MicrostockGroup
Agency Based Discussion => iStockPhoto.com => Topic started by: U11 on May 17, 2013, 15:08
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really?
http://www.istockphoto.com/Yuri_Arcurs (http://www.istockphoto.com/Yuri_Arcurs)
http://i052.radikal.ru/1305/89/a4beba572ace.jpg (http://i052.radikal.ru/1305/89/a4beba572ace.jpg)
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Looks like it. http://www.shutterstock.com/g/yuriarcurs (http://www.shutterstock.com/g/yuriarcurs)
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A bug? He doesn't have any exclusive images, and there's still 32K on Dreamstime, for example. He does have 2830 exclusive audio files, though.
If so, that would ceeeeertainly explain the lifting of upload limits.
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Didnt he have a meeting with Getty at the time of the Google deal when Sean got the boot?
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Oh, and there's still the little matter of this:
http://peopleimages.com/ (http://peopleimages.com/)
So, I don't think so.
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http://www.fotolia.com/p/17174 (http://www.fotolia.com/p/17174)
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A bug? He doesn't have any exclusive images, and there's still 32K on Dreamstime, for example. He does have 2830 exclusive audio files, though.
If so, that would ceeeeertainly explain the lifting of upload limits.
It's too much of a coincidence for me that his entire port has disappeared from SS ... and now he's suddenly wearing a crown at IS.
It appears that IS may have relaxed their normal rules for him (assuming it is just a question of timing of portfolio removal from FT, DT, etc) or have possibly been overruled by a Getty manager.
I've heard about Getty managers making big decisions regarding Istock contributors in the recent past so it certainly could have happened again.
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Maybe they "upgraded" him to a certain price group or best match status and they need to add the crown to push his files. Getty has many "exclusive" collections on istock (and getty) that are being sold elsewhere as well. Blendimages is the easiest example. They sell on istock, getty, their own site and also have their files on Shutterstock etc...
So I wouldnīt be surprised if Yuri made a deal to get the same benefits and preferences.
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its just the profile page, the portfolio has indie prices (at least looking at the credits)
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Maybe their only prerequisite was that he had to remove his port from SS. That would benefit IS as well in terms of giving a small blow to their closest competition.
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As a "real" exclusive, I think I'd be a bit livid if he was allowed to reap exclusive benefits for images he is selling on his own site:
http://peopleimages.com/image/guiding-her-feet-with-love-baby-hands-mother (http://peopleimages.com/image/guiding-her-feet-with-love-baby-hands-mother)
http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-23912458-guiding-her-feet-with-love.php (http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-23912458-guiding-her-feet-with-love.php)
for example...
However, since his portfolio is still at DP, Dreamstime, etc., maybe it's just a coincidence - an SS bug and and IS bug.
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Still his sets have his images
http://www.shutterstock.com/g/yuriarcurs/sets?page=2 (http://www.shutterstock.com/g/yuriarcurs/sets?page=2)
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You can never know for sure what IS is thinking. But I'm sure it's not a glitch, I'd say it is a private deal with him and IS. We however will not know unless someone involved decides to tell us.
in any case, everyone have a great weekend!
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As a "real" exclusive, I think I'd be a bit livid if he was allowed to reap exclusive benefits for images he is selling on his own site:
[url]http://peopleimages.com/image/guiding-her-feet-with-love-baby-hands-mother[/url] ([url]http://peopleimages.com/image/guiding-her-feet-with-love-baby-hands-mother[/url])
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-23912458-guiding-her-feet-with-love.php[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-23912458-guiding-her-feet-with-love.php[/url])
for example...
However, since his portfolio is still at DP, Dreamstime, etc., maybe it's just a coincidence - an SS bug and and IS bug.
It's not being sold at exclusive rates, but who knows what percentage he's getting.
Aren't there other pseudo-exclusives?
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He still has image sets up on SS
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
Indeed, but if it's not a bug that he's being touted as 'exclusive', that will confuse the poor bewildered buyers far more than seven collections ever could.
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
Indeed, but if it's not a bug that he's being touted as 'exclusive', that will confuse the poor bewildered buyers far more than seven collections ever could.
It may just take a little while until the system updates.
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
Indeed, but if it's not a bug that he's being touted as 'exclusive', that will confuse the poor bewildered buyers far more than seven collections ever could.
Do buyers care if they are buying from an exclusive? Outside of price, I'd guess no.
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
Indeed, but if it's not a bug that he's being touted as 'exclusive', that will confuse the poor bewildered buyers far more than seven collections ever could.
Do buyers care if they are buying from an exclusive? Outside of price, I'd guess no.
I think Yuri could legitimately claim to have a fan club.
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Well, if this is the "new exclusive" type of content that will be pushed in E+/signature+...and with the volume of files involved...that will really make the traditional istockers feel squeezed in that price level.
I donīt blame Yuri for whatever deal he made, the guy is just running his business. But what about the regular istock exclusives?
But maybe it is a bug...just a fata morgana on the internet...
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A bug? He doesn't have any exclusive images, and there's still 32K on Dreamstime, for example. He does have 2830 exclusive audio files, though.
If so, that would ceeeeertainly explain the lifting of upload limits.
[url]http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-2700p1.html[/url] ([url]http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-2700p1.html[/url])
It's too much of a coincidence for me that his entire port has disappeared from SS ... and now he's suddenly wearing a crown at IS.
It appears that IS may have relaxed their normal rules for him (assuming it is just a question of timing of portfolio removal from FT, DT, etc) or have possibly been overruled by a Getty manager.
I've heard about Getty managers making big decisions regarding Istock contributors in the recent past so it certainly could have happened again.
? Yet another SS bug or could be he is fully aware of what SS is up to these days and he feels IS will give his images better placement.
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None of his images have Exclusive prices or crowns next to them.
I'll bet this is some kind of typical shady deal to get all his stuff into Signature+ en masse in time for the changeover.
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Still his sets have his images
[url]http://www.shutterstock.com/g/yuriarcurs/sets?page=2[/url] ([url]http://www.shutterstock.com/g/yuriarcurs/sets?page=2[/url])
I think the servers are updating because the images are also disappearing from the sets as we speak. Click on the thumbnail and the image is not available
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
Indeed, but if it's not a bug that he's being touted as 'exclusive', that will confuse the poor bewildered buyers far more than seven collections ever could.
Do buyers care if they are buying from an exclusive? Outside of price, I'd guess no.
Price is the thing. If a file is 'exclusive', they shouldn't be able to find it on any other site.
Also it's a matter of site honesty. Sneaking that sort of thing could lose buyer trust and confidence.
OTOH, maybe his own site didn't pan out as well as expected and he's abandoning it. He did say before that if he was going to be exclusive it would be with iStock, though he accepted all sorts of deals with other companies on the way.
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Could it be that "IF" he has a special deal with IS it's because they are feeling the pinch from letting Sean go and need to re-fill his content with similar quality work? And if that's true then they really didn't know what they were doing when they gave Mr. Locke his walking papers. Instant gratification is one thing, longevity is another.
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I'd love to think so, but I doubt cutting me has hurt them much.
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Could it be that "IF" he has a special deal with IS it's because they are feeling the pinch from letting Sean go and need to re-fill his content with similar quality work?
That was my first thought, I mus admit.
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Welcome to the Twilight Zone. ???
really?
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/Yuri_Arcurs[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/Yuri_Arcurs[/url])
[url]http://i052.radikal.ru/1305/89/a4beba572ace.jpg[/url] ([url]http://i052.radikal.ru/1305/89/a4beba572ace.jpg[/url])
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What new content? Yuri was already on IS, its not that they got a completely new portfolio. Yuri already had a meeting with Getty before Sean was let go, if I recall correctly. Would they have discussed anything with Yuri related to that? I find that hard to believe.
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Letīs focus on what we really know. His files have been removed from Shutterstock. Does he no longer trust Shutterstock as a good sales partner? Or does he believe they are going down after many successful years?
The little icon on istock is not as relevant IMO than the fact that he removed his files from the most successfully growing microstock site.
What does it mean for Shutterstock that the "most successful photographer of the decade" no longer has his portfolio with them?
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Letīs focus on what we really know. His files have been removed from Shutterstock. Does he no longer trust Shutterstock as a good sales partner? Or does he believe they are going down after many successful years?
The little icon on istock is not as relevant IMO than the fact that he removed his files from the most successfully growing microstock site.
What does it mean for Shutterstock that the "most successful photographer of the decade" no longer has his portfolio with them?
Maybe Shutterstock is not the agency that a few people on here tell everyone it is, don't buy the hype folks.
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Yawn....
Business is business, if a deal is mutually beneficial to both parties there is a high likelihood "rules" will be bent - happens all the time
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Letīs focus on what we really know. His files have been removed from Shutterstock. Does he no longer trust Shutterstock as a good sales partner? Or does he believe they are going down after many successful years?
The little icon on istock is not as relevant IMO than the fact that he removed his files from the most successfully growing microstock site.
What does it mean for Shutterstock that the "most successful photographer of the decade" no longer has his portfolio with them?
Some photographers, particularly those who invest heavily in their shoots, just don't like the subscription model. Never have and never will in many cases. They simply feel that their work is too good to be 'sold' at those sort of prices.
I am not unsympathetic to that view and the concern that the subscription model acts as a brake on the value of images. Unfortunately, up until now anyway, the only realistic choices for the microstock photographer has been to either accept exclusivity at IS (no thanks) or to accept the subscription model.
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No denial or bug explanation from Lobo:
Posted By fotoVoyager:
Looks like Yuri Acurs has negotiated some kind of Exclusive deal here so that could explain the massive queue growth as tens of thousands of his images are ingested.
Always on a Friday...
Lobo:
That is an interesting theory. Let's keep this thread on topic and free of conspiracies. As you might have noticed in the past we don't provide much real estate in the forums for discussions related to specific contributors.
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=353223&messageid=6888791 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=353223&messageid=6888791)
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it doesn't surprise me if they've afforded him special exclusivity. does this really surprise anyone? or it's just a mistake but I doubt it....they needed another big hitter without Sean. enter Yuri...seems pretty typical a move these days. I just don't see why anyone would agree to be exclusive under the current regime given the obvious direction it's moving in. whatever.
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Allowing a direct contributor to IS to be exclusive and to submit the same images elsewhere would be a complete destruction of exclusivity. There's no getting around it. I can't imagine them doing something that truly dumb. It does, however, deserve an explanation and not a dodge.
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Letīs focus on what we really know. His files have been removed from Shutterstock. Does he no longer trust Shutterstock as a good sales partner? Or does he believe they are going down after many successful years?
The little icon on istock is not as relevant IMO than the fact that he removed his files from the most successfully growing microstock site.
What does it mean for Shutterstock that the "most successful photographer of the decade" no longer has his portfolio with them?
Good questions, Yuri started at SS and has been there since at least 2005.
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Looks like he's definitely pulled all his work from Shutterstock, if he has its a massive PR blow for them.
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Allowing a direct contributor to IS to be exclusive and to submit the same images elsewhere would be a complete destruction of exclusivity. There's no getting around it. I can't imagine them doing something that truly dumb. It does, however, deserve an explanation and not a dodge.
Recently they have posted twitter links when complete nobodies become exclusive then don't say anything about this. Strange behaviour unless they have something to hide or know it is not going to be liked.
Perhaps this is the next step in the journey to remove exclusivity, it certain shits all over the concept, mind you they have been watering exclusivity down for ages. Alternatively, they have just bought Yuri's site and therefore it is just another Getty outlet and therefore aren't breaking the terms of exclusivity
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What new content? Yuri was already on IS, its not that they got a completely new portfolio. Yuri already had a meeting with Getty before Sean was let go, if I recall correctly. Would they have discussed anything with Yuri related to that? I find that hard to believe.
Not all of his stuff is/was there.
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Alternatively, they have just bought Yuri's site and therefore it is just another Getty outlet and therefore aren't breaking the terms of exclusivity
that's a good one! who would have thought to predict "Getty buys Yuri" as the next instalment in the iSG soapie?
I'd suggest iS insisted he leave SS as part of whatever deal he has done. Could be the others too, but they just aren't as efficient as SS at removing content? shall we break out the popcorn and wait for it to unfold?
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Wonder if he is a puppet now....controlled (or disallowed) from posting in MSG. I mean, they obviously are giving him some sweet nectar of a deal they won't give anyone else, or very few anyway or he wouldn't leave so much cash on the table from other micros. If this is the case, I would be pissed off if I were other high end exclusives who work just as hard as Yuri to produce quality content, yet get paid less....unless of course Yuri is given a new designation as SUPER Exclusive with a platinum crown, a magic carpet, red cape, and a polished, golden, rose scented turd for those super exclusives.
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A bug? He doesn't have any exclusive images, and there's still 32K on Dreamstime, for example. He does have 2830 exclusive audio files, though.
If so, that would ceeeeertainly explain the lifting of upload limits.
Sorry Sean , but is not the same with Quavondo that is still exclusive in istock and a contributor in Stocksy ???
There's a special deal for everyone ....these days
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I don't know about that, but I'm sure he isn't selling the same images both places.
Yuri's portfolio is on dozens of sites. He can't be exclusive to IS with that work. And if he could blatantly enjoy image exclusivity if that mishmash is cleaned up, that opens the gates for everyone to do the same.
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I don't know about that, but I'm sure he isn't selling the same images both places.
Yuri's portfolio is on dozens of sites. He can't be exclusive to IS with that work. And if he could blatantly enjoy image exclusivity if that mishmash is cleaned up, that opens the gates for everyone to do the same.
hmm, presuming iStock have one rule for all... it certainly will open up some more discussion/complaining/outrage. Things have quietened down now that nobody is bringing up the resolved Google issue.
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I'd suggest iS insisted he leave SS as part of whatever deal he has done.
Or the other way round, he may have got tired of commoditising his work through the subs model and calculated what percentage he would need to make up the difference and approached iStock/Getty with an offer.
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Or it might just be that he's got his crown before his images are off the other micros. They have jumped the gun before with people they desperately wanted as exclusives.
Still curious about his own site, and the apparent 'image exclusivity' enjoyed by others, as suggested above.
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Since we are on conspiracies...
the one that makes the most sense is iStock removing exclusivity...kind of fits with the limits removed and the new collections that exclusive and non-exclusive content can be in. And iStock is taking control of what content goes where...for a company with such low trust these days I wouldn't put it past them positioning themselves to to be on top by buying proven portfolios...and I wouldn't be surprised if the only signature plus content ends up being those portfolios...all while spinning these changes as good for all and based off of survey feedback....smoke and mirrors...they may even be responsible for the assassination of JFK...
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Do prices matter? In a few week IS can just bump his work up to the signature+ collection regardless of exclusivity
Not, what it matters is that if you want some image from him you (at least talking of real exclusives) just can find there (or in some cases a getty brands)
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maybe and as usual we talk before really knowing what is going on, human nature yep
anyway why would Yuri join exclusivity when he is doing 12k $ per day at PI?
(http://www.microstockgroup.com/selling-direct/today-is-a-good-day-peopleimages-com-is-up-up-up!/?action=dlattach;attach=10938;image)
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Maybe everybody (except me, I didn't think of it :-P) said on the exclusive questionnaire that the thing they wanted most of all was to make Yuri exclusive, no matter what the terms were. ::)
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Maybe everybody (except me, I didn't think of it :-P) said on the exclusive questionnaire that the thing they wanted most of all was to make Yuri exclusive, no matter what the terms were. ::)
good one ;D
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maybe and as usual we talk before really knowing what is going on, human nature yep
anyway why would Yuri join exclusivity when he is doing 12k $ per day at PI?
([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/selling-direct/today-is-a-good-day-peopleimages-com-is-up-up-up[/url]!/?action=dlattach;attach=10938;image)
Let's be fair here: http://www.microstockgroup.com/selling-direct/today-is-a-good-day-peopleimages-com-is-up-up-up!/ (http://www.microstockgroup.com/selling-direct/today-is-a-good-day-peopleimages-com-is-up-up-up!/)
No where does it state he is pulling that a day...that happens to be a good day...a very good day, but let's at least not skew the few facts we do have ;)
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not skewing anything dingles, if you were doing that kind of money (even if half) would you put your work in just one agency? (not to mention it is iStock ;D)
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That kind if money sounds good if your a one man shop, but doesn't Yuri have staff and overhead? He even said it wasn't turning a profit yet, but if it keeps going it could
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I don't know about that, but I'm sure he isn't selling the same images both places.
Yuri's portfolio is on dozens of sites. He can't be exclusive to IS with that work. And if he could blatantly enjoy image exclusivity if that mishmash is cleaned up, that opens the gates for everyone to do the same.
I'll take my exclusive royalty level back please, and continue selling my images through better agencies too in that case ;) if his avatar changes to batman, you know something's up...
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I don't see how Yuri can be exclusive and still own peopleimages.com unless, as dcdp suggests, Getty bought Yuri out. Looks like it will take some time for this mystery to be cleared up...
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i think it would make sense to remove his pictures from shutterstock and put them on offset go sell them at a much higher price??
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
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ouch, Yuri, just ouch.
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This is going to be a VERY interesting experiment:
Will it be REALLY possible to delete all images from ALL the 50+ websites Yuris images are spread on?
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
All the best Yuri, but I can't help think this is the equivalent of boarding the Titanic as a first class passenger after it has already hit the iceberg.
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
Why did it take you so long to realise that?
Have they bought over PI?
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I'm sure this was a carefully thought out move. Best of luck!
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Hi Yuri,
does this mean you are closing your own webshop peopleimages as well?
Whatever you do, best of luck!
And maybe we will see you in Berlin at the mexpo.
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
THANKS YURI !!
it's at least 4-5 years i'm trying to tell the guys here that micro is a failed business model, now you're the living proof i was right.
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hahahaha this is gotta be a bombshell for many guys here.
i'm literally shi-tt-ing in my pants while laughing !
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to me this decision sounds like a huge stamp of approval on everything getty and istock have done in the past months and years (quote: "good distributor"). This at the same time feels like a huge slap into the face of those fighting against the contributor treatment (speak googledrive deal, redeemed credits, commission cuts) by above mentioned distributor.
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hahahaha this is gotta be a bombshell for many guys here.
i'm literally shi-tt-ing in my pants while laughing !
Can someone remind me how to set the ignore feature?
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This is actually great news for people who create similar content for microstock sites.
On the other hand, anyone who thinks they can kinda 'force' buyers to pay more by some business judo move, in the current environment will be severely dissappointed, I can assure you of that. I worked at several BTL / ATL agencies, often next to the actual owners or ceos and in daily contact with marketing people. Even when they weren't squeezed nearly as bad as in the current economy, they were so aggressively pushing cots down all the time it was warlike. You showed them a price on anything a notch higher than their expectations, they instantly turned their back and never ever even looked at it again. Everything is just click away and they have many choices.
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
You're going to have to come forward with some more information, especially about your multi-million dollar personal website.
I'm not so sure getting in bed with the "evil empire" is actually a good move for the industry. Giving Getty more "power" is not in anyone's best interest, except Getty's. Not that what anyone here thinks is really important to your business.
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Getty must of paid Yuri a huge amount to do this. A clear sign to me that they're losing the plot. They get rid of Sean and pay for Yuri? Absolute madness.
Can't blame Yuri, he needs to do whatever is best for him but I don't think it will make much difference to the other sites. The portfolios of the many are better than one person. Many people have dumped exclusivity and their content is more valuable than Yuri alone.
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Can someone remind me how to set the ignore feature?
please bring me respect, unlike you and many others i've correctly predicted the outcome of microstock in the long term a long time ago.
now you dont want to hear the ugly truth, well dont shoot the messanger, you can only blame yourself if you bet the farm on micros and put all the eggs on istock.
it's funny that those like me are called "trolls" both here and on RM forums.
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Yuri is a good businessman, so yes, a nice little "golden" welcome for the trouble of removing all his files elsewhere is probably not far off.
But Yuri is also not a shy little mouse who just plays along with everything that gets thrown at him. He is as smart as all the other big players and will certainly raise his voice if he feels mistreated. Maybe he will do it in private first, but he also has the legal firepower if necessary.
This will really be fun to watch. And like others have said, I donīt think it will slow down the growth of Shutterstock and the other micros in any way. The amount of great content out there is just amazing. And if Yuri keeps his files off Thinkstock and the other cheap getty sites, they will actually be weaker.
And who knows, maybe he will force getty/istock to evolve much faster than if they had kept Sean on board. Actually if they put him in charge of the ship, he could certainly get it to grow again.
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Who knows, but I have an one hypothetical opinion.
There are only some aggregator agencies only which can sell same images directly from their own site and at Corbis and at Getty simultaneously.
Usually contributing agencies must have a selection. Gettys family or Corbis and all others. Not simultaneously same images for Getty and Corbis.
Now my hypothetical idea. Yuri got simply this agreement. He can sell images from his own Peoples Images site and via Getty family too. Very easy and logical.
Best,
Jaak Nilson
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But Yuri is also not a shy little mouse who just plays along with everything that gets thrown at him. He is as smart as all the other big players and will certainly raise his voice if he feels mistreated. Maybe he will do it in private first, but he also has the legal firepower if necessary.
And when he gets booted, he won't have content anywhere and will have to start from zero, so I doubt any concerns will be raised. At least I didn't have 100 employees to support.
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Getty must of paid Yuri a huge amount to do this. A clear sign to me that they're losing the plot. They get rid of Sean and pay for Yuri? Absolute madness.
business is business.
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But Yuri is also not a shy little mouse who just plays along with everything that gets thrown at him. He is as smart as all the other big players and will certainly raise his voice if he feels mistreated. Maybe he will do it in private first, but he also has the legal firepower if necessary.
And when he gets booted, he won't have content anywhere and will have to start from zero, so I doubt any concerns will be raised. At least I didn't have 100 employees to support.
Precisely, Sean!!!
Anyone who hoped Yuri will, could, would do anything with his market power to support the contributor community will be sorely disappointed.
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Who knows, but I have an one hypothetical opinion.
There are only some aggregator agencies only which can sell same images directly from their own site and at Corbis and at Getty simultaneously.
Usually contributing agencies must have a selection. Gettys family or Corbis and all others. Not simultaneously same images for Getty and Corbis.
Now my hypothetical idea. Yuri got simply this agreement. He can sell images from his own Peoples Images site and via Getty family too. Very easy and logical.
... and completely against what "exclusivity" is supposed to mean and represent. Blend and the others are bad enough, distributing through Getty and making it onto IS getting 20% for their "exclusive" Agency content. But Yuri directly contributes to IS. Selling those same images on his own site is a clear violation of "exclusivity".
"The Supplier wishes to appoint iStockphoto as its exclusive agent to license, sublicense and distribute Exclusive Content"
Unless he is going to pull everything from IS, and send content to Getty for a "special" collection, and then they decide to put it onto IS and he gets %20. Which doesn't seem like a smart move.
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Getty must of paid Yuri a huge amount to do this.
What makes you say that ?
I don't see how is this any different from any of the other big high quality collections which are being imported in via GI as exclusive distribution. Eg Blend Images etc.
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
You're going to have to come forward with some more information, especially about your multi-million dollar personal website.
I'm not so sure getting in bed with the "evil empire" is actually a good move for the industry. Giving Getty more "power" is not in anyone's best interest, except Getty's. Not that what anyone here thinks is really important to your business.
The expensive site might just be the main reason.
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But Yuri is also not a shy little mouse who just plays along with everything that gets thrown at him. He is as smart as all the other big players and will certainly raise his voice if he feels mistreated. Maybe he will do it in private first, but he also has the legal firepower if necessary.
And when he gets booted, he won't have content anywhere and will have to start from zero, so I doubt any concerns will be raised. At least I didn't have 100 employees to support.
or he could sell out.
Lonely Planet Images was previously distributed by Getty, now LP has been sold by BBC to another publisher and the whole LPI collection has been bought by Getty.
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@ Jaak Blendimages not just have their own site, they also have 20 000 files on Shutterstock. These images are also available via Getty.
Getty does not necessarily need it all exclusive. That is just a marketing myth.
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I think everyone is waiting more or less patiently for you to understand what you have read.
"are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce" - does not mean microstock is dead. It means that Yuri believes his work that is produced by a team of people at a high cost is better suited on agencies elsewhere.
Of course, it would help if the agency you are moving to actively wants your work and is willing to negotiate a special deal for you . . . which is what everyone, probably correctly, suspects.
By contrast, many of us don't produce high production cost work, much less have large agencies beating a path to our doors.
After the dust settles, business as usual.
For me, that's in around 5 minutes from now.
Can someone remind me how to set the ignore feature?
please bring me respect, unlike you and many others i've correctly predicted the outcome of microstock in the long term a long time ago.
now you dont want to hear the ugly truth, well dont shoot the messanger, you can only blame yourself if you bet the farm on micros and put all the eggs on istock.
it's funny that those like me are called "trolls" both here and on RM forums.
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I think everyone is waiting more or less patiently for you to understand what you have read.
"are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce" - does not mean microstock is dead. It means that Yuri believes his work that is produced by a team of people at a high cost is better suited on agencies elsewhere.
Of course, it would help if the agency you are moving to actively wants your work and is willing to negotiate a special deal for you . . . which is what everyone, probably correctly, suspects.
By contrast, many of us don't produce high production cost work, much less have large agencies beating a path to our doors.
After the dust settles, business as usual.
For me, that's in around 5 minutes from now.
Can someone remind me how to set the ignore feature?
please bring me respect, unlike you and many others i've correctly predicted the outcome of microstock in the long term a long time ago.
now you dont want to hear the ugly truth, well dont shoot the messanger, you can only blame yourself if you bet the farm on micros and put all the eggs on istock.
it's funny that those like me are called "trolls" both here and on RM forums.
People won't pay more. They will skip it. If this wasn't true, there wouldn't be microstock companies.
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Getty must of paid Yuri a huge amount to do this.
What makes you say that ?
I don't see how is this any different from any of the other big high quality collections which are being imported in via GI as exclusive distribution. Eg Blend Images etc.
I'm not quite sure how many sites Yuri had his portfolio on but I read in an article that it was around 200 (that might be wrong but it has to be over 50). Removing his huge portfolio from all those sites is a big job and I don't see why he would want to do that now without being paid to do it?
He could just leave his microstock portfolio on all the sites and only do new stuff with Getty and other macro sites. Why go exclusive now and why have istock given him a crown when he still has images on other sites? It looks to me that they've panicked. They've come up with a way to hit their competitors but I find it hard to believe that Yuri would do this without a big incentive. He did mention a meeting with Getty a while ago, I presume they made him an offer he couldn't refuse?
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He did mention a meeting with Getty a while ago, I presume they made him an offer he couldn't refuse?
I can kind of imagine how that meeting went.
Yuri: I don't like the way you are selling my images for almost nothing on Google Images. I am going to see you in court.
Getty VP: Here is bag of cash and a very enticing "exclusivity" offer. Will that make this little lawsuit go away?
Yuri: (holding bag of cash) What lawsuit?
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Why go exclusive now and why have istock given him a crown when he still has images on other sites? It looks to me that they've panicked.
All the stuff on Istock via Getty has a crown currently including stuff on other sites. Currently all TAC but that is about to change. He has a great collection of work, why wouldn't they want to accommodate him ?
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Getty must of paid Yuri a huge amount to do this. A clear sign to me that they're losing the plot. They get rid of Sean and pay for Yuri? Absolute madness.
lol yeah. and I wonder if Yuri's this move will be beneficial for Sean as now he has his unique images everywhere in different price range including subs.. buyers ! you are free to choose/buy my images where ever you want and suitable to you... :)
ps- cobalt! you just said before me what i wanna say
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But Yuri is also not a shy little mouse who just plays along with everything that gets thrown at him. He is as smart as all the other big players and will certainly raise his voice if he feels mistreated. Maybe he will do it in private first, but he also has the legal firepower if necessary.
And when he gets booted, he won't have content anywhere and will have to start from zero, so I doubt any concerns will be raised. At least I didn't have 100 employees to support.
It is not difficult to attach a price tag to this risk. How much would they need to pay him upfront so that in case things donīt work out he can keep his operations going until he gets his No1 position back. 30 Million? 50 Million? 100???
And if he can keep his webshop going than he also has the time to build the brand and attract more customers. It takes time to build an online store. 3-5 years if you are looking at a certain revenue. So if he does leave, he would not start at zero.
If he gives up peopleimages...well...then we know that he must have gotten a really, really golden or platinum diamond "welcome package". Enough to give everyone from his team a nice golden good bye if he needs to downsize.
He is a very clever man and he had the benefit of seeing what happened to you. The rest is up to negotiations. It does make you wonder how desperate they are.
Of course Getty does have a lot of experience in getting business owners to sign over their company for a nice sum. After all this is how they built their business in the first place.
Except that the old game of "buy out the competition, raise prices for the customer, lower royalties for the artist" does not work automatically any more. There is simply too much content and the customers can compare prices with a few mouse clicks on the internet.
