MicrostockGroup
Agency Based Discussion => iStockPhoto.com => Topic started by: ShadySue on January 07, 2011, 17:04
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Just up.
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=289922&page=1 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=289922&page=1)
"As 2010 wound down, our data gave us a more and more complete picture of how the year went. We've now been able to crunch everything down and examine how performance matched up against our predictions.
And I must say, thank you to everyone for helping iStock with an exceptional year. With your hard work, we continue to meet and exceed our goals. We were almost exactly right on our credit burn targets, but the distribution was a little different from what we expected. We’ve adjusted the credit targets to better reflect that. Some targets have stayed the same, some down--none up. So good news."
So.
We "contiune to met and exceed our goals", but we're still unsustainable.
What's wrong with these people?
At least he knows who's doing the hard work. And shafting us anyway.
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Thanks for the link.
Looks like I'll be going down to 17%, a 15% drop in earnings :(
Yeah, and I do find it awfully curious that when talking about the company they always comment how goals are reached and exceeded and business is going crazy good, but when talking about their relationship to contributers, things are getting tough and we have to tighten our belts to stay alive.
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Thanks for the link.
Looks like I'll be going down to 17%, a 15% drop in earnings :(
But Kelly says that's "good news".
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credit targets = hampster wheel
:-\
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SWEET!
I had 1403 RC in 2011 :P (if PP entered on RC I would be at 16% for sure, got almost more sales there than in regular) lol maybe in 2012 :)
please be sustainable, I feel bad for IS :(
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Vomit inducing.
But not as vomit inducing as the grovelling tone of the replies.
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Vomit inducing.
But not as vomit inducing as the grovelling tone of the replies.
I couldn't believe my eyes. That's exactly why they do it. People just bend over further. ??? >:(
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still dropping to 16%
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Nothing changes for me, still a 15% drop. Woo Yay
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"Also: for anyone who had downloads as part of the fraud we experienced right at the end of 2010. We will not be removing those redeemed credits. You get to keep them. Royalties may be a different story but the redeemed credits will stay."
As I predicted when the fraud was first reported.
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Roger said:
"Please remember that we still haven't added the bonus redeemed credits from the holiday Vetta sale. That's going to happen next week.
Also: for anyone who had downloads as part of the fraud we experienced right at the end of 2010. We will not be removing those redeemed credits. You get to keep them. Royalties may be a different story but the redeemed credits will stay.
(Edited on 2011-01-07 15:39:46 by rogermexico)"
Now, isn't that exactly the impossible scenario that some sceptics painted when they suggested the credit card fraud was just a scam to push up the credits of favoured individuals?
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[Loud Fart Noise] I mean Woo Yay! They moved the impossibly high bar down slightly. Now, it is only mostly impossible.
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Roger said:
"Please remember that we still haven't added the bonus redeemed credits from the holiday Vetta sale. That's going to happen next week.
Also: for anyone who had downloads as part of the fraud we experienced right at the end of 2010. We will not be removing those redeemed credits. You get to keep them. Royalties may be a different story but the redeemed credits will stay.
(Edited on 2011-01-07 15:39:46 by rogermexico)"
Now, isn't that exactly the impossible scenario that some sceptics painted when they suggested the credit card fraud was just a scam to push up the credits of favoured individuals?
It's impossible for that possiblity not to raise its ugly head.
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Roger said:
"Please remember that we still haven't added the bonus redeemed credits from the holiday Vetta sale. That's going to happen next week.
Also: for anyone who had downloads as part of the fraud we experienced right at the end of 2010. We will not be removing those redeemed credits. You get to keep them. Royalties may be a different story but the redeemed credits will stay.
(Edited on 2011-01-07 15:39:46 by rogermexico)"
Now, isn't that exactly the impossible scenario that some sceptics painted when they suggested the credit card fraud was just a scam to push up the credits of favoured individuals?
It's impossible for that possiblity not to raise it's ugly head.
It would be quite possible for it not to have been raised if they had done the obvious thing and cancelled the transactions wholesale, including the credits.
Now, apparently, frausters who steal photos and resell them also dictate to istock who is to get a pay rise and who wont. And the fraudsters are in charge because iStock wants them to be. Genius.
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"Also: for anyone who had downloads as part of the fraud we experienced right at the end of 2010. We will not be removing those redeemed credits. You get to keep them. Royalties may be a different story but the redeemed credits will stay."
As I predicted when the fraud was first reported.
And I thought you were spouting paranoid rubbish. Sorry. You were right. The loonies are running the asylum (or worse).
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Vomit inducing.
But not as vomit inducing as the grovelling tone of the replies.
^^^ They certainly induced my vomit.
This 'adjustment' basically tells me that Istockphoto's projections were way off the mark and they simply sold far fewer images in the latter part of the year than they were expecting to. That's exactly what my statistics show too. My downloads at IS for December were 23% down on 2009. Funny how they've managed to turn that into 'good news' and the woo-yayers are now s**king it up.
Btw, at FT my sales were the same and SS well up, so whatever is happening is unique to IS as far as I'm concerned. For me the slide in their 'share' of my earnings began seriously in August and IS has been in steady decline ever since. So far this month they've fallen off a cliff. I'm praying it won't be this bad but at the moment I'm over 40% down on Jan 2010 __ and that's before the commission cut.
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I don't often read the iStock forums but having read the initial statement and then some of the replies I have to remind myself I'm not reading a revised script for Dumb and Dumber.
"As 2010 wound down, our data gave us a more and more complete picture of how the year went." - I can't wait until he finds out they landed on the moon :o
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Btw, at FT my sales were the same and SS well up, so whatever is happening is unique to IS as far as I'm concerned. For me the slide in their 'share' of my earnings began seriously in August and IS has been in steady decline ever since. So far this month they've fallen off a cliff. I'm praying it won't be this bad but at the moment I'm over 40% down on Jan 2010 __ and that's before the commission cut.
My second half of the year was worse at FT, SS & IS. DT was the only one in the big 4 that had a better second half.
I probably should thank IS though. I find all their announcements very motivating, but probably not in the way they would like. ;D
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Now, apparently, frausters who steal photos and resell them also dictate to istock who is to get a pay rise and who wont. And the fraudsters are in charge because iStock wants them to be. Genius.
That's pretty much how it struck me too - but you expressed it better than I could have.
I'm also dismayed that this has prompted another 'woo-yay' day. Truly weird.
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This is no doubt a tough cut for some people. For non-exclusives it is only 1% step per level (5% of your income) but for exclusives it is a whole 5% step (12% of your income)
If someone just misses their target, say, sells 115,500 credits, their commissions next year is 35% instead of 40% like the person who sold 120,000 credits. So their income next year is around $5,000 less. iStock said they might put people over if they are close to the target... which is fine, maybe the 115,500 photographer gets pushed over... that means the 'real' level was 115,500 .. what about the photographer who sold 115,000 credits and doesn't get pushed over. He is stuck with 35% commissions.
In regards to the stolen files and Royalty Credits, I think SeanL made a great analogy - that RC have become like candy which iStock can dispense at will.
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This is no doubt a tough cut for some people. For non-exclusives it is only 1% per level but for exclusives it is a whole 5%.
If someone just misses their target, say, sells 115,500 credits, their commissions next year is 35% instead of 40% like the person who sold 120,000 credits. So their income next year is around $5,000 less. iStock said they might put people over if they are close to the target... which is fine, maybe the 115,500 photographer gets pushed over... that means the 'real' level was 115,500 .. what about the photographer who sold 115,000 credits and doesn't get pushed over. He is stuck with 35% commissions.
Exactly. Using large 5% steps is simply an IDIOTIC way of doing things.
So I suppose it shouldn't come as any surprise that that's the way iStock is doing it.
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This is no doubt a tough cut for some people. For non-exclusives it is only 1% per level but for exclusives it is a whole 5%.
No, for independents it is 5% per level, for exclusives it is around 12%.
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This is no doubt a tough cut for some people. For non-exclusives it is only 1% per level but for exclusives it is a whole 5%.
No, for independents it is 5% per level, for exclusives it is around 12%.
My "5%" pay cut is 16.67%.
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This is no doubt a tough cut for some people. For non-exclusives it is only 1% per level but for exclusives it is a whole 5%.
No, for independents it is 5% per level, for exclusives it is around 12%.
Yeah, that's right. I should have been clearer - I was referring to the percentage steps as apposed to the actual % cut. I edited my original post.
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Even the veneer of 'community' has been shown to be micro-thin. It's all "I'm all right, Jack" from the relieved, and even a few, I'm still down, but I'm happy for those who are up.
Isn't that a prime definition of masochism?
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This is no doubt a tough cut for some people. For non-exclusives it is only 1% per level but for exclusives it is a whole 5%.
No, for independents it is 5% per level, for exclusives it is around 12%.
My "5%" pay cut is 16.67%.
Yup, sorry, I think it is 12.5% minimum, rising as you go down the cannisters.
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Even the veneer of 'community' has been shown to be micro-thin. It's all "I'm all right, Jack" from the relieved, and even a few, I'm still down, but I'm happy for those who are up.
Isn't that a prime definition of masochism?
Yeah, note also that the poster concerned considered that hanging on to what you've been entitled to is being "up", losing out is apparently what you should expect from life.
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That thread is creepy. They start to seem like victims.
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That thread is creepy. They start to seem like victims.
As in some of them are happy their partner's stopped beating them (for the moment)?
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That thread is creepy. They start to seem like victims.
Ah, yes, Stockholm Syndrome.
Wikipedia:
In psychology, Stockholm syndrome is a term used to describe a paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express adulation and have positive feelings towards their captors that appear irrational in light of the danger or risk endured by the victims, essentially mistaking a lack of abuse from their captors as an act of kindness
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Too bad the higher levels haven't moved much. To me, 1.2 million RC is just as unattainable a goal as 1.4.
And I agree, Balderick. It certainly skews the equation when people are counting themselves "winners" just for not losing a % level. That is still losing, IMO, because of the drops in Vetta royalties. Even the scarce handful of people who are getting a royalty bump are still having their Vetta commissions cut.
Are there ANY real winners among the contributors in this situation?
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i'm really happy with this announcement since i will be going up a level now for vectors at 35%. I missed the original absurd target by less than 3 thousand credits and would have made it if my last three months weren't so terrible. Still dropping a level for photos but that's not a big deal for me. Overall a pleasant surprise for me.
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Are there ANY real winners among the contributors in this situation?
I guess a handful of newbies who are really good will have shifted up a level or two, but they are the ones who would have made the 40% after a year or two, which in most cases will now be unattainable.
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pfft... .
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I have no idea how people make plans moving forward.
There has always been little point in uploading less desired images, even if unique.
There seems little point in everyone competing in the already overpopulated, if popular, areas.
Like I said in another thread, it'll be all about finding a niche which no-one else has access to, yet is still wanted by buyers. I'm afraid my brain doesn't work that far (I've never been able to second-guess buyers), and I don't have unique access to anything I'd be able to sell photos of.
Totally demotivating.
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I missed the original absurd target by less than 3 thousand credits and would have made it if my last three months weren't so terrible.
More evidence that they had to re-jig the 'targets' because sales were much worse than anticipated. Hmmm.
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A 25% drop in income for me....Happy (?) New Year! I've been with traditional stock agencies for 20+ years and have never seen contributors treated this way....if this is what microstock is all about, no thanks.
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Do any of those who are whooping with relief that they've been spared this year (seem to be a lot on that thread!) not realise that their happy position will no doubt be unsustainable next year.
First they came for the Jews ...
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Are there ANY real winners among the contributors in this situation?
I guess a handful of newbies who are really good will have shifted up a level or two, but they are the ones who would have made the 40% after a year or two, which in most cases will now be unattainable.
There's one such contributor (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=287942&page=2) - very talented, I'll grant you - who is going from 30% to 40% (and was even at the 150K target level).
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There's one such contributor ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=287942&page=2[/url]) - very talented, I'll grant you - who is going from 30% to 40% (and was even at the 150K target level).
Loved his portfolio, the natural look in the images.
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There's one such contributor ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=287942&page=2[/url]) - very talented, I'll grant you - who is going from 30% to 40% (and was even at the 150K target level).
It's great port but I doubt it has been created in the last year or two. Looks to me like an 'old & bold' pro who has given up on his previous markets and moved to micro. To create that port, as well as the talent, would have required an eye-watering investment in the shoots themselves.. They deserve every cent (and more) of their 40%. Not sure I can so easily see the justification for IS's 60% slice of the pie though.
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It's great port but I doubt it has been created in the last year or two. Looks to me like an 'old & bold' pro who has given up on his previous markets and moved to micro. To create that port, as well as the talent, would have required an eye-watering investment in the shoots themselves.. They deserve every cent (and more) of their 40%. Not sure I can so easily see the justification for IS's 60% slice of the pie though.
