Author Topic: iStock penalising Diamonds ? (Read 8711 times)

everest · « **Reply #25 on:** August 05, 2014, 09:17 »

As an Istock diamond with crashing sales month after month I don't think it is Istock penalizing anyone. It is just that buyers have left the place. That simple. Exclusivity Istock and Getty (I contribute to PC and house collections) are no longer a viable photography business. I give them 6 more months to change that trend, thats when my cut will drop from 40 to 35, then I will be out. I hope my psychological health will improve after that :-)

etudiante_rapide · « **Reply #26 on:** August 05, 2014, 10:11 »

Quote from: everest on August 05, 2014, 09:17

As an Istock diamond with crashing sales month after month I don't think it is Istock penalizing anyone. It is just that buyers have left the place. That simple. Exclusivity Istock and Getty (I contribute to PC and house collections) are no longer a viable photography business. I give them 6 more months to change that trend, thats when my cut will drop from 40 to 35, then I will be out. I hope my psychological health will improve after that :-)

nary a worry, chum. even if your psych-health dips into looneymania,
u & your IS diamonds will have enough chums from Shutterstock ... to welcome u at the microstock looney-bin.
at least the monthly fee is reasonable, +- 33 cents per day , increasing to 38 cents
premium single-room only for fotolia members $1.

ShadySue · « **Reply #27 on:** August 05, 2014, 10:22 »

Quote from: Colonel on August 05, 2014, 07:44

Quote from: BoBoBolinski on August 05, 2014, 07:37
"June was my best month ever in vector sales. July seems to be even better,"

There's someone doing well in vector sales though, Frank Ramspott quoted above in the Illustration forums at IS. He must be the only person doing well, maybe being an inspector helps?

What is interesting is that some of his recent work is very 'simple', yet others have had illos rejected for being 'too simple'.

From memory he has quite a few original veery nice football illustrations, which probably gave him a bit of a boost this month... he's a talented guy though.

And I'm sure that was just a throwaway comment, but of course inspectors don't get special treatment, I was, I'm not now, and I didn't.

Difydave · « **Reply #28 on:** August 05, 2014, 10:52 »

Quote from: everest on August 05, 2014, 09:17

As an Istock diamond with crashing sales month after month I don't think it is Istock penalizing anyone. It is just that buyers have left the place. That simple. Exclusivity Istock and Getty (I contribute to PC and house collections) are no longer a viable photography business. I give them 6 more months to change that trend, thats when my cut will drop from 40 to 35, then I will be out. I hope my psychological health will improve after that :-)

If it just the buyers leaving then all I can say is that quite a few of them must have left with the last big best match change 2-3 weeks back.
There may be less buyers, and there are almost certainly more contributors after the DLs, but those would mean slower drops over time, which we have of course seen.
It's not that iStock penalises any particular persons or group deliberately, it's just "business"
Their business that is. Our's doesn't count.

w7lwi · « **Reply #29 on:** August 05, 2014, 11:40 »

Quote from: Difydave on August 05, 2014, 10:52

Quote from: everest on August 05, 2014, 09:17
As an Istock diamond with crashing sales month after month I don't think it is Istock penalizing anyone. It is just that buyers have left the place. That simple. Exclusivity Istock and Getty (I contribute to PC and house collections) are no longer a viable photography business. I give them 6 more months to change that trend, thats when my cut will drop from 40 to 35, then I will be out. I hope my psychological health will improve after that :-)
If it just the buyers leaving then all I can say is that quite a few of them must have left with the last big best match change 2-3 weeks back.
There may be less buyers, and there are almost certainly more contributors after the DLs, but those would mean slower drops over time, which we have of course seen.
It's not that iStock penalises any particular persons or group deliberately, it's just "business"
Their business that is. Our's doesn't count.

To quote Lord Cutler Beckett at the end of the movie Pirates of the Caribbean, At World's End "He actually expects us to honor our agreement. Nothing personal Jack, it's just good business."

Sounds to me like Disney copied this line from iStock's current business plan.

PixelBytes · « **Reply #30 on:** August 05, 2014, 18:45 »

Quote from: Difydave on August 05, 2014, 10:52

Quote from: everest on August 05, 2014, 09:17
As an Istock diamond with crashing sales month after month I don't think it is Istock penalizing anyone. It is just that buyers have left the place. That simple. Exclusivity Istock and Getty (I contribute to PC and house collections) are no longer a viable photography business. I give them 6 more months to change that trend, thats when my cut will drop from 40 to 35, then I will be out. I hope my psychological health will improve after that :-)
If it just the buyers leaving then all I can say is that quite a few of them must have left with the last big best match change 2-3 weeks back.
There may be less buyers, and there are almost certainly more contributors after the DLs, but those would mean slower drops over time, which we have of course seen.
It's not that iStock penalises any particular persons or group deliberately, it's just "business"
Their business that is. Our's doesn't count.

I am thinking we may be seeing the effect of buyers switch to subs. Subs were many more in June than May. Will be interesting to see if trend continues into July. And subs are so cheaper than credit sales that explain some part of latest income drops.