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Thus far, the discussion seems to have centered on Getty being desperate after all the bad press of the past months and years and offering Yuri a golden nest to come in as an exclusive. But maybe there is also some desperation on Yuris side following, maybe, some business descisions that weren't that successful. And maybe the golden egg wasn't as big as anyone assumes.
Of course, this is all speculation and we will never know for sure... .
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Why go exclusive now and why have istock given him a crown when he still has images on other sites? It looks to me that they've panicked.
All the stuff on Istock via Getty has a crown currently including stuff on other sites. Currently all TAC but that is about to change. He has a great collection of work, why wouldn't they want to accommodate him ?
He isn't the only person with a great collection of work and up until now, they haven't shown much respect for all the exclusives that have felt they had no choice but to go non-exclusive or leave istock/Getty. So I don't understand why it looks like they've done a deal with him while letting others go. And what about all the Yuri clones that are non-exclusive? It's not going to be too difficult for buyers to find a cheaper alternative to a lot of Yuri's portfolio on the other sites.
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you guys keep missing the bus !
the world's top microstocker just announced he's leaving the boat before it sinks, if microstock was on Nasdaq it would lose 90% of its value in a day !
try to see the situation from a financial and technical analysis perspective, please.
the message is very clear here : he's got his own agency, he's selling his whole portfolio on dozens of different agencies, and he reached the conclusion that he's barely paying the bill considering his production costs and the meagre fees paid by micro agencies.
is the microstock business still sustainable if even Yuri cant stay in biz ? that's THE question, and his answer is NO !
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
BTW, I was looking at peopleimages, and I'd say half of the newest images are very simple one person, isolated-on-white. Businesswoman, doctor, shopping bags, repetitive, pointing here, pointing there, pointing up, etc. Don't you feel that is simple "microstock"/low production cost work?
Also, I see a few recent series that seem very "inspired".
is the microstock business still sustainable if even Yuri cant stay in biz ? that's THE question, and his answer is NO !
Maybe he's done in the biz. Looking at the recents, it really seems like the work is being phoned in or being done by trainees, so perhaps this is the move to sell out and move on to retirement!
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you guys keep missing the bus !
Maybe. Or maybe you keep trying to start up a bus that doesn't have an engine.
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yep, agree again Sean, that too is a possible explanation to Yuri's move.
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The only thing that matters to me:
How will customers react?
1) "Hmm... that pic I wanted of a doctor next to a smiling patient is gone from (insert agency name here)... oh wait, there are several hundred just like it. I'll buy one of those."
or
2) "I've investigated and found that I can buy that pic of the doctor and smiling patient for much more money by opening a new account at a different site. Take my money, please!"
Answer: customers will stay right where they're at, and my income will not go down one dime (perhaps will go up a few dimes due to less competition).
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hahahaha this is gotta be a bombshell for many guys here.
i'm literally shi-tt-ing in my pants while laughing !
That's not a blow against microstock. That's a blow against subs, not the concept, but the prices. Actually, it's good news for microstock photographers.
Of course, you can see "white" and read aloud "black", you are experienced in that.
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This is good news for Getty and iStock, not so good news for other Exclusives who are subject to very restrictive rule that others appear to be exempt from.
If they made this 'image exclusive' deal available to everybody then I'm sure they could keep Exclusivity viable. Unfortunately falling sales numbers mean artist exclusivity will become uneconomical in the not too distant future, even if the return per download stays high.
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no discussion on the iS forums about this.
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Maybe the warm welcome thread is in the exclusive forum ;)
Anybody ready to bet istock didnīt know this was coming?
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
BTW, I was looking at peopleimages, and I'd say half of the newest images are very simple one person, isolated-on-white. Businesswoman, doctor, shopping bags, repetitive, pointing here, pointing there, pointing up, etc. Don't you feel that is simple "microstock"/low production cost work?
Also, I see a few recent series that seem very "inspired".
is the microstock business still sustainable if even Yuri cant stay in biz ? that's THE question, and his answer is NO !
Maybe he's done in the biz. Looking at the recents, it really seems like the work is being phoned in or being done by trainees, so perhaps this is the move to sell out and move on to retirement!
The most likely scenario, IMO. Might just want to simplify his life. Might be a case of burnout.
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Iīm (a currently not very happy) exclusive iStock photographer and to be honest, I donīt care that much. Actually the contrary. I really thought that iStock didnīt value exclusivity anymore. If this move is more than a joke or bug, it gives at least hope that they still do. It will give iStock some publicity and with it all our portfolios, which is a good thing.
Reading Yuris post, I guess theyīll put all his work into the new higher collections and (beside other things) he made a deal that they will never drop them into the "value collection", even if some of them donīt sell for years. That way he has all his files sent over to Getty. I guess he will also get the same mass ingestion process that all the content comming from getty gets, and you canīt blame anybody - thatīs just business. VIPs always get the better deal no matter what. They buy less for their cars, food,...
To me this is a wakeup call for all out there who thought that they can live without agencies and sell their work on their own site. Iīm not an iStock fanboy, but the agencies keep the majority of our sales for a reason, even if it sometimes is too much especially for non exclusive content. Maybe not even Yuri has enough money, manpower and publicity to make his own site worth all the effort and pay for his bills in the longrun.
And btw: some of Yuris "trainiees" are iStock exclusives for years, and it was his recommendation.
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Yep, actually if you think about it, yuri bacame 'exclusive' when it won't matter much anymore.
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Yep, actually if you think about it, yuri bacame 'exclusive' when it won't matter much anymore.
It could be those sunglasses patent lawsuit also. If he's exclusive, I think he'll greatly reduce the chances of getting caught up with those kinds of hassles. 8)
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This is actually great news for people who create similar content for microstock sites.
On the other hand, anyone who thinks they can kinda 'force' buyers to pay more by some business judo move, in the current environment will be severely dissappointed, I can assure you of that. I worked at several BTL / ATL agencies, often next to the actual owners or ceos and in daily contact with marketing people. Even when they weren't squeezed nearly as bad as in the current economy, they were so aggressively pushing cots down all the time it was warlike. You showed them a price on anything a notch higher than their expectations, they instantly turned their back and never ever even looked at it again. Everything is just click away and they have many choices.
I work for a $2 billion company and they use SS and used to use Istock. I asked them about Getty several times and their answer is always the same: why would I pay that much when I can get the same thing or better on SS?
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This is actually great news for people who create similar content for microstock sites.
On the other hand, anyone who thinks they can kinda 'force' buyers to pay more by some business judo move, in the current environment will be severely dissappointed, I can assure you of that. I worked at several BTL / ATL agencies, often next to the actual owners or ceos and in daily contact with marketing people. Even when they weren't squeezed nearly as bad as in the current economy, they were so aggressively pushing cots down all the time it was warlike. You showed them a price on anything a notch higher than their expectations, they instantly turned their back and never ever even looked at it again. Everything is just click away and they have many choices.
I work for a $2 billion company and they use SS and used to use Istock. I asked them about Getty several times and their answer is always the same: why would I pay that much when I can get the same thing or better on SS?
This is the grave we dug ourselves. Without any doubt, they would gladly pay more, not probably the Getty or Corbis prices, but yes the pay per download microstock prices. But if people allows to sell their work for subs cents they take the opportunity, and image buying in his budget comes to 0,0001 %. Almost zero. Probably, they spend more paying the person who cleans the toilets.
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This is actually great news for people who create similar content for microstock sites.
On the other hand, anyone who thinks they can kinda 'force' buyers to pay more by some business judo move, in the current environment will be severely dissappointed, I can assure you of that. I worked at several BTL / ATL agencies, often next to the actual owners or ceos and in daily contact with marketing people. Even when they weren't squeezed nearly as bad as in the current economy, they were so aggressively pushing cots down all the time it was warlike. You showed them a price on anything a notch higher than their expectations, they instantly turned their back and never ever even looked at it again. Everything is just click away and they have many choices.
I work for a $2 billion company and they use SS and used to use Istock. I asked them about Getty several times and their answer is always the same: why would I pay that much when I can get the same thing or better on SS?
This is the grave we dug ourselves. Without any doubt, they would gladly pay more, not probably the Getty or Corbis prices, but yes the pay per download microstock prices. But if people allows to sell their work for subs cents they take the opportunity, and image buying in his budget comes to 0,0001 %. Almost zero.
They would pay more, they used to pay more when MS wasn't around. They are now conditioned to cheap imagery. Where we contributors get more hosed is the poor commissions from total those MS sales. As you state, the lower the prices go the less we make and most if not all MS sites compete on price, GL & P5 being the basic exceptions.
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This is good news for Getty and iStock, not so good news for other Exclusives who are subject to very restrictive rule that others appear to be exempt from.
If they made this 'image exclusive' deal available to everybody then I'm sure they could keep Exclusivity viable. Unfortunately falling sales numbers mean artist exclusivity will become uneconomical in the not too distant future, even if the return per download stays high.
He is taking his images off of all the microstock sites so it may not be that special of a deal in that regard. Also isn't it ok to have a business and personal account as long as similars and sisters aren't on both? His peopleimages site also might be changed to only images that he didn't create, I thought he had other photogs working there.
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I think it's quite ok with Yuri moving on, can't blame him.
He grew his company to a considerable size using several shooters, nice locations... the whole shebang.
His equipment and image quality is in most cases miles ahead compared to the average microstock shooter can produce with the "little" means they have.
Yuri is a businessman who decided to find a better home for his high cost production content and by nature this cannot be microstock. I can see that.
However, this has nothing to do with an "end of microstock". In fact it will open up better revenue again for top quality producers in microstock because many (micro) customers will not switch to Getty in order to buy Yuri's stuff so they have to look for comparable images from other contributors.
I think that's a good thing. It also takes the pressure off that we have to shoot with 60MP Hasselblads so we can sell those images at 25-38 cents at Shutterstock - which didn't make sense to me in the first place.
I don't see anything special happening. Yuri is going his way and besides some groupies screaming of joy that he joined "the herd", nothing, absolutely nothing else will change.
Good luck to him.
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This is good news for Getty and iStock, not so good news for other Exclusives who are subject to very restrictive rule that others appear to be exempt from.
If they made this 'image exclusive' deal available to everybody then I'm sure they could keep Exclusivity viable. Unfortunately falling sales numbers mean artist exclusivity will become uneconomical in the not too distant future, even if the return per download stays high.
He is taking his images off of all the microstock sites so it may not be that special of a deal in that regard. Also isn't it ok to have a business and personal account as long as similars and sisters aren't on both? His peopleimages site also might be changed to only images that he didn't create, I thought he had other photogs working there.
Hmm, do you think if you or I tried that 'business account' and 'personal account' trick to upload to multiple sites we'd last very long?
There's no getting round it, they change the rules to suit themselves whilst grinding the rest of us down.
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If it's a trick then it probably wouldn't work. He did say he's taking his images off the microstock sites and we haven't heard what is happening to his website so maybe he isn't really going to have images at multiple sites?
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blendimages has the exact same images on getty, their own site and even on shutterstock.
Getty also distributes files you send to them to many, many agencies, including corbis, master file, f1online etc...so having files only on getty is just not what getty does. They move the stuff around.
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blendimages has the exact same images on getty, their own site and even on shutterstock.
Getty also distributes files you send to them to many, many agencies, including corbis, master file, f1online etc...so having files only on getty is just not what getty does. They move the stuff around.
I don't think that's what fotovoyager was talking about. Doesn't anyone who contributes to Getty RF have their images put into different places?
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deleted
this should no longer be my concern
back to shooting and uploanding
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Right I'm saying that isn't a special deal that only Yuri gets anyone that contributes to Getty RF will have their work on different sites. I'm pretty sure fotovoyager was talking about peopleimages or some other site that Yuri directly contributes to.
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you guys keep missing the bus !
the world's top microstocker just announced he's leaving the boat before it sinks, if microstock was on Nasdaq it would lose 90% of its value in a day !
try to see the situation from a financial and technical analysis perspective, please.
the message is very clear here : he's got his own agency, he's selling his whole portfolio on dozens of different agencies, and he reached the conclusion that he's barely paying the bill considering his production costs and the meagre fees paid by micro agencies.
is the microstock business still sustainable if even Yuri cant stay in biz ? that's THE question, and his answer is NO !
Yuri was doing incredibly well. He boasted in an article that he was making millions each year. He wants to make even more. So Getty must have paid him or I don't think he would be doing this. So all your facts are wrong as usual. Just because you want Yuri to be barely paying the bill doesn't make it a fact. At any time he could of cut his costs to zero and just made millions each year from his portfolio for the rest of his life. He's obviously more ambitious than that.
If you wanted to have any idea about the financial side of this business, you would do some research and use some actual facts instead of just making up what you would like to happen.
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Yuri was doing incredibly well. He boasted in an article that he was making millions each year. He wants to make even more. So Getty must have paid him or I don't think he would be doing this. So all your facts are wrong as usual. Just because you want Yuri to be barely paying the bill doesn't make it a fact. At any time he could of cut his costs to zero and just made millions each year from his portfolio for the rest of his life. He's obviously more ambitious than that.
If you wanted to have any idea about the financial side of this business, you would do some research and use some actual facts instead of just making up what you would like to happen.
Hmmm. You say that but Yuri can't even afford to operate in his own country. He's had to leave his home in the idyllic country of Denmark (by many reports about the nicest place on earth to live) to set up shop in crime-ridden South Africa. By his own admission he can't afford the costs of doing business and paying taxes in Denmark.
Now he's even sold his soul to the devil and climbed into bed with Getty.
Wealth is supposed to bring freedom and choices isn't it? Seems to me that Yuri's 'wealth' has made him a prisoner of his own ambition and greed.
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I know people that live in South Africa and would never move to Denmark. Yuri wouldn't be the first person to move country to pay less tax. While I don't have the ambitious streak Yuri does, I wouldn't say he is a prisoner of his own ambition and greed. It looks to me that he really enjoys what he is doing and that's the most important thing. If he ever gets bored, he can close everything down and live off his portfolio. I'd love to be in that position.
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If we are touting prognostication powers, I'm nominating Cobalt...
It is very interesting news for independents and maybe people with very special content can now make deals with getty to have their content placed even higher than before.
I'm wondering if that is the real future. As contributors pull away, will these sites have to invite them back through side deals? If so, my phone is available for calls. ;D
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If he ever gets bored, he can close everything down and live off his portfolio.
Like most stock photos of people his portfolio, if frozen, would have a relatively limited shelf life. Styles change quickly. Not just the fashions. He is a bright guy so I would expect to see him start producing work with a completely different look and feel.
I think it is sad the amount of nastiness and silly speculation which his move has generated here. Well played and good luck would be a much nicer reaction.
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Anyone who hoped Yuri will, could, would do anything with his market power to support the contributor community will be sorely disappointed.
sorry but Yuri was never there for community (ever), its all about show off, getting the best deal and of course distract all competition so he can carry on shooting/uploading to iStock etc etc
you can see many top contributors regularly posting here and actually doing something for microstock not Yuri, kudos to them!
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you guys keep missing the bus !
the world's top microstocker just announced he's leaving the boat before it sinks, if microstock was on Nasdaq it would lose 90% of its value in a day !
try to see the situation from a financial and technical analysis perspective, please.
the message is very clear here : he's got his own agency, he's selling his whole portfolio on dozens of different agencies, and he reached the conclusion that he's barely paying the bill considering his production costs and the meagre fees paid by micro agencies.
is the microstock business still sustainable if even Yuri cant stay in biz ? that's THE question, and his answer is NO !
Actually, I don't see this as a repudiation of microstock. I see it as a repudiation of the factory production model in microstock.
When microstock began, it was small, individual contributors with low production costs, producing a few thousand images at most. The appeal was the low cost and the variety that all those small individual portfolios together provided.
At the time, the big players with high production values were in RM and macro RF, where they belonged. Buyers who wanted that level of images understood they had to pay a premium for them. Microstock was for the buyers who just wanted "good enough" at a low price.
Huge factories like Yuri, Monkeybusiness, etc. upset the balance for everybody, by flooding the micro market with tens of thousands of images that probably didn't belong at that price point in the first place. And Yuri has obviously discovered that YURI's production model doesn't work for micro. I expect Cathy Yeulet, Andres Rodriquez, and maybe a few other big factories will eventually come to the same conclusion.
Perhaps after this period of rebalancing occurs, the market will settle back to mass produced HPV images being sold at high prices, and LPV, inexpensive images by mom & pop producers will once again dominate the micro sites.
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"if microstock was on Nasdaq it would lose 90% of its value in a day !"
Lets see what happens to Shutterstock shares on Monday. If you are that confident you could short sell and make $$$$$$s somehow I suspect you wont be doing that
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Perhaps after this period of rebalancing occurs, the market will settle back to mass produced HPV images being sold at high prices, and LPV, inexpensive images by mom & pop producers will once again dominate the micro sites.
10 years ago when the microstock boom began things were very different. There was a huge demand for cheap images because so many new and existing companies were coming online for the first time. Plus a whole new market supplying small community publishing and cheap marketing. And there were relatively few people supplying microstock initially. That boom in cheap content ended relatively soon after the financial bubble burst. Most of the internet gets its pictures for free today thanks to phone cameras.
SS have performed well against that trend probably be taking business from other sites and certainly by spending lots on advertising. But I cannot see that there is much room to grow the market for content with lower production values when that content is competing with free. Low paying customers are expensive to service.
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Perhaps after this period of rebalancing occurs, the market will settle back to mass produced HPV images being sold at high prices, and LPV, inexpensive images by mom & pop producers will once again dominate the micro sites.
10 years ago when the microstock boom began things were very different. There was a huge demand for cheap images because so many new and existing companies were coming online for the first time. Plus a whole new market supplying small community publishing and cheap marketing. And there were relatively few people supplying microstock initially. That boom in cheap content ended relatively soon after the financial bubble burst. Most of the internet gets its pictures for free today thanks to phone cameras.
SS have performed well against that trend probably be taking business from other sites and certainly by spending lots on advertising. But I cannot see that there is much room to grow the market for content with lower production values when that content is competing with free. Low paying customers are expensive to service.
By LPV, I don't mean cr@p. Obviously images that sell for any money at all will have to be better than free stuff, but that's a pretty low bar and one that most microstock producers already surpass.
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By LPV, I don't mean cr@p. Obviously images that sell for any money at all will have to be better than free stuff, but that's a pretty low bar and one that most microstock producers already surpass.
I don't mean cr@p free! Sure it is sometimes difficult to find great content on the free stock sites like sxc.hu (even that has some good content - we used a great image from there yesterday FWIW !). But there is also the whole world of great camera phone images. Lots more people are sharing great pics than 10 years ago.
Today much more of the web is using free content. And lots of businesses no longer especially maintain their websites having switched to FB and Twitter where the content is often supplied by their users. We also rarely see junk print mail these days. The market for cheap content is in decline IMO.
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I think FLICKR more than Yuri has something to do with the death of subscription microstock as we know it (if there is any death at all)
Getty now is able to offer clients more than SS, they offer expensive stuff, medium cost images, cheap crap, subscriptions and more in one portal.
The only reason IMO lot of people preferred SS was because huge content, IS could not offer then a subscription site as big as SS.
Now Getty in filling TS and Photos.com of content.
Getty through IS created a way contributors get compensation depending quality and exclusivity.
SS ignored any other way of offering content beside micro price subscription, and I think it was a big mistake.
I think what Yuri saw when signed with getty was more income and more exposure, if someone knows today about Microstock and stock in general is mr accurs.
He is just surrendering to the evident.
The model is changing, not dying, IMO
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The market for cheap content is in decline IMO.
curiously SS grows "every 4 months"
if the market for cheap content is declining, is the market for expensive content growing?
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other than reading other peoples' opinions about Yuri, I've had very few of my own about him. I don't know him. but this move speaks volumes, about the industry, about Getty and about greed versus principle.
Yuri, this seems like kind of a "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground". to each his own I guess.
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other than reading other peoples' opinions about Yuri, I've had very few of my own about him. I don't know him. but this move speaks volumes, about the industry, about Getty and about greed versus principle.
Yuri, this seems like kind of a "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground". to each his own I guess.
I think it's a business decision, he thinks he can make more money with Getty than on the sub sites. Why does it have to be more complicated than that? It would be pretty crazy for him to choose to make less money so he can say "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground".
And what's this talk about principle? Is it more principled to license your work through 50 different agencies including Istock and Getty rather than just through Istock and Getty.
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1) "Hmm... that pic I wanted of a doctor next to a smiling patient is gone from (insert agency name here)... oh wait, there are several hundred just like it. I'll buy one of those."
+1
And just think of the server disc space that will be freed up at the microstocks, once Arcurs and a couple other big players are gone. :)
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other than reading other peoples' opinions about Yuri, I've had very few of my own about him. I don't know him. but this move speaks volumes, about the industry, about Getty and about greed versus principle.
Yuri, this seems like kind of a "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground". to each his own I guess.
I think it's a business decision, he thinks he can make more money with Getty than on the sub sites. Why does it have to be more complicated than that? It would be pretty crazy for him to choose to make less money so he can say "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground".
And what's this talk about principle? Is it more principled to license your work through 50 different agencies including Istock and Getty rather than just through Istock and Getty.
I agree. It is hard to say what the deal was and if any of us wouldn't have made the same deal if it was offered to us. I can't blame anybody for making decisions that they think are in the best interests of their own business.
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The market for cheap content is in decline IMO.
curiously SS grows "every 4 months"
if the market for cheap content is declining, is the market for expensive content growing?
Post 2008 ( + 18 appx months for the effects to be realised) I strongly suspect that SS have done well by taking customers from other sites rather than by growing the market. I suspect they have won that business by spending heavily on advertising. And not all of their content is cheap anyhow. I also suspect that at least one company have at least partially decided that low paying customers are too expensive to service, or certainly too expensive to chase.
Is the market for expensive content growing ? I think that a market for somewhat more expensive better quality content is growing yes. Still much less expensive than bespoke content and still relatively much less expensive than stock cost before micro. I think that people producing great work probably expect to sell less often for more. (Which is partly why I think Stocksy is looking good).
I suspect that a subs market for high production value content is unsustainable.
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There's one issue I'd like clarified. Yuri indicates microstock no longer fits with his work/production model and he's going to remove all images from microstock and going with GI. Well and good, but the last time I looked, IS was a microstock agency. He doesn't mention anything about IS specifically, so the question would be will all of his images be removed from IS and only available on GI? He also states that his main beef is with the subscription model. Since IS has no subscriptions (yet anyway), does this mean he's OK with having his GI content mirrored on IS, even though it's microstock?
Just a clarification question (among many, many others).
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it would be interesting to see if any other big players will follow yuri.
one thing does not match with what Yuri wrote here about cost of producing images in order in stay microstock, couple of years ago he wrote production for him was becoming very cheap
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other than reading other peoples' opinions about Yuri, I've had very few of my own about him. I don't know him. but this move speaks volumes, about the industry, about Getty and about greed versus principle.
Yuri, this seems like kind of a "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground". to each his own I guess.
I think it's a business decision, he thinks he can make more money with Getty than on the sub sites. Why does it have to be more complicated than that? It would be pretty crazy for him to choose to make less money so he can say "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground".
And what's this talk about principle? Is it more principled to license your work through 50 different agencies including Istock and Getty rather than just through Istock and Getty.
So, are you saying that contributors who license only through Getty and iStock are more principled than those who license through multiple sites? If so, it sounds a little like an 'I'm better than you' philosophy....
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The market for cheap content is in decline IMO.
curiously SS grows "every 4 months"
if the market for cheap content is declining, is the market for expensive content growing?
Post 2008 ( + 18 appx months for the effects to be realised) I strongly suspect that SS have done well by taking customers from other sites rather than by growing the market. I suspect they have won that business by spending heavily on advertising. And not all of their content is cheap anyhow. I also suspect that at least one company have at least partially decided that low paying customers are too expensive to service, or certainly too expensive to chase.
Is the market for expensive content growing ? I think that a market for somewhat more expensive better quality content is growing yes. Still much less expensive than bespoke content and still relatively much less expensive than stock cost before micro. I think that people producing great work probably expect to sell less often for more. (Which is partly why I think Stocksy is looking good).
I suspect that a subs market for high production value content is unsustainable.
Sean reported a 96% drop (from April 2012) so don't tell me Stocksy is "the thing" of the future and buyers are crazy about that type of model
what chances of surviving do you think "agencies" like Stocksy have comparing to a very well establish SS?
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stocksy is a special niche content agency and it is very, very early stages. Bruce has come up with a clever model and is not planning to add 30 000 photographers and 30 million images.
The world is very big place and I am very confident that stocksy will find itīs niche in the global market.
Think of trendy expensive organic food stores. They exist inspite of walmart.
Also I think stocksy is so different, it cannot really be compared to the regular agencies. Itīs just another world. Like Photocase is another planet all itīs own.
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other than reading other peoples' opinions about Yuri, I've had very few of my own about him. I don't know him. but this move speaks volumes, about the industry, about Getty and about greed versus principle.
Yuri, this seems like kind of a "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground". to each his own I guess.
I think it's a business decision, he thinks he can make more money with Getty than on the sub sites. Why does it have to be more complicated than that? It would be pretty crazy for him to choose to make less money so he can say "screw you rest of the industry, now I'm the king of the playground".
And what's this talk about principle? Is it more principled to license your work through 50 different agencies including Istock and Getty rather than just through Istock and Getty.
So, are you saying that contributors who license only through Getty and iStock are more principled than those who license through multiple sites? If so, it sounds a little like an 'I'm better than you' philosophy....
Nope I said people who sell through 50 sites including Getty and Istock are not more principled than people who sell through just Getty and Istock. You don't get more principled the more sites you license your images on, that's all. Like I said it's a business decision and not about principle at all, whatever that's supposed to mean in this context.
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stocksy is a special niche content agency and it is very, very early stages. Bruce has come up with a clever model and is not planning to add 30 000 photographers and 30 million images.
The world is very big place and I am very confident that stocksy will find itīs niche in the global market.
Think of trendy expensive organic food stores. They exist inspite of walmart.
not to mention it is a business model that has the long-term health of its suppliers in mind as a priority
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Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
Sadly we have much more speculation than fact..
Yuri is very specific - his distribution partner is Getty, not iStock; and there's no reference to any form of exclusivity. The confounding factor is his portfolio on iStock. Just a guess, but could it be that Getty is placing some of Yuri's images there with Yuri's permission, as long as Getty pays royalties based on Getty prices and rates?
Yuri has the advantage of knowing what happened to Sean and other Getty contributors, and I'm going to bet he took that into account in negotiating his contract - Yuri just doesn't seem to be a dunce.
It's hard to believe his production costs in South Africa are high in comparison with other locations. Just go check the ZAR/Euro and ZAR/USD exchange rates (per www.oanda.com (http://www.oanda.com) today, US$1.00 gets more than ZAR9.3, and EUR1.0 gets more than ZAR 11.9). There are lots of very capable people there who are not fully employed, if employed at all; they are much more likely to be self-employed. Importantly, I would expect them to be paid in ZAR, so even if Yuri has been generous, the cost is most likely not that high in international terms. Is there any reliable and publicly available information on Yuri's actual costs, or the financial condition of his enterprise?
Regards
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I can't imagine Yuri would forgo the earnings from other sites just for the convenience of only having one agent and 20%, so I can only presume he must have negotiated a special percentage rate higher than the 20% offered to other 'special exclusives'.
I certainly don't blame him for accepting a generous deal even if it is with the devil.
Not sure why such generous terms and open exclusivity arrangements shouldn't be open to all though. It's not like it's a unique portfolio or full of rare, hard to obtain images, just lots of really great people images. If only there was a site that specialised in that.
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I can't imagine Yuri would forgo the earnings from other sites just for the convenience of only having one agent and 20%, so I can only presume he must have negotiated a special percentage rate higher than the 20% offered to other 'special exclusives'.
maybe he won't get royalties anymore but a fat check every month (beside the one before joining this special exclusivity that allows him to be all around)
money talks and again Yuri got us talking about him for FREE :D
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Not sure why such generous terms and open exclusivity arrangements shouldn't be open to all though. It's not like it's a unique portfolio or full of rare, hard to obtain images, just lots of really great people images. If only there was a site that specialised in that.
exactly. why keep up the illusion of exclusivity?
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I'm not sure that many of you have been to Cape Town? There are many more reasons why a stock photographer would want to move to Cape Town other than an exchange rate - which is a pretty bum way of measuring the cost of doing business all things considered.
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I can't imagine Yuri would forgo the earnings from other sites just for the convenience of only having one agent and 20%, so I can only presume he must have negotiated a special percentage rate higher than the 20% offered to other 'special exclusives'.
I certainly don't blame him for accepting a generous deal even if it is with the devil.
Not sure why such generous terms and open exclusivity arrangements shouldn't be open to all though. It's not like it's a unique portfolio or full of rare, hard to obtain images, just lots of really great people images. If only there was a site that specialised in that.
I guess it all depends on who wanted or needed the deal more. What if Istock and Getty have both been haemorrhaging sales/customers/revenue for several months or quarters? If content is king then gaining the exclusive services of "the world's most popular microstock photographer" might boost sales and also help justify their prices. Under such circumstances I could certainly imagine non-standard terms being offered.
