There's no point in them secretly demoting critics. It doesn't stop criticism. Any demotion is unlikely to be personal, more that you happen to represent a segment of contributors that are not in favour for business reasons.

Quote from: lagereek on April 04, 2011, 12:07

Quote from: VB inc on April 04, 2011, 11:50

If certain contributors are propped up by this best match, wouldn't it also be possible for the best match to demote (put further back on the ebb line) certain contributors? Contributors that actively voice their concerns and protest here or on istock would be on this if there was such a thing.

Sure!  after what I can see, you, yourself have just been put back on the ebb-line,  you know, demoted, that is. Im truly sorry for you.

best.

Thats why i dont post on istock forums... and i go all incognito here =D

We are only selling pics here you know, no big deal, just cheapo pics off the peg. No more no less. We are all, including you, scraping the bottom of the barrell. Words like conspiracy doesnt belong here. Not important enough.

No conspiracy IMO. At least not against individuals. Groups of people may get hurt in the fallout from changes, but there's no malice in that, it's just "business" trying to get the biggest profit. I still think these big changes are counter productive myself?  If they push buyers far enough with this business of putting more and more expensive content from a limited contributor set in front of them, then they will either leave, or learn new behaviour where they ignore the best match and use the other sort orders to get what they want. The only reason best match is so powerful is that it offers the line of least resistance to buyers. Put in a search term and there's what the buyers want. Relevant results with a choice of styles and prices. They don't necessarily want to see what brings in the biggest profit for the seller. Microstock is after all's said and done the supermarket of the stock business. Supermarkets try to make sure that of you're going to buy then the choice and the price you want is there on the shelf in front of you. Carefully arranged yes, but still there to see.
'Nuff said.

Hiya Chris. Glad to hear you're still smoke free. All we both need to do now is pack in the beer and we can be really healthy (and miserable!) :-)
All the best
Dave

Hi Dave!  thats it, bring on the Lagers, some lovely caves down in Cornwall to sit and get well merry.

all the best. Chris

VB Inc. is saying that just by posting here in this forum and speaking negatively, people are getting "demoted". I suspect people were getting "demoted" long before all the negative talk started here, meaning whatever "demotions" there may be, doesn't have to do with posting in this forum.

If that's true, I wish they would be open about that policy.  Although I don't agree with Fotolia's punishing contributors for posting negatively here, at least they are up front about it, so we know that going in.  If Istock is penalizing people for speaking their minds here, it would have to be pretty recent, because I have been critical of Istock for months and they are still my top selling site (though less so than a couple of years ago).  

Just read Balderick's post.  Makes sense that we are more likely being penalized as a group (non-vetta/agency, and non-exclusive).

ETA:  by "penalized as a group", I don't mean for posting in the forums.  I mean just because they want to promote other images at the front of the searches.

I know this place is as negative as can be about istock and I also know that in the last months has mucked up a lot but sometimes I wonder....

When you have any business that has one massive screw up after another for many months, coupled with terrible communication (or none at all) , it creates a fertile environment for conspiracy theories. 

The customer complaints are already starting:

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=321072&page=1

I like this

"A result of this is that the Vetta and Agency images have temporarily been boosted to the top of the results today, although I've been told that this is an ongoing project and they are continuing to make adjustments. So I anticipate the results returning to something closer to normal in the near future."


= oh well we won't give you what you really want,(i.e. ability to filter vetta and agency out) but we'll tweek the system again to make it less obvious (which will end in some other disaster)

Question = What is normal search results ?  The only normal part of istock in the last 12 months has be the disarray.

I wonder if sales of agency / vetta has offset the loss of customers these ongoing fiasco are causing.

 

Given the overall lack of competence in iStock's IT crew, I don't think they could implement a contributor-specific targeting scheme even if they wanted to.

In spite of my negative opinion of iStock's recent behavior, I don't think they would try to retaliate against vocal critics. I do think the clubby atmosphere around Vetta (an "in" group that has way more Vetta images than seem warranted) has created an oligarchy that is why we don't see the ability to filter out Vetta and Agency, but that's not the same thing as shuffling problem contributors to the back.

I've seen lots and lots of best match shifts and it can be very tempting to read more into what's happening than is really there.

