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Messages - gostwyck
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226
« on: February 24, 2014, 16:41 »
absolutely true, but i also think GI is established in controlling our work pro-actively. i know the difference in my statements are night and day. GI always shows who the client is, what the image was used for etc. IS and the micros just show you sold an image with almost no accountability.
Do GI provide that level of detail for RF sales ... or are you actually comparing RM sales on GI with RF sales everywhere else? At least SS provide real-time data of sales (and a nice little map on where the sale occurred). I thought you had to wait several weeks or months to find out if you sold any images on GI today? Anyway, I'd trust SS over GI all day long. GI's accounting systems are all over the place as we know from the multiple cock-ups and clawbacks at IS and the PP. They make you wait nearly 2 months to tell you what sales you made ... and then they get it completely wrong.
227
« on: February 24, 2014, 15:18 »
The practice goes back forever. I used to buy stock occasionally from stock agencies and they would send me a whack of transparencies. We paid for what we used (and returned the transparencies). It's the way the business operates and to not allow ad agencies to download comps would be counter productive.
yes this practice does go back forever, but way back when your agency actually had people that worked with people, not some computer dealing with another computer and there were controls in place more or less. i think this practice is bad news. if i can give my clients a very low res image for layouts then so can SS. why not give them an image for layout purposes at 72dpi and 600 X 400 or tops 1200 X 800 saved at 50%, it's enough for layout and can't be used and if they want the image then they have to pay for it. lets not forget this practice way back when was managed much more so than today, and there is a prevention that seems SS is not applying.
this sounds like a total free for all if you ask me, absolutely no way to manage this free layout package.
I understand that when these 'special license' deals take place, with the bigger clients, then you do get "people working with people". That's partly why the prices are much higher, for the service the client receives.
228
« on: February 24, 2014, 12:20 »
The reason ad agencies don't get stock subscriptions is because they don't pay for the images themselves...their clients do. The cost of licensing the image is included in the budget for the work being produced. Smaller graphic design shops may buy subscriptions, but the large agencies who negotiate the big extended licenses for their clients do not.
Ad agencies will simply go back to Getty and Corbis if you charge them for comp use or try to force them into a subscription. They can get access to images there for free.
Well said. I have to say I am perfectly relaxed about my images being used for comps in this way, especially when they result in a big sale __ they're always such a nice surprise! I trust SS to know the industry and understand the needs of their important clients.
229
« on: February 23, 2014, 17:08 »
FB just paid $19 billion for a company with about 55 employees. We're not even comprehending how deep these pockets are, or how badly FB wants to increase ad revenue. Yet we'll give them our photos for 38 cents to put in front of hundreds of millions of users.
WhatsApp claims to have 450 million users, and FB wants to start stuffing that stream with ads.
There's nothing like entering a brand new market, with unknown potential, at the absolute rock bottom price point, with nowhere to go but down.
So stop your constant whining, go develop an app and then sell it to FB for $B's. Truth is you are paid what your skills are worth in the open market ... but you struggle to accept that reality.
230
« on: February 23, 2014, 16:50 »
I guess if you really think 38 cents is fair, for an ad potentially seen by millions of users - given that the real money was probably all hidden in the form of a big upfront pseudo-subscription payment from FB to SS, of which we get nothing... then probably I have nothing to add.
What's the difference between someone doing this and downloading it themselves from SS and then uploading that?
Now you've got a huge new 'buyer' base that 99% of didn't have an SS subscription and wasn't going to open one just for this.
And I'm pretty sure they can't download it. FB is not licensing it to the ad creator.
... and it's free to them, so they'll use it like candy. I know I do. I've used probably 20 images from Shutterstock in the last couple days in my ads. I'll run an ad for 2 days.. test what type of image performs the best then change the text.... test the text for a couple days, then try the best text with 6 new images. There is nothing stopping me from testing a new set of 6 images every day to find the best one. The photographer wins... I feel it is a great exchange and deal. Facebook will make money because I'm running lots of ads, Shutterstock gets lots of customers, as a photographer I get lots of new customers and as an advertiser on FB I get free images in a very easy to implement user interface.
Good thread Leaf. Have you been 'choosing' any of your own images on SS to ensure that the use is properly registered and a royalty paid?
231
« on: February 22, 2014, 09:17 »
Thanks very much Scott for the detailed answer to the many questions above however I have serious reservations how this can really work.
