragged about your professionalism but you weren't able to compete with a load of amateurs because your stuff wasn't good enough (not you, personally, whoever you are, I've no idea, but your private club of people allowed into traditional agencies).
You wanted to run a closed shop and keep it secret from the world that most of you weren't really doing anything very special. And we broke it for you and you had to share the money with people you despised. Well, hard luck, that's the way the world works.
Whether or not microstock is sustainable has got nothing to do with it. Jobs for life went out of the window a generation ago. We all have to be able to adapt to innovation, at least enough to keep ourselves fed.
Those of us who didn't listen to the carping of you and your ilk a decade ago have done very nicely, thank you, and made a big pile of money we wouldn't have had otherwise. The boom may be behind us, and a lot of people are looking at ways to adapt to microstock being a dwindling income source from now on, but that's just the way things go, it doesn't mean that you were giving us good advice in the early noughties.
All you guys ever cared about was yourselves and your comfy little earner, and we spoiled it for you. Now you want to wallow in glorious schadenfreude over life getting tough for microstockers. Well, sorry, chum, it's not a big shock for us. We're still making some pretty decent cash and we've known for a long time that one day we would have to adapt to a flooded market.
Now, if you're a real professional, go and shoot something remarkable that I can't do and then you can sell it for a pile on Getty or Corbis or do something for one of the many major corporations who no doubt hire you on a huge day-rate.
Mate, you have it all wrong. Us trad guys had to submit at least 100 solid images in order to get accepted to an agency like Getty, Corbis, Tony Stone, The Image Bank, etc. If you did not have the mojo, then it was always a flat out rejection to any agency of note, big or small. Once you did get in based on talent that actually showed any consistency, you were lucky if you got 10% of your best work accepted, and yes we made tons of cash.
Your ilk came along and only had to submit three borderline photos and pass a brainless ten question multiple choice test (Istock) then wham, you were in, heck, you've never even had to go through the rigor of a ruthless editor, this inspector bu!!sh!t is easy street man.
FYI, the Macros, Trads, whatever you want to call it were never ever a closed shop, provided you had the mojo to prove yourself, nor was it ever a big secret.
Water seeks it's own level, and congratulations, you made it into microstock - you have it so easy. Why don't you take it to the next level if it's so easy?
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Your RM wisdom amounted to "we don't want competition, we don't want the world to change". You weren't the only ones who saw that it probably wouldn't be a job for life but what you are overlooking is the £100,000+ that I've shoved in my back pocket thanks to microstock (and which now yields 5% per year in interests). Your argument that we would all have been better off if you had had that 100k instead of me is a crock of nonsense. You would have been. I wouldn't.
great, so now that nobody is making serious money composing music, writing books, drawing cartoons, recording videos, with journalism, or doing stock photography, what's left for us creatives ? doing gigs in bars and getting paid in beers ? switching to wedding photography and buying a cheap canon rebel ?
nobody ever complained about selling cr-ap images at bulk prices, but there's a big difference between a huge discount and selling stuff at 1/10th or even 1/100th of the going rates.
competition has always been welcome in pretty much any industry selling digital products, it's the distributors filtering the sh-it out of the whole sea of products for sale and finally it's the buyers voting with their feet.
you 100K could have been 500K or 1 million not long time ago, all you guys were doing was unfair competition and underpricing.
moral of the story, photographers are the ones who got scre-wed again and now it's too late to complain, agencies don't have a single reason to raise our fees, actually they can't even keep up with their backlog of new images on que and you're all thinking here they will miss you or other exclusives if they ever leave in droves ?
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£100,000+ that I've shoved in my back pocket thanks to microstock (and which now yields 5% per year in interests).
Baldrick, that is off-topic, but where do you get 5% interest in the current financial climate? Just curious, I would love to know :)
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So what, Shudderstock? Most of us may have been really crap at the start but we supplied a market need that you didn't meet. And if your lot had been that much better than us, we would have only ever had the small-time designers buying from us, instead of having Seimens looking to buy my work off SS.
In any case, I read the GI terms back then and the whole thing was designed to minimise the number of applications, I seem to recall that you had to be exclusive to them for stock and on call at 48 hours notice to do assignments for them anywhere they liked, there was a camera list and most likely the only digital one on it would have been the Canon 1Ds, which cost $8,000 - it's a long time ago I can't remember all the stuff but it was perfectly clear that unless you had a well stocked studio and a long record of having been working solely as a photographer they weren't going to look at you.
I know they took very few of the images that were submitted, but I also saw some of the garbage that got through, anyway. Sure there always has been some really fabulous stuff, too, but there were some real stinkers there as well.
Xanox, I know that if I was where I am now 20 years ago and got into stock I would have made a million. In fact, if I had known 10 years ago what I know now I could have been a Lise Gagne or a Sean Locke and made a million in the micros. But I was learning. No way were your lot going to invite me in to your little clubs and let me get my hands on the big cash, so I did what I could, where I could and when I could and it worked out for me.
It wasn't unfair competition, either. Unfair competition happens when people sell things for less than they cost to make. Your problem wasn't really me, it was the Canon 300D. 6MP digital for less than $1,000. That cut the cost of making big digital pictures by almost 90% at a stroke and as soon as that happened your existing stock was overpriced by the same amount (at least, if we are talking about isolated objects, plates of food and holiday snaps; for real top-quality stuff it's a different story). The technology made everything inevitable.
@ Maui - Buy a house and rent it out. My return from rent is just over 6% with a sixth of that going out on costs. It compensates for the slippage in microstock earnings and helps towards the next house purchase, hopefully next year. Like I said, we need to be ready to adapt to a time when MS won't deliver much any more. [PS - I suppose that isn't really interest, but I think of it as being interest]
PPS: Xanox - I think writing books, drawing cartoons and journalism are still potentially profitable. So is photography. Like everything, it depends how good you are and how willing you are to adapt to the market.
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Baldricks is on to the right idea. My skill is in options trading, where I can safely make 6 to 8 percent per year. Like anything else, is takes a few years of skills development. Some of the money I started with came from microstock, that much is true. Eventually I see trading as a way to keep a full income in retirement. The bottom line is I can rely on my mind to make my next paycheck, rather than the whims of an agency which wants me to produce better images for smaller and smaller commissions. Deciding where to focus my future energies is not difficult at all.
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Your ilk came along and only had to submit three borderline photos and pass a brainless ten question multiple choice test (Istock) then wham, you were in, heck, you've never even had to go through the rigor of a ruthless editor, this inspector bu!!sh!t is easy street man.
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Water seeks it's own level, and congratulations, you made it into microstock - you have it so easy. Why don't you take it to the next level if it's so easy?
I obviously don't know what the "ruthless editing" in the old agencies is like, not being there, but I have been amused by the squeals of rage from some old trad guys who throw wobblies when they fail the entry tests for microstock or have work rejected by the inspector bu!!sh!t (is that why it's bu!!sh!t? Have you had rejections?)
Personally, I'm not interested in learning the ropes at the trad libraries. I do, indeed, have it easy and I don't feel the need to scrabble for more any longer. It's an age thing. I'll set my own levels and do what I want rather than making what would necessarily be a considerable investment risk to try to become a mini-Yuri and head off in a different direction. Now, if I were 30 or even 40 it would be a different thing.
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heck, you've never even had to go through the rigor of a ruthless editor, this inspector bu!!sh!t is easy street man.
I still have the old RF Photodisc's from Getty in the 90's sitting on my shelves, there was not much ruthless editing going on in those, lots of mediocre images for £500 per disc with about 200 photo's - that's £2.50 per photo. These pricing models have been around longer than Microstock was conceived.
Saturation and falling royalties are a bigger longterm problem and will eventually make the industry unsustainable.
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Xanox, your problem was you trad guys had had it too easy. You bragged about your professionalism but you weren't able to compete with a load of amateurs because your stuff wasn't good enough (not you, personally, whoever you are, I've no idea, but your private club of people allowed into traditional agencies).
You wanted to run a closed shop and keep it secret from the world that most of you weren't really doing anything very special. And we broke it for you and you had to share the money with people you despised. Well, hard luck, that's the way the world works.
Whether or not microstock is sustainable has got nothing to do with it. Jobs for life went out of the window a generation ago. We all have to be able to adapt to innovation, at least enough to keep ourselves fed.
Those of us who didn't listen to the carping of you and your ilk a decade ago have done very nicely, thank you, and made a big pile of money we wouldn't have had otherwise. The boom may be behind us, and a lot of people are looking at ways to adapt to microstock being a dwindling income source from now on, but that's just the way things go, it doesn't mean that you were giving us good advice in the early noughties.
All you guys ever cared about was yourselves and your comfy little earner, and we spoiled it for you. Now you want to wallow in glorious schadenfreude over life getting tough for microstockers. Well, sorry, chum, it's not a big shock for us. We're still making some pretty decent cash and we've known for a long time that one day we would have to adapt to a flooded market.
