I think you're just starting to sound like a one track record.  I can't say I read too much of your posts any more.  They're all just 'bitter complain insult whine repeat'.  Sorry.

I've lost nearly all my motivation with microstock.  The only site that makes enough for me to get interested is SS and I have gone from getting most of my images accepted to having most of them rejected.  

I really don't feel like raising my standards and working harder when there's nothing to stop sites lowering commissions again.  It seems crazy to invest time and money in to something that could get worse in the future.  The sites could promise not to cut commission again but there have already been lots of broken promises.

I'm looking at other ways to make money, even thinking that something other than photography might be more lucrative.  I've tried living without much money for a few years now and it's not much fun.  Better get another euro millions ticket

Istock's motivational incentives worked a lot better before they started coming up with ways to screw their contributors. 

Come on fellas!!   its not THAT bad.  Many of us knew, already from the start of Micro: it dont last forever. In the creative world, no matter what, you get your 10 years or something and thats it. Pretty soon something else, revolutionary will come along and that will be the end of micro and everyone will start embarking on this new, whatever thing. It always does!

Think about it, who wants to sit here for another 10 years, square-eyed and upload for pittens? even if you earn thousands!  what a crummy way of making a living. Its not even about photography anymore, its all about quickly raking together some rubbish and then upload it and if you cant find any inspiration, well?  then you do some isolations on white or shoot some young pimply business people with thumbs in their ass, Sorry, I mean thumbs up!

About the exclusives at IS. forget it, in spite of what we are led to believe or want us to believe, the average exclusive, even the average Diamiond exclusive, and I know quite a few,  is having no better times then the independant, theyre suffering as well. Only the die-hard Vettas and agencies, are making it.

Now Im on my way down to Fortnum-Mason having my breakfast tea.

Quote from: sharpshot on July 08, 2011, 04:20

^^^I don't think many people are like that because there are sites where we can see how many downloads they've had and it's easy to see if people are exaggerating.

If they don't share any personal info, we can't. And that one doesn't (yeah go figure why, lol). I'll buy u a beer if you can find out how many DLs I have, just to "make my case"

Quote from: Slovenian on July 08, 2011, 04:28

Quote from: sharpshot on July 08, 2011, 04:20

^^^I don't think many people are like that because there are sites where we can see how many downloads they've had and it's easy to see if people are exaggerating.

If they don't share any personal info, we can't. And that one doesn't (yeah go figure why, lol). I'll buy u a beer if you can find out how many DLs I have, just to "make my case"

I can sometimes guess who people are from clues they leave.  Not being funny but if I'm right, your initials are BS.  I can see downloads on some sites, not easy to guess how many people sell with SS but it's obvious when people exaggerate too much.

If I guessed right, nice portfolio.

I would expect, though, that some cycle will run its inevitable course and a new market will develop.  What I think forces this is that the current microstocks have vastly too much cr@p - lousy, repetitious images loaded with spammed keywords -  and going back through it now, to make real value judgements on 10s of millions of images, is prohibitively expensive.  They're trying to force the junk to the rear of the search by all sorts of crazy tweaks to the search rules, "vetta" nonsense and so on -  but they can't accomplish what they really need, and just get tied up in other knots.  That huge collection of junk is just overwhelmig.  Basically, they're hoarders, living in houses full of useless trash that they're unable to deal wth.  This is where crowdsourcing eventually leads.

So there should be opportunity, at some point, for new sites that start fresh and are much more sophisticated about what they take in and how they index it - not to mention how they pay contributors.  

Quote from: stockastic on July 08, 2011, 11:38

I would expect, though, that some cycle will run its inevitable course and a new market will develop.  What I think forces this is that the current microstocks have vastly too much cr@p - lousy, repetitious images loaded with spammed keywords -  and going back through it now, to make real value judgements on 10s of millions of images, is prohibitively expensive.  They're trying to force the junk to the rear of the search by all sorts of crazy tweaks to the search rules, "vetta" nonsense and so on -  but they can't accomplish what they really need, and just get tied up in other knots.  That huge collection of junk is just overwhelmig.  Basically, they're hoarders, living in houses full of useless trash that they're unable to deal wth.  This is where crowdsourcing eventually leads.

So there should be opportunity, at some point, for new sites that start fresh and are much more sophisticated about what they take in and how they index it - not to mention how they pay contributors.  

But that's just the problem, every new site wants to get as much content as possible to be able to compete with other, especially the established ones. That's where they all go wrong. That or trying to be a niche agency with only a few dozens of togs. Nothing in between. And certainly no pioneers among them introducing a new licencing model or at least up the restrictions in a way, buyers would have to buy at least 10x more of ELs. Lower print runs for starters, all magazine covers and photos for billboards should be bought as an ELs.