I have to admit that its the first time I've heard of hearing about entering your zip code.... but I totally agree with you when you say it needs to be a lot harder in order to prevent it happening. CC fraud is costing these companies hundreds of millions each year....

I've been to gas stations where they ask for your zip.

There's a thread up now...

I have a merchant account for selling prints at art shows, and I'm required to get each customer's zip code in order to authorize each sale.

They seem to have brainwashed the contributors.

I'm still angry at IS for the reductions. I can't understand where they manage to put the 83% of my image sales and yet not able to cover some frauds with the money. GRRRRRRRRRRRR

Looks as if the meeting was as expected. IGetty states they are working on it, but no promises. No real surprises.

Hi All,

 The one area that surprises me is that with 12 years of sales at Getty this has never happened to me before and still does not seem to be a problem with their RM/RF macro collections. I don't understand why this is only a problem with their Istock collection. I am sure there is a good answer but why never before with the other areas of their business models.

Best,
Jonathan

I am under the impression that the immediacy of newer site reporting shows things that may be occurring but not obvious on slower moving 'traditional' type sites.

Perry, don't insult me with your 'brainwashing' crap.

Perry, don't insult me with your 'brainwashing' crap.

Sorry, I sounded perhaps harsher than I meant.
What I meant was that everyone are basically saying the same things that IS is saying, almost like they have forgotten that making contributors pay for their mistakes is wrong.
Did anyone of you ask why they think it's the contributors that have to pay for their mistakes?

Now when I think about it, it's propably impossible to criticize anything at IS forums without getting moderated.

Quote from: sjlocke on March 17, 2011, 14:29

Perry, don't insult me with your 'brainwashing' crap.

Sorry, I sounded perhaps harsher than I meant.
What I meant was that everyone are basically saying the same things that IS is saying, almost like they have forgotten that making contributors pay for their mistakes is wrong.
Did anyone of you ask why they think it's the contributors that have to pay for their mistakes?

Now when I think about it, it's propably impossible to criticize anything at IS forums without getting moderated.

There appears to be great 'controlling' job going on right now on the thread for the conference call. They are up to four pages now and, I kid you not, there is not one single negative/scepitical post listed, not a single one. ISP contributors might not be brainwashed but their certainly being controlled in what they are allowed to say. I posted a polite 'disappointed' comment a couple of hours ago and it has been removed. I can't help thinking that others have been too. Perry, you're right, it is impossible to criticize ISP on the forums.

There appears to be great 'controlling' job going on right now on the thread for the conference call. They are up to four pages now and, I kid you not, there is not one single negative/scepitical post listed, not a single one. ISP contributors might not be brainwashed but their certainly being controlled in what they are allowed to say. I posted a polite 'disappointed' comment a couple of hours ago and it has been removed. I can't help thinking that others have been too. Perry, you're right, it is impossible to criticize ISP on the forums.

I had replied to your post over there, but my post quoting yours was removed as well. The post of yours that I replied to was not just a "polite disappointed" comment, it appeared to be accusing Sean of having submitted his response to iStock for approval first and then forgetting to remove this bit:

"I don't know - was that sufficiently vague but descriptive, helpful but not specific? (Andrew, edit me if I said anything)"

And that you seemed disappointed about him needing to get approval first. I replied that I thought you had misunderstood the situation and came to a faulty conclusion based on that assumption.

FWIW, I do not believe anyone submitted any replies for approval to iStock first before posting. I believe Sean posted that last bit intentionally as a joking way of giving Andrew permission publicly to edit his post if he said anything he wasn't supposed to say based on the NDA. Since there is no edit from anyone but Sean in that post, I'd say no editing took place. I can assure you that even moderator/admin edits are shown publicly. In all my years moderating those forums I was never asked to get approval on anything I posted in the forums before doing so, and I'd be surprised if they started that now.

So, my assumption (which could be faulty as well I grant you) based on all of that was that someone simply wanted to avoid further faulty-assumption making based on having just read your post, so they removed both yours and mine. Hope that helps shed some light.