Nils is young, talented, and works very hard. The bulk of his port has been created while he's been on iStock.
Even so, when the target was 150,000 RCs, it didn't look like he was going to make it until the Dec Vetta sale (with the double-bonus RCs) came along. And even then, it was very close.
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pfft... .
haha the best comment so far.
On one of the countless threads created on msg about istock in the past few months, I remember someone saying that istock takes and when the time comes gives something back, so as to appear as the good guy again. I've noticed other agencies doing exactly the same thing too. I wouldn't be surprised if these newly announced levels were the actual levels originally agreed on in the first boardroom meeting they had, probably in the spring or summer of last year.
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Or maybe they had some specific people in mind and tweaked the numbers so that they came in at the levels they planned (like one indy kept 20% and so on). It is wise to put them a bit high and then lower them rather than the opposite. Also I suspect they expected more sales in the 3rd part of the year.
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I remember someone saying that istock takes and when the time comes gives something back, so as to appear as the good guy again.
Judging by many of the comments in the iStock thread, it doesn't seem like they're appearing as the good guy to most contributors (at least, of those who are posting). So if that was their plan, it failed.
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I think I just threw up in my mouth.
the whole RC scheme is crazy. and the numbers didnt really move that much.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1999508/Critiques/RC%20targets%20new%20and%20old.jpg (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1999508/Critiques/RC%20targets%20new%20and%20old.jpg)
and I cannot believe that they let all those people keep the fraudulent RCs -- do they also get DOUBLE for the ones that were Vetta??? completely unfair. why not just put a sign up that says "unless you qualify for our Vetta program, we really don't give a shite about you."
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credit targets = hampster wheel
:-\
You and Sue have covered it pretty well.
As a "non" I don't think the 15% will change or improve, so not only on the wheel, but it squeeks and needs some grease. :D
That thread is creepy. They start to seem like victims.
As in some of them are happy their partner's stopped beating them (for the moment)?
Perfect, and so is the Stockholm Syndrome analogy, but then you added Rev. Martin Niemöller quote which I think I had on the bottom of my first web page and it hasn't ever left. :) Good one!
(There are all kinds of micro defenders and cheerleaders, including the abused IS lovers in denial)
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I'm at 36,705 RCs will I get bumped to 37,000 since I'm at 99.2% of the level needed?
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I'm at 36,705 RCs will I get bumped to 37,000 since I'm at 99.2% of the level needed?
Why should you be? If you are "bumped" then someone with 36,410 will want to know why they shouldn't be, too, and so on ad infinitum.
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They should because they want to keep me as an exclusive...obviously they don't have to.
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17% still isn't 20%. So I don't care.
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They should because they want to keep me as an exclusive...obviously they don't have to.
How do you know they want to keep you as exclusive? They show no sign of giving a * about the dropped crowns.
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I think the revised targets are to try and minimise the loss of exclusives and to keep a few at the top around the 1.2 - 1.4 million on board. I'm sure they don't give a #### about non-exclusives except the top 3 of them.
With no exclusives no vetta which makes them the most money
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I am non-exclusive and the new targets give me pride in saying I am still on 16% but made it really easy. The pride makes tears swell in my eyes. LOL TIC
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With no exclusives no vetta which makes them the most money
It makes them most from an individual sale but the non-exclusive bulk of the collection could still generate more income overall than all the Vetta sales.
Vetta pricing seems to be based on the ailing Getty Images model. My understanding is that high-priced sales are going down as people opt for cheaper content. If that is the overall pattern of the industry, then pushing once cheap files into a high price bracket is swimming against the tide.
Istock may have a captive market of buyers who can have expensive content shoved under their noses, perhaps for the first time, and some of them will buy it. But in the long term surely the strategy must backfire as price resistance continues to increase. Yes, it looks UNSUSTAINABLE!
But it may ramp up the returns just long enough to enable the group to be offloaded at an inflated price.
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But it may ramp up the returns just long enough to enable the group to be offloaded at an inflated price.
Well said BT - this is surely the sole point of all of this. I hold out little hope for any change in this (for me) downward trajectory until the next owners step in... and then? Who knows? I'll just stomp up efforts elsewhere - where my trajectory continues upwards - until the next part of the iStock story begins.
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I'm not sure this is the right thread for this comment... but I'm wondering if the lowered levels is due to lower than anticipated sales because customers are leaving as a result of a myriad of missteps and incomptence?
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They should because they want to keep me as an exclusive...obviously they don't have to.
They don't want to keep you because you didn't work hard enough last year. And anyone who doesn't work hard enough isn't serious about their business or a professional either. Whether you are exclusive or not. <whip cracks> ;)
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I'm not sure this is the right thread for this comment... but I'm wondering if the lowered levels is due to lower than anticipated sales because customers are leaving as a result of a myriad of missteps and incomptence?
It's not just you - Gostwyck has been saying the same thing, and I'm sure many of us see much that theory.
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I'm absolutely positive that after this (dead chicken) announcement the targets will never ever be lowered again. Doing so (for them) would be the same as announcing it was a bad year, something they'll never do because its nothing but growth, more growth, 'we're doing extremely well' and sexiness there in Lalalistockland.
As we all know and witnessed they'll make sure their favourite pets get their new higher goal RC's (whether it be by doubling them for vetta, or setting up a 'scam' to reward them with a bunch of extra credits), and the other 'plebs' can bend or drop under the higher RC levels. (am i the only one thinking they actually WANT to get rid of all the non-vetta plebs to replace them with the neverending supply of cheap base canisters (who probably whine less too) ?)
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I'm absolutely positive that after this (dead chicken) announcement the targets will never ever be lowered again. Doing so (for them) would be the same as announcing it was a bad year, something they'll never do because its nothing but growth, more growth, 'we're doing extremely well' and sexiness there in Lalalistockland.
As we all know and witnessed they'll make sure their favourite pets get their new higher goal RC's (whether it be by doubling them for vetta, or setting up a 'scam' to reward them with a bunch of extra credits), and the other 'plebs' can bend or drop under the higher RC levels. (am i the only one thinking they actually WANT to get rid of all the non-vetta plebs to replace them with the neverending supply of cheap base canisters (who probably whine less too) ?)
No, you aren't the only one thinking this. ;) I see this happening in regular companies, so it's no surprise to me that IS is doing the same thing. Reminds me of third world countries...you are either in the "club" and reaping all kinds of rewards, or you are dirt poor, and should be happy that you are getting minimum wage or less. There will be no middle class anymore. Sure seems like this country is moving in that direction.
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That thread is creepy. They start to seem like victims.
Ah, yes, Stockholm Syndrome.
Wikipedia:
In psychology, Stockholm syndrome is a term used to describe a paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express adulation and have positive feelings towards their captors that appear irrational in light of the danger or risk endured by the victims, essentially mistaking a lack of abuse from their captors as an act of kindness
This is true!!! I was born and lived in Stockholm, I know and this is absoloutely true.
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I'm not sure this is the right thread for this comment... but I'm wondering if the lowered levels is due to lower than anticipated sales because customers are leaving as a result of a myriad of missteps and incomptence?
Haven't they more or less admitted that sales have fallen with this statement?
"As 2010 wound down, our data gave us a more and more complete picture of how the year went. We've now been able to crunch everything down and examine how performance matched up against our predictions.
And I must say, thank you to everyone for helping iStock with an exceptional year. With your hard work, we continue to meet and exceed our goals. We were almost exactly right on our credit burn targets, but the distribution was a little different from what we expected. We’ve adjusted the credit targets to better reflect that. Some targets have stayed the same, some down--none up."
I'm struggling to believe the 'distribution theory'. In fact all the targets for Photos have been revised downwards between 8-25%. If most targets have gone down but none up then where's the 'distribution' issue?
I think we are witnessing a case-perfect example of "the law of unintended consequences" here. I suspect that they began devising the RC plan immediately after they retreated to some degree on the canister changes. At that time everything was rosy in the garden, monthly sales were still growing and no-one considered what would happen if and when they actually started to fall. I also doubt that it occurred to anyone that subsequent 'adjustments' to the RC levels, if done fairly and accurately to maintain the status quo, would effectively be a open window into how well (or otherwise) the business was doing.
Oh dear, oh dear ... if sales continue to fall then what on earth are they going to when they have to announce the RC targets for 2011 within the next quarter? Didn't they originally promise that those would be announced in the New Year? Why the delay?
If sales do fall and they don't keep revising the targets downwards then yes, iStock will make a slightly higher percentage of profit, but then more and more contributors will become dissatisfied as the targets become ever more unattainable and fewer will qualify at each level. Of course microstock sales cannot continue to grow forever and there's certainly no guarantee that iStock will maintain their share whenever the market does mature. This issue was always going rear it's ugly head at some point in time.
Of course if sales are falling ... then so the value of the business will be falling too ... and so H&F will have missed the boat when it comes to selling iStock on. That's a lot of bonus cheques that won't be getting handed out.
It looks to me that in implementing the RC system iStock have inadvertently hoisted themselves by their own petard.
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Or maybe they had some specific people in mind and tweaked the numbers so that they came in at the levels they planned (like one indy kept 20% and so on). It is wise to put them a bit high and then lower them rather than the opposite. Also I suspect they expected more sales in the 3rd part of the year.
I completely agree with this. End of year sales were slower than expected and some of the privileged few didn't get the RC counts they needed to hold their royalty level. Easy fix to tweak the royalty levels just enough to boost those folks.
I will also add that I don't think the levels were tweaked for any non-exclusives. Quite a few independents seem to be within whisper of the next levels, but I don't expect Istock will cut them a break. For exclusives, OTOH, they might.
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They should because they want to keep me as an exclusive...obviously they don't have to.
Maybe they should bump me up 300,000 credits, so they can keep me as an independent. ;D
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It looks to me that in implementing the RC system iStock have inadvertently hoisted themselves by their own petard.
^^ Absolutely! This isn't the first time in recent months, either. They seem to be spending a lot of time sitting on that petard. When do you reckon they will notice their a$$ is starting to hurt? ;)
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The whole "fraud" fiasco reminds me of the "ratings rings" that were around a few years ago. Back in the day ratings were a big part of the best match. Then these "rings" started to make deals to rate each others images. Back then getting just a 4 out of 5 on an image could send it to the back of a search so you needed every "5" you could get. Eventually 2 or 3 people were kicked off the site for it but all the ratings they, and the others, made were not changed. Thus, continuing to give certain people an advantage in the searches.
Now we have this "fraudulent" credit card purchase that lasted for over a week, and almost exclusively purchased Vetta images. While the money from the purchases will have to be returned to IS, the RC's will be allowed to stay - giving many of those people the boost they needed to either remain or raise their 2010 royalty rate.
It's being an MO for IS. If the choosen few aren't going to be able to make it then we'll pull something to make sure they do.
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Now we have this "fraudulent" credit card purchase that lasted for over a week, and almost exclusively purchased Vetta images. While the money from the purchases will have to be returned to IS, the RC's will be allowed to stay - giving many of those people the boost they needed to either remain or raise their 2010 royalty rate.
This fraud "conspiracy" theory is ridiculous. It was not just Vetta and Agency. I had quite a few regular sales too. And before someone starts whining it was just exclusives, well, maybe that's because for $250 or whatever, you can get all the independent content you want at SS for your illegal cd collections. I certainly wouldn't waste my time dl'ing independent content at IS, when I'd have a teeny tiny chance of getting caught at SS.
And the amount of RCs kept likely did not affect anyone's transition from one level to the next or their ability to stay anywhere. If the larger portfolio people got proportionally more fraud dls, an extra 500-100 RCs was less likely to move them anywhere, like an extra 50 wouldn't move a smaller contributor anywhere. I agree with SNP (shock!) that TPTB decided it wasn't enough trouble to waste development time on figuring how to pull them back as yet another adjustment, and in the current climate, just look at it as a random bonus that doesn't really do anything much.
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Now we have this "fraudulent" credit card purchase that lasted for over a week, and almost exclusively purchased Vetta images. While the money from the purchases will have to be returned to IS, the RC's will be allowed to stay - giving many of those people the boost they needed to either remain or raise their 2010 royalty rate.
This fraud "conspiracy" theory is ridiculous. It was not just Vetta and Agency. I had quite a few regular sales too. And before someone starts whining it was just exclusives, well, maybe that's because for $250 or whatever, you can get all the independent content you want at SS for your illegal cd collections. I certainly wouldn't waste my time dl'ing independent content at IS, when I'd have a teeny tiny chance of getting caught at SS.
