I really don't understand this attitude.

I'm a fellow SS contributor who's also affected by this cut of royalty, but i still fail to see how SS is responsible for the current economic hardships of that alleged single mother or anyone else here. SS is a business not a charity. We are not employees, we are just contracted freelancers, and SS as an organization has zero responsibility towards us. They never made any promises and you are free to terminate your contract any time. The only reason you don't is because the rest of the agencies are just as crap or worse. A few agencies who are committed to fair trade, like pond5 or alamy, don't sell sh*, so it doesn't matter that they give you 40 to 60% of nothing. SS remained the only big one that actually sells and now it's gone too. I don't count istock/getty. The business landscape keeps shifting.

Let's face it: creating stock is a skill of very little added value, at least according to the market. No one cares how long it took you to learn photography and how much you spent on gear. Photography is extremely hard to sell even outside stock, otherwise we wouldn't bother selling for 20 cents a pop. As for me, i just stopped uploading and don't care any more.

It's not SS management's mistake that the single mother failed to obtain more marketable skills. We are all free to move on. Why would you rely on a single source of income, especially if it's known to be very unreliable?

Looking at your previous posts, it sounds like you had a tiny portfolio and stopped uploading. So yeah, this change doesn�t affect you much. But there are many people who make a full-time living from this, and others, like me, who make a five figure income from this every year and are currently unemployed and were unfortunately counting on this to help us make it through a lean time, during a pandemic, until we get our day jobs back.

You sound very much like an attorney who posted a similar sentiment on the Ss forums. Like him, you seem to have a complete lack of empathy for anyone who decided to make illustration, videography or photography their full time career.

Honestly looking through his likes on Twitter is terrifying. It really will help you understand his attitude to us peons when you see the stuff he reads and agrees with (fox, daily mail, trump, leftists are fascists posts and so on).

Based on that world view I can't see a positive response to collective action on the horizon, without a lot of pressure that is.

Even more reason to make sure this...person...never gets his bonus.

How about a Twitter campaign where everyone posts photos, videos and illustrations that are #NoLongerOnShutterstock ? You could include a link to where the work is still available.

This would allow many more people to get involved, because you don�t have to close your account or turn your port off, just delete one item. Imagine if thousands of people did this all on the same day.

Maybe after two years of litigation they need to drum up a lot of money quickly? That might help explain the short notice about their new royalty structure.

Interesting.

� July 20, 2018, Oakland � A former Image Reviewer who worked for Shutterstock, Inc. has filed a class and representative action suit against Shutterstock on behalf of herself and others, seeking to recover significant unpaid wages and penalties. The lawsuit, filed in the Superior Court for the County of Sonoma, claims Shutterstock systematically misclassifies its Image Reviewers, Footage Reviewers, Vector/Illustration Reviewers, and similar content Reviewers as independent contractors, in violation of California state law.�

https://www.bryanschwartzlaw.com/072018

Quote from: Minsc on June 01, 2020, 12:42

Since they're destroying our livelihood, let's take their online reputation down a few notches. I've complied a list of sites where you can file a report against company or leave a review.

It would be great is someone knew blogs, websites, magazines that graphic designers and marketing companies read. And get them to write articles.

I don't know any of such. So far my small contribution to the matter was telling 3 graphic designer friends to consider using some other service at their companies if they can.

@adage @adweek @marketingweeked @CommArts

Pavlovsky doesn't get his bonuses if the SS stock doesn't perform, and Oringer loses investment value. 

#ResetPavlovsky #ResetOringer

May I recommend tweeting about the pay slash, the reco to go to Adobe instead, and the petition, and adding @adage (Advertising Age) and @adweek (Adweek) to get their attention? They�re the major newsmagazines for the advertising industry. Maybe we can get them to run a story about it. If anyone can think of other publications to add that reach large numbers of buyers...

Also, @freelancersu ...Freelancers Union, based in NYC. They also write stories.

Pavlovsky takes the money from our pockets and places it directly into his.

#boycottshutterstock #nobonusforPavlovsky

Quote from: Snow on May 27, 2020, 12:16

https://forums.submit.shutterstock.com/topic/100168-why-deactivating-is-a-mistake-at-least-for-me/

These groupies sure are something else. What on earth makes them think they will get more sales if someone with a 10k food, concept or fashion portfolio leaves?
Do they fill all the gaps with their subject matter, concepts, quality?

They lack self respect and do not value their own work, that we already get but at least they can show some respect for those who work their butt off to survive in this market.

Shame on you!

That guy starting the thread has 4 pages of mediocre images after "years of uploading". Who cares about him anyway. Don't take him too seriously. Besides, as political parties do, he could be sent by SS to send their voice, I'm surprised they haven't done that earlier.

I�m afraid I couldn't help responding to him. Asshat.

Basically they�re saying a big f*ck you to all individual contributors while rewarding image factories.

Unless we all turn off our ports this will be it...although I�m not sure how much of an impact even that action will have, since they�ve been purposely approving zillions of similar junk images from factories en masse while simultaneously handing out rejections to individual contributors.

I guess that was the plan, they waited until most sales went to image factories and wouldn�t have a huge impact if we all quit, and the writing was on the wall.

Hey, they promised to pay me for all my stolen work a couple of years ago and I haven�t seen a dime from them. And despite me warning people about them, some people go ahead and work with them anyway. Zero sympathy for you.

I should apply, but honestly from the stories I've heard about the nightmare of NJ unemployment, I just keep putting it off. I do remember there was one person here who was getting unemployment and reported his royalties each month, and that amount was deducted from his benefits. I'm not sure if he was in NJ, though...everyone I know has yet to see any payment.