As a 0,1 percent contributor and 99,9 percent customer at iStock, historically my biggest gripe with iStock keywords has been lack of relevance. Lately another thing is happening as the iStock site simply replaces my search.

Exempli gratia I search for turbo and iStock replace my search with engine. That gives me 21.000 hits to go through - most with little relevance to my search. There have been many similar occurrences lately.

How on earth do they think replacing my search terms helps me find images?

Exempli gratia I search for turbo and iStock replace my search with engine. That gives me 21.000 hits to go through - most with little relevance to my search. There have been many similar occurrences lately.

Hahaha, this is TRUE! And even more, first images are related to internet search engines. Are they using turbines? 

As a "99.9% customer" why don't you try searches at other microstock agencies to see if you get results more relevant to your needs?

Whilst the CV is a great idea it is still not yet developed enough for all subjects and, in such cases, can be worse than useless.

Quote from: sjlocke on May 05, 2010, 05:21

As a 99% customer, I'd be surprised if you hadn't shopped in the last 3 years to experience the controlled vocabulary IS uses.  "turbo" for example, is not in the CV, but it is linked to "engine", which may or may not be equivalent, depending on your need.

Read more here:
http://seanlockedigitalimagery.wordpress.com/2008/08/15/the-controlled-vocabulary-and-you/

I am well aware of CV, which sometimes have been helpful refining my search. But I have never before until recently experienced iStock actually replacing my search words to something rendering my search useless.

It's not replacing your search.  The disambiguation choice for "turbo" is engine, so no need to refine.  It presents you automatically with the result.

Turbo is of course something different from engine.

I'm curious as to what one would expect "turbo" to return.

Quote from: Whitechild on May 05, 2010, 06:10

Turbo is of course something different from engine.

I'm curious as to what one would expect "turbo" to return.

A turbo is a component of an engine

I would expect to see the part not an engine

If I wanted an engine I would search for that

Does IS CV suggests "turbocharger" when you enter "turbo"? If it does, than it's ok, but if it doesn't, than it should.

Quote from: Whitechild on May 05, 2010, 06:10

Turbo is of course something different from engine.

I'm curious as to what one would expect "turbo" to return.

I was initially looking for something to illustrate "turbo"; that could be a turbocharger as sjlocke pointed out (or even better something with schematics), or something like below. Anyways, iStocks 21.000 hits engine gave me nothing but bewilderment.

would this work? http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-9913512-white-plastic-button.php Found using the keywords "Turbo, Word". 

Quote from: Whitechild on May 05, 2010, 06:37

Thermal is not visible it self, but the only thing that birds use to fly in circles and gain altitude is thermal, so it's visible in some way. Air is also not visible, right? But the air is often used as a keyword. So, it's not really true that only visible things are included in vocabulary. Wind is also invisible, but branches and grass swinging on the wind are visible, as well as birds soaring on the thermal. It's a very specific phenomenon, and it can't be replaced with just "flying" or "soaring".

You're right. and in any case 'soar' maps only to 'flying', so if you type in bird soaring you have to wade through 19518 results. Photos only takes it down to 14722. Add 'group of animals' and you're down to 851, but none of the 'top 200' are soaring in a  thermal. However, Vulture, group of animals, flying cuts right down to two, both vultures in thermals. Of course, I don't know how many I've missed by doing that (people who didn't put 'group of birds', perhaps because they put 'small group of birds' or 'medium group of birds'. One more turns up by searching on flock vultures, though flock is pretty inaccurate IMO.
Interestingly, although soaring maps only to flying, 'gliding' is a keyword in its own right, presumably because it relates to gliding (the sport).

And a buyer is supposed to understand all of the above when searching for images? I know I would get frustrated and go somewhere else. I totally understand the concept of the CV and in a lot of instances it works, but in a lot it doesn't. There is a lot more work to be done on that whole technology.

I'm not a buyer or a big-time contributor.  But it just seems to me that IS leaves a lot of money on the table because of the CV.  Shouldn't 'concept' images be a big part of microstock?  Isn't the contributor the logical person to assign 'concept' keywords to an image, subject to approval?  

"Thermal", attached to a group of soaring, circling birds, makes perfect sense.   That is in fact exactly what the photo is showing.  It's not the photographer's fault that our atmosphere is transparent and so a 'thermal' is invisible.

Do you mean a "turbocharger"?

http://www.istockphoto.com/file_search.php?action=file&order=4&perPage=200&showTitle=true&showContributor=true&showDownload=true&text=turbocharger

either term is acceptable

"A turbocharger, or turbo, is a gas compressor that is used for forced-induction of an internal combustion engine."

Quote from: stockastic on May 05, 2010, 10:45

"Thermal", attached to a group of soaring, circling birds, makes perfect sense.   That is in fact exactly what the photo is showing.  It's not the photographer's fault that our atmosphere is transparent and so a 'thermal' is invisible.

Ok then __ let's see how much it helps not having a CV and where the word 'thermal' can be used with complete freedom by the contributor. Try doing a search at FT on 'bird thermal' and see what you get. DT isn't much better.

I think we are all talking about the same thing, but we don't listen to each other good enough.
I was saying, I think IS should invest more in faster development of CV. They should have more people more specialized in some areas who will develop CV. I don't think they have to pay huge money to genetic engineers, or linguists, or astronomers. I think they should pay some small money to more people who would help development of CV in certain areas. No offense, but I'm sure I know much more about biology, medicine, or astronomy than average person, and they could hire me to make suggestions in these areas. I'm sure everyone of you guys also have experience and knowledge in certain areas that could help CV development.
IS could provide a form where contributors could write their suggestions, and we could analyze and approve, or correct if needed. Maybe you guys who submit huge numbers of photos don't have time for this, but there are people who would do it. I would do it in the first place. I am not a pro photographer, I don't depend on microstock completely, and I have time to do it. there are probably more people like me who could help.