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Messages - Jo Ann Snover
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1251
« on: August 23, 2019, 19:31 »
Suddenly my "good news" that I received $1.10 looks less horrific 
1252
« on: August 22, 2019, 22:25 »
...Wow, quite the negative attitude. Maybe thats the problem...
You should learn a little of the history before you start making rash judgments of people who have already done a version of what you're asking about. A negative attitude was not the problem. I've been part of two prior efforts, Symbiostock (common search across a network of independent artist sites) and WarmPicture (a coop). There are two things that'd I would want from any cooperative/own site setup and the biggest is marketing the sites to image buyers - without that nothing else matters. The other is some assurance that the underlying technology will be around a while and maintained. Having a thin skin when you get questions from prospective site owners isn't a good start - a volatile leader of a project doesn't inspire confidence in my second must-have (longevity).
1253
« on: August 22, 2019, 13:37 »
The portfolio is still there, so I replied to the "we're working on it" email with two examples of Getty images work the thief has claimed were his - along with a suggestion they need to look more closely at initial uploads of new contributors to stop this crazy behavior.
...
As noted above, the portfolio did come down, but today, a week and a half later, I received snotty email from Shutterstock compliance saying that they (1) had taken down the images; (2) rely on the integrity of their contributors not to infringe others' copyright; (3) were a "service provider" (their quotes) and would respond to proper DMCA take down notices; (4) "Though your correspondence did not adhere to the strict statutory requirements of the DMCA, we elected to treat it as a proper notice and expeditiously removed the image(s) in question."Very big of them to do me a favor that way... This is a pathetic, butt-covering piece of corporate word barf apparently disavowing any and all responsibility for vetting their uploads and leaving it to copyright holders to submit streams of DMCA notices when thieves have uploaded their content to Shutterstock. Tossers!
1254
« on: August 18, 2019, 10:39 »
I approved them then was going to send them to the garbage bin. Apparently you were deleting the same time as I was approving. 😀 Its 3am here on the east coast, I am listening to a broadcast of woodstock, as it was recorded 50 years ago, so figured i would do it now, thinking not many would be around. The moderate feature doesnt have a delete button. There were 6 topics that i approved, so all 6 should have been able to have been deleted. If one went to a post, thats another bug.
I checked the site late in the evening (I'm on the West coast, so 3 hours behind) and saw spam posts on the home page. I just went ahead and moved them as there is no way to see they were in the process of moderation (as it were). I guess someone's always up somewhere around the globe I moved 7 - plus there was the reply I couldn't do anything about. I think the solution is to be able to delete versus approve+garbage bin. Failing that, can there be a list of moderator actions with dates/times that we can all see - perhaps just the last 20 or so - so one person can know that another moderator is handling things?
1256
« on: August 16, 2019, 14:36 »
Possible, yes. Likely to be a profitable - very low chance IMO
The big issue for selling yourself is finding the buyers - if you sell subscriptions, you need to keep the buyers as well. Those tasks take time and/or cost money. As does running the site (those sub buyers will expect close to 100% uptime, $5 a month or no). As does handling credit card and payment issues and customer service, etc.
And as you point out, to a large ad agency, $5 a month is noise; but that also means there's no reason they'll balk at paying one larger monthly fee for having a choice of 300 million images (Shutterstock). You should do some searches there to see if your work is different enough from what's already there to think you could persuade buyers to add your subscription to the others they already have because of unique content. There's a lot of dreck on Shutterstock, but there's also a lot of very usable stuff that I'm guessing you'd have a very hard time competing with
And you'd have to give up exclusivity anyway unless you could somehow craft the license as RM (the only type of licensing you can do as an iStock exclusive). Is that what you were thinking? Exclusivity and your own sub site?
How sure are you that your income would plummet as an indie? Once upon a time that might have been true, but times have changed quite a bit for iStock exclusives.
1257
« on: August 15, 2019, 09:12 »
With Chrome on a Mac (Mojave) I tried to delete one of the spam posts and received the following error message:
"Wrong value type sent to the database. Array of integers expected. (topics)"
1258
« on: August 15, 2019, 09:09 »
...what troubles me is that there's no system in place them being accepted in the first place. I know it's RF and non-exclusive which makes it more difficult but the current system isn't working.
I don't think it's difficult at all. It just requires more careful (and largely automatic) monitoring of the uploads of new accounts. Probably just monitoring the first 100 uploads would do it - at least it would weed out the vast majority of the professional thieves. I included that suggestion in my emails to compliance You would have to have been purposefully asleep at the wheel to allow what's been going on to occur.
1259
« on: August 14, 2019, 18:47 »
Wednesday afternoon I'm getting a 404 error on these pages, so it appears SS has taken the thief's work down. Finally.
If I were a betting person, I'd take odds on how long before a contributor spots another of these portfolios - but at least there are two down...
1261
« on: August 12, 2019, 20:30 »
I think the date of the release would matter - so if she signs now and the release is dated today, it's an adult release, but some agencies may fuss as it wasn't signed when the shoot was done.
