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Agency Based Discussion => iStockPhoto.com => Topic started by: Elenathewise on November 25, 2011, 13:10

Title: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Elenathewise on November 25, 2011, 13:10
Hmmm... for a few days now every time I go to "My uploads" page and try to sort by "Last DL" it shows me the same page ending with 01/11/2011. My total shows there's been many sales since then, but they don't show on the page! Anyone else is seeing this?
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: fotografer on November 25, 2011, 13:12
Yes, it's happening to everybody.  They're talking about it in the November problem thread in the IStock forums.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Cogent Marketing on November 25, 2011, 13:33
I think it's a bug. Sometimes it works fine (as it normally does) and then the last D/L is dated as 10 Oct (in my case). But as the OP said, the total revenue amount is correct. If it's in the 'bug thread' they'll get to it sooner or later.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Elenathewise on November 25, 2011, 13:42
thanks! sigh... makes you wonder what else is broken on the site. Bugs don't just appear out of nowhere, it means they are tinkering with things...
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ShadySue on November 25, 2011, 14:05
About a week, I think.
What I find really weird is that it seems only to be affecting the latest uploads column. The rest seem to be working fine. How can that happen?
Might be fixed during tomorrow's downtime.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: cobalt on November 25, 2011, 14:26
I hope it gets fixed tomorrow, it is really frustrating that I canīt see my last downloads.

And yes, i do worry what else will break while they try to fix this bug...

 
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ToniFlap on November 25, 2011, 14:33
Same here. But sometimes works for minutes .... baffling
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: SNP on November 25, 2011, 14:46
since yesterday afternoon I cannot see my latest dls, no idea what my newest sales are. tried in safari on iPhone, in Firefox and explorer.....all stuck on November 1st
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Jo Ann Snover on November 25, 2011, 14:54
I had given up trying in Firefox (Mac) to get any sales after November 1st, but did manage to see them in Chrome after a refresh or two (which used to work for Firefox, but no longer seems to).

I hope developers will be working on Sunday so they can fix any remaining bugs and have the site ready to go on Monday. This is the second year in a row things have been broken during the busy season (although it's not as much breakage this year as last). This isn't the time of year to be leaving the site in a flaky state (random objects in searches; delays in posting credits for PayPal purchases - it's not just contributors who are inconvenienced by their bugs)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: dhanford on November 25, 2011, 15:07
Well, if you keep refreshing, say 20 times or so, it will eventually show up.  But if you do it too quickly, you pass the correct update and have to start over.

Seriously, is this any way to run a business?

They're going to do some site maintenance this Saturday and I'm almost certain that:
A. none of the current site bugs will be addressed
B. the execution of site maintenance will promote even more problems with the site

I cannot understand why they refuse to fix the site properly.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: madelaide on November 25, 2011, 18:06
Now that you've mentioned it, yes, it is hapenning to me, but it must have been just in the past few days, because my speadsheet is updated. I use FF.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: gostwyck on November 25, 2011, 19:01
Thats Istock for you! Now it's the 'weekend' too so apparently no chance of anyobody in Canada getting out of bed.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: cobalt on November 25, 2011, 19:06
deleted - sue was faster  ;)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ShadySue on November 25, 2011, 19:07
Cobalt typed faster.  ;D
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: cobalt on November 25, 2011, 19:08
Nooooo!

Ok, here is the thread! Site maintenance on saturday, announced on Thursday.

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=337357&page=1 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=337357&page=1)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ShadySue on November 25, 2011, 19:14
 :D  ;D  ;)

I do, however, strongly agree with the posters there who said this planned downtime should have been pre-announced much more prominently, especially to buyers, even though today is a particularly quiet Saturday.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: stockanon on November 26, 2011, 06:10
Just iStock living up to itīs true identity: iStuck (or iSuck if you prefer)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: madelaide on November 26, 2011, 12:40
What amazes me is how they manage to make something that was working stop working all of a sudden. I have registered this month's sales in my spreadsheet, and now I only see one at Nov 1st (unless I try many times). What do these people do with their code to let this happen?? How can we even trust that each sale is being registered correctly?
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ToniFlap on November 26, 2011, 15:25
What amazes me is how they manage to make something that was working stop working all of a sudden. I have registered this month's sales in my spreadsheet, and now I only see one at Nov 1st (unless I try many times). What do these people do with their code to let this happen?? How can we even trust that each sale is being registered correctly?
+1
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Jo Ann Snover on November 26, 2011, 15:43
I can't say I'm surprised, but I think it is a disgrace that a whole week has gone by with no e-mail follow up on the missing royalties from the time when all sales (we hope!) were being recorded with the minimums. I would have liked the money and the accounting by now, but at the very least a mass e-mailing to contributors apologizing for the delay and giving a deadline by which the payments will be made.

I suspect that their internal systems are so inept that it isn't trivial to do the mass e-mail and they don't know when they'll make the payment because their tangle of script-running catchup procedures is a mess too. So they tweet things and ignore the forums and hope. Not good.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Larry on November 26, 2011, 16:07
There are well known ways to keep a "mission critical" system running.  For an internet-only business, itys web presence is "mission-critical".  IStock needs to get a grip and either hire some qualified people or fire the manager who is over-driving the team beyond the point of adequacy.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: stockastic on November 26, 2011, 16:45
[dup]
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: stockastic on November 26, 2011, 16:46
There are well known ways to keep a "mission critical" system running.  For an internet-only business, itys web presence is "mission-critical".  IStock needs to get a grip and either hire some qualified people or fire the manager who is over-driving the team beyond the point of adequacy.


