Well, not a good change for me this time.
Was on my way to another BME but downloads have slowed down drastically since the end of last week.
Very sad, and I'm really glad I have other sites that are doing well this month.

I can say one thing about being in microstock - NEVER A DULL MOMENT!

The weekend & yesterday in particular were really bad for me, my sales were practically non-existant, so I noticed it immediately.

I was about to voice concern in the iStock forums earlier today, then I noticed that even though my stats weren't updating, I did actually have a few downloads this morning.

Thankfully the downloads have continued throughout the day and my sales are just in a completely different league to yesterday. This leads me to believe iStock has definitely made some changes today, although I'm not sure what exactly! I'll be keeping a close eye on it over the next few days.

Yeah guess they changed it a bit, here's what JJRD said on IS forums:

QuoteUpdate : yesterday, there was an adjustement that was asked for - and granted - in order to adjust best match for vectors; however, it seems like the adjustement applied did very little as a result. There is another adjustement coming and very soon at that.

Again... thanks to everyone for your patience and understanding... as some things we simply CANNOT control... they simply need to be pushed to the entire collection in a live environment & that's the way that it is.

I haven't had a vector sale since the best match changed, but I've had some photos sell that haven't sold before. The new best match also highly favours exclusives, even more than before so non exclusive illustrators (like you) suffered the most. Hopefully they will tweak it even a bit more.

I have also had a couple of files sell that never sold before. Unfortunately all my good sellers are pushed so far back that even I don't have the patience to look for them.

I have a small port and possibly I'm being affected more than someone with a diverse portfolio, but so far the best match change is completely messing my sales - from average 10 photos a day down to 1-2.

I figured something was up as my sales for the last few days have dropped quite a bit.  My best selling image on IS is a black bible.  I just did a search, and it showed up on page 31 of 32 pages.  *sigh* -- no wonder it hasn't sold much lately.  It's like being sent to the back of the line for no good reason...

Does anyone know the proportion of images on IS that are exclusive vs non exclusive?

I hope making it even harder for non-exclusives isn't the policy of the new owners of istock.  I wont carry on uploading if my earnings continue to fall.  The other sites are doing well and I will spend more time on them.  At my current earnings level, the tedious istock upload is hardly worth it.

Apparently older files from years ago are now selling more.
Problem is I don't have any older files to sell since I joined last February
Boooooooo!

I have a good mix of older and newer files.  Normally I am able to weather best match changes okay, without huge dips or rises in sales. 

But as already stated, this best match is really penalizing independents heavily. My sales are down by a third from the beginning of the month. 

I'm an independent and this last change seems to be for the better. Yesterday was my best day this month and today is shaping up well.

What ever they did I am certainly seeing a bad effect from it. My sales have dropped to near zero

It looked like the first best match change put me down 35-50% while this one has put me down 80% in the last week.   IS used to be my number one and now it's consistently getting beat by 123rf, dreamstime, and some days by BigStock.  I'm not sure what to do, should I stop uploading there?  I can't upload more the 15 slots are already filled up for the next two months.

Wish I knew what to say to put a happy face on this, but IS seems to be well and truly letting independent contributors know what they think of us. 

I have an unreasonable believe that this will turn around at some point, but only time will tell.

I hope so.  I know I don't sell much (about 10-15 per weekday before the change) and now it's like 2 a day.  I was really considering going exclusive because my sales had increased for the last 18+ months but overnight it's all wiped out.  I could deal with the 20% commission when I was getting sales but now I'm thinking this might not be worth it.

IS used to be my best saler, This month it will move back behind the SS, DT and FL. since they changed best match, My earn drop off 40%.

Hoping things change here also. It will be important to see what happens from here. Will files that get downloaded move up the best match? Or will it just stay as it is? I don't see any movement at this point.

I would like to think they would let the files that are selling the most drift back to the front. Heavy weighting by views seems a little silly. Hopefully they are just mixing up the order a bit as a starting point.

Quote from: traveler1116 on October 22, 2008, 23:46
I hope so.  I know I don't sell much (about 10-15 per weekday before the change) and now it's like 2 a day.  I was really considering going exclusive because my sales had increased for the last 18+ months but overnight it's all wiped out.  I could deal with the 20% commission when I was getting sales but now I'm thinking this might not be worth it.

Since this version of the best match supposedly helps exclusives more than previous versions wouldn't that be an incentive to go exclusive and not a disincentive?

Quote from: yingyang0 on October 23, 2008, 01:02

Quote from: traveler1116 on October 22, 2008, 23:46
I hope so.  I know I don't sell much (about 10-15 per weekday before the change) and now it's like 2 a day.  I was really considering going exclusive because my sales had increased for the last 18+ months but overnight it's all wiped out.  I could deal with the 20% commission when I was getting sales but now I'm thinking this might not be worth it.

Since this version of the best match supposedly helps exclusives more than previous versions wouldn't that be an incentive to go exclusive and not a disincentive?

Yes, but you never know when the tide will change...

I can't go exclusive now because of Dreamstime and Bigstock.  The worrying part is that IS can overnight make me lose 50% of sales (maybe more like 80% if the last week keeps going how it has) and do this very arbitrarily.  I don't know if anyone has heard a reason why there needed to be a change in the first place. 

Quote from: devon on October 22, 2008, 23:59
IS used to be my best saler, This month it will move back behind the SS, DT and FL. since they changed best match, My earn drop off 40%.

Same for me, IS will be fourth for me this month. If things carry on, it might actually go fifth! I can't see how this is good for IS. I don't think they will be shifting that many more photos due to the change in best match yet they are giving up all the extra money from us Excludeds.

Just when I thought thinks were looking up.  I've had a horrible week also, the algorithm change would explain it.

They have been 4th for me for the last 3 months and won't go fifth only because I'm having  a slow month at StockXpert also.  I used to make over 50% of my earnings there now it's dropped to well under 20%.

Quote from: yingyang0 on October 23, 2008, 01:02
Since this version of the best match supposedly helps exclusives more than previous versions wouldn't that be an incentive to go exclusive and not a disincentive?

If you look at IS forum you will see that MANY exclusive also do see their sales dropping with the new best match algorithm.

IS just do it completely wrong here 

IS is very erratic. search placement is everything. buyers seem never to venture deeper into the results. page one image might get 1000 dls, page ten seems forgotten. I keep checking from time to time. if it doesn't fly off in the beginning, it never does. IS is my fourth seller behind SS, StockXpert, FT closely followed by DT.
I gave up filling portfolio. I will drop one by one in it like fishes in the pond until one of them gets noticed and picked up by search engine.

Quote from: yingyang0 on October 23, 2008, 01:02

Quote from: traveler1116 on October 22, 2008, 23:46
I hope so.  I know I don't sell much (about 10-15 per weekday before the change) and now it's like 2 a day.  I was really considering going exclusive because my sales had increased for the last 18+ months but overnight it's all wiped out.  I could deal with the 20% commission when I was getting sales but now I'm thinking this might not be worth it.

Since this version of the best match supposedly helps exclusives more than previous versions wouldn't that be an incentive to go exclusive and not a disincentive?

The only way istock could seriously tempt me would be by increasing my sales consistently each month, not reducing them and letting the other sites catch up.  At the moment they would have to make me 10x more than they do now if I went exclusive.  Is that likely to happen?