Read my comment thoroughly, maybe someday you will understand it.

Loop, if they don't treat people fairly, I won't do business with them.  As I have no real community history with any sites other than iStock, I would feel no obligation to do more than remove my portfolio.

Your comfort with exploitative business practices tells me all I need to know about you and your opinions.

Quote from: hawk_eye on September 19, 2010, 23:13
I think at this point it's fairly clear it was just an error. I'm relieved by that personally

Thats because it is the easiest thing for you to believe.  How do you feel on the subject of Darwinian Evolution?

Recall that I had a strong connection with the iStock community for over six years, and consider my past week of commentary advocation on your behalf, attempting to provide helpful information for people who can't find it in the long threads, and generally attempting to keep some kind of accountability in play.  I hate to see people being mistreated, especially people I have been associated with for many years.  So yes, I stuck around, like any good friend would do.

My suspicion is that I struck too close to the truth.  I felt I was actually being pretty fair and even favorable to iStock, taking a point of view I think many hadn't considered yet.  Its also interesting that they did *not* revoke my access this morning when others had their rights removed, it was only after that particular post.

So here is what I posted on iStock that caused them to revoke my ability to post in the forums, and lock me out of sitemail.   Make of that what you will:

Quote
So lets take a step back and look at all this from a different perspective. Lets change our base assumption of corporate greed and look at this from a protective iStock point of view.

Individual sales have slowed for many people as prices have gone up. Ultimately, that has actually increased the amount of money iStock has paid out to us. Now lets assume iStock is looking out for the contributors more than itself. If sales are going to slow down severely, it would make those previous cannister based royalties unsustainable. It would take much longer to get to each level. If, however, you switch to this 'credits redeemed' system, each sale carries more weight, and the targets can be adjusted to help people reach those next royalty levels on the same pace they would have if the sales had not historically dropped due to price increases.


So where does that leave us? Kelly says you will make the same or more under the new system. If iStock is truly the benefactor in this situation, then the credit cost for images stands to rise dramatically in the new year. This is why they would need a new system, because sales quantities will drop, and they would need a way to keep people on track for their royalty levels.


iStock is going Midstock

Buyers Beware.

I've had Shutterstock come back and pay me an EL fee they recovered from someone as part of a settlement.  Not sure if it was a legal settlement or just something the person who misused the images agreed to do to make up for it, but it was nice to see some small compensation for improper use.

http://www.printedtp.com/

Sorry, where was the bit about the files coming from SS?  I see they linked to images downloadable on rapidshare and mediafire, but where did they brag about getting them from Shutterstock?

What, you didn't download them and print them to hang on your wall with an 'Our Beloved Leaders' banner?  I guess you missed that memo.

Quote from: Gannet77 on September 18, 2010, 19:09
I don't get this "battered spouse" analogy.

Don't worry, it will sink in, probably in January, then I predict at least once sometime mid-year, and again the following January when all the hard work you put in to stand till on iStock turns out to be for nothing when the targets are raised to keep X number of contributors at their proper royalty percentage.

Each time you will probably say 'Wow, I wasn't expecting that, it came out of nowhere', but it will still be easier to stick with them, too difficult or life changing to move on.  That is called Learned Helplessnes.

If the slashing of independents' and your own royalties isn't enough of a jolt to induce you to change, then you are already helpless.

Sue, it may not set them worrying, but are you really concerned with their worrying at this point?  It sounds like you are still expecting them to about-face on this.  They are too deeply invested in their new strategy, and they wouldn't have started in on it so drastically if they weren't flat out required to do so.

Anyone who is hoping that anything they do is going to change iStock's mind is missing the point.  This isn't about changing minds anymore, this is about who you feel comfortable doing business with.

Don't be the battered spouse who stays.

Sorry, $1000/month? Or $1000 total?

Edit:  Sorry, I see you said total in the OP now.  So, no, not semi-professional by U.S. standards, maybe by some other country.

If you delete some of your port now, it will stick in your head better that there was a significant enough problem that it demanded action.

Why not take the opportunity to cull slow/non sellers and subpar images?

Complacency.  If you do nothing at all now, you will slowly adjust to the idea, and decide that maybe it isn't all that bad after all.  That is human nature and what istock is counting on.

Well,that depends partly on whether the leaders trip and fall on their faces and their pocket change falls out and lands in your pocket.  Improbable? Yes.  Impossible? No.

Conveniently, I happen to have both a dreamstime and stockfresh account, so this is good news for me.

You have to add yourselves to it, they originally took a list of all the existing contributors, but they were asked to remove anyone's name who didn't want their info listed.  They go through the iStock API if I'm not mistaken to get updated stats.

I did some calculations awhile back and it would take a few weeks to get a full and accurate list of iStock's users by spidering the iStock site.

Besides myself, I  have seen at least five or six others who have said they are dropping and removing their ports.  Personally, I know of four more who are in the planning process for dropping and removing.  Thats a small number, but thats just what I know of, and I suspect its just the tip of the iceburg since so few are vocal in the forums out of fear.

Jan 1st will be an interesting day.

No, they  haven't, and I don't think they could if they wanted to.  Too much legal risk, considering I have a signed and witnessed document that they acknowledge receipt of, that essentially guaranteed me a future 40% royalty in exchange for becoming exclusive at the start of the year.

Quote from: Caz on September 17, 2010, 09:50

Quote from: dgilder on September 16, 2010, 23:35
Next you guys are going to tell me you guys didn't know that inspectors can self-inspect their images (or at least they used to be able to).

Completely untrue

It is true, I have heard this directly from several inspectors.  Maybe they changed the rules at some point, but this is definitely something that used to happen.

Well, 'Agency' collection kind of implies it will have content from agencies of more than one person.

Not my problem though, in a couple more weeks I don't have to deal with iStock anymore.

Hey, maybe I should talk to Derick about submitting to fStop...

Thanks for taking the time to come in here and discuss this with us.  I think you were mainly caught up as a victim in this whole debacle with the rejected images moving through the iStock queue and into your portfolio.  It was stunning to see something like the toilet door photo as a representation of what we were told would be some of the best imagery available.  I know this isn't your fault, and there were many higher quality images that were in your portfolio that were obviously more difficult to come by (lab environments, etc).

Much of the outrage was due to these first samples of the 'Agency' collection being photos many of us would not have even submitted because we knew they would not pass iStock inspection standards.  It was handled poorly by iStock, and you/fStop bore the brunt of the ill will.

The samples you provided here are quite good.  Thank you for showing us some of the work that is more along the lines of what we envisioned when iStock told us we'd be seeing a collection on par with Vetta.

Edit: By the way, the aerial airplane image is my favorite of the three.  Excellent.

Next you guys are going to tell me you guys didn't know that inspectors can self-inspect their images (or at least they used to be able to).