News is news and images of it are most valuable the instant they are available. That's why professional photojournalists will have the means to transmit their images almost immediately, if not in real-time. What facility does SS have to accept such images other than via the standard submit route where they can take several days to be reviewed. 'News' images that are 3 days old aren't going to make the front pages.
How can SS be confident that the 'news' images are as described by the contributor without some means of verifying the photographer and also the history of the image to ensure it has not been manipulated? SS and their customers could be placed in an embarrassing position if images sold were later found to be doctored or of a different event. It seems clear to me that there are many contributors who are so desperate to sell images that they spam their keywords all the time. Having "55K contributors all over the world" is a potentially useful resource but only if it can be trusted, both by SS and also their customers.
For 'editorial images' to work on SS there needs to be a totally different pricing architecture with much higher royalties paid to photographers. I'm amazed that some contributors are risking life and limb and damage to their equipment to send images to SS to be sold at current prices. I certainly wouldn't. I wouldn't even drive 5 miles down the road to capture an event for SS as I'd be unlikely to recover my transport costs let alone actually earn some money.
I just don't understand this 'toe dipped in the water' attitude to editorial images at SS. Surely, if you are intending to offer this service to customers, you need to think it through properly and offer the appropriate facilities and decent compensation to your contributors.
232
« on: February 21, 2014, 22:39 »
Did I say there was dodgy dealing? Just noted that insiders did not add to their potions.
As I recall you are a proud stock holder.
Being as the 'insiders' already owned more than 54% of the business they could hardly add to their holding could they? In fact they were under pressure to release some of their stock. No, I don't own any SS stock, although I most certainly would have bought in if I'd had the funds available at the time. I did recommend them to a couple of close friends, who had plenty of spare cash when the stock was $22. Unfortunately neither took my advice.
233
« on: February 21, 2014, 21:34 »
That's a good point. I'm sure they will want to know what all the money was spent on. Maybe Offset launch? Which for the life of me, I don't understand why Shutterstock is doing that. The quality of images on Offset aren't really any better than what's on Shutterstock already for a sliver of the price. It'd be like Walmart trying to open a high end store and charging top dollar for stuff they're selling for cheap in their regular stores. Stick to what you're good at.
That and the move to the new vanity location.
Shutterstock Inc: Insider Trading and Stock Options
Total insider sales $340,871,142 Total Insider Buys since 11/2012 $0
http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1549346.htm
That's because Oringer and (and Theo-whatever-his-name-is, if I remember correctly) released some of their personal shareholding due to massive demand from institutional investors. It's a measure of the success of the IPO and the strength of the business ... not as some dodgy dealing as you are trying to paint it. Quite clearly they'd have made more money if they'd have kept hold of the stock. I guess your bitterness at SS's success is because you didn't buy in when the stock was cheap? Or are you exclusive at IS?
234
« on: February 21, 2014, 19:06 »
Great blog and images of a terrible situation. Thanks for posting and well done to the photographers who captured the events.
235
« on: February 21, 2014, 16:25 »
Well, at least I got to learn a new term from this exchange. Am I the only one who didn't know what "duck face" is? (Thank you Google...)
+1 I just learned a new term too 
Me too! Not sure it is one I am likely to use often though.
236
« on: February 20, 2014, 21:27 »
that's why they 'experiment' LOL
enjoy making your 0.25 - 0.38 per download pros
welcome to the walmart of stock, you made it to the bottom, congratulations
Well yesterday I had 117 sales on SS which, thanks to 4 SOD's and many more OOD's, made just under $300. I'm happy enough with that.
I think that works out at a tad more than the 25-38c per download you quoted?
WOW, roughly $2.50 per image with whatever sod's and ood's are. no wonder ortner is a billionaire on paper. i make the just shy of $300 daily on IS from 20-25 or so downloads, i know my worth. not sure why i would want to sell my work for a fraction of that, but i guess folks like you enjoy selling their work for as little as they can.
also noted how you did not have a snappy come back on the RM issue, seems to silenced your man as well.
keep up the good work, glad you are happy with SS, but it's certainly not for me, i'd quite photography before i sold for those amounts.
What 'RM issue' was I supposed to have a snappy answer to? Yours was the first mention of RM in this thread.
Nice to hear you're doing so well at IS anyway! Good luck with that sinking ship , oops, I mean 'outstanding agency'.