I don't think the fraud problem is over yet. I have gotten a LOT of suspicious sales today. Here's the thread:
http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/image-thieves-targetting-is-again!!/msg178897/?topicseen#new (http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/image-thieves-targetting-is-again!!/msg178897/?topicseen#new)
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And the amount of RCs kept likely did not affect anyone's transition from one level to the next
I know of one person who DEFINITELY moved up a level because of it, and I don't know that many contributors. Which leads me to believe there likely were more. Probably not many, but some.
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This fraud "conspiracy" theory is ridiculous. It was not just Vetta and Agency. I had quite a few regular sales too. And before someone starts whining it was just exclusives, well, maybe that's because for $250 or whatever, you can get all the independent content you want at SS for your illegal cd collections. I certainly wouldn't waste my time dl'ing independent content at IS, when I'd have a teeny tiny chance of getting caught at SS.
And the amount of RCs kept likely did not affect anyone's transition from one level to the next or their ability to stay anywhere. If the larger portfolio people got proportionally more fraud dls, an extra 500-100 RCs was less likely to move them anywhere, like an extra 50 wouldn't move a smaller contributor anywhere. I agree with SNP (shock!) that TPTB decided it wasn't enough trouble to waste development time on figuring how to pull them back as yet another adjustment, and in the current climate, just look at it as a random bonus that doesn't really do anything much.
Makes sense. With all the other problems or things IS has going on, going through and adjusting RC's is probably low on the priority list. I remember when I was new to IS. Someone downloaded all my files which was about 70 at the time. IS said it was fraud, but let me keep the royalties.
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My stats at Istock was just over 170K credits for 2010. Istock has only a half of my portfolio because of the upload limits. To get over 1,200,000 limit you have to be selling 7 times more. For me, this goal is still unreachable since as a non-exclusive I have ridiculously low upload limits. Even if I suddenly start producing only files that are selling 5 times better than my average, it would still take me several years even to approach this. Yuri's portfolio size on Istock is just slightly bigger than mine, and I doubt he made the 1,200,000 level (although it's possible if he was uploading mostly his proven best-sellers to Istock). So, it looks like the only contributors who have a chance to make that level are exclusive ones (providing they are very talented) since they are not crippled by restrictive upload limits.
Not to start again exclusive/non-exclusive war:) - these are just facts.
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Can't remember where, but I read that Yuri did make the top level. Doubt he is dancing in the streets, though, to just get to keep the 20% he was already making.
I seriously doubt that any other non-exclusives made it, though, and I haven't yet heard of any exclusives who made the 1.2 million to get to 45% either.
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Can't remember where, but I read that Yuri did make the top level. Doubt he is dancing in the streets, though, to just get to keep the 20% he was already making.
I seriously doubt that any other non-exclusives made it, though, and I haven't yet heard of any exclusives who made the 1.2 million to get to 45% either.
The vector level for the top is a lower, so I assume someone made that. Still, it seems like an awful lot of work just to get to royalties that you can easily achieve at other sites.
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I agree with SNP (shock!) that TPTB decided it wasn't enough trouble to waste development time on figuring how to pull them back as yet another adjustment, and in the current climate, just look at it as a random bonus that doesn't really do anything much.
That is shocking! :D
Though, regarding the RCs from the scam as "a random bonus that doesn't really do anything much" - without all the details including a breakdown of numbers before/after how many such credits were racked up for individuals, I'm just not sold on the idea that the bonus didn't do anything much for at least a few people. Because you have to remember the "legit" bonus that was in play for Vetta sale files, too. Those two bonuses together may well have helped a few, and particularly after Kelly's overall adjustment to the RC system.
We can never know for certain. But those, if any, who were boosted by these two bonuses know who they are.
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Thanks for nothing.....
Gold Cannister here still dropping from 20% to a ridiculous 16% and yes I will be working harder this year but I can assure you it will not be at IS to much nonsense going on there ;)
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(http://houseofshane.com/posters/istock-cart.jpg)
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LOL
I would submit it, no text on it of course..
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Funny. Too bad mine and the majority of people's screw didn't get any smaller.
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([url]http://houseofshane.com/posters/istock-cart.jpg[/url])
Absolutely hilarious!! But I'm with Cthoman - still getting the big screw!
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Me too (big screw). :'(
Funny image though :D
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hahahaah.. that's classic!
yeah, I am still getting the big screw, too.
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ROFLMAO! Oh, that is hilarious! I love the Woo-yay face!
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They should because they want to keep me as an exclusive...obviously they don't have to.
How do you know they want to keep you as exclusive? They show no sign of giving a about the dropped crowns.
I'm tending to agree with this these days...sadly. I think of istock as a gallery/storefront. I pay for space on the walls and for marketing, and they take a chunk of my income. these days I feel like the chunk they get is being shoved into a dirty hole in the floorboards before I know what's happening, and there's two marketing departments--one for those of who don't matter much, and the real marketing department for the superstars.
so any chance of istock ever going exclusive only? I can't see that would ever work, but I'm curious what responses are to the question.
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LOL
I would submit it, no text on it of course..
Yeah, go on, do it ... then tell us what po-faced rejection reason they come up with.
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hahahaah.. that's classic!
yeah, I am still getting the big screw, too.
Independent at 15% for life, I could have it tattooed on my sorry WhooYay where the screw is sticking out. ;)
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very funny cartoon, chico, and right on the money (or lack of, I should say) :)
I, too, still get the big screw.
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very funny cartoon, chico, and right on the money (or lack of, I should say) :)
I, too, still get the big screw.
Was made by "artpuppy" Istock vector artist. Great job.
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so any chance of istock ever going exclusive only? I can't see that would ever work, but I'm curious what responses are to the question.
At one time we were promised that would never happen, but current ownership has failed to honor lots of promises. I think that Istock as an exclusive only site could be a possibility in the future. If that were to happen, probably non-exclusives would be shoved off on the partner program sites.
The problem, for exclusives, with the site going all-exclusive, is that there would still need to be haves and have-nots. That just seems to be the way Istock operates. Once independents are gone, that leaves the lower selling exclusives as the have-nots. To some extent, we can already see that happening.
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At one time we were promised that would never happen, but current ownership has failed to honor lots of promises. I think that Istock as an exclusive only site could be a possibility in the future. If that were to happen, probably non-exclusives would be shoved off on the partner program sites.
I don't see it as a realistic possibility for IS to insist on exclusivity. For starters they risk losing up to 80% of their library.
The only time they had a realistic opportunity of making IS an 'exclusive only' agency was when they first introduced exclusivity itself. Had they been a little more generous at the time then exclusivity would have been a no-brainer for most of us anyway. Such was their domination back then they could probably have prevented realistic competition from taking off. That horse has well and truly bolted now.
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At one time we were promised that would never happen, but current ownership has failed to honor lots of promises. I think that Istock as an exclusive only site could be a possibility in the future. If that were to happen, probably non-exclusives would be shoved off on the partner program sites.
I don't see it as a realistic possibility for IS to insist on exclusivity. For starters they risk losing up to 80% of their library.
The only time they had a realistic opportunity of making IS an 'exclusive only' agency was when they first introduced exclusivity itself. Had they been a little more generous at the time then exclusivity would have been a no-brainer for most of us anyway. Such was their domination back then they could probably have prevented realistic competition from taking off. That horse has well and truly bolted now.
What if that 80% only counts for a small percentage of their revenue? What if they kept only the small percentage of contributors that make up 80-90%+ of their revenue? They would have a much smaller, but exclusive, library.
Getty Images is image-exclusive. And Getty owns...
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At one time we were promised that would never happen, but current ownership has failed to honor lots of promises. I think that Istock as an exclusive only site could be a possibility in the future. If that were to happen, probably non-exclusives would be shoved off on the partner program sites.
I don't see it as a realistic possibility for IS to insist on exclusivity. For starters they risk losing up to 80% of their library.
I hope you're right. Just seems like lately Istock has been shooting themselves in the foot so much that nothing would surprise me anymore.
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What if that 80% only counts for a small percentage of their revenue? What if they kept only the small percentage of contributors that make up 80-90%+ of their revenue? They would have a much smaller, but exclusive, library.
Getty Images is image-exclusive. And Getty owns...
Fair point but it's a reasonable assumption that if 80% of the library is non-exclusive then 80% of the revenue will be generated by it too. It'll be an even higher percentage of the profitability.
Other agencies would react to keep their contributors too. They would have to.
A move towards mandatory exclusivity would be virtual suicide IMHO ... but then again they seem to be getting good at self-harming lately.
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At one time we were promised that would never happen, but current ownership has failed to honor lots of promises. I think that Istock as an exclusive only site could be a possibility in the future. If that were to happen, probably non-exclusives would be shoved off on the partner program sites.
The problem, for exclusives, with the site going all-exclusive, is that there would still need to be haves and have-nots. That just seems to be the way Istock operates. Once independents are gone, that leaves the lower selling exclusives as the have-nots. To some extent, we can already see that happening.
I totally agree. Now, the exclusives (and really, still the non-exclusives) "who didn't work hard enough" last year are the have-nots. In time, I think most all contributors will end up being have-nots at IS. Only the top echelon of producers will remain. IMHO.
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What if that 80% only counts for a small percentage of their revenue? What if they kept only the small percentage of contributors that make up 80-90%+ of their revenue? They would have a much smaller, but exclusive, library.
Even if that's true, it changes the equation in ways that would hurt iStock even more than their failures are doing now. That nonexclusive content allows them to be a one stop shop for image buyers; chances are good that a buyer will find something they want in iStock's collection. Take away all those images and iStock becomes a niche player, albeit a profitable one. Buyers will have to find other sources for a lot of their needs. And once they've discovered those other (cheaper, easier, friendlier, less incompetent) markets, how likely are they to return to iStock?
Buyer inertia is one of iStock's advantages. Take it away and what do they have?
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What if that 80% only counts for a small percentage of their revenue? What if they kept only the small percentage of contributors that make up 80-90%+ of their revenue? They would have a much smaller, but exclusive, library.
Even if that's true, it changes the equation in ways that would hurt iStock even more than their failures are doing now. That nonexclusive content allows them to be a one stop shop for image buyers; chances are good that a buyer will find something they want in iStock's collection. Take away all those images and iStock becomes a niche player, albeit a profitable one. Buyers will have to find other sources for a lot of their needs. And once they've discovered those other (cheaper, easier, friendlier, less incompetent) markets, how likely are they to return to iStock?
Buyer inertia is one of iStock's advantages. Take it away and what do they have?
But what images comprise that 80%? Is it stuff that sells? Or a lot of non-selling junk?
Buyers want convenience. If keeping a small percentage of images represented a good high value collection minus the junk, even better.
Now if Istock could have that exclusive collection and fix all the bugs...
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But what images comprise that 80%? Is it stuff that sells? Or a lot of non-selling junk?
It includes a lot of stuff that sells. It's every independent on iStock. Every dime I've made on iStock has come from that 80%. So yeah, buyers do find value there. And not every independent can be wheedled or threatened into taking the crown. I would never have moved to exclusivity, and I can't be the only one.
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thanks for the replies. I remember they said it wouldn't happen. but they have gone back on other promises and statements--so logically I'm just not going to put a lot of stock in statements and promises anymore. as was already said, I feel like the opportunity to go all--exclusive has come and gone. but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if they did that. despite being exclusive, I think it would be a huge mistake. and I agree Lisa, that it would simply shift the divide across exclusive lines instead of the obvious line between exclusivity and independence.
I really wish iStock would go the way of image exclusivity like other agents rather than artist exclusivity. it used to seem that exclusivity would maintain demand for files not available elsewhere. but now that they're slinging our wares haphazardly across multiple sites and markets, and seeing some of the Agency contributors with flexible exclusivity--it's like there's a big piece of sand under my crown. the more I rub it, the worse it feels. it really bothers me that some artists have flexible exclusivity. makes me wonder where we're headed. seems they want to bring everything exclusively under the Getty umbrella. they don't seem to realize the umbrella's inside out right now.
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I really wish iStock would go the way of image exclusivity like other agents rather than artist exclusivity.
That could work well in their favour although again, maybe it's now too late even for that. I've got a feeling that many contributors, especially independents, have lost all faith in iStockphoto and their constantly moving goalposts. It still staggers me that they even dream of paying contributors as little as 15%. If I were a new contributor I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to stomach signing up for that.
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I really wish iStock would go the way of image exclusivity like other agents rather than artist exclusivity.
There aren't many agencies that have complete image exclusivity anymore, some like Getty and Corbis still insist on image exclusivity from individual contributors but their collection as a whole hasn't been exclusive for a long time, therefore I can't see iStock ever doing it, up until last year I would have submitted images to iStock on an exclusive basis but obviously I wouldn't consider that now.