I have shots of my kids (both now adults) but I have releases done when the shoots were so I'd submit those if submitting to a new agency.
I'd try the first approach and see how that goes. It's legally sound.
1262
« on: August 12, 2019, 16:21 »
1263
« on: August 12, 2019, 10:38 »
It seems like I can't start a new thread even though I have a couple of posts, any idea why ?
You have 6 posts and a status of "Newbie" so I think you should be able to create new threads. However, Leaf has been making changes to try and halt the flood of spam, so it's possible there's an error somewhere. You might want to contact him (via the contact link at the bottom of each page) to ask him to check on your account.
1264
« on: August 11, 2019, 23:27 »
There really isn't a single answer to this as it depends on the license terms and prices at each agency. I am not aware of an "items for resale" extended license going for as little as $2.50 royalty from any of the major agencies. There are some outliers that have experimented with including all rights with any sale at low prices and I would just stay away from those.
Not all sites give opt outs where you'd like them to be, so you need to decide support/don't. In all cases, you need to read the terms of your agreement with the agency before uploading - in addition to looking at license terms, you want to know if you can delete your own uploads at will (you can't at iStock for example, and there are restrictions at Dreamstime as to how long uploads must remain before you can delete them). That's important because agencies can and do change the terms of their agreements and you need to be able to leave (and get paid) if you're not happy with new terms.
When you have changes in Extended license terms (typically more rights offered) or pricing - Shutterstock went from a flat rate to a percentage, for example - you may find you're better off in practice rather than worse, but you have to see over time how that plays out.
Individual choice. But if you feel you're being ripped off, then don't sell there or opt out if you have that ability.
1265
« on: August 11, 2019, 15:19 »
DT has "improved" the pages showing recent sales and whole portfolio with sales (the online-files page) and it's a broken trainwreck. Theoretically you can sort by number of downloads, but that starts with zero download files and if you go to the next page it reverts to sorting by file ID. By hand-editing the URL I was able to see the list sorted by downloads, but that's a faff. Putting all the information off to the left in the recent sales list makes it really hard to quickly scan. Perhaps whoever designed the Shutterstock dashboard moved over to DT 'cause they are both useless functionally even if they look more up-to-date visually. The only reason it hardly matters is that DT sales are so crappy I only take a look once a week or so
1266
« on: August 10, 2019, 15:37 »
Perhaps I misunderstood the new restriction. Leaf said (in the chat box) that people with 3 or fewer posts need approval for their post/new topic.
I just reported a post that was a reply and in looking at the perpetrator, that was the only post the person had made.
All posts, replies or new topics, need to be moderated for newbies if that's possible to do.
The spammer's next trick might be to post irrelevant but not obviously spam stuff until they're off moderation. Any way we can extend the moderation period - reset the clock so 3 more are needed - if we haven't seen a post that looks legit yet?
1267
« on: August 09, 2019, 11:08 »
Possibly I whined too soon - I think the portfolio is now offline. Can anyone else follow any of the links? Even if you can't follow the links, the large watermarked previews are still online (not sure for how long) and you can take the image links posted here and get to the previews. You need to paste in location, with hyphens at word boundaries, and description to the following template (I had to put spaces at the beginning to avoid the forum trying to make this a hyperlink): https: // image.shutterstock.com/z/stock-photo- (location information) -photo-of- (description of image with number) .jpgSo for the link I posted this morning to Sam Grant's blog: https: // www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/portsoyscotland07212019-photo-person-wearing-traditional-scottish-1464917864https: // image.shutterstock.com/z/stock-photo-portsoy-scotland-photo-of-person-wearing-traditional-scottish-clothing-1464917864.jpgAnd for Jason Stratham showing baldness: los-angelescaliforniausa-05112019-men-baldness-1438183688https: // image.shutterstock.com/z/stock-photo-los-angeles-california-usa-photo-of-men-baldness-1438183688.jpg
1269
« on: August 08, 2019, 18:43 »
I found another stolen photo where I could find a way to contact the original photographer (which I did), suggesting they contact Shutterstock compliance to complain https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/portsoyscotland07212019-photo-person-wearing-traditional-scottish-1464917813https://wwd.com/fashion-news/street-style/they-are-wearing-edinburgh-international-festival-fashion-10203377/The portfolio is still there, and honestly, if they did actually take this seriously, it should at least be taken off line at this point. I realize that they may need to investigate to be sure they're not penalizing someone who has been wrongly accused, but with this many examples of stolen work, I think they're just not putting any effort into this... And on the theme of "men with baldness" the thief has an Associated Press photo of Prince William He should have gone with the headline many of the newspapers did "No hair on the heir?" And the photo was taken in 2018 in London, not 2019 in Los Angeles "Britain's Prince William arrives to visit the Evelina London Children's Hospital in London, Thursday Jan. 18, 2018, to celebrate the national rollout of the 'Step into Health' programme. "https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/los-angelescaliforniausa-05112019-men-baldness-1438183730https://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/news/article.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=11978795Another Getty Image https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/los-angelescaliforniausa-05112019-men-baldness-1438183700https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/photo/man-working-in-modern-office-royalty-free-image/878980448
1270
« on: August 08, 2019, 09:39 »
1272
« on: August 06, 2019, 18:56 »
Slide 5 tells you all you need to know ... downloads up 3%.