Btw, don't forget that SS, for most independent contributors, only represents about half their earnings. You just lost $300 yesterday by not being independent.
yes i can see that.
judging from any consistency here, the microstock poll results for site earnings rating (top right of this page) always clearly shows exclusive always pays better than all the sites reporting combined. in fact it has been this way for as long as i can remember.
so why would anybody in their right mind want to upload to ten sites or more to make less money on average? that amigo makes no sense at all to me.
i think basing results of the poll is accurate give or take of a good reflection of photographers earnings. i could care less about how much SS or GI make, that is not going in my pocket, and if i can spend less time uploading to make more money, that is what i am going to do.
if it works for you, excellent, good to hear, but i would not submit at SS on principle and i sure as hell would not sugar coat it and call an act of desperation and 'experiment'.
whatever works for you is all that matters. i just don't see the point in working so hard to make so little when i can work less and make more.
Trust me, you'll be uploading to SS soon enough! IS have been saying for years that their business is "unsustainable" ... and so it will prove to be. Hold on tight ... because you're in for a very rough ride!
237
« on: February 20, 2014, 20:46 »
that's why they 'experiment' LOL
enjoy making your 0.25 - 0.38 per download pros
welcome to the walmart of stock, you made it to the bottom, congratulations
Well yesterday I had 117 sales on SS which, thanks to 4 SOD's and many more OOD's, made just under $300. I'm happy enough with that.
I think that works out at a tad more than the 25-38c per download you quoted?
WOW, roughly $2.50 per image with whatever sod's and ood's are. no wonder ortner is a billionaire on paper. i make the just shy of $300 daily on IS from 20-25 or so downloads, i know my worth. not sure why i would want to sell my work for a fraction of that, but i guess folks like you enjoy selling their work for as little as they can.
also noted how you did not have a snappy come back on the RM issue, seems to silenced your man as well.
keep up the good work, glad you are happy with SS, but it's certainly not for me, i'd quite photography before i sold for those amounts.
What 'RM issue' was I supposed to have a snappy answer to? Yours was the first mention of RM in this thread. Nice to hear you're doing so well at IS anyway! Good luck with that sinking ship , oops, I mean 'outstanding agency'. Btw, don't forget that SS, for most independent contributors, only represents about half their earnings. You just lost $300 yesterday by not being independent.
238
« on: February 20, 2014, 20:13 »
that's why they 'experiment' LOL
enjoy making your 0.25 - 0.38 per download pros
welcome to the walmart of stock, you made it to the bottom, congratulations
Well yesterday I had 117 sales on SS which, thanks to 4 SOD's and many more OOD's, made just under $300. I'm happy enough with that. I think that works out at a tad more than the 25-38c per download you quoted?
239
« on: February 20, 2014, 17:46 »
^^^ That's always been the case at DT. It probably saves load on the servers and I can't imagine many buyers actually wading through 10K+ images without refining their search parameters.
240
« on: February 20, 2014, 17:31 »
http://seekingalpha.com/pr/9033813-shutterstock-reports-fourth-quarter-and-full-year-2013-financial-results
- Fourth quarter revenue increases 38% from prior year, to $68.0 million
- Full year revenue increases 39% from prior year, to $235.5 million
- Adjusted EBITDA of $15.4 million in fourth quarter, increase of 37%
- Adjusted EBITDA of $53.4 million for full year, increase of 53%
- Quarterly paid image downloads reach record of 28.0 million
- Collection exceeds 33 million images and 1.5 million video clips
- Number of active customer accounts surpasses 940,000
It can't just be the 'Sean Effect' surely? Professionals deal with professionals.
241
« on: February 20, 2014, 08:44 »
I really don't understand what's going on at DT this month. I had a good January however both my sales and earnings for February are projected to be almost 50% down on January. They have literally halved from one month to the next.
My RPD has also been in free-fall for about a year but especially so since September when I uploaded several hundred new files, adding about 20% to my portfolio size. This time last year my RPD was usually about $2.30-2.40. Now it is $1.06-10. It is as if I've suddenly gone back to 2007-8.
Is anyone else experiencing similar issues at DT?
242
« on: February 19, 2014, 22:11 »
I did a shoot in 2006 and I gave the business some of the images in return. They were put RM on Getty. Last year Getty contacted them with a big claim because they found those images on the business' website. I had to call Getty and clear it up.
it is standard business practice to notify GI and/or any other RM agency on usage restrictions and/or rights granted to a third party if you submit an image as RM, that way this does not happen. did you do this? if you did this then there would be nothing to clear up.e
Great news! Can you supply a screen-shot of where that 'standard business practice' is accommodated within Getty's TOS?
