Quote from: ShadySue on September 09, 2011, 20:52

Quote from: sjlocke on September 09, 2011, 07:46

'edstock' is a collection of existing wholly owned Getty content from a variety of editorial photographers.  It isn't one man or a team, and it's already keyworded and sitting on Getty.  

Oh, I didn't realise it was wholly-owned content. That's why even non-editorial stuff is getting shovelled up, then.
Am I right in thinking that Getty keywording is done by Getty staff? I've often thought they do a poor job, and this lot confirms it.

I suspected that it was, now confirmed by SJL. And yes, this is the same as ThinkStock which wasn't early use of wholly owned, it still is a majority of Getty collections and purchases. The IS pp additions are just some frosting on the Getty cake. Take all your old stale collections that have no home and nearly no sales and put them onto a new subscription site, cheap.

Now EdStock is profitable, whatever level it earns at, because it is making money, instead of sitting in a warehouse. Also no commission and as some others have pointed out, it's riding on the backs of people who work hard to produce good new and interesting content.

I thought it had slowed down. Now 57,401 images!

60876 now ! any guesses on when it'll stop. My guess it 99,942

As I said before, if they put enough of this sort of material in and give it a preferential placement, they'll end up with the best match search looking as if it only has content from a few people. Some searches are already like that, not with necessarily "Edstock" but with all the other "Agency" stuff. No good saying buyers will find the other material. If a large amount of buyers looked farther than best match then this thing of putting preferred content up front wouldn't work in the first place. I'm afraid that with sales seemingly going the way they are we may be seeing buyers finding it all a turn off. The whole point of best match from a buyers perspective is that it gives good quality usable content with minimum time and effort.

The whole point of best match from a buyers perspective is that it gives good quality usable content with minimum time and effort.

Oh, screw that. It's not about the buyers, heaven forfend: it's all about profitability.
Keep up at the back!

apologies for the epic post, but for the benefit of other contributors, I'd hate to think of someone else spending the time and effort I've put in to get the same info. it was my work in marketing/journalism and publishing that led me to iStock in the first place. I was a full-time writer before any of my paid photography work. I shoot a lot of editorial, but have generally shot editorial images freelance, for regional papers, magazines and for myself as a strong interest. when iStock editorial launched, I thought it was an opportunity to get my editorial files 'out there' in addition to my creative work. then, the limitation placed on celebrities and politicians eliminated a lot of my imagery since it contains these subjects.

I've spent the months since editorial launched on iStock communicating with iStock and Getty. Particularly since I've been in contact with a number of major wire agencies about submitting my work. always bumping into the problem of granting RF rights as well as RM, and being stuck as an iStock exclusive since I can't license for RF. not all agencies require this, but some of the big ones do.

a year's worth of emails and calls to Getty editorial went unanswered until the last few days. the whole process had been educational/frustrating but ultimately enlightening.

I'd hoped to submit archives of my news coverage and celebrity content to Getty editorial. they don't do this. you'd think someone could have saved me months of work and just emailed that to me. This response from an editorial manager was communicated to me. I am paraphrasing the email sent to me. Getty doesn�t have a main editorial collection that they market.  Their editorial divisions, News, Sport and Entertainment are treated as News and all content and events are coordinated by their assignment desk. For some of you this may have been obvious, but other news wire services I work with welcome archive photos. It seems Getty simply archives submissions by assignment shooters. and unfortunately, there are already some very established shooters in my region and they do not need or want another one. I've realized that I've probably spent far too much time trying to build some sort of editorial presence. when I really should continue focusing on what is working well for me, which is my creative content. I had a moment of clarity asking myself why I am busting my a55 to produce editorial series for Getty.

so it seems that edstock is simply the culmination of news outtakes and footage that they don't market via Getty after a story's time has passed. they have loads of images sitting there that they've realized they can make money on through iStock. so they are moving them into iStock to get something out of them. we've all speculated this is the case, now it seems more concretely so. it also seems there is no plan to cultivate any sort of collection on iStock that includes celebrities or politicians from iStock contributors. so I have my answer, and it's a relief at this point. I had attended the Lypse in London expecting some sort of editorial Mecca and came away feeling less than excited about editorial. and now that seems to have been a good instinct. so, will refocus on creative. but maybe other newish editorial shooters will knock on the right doors and save themselves some headaches.

It's good of you to share that.  Thanks Stacey (I presume it's all right to call you that now that your photo is by your moniker....?)

no problem, I think people know who I am here :-)

Stacey, really great of you to take the time to post the results of your research.  You probably saved a lot of people a lot of pointless frustration. 

