Really!  we are very stupid here!  every time this happens,  up comes all these threads, postings, etc. Why not just let them hang in there, let them try to survive on their meazly little 5000, exclusives and then see what happens. Be like GM, trying to survive without thousands of factory workers,  down they go.

Its all going according to the Getty plan, they are slowly strangling the company, bleeding it dry, in fact, hoping the reaction will be that lots of exclusives and independants are leaving.

In fact only a couple of days back, I was speaking to one of the mentors, founders of the entire stock-industry back in the early 80s, whishing him a merry X-mas, etc. In touching this subject, he said: "be happy you never signed the dotted line for exclusivity, they are showing the signs of a company in deep trouble and they are not going to exist in a years time and thats when their remaining exclusives will have little option but to go with Thinkstock, if they still want to sell pictures, that is".
Just want to point out, this person is still a shareholder with major influence in the stock-world.

They have just thrown the exclusives a bone, in the form of a best match, knowing fully well that will shut them up over the hollidays, etc, then after all hollidays, the wrecking-crew will emerge and brush them aside and why not?  they seem so stupid they believe anything,  even in Santa.

There is no real bone thrown at the exclusives. Well established exclusives with years of creating well-selling images are being punished. Only recently uploaded files by exclusives benefit. Exclusives will only benefit in those particular areas/niches where they have RECENTLY uploaded - in all other areas (areas where they haven't uploaded but have excellent images in) they will be punished by other exclusives that have uploaded those subjects. So new very active exclusives stand to benefit the most, the rest are losing out.

Therefore I don't think this is really according to your theory of the Getty "plan". Why would they want to push well-established with a proven track-record exclusives towards independence thus benefiting their direct competitors - that doesn't make any sense for Getty or iStock. I must be missing something?

ADDED:
If this really isn't temporary, a glitch or similar it is really a super incentive for exclusives to "go to work" and work their socks off! Never before has there been such an opportunity to upload, get properly seen and sell new work. Time to get busy!

Hi martin!

Well, yes, if this isnt temporary?  but really?  what else can they do?  they are dropping exclusives all over the place and we are not just talking about the run-of-the-mill, contributors here, we are talking heavy exclusives, etc. Ofcourse!  they HAVE, to do something and what better then to throw a bit of monies in their pockets.

Surely you must see its exactly the same pattern as back in 93, when Getty took over Stones and Image-Bank but with the incredible differance: it wasnt internet-based and with billions of digital files, also the people then were of a differant breed, professionaly, that is.

Dont you see?  in the long run they cant have IS, running alongside TS, it doesnt make sense! Vettas or no Vettas, it just does not make business-sense. Sooner or later they are forced to come with an excuse or reason, why even the exclusives simply have to go with TS.
I would say, forget the independant, thats not a problem for them, their big problerm will be their exclusives, how to break the news, etc, still keeping them happy, thats their main problem.
We, the independants, were the lucky ones, we are out of it.

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on December 22, 2011, 02:02

Quote from: SNP on December 22, 2011, 00:15

Sales usual for a few days before xmas...if there is a big exclusive boost, it's not doing much for me

Maybe it is Edstock who is benefiting, "he" certainly dominated my Qatar search.  No doubt the management will be buying in champagne if the sales are going there.

As for the iStock forums, obviously Lobo has won. The last thread I opened there, helpfully informing them of the reappearance of a bug and which I carefully put in the forum where Joyce discusses bugs, was slammed shut by Lobo with the comment "this isn't the help forum". My unwritten response was "Well, feck you, you uncouth ar$e'ole. I didn't want help, I was simply trying to give your company early warning of the reappearance of a bug. If you don't want my help then I won't fecking bother, you winker". So I see no point in posting what would be a "oooh-nay" thread when they deliberately shift the search. We know the wolfman doesn't like it.

I know you're partly kidding...but I gotta say, I think Edstock is getting way too much press. I don't like Edstock, and I really don't like how they've trucked it all in and locked us out. having said that, Edstock is just a dumping ground for archival editorial images that Getty had laying around gathering dust--so they might as well make a few bucks off the images. Edstock is a threat to editorial contributors mainly because it represents a thoroughly insulting double standard. The Edstock collection doesn't pose any serious sales threat nor is it stealing all the best match window space.

I wasn't kidding at all. In the last 12 hours four or five new exclusive images of Qatar have been accepted and now top the search, if you search on "Qatar" and disregard those, you will see what I mean. Page after page is dominated by Edstock. Maybe that search is an exception to the rule but niches where uploading is low are likely to see it if "Edstock" has been there because best match now seems to mean "Exclusive by descending age".

Edstock is a threat to travel photographers since lots of generic travel is included in it and buyers may take an editorial image with people for travel advert/orials regardless of the labelling.

In fact only a couple of days back, I was speaking to one of the mentors, founders of the entire stock-industry back in the early 80s, whishing him a merry X-mas, etc. In touching this subject, he said: "be happy you never signed the dotted line for exclusivity, they are showing the signs of a company in deep trouble and they are not going to exist in a years time and thats when their remaining exclusives will have little option but to go with Thinkstock, if they still want to sell pictures, that is".
Just want to point out, this person is still a shareholder with major influence in the stock-world.