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it would be interesting to see if any other big players will follow yuri.
I think the key here will be that Yuri became a "Getty Exclusive" not an "Istock Exclusive". It'll be like a couple of the other distribution houses Getty made deals with that get to place content on IS as "exclusive" but get to continue selling through their original brand/channel. I'll bet People Images stays.
So, what are the implications? A windfall for Yuri, and congrats to him! Next, if it pulls high quality content off of subs sites and low price point sites, it is good for mid-stock, Stocksy, and higher priced collections at agencies. Probably good for micro contributors too easing the need to compete against his factory at the lower price points.
What else? It appears to shaft established exclusives at IS by watering down that exclusive label yet again. Establishes that anyone can be exclusive but some are more exclusive than others. And, seems to suggest that if you want a sweet deal like Yuri (or the other "Getty Exclusives" got), that IS exclusivity may be a shackle to be shed before you can make a deal with Getty. Few people probably have the clout, but some do. And if some banded together... for example, imagine 4 or 5 of the top ten contributors making a new "brand" to negotiate a similar type of deal with 40k-50k of top quality/selling files as leverage.
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The market for cheap content is in decline IMO.
curiously SS grows "every 4 months"
if the market for cheap content is declining, is the market for expensive content growing?
They mostly grow in revenue due to the introduction of OD, and later single downloads, special sensitive downloads etc... I wouldn't say its in market share, I'm not sure
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This is a huge blow for Shuttterstock and the subs model, Yuri will have been watching his RPI like a hawk and I guess the figures didn't stack up against the production costs.
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I can't imagine Yuri would forgo the earnings from other sites just for the convenience of only having one agent and 20%, so I can only presume he must have negotiated a special percentage rate higher than the 20% offered to other 'special exclusives'.
I certainly don't blame him for accepting a generous deal even if it is with the devil.
Not sure why such generous terms and open exclusivity arrangements shouldn't be open to all though. It's not like it's a unique portfolio or full of rare, hard to obtain images, just lots of really great people images. If only there was a site that specialised in that.
I guess it all depends on who wanted or needed the deal more. What if Istock and Getty have both been haemorrhaging sales/customers/revenue for several months or quarters? If content is king then gaining the exclusive services of "the world's most popular microstock photographer" might boost sales and also help justify their prices. Under such circumstances I could certainly imagine non-standard terms being offered.
If I'm remmebering correctly, somewhere he said he was doing that because of Danish taxes. Correct me if I'm wrong.
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I'm not sure that many of you have been to Cape Town? There are many more reasons why a stock photographer would want to move to Cape Town other than an exchange rate - which is a pretty bum way of measuring the cost of doing business all things considered.
Know Cape Town quite well, but less well now than when I was much younger; have also contemplated moving there. As you point out, there are lots of reasons to go there as any kind of photographer. Spectacular place, very warm people, wonderful climate, some of the best wine in the world, to name a few.
I agree that exchange rates alone are not a good way to measure the cost of business, but in these circumstances it does seem to be relevant. Most of Yuri's cost to create content will surely be local, and most of his sales will be international - smart move, even with the exchange rate risk. I hope Yuri's very successful.
Anyway, I just think more fact would make this discussion more valuable.
Regards
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CapeTown doesnt look so cheap to me.
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Actually, I don't see this as a repudiation of microstock. I see it as a repudiation of the factory production model in microstock.
When microstock began, it was small, individual contributors with low production costs, producing a few thousand images at most. The appeal was the low cost and the variety that all those small individual portfolios together provided.
At the time, the big players with high production values were in RM and macro RF, where they belonged. Buyers who wanted that level of images understood they had to pay a premium for them. Microstock was for the buyers who just wanted "good enough" at a low price.
Huge factories like Yuri, Monkeybusiness, etc. upset the balance for everybody, by flooding the micro market with tens of thousands of images that probably didn't belong at that price point in the first place. And Yuri has obviously discovered that YURI's production model doesn't work for micro. I expect Cathy Yeulet, Andres Rodriquez, and maybe a few other big factories will eventually come to the same conclusion.
Perhaps after this period of rebalancing occurs, the market will settle back to mass produced HPV images being sold at high prices, and LPV, inexpensive images by mom & pop producers will once again dominate the micro sites.
the irony is Yuri and other "factories" are the ones who contribute to make microstock famous and by domino effect to "destroy" the old RM model which thanks god is still alive.
no idea if Yuri will stick being 100% RF or he's also entering RM but in any case he's very clear about this being a marketing and business decision and i'm sure it was his goal since launching PeopleImages, why else do you start an agency if not to be distributed by someone like Getty or Corbis ?
all the best agencies are with Getty, it wouldnt make any sense to do it in-house unless you've fat pockets and you know what you're doing but that would be OK for exclusive stuff or paparazzi or reportages, not for stock/RF with models !
i mean what he's selling is very commercial, it's not stuff you sell to Rex Features not it's going in art galleries, there was no other way than Getty or other big distributors and i cant understand why many here are complaining about, it's a business and he's a great businessman, he never pretended to be a great artist and there would be no point being into RF stock if you're an artist.
he's exactly where he belongs now, with Getty, and yes probably other major stockers will follow but since their portfolios are small i dont think they've any chance, PeopleImage has 100K images, that seems to be the minimum to join Getty as an agency unless you're specialized in a profitable niche.
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This is a huge blow for Shuttterstock and the subs model, Yuri will have been watching his RPI like a hawk and I guess the figures didn't stack up against the production costs.
the subs model only makes sense for leftover images or for stuff that is very very cheap to produce.
it's unthinkable professional images can be sold at such low prices.
unfortunately, this is the trend also in many other digital markets, in music for instance they dont even discuss anymore about prices being too low to make a living, they take for granted you can NOT make a living with it !
and same with journalism, blogging, ebooks and much more.
after all we're lucky.
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"if microstock was on Nasdaq it would lose 90% of its value in a day !"
Lets see what happens to Shutterstock shares on Monday. If you are that confident you could short sell and make $$$$$$s somehow I suspect you wont be doing that
SS is one of the rare cases where it would be wise to invest long term in my opinion (6-12 months).
they're the only ones delivering.
i dont think SS will lose anything from Yuri's announcement, for each one of his images they have dozens of copycats on sale, it's really a non issue for the buyers.
the issue is for micro photographers.
it's indeed a wake-up call.
agencies will never die, by all means they've all the critical mass to survive, it's the photographers who are paying the price to sustain the whole failed model.
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...and i'm sure it was his goal since launching PeopleImages, why else do you start an agency if not to be distributed by someone like Getty or Corbis ?
To make money with it and because you think you can sell your images better than the other sites do. You also don't have to conform to the whim of the day. That's why I started my own. That is why I continue to run it (because I proved all of those things true). If distribution deals come along, that's an added bonus. But, I wouldn't think it would be the sole purpose for starting a site.
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SS seems to be the only place where Yuri has no longer files which must have been the main request by Getty (all other its fine), that shows their fear of SS and the desperation of selling
interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
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SS seems to be the only place where Yuri has no longer files which must have been the main request by Getty (all other its fine), that shows their fear of SS and the desperation of selling
interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
I would imagine that it is the easiest place to remove files. You just hit the off switch. That and if his issue was with subs, then it's the biggest target too.
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"unfortunately, this is the trend also in many other digital markets, in music for instance they dont even discuss anymore about prices being too low to make a living, they take for granted you can NOT make a living with it !"
The market is quite different - you don't pay more for "premium" content its often less. The music biz now seems to make more from live music I'm not sure there is a photographic equivalent. Some female singer whose name escapes me has just shifted more albums than the Beatles so doesn't sound that bad!
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SS seems to be the only place where Yuri has no longer files which must have been the main request by Getty (all other its fine), that shows their fear of SS and the desperation of selling
interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
I would imagine that it is the easiest place to remove files. You just hit the off switch. That and if his issue was with subs, then it's the biggest target too.
Agreed, Shutterstock is the only site with a main breaker switch to turn the lights off. All other sites require an image by image deactivation or at least an email sent to someone in the office to disable the account on the back end.
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All other sites require an image by image deactivation or at least an email sent to someone in the office to disable the account on the back end.
True, and I imagine the other sites, particularly the biggies are going to be pi$$ed (angry, not drunk ;) ). I doubt they will make it as easy for Yuri as writing an e-mail to get the portfolio removed.
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interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
Where are you seeing that?
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interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
Where are you seeing that?
aren't you seeing his files everywhere? ::)
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interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
Where are you seeing that?
aren't you seeing his files everywhere? ::)
I don't see exclusives being very happy about his different treatment.
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Everybody is guessing. Only Yuri and Getty know the truth and no one will ever know what the deal is
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Since IS has no subscriptions (yet anyway), does this mean he's OK with having his GI content mirrored on IS, even though it's microstock?
iS does have subscriptions, but not as dirt cheap as elsewhere (which is fine by me!) and apparently not as successful.
http://www.istockphoto.com/help/buy-credits/subscriptions (http://www.istockphoto.com/help/buy-credits/subscriptions)
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Good luck Yuri! That is a huge move and you should be seriously proud of all you have accomplished!
I am assuming that this means Getty has purchased People Images from you and I am hoping that also means that you will be able to open up shop for other shooters now.
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interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
Where are you seeing that?
aren't you seeing his files everywhere? ::)
I don't see exclusives being very happy about his different treatment.
I was being sarcastic....
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interesting to see how exclusives can't have a single file anywhere (except RM), believe they must be very happy about this different treatment
Where are you seeing that?
aren't you seeing his files everywhere? ::)
I don't see exclusives being very happy about his different treatment.
I was being sarcastic....
Sorry. :-[
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Since IS has no subscriptions (yet anyway), does this mean he's OK with having his GI content mirrored on IS, even though it's microstock?
iS does have subscriptions, but not as dirt cheap as elsewhere (which is fine by me!) and apparently not as successful.
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/help/buy-credits/subscriptions[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/help/buy-credits/subscriptions[/url])
I knew Thinkstock had them but was unaware that Istock had them as well. Has this been around forever or is it a relatively new addition? Not sure how I overlooked it.
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Since IS has no subscriptions (yet anyway), does this mean he's OK with having his GI content mirrored on IS, even though it's microstock?
iS does have subscriptions, but not as dirt cheap as elsewhere (which is fine by me!) and apparently not as successful.
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/help/buy-credits/subscriptions[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/help/buy-credits/subscriptions[/url])
I knew Thinkstock had them but was unaware that Istock had them as well. Has this been around forever or is it a relatively new addition? Not sure how I overlooked it.
It's been a few years, but I can't remember exactly.
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May 2008
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=67639 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=67639)
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May 2008
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=67639[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=67639[/url])
Wow Joanne:
1. Your search skills are good.
2. Time flies, I'd have guessed 2010 if pushed.
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Thanks Liz :)
This is the search string to look through forum messages via Google
site:istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php subscriptions
You can sort by date but what I was looking for was on the first page, so no need to
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however you paint this story, Yuri did the math and finally realized there's more money to be made selling on Getty than selling on 50+ micro agencies together.
or at least that's the case with the contract he signed as he will probably earn 30-40% from each sale + eventual bonuses.
moral of the story : the slice of the pie for random microstockers is getting smaller and smaller and it will be soon game over in 2-3 years from now.
the only ones surviving in this mess will be the few ones able to cut costs to the bone preserving a "good enough" quality, but it's gonna be a survival job, nobody will get rich with that.
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"unfortunately, this is the trend also in many other digital markets, in music for instance they dont even discuss anymore about prices being too low to make a living, they take for granted you can NOT make a living with it !"
The market is quite different - you don't pay more for "premium" content its often less. The music biz now seems to make more from live music I'm not sure there is a photographic equivalent. Some female singer whose name escapes me has just shifted more albums than the Beatles so doesn't sound that bad!
it's a totally different market and thanks god i've nothing to do with it anymore, actually when i was there we were still printing on vinyl and making good returns, now it's all gone to the dogs.
stock is doomed to stay where it belongs, ironically you've more chances of being discovered by an art gallerist with your images on Flickr or Instagram than on stock agencies.
and art galleries are a whole different mafia too, if you think stock is bad try the art market !
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however you paint this story, Yuri did the math and finally realized there's more money to be made selling on Getty than selling on 50+ micro agencies together.
or at least that's the case with the contract he signed as he will probably earn 30-40% from each sale + eventual bonuses.
moral of the story : the slice of the pie for random microstockers is getting smaller and smaller and it will be soon game over in 2-3 years from now.
the only ones surviving in this mess will be the few ones able to cut costs to the bone preserving a "good enough" quality, but it's gonna be a survival job, nobody will get rich with that.
Isn't the slice of the microstock pie getting bigger for random microstockers because the factories are moving on ?
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however you paint this story, Yuri did the math and finally realized there's more money to be made selling on Getty than selling on 50+ micro agencies together.
for his cost base.
I have other work and I don't rely on stock on as much job, but my costs are very low: I've got all the gear that my humble work requires, and I use each new paid assignment for the magazine I work for or commercial clients as my next stock shoot. For me the shoots don't really cost me anything, and most of the time I've been paid already to hand over half a dozen shots to the client, and I just shoot as many more as I feel necessary.
edit:
I have to also ask you why you are here, if you hate microstock so much? Is it just to crow with glee whenever something awful happens? It's called Schadenfreude, isn't it?
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I guess it all depends on who wanted or needed the deal more. What if Istock and Getty have both been haemorrhaging sales/customers/revenue for several months or quarters? If content is king then gaining the exclusive services of "the world's most popular microstock photographer" might boost sales and also help justify their prices. Under such circumstances I could certainly imagine non-standard terms being offered.
This move by Yuri gives me the feeling that our whole effort on 2nd February (D-Day against Google Drive Deal) was completely in vain. I deleted 1000 files that day to make a statement to both Getty and Istock. To me, Yuri's move to Getty/IS means we lost that battle, even more than IS ignoring our effort.
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I deleted 1000 files
he uploaded 636
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WOW... I mean WOW.... Yuri is the first high volume producer who gets tired to receive $0.38 for a high resolution image. I hope this is a wake up call for the entire industry.
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I deleted 1000 files
he uploaded 636
And what will happen to the 60,000+ images he's taking down from the other microstock sites?
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I think too many conclusions are being drawn on the basis of inadequate and possibly misleading information. Obviously Yuri didn't spontaneously decide to go exclusive and therefore he has received a sweetener, which, considering the scale of his operation, must amount to a lot of money.
So I wouldn't be drawing any conclusions about the health or otherwise of microstock.
And, by the way, I live in Cape Town. It is anything but a hellhole. I'd far rather be here than in Denmark, regardless of costs.
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And, by the way, I live in Cape Town. It is anything but a hellhole. I'd far rather be here than in Denmark, regardless of costs.
All due respects, but if you grow up living in a cage you can't see the fact you're in a cage. Granted CT isn't anywhere near as bad a Jo'berg but seriously, you've seen how the rest of us live, right? My family in JB can't even go to the loo in the middle of the night cos they have alarms everywhere. I guess you just get used to the fact that you can't randomly take fish n chips to the park, enjoy a bottle of wine and laze about while your children run around...
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Yuris father wrote on the SS forum saying he is leaving too. He mentioned yuri had 3-4000 dls a day
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I'm sure anyone of us would do the same thing if you would be offered a good deal, regardless whether you hate IS for the Google deal or not. It's not like you're selling your soul to the devil although some probably would think so.
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I'm sure anyone of us would do the same thing if you would be offered a good deal, regardless whether you hate IS for the Google deal or not. It's not like you're selling your soul to the devil although some probably would think so.
Yuri is not concerned for the community. He's probably managed an opt out of these deals, or special payment or only nominated files or suchlike. He came on here to ask about his spectacles case then never fed back the outcome of his legal discussions with the Italians; though as he is still using these photos, I assume that means it was all sorted out.
Just what Getty wants, a high seller who won't rock the boat about their dubious practices, so long as he's OK. And from his pov, why should he, in the short term at least.
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WOW... I mean WOW.... Yuri is the first high volume producer who gets tired to receive $0.38 for a high resolution image. I hope this is a wake up call for the entire industry.
Yes and he went to get cozy with the people who gave away pics basically for free, making backroom deal(s) on the copyright owners property without't even bothering to tell them about it...
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Yuris father wrote on the SS forum saying he is leaving too. He mentioned yuri had 3-4000 dls a day
Can anyone trust that? SS forums have more attention seeking creep(ier) lunatics than crossdressers' board. : )
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Isn't the slice of the microstock pie getting bigger for random microstockers because the factories are moving on ?
yes, at least for a while, but not for long.
there must be an army of copycats and imitators with a big smile in their face now at the idea that Yuri's images will suddenly disappear in a few weeks.
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All due respects, but if you grow up living in a cage you can't see the fact you're in a cage. Granted CT isn't anywhere near as bad a Jo'berg but seriously, you've seen how the rest of us live, right? My family in JB can't even go to the loo in the middle of the night cos they have alarms everywhere. I guess you just get used to the fact that you can't randomly take fish n chips to the park, enjoy a bottle of wine and laze about while your children run around...
after all even Pistorius was sleeping with a rifle under his pillow and he ended up gunning down his own wife !
looks like a very safe place eh ! ?
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SS forums have more attention seeking creep(ier) lunatics than crossdressers' board. : )
I'm not actually familiar with crossdressers' boards ... but I'll accept your expertise on them.
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for his cost base.
I have other work and I don't rely on stock on as much job, but my costs are very low: I've got all the gear that my humble work requires, and I use each new paid assignment for the magazine I work for or commercial clients as my next stock shoot. For me the shoots don't really cost me anything, and most of the time I've been paid already to hand over half a dozen shots to the client, and I just shoot as many more as I feel necessary.
edit:
I have to also ask you why you are here, if you hate microstock so much? Is it just to crow with glee whenever something awful happens? It's called Schadenfreude, isn't it?
well, to each his production costs !
like you i'm very money conscious, i would never fly models in and out of 5 stars hotels to shoot subs for micros but if he like to play work hard and play hard it's not my business, i wish him good luck.
micros : i'm a stocker, no matter if RF or RM, this is not a religious war or my personal crusade.
all i'm asking is for agencies to raise the bar and for buyers to pay a fair price.
of course i enjoy the occasional rants and raves, too bad they close down the old alamy forum, i must be one of the most banned stockers around ... their new forum is almost dead now.
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Paranoia knows no bounds for some people. I've never owned a gun, my children frolic in the park and I walk the streets of my suburb by day and by night. At the moment I'm on the beach with my kids in one of the most beautiful spots in the world.
Yes, crime is high here, and you'd best be prudent, but it's mostly confined to deprived areas and it's not the siege some people think it is. I lived in the UK for years and didn't feel dramatically freer or safer. Anyway, back to the topic ... I don't think Yuri is exactly suffering in reluctant exile here.
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And, by the way, I live in Cape Town. It is anything but a hellhole. I'd far rather be here than in Denmark, regardless of costs.
Perfectly right.
I lived in Cape Town for 19 years until 2010.
It is a beautiful country with stunning locations to shoot. It is full of models and the people are extremely kind.
All the conclusions with the exchange rate also doesn't really make sense. Cape Town isn't as cheap as most of the people here might think.
I now live in Austria, which is one of the more expensive countries in Europe and the price differences really aren't that big.
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So many different angles to see this from, but whatever - it's big news.
I wish Yuri and his team well, and certainly don't blame him for 'getting into bed' with Getty, or for using his clout to negotiate the best possible deal with them. Who wouldn't?
I totally agree that a Stocksy-type model would be good for all of us, but at the moment, fantastic though Stocksy looks, it's a 'boutique' model just now, with a carefully curated approach. A Stocksy type of co-op model but aimed towards a wider market would be a great development, but also a huge undertaking. Who knows though, maybe it'll happen in time. A company like that, not lumbered with massive imposed debts and a demanding profit-obsessed ownership could do great business.
Fair enough it's very early days since this was only flagged up on Friday, but it would be in iStock's best interests to at least be somewhat clear about what's going on, there is already so much uncertainty about what's going on there, covering everything in more dollops of what sauce won't be good for anyone, including iS/Getty.
But as well as thinking that Yuri's perfectly entitled to get the best deal that he can, I can't really blame iStock for bending the rules or creating a special case for Yuri, especially around other sites still hosting his work for a brief period. But at the same time, normal exclusives at iStock have played (and continue to play) an important role in the success of iStock, and if the integrity and rules of the exclusive system get more and more eroded and foggy, both customers and contributors are bound to get confused and maybe a little cynical.
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Yuris father wrote on the SS forum saying he is leaving too. He mentioned yuri had 3-4000 dls a day
Can anyone trust that? SS forums have more attention seeking creep(ier) lunatics than crossdressers' board. : )
And there are some over there that regard over here in exactly the same way.......prefix 'crossdressers' with 'psychotic'. ;D
As to Yuri, IMO he wants to move his business to the next level in terms of creation/creativity and he can't do that from micropayments. He's still a young man who is driven, hardworking and creative both artistically/technically and businesswise. (Call it boilerplate stock if you will but Yuri was one of the first to produce technically 'perfect' quality RF stock and in my book that is creative).
In any form of photostock, distribution is the big problem and GI is the biggest image distributor on the planet with tracking and enforcement to match. So, why not do a deal if the conditions are right and I'm sure they were. Big producers need big distributors and with one distributor you can define your sale price to ensure that you make the return sufficient to sustain and progress the business.
OTH, I could be completely wrong and Yuri is setting up to retire at the age of 35 or pursue other interests. ;)
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removed
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two entries on SS forum from Yuri's father
Well, now Yuri has left Shutterstock I can just as well reveal a few things. It is a long time ago since Yuri only had 1000 downloads a day at SS. A typical day at SS had between 3000-4000 downloads!! How do I know? Well, I introduced Yuri to SS. And I am Yuris dad - and very proud of my sonīs success!
By the way, Yuri is not the only one leaving SS. If you want to see my port, do it now. In some weeks it will be gone too! Time to say goodbye!
The best to all of you!
PS: Rinder99, thanks! You have always been fair to Yuri (and me) from the very beginning about 7-8 years ago.
Vista/Dhoxax
AND
Thanks for the nice words about my son Yuri (and my port)!
Why I leave too? Not so difficult to figure out really: I simply got an offer I could not refuse! Got It?
No, stock photography is only my hobby (though, a hobby with a nice income). In "real life" I work as an university professor and researcher.
The best to all of you!
Vista/Dhoxax .)
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to me it sounds like a super fake.
Yuri's father ? hahaha ....
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to me it sounds like a super fake.
Yuri's father ? hahaha ....
on that we agree, just that ;D
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stocksy is a special niche content agency and it is very, very early stages. Bruce has come up with a clever model and is not planning to add 30 000 photographers and 30 million images.
The world is very big place and I am very confident that stocksy will find itīs niche in the global market.
Think of trendy expensive organic food stores. They exist inspite of walmart.
but why so many of you guys are raving about Stocksy ?
first of all the founder is now a millionaire and his belly is full.
Stocksy is just his new playground, his new toy.
you say he's not seeking to make big money ? well and neither those joining Stocky will see any money then...
and in any case it's the deja-vu of Digital Railroad, a wannabe "boutique" agency, a sort of mid-stock, neither flesh nor fish.
as an analyst, i give him 12 months before crashing and burning, but since it's his personal toy he could keep it in artificial life for a few years just to boast around he's in the stock business and he runs an agency.
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This is a huge blow for Shuttterstock and the subs model, Yuri will have been watching his RPI like a hawk and I guess the figures didn't stack up against the production costs.
well, the emperor has no clothes !
finally someone put the money where his mouth is.
in a healthy economy subs should be just for low-earning images, leftovers, backgrounds, and anything requiring low production costs.
now the experiment is over and many others will reach Yuri's conclusions causing a domino effect.
as much as he discovered hot water, many like me were saying the same things since the last decade just to be called trolls, banned, and bla bla bla.
let's face it, this forum is quite extremist, it's run on untouchable dogmas rather than being a place for discussion, either you're in or you're out.
all i can say is .. subs are probably the last thing that will remain out of microstock in the long term, say 5-10 yrs from now.
but only agencies are going to make any profit from it.
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The world is very big place and I am very confident that stocksy will find itīs niche in the global market.
I wouldn't trust my dad that much :D
the only sites I trust are the ones I am running myself..
in my opinion, stocksy is a lost case already..
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As to Yuri, IMO he wants to move his business to the next level in terms of creation/creativity and he can't do that from micropayments.
it's a creative job, but nothing to do with ART.
he's on F1.4 primes, light walls, fake smiles, fake models, fake everything, perfect stuff for generic advertising, but nothing you couldn't find before in any RM agency honestly.
i'm not into that sort of stuff, i would puke at the idea, but he can easily sell 100x times more than me so i don't blame him and i respect him, to each his own, i'll be the own begging for money, not him.
and i think one of the very reasons for him to move upscale is that Getty allows a lot more creativity than micros.
many photos that would be rejected at IS or SS could sell once for a lot of money on getty, 100s or 1000s of dollars.
at this point there's no other level he can push his business apart quantity.
his direct competitors are now the other lifestyle agencies under getty, that's his new playfield.
i'm sure one day he'll regret having wasted time with micros, mark my words.
or maybe, considering his attitude, he'll pat himself on the shoulder and claim to having joined micro at the right time and left it at the right time.
well, i disgress, if he was good enough from the start he had to join getty from the start but it's not my business to judge his business.
as an RM guy i'm glad he came back home, so to speak.
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in my opinion, stocksy is a lost case already..
their timing is bad.
anything else is ok, and they've millions in the bank.
it's not a matter of bad execution or bad business plan.
it's alright from that perspective.
but the timing .. it's 2013 ... SS is the king of the hill, public company, millions at stake, the cheapest prices ever seen, bla bla bla.
how do they plan to compete in such an environment ? where exactly do they plan to set their market niche ? would the next Yuri Arcurs join them, and why ?
so far, it's just "vaporware".
even Tony Stone some time ago launched his micro agency or whatever, just to be never heard again, can't even remeber the name of the agency actually and we're talking of Tony Stone the "father" of stock photography !!!
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Firstly, someone needs to put up a Downfall parody. You know, the one where Hitler is really angry to hear that Yuri Arcus has defected to Getty. Please make it so.
Secondly, I am rather hoping that the rest of Yuri's family will now decloak, coming out from behind their avatars and revealing their true identities.
we're talking of Tony Stone the "father" of stock photography !!!
Oh.
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Secondly, I am rather hoping that the rest of Yuri's family will now decloak, coming out from behind their avatars and revealing their true identities.
;D ;D ;D ;D
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two entries on SS forum from Yuri's father
Well, now Yuri has left Shutterstock I can just as well reveal a few things. It is a long time ago since Yuri only had 1000 downloads a day at SS. A typical day at SS had between 3000-4000 downloads!! How do I know? Well, I introduced Yuri to SS. And I am Yuris dad - and very proud of my sonīs success!
By the way, Yuri is not the only one leaving SS. If you want to see my port, do it now. In some weeks it will be gone too! Time to say goodbye!
The best to all of you!
PS: Rinder99, thanks! You have always been fair to Yuri (and me) from the very beginning about 7-8 years ago.
Vista/Dhoxax
AND
Thanks for the nice words about my son Yuri (and my port)!
Why I leave too? Not so difficult to figure out really: I simply got an offer I could not refuse! Got It?
No, stock photography is only my hobby (though, a hobby with a nice income). In "real life" I work as an university professor and researcher.
The best to all of you!
Vista/Dhoxax .)
I bet Yuri had a Star Wars moment when he read that posts - "I am your father!" *chhhhh*
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Xanox has made me realise something. I could be full of joy if I made up a war in my head each day and then decided I'd won it.
I'm gonna try that... :)
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the cheap Cape Town ;)
(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2cPFTbufx2w/UZjyDtKjorI/AAAAAAAABxY/x1IJyBliyyc/s1600/cape.JPG)
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As to Yuri, IMO he wants to move his business to the next level in terms of creation/creativity and he can't do that from micropayments.
it's a creative job, but nothing to do with ART.
he's on F1.4 primes, light walls, fake smiles, fake models, fake everything, perfect stuff for generic advertising, but nothing you couldn't find before in any RM agency honestly.
i'm not into that sort of stuff, i would puke at the idea, but he can easily sell 100x times more than me so i don't blame him and i respect him, to each his own, i'll be the own begging for money, not him.
and i think one of the very reasons for him to move upscale is that Getty allows a lot more creativity than micros.
many photos that would be rejected at IS or SS could sell once for a lot of money on getty, 100s or 1000s of dollars.
at this point there's no other level he can push his business apart quantity.
his direct competitors are now the other lifestyle agencies under getty, that's his new playfield.
i'm sure one day he'll regret having wasted time with micros, mark my words.
or maybe, considering his attitude, he'll pat himself on the shoulder and claim to having joined micro at the right time and left it at the right time.
well, i disgress, if he was good enough from the start he had to join getty from the start but it's not my business to judge his business.
as an RM guy i'm glad he came back home, so to speak.
