had 3 $25 sales this week...I'm game to hang out and see what happens 

Did anybody NOT receive the email?

We don't know if site sales are down or not.   My personal sales are way up as are lots of other people that have probably not bothered to comment on the forums.  The ones making a noise are the ones who's sales are affected badly which doesn't mean that sales are down overall.

Quote from: anonymous on May 26, 2008, 08:38

When your site's sales are down, it would probably behoove you to approve more images in an attempt to offer something that other sites don't OR at least offer what they do...

My sales are actually steady in spite the site's overall numbers are down (and congrats to you on kicking-some-serious-fotolia-ass!). My point is that their ditzy "Type of photo" rejections are just dopey. Rejecting images that will certainly give them a broader offering to their potential clients and MAYBE might increase their sales, is just piss-poor management....but I have a plan...muaaaaahahahahaha!!!! (cshack..puff puff pass)

now all of a sudden, my shots are being reviewed with 6 - 8 hours...I'll take it!

Curious, I love my Commarts, do you read it end-to-end  or just scan the company copy on coffee break?  They've been friendly enough to publish an article about us before. Any first-hand feedback on how you deal with the ad vs editorial content in these types of trade magazines present is appreciated.

I DO read it cover to cover but, more importantly, I look at the ads. I've been a subscriber as long as I've been in the design business (14 years +). The magazine is not only a great way to check out what my peers / competition are doing, but it's an excellent barometer on the industry (plus they even have an annual photo yearbook).
Prior to my becoming active in microstock, I would make image searches based upon the ads within. Since most of my design work is for the web, I have little interest in the high-end photogs but it is where I first discovered IS and StockXpert since they are regular advertisers. I have to believe that I'm not alone and if it wasn't paying dividends for them, I'm sure they wouldn't buy ad space there.
...hope this sheds some light.
(forgive spelling as I'm typing wayyy too fast...)

I would do it something like jpgmag.com does for their contests. You get two choices - a yeah or a nay. A yeah counts as a positive, a nay simply marks it voted on, doesn't go against a rating, and prevents anyone from voting a second time.

Just my two cents worth.

sounds better than the current standard...I'll second that emotion 

Quote from: acceptance rate redhead on May 24, 2008, 01:49

What's the point of being so ugly to people? You judge him by how many images he has on his iStock port? What if he's only been in stock for a few months but has been a professional photographer for a long time? What do you know about him, that you can hurl those kinds of insults? 

Gee, I don't know.  Maybe because he is handing out poor ratings to other photographers to drive their ratings down?  I tend to take things like that seriously.  Obviously you don't.

If he's been a professional photographer for a long time, then he hasn't learned anything in the process.  His pictures don't sell, which means he knows nothing about microstock. And therefore he shouldn't have the power to rate the microstock viability of anybody else's work.

Once again I stress - he has 1 sale at iStock in 3 months, and he has handed out over 1000 poor image ratings at MostPhotos.  Absolute joke.

suwannee, I have to agree with Dan. I too have been the victim of Windmill's "voting envy" and it is quite annoying that someone who has no luck or track record in the industry has the ability to "push" legitimate micro-folk down in the rankings (which directly affects SE results on MP) while offering up nothing but smack. I blocked him/her out a long time ago from my port but he/she tends to revel in ball-busting legit photographers (which he/she is not).

It's a slow and laborious 4-6 months to reach payout but it has always been slow and steady. However, my last 8 sales there were all for $1.00. But the $0.25 sub sales are deflating. That's what drove me away from Crestock so I may have a change of heart after the next cash out. Pleeeez let Yay survive and thrive and I'll have NO problems saying goodbye to CanStockPhoto as well.

I'm not as concerned about the name as I am of the marketing due to start in June. I was hugely skeptical of Lucky Oliver's disdain for traditional marketing, and instead favored "creative" marketing that turned out to be attending a bunch of trade shows. And not much else that I could see.

Yay has also talked about non-traditional marketing (they called it "crafty" marketing) and not the typical ads running in publications that the big guys are using. I wish them well. They've done so much right to this point.

But back when I was consulting in the direct marketing area the first thing you did was look and see what the most successful competition was doing and you tried to do much the same thing only better. They have spent the big bucks finding the most successful mix. It's a great starting point in that you've spent zero of your own money finding the best places to be.

Agreed. As a designer by trade, I rely heavily on the ads in Communication Arts. I'm sure it's pricy to advertise there, but it might be a good start.

Quote from: anonymous on May 21, 2008, 12:06

Quote from: Magnum on May 21, 2008, 11:40

Yuri rocks!

Look in the dictionary under "stockphotography" and you�ll see him!

Fools...

..i think the point being made here is that Yuri didn't make the crazy composite...i don't think ANYBODY here would have done that...
Yuri IS a great photog...one of his assistants is not..

You thought wrong. But who cares. We don�t need to complain about others pictures, without them here to explain! That�s for cowards.

No, I thought right. But who cares. We don�t need to fawn over other photogs without them here to soak it up! That�s for polyannas.

cool tool but going to take awhile to develope the database. I only received 123RF results as well.

thanks folks, I'll give them a try!!!

bump