Could someone provide a comparison between enhanced licenses provided by major agencies (SS, FT, IS, 123RF, etc) and the royalties they pay?

I don't have one already made up, and you could do the research as easily as anyone else if you want to make a chart. It's hard to make apples to apples comparisons though.

For example, 123rf splits out different rights (as does DT) so they have limited, print and comprehensive ELs. The comprehensive EL netted me $37.35 last year for the 100 credit purchase (exact amount will vary depending on buyer's purchase price; I found one a few months before that netting $36.00).

DT's extended license royalties are priced differently based on image level as well. But when you consider that their rights are sold � la carte as opposed to one bundled set at SS, DT's royalties of up to $17 at level 0 and $30 at level 5 are greater than SS. I can't remember the last time I got an EL at DT though.

The other thread on SS's royalty cut has gotten buried in a pile of off topic p*ssing contests, so I thought I'd start something on what action we can take if we don't like SS's recent cash grab.

This morning I opted out of ELs

Go to the contributor (submit...) home page and Account Settings is under your name - top right, between the earnings menu and the language drop down.

I get a few ELs every month, so this will cost me, but after getting my first EL at the "improved" rates earlier in the week - and losing $7.61 on the deal - I'm frustrated enough to take the risk.

Opting out of ELs doesn't do anything to change SOD options, so the larger corporations who've done a custom deal keep on as before.

Some people have said that they get so few ELs after the standard license print run was raised to 500K that it doesn't matter about the cut.

I'd argue that if you aren't getting a lot of ELs, it makes it even easier to opt out as you won't have to spend much to send a message to SS that they can't cut royalties to contributors without consequences.

The argument that they're making this change to increase EL volumes fails on two levels:

1. They're just cutting contributor royalties (most severely for the lower-tier contributors; this is where they hope that higher tier contributors will quietly accept the change as they don't lose all that much). Buyers are still paying the same prices

2. Even if they do cut prices, you don't buy more ELs because they got cheap. If you're not doing a long print run or selling mugs/T shirts/prints etc, then you don't buy an EL regardless of the price. If they think they're losing business to a rival site when an EL is needed, then this is just a price war and contributors can't possibly win if sites start cutting prices to try and swipe business from a competitor

It's important to remember that high price extended/enhanced licenses are just gravy to stock agencies. They need to be compensated for their costs to host the site, inspect the incoming work, market the agency to buyers, process payments, etc. But to take the same percentage from the extra license terms as they do from the base license is disgraceful - the agency should pay a higher percentage as they have no additional costs associated with it (I think iStock used to when they started ELs; Stocksy pays 75% on ELs versus 50% on regular license sales)

I realize that SS is now focused on keeping Wall St analysts happy - they want to see profit growth and increasing their take on what the buyer pays is one way for them to do that - but they can't just forget about contributors.

They can boost the collection numbers with vast wastelands of marijuana pictures or near-duplicate icons but I doubt those matter much to buyers in the long run.

Paul Brennan should get a KK Thompson (money isn't what makes you happy) hall of fame award for this: "We are your partners and our job is to work tirelessly to serve you and grow our marketplace together."

If SS really wants to serve contributors, how about adding 10% to the tier percentages for EL sales? 30% to 40% for ELs versus 20% to 30% for all other non-sub sales.

Something has updated this evening, although if that's all for the day it was pretty quiet

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/28/business/media/with-corbis-sale-tiananmen-protest-images-go-to-chinese-media-company.htm

The story points out that many of the images are not owned by Corbis, they just have the right to license them. There's also some soothing words from VCG, whether or not that means anything in the long run - the plan is the plan until the plan changes being the mantra of many large organizations...

Hello. Do you wish to remain anonymous or will you share portfolio links so we can get to know you (so to speak) via your work.

Welcome.

Creative Market (if you can deal with the license changes), your own Symbiostock site (if you're still uploading there)

So I have one data point that someone buys the 25-pack ELs - I just received my first at the new "improved" rate and the royalty was $20.39. Nice that they rounded up from 20.388, but that's all the good I can find in this cash grab.

So the SS coffers just swelled by an extra $7.61 on that sale.

Having been through a whole series of cash grabs from a whole series of greedy agencies, I feel entirely justified in complaining about this latest conversion of contributor cash to agency nice-big-yacht fund. Those of you newer to this racket feel free to celebrate SS's "improvement" in our circumstances

I just got my first EL under the new structure, I got $30.

Did you get $29.85 or $30? I ask because 30% of 99.50 ( the current price of the 2-pack in the US) is $29.85. Possibly if the purchase were made in another country, the price amounted to $100 when converted into USD, but nice round numbers on currency conversions suggest shenanigans with the exchange rate

...So this means it's raise for veterans and a cut for newbies...I'd like to add that the raise is only for 2-image EL pack ($199), but it'll be a lower number if they bought a 5-image or 25-image EL pack.

The only interesting (in a good way) thing to come out of this change is that we'll get to see who buys in quantity versus in a 2 pack. I'm guessing that a lot more people buy 5 packs, in which case it is a cut for everyone.

If they cut the price of ELs (which I have to believe they will given their hints about wanting to sell more) then it's less for everyone, but a bigger cut for newer contributors.

So are you just trying to build traffic to your site to increase ad revenue? Otherwise, what on earth is the point of your poll?

That's a very interesting presentation. I was sort of joking about funding expansion by swiping royalties, but how does the video tie in with that? I'm missing the connection

The press release was issued yesterday. SS has partnered with Optimizely and Sprinklr

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/shutterstock-expands-successful-api-program-with-new-technology-partners-300207701.html

Shutterstock's developer page on this program lists Facebook (old news) plus others such as Percolate and NewsCred.

NewsCred and the new partner Sprinklr seem to be doing something similar. The NewsCred Image Editor may have something to do with the SS image editor development? Another article on what NewsCred does. Here's SS's post about the Percolate partnership

The interesting thing is that this appears to be a different route to integrating into customer's workflow. Adobe is plugging stock into their creative tools. SS is plugging it into online platforms and apps where the ads (or other content) are created or tested.

Perhaps SS's bet is that more and more use of imagery and video will be by people using web tools to do their marketing or customer engagement activities. I would assume Photoshop and Illustrator aren't much in evidence in these environments. From SS's developer page:

"WHY CONSIDER A PRODUCT INTEGRATION?
Create a seamless workflow for users to find images or video while staying on your platform"

It'd be interesting to know how contributors are compensated for images used in A/B testing or any of the above sites' activities, but I assume it fits into one of the existing packages. But the more interesting thing (I think) will be to watch how (if) this list of partners grows and what (if anything) that means for the other big players.