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thanks for the replies. I remember they said it wouldn't happen. but they have gone back on other promises and statements--so logically I'm just not going to put a lot of stock in statements and promises anymore. as was already said, I feel like the opportunity to go all--exclusive has come and gone. but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if they did that. despite being exclusive, I think it would be a huge mistake. and I agree Lisa, that it would simply shift the divide across exclusive lines instead of the obvious line between exclusivity and independence.
I really wish iStock would go the way of image exclusivity like other agents rather than artist exclusivity. it used to seem that exclusivity would maintain demand for files not available elsewhere. but now that they're slinging our wares haphazardly across multiple sites and markets, and seeing some of the Agency contributors with flexible exclusivity--it's like there's a big piece of sand under my crown. the more I rub it, the worse it feels. it really bothers me that some artists have flexible exclusivity. makes me wonder where we're headed. seems they want to bring everything exclusively under the Getty umbrella. they don't seem to realize the umbrella's inside out right now.
I agree. Customers may want "exclusive imagery" but do they put any value on "exclusive artists" ? Other than maybe a handful of artists with very unique, specialized and distinctive imagery I doubt it very much. Are my pictures of professionals in business settings more desirable to a customer if they know that I don't have animal photos for sale at another website?
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Image exclusivity would be great. As SNP points out, exclusivity is already a much more flexible term since the introduction of Agency.
At one time, I argued that image exclusivity would completely erode the value of artist exclusivity. However, none of what I thought I knew about Istock seems to be accurate anymore, and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
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But any kind of exclusivity, image or artist, at 20% royalties is of no interest to me. And that's where Getty's going. So I'd go independent rather than deal with that.
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...and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
I disagree, IS still seems to be propping up their exclusive program with a number of perks that might be interesting opportunities to independents. Higher priced files, Vetta, Getty, etc. Even Fotolia has perks for exclusives with their exclusives allowed to adjust prices. I wouldn't mind being able to use all those features.
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...and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
I disagree, IS still seems to be propping up their exclusive program with a number of perks that might be interesting opportunities to independents. Higher priced files, Vetta, Getty, etc. Even Fotolia has perks for exclusives with their exclusives allowed to adjust prices. I wouldn't mind being able to use all those features.
I admit sales are there and continue to grow, albeit more slowly. but otherwise, what perks? they've whittled away all the perks. exclusivity doesn't feel special at all anymore
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I admit sales are there and continue to grow, albeit more slowly. but otherwise, what perks? they've whittled away all the perks. exclusivity doesn't feel special at all anymore
There's always independence. You can make your own flag and have a holiday with fireworks and everything. ;D
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...and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
I disagree, IS still seems to be propping up their exclusive program with a number of perks that might be interesting opportunities to independents. Higher priced files, Vetta, Getty, etc. Even Fotolia has perks for exclusives with their exclusives allowed to adjust prices. I wouldn't mind being able to use all those features.
Yes, but are customers going to prop up IS to allow them to continue to prop up their exclusive artists? I hope their exclusive perks are not coming at the expense of confusing and annoying customers.
What I mean is, does the quality, uniqueness, searchability, size, format, price, packaging, etc. of the various flavors of "exclusive images" actually correspond to what customers think is good value for their money? If IS focus too much on making their agency attractive to their top contributors and not enough on making it attractive to customers then the perks won't be worthwhile.
I'm not saying that they have definitely blundered because I really don't know. But to me, there are some signs that they may have blundered. For example the term "agency collection" is meaningless because IS is already an agency. How can an agency offer a collection of certain content called "agency collection" and offer another collection of content which is "NOT agency collection". They're both collections of content at an agency, therefore they're both agency collections. Do they really think that customers will know or care about the history which brought in this content through the back door, as it were, and not through normal uploading by individual contributors?
Likewise the term "Vetta" is a made-up term which means nothing, except it is hinting that the content it contains is "vetted". Do customers need someone to vet ("to examine, investigate, or evaluate in a thorough or expert way") imagery or would they rather have a decent search engine to help them do it themselves? Even if customers prefer to search only within vetted imagery, there was an indication that some artists are hedging their bets by putting SOME images in a series into the high-priced collection but leaving other, nearly identical images in the regular-priced ordinary collection. It is understandable for an artist to want to do this, not wanting to take a chance on killing their sales to the low-priced market, but to a customer it is completely silly to have practically identical content for sale at the same web site for vastly different prices.
Companies always need to have some people working on employee recruiting and retention, but by far the largest focus has to be on customers ... otherwise their won't be enough ca$h to recruit and retain anybody.
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...and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
I disagree, IS still seems to be propping up their exclusive program with a number of perks that might be interesting opportunities to independents. Higher priced files, Vetta, Getty, etc.
I agree with pretty much all the points Pet Chia made above (big surprise, lol), and would like to add that Istock exclusivity, in and of itself, isn't as valuable as it used to be. Exclusives are being stratified according to their value to the company much more than the old canister system did.
It used to be that every exclusive contributor had a chance to make it to the top royalty levels. Some did it faster and some slower, but if you hung in there you would eventually make it. That's not true anymore. The RC targets mean that most istock exclusives will NEVER make it to the higher royalty levels.
There is an elite club of very successful, very talented people who manage to gain enough access to Vetta, Agency, etc. and can therefore have the full benefits of exclusivity. Unfortunately, for the rank-and-file Istock exclusive contributor, who doesn't produce Vetta or Agency-style images, who is now stuck forever at 25-30%, the benefits of exclusivity are all but gone.
ETA: Unless you REALLY like Moo cards and can't fork over the $22 to have them made yourself. ;)
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...and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
I disagree, IS still seems to be propping up their exclusive program with a number of perks that might be interesting opportunities to independents. Higher priced files, Vetta, Getty, etc.
It used to be that every exclusive contributor had a chance to make it to the top royalty levels. Some did it faster and some slower, but if you hung in there you would eventually make it. That's not true anymore. The RC targets mean that most istock exclusives will NEVER make it to the higher royalty levels.
There is an elite club of very successful, very talented people who manage to gain enough access to Vetta, Agency, etc. and can therefore have the full benefits of exclusivity. Unfortunately, for the rank-and-file Istock exclusive contributor, who doesn't produce Vetta or Agency-style images, who is now stuck forever at 25-30%, the benefits of exclusivity are all but gone.
(your comment in red) is bang on. really succinct. and the new system ensures a steady income for Getty/iStock without consideration for motivating exclusives. They've made it very clear that it doesn't matter who the income comes from, as long as it comes. that's really disappointing.
I'm kind of happy now that I don't have much Vetta or Agency, because they're pushing it so much on Getty that 20% is going to be more and more the royalty for non-exclusives. In fact, I'm considering opting out entirely from Vetta/Agency as I have for the Partner Program. that gives me regular collection and E+ to work with and my 35% on iStock (though that's indefinite, depending on what happens next year with RC targets).
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@ Pet_Chia Vetta is Italian for Summit or Peak.
The insinuation being this stuff is the pinnacle of our collection.
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It's alive!!!!
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It's alive!!!!
Yep. The monster wake up.
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But what images comprise that 80%? Is it stuff that sells? Or a lot of non-selling junk?
I love ya Paulie, but I think it would be suicide too. The top selling independent collection images at SS, DT, FT are very strong images. Removing all of it from IS would send quite a few buyers packing by necessity. IS would also be eliminating the image factories, which arguably create the most popular collections in all of microstock.
Honestly I hope it happens. It would be an epic fail to be certain, and I would just as soon have buyers purchasing my images where I make 30-50% rather than 16-17%.
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...and the value of artist exclusivity seems to be rapidly declining.
I disagree, IS still seems to be propping up their exclusive program with a number of perks that might be interesting opportunities to independents. Higher priced files, Vetta, Getty, etc.
It used to be that every exclusive contributor had a chance to make it to the top royalty levels. Some did it faster and some slower, but if you hung in there you would eventually make it. That's not true anymore. The RC targets mean that most istock exclusives will NEVER make it to the higher royalty levels.
There is an elite club of very successful, very talented people who manage to gain enough access to Vetta, Agency, etc. and can therefore have the full benefits of exclusivity. Unfortunately, for the rank-and-file Istock exclusive contributor, who doesn't produce Vetta or Agency-style images, who is now stuck forever at 25-30%, the benefits of exclusivity are all but gone.
(your comment in red) is bang on. really succinct. and the new system ensures a steady income for Getty/iStock without consideration for motivating exclusives. They've made it very clear that it doesn't matter who the income comes from, as long as it comes. that's really disappointing.
I'm kind of happy now that I don't have much Vetta or Agency, because they're pushing it so much on Getty that 20% is going to be more and more the royalty for non-exclusives. In fact, I'm considering opting out entirely from Vetta/Agency as I have for the Partner Program. that gives me regular collection and E+ to work with and my 35% on iStock (though that's indefinite, depending on what happens next year with RC targets).
Sounds like you're changing your tune.
Here's hoping it sticks. This time :)
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I admit sales are there and continue to grow, albeit more slowly. but otherwise, what perks? they've whittled away all the perks. exclusivity doesn't feel special at all anymore
There's always independence. You can make your own flag and have a holiday with fireworks and everything. ;D
(http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/111517/111517,1237783579,3/stock-photo-the-american-flag-comes-to-life-with-this-powerful-fireworks-display-great-for-the-th-of-july-27158035.jpg)
There's always room for one more SNP. I'll cook the hot dogs! :P
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the new ASA is live too....it's full of red highlights and strike through words...not sure why all that is visible. there don't seem to be any earth-shattering changes other than what we've been told to expect. I'm not signing it until I know the official version on there remains static....so far it looks slightly different everytime I log in.
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My god! FcukUp in the new F5!
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At one time we were promised that would never happen, but current ownership has failed to honor lots of promises. I think that Istock as an exclusive only site could be a possibility in the future. If that were to happen, probably non-exclusives would be shoved off on the partner program sites.
I don't see it as a realistic possibility for IS to insist on exclusivity. For starters they risk losing up to 80% of their library.
The only time they had a realistic opportunity of making IS an 'exclusive only' agency was when they first introduced exclusivity itself. Had they been a little more generous at the time then exclusivity would have been a no-brainer for most of us anyway. Such was their domination back then they could probably have prevented realistic competition from taking off. That horse has well and truly bolted now.
What if that 80% only counts for a small percentage of their revenue? What if they kept only the small percentage of contributors that make up 80-90%+ of their revenue? They would have a much smaller, but exclusive, library.
Getty Images is image-exclusive. And Getty owns...
You are correct, the top 5000 contributors probably contribute 98% of the profits, the others 98% of the headaches.
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But what images comprise that 80%? Is it stuff that sells? Or a lot of non-selling junk?
I love ya Paulie, but I think it would be suicide too. The top selling independent collection images at SS, DT, FT are very strong images. Removing all of it from IS would send quite a few buyers packing by necessity. IS would also be eliminating the image factories, which arguably create the most popular collections in all of microstock.
Honestly I hope it happens. It would be an epic fail to be certain, and I would just as soon have buyers purchasing my images where I make 30-50% rather than 16-17%.
Haha. I love you, man!
I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just doing some what-if's.
What-if they came up with some massive exclusive incentives for the image factories, and other high performing non-exclusive contributors, that they couldn't resist?
Istock would be the only exclusive site with a smaller collection of mostly excellent content. A micro version of Getty images with pricing in-between micro and macro. Non-exclusives and low value images would get moved to the new Getty true micro site, Photos.com. The other dozen micros would have most of the same images and would be competing only on price along with Photos.com.
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Haha. I love you, man!
I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just doing some what-if's.
What-if they came up with some massive exclusive incentives for the image factories, and other high performing non-exclusive contributors, that they couldn't resist?
Istock would be the only exclusive site with a smaller collection of mostly excellent content. A micro version of Getty images with pricing in-between micro and macro. Non-exclusives and low value images would get moved to the new Getty true micro site, Photos.com. The other dozen micros would have most of the same images and would be competing only on price along with Photos.com.
Photos.com pays 30-50% commission? I was under the impression Getty's mission was to get EVERYBODY at 20% or less. If Photos.com pays 20%, then "low value images and non-exclusives" would still get a better deal somewhere else. In other words, dumping Getty altogether. Photos.com might be competing on price with the other sites, but Getty would still be losing a lot of non-exclusives. Not that they care, except for the biggies.
And I am certain the back-room deals are going to continue with the big indies. It wouldn't surprise me if your what-if is actually a soon-to-be. ;)
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Haha. I love you, man!
I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just doing some what-if's.
What-if they came up with some massive exclusive incentives for the image factories, and other high performing non-exclusive contributors, that they couldn't resist?
