Quote from: click_click on June 12, 2012, 15:56
Alamy's CEO will NOT like the fact that duplicates are floating around their library, for whatever reason. As soon as this hits the management level I'm 100% sure Alamy will take care of the problem asap, regardless if this is caused by some dodgy partner agreement or whatever.

Have you actually been following this thread at all?

From page 6:

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on May 21, 2012, 13:02
OFFICIAL ALAMY REPLY:
We do not have a policy to delete duplicates as Alamy is a non exclusive market place.

Quote from: click_click on June 11, 2012, 22:27
iStock has proven to a very large number of contributors that they can do whatever they want without having to fear severe consequences to their operation.

Sure some angry big shot will pull his/her port and a few mid-size contributors but it's really just a drop in the bucket.

Whatever iS have done is nothing in comparison to what Veer is doing, Veer is directly taking money away from contributors who already have their portfolio on Alamy by making you compete against yourself, and by the very fact that they will eventually climb the search rankings through sales volume lead by the sheer number of images in their 'collective portfolio' it means that soon all your images you uploaded directly will be buried behind your same images that they uploaded, meaning that most likely the buyer will see and get your image at the same cost to him/her but you'll get a fraction of the commission you would have done before this move.

And from the 'big shots' I've been in touch with I think you'll find it's going to be more than a drop in the bucket.

It would seem that they're not taking this issue seriously, as they are clearly continuing to increase the Alamy Creativity collection I can only presume that not enough contributors have complained about this issue and they have decided to go back on their word as posted on this forum 11 days ago:

Quote from: Brian O'Shea on May 31, 2012, 16:57
We will be working with Alamy to halt loading, and remove all content loaded to Alamy from Veer.

We apologize for the frustration this has caused our community, and the undue delays and lack of clarity in communication while we untangle this.  More details to come.

I guess from their point of view they stand to make a lot of money selling their contributors work on Alamy whilst only paying them a fraction of the commission they would have received by going direct.

Either way their lack of communication and u-turn over this move shows how much they value their contributors.

When I emailed them to ask to have my account terminated I got a personal reply asking whether it was over the Alamy issue and whether I would stay if they provided a solution, looks like I'll continue with my termination then.

Now at 910,644 - so it's still going up despite their latest promise of putting it on hold.

Quote from: gbalex on June 03, 2012, 18:14
Why any one is entertaining the idea of going exclusive with SS is beyond me......

+1

 ^ One of the reasons (amongst many many others) that I gave up spending anytime other than just basic uploading to Fotolia is when about a year or so ago I discovered a large portfolio of images from a Hong Kong (if my memory is correct) based agency where each and every single image had about 150 keywords in it, and the keywords were totally irrelevant to the image in question, it appeared that the agency just took the 150 most popular keywords and added them to every image and then uploaded them - and were allowed to do so! Us mere mortals have to stick to 50.

Don't know if it was ever addressed and I really don't care enough about FT to go and check if they're still doing it - all I do now is upload and forget.

Mistakes do happen we all know that, but I think the biggest error on this occasion was the false promises, I feel sorry for all the people that posted in that thread explaining how they really relied on the money to make rent etc.

Up from last year overall but not within my estimated figures, the only site that was a drop from the previous year was DT.

Quote from: lisafx on June 02, 2012, 16:35

Yep.  I used to have weekly rankings below 30.  Sometimes as low as 13.  When I posted here in April it had dropped to 280.  Now it's over 450. 

Just checked my rank, sorry Lisa I've taken your weekly rank of 280 

I don't normally take much notice of rankings as I'm more concerned with total income on a site, but like everyone else I've noticed my ranking has dropped significantly recently both weekly and overall.

For anybody that didn't get payed yesterday and got paid the wrong amount today here's the thread on their forum:

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=344139&page=1

Sent another email and got the response I wanted at last - good luck to those that stay.

Quote from: lisafx on May 25, 2012, 00:09
Just a suggestion to those asking that their Veer accounts be closed.  You might want to ask them to deactivate your images, rather than removing them.  This situation will probably be resolved favorably and it would be a bummer to have to start over uploading again. 

Thanks Lisa but I'd rather be rid of them, they've been aware of this issue for 7 days and yet they're still transferring images form my portfolio onto Alamy, that doesn't indicate to me that they are going to offer an opt out because it would have made sense if they just stopped the uploading till they sorted things out.

Sales aren't brilliant on Veer and losing that income isn't something I'm going to sweat about.

Incidentally I PM'd Brian here asking him to make sure my account is closed as per the email I sent to Veer support - guess what no reply from him or anyone else at Veer! Another good reason for me to be rid of them.

Well a week has gone by since I emailed Veer asking them to terminate my account and remove my images from Alamy, guess what no reply whatsoever - guess after 30days I'll have to take the legal route.

Quote from: Wim on May 16, 2012, 12:03
I have my micro (and macro) port at Alamy, an RF at Alamy sells for much more than an EL on micro.

An EL on iS covering all possibilities (minus their worthless 'legal guarantee') will cost you $450 (GBP £280 approx) , all of that's included in the standard Alamy RF license which at full price would cost you £210. Don't the Alamy USD figure as I'm in the UK and I get prices in GBP.

Admittedly iS are one of the most expensive micros, but they're also the market leader, and don't forget Alamy discount many of their fees at the drop of the hat, either way the price difference to a buyer on a like for like basis between micro and Alamy is not the difference most people think. From a contributors point of view the price difference is huge as Alamy pay a respectful 60% commission and micros, as we all know, pay a heck of a lot less.

