Among the top and middle tiers, I don't see any at risk of going under soon (excluding possible acquisitions or inclusions of sites into their parent sites, but I wouldn't consider that actually 'going under', like it or not)

From the low earners on the right, it's easier for me to say which ones will NOT go under:

PantherMedia - because, despite their horrible upload method, they are otherwise acting very professionally;

Pond5 - because, concentrating on video and audio, they have a unique approach;

ScanStockPhoto - because I like them: they always acted very honestly towards contributors, so I am gladly listing them here even if they don't have a referral scheme nor a lot of sales;

The three above are the only one I put some hope into at present. But things are changing so quickly in this crazy microstock industry that I upload a sample of my port to most of the other sites as well just to keep monitoring them.

Even though Elena seems to be a very nice person, I am afraid that FeaturePics will be the next to fall.

Crestock has already been absorbed into a larger agency, it may just slowly disappear within Masterfile .  . . .

Interesting that you had Polylooks in your list, perry - they are closing at the end of the year. They sent out an email to contributors today (I'm not a contributor, so I can't post the text).

Yes... the Polylooks disaster was the thing that made me write my post...

Quote from: Pheby on September 29, 2010, 15:48

Interesting that you had Polylooks in your list, perry - they are closing at the end of the year. They sent out an email to contributors today (I'm not a contributor, so I can't post the text).

Yes... the Polylooks disaster was the thing that made me write my post...

oooops, it didn't sound to me as if you knew already. 

As much as I'd hate to see it happen cause John is such a nice guy, but perhaps Cutcaster.

Here in a few years Wal-Mart will get into the microstock game and then all of them will die off.

Too funny but probably true. 

Quote from: Randy McKown on September 30, 2010, 00:24

Here in a few years Wal-Mart will get into the microstock game and then all of them will die off.

Walmart? Nah. Maybe Google.

Google is too busy getting ready to attack Apple and Facebook which I'm really looking forward to so let's not give them any more ideas right now. 

I know that Cresock has been bought, but I still don't see a bright future for them.
And FeaturePics: I'm surprised they're still open for business.
Don't know also how to interpretate last moves by MostPhotos. Maybe financial crisis on the horizon?

Quote from: Kngkyle on September 30, 2010, 00:31

Quote from: Randy McKown on September 30, 2010, 00:24

Here in a few years Wal-Mart will get into the microstock game and then all of them will die off.

Walmart? Nah. Maybe Google.

Google is too busy getting ready to attack Apple and Facebook which I'm really looking forward to so let's not give them any more ideas right now. 

Google pay a 68% revenue share to their publishers:
http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/05/adsense-revenue-share.html

Any sites paying us anything close to that?

I don't think Crestock will be the next one. At least if the new owner has some money to spend. They review faster now, and they pay etc.

Strangely I got a few sales at Featurepics this september!

I wonder how some sites like Imagevortex manages to keep their site online. I uploaded a few images there back in 2005, I sold one image in 2006 and after that it has been quiet.

Maybe a site with no traffic don't need that much mainteinance either...

I haven't high expecations on Depositphotos. They paid me $100 to upload images but have made me only $16 in "real" sales. They also are owned by a bigger company that might get bored with the poor sales and stop the whole business.

MostPhotos seems also to be without any sales. I had ONE sale in 2008, nothing after that.

Don't people care that crestock only pay $0.25 for subs?  The rest doesn't bother me much, I just don't like $0.25 when other sites pay a lot more.

They're currently 'stealing' about 3 of my sales per month from SS where I would earn $.38 so, yes, I am probably losing about 39 cents each month.
But what if I stop uploading and I lose buyers not finding my pictures there? I could lose a huge $.75  

Quote from: sharpshot on September 30, 2010, 10:03

Don't people care that crestock only pay $0.25 for subs?  The rest doesn't bother me much, I just don't like $0.25 when other sites pay a lot more.

They're currently 'stealing' about 3 of my sales per month from SS where I would earn $.38 so, yes, I am probably losing about 39 cents each month.
But what if I stop uploading and I lose buyers not finding my pictures there? I could lose a huge $.75  

That's not the problem.  We lose much more money because the other sites see that people will accept $0.25, so they wont pay more.  Then we end up with thinkstock paying $0.25, I wonder how they came up with that   Shutterstock haven't raised their subs commissions for over 2 years, why would they when people are accepting $0.25?