Did I mention ART? Nope. Creation/creativity has myriad forms and not necessarily anything to do with 'art'. And as to whether Yuri will look on back on microstock with regret.....I doubt it cos GI doesn't do deals with nonentities. Need to get their attention first; level the negotiating playing field a little before a mutually beneficial discussion can be initiated and Yuri has certainly done that.
You only negotiate with 'the suits' from a position of strength......no free lunch when they've already eaten you for breakfast.
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Xanox I think you and others who you refer to are not being banned or called troll for what you say but how you say it. In a normal discussion no one gets banned for having an opinion
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The world is very big place and I am very confident that stocksy will find itīs niche in the global market.
I wouldn't trust my dad that much :D
the only sites I trust are the ones I am running myself..
in my opinion, stocksy is a lost case already..
I think the thing about Stocksy is there seems to be a push in the market for these higher priced curated collections. First, you had Vetta. Now, Stocksy and Offset is right on the heels of that. Maybe these agencies are trying to manufacture the demand for this, but I'm more inclined to believe that the demand already exists.
The second thing about Stocksy is the people around it. It has an impressive group of contributors that believe in it. I know I've seen first hand how believing in an agency or site and putting all your efforts into it can make a huge difference. So, I can't underestimate contributors working hard to make an agency grow.
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to me it sounds like a super fake.
Yuri's father ? hahaha ....
on that we agree, just that ;D
Oh well - everybody always just seems to want to read their own words. If you donīt know, why write?
Dhoxax IS Yuriīs father.
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to me it sounds like a super fake.
Yuri's father ? hahaha ....
on that we agree, just that ;D
Oh well - everybody always just seems to want to read their own words. If you donīt know, why write?
Dhoxax IS Yuriīs father.
Dhoxax has the same images in his port as Steen Wackerhausen does over on Stock Fresh (so they appear to be the same person). According to the wikipedia (I know, I know), Steen Wackerhausen is Yuri's father. I am sure someone better at Google reseach can dig more correlations out than me.
https://stockfresh.com/gallery/StonyArt (https://stockfresh.com/gallery/StonyArt)
http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-uVista.html (http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-uVista.html)
Of course, for all I know, "Wackerhausen" is as common of a name in Danish as "Smith" is in the states and its just a coincidence. But it seems legit on the surface.
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Firstly, someone needs to put up a Downfall parody. You know, the one where Hitler is really angry to hear that Yuri Arcus has defected to Getty. Please make it so.
Secondly, I am rather hoping that the rest of Yuri's family will now decloak, coming out from behind their avatars and revealing their true identities.
we're talking of Tony Stone the "father" of stock photography !!!
Oh.
I'm Yuri's half-Black brother. I'm very proud of him. Please like me on Facebook.
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the cheap Cape Town ;)
([url]http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2cPFTbufx2w/UZjyDtKjorI/AAAAAAAABxY/x1IJyBliyyc/s1600/cape.JPG[/url])
I'm sure 38c a whack (for at least some sales) doesn't sustain a film star lifestyle, even with Yuri's sales.
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Oh for the love of... I wonder just what it is that the "father" is "researching" as a "professor" if he has enough spare time to create 11,000 nicely processed photos.
Why do I always get a strange sense of psychosis whenever I read something originating with this guy that calls himself Yuri??
Off-putting nouevau riche bigging his self up at every opportunity.
Maybe there's a positive here. Once he leaves microstock we can all get along counting our pennies, instead of paying attention to this attention hoe. Let's hope so. I for one have had enough of the mind**ck known as Yuri.
Rant over, moving on. :)
PS: and no, I won't follow up with an apology. I actually mean it.
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Yuri is the most successful artist on istock with only part of his portfolio as an independent. Once he uploads the rest of his catalogue and keeps on shooting huge volumes of new content plus the best match push he will certainly get, he will probably soon completly dominate the site at all price points.
And once he gets the hang of getty macro, both rf and rm, he will be dominating that too.
I really wonder how the old school gettyshooters will react to such a powerhouse in their protected walled garden. Yuri will be like a force of nature they cannot compete with. Just think of all those cynical dinosaurs that made fun of Sean when he got kicked out...this is the right kind of experience for them. The 21st century has finally arrived...
Maybe they will rename the company in his honor in a year or so..."arcursimages" has such a nice ring to it :)
Just kidding, I really wish Yuri all the best and I admire that he obviously has a built in crystal ball and knows EXACTLY what the customers want to buy.
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I really wonder how the old school gettyshooters will react to such a powerhouse in their protected walled garden. Yuri will be like a force of nature they cannot compete with.
well, at the moment he can barely compete with BlendImages on Getty.
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I'm sure 38c a whack (for at least some sales) doesn't sustain a film star lifestyle, even with Yuri's sales.
location location location !
no idea about CapeTown, but you can buy a similar villa with seaview and small swimming pool in Thailand for as low as 2-300K $.
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two entries on SS forum from Yuri's father
Well, now Yuri has left Shutterstock I can just as well reveal a few things. It is a long time ago since Yuri only had 1000 downloads a day at SS. A typical day at SS had between 3000-4000 downloads!! How do I know? Well, I introduced Yuri to SS. And I am Yuris dad - and very proud of my sonīs success!
By the way, Yuri is not the only one leaving SS. If you want to see my port, do it now. In some weeks it will be gone too! Time to say goodbye!
The best to all of you!
PS: Rinder99, thanks! You have always been fair to Yuri (and me) from the very beginning about 7-8 years ago.
Vista/Dhoxax
AND
Thanks for the nice words about my son Yuri (and my port)!
Why I leave too? Not so difficult to figure out really: I simply got an offer I could not refuse! Got It?
No, stock photography is only my hobby (though, a hobby with a nice income). In "real life" I work as an university professor and researcher.
The best to all of you!
Vista/Dhoxax .)
Is this really Yuri's father ? or are you talking about Christian ? I heard he is reporting in forums that he is also going to leave micro (once again...) ?
anyways.. god luck to Yuri, Yuri's father and christian !
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I'm sure 38c a whack (for at least some sales) doesn't sustain a film star lifestyle, even with Yuri's sales.
location location location !
no idea about CapeTown, but you can buy a similar villa with seaview and small swimming pool in Thailand for as low as 2-300K $.
Believe me, the area his house is located at isn't as cheap as you might think!
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to me it sounds like a super fake.
Yuri's father ? hahaha ....
on that we agree, just that ;D
Oh well - everybody always just seems to want to read their own words. If you donīt know, why write?
Dhoxax IS Yuriīs father.
Dhoxax has the same images in his port as Steen Wackerhausen does over on Stock Fresh (so they appear to be the same person). According to the wikipedia (I know, I know), Steen Wackerhausen is Yuri's father. I am sure someone better at Google reseach can dig more correlations out than me.
[url]https://stockfresh.com/gallery/StonyArt[/url] ([url]https://stockfresh.com/gallery/StonyArt[/url])
[url]http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-uVista.html[/url] ([url]http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-uVista.html[/url])
Of course, for all I know, "Wackerhausen" is as common of a name in Danish as "Smith" is in the states and its just a coincidence. But it seems legit on the surface.
And if you look back to the very early pictures in the Vista portfolio, you'll notice a number of buildings which belong to the University of Aarhus at which Yuri's father works. Proves little though especially if the images were planted there in 2005 in the event that they may be needed at some point in the future to convince doubters on MSG that it really is Yuri's dad! LOL.
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Oh, and there's still the little matter of this:
[url]http://peopleimages.com/[/url] ([url]http://peopleimages.com/[/url])
So, I don't think so.
Actually, on Dreamstime you can be exclusive AND sell your images on your own website.
I don't know the terms of exclusivity at Istock, but maybe it's the same situation or he got a pass.
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Yuris father wrote on the SS forum saying he is leaving too. He mentioned yuri had 3-4000 dls a day
Can anyone trust that? SS forums have more attention seeking creep(ier) lunatics than crossdressers' board. : )
And there are some over there that regard over here in exactly the same way.......prefix 'crossdressers' with 'psychotic'. ;D
The phrase I read was " the MSG zoo for a bunch of anonymous nobodies". I resemble that remark. ;D
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Oh, and there's still the little matter of this:
[url]http://peopleimages.com/[/url] ([url]http://peopleimages.com/[/url])
So, I don't think so.
Actually, on Dreamstime you can be exclusive AND sell your images on your own website.
I don't know the terms of exclusivity at Istock, but maybe it's the same situation or he got a pass.
Exclusives specifically may not sell RF from their own sites (point 2b), so he presumably 'got a pass'. He wouldn't be the first.
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The phrase I read was " the MSG zoo for a bunch of anonymous nobodies".
That guy is hilarious. Really good value and an absolute gentleman. But his criticism is ironic given that (he said) that it was not always actually him posting. They used to post here. Sometimes they got quite heated.
Eg. http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istockphoto-down-for-maintenance-or-hacked/msg229801/ (http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istockphoto-down-for-maintenance-or-hacked/msg229801/)
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Yuris father wrote on the SS forum saying he is leaving too. He mentioned yuri had 3-4000 dls a day
Can anyone trust that? SS forums have more attention seeking creep(ier) lunatics than crossdressers' board. : )
And there are some over there that regard over here in exactly the same way.......prefix 'crossdressers' with 'psychotic'. ;D
The phrase I read was " the MSG zoo for a bunch of anonymous nobodies". I resemble that remark. ;D
Apologies for inaccurate transcription. Just trying to capture the flavour of the disdain over there for here. ;D
The next time the SS VP's turn up here to explain something instead of on their own site, I think they should be welcomed to this zoo using the original quotation and forum post. ;D
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in my opinion, stocksy is a lost case already..
their timing is bad.
anything else is ok, and they've millions in the bank.
it's not a matter of bad execution or bad business plan.
it's alright from that perspective.
but the timing .. it's 2013 ... SS is the king of the hill, public company, millions at stake, the cheapest prices ever seen, bla bla bla.
how do they plan to compete in such an environment ? where exactly do they plan to set their market niche ? would the next Yuri Arcurs join them, and why ?
so far, it's just "vaporware".
even Tony Stone some time ago launched his micro agency or whatever, just to be never heard again, can't even remeber the name of the agency actually and we're talking of Tony Stone the "father" of stock photography !!!
No Tony Stone did not launch his own agency he was asked to be a consultant in a new launched agency, asked for advice thats all. He is not in favor of the micro model as such.
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The phrase I read was " the MSG zoo for a bunch of anonymous nobodies".
That guy is hilarious. Really good value and an absolute gentleman. But his criticism is ironic given that (he said) that it was not always actually him posting. They used to post here. Sometimes they got quite heated.
Eg. [url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istockphoto-down-for-maintenance-or-hacked/msg229801/[/url] ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istockphoto-down-for-maintenance-or-hacked/msg229801/[/url])
I knew it!!!! That thread is hilarious. I remember it now. I knew something was the matter with his posts on SS. One minute he is telling people they have bad manners and the next he is throwing out insults. Must be his personnel using his account.
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Believe me, the area his house is located at isn't as cheap as you might think!
well, there's an interesting (and a bit apocalyptic) article on today's BBC :
Do white people have a future in South Africa?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22554709 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22554709)
"Apartheid South Africa looked after white people and nobody else. Now some of its white communities face a level of deprivation, or of violence, which threatens their future in the country. "
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Believe me, the area his house is located at isn't as cheap as you might think!
well, there's an interesting (and a bit apocalyptic) article on today's BBC :
I thought John Simpson was a better journalist.
This is a country with millions of poor people. That some whites should become poor when no longer unfairly coddled is neither odd nor wrong. Nor is it news: I remember seeing a heartbreaking photo essay more than 10 years ago.
Farm murders are a difficult subject and they have several probable contributing factors, including farmers' sadly commonplace maltreatment of their labourers. That some farmers should be hated is unsurprising. Rural whites were, after all, a key racist constituency that elected apartheid governments and then gave support to the neo-Nazi AWB. And they often look like lonely islands of astounding and tempting wealth, relatively speaking, in a sea of rural squalor and exploitation.
Anyway, all these unfortunate whites that Simpson cites can number no more than 10% of the total. And Yuri, most certainly, is not and never will be among them.
Simpson seems to have swallowed the right-wing line unexamined.
If you want to read some apocalyptic material that actually contains intelligent thought, try Disgrace by JM Coetzee.
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Yuri was doing incredibly well. He boasted in an article that he was making millions each year. He wants to make even more. So Getty must have paid him or I don't think he would be doing this. So all your facts are wrong as usual. Just because you want Yuri to be barely paying the bill doesn't make it a fact. At any time he could of cut his costs to zero and just made millions each year from his portfolio for the rest of his life. He's obviously more ambitious than that.
If you wanted to have any idea about the financial side of this business, you would do some research and use some actual facts instead of just making up what you would like to happen.
Hmmm. You say that but Yuri can't even afford to operate in his own country. He's had to leave his home in the idyllic country of Denmark (by many reports about the nicest place on earth to live) to set up shop in crime-ridden South Africa. By his own admission he can't afford the costs of doing business and paying taxes in Denmark.
Now he's even sold his soul to the devil and climbed into bed with Getty.
Wealth is supposed to bring freedom and choices isn't it? Seems to me that Yuri's 'wealth' has made him a prisoner of his own ambition and greed.
Not to turn this into a political discussion, but taxes in Denmark are incredibly high, sometimes up to 60-65% depending on your level of income. So, as a dane, I understand Yuri's move and in fact I encourage it.
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I think everyone is waiting more or less patiently for you to understand what you have read.
"are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce" - does not mean microstock is dead. It means that Yuri believes his work that is produced by a team of people at a high cost is better suited on agencies elsewhere.
Of course, it would help if the agency you are moving to actively wants your work and is willing to negotiate a special deal for you . . . which is what everyone, probably correctly, suspects.
By contrast, many of us don't produce high production cost work, much less have large agencies beating a path to our doors.
After the dust settles, business as usual.
For me, that's in around 5 minutes from now.
Can someone remind me how to set the ignore feature?
please bring me respect, unlike you and many others i've correctly predicted the outcome of microstock in the long term a long time ago.
now you dont want to hear the ugly truth, well dont shoot the messanger, you can only blame yourself if you bet the farm on micros and put all the eggs on istock.
it's funny that those like me are called "trolls" both here and on RM forums.
People won't pay more. They will skip it. If this wasn't true, there wouldn't be microstock companies.
Well that is not true.
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My guess is this isn't just about a % royalty or exclusivity. This is a takeoff of Yuri Inc, who either gets a lot of cash or a % stake in Getty ...
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Give me a meritocracy over a deal-based income any day.
As we all know, deals can suddenly be pulled out of the air that were never anticipated and can work against you. Even where agreements are signed in triplicate, they can't anticipate every eventuality.
I hope it works out for Yuri at Getty, and I hope his absence from the indie market will allow the excellent work of others to rise to the top. If everybody wins from this change, that can only be a good thing.
I'll keep my faith in a meritocracy though. I much prefer the straightforwardness of knowing that my income depends only on the effort I put in, with no additional strings attached.
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My guess is this isn't just about a % royalty or exclusivity. This is a takeoff of Yuri Inc, who either gets a lot of cash or a % stake in Getty ...
Interesting thoughts but I don't think Yuri is in that league yet! The Getty family, Klein and Co have personal stakes supposedly valued in the $Billions. Yuri, at best, is in the very small millions.
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It'll just be an increase in the basic royalty, a blind eye turned to his own site and a guarantee that all the work goes into Sig+ and therefore duplicated onto Getty.
Infuriating, unfair and hypocritical on iStock's part, but perfectly understandable from Yuri's point of view.
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Actually, if you add to that an agreement that he can review all upcoming deals and choose to opt out as he sees fit, that would probably cover his end of things.
Ultimately, no doubt Yuri will do what works for Yuri and Getty will do what works for Getty.
I'm going to have have to stop thinking about this now and do what works for me. :)
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New message to iStock, I will let you know the results
Hello,
Since Yuri is now exclusive and stated so himself, I have notice that he still has his "peopleimages" site up. I was wondering if I could sell my video's on my own site as I can see this is now an exclusive perk? Thank-you
John
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Good luck with that!
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two entries on SS forum from Yuri's father
Well, now Yuri has left Shutterstock I can just as well reveal a few things. It is a long time ago since Yuri only had 1000 downloads a day at SS. A typical day at SS had between 3000-4000 downloads!! How do I know? Well, I introduced Yuri to SS. And I am Yuris dad - and very proud of my sonīs success!
By the way, Yuri is not the only one leaving SS. If you want to see my port, do it now. In some weeks it will be gone too! Time to say goodbye!
The best to all of you!
PS: Rinder99, thanks! You have always been fair to Yuri (and me) from the very beginning about 7-8 years ago.
Vista/Dhoxax
AND
Thanks for the nice words about my son Yuri (and my port)!
Why I leave too? Not so difficult to figure out really: I simply got an offer I could not refuse! Got It?
No, stock photography is only my hobby (though, a hobby with a nice income). In "real life" I work as an university professor and researcher.
The best to all of you!
Vista/Dhoxax .)
Well Vista/Dhoxax joined SS in June 2005 while Yuri joined SS in Feb 2005 but he is still claiming he introduced Yuri to SS.
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Well Vista/Dhoxax joined SS in June 2005 while Yuri joined SS in Feb 2005 but he is still claiming he introduced Yuri to SS.
I could suggest an agency to someone ('introduce' them) without using the agency myself. I did do it once, for someone with a narrow specialism.
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Well Vista/Dhoxax joined SS in June 2005 while Yuri joined SS in Feb 2005 but he is still claiming he introduced Yuri to SS.
I could suggest an agency to someone ('introduce' them) without using the agency myself. I did do it once, for someone with a narrow specialism.
sure he can but the whole thing is strange especially for a professor...
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Written on Fri May 11, 2007 9:47 pm by Yuri
.....
I am proud of being a microstock contributor and I truly believe in the microstock way of selling pictures. I do however believe that the general prices on pictures at microstock agencies will rise over the next couple of years and I believe we will see microstock prices merge with, or get close to, prices found at royalty manages sites. Because the quality of pictures accepted at microstock agencies today is at least as good as some of the royalty managed agencies I contribute to, I believe the prices in microstock are a bit too low right now. A person does not care if he has to pay $1 or $10 for a picture, as long as he likes it and as long as it fits his project. When the microstock industry realizes this, (such as Jon obviously has) they will start to generate massive income.
I had a meeting with C..
images in New York just a few months ago and became even more happy to be a microstocker. NO way
could I accept or be a part of what was offered to me at this agency. Even dough you can find some of my pictures at some of the old school high priced agencies, this only generates about 15% of my total income. Microstock rocks!
Its all about adapting and making decisions that help your business, dont make decissions based on emotions or what you personally like best. Apple didnt become the company it is today if it hadnt followed a strict strategy and if you didnt agree with it, you were out. This is why businesses become successful.
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Well Vista/Dhoxax joined SS in June 2005 while Yuri joined SS in Feb 2005 but he is still claiming he introduced Yuri to SS.
I could suggest an agency to someone ('introduce' them) without using the agency myself. I did do it once, for someone with a narrow specialism.
sure he can but the whole thing is strange especially for a professor...
It would be extremely surprising for a professor here (due to lack for free time), but:
1. 'Professor' doesn't always mean the same in other countries. Sometimes it means an ordinary university lecturer (who would still normally be involved in heavy research/publicatihn activities). Sometimes it's used of a secondary school teacher, who again wouldn't have the time, except that:
2. I learned that some (all?) secondary teachers in Germany have a much smaller teaching hours commitment, which means that they have less prep and marking and much more time available to do it, so more free time. Maybe Denmark is the same (I have no idea.)
3. Maybe he's an emeritus professor or visiting professor, who gives occasional lectures but doesn't have to maintain his standing in producing new work.
4. Or ...
5. Your guess is as good as mine.
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two entries on SS forum from Yuri's father
Well, now Yuri has left Shutterstock I can just as well reveal a few things. It is a long time ago since Yuri only had 1000 downloads a day at SS. A typical day at SS had between 3000-4000 downloads!! How do I know? Well, I introduced Yuri to SS. And I am Yuris dad - and very proud of my sonīs success!
By the way, Yuri is not the only one leaving SS. If you want to see my port, do it now. In some weeks it will be gone too! Time to say goodbye!
The best to all of you!
PS: Rinder99, thanks! You have always been fair to Yuri (and me) from the very beginning about 7-8 years ago.
Vista/Dhoxax
AND
Thanks for the nice words about my son Yuri (and my port)!
Why I leave too? Not so difficult to figure out really: I simply got an offer I could not refuse! Got It?
No, stock photography is only my hobby (though, a hobby with a nice income). In "real life" I work as an university professor and researcher.
The best to all of you!
Vista/Dhoxax .)
Well Vista/Dhoxax joined SS in June 2005 while Yuri joined SS in Feb 2005 but he is still claiming he introduced Yuri to SS.
I think that Yuri only started serious uploading to SS in late 2005. Yuri's SS ID is 2700 whereas his father's is 2702 which obviously suggests that both accounts were opened at the same time, quite possibly by the same person. It might be that Yuri or his father opened both accounts and it was some months before Yuri bothered to do anything about it. His father might well have encouraged Yuri to do so only after having a positive experience with sales himself.
It's a pity that Yuri's SS gallery is now gone because was extraordinary to see his level of photography skill (or lack of) when he started . He clearly wasn't even a hobbyist photographer back then and his first few images were amateur snaps of a squirrel in a garden which appeared to have been taken with a P&S camera. He was an amazingly quick learner.
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I remember someone saying that they would have loved to be the one that referred Yuri. If Yuris father referred Yuri, then he would have been making 4000*0.03*31=$3600 dollar per month (give or take). SS cut that income back in February. Thats a big hit to take, for anyone.
It might have pissed the Wackerhausen family off, to get hit with a +/- $40k annual pay cut. On top of the low royalties.
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I remember someone saying that they would have loved to be the one that referred Yuri. If Yuris father referred Yuri, then he would have been making 4000*0.03*31=$3600 dollar per month (give or take). SS cut that income back in February. Thats a big hit to take, for anyone.
It might have pissed the Wackerhausen family off, to get hit with a +/- $40k annual pay cut. On top of the low royalties.
That's the best bit of joined-up thinking on this thread. The timing is right for Yuri to have his files off the 3-month rule sites, and coincided more or less with the February deletion, ensuring Getty wouldn't be too bothered about it, and knowing Y was lurching aboard mean they could more easily pap Sean, who was a thorn in their side, but an excellent seller.
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I remember someone saying that they would have loved to be the one that referred Yuri. If Yuris father referred Yuri, then he would have been making 4000*0.03*31=$3600 dollar per month (give or take). SS cut that income back in February. Thats a big hit to take, for anyone.
It might have pissed the Wackerhausen family off, to get hit with a +/- $40k annual pay cut. On top of the low royalties.
That's the best bit of joined-up thinking on this thread. The timing is right for Yuri to have his files off the 3-month rule sites, and coincided more or less with the February deletion, ensuring Getty wouldn't be too bothered about it, and knowing Y was lurching aboard mean they could more easily pap Sean, who was a thorn in their side, but an excellent seller.
I just wrote something similar in the other thread on iStock simplifying collections
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I remember someone saying that they would have loved to be the one that referred Yuri. If Yuris father referred Yuri, then he would have been making 4000*0.03*31=$3600 dollar per month (give or take). SS cut that income back in February. Thats a big hit to take, for anyone.
It might have pissed the Wackerhausen family off, to get hit with a +/- $40k annual pay cut. On top of the low royalties.
That's the best bit of joined-up thinking on this thread. The timing is right for Yuri to have his files off the 3-month rule sites, and coincided more or less with the February deletion, ensuring Getty wouldn't be too bothered about it, and knowing Y was lurching aboard mean they could more easily pap Sean, who was a thorn in their side, but an excellent seller.
I just wrote something similar in the other thread on iStock simplifying collections
Yup, it seems like a reasonable inference from the facts. A real joining up of the dots.
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sad to see there isn't a single exclusive welcoming Yuri to iStock/GI, oh!
doesn't he deserve a topic at the forum? ;D ;D ;D ;D
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sad to see there isn't a single exclusive welcoming Yuri to iStock/GI, oh!
doesn't he deserve a topic at the forum? ;D ;D ;D ;D
Maybe all the welcoming comments are within the Exclusive forum (which you and I can't access)?
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sad to see there isn't a single exclusive welcoming Yuri to iStock/GI, oh!
doesn't he deserve a topic at the forum? ;D ;D ;D ;D
Maybe all the welcoming comments are within the Exclusive forum (which you and I can't access)?
sure tickstock will show us all that excitement ;D
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sad to see there isn't a single exclusive welcoming Yuri to iStock/GI, oh!
doesn't he deserve a topic at the forum? ;D ;D ;D ;D
Maybe all the welcoming comments are within the Exclusive forum (which you and I can't access)?
Nope.
And posts elsewhere were deleted as per Lobo's earlier comment.
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sad to see there isn't a single exclusive welcoming Yuri to iStock/GI, oh!
doesn't he deserve a topic at the forum? ;D ;D ;D ;D
Maybe all the welcoming comments are within the Exclusive forum (which you and I can't access)?
sure tickstock will show us all that excitement ;D
Still trolling Luis?
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sure tickstock will show us all that excitement ;D
Still trolling Luis?
why don't you give us your opinion about this matter instead of that
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sure tickstock will show us all that excitement ;D
Still trolling Luis?
why don't you give us your opinion about this matter instead of that
I think I'll wait until I understand what's going on better. I will say that it's good news that the most visible microstocker has pulled his images off Shutterstock.
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Istock's system has now updated so that Yuri's individual files have little crowns next to them, indicating that they are exclusive to Istock/Getty ... but they're not. I can see the same images for sale on DT, FT and probably lots of other places too.
Don't they have laws against this sort of misrepresentation in Canada? Istock are charging a premium price for those images based on an exclusive (to them) status that they don't actually have.
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I remember someone saying that they would have loved to be the one that referred Yuri. If Yuris father referred Yuri, then he would have been making 4000*0.03*31=$3600 dollar per month (give or take). SS cut that income back in February. Thats a big hit to take, for anyone.
It might have pissed the Wackerhausen family off, to get hit with a +/- $40k annual pay cut. On top of the low royalties.
1. SS left all of us out of the Offset rollout. There are plenty of high end photographers on SS with ports that exceed the quality level they are expecting from their new Offset collection.
2. Besides the referral loss for his father I am sure Yuri had a big referral hit of his own.
3. Ports with a large number of images on front page searches have been taking 20% to 60% hits and I am certain Yuri had a huge number of images on the top row of first page searches.
4. SS has not given a raise out since 2008, we all need to justify production cost's for images that rise to the next level and SS is not supportive of those expenditures as they killed off it's long standing merit system with this new search in lieu of supporting images from Yuri's numerous copycats.
SS brought this upon themselves and Yuri is not the only high end shooter they stand to lose if they continue to choose greed over those submitters who helped build SS.
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^^^Didn't you notice that the rest of the big 4 cut commissions while SS kept theirs and added more ways to sell our images? Isn't there more reasons to leave istock, FT and DT than SS? Yuri has obviously been made an offer he can't refuse, I'm not sure Getty will do that for many more and for everyone they do, there will probably be exclusives going the other way.
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Istock's system has now updated so that Yuri's individual files have little crowns next to them, indicating that they are exclusive to Istock/Getty ... but they're not. I can see the same images for sale on DT, FT and probably lots of other places too.
Don't they have laws against this sort of misrepresentation in Canada? Istock are charging a premium price for those images based on an exclusive (to them) status that they don't actually have.
Yuri is the new special one, Mourinho was the first one! ;D
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It was inevitable Yuri would leave when you think about it.
The work of many artists there have progressed lightyears beyond the grab shots of the early days but the SS pricing structure has remained stubbornly stuck in 2008 - subs prices do not remotely reflect the production costs of todays standards. I doubt he'll be the only one to come to the same conclusion.
Jon Origner will have to bite the bullet at some point and split the collections into different price points if he wants to retain the high value work. I does seem crazy I can buy an apple on white with no production costs and a high production lifestyle photo shot in the Caribbean with massive overheads for the same $0.25. There's a serious crack in their business model and Yuri just fell through it.
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^^^Didn't you notice that the rest of the big 4 cut commissions while SS kept theirs and added more ways to sell our images? Isn't there more reasons to leave istock, FT and DT than SS? Yuri has obviously been made an offer he can't refuse, I'm not sure Getty will do that for many more and for everyone they do, there will probably be exclusives going the other way.
Shutterstock ended referral earnings for many people (myself included and just a couple dollars from a payout). As was stated earlier that could be a huge deal to some contributors. They also introduced subscription sales on Bigstock which payout less than Shutterstock subs. They also pay out a much lower rate than credit sales on Bigstock. Either way expanding Bigstock's (part of Shutterstock) market is a pay cut. And of course they pay between a quarter and 38 cents for sub sales, how much could they lower that and expect quality content.
