Thinkstock ads disappeared from Getty
Now it's only Getty, iStock and Photos.com

It is a very good move if true. If only they had done this 5 years ago but...anyway. It is so much easier for branding, they will save tons of money while increasing brand awareness and exposure.

TS is selling more than SS for me, I'm worried because IS itself hardly sells anything.

I rather think you are jumping to conclusions when  you have very little evidence indeed. TS must have a very considerable turnover to deliver the returns that it has been doing. Perhaps they have just decided not to push it on Getty because they've found it is counterproductive to push GI customers over there.  Their marketing logic has been very mysterious for a long time.

Marketing logic?  WHAT logic??

That's great news. I hope they close down Thinkstock and move all subscription customers to iStock.

Quote from: Monkeyman on May 23, 2014, 06:06

That's great news. I hope they close down Thinkstock and move all subscription customers to iStock.

I need to say something that many may agree with and others won't.  When Thinkstock wasn't here, I made, say, $250 a month on Istock.  In comes thinkstock. Today I still make $250 a month at Istock, and another $150-$250 a month with Thinkstock. While some of us (including me) tend to cheerlead for things to fail for bully agencies, I would prefer to keep thinkstock (assuming it's going away). If they kill TS, I doubt I will see an increase of the same amount on my monthly income.  So I see the elimination of TS as a bad thing for me revenue wise.

Maybe your figures relate to the time when everyone was forced to join TS. I've been in it since the start of 2010. Four years ago TS was 20% of my earnings from iStock. In cash terms it has remained pretty steady ever since then, but the repeated attacks on independent income by iStock since then mean that my earnings from the main site are down about 60% and as a proportion of iS earnings TS has risen to about 40%.

If TS is scrapped, I see no particular reason to expect that it will lead to an increase in iS earnings. Maybe there will be a shift from TS to the new subs - I'm not sure what that would mean for earnings - or there might be a further shift to SS or DPC.  Overall, it probably wouldn't do me any good at all and it might mean a significant further cut in earnings. So I'm with you on this.

That's great news. I hope they close down Thinkstock and move all subscription customers to iStock.

It's a very good move for Getty.
It will simplify everything from buyer's perspective, increase iStock exposure and save operation costs.

The thinkstock site is still up and offering plans and pricing, so perhaps this is a slow goodbye.

For those indies who were on StockXpert when it shut down - and thus are in the Hemera collection currently on Thinkstock but not iStock - will there be any easy way to have those images continue selling?

Given the stories about iStock accepting almost anything these days, earlier worries that iStock would reject images StockXpert had accepted are perhaps no longer applicable, but it'd still be a lot of work to upload images again.

I had become exclusive at IS when StockXpert was shut down, so I didn't have work migrated to Hemera. Has it been making money via Thinkstock?

Yes, still makes me money. I was at 500$ at Stockxpert when they closed it, it was a big shock for me. They continued to sell the collection via Hemera, but in 100-150 $ range for me, even today.

I don't think the "ads" on the front page are a good indicator. There are just three slots and currently they are using them for two brand new products (iStock subs, photos.com print) and a current event.

Yes, I am sure Getty is pushing iStock subscriptions right now and most likely will shift focus from Thinkstock to iStock over time. It doesn't make much sense to have two different subscription offers within the family (didn't make sense with Thinkstock and photos.com to start with) but I'd assume it's a long term process over the next few years.

I don't think the "ads" on the front page are a good indicator. There are just three slots and currently they are using them for two brand new products (iStock subs, photos.com print) and a current event.

Yes, I am sure Getty is pushing iStock subscriptions right now and most likely will shift focus from Thinkstock to iStock over time. It doesn't make much sense to have two different subscription offers within the family (didn't make sense with Thinkstock and photos.com to start with) but I'd assume it's a long term process over the next few years.

You're forgetting that TS contains a pile of non-iS material, some of it wholly owned by Getty Images. If they restrict subs to iStock they stop making money from old stuff they had lying around on their hard-drive. Sometimes a multiplicity of brands can boost overall market share

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on May 26, 2014, 12:24

You're forgetting that TS contains a pile of non-iS material, some of it wholly owned by Getty Images.

Didn't they already dump it to iStock?

I don't think so. But I might be wrong. They sent some stuff to iStock but it was premium priced, I thought there was a different stream going to TS.

TS is where I get almost all my sales from via IStock. I would say most IS contributors are in the same boat, we all wait for TS payments to roll in each month. Therefore it appears that TS is ticking over quite nicely whereas IS hardly generates any sales.

Getty's new strategy is to boost competition with SS,
to keep exclusives on board and to minimize operation costs.
In addition to Thinkstock closure, I guess they will mirror all exclusive content on Getty site and will bring the old canister system.