Now, if you're a real professional, go and shoot something remarkable that I can't do and then you can sell it for a pile on Getty or Corbis or do something for one of the many major corporations who no doubt hire you on a huge day-rate.
walled-gardens are the norm in many creative fields, it's not only the old RM agencies being difficult to get the foot in the door.
try doing film music they'll hardly give you a chance if you don't live in L.A. and you're friend with producers, try showing some demos to Sony or Universal, no way if you're not friend of producers and if you're not famous already.
what about fine-art photos sold in art galleries ? even worse, that's a whole mafia in itself.
books & ebooks : good luck finding a medium/big publisher if you don't have an agent, and no agent will care about you if you're not recommended by someone in the industry or other agents.
getty had strict requirements but was not impossible to join, it's Corbis the only one who's not taking anybody in apart for news and other niches.
by the way, my market hasn't been ruined much by micros, i will survive pretty well don't worry, what makes my blood boiling is to see once again artists and creatives happy to self-scre-w themselves agreeing on unacceptable low fees and creating a domino effect where the only ones doing good money are the rats owning the agencies.
they're the ones laughing all the way to the bank, not me !
your rants about pay cust are pointless, do you think it makes such a big difference if you get 2$ instead of 0.50$ when by all means in 2013 we should expect at least 5$ for the crap-piest snapshot ?
yeah, musicians sell their sh-it for 0.99$ gross but there's a big difference : their biz in doing live gigs as that's where the money is, we can't do live gigs nor we can expect to do exhibitions with stock images, in the best scenario we can make some beer money with PoD sites and merchandising but that's all.
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Xanox, your problem was you trad guys had had it too easy.
I like your post, but I was thinking the same could probably said for micro. We all had it pretty easy in the beginning days. You could make money off any crappy image.
Now, it is a little tougher. My problem has been that I don't think the model has evolved properly to accommodate contributors needs and wants. I still have some faith that it might, but it doesn't seem to be happening.
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So you're saying the walled gardens are OK and buskers should be banned to prevent them interfering with elite musicians earnings rights?
Actually, there are plenty of ways we can go and do gigs if we feel like it. Try marketing yourself around town if you want to get "gig" payouts. I've turned down a few requests for jobs because I don't want the hassle of dealing with clients.
It does make a difference getting 50c per dl instead of $2. It is 75% less. If you don't know the difference between $10,000 and $2,500, I'm afraid I can't help you.
@ cthoman - yes, it was ridiculously easy to make money in the early days. We should have kept quiet about it!
The problem is that the market keeps demanding higher quality for lower prices. It's a natural consequence of there being a glut in supply. I don't see anything that will change that, any more then Xanox and his chums could halt the tide of microstock.
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...do you think it makes such a big difference if you get 2$ instead of 0.50$ when by all means in 2013 we should expect at least 5$ for the crap-piest snapshot ?
I actually agree with this. $5 is where I'd like to see the minimum royalty.
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instead of having Seimens looking to buy my work off SS.
Xanox, I know that if I was where I am now 20 years ago and got into stock I would have made a million. In fact, if I had known 10 years ago what I know now I could have been a Lise Gagne or a Sean Locke and made a million in the micros. But I was learning. No way were your lot going to invite me in to your little clubs and let me get my hands on the big cash, so I did what I could, where I could and when I could and it worked out for me.
It wasn't unfair competition, either. Unfair competition happens when people sell things for less than they cost to make. Your problem wasn't really me, it was the Canon 300D. 6MP digital for less than $1,000. That cut the cost of making big digital pictures by almost 90% at a stroke and as soon as that happened your existing stock was overpriced by the same amount (at least, if we are talking about isolated objects, plates of food and holiday snaps; for real top-quality stuff it's a different story). The technology made everything inevitable.
PPS: Xanox - I think writing books, drawing cartoons and journalism are still potentially profitable. So is photography. Like everything, it depends how good you are and how willing you are to adapt to the market.
well congratulations selling to Siemens and earning what .. 10$ ?
20 yrs ago : i don't think so, people hated film cameras at that time, even autofocus was a sort of novelty.
a pro was supposed to everything manual including white balance and spent a lot on print labs.
even as a hobby the bar was raised pretty high from the start, it's not like today where any one with a bit of luck can make some lucky shots on green mode on a 500$ canon rebel and send the image anywhere with a few clicks.
in a nutshell, only the few ones with talent had any reason to invest time and money on it, anyone else quickly lost insterent and gave up.
Canon 300D : maybe, but what about the cost of prints, of shipping prints with DHL/UPS, of storing negatives, etc etc ? it's the internet that disrupted everything and broke the distribution chain, not the cheap canon rebels, there were already many "auto everything" film cameras around producing decent results.
and then Photoshop of course, allowing you to quickly correct white balance, dodge and burn, spots, saturation, exposure, cropping ..
i mean with the actual gear we have today the sky is the limit, even my grandma now takes snapshots with her smartphone and she could upload the whole cr-ap on instagram with a couple clicks if she just knew how.
and yet, how many of these punks with their Rebels will join the stock industry nowadays ? one in a million ? maybe.
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I guess the internet is now guilty of breaking things.
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well congratulations selling to Siemens and earning what .. 10$ ?
Actually, they wanted me to supply another version of something ..... so I dashed it off to Alamy. They paid $529 for it, so I ended up with about $300. I'm not entirely stupid.
The digital rebel was THE istock camera of 2004. Hundreds of people were uploading using them. Today more than 200,000 people have tried to get into microstock, most of them haven't made it, but the fact that it is possible with everyday gear is and was the major incentive.
You're right about the internet, though, and digital generally. Didn't you have to make and supply half-a-dozen copies of slides for stock libraries in the old days? And if you had 10 slides selected out of 100 that you had selected from maybe 300 shots, then you had to pony up for 360 slides - 30 rolls of 120 film and developing - to get 10 pictures on sale. At today's prices, it costs about $1 a frame, so that's $360 up front for materials, then fingers crossed you get a sale. It was that sort of investment that justified the prices.
With digital, once you've got your camera you can take 10,000 shots to get 10 decent ones if you want to without incurring any significant cost, and then transmit the 10 best to an agency for nothing. So the value of the product slumps. That's what happens.
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@Baldrick : the issue is all about the so called "entry barrier".
yes, nowadays the bar has belowered so low that anyone can produce some stock snapshots and start selling for fun and profit and then see what sticks on the wall.
but this because to get the foot into a micro agency all you need is a few decent photos and you're done.
if just they asked 100 or 500 photos to start the whole crowd of amateurs will stick to Flickr rather than polluting the stock market.
it should be a basic requirement as without at least 500 images you can't earn any decent sum anyway, where's the logic in allowing access to anyone with portfolios of 30 images ?
but the value of an image is still there as it still had a production cost.
even if i take a sh-it in my toilet and make a photo of it i will waste 30-60 minutes to get the final photo edited keyworded and uploaded.
that's the bare minimum production cost .. so i must earn 5-10$ at least if i plan to sell the image once, or 1-5$ if i plan to sell multiple times, but these numbers are barely to get my production costs back actually, what about taxes and all, what about working to make a decent profit, or we're supposed to just pay the bills and save nothing for tomorrow ?
yeah, you can take a snap with your image and send it to instagram in 30 seconds all inclusive.
ok, but that's not a stock photo, it's not edited it;s not keyworded, and that means 10-20 minutes more at least, so end of the story it's half an hour even for images of your dog taking a po-o.
this is the reality agencies dont want to admit and buyers fail to realize and instead prices will keep going down and fees will keep getting slashed.
no problem, but people will just stop producing images altogether, only phoographers living in third world country will be able to keep costs down as doing stock in the west will soon become unsustainable.
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Won't work, Xanox. If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
The iStock model, where you don't pay the supplier of goods until months after you have sold them, while the purchaser pays you weeks before they take delivery was a stroke of utter business genius. It made it very difficult not to make money or to run into cash flow problems - your customers became your financial backers without even knowing it. So anyone can set up one of these operations as soon as they notice that people are trying to mess with the market, push people out of it and charge more than the minimum. That's the reality. You can't bring the 1990s back again.
Yes, there is a minimum production cost. But if the cumulative average earnings of the images significantly exceed it, then you're basically OK. I've got pictures that have clocked up more than $1,000 in pennies here and there. I suppose that on average each of my images has made $40-$50 and rising (some of them make nothing at all). And I spend hardly anything to create them. Maybe $20,000 on equipment over 10 years. So, it works.
Asian producers won't supplant western ones in the end. The models don't look Western so they won't meet Western market demand. The goods and food aren't Western. I live in the east and my pictures don't sell particularly well in the US, they do sell in Europe and Asia. If first-world photographers do stop producing, then the prices will have to rise to pull them back again.
I think that the return has now dropped to the level that may well keep new producers out. I've been arguing for about eight years that at some point the return per image will become so low that anybody who isn't already established will just give up. I suspect that we are about there (looking at the $5 iStock has made me on 60 images over the last six months).
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yes, nowadays the bar has belowered so low that anyone can produce some stock snapshots and start selling for fun and profit and then see what sticks on the wall.
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if just they asked 100 or 500 photos to start the whole crowd of amateurs will stick to Flickr rather than polluting the stock market.
You could make the argument that the polluted stock market you're referring to did not exist before MS and that the pros were responsible for raising the quality bar (without demanding higher prices) instead of amateurs lowering it.