Istock would be the only exclusive site with a smaller collection of mostly excellent content. A micro version of Getty images with pricing in-between micro and macro. Non-exclusives and low value images would get moved to the new Getty true micro site, Photos.com. The other dozen micros would have most of the same images and would be competing only on price along with Photos.com.
Photos.com pays 30-50% commission? I was under the impression Getty's mission was to get EVERYBODY at 20% or less. If Photos.com pays 20%, then "low value images and non-exclusives" would still get a better deal somewhere else. In other words, dumping Getty altogether. Photos.com might be competing on price with the other sites, but Getty would still be losing a lot of non-exclusives. Not that they care, except for the biggies.
And I am certain the back-room deals are going to continue with the big indies. It wouldn't surprise me if your what-if is actually a soon-to-be. ;)
Sure, the new sites and low sales volume sites will always offer higher commission.
But what do you think is going to eventually happen with the other top sites now that they've seen Istock massively drop commissions with little repercussion other than a lot of threats to leave and complaining? So far contributors' only threat/tool is to stop submitting or leave. If over the next couple of years the top 5 sites all cut commissions to 20% where will everybody go?
The execs at the other sites already have dollar signs rolling in their eyes after this move by istock. Many of you keep praising the other sites but they are all businesses acting in their own best interests. Change is coming.
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What-if they came up with some massive exclusive incentives for the image factories, and other high performing non-exclusive contributors, that they couldn't resist?
Well, as one of those "high performing non-exclusive contributors", there is absolutely nothing Istock could come up with that I could not resist, at this point. Maybe a year or two ago, but not now. And FWIW, I have never been offered any sweetheart deal by Istock. If I had been, there was a time I would have probably taken it.
But what do you think is going to eventually happen with the other top sites now that they've seen Istock massively drop commissions with little repercussion other than a lot of threats to leave and complaining? So far contributors' only threat/tool is to stop submitting or leave. If over the next couple of years the top 5 sites all cut commissions to 20% where will everybody go?
The execs at the other sites already have dollar signs rolling in their eyes after this move by istock. Many of you keep praising the other sites but they are all businesses acting in their own best interests. Change is coming.
Back in September, when Istock first announced these royalty cuts, I was worried the other sites might want to follow suit at some point. Now, after months of Istock falling deeper and deeper into the quicksand of their own greed and hubris, I think they serve more as a cautionary tale to the other sites, of what can happen if you lose sight of the importance of your contributors and buyers. I doubt any of the other sites are looking at this mess at Istock, and saying "Hey, lets try that!" :P
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Back in September, when Istock first announced these royalty cuts, I was worried the other sites might want to follow suit at some point. Now, after months of Istock falling deeper and deeper into the quicksand of their own greed and hubris, I think they serve more as a cautionary tale to the other sites, of what can happen if you lose sight of the importance of your contributors and buyers. I doubt any of the other sites are looking at this mess at Istock, and saying "Hey, lets try that!" :P
I'd agree 100% (and so does my data). Istock appear to be on course to prove how an eye-wateringly profitable business can be rapidly driven onto the rocks by unbelievable greed and short-term thinking. Things will never, ever be the same again for Istockphoto. They f*cked it up and they'll go into the history books of 'how not to do it'.
Sales are already falling, which is why the RC targets were 'revised', and it's going to get really embarrassing for them when they announce the 2011 RC if they make any attempt to be realistic about them. They won't of course. They'll probably announce 'no change' when they do and then revise them downwards again towards the end of the year or earlier if enough exclusives start to kick up a fuss.
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Here's my prediction for the end of 2011:
istockphotos.com
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Sales are already falling, which is why the RC targets were 'revised', and it's going to get really embarrassing for them when they announce the 2011 RC if they make any attempt to be realistic about them. They won't of course. They'll probably announce 'no change' when they do and then revise them downwards again towards the end of the year or earlier if enough exclusives start to kick up a fuss.
I guess it depends exactly which exclusives and what kind of a fuss. Anyone lower than Diamond is easily dispensible. If the Diamonds (and BDs) drop exclusivity but keep uploading, iStock stands mostly to gain, beyond any value of 'exclusive images', and other sites have their own 'exclusive images'. If a lot of Diamonds and BDs pulled their ports altogether, it would make a difference. But it would take a lot of nerve/chutzpah for a BD or high Diamond exclusive to do that.
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But it would take a lot of nerve/chutzpah for a BD or high Diamond exclusive to do that.
Not really. It'll just take falling sales and reducing income. Not to mention frustration from the endless further disruption to the site and it's functionality. I don't expect Istock's greed to stop anyway. They'll think up other ways to charge their customers more and pay us less __ it's what they do best.
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Sales are already falling, which is why the RC targets were 'revised', and it's going to get really embarrassing for them when they announce the 2011 RC if they make any attempt to be realistic about them. They won't of course. They'll probably announce 'no change' when they do and then revise them downwards again towards the end of the year or earlier if enough exclusives start to kick up a fuss.
And you can be sure it will be accompanied by how great the company did over the past year, meeting and exceeding all their targets!
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(http://houseofshane.com/posters/istock-cart2.jpg)
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([url]http://houseofshane.com/posters/istock-cart2.jpg[/url])
Excellent!
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([url]http://houseofshane.com/posters/istock-cart2.jpg[/url])
Wonderful! You are really talented Chico. You should go into political cartooning. If you haven't already :D
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Would look great on a t-shirt ;D
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chico's only posting it...ARTPUPPY is the artist:
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=289922&page=24 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=289922&page=24)
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chico's only posting it...ARTPUPPY is the artist:
But have you ever seen Chico and Artpuppy in the same room together? I haven't. *knowing wink*
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chico's only posting it...ARTPUPPY is the artist:
But have you ever seen Chico and Artpuppy in the same room together? I haven't. *knowing wink*
hshshshshs... i'm a illustrator (IS big loser kind), but i'm not artpuppy
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hshshshshs... i'm a illustrator (IS big loser kind), but i'm not artpuppy
Ah. Some people have different names on the sites than they do here. Guess I shouldn't have assumed it was you.
Great cartoon! Artpuppy deserves his props :D
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chico's only posting it...ARTPUPPY is the artist:
But have you ever seen Chico and Artpuppy in the same room together? I haven't. *knowing wink*
hshshshshs... i'm a illustrator (IS big loser kind), but i'm not artpuppy
I know nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing. ;) The cartoons are great!
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Nice cartoon! A really mean editorial cartoon would have the puppeteer dude's back pocket stuffed with $$$ though.
(just saying)
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Back in September, when Istock first announced these royalty cuts, I was worried the other sites might want to follow suit at some point. Now, after months of Istock falling deeper and deeper into the quicksand of their own greed and hubris, I think they serve more as a cautionary tale to the other sites, of what can happen if you lose sight of the importance of your contributors and buyers. I doubt any of the other sites are looking at this mess at Istock, and saying "Hey, lets try that!" :P
I'd agree 100% (and so does my data). Istock appear to be on course to prove how an eye-wateringly profitable business can be rapidly driven onto the rocks by unbelievable greed and short-term thinking. Things will never, ever be the same again for Istockphoto. They f*cked it up and they'll go into the history books of 'how not to do it'.
Sales are already falling, which is why the RC targets were 'revised', and it's going to get really embarrassing for them when they announce the 2011 RC if they make any attempt to be realistic about them. They won't of course. They'll probably announce 'no change' when they do and then revise them downwards again towards the end of the year or earlier if enough exclusives start to kick up a fuss.
I think both of you are lumping two separate issues together.
There's the contributor commission cut. What problems has this caused for Istock other than a lot of contributors complaining? There's less woo-yaying and trust but I'm not seeing how this is hurting their business. I doubt most buyers know or even care about how micro sites get images and where the money goes.
Then there's the technical issues. This seems to be what's mostly affecting buyers. A few buyers are complaining and some are leaving. I'm sure more are quietly leaving. But none of us have istock sales data so none of us know how their sales are doing. Sales are falling for you. That doesn't mean they're falling for Istock or even anybody else.
Now, what happens when one or more of the other big four cuts commissions without screwing up their sites? Life goes on as usual for buyers and contributors can do nothing but complain, draw funny screw pictures, quit, or move to a bottom tier site paying 50% where you make $5 per month from 5,000 images.
This is the problem everybody should be concerned with, and planning for now, because it's coming. Not if, when. You'll need a better plan than threatening to leave because there will be nowhere to go.
So what the other sites have learned from this is to not screw up their site while cutting commissions.
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Back in September, when Istock first announced these royalty cuts, I was worried the other sites might want to follow suit at some point. Now, after months of Istock falling deeper and deeper into the quicksand of their own greed and hubris, I think they serve more as a cautionary tale to the other sites, of what can happen if you lose sight of the importance of your contributors and buyers. I doubt any of the other sites are looking at this mess at Istock, and saying "Hey, lets try that!" :P
I'd agree 100% (and so does my data). Istock appear to be on course to prove how an eye-wateringly profitable business can be rapidly driven onto the rocks by unbelievable greed and short-term thinking. Things will never, ever be the same again for Istockphoto. They f*cked it up and they'll go into the history books of 'how not to do it'.
Sales are already falling, which is why the RC targets were 'revised', and it's going to get really embarrassing for them when they announce the 2011 RC if they make any attempt to be realistic about them. They won't of course. They'll probably announce 'no change' when they do and then revise them downwards again towards the end of the year or earlier if enough exclusives start to kick up a fuss.
I think both of you are lumping two separate issues together.
There's the contributor commission cut. What problems has this caused for Istock other than a lot of contributors complaining? There's less woo-yaying and trust but I'm not seeing how this is hurting their business. I doubt most buyers know or even care about how micro sites get images and where the money goes.
Then there's the technical issues. This seems to be what's mostly affecting buyers. A few buyers are complaining and some are leaving. I'm sure more are quietly leaving. But none of us have istock sales data so none of us know how their sales are doing. Sales are falling for you. That doesn't mean they're falling for Istock or even anybody else.
Now, what happens when one or more of the other big four cuts commissions without screwing up their sites? Life goes on as usual for buyers and contributors can do nothing but complain, draw funny screw pictures, quit, or move to a bottom tier site paying 50% where you make $5 per month from 5,000 images.
This is the problem everybody should be concerned with, and planning for now, because it's coming. Not if, when. You'll need a better plan than threatening to leave because there will be nowhere to go.
So what the other sites have learned from this is to not screw up their site while cutting commissions.
+1
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This is the problem everybody should be concerned with, and planning for now, because it's coming. Not if, when. You'll need a better plan than threatening to leave because there will be nowhere to go.
So what's your suggestion about how to "plan" for this? I am certainly interested in any solutions you might propose.
From where I sit, there is little danger of the other stock sites dropping royalties again. The ones that intended to did so already. Istock is playing catch up in this deparment. Most of their new "innovations", bad and good, (site redesign, royalty cuts, editorial images, etc.) were all done more successfully by other sites long ago.
Besides, if other sites were to shaft us down to 15-19% royalties like Istock, quitting would indeed become a likely option. There was life before microstock for all of us and there will be life after microstock.
The agencies need to be very careful. If they make it unprofitable for serious contributors to produce high production value stock, eventually they are going to be stuck with outdated libraries, supplemented by the pets, flowers, and found objects of the few newbies that trickle in willing to sell at those pitiful commissions.
You're free to disagree, of course :).
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that's where I think it gets interesting...if agencies continue to drop royalties and continue to go back on agreements they make with contributors, eventually they will lose (whether slowly, or in the form of a mass exodus) the serious, profit-generating, productive contributors. microstock might change for a bit, but ultimately the power is in the images and the work made available (or unavailable) to agencies.
quality will demand some form of price always.
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if agencies continue to drop royalties and continue to go back on agreements they make with contributors, eventually they will lose (whether slowly, or in the form of a mass exodus) the serious, profit-generating, productive contributors.
Well said. You put it much more concisely than I did :)
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The agencies need to be very careful. If they make it unprofitable for serious contributors to produce high production value stock, eventually they are going to be stuck with outdated libraries, supplemented by the pets, flowers, and found objects of the few newbies that trickle in willing to sell at those pitiful commissions.
Well said. I totally agree with this.
IF the other agencies should follow suit (I don't think they will, but....) it's up to individual contributors to choose whether they accept being backed into a corner, or whether to just walk away, reignite their old skill set or adopt new ones. AFAIC, unless particular life circumstances have reduced a person's options, there's no reason for anyone to feel disempowered and at the mercy of the agencies.
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You're free to disagree, of course :).
Totally agree. All I'm trying to do is getting people talking about the other agencies are thinking about. If they knew contributors are at their breaking point, and it would negatively affect their sales, they may decide against making cuts.
Only suggestion is to start diversifying outside of micro. Weddings, portraits, or whatever.