Especially as downloads aren't really up; just up from a year earlier. Down from Q1 2019...
1273
« on: August 06, 2019, 17:52 »
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/shutterstock-reports-second-quarter-2017-financial-results-300498083.htmlSSTK closed at $34.37 Tues Aug 6, down $3.26 for the day, which suggests to me investors weren't happy with the results and/or their lowered guidance for revenue and earnings for the 2nd half. The market recovered somewhat today (DOW up 1.21%) so this drop was all about Shutterstock specifically. Edited to add that the closing price on Fri Aug 9 was $34.54 - the price had recovered somewhat later in the week, but I guess investors settled back to what they first thought after Tuesday's report. Aug 12 closing price was $33.96 (but the market was down too). https://seekingalpha.com/news/3487422-shutterstock-reports-mixed-q2-weak-fy-viewCouple of things I noticed. -They say paid downloads increased over Q2 2018, but the absolute number of paid downloads in the quarter was down on Q1 2019 and Q4 2018 - 46.6 vs 47.2 vs 46.8. That is not now it went if you look at Q2 2018 versus Q1 2018 and Q4 2017 (45.2 vs 43.7 vs 43.9) What that says to me is that in addition to filling the collection with image spam, the growth in purchases is slowing, both providing pressure on income of existing contributors. -While the e-commerce/enterprise split is sill about 60%/40%, e-commerce growth was 6% in the quarter versus enterprise declined 0.2% -In explaining the increase in operating expenses they mentioned "one-time severance costs". Not sure who or how many were severed... I couldn't find a transcript of the earnings call (see link to one below), so I listened to parts of the recording (and that was a pretty downbeat experience - they talk about being excited in tones that suggest they're bored stiff). They talked about restructuring the enterprise channel and Jon mentioned getting back to our roots; thinking big and acting bold. The phrase "critical re-evaluation" was used to describe their look at the enterprise business. The new guy - Co-COO Stan Pavlovsky talked after Jon about how wonderful the company was, the people, the new "View in Room" feature; understoring their path forward... etc. Both of them were clearly reading from a prepared script. The questions asked what was up with the enterprise segment: was there potential for growth, were there competitive pressures, was SS going to change pricing or offer new products or... I did listen to the responses from SS but they really have learned to avoid specifics and the analysts just say thank you. They did mention changes in how things were organized and in incentive systems. Several mentions of their "go to market" strategy, but I have no clue what that is. There was some talk about making it easier for customers who purchase both images and video but no details about changes. They're still looking for a new CFO - the previous one, Steven Berns, quit "to pursue other opportunities". His LinkedIn page shows his Shutterstock job ended in June, but not anything new. Couple of interesting factoids mentioned in passing. About 1/3 of their revenue is in foreign currency, primarily GBP and Euros. Jon mentioned the term "data velocity" - new to me - in talking up how they're going to keep growing and fix whatever ails enterprise sales. He said they sell 6 images a second and that this was faster than anyone else. He did use the term images, so I have no idea if that includes video or not. Shutterstock slideshttp://investor.shutterstock.com/static-files/43c73326-25aa-4ad8-9306-d7f57ef87091Edited to add a Motley Fool article on the reaction to Shutterstock's Q2 earnings reporthttps://www.fool.com/investing/2019/08/06/sales-slowdown-hits-shutterstock.aspxThey picked up on the drop in actual numbers of paid downloads Q1 to Q2. No one (in the general investing community) seems to have picked up that all these happy talk numbers about collection growth conceal the truth about the vast amount of garbage they've allowed in along with all the really good and useful content. I wonder if any enterprise customers have expressed frustration at the difficulty of sorting the wheat from the chaff... Edited Aug 7 to add a link to the earnings call transcripthttps://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2019/08/07/shutterstock-inc-sstk-q2-2019-earnings-call-transc.aspx
1274
« on: August 06, 2019, 10:34 »
Yep, last month was about half of my peak, which was last November.
Yep. We call that "summer."... Learn to live with it... or leave the hobby/business...
Where I come from we refer to this as "Teaching your grandmother to suck eggs"
1275
« on: August 05, 2019, 18:44 »
Suspending forum privs for a little while won't hurt you, but closing your contributor account probably would. I'm not in any way criticizing you or defending Shutterstock's pathetic lack of useful measures to prevent upload of stolen content.
I just want to remind everyone, particularly those who haven't been around the agencies for very long, that the terms under which most agencies operate allow them to close your account at any time, for any or no reason, and you have no appeal process.
Getty was the most prominent of the "crush the uppity contributors" examples when they closed several high profile accounts during the 2013 protests over the Getty-Google partnership. Fotolia (prior to the Adobe acquisition) took a similar approach.
For those who want to pursue the agencies (who clearly could use some reminders that without contributors they have nothing to sell), just be aware of what the consequences might be for your income.
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