243
« on: February 19, 2014, 20:15 »
Love the 'FAQ answers' ... Getty really knows how to take care of their customers!
This tells me that Getty is retracting and certainly not expanding their business. It tells me that Photos.com has not been able to compete against SS. It tells me that this is a retreat to Getty's last remaining platform in subscription image services. Thinkstock is now their only hope against the onslaught of SS, DT and FT (the latter ... not so much).
The times they are a-changin'.
244
« on: February 19, 2014, 13:39 »
This list shows emerald starting at 2 credits, but AFAIK my images that haven't sold in 6 months are all still knocked down to 1 credit.
I too would be happy to see prices go up, but I don't understand why they went down to a 1 credit base after 6 months to begin with...?
I know! I've got lots of images that have each sold hundreds of times that have been down-graded to 1 credit pricing. Of course the reason that they stopped selling was not due to their price ... but because FT insisted on knocking older images so far back in the default sort order that buyers never get to see them. FT don't appear to have been investing much in their site for ages, in contrast to most others. I wonder if the price increase could be the first step towards an exit strategy?
245
« on: February 19, 2014, 09:55 »
From a developer perspective, Android is something of an hodgepodge for the moment. I have relatively recently come back to doing some programming / development. I took a good look at both Android and iOS.
At the moment, most developers find that iOS is much better platform to build for. Partly because it is much more mature - being built on Mac OS X which was built on NeXT. Also - the iOS model is extremely well specified. Much of what you need to do when building an iOS media app is already there - you only have to hook into functionality which is already provided and well documented.
iOS is standardized. So, for example, if you are building an app which needs access a users picture library - well you know where that picture library is and how to address it in code. The rules already exist. And you know all of the possible hardware that the app might be running on. No surprises - no matter what particular camera app they have used.
Building an Android app, by comparison, means taking into account an almost infinite range of possibilities. iOS also has a much more mature integrated development environment. Developing for Android is potentially a much more expensive prospect. But because the money for developers is in iOS development (especially the in-house bespoke stuff which does not get distributed via the store), iOS development is much more established. It is much easier to get good iOS stuff developed.
(Also - there have been relatively few iPhone models and therefore relatively few iPhone cameras - taking the camera to mean the actual hardware + inbuilt processing before whatever any app does). The iPhone cameras are well regarded. There are probably hundreds of variations on the Android side which likely represents a potential QC inspection bottleneck).
^^^ Very interesting Bunhill, thanks for the explanation. I'm even more glad now that I went the Apple-route. Just bought a Macbook Pro last week to compliment the iPhone and iPad and it truly is a dream machine beyond my wildest expectations.
246
« on: February 11, 2014, 17:27 »
... and the awards are?
... and who exactly cares?
247
« on: February 06, 2014, 13:39 »
Percentages mean nothing in this case.
When I say 2% you still know nothing. I could well make 4000$ dollar per month or 50$.
Not always. My percentage is exactly 0% because I don't have any referrals.
248
« on: February 05, 2014, 10:48 »
I can not see anything wrong with promoting new files since they are the sellers of tomorrow. I mean we all know of another giant who will give new files a 5 sec exposure and if they dont sell, well then they are just history. Hobsons choice really.
Grey1 banned already? That was quick!
249
« on: February 04, 2014, 19:34 »
They can and do not produce any of the assets they sell themselves and they could not have become successful or continue to be successful with out our assets. Ummm... Jon Oringer founded Shutterstock to sell his own images. 
Anyway, what does it mean to manage assets fairly and responsibly? For me, it's whatever works for them (but I like contributor-neutrality), and for some, it's preferential treatment for older microstockers.
Exactly. As Jon has said repeatedly, the SS algorithm is largely driven by data harvested from buyers' actions. They are simply trying to provide the best service they can to the buying public. The contributors' levels of royalty payments are there to provide an incentive, not to save SS money on payments. I'm quite sure that vast majority of downloads are paid at the highest rate.
250
« on: February 03, 2014, 14:06 »
Back on-topic ...
Assuming average PP earnings my January should be just above Jan 2013 (+2%).
SS was equal, IS was well down due to the price decrease, DT and FT (most unusually) were significantly up and BigStock was up a little.
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