The big, big worry is that in their lust for soaking the customers they'll drive too many of them away. I don't think they're currently presenting a good mix of results, but I'm hoping they'll keep  "tweaking" some more and improve  it.

I really hope they keep tweaking because my sales have shriveled up to zilch.  I used to get 15 or sales a day. 

Given the overall lack of competence in iStock's IT crew, I don't think they could implement a contributor-specific targeting scheme even if they wanted to.

In spite of my negative opinion of iStock's recent behavior, I don't think they would try to retaliate against vocal critics. I do think the clubby atmosphere around Vetta (an "in" group that has way more Vetta images than seem warranted) has created an oligarchy that is why we don't see the ability to filter out Vetta and Agency, but that's not the same thing as shuffling problem contributors to the back.

I've seen lots and lots of best match shifts and it can be very tempting to read more into what's happening than is really there.

The big, big worry is that in their lust for soaking the customers they'll drive too many of them away. I don't think they're currently presenting a good mix of results, but I'm hoping they'll keep  "tweaking" some more and improve  it.

I agree!  there is no conspiracy or malice here and I do not believe for one minute of any punishment, etc.

Funny this. This search, best match, or whatever you want to call it, is nothing new, its been going on since the computerization of images, long before Micro, it went on in the old Trad-agency world, always trying to find the perfect solution but always only resulting in a compromize. Stan kanney of the Image-Bank, came to the conclusion, there is no such thing as a good Search, its only a matter of trying to keep everyone happy, still keeping the customers. We never heard about it because there was no Internet, nothing. ofcourse in them days , a search was only meant to be for the picture-finders, inside the Agency, so that they could quickly find the trannies and send them by post to the clients.

Today! this search, is meant to be for a gazillion of buyers, well no wonder mayhem breaks out for every change, constant battle of blood, sweat, toil and tears.

So I think we find that most annemosity, jealousy, etc, is in fact among the contributing members, i.e. the photographers and for all we know, in this case the IS-Admin could be hammered and clobberd every day by unhappy contributors why their files cant be seen, why they wernt good enough for Vetta, why such and such indepentant shots have priority in the best match?

Alberto Sciama, friend of mine who used to own PICTOR-International told me once, I spend 95% of my time here at the agency, just trying to make peace and keep you guys happy.

Given the overall lack of competence in iStock's IT crew, I don't think they could implement a contributor-specific targeting scheme even if they wanted to.

In spite of my negative opinion of iStock's recent behavior, I don't think they would try to retaliate against vocal critics. I do think the clubby atmosphere around Vetta (an "in" group that has way more Vetta images than seem warranted) has created an oligarchy that is why we don't see the ability to filter out Vetta and Agency, but that's not the same thing as shuffling problem contributors to the back.

I've seen lots and lots of best match shifts and it can be very tempting to read more into what's happening than is really there.

The big, big worry is that in their lust for soaking the customers they'll drive too many of them away. I don't think they're currently presenting a good mix of results, but I'm hoping they'll keep  "tweaking" some more and improve  it.

Spot on........................I don't think we will see in the near future the actual best match favouring V&A so strong like it is now. They are at a testing and experimenting phase to see how they can optimize to the max revenues. But short-term profits is usually not a synonym of long-term-profits....I also think the Vetta "oligarchy" might be an important pushing force that explains were we are now. But at the end of the day even that "club" has no power if some at H&F/Getty decides the contrary to what is happening now. The only thing I am sure is that we are all in a spinning wheel that never stops.

I'll hold off voting for a while more. Yesterday had what are now high-average dls for me, though last year would have been low-average. Total mix from my second best seller to two new editorials, first sale of a file that was uploaded in July 2007 and three lowish sellers. HOWEVER, apart from one, none of these, if searched on by the most obvious keyword/s, would be in a search with (m)any Vetta/Agency files.

(Not a reply to any post above)
One thing that we (or at least I) keep forgetting is a certain proportion of sales comes from files already in lightboxes, so best match only has an effect on the others in the short term.

I'd seemed to survive all the recent 'tweaks' relatively unscathed including the big Sunday one as Monday was well within the spread of Mondays this year so far, but after what looked like a minor change in my portfolios best match results overnight today I am only at 16% of  where I would be on an average Tuesday at this time of day.