Quote from: Wim on May 16, 2012, 10:53
But the fact that we sell our micro images at macro prices does not concern you guys? 

Same image different license, hence the price difference. it's not much different to selling the same image across all the microstock sites, each charges a different fee.

However - we are not selling images, we are selling a license to use an image. The standard Alamy RF license is the equivalent to most microstock sites enhanced license where in many cases it's more expensive than buying the from Alamy.

Quote from: fotografer on May 16, 2012, 11:20
Has anybody got any images on line through Veer that were first uploaded to Alamy?

Yes so far just short of 500, hence I've terminated my Veer account. I hate all these 'partner' type agreements, and there's no way I'm going to let Veer or anyone else make money off me by uploading my images to a site I'm already on, I uploaded to them because I wanted them to market my images, not take the lazy approach and take a cut from a sale on another site that does actually do marketing.

Just realised -  I'm flying out of the country in a few hours so won't be able to reply to any of your responses till next week.

And on that note I've just emailed Veer asking them to close my account unless they allow me to opt out of their partner API.

Quote from: rubyroo on May 16, 2012, 09:44
Wow.  I didn't know anything about this.  Thanks RT.

If the keywords were left intact, and the commission didn't drop below 50%, I'd actually be quite happy for the Veer arrangement to save me from the relatively arduous upload process at Alamy.     

Wishful thinking I know...

But that'd be 50% of the 60% Alamy would give you for the exact same image, and of course we don't actually know what percentage Veer pay for a 'partner sale', either way you'd lose a shed load of money.

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on May 16, 2012, 09:03
Is that 20% of 100% or 20% of 60%, which = 12%?

Whatever the percentage one thing is absolutely clear - you'll make a lot less money selling your content on Alamy through Veer than you would by selling it there yourself.

As someone pointed out above after Alamy where else are Veer going to sell your stuff? iStock, Shutterstock, DT, FT - allow them to get away with this and soon you could be getting a small cut of a small percentage on all the microstock sites with your portfolio removed under your own name.

Is it a bad deal 

Alamy pay you 60% commission - Veer will pay you a fraction of that. For anybody that already has their content on Alamy it would appear that (from peoples posts in the thread above) that content is being removed under your own Alamy psuedonym.

In other words this is a scheme that could potentially lose you huge amounts of money.

I make on Veer less than 1% of what I make on Alamy - bad deal is an understatement!

In case you haven't seen the other thread please view http://www.microstockgroup.com/alamy-com/alamy-creativity/msg255358/?topicseen#new for info on how Veer are putting your portfolio on Alamy, I've also added details of how you can delete your portfolio from Veer if they don't allow opting out from this collection.

Well unless Veer allow us to opt out of this deal I'll be removing my portfolio from them.

edit:

Just found this on Veers contributor FAQ -

Can I opt out of the API?
No. At this time, all registered Veer contributors are automatically opted in to the partner program.

I've emailed them to confirm whether or not we can opt out.

If not it's goodbye Veer from me.

For info for anybody else that doesn't want their Veer portfolio on Alamy, from the Veer contributor agreement:

A. Contributor may terminate this Agreement at any time by providing Veer with thirty (30) days notice by
using the Contact Us page to provide notice to Veer or by following the written notice provision below.


D. Upon termination of this Agreement:
(i) Veer will remove your Content from the Site within a thirty (30) day period, and will use reasonable
efforts to cause Content to be removed from the Sites of any affiliates and partners within sixty (60) days
from the removal from the Site, provided, however, that Veer may retain a copy of your Content for
archival and record-keeping purposes. Contributor acknowledges and agrees that Veer, its affiliates and
partners may continue to license the Content in accordance with this Agreement until the Content is so
removed.

Quote from: wut on May 11, 2012, 17:03

Quote from: RT on May 11, 2012, 16:48

Quote from: wut on May 11, 2012, 16:30
Fu*k me!!! I found a niche at IS, more than half of my sales in the last couple of days are coming from that series.

Congratulations, to be honest though no matter how desperate I was for sales I wouldn't have had my photo taken in that situation let alone upload them  

Sry, but I don't get what you're trying to say

"Fu*k me!!! I found a niche at IS, more than half of my sales in the last couple of days are coming from that series. "

Sorry my mistake I thought that was the title of your series  

Quote from: wut on May 11, 2012, 14:46

Quote from: RT on May 10, 2012, 18:57

Quote from: wut on May 10, 2012, 18:34
..... but I've never heard anyone selling more at IS than at SS.

I sell more at SS but make more money at iS.

I meant earnings of course. Wow, really? Like they say, it's a first time for everything. What's the ratio between them? Is IS your top earner then?

So did I. And I'm surprised you're surprised, up until about 18 months ago or whenever it was iStock photo decided to self implode most of the top contributors made more on iS and it was the top of the polls over there ------> for years, and as far as I'm aware SS was never in 2nd place either, Fotolia used to be peoples second biggest earner.

Tis' the beauty of being an independent though, no matter which site makes the f* up we still get the sales somewhere ;-) And FYI none of the microstock sites is my top earner, and the ways things are going I doubt they ever will be which is a switch round from what I'd have said if you asked me two years ago.

Quote from: wut on May 11, 2012, 16:30
Fu*k me!!! I found a niche at IS, more than half of my sales in the last couple of days are coming from that series.

Congratulations, to be honest though no matter how desperate I was for sales I wouldn't have had my photo taken in that situation let alone upload them