I think you need to put at least some of the blame back onto the pro stock photogs who decided to upload high quality images for a very low return per image. No one asked those guys to raise the quality bar in MS so high that great images are worth next to nothing now. There is absolutely no surprise that high end buyers decided to save money by buying the same quality images for a fraction of the price. The high end shooters brought it on themselves by intentionally competing for pennies on the dollar. Some made out very well because they looked at the numbers and decided it was worth it, some just complain about the good old days.
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If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
There are 20 new agencies popping up already that nobody cares about. What boggles my mind is that nobody is really trying it. You have Stocksy, SS's new project and some illustration sites, but not a whole lot beyond that. If contributors want it, why isn't somebody building it?
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If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
There are 20 new agencies popping up already that nobody cares about. What boggles my mind is that nobody is really trying it. You have Stocksy, SS's new project and some illustration sites, but not a whole lot beyond that. If contributors want it, why isn't somebody building it?
Because there isn't an available niche for them to slide into. But Xanox wants to create that niche by raising prices and excluding photographers from selling - basically taking us right back to 2004.
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If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
There are 20 new agencies popping up already that nobody cares about. What boggles my mind is that nobody is really trying it. You have Stocksy, SS's new project and some illustration sites, but not a whole lot beyond that. If contributors want it, why isn't somebody building it?
Because there isn't an available niche for them to slide into. But Xanox wants to create that niche by raising prices and excluding photographers from selling - basically taking us right back to 2004.
I actually do pretty well with that philosophy, so I'm not sure about the niche not being available. It's just not being filled at all. I only have 3 sites that I've found and one of them I had to build. They are all still within the micro pricing model, but they just don't have all the garbage at the bottom (subs, images for a buck, poor royalty rates, etc.). I wish I had 2 more sites like these, but they don't exist.
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If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
There are 20 new agencies popping up already that nobody cares about. What boggles my mind is that nobody is really trying it. You have Stocksy, SS's new project and some illustration sites, but not a whole lot beyond that. If contributors want it, why isn't somebody building it?
Because there isn't an available niche for them to slide into. But Xanox wants to create that niche by raising prices and excluding photographers from selling - basically taking us right back to 2004.
I actually do pretty well with that philosophy, so I'm not sure about the niche not being available. It's just not being filled at all. I only have 3 sites that I've found and one of them I had to build. They are all still within the micro pricing model, but they just don't have all the garbage at the bottom (subs, images for a buck, poor royalty rates, etc.). I wish I had 2 more sites like these, but they don't exist.
Is that about them charging more, or are they charging the same and paying higher commissions? I guess Stocksy would be the prime example of pricing high, excluding people and giving good commissions but I've yet to see any sign that it is delivering livable returns (and Sean sounded less than excited last time I saw a comment from him about how things are going).
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Is that about them charging more, or are they charging the same and paying higher commissions? I guess Stocksy would be the prime example of pricing high, excluding people and giving good commissions but I've yet to see any sign that it is delivering livable returns (and Sean sounded less than excited last time I saw a comment from him about how things are going).
It's a little of both. It's really about getting in a certain RPD range for me (Obviously sales too). Like Xanox said, I'm not really interested in the difference between $2 and $.50. I'm more interested in the $5-$15 range. It's just hard to find anybody offering that even though it has proven to be hugely profitable for me. If I had two more sites like this, I'd seriously consider packing it up with the traditional micros.
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Is that about them charging more, or are they charging the same and paying higher commissions? I guess Stocksy would be the prime example of pricing high, excluding people and giving good commissions but I've yet to see any sign that it is delivering livable returns (and Sean sounded less than excited last time I saw a comment from him about how things are going).
It's a little of both. It's really about getting in a certain RPD range for me (Obviously sales too). Like Xanox said, I'm not really interested in the difference between $2 and $.50. I'm more interested in the $5-$15 range. It's just hard to find anybody offering that even though it has proven to be hugely profitable for me. If I had two more sites like this, I'd seriously consider packing it up with the traditional micros.
You're not going to tell who it is, are you?
But I think being a vector artist might be the key to the whole thing .....? Something we button pushers don't have open to us?
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Perhaps veering too far off course, but I think the bigger issue of the economy and lack of jobs is just playing out again in our field with tighter budgets and lower ratio of demand vs supply for stock images. I have skilled friends that have been out of work for 6 months or longer, they had nothing to do with microstock, but it's an anecdotal warning to me that the answer to shrinking micro revenues may not be a different career or an "adaptation."
I used to scoff along with many others at buggy whip maker vs automobile manufacturer arguments, but it appears we are approaching a structural change in economies with robotics and automation that is finally limiting the need for labor. It is one explanation for the giant productivity gains since the 70s that pair with flat inflation adjusted wages. So, at the point where labor is simply in lower demand, how do whole populations make a living? How do you spread the wealth that goes to those with infrastructure capital? My Utopian wish (naive, kid view) was that we'd own robots that went to work for us. Presently, it looks like a very small group will own all the capital and receive all the spoils.
Here is a thought experiment in a sci-fi short story form --
http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm (http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm)
Sean called this video propaganda, but considering low demand for jobs and declining purchase power, it's pretty obvious economic activity would be a lot stronger if things weren't so lopsided.
Wealth Inequality in America (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM#ws)
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You're not going to tell who it is, are you?
But I think being a vector artist might be the key to the whole thing .....? Something we button pushers don't have open to us?
I just assumed everybody was sick of me and others singing the praises of Clipartof. I'm also very excited about Toon Vectors and my own site, but those are still relatively small.
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You're not going to tell who it is, are you?
But I think being a vector artist might be the key to the whole thing .....? Something we button pushers don't have open to us?
I just assumed everybody was sick of me and others singing the praises of Clipartof. I'm also very excited about Toon Vectors and my own site, but those are still relatively small.
Sorry, I haven't been paying attention because I'm purely photos. You guys are in a different market and I have no idea if the same logic applies as it does with photographs.
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I too have tumbled down from a fairly lofty perch. I was in advertising in NYC for a long time...4000sqft studio...and all that it entailed including fat assignments. I segued to stock a very long time ago when it produced results. Now, lucky for me, my wife still works, I'm semi retired and all my earning from stock are icing... but not much. I have a collection of pics that keep selling and remain fairly industrious because I like to be, but starting over...from where we are now? Not on your life...certainly not on mine. The power brokers, such as the esteemed newly minted billionaire of Silicon Alley in NY are vultures, not good people as my grandma used to say. Yes, they deserve credit for good ideas...but c'mon, pigs are pigs by any standard. I left a few of these awful places and will another fairly soon. Been a little lazy about it for obvious reasons to me...the dribs and drabs are MY dribs and drabs. They do accumulate but in reality it's not oo funny a joke. The thing is that talent and cameras are everywhere so the many think they'll make a living from this. It won't happen for the vast majority but don;t try to convince anyone, it's not worth your time. Worse is true of the art community. I see huge man-hours spent there too...much more than in stock and it produces the same result: if you enjoy the process, great. But don't for a split second think you'll be paying your bills with the proceeds. If you have another thing that tickles you AND you have responsibilities like family, you're better off leaving this nonsense being. As I said, I'm mostly retired so it's no doubt easier for me to say. Just steer clear of the vultures if possible. They don't give a hoot.
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"5% per year in interest" "return from rent is just over 6%"
bit of a drama queen don't you think? hell of a difference mate between rent and interest.
"Actually, they wanted me to supply another version of something ..... so I dashed it off to Alamy. They paid $529 for it, so I ended up with about $300. I'm not entirely stupid."
So you are saying they somehow contacted you to supply another version of an image, you dashed it off to an agency (Alamy) so that they could find it there and you instantly lost $229 on this image? If you are not entirely stupid, why not sell it direct? or was this just for more drama queen effect to impress us all on how wonderful you are?
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Brian, your video is quite shocking.
Revolutions are born out of that kind of distribution.
As for the other posts, there are many many interesting thoughts in your guys wise words. I enjoy reading your elaborate posts.
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Brian, your video is quite shocking.
Revolutions are born out of that kind of distribution.
It is quite amazing what its tolerated, but they (or we) keep us pretty busy fighting among ourselves. Howard Zinn has some interesting examples of that in Amercan history.
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Brian, your video is quite shocking.
Revolutions are born out of that kind of distribution.
It is quite amazing what its tolerated, but they (or we) keep us pretty busy fighting among ourselves. Howard Zinn has some interesting examples of that in Amercan history.
worst is that it is global and it is getting worse.
and people believe in all this work hard --> get rich crap.
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I just assumed everybody was sick of me and others singing the praises of Clipartof. I'm also very excited about Toon Vectors and my own site, but those are still relatively small.
Sick of it? No. But it does sting a little every time I hear about someone else having a really positive experience with them. Think I missed the boat on that one back when there was even a chance I might have gotten in.
Guess we all have a regret or two in this business. Missing out on Clipartof is top of my list. :)
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Because there isn't an available niche for them to slide into. But Xanox wants to create that niche by raising prices and excluding photographers from selling - basically taking us right back to 2004.
if you want higher prices, just ask for it.
that's what marketers always did !
the finest example is the Vetta collection, same cr-ap but at a premium price.
