This question of earnings per online file on Fotolia got me thinking. My earnings have been flat with them, even though I continued to upload.

Worse than I thought. Earnings per online images have dropped by more than 50% over the past 3 years. Why on earth did I keep uploading images and suffering their mindless upload process with its complex categories and their high rejection rates.... I've again recommended that the readers of my blog ignore this latest attempt to bribe us with minute increases in payments.

Update: This is on 3000 images so is statistically valid. My earnings last month - $63!!

On top of it, there is also a very real possibility that if those images had not been offered on FT, they could have sold on the other agencies for higher price.
 

I respectfully disagree. I think the amount of images that have been opted out in just a few days is phenomenal, considering the number of years it took to build up that library. More buyers are getting aggravated with disappearing files and tweeting about it. More of us are making those buyers aware of the boycott and other options for images. I see the message getting out there even more.

I'm sure every boycott, protest, and revolution seemed impossible at the beginning. Yet many of them worked. If citizens can overthrow governments, we can shut down one little website.

Very true, Michelle! And to paraphrase Neil Armstrong, it is just one small step as one little agency goes, but a giant leap for the community of creative photographers and illustrators.

Ability to voice our opinions on this board, creation of Symbiostock, establishment of a new type of artist co-op Stocksy agency, and other new agencies emulating their approach, and now a successful joint action to withdraw our images from DPC are all important milestones in reversing the previous trends to devalue images and exploit the authors. All these very concrete accomplishments would have seemed like an impossible dream just a few years ago.

Even if the protest succeeded in getting more images opted out, Fotolia has the trump card. They can just shut off the opt-out and force inclusion. There is no scenario in which they just agree to shut the thing down. It won't happen.

Not in my book! Since they won't be selling my images at DPC, they don't have the trump card.

Topaz Labs runs this month a promotion for Topaz Clean that can be used to smooth and clean portraits/faces, but you could use it also to control surface texture in other type of images.

The current promotion ($14.99 instead of regular $29.99) will run until May 31, 2014.
For more information or to purchase it at the reduced rate, use the link below:

Topaz Clean

and enter "mayclean" as the discount code at the checkout to get 50% discount

I have to admit that I haven't used this program very much before. I tried it again recently, this time on an image of a large airplane and the program did a really good job of getting rid of the noise in the shadow areas and all kinds of scuff marks on the fuselage. You can see the Before and After examples on the Topaz Clean review on my blogsite:

http://advantica.wordpress.com/2014/05/10/topaz-clean-review/ 

Another user reported that she uses it with a great effect on cleaning up fractal images. Not something I would think of, but apparently the program smoothes it nicely without loosing the fine details.
 
At this price, it's a simple and cheaper alternative to Topaz Simplify or Denoise plugins for cleaning up some images that could be otherwise rejected by the stock agency inspectors. As another possibility, if used with the Flat Style preset, the program creates a highly simplified version that could be used to generate a different variation of the original image - similar to some modes in their Simplify plugin.

Well, I wouldn't put it on my face.

Must be caused by one of those loose algorithms we hear so much about.

You are most welcome! I'm glad that you found the programs useful and that you got them at the discounted price.
Thank you for letting me know and also many thanks to Leaf who made this amazing site available to all of us.

Les

Yes, Goofy, I am affiliated with Topaz Labs.
For full disclosure, if you read the related reviews on my blogsite, I use also NIK, LR, PS. If I need a quick adjustment, I may use just LR or PS sharpening while I'm in those programs to save me a trip to an external plugin. In some situations, I use NIK. There are similar tools available also from other companies, but I don't have any experience with those.
 
However, for many critical image adjustments, especially for noise reduction and detail enhancement, I use Topaz DeNoise and Detail plugins myself and don't hesitate to recommend them to my friends and others. So far, all who acted on that recommendation, have been quite happy with them. Especially the ones, who bought these programs with 50% discount.

Quote from: Freedom on April 08, 2014, 15:19

Just curious, what is the cut for stock photo contributors at FAA?

100%, you set your own pricing and they ad 40% on top of that or something. So theoretically you dont get 100% but if you want to get paid 10 dollar, you will get paid 10 dollar. He just sells it for 14.

The markup has been reduced to 30%, in other words the artist gets 77% from the selling price.

Another month, another Topaz promotion!

This month, Topaz Labs runs a 50% off promotion for their Topaz Detail sharpening plugin. This program allows you to specify sharpening on multiple levels with the addition of local contrast. I find it especially useful for the creative sharpening phase in landscape or macro images.
The special price is only $19.99 instead of regular $39.99 which is a great deal for this plugin.

Main features and benefits:

 * Better control over image detail. Detail uses size-based processing that lets you independently adjust small, medium, and large details.
 * More natural images. The technology in Detail substantially reduces the halos and artifacts you get from over-sharpening.
 * More volume and three-dimensionality. Detail can enhance larger image features to increase the perceived "depth" of your photo.

I posted a short review of the Topaz Detail plugin with some examples on my blogsite.

http://advantica.wordpress.com/2014/04/08/topaz-detail-3/


The current promotion will run from Apr 10 to Apr 30, 2014. To see more information and before/after samples, or to buy it at the reduced rate, use the link below:
Topaz Detail
and enter "aprdetail" as the 50% discount code

Using this link, you should get also a 15% discount on any of their other products


EDIT:
Added the link to the review on my blogsite.

The fact that a particular deal isn't as bad as some other deals does not make it a "good" deal.

It's not a great deal, but much better than subscription prices or partner sales at some other agencies. And as Ron points out, it's only a thumbnail. No danger of theft or inappropriate use. It's an additional application or sales channel.
Now, what I find really puzzling is that some contributors get ecstatic about their 10-27 cents sales for full-size mages with the other agencies.

Yes, you have the files, a non-functioning program, and memories (how the program used to work).  Unlike LR or other program with a perpetual license.