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the way I see it is that Fotolia dropped rates and despite some squawking, they got away with it, so then DT did it with about the same results and IS said hey, we want even more too, except they were already taking too much as it was. I think they found the tipping point (and they did so many things so poorly in the last few months). I hope the trend reverses and rates actually go up, but I don't think that will happen, I just hope they don't drop any more.
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So what's your suggestion about how to "plan" for this? I am certainly interested in any solutions you might propose.
I'm starting to think that if you don't consider microstock a hobby, then you should probably have your own site or at least using one of the pre-made systems with your own URL like Clustershot. Otherwise, you really have no recourse if things get worse.
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Great cartoon! Artpuppy deserves his props :D
I'd like to crash a iStockalypse wearing that on a t-shirt. :P
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So what's your suggestion about how to "plan" for this? I am certainly interested in any solutions you might propose.
I'm starting to think that if you don't consider microstock a hobby, then you should probably have your own site or at least using one of the pre-made systems with your own URL like Clustershot. Otherwise, you really have no recourse if things get worse.
I keep hearing all of the analysts saying having your own site is the way to go. "The future". I'm not buying it unless some new innovative method is developed for connecting buyers with contributors. In my experience, all of the people who have contacted me directly want freebies. Buyers use stock agencies. Freebie hunters use Flickr and Google. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Every once in a while you hear about someone on Flickr making a sale.
Why would anyone want to do stock as a hobby? Flickr is a hobby. Stock is a business. But it seems to be turning into a "supplemental income" business. Commission cuts, competition, oversupply, economy, and hitting the growth wall all seem to be slamming contributors pretty hard right now.
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I keep hearing all of the analysts saying having your own site is the way to go. "The future". I'm not buying it unless some new innovative method is developed for connecting buyers with contributors. In my experience, all of the people who have contacted me directly want freebies. Buyers use stock agencies. Freebie hunters use Flickr and Google. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Every once in a while you hear about someone on Flickr making a sale.
Why would anyone want to do stock as a hobby? Flickr is a hobby. Stock is a business. But it seems to be turning into a "supplemental income" business. Commission cuts, competition, oversupply, economy, and hitting the growth wall all seem to be slamming contributors pretty hard right now.
If you build it, they will come. Kidding (sort of). If you have a site that has content and is relatively search engine friendly, people will find it. My site has only been open a few months, and guess who is leading the pack this month? ME!
I can't say this will last or improve or that other people will have the same results, but who knows. Especially, if you don't even make an effort. Do some research about SEO, web design, marketing etc. You don't have to be an expert, just motivated. Most of us know more about selling our work than any other agency does. Why? Because it is our work and we are actually paying attention to what sells and what doesn't. If I think 100 images of parrots in tuxedos are what people want, then I don't need rejections for "too many" parrots in tuxedos. I also have sold at many different price points, so I have some idea of what buyers want to buy my files for.
My quest isn't to become a multi-million dollar corporation. I just want to make a living off the work I do. If I have to do a little extra hard work now to make that more viable in the future, then I'm going to suck it up and do it. If nothing else, I can strive to have better customer support than istock, lately. ;D
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So what's your suggestion about how to "plan" for this? I am certainly interested in any solutions you might propose.
I'm starting to think that if you don't consider microstock a hobby, then you should probably have your own site or at least using one of the pre-made systems with your own URL like Clustershot. Otherwise, you really have no recourse if things get worse.
I keep hearing all of the analysts saying having your own site is the way to go. "The future". I'm not buying it unless some new innovative method is developed for connecting buyers with contributors. In my experience, all of the people who have contacted me directly want freebies. Buyers use stock agencies. Freebie hunters use Flickr and Google. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Every once in a while you hear about someone on Flickr making a sale.
Why would anyone want to do stock as a hobby? Flickr is a hobby. Stock is a business. But it seems to be turning into a "supplemental income" business. Commission cuts, competition, oversupply, economy, and hitting the growth wall all seem to be slamming contributors pretty hard right now.
when I started in microstock, it was always with the intention to make a business of it. but for a lot of people it has remained a hobby, and that's better for those of us for whom it's the primary source of income. it's very important to have your own website, and it wouldn't be a huge stretch to enable your site for ecommerce. where I feel private sites will never be able to compete with agencies is differentiating between license types, image guarantees, and all the ugly legal stuff that agents cover for us. I would sell from my own site, but I don't want to HAVE to sell from my own site because there's no other option.
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I keep hearing all of the analysts saying having your own site is the way to go. "The future". I'm not buying it unless some new innovative method is developed for connecting buyers with contributors. In my experience, all of the people who have contacted me directly want freebies. Buyers use stock agencies. Freebie hunters use Flickr and Google. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Every once in a while you hear about someone on Flickr making a sale.
Why would anyone want to do stock as a hobby? Flickr is a hobby. Stock is a business. But it seems to be turning into a "supplemental income" business. Commission cuts, competition, oversupply, economy, and hitting the growth wall all seem to be slamming contributors pretty hard right now.
If you build it, they will come. Kidding (sort of). If you have a site that has content and is relatively search engine friendly, people will find it. My site has only been open a few months, and guess who is leading the pack this month? ME!
I can't say this will last or improve or that other people will have the same results, but who knows. Especially, if you don't even make an effort. Do some research about SEO, web design, marketing etc. You don't have to be an expert, just motivated. Most of us know more about selling our work than any other agency does. Why? Because it is our work and we are actually paying attention to what sells and what doesn't. If I think 100 images of parrots in tuxedos are what people want, then I don't need rejections for "too many" parrots in tuxedos. I also have sold at many different price points, so I have some idea of what buyers want to buy my files for.
My quest isn't to become a multi-million dollar corporation. I just want to make a living off the work I do. If I have to do a little extra hard work now to make that more viable in the future, then I'm going to suck it up and do it. If nothing else, I can strive to have better customer support than istock, lately. ;D
finally some optimism on this forum ;D
thanks a lot for your inspirational speech!
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I have a couple of sites. One is commerce enabled, the other isn't. I know SEO very well. I'm sure a personal site can help sell something, but not at the volume of an agency. Would love to see this change.
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I keep hearing all of the analysts saying having your own site is the way to go. "The future". I'm not buying it unless some new innovative method is developed for connecting buyers with contributors. In my experience, all of the people who have contacted me directly want freebies. Buyers use stock agencies. Freebie hunters use Flickr and Google. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Every once in a while you hear about someone on Flickr making a sale.
Why would anyone want to do stock as a hobby? Flickr is a hobby. Stock is a business. But it seems to be turning into a "supplemental income" business. Commission cuts, competition, oversupply, economy, and hitting the growth wall all seem to be slamming contributors pretty hard right now.
If you build it, they will come. Kidding (sort of). If you have a site that has content and is relatively search engine friendly, people will find it. My site has only been open a few months, and guess who is leading the pack this month? ME!
I can't say this will last or improve or that other people will have the same results, but who knows. Especially, if you don't even make an effort. Do some research about SEO, web design, marketing etc. You don't have to be an expert, just motivated. Most of us know more about selling our work than any other agency does. Why? Because it is our work and we are actually paying attention to what sells and what doesn't. If I think 100 images of parrots in tuxedos are what people want, then I don't need rejections for "too many" parrots in tuxedos. I also have sold at many different price points, so I have some idea of what buyers want to buy my files for.
My quest isn't to become a multi-million dollar corporation. I just want to make a living off the work I do. If I have to do a little extra hard work now to make that more viable in the future, then I'm going to suck it up and do it. If nothing else, I can strive to have better customer support than istock, lately. ;D
Both of you guys bring up excellent points. This has been an enlightening exchange. I do think a better plan is needed by all contributors for all of the reasons you previously mentioned. Thanks for all the pointers.
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Cthoman, your site looks great. I am glad it is working out for you. Did you use Clustershot to set it up or did you do the web development yourself?
I am really becoming motivated to have my own site, but nobody seems to be willing to divulge any information on how they set up their sites. I can go to GoDaddy or someplace and start from scratch using a wysiwyg, but I really need an interface specifically designed to display and sell images.
Not to mention that I don't want to get hit with massive charges for data storage or transfer. I had checked out Photoshelter, but their storage rates were extremely high if you have a decent sized portfolio.
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I'd be even more scared of credit card fraud.
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I'd be even more scared of credit card fraud.
PayPal is a pretty good thing in helping to avoid that. They seem to be rather diligent and have a lot of guarantees for buyers and sellers. but then, nothing will be foolproof.
check out ipowerweb.com for hosting. there are a lot of hosting companies out there you can use for pretty cheap that give you a lot of space. Godaddy nickle and dimes you to death (not to mention they have the most annoying marketing program around).
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Cthoman, your site looks great. I am glad it is working out for you. Did you use Clustershot to set it up or did you do the web development yourself?
I am really becoming motivated to have my own site, but nobody seems to be willing to divulge any information on how they set up their sites. I can go to GoDaddy or someplace and start from scratch using a wysiwyg, but I really need an interface specifically designed to display and sell images.
Not to mention that I don't want to get hit with massive charges for data storage or transfer. I had checked out Photoshelter, but their storage rates were extremely high if you have a decent sized portfolio.
Thanks. No, it's KTools Photostore. There was thread here about it:
http://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/so-i-made-a-microstock-site-for-me/ (http://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/so-i-made-a-microstock-site-for-me/)
I signed up for a Clustershot store, but realized they didn't do Vectors. I thought it looked like a pretty good solution, but not being able to sell eps versions was a deal breaker for me.
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Anyone know a ktools site that has RM options on it? I'd like to see how they handle pricing.
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Speaking just for myself - I don't think I need to be creating and promoting my own site, handling VISA transactions, downloads, and all that. I just need some new web-based marketing channel to replace the current microstocks, which are now officially brain-dead. A site where I can upload my photos, have my own page - which I'm free to promote - and which handles transactions and downloads (in all sizes) for a reasonable commission - not 85%.
The sticking point I think is image quality and 'inspection'.
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Thanks. No, it's KTools Photostore. There was thread here about it:
[url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/so-i-made-a-microstock-site-for-me/[/url] ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/so-i-made-a-microstock-site-for-me/[/url])
I signed up for a Clustershot store, but realized they didn't do Vectors. I thought it looked like a pretty good solution, but not being able to sell eps versions was a deal breaker for me.
Thanks, that's really helpful information! :D
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It comes to something when the agency we pay the biggest commission to so that they can enable our images to be:
Found
Promoted
Sold securely
...is failing to provide the above to the point where contributors feel driven to go and look for a DIY solution.
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Cthoman, your site looks great. I am glad it is working out for you. Did you use Clustershot to set it up or did you do the web development yourself?
I am really becoming motivated to have my own site, but nobody seems to be willing to divulge any information on how they set up their sites. I can go to GoDaddy or someplace and start from scratch using a wysiwyg, but I really need an interface specifically designed to display and sell images.
Not to mention that I don't want to get hit with massive charges for data storage or transfer. I had checked out Photoshelter, but their storage rates were extremely high if you have a decent sized portfolio.
KTools Photostore website. They also will install the basic version, included with the price. I think they do that to make it easier and check the hosting.
Here's the page about the software with demo and links to actual sites that run their software. It works right out of the box. http://photostore.ktools.net/?aff=9770 (http://photostore.ktools.net/?aff=9770)
They do offer hosting through an affiliate, but I think you can find your own for less. My website (no sales or anything) would handle it and most hosting sites will get your name registered and the fees shouldn't be more than $10 a year for the domain name, I'm paying about $100 a year for the actual hosting. I'm not going to mention the host because there are probably better out there. But just check around.
My thoughts are to create a new site just for photo sales, but what's another lost photo site selling images on the web? I think there must be thousands out there. As I mentioned in PM the idea I had I found a site and they were already on the web selling similar materials for $1 a download. Price war is not my cup of tea. I'll have to find another "great" idea. :D
Of course CrapStock could always find it's way onto the web, even if it was just for the humor of running the site as a comment on some of the new agencies that pop up with big promises and no sales.
(link to ktools = photostore is an affiliate link) http://photostore.ktools.net/?aff=9770 (http://photostore.ktools.net/?aff=9770) If you follow the link, take a look at Featured Sites to see what some people are doing with this software.
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Thanks for the links to Photostore Ktools. I had heard them mentioned before, but never understood exactly what they are. Now it makes sense.
Guess I will have to take some time out from shooting/uploading/repeating, to learn this and set up a site. If these sites would stop screwing around I wouldn't have to bother with this. :P
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Lisa - you're always welcome to email me and I'd be happy to show you how to set up a simple site. FWIW, I think it's important that a professional photographer has their own website....no matter what's going on with the agency sites.