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Because there isn't an available niche for them to slide into. But Xanox wants to create that niche by raising prices and excluding photographers from selling - basically taking us right back to 2004.
exactly because they're niches they should ask more money, that's what happens in pretty much any other industry.
only mainstream products are doomed to be low-cost forever.
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Won't work, Xanox. If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
The iStock model, where you don't pay the supplier of goods until months after you have sold them, while the purchaser pays you weeks before they take delivery was a stroke of utter business genius. It made it very difficult not to make money or to run into cash flow problems - your customers became your financial backers without even knowing it. So anyone can set up one of these operations as soon as they notice that people are trying to mess with the market, push people out of it and charge more than the minimum. That's the reality. You can't bring the 1990s back again.
Yes, there is a minimum production cost. But if the cumulative average earnings of the images significantly exceed it, then you're basically OK. I've got pictures that have clocked up more than $1,000 in pennies here and there. I suppose that on average each of my images has made $40-$50 and rising (some of them make nothing at all). And I spend hardly anything to create them. Maybe $20,000 on equipment over 10 years. So, it works.
Asian producers won't supplant western ones in the end. The models don't look Western so they won't meet Western market demand. The goods and food aren't Western. I live in the east and my pictures don't sell particularly well in the US, they do sell in Europe and Asia. If first-world photographers do stop producing, then the prices will have to rise to pull them back again.
I think that the return has now dropped to the level that may well keep new producers out. I've been arguing for about eight years that at some point the return per image will become so low that anybody who isn't already established will just give up. I suspect that we are about there (looking at the $5 iStock has made me on 60 images over the last six months).
well, it takes millions in marketing to launch a new agency and to acquire new buyers.
it's easier if you're the only bloke in the market and you've little or no competition like IS years ago, but nowadays the market is saturated, new small agencies are dime a dozen and as you can see they're going nowhere, even FT and DT are not doing well and they're supposed to have money and being backed by rich investors and yet they still can't compete with SS.
same for Stocksy as i predicted from day one.
to clone the booming success of IS in its early days you would need the same ingredients : either selling products for 1/10th of the competition or providing a solution that it's 10 times better at the same price.
but i can't see a single way to go anywhere near both scenarios, everything has been tried already, any kind of sh-it has been throw at the wall and not much sticked, it's always about rock bottom prices and unfair fees, same situation we can see in music and other creative fields actually.
if there ever was a magic idea someone would be a billionaire by now but instead all we have is SS's founder or Yuri and his clones.
i mean the moral of this story is that SS's founder who just cloned someone else business model made 10 or 20x times more money than the IS founder.
as they always say, ideas are worthless, execution is king !
anyway, yes nobody can bring the '90s back again, but a sort of midstock has certainly reason to exist and its place in the market, not to mention the disasters caused by the RF licence.
asians : agree but there are many niches where they could do fine, i think they just dont know that stock is an option for photographers, they could do well even with travel images alone, think about places like Thailand or Japan, but so few asians travel a lot and in any case they don't have the english skills to do proper keywording, same reason for why there's not a boom of asian writers doing books in english or asians going into written-english journalism.
production costs : yes and as i said we're still having it a lot better than in other creative fields, but i'm scared about the future as there's nothing stopping agencies to reach the point where producing stock is no more profitable for artists, see in the book publishing industry for example where it's taken for granted that only the best selling guys can stay afloat and anybody else (99% ?) is condemned to make peanuts or beer money from spending months doing a book.
so writers know from the starts it's gotta be just a hobby, next it will be musicians' turn, and next .. photographers ? who knows .. if the trends keeps going on yeah this is the future waiting for pretty much any digital artist and good luck saying "adapt or die", the buyers and the agencies owe us nothing !
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I think you need to put at least some of the blame back onto the pro stock photogs who decided to upload high quality images for a very low return per image. No one asked those guys to raise the quality bar
actually photo editors and buyers did.
it was a different era, even journalists were paid a sh-itload of money to write dull articles any blogger could do better nowadays, and they also had people doing editing and spellchecking.
it's all gone down the drain now, yeah it was crazy how much expensive it was but now we switched to another extreme where even photo editors have been booted out and replaced by bloggers with iphones, volunteers, and images stolen from the web.
all i can say is that now it's a buyer's dream and it can't last forever, we must reach a sort of compromise before or later.
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There are 20 new agencies popping up already that nobody cares about. What boggles my mind is that nobody is really trying it. You have Stocksy, SS's new project and some illustration sites, but not a whole lot beyond that. If contributors want it, why isn't somebody building it?
they don't have money and/or ideas to compete.
their cost to acquire a single buyer is too high compared to the top agencies as they're not backed by a famous brand and they are failing to set themselves apart by offering a unique service or a substancial cost advantage.
simples as that !
it took 20 yrs for brands like Samsung to reach the place they deserve now, and what about KIA, Huawei, Lenovo, Acer .. all these companies were absolutely unknown not long ago.
is Samyang the next Nikon ? we'll see .. but in the meantime it's considered rubbish (wrong, but go tell buyers..) and they will need to spend a sh-itload of money before being perceived at least on par with Tamron, let alone canon or nikon.
producing a product is easy, selling is VERY hard ! that's the hard truth in any business.
i could start selling my worst stock images at 1000$ a pop, but i would probably spend 999$ to find the only crazy buyer willing to pay for it.
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"5% per year in interest" "return from rent is just over 6%"
bit of a drama queen don't you think? hell of a difference mate between rent and interest.
"Actually, they wanted me to supply another version of something ..... so I dashed it off to Alamy. They paid $529 for it, so I ended up with about $300. I'm not entirely stupid."
So you are saying they somehow contacted you to supply another version of an image, you dashed it off to an agency (Alamy) so that they could find it there and you instantly lost $229 on this image? If you are not entirely stupid, why not sell it direct? or was this just for more drama queen effect to impress us all on how wonderful you are?
Did I touch a raw nerve? Clever of you to point out that I used the wrong word after I had pointed it out. As for (B), I don't have the sort of paperwork - purchase orders, billheads, company name etc. - that Seimens accounts department would probably expect and that might have caused problems, so I decided the best thing was Alamy. As it happens, they negotiated two or three times what I would have asked (since I knew they had been looking at similar stuff on SS) so I ended up better off by leaving the professional negotiators to do the negotiating.
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Won't work, Xanox. If all the microstock agencies in the world got together tonight and created an entry barrier and push up prices, then tomorrow there would be 20 new agencies pop up to grab all the material that was being pushed away and sell it cheaply. That was what created iStock and the moment it showed there was a niche DT, Canstock and SS sprang into being to grab a slice of the action.
The iStock model, where you don't pay the supplier of goods until months after you have sold them, while the purchaser pays you weeks before they take delivery was a stroke of utter business genius. It made it very difficult not to make money or to run into cash flow problems - your customers became your financial backers without even knowing it. So anyone can set up one of these operations as soon as they notice that people are trying to mess with the market, push people out of it and charge more than the minimum. That's the reality. You can't bring the 1990s back again.
Yes, there is a minimum production cost. But if the cumulative average earnings of the images significantly exceed it, then you're basically OK. I've got pictures that have clocked up more than $1,000 in pennies here and there. I suppose that on average each of my images has made $40-$50 and rising (some of them make nothing at all). And I spend hardly anything to create them. Maybe $20,000 on equipment over 10 years. So, it works.
Asian producers won't supplant western ones in the end. The models don't look Western so they won't meet Western market demand. The goods and food aren't Western. I live in the east and my pictures don't sell particularly well in the US, they do sell in Europe and Asia. If first-world photographers do stop producing, then the prices will have to rise to pull them back again.
I think that the return has now dropped to the level that may well keep new producers out. I've been arguing for about eight years that at some point the return per image will become so low that anybody who isn't already established will just give up. I suspect that we are about there (looking at the $5 iStock has made me on 60 images over the last six months).
well, it takes millions in marketing to launch a new agency and to acquire new buyers.
it's easier if you're the only bloke in the market and you've little or no competition like IS years ago, but nowadays the market is saturated, new small agencies are dime a dozen and as you can see they're going nowhere, even FT and DT are not doing well and they're supposed to have money and being backed by rich investors and yet they still can't compete with SS.
same for Stocksy as i predicted from day one.
to clone the booming success of IS in its early days you would need the same ingredients : either selling products for 1/10th of the competition or providing a solution that it's 10 times better at the same price.
but i can't see a single way to go anywhere near both scenarios, everything has been tried already, any kind of sh-it has been throw at the wall and not much sticked, it's always about rock bottom prices and unfair fees, same situation we can see in music and other creative fields actually.
if there ever was a magic idea someone would be a billionaire by now but instead all we have is SS's founder or Yuri and his clones.
i mean the moral of this story is that SS's founder who just cloned someone else business model made 10 or 20x times more money than the IS founder.
as they always say, ideas are worthless, execution is king !
anyway, yes nobody can bring the '90s back again, but a sort of midstock has certainly reason to exist and its place in the market, not to mention the disasters caused by the RF licence.
asians : agree but there are many niches where they could do fine, i think they just dont know that stock is an option for photographers, they could do well even with travel images alone, think about places like Thailand or Japan, but so few asians travel a lot and in any case they don't have the english skills to do proper keywording, same reason for why there's not a boom of asian writers doing books in english or asians going into written-english journalism.
production costs : yes and as i said we're still having it a lot better than in other creative fields, but i'm scared about the future as there's nothing stopping agencies to reach the point where producing stock is no more profitable for artists, see in the book publishing industry for example where it's taken for granted that only the best selling guys can stay afloat and anybody else (99% ?) is condemned to make peanuts or beer money from spending months doing a book.
so writers know from the starts it's gotta be just a hobby, next it will be musicians' turn, and next .. photographers ? who knows .. if the trends keeps going on yeah this is the future waiting for pretty much any digital artist and good luck saying "adapt or die", the buyers and the agencies owe us nothing !