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Jon Origner will have to bite the bullet at some point and split the collections into different price points if he wants to retain the high value work. I does seem crazy I can buy an apple on white with no production costs and a high production lifestyle photo shot in the Caribbean with massive overheads for the same $0.25. There's a serious crack in their business model and Yuri just fell through it.
It depends if the Caribbean shot is actually any good, money doesn't always make a better photo. Cost of making the photo shouldn't be a factor, quality and uniqueness should be the only measure in my opinion.
I do agree on different price points though. I'd hate to be the reviewer deciding that, can you imagine the fights over being placed in a tier you think is too low for your picture? :)
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^^^Didn't you notice that the rest of the big 4 cut commissions while SS kept theirs and added more ways to sell our images? Isn't there more reasons to leave istock, FT and DT than SS? Yuri has obviously been made an offer he can't refuse, I'm not sure Getty will do that for many more and for everyone they do, there will probably be exclusives going the other way.
5. Check out the R rates on BS, they did cut our rates. Last I checked BS was up 70% and SS was down 30%.
Thanks for reminding me, that would be point 5.
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It was inevitable Yuri would leave when you think about it.
The work of many artists there have progressed lightyears beyond the grab shots of the early days but the SS pricing structure has remained stubbornly stuck in 2008 - subs prices do not remotely reflect the production costs of todays standards. I doubt he'll be the only one to come to the same conclusion.
Jon Origner will have to bite the bullet at some point and split the collections into different price points if he wants to retain the high value work. I does seem crazy I can buy an apple on white with no production costs and a high production lifestyle photo shot in the Caribbean with massive overheads for the same $0.25. There's a serious crack in their business model and Yuri just fell through it.
Sorry but that is largely nonsense. Even half-decent shooters don't get '$0.25' at SS and certainly Yuri didn't. Personally I'm now averaging nearly 80c per sale there __ that's almost 4x my average at SS when I started. My earnings at SS have roughly trebled since 2008 so again, not too much to complain about there. If only all the other agencies had done the same I'd be laughing.
My costs of production have gone way down too. For the first few years I was using my earnings to buy all the gear I needed __ or more accurately, thought I needed. Now I'm in the business of flogging off excess gear that I realise I almost never use. My equipment was all paid for years ago and I control my costs according to the likely revenue the images will generate. It's not exactly rocket-science __ well, other than when I'm using rocket (arugula) leaves in my food shoots anyway.
Neither microstock or SS was ever about flying models off to the Caribbean and staying in 5* hotels. Never was and never will be. It's about producing images cheaply for our market segment. Wal-Mart is never going to try and compete against Harrods. They operate in completely different market sectors and therefore they also have different suppliers.
By the way, in case you hadn't heard, Oringer already has 'split the collection into different price points' by launching Offset. Maybe Yuri didn't an invite to Offset and that's why he's stomped off in a huff.
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Honestly, "offset" doesn't look like any images that "micro" artists, Y and myself included, would be able shoot. The mentions of Nat'l Geo and others, just by means of their access to unique venues, locations, people, etc., would set it apart. I wouldn't take it as an insult that I wasn't invited.
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Honestly, "offset" doesn't look like any images that "micro" artists, Y and myself included, would be able shoot. The mentions of Nat'l Geo and others, just by means of their access to unique venues, locations, people, etc., would set it apart. I wouldn't take it as an insult that I wasn't invited.
I know. I wasn't being serious. I don't think I see Offset becoming a significant entity either.
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By the way, in case you hadn't heard, Oringer already has 'split the collection into different price points' by launching Offset.
It hasn't launched. It has been announced as an idea. And there has been no mention of splitting the existing collection. Actually almost no detail.
@Sean - have you looked at Maura McEvoy's work (which I think is excellent and which I like)? She isn't shooting unique venues etc.
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By the way, in case you hadn't heard, Oringer already has 'split the collection into different price points' by launching Offset.
It hasn't launched. It has been announced as an idea. And there has been no mention of splitting the existing collection. Actually almost no detail.
@Sean - have you looked at Maura McEvoy's work (which I think is excellent and which I like)? She isn't shooting unique venues etc.
You can see more photographers here
https://twitter.com/offsetimages (https://twitter.com/offsetimages)
http://melee-media.com/projects/offsetpreview/ (http://melee-media.com/projects/offsetpreview/)
"Melees objective was to strategize and produce a buzz generating brand launch. Internally, our goal was to get hundreds of New Yorks influencers hands-on with the content in a way that didnt feel forced or overtly commercial...."
"Inspired by a recent Harvard Business Review article, Making Star Teams Out of Star Players, we were determined to put together a ridiculous team of the most talented specialists in New York no matter what the cost: Rockstar developers, projectionists that handle 3D mapping around the world, digital strategists and art directors that work on some of the biggest ad campaigns in the world, builders that have constructed major New York Fashion Week presentations, and finally a well-known curator and art consultant that has one of the sharpest eyes in the art world."
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A person living in the caribbean doesnt have any significant overhead, all he needs to do is wake up and go to the beach and shoot whatever the day brings. If you are going to fly to the caribbean for a shoot, then you shouldnt be involved with micro RF.
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at the risk of enticing you-know-who I have to wonder if they aren't all just creating a new model that's a cross between RM and RF. Hopefully everyone is realising that paying peanuts for our work is insulting to us, and missing out of profits from customers who will pay more for higher quality.
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Neither microstock or SS was ever about flying models off to the Caribbean and staying in 5* hotels. Never was and never will be. It's about producing images cheaply for our market segment. Wal-Mart is never going to try and compete against Harrods. They operate in completely different market sectors and therefore they also have different suppliers.
The success and floatation of the company was not built on apples on white backgrounds with zero production budget, it is largely due to the high production work in the collection. The problem with SS is that its a Walmart that desperately wants to become Harrods, unfortunately for them their top supplier just moved to Harrods.
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Agree. What I see this as, is a sign of industry changes. Hopefully, better pay for a better product could spell the end for the parasitic agencies that use artists. This could also be the end of the race to the bottom.
Storm Warning there's a crash landing coming for some people who don't adjust and change their marketing from indiscriminate uploading "everywhere". The old way of doing business, shotgun all the agencies everything you can shoot, and collect the pennies as they fall to the ground, is passing on.
Happy, little, quirky Microstock with referral bonuses, volume pricing, taking almost anything of any size and as many duplicates as someone could push through, paying artists as little as possible, friendly lypses and conventions. Big business takes no prisoners and the weak will perish from the marketplace.
If the agencies which started to limit membership and demand higher quality standards, wasn't a sign, this might be something to watch as an indication of big industry wide changes on the way.
at the risk of enticing you-know-who I have to wonder if they aren't all just creating a new model that's a cross between RM and RF. Hopefully everyone is realising that paying peanuts for our work is insulting to us, and missing out of profits from customers who will pay more for higher quality.
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Wal-Mart is never going to try and compete against Harrods. They operate in completely different market sectors and therefore they also have different suppliers.
To some extent, but there's a local company which makes exactly the same product for supermarket own-brands and Harrods; they're just packaged - and priced - differently.
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The success and floatation of the company was not built on apples on white backgrounds with zero production budget, it is largely due to the high production work in the collection.
Can you back that up with stats? Seriously curious, not argumentative.
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Honestly, "offset" doesn't look like any images that "micro" artists, Y and myself included, would be able shoot. The mentions of Nat'l Geo and others, just by means of their access to unique venues, locations, people, etc., would set it apart. I wouldn't take it as an insult that I wasn't invited.
A list of the people involved with Offset:
Maura McEvoy
Glasshouse Images
National Geographic
Martin Bailey
fStop Images
Johnér
Huber Images
Leaving out the exclusive locations of NatGeo, many of the images in the galleries on these photographers/collectives/ existing stock agencies could have been shot (and often done better) by competent microstock photographers working on low overheads but wouldn't have been submitted to SS for fear of rejections on mixed lighting, focus not where we would like to see it, composition and general LCV! ;)
Interesting to note that MS contributors appear to have been trained by their distributors (not true in all cases but valid for many).
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Honestly, "offset" doesn't look like any images that "micro" artists, Y and myself included, would be able shoot. The mentions of Nat'l Geo and others, just by means of their access to unique venues, locations, people, etc., would set it apart. I wouldn't take it as an insult that I wasn't invited.
A list of the people involved with Offset:
Maura McEvoy
Glasshouse Images
National Geographic
Martin Bailey
fStop Images
Johnér
Huber Images
Leaving out the exclusive locations of NatGeo, many of the images in the galleries on these photographers/collectives/ existing stock agencies could have been shot (and often done better) by competent microstock photographers working on low overheads but wouldn't have been submitted to SS for fear of rejections on mixed lighting, focus not where we would like to see it, composition and general LCV! ;)
Interesting to note that MS contributors appear to have been trained by their distributors (not true in all cases but valid for many).
That is so true. A heart for ya.
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Interesting to note that MS contributors appear to have been trained by their distributors (not true in all cases but valid for many).
Where 'trained' = 'indoctrinated'.
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that's true.
there's definitely a style to shooting for stock - more light, bright & colorful than I usually do.
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There is a difference between being trained by the sites and simply understanding that SS accepts and promotes images which frequently have color channels completely blown because the saturation has been ramped up to ghastly levels. Case in point look at the color channels in a few of the red rock images from monument valley. The red channels are completely blown.
There are plenty of us who do not buy into those who endorse or train newbies to shoot at extremely warm jpeg color temps touted at certain workshops, nor do we do we endorse doing it in post. But SS seems to accept and promote those type of images more than some sites do. Based on what they rejected and accepted, it is their own fault that they ended up with piles of that type of content.
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Did anyone wonder if Getty purchased People Images and has a no-compete with Yuri for a couple years?
I haven't had the time to really ingest 12 pages of this thread - but last I heard from Yuri he had a meeting coming up with Getty about Google Drive. Then Sean got fired. And now Yuri is running around town wearing a crown. Hmmm.... maybe SJLocke was a condition.
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Offset is interesting, and has a more editorial feel than what is being discussed. I don't see it being high end or even stock photography primarily. Shutterstock is an intriguing company. It's the one agency I'm really on the fence about. I have argued myself onto both sides. The price per download is so little that it really does feel like an insult when you've been 'raised' in another agency. But, there are a lot of really good shooters out there who make great money on Shutterstock. They have good contributor relations, reaching out by phone and email. I also like what I know of Jon Oringer. But it's not like that matters, except that he is a photographer first and still runs the company. Right now my 500 or so images are all opted out. I'm reluctant to completely close my account at SS though until I've made a concrete decision about whether it's worth it or not. If I do continue to contribute to SS, it will probably be the only sub site I contribute to (other than iStock).
anyways, I heard from someone with more experience with SS. they have me rethinking the decision to stay on SS.
Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
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Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
I'm pretty sure you can opt out of their distributing to secondary sites. Please correct me if I'm wrong as I'm about to reactivate my account....it's been awhile since I've been active there.
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Offset is interesting, and has a more editorial feel than what is being discussed. I don't see it being high end or even stock photography primarily. Shutterstock is an intriguing company. It's the one agency I'm really on the fence about. I have argued myself onto both sides. The price per download is so little that it really does feel like an insult when you've been 'raised' in another agency. But, there are a lot of really good shooters out there who make great money on Shutterstock. They have good contributor relations, reaching out by phone and email. I also like what I know of Jon Oringer. But it's not like that matters, except that he is a photographer first and still runs the company. Right now my 500 or so images are all opted out. I'm reluctant to completely close my account at SS though until I've made a concrete decision about whether it's worth it or not. If I do continue to contribute to SS, it will probably be the only sub site I contribute to (other than iStock).
anyways, I heard from someone with more experience with SS. they have me rethinking the decision to stay on SS.
Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
You don't have to put everything on all the sites.
As Gostwyck has said many times, Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
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Interesting to note that MS contributors appear to have been trained by their distributors (not true in all cases but valid for many).
Where 'trained' = 'indoctrinated'.
"Incentivized in a Pavlovian manner" ;D
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Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
fully agree.
the future of micro is ALL about subs and SS is the living proof of that.
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Well Vista/Dhoxax joined SS in June 2005 while Yuri joined SS in Feb 2005 but he is still claiming he introduced Yuri to SS.
I could suggest an agency to someone ('introduce' them) without using the agency myself. I did do it once, for someone with a narrow specialism.
sure he can but the whole thing is strange especially for a professor...
to me this is not as strange as this may sound at first.
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Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
fully agree.
the future of micro is ALL about subs and SS is the living proof of that.
How many times do you need to be told that SS isn't a subs site? It was almost all subs 5 years ago but things have changed. Shame your opinions are still so outdated.
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Offset is interesting, and has a more editorial feel than what is being discussed. I don't see it being high end or even stock photography primarily. Shutterstock is an intriguing company. It's the one agency I'm really on the fence about. I have argued myself onto both sides. The price per download is so little that it really does feel like an insult when you've been 'raised' in another agency. But, there are a lot of really good shooters out there who make great money on Shutterstock. They have good contributor relations, reaching out by phone and email. I also like what I know of Jon Oringer. But it's not like that matters, except that he is a photographer first and still runs the company. Right now my 500 or so images are all opted out. I'm reluctant to completely close my account at SS though until I've made a concrete decision about whether it's worth it or not. If I do continue to contribute to SS, it will probably be the only sub site I contribute to (other than iStock).
anyways, I heard from someone with more experience with SS. they have me rethinking the decision to stay on SS.
Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
You don't have to put everything on all the sites.
As Gostwyck has said many times, Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
Sometimes I find conversations a bit funny. Seems to me many consider it weird and strange almost Bizarre to spend time and money on a shoot. Why is that? "micro is all about quick and easy files selling in large quantities". Sure it is but its also a sad fact that its come to that. Scraping the bottom of the barrel that is.
If thats all we can produce no wonder we get crappy buyers for crappy pics. Thats really what we are saying or thinking is it not.
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Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
fully agree.
the future of micro is ALL about subs and SS is the living proof of that.
How many times do you need to be told that SS isn't a subs site? It was almost all subs 5 years ago but things have changed. Shame your opinions are still so outdated.
It is, in my view. Subs sites are the sites that offer cheap subs, no matter if they also offer single downloads or other options. DT, Fotolia, SS etc
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Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
fully agree.
the future of micro is ALL about subs and SS is the living proof of that.
How many times do you need to be told that SS isn't a subs site? It was almost all subs 5 years ago but things have changed. Shame your opinions are still so outdated.
It is, in my view. Subs sites are the sites that offer cheap subs, no matter if they also offer single downloads or other options. DT, Fotolia, SS etc
You can thumb your nose at the 'sub sites' all you like but I can assure you that your disappearing sales from IS are reappearing on those very same sites, mainly SS.
Last month on SS my earnings were 45% from subs and 55% from OD's, EL's, etc. So far this month subs are only 42% of earnings.
Funnily enough, as an independent contributor on IS whose port was forced over to TS, TS subs are roughly 50% of my non-sub earnings at IS itself. I reckon TS is now the second biggest agency for 'sub' sales alone.
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Allow me to pontificate on what Yuri is doing based on very little real information. If he's feeling the pinch like the rest of us who have been fulltime for the past 8 years, he's consolidating, retiring and getting his income into real assets because he senses that the end is near. I bet he has a deal with Getty that allows him to sell on his own site and exclusive with Getty. Oversupply is killing everyone no matter how good they are. Good for him. You Getty do what ya getty do.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
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Offset is interesting, and has a more editorial feel than what is being discussed. I don't see it being high end or even stock photography primarily. Shutterstock is an intriguing company. It's the one agency I'm really on the fence about. I have argued myself onto both sides. The price per download is so little that it really does feel like an insult when you've been 'raised' in another agency. But, there are a lot of really good shooters out there who make great money on Shutterstock. They have good contributor relations, reaching out by phone and email. I also like what I know of Jon Oringer. But it's not like that matters, except that he is a photographer first and still runs the company. Right now my 500 or so images are all opted out. I'm reluctant to completely close my account at SS though until I've made a concrete decision about whether it's worth it or not. If I do continue to contribute to SS, it will probably be the only sub site I contribute to (other than iStock).
anyways, I heard from someone with more experience with SS. they have me rethinking the decision to stay on SS.
Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
You don't have to put everything on all the sites.
As Gostwyck has said many times, Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
Sometimes I find conversations a bit funny. Seems to me many consider it weird and strange almost Bizarre to spend time and money on a shoot. Why is that? "micro is all about quick and easy files selling in large quantities". Sure it is but its also a sad fact that its come to that. Scraping the bottom of the barrel that is.
If thats all we can produce no wonder we get crappy buyers for crappy pics. Thats really what we are saying or thinking is it not.
You can spend $500 on one photo, if it makes $700, that's a nice profit. It's not that difficult to do with microstock but its much easier to spend $1 and make $200. And I don't agree that low budget images have to be "crappy". People can produce crap at any price point.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
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That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
Agent Smith and Cypher (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7BuQFUhsRM#)
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
I'm sure he did/does well but revenue and profit is not the same, so maybe he did not that wonderful well as we all thought because of his 'good marketing'.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
Classic example of the old adage "Sales are vanity, profit is sanity".
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Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
fully agree.
the future of micro is ALL about subs and SS is the living proof of that.
How many times do you need to be told that SS isn't a subs site? It was almost all subs 5 years ago but things have changed. Shame your opinions are still so outdated.
It is, in my view. Subs sites are the sites that offer cheap subs, no matter if they also offer single downloads or other options. DT, Fotolia, SS etc
You can thumb your nose at the 'sub sites' all you like but I can assure you that your disappearing sales from IS are reappearing on those very same sites, mainly SS.
Last month on SS my earnings were 45% from subs and 55% from OD's, EL's, etc. So far this month subs are only 42% of earnings.
Funnily enough, as an independent contributor on IS whose port was forced over to TS, TS subs are roughly 50% of my non-sub earnings at IS itself. I reckon TS is now the second biggest agency for 'sub' sales alone.
Where did I say that I have "dissapearing sales"? I've been here for many years and I'm on the rise moneywise, I even had my BDE recently. And TS is optative for exclusives. Don't make up things.
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It's precisely because of the extent of Yuri's overheads that I fail to see why he is revered as the fount of all wisdom when it comes to microstock, or the person whose finger is most 'on the pulse'.
Be careful of hero-worship young ones and noobs. All humans are fallible. Look to your own ports and progress to take your measurements and don't follow blindly into unknown territory. The guy at the front doesn't know what's over the next hill either.
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Offset is interesting, and has a more editorial feel than what is being discussed. I don't see it being high end or even stock photography primarily. Shutterstock is an intriguing company. It's the one agency I'm really on the fence about. I have argued myself onto both sides. The price per download is so little that it really does feel like an insult when you've been 'raised' in another agency. But, there are a lot of really good shooters out there who make great money on Shutterstock. They have good contributor relations, reaching out by phone and email. I also like what I know of Jon Oringer. But it's not like that matters, except that he is a photographer first and still runs the company. Right now my 500 or so images are all opted out. I'm reluctant to completely close my account at SS though until I've made a concrete decision about whether it's worth it or not. If I do continue to contribute to SS, it will probably be the only sub site I contribute to (other than iStock).
anyways, I heard from someone with more experience with SS. they have me rethinking the decision to stay on SS.
Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
You don't have to put everything on all the sites.
As Gostwyck has said many times, Micro is all about quick and easy files that can sell in large quantities, and this is especially true for sub sites.
Anything that's been time consuming or expensive to produce can go elsewhere.
Sometimes I find conversations a bit funny. Seems to me many consider it weird and strange almost Bizarre to spend time and money on a shoot. Why is that? "micro is all about quick and easy files selling in large quantities". Sure it is but its also a sad fact that its come to that. Scraping the bottom of the barrel that is.
If thats all we can produce no wonder we get crappy buyers for crappy pics. Thats really what we are saying or thinking is it not.
You can spend $500 on one photo, if it makes $700, that's a nice profit. It's not that difficult to do with microstock but its much easier to spend $1 and make $200. And I don't agree that low budget images have to be "crappy". People can produce crap at any price point.
Agree. Although its not very often you spend 1$ and in one single micro sale get 200$ in return. Its not crappy and thats my whole point but we make it sound crappy and cheap. The way we word it, "cheap pics", "quick and easy", etc. We tend to use a sort of downgrading vocabulary about what we are doing.
People, buyers read that.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
NO ONE contributor or "house" matches Yuri in quality or production. He is alone. He is michael jordan of the NBA. I have an email from him a few years ago stating that I was correct in commenting on the low payouts from SS and the like. He asked me not to reveal this at the time but he was not happy.
So, this smacks the indies on here and the exclusives on here because the "not all eggs in one basket" ideal does not compute financially. Yuri has the most sales possible and it is not working for him. It also says that supporting competition makes prices paid to suppliers less. This rule never sleeps. If I was Yuri, I would have been pissed that Jon made 400 million dollars by undercutting the market place with largely my help.
If Yuri had avoided SS would it had made a dent and told others to avoid it too. IS would have been stronger. Basically, if you match Yuri in sales and production you to can live by different rules. It's not like IS has been fair from the begining. Lise was chosen to by the face of IS and those sales were made by a team. Who knows what help she received. There is a natural progression to the top and then there are these warp speed jumps.
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if he is having problems which I doubt maybe its time to fire everybody, don't believe he made contracts for eternity ;D
I can feel pity for all microstockers just not Yuri, not for the person who says it is the number 1 every time and everywhere and as many time as possible, believe we don't need to worry about him ;D
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the "not all eggs in one basket" ideal does not compute financially.
....for Yuri.
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So, if the "World's No. 1 Selling Microstock Photographer" is no longer in micro, who will take this title? Of will his sales at IS alone maintain this title?
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Offset is interesting, and has a more editorial feel than what is being discussed. I don't see it being high end or even stock photography primarily. Shutterstock is an intriguing company. It's the one agency I'm really on the fence about. I have argued myself onto both sides. The price per download is so little that it really does feel like an insult when you've been 'raised' in another agency. But, there are a lot of really good shooters out there who make great money on Shutterstock. They have good contributor relations, reaching out by phone and email. I also like what I know of Jon Oringer. But it's not like that matters, except that he is a photographer first and still runs the company. Right now my 500 or so images are all opted out. I'm reluctant to completely close my account at SS though until I've made a concrete decision about whether it's worth it or not. If I do continue to contribute to SS, it will probably be the only sub site I contribute to (other than iStock).
anyways, I heard from someone with more experience with SS. they have me rethinking the decision to stay on SS.
Am I correct that Shutterstock doesn't farm images out like istock does to programs and subsidiary sites? Or do they?
Jon is a computer programmer first and a photographer based on the need to fill his new web application with content/images. He has a B.S., Computer Science 1997 and B.S. Mathematics 1997
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-129013864.html (http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-129013864.html)
http://www.list-company.com/company-info/4028809a13dd74c80113ddb25c1c7e71/SurfSecret-LLC-Programming-Daily-Software-Florida-USA.shtml (http://www.list-company.com/company-info/4028809a13dd74c80113ddb25c1c7e71/SurfSecret-LLC-Programming-Daily-Software-Florida-USA.shtml)
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Jon is a computer programmer first and a photographer based on the need to fill his new web application with content/images. He has a B.S., Computer Science 1997 and B.S. Mathematics 1997
he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
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SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
Getty is following suit, with people reporting batches of 25c GI sales from April. That might be the new thingy that I didn't understand, but no explanation has been forthcoming, as there never has been for the sub-$5 payments.
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SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
Getty is following suit, with people reporting batches of 25c GI sales from April. That might be the new thingy that I didn't understand, but no explanation has been forthcoming, as there never has been for the sub-$5 payments.
The sub $5 payments were explained.
ETA: My E+ files on Getty are priced at $15 for the smallest size so I would expect $3 per sale for those.
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SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
Getty is following suit, with people reporting batches of 25c GI sales from April. That might be the new thingy that I didn't understand, but no explanation has been forthcoming, as there never has been for the sub-$5 payments.
The sub $5 payments were explained.
As?
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I think it was small sized images used for one day or something similar but a small E+ sale on Getty should get you $3 if there is no discount.
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yeah but these are exceptions, Getty is not the business or selling subs as a core business.
how big is the market for subs ? SS made 160 millions in revenues last year, 50% of that from subs probably, that's 80 millions, not a big deal considering the whole stock market is said to be worth 5-6 billion $.
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I think it was small sized images used for one day or something similar but a small E+ sale on Getty should get you $3 if there is no discount.
Oh yes, I remember the 'used for one day' thing now. Tx. A sort-of cheap RM use.
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I was wondering my my IS balance jumped by $.50 . Sweet! Two GI sales, lol. Now I can get that cup of coffee.
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he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
I got the lowest ever comissions, 9-7 cents from the getty/istock crooks... and getty is into nanopayment now, with that 'connect' junk - which actually is the final rock bottom everyone feared they will hit: the ad-space revenue model. Getty is the worst by far.
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he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
I got the lowest ever comissions, 9-7 cents from the getty/istock crooks... and getty is into nanopayment now, with that 'connect' junk - which actually is the final rock bottom everyone feared they will hit: the ad-space revenue model. Getty is the worst by far.
Fair or unfair, Connect is not for selling photos, just for showing them.
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he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
I got the lowest ever comissions, 9-7 cents from the getty/istock crooks... and getty is into nanopayment now, with that 'connect' junk - which actually is the final rock bottom everyone feared they will hit: the ad-space revenue model. Getty is the worst by far.
Fair or unfair, Connect is not for selling photos, just for showing them.
Maybe, but if the best we're going to get is (literally) a few pennies, at an unknown royalty %ge, I'd prefer to disConnect.
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Jon is a computer programmer first and a photographer based on the need to fill his new web application with content/images. He has a B.S., Computer Science 1997 and B.S. Mathematics 1997
he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html (http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html)
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[url]http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html[/url] ([url]http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html[/url])
He's got a big hole to fill.
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Jon is a computer programmer first and a photographer based on the need to fill his new web application with content/images. He has a B.S., Computer Science 1997 and B.S. Mathematics 1997
he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
DUDE once for all put in your head that you cannot bury microstock, it won't happen, adapt or quit!
if you are against it why don't you open an agency and do us all a big favor, not talking about the sales you will get us but the less complaining you will do in this forum :D
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[url]http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html[/url] ([url]http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html[/url])
He's got a big hole to fill.
posted 2003
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[url]http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html[/url] ([url]http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t241347-looking-for-licenses-to-redistribute-stock-photog.html[/url])
He's got a big hole to fill.
posted 2003
It has always been about the math, the PR is just a means to obtain the intended results.
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Jon is a computer programmer first and a photographer based on the need to fill his new web application with content/images. He has a B.S., Computer Science 1997 and B.S. Mathematics 1997
he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
That's true! He's done a big damage in the industry.
It's good to see Yuri's work is not available at SS anymore. It's kind of sad to see photographers with high quality portfolios selling their images for just a few cents. If I ever had no choice, and had to sell images on SS to make some money, it would only be my isolated-on-white shots and other similar garbage.
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Jon is a computer programmer first and a photographer based on the need to fill his new web application with content/images. He has a B.S., Computer Science 1997 and B.S. Mathematics 1997
he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
That's true! He's done a big damage in the industry.
It's good to see Yuri's work is not available at SS anymore. It's kind of sad to see photographers with high quality portfolios selling their images for just a few cents. If I ever had no choice, and had to sell images on SS to make some money, it would only be my isolated-on-white shots and other similar garbage.
thank god IS is giving what you want ;D
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
In that article, Yuri was talking about how much he makes in profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
I put a link on here somewhere not long ago where Yuri was talking in a magazine article about how much he makes, profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
Don't believe every marketing blub!
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
In that article, Yuri was talking about how much he makes in profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
That was then this is now:
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436 (http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436)
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
In that article, Yuri was talking about how much he makes in profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
That was then this is now:
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
[url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436[/url] ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436[/url])
It was only a couple of months ago. So what's changed? I'm guessing a big bag of money from Getty but of course that's just me being silly.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
In that article, Yuri was talking about how much he makes in profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
Dollars!
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
In that article, Yuri was talking about how much he makes in profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
That was then this is now:
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
[url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436[/url] ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436[/url])
It was only a couple of months ago. So what's changed? I'm guessing a big bag of money from Getty but of course that's just me being silly.
If you know you have a meeting with Getty what would you do? Telling the interviewer you have problems with overheads and diminishing profits or that you are making millions in profit?
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So he made it all up to get a better deal with Getty? If they were that stupid, he would be just as stupid to go exclusive with them :)
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he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
I got the lowest ever comissions, 9-7 cents from the getty/istock crooks... and getty is into nanopayment now, with that 'connect' junk - which actually is the final rock bottom everyone feared they will hit: the ad-space revenue model. Getty is the worst by far.
Fair or unfair, Connect is not for selling photos, just for showing them.
In case you didn't know: you don't sell photos on stock sites, you sell licenses (which basically means you allow someone else to show them around.) so this is another license, the puniest yet.
