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Messages - sharpshot
Pages: 1 ... 12 13 14 15 16 [17] 18 19 20 21 22 ... 263
401
« on: December 07, 2016, 10:13 »
Gee, I wonder why Yuri don't bother to come around anymore?
He only came here when he had something to boast about, or when he wanted help. In the latter cases, he didn't feed back. He's not a great loss.
Besides, when people openly boast about how they're going to make things better, they should offer an explanation about why their project management didn't work, or expect a lot of flak.
Not that there is any reason to debate what Yuri said years ago but he was talking about the user experience improving. I think it has, the site is a lot less buggy now than it was back then. I also looked back through some of his old posts I'd much rather have someone like him posting here occasionally than the people who were attacking him.
You also edited my quote which leaves out the most important point, many people who had expertise here were forced out. Anyone remember Lisa, it wasn't just those two either.
I don't like some of the bullies here but rightly or wrongly, I'm sure many people saw Yuri going exclusive as a betrayal. It should of been totally predictable that he would be met with hostility here when he went exclusive. Then he made some posts that stirred things up even more and expected to be treated with respect. I thought he knew a bit about psychology, so that looked deliberate to me but if he was genuine, then I can't believe how naive he was. It would be nice if this was a civilised forum and we all treated each other with respect but for that to happen, Leaf would have to be kicking people 24/7. It's a lot easier if we all grow a thicker skin or use the ignore button.
402
« on: December 07, 2016, 09:53 »
Totally agree with the "Alamy Sucks" statement. Despite quite some negative vibes we decided to add them to our distribution First upload the system got stuck several times till we managed to get 42 shots done. After x tries we managed 60. Here it comes, they managed to check ONE, yes the first one, didn't like it and hence rejected them all. Following up on this attitude we were advised this is their standard procedure as the first upload should only be 5-8 images. A few weeks later, calm again, we uploaded 6 images and the same BULLCRAP attitude - 1st one rejected, all rejected. They milk the cow on contributors hard work and considering the quantity they have piled up and their lack of training, manning,... they bounce you off as quick as they can.
Won't waste my time again. Since I spent much of my career in Marketing I can only say just good I never purchased an image from them and for the future one won't even waste the time to check what they have.
They are so lenient with reviews, there must be something technically wrong with one of your images. I think I've had one rejection in 8 years of uploading. They have over 95 million images, so isn't it worth looking at your images with a more critical eye if you can't get past QC when they are very lenient? That's what I did with my one rejected batch and I have to say it helped me much more than pretending the problem was with them.
403
« on: December 06, 2016, 17:27 »
It isn't just here, Yuri doesn't seem to be active on social media or his own blog. I can understand why he no longer comes here.
404
« on: December 06, 2016, 04:48 »
I'm sure he's doing great financially but he would of been as a non-exclusive as well. The other sites were always going to be OK without him, because he is so successful, there are going to be thousands of copycats.
I hope one day he can talk about the Getty deal, it must of been a very interesting negotiation. I think he would have to be exclusive for many years, he obviously doesn't have the same deal an average contributor would get but does keeping his account open on other sites mean that he's keeping his options open?
405
« on: December 05, 2016, 18:12 »
Anyone heard from Yuri Arcurs? I see he has stopped doing anything with social media and was last here in August, if he doesn't have a secret alias. He still has a tiny portfolio on DT. Shame there was such a bust up with the non-exclusives, I'm sure Getty must of made him an offer he couldn't refuse but it was still so strange to see the biggest non-exclusive going with them at that time. I'm sure it was always going to work out well for him financially and that makes business sense but it didn't seem like a smart PR move 
406
« on: December 05, 2016, 07:12 »
Q1 + Q2 2015
Earnings: 198.000.000 $
Download: 69.300.000
Items (June 2015): 57.200.000
Q1 + Q2 2016
Earnings: 240.000.000 $ (+21%)
Download: 84.200.000 (+21%)
Items (June 2015): 92.000.000 (+61%)
- Shutterstock Earning increase 21% in a year,
- Almost all contributors complaining about earning decrease,
- Where do you think the "increased earnings" are?