Great post. However, there is a significant difference between many Musicians and Writers and MS Photographers: Many people who write or make Music want to express themselves, show something special, create something unique (not all though lol), while MS photographers create boring but technical perfect content which is specialized for this kind of commerce. Wanna say: If MS isn`t worth the production anymore, most photographers return on shooting what they love, not what the market demands, and this may dry out the industry.
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Xanox, writing books almost always starts as a hobby, but there are other forms of writing that you can make money from. Same with photography. And when you talk of stock photographers being "creatives", we're about as creative as an advertising copy-writer or political speech writer. One or two may stand out as having real creativity and flair, most are just workmanlike. That's the problem, the bulk of stock photography is easily copied and sometimes better than the original. Even the very best microstockers are just exceptionally good and hardworking technicians, they are not great creative artists, we don't have any Leonardo da Vincis, or Jane Austens among our ranks or, as Tror rightly points out, if there are then they aren't using their creativity in this field.
Let's remember that neither stock nor microstock were created with the intention of creating full-time jobs for photographers. Stock started as a way for photographers to make a bit of extra cash from stuff they happened to have left over from jobs. Microstock began as a swap-shop for designers. Maybe they are drifting back to their roots.
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"5% per year in interest" "return from rent is just over 6%"
bit of a drama queen don't you think? hell of a difference mate between rent and interest.
"Actually, they wanted me to supply another version of something ..... so I dashed it off to Alamy. They paid $529 for it, so I ended up with about $300. I'm not entirely stupid."
So you are saying they somehow contacted you to supply another version of an image, you dashed it off to an agency (Alamy) so that they could find it there and you instantly lost $229 on this image? If you are not entirely stupid, why not sell it direct? or was this just for more drama queen effect to impress us all on how wonderful you are?
Did I touch a raw nerve? Clever of you to point out that I used the wrong word after I had pointed it out. As for (B), I don't have the sort of paperwork - purchase orders, billheads, company name etc. - that Seimens accounts department would probably expect and that might have caused problems, so I decided the best thing was Alamy. As it happens, they negotiated two or three times what I would have asked (since I knew they had been looking at similar stuff on SS) so I ended up better off by leaving the professional negotiators to do the negotiating.
no, you did not touch a raw nerve at all, rather i find your musings to be arbitrary, exaggerated and entertaining while you make your point.
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i find your musings to be arbitrary, exaggerated and entertaining while you make your point.
Good :) That's how it's meant to be.
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i find your musings to be arbitrary, exaggerated and entertaining while you make your point.
Good :) That's how it's meant to be.
Cheers and bottoms up I say...
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i find your musings to be arbitrary, exaggerated and entertaining while you make your point.
Good :) That's how it's meant to be.
Cheers and bottoms up I say...
Too early where I am :)
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i find your musings to be arbitrary, exaggerated and entertaining while you make your point.
Good :) That's how it's meant to be.
Cheers and bottoms up I say...
Too early where I am :)
but you said "I live in the east", and from what i gather it's beer thirty there...
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Since eloquence has now found its liquid form as is so often the case, I will say cheers, first in Retsina and then in Ouzo.
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Since eloquence has now found its liquid form as is so often the case, I will say cheers, first in Retsina and then in Ouzo.
while we are mixing it up, let's top it off with Aquavit followed by a Caipirinha smoothie :)
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I once had a Brazilian GF, she had Caipirinha sent from Porto Allegre, nice taste, terrible hangover.
But fun while it lasted.
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Xanox, writing books almost always starts as a hobby, but there are other forms of writing that you can make money from. Same with photography. And when you talk of stock photographers being "creatives", we're about as creative as an advertising copy-writer or political speech writer. One or two may stand out as having real creativity and flair, most are just workmanlike. That's the problem, the bulk of stock photography is easily copied and sometimes better than the original. Even the very best microstockers are just exceptionally good and hardworking technicians, they are not great creative artists, we don't have any Leonardo da Vincis, or Jane Austens among our ranks or, as Tror rightly points out, if there are then they aren't using their creativity in this field.
Let's remember that neither stock nor microstock were created with the intention of creating full-time jobs for photographers. Stock started as a way for photographers to make a bit of extra cash from stuff they happened to have left over from jobs. Microstock began as a swap-shop for designers. Maybe they are drifting back to their roots.
yeah, it's only incidentally that stock agencies allowed a bunch of pros to become full time stockers but it's still in their interest to deal with a small number of trusted suppliers rather than messing with an army of random snappers with their canon rebel.
i'm sure istock could pretty much stay afloat even just hiring their top 50 sellers and close the doors, who needs 300K amateurs with a portfolio of 20-30 images of their dog ?
this is still a multi billion industry, it's disgusting that it's been ruined in such way.
the billions are still there to be made, but someone had the awful idea of doing it micro style and making a big horrible mess for all.
indeed it's not art or whatever, but it never had such pretentiousness, and for sure i've seen some creative images on stock that beat plenty of "fine art" sh-it hands down.
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Great post. However, there is a significant difference between many Musicians and Writers and MS Photographers: Many people who write or make Music want to express themselves, show something special, create something unique (not all though lol), while MS photographers create boring but technical perfect content which is specialized for this kind of commerce. Wanna say: If MS isn`t worth the production anymore, most photographers return on shooting what they love, not what the market demands, and this may dry out the industry.
i see no reason for the industry to dry up anytime soon.
by opposite i see opportunities for the industry to get bigger and expand its tentacles in some asian markets but it could take a long time for that considering the abysmal attitude towards copyright and licencing in places like china in particular.
for RF the oversaturation will reach levels that will make it next to impossible for contributors to stay afloat unless they find a way to cut costs dramatically and to double or triple their portfolios.
for RM it's stable as ever, a few up and downs but as an industry it will never die because you just can't find the RM images sold as RF or micro RF ! and good luck browsing Flickr or google images if you need a specific hard to find image, buyers will either pay a fair price or shut the F up as they deserve.
microstockers : yes but they've nowhere to hide at this point.
they specialized and invested in a type of imagery that nowadays is worth a couple dollars at most.
of course they can U-turn and become good wedding photographers or join a newspaper or whatever, but how many will make it ?
i see too much perfectionism in microstockers, people taking 10 years to get a 5000 images portfolio, and now suddenly they're crashing and burning and suffering big losses as they bet the farm on istock.
well, we told you so !
but neither i've any magic solution for that, the only clear pattern is that you need a big portfolio to make a living in stock, no matter if RF or RM.
too many think it's all about quality but this will make them very vulnerable to the oversaturation factor and to sudden changes in search algorithms.
yeah there are dudes with 300 photos selling like hot cakes, but their biz can be wiped out overnight if the agencies adds new features or relegates you images into a second tier collection, see Alamy for example.
music : i think as a biz it's focked, even labels have a hard time, but DJs and live performers have never made so much easy money like today, no idea how long the party will last however.
as much as in the past everyone was complaining that gigs were too expensive, well what about today then ? i see awful bands asking 100$ entrance tickets and their shows are packed.
on the other side even asking a meagre 0.99$ to download one of their song is considered "too expensive" by the crowd of freeloaders.
ok, so bands will do it all alone and give away their music online as if it was a marketing tool ? but who will produce the songs actually ? what about the indie labels ? who will filter the sh-it out ? who will have any interest to promote an artist ? it's the same here in asia where everything is openly pirated and sold in the street and artists starve with live gigs and tv shows ... great if you're into mainstream music but for anything else it's just a hobby and in fact most of their music is trash copied or inspired from western hits, no space and no money left for any experimentation or avantgarde, a few places in the big cities yeah but just because they make live gigs but if we talk about studio albums forget it that's only for established bands backed by a major, the indies are relagated to the rock bottom much more than in europe where at least they can still publish with a few small labels.
i mean there's more money joining an itinerant philipino cover band than doing non-mainstream music in asia, that's the future waiting for the west too as soon as piracy will finally kill what's left of the industry.
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@ Xanox...
I agree with what you are saying. Others might not, but I get it.
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Dan, don't give up just yet... just adjust your focus. Change is coming. You are just at the forefront of it. Others will follow, it's just a matter of time. 55 new self hosted sites in 6 months is pretty impressive. I bet that number is 200 by the end of the year. I said it two years ago that "the future is in the little guys". I still believe that but I will amend it to include "self hosted" as well.
Of the 55 self-hosted sites, how many of them are making money?
