There has to be some type of quality control. We personally don't upload crap to our micro sites and we don't upload that crap to our personal web sites, but if it's open to anyone and everyone then you will end up with alot of people with a point and shoots taking pictures of their cat crapping in the litter box....then once the buyer's keep pulling up those images among the quality ones...they will get tired of looking and go back to the quality controled sites...so there has to be some sort of quality control here.
Agreed???

I was thrilled to awaken to some productive communication!!

My brainstorm.....as for covering costs. Would something like Flickr where you are limited to uploads unless you pay to be a member work? This might not solve the problem of huge uploads, but again like was mentioned before the more images on the site the more the buyer will stay there.

My wife and I started a microstock site a few years ago (justmacros.com). We were going for a niche market. It was tough going and didn't quite make it. I would love to be involved in this project!

Well you guys might have some perspective on what is involved...Think about what you did right and what you did wrong... The right as well as the wrong are very important. We wouldn't want to repeat the wrong's.
Think about it and give us some feedback..  

Do any of you know anyone that has experience running a site?? I know there are some in this forum, but as to who they are I don't know. We really need to see their perspective on this...

Also need someone who knows web design and is good at it as well as marketing. We need to start asking around. I'm sure there are some that haven't even read this thread but could help with these issues.

Quote from: aremafoto on May 04, 2009, 12:58

Quote from: batman on May 04, 2009, 12:43

If you're considering each of us owning our own site, then linking our whole community to each other, it could well work.

I think that is a great idea!!!

actually it was one of my ex students who told me about it. at the u, he did a thesis on the porn industry and how individual girls (most ex showgirls, ladies of the nights,etc..) would be running their business. all without the help of their pimps or agents. when he mentioned this to the class, they all laughed at him.
by the time he finished his presentation, no one was laughing.

Believe me, none of these girls who started out in the advent of www was making 25 cents per download. and today some of them are truly enterprises with their own fashion shop, merchandising stores,etc...
It isn't a dirty thing, it's real effective marketing and a true community in the sense of the business world. A model to emulate? I should think so.

Does anyone here actually know how to do this? Heh I'd be willing to add a web site, but they would almost have to be exclusive images or pull from the other sites and that would be extremely risky especially those who make decent money off it. If you add the same images the buyers are going to continue to go to those old sites. Someone would have to know the pricing structure of the microsites also in order to make it work.

While this sounds like a great idea, it has been discussed a few times over the last few years and nothing has ever come of it.  I had actually started down the path of creating a new site that would be fair to contributors, but after a few months I realized how much effort it truly was (and there is no guarantee of success).  I'm glad that I didn't go through with it because since then there have been dozens of sites that have come out of the woodwork and none of them have ever come close to competing with the big 5 (or 6 or 7).  I hate to be a naysayer, but I don't think that anything ever will come of this idea for a few reasons:

- First, to create a new site, someone has to create the infrastructure (both hardware and software).  There is an initial cost (both monetary and time) to setup a new site, especially one that needs to be able to handle the large workloads that stock sites can receive.  You would need high bandwidth, large hard disk capacities (on the order of multiple terabytes), redundancy (for 24x7 operability), a programming staff (to create the site and maintain it), a support staff, etc, etc.  If someone is going to put in their own time and money to start a new site, then they are going to want to get a larger slice in return.  Also, if they are going to do this, then why set up a new site for others to make a profit?  Why not just keep all of the profit for themselves?

- Second, sites already exist that offer a higher return, among them FeaturePics.  Contributors could band together and put up exclusive content on FP and support that site (or any other site that offers
better royalties), but most contributors don't support FP because of the low income that they receive.

- Third, why would contributors contribute exclusive content?  If the content was worthy of sales, most contributors would want it to be placed on the top sites, not a startup that has very little traffic and little sales.

There are other reasons as well, but these alone would probably kill any real effort.

IMHO, I believe that setting up some sort of association/union would be more likely, but it would need to be done correctly.

A union would be a good idea but the problem with that is how would you get the thousands and thousands of microstock contributors to join. You proubably couldn't post on the forums because they'd delete the post then kick you out. We here are just a tiny fish in a sea of large contributor fish.

Just think if the price got to one cent per download you'd have to make 100 sales just to make 1.00. And with the big microstock's that require a $100.00 worth of sales before payout would be loving it while collecting interest off their contributors!!!