That's an easy one. They have a lot more contributors. The pie gets bigger but most of us get a smaller slice. They can also raise prices and pay us the same or less.
407
« on: December 05, 2016, 06:50 »
Well I have just has a batch accepted for editing keywords but nothing has changed. Still the same 3 groups and no option for editorial or is there something I should click, instigate, sign etc for this new procedure to happen ?
We can't use it yet. Alamy take their time, hopefully we will have it before the end of 2017
408
« on: December 05, 2016, 05:06 »
Did they start messing us about three years ago or six years ago? Well, maybe eight or more years ago. See this thread from summer 2008 http://www.microstockgroup.com/stockxpert-com/StockXpert-photos-com/
I'm not even sure that's the earliest sign of looming troubles. When did Fotolia disconnect the value of a credit for photographers from the cost of a credit to buyers? I can't remember.
But if you really want to go back to the first sell-out, it was Bruce selling to Getty back in 2005 IIRC. Many early submitters were virulently anti- big business and regarded Getty as the great Satan. I'm told that a lot quit after Getty bought iStock. So that pushes it back more than a decade.
I think the problems started 15 years ago when istock started paying just 20% to its contributors. Alamy were around then, I think they were paying 60%? Other sites started up paying a much higher percentage than istock and that meant they had a lot of competition. I think if istock started at 50% and didn't sell out to Getty, it would have almost no competition.
409
« on: December 04, 2016, 06:15 »
There have been several threads about this in the past. I could draw no conclusion from any of them. I mostly use 25p, as I live in Europe.
410
« on: December 03, 2016, 06:52 »
I hope Adobe/Fotolia appreciate Mat's work for making contributor-agency relations so positive. I believe it already pays off.
The last time any agency was really concerned about honest positive communication and working towards contributor's best interest was a few years ago, and it was Shutterstock. I guess it come to an end with Scott Braut leaving SS.
Now lets compare the two worlds - Adobe/Fotolia vs Istock. The first is a knight in a shining armor and the latter is a miserable Gollum creature .
I didn't like Fotolia at all until Adobe took over. Fotolia were like istocks little brother, copying their commission cuts and setting top level rankings almost all of us will never reach. I'm still not that impressed because my earnings fell off a cliff under Fotolia and there's been no real recovery under Adobe. We are still paid too little and have those crazy top ranking levels most people will never reach. I hope things will change but until now, not much has happened to make me enthusiastic. SS set a top tier level that's possible for almost anyone to reach if they put in the work, if Adobe want to go up in my estimation, they need to change their ranking system and give us an incentive to sell more.
411
« on: December 02, 2016, 04:37 »
Has anyone who's earnings fell off a cliff a few years ago seen a recovery? I'm still lucky to get 20% of what I used to get. SS has been much more stable for me.
412
« on: December 01, 2016, 04:25 »
The IP address from the email from donotreply@fineartamerica's is: 207.150.192.50
It says Austin, Texas.
The IP address from the hotmail account is: 65.55.116.12
It says Virginia, Washington
So now I'm really worried...
They wouldn't use a hotmail email and have an error with their English if they were legitimate. Scammers use hotmail and usually make mistakes with their English. Stop worrying, you might want to change your email address because if this causes you stress, you are likely to be getting more scam emails now.
413
« on: November 30, 2016, 13:08 »
I posted the photo on the first page - the only thing I can think of is the "addition" icons on the side. Can we not use those in images? I'm shocked if so ...
Sorry, first read the thread on my mobile and must not have waited for it to load.
I've got no idea what their problem is. Maybe they have a similar logo, maybe with the three plus signs?
There's nothing wrong with the image, this is a scam. Easy to spot because they use bad English and a hotmail email address. Everyone should ignore these people or report them to the sites and let them deal with it.
414
« on: November 29, 2016, 19:03 »
yes the search can be automated but then what? enlighten me. how does the script tell you which images is infringing copyright or is stolen.