Apologies if I've now gone and misunderstood you.  

First off, Thanks to Sean and the others that participated in the conference call. Its a difficult issue with a lot of us and many a temper are flaring...I dont envy the task of that call.

my 2c.. this is largely based on the post from Sean, and also from the email I received directly from iStock on the matter.

With so much attention focused on this issue right now, both on external websites and within the iStock forums itself... and given the malcontent of contributors over recouped monies, they obviously need to be seen to be actively doing something about it. It should go without saying they cant specifically and publicly state how they intend to defeat the bad guys - doing that, we might as well hang a sign out and say 'Hey come here, this is how to rip us off now'.

One of the biggest issues regarding the ill feeling is having the earnings taken back by iStock. While it was done fairly quickly the first time, on reflection I have to say that this last time, they at least gave warning and some time in advance, additionally, there's the option to contact Joyze and have the repayment spread out over time rather than in one swoop. Given that its not a new issue at iStock however, and 'was just a file here and there in the past', the cost of which they absorbed up to now... this says to be that the problem is an ongoing one and measures should have been well in place before now. I still stand by my statement that we shouldn't have to foot the bill for this second instance.

As Sean commented on the iStock thread, future royalties are not necessarily precluded from being withdrawn in the event of another fraudulent sale. Given the track record of the past three months, I may be somewhat pessimistic, but I dont think this is over and I foresee royalties being recouped again at a future date. I hope I'm wrong in saying that....but....we'll see I guess

Given that Paypal has the ability to insure users on their site in respect of sending / receiving money... obviously insurance of some sort exists for companies dealing in large sums of money, hopefully iStock is examining this issue. I agree with Sean on that contributors need to be insured against this type of loss in some way.


on a side note, a little story (and I must admit I was a little stunned by how easy this was....)

Yesterday, I finalized a deal with a Toronto camera store.,...a fairly well know chain in this area of Canada. I was upgrading my slr (I used to have a 1Ds MkII)... and I was getting a G11 as well. Long story short, I discovered while they did accept paypal, going through their checkout process, it would only allow me to use echeck or a credit card. echeck was too slow (I wanted the camera so i could keep working rather than depending on the backup camera's)... but my CC didn't have enough room to make full payment. I consulted with she who must be obeyed without question aka the wife, who agreed to let me split the cost on her card. So....moving right along, here I am om the phone, giving credit card details to a store rep... who accepted me at face value and processed the transaction). Now maybe because it was the wife and I had said that, the store rep didn't blink an eye, or question it, neither did they call to verify that it was me calling, they didn't call wifey to verify that I was authorized to use her card....payment was simply accepted. Now I don't for a minute advocate giving information like that over the phone and I don't normally make a practice of doing so, neither have I shopped at this particular outlet before.... (and yes I know there's most likely more than a few reading this that thinks I'm an idiot for giving CC info over the phone)... my point is this.... had my wife and I been compromised, and someone had the CC numbers. doe of the card and the csv number.... it's all too easy to spend money that's not yours. In this respect, I find it a little harder to hold istock at fault.

An assignment photographer turns up for a shoot and is asked "Do you have insurance?" "No I don't, but if we break anything, we'll pay for it. Though if we burn the house down, then we won't pay, you bear the cost." That photographer would be in danger of getting sued for negligence. Why isn't iStock held to the same standard, I wonder.

Thanks to sjlocke and the others for bringing up the subject of insurance, it's a start.

"What was actually said?"

Well no, that's the point isn't it?  Either you think we're reasonably smart enough, or at least one of us is that you are able to go, "Yeah, they're positive about the outlook, so I'm good".  So either you do or you don't, and I totally get it that someone would want explicit details.  Heck, we didn't even get those.  However, it seems we did mostly feel that ongoing work will address this (from the forum posts).

@ chrisboy2004  I didn't want to quote your entire post but we you having the equipment shipped to the billing address for the credit card?  Also, your camera will probably also require a signature when it arrives.