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That's a fair point about personal websites SNP. I'm just concerned that people feel pushed into it by the failure of one agency to deliver on it's fat-fee promise, rather than taking a leap by choice.
Choice = good
Backed into corner = bad
(IMHO)
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That's a fair point about personal websites SNP. I'm just concerned that people feel pushed into it by the failure of one agency to deliver on it's fat-fee promise, rather than taking a leap by choice.
Choice = good
Backed into corner = bad
(IMHO)
One agency's failure has certainly been the straw that broke the camel's back, but really, all the agencies take too much and do too little to earn their money.
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That's a fair point about personal websites SNP. I'm just concerned that people feel pushed into it by the failure of one agency to deliver on it's fat-fee promise, rather than taking a leap by choice.
Choice = good
Backed into corner = bad
(IMHO)
One agency's failure has certainly been the straw that broke the camel's back, but really, all the agencies take too much and do too little to earn their money.
I think we must all have known for some time that the steady decline in the rate of sales per image means that there will come a point where the return from the micros starts to fall. We simply can't produce fast enough to compensate for the growth in the collections and the prices can't go on rising forever to make up for falling sales. Commission cuts simply accelerate the speed at which incomes will start to decline. Last year, I managed to make exactly the same as the year before, to within a handful of dollars, despite the pay cut at my biggest agency and the pay freeze at my second one. I can't be optimistic about the coming year, so I'm looking for different ways to make money from my images.
I'm not convinced that direct sales from websites in competition with the micros is the answer. If they are so flooded with images that we can't make decent money, how are we going to find customers that they miss - and if the customers know about them, why will they buy from us instead of using them?
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I keep hearing all of the analysts saying having your own site is the way to go. "The future". I'm not buying it unless some new innovative method is developed for connecting buyers with contributors. In my experience, all of the people who have contacted me directly want freebies. Buyers use stock agencies. Freebie hunters use Flickr and Google. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Every once in a while you hear about someone on Flickr making a sale.
Why would anyone want to do stock as a hobby? Flickr is a hobby. Stock is a business. But it seems to be turning into a "supplemental income" business. Commission cuts, competition, oversupply, economy, and hitting the growth wall all seem to be slamming contributors pretty hard right now.
If you build it, they will come. Kidding (sort of). If you have a site that has content and is relatively search engine friendly, people will find it. My site has only been open a few months, and guess who is leading the pack this month? ME!
I can't say this will last or improve or that other people will have the same results, but who knows. Especially, if you don't even make an effort. Do some research about SEO, web design, marketing etc. You don't have to be an expert, just motivated. Most of us know more about selling our work than any other agency does. Why? Because it is our work and we are actually paying attention to what sells and what doesn't. If I think 100 images of parrots in tuxedos are what people want, then I don't need rejections for "too many" parrots in tuxedos. I also have sold at many different price points, so I have some idea of what buyers want to buy my files for.
My quest isn't to become a multi-million dollar corporation. I just want to make a living off the work I do. If I have to do a little extra hard work now to make that more viable in the future, then I'm going to suck it up and do it. If nothing else, I can strive to have better customer support than istock, lately. ;D
your site's pagerank is 0
shutterstock, istock, getty: 7
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That's a fair point about personal websites SNP. I'm just concerned that people feel pushed into it by the failure of one agency to deliver on it's fat-fee promise, rather than taking a leap by choice.
Choice = good
Backed into corner = bad
(IMHO)
One agency's failure has certainly been the straw that broke the camel's back, but really, all the agencies take too much and do too little to earn their money.
I think we must all have known for some time that the steady decline in the rate of sales per image means that there will come a point where the return from the micros starts to fall. We simply can't produce fast enough to compensate for the growth in the collections and the prices can't go on rising forever to make up for falling sales. Commission cuts simply accelerate the speed at which incomes will start to decline. Last year, I managed to make exactly the same as the year before, to within a handful of dollars, despite the pay cut at my biggest agency and the pay freeze at my second one. I can't be optimistic about the coming year, so I'm looking for different ways to make money from my images.
I'm not convinced that direct sales from websites in competition with the micros is the answer. If they are so flooded with images that we can't make decent money, how are we going to find customers that they miss - and if the customers know about them, why will they buy from us instead of using them?
Both you and molka bring up some interesting points.
The agencies pagerank is always going to be good. They have tons of money to buy their way to the top. I will never be able to compete with that.
I just hate having such a defeatist attitude, and I especially hate showing it to the agencies. A lot of bad things in history have happened because people were convinced that there was nothing they could do. I personally think there is something that people could do, but there are too many afraid to take the chance to make a change. <sigh>
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Anyone know a ktools site that has RM options on it? I'd like to see how they handle pricing.
You set your own prices with that software package, whether it is $1 or a few orders of magnitudes higher. And you can charge different prices by image size, or have a one price fits all option.
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I'm not convinced that direct sales from websites in competition with the micros is the answer. If they are so flooded with images that we can't make decent money, how are we going to find customers that they miss - and if the customers know about them, why will they buy from us instead of using them?
You may be right, Balderick. Certainly we can't expect our personal sites to compete with the micros for search position or on volume of customers. OTOH, if we are setting our own prices and keeping 100% of the sale, we wouldn't need a whole lot of customers for our own site to rank in our earnings at least as well as the lower or maybe even mid-tier agencies.
I'm with Cathy. Tired of sitting back and feeling helpless. Those that have already started their own sites seem to be reporting some traffic, and if expenses can be kept down, there's no reason not to give it a try.
Eventually, if enough of us have our own sites, we might be able to find some way to integrate them into one search function to make one-stop shopping for customers.
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Anyone know a ktools site that has RM options on it? I'd like to see how they handle pricing.
You set your own prices with that software package, whether it is $1 or a few orders of magnitudes higher. And you can charge different prices by image size, or have a one price fits all option.
Yes, I found lots of RF pricing on the demo sites. I'm asking if anyone knows of someone using the software that has their images licensing as RM.
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Anyone know a ktools site that has RM options on it? I'd like to see how they handle pricing.
You set your own prices with that software package, whether it is $1 or a few orders of magnitudes higher. And you can charge different prices by image size, or have a one price fits all option.
Yes, I found lots of RF pricing on the demo sites. I'm asking if anyone knows of someone using the software that has their images licensing as RM.
When you originally asked the question, Sean, I looked around too and couldn't find a site that specifically used RM pricing. I noticed on some of the sites there was an option showing for RM and RF, and the user had checked RF, but that's about all I could find.
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That's a fair point about personal websites SNP. I'm just concerned that people feel pushed into it by the failure of one agency to deliver on it's fat-fee promise, rather than taking a leap by choice.
Choice = good
Backed into corner = bad
(IMHO)
One agency's failure has certainly been the straw that broke the camel's back, but really, all the agencies take too much and do too little to earn their money.
I think we must all have known for some time that the steady decline in the rate of sales per image means that there will come a point where the return from the micros starts to fall. We simply can't produce fast enough to compensate for the growth in the collections and the prices can't go on rising forever to make up for falling sales. Commission cuts simply accelerate the speed at which incomes will start to decline. Last year, I managed to make exactly the same as the year before, to within a handful of dollars, despite the pay cut at my biggest agency and the pay freeze at my second one. I can't be optimistic about the coming year, so I'm looking for different ways to make money from my images.
I'm not convinced that direct sales from websites in competition with the micros is the answer. If they are so flooded with images that we can't make decent money, how are we going to find customers that they miss - and if the customers know about them, why will they buy from us instead of using them?
Both you and molka bring up some interesting points.
The agencies pagerank is always going to be good. They have tons of money to buy their way to the top. I will never be able to compete with that.
I just hate having such a defeatist attitude, and I especially hate showing it to the agencies. A lot of bad things in history have happened because people were convinced that there was nothing they could do. I personally think there is something that people could do, but there are too many afraid to take the chance to make a change. <sigh>
ok, how 'bout everyone withdrawing their shots from at least istock... or at least deactivating them? punishment due. the best would be everybody removing their ports from micro sites and uploading them to sites like alamy. think big, do something like this, or they'll just keep raping you untill you look like swiss cheese.
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ok, how 'bout everyone withdrawing their shots from at least istock... or at least deactivating them? punishment due. the best would be everybody removing their ports from micro sites and uploading them to sites like alamy. think big, do something like this, or they'll just keep raping you untill you look like swiss cheese.
That's easy to say, not so easy to do. You're asking people to stop making a living from microstock and potentially move to a site that might not make them anything. I've been with Alamy, never made much money there. I make a modest living with microstock sites. Why should I give that up because of your moral objection to microstock?
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That's easy to say, not so easy to do. You're asking people to stop making a living from microstock and potentially move to a site that might not make them anything. I've been with Alamy, never made much money there. I make a modest living with microstock sites. Why should I give that up because of your moral objection to microstock?
You might as well have said "Hello Mr Troll. Would you like a nice banana?"
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Anyone know a ktools site that has RM options on it? I'd like to see how they handle pricing.
You set your own prices with that software package, whether it is $1 or a few orders of magnitudes higher. And you can charge different prices by image size, or have a one price fits all option.
Yes, I found lots of RF pricing on the demo sites. I'm asking if anyone knows of someone using the software that has their images licensing as RM.
I haven't done a lot of search, but I know there are online solutions (not downloadable software) that allow you to sell RM. One I've been found long ago, but have no personal nor third-party experience with it, is http://www.ifp3.com (http://www.ifp3.com), but I am not sure if downloads are automatic even as RF.
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That's easy to say, not so easy to do. You're asking people to stop making a living from microstock and potentially move to a site that might not make them anything. I've been with Alamy, never made much money there. I make a modest living with microstock sites. Why should I give that up because of your moral objection to microstock?
You might as well have said "Hello Mr Troll. Would you like a nice banana?"
I do hope the microstock business doesn't collapse completely - I'd so miss your delightful (if sometimes biting) sense of humour :)
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Continuing on the agency vs personal site talk, I'm saying there needs to be something totally new.
How about this? Asthethic rating technology. http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php (http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php).
What about a community site without inspectors? An algorithm inspects the photos and rates them for technical and aesthetic quality . Buying patterns determine if the image sinks or rises from there. Buyers could filter by quality and aesthetics.
Take Flickr (or make a site), add this technology, and tweak for stock requirements.
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ok, how 'bout everyone withdrawing their shots from at least istock... or at least deactivating them? punishment due. the best would be everybody removing their ports from micro sites and uploading them to sites like alamy. think big, do something like this, or they'll just keep raping you untill you look like swiss cheese.
That's easy to say, not so easy to do. You're asking people to stop making a living from microstock and potentially move to a site that might not make them anything. I've been with Alamy, never made much money there. I make a modest living with microstock sites. Why should I give that up because of your moral objection to microstock?
do you people ever do this thing called THINKING? it helps you make connections between certain phenomenona. of course you don't have sales on a place like alamy, when you got millions of files on sale for a couple fo bucks. jezuz... : (
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Continuing on the agency vs personal site talk, I'm saying there needs to be something totally new.
How about this? Asthethic rating technology. [url]http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php[/url] ([url]http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php[/url]).
I that like "Hot or Not" for your images. ;D
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Continuing on the agency vs personal site talk, I'm saying there needs to be something totally new.
How about this? Asthethic rating technology. [url]http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php[/url] ([url]http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php[/url]).
What about a community site without inspectors? An algorithm inspects the photos and rates them for technical and aesthetic quality . Buying patterns determine if the image sinks or rises from there. Buyers could filter by quality and aesthetics.
Take Flickr (or make a site), add this technology, and tweak for stock requirements.
In this asthetic rating allways will pets, flowers or skies poped up first, because lets say most "ordinary" people loves that but nobody buy that as stock. EG see on yahoo video pages there are 99% stuff with "smart/dum" pets. And with social community is problem that only 1% of images have any kind of ratings which are almost made by you friends when you forced them to say something about, or vote for you.
Just my opinion
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Continuing on the agency vs personal site talk, I'm saying there needs to be something totally new.
How about this? Asthethic rating technology. [url]http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php[/url] ([url]http://acquine.alipr.com/index.php[/url]).
What about a community site without inspectors? An algorithm inspects the photos and rates them for technical and aesthetic quality . Buying patterns determine if the image sinks or rises from there. Buyers could filter by quality and aesthetics.
Take Flickr (or make a site), add this technology, and tweak for stock requirements.
In this asthetic rating allways will pets, flowers or skies poped up first, because lets say most "ordinary" people loves that but nobody buy that as stock. EG see on yahoo video pages there are 99% stuff with "smart/dum" pets. And with social community is problem that only 1% of images have any kind of ratings which are almost made by you friends when you forced them to say something about, or vote for you.