A thief often has images from several other peoples portfolios. They would be uploaded at a later date. I don't think it should be too difficult to work out who is likely to be infringing copyright.
415
« on: November 29, 2016, 11:03 »
4,800
Cool vectors or photos? And how much approximate dwl u get daily?
died from overdrawn
All photos of cannabis plants
416
« on: November 29, 2016, 10:54 »
They made it more difficult to deactivate images years ago and now they have made it more difficult again. My solution was one message to support to close my account.
417
« on: November 29, 2016, 05:33 »
joann, its an immense job for an agency to check millions of submitted images dragging them into google images one by one and then check through every returned result to see if it is legal usage or an infringment, not saying you are wrong, just saying its an immense manual job i am not expecting them to do.
Is it really that hard to automate it and find the people that are uploading stolen images from lots of different portfolios? I would of thought someone would be capable of coding something to do that.
418
« on: November 29, 2016, 03:55 »
Looks like a great start. My experience with P5 is that they take a while to get sales going but then they have been my best selling site. I'm only an amateur with video though. I'll stick with iStock for a while longer and hope they become more contributor friendly.
I did that for 10 years and it never happened. I really don't think non-exclusives should use them now because it will damage our earnings with other sites. If all the sites sold for low prices and paid us 20%, it would be almost impossible to make money. Istock are soon going to pay all non-exclusives 15% for stills, if we put up with that, the other sites wont pay us 30 to 50%.
419
« on: November 29, 2016, 03:35 »
I stopped uploading almost entirely when they started their strange rejections years ago. The decline in earnings has been steady and they are doing better than FT for me.
It was easy to predict the decline in DT when they started rejecting images that were selling very well on other sites. I have no idea why they did that, it seemed obvious that buyers can decide for themselves what they want and leaving that decision in the hands of low paid reviewers was madness. All it did was annoy contributors, who had lots of their rivals to upload to. Then they cut commissions and that was the only thing that might of kept me uploading.
If they went back to 50%, they might still have a chance. If it works for Pond5 and Alamy, there's no reason why they couldn't make it work as well. There's an opportunity now a lot of us are going to be leaving istock but I don't think DT would be brave enough to take it.
420
« on: November 29, 2016, 03:23 »
4,800
421
« on: November 29, 2016, 02:58 »
FT sell for low prices, that's why I didn't upload footage there. I thought Adobe had higher minimum prices but I find the Adobe/FT thing confusing. They should kill off FT and just have Adobe.
422
« on: November 29, 2016, 02:55 »
I'm averaging $1.15 per sale this month, that's higher than usual. Subs bring the average lower most months but they sell a lot and that makes up for it.
423
« on: November 28, 2016, 13:10 »
I have some that haven't been reviewed for a few weeks.
424
« on: November 28, 2016, 04:23 »
.....The agencies screwing over their contributors like this is a relatively recent phenomena. Past 3 years maybe. Before that some tried, but petitions and group actions did mostly work to stop them.
More like 6 years. It's all in this forum, istock sent us a "good news" email telling us they were cutting non-exclusives commission below 20%. Until then, we had some success improving things with a few sites but they ignored our deactivation day protest and all the big sites have given us "good news" since then.
I became active 8ish years ago, but I remember making 20% as nonexclusive until at least 2013, and the thread on the deactivation day subject seems to back that up. So isn't that more like 3+ years?
Not saying it doesn't suck, but explaining why some of us felt happy with stock til the past couple years.
They announced the cuts in 2010, so you must of been getting below 20%in 2011? Here's one thread about it http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/so-what-are-we-all-going-to-do/
425
« on: November 27, 2016, 17:17 »
.....The agencies screwing over their contributors like this is a relatively recent phenomena. Past 3 years maybe. Before that some tried, but petitions and group actions did mostly work to stop them.
More like 6 years. It's all in this forum, istock sent us a "good news" email telling us they were cutting non-exclusives commission below 20%. Until then, we had some success improving things with a few sites but they ignored our deactivation day protest and all the big sites have given us "good news" since then.
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