PI will probably rank third by tomorrow over here ------------------------------------------------------->

(not too far fetched IMO if PM as an active agency ranks ridiculously high...)

Quote from: Elenathewise on April 30, 2012, 22:14
3.4 million dollars investment? Wow he really knows how to spend money:) My investment in my own site was 250 dollars:)

Somewhere there's a web programmer with 3.35 million dollars in his bank account.

IF.. Yuri decides to open up his site for downloads from the general public - who of you would sign up and what would you like to see Yuri offer thats different from all the MS sites?

Quote from: cthoman on May 01, 2012, 02:34

Quote from: Elenathewise on April 30, 2012, 22:14
3.4 million dollars investment? Wow he really knows how to spend money:) My investment in my own site was 250 dollars:)

Somewhere there's a web programmer with 3.35 million dollars in his bank account.

WOW! That's insane! Sure it's not Danish money...? :s Would make a lot more sense......

Quote from: cthoman on May 01, 2012, 02:34

Quote from: Elenathewise on April 30, 2012, 22:14
3.4 million dollars investment? Wow he really knows how to spend money:) My investment in my own site was 250 dollars:)

Somewhere there's a web programmer with 3.35 million dollars in his bank account.

Heeeee....:-)

Quote from: noodle on May 01, 2012, 02:48
IF.. Yuri decides to open up his site for downloads from the general public - who of you would sign up and what would you like to see Yuri offer thats different from all the MS sites?

I don't get the feeling that this site would be open for submissions from most micro contributors.  More likely just for Yuri and his apprentices. 

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 04:21

Quote from: noodle on May 01, 2012, 02:48
IF.. Yuri decides to open up his site for downloads from the general public - who of you would sign up and what would you like to see Yuri offer thats different from all the MS sites?

I don't get the feeling that this site would be open for submissions from most micro contributors.  More likely just for Yuri and his apprentices. 

That's sure what it looks like right now. I didn't want the free credits for opening an account so I guess it's the same old me... wait and see. 

http://peopleimages.com/

Populated with a nice pretty front page. Shades of blue and grey theme.

Retouching
12/hr
Custom retouching
We can edit all images if needed.
Time-exclusivity
160/mo
Exclusive Rights
Get exclusive rights for as low as c160.
26 Credits
$ 25
Minimum Package
Get 4% bonus with this credit package.
220 Credits
$ 200
Large Package
Get 10% bonus with this credit package.

Is it just me or is it live now?!??   

Maybe the 3.5M includes the shoot costs for creating images that aren't available elsewhere?

I like the "Late Extended License": "Got your Image Illegally? Get a license now"

Very interesting! Good luck Yuri, you have good ideas and know how to execute them.

If he treats his artists well and generates sales this could be a really positive influence in this market.

Will you take video??

The site looks really nice and seems to work really well. I'm sure he will do well, but to do great I think the real big challenge is marketing, getting enough traction etc. Sure as hell must be nice to keep 100% royalties though!

Good luck Yuri!

Quote from: eyecandy on May 01, 2012, 04:03

Quote from: cthoman on May 01, 2012, 02:34

Quote from: Elenathewise on April 30, 2012, 22:14
3.4 million dollars investment? Wow he really knows how to spend money:) My investment in my own site was 250 dollars:)

Somewhere there's a web programmer with 3.35 million dollars in his bank account.

WOW! That's insane! Sure it's not Danish money...? :s Would make a lot more sense......

Yeah, the article says 3.5 M danish kroner.. which is 624K USD

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 00:50
All I can say is congratulations, and I hope it is a success! 

If Yuri is successful with this, it could get the agencies to sit up and take notice, and perhaps (gasp) start treating their remaining contributors better.  Yeah, I know, perhaps a bit too optimistic

Yes, we can certainly hope!

It would certainly be a wonderful thing if the agencies would consider viability for the creatives in their calculations, and reward us accordingly to help us all keep producing... but I don't hold out much hope for that.

Congrats on your site Yuri, I hope it works really well for you and that it turns out to be a positive, and not a negative for the rest of us.

Quote from: leaf on May 01, 2012, 09:33

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 00:50
All I can say is congratulations, and I hope it is a success! 

If Yuri is successful with this, it could get the agencies to sit up and take notice, and perhaps (gasp) start treating their remaining contributors better.  Yeah, I know, perhaps a bit too optimistic

Yes, we can certainly hope!

I can't see it making them do anything at all. All Yuri has done is make a site to sell his photos directly (note the "cutting out the middleman" line in the press release, that does not mean "becoming a middleman", for all those who dream of selling on his website).

All of us already have the option of establishing our own websites to sell directly - you could get a photo-sales website, tools and a merchant account for credit card trades today if you wanted to, just sign up at Photoshelter - so why haven't the agencies already taken notice? Simply because it doesn't matter to them. I doubt if there is another artist who has sufficient content and resources to be able to do this.

Remember the reason we use agencies? Because we can delegate all the marketing and technical support to them, and the reason for doing that is because we couldn't do it successfully ourselves. Yuri is different because he is already a self-marketing machine, he already has a staff working for him who are able to produce and process huge numbers of images and he has the financial resources to sink the price of a very nice house into trying to outflank the agencies - and presumably more cash up his sleeve to support marketing and wages while he establishes his site.

As long as the extra earnings from cutting out the middleman cover the running costs and interest on investment, he can't lose, as long as none of the major agencies retaliate by dropping him or pushing him to the back of their search.