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So he made it all up to get a better deal with Getty? If they were that stupid, he would be just as stupid to go exclusive with them :)
He didn't make all up, and I haven't said that but he did marketing from time to time.
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I don't get how Yuri was feeling the pinch earning millions a year? He was doing great, unless he made it all up for that magazine article recently? This is just a way for him to make even more money. That's his choice, I'm sure we all have a price to sell out to Getty :)
LOL, he is staffing 100 people. He said himself micros where not enough compensation for the overhead he has on the books. Its somewhere on page 1-3 of this thread.
In that article, Yuri was talking about how much he makes in profit, not turnover. I can't remember exactly what it was, I think he was saying several million. That's with all the overheads, he could cut them whenever he wanted but I don't think he's doing this just for the money. I think he wants to see how big he can grow the business and a big cash injection from Getty will help. I can't think of any other reason why he would want to stick all his eggs in one basket.
That was then this is now:
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
[url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436[/url] ([url]http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/yuri-arcurs-is-is-exclusive/msg317436/#msg317436[/url])
It was only a couple of months ago. So what's changed? I'm guessing a big bag of money from Getty but of course that's just me being silly.
If you know you have a meeting with Getty what would you do? Telling the interviewer you have problems with overheads and diminishing profits or that you are making millions in profit?
I am always amazed at how many people buy the PR from both the micro sites and contributors who promote themselves.
We should ask ourselves what are they trying to accomplish and why.
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DUDE once for all put in your head that you cannot bury microstock, it won't happen, adapt or quit!
if you are against it why don't you open an agency and do us all a big favor, not talking about the sales you will get us but the less complaining you will do in this forum :D
you're missing the point.
stock photography exists only as long as photographers can make a living with it.
once only a handful or CEOs and shareholders and agency owners can live off photography the party will be over including me and you.
i know musicians, journalists, bloggers, and other people living off digital products, now they're all in deep sh-it financially and you can bet we're next on the list.
i've many other marketable skills apart stock photography but if possible i want to keep my career as a creative and an artist, and this is no more possible in so many creative fields because of the rock bottom cheap fees paid by major corporations and distributors.
those like you defending the microstock model of agencies like Shutterstock are equally responsible for what will be the situation in a few years and you're just shooting yourself in the foot.
i've nothing else to say in this discussion .. and after all this is a pro-micro forum of course.
bye bye
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i've nothing else to say in this discussion
Please let this be true.
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he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
I got the lowest ever comissions, 9-7 cents from the getty/istock crooks... and getty is into nanopayment now, with that 'connect' junk - which actually is the final rock bottom everyone feared they will hit: the ad-space revenue model. Getty is the worst by far.
Fair or unfair, Connect is not for selling photos, just for showing them.
In case you didn't know: you don't sell photos on stock sites, you sell licenses (which basically means you allow someone else to show them around.) so this is another license, the puniest yet.
If you really think it is the same, no need to try to explain it to you. It would be a worthless effort.
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he might be a photographer but he'll go down in history as the photographer who killed the value of stock photography thanks to his bulk subs deals.
seriously, who's worse ? getty acting as a monopoly or SS selling images for 0.30$ ?
kudos to his coding and entrepreneurial skills but i see no reason to see him as a positive figure in our industry, SS is nothing but the Walmart of stock.
I got the lowest ever comissions, 9-7 cents from the getty/istock crooks... and getty is into nanopayment now, with that 'connect' junk - which actually is the final rock bottom everyone feared they will hit: the ad-space revenue model. Getty is the worst by far.
Fair or unfair, Connect is not for selling photos, just for showing them.
In case you didn't know: you don't sell photos on stock sites, you sell licenses (which basically means you allow someone else to show them around.) so this is another license, the puniest yet.
If you really think it is the same, no need to try to explain it to you. It would be a worthless effort.
You are very gullible, and there are a lot of you. That's why most things go downhill after a short while.
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Tunnel vision. And deciding what you are going to see before really looking. Too bad.
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I must admit I haven't read all 14 pages of this thread:) so forgive me if I am repeating what was said already. I remember Yuri was looking into exclusivity for a long time, he just didn't like the terms the agencies were willing to offer. I guess finally he got what he was looking for. Plus a few months ago he reported some legal trouble with certain eyewear company. From what I heard, if you're exclusive with Getty, they take care of things like that for you. So really it makes a lot of sense - instead of paying his own lawyers and technical stuff to upload images to many agencies he can cut costs and extra work and trouble and concentrate on whatever's next in his life. Yes it does mean having all eggs in one basket, but if I am sure he has a lot of padding now in case of any trouble.
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I think you all should be less worried about Yuri and more worried about Adobe trying to force their rental program down our throats! :o
Sign the petition if agree: http://chn.ge/11YiakJ (http://chn.ge/11YiakJ)
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i've nothing else to say in this discussion
Please let this be true.
+1
My vote to say bye bye Xanox and leave this forum. Microstock will stay because crowdsoucing will always be here with digital camers and world market on the web. Microstock fills a demand market, it doesn't create that market.
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No interest to get pulled into this debate, other than to say how happy teams like Andresr, Monkeybusiness, Pressmaster, etc must be! Greatest competition gone. Their earnings will no doubt grow hugely on the back of this.
Who will emerge as the next #1 in microstock?
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Another quite worrying thought. Maybe Yuri have heard or know something about the future of SS that we do not know? visiting their own forum its quite clear something is not right and have not been for many months. Many people are truly unhappy.
Its also very true as one poster points out. Many of these prominent members and special portfolios have been looking in to exclusivity for some years now but probably halted by the ongoing IS-Getty troubles. You do not have to go to the heights of Yuri to see this brewing its just enough to watch some other smaller stock-suppliers move and break away. :)
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Both yuri and his father. Jacob Wackerhausen and Steen Waskerhousen are real. They can easily be googled.
There is an amazing amount of speculations and hear say in this thread.
And not so many facts.
as for all eggs in one basket?
It is noticable that Yuri actively moves content from non exclusive into exclusivity.
Last time I heard a Danish microstocker do that, was because he stopped doing micro and let micro be one egg in the basket while he persued other income streams.
If Yuris move has any significance in the microstock market, in my opinion it would be that... People are becoming a lot more critical as to where they distribute their content and they shut down portefolios at places that are not cost/ benificial or directly annoying to work with. It is not just "upload to them all" anymore. And thats a good thing.
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Then there are people here that keep blaming the subscription models for the loss of possibility to earn a living from stock.
we hear: You might as well flap burgers or 25 cents is too cheap.
we have heard it so many times.
But these guys (mostly one) have completely misunderstood what is happening.
Simply... digital globalization. Wages, costs, and distribution is being globalized.
Burgers can not be distributed cost free through a digital network, so prizes on burger flapper wages are determined locally.
Things that can be distributed and aquired digitally are now being priced after global supply and demand. And it will not end until all wages are the same all around the globe.
So it is not the subscription model, but global aquisition and distribution of content that caused the traditional "fenced in" stock market to decline.
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Another quite worrying thought. Maybe Yuri have heard or know something about the future of SS that we do not know? visiting their own forum its quite clear something is not right and have not been for many months. Many people are truly unhappy.
Its also very true as one poster points out. Many of these prominent members and special portfolios have been looking in to exclusivity for some years now but probably halted by the ongoing IS-Getty troubles. You do not have to go to the heights of Yuri to see this brewing its just enough to watch some other smaller stock-suppliers move and break away. :)
And SS is still dealing with an influx of ex- IS exclusives. So what does that say?
It all balances each other out in the end. The only thing that happened is that there is a tiny shuffle in the two libraries. I know Sean doenst want to sell his stuff for cents, but he should go talk to SS to get his portfolio on there. Complete the circle that started back in February.
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Another quite worrying thought. Maybe Yuri have heard or know something about the future of SS that we do not know? visiting their own forum its quite clear something is not right and have not been for many months. Many people are truly unhappy.
Its also very true as one poster points out. Many of these prominent members and special portfolios have been looking in to exclusivity for some years now but probably halted by the ongoing IS-Getty troubles. You do not have to go to the heights of Yuri to see this brewing its just enough to watch some other smaller stock-suppliers move and break away. :)
And SS is still dealing with an influx of ex- IS exclusives. So what does that say?
It all balances each other out in the end. The only thing that happened is that there is a tiny shuffle in the two libraries. I know Sean doenst want to sell his stuff for cents, but he should go talk to SS to get his portfolio on there. Complete the circle that started back in February.
With his experience why should he trust SS more then IS or any other for that matter? for all you know you might be asking him for a jump out of the frying pan into the fire.
Life in our world is not so green anymore. Nowhere.
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Both yuri and his father. Jacob Wackerhausen and Steen Waskerhousen are real. They can easily be googled.
There is an amazing amount of speculations and hear say in this thread.
And not so many facts.
as for all eggs in one basket?
It is noticable that Yuri actively moves content from non exclusive into exclusivity.
Last time I heard a Danish microstocker do that, was because he stopped doing micro and let micro be one egg in the basket while he persued other income streams.
If Yuris move has any significance in the microstock market, in my opinion it would be that... People are becoming a lot more critical as to where they distribute their content and they shut down portefolios at places that are not cost/ benificial or directly annoying to work with. It is not just "upload to them all" anymore. And thats a good thing.
Nobody said they aren't real, it was just about a post in green big letters on the SS forum that led to some uncertainty if the poster is really his father. My personal estimation for him was also 3000-4000 downloads on a working day that leads to around 60.000$ a month and to around 200.000$ overall revenue per month assuming that SS was a little less than a third of his income stream.
Who was this? (the Danish microstocker)
I see this as a good thing too!
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Noone famous.
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I don't like how SS seem to get blamed for low priced subs when they were raising the prices every year until other sites stopped them. Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25? I think subs commissions were heading much higher but now were stuck until the sites have decided they can't get any more buyers and see how much they can raise prices. It would be hard for SS to raise prices first when they pay many of us the highest subs commission. There was a tiny commission raise from Thinkstock but $0.28 is still a lot less than $0.38.
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I don't like how SS seem to get blamed for low priced subs when they were raising the prices every year until other sites stopped them. Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25? I think subs commissions were heading much higher but now were stuck until the sites have decided they can't get any more buyers and see how much they can raise prices. It would be hard for SS to raise prices first when they pay many of us the highest subs commission. There was a tiny commission raise from Thinkstock but $0.28 is still a lot less than $0.38.
subs have never been a good idea but they are here and now we have to deal with them. Subs have been introduced on other sites because of the success of SS so one can blame SS but I wouldn't.
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I don't like how SS seem to get blamed for low priced subs when they were raising the prices every year until other sites stopped them. Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25? I think subs commissions were heading much higher but now were stuck until the sites have decided they can't get any more buyers and see how much they can raise prices. It would be hard for SS to raise prices first when they pay many of us the highest subs commission. There was a tiny commission raise from Thinkstock but $0.28 is still a lot less than $0.38.
SS has been steadily growing and gaining market share despite paying .38. They could have raised prices and continued the upward trend because submitters who are also buyers respected and trusted them. I would say that trust has been shaken recently based on their actions. Traffic is dropping at SS and rising at other ms sites, how much of this is because of those actions remains to be seen.
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I don't like how SS seem to get blamed for low priced subs when they were raising the prices every year until other sites stopped them. Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25? I think subs commissions were heading much higher but now were stuck until the sites have decided they can't get any more buyers and see how much they can raise prices. It would be hard for SS to raise prices first when they pay many of us the highest subs commission. There was a tiny commission raise from Thinkstock but $0.28 is still a lot less than $0.38.
SS could perfectly rise prices because they have more files than anyone and they have the prestige and the trust of their customers and, even if doubling subscription prices they would go on being insanely cheap for buyers. Raising prices is something that just industry leaders can do, and SS is one of them. Prices and comissions ar not the same, btw.
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I don't like how SS seem to get blamed for low priced subs when they were raising the prices every year until other sites stopped them. Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25? I think subs commissions were heading much higher but now were stuck until the sites have decided they can't get any more buyers and see how much they can raise prices. It would be hard for SS to raise prices first when they pay many of us the highest subs commission. There was a tiny commission raise from Thinkstock but $0.28 is still a lot less than $0.38.
SS could perfectly rise prices because they have more files than anyone and they have the prestige and the trust of their customers and, even if doubling subscription prices they would go on being insanely cheap for buyers. Raising prices is something that just industry leaders can do, and SS is one of them. Prices and comissions ar not the same, btw.
Shutterstock has raised some prices. They charge $400 for some single sales (apparently down to a few dollars for some sales), you know the ones where no one knows what the license allows. It's for sensitive use but most buyers don't even use that, right?
Also Thinkstock subs for exclusives start at the highest level that Shutterstock has, I doubt that's a coincidence. If Shutterstock were to raise their royalty rates others would be forced to follow, now Thinkstock can pay almost nothing and still be better than Shutterstock.
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I don't like how SS seem to get blamed for low priced subs when they were raising the prices every year until other sites stopped them. Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25? I think subs commissions were heading much higher but now were stuck until the sites have decided they can't get any more buyers and see how much they can raise prices. It would be hard for SS to raise prices first when they pay many of us the highest subs commission. There was a tiny commission raise from Thinkstock but $0.28 is still a lot less than $0.38.
SS could perfectly rise prices because they have more files than anyone and they have the prestige and the trust of their customers and, even if doubling subscription prices they would go on being insanely cheap for buyers. Raising prices is something that just industry leaders can do, and SS is one of them. Prices and comissions ar not the same, btw.
Shutterstock has raised some prices. They charge $400 for some single sales, you know the ones where no one knows what the license allows. It's for sensitive use but most buyers don't even use that, right?
Of course, I know. But I meant the standard cheaper sub license.
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Hi All,
The speculation here is all over the board but I will just offer my own feelings if I was in Yuri's shoes. Move all my content to Istock and retire. If you do the math ( you all make money at this ) just add up how many images he has and how well they sell and the numbers are off the hook. Whatever he paid his team to produce was paid for out of past returns over the years of production so he is clean to shut down and make his retirement money off the sales of 100,000 images. If I was Yuri I would shut down and move onto something new. Quitting while you are ahead is not quitting it is smart, but that is an older guy talking who just wants to smell the roses for a few years :) My 2 cents
Best,
Jonathan
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I agree! I would cut all the staff and overhead and just go shoot what I feel like on any given day. Oh heck that is what I do :-)
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Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25?
SS now is on Nasdaq, it's a public company, their mission now is not to survive but to GROW over time, that is making profits for their shareholders.
in order to so, either they grow their customer base or they cut costs or both.
simple as that.
where in this equation do you see any space for raising fees to photographers ?
nowhere, as the growth in buyers will be achieved by massive and aggressive investments in marketing and this leave photographers completely out of the scenario as there is no correlation between how many contributors and images you have and you sell and how many buyers you're able to supply and to keep under your wing.
now, how much profit exactly ? at the moment they claim to have a net profit of 28% which is huge for a Nasdaq company.
and it aint go on like this forever, this is not normal, and this is not sustainable.
in a normal scenario SS will stick with a 10-20% net profit and be happy with that.
of course they could push things even further and reach a 40-50% net profit .. that would mean cutting costs to the bone and paying us a pittance ... say 0.10$ per image or less.
it's doable, they've nothing to lose, in the worst scenario the insiders will sell their shares and bye bye ...
now again, where do photographer fit into this scenario ? NOWHERE !
we're the very last ones in the food chain.
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I agree! I would cut all the staff and overhead and just go shoot what I feel like on any given day. Oh heck that is what I do :-)
Same here ! :)
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Why would SS increase their $0.38 commission when several sites were paying $0.25?
Apple and Amazon make billions selling digital products from which you keep 50-70% of a sale.
Stock photography instead is one of the only industries where the distributor gives you as low as 15% of a sale.
And on top of this, some of the market leaders had the guts to claim this model is financially "unsustainable".
THIS is the market we're in, guys !
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Hi All,
The speculation here is all over the board but I will just offer my own feelings if I was in Yuri's shoes. Move all my content to Istock and retire. If you do the math ( you all make money at this ) just add up how many images he has and how well they sell and the numbers are off the hook. Whatever he paid his team to produce was paid for out of past returns over the years of production so he is clean to shut down and make his retirement money off the sales of 100,000 images. If I was Yuri I would shut down and move onto something new. Quitting while you are ahead is not quitting it is smart, but that is an older guy talking who just wants to smell the roses for a few years :) My 2 cents
he's still relatively young and ambitious, why should he stop now ?
makes no sense.
besides, he certainly agreed with Getty to provide a minimum number of new images per month.
as far as i know it's the norm for other agencies under getty.
his new agency is his "baby", why should he get bored seeing it grow to new heights ?
maybe in 10 yrs from now, but not now.
many here fail to realize Yuri so far was the only microstocker really "thinking BIG".
that's why he's not happy with what he achieved in micros and the new getty deal is just the start of the next step.
and he's not stopping there, he's got all the skills and the qualifications to become a serious player in the stock industry as a major agency in the future.
it's ridicolous that most of the guys posting here are completely missing the whole logic on this.
Yuri wanted to succeed from the start and he had the skills to do it, no matter if on micro or macro or whatever, that's not the point.
he's the bread winner and you guys are the losers, that's the moral of the story, no matter if this discussion goes on for 50 more pages.
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I also heard he had bought himself a 50% stake in Danish Lego and thats a giant corporation. Well if I ever meet him I have to treat him to a portion of genuine Fleskestek.
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"he's the bread winner and you guys are the losers, that's the moral of the story, no matter if this discussion goes on for 50 more pages"
(XANOX)
Losers tend to whine and complain instead of looking ahead and trying new things. You have been complaining and whining every day for about eigth or ten years now. Go on.
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yes it's true he moved to Legoland :D
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I heard he was the original model for the Lego man.
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SS now is on Nasdaq, it's a public company, their mission now is not to survive but to GROW over time, that is making profits for their shareholders.
in order to so, either they grow their customer base or they cut costs or both.
Actually SS is on the NYSE, not NASDAQ and a third option is to somehow figure out a way to increase prices. Apart from that, you've pretty well hit their dilemma. Their stock took a fairly hard hit today. Even at that the stock is still at 47 times future earnings and 9 times sales. Over priced in my estimation. I sold my IPO shares when they went above $43. If they fall back to the upper $20's or low $30's I'll consider buying again.
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SS now is on Nasdaq, it's a public company, their mission now is not to survive but to GROW over time, that is making profits for their shareholders.
in order to so, either they grow their customer base or they cut costs or both.
Actually SS is on the NYSE, not NASDAQ and a third option is to somehow figure out a way to increase prices. Apart from that, you've pretty well hit their dilemma. Their stock took a fairly hard hit today. Even at that the stock is still at 47 times future earnings and 9 times sales. Over priced in my estimation. I sold my IPO shares when they went above $43. If they fall back to the upper $20's or low $30's I'll consider buying again.
The whole market seems over priced. Lots of people still think it has a way to go yet !
I cannot see them growing the microstock market which is being eaten into especially by shared social media content. Many small and even many larger businesses and groups are abandoning their websites in favor of social media. And cheap junk print marketing is dying. I could see them buying and consolidating other agencies in order to try to expand their share especially outside of the US. Sooner or later Thinkstock is going to be a challenge.
Maybe they will go into a completely different business.
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SS now is on Nasdaq, it's a public company, their mission now is not to survive but to GROW over time, that is making profits for their shareholders.
in order to so, either they grow their customer base or they cut costs or both.
Actually SS is on the NYSE, not NASDAQ and a third option is to somehow figure out a way to increase prices. Apart from that, you've pretty well hit their dilemma. Their stock took a fairly hard hit today. Even at that the stock is still at 47 times future earnings and 9 times sales. Over priced in my estimation. I sold my IPO shares when they went above $43. If they fall back to the upper $20's or low $30's I'll consider buying again.
The whole market seems over priced. Lots of people still think it has a way to go yet !
I cannot see them growing the microstock market which is being eaten into especially by shared social media content. Many small and even many larger businesses and groups are abandoning their websites in favor of social media. And cheap junk print marketing is dying. I could see them buying and consolidating other agencies in order to try to expand their share especially outside of the US. Sooner or later Thinkstock is going to be a challenge.
Maybe they will go into a completely different business.
I was assuming that was IS reason for removing upload limits - so they had the content to compete with SS.
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SS now is on Nasdaq, it's a public company, their mission now is not to survive but to GROW over time, that is making profits for their shareholders.
in order to so, either they grow their customer base or they cut costs or both.
Actually SS is on the NYSE, not NASDAQ and a third option is to somehow figure out a way to increase prices. Apart from that, you've pretty well hit their dilemma. Their stock took a fairly hard hit today. Even at that the stock is still at 47 times future earnings and 9 times sales. Over priced in my estimation. I sold my IPO shares when they went above $43. If they fall back to the upper $20's or low $30's I'll consider buying again.
I think one easy and fair way to increase prices and contributor return is to offer the option of exclusive image series. I know they are opposed to contributor exclusivity but having the option of image exclusives at a higher return for the contributor and a higher price for the buyer seems like an easy solution. Position it outside of the subs and more like the SOD sales. Buyers and SS get the benefit of some exclusive images and contributors get their raise in the way of a better return.
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SS now is on Nasdaq, it's a public company, their mission now is not to survive but to GROW over time, that is making profits for their shareholders.
in order to so, either they grow their customer base or they cut costs or both.
Actually SS is on the NYSE, not NASDAQ and a third option is to somehow figure out a way to increase prices. Apart from that, you've pretty well hit their dilemma. Their stock took a fairly hard hit today. Even at that the stock is still at 47 times future earnings and 9 times sales. Over priced in my estimation. I sold my IPO shares when they went above $43. If they fall back to the upper $20's or low $30's I'll consider buying again.
Top 10 New York Stock Exchange-traded stocks posting largest percentage decreases
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/nyse-stocks-posting-largest-percentage-174225999.html (http://finance.yahoo.com/news/nyse-stocks-posting-largest-percentage-174225999.html)
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Hi w7lwi,
Great advice and thanks for the post.
Cheers,
Jonathan
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I am curious - since Yuri's port is not available on SS anymore, did anyone who works in the same style see any increase in sales? Or the effect is negligible? My search for "business people" there turned up 900,356 results... hmm I guess I have my answer then:)
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I am curious - since Yuri's port is not available on SS anymore, did anyone who works in the same style see any increase in sales? Or the effect is negligible? My search for "business people" there turned up 900,356 results... hmm I guess I have my answer then:)
Must be around 200 members there working in almost exactly the same style. They cant all be up? Thank God! I am not into lifestyles. ;D
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Yuri Arcurs back on November 21, 2009
http://arcurs.com/2009/11/what-is-macro-stock/ (http://arcurs.com/2009/11/what-is-macro-stock/)
""Consider this image that I just got online at Getty Images house collection. You do not get much further away from microstock than that. This image would have been rejected again and again and again on microstock. But last month I just sold this image for 1200USD on Getty.""
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1 week after and Yuri is still everywhere beside SS
microstock at his best, hidden deals and corruption is OK, this is just shameless :o
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1 week after and Yuri is still everywhere beside SS
microstock at his best, hidden deals and corruption is OK, this is just shameless :o
He said: "We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks."
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1 week after and Yuri is still everywhere beside SS
microstock at his best, hidden deals and corruption is OK, this is just shameless :o
He said: "We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks."
so what Yuri says its LAW ;D
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1 week after and Yuri is still everywhere beside SS
microstock at his best, hidden deals and corruption is OK, this is just shameless :o
He said: "We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks."
While there have been reports of people who were refused exclusivity because they had tiny numbers of files (two, in one instance) on partner sites they didn't even know about, and had to wait until they managed to find out how to get them removed. Fair enough, that's the rules. Unless you're Special.
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1 week after and Yuri is still everywhere beside SS
microstock at his best, hidden deals and corruption is OK, this is just shameless :o
He said: "We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks."
While there have been reports of people who were refused exclusivity because they had tiny numbers of files (two, in one instance) on partner sites they didn't even know about, and had to wait until they managed to find out how to get them removed. Fair enough, that's the rules. Unless you're Special.
Right, obviously Yuri got a special deal including some leeway with removing his files. It's not surprising and it's not news since he said it up front in the only statement he's made about it. I don't know why you would expect him to take down his files faster than he has to.
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Come on, its a huge work to remove that amount of files even with the best intents and cooperation from all sides.
Aggreements should always be reasonable and practical. And in this case they are.
And there is no big damage done, it doesnt matter much if a customer bought a file in the timespan where exclusivity ended or if it was bought when it was not exclusive. The only party it could hurt, is istock/ getty and they have agreed to the transition period.
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Yuri Arcurs back on November 21, 2009
[url]http://arcurs.com/2009/11/what-is-macro-stock/[/url] ([url]http://arcurs.com/2009/11/what-is-macro-stock/[/url])
""Consider this image that I just got online at Getty Images house collection. You do not get much further away from microstock than that. This image would have been rejected again and again and again on microstock. But last month I just sold this image for 1200USD on Getty.""
Well done!! I know a guy who joined the house collection at the same time as I did. He uploaded four Sci-fi pics to another RF agency. They refused them for some reason.
However they got accepted in the house-collection and only a few months ago they sold for 6K, Euro that was.
Funny but you just cant tell, can you. :)
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Well done!! I know a guy who joined the house collection at the same time as I did. He uploaded four Sci-fi pics to another RF agency. They refused them for some reason.
However they got accepted in the house-collection and only a few months ago they sold for 6K, Euro that was.
Funny but you just cant tell, can you. :)
for sci-fi and science images just join SPL agency and they resell with Getty.
6K euro ? 8000$ ? that's a great sale.
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Yuri's portfolio at iStock is down to 255 images. What is going on?
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Yuri's portfolio at iStock is down to 255 images. What is going on?
Has the normally-malfunctioning connector to Getty worked for his images?
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Yuri's portfolio at iStock is down to 255 images. What is going on?
They need to reverse it and have them come from Getty, likely.
Wonder if teaching a class for Depositphotos at MSExpo is part of the deal ;) .
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"I am curious - since Yuri's port is not available on SS anymore, did anyone who works in the same style see any increase in sales? Or the effect is negligible? My search for "business people" there turned up 900,356 results... hmm I guess I have my answer then:) "
Yes, I am up by $.33 so far :)
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Try Urilux.
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Try Urilux.
Created in April 2013, 12000+ images. Shows 50 Dls, but there are numerous blue flames in his port. Something funny going on.
Nice find EyeDesign
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Look at the caption on this image of "Urilux"
http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f (http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f)
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Look at the caption on this image of "Urilux"
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url])
Young man in a boat on the water. Yuri Arcurs in 2009.
Yet it was Uploaded on: 01-29-06 Đ Urilux
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Look at the caption on this image of "Urilux"
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url])
Uploaded in 2006, claims to be shot in 2009. Hmmm ...
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So they just changed his username? Bizarre.
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Try Urilux.
Does Roche know about it?
http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html (http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html)
"The Urilux 100 is the smartest test reader most suitable for rapid screening of diseases of the kidney and the urogenital tract, carbohydrate metabolism disorders (diabetes mellitus) and liver diseases and haemolytic disorders. "
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Maybe he changed his screen name since everyone was catching on to what is going on. I don't put anything past iStock
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So they just changed his username? Bizarre.
Yet, I saw new uploads today to his old username.
Why 2 accounts?
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So they just changed his username? Bizarre.
Yet, I saw new uploads today to his old username.
Why 2 accounts?
I can think of a few possible reasons, and it has never officially been allowed before [1]. But maybe it's just to underline how special he is, like Edstock. I still haven't worked out why ' Ed' has two.
[1] Someone ages ago asked whether he could have two accounts to separate his 'aduilt-content' work from his photos involving kids, as it could be awkward referring parents of potential models to his port and was told 'No'.
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Maybe 999 uploads per week isn't enough
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Maybe it is to prevent people searching on the username and finding it elsewhere.
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I find incredible that a thread full of "maybe he did" "maybe he did not"
can reach the amount of 17 pages
::)
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I find incredible that a thread full of "maybe he did" "maybe he did not"
can reach the amount of 17 pages
::)
Well apparently there are 318779 posts (this makes 318780) and most of them are full of "maybes". Maybe this is the maybe forum :)
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Try Urilux.
Does Roche know about it?
[url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url] ([url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url])
"The Urilux 100 is the smartest test reader most suitable for rapid screening of diseases of the kidney and the urogenital tract, carbohydrate metabolism disorders (diabetes mellitus) and liver diseases and haemolytic disorders. "
Must admit the name 'Urilux' does sound more like a painful medical condition than a stock photographer.
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urilux = U r i Lux = You Are ?? Light
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Try Urilux.
Does Roche know about it?
[url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url] ([url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url])
"The Urilux 100 is the smartest test reader most suitable for rapid screening of diseases of the kidney and the urogenital tract, carbohydrate metabolism disorders (diabetes mellitus) and liver diseases and haemolytic disorders. "
Must admit the name 'Urilux' does sound more like a painful medical condition than a stock photographer.
Your right actually. Its Latin and stands for incontinence, comes from incontinecium-fatale.