Change may indeed be coming, but I see no evidence that this is it.
When people start saying "I sold 20 images today on my site" instead of "I had my first sale" we can proclaim that the tide is turning, but until then, I'll remain doubtful that this is the solution.
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I think that this kind of shift is happening in many different markets... writing and music come to mind.
I'm just getting started with photography and the microstock is a way of getting feedback with the potential for some payback. I don't expect it to become my primary income, but rather a fun way to support my hobby for now.
But the fact is that the agencies will do what it takes to protect themselves over the contributors. As long as they can continue to pull in contributors and sell images then they'll keep cutting the margins.
Going on your own may seem like a great option, but then you keep 100% of a much smaller pie. Unless you can work the SEO and marketing angles to get your portfolio infront of the eyes of the market you'll probably struggle.
I haven't looked into symbiostock yet. If it is just software then it will probably not do what people are hoping for. If it is more of a cooperative then there might be some teeth to it. Photographers working together to build each other up. But then you'd need some way to monitor the quality of each photographer so that you don't get an inrush of poor quality images. And it will happen if it is allowed to happen.
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What was the OP about again?
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I am as small potato as you get at this game. But to me, I would think that this forum would be a really good place for a power shift to begin. Organize a walk-out. As long as the agencies have the free inventory which we provide, then they have the power. Imagine if thousands of contributors pulled the plug on their portfolios, all over the world. In a viral world, it can be done.
This has been coming on for a few years now. I think I've had it with stock altogether. The relationships with these agencies is abysmal. In the last 2 years I have had my commissions cut by iStock twice, and now with the new pricing program I barely make 50 cents per download. Bigstock turned most of my on demand sales into very low paying subs, and 123RF made a similar move. Fotolia made so many anti-contributor moves that I removed my portfolio 18 months ago and haven't considered ever doing business with them again.
Who's next? SS? DT? Should I even care?
On one hand I could keep my ports up and let the money continue to flow in at a reduced rate every month as commissions keep getting slashed. But I'm pretty much getting raped every month. I don't see the agencies I supply images to working hard enough on my behalf to justify keeping 70%, 80% or more of the profit.
Sure this is just a rant, but I'm pretty serious about it. My heart isn't in it. I feel like I'm getting swindled. I certainly can't say I enjoy "shooting stock." So maybe it is time to just be done with it and let somebody else take the abuse.
A lot of people told me a few years ago, "Just walk away from it for a while." Well I did. From January until April of this year, I barely ever checked my sales. Stopped shooting stock altogether. Only made a few posts here. Then I came back after spring and made one last go of it, and I realize now that I simply detest most of these agencies and don't find anything about stock to be interesting or enjoyable. And the commission cuts just keep coming, and coming.
Thoughts? Anyone feel the same?
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I am as small potato as you get at this game. But to me, I would think that this forum would be a really good place for a power shift to begin. Organize a walk-out. As long as the agencies have the free inventory which we provide, then they have the power. Imagine if thousands of contributors pulled the plug on their portfolios, all over the world. In a viral world, it can be done.
This has been coming on for a few years now. I think I've had it with stock altogether. The relationships with these agencies is abysmal. In the last 2 years I have had my commissions cut by iStock twice, and now with the new pricing program I barely make 50 cents per download. Bigstock turned most of my on demand sales into very low paying subs, and 123RF made a similar move. Fotolia made so many anti-contributor moves that I removed my portfolio 18 months ago and haven't considered ever doing business with them again.
Who's next? SS? DT? Should I even care?
On one hand I could keep my ports up and let the money continue to flow in at a reduced rate every month as commissions keep getting slashed. But I'm pretty much getting raped every month. I don't see the agencies I supply images to working hard enough on my behalf to justify keeping 70%, 80% or more of the profit.
Sure this is just a rant, but I'm pretty serious about it. My heart isn't in it. I feel like I'm getting swindled. I certainly can't say I enjoy "shooting stock." So maybe it is time to just be done with it and let somebody else take the abuse.
A lot of people told me a few years ago, "Just walk away from it for a while." Well I did. From January until April of this year, I barely ever checked my sales. Stopped shooting stock altogether. Only made a few posts here. Then I came back after spring and made one last go of it, and I realize now that I simply detest most of these agencies and don't find anything about stock to be interesting or enjoyable. And the commission cuts just keep coming, and coming.
Thoughts? Anyone feel the same?
Well they killed our best selling images, new images are not selling and they are adding more crap everyday to bury the content which is still selling. With these diminishing returns there is nothing left to lose.
Time to spend my time on something far more productive. I will continue to buy and support the sites who pay a fair royalty's to contributors, but for now I am done uploading content which only has the potential to make the greedy sites richer at our expense.
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1 stop submitting images to crap and low commission microstocks
2 upload our new images only on fair commission microstock, 50% minimum (pond5, GL,...) and to your own website stock images.
3 talk to everyone what you are doing, customers have to know where new images are going.
4 delete portfolio on crap microstocks, stay with some good earner for a while but don't upload new content.
5 yes you are losing a few money, wait few months, when customers will understand than new images are on other microstock.
Very easy to change the done, we have only to do the same thing, together. We just have to choice the best fair microstocks.
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1 stop submitting images to crap and low commission microstocks
2 upload our new images only on fair commission microstock, 50% minimum (pond5, GL,...) and to your own website stock images.
3 talk to everyone what you are doing, customers have to know where new images are going.
4 delete portfolio on crap microstocks, stay with some good earner for a while but don't upload new content.
5 yes you are losing a few money, wait few months, when customers will understand than new images are on other microstock.
Very easy to change the done, we have only to do the same thing, together. We just have to choice the best fair microstocks.
I second that. It will take time. Especially since many contributors are financially tied. But I am sure the current situation and self-respect will drive the mass towards 1-5 :D
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50 percent of nothing is nothing. I made in 3 weeks more on Symbiostock then I did on GL in half a year.
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I too have tumbled down from a fairly lofty perch. I was in advertising in NYC for a long time...4000sqft studio...and all that it entailed including fat assignments. I segued to stock a very long time ago when it produced results. Now, lucky for me, my wife still works, I'm semi retired and all my earning from stock are icing... but not much. I have a collection of pics that keep selling and remain fairly industrious because I like to be, but starting over...from where we are now? Not on your life...certainly not on mine. The power brokers, such as the esteemed newly minted billionaire of Silicon Alley in NY are vultures, not good people as my grandma used to say. Yes, they deserve credit for good ideas...but c'mon, pigs are pigs by any standard. I left a few of these awful places and will another fairly soon. Been a little lazy about it for obvious reasons to me...the dribs and drabs are MY dribs and drabs. They do accumulate but in reality it's not oo funny a joke. The thing is that talent and cameras are everywhere so the many think they'll make a living from this. It won't happen for the vast majority but don;t try to convince anyone, it's not worth your time. Worse is true of the art community. I see huge man-hours spent there too...much more than in stock and it produces the same result: if you enjoy the process, great. But don't for a split second think you'll be paying your bills with the proceeds. If you have another thing that tickles you AND you have responsibilities like family, you're better off leaving this nonsense being. As I said, I'm mostly retired so it's no doubt easier for me to say. Just steer clear of the vultures if possible. They don't give a hoot.
I, too, have 'tumbled down from a fairly lofty perch'. I was fortunate to be in the midst of the RM 'boom' back in the 80's and early 90's and made enough to make a big dent in my mortgage and my daughter's college tuition.
And, like you, I am semi-retired with a wife that is still working. Which puts me in the comfortable postition of being able to be very picky with whom I work. I've left a few agencies who treated their contributors like dirt and will be leaving another one soon. I also have the luxury of working with a new startup knowing that sales are a ways off yet feeling like I belong there.....good for the blood pressure, too.
Very difficult to make a living in this business any longer but some do and my hat's off to them. I see more and more pros who I came to know during the 'good old days' that are turning away from stock and finding other avenues within the profession to put food on the table; leading workshops being one of the more popular ones now. Diversification is critical with stock being a (now) small part of a successful business plan, for most.
I feel for those who have no choice but to put up with the 'vultures'; just glad I'm not one of them.
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1 stop submitting images to crap and low commission microstocks
2 upload our new images only on fair commission microstock, 50% minimum (pond5, GL,...) and to your own website stock images.
3 talk to everyone what you are doing, customers have to know where new images are going.
4 delete portfolio on crap microstocks, stay with some good earner for a while but don't upload new content.
5 yes you are losing a few money, wait few months, when customers will understand than new images are on other microstock.
Very easy to change the done, we have only to do the same thing, together. We just have to choice the best fair microstocks.
I second that. It will take time. Especially since many contributors are financially tied. But I am sure the current situation and self-respect will drive the mass towards 1-5 :D
yes im in the process of that.
These days I delete more pictures than i upload.