There is one major flaw in his project: he is essentially only supplying a single genre (people/business/lifestyle) and a single look.  Anybody who wants both lifestyle and a travel location - say India - can either get the whole package at one traditional agency or they can go to Yuri's site to buy a lifestyle picture, then go to a micro to get the India shot. I reckon most buyers would prefer one-stop shopping and that will limit his potential success.

Quote from: sjlocke on May 01, 2012, 00:16

Quote from: sharpshot on May 01, 2012, 00:09
A new site? So when can we start uploading   Good luck Yuri, hope it's a big success.

Who says you get to?

BTW, for 3.4 million, they should be sure to add some index.htm files in there: http://peopleimages.com/images/ and do some error checking: http://peopleimages.com/about .

A credit based system?

I was joking about uploading, hence the   I don't have people photos and I presume Yuri isn't going to open this up to everyone.

Quote from: lisafx on May 01, 2012, 00:50
All I can say is congratulations, and I hope it is a success! 

If Yuri is successful with this, it could get the agencies to sit up and take notice, and perhaps (gasp) start treating their remaining contributors better.  Yeah, I know, perhaps a bit too optimistic

I can see them using this as an excuse for yet another commission cut.  How else can they compete with a new site full of photos by Yuri   I don't believe any of their previous reasons for commission cuts, they're just doing it because they know they can get away with it.  Losing a lot of sales to Yuri might hurt but they could fix that by punishing the rest of us.  The big sites still have too much control over most of us, I think they might take notice if lots of us get our own sites and have a combined search and payment system but that might never happen.  Buyers might be interested in sites from the microstock factories but the vast majority of us aren't likely to make a good income from our own sites.  I hope that can change in the future but it needs a lot of collaboration or someone to come up with a viable alternative to the current sites.

Quote from: holgs on May 01, 2012, 06:55
I like the "Late Extended License": "Got your Image Illegally? Get a license now"

I doubt anyone is going to pay 300+ credits for a "late" license.  Most anyone using an image illegally isn't going to care, and selling RF, he can't track who is supposed to be using it any better than anyone else.

"Time-Exclusive" sounds like the false exclusive license DT sells.  "When you buy this license, we will stop the image from being sold on PeopleImages.com for a certain period of time." - don't mind the fact its already sold 40 times (or whatever).  The front page says "Get exclusive rights for as low as c160" - so the whole thing is unclear, unless the option disappears after the first sale.

Agree with the others.  Nice site, nothing groundbreaking.  This similar results thing sounds interesting: http://peopleimages.com/more/ai .  No price filter.

As a buyer, I don't think I could handle that much Yuri.  "Yuri's choice" "Ask Yuri"  "Where's Yuri".  It certainly is all about the brand name.

Quote from: noodle on May 01, 2012, 02:48
IF.. Yuri decides to open up his site for downloads from the general public - who of you would sign up and what would you like to see Yuri offer thats different from all the MS sites?

I don't have any need to download images; but if I did, I guess I'd want more 'real' looking people, but that won't happen!

Am I reading this right?

26 credits for $25

12 credits per hour for retouching?

I would LOVE to be able to hire a retoucher to edit my images for $11.50/hour.

Wow.

It's going to be an interesting month.

My guess is he's spent the past 2 years developing a huge library of exclusive images.  Through his boot camps he has trained a large number of photographers to shoot the way he does all over the world.  Now he will have his own agency to market all of that content, plus is providing some additional services that may be in demand by companies.  He's thought this all out and probably will be very successful.

The interesting bit will be to see how this affects the existing agencies.  Will he keep his content there as well?  How will they react if he is now competing with them directly?  Or will his new site only have exclusive content?  Might lead to a major market shakeup or might just be an interesting blip - no way to know until Wednesday.  In any event hats off to Yuri for taking the plunge.  Hopefully this will generate a lot of positive spin for photography in general.

Quote from: Ed on May 01, 2012, 13:08
Am I reading this right?

26 credits for $25

12 credits per hour for retouching?

I would LOVE to be able to hire a retoucher to edit my images for $11.50/hour.

Wow.

that is way subjective.. how many pics? 1 or 2 or half?

Quote from: sgoodwin4813 on May 01, 2012, 13:32
It's going to be an interesting month.

My guess is he's spent the past 2 years developing a huge library of exclusive images.  Through his boot camps he has trained a large number of photographers to shoot the way he does all over the world.  Now he will have his own agency to market all of that content, plus is providing some additional services that may be in demand by companies.  He's thought this all out and probably will be very successful.

The interesting bit will be to see how this affects the existing agencies.  Will he keep his content there as well?  How will they react if he is now competing with them directly?  Or will his new site only have exclusive content?  Might lead to a major market shakeup or might just be an interesting blip - no way to know until Wednesday.  In any event hats off to Yuri for taking the plunge.  Hopefully this will generate a lot of positive spin for photography in general.

there are only around 5k exclusives pictures at his agency and they don´t like shoot yesterday..

Quote from: Ed on May 01, 2012, 13:08
Am I reading this right?
26 credits for $25
12 credits per hour for retouching?
I would LOVE to be able to hire a retoucher to edit my images for $11.50/hour.
Wow.

As featured in: http://www.psdisasters.com/2011/10/fotolia-psd-for-sale.html

Quote from: Ed on May 01, 2012, 13:08
Am I reading this right?

26 credits for $25

12 credits per hour for retouching?

I would LOVE to be able to hire a retoucher to edit my images for $11.50/hour.

Wow.

Go ahead. There's plenty of folk in places like India that would bite your hand off for that sort of money.