Just my opinion
I was just using that as an example. The point being, create the technology that checks specifically for stock requirements. Sharpness, CA, posterization, etc and also saleability then gives the image a rating. Buying patterns will then trend the image high or lower.
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do you people ever do this thing called THINKING? it helps you make connections between certain phenomenona. of course you don't have sales on a place like alamy, when you got millions of files on sale for a couple fo bucks. jezuz... : (
Right, so by your logic, all I need to do is remove all of my images from microstock, upload to Alamy, and I'm rolling in money. I had no idea it was so simple!
:-\
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do you people ever do this thing called THINKING? it helps you make connections between certain phenomenona. of course you don't have sales on a place like alamy, when you got millions of files on sale for a couple fo bucks. jezuz... : (
Right, so by your logic, all I need to do is remove all of my images from microstock, upload to Alamy, and I'm rolling in money. I had no idea it was so simple!
:-\
Darn and I missed it too! :)
Here's the answer, a co-op site with links to everyones own site. (that may be confusing?)
OK I'll try again. A main site with samples and links to what's on the various private sites and the buyers can then move to whatever collection interests them and buy direct.
The co-op would collect a small annual fee for membership and use that to advertise and make the site rank higher than any one single individual site ever could. Kind of the same as a webring but everyone would also benefit because their site would point to the central co-op site. If someone wanted to drop, that's fine because the central site would still remain the major web presence.
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do you people ever do this thing called THINKING? it helps you make connections between certain phenomenona. of course you don't have sales on a place like alamy, when you got millions of files on sale for a couple fo bucks. jezuz... : (
Right, so by your logic, all I need to do is remove all of my images from microstock, upload to Alamy, and I'm rolling in money. I had no idea it was so simple!
:-\
what an infantile response... who talked about rolling in money? : )
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do you people ever do this thing called THINKING? it helps you make connections between certain phenomenona. of course you don't have sales on a place like alamy, when you got millions of files on sale for a couple fo bucks. jezuz... : (
Right, so by your logic, all I need to do is remove all of my images from microstock, upload to Alamy, and I'm rolling in money. I had no idea it was so simple!
:-\
Darn and I missed it too! :)
Here's the answer, a co-op site with links to everyones own site. (that may be confusing?)
OK I'll try again. A main site with samples and links to what's on the various private sites and the buyers can then move to whatever collection interests them and buy direct.
The co-op would collect a small annual fee for membership and use that to advertise and make the site rank higher than any one single individual site ever could. Kind of the same as a webring but everyone would also benefit because their site would point to the central co-op site. If someone wanted to drop, that's fine because the central site would still remain the major web presence.
I think a coop site amongst competitive creatives is a pipe dream. Day one: set up coop site. Day two: everyone posts links to their respective websites. Day three: spent obsessing over how to get buyers to follow your link and your link alone....no idea based on a coop model is going to work IMHO. if microstock were to go under, I'd worry about promoting my work as an individual, as someone suggested in an earlier post. Ibranching out is important. Microstock is my primary source of income, but I do custom work outside of microstock. There's good money there too.
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I think a coop site amongst competitive creatives is a pipe dream. Day one: set up coop site. Day two: everyone posts links to their respective websites. Day three: spent obsessing over how to get buyers to follow your link and your link alone....no idea based on a coop model is going to work IMHO...
Not a coop, but a distributed model where the search engine is google or bing. Payments, PayPal or Moneybookers. Some sort of easy setup for a web site like the Ktools thing. I was thinking about the IS controlled vocabulary and how one might get something like that without an agency - to provide more useful search results when searching across many seller sites. Then it occurred to me that google already does a wonderful job at finding things even when people don't use a controlled way of describing what they want. Perhaps a CV isn't really all that important in the age of the super-savy search engine.
In a distributed model there'd still be issues of IP and model releases, and I'm not sure how that could be handled - anyone want to start a cloud-based service for that? :)
Although the administrative overhead of various small payments to multiple service providers is a bit greater than uploading to agencies, (a) it's not that much worse and (b) as there's multiple places earning small amounts of cash from us there is less incentive for any one of them to get greedy and start taking more cash when the business takes off.
Obviously the search engine is the big dog in the pack - and if they start fiddling with the order of results in could boost or hurt sales - but at least there'd be no more of the pleas to make the search for photos work more like google :)
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^^^ Interesting post JoAnne.
In this age in which 'Information Is King' a business can often generate far more money from it's data than it's product. A classic example is 'Party Pieces Ltd', the family-owned business of Kate Middleton's parents. Their product is cheap throwaway stuff for childrens' parties but they make FAR more money from selling their massive database of mothers with kids aged 2-10. That's a goldmine for those who sell into that market and they will happily pay big money for access to it.
Not sure yet how a database of designers and photographers might generate extra cash (insurance, equipment, outsourced services, etc?) but it could play a part.
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Not a coop, but a distributed model where the search engine is google or bing. Payments, PayPal or Moneybookers. Some sort of easy setup for a web site like the Ktools thing. I was thinking about the IS controlled vocabulary and how one might get something like that without an agency - to provide more useful search results when searching across many seller sites. Then it occurred to me that google already does a wonderful job at finding things even when people don't use a controlled way of describing what they want. Perhaps a CV isn't really all that important in the age of the super-savy search engine.
In a distributed model there'd still be issues of IP and model releases, and I'm not sure how that could be handled - anyone want to start a cloud-based service for that? :)
Although the administrative overhead of various small payments to multiple service providers is a bit greater than uploading to agencies, (a) it's not that much worse and (b) as there's multiple places earning small amounts of cash from us there is less incentive for any one of them to get greedy and start taking more cash when the business takes off.
Obviously the search engine is the big dog in the pack - and if they start fiddling with the order of results in could boost or hurt sales - but at least there'd be no more of the pleas to make the search for photos work more like google :)
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Maybe something like http://www.abebooks.com/ (http://www.abebooks.com/) or http://www.alibris.com/ (http://www.alibris.com/) which are used book sites. Each site is a compilation of individual book stores selling their inventory through a common interface. You search for book x and get a listing a number of different individual vendors each of whom are offering a copy of book x for sale. You pick the one you want, and purchase it through the site's ecommerce feature. The order is transmitted to the bookshop who then ships you the book.
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Someone start a site that only takes 40% of the final sale price, doesn't offer subs and then they could be talking about "rolling in the dough". :D Sounds a great deal like Alamy but they aren't micro and don't sell the same type of product that most people here are producing.
A new micro site that only takes 40%, for exclusives for example, would have a flood of contributors that would take that instead of 25-38 cents, or the 15% and up on IS, or whatever the rest are handing out to keep the starving artists from quitting, at the bare minimum.
I think my only question is, if it's so easy and there's so much profit to be had, why hasn't someone done it?
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Someone start a site that only takes 40% of the final sale price, doesn't offer subs and then they could be talking about "rolling in the dough". :D Sounds a great deal like Alamy but they aren't micro and don't sell the same type of product that most people here are producing.
A new micro site that only takes 40%, for exclusives for example, would have a flood of contributors that would take that instead of 25-38 cents, or the 15% and up on IS, or whatever the rest are handing out to keep the starving artists from quitting, at the bare minimum.
I think my only question is, if it's so easy and there's so much profit to be had, why hasn't someone done it?
Graphic Leftovers? OK, so it is only 52% instead of 60%.
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Someone start a site that only takes 40% of the final sale price, doesn't offer subs and then they could be talking about "rolling in the dough". :D Sounds a great deal like Alamy but they aren't micro and don't sell the same type of product that most people here are producing.
A new micro site that only takes 40%, for exclusives for example, would have a flood of contributors that would take that instead of 25-38 cents, or the 15% and up on IS, or whatever the rest are handing out to keep the starving artists from quitting, at the bare minimum.
I think my only question is, if it's so easy and there's so much profit to be had, why hasn't someone done it?
Some have offered better deals, most either don't sell (60% of very little isn't much) and/or go belly up fairly quickly. I'm guessing it must take a considerable amount of money to set up a site which would even begin to rival the Big 4. And it's difficult to persuade any but the most bullish - or naive - to submit their images to a company which was unproven, but you can hardly start to market a collection of, say, under 10,000 'general' images, no matter how good. Especially if these images were also available elsewhere.
Of course, all stock libraries had to start somewhere, but the general micro market is now well established.
The alternative would be for highly specialist niche RM libraries, where your marketing would be very tightly and personally targetted.
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Someone start a site that only takes 40% of the final sale price, doesn't offer subs and then they could be talking about "rolling in the dough". :D Sounds a great deal like Alamy but they aren't micro and don't sell the same type of product that most people here are producing.
A new micro site that only takes 40%, for exclusives for example, would have a flood of contributors that would take that instead of 25-38 cents, or the 15% and up on IS, or whatever the rest are handing out to keep the starving artists from quitting, at the bare minimum.
I think my only question is, if it's so easy and there's so much profit to be had, why hasn't someone done it?
Graphic Leftovers? OK, so it is only 52% instead of 60%.
Maybe I've been ignoring them and I shouldn't be. Also I think 3DStudio offers a pretty good share. I wasn't set on the 60%, in fact before I hit [post] I was writing 50%. :)
Yes that's the point, it's terribly expensive to start up. It's not easy to get a market share. Most of the people here (which represent the majority of upper MS contributors) might not be interested in yet another Me Too agency. It would take someone with millions, willing to take the risk and share on a fair basis. On the other hand, if it did happen, it would be a real kick in the ass for the big four and their screw the contributor policies!
It's a long uphill battle and would take a few years to make a dent in the market. WHo knows what the market will support in three years?
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what an infantile response... who talked about rolling in money? : )
So what are you saying then? You say we don't have sales on Alamy because we're cannibalizing earnings with microstock. So I suggest that by your logic I would do much better to delete my microstock portfolios and just sell on Alamy. To which you reply that my suggestion is "infantile."
Help me out here. What the heck are you trying to say?
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what an infantile response... who talked about rolling in money? : )
So what are you saying then? You say we don't have sales on Alamy because we're cannibalizing earnings with microstock. So I suggest that by your logic I would do much better to delete my microstock portfolios and just sell on Alamy. To which you reply that my suggestion is "infantile."
Help me out here. What the heck are you trying to say?
That you too should ignore him...
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R.I.P. We need a better explanation of the new royalty guidelines for vectors thread. You've been going since September and were never really answered.
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=252412&page=25#post5647842 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=252412&page=25#post5647842)
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Back in September, when Istock first announced these royalty cuts, I was worried the other sites might want to follow suit at some point. Now, after months of Istock falling deeper and deeper into the quicksand of their own greed and hubris, I think they serve more as a cautionary tale to the other sites, of what can happen if you lose sight of the importance of your contributors and buyers. I doubt any of the other sites are looking at this mess at Istock, and saying "Hey, lets try that!" :P
I'd agree 100% (and so does my data). Istock appear to be on course to prove how an eye-wateringly profitable business can be rapidly driven onto the rocks by unbelievable greed and short-term thinking. Things will never, ever be the same again for Istockphoto. They f*cked it up and they'll go into the history books of 'how not to do it'.
Sales are already falling, which is why the RC targets were 'revised', and it's going to get really embarrassing for them when they announce the 2011 RC if they make any attempt to be realistic about them. They won't of course. They'll probably announce 'no change' when they do and then revise them downwards again towards the end of the year or earlier if enough exclusives start to kick up a fuss.
I think both of you are lumping two separate issues together.
There's the contributor commission cut. What problems has this caused for Istock other than a lot of contributors complaining? There's less woo-yaying and trust but I'm not seeing how this is hurting their business. I doubt most buyers know or even care about how micro sites get images and where the money goes.
Then there's the technical issues. This seems to be what's mostly affecting buyers. A few buyers are complaining and some are leaving. I'm sure more are quietly leaving. But none of us have istock sales data so none of us know how their sales are doing. Sales are falling for you. That doesn't mean they're falling for Istock or even anybody else.
Now, what happens when one or more of the other big four cuts commissions without screwing up their sites? Life goes on as usual for buyers and contributors can do nothing but complain, draw funny screw pictures, quit, or move to a bottom tier site paying 50% where you make $5 per month from 5,000 images.
This is the problem everybody should be concerned with, and planning for now, because it's coming. Not if, when. You'll need a better plan than threatening to leave because there will be nowhere to go.
So what the other sites have learned from this is to not screw up their site while cutting commissions.
I may change my name from PaulieWalnuts to Prophet
Fotolia cuts commissions again (http://www.microstockgroup.com/fotolia-com/fotolia-cuts-commissions-again/msg180632/#msg180632)
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I may change my name from PaulieWalnuts to Prophet
Fotolia cuts commissions again ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/fotolia-com/fotolia-cuts-commissions-again/msg180632/#msg180632[/url])
Yup, one screws us, all screw us.