This story on Huffington Post:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-dennett/cute-funny-sexy-cognitive-science_b_3692072.html

Uses this picture for sale on Featurepics (and perhaps elsewhere):

http://www.featurepics.com/online/Chocolate-Cake-Picture-243227.aspx

Huffpost credits "Google."

Does google now sell microstock?

fred

Well Capitalism is sort of like god.  It is a very broad subject with everyone going to a different church/school.  Here is another video (rather long but econ geeks should love it) with a debate at Columbia between the opposite ends of the economic spectrum - "Austrian" and Modern Monetary Theory (MMT).   Professor Murphy does not really do a very good job on the "Austrian" side - they could have found someone much better - but Warren Mosler for MMT is quite good and clear.

MMT vs. Austrian School Debate

c h e e r s
fred

Quote from: Beach Bum on February 16, 2013, 06:51
Thought this letter was right on point.  Aimed at the music industry, but could apply to many.

http://christiegoodwin.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/open-letter.html

Not much of a letter.  Just whining about giving away images.  If she is a professional then she should simply not give them away.  If her pictures are good enough they will pay for them.  If not then maybe they just don't need top quality images.  Either way it is up to her.

lff

It is similar to my portfolio.  I would estimate $100 per month for yours.

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fred

I have depended on this site for Nikon lens evals - http://www.naturfotograf.com/lens_surv.html - and they give the 18-55mm pretty bad marks - http://www.naturfotograf.com/lens_zoom_01.html#AFS18-55

Looks like you should go for another lens.  I used the 18-70mm and was very happy with it.  Rated much better than the 18=55mm here - http://www.naturfotograf.com/lens_zoom_01.html#AFS18-70G

Good luck and

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fred

Quote from: jm on October 13, 2012, 10:03
...I just sold EL of image (vector) from my MS early days that I deleted from almost all sites because I thought it's too simple and unsalable.

I could never understand the logic of voluntarily deleting an accepted image from a site.  There is no cost to keeping it online and always some chance it will sell.  Some think unsaleable images may detract from their portfolio and somehow affect sales but I just don't see this as being much of a factor.

fred

Well sales at CS are very slow but I average over  $2.50 a sale there and that more than makes up for it for me.

fred

I haven't been able to use Dashboard either but if I go to Workspace instead I can then (usually!) click on either Approved or Rejected and see total earnings.  The Statistics link for me has not worked at all in over a month.

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fred

My best seller on IS and a top 10 image for me on 5 other sites has been rejected on Fotolia multiple times over the last 3 years.

fred

I thought something must be wrong.  I had a sale there this morning!

lff

Quote from: Microstock Posts on May 31, 2012, 08:53
I'm surprised by all the happiness from the absence of the captcha. I thought it was a Game 

Actually, it was manual OCR enhancement.

fred

Does Veer generally keep money in your account that is under the payout limit if you quit?   I would just remove the images from Veer that they have transferred to Alamy Creativity but that does not seem to be possible.

fred

Quote from: click_click on May 15, 2012, 19:10

Quote from: Fred on May 15, 2012, 18:01I'm guessing Veer.  I don't have an Alamy or Stockfresh account but some of the 47 of mine that show up in Alamy Creativity are only on Veer and Bigstock. 
lff

I'm on Alamy and with all "major" micros including Veer, Bigstock, 123RF, Stockfresh etc. and my images don't show up in the Creativity pseudonym.

This is getting fishy.

Even if it is Veer the selected 47 on Alamy Creativity have nothing else in common that I can figure out.  They are not good sellers (most have never sold on Veer at all) not subject matter (animals, scenic, objects etc. are in the 47).  Selection looks random.

fred

Quote from: pancaketom on May 15, 2012, 16:53
My guess is Veer, since it looks like there are images of mine there that I don't think are on 123RF or Stockfresh. I wish that they wouldn't strip out the copyright not to mention I'd rather sell it through Alamy myself and get 60% instead of whatever I would get through the second hand sale - 30% of 60% = 20% of the original price. It would be nice if Alamy could let me remove the duplicates - but then again as far as they are concerned maybe they'd let "creative collection" delete my images.

Frustrating to see this happening. I wonder how long before some site puts our stuff on all the other microstock sites.

I'm guessing Veer.  I don't have an Alamy or Stockfresh account but some of the 47 of mine that show up in Alamy Creativity are only on Veer and Bigstock. 

lff

Quote from: JPSDK on April 24, 2012, 16:04
Canstock?
Is a place where you uploaded 10- 20 images and later on found out not to bother...

Go for IS, SS, DT and FOT

Based on cost/benefit this certainly does not stand up in my experience.  Uploading to Canstock is much easier and acceptance looser than any of the other sites you list.  This keeps production costs very low and my average sale there is over $2.00 making it the highest per download site I have.

If you are uploading to other sites including Canstock is a no brainer.

For the last year it has beaten Fotolia in every way for me.

fred

With over 400 images on Canstock for about 2 years I average about 2 sales a month.  The upside is the occasional $15-$20 sale which has allowed me to have 2 $50 payouts.  It is a pretty slow site but better for me than Fotolia or BigStock or Veer.

fred

Thanks guys.  I will check them out.

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fred

Quote from: WarrenPrice on March 25, 2012, 18:04
Interested in the results.  Please keep us informed.

Will let you know.  Would still be interested in anyone else's experience.

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fred

Quote from: Ed on March 25, 2012, 17:34
I've bought a lot of equipment from Adorama and B&H that is used.  I've even returned equipment bought used from them (thought I bought a 2nd Generation lens when I had bought a 1st Generation lens).  No problems at all....and they've even bought some used equipment from me that was in good shape.  They inspect everything when they receive it.

Thanks.  I have dealt with both of those sellers before and had no complaints.  Good to know that others like them also.  I've never dealt with NikonUSA but they have the best price on the refurb'ed d7000 by a couple of hundred dollars.  Still haven't decided which way to go.

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fred

Quote from: sharpshot on March 24, 2012, 15:36
I bought my 5DMKII refurbished from Canon on ebay.  It's been fine, never had any problems with it.

Thanks.  I haven't really seen many complaints about buying refurbished but still a little hesitant.

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fred

Thinking of buying a refurbished Nikon D7000.  They are available from NikonUSA at significantly less than Adorama.  Can anyone provide experience with used/refurbished equipment from either vendor?  Or just general experience with any refurbished photo equipment?

Thanks and

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fred

Is it just me or is this really kind of a presumptuous question?  I guess a function of this forum is to help newbies get on in Microstock. But recommendations for what to shoot in certain locations so someone can make images that compete for sales directly with one's own images? 

Places to eat, places to stay, ok. But places to shoot?  I don't think so.

Have a nice trip and take some good pictures but do your own research.

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fred

I can't say for sure but I think Exiftool would do it and also do it in a batch to replace all at once in a directory full of image files.  You can do lot of data manipulation in image files with it but it might be a little complicated to figure out the exact command.

Take a look at it.  http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/exiftool/

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fred

EL's can be important - they represent over 25% of my income on SS.

fred

After about 4 years my average is 1 EL for every 217 downloads of all types.

fred