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This thread, and others of a similar subject before it, has gotten to an interesting place. BTW, there is nothing new here. Those in the trenches for a long time understand the implications of crowd sourcing. To the point, in looking at the sidebar to my immediate right in this column SS ranks way higher than all the rest by a considerable %. Can it really be true that some of you derive 76.5% of your earning from them? That is bazaar, BUT, I'm not here to say how brilliant and knowledgeable I am, rather, to share. For whatever reason, I make considerably more from that company in London and also from DT. AND, I'm so disgusted by who's on top, it's my latest plan to leave them. Of course, I may not shoot what you all do. My work tends to be still-life and some people stuff, but usually conceptual and requiring a headline...not lifestyle or "simply" pretty pictures...so I know there's a lesser need for my work. Frankly, I'd be better served had I stayed a RM photographer with one good agent rather then falling into the trap of MS. But that's just me and my work.
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This thread, and others of a similar subject before it, has gotten to an interesting place. BTW, there is nothing new here. Those in the trenches for a long time understand the implications of crowd sourcing. To the point, in looking at the sidebar to my immediate right in this column SS ranks way higher than all the rest by a considerable %. Can it really be true that some of you derive 76.5% of your earning from them? That is bazaar, BUT, I'm not here to say how brilliant and knowledgeable I am, rather, to share. For whatever reason, I make considerably more from that company in London and also from DT. AND, I'm so disgusted by who's on top, it's my latest plan to leave them. Of course, I may not shoot what you all do. My work tends to be still-life and some people stuff, but usually conceptual and requiring a headline...not lifestyle or "simply" pretty pictures...so I know there's a lesser need for my work. Frankly, I'd be better served had I stayed a RM photographer with one good agent rather then falling into the trap of MS. But that's just me and my work.
I don't think that is a percentage, Ken. If so, SS and iS equal more than 100%.
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I too have tumbled down from a fairly lofty perch. I was in advertising in NYC for a long time...4000sqft studio...and all that it entailed including fat assignments. I segued to stock a very long time ago when it produced results. Now, lucky for me, my wife still works, I'm semi retired and all my earning from stock are icing... but not much. I have a collection of pics that keep selling and remain fairly industrious because I like to be, but starting over...from where we are now? Not on your life...certainly not on mine. The power brokers, such as the esteemed newly minted billionaire of Silicon Alley in NY are vultures, not good people as my grandma used to say. Yes, they deserve credit for good ideas...but c'mon, pigs are pigs by any standard. I left a few of these awful places and will another fairly soon. Been a little lazy about it for obvious reasons to me...the dribs and drabs are MY dribs and drabs. They do accumulate but in reality it's not oo funny a joke. The thing is that talent and cameras are everywhere so the many think they'll make a living from this. It won't happen for the vast majority but don;t try to convince anyone, it's not worth your time. Worse is true of the art community. I see huge man-hours spent there too...much more than in stock and it produces the same result: if you enjoy the process, great. But don't for a split second think you'll be paying your bills with the proceeds. If you have another thing that tickles you AND you have responsibilities like family, you're better off leaving this nonsense being. As I said, I'm mostly retired so it's no doubt easier for me to say. Just steer clear of the vultures if possible. They don't give a hoot.
I, too, have 'tumbled down from a fairly lofty perch'. I was fortunate to be in the midst of the RM 'boom' back in the 80's and early 90's and made enough to make a big dent in my mortgage and my daughter's college tuition.
And, like you, I am semi-retired with a wife that is still working. Which puts me in the comfortable postition of being able to be very picky with whom I work. I've left a few agencies who treated their contributors like dirt and will be leaving another one soon. I also have the luxury of working with a new startup knowing that sales are a ways off yet feeling like I belong there.....good for the blood pressure, too.
Very difficult to make a living in this business any longer but some do and my hat's off to them. I see more and more pros who I came to know during the 'good old days' that are turning away from stock and finding other avenues within the profession to put food on the table; leading workshops being one of the more popular ones now. Diversification is critical with stock being a (now) small part of a successful business plan, for most.
I feel for those who have no choice but to put up with the 'vultures'; just glad I'm not one of them.
i guess this makes at least three of us. funny thing is, ten or more years ago i would have never in my life dreamed of selling a photo for a few bucks, let alone getting 0.38c per download. glad i was around for the real boom time in stock photography not this newly perceived boom time. making a living on 0.38c per download is bu!!crap. i've been saying for years, this is the end of making a solid living from stock photography, or very close to it.
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Well they killed our best selling images, new images are not selling and they are adding more crap everyday to bury the content which is still selling. With these diminishing returns there is nothing left to lose.
Someone is getting more sales? Shutterstock grew over 40% in 2012? 1st quarter was slower, only 4% growth over 4th quarter 2012.
How does that include killing best sellers, new images don't sell, and burying content. There seems to be something wrong with the assumption that sales are down, when in fact they are up? Maybe not for people here, but someone is making all that money and all those downloads? If it's someone new, then, new uploads ARE selling.
Who is getting all the sales increase, when the complaints here say, everything is upside down and losing?
http://seekingalpha.com/article/1545712-shutterstock-valuation-makes-me-shudder (http://seekingalpha.com/article/1545712-shutterstock-valuation-makes-me-shudder)
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It is a percentage. It's a percentage of $500. Exclusives make on average 342% of $500 or $1710. Contributors to Shutterstock and Istock make 108% of $500 or $540 per month.
That's not what Leaf said at all, I don't know where you get that from. It's measured against some time when SS was 100. Since the survey does not deal in actual earnings, only in earnings bands, it can't even pretend to give an accurate cash figure, or even an accurate comparison of cash, come to that. It's really little more than a ranking system but it does give some idea of the direction things are going in.
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It is a percentage. It's a percentage of $500. Exclusives make on average 342% of $500 or $1710. Contributors to Shutterstock and Istock make 108% of $500 or $540 per month.
That's not what Leaf said at all, I don't know where you get that from. It's measured against some time when SS was 100. Since the survey does not deal in actual earnings, only in earnings bands, it can't even pretend to give an accurate cash figure, or even an accurate comparison of cash, come to that. It's really little more than a ranking system but it does give some idea of the direction things are going in.
Nope. This is what Leaf said: "Yeah, the magical number is 500 for whatever that's worth... so the average photographer on MSG is saying he is making just under $500 on SS"
[url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/site-related/why-is-the-shutterstock-ranking-not-100-anymore[/url] ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/site-related/why-is-the-shutterstock-ranking-not-100-anymore[/url])
What you are referring to is how it used to be before it was changed to a constant number of $500.
"previously I had it set that whatever was at the top of the poll would set the standard at 100 and the rest of the results would be something relative to that." and "Now I've set the top value at an arbitrary constant amount so that Shutterstock isn't at 100."
It is a real number of earnings based on what the average contributor says they make, whether or not the amount of answers is sufficient or how truthful the respondents are is a separate issue. The numbers are the percentage of the constant of $500, the number was chosen arbitrarily but it's a real dollar value.
I hadn't read all that, but note that at the end of the thread he admits to a large error range and says: "In the polls though, we aren't looking for an accurate number per say, just an accurate ranking, one site to another."
Because of the broad bands, especially for the higher numbers, $500 doesn't mean $500. I don't recall what the bands are exactly, but it just means that the average result falls within a certain range (and logic suggests that the majority of people in each band is skewed towards the bottom end, since there are going to be more people getting, say, $375 than $625 if a band extends between those ranges, so saying they all averaged $500 would be wrong, they are more likely to average something like 425).
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The other thing, of course, is that it is subject to the most atrocious sampling error since most people who participate on MSG are extremely successful at microstock. You'd probably get a more accurate picture of what the average happy-snapper who signs up for stock makes in a month if you divide by somewhere between 10 and 100.
I know for a fact that about seven years ago when DT had just reached 10,000 members there were 14 who had achieved more than 10,000 sales and there were 5,631 who had 10 sales or less. Out of all 10,000 members only 1,132 had enough sales to have reached a payout. This was all freely published info on the DT site for anyone who felt like wasting a morning working it out. I assume the shape of the curve is exactly the same for every site out there.
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Well they killed our best selling images, new images are not selling and they are adding more crap everyday to bury the content which is still selling. With these diminishing returns there is nothing left to lose.
Someone is getting more sales? Shutterstock grew over 40% in 2012? 1st quarter was slower, only 4% growth over 4th quarter 2012.
How does that include killing best sellers, new images don't sell, and burying content. There seems to be something wrong with the assumption that sales are down, when in fact they are up? Maybe not for people here, but someone is making all that money and all those downloads? If it's someone new, then, new uploads ARE selling.
Who is getting all the sales increase, when the complaints here say, everything is upside down and losing?
[url]http://seekingalpha.com/article/1545712-shutterstock-valuation-makes-me-shudder[/url] ([url]http://seekingalpha.com/article/1545712-shutterstock-valuation-makes-me-shudder[/url])
I just went to have a look at what is filling some of the spots where i have been displaced to the nether regions. A simple look at one category which contains 40665 pages showed that at a good many of those spots on the first 2 pages had been replaced with "inspired" images from submitters who had been Member's since 2012 and 2011.
I have quite a few friends who had large numbers of images that "earned" their way to first page popular searches. Everyone of them have been hit hard, the more they had the worse the hit has been on monthly returns.
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Hi All,
A lot of Tornado's blowing around this post and probably some feelings getting hurt. I think this post alone shows and shares the frustration that many are feeling about Microstock. Try to remember that it is the industry you are frustrated with not each other.
