Again, I don't know if people have done their math, but I find it naive if contributors think the shared wealth of $20,000 among more than 50,000 contributors amounts to much.

It's the principle.

Although ratings used to factor in to best match placings, they have categorically stated for a couple of years that it no longer does so (there were 'rating rings'). I rate when I see something I like - purely subjectively.

I found this post from Paul Cowan on the Istock forum thread interesting.  I certainly didn't know that Istock had been skimming fractions of a cent from us for some time now....

What's even more surprising is that there was so little reaction to the news.  Guess we are all becoming shell shocked.

Posted By PaulCowan:
[snip]
I don't understand how it is possible for them to quote percentage commission rates in the terms of agreement and then pay a lower rate than stated. Perhaps they would like to give us all back those fractions of cents that have accumulated over the years? BTW, the place that invented crowdshafting in its pricing scheme does actually calculate earnings to fractions of a cent, presumably to avoid being accused of failing to comply with its own contract terms.

I found this statement by Andrew (RogerMexico) in the Paypal hiccup thread quite depressing:
"People's nerves are raw around here from bad news and the fall out from bad news. So every time we screw something up - like this - it's just that much testier. It makes for a bad atmosphere but its understandable.

I don't know how much time its all going to take. When I look around the forums this week, its seems a little more normal than it did last week, which was better than the week before. But there's still a lot of hard feelings pretty close at hand."

So basically they know that if they wait long enough, we'll all be OK. They don't see that trust has been permanently lost, probably irrecoverably so.

And I noticed that in that Paypal problem thread, they didn't mention who was getting the interest for the two days - them or Paypal.
Not to mention all the fractions of a cent multiplied by gazillions.
And they are still unsustainable.
Tchah.

Not mentioning any names here  but this is how I feel every agency CEO should act in reply to their suppliers concerns:
http://www.alamy.com/Blog/contributor/archive/2010/10/18/4845.aspx

Yup. Good to read.
We all mess up - it's what we do about it which matters.

Congratulations from the green-eyed monster!

FRom what I understand of this. The executor of the estate is the only one who can sign a model telease of someone who has died after 1923. If it was a photograph that was taken before 1923 it has now passed into the public domain. <snip more info>

Best be totally clear you're talking about the US only.

Just noticed the inspection queue is over 79000, the biggest I've ever seen it.
Wonder if the inspectors are tied up with getting to grips with Agency requirements or on a go-slow as a protest against the changing royalty structure. Or maybe they're just all on holiday. Don't remember ever seeing the queue that big.

I just became a diamond contributor at Istock (a few minutes ago).
I knew this would happen somewhere in Autumn, and I was looking forward to this milestone for months.
Now why am I not celebrating

:0(
Sympathy. Hope the next three months are very good for you, though it's cold comfort.
Congratulations on the achievement, anyway.

Quote from: caspixel on October 01, 2010, 19:03

What would be really funny is if the same "supporters" showed up in their rivals ads.

It already happened in the UK during the last major election. Sorry I'm not in the UK, but I'm sure google will find it if you play around with some searches. There might even be a thread right here on MSG.

There was a thread here. A photo (iStock?) of a young woman was used with a "quotation" actually "saying" she supported the (Northern Irish) party concerned.
A rival party licensed the same photo, and used it similarly, but with a "quotation" saying, "I've changed my mind"!
Even more worrying was the case where a photo of a family from iStock was used, with a quotation stating why they supported the National Front, an extreme Right Wing/Fascist/jingoistic party in the UK. Ironically, the family in the pic was Italian; but just as well, as membership of the NF can be a sackable offence here, and it would have been extremely awkward in working and social life.

gostwyck: we are not yet at the top 100 or anywhere near that, but working out it 
Since we are now at 25%, we will retain our 25% for next year and bump up to 30% sometime near July.
I don't know why you think its going to be a blood bath but we always have the option of becoming independent.

Don't understand how you are going to "bump up to 30% somewhere near July".
If you're 25% in January, that's what you'll get all year.
(e.g. I expect to retain my 30%, but I had expected to go Gold/35% around April, which won't now happen.)

I've always wondered if rejected images could be sold as RM elsewhere, or if they exclusively rejected as well.

Yes, but you must contact CR each time, to get permission for every image individually.

those are a lot better than the rejected images uploads. I have found my E+ files sell well, and I put bestsellers in E+ too. Vetta sales have increased too, so probably more visibility. I have done a bazillion searches throughout the day because the posts today have made it sound like the best match returns are Vetta saturated...not so at all. all I can say is thank goodness the 'statisticians' here are not scientists. every search I've returned using random keywords, including big ones like 'business', 'family' and so many others I can't remember them all. the returns are a balanced mix of Vettas, flames, newer uploads and files that seem to be newer well-selling files etc.

nothing much different from the search returns before the new Vetta pricing took effect today.

best match is so weird.
'horse' seems to be very Vetta dominated.
Others seem to be very 'one member' dominated, e.g. 'Murchison Falls' (disclosure: I have a vested interest in this one!)

Does anyone know if the Vetta taking so many spots in the searches is recent adjustment or if it was always this way? I know there were always quite a few Vetta files in the top results, but recently it looks like 90%+ spots on the first and second page are occupied by Vetta images. I wonder if this is part of a greater scheme of things. Or just thing I did not notice before.

Try New York City or Fashion (Phoho only) searches.

It seems to depend on the search. Try 'men'.