Considering that 99.9% of these "mentors, founders of the entire stock industry" are the same ones that several years ago were saying and repeating that a) microstock would never take off and couldn't never offer quality content, b) digital photography never would replace film, this new prediction can be considered a garantee of success and future for istock.

Quote from: sjlocke on December 21, 2011, 21:51

Sales today are nothing unusual.

Looks like traffic fell to a level, even with such an enormous boost all that exclusives get, are average sales. My sales are limited to 3/day (for 3 days in a row now). Now that can't be a coincidence

Until now, I'm having Best Week Ever. Being Christmas so near, I suppose that it won't hold until Sunday, but for the moment, it works.

Quote from: lisafx on December 21, 2011, 18:07

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on December 21, 2011, 18:02

Changes that completely dislocate earnings should be something that agencies avoid for the sake of their suppliers and for their own reputation.

Completely agree, but in Istock's case, they long ago decided they don't care much for their reputation, and even less for their suppliers.   

True.

What amazes me is that not a word of this is being spoken on the IS forum (unless exclusives are laughing behind their hands on their own forum). Have we become so used to Istock's shenanigans that we can no longer be bothered?

There were a couple of posts earlier, independents flabbergasted at the new best match...but Kelvin deleted them.  (I used to think he called it as he saw it...now he comes across every bit the tosser that lobo is)

 Giving exclusives a better best match and new content from exclusive great best match shows a worrying pattern not just for independents but many old faithfuls will see an accelerating decline in income. Sales from Istock already appear down only made up by higher prices and TS. Searches will not look better at Istock than elsewhere. I would say they may look worse, more expensive and have less variety. Tell me I am wrong but this is business. Money is being made short term without real long term strategies (apart from sell on the basis of record profits). Certainlt what happens to contributors is not part of the plan. It is better to get in "collections", no inspection required and good cash rewards than deal with contributors en masse.

    I completely am baffled by these claims.  You say istock is making a mistake by having content no one else has and their higher prices can not support this exclusive content.  You say they would be better to continue with showcasing independents that are on every site out there where price the only difference.
      I was shocked a few years back when best match was so utterly dominated by Yuri and then MBI.  That was truly a short term profit strategy that had no long term health for istock.  Now, maybe because independents thought this foolish short term money grab was smart they are surprised.  But in truth it made no business sense to feature content that is not exclusive.  Did you not see the Bigstock ad saying they were (some percentage) cheaper than istock.  Well now that marketing strategy doesn't hold water.  I remember looking at other sites a while back and seeing the same images on the best match of every site.  It was dumb of istock to have the basic same best match as shutterstock when prices were not the same.  It would be like Coca-cola allowing their exact formula to be sold in cheaper bottles by competitors.  Coke charges a premium for their product because no one else has it.  How is price supported otherwise?

"I was shocked a few years back when best match was so utterly dominated by Yuri.."

Well they fixed that!  A search for business man shows page upon page upon page of exclusive files - so Yuri's shots are deemed of less interest to buyers than thousands of exclusive images, many of which have no sales???  They really need to rename if from best match to 'bolster exclusive sales'
What a joke

"I was shocked a few years back when best match was so utterly dominated by Yuri.."

Well they fixed that!  A search for business man shows page upon page upon page of exclusive files - so Yuri's shots are deemed of less interest to buyers than thousands of exclusive images, many of which have no sales???  They really need to rename if from best match to 'bolster exclusive sales'
What a joke

Perhaps their market surveying said that buyers are tired of seeing the same thing they see everywhere else.  So they are giving the buyers what they asked for.  Who knows?

Quote from: briciola on December 22, 2011, 09:45

"I was shocked a few years back when best match was so utterly dominated by Yuri.."

Well they fixed that!  A search for business man shows page upon page upon page of exclusive files - so Yuri's shots are deemed of less interest to buyers than thousands of exclusive images, many of which have no sales???  They really need to rename if from best match to 'bolster exclusive sales'
What a joke

Perhaps their market surveying said that buyers are tired of seeing the same thing they see everywhere else.  So they are giving the buyers what they asked for.  Who knows?

Someone who cared that much could tick 'exclusives only'. OK they have to work out to filter under 'more attributes', but I just did it in about five seconds; so if they cared that much, they could easily work it out.
Also if so many buyers said that, the sensible thing would be to make that option more visible.

Someone who cared that much could tick 'exclusives only'. OK they have to work out to filter under 'more attributes', but I just did it in about five seconds; so if they cared that much, they could easily work it out.
Also if so many buyers said that, the sensible thing would be to make that option more visible.

Remember, buyers are stoopid - they can't be bothered to figure out things like sliders and buttons and stuff like that there.

Perhaps their market surveying said that buyers are tired of seeing the same thing they see everywhere else.  So they are giving the buyers what they asked for.  Who knows?

So the buyers first bought 1.3M of Yuri's images (plus 350K of MB's, 200K of Lisa's, etc, etc) before finally deciding that they didn't want to see them anymore. Interesting theory. "We the buyers demand less choice when we shop here".

We just have to hope that 'their market surveying' didn't say that buyers wanted cheaper prices too __ because Istock always does what the buyers want right?