Quote from: Roadrunner on May 04, 2009, 12:22

I usually get one payout a year of between $50 and $55 from FT.  Pretty near anything sells from scenic to isolation.  I can't say anything in particular sells well. 

The interesting thing is that I haven't been able to get one image accepted at FT for the past 12 months. The only other site that I submit to on a very limited bases also has a rejection rate over 90% is IS.   Perhaps that's why I took a three month leave of absence.  I haven't bothered to submit to anyone for the past three months.  I will probably just upload to BS, SS and DT.  DT is my best selling site, but acceptance rate there is only 45%.  Lets just say I'm lousy at photography, but it is an interesting challenge.

I am just happy that some folks find an image of mine to use. 

The Roadrunner

Yeah...I guess...whoops gotta catch the geico in my house,...be right back!!!!

Got him...hope he stays outside cause it's raining and he doesn't think this is his new home!!

Anyway...maybe we are just to old school for them. It looks to me like Vector's sell pretty well on there. I haven't even tryed that and don't even know if I could do it. I struggle enough just trying to make a cutout...and even those don't seem to sell. My pictures hardly get any views so like I said before I think they are buired under the pile and don't get to see much daylight!

it isn't just military bases that are off limits to photographers. in some countries, simply pointing your camera towards the heads of state's residences could find you surrounded by security to confiscate your camera. even if you're a nice ole senior couple unable to carry a bazooka, or that lens leaf has in the other thread.
so, if you're travelling, it's best to know the what you should not do as a photographer. you don't want to come home without your equipment.

I really am half afraid to even point a camera towards people, especially kids...I'm afraid they'll think I'm a stalker.....lol. 

Around here because it's right outside of a base, when you say certain words on your cell phone you find that all of a sudden....Connection Is Lost..!! or all of a sudden you find your voice being echoed on the phone like it's on a speaker system.  Oh and we so treasure our privacy and don't even know that there really isn't such a thing any more!!

I was also thinking more along these lines...
 

So true Click Click!!!!

Quote from: donding on May 02, 2009, 22:46

ROFL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm sitting here laughing my "you know what" off!!!

I had recently been shooting...lol...Apachie helicopters, which practice taking off and landing right next to the road. People are always out there right next to the site photographing. One day I set up the tri pod about 3/4 of a mile up the road on private property to photograph them. Well I guess the look out helicopter must have thought the tri pod was a machine gun or something because some one from the base came down and told me to quit photographing them and leave at once (again I was on private property!) or they were going to call the MP's which would call the state troopers and they would confiscate my card.....needless to say I put the camera up..but didn't leave.

It's sad that professional photographers are pushed away from opportunities like these where you can get real "close" without being a military photographer.

Just as a side note - I came across this PDF the other day (it's a bit old) but I think it gives some of you an idea how far to go when taking pics:

http://www.krages.com/phoright.htm

Thanks for that link Click-Click. I printed it out. It was updated in November 2006 so it's still old, but at least it contains some legal information. I have a nephew who works for the military and he told me the only thing you can't photograph is the actual cockpit of one of these Apachie helecoptors. Of course he wanted to know if I'd gotten the guys name...but I didn't. I think I was in shock about even being asked to stop photographing that I didn't even think to ask. Like I told the guy...why wouldn't you be able to photograph them when they are in the sky and the only thing around them is blue sky and clouds...it's not like your disclosing some secret location. These things fly over my house everyday while in training so I guess next time I'll just set the tripod up behind a tree and photograph them from my back yard!!

Any one notice their sales picking up in the last week, week and a half or is it just me? Mainly on Dreamstime, Shutterstock, iStock and Big Stock....and somewhat on StockXpert.

Hint: these are not real words:

womans
womens


Try some apostrophes. IStock's search engine automatically corrects these common grammatical errors. Perhaps Fotolia's does not.

Well spelling and proper grammer was never my strong point....I guess I need to start deleting and reuploading to Fotolia to get the correct grammer and spelling.  Hmmmm maybe that's why I hardly sell anything on Fotolia and do all the other sites. 

If you've been in this micro business long enough this wouldn't surprise you. Keyword searches are just plain goofy, depending on the site. A good way to go nuts is to try to put some logic to it.
My best advice is leave the logic on the shelf, shoot more, and worry less.
And don't get me started on categories!

Well I've been in it for about two years now and really have never done a search before ...I don't even go cruising other peoples portfolio's unless they ask...I usually do just what you suggested and I think I'm just gonna continue otherwise I'll go insane.