Quote from: spike on July 09, 2022, 18:36

Quote from: hiker on July 09, 2022, 15:09

...sorry, but authors do not nominate the files by themselves, Adobe does... we just approve or disapprove... My problem is I can't remove any files from this eligible free collection... Last year it was possible, now not!!!

They tell us which files are eligible for us to nominate them. We nominate from that selection and then they approve our nominated files or not.


"Eligible for free" only means that you may (or may not) nominate those files. If you don't nominate them, they remain "eligible", but they are not considered by Adobe.

...no, last year was done differently, - Adobe first picks up eligible files and marks them eligible, then the contributor has to remove if he/she wants certain files out from this selection (there was only one action available for contributor to remove a file if any, I removed just a couple), then Adobe reviews the eligible collection and selects only a few, the best ones... In my case, last year, Adobe picked up only about 100 files from a few thousands, a ratio was 1:20 I guess... So, now, my problem is that I can not anymore remove any files from the eligible collection, there is no such action available... I think it is a bug... and that was and still is my question to Mat!

No, it was the same last year. You had a deadline till when you could add or remove images that are eligible for the free collection. I think it was something like the 27th of June this year. After this you cannot add or remove images anymore.

Where do we see our rank, gold, silver?

Go to your dashboard and click on the "Account settings" tab. On the right side in the second square from above you will see a text saying "your commission model is XY".

Still two questions for Mat/Adobe:

- to download the pictures that are free, do you need a (paid) account with Adobe?
- are there any restrictions what you can do with these images? For example can downloaders use them commercially?

To late anyway now because we submitted them (or not) and there is no way back. But still curious.

I am not Mat, but I can answer that question. Yes, you need an account, if you click on the license button on a free image it askes you to log into your account.
The licence type for the free images is a "standard" licence, as it says under each free image. The images can be used commercially. They standart licence allows the following usage:
-Unlimited web views
-Use the asset in email marketing, mobile advertising, social media, or a broadcast program
-Can modify the asset
-Up to 500,000 copies or views of the asset

I did last time we had this same discussion?

I can't recall having this discussion with anyone before?

I beg to differ. A friend of mine has been allowed on the testing list and the results are mind blowing.

The analysis of DALL-E 2 is anything but mind-blowing though:
https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/2204/2204.13807.pdf

"for 5 out of the 14 prompts, at least one of the ten images fully satisfied our requests. On the other hand, on no prompt did all of the ten images satisfy our requests"

Only 5 out of 14 test images providing any satisfying result isn't blowing my mind. Also, if you take a look at the examples in this test: Even if the AI got it right and understood what was supposed to be displayed in the the images, the how is still problematic.
Look at this example of a pumpkin and a tomato. That the AI couldn't understand what was asked of it in most cases is one thing, but does any of these images look like high quality food photgraphy to you? Do you think any of these would have any real sale potential on microstock agencies and this is the kind of quality customers are looking for? Can you imagine images like this being used in an ad for a restaurant?



I think that AI will replace us at some point. Not just us, but a lot of jobs will be replaced by AIs and machines at some point. But I don't think we are quite there yet and won't be for a while.
Just look at all the graphic programs using AI technology, like sky replacement: It has been out there for years, and it's still highly flawed and needs manuall fix up in most cases. If not even something more simple, that has been in development and published for years, is functioning correctly, I don't think we will see high quality AI generated images without flaws for years. Even with Dall e 2 - Has anyone actually seen a zoomed in high resolution full size test image? How many weird flaws will you find then?

Either way the people on there for free who didn't even sign up for RSM need their work removed and to be paid for all the DLs arising from the mistake.

Of course!

And please don't get me wrong, I was not trying to defend the RSM system. I think this RSM is a total rip-off. The lowest of the low of microstock. (Okay, maybe the "give us free content for exposure!"-thing is even worse) But maybe people who did sign up need to be made more aware of what they signed up for. Becaus with a RSM the more images are downloaded as part of a RSM program, the lower the individual share of the revenue every contributor gets. And if there are free downloads in the mix it means A LOT more downloads, but the revenue pool doesn't get bigger by these downloads. It's such a rip-off, because the agency will always take the same % share out of the whole pool, but the contributors have to share the rest with all other contributors, so Depositohotos always gets the same profit, contributors get less the more content is downloaded.

