Quote from: Video-StockOrg on April 05, 2019, 08:33

Quote from: SuperPhoto on April 05, 2019, 08:04

Yeah, unfortunately - they are allowed to do that...

When amazon first started becoming *really* popular (about 10/15 years ago) - a bunch of "internet marketers" popped up "reselling" books claiming to be a "new publisher"...

So they went to the gutenberg press (holding of public domain works) - downloaded tens of thousands of books, slapped their name on it as a "publisher", made 1-2 "edits" (i.e., commentary/intro etc on the book so they could claim it as a "new" book) - and essentially profited off of thousands and thousands of other people's hard work...

With this kinda logic, I can buy a movie, add some of my own shots and resell it as my own work?

If it is in the public domain, or I believe it is 20 years for expired copyrighted works, then yes.

Part of the reasons you have 'oldie' radio stations, because I believe it is after 20 years, then don't have to pay royalties to the artists.

Hmmm. I was going to contradict you and sat it's the author's death plus 70 years, but that's different in different countries, e.g. France.

However, I googled to check whether it's 70 or 75 and found two totally different bits of info on apparently authoritative websites. One claimed the Berne Convention says specifically photos and applied art go out of copyright in 25 years, which presumably is what you were thinking about. The other was specifically UK and said 70 years after the author's death for photos (etc). My internet is down and I don't want to use up my phone's 4G allowance on this, but it's worth quadruple checking the info for the author's country if you ever want to do this.

Quote from: christiano on March 29, 2019, 07:31

... almost double my numbers in the past months ... have you seen the same phenomenon for your portfolio?

How do you know what is being downloaded in March? We don't get that info until around the 21st of the next month. I must be missing something.

You can't see which files sold, but you can see how many are selling in quasi real time fits and starts) in your profile. However the number is obfuscated for exclusives who get two 'counts' per 'plusses sale counting towards the targets.

Besides, copyright violations are very easy to pursue.

Indeed they are not, particularly if cross border involving very expensive international IP lawyers and legislations where you are not automatically awarded expenses, even if you win the case.

Hi:

Do you know if brands can be used as keywords in creative content? f.i. "les paul" and "gibson" in a les paul type guitar without logos?

Thank you.

Definitely not on iStock. I don't know what other agencies' policies are - presumably you have PRS or the images couldn't be used commercially anyway?

Could be an interesting watch for some of you from Pond5 (if the bloke didn't sound too much like a 70s TV evangelist.) Start from about 3' 20"

Do they? Only via third party apps etc I s'pose

No, not only via these.
It's on the downloadable statements you get on the Royalties tab. The pdf is the quickest and easiest to read, of the options getty provides.

No, but last year, July for me spiked inexplicably. It meant nothing in the long run, though.

Quote from: asiseeit on March 28, 2019, 16:27

I just figured this up the other day for iStock. RPD at 40%:
2008 1.85
2009 2.44
2018 3.59

40% of what for what? You know what they charge? How's your total income on IS since 2008?

My RPD Alamy is $50 only 2 sell a year, the number RPD means nothing.

Volume was much higher before 2012. Competition up, sales down, income down. But I don't feed the parasites or the race to the bottom, might be different for desperate people who put their work anywhere that will take it, probably worse for them. If you feed the bottom agencies you are stealing from your own earnings, forcing prices down.

The OP's question was specifically about RPD.

In theory, it could be done.

In practice, most people are understandably most concerned about their bottom line.
E.g. https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/20082009-image-prices/msg529645/#msg529645
iS tried to raise prices, and for a while were managing to do that, but e.g. SS were holding their super low prices. Now, I believe more factors were at play than just that SS was holding prices super low, but no-one can keep holding prices up while a sizeable competitor holds down prices.

How often have we read here people saying that although prices are higher on Alamy, they make more on Micro, so that's where they're putting their efforts. I have rejoined that camp, with reluctance, but with an eye on the bottom line. And micros are squeezing Alamy, as they have made the expectation of super low prices, so Alamy's rpd is falling, without any rise in sales volume (OK, that  statement is only based on the small number who report on their forums. And for sure, the $$$ earned from Live News is much higher, but that's not 'stock' as most of us know it.

Nowadays on this forum, the agency of choice is Adobe, iS and SS having fallen from grace. But Adobe has low prices, and I'm totally confused about them. They offer prices as low as 15c per asset on the 750 / month deal, and they say "Every time someone purchases your content, you get a 33% commission for photos and vector art and a 35% commission for videos based on the price of the image" So, even understanding that buyers don't use up all their allowance, why aren't people reporting super low sales there*? And how are they able to calculate the 33% 'in real time'** without knowing how much of their subscription they will use in the month?

* I know there's some sort of guaranteed minimum for sub sales, but how does that equate with "Every time someone purchases your content, you get a 33%/35% commission"? They don't say, "You'll get an average of 33%/35% commission"

**I assume they do, as people always complain about iS not reporting in real time.

This isn't as irrelevant to the current discussion as it seems.
Many (most?) people are only concerned about their bottom line at the end of the month. Other than that, many will put up with all sort of cr*p and unknowables from sites so long as they're getting paid each month.

Bear in mind that the people on e.g. msg only represent a tiny proportion of suppliers. (The ones who don't spend all their time shooting and uploading!) How would you get in contact with the others?

I just figured this up the other day for iStock. RPD at 40%:
2008 1.85
2009 2.44
2018 3.59

Yeah, my rpd is higher now than  in 2008/9 (but nowadays I get far fewer dls), but what about e.g. 2012 or 3, my rpd was higher then (I know that's not what the OP asked).

Amazing that they tell us how much the client pays as well as what we get......   Guess many other sites would be utterly cringeworthy!

iS/Getty gives us that info.

As long as there are contributors ok with �I would rather make pennies than nothing at all�, nothing will change. Contributors with big portfolios say they will �just stop uploading�, as if the sites care, rather than taking their business elsewhere, because after all, still taking the agency�s money is better than nothing at all. Every couple of months, a noob comes up with this idea. Check the threads here about it. It�s a great idea, but unless you have a boatload of money to do something concrete, you are just spinning your wheels. It takes money.

And for many people, the sites which pay small amounts or small percentages still manage to yield the most total $$$. Although that's not sustainable, people still have to pay bills now.
I submitted only to Alamy for 2.5 years, but iS was still netting me more each month, and twice as much in total for 2018, despite not having uploaded there for that time and my Alamy port becoming bigger over that time.
Not so much sense in my policy, as it turned out. And Alamy's rpd, for me at least, is falling sharply (almost all my files are exclusive there, by their terms so still give me 50% on direct sales).
And, as I always say, I'm in a very privileged position, I have no-one else who is financially dependent on my choices. Many/most others don't have that luxury.