Maybe fire the 15 managers that are coming in every week with new pricing, search and commission schemes for immediate implementation...
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: luissantos84 on November 26, 2011, 19:48
The site will be down today between 4pm and 9pm MST while we do some routine maintenance. But don’t worry, we’ll be back soon!

I am not worried but ainīt 5 hours a lot? I have never seen a Bank offline for a single second ok its different but it ainīt good I guess
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: klsbear on November 26, 2011, 21:39
I can't say I'm surprised, but I think it is a disgrace that a whole week has gone by with no e-mail follow up on the missing royalties from the time when all sales (we hope!) were being recorded with the minimums. I would have liked the money and the accounting by now, but at the very least a mass e-mailing to contributors apologizing for the delay and giving a deadline by which the payments will be made.

I suspect that their internal systems are so inept that it isn't trivial to do the mass e-mail and they don't know when they'll make the payment because their tangle of script-running catchup procedures is a mess too. So they tweet things and ignore the forums and hope. Not good.

Lobo had an "update" with no real news this afternoon.  Basically said that they were working on it and it was a lot of data and he thought maybe by the end of next week they would have things back in order.  Not specifically indicating that there would be an e-mail accounting by that time though, seemed to be talking more about restoring the online data that's visible to us all.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: oxman on November 26, 2011, 22:32
I cannot understand why iStock does not have an offline mirror site they can work on and debug and then swap out the current live one with no downtime. That is how it's done with all mega sites I have worked with. Back it up. Fix it. Test it. Fix it. Reload it.  ??? ::)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: dhanford on November 26, 2011, 22:41
Looks like their back, but I don't detect any changes or fixed - unless you want to include that I didn't need to log in again after the maintainence run was finished...
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: oxman on November 26, 2011, 22:48
I just logged in and the Downloads is still showing 1/11/2011. Nice work  ::)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: SNP on November 26, 2011, 23:26
no change after site maintenance. I don't know if the last dls bug was one of the fixes being addressed, but if it was, it didn't work.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Microbius on November 27, 2011, 05:01
Is it time they invested in getting the site re-coded from scratch?
I mean there are just sooooooo many bugs, and whenever they add or change anything at all they seem to be causing new unforeseen bugs along the way.
The code must be a total mess!
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: rubyroo on November 27, 2011, 06:04
I cannot understand why iStock does not have an offline mirror site they can work on and debug and then swap out the current live one with no downtime. That is how it's done with all mega sites I have worked with. Back it up. Fix it. Test it. Fix it. Reload it.  ??? ::)

Exactly.  This is the most basic common sense even for a small site project.  It should be patently obvious for a large site that generates sales 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Also, as others have said, the holding page they put up looked like a hacker's page.  I couldn't believe it when I saw it. 
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Elenathewise on November 28, 2011, 12:34
Still broken! So annoying. And sad.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ShadySue on November 28, 2011, 12:35
Still broken! So annoying. And sad.
And plenty more bugs being reported on the Help forum.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: tee on November 28, 2011, 12:41
Also, as others have said, the holding page they put up looked like a hacker's page.  I couldn't believe it when I saw it.

Did anyone here happen to snap a screenshot of this? I'd like to see it since everyone's talking about it so much. BTW I love how they say that yes, we know the site is overridden with bugs, but trust us, the sales end of it isn't and all sales will be accounted for. Oh yeah, I'm confident of that. ::)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: lisafx on November 28, 2011, 14:29

Did anyone here happen to snap a screenshot of this?

+1.  I never saw the "Jay is working on it" page.  Would love to see what the fuss is about.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: rene on November 28, 2011, 19:36

Did anyone here happen to snap a screenshot of this?


+1.  I never saw the "Jay is working on it" page.  Would love to see what the fuss is about.

(http://i44.tinypic.com/16ln43s.png)
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Karimala on November 28, 2011, 19:57
ARGH!!!  Now I can't view my stats or financials pages.  It's just plain text.  Good thing I cashed out this morning before this latest bug.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: ShadySue on November 28, 2011, 20:13
Does the 'Total Earnings' amount get refreshed at a different time than the 'current balance' on the Financials page? Mine haven't gone up in synch since this time last night.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: Karimala on November 28, 2011, 20:20
I've noticed IS only updates the dailies once a day, sometime after midnight California time.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: PaulieWalnuts on November 28, 2011, 22:24

Did anyone here happen to snap a screenshot of this?

+1.  I never saw the "Jay is working on it" page.  Would love to see what the fuss is about.


I didn't get that nice looking page.  It was just plain text. I was wondering if they got hacked because the message was so weird and there were no graphics.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: disorderly on November 28, 2011, 22:52
I didn't get that nice looking page.  It was just plain text. I was wondering if they got hacked because the message was so weird and there were no graphics.

The first time I saw it, it was just the text as Paulie describes.  When I came back it was all formatted and pretty.  I assume there was a CSS file they neglected to install when they first put the page up.
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: The Mighty Jungle on November 29, 2011, 09:41
wow.... I'm realizing how much of a barometer it's always been to view the Last Downloads column.... I usually check it a couple times/week to gauge what buyers are wanting. It was a great tool for us contributors.

How difficult can it be to just fix that column for us?

Could it be that ... it's just such low priority because it involves helping contributors rather than buyers....

Naaaaahhh.....
Title: Re: Istock doesn't show new sales
Post by: lisafx on November 29, 2011, 16:56
Thanks for posting that Rene.  Now I feel more in the loop :)

At least the 10% is only for a week, and the way things are going the site won't be very usable for that week.  ;)