I doubt Istock is really the right venue for boatloads of (out)dated editorial content.  Seems to me that Thinkstock would be a better place to put that sort of thing.  It has to be pretty low demand, considering its news value is past. 

Stacey, really great of you to take the time to post the results of your research.  You probably saved a lot of people a lot of pointless frustration.  

I doubt Istock is really the right venue for boatloads of (out)dated editorial content.  Seems to me that Thinkstock would be a better place to put that sort of thing.  It has to be pretty low demand, considering its news value is past.  

since I don't participate in the PP, and since istock don't accept this content, I can't get my editorial content over to TS anyways. but FWIW, my 'old' content is somewhat timeless. some of it is time-sensitive (like the deaths of politicians/inaugurations and that kind of coverage), but much of it is just celebrity red carpet content. some with festival and ceremony backdrops, but much of it without any (timestamped) backgrounds. they don't want that either. as a freelancer, I cover the cost of all this editorial coverage. parking in the city, travel, sometimes fees to apply for accreditation. ten hours of shooting and then rushing home to process and submit same day. it just isn't worth it.

I'm not wanting to step on colleagues' toes either, but they can't cover everything and discouraging new talent just seems pretty myopic. not to mention a lot of the pros they mentioned I've seen work and in some cases their assistants should be paid more than they are. they do nothing but press the shutter half the time and really don't care anymore about what they're shooting, at least by appearances and by tidbits of conversations. anyways, I'll still throw up generic editorial but I'm not busting my butt anymore on reportage and stories and all that jazz. I love doing it, but it's time consuming and expensive and I want to focus on what's working for me.

Quote from: SNP on September 16, 2011, 13:33

Quote from: lisafx on September 16, 2011, 13:09

Stacey, really great of you to take the time to post the results of your research.  You probably saved a lot of people a lot of pointless frustration.  

I doubt Istock is really the right venue for boatloads of (out)dated editorial content.  Seems to me that Thinkstock would be a better place to put that sort of thing.  It has to be pretty low demand, considering its news value is past.  

since I don't participate in the PP, and since istock don't accept this content, I can't get my editorial content over to TS anyways. but FWIW, my 'old' content is somewhat timeless. some of it is time-sensitive (like the deaths of politicians/inaugurations and that kind of coverage), but much of it is just celebrity red carpet content. some with festival and ceremony backdrops, but much of it without any (timestamped) backgrounds. they don't want that either. as a freelancer, I cover the cost of all this editorial coverage. parking in the city, travel, sometimes fees to apply for accreditation. ten hours of shooting and then rushing home to process and submit same day. it just isn't worth it.

I'm not wanting to step on colleagues' toes either, but they can't cover everything and discouraging new talent just seems pretty myopic. not to mention a lot of the pros they mentioned I've seen work and in some cases their assistants should be paid more than they are. they do nothing but press the shutter half the time and really don't care anymore about what they're shooting, at least by appearances and by tidbits of conversations. anyways, I'll still throw up generic editorial but I'm not busting my butt anymore on reportage and stories and all that jazz. I love doing it, but it's time consuming and expensive and I want to focus on what's working for me.

Oh, no, I was referring to Edstock's stuff as being old and better suited to Thinkstock.  

The editorial photogs on Istock, including you, are producing very good stuff, from what I have seen.  It's not right that talented and motivated Istockers are being muscled out of the editorial category by the outdated dregs of Getty editorial.  

ahhh, lol. yeah, send it to TS! actually, it creeps me right out every time I see TS images used in major papers, print and online. and they are all over CNN. I think the Getty mandate these days is pay as little to expensive contributors as possible and market . out of wholly owned content. which certainly sucks for any of us with ambition.

lol....yeah, Lisa, you're a huge slacker.....

Freeze out the newcomers is a very old Getty tradition. It's why iStock had to come into existence once digital arrived.

I guess I just learned this the hard way. should have asked here first...

The induction of Edstock files has been going on since April.  That's at a rate of about 400 files a day.  It sickens me.

The induction of Edstock files has been going on since April.  That's at a rate of about 400 files a day.  It sickens me.

15,000 on Aug 24 when this thread started, about 60,000 on Sept 17, that's 45,000 in 24 days - close to 2,000 files a day, all piling into the front of the search, pushing up Getty's share and pushing down our sales and RCs. It's win-win for Getty as usual. I'm sure a lot of these "editorial" files are going to end up used in questionable "advertorial" publications which used to use our commercial pictures.