No improvement here. June is a particularly bad month compared to the rest of the year so far. And compared to June last year I have an 60% increase in sales, but no significant increase in earnings.

In or out of RSM they shouldn't be on there for free.

But that's kind of what the RSM program is for? For shared revenue where customer's don't buy single images, but special program packs, so for programs that don't have single "sales" where a contributor could get a shared profit form a single image purchase. With VistaCreate cusomers can buy a package for 10�/month and all the money goes into a pot and everyone who agreed to the RSM program will get a tiny share of it.
Is it bad? Of course! But everyone who agreed to the RSM program should know that such deals are exactly what they signed up for. It's exactly the use I anticipated, thus didn't sign up for this. What else would it be? If it involved image sales of your images, a RSM wouldn't even be necessary as your profit could be calculated based on your sales.
(Of course, if someone didn't agree to this program, but still has his images up there, that's a whole other story)

Quote from: Firn on June 22, 2022, 01:51

Quote from: Big Toe on June 20, 2022, 16:54

For what it's worth: The picture with two downloads is also the second image in your port, at least for me.

Intersting. It's not anywhere on the first pages for me (Actually couldn't find it on the first 10 pages, after that I stopped searching), so that confirmes my suspicion that Shutterstock sorts image differently depending on where you are located.

Just did a quick test. Below my port sorted by top images from Germany at the top and with an US proxy below.
Neither of the results contains my bestseller and both are a weird mix of images that actually do sell frequently and images that have only sold like 1-3 times.

Are you sure that you linked the correct images earlier? They seem to belong to a totally different port, which also contains some images of the Philodendron plant, but none of your dressed up dog photos.

When I view your port with the dogs, I see a very similar, although not identical sorting then the one in your sreenshot for Germany, where I am also located.

Huh, you are right! Don't know how that happened. Probably trying to handle too many tabs at once when browsing for similar images to compare.
But I have enough examples from my port with images with only two sales that are labeled "frequently used":
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/easter-dog-french-bulldog-puppy-sitting-2123309765
and here, 3 sales, but "high usage" : https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/close-leaf-tropical-philodendron-melanochrysum-houseplant-1946003566

In my port it seems to be like:

one sale - "rarely used" (or sometimes "never used")
two sales - "frequently used"
three sales - "high usage"

which is reeeeally stretching it, if you ask me.

Quote from: Firn on June 20, 2022, 00:49

Not sure what profit customers should have from this random rating generator.

I do not know how valuable it is for customers, but as a contributor, I find it somewhat useful.

For example, if I have pictures of a flower, then I can look what kind of pictures of the same species are already online and to some extent, how they are selling.

But how do you determine how they are selling with that rating? If an image that has sold 5 times is rated the same way as an image that sold 500 times, as it is now, you have absolutely no clue how they are selling. As I said above - With my port many images that have sold only 2-5 time have the highest rating, same as images that sold hundreds of times and some images that sold are marked as not sold at all. I am not making this up.
Maybe for some mysterious reason it works correctly with your port - Still doesn't help you, because you don't know whether the rating is correct for images you look up or as random as with my port.

Here are example:
 edit: oops, wrong URLs, put examples in post below

On March 31st clearly many people had not 'got' their code and Matt was silent.

Not really, people were asking about whether there will be a bonus program for this year and Mat said he has no info about that. You are confusing the 2021 program with the not confirmed 22 program.

I did all those things except for the last one, the model chose to use their name as their signature, what should I tell them? Should I use a cursive font instead?

No, a cursive font won't do. It needs to be an actual hand-written signature.
Shutterstock also has a digital release option, maybe a physical signature isn't needed there, but I don't know about that.