ShadySue · « **Reply #31 on:** August 05, 2014, 19:50 »

Quote from: Batman on August 05, 2014, 01:19

Mary and Lobo say the search favors exclusive, but don't say how much.

Who is Mary?
Lobo says what they want him to feed us.
As for exclusives being favoured, it depends on the search. Business is heavily favoured to exclusives on top of the first page, others, not at all. I'm looking at a low-supply, low demand nature species just now where 52 of the top 53 images are 0 dl by one indie (mostly from one shoot), one is a 0 dl by another indie, and the bottom ten are all exclusive, seven of these with sales.

goober · « **Reply #32 on:** August 05, 2014, 19:58 »

Algorithms can be incredibly complex and they can be tweaked to maximise profits for istock at the expense of photographers be they long term faithful contributors or newbies. They can share the views and downloads around to increase production amongst new or part-time contributors.

IS is so opaque. Opaque in best match. Opaque in leadership. Opaque in financial reporting.

I'm a black diamond and after 9 years full-time with IS I'm now looking for a job. I've had two dramatic drops in income level this year along with a steady downward trend. By April next year I'll be lucky to be earning anything.

If I thought that improving keywords or improving image quality or subject matter could make a difference I would do it but I think the system is bent on sharing the views, increasing the contributions from part timers and taking out as much cash as possible for the parent companies.

MichaelJayFoto · « **Reply #33 on:** August 06, 2014, 01:49 »

Quote from: goober on August 05, 2014, 19:58

Algorithms can be incredibly complex and they can be tweaked to maximise profits for istock at the expense of photographers be they long term faithful contributors or newbies. They can share the views and downloads around to increase production amongst new or part-time contributors.

You need to exchange "can" with "could". Like in "hypothetically". Given iStock always having been "technologically challenged" I have serious doubts they actually can do anything like that. Even if they wanted to, why would this be the only technical plan that they didn't screw up?

fotoVoyager · « **Reply #34 on:** August 06, 2014, 03:01 »

Quote from: goober on August 05, 2014, 19:58

I'm a black diamond and after 9 years full-time with IS I'm now looking for a job. I've had two dramatic drops in income level this year along with a steady downward trend. By April next year I'll be lucky to be earning anything.

Don't despair - one of my friends with good work has got his dollar per image per month rate back over $1 (which I think is a reasonable target) a few months after quitting exclusivity by uploading mainly to SS and a few others.

I think there is light at the end of the exclusivity tunnel if you can survive the initial drop in earnings.

You're right about iStock though, the trend is tapering to zero or bumping just above it.

Uncle Pete · « **Reply #35 on:** August 07, 2014, 21:00 »

From searching, she is apparently the SearchFairy. http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=353233&page=1

Lobo: "...The Best Match will always benefit Exclusive content over non-Exclusive. We have a few days to see how things shake out. I think it's important to see how things shake out before we pass judgement."

He didn't say, go to the head of the class, king of the hill, or first page. Just "benefit". I think most of the time, Lobo only knows what they tell him to know. If he knows more, he's not allowed to say so.

Quote from: ShadySue on August 05, 2014, 19:50

Quote from: Batman on August 05, 2014, 01:19
Mary and Lobo say the search favors exclusive, but don't say how much.

Who is Mary?
Lobo says what they want him to feed us.
As for exclusives being favoured, it depends on the search. Business is heavily favoured to exclusives on top of the first page, others, not at all. I'm looking at a low-supply, low demand nature species just now where 52 of the top 53 images are 0 dl by one indie (mostly from one shoot), one is a 0 dl by another indie, and the bottom ten are all exclusive, seven of these with sales.

gbalex · « **Reply #36 on:** August 07, 2014, 22:20 »

Quote from: goober on August 05, 2014, 19:58

Algorithms can be incredibly complex and they can be tweaked to maximise profits for istock at the expense of photographers be they long term faithful contributors or newbies.

They can share the views and downloads around to increase production amongst new or part-time contributors.

IS is so opaque. Opaque in best match. Opaque in leadership. Opaque in financial reporting.

I'm a black diamond and after 9 years full-time with IS I'm now looking for a job. I've had two dramatic drops in income level this year along with a steady downward trend. By April next year I'll be lucky to be earning anything.

If I thought that improving keywords or improving image quality or subject matter could make a difference I would do it but I think the system is bent on sharing the views, increasing the contributions from part timers and taking out as much cash as possible for the parent companies.

+110%

I feel exactly the same about more than one site. Those who jump to SS, DT, FT will find the same scenario once their newb status wears off in the searches.

Once SS lures a lions share of IS exclusives over, they will focus on bringing in fresh new and more profitable contributors with skillfeed. http://tinyurl.com/q6h8y4c

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Author Topic: iStock penalising Diamonds ? (Read 8711 times)

everest

etudiante_rapide

ShadySue

Difydave

w7lwi

PixelBytes

ShadySue

goober

MichaelJayFoto

fotoVoyager

Uncle Pete

gbalex

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