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Try Urilux.
Does Roche know about it?
[url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url] ([url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url])
"The Urilux 100 is the smartest test reader most suitable for rapid screening of diseases of the kidney and the urogenital tract, carbohydrate metabolism disorders (diabetes mellitus) and liver diseases and haemolytic disorders. "
Must admit the name 'Urilux' does sound more like a painful medical condition than a stock photographer.
Your right actually. Its Latin and stands for incontinence, comes from incontinecium-fatale.
Google it, comesback as a urine tester, someone's taking the pi$$ methinks !
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urilux is easy to remember and simpler to type than his old alias. Makes sense.
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urilux is easy to remember and simpler to type than his old alias. Makes sense.
Someone who knew about him and only cared to check his portfolio rather than all that is available only had to type his old alias once and bookmark the page.
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Also the account of two danish contributors ( pixdeluxe and laflor ) yesterday was been merged into globalstock ...47000 images , 2300 agency files and almost 400 vetta(s) not bad
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IS is playing all kinds of games.
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iStock like to be straightforward with their contributors, they'll probably fully clear things up about this in the next newsletter to contributors. Along with information about Google Drive. *cough*
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Yuir, yuri lets all talk about Yuri. I wonder what he did today...
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Yuir, yuri lets all talk about Yuri. I wonder what he did today...
It's not about Yuri. It's about iStock/Getty.
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Yuir, yuri lets all talk about Yuri. I wonder what he did today...
It's not about Yuri. It's about iStock/Getty.
I think you'll find the thread is about Yuri and IS. 17 pages of conjecture.
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Yuir, yuri lets all talk about Yuri. I wonder what he did today...
It's not about Yuri. It's about iStock/Getty.
I think you'll find the thread is about Yuri and IS. 17 pages of conjecture.
It's more about iS/Getty and their different strokes for different folks.
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Yuir, yuri lets all talk about Yuri. I wonder what he did today...
It's not about Yuri. It's about iStock/Getty.
I think you'll find the thread is about Yuri and IS. 17 pages of conjecture.
It's more about iS/Getty and their different strokes for different folks.
Well it is their sandbox. They can make and change the rules in the sandbox, and they do. If Yuri has the balls to ask for a better deal then good for him.
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Look at the caption on this image of "Urilux"
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url])
Young man in a boat on the water. Yuri Arcurs in 2009.
Yet it was Uploaded on: 01-29-06 Đ Urilux
Wonder why that didn't get rejected for direct on camera flash.
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Look at the caption on this image of "Urilux"
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-1251598-happy-young-man-swimmimg-in-a-lake-outdoor-vacation.php?st=53d489f[/url])
Young man in a boat on the water. Yuri Arcurs in 2009.
Yet it was Uploaded on: 01-29-06 Đ Urilux
Wonder why that didn't get rejected for direct on camera flash.
Because it's Yuri. ;)
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Yuir, yuri lets all talk about Yuri. I wonder what he did today...
I was thinking of this song when I wrote the post.
Mad as Hell on Henry Heng: "Tony, Tony, Let's all vote for Tony!" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmCsdWqxDmQ#)
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http://www.dpchallenge.com/forum.php?action=read&FORUM_THREAD_ID=1194494 (http://www.dpchallenge.com/forum.php?action=read&FORUM_THREAD_ID=1194494)
"Yuri Arcurs, creator of PeopleImages is looking to include 10 experienced stock buyers in his personal customer feedback group.
...
-This opportunity for the right person is a dream come true. You will have a concrete impact on features, images and the outcome of the website and be discussing it directly with Yuri Arcurs himself."
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^^^ Get in there Sean! You know you want to. Just think ... you'll actually get to discuss things with Yuri HIMSELF! You even get paid $100 per month for speaking to Yuri HIMSELF.
There is a warning though;
"Don't just "criticize!" - anybody can do that - show that you know the industry by suggesting smart solutions."
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^^^ Get in there Sean! You know you want to. Just think ... you'll actually get to discuss things with Yuri HIMSELF! You even get paid $100 per month for speaking to Yuri HIMSELF.
There is a warning though;
"Don't just "criticize!" - anybody can do that - show that you know the industry by suggesting smart solutions."
LOL. come now old chap ;) you know sarcasm is the lowest form of wit ;D ;D
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You even get paid $100 per month for speaking to Yuri HIMSELF.
There is a warning though;
"Don't just "criticize!" - anybody can do that - show that you know the industry by suggesting smart solutions."
So, he's wanting a real-life consultancy service for $100pm.
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The point is coming for microstock...simply put is a kind of photogrpahy who will not take anybody to anywhere.
I use all the best microstock, i earn slow money but i sell only travel and reportage photo. Now contributing to big agency, selling directly, selling less but for better money. Microstock evne for Yuri is not profitable.
In my opinion this is risky for yuri....
- many here consider yuri arcurs wrks superb. yes superb in micro community, pretty standard for macro agency. igf i browse the same theme in other agency, like image source or getty itself, there are images with more creativity or at least same IQ. Yuri strong point was to create high iq images in microstock world, but these images compared to similar images in macro stock are not so amazing, i mean there are more talented photog of yuri in macro work.
- he sold a lot because it was cheap to buy. istock is falling down, maybe some buyers know yuri and want his works, but in my opinion most buyer just search and choose the most downloaded images for theme. yuri having begun selling tons of images in 2006 is high in every ranking. The download ranking explains while all te images from yuri from 2006-2008 have sold in thousand, while all the images from yuri after 2009 have sold less. In practice he's selling mostly old images. New images with new theme struggles.
- Yuri to keep is business is producing how much 50k images per year? now he has a group of 14 young "student" who are simpy producing images for him to keep the business going. In my opinion this is another blow to the industry. Now in PI there 100k more images. hes producing like crazy, but is this profitable or good for market? i doubt.
- ss will keep selling the same, people don't care of yuri works in microstock. they buy here for price, if they have tp buy same image theme from yuri at 20 dollar and from another at 1 dollar, who you think they will choose?
in practice yuri is simply telling that the feast is ended. Microstock wil be good to earn good money while keeping cost at minimum, but for big business company this scheme is unprofitable in the long run,
I dont know if he will sell rm or rf, but now many images of yui who have sold for peanuts in ss , will be sold for dollars, maybe even big dollars, from getty. And this is still confusing , in an industry already highly confused.
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You even get paid $100 per month for speaking to Yuri HIMSELF.
There is a warning though;
"Don't just "criticize!" - anybody can do that - show that you know the industry by suggesting smart solutions."
So, he's wanting a real-life consultancy service for $100pm.
Yup. Microconsultancy rather than trad consultancy. It's a race to the bottom!
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i don't think Yuri will ever post in this forum again.
he must be laughing his ass off reading all this.
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i don't think Yuri will ever post in this forum again.
he must be laughing his ass off reading all this.
are you talking about shame?
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i don't think Yuri will ever post in this forum again.
he must be laughing his ass off reading all this.
are you talking about shame?
If nothing else, he's certainly got plenty of chutzpah.
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May 29 - 0 sales (http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782 (http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
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May 29 - 0 sales ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url] ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url]))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
Like I said in another thread, presumably Canadian advertising legislation must be very lax, if they can say, via the crown, that he's exclusive, but he isn't.
It's also devaluing the crown for all the exclusives who don't have special 'deals'.
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Let me understand,
He is member since April 2013
http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/9575/scr20130608alle175059.png (http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/9575/scr20130608alle175059.png)
But he has photos uploaded in 2010
(and even before)
http://img694.imageshack.us/img694/2509/scr20130608alle175126.png (http://img694.imageshack.us/img694/2509/scr20130608alle175126.png)
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^^ It's a miracle ;)
-
BTW, it looks like another Scandinavian, formerly of this parish, is in the process of becoming iS exclusive.
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May 29 - 0 sales ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url] ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url]))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
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May 29 - 0 sales ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url] ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url]))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
Maybe he just really doesn't like Shutterstock? How much of a pay cut did his family just get from the changes to the referral scheme? $100,000 per year? Who knows but I bet it was very significant.
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May 29 - 0 sales ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url] ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url]))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
Maybe he just really doesn't like Shutterstock? How much of a pay cut did his family just get from the changes to the referral scheme? $100,000 per year? Who knows but I bet it was very significant.
I calculated 40k dollar
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May 29 - 0 sales ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url] ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url]))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
Maybe he just really doesn't like Shutterstock? How much of a pay cut did his family just get from the changes to the referral scheme? $100,000 per year? Who knows but I bet it was very significant.
I calculated 40k dollar
From Yuri alone right? He probably had hundreds of referrals of his own that disappeared over night.
-
Why don't one of you guys contact IS support and pose the question? Obviously, they wouldn't answer me if I asked.
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Why don't one of you guys contact IS support and pose the question? Obviously, they wouldn't answer me if I asked.
They wouldn't answer even if they knew the details. The deal is between him and Getty so they probably don't know everything. Besides what kind of answer would be satisfactory? Everyone already knows he got a special deal and he was allowed to keep his images up at other sites at least for a few weeks, he said that much. What more do you need to know?
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May 29 - 0 sales ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url] ([url]http://web.archive.org/web/20130529080941/http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=10204782[/url]))
June 8 - 3500 sales
3.5k sales (8 week days and 2 weekend days)
1 week left for a full month and still portfolio all around
I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
Maybe he just really doesn't like Shutterstock? How much of a pay cut did his family just get from the changes to the referral scheme? $100,000 per year? Who knows but I bet it was very significant.
I calculated 40k dollar
From Yuri alone right? He probably had hundreds of referrals of his own that disappeared over night.
Yeah, his dad said he referred Yuri, and said Yuri had 3-4k dls per day.
Edited
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Yeah, his dad said he referred Yuri, and said Yuri had 3-4k dls per month.
And Yuri was pretty active in trying to get referrals from what I remember. He said 3-4k dls per DAY not month.
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Yeah, his dad said he referred Yuri, and said Yuri had 3-4k dls per month.
And Yuri was pretty active in trying to get referrals from what I remember. He said 3-4k dls per DAY not month.
Yes per day, typo and corrected.
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Why don't one of you guys contact IS support and pose the question? Obviously, they wouldn't answer me if I asked.
They wouldn't answer even if they knew the details. The deal is between him and Getty so they probably don't know everything. Besides what kind of answer would be satisfactory? Everyone already knows he got a special deal and he was allowed to keep his images up at other sites at least for a few weeks, he said that much. What more do you need to know?
You don't have to ask for details.
"Hi, I see another contributor who has thousands of images here as an exclusive, also has the same thousands of images on many other microstock sites. Has there been a change to the ASA in some way?"
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Why don't one of you guys contact IS support and pose the question? Obviously, they wouldn't answer me if I asked.
They wouldn't answer even if they knew the details. The deal is between him and Getty so they probably don't know everything. Besides what kind of answer would be satisfactory? Everyone already knows he got a special deal and he was allowed to keep his images up at other sites at least for a few weeks, he said that much. What more do you need to know?
You don't have to ask for details.
"Hi, I see another contributor who has thousands of images here as an exclusive, also has the same thousands of images on many other microstock sites. Has there been a change to the ASA in some way?"
It's been mentioned in the forums in a variety of ways and the posts have been deleted....that says it all, IMO.
-
oops.
-
Why don't one of you guys contact IS support and pose the question? Obviously, they wouldn't answer me if I asked.
Seriously?
They have lied to us, they are lying to us, and they will lie to us in the future. The best that can be said is that they (IS) aren't actually lying because they (Getty) don't give them (IS) all the facts.
I think that we should accept - with our own sanity in mind - that, while all animals were created equal, some are more equal than others. And that some people got a (very) short end of the stick, while others, well, got a very special deal. The sooner people realize that they aren't in Kansas anymore, the sooner they will be able to make rational decisions about their own and their portfolio's future...
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I still can't quite believe this is happening. Just when I think Getty/istock can't get any worse, they prove me wrong again. Would be interesting to see what would happen if some of the big exclusives saw Yuri was selling on other sites and demanded that they should be allowed to do the same. Seems wrong that all other exclusives are restricted from selling RF on other sites while one is given permission. Not ethical and I would of thought that if one person has a special deal, others would want to negotiate the same.
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Am I missing something again?
Sorted by age, the most recent photo in the Urilux port was uploaded on 29th March, and the most recent file, an audio file, was uploaded 4th April.
Added: Whoops, I forgot that he still has a Yuri_arcurs port there too, which is where his new stuff is. (earlier in this thread) :-[
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I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
I think this says something about who Getty/Istock perceive as the real competitor: SS. I wonder if the deal they negotiated with Y. looks something like that: "all work you uploaded so far can stay where it is, just do not add something to it (they aren't worried about the other agencies really), but your port from SS needs to be gone. Then you are welcome to be a Getty/istock (special) 'exclusive'."
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I still can't quite believe this is happening. Just when I think Getty/istock can't get any worse, they prove me wrong again. Would be interesting to see what would happen if some of the big exclusives saw Yuri was selling on other sites and demanded that they should be allowed to do the same. Seems wrong that all other exclusives are restricted from selling RF on other sites while one is given permission. Not ethical and I would of thought that if one person has a special deal, others would want to negotiate the same.
Deals are made everywhere, its not an IS thing. I would like to opt out of subs on Deposit, but I cant. Others can. If you have a massive HCV port, you have negotiating power. We dont. Doesnt make it right, just that it happens everywhere. But it would be interesting to know what other exclusives think of the
Yuri / GY-IS deal.
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I still can't quite believe this is happening. Just when I think Getty/istock can't get any worse, they prove me wrong again. Would be interesting to see what would happen if some of the big exclusives saw Yuri was selling on other sites and demanded that they should be allowed to do the same. Seems wrong that all other exclusives are restricted from selling RF on other sites while one is given permission. Not ethical and I would of thought that if one person has a special deal, others would want to negotiate the same.
Deals are made everywhere, its not an IS thing. I would like to opt out of subs on Deposit, but I cant. Others can. If you have a massive HCV port, you have negotiating power. We dont. Doesnt make it right, just that it happens everywhere. But it would be interesting to know what other exclusives think of the
Yuri / GY-IS deal.
I know other deals are done but we don't usually see what they are. This one is in the open, we can all see that he has been given preferential treatment. I think it makes a mockery of istock exclusivity.
Perhaps this is in indication that contributor exclusivity is going soon? The rules have been changed for one person, I don't see how that can work?
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Shame Yuri doesn't dip in here to add some clarity. Why should he? Well he's happy to use this forum as a soundboard for ideas and his sunglasses copy-write issue; an explanation would end the speculation.
Why am I starting to think his input here only goes on way.
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Hasn't his input here always only gone one way? I don't have anything against Yuri, he is a great business person and knows how to use this forum for his benefit. It looks like he has struck an amazing deal with Getty. I just don't think Getty have thought about their other contributors but thats no surprise.
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I really don't understand what's going on here. There's surely no reason that his FT portfolio for example couldn't have been disabled at the same time as his SS portfolio (unless he had another 'special deal' with them too)? Even at DT Yuri doesn't appear to have uploaded for over a year so again his entire portfolio could be gone from there too.
I think this says something about who Getty/Istock perceive as the real competitor: SS. I wonder if the deal they negotiated with Y. looks something like that: "all work you uploaded so far can stay where it is, just do not add something to it (they aren't worried about the other agencies really), but your port from SS needs to be gone. Then you are welcome to be a Getty/istock (special) 'exclusive'."
That did occur to me as well. Getty/IS certainly have every reason to consider SS as their major threat. However this 'deal', from what we know of it, appears to cross so many 'lines in the sand' that it reeks of desperation.
This supposed 'exclusive Vetta' image on IS would cost a customer about $300 for the largest size;
http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-15424386-training-session.php?st=0663f22 (http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-15424386-training-session.php?st=0663f22)
... or alternatively they could go to FT and buy the same size for 36 credits. Actually their cheapest option might be to buy a 5 image/month subscription for about $25 via which that image at maximum size could be theirs, along with 4 others, for about $5 apiece;
http://en.fotolia.com/id/29014491 (http://en.fotolia.com/id/29014491)
The same 'exclusive Vetta' image also available on DT too and probably lots of other places.
Apart from the potential legal issues and credibility they stand the risk of damaging their relationship with customers. Were Getty/IS in such a hurry to close this deal that they have agreed to pretty much anything ... apart from Yuri's port being on SS?
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Shame Yuri doesn't dip in here to add some clarity. Why should he? Well he's happy to use this forum as a soundboard for ideas and his sunglasses copy-write issue; an explanation would end the speculation.
Why am I starting to think his input here only goes on way.
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
He said he's going to take down all his images from the other microstock sites, I doubt he's lying.
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Thats what I thought as well.
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He said he's going to take down all his images from the other microstock sites, I doubt he's lying.
A "few" weeks have passed. So, at the least, he's proved inaccurate. Of course, the longer it takes, the more double dip cash you make.
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Hasn't his input here always only gone one way? I don't have anything against Yuri, he is a great business person and knows how to use this forum for his benefit. It looks like he has struck an amazing deal with Getty. I just don't think Getty have thought about their other contributors but thats no surprise.
Look into the story of the highest selling woman on IS. Let's see, 36 and trying to figure out what to do to make a living up there in the Canada. I know I will go back to school and take graphic design classes. Hey what this IS. NO problem I will pick up a camera and instantly become the face of this stock site with no experience what so ever. Cool, this is so easy. Hey I just passed a million sales. Great thing I went back to take that graphic design class.
Does this sound legit to you? Or fair. Getty is just putting the best stock photographer in a position to shape the business model back into their favor. You have to remember the goal when getty was selling to the big hedge funds. Profit in the short term to boost sales price. No sane business would make yuri dominant in the search along with Monkey for so long if it did not boost the income by double. And it worked but it also built up the competition. Now is the holy$hit moment where they have to fend off the comp and Yuri off SS is a big shot accross the bow.
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Does this sound legit to you? Or fair.
Whaaat? Lise was in the right place at the right time, and did the right thing. I'm not sure what you're trying to say with this.
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over 3k files uploaded from monkeybusinessimages in the last month (+30% in terms of portfolio)
not much to say about that ???
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Looks like they bought a collection of food photos, and then uploaded more of the same old bright white business groups, people with headsets type stuff.
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I wonder if iStock (or Getty) is being singled out. Even small players have been offered "special deals." I know of several who found offers from DP unethical -- even refusing to be a part of special deals. Even I was offered a special deal at Cutcaster (to keep my mouth shut.)
Why is this "special deal" any different?
And, do you really think Y is the only contributor getting a "special deal?"
What is it that any of us expect WE can do about it?
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Even I was offered a special deal at Cutcaster (to keep my mouth shut.)
aren't you opening it now? ;D
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" the highest selling woman on IS" also happens to be a hell of a photographer, good at concepts, brilliant at execution, intense at work, way better at the craft than most of us. What matters what she was being before being a photographer?
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" the highest selling woman on IS" also happens to be a hell of a photographer, good at concepts, brilliant at execution, intense at work, way better at the craft than most of us. What matters what she was being before being a photographer?
I am just challenging the belief of a natural rise and a fair market place. There has been a lot of behind the curtain stuff going on since IS began. And Getty is way worse!! If you believe this was natural tallent then how was she so far ahead of everybody just to get caught. Like I said before sean outsould her 3 to 1 since 2010. Go back and look his first images and you see a natural progression in ability. Yuri had a warp jump from his first images in a few months. There are people who figure it out and it takes years. Then there are these unexplainable warp jumps in finished images.
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Looks like they bought a collection of food photos, and then uploaded more of the same old bright white business groups, people with headsets type stuff.
I think most of those food images are a good few years old. MBI didn't bother to upload them due to the upload limits at IS but they were available elsewhere.
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" the highest selling woman on IS" also happens to be a hell of a photographer, good at concepts, brilliant at execution, intense at work, way better at the craft than most of us. What matters what she was being before being a photographer?
I am just challenging the belief of a natural rise and a fair market place. There has been a lot of behind the curtain stuff going on since IS began. And Getty is way worse!! If you believe this was natural tallent then how was she so far ahead of everybody just to get caught. Like I said before sean outsould her 3 to 1 since 2010. Go back and look his first images and you see a natural progression in ability. Yuri had a warp jump from his first images in a few months. There are people who figure it out and it takes years. Then there are these unexplainable warp jumps in finished images.
I have noticed the warp jumps too, but I just attributed it to people who have money behind them to buy the best equipment, some quick photography lessons, money to buy props and hire models and travel vs. the rest of us who progress over a period of a year or years and have to work our way up to the top, without the benefit of a huge amount of cash behind us.
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" the highest selling woman on IS" also happens to be a hell of a photographer, good at concepts, brilliant at execution, intense at work, way better at the craft than most of us. What matters what she was being before being a photographer?
I am just challenging the belief of a natural rise and a fair market place. There has been a lot of behind the curtain stuff going on since IS began. And Getty is way worse!! If you believe this was natural tallent then how was she so far ahead of everybody just to get caught. Like I said before sean outsould her 3 to 1 since 2010. Go back and look his first images and you see a natural progression in ability. Yuri had a warp jump from his first images in a few months. There are people who figure it out and it takes years. Then there are these unexplainable warp jumps in finished images.
I have noticed the warp jumps too, but I just attributed it to people who have money behind them to buy the best equipment, some quick photography lessons, money to buy props and hire models and travel vs. the rest of us who progress over a period of a year or years and have to work our way up to the top, without the benefit of a huge amount of cash behind us.
That would seem to be a more obvious answer that somebody is just putting in the time, effort, money, etc.
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" the highest selling woman on IS" also happens to be a hell of a photographer, good at concepts, brilliant at execution, intense at work, way better at the craft than most of us. What matters what she was being before being a photographer?
I am just challenging the belief of a natural rise and a fair market place. There has been a lot of behind the curtain stuff going on since IS began. And Getty is way worse!! If you believe this was natural tallent then how was she so far ahead of everybody just to get caught. Like I said before sean outsould her 3 to 1 since 2010. Go back and look his first images and you see a natural progression in ability. Yuri had a warp jump from his first images in a few months. There are people who figure it out and it takes years. Then there are these unexplainable warp jumps in finished images.
There was a natural progression with Lise too __ you just weren't around early enough to see it. Lise has always cleaned her portfolio of earlier images that she considered below standard. I know people that have worked with Lise over the years too and they say she's a unique talent with a unique way of working. Every set-up is always one click of the shutter. Then she moves on to the next. She knows she's got the shot. Everytime.
If Yuri's port was still available on SS then you have been able to see the extraordinary progression there too (that was where he started). From shots of squirrels in his back garden with a P&S ... to world-class business concepts ... in about 18 months.
The proof of the 'fairness' in the system is the fact that Yuri, as an independent contributor, was actually allowed to surpass Istock's exclusive heroine. They could easily have rigged to best match (even further) to prevent it.
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I know people that have worked with Lise over the years too and they say she's a unique talent with a unique way of working. Every set-up is always one click of the shutter. Then she moves on to the next. She knows she's got the shot. Everytime.
I'm not questioning her skills, and I had no idea what pro was beefing about; but her models, some of which are animals, never, ever blink or twitch? That's a truly unique talent.
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"businessman" (200 results / best match / all file types)
- urilux (24)
- globalstock (21)
beside that the more relevant are kupicoo, londoneye and lise
there wasn't a single file from monkeybusinessimages
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OK, folks, iStock is launching a new collection, called "Exclusive Light". The royalties will most likely be somewhat higher than normally. The main difference between Exclusive Light and the regular Exclusive collection is that the contributors may sell their images on other sites, with the exception of any agencies whose name begins with an "S"and ends with a "K" and whose founder's surname begins with an "O".
At this point, participation in the Exclusive Light collection is by invitation only.
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
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Shame Yuri doesn't dip in here to add some clarity. Why should he? Well he's happy to use this forum as a soundboard for ideas and his sunglasses copy-write issue; an explanation would end the speculation.
Why am I starting to think his input here only goes on way.
Why do you even bother thinking about this?
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What those people have is talent and tenacity. That's the secret to their success, there's no 'mystery'.
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
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What those people have is talent and tenacity. That's the secret to their success, there's no 'mystery'.
Exactly. 'Talent and tenacity' in spades.
"Massive action produces massive results" ... as they say in network marketing. It's true too.
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
for a start we are free to do whatever we wish, that is just my feeling
IMO iStock haven't been playing fair with us and I was thinking they were learning a lesson but that is not the reality anymore, sure many exclusives and indies stopped but I am seeing many coming back, that said I haven't got much money from them so I can understand some cases
I am not really interested in joining their show unless they change drastically like I have said, other contributors believe what they are giving them is enough even considering all the lows such as: royalties, google fiasco, thinkstock, buyers bailing
will it be worth?
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
Surely if our main goal is money, we shouldn't put up with a site that pays as low as 15% commission, does bad deals like the Google one and has made it clear that we wont be informed about future deals that could make our images virtually worthless?
Unfortunately, too many people don't value their work and would probably accept 5% commission rather than remove images from istock. Those of us that have done something end up thinking our efforts were worthless. It didn't make much difference when I removed all my best images from istock when so many people are still uploading all they can.
There isn't a solution to this problem, so now I just laugh at people who constantly run down istock in this forum while uploading all they can to them.
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
Surely if our main goal is money, we shouldn't put up with a site that pays as low as 15% commission, does bad deals like the Google one and has made it clear that we wont be informed about future deals that could make our images virtually worthless?
Unfortunately, too many people don't value their work and would probably accept 5% commission rather than remove images from istock. Those of us that have done something end up thinking our efforts were worthless. It didn't make much difference when I removed all my best images from istock when so many people are still uploading all they can.
There isn't a solution to this problem, so now I just laugh at people who constantly run down istock in this forum while uploading all they can to them.
I mostly agree with you but don't laugh about it. I don't know if I would continue to upload at 5%. I hope it doesn't come to that.
I also don't know why this is all about iStock. I don't upload to many agencies. I don't trust any of them. iStock is still producing more dollars than most others. Should I drop all but Shutterstock? And, what makes SS so much more trustworthy?
Just asking for answers. I haven't heard an answer yet that fits us all. Yuri does his thing; I do mine.
:(
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I started to type out all the problems I have with istock but it would take too long. They're the worst of several sites that I no longer enjoy working with. At the moment, SS pay me almost double the commission for PPD, have far more EL's and I can even get up to $120 commission for one sale. They pay me much more for subs than TS. I can still get BME's. Until they cut commissions or my earnings drop significantly, I am still happy working with them.
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Surely if our main goal is money, we shouldn't put up with a site that pays as low as 15% commission, does bad deals like the Google one and has made it clear that we wont be informed about future deals that could make our images virtually worthless?
Unfortunately, too many people don't value their work and would probably accept 5% commission rather than remove images from istock. Those of us that have done something end up thinking our efforts were worthless. It didn't make much difference when I removed all my best images from istock when so many people are still uploading all they can.
There isn't a solution to this problem, so now I just laugh at people who constantly run down istock in this forum while uploading all they can to them.
I think the problem has always been defining the goal of "our main goal is money". With so many contributors, there is no one single goal. I think we have all seen from reading this forum that there is a wide range of opinions on what is fair.
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I started to type out all the problems I have with istock but it would take too long. They're the worst of several sites that I no longer enjoy working with. At the moment, SS pay me almost double the commission for PPD, have far more EL's and I can even get up to $120 commission for one sale. They pay me much more for subs than TS. I can still get BME's. Until they cut commissions or my earnings drop significantly, I am still happy working with them.
Is SS the only agency for you?
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
I'm of deep belief that if one thinks money is main goal in literary anything in life, then one is heavily misguided by wrong values.
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
I'm of deep belief that if one thinks money is main goal in literary anything in life, then one is heavily misguided by wrong values.
Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
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Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
And I'm perfectly happy making dimes and quarters for each sale. I don't think I'd ever be excited by Alamy; I'd rather have a bunch of sales every day than one big one every few weeks or even months. It's the constant positive reaction from someone who paid real money for my work, even little bits of real money. It's reinforcement, and an indication that I've gotten better at this. Kind of like Flickr comments, only with a clear indication that the commenter meant it.
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Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
And I'm perfectly happy making dimes and quarters for each sale. I don't think I'd ever be excited by Alamy; I'd rather have a bunch of sales every day than one big one every few weeks or even months. It's the constant positive reaction from someone who paid real money for my work, even little bits of real money. It's reinforcement, and an indication that I've gotten better at this. Kind of like Flickr comments, only with a clear indication that the commenter meant it.
Certainly understandable and I cannot disagree. I do wonder, however, if it isn't about the money for you (a collective YOU) why are we complaining about Yuri or iStock or any other "special deal?" It shouldn't matter to those of us who don't have a monetary objective, should it?
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Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
And I'm perfectly happy making dimes and quarters for each sale. I don't think I'd ever be excited by Alamy; I'd rather have a bunch of sales every day than one big one every few weeks or even months. It's the constant positive reaction from someone who paid real money for my work, even little bits of real money. It's reinforcement, and an indication that I've gotten better at this. Kind of like Flickr comments, only with a clear indication that the commenter meant it.
