I'm not involved in the Envato Marketplace, but I once considered becoming a contributor. However, considering the total lack of clarity on this matter I would now get the heck out of there.

(Edited to make more sense :O)So what does Red Bubble do, they act like an "agent" don't they, even though you set your own prices?  Don't both companies originate in Australia?  Has RB had sweeping changes this tax year?

I was wondering about that as well.

John,

When I get paid by MotionElements through Paypal, Paypal charges me a fee for receiving the payout. Other agencies usually pay those fees for us, so the contributor receives the correct amount of commissions. Why doesn't ME pay those fees?

Contributors may add other people's images to their lightboxes because a lightbox can only be made public if it contains images from more than 5 different contributors. Or perhaps your images were added because it fits the lightbox theme, and a big lightbox containing relevant images could be attractive for customers (so the lightbox creator's own images would be getting exposure as well).

Quote from: ruxpriencdiam on February 24, 2015, 17:25

Tyler asked and said before to please post a link to threads you are discussing that there is a link to so here it is.

http://submit.shutterstock.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=145571&start=0

Thing with all the microstock people that are the ones complining is they never worked a real job in their life!

Some 90%-95% of the micro photogs work for themselves and never had a job where they were on a timeclock or piecerate or salaried!

Google offers this and then some for their employees as do many companies in the real world anymore because they have found out that happy employees are more productive and better overall for the company!

Once all of you micro photogs work as a blue collar worker as an employee for a company that doesn't offer these kind of benefits for 20 or so years and then you see these offers from companies you too would want to work for them.

So stop your crying because someone has what you don't have and do something about it!

All you full time self employed photogs set your own hours and do whatever you want when and how you want with no one to have to report to!

SS offers this as a perk for employees who do their job they get paid to do and they have someone to report to unlike you all do!

Being in the work force my entire life I would love to have had the chance to work for or with a company that treated their employees with a little respect and dignity and offered these type of company perks unlike many do.

The only ones you have to blame for your expenses going up are yourselves.

Micro cost should be dam near nothing for dam near any shoot you do.

Wow! I've worked a typical job like most people, saved my money and then risked it all to be self employed only to have to work three times harder morning till midnight 6 days a week to get where I am. I do all the jobs a small business does with several people and I don't get paid vacation leave, I don't get sick leave, I don't get health insurance or any type of retirement. If I just do what I want I don't make any money, all my time is spent working. I also have no security, however the market goes so does my income. I also have to pay more in taxes as I don't have an employer paying half like all other employed people. I also have to file taxes four times a year. As far as having someone to report to I have to report to thousands of buyers instead of one boss. Unlike people who have a typical job I have to constantly guess what I need to do to make money whenI worked as a graphic designer there was not guess work, you did what you were assigned. I f I guess wrong I have wasted time and money.

Even though I agree with the above (in that self-employment is not easy), you make it sound like being self-employed is a torture and a punishment. I assume you gave up employment to become self-employed for a reason: because you enjoy doing this work. However, the above doesn't sound like you're enjoying it at all. If so, why not go back to employment?

For the record, I don't agree with ruxpriencdiam, because he's making it sound like we sit back and do nothing all day.
I too experience the pressure of making ends meet if times are bad, it's no walk in the park. However, it's better than employment because of the freedom it gives me. I can accept any assignment I want, I get to work in my own time, whenever I want. Therefore I would never complain about it like you did.

Yeah, the review times may be "quick", the pending queue sure as hell isn't. Waiting days before the images can be SUBMITTED after uploading is ridiculous. That really shouldn't take more than 10 minutes for any decent server.

Well, I'd like a raise, and I've worked in spaces just as nice as SS's. In fact, the last place I worked had a beer tap built into the kitchen island. Free beer, as much as you like, any time.

Why did you ever quit?

My images keep disappearing or fail to be submitted through both website upload and Stocksubmitter. SS seems to be buggy lately.

Wow, I think I have hit a new low at this agency: $0.16 for an S-sized download.

To my knowledge, a 1 credit S-sized vector should be at least 0.76 euro's, so at level 3 I should be getting 40% of that amount. Most of the time I receive $0.28 or $0.35. So what is going on? Why was it sold for only $0.40?

The aspect of maintaining lightboxes which (used to) bring me more sales has gone. All the time spent on those has been a complete waste of time then. Pity.
The image carousel is fine by me, as long as the images are actually a) relevant and b) my images only. Most other sites have carousels too.

The bigger preview size is fine.
The download and view counters were never relevant to the customer to begin with (well, it could work both ways: 100+ downloads speaks for its quality/popularity, 0 downloads/1000 views could make a customer believe that "maybe something's wrong with the image if nobody wants it"). SS doesn't show counters either and that works just fine.

However, I don't see why descriptions should be eliminated during subsequent views, as it could contain a lot of information for the customer.

Wow. Completely down, that's not good.

Probably while trying to fix the uploading issues, some intern pulled the plug.

You can enable "Automatically cut metadata according to agency requirements" option in program settings
Refresh folder after enabling it and files will be ready to upload

Thanks!

There really is only one way to find out.

I know this will make some people cross - but I wouldn't advise making any business decisions based on what anyone (myself included) says in a forum.....Unless you can establish a consensus backed up by hard data from a diverse range of contributors.

I disagree. While I believe that you should make an informed decision based on reliable sources, hard data is often not openly available. So we have to make decisions based on the little information we do have. If one of those sources is an internet forum full of personal opinions, so be it.
And doing nothing with the opinions above is a business decision as well, but you'll never know whether it's a good decision. Sometimes you just have to try and find out yourself.