Cheers,
Jonathan
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Hi All,
A lot of Tornado's blowing around this post and probably some feelings getting hurt. I think this post alone shows and shares the frustration that many are feeling about Microstock. Try to remember that it is the industry you are frustrated with not each other.
Cheers,
Jonathan
I disagree. I'm frustrated with the people too. Kidding. Happy Friday. ;)
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My frustration is with RM as well, like Alamy taking 70% on partner sales. Its about the royalties not microstock in particular.
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Hi Ron,
I agree, the percentage split with the big agencies is difficult at all levels.
Thanks,
Jonathan
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I'm just a small fish, but I'd sum up my frustration this way: the agencies have made it abundantly clear that the future is going to be just like the past, only worse. Lower and lower returns. Commissions cut, and cut again. Subscription plans with token payments. Cheesy partner programs and giveaways like the Google Drive deal.
Who is going to invest their time and effort in something which is obviously headed in only one direction?
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Who is going to invest their time and effort in something which is obviously headed in only one direction?
That's what I'm wondering too. And what will happen with the agencies when nobody is uploading new material any longer?
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Look at all of the people giving their work away as Creative Commons. Tell them, "hey not only will we let you give your work away, we'll even pay you 10 or 15 cents for ever download!" And I guarantee there will be a ton of people who think it is a great deal. Ever lower commissions for higher standards, just for the privilege of possibly having one of your images used in an advertisement someday. How exciting! :P
That's where I think microstock is headed, and why I've decided I really want no part of it except for a few companies (and those few companies will probably jump the shark eventually too).
I'm putting the Over/Under on 18 months before Shutterstock implements a Bigstock inspired commission structure, and most of us go back to 25-29 cents per sub sale. Why not? We already accept it at Bigstock, Canstock, and 123RF. It's inevitable, and it will be a great way to show investors how they raised margins substantially year over year.
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Look at all of the people giving their work away as Creative Commons. Tell them, "hey not only will we let you give your work away, we'll even pay you 10 or 15 cents for ever download!" And I guarantee there will be a ton of people who think it is a great deal. Ever lower commissions for higher standards, just for the privilege of possibly having one of your images used in an advertisement someday. How exciting! :P
so far it's not happening, also because of the CC licence itself imposing idiotic limitations on commercial use and allowing the author to even change the licence retroactively.
from what i see amateurs are more prone to sell prints for 10-20$ rather than digital downloads for a pittance.
there are some diamonds in the rough on sites like 500px, flickr, instagram but recently i wasted a few hours browsing some stuff about the city where i'm living now and i was flooded by cr-ap i don't want to ever see again, now i see why Getty's flickr experiment turned out to be a waste of time, even for top travel destination you can easily be facing 1 good image vs 200 absolute trash images, what would be the outcome if each one of these photos had a "buy" button for 1$ ? and it seems the authors are also quite proud of their cr-ap snaps, they would complain the price is too cheap, go figure ! that;s what they did with getty paying decent fees actually.
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Who is going to invest their time and effort in something which is obviously headed in only one direction?
And yet we're all still here. Wonder what that says about us. :)
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Maintenance on Shutterstock today, the RC schedule might come sooner than we think ;)
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Who is going to invest their time and effort in something which is obviously headed in only one direction?
That's what I'm wondering too. And what will happen with the agencies when nobody is uploading new material any longer?
we could all stop uploading for three or four years, to every site, and they would still make another billion dollars. there is such a saturation of images at the moment and they really don't give one flying f*ck about us.
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That maintenance is never for our benefit. Not like they're going to do that then I get 10 EL's after they come back up :p
@Dan man I hope SS doesn't do that or head in that path then how many of us would leave there in droves? And how many after that would replace us? Most if not all of us knew that something was going to happen to the contributors once they went public and I think now we're feeling that effect now more than what we did the first few months.
I also know that's it's always going to be slow in the summer but it's slower than normal. I don't even think that my numbers this year will be anywhere near last year.
I also agree that they don't care enough about the suppliers just their d**n bottom line. And that's any of them.
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Maintenance on Shutterstock today, the RC schedule might come sooner than we think ;)
Lets hope that is not the case.
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Having started this business in 2011 I was officially done but didn't know it ???
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A minus for a cheeky joke including a smiley. Sigh. I have said this before, but people need to lighten up and take joke as a joke. Its all taken too serious at points.
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Who is going to invest their time and effort in something which is obviously headed in only one direction?
And yet we're all still here. Wonder what that says about us. :)
It says that for years since we started, the reward justified the effort.
As far as "still here", I don't know that's exactly true. Many folks whose incomes are dropping seem to be uploading less and less in response.
It's sensible to leave your existing ports up and wring whatever remaining income you can from them, but fewer people seem to be investing time and money in uploading new HCV shoots.
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The past being the best indicator of the future - and history having a tendency to repeat itself.. and so on..
We should all just keep shooting and contributing, shouldn't we ;)
Keep shootin for the LOVE of photography just as we did before - followed by keywording - loading - taking rejections with a grin - and shooting some more..
And the agencies should also go on just as they did before - squeezing commissions, squeezing some more and then some - and keeping an ever larger chunk of the sales for all the hard work (and hard squeezing) done.
And history shall keep repeating itself, till one fine day every next stock agency will have a trillion and a half stock images of the handsome businessman shaking hands etc - and then perhaps this stock model will die a quiet death - with no more contributors - and trillions of stock images already uploaded chasing and badgering the buyers to buy buy buy .. or well, just take it for free.
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There was a time when I thought that by increasing the costs and the commission payments iSTock risked wrecking the model, driving away buyers and pulling in people who would not have bothered when we were getting 10c 20c and 30c or evern 20c, 40c, and 60c per DL.
I'm starting to think again that I was right. Standards would have been much lower, the factories would never have appeared and the RPI might not have shrunk to where it is now. I'm not sure, of course, but I do wonder,
And now the iS commissions seem to be back at 20c, 40c and 80c anyway. No progress in a decade.
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getting into this business in 2012- "Heck, I was done and didn't even know it!"
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There was a time when I thought that by increasing the costs and the commission payments iSTock risked wrecking the model, driving away buyers and pulling in people who would not have bothered when we were getting 10c 20c and 30c or evern 20c, 40c, and 60c per DL.
I'm starting to think again that I was right. Standards would have been much lower, the factories would never have appeared and the RPI might not have shrunk to where it is now. I'm not sure, of course, but I do wonder...
I think istock was right that the industry can bear higher prices, they just got it wrong about which companies could do it and the context in which it would be accepted by buyers. They established themselves as a microstock company but ventured too far out of that realm. When really what they should have done was create something separate, like SS is doing with Offset.
Of course it is yet to be seen whether Offset will work, but at least SS isn't ruining their existing business by trying to change it up too drastically.
There's a proper place for what istock wanted to do. That place just wasn't istock.
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There was a time when I thought that by increasing the costs and the commission payments iSTock risked wrecking the model, driving away buyers and pulling in people who would not have bothered when we were getting 10c 20c and 30c or evern 20c, 40c, and 60c per DL.
I'm starting to think again that I was right. Standards would have been much lower, the factories would never have appeared and the RPI might not have shrunk to where it is now. I'm not sure, of course, but I do wonder...
I think istock was right that the industry can bear higher prices, they just got it wrong about which companies could do it and the context in which it would be accepted by buyers. They established themselves as a microstock company but ventured too far out of that realm. When really what they should have done was create something separate, like SS is doing with Offset.
Of course it is yet to be seen whether Offset will work, but at least SS isn't ruining their existing business by trying to change it up too drastically.
There's a proper place for what istock wanted to do. That place just wasn't istock.
Didn't they already have an Offset? It's called Getty. I agree though. They were doing a good job selling higher priced content until they broke it.
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There was a time when I thought that by increasing the costs and the commission payments iSTock risked wrecking the model, driving away buyers and pulling in people who would not have bothered when we were getting 10c 20c and 30c or evern 20c, 40c, and 60c per DL.
I'm starting to think again that I was right. Standards would have been much lower, the factories would never have appeared and the RPI might not have shrunk to where it is now. I'm not sure, of course, but I do wonder...
I think istock was right that the industry can bear higher prices, they just got it wrong about which companies could do it and the context in which it would be accepted by buyers. They established themselves as a microstock company but ventured too far out of that realm. When really what they should have done was create something separate, like SS is doing with Offset.
Of course it is yet to be seen whether Offset will work, but at least SS isn't ruining their existing business by trying to change it up too drastically.
There's a proper place for what istock wanted to do. That place just wasn't istock.
Didn't they already have an Offset? It's called Getty. I agree though. They were doing a good job selling higher priced content until they broke it.
The original "offset" was iStockpro. The idea was that if you were professional standard, then you would be accepted into the "pro" section of the site which would sell at Alamy type prices. The amateurs would stay in iStock, where we belonged, until we learned enough to move up.
That was where things were in April 2004, but iStockpro never took off.
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Didn't they already have an Offset? It's called Getty. I agree though. They were doing a good job selling higher priced content until they broke it.
I'm not sure they did break it, I just think the quality at SS got so high that designers rarely felt the need to shop anywhere else.