Certainly understandable and I cannot disagree. I do wonder, however, if it isn't about the money for you (a collective YOU) why are we complaining about Yuri or iStock or any other "special deal?" It shouldn't matter to those of us who don't have a monetary objective, should it?
1 - nobody said we don't enjoy the money (see my arguments on the previous posts)
2 - we can discuss/complain what we wish, it doesn't matter if it is about Yuri, iStock or other subject
3 - please add value to the conversation, you aren't saying anything relevant have you noticed that?
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this is just unbelievable, just took a look at a bunch of people I usually follow, some I even talk daily and other bigger contributors from this forum, I wonder what does iStock need to do so we once for all tell them goodbye unless they change drastically? ain't 15% / google stuff / specials deals enough? its really race to the bottom and don't tell SS is doing such, uploading to iStock and having files mirrored at thinkstock is way worst, I really don't understand some contributors mind and its very sad that we have as main goal money / greed or need desperately to think we will do something if we upload...
why deactivating files / removing them in the past if now "we" are back uploading? perhaps we should all do that and make iStock "number 1" again because buyers don't really care if we get 15 or 50%, iStock does ;D
What should we do, Luis? I thought it was a given ... our main goal is money.
If that isn't true, then wouldn't we all get a bigger ego boost at Flickr? :P
I'm of deep belief that if one thinks money is main goal in literary anything in life, then one is heavily misguided by wrong values.
Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
Personally Im in for the time i get extra for not working a "normal job" and not less important for the fun Im having doing what Im doing now.
I sell few images, do few weddings, design few flyers or something every now and then and been watching many of my friends for many years. Its like standing on a best spot in a world and look some people passing by in cars going like crazy ,like they are in some different universes , most of them doing what they hate, and Im thinking what can be so important that some of them see their kids few hour weekly.
We need money they say...later ill slow dow, and nobody does it...Im still waiting
Im on job in my home, dont wast time travelling, traffic jams, 4 months yearly Im on the beach every single day, have 2 or 3 coffees daily , walk my dog in the nature every day...playing football, playing guitar, i go boat fishing every few days... and am still here am I not.
If whole industry falls apart Im not worrying, Im a human , we tend to adopt and survive and its been proven on more big deals, so Im pretty much sure I wont be changing my style of living too much.
In microstock words , I can afford not to upload somewhere even if it means some loss who knows, loss today may be a gain tomorrow, God works in mysterious ways they said, but I doubt that for he planned a life in a circle with money hanging around my head as a "main goal".
Good old time that i spend on what I really love cannot be replaced by money from my point of view
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Certainly understandable and I cannot disagree. I do wonder, however, if it isn't about the money for you (a collective YOU) why are we complaining about Yuri or iStock or any other "special deal?" It shouldn't matter to those of us who don't have a monetary objective, should it?
I actually see contributors like Disorderly as a bigger threat than any side deal Yuri gets because they represent a larger base of the contributor community, and they are the biggest obstacle to actually enacting any change in the micro. They are probably the biggest lobbying group in micro, but they don't lobby much because they are fairly content.
I don't mean that to be disparaging or as an attack because I can't disagree with that position at all. I completely understand it. It is just that it is hard to compete with that mentality if your mentality is to try to make a living selling stock.
But, that is the monster that micro made. ;)
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Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
And I'm perfectly happy making dimes and quarters for each sale. I don't think I'd ever be excited by Alamy; I'd rather have a bunch of sales every day than one big one every few weeks or even months. It's the constant positive reaction from someone who paid real money for my work, even little bits of real money. It's reinforcement, and an indication that I've gotten better at this. Kind of like Flickr comments, only with a clear indication that the commenter meant it.
Certainly understandable and I cannot disagree. I do wonder, however, if it isn't about the money for you (a collective YOU) why are we complaining about Yuri or iStock or any other "special deal?" It shouldn't matter to those of us who don't have a monetary objective, should it?
Maybe I just like fairness, and I expect it from those I do business with. I don't shop at places that mistreat their workers, and I won't be a worker for one either. Old fashioned, I know.
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Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
And I'm perfectly happy making dimes and quarters for each sale. I don't think I'd ever be excited by Alamy; I'd rather have a bunch of sales every day than one big one every few weeks or even months. It's the constant positive reaction from someone who paid real money for my work, even little bits of real money. It's reinforcement, and an indication that I've gotten better at this. Kind of like Flickr comments, only with a clear indication that the commenter meant it.
Certainly understandable and I cannot disagree. I do wonder, however, if it isn't about the money for you (a collective YOU) why are we complaining about Yuri or iStock or any other "special deal?" It shouldn't matter to those of us who don't have a monetary objective, should it?
Maybe I just like fairness, and I expect it from those I do business with. I don't shop at places that mistreat their workers, and I won't be a worker for one either. Old fashioned, I know.
Deposit Photos gave a "special deal" to Sean Locke; 123rf dropped commission rates and initiated the hated iS system, and aren't you still selling through iS?
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Why do you take part in microstock? It does seem demeaning to accept such minuscule amounts for our artistic efforts.
Maybe I am misguided. I must be missing something. Why do we do this?
I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
And I'm perfectly happy making dimes and quarters for each sale. I don't think I'd ever be excited by Alamy; I'd rather have a bunch of sales every day than one big one every few weeks or even months. It's the constant positive reaction from someone who paid real money for my work, even little bits of real money. It's reinforcement, and an indication that I've gotten better at this. Kind of like Flickr comments, only with a clear indication that the commenter meant it.
Certainly understandable and I cannot disagree. I do wonder, however, if it isn't about the money for you (a collective YOU) why are we complaining about Yuri or iStock or any other "special deal?" It shouldn't matter to those of us who don't have a monetary objective, should it?
Maybe I just like fairness, and I expect it from those I do business with. I don't shop at places that mistreat their workers, and I won't be a worker for one either. Old fashioned, I know.
Deposit Photos gave a "special deal" to Sean Locke; 123rf dropped commission rates and initiated the hated iS system, and aren't you still selling through iS?
that is so irritating, why don't you open yourself his portfolios links? 400 files at iStock vs 20k on other agencies, believe you got your answer ::)
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I started to type out all the problems I have with istock but it would take too long. They're the worst of several sites that I no longer enjoy working with. At the moment, SS pay me almost double the commission for PPD, have far more EL's and I can even get up to $120 commission for one sale. They pay me much more for subs than TS. I can still get BME's. Until they cut commissions or my earnings drop significantly, I am still happy working with them.
Is SS the only agency for you?
No. I was answering your question, "And, what makes SS so much more trustworthy?". I will stick with SS until they cut commissions, then they would be as bad as the other big microstock sites. I prefer GL for their commission, 52% but they sell very little. I like Pond5 and will be doing a lot more video clips this summer. Alamy are OK but they've had 2 commission cuts, have cut prices and don't make me much money.
It's not just the commission cuts that have put me off istock, DT and FT. They have all made changes that have made it harder for me to increase my earnings with them. SS is the only big microstock site that has made it easier for me to increase my earnings in recent years. That gives me some motivation to carry on with microstock but that could change any day.
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why don't you open yourself his portfolios links? 400 files at iStock vs 20k on other agencies, believe you got your answer ::)
Are we still talking about Yuri?
If so, don't foget the almost 13k under his urilux account.
(I'm currently speculating that the reason for the portfolio split is that somehow there's a different %age being paid on the two ports as part of the deal.)
Otherwise who are we talking about (400 vs 20k)? I've got confused. Oops, we can't be talking about Yuri as his 'new' portfolio has nearly 3000 files.
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I'm of deep belief that if one thinks money is main goal in literary anything in life, then one is heavily misguided by wrong values.
Money is definitely my main goal for shooting stock. If it wasn't I would be shooting a lot more arty stuff. I don't see anything wrong with that. It's just something I do to make money. I certainly don't dislike it and I would rather be doing it than many other jobs but money is still my main goal for shooting stock type images.
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why don't you open yourself his portfolios links? 400 files at iStock vs 20k on other agencies, believe you got your answer ::)
Are we still talking about Yuri?
If so, don't foget the almost 13k under his urilux account.
(I'm currently speculating that the reason for the portfolio split is that somehow there's a different %age being paid on the two ports as part of the deal.)
Otherwise who are we talking about (400 vs 20k)? I've got confused. Oops, we can't be talking about Yuri as his 'new' portfolio has nearly 3000 files.
I think he is referring to Disorderly?
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saw this today
http://depositphotos.com/portfolio-1011061.html (http://depositphotos.com/portfolio-1011061.html)
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I like the money, but I pretty much run my microstock business to break even. It pays for the shoots and sometimes for photo gear but is a trickle compared to my day job. And even when I wish that weren't the case, I don't know how I'd feel if this was my major source of income. Because I shoot what I want, not what will bring in the most sales. And I can't picture it any other way.
Wait a minute you break even? What's the secret! :)
Yes, I'm a shoot what I like person and have other sources of reliable income. I'd hate to be in the vise between low paying agencies, changing commissions, unfulfilled promises and every other way they seem to be putting the screws to people. They offer hope and then pull the rug out from under the dedicated hard working people.
I'm having fun, I'm challenged and it's educational. The pay is nice too. Yes I'm very happy with the income from SS and the subs.
I find this whole thread about someone else's business to be interesting. Not related to anything I do or ever will do. I think the whole exclusive, somewhat exclusive and special contract deal, will eventually come to light. I considered that one collection could be exclusive and for the future, while the other was already exposed to the market, so it's free content. Hardly "exclusive" when it's been for sale to the world from 50 sites for eight years?
Anyone who can makes special contracts and deals, best to them.
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saw this today:
[url]http://depositphotos.com/portfolio-1011061.html[/url] ([url]http://depositphotos.com/portfolio-1011061.html[/url])
Oh well, in the new iStock, pointing out that "there are a number of recent high profile "Exclusive" contributors who continue to sell their files at their own sites and a number of other sites that are completely unrelated to Getty."
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901059 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901059)
is merely "pedantic semantics"
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901065 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901065)
So, stop with your legalistic nitpicking already, OK. ::)
To be honest, I'm pretty shocked that Kelvin has let himself be assimilated. :(
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its unbelievable really, there is no shame, how rotten is iStock?
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"If only this were true. "Exclusive" images can be purchased at a large number of different sites at different price points. Some of those sites are clearly Getty entities but a number of those sites you have to dig to find out they are Getty sites. Additionally there are a number of recent high profile "Exclusive" contributors who continue to sell their files at their own sites and a number of other sites that are completely unrelated to Getty. There are also a number of contributors ingested through the former Agency program who are not even exclusive to Getty.
"Exclusivity" is only relevant when it is accurate, and the people in charge of Getty only see it as relevant when it is convenient and suits their business purposes, regardless of how it affects the customer."
Excellent point. Exclusivity has no meaning anymore. IS has abused the term so much, it's lost any meaning as a USP. The only benefit to exclusivity is the royalty bump. And these days I see no quality or any other difference between IS and other content. With all the * about, I just don't know why buyers stay there.
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these days I see no quality or any other difference between IS and other content. With all the * about, I just don't know why buyers stay there.
Your thinking seems to have become more closely aligned with mine at some point in the last six months. Can't think why.
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..these days I see no quality or any other difference between IS and other content. With all the * about, I just don't know why buyers stay there...
With the latest policy of accepting 999 images a week from contributors with what looks like almost no QC, I think istock is going to fall way behind most of the other sites in terms of overall quality.
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..these days I see no quality or any other difference between IS and other content. With all the * about, I just don't know why buyers stay there...
With the latest policy of accepting 999 images a week from contributors with what looks like almost no QC, I think istock is going to fall way behind most of the other sites in terms of overall quality.
I did a few searches of new content on Istock and Shutterstock, I don't think the Istock content looks any worse and many of the same nonexclusive files are both sites. I don't see how Istock having 999 uploads a week and Shutterstock having infinity uploads a week means Istock is going to fall way behind because they are accepting too much stuff. Shutterstock is still adding twice the number of images, I guess you think all those are gems?
I do agree with you though that Istock shouldn't be lowering it's standards to allow more nonexclusive work into the collection.
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Looking at some of the examples of what istock is now accepting, there's no doubt they have much lower standards than SS. So they will have a lot of new LCV images that wont make any money and will make it difficult for buyers to find the higher quality images. I think sites shouldn't be too strict with QC but they need to reject at least the worst 20% of images that have no chance of selling and just make the site look bad.
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The latest uploads don't look too horrible and many of those same images that I would say shouldn't have been accepted were also accepted on Shutterstock.
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The latest uploads don't look too horrible and many of those same images that I would say shouldn't have been accepted were also accepted on Shutterstock.
Not sure why you'd be so excited about your earnings being diluted by the engorged competition.
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I'm of deep belief that if one thinks money is main goal in literary anything in life, then one is heavily misguided by wrong values.
Money is definitely my main goal for shooting stock. If it wasn't I would be shooting a lot more arty stuff. I don't see anything wrong with that. It's just something I do to make money. I certainly don't dislike it and I would rather be doing it than many other jobs but money is still my main goal for shooting stock type images.
Yes, exactly. I tried shooting photographs simply for the creative satisfaction, but unfortunately, my mortgage company, electric company and other utilities wouldn't accept my sense of artistic satisfaction as payment. So I shoot stock for the money. Sorry if some people think feeding my family is immoral or a less than noble motive. :P
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The latest uploads don't look too horrible and many of those same images that I would say shouldn't have been accepted were also accepted on Shutterstock.
Not sure why you'd be so excited about your earnings being diluted by the engorged competition.
I'm not excited but again what are the options? I could leave Istock because they are accepting lots of images (half as many as Shutterstock) and then contribute to Shutterstock and 20 other sites and make less money than I am now and be competing in an even more diluted market. I don't see the alternatives as being better, in fact they look much worse.
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I'm of deep belief that if one thinks money is main goal in literary anything in life, then one is heavily misguided by wrong values.
Money is definitely my main goal for shooting stock. If it wasn't I would be shooting a lot more arty stuff. I don't see anything wrong with that. It's just something I do to make money. I certainly don't dislike it and I would rather be doing it than many other jobs but money is still my main goal for shooting stock type images.
Yes, exactly. I tried shooting photographs simply for the creative satisfaction, but unfortunately, my mortgage company, electric company and other utilities wouldn't accept my sense of artistic satisfaction as payment. So I shoot stock for the money. Sorry if some people think feeding my family is immoral or a less than noble motive. :P
What Lizard says has truth, money doesnt have to be the main goal in life, but people saying that confuse having a paycheck to pay the bills and buy groceries with having money as your main goal in life. You often get accused of stuff because of their fallacies. I fully agree with what you are saying, money is not my main goal in life, but I certainly love having lots of it, to achieve the real goals I have set in life.
And yes, most of the things we do cost money, even if the goal is having a healthy family.
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1 month and files still all around beside SS
that said his account at iStock was opened in April
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Exclusive, but not really. Amazed that nobody wants to take a stand on anything anymore.
http://www.michaeljayfoto.com/distribution-channels/the-danish-taking-over-istockphoto/ (http://www.michaeljayfoto.com/distribution-channels/the-danish-taking-over-istockphoto/)
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...money doesnt have to be the main goal in life, but people saying that confuse having a paycheck to pay the bills and buy groceries with having money as your main goal in life. You often get accused of stuff because of their fallacies. I fully agree with what you are saying, money is not my main goal in life, but I certainly love having lots of it, to achieve the real goals I have set in life.
Very well said! Thanks for putting that discussion into the proper perspective :)
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Exclusive, but not really. Amazed that nobody wants to take a stand on anything anymore.
[url]http://www.michaeljayfoto.com/distribution-channels/the-danish-taking-over-istockphoto/[/url] ([url]http://www.michaeljayfoto.com/distribution-channels/the-danish-taking-over-istockphoto/[/url])
Take a stand on what? Is the idea that in a year and a half RC levels will be set too high for us, maybe or maybe not? The two guys that joined up are regular exclusives as far as I know aren't they? And again with Yuri, he's said he's taking down his microstock images from all the other microstock sites, I guess you're calling him a liar? I think if any of us legitimately wanted to join with another contributor through the proper legal channels there wouldn't be a problem from Istock with doing that, like michael says maybe that's what some of us should be looking into.
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Yuri isn't a liar, we all make mistakes, sure he meant a few months, not weeks ;D
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Yuri isn't a liar, we all make mistakes, sure he meant a few months, not weeks ;D
"Few" could be a couple months, depends on what your perspective is.
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Yuri isn't a liar, we all make mistakes, sure he meant a few months, not weeks ;D
"Few" could be a couple months, depends on what your perspective is.
Heaven forbid that we should indulge in semantic nitpicking.
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Yuri isn't a liar, we all make mistakes, sure he meant a few months, not weeks ;D
"Few" could be a couple months, depends on what your perspective is.
Heaven forbid that we should indulge in semantic nitpicking.
The word "few" is ambiguous it just means a small amount, I'm not sure who you are saying is nitpicking but I had a teacher that always used to say nitpicking is a good thing because nits grow up to become lice.
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Yuri isn't a liar, we all make mistakes, sure he meant a few months, not weeks ;D
"Few" could be a couple months, depends on what your perspective is.
Heaven forbid that we should indulge in semantic nitpicking.
The word "few" is ambiguous it just means a small amount, I'm not sure who you are saying is nitpicking but I had a teacher that always used to say nitpicking is a good thing because nits grow up to become lice.
I'm referring back to Kelvin's unbelievable post about the meaning of 'exclusive':
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901065 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901065)
So what iStock "exclusive" mean? Not what the definition on the crown icon says, for sure.
I didn't actually know that Yuri has said he's taking his images down from competing micros, but he's certainly not in a hurry to do so.
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Oh I thought you were referencing me since you quoted me. You should have realized what Yuri said, you quoted that too.
Yuri isn't a liar, we all make mistakes, sure he meant a few months, not weeks ;D
"Few" could be a couple months, depends on what your perspective is.
Heaven forbid that we should indulge in semantic nitpicking.
The word "few" is ambiguous it just means a small amount, I'm not sure who you are saying is nitpicking but I had a teacher that always used to say nitpicking is a good thing because nits grow up to become lice.
I'm referring back to Kelvin's unbelievable post about the meaning of 'exclusive':
[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901065[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=354349&messageid=6901065[/url])
So what iStock "exclusive" mean? Not what the definition on the crown icon says, for sure.
I didn't actually know that Yuri has said he's taking his images down from competing micros, but he's certainly not in a hurry to do so.
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
Why did it take you so long to realise that?
Have they bought over PI?
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Heaven forbid that we should indulge in semantic nitpicking.
I got it. ;)
A few weeks means 3 or 4 weeks. Not 3 months. So, not only is he getting whatever special "exclusive" IS rate negotiated, he's getting royalties from the thousands and thousands of images still sitting on every site besides SS. Plus buyers are being misled (false advertising). You'd think with 100 interns, it could be sped up a bit.
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Heaven forbid that we should indulge in semantic nitpicking.
I got it. ;)
A few weeks means 3 or 4 weeks. Not 3 months. So, not only is he getting whatever special "exclusive" IS rate negotiated, he's getting royalties from the thousands and thousands of images still sitting on every site besides SS. Plus buyers are being misled (false advertising). You'd think with 100 interns, it could be sped up a bit.
Well it has been a month now, maybe it will happen in your gray area between 4 weeks and 3 months?
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Oh I thought you were referencing me since you quoted me. You should have realized what Yuri said, you quoted that too.
On May 18th. ::)
H*ll, I didn't spend a month meditating on the Sayings of Yuri.
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That is his one and only statement and this thread is about that one issue, what have you been posting about if not that?
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i have no read the last pages of this thread but i'm wondering why yury arcurs is still with his full portfolio on dreamstime http://www.dreamstime.com/yuri_arcurs_info (http://www.dreamstime.com/yuri_arcurs_info)
:o special agreement ?
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lol
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No special agreement, anyone can get that deal if they license a few million dollars a year worth of stock images.
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No special agreement, anyone can get that deal if they license a few million dollars a year worth of stock images.
and keep their heads down and don't try to 'keep them honest'.
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You even get a huge write up on your stock audio production unit.
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Try Urilux.
Does Roche know about it?
[url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url] ([url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url])
"The Urilux 100 is the smartest test reader most suitable for rapid screening of diseases of the kidney and the urogenital tract, carbohydrate metabolism disorders (diabetes mellitus) and liver diseases and haemolytic disorders. "
Must admit the name 'Urilux' does sound more like a painful medical condition than a stock photographer.
Your right actually. Its Latin and stands for incontinence, comes from incontinecium-fatale.
That must explain the recent change from Urilux to Yurilux ;D
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Since we have agreed that we do this for money we can hardly blame Yuri for collecting as much as he can from other sites while being "exclusive" at iS. The difference between what he is doing and what a few other people have done in the past is that he is obviously doing it with the full agreement and approval of iStock.
Whether or not this undermines the relationship between iStock and the buyers is not Yuri's problem, that's for iStock to deal with. And whether or not this undermines the relationship between iStock and other exclusives is not iStock's problem, it's just something else for their exclusive-exclusives to come to terms with.
Frankly, if iStock offered me the little crown and special enhanced payments while allowing me to carry on selling everywhere else I would snap up the deal in an instant.
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why not....??
Why not make "xxx-LUX" version of your port, with another legal entity and go exclusive here and there.
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We already pulled Yuri's content from Stockfresh and I'm curious about the rest of the sites. I wonder how long they are going to drag it out... ;)
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Try Urilux.
Does Roche know about it?
[url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url] ([url]http://www.micglobal.co.uk/roche-urilux-system-i1006.html[/url])
"The Urilux 100 is the smartest test reader most suitable for rapid screening of diseases of the kidney and the urogenital tract, carbohydrate metabolism disorders (diabetes mellitus) and liver diseases and haemolytic disorders. "
Must admit the name 'Urilux' does sound more like a painful medical condition than a stock photographer.
Your right actually. Its Latin and stands for incontinence, comes from incontinecium-fatale.
That must explain the recent change from Urilux to Yurilux ;D
LOL!
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The funny part will be when Yuri will drop the crown to submit to multiple sites again. With the current changes on istock, his sales must be one third of what he expected :)
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Since we have agreed that we do this for money we can hardly blame Yuri for collecting as much as he can from other sites while being "exclusive" at iS. The difference between what he is doing and what a few other people have done in the past is that he is obviously doing it with the full agreement and approval of iStock.
Whether or not this undermines the relationship between iStock and the buyers is not Yuri's problem, that's for iStock to deal with. And whether or not this undermines the relationship between iStock and other exclusives is not iStock's problem, it's just something else for their exclusive-exclusives to come to terms with.
Frankly, if iStock offered me the little crown and special enhanced payments while allowing me to carry on selling everywhere else I would snap up the deal in an instant.
Good summary, Paul. I think that's the way many of us would react if the opportunity came up.
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The funny part will be when Yuri will drop the crown to submit to multiple sites again. With the current changes on istock, his sales must be one third of what he expected :)
His sales might be doing great. I don't think Getty would want the bad publicity of losing Yuri, after bending over backwards to get him. I would also think he's signed up for a few years, how crazy would they have to be to let him sell with exclusive commissions and on other sites without locking him in for a few years?
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The funny part will be when Yuri will drop the crown to submit to multiple sites again. With the current changes on istock, his sales must be one third of what he expected :)
His sales might be doing great. I don't think Getty would want the bad publicity of losing Yuri, after bending over backwards to get him. I would also think he's signed up for a few years, how crazy would they have to be to let him sell with exclusive commissions and on other sites without locking him in for a few years?
True, but if Canadian law is anything like our (UK) law, several of the things iS have done in the past couple of years would invalidate the contract on their side (clear example: the broken promise of grandfathering to the next level as an incentive to become exclusive). Sure, all it means is that if the applicable law is the same, we (if exclusive) could cancel our contract immediately rather than wait 30 days , but it could also let Yuri out (though his contract is presumably somewhat different from ours) at some point if they break their side.
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We already pulled Yuri's content from Stockfresh and I'm curious about the rest of the sites. I wonder how long they are going to drag it out... ;)
too bad you haven't done it on the 1st day :D
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Press release is just around the corner. Professionals deal with Professionals. Getty is the right partner for us! :)
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Press release is just around the corner. Professionals deal with Professionals. Getty is the right partner for us! :)
I'll bet you won't be saying that in 5 years time!
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Wow, you've been bought my friend.
Professionals ( and 'partners') treat others ethically and with respect. They don't, for example, give away perpetual redistribution rights for $12 to the photographer.
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you are so pretentious, don't forget TV ;D
are you saying SS is unprofessional?
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you are so pretentious, don't forget TV ;D
are you saying SS is unprofessional?
... and that Istock is! Laughable more like.
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no more files in Yuri's Fotolia portfolio.
impatiently waiting for press-release.
my own speculation about things we will not see from press-release:
GI got 60% of peopleimages, arcurs production and related companies
Yuri got equivalent of approx. 6 years expected profit and contract for himself as a CEO with very decent salary. plus good contracts for key figures in companies.
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Press release is just around the corner. Professionals deal with Professionals. Getty is the right partner for us! :)
What you mean is they gave you the best deal.
No doubt you'll change your tune again sometime along the way.
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Press release is just around the corner. Professionals deal with Professionals. Getty is the right partner for us! :)
What you mean is they gave you the best deal.
No doubt you'll change your tune again sometime along the way.
Of course, successful businesses recognise changes in the market and change direction when needed, to grow and be successful. Nothing wrong with that. If you dont you end up like Kodak.
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ShadySue,
i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
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ShadySue,
i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
You mean they're made for each other ;)
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He's still on DT
Uploaded files: 35,111
Total sales: 432,388
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He's still on DT
Uploaded files: 35,111
Total sales: 432,388
there is no rush! one at a time / month ;D
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Who cares? If I were Serban I might jib at being called "unprofessional" and bin his account forthwith.
Personally, I have always regarded Yuri as an arrogant, unprofessional, self-obsessed .... err ... individual from the time that he dismissed criticism of the fact that a picture on SS had a fake "reflection" that didn't match by saying that maybe buyers wanted pictures like that.
Oh, and he said it was a trainee to blame, anyway. (Has he ever admitted a mistake?)
Yuri and his "professionalism" will fit well with iStock.
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What will be the first words from Bubba to Yuri???
Bent over Yuri..... It'll hurt a little.............
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
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'Long' Jon?????? :D
He will be out of the business after about a year or so.
Almost a Standard procedure when a company is taken over or goes to the market
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
Probabluy Bubba offered him the best deal. No puzzle.
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
Probabluy Bubba offered him the best deal. No puzzle.
So the best deal is sharing a prison cell with 'Bubba' rather than continuing as things were as an independent? Being independent must be pretty bad then?
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
Probabluy Bubba offered him the best deal. No puzzle.
So the best deal is sharing a prison cell with 'Bubba' rather than continuing as things were as an independent? Being independent must be pretty bad then?
More likely he got a phenomenally good deal, without too many restrictions, apparently, and he'll be more than happy to keep his head down and not rock the boat.
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Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
Wikipedia answers all:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubba (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubba)
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
Probabluy Bubba offered him the best deal. No puzzle.
So the best deal is sharing a prison cell with 'Bubba' rather than continuing as things were as an independent? Being independent must be pretty bad then?
More likely he got a phenomenally good deal, without too many restrictions, apparently, and he'll be more than happy to keep his head down and not rock the boat.
Since when is getting a phenomenal deal without too many restrictions like sharing a prison cell with 'Bubba'?
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i believe you misunderstand the meaning of "Partner" word in Yuri's statement.
I believe Yuri is using the word 'Partner' in the way that someone might whilst sharing a prison cell with a huge inmate called 'Bubba'.
Maybe you can explain why he chose Bubba over Jon then?
Probabluy Bubba offered him the best deal. No puzzle.
So the best deal is sharing a prison cell with 'Bubba' rather than continuing as things were as an independent? Being independent must be pretty bad then?
More likely he got a phenomenally good deal, without too many restrictions, apparently, and he'll be more than happy to keep his head down and not rock the boat.
Since when is getting a phenomenal deal without too many restrictions like sharing a prison cell with 'Bubba'?
Haven't a clue. The only meaning I knew for Bubba was a Jewish grandmother, until I saw the link above. The whole Bubba reference made no sense to me.
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Isn't this all old news by now? Yuri isn't a God...he is in for the same reason we all are.
Everyone here has turned iStock into this mythical beast that devours us poor little contributors. Yes they have made some odd moves and we can speculate all day, but it is all out of context. You'd be a fool to think they are making this and any other decisions on a whim and prayer. Yes they are taking risks, but they have data and reasoning behind their moves. And is it really a shock they are looking after their own interests? The reality is we all have a choice to continue play or not. Don't think for a second that any other agency can't be bought.
Yuri made a business decision. I wish him the best.
I think we can complain all day (in fact we do), but I encourage everyone to go out and continue to learn and make better content...or bail out of the game.
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ok,... i'll lock this thread now. I think this thread has deteriorated a tad and isn't exactly discussing the issue anymore.