Quote from: bunhill on October 08, 2014, 09:43

Quote from: gostwyck on October 08, 2014, 09:40

I have to say that both downloads and revenue have absolutely plummeted at Istock for me since the changes. I'm seeing the fewest sales numbers on weekdays that I have for nearly 10 years (since I first began uploading). So far this month I have yet to make double figures on any day. A few years ago, even as an independent, I was selling 50-60 licenses per weekday.

On the other hand sales at SS have gone ballistic and if it keeps up then I'm on target for a massive BME. In particular sales of On-Demand-Downloads have increased hugely.

Can I be alone in wondering whether the two events could possibly be connected?

I think that almost everyone (apart from Tickstock obviously) will now agree that you were right all along with respect to that thing about eggs and baskets.

Oh well.

:-)

I'm not sure almost everyone will now agree, almost everyone has not quit exclusivity have they?  Have you?

I haven't run the numbers too extensively yet but it looks to me like the number of essentials downloads has gone way down, at least 50% if not more for my portfolio while signature and + downloads are up on the last 4 months significantly.

I thought exclusives were only supposed to have Signature files? At least that's what Bortomia's saying on the iS forums. Essentials files in an exclusives port are a mistake.

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=362716&page=86

Place into Illustrator, live trace, black and white, play with the values until you get something you like, expand, use the magic wand to select the black and "cut," then select all and "delete," then "paste" and only the black portion will come back (I find that's easiest).

You may have to do object>path>simplify after you expand and play with those values as well, because it looks like you'll have a lot of jagged edges and a potentially large file size. Then save down to EPS 10.

This is assuming you'll be working in Illustrator.

Quote from: Monty-m-gue on October 06, 2014, 09:53

Quote from: Shelma1 on October 06, 2014, 09:49

Quote from: Monty-m-gue on October 06, 2014, 08:59

Forgive me my ignorance. Why would a Pharma company - or any other company for that matter - elect to pay $400 for an image that is available to them as part of a sub package for pennies?

There are a variety of reasons. Which is why many ad agencies use Getty, for example, but not iStock. They want to be able to negotiate terms of usage.

I understand entirely why an organisation would pay top dollar for a RM image. I don't understand why said organisation would license an RF image on a Microstock agency for $400 when the same image is available for pennies.

And to any Tom, Dick or Harry who chooses it.

From my understanding, it's a legal issue. But I'm not an art buyer, so I don't know all the ins and outs. Also, ad agencies want access to unwatermarked images for comps, and I believe they pay more for that access at Shutterstock. They also get them from Getty but not iStock. Keep in mind a $400 image is a huge bargain for big corporations. And before someone says why don't ad agencies just buy a subscription for unwatermarked images, I'll answer in advance that they don't pay for images themselves; their clients pay once the image is approved.

^^^ One reason for the discrepancy in the poll might be that iStock exclusives are more "serious" about microstock...serious enough to pay attention to things like exclusivity (something I never noticed when I was a newbie, because I had a day job). So they may be earning more overall because they have larger than average/better quality than average ports. After all, they have to achieve a certain number of downloads to go exclusive.

If he's making nothing at iS he's bound to earn more at SS, and probably in the multiples of thousands of $, so what's there to lose by dropping the crown?

This appears to be a glitch. Apparently the "dummy" page is showing up and not changing over to the live page on Chrome for you. I see the same page for half a second when looking at my newly approved images, then it "flips" to the live page for me. I took a screen shot Of mine. Hopefully I'll get to a computer today and can upload it. I'll post it in their forums.

Site's as slow as it's ever been, inspections are taking a week. Waited a year and a half to log in, only to be asked to log in again when I hit the "submit" button. Yay!

Their upload process is one of the easiest, and though there's a glitch once in a while usually things go smoothly. You do need to drag the eps and jpg in together. Their system figures out it's the same file.

Just saw the Shutterstock ad on Facebook. More than 1,100 likes and hundreds of shares. Meanwhile, iStock's FB page collects more and more disgruntled posts, mostly from buyers. Time to buy shares of SSTK?

From a buyer on the Facebook page: "I got a promo email from you yesterday offering 10 free credits when I purchase 10 -- price listed in the promo is $2/credit. YESTERDAY! I went to your site today to make the purchase, and find it seems the whole deal is obsolete -- yet it says in the email it's valid until December 31st, 2014. What's going on here?"

Fail.

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1  Your first point, I don't know if those numbers show Shutterstock is growing contributors faster.  They might be growing contributors faster but nothing in the stat would suggest it.   Shutterstock was founded in 2003 and istock in 2000 so iStock has been around 14 years and SS 11 so lets say 30% longer, you would expect the numbers to be about that difference if the growth was the same, not 150% higher right?  A better criticism would probably be that the number of contributors isn't terribly relevant, total images or something else is a better measure.

Does Shutterstock count Getty in its contributors? I honestly don't know. But either company could spin this their way.

2  Second point, not sure about that one.  Most people say SS has a faster search.  There is contact info there so you could ask where they got that one.

"Most people"? Who? Shutterstock has a faster site, at least for contributors. Who cares if 30% of images show up in under 3 seconds? How many people make it past page 1 or 2 of the results? And jeebus, just say iStock's search is faster, if it's true. That language makes my head spin.

3  Third, nonexclusive video is 6 credits not 18, 18 is for exclusive.  Compare like to like.  $48-65 is the correct price you should be looking at, either way it is cheaper than SS for the same clips.

Well, you can't really compare like to like, because Shutterstock doesn't have exclusive images, so I guess you could average the two and say iS video clips cost $1XX.00 on average.

4  Fourth minimum entry of 1 vs 2.  It's true that average price for 1 iStock photo vs. 2 Shutterstock photos is more expensive but you could also say 3 photos for iStock is cheaper on average than 2 photos on SS.  3 on iStock would average $12 at most compared to $14.50 on Shutterstock. 

Yeah, you could say that. But iStock chose what to say, and they chose to compare a slightly more expensive buy to a slighter cheaper one and use the weasel words "minimum entry."

5 Fifth.  Buyers don't buy as much on the weekends, I'm sure you know that because they are away from work.  Buyers at SS would probably rather roll those unused downloads over into the work week if they could.

Sub sites make money on subs because hardly anyone uses all their downloads. Moot point.

6 Last, having exclusive content is a selling point.  I'm sure it sounds good to some buyers or they wouldn't be paying contributors more for it would they?

This I don't know. The images are only exclusive to iStock, not to the buyers. Which is probably why iStock calls them something other than "exclusive," like "Vetta" or "Signature," which connote quality rather than exclusivity.

Quote from: Shelma1 on September 17, 2014, 13:30

iStock suddenly raised prices for small images and dropped them for large images. Plus, they still have two collections, one three times the price of the other. Many of the buyers who've commented on their FB page were happy with iStock because they liked paying less for small images and didn't think of looking elsewhere. iStock has managed to alienate them while also dropping our earnings. So now both users and contributors will be looking elsewhere.

Shutterstock is advertising to iStock buyers that they have always had one price for all sizes, if that is the reason people are leaving iStock wouldn't that argument keep them from switching?

Why do you assume people will automatically switch to Shutterstock? There are dozens of choices out there that small image buyers will now be looking at. I shudder to think of some of them.

But if they do switch, it will be because Shutterstock offers one price for every image. IStock does not. Some of their images are 3 times the price of others, simply because they're exclusive to iStock, which does not mean they're exclusive to the buyer. Why do you willfully ignore facts that contradict your image of iStock?