its not positive at all... its the smoke and mirrors they are doing to keep exclusives exclusive as long as possible till they squeeze that last drop!

It almost seems to me like the puppets at istock management is trying to bombard contributors with all these new developments and recent forum posts in order try to take the spotlight off its real issues. Rebeccas last post was pretty clear that it is no longer istock and is only interested in gettys profits.

I haven't been around here much lately. I have been focusing my efforts outside of micro and doing more freelance work. One of my areas I do is t shirt designs. I figured i design tees for other clients, might as well make some for myself. I have come up with my own site this week selling my own designs which i illustrated. During this process, I found out i sucked at making type shirts as i spent almost 10 hours custom drawing the words "Kings of Queens" on my elephant tee. It's a simple big cartel site which caters to independent labels. I chose this site for its easy templates and the shopping cart system. A more fuller website is on its way.

The styles of my shirts are slightly different as i am developing my brand. They are mainly targeted at the 18-25 yr old male urban market. I am hoping to make a print out on ladies tees. Any suggestion on which current design might work on women will be appreciated. Most of the designs are just designs but i plan to make more social commentary type tees like "the 11th hour". Its my take on human nature and our impact on earth. Future shirt ideas are about the 1 percent (1%), Monsanto [They remind me of the empire from star wars somehow], the banking cartel, and so forth.

I know it has nothing to do with micro but i wanted some valuable feedback from this community. I havent uploaded the FAQ page and i plan to upload a Lookbook page if i feel the need.

http://kingsthreads.com please hit the like button if you like the site as i have no shame in begging for like buttons!  Much appreciated

I have come up with discount codes for anyone that wants to make some money. These codes will last for about 3 months. They are 15% off entire order. Its basically going to be around $1.50 per shirt (other products are different rate) ordered so if you give out the code and someone uses that and orders 4 shirts, thats $6 in your pocket. I will figure out a way for you to track the amount of sales. The payout will happen once you hit $25. Then i will pay you thru paypal. Anyone interested can email me at [email protected]

gbalex, are you saying only buyers go into the secure subdomains of the sites? Im not understanding your point. Im not sure about shutterstock but i have to log into my istock account as do most buyers and contributors.

If we factor in the amount of contributors visit to these pages to these rankings, these stats may be useless.
First we need to find out how many contributors each site has in relevance to the buyers. Then figure out a way to differentiate page views between buyers and contributors. I almost think most of these hits come from contributors checking their daily downloads.

Can anyone point me to where i can get a fairly generic model release? This might seem obvious to some but the only model release i am familiar with is from istock.

embermike, the last time i checked (a while back), you were selling stuff at vectorstock which sells vectors at a ridiculous price.

Well, majority of other site sells illustrations and graphic design elements for pennies(subscriptions). Its hard for me to participate with those returns knowing i am part of the problem driving down the wages and fair compensation for illustrators and designers alike. Its all relevant to what kind of product you produce. Successful vector files on istock can easily generate over $5,000 in 2 or so years. If you have the skills to create those, why harm the industry by putting it a subscription based site like SS where you are training the buyers that good quality art can be bought on the cheap??

Do any of these sites have some sort of contractual commitment to keep your files safe?. Whats to stop a failing site to just unload (or look the other way and give it to one of their partners to steal) all the vectors they have in their library and create an account on some other sites to make money that way? just playing devils advocate here. I would be a little wary about providing my wares to every little shop i have no idea on.

im more worried about the harm to to planet and future of humanity. not necessarily what i can get by breathing bad air. nuclear waste lasts way too long for any good. im thinking long term

Forget oil and gas and coal for a second.... the real danger to humanity is humans.
We make all these great progress through technology but technology itself isn't the best for man kinds future.  
We invent huge trawlers that pretty much picks up everything on the ocean floor so that we can consume fish on the cheap. Scientists say we will decimate ocean wild life by 2050. Im beginning to see a lot more farmed fish than ever before. cheaper food, mass consumption, longer life span.
Same thing goes for farming technology. seeds and crops yield a whole lot more now a days on 1 acre of land than ever before. cheaper food, mass consumption, longer life span.
In the past, we had plagues and wars that kept our population in check. Generally speaking, average lifespan has risen. Mom and pop not hungry, lets pop out babies =P The threat of a nuclear holocaust is preventing an all out war. Mass unchecked population growth that is living beyond our means. Thats why there is a general feeling that our kids will have it worse.
Previous poster talked about a virus that wipes out half the population which reminded me of "12 monkeys". Either mother nature or man made, a virus or a resource war will surely decrease our population.
Back on oil, I believe thats whats happening now in IRAN. Less dependence on oil, Iran's position in the world is weakening, so in their self interest, they are looking to go nuclear.

Quote from: VB inc on March 12, 2012, 11:01

Quote from: etienjones on March 09, 2012, 10:33

All of these concerns seem small compared to what surely is on the way:

Paul Gilding: The Earth is full

This type of information is IMO too much for most people to handle. No wonder theres a show called "Doomsday Preppers" on cable in the US.

Yeah, but none of these two know what theyre talking about, just glib, thats all. Theyre probably associating nuclear power with nuclear weapons.

Did you even see the TED video on that link he posted?