I now make more from this than from my 'proper' job, so yes my lifestyle would change quite drastically.

I agree it is good stock photographer with clear concepts, don't understand why it's being refused.  Perhaps Steve will drop buy and take a look.

Are most of the top 50 sustained for more than 1 month? Or is it usually just 2-3 weeks then it slows down?

I�ve had images in the top 50 for as little as one day.  Or I have had them go in out and back in again.

Oh i see.. but it still is generating sales for you right?

Being in the top 50 list doesn�t in itself generate sales as the buyers don�t get to see the list only the contributors, but once your image is in the top of the popular searches than that will generate sales.

OK that made me laugh out loud. 

DT have given us a payrise.  5c more on sub sales bringing them up to 35c and
quote by serban
' The credit packages will increase royalties much more, with as high as 50-75% in average.'
Great news.  DT are fast becoming my favourite stock site to work with

Thank you so much Alex for replying. Sorry for panicking but I have children in my portfolio and I have reassured the parents that the information won't become public and it totally freaked me when I read that on your forums.

I hope you're right about that but why would anybody pay 60$ for it instead of just downloading it from the site?

I read the following on the 123 forums.  It's taken from their faq's. Unless I'm missing something they are willing to sell our model releases-

From 123RF FAQ:

Q: Are all your images model and property released?
How do I get a copy of it?
A: Images with relevant releases are clearly indicated.
There will be a charge of $60 for each release information
requested.

That is very worrying especially for those of us that have children in our portfolios. If they don't change this policy then they are about to lose 1000's of photos when people find out.   I hope it is a misunderstanding but I don't know how to read it any other way. I think that it is probably illegal to sell this kind of information

This is a quote from a yahoo forum written by Chad Bridwell which I will post here as it will be important to some of you especially the last paragraphs.

Hello Folks,

 

I would like to give you a quick update on Fotolia. We have recently raised the base price of subscription commissions from 25 � 30 cents for white rank photographers and up to 37 cents for top Diamond rank. As I mentioned 2 weeks ago Fotolia needed to gather more data before we could adjust the commissions. And as I predicted our data did allow us to raise our commissions to photographers. In addition Fotolia has decided to count subscription sales towards a photographer�s rank, as a 4:1 ratio meaning 4 subscription sales equal 1 traditional sale.  These changes are live on the site now.

 

Our recent statistics show us that Fotolia is doing something right as just yesterday Fotolia was ranked in the top 1000 websites by Alexa, ranking us as 983. Fotolia is ranked well above our competitors with the exception of istockphoto http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details/fotolia.com.

 

Never in the history of Fotolia has the photographer community made so much money. Every week we continue to break payout records to photographers. It is amazing to see our growth in just 3 short years of operation. Many said it could not be done but here we are. However we still have a long way to go. Everyday we fight for new buyers around the globe. Our competition is fierce and we are a small team but I believe in the future of Fotolia.

 

In concern to the discussions happening in various forums, we believe the majority of these discussions are not constructive and organized by a few to cause riots in the community. We also believe there are those who seek after selfish means of popularity and personal gain. Such discussions are dangerous not only to Fotolia but the entire community because we know that many buyers read and research your words. We believe in free speech but we will not tolerate such discussions from people who benefit from Fotolia�s success by day and tear us down at night. We will not allow this to continue. If we believe a members actions or comments (on or off Fotolia) are detrimental to the growth of Fotolia we will not hesitate to take action and remove their account regardless of their rank or past success. 

 

I want to make one thing clear, the Fotolia management team decides the strategy for Fotolia, no one else. Those who do not share in our vision for the company are free to leave at any time.

 

The reality has been that Fotolia has always tried to raise photographers� earnings through higher prices, ranking, the ability to sell in the infinite collection, and now subscriptions. We believe in our model and do not make decisions irrationally. Generally people who have trusted us throughout these years are not disappointed.

 

I wish you all a great weekend.

Me too.   I  imagine him sitting back in a chair with his feet up laughing his head off waiting for the reactions after making  a controversial statement.

 I too enjoy MIZmania!!  It's the best!!   =tom

It's not that, I just tried a search using 6 of my common  keywords and it came up with 6 pages of results and I had 23 on the first page. I looked at the images on the last  page and they had all of the keywords so it wasn't because they only had 5 or  or less out of the 6.  I am due to become emerald quite soon so I still believe that ranking plays quite a major part .

Quote from: CofkoCof on June 13, 2008, 05:12

Quote from: Chode on June 13, 2008, 04:15

I give up. I totaly dont get this search engine. I just got aproved some watermelon images, and they have 13 keywords. 5 images on first page for "watermelon". This is really strange. There is no rule I guess....

Maybe they have a limit like IS. Only a few images (5?) from the same author can be on the first page.

that might be as well.

I think if you started putting in the description ' please buy this image at istock' they would soon delete the portfolio. 

18 so far about about 6% of this months sales.
I have sold over 70 images more this month than the first 12 days in May which was a BME so no complaints here.