@sweetgirll - No, I do not sell at clipartof. Thanks.

UPDATE: I contacted the business via their Facebook page. The owner responded and was very surprised to see this. He had paid a "designer" friend of his to develop the logo. He is very disappointed with his friend but glad to know the truth. The owner of the restaurant and I are now discussing how we can make this right.

Thanks to all the MSG folks who offered their input, I will let you know how this all unfolds.

This type of thing is rampant these days as the tools are available to anyone..and anyone with the tools can call themselves a designer. Good to hear they are working with you.

Apparently them messing with best match search results has brought older files up higher in results. I fear they screwed this up so much they may never get it to a balanced level

Quote from: dingles on March 13, 2013, 13:47

Being able to use stock vector as a logo shouldn't happen unless they have/purchase the exclusive rights to use that vector art. The main reason being what is to stop a business using said art to later sue when the art is used elsewhere. If they trademarked the logo they can do so. I would hope that if it is allowed it is stated they are not allowed to trademark the logo...but that is still iffy as who would police that? I doubt either the seller, agency or business would want this. In cases such as this I think it comes down to either a naive designer or business...or both.

it's too obvious that they can't trademark it.. therefore there is no need to emphasize it imo.. how can you even remotely think of trying to trademark or register something that the original artist will continue selling on RF sites?

that would be crazy.. 

Easy, the same reason whey full resolution images are showing up in Google search...naive buyers. There are plenty of people who feel they can use a copy written Google search image freely also. Just because it's obvious to us, doesn't mean every one is in the know

Using artwork and owning it are two separate things

Quote from: Sadstock on March 12, 2013, 19:53

They are just pissing this money away.  BCG will give them a bunch of BCG boxes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth-share_matrix, tell them that they had a star that they turned into a cash cow, that is on its way into becoming a dog, and send them a bill for $5,000,000.

Exactly.

The one thing they absolutely won't spend their money on is creating good will with their contributors, and that is the ONLY thing that could turn things around for them at this point.

I agree hiring consultants can be throwing money away, but it is common and I doubt they are the only stock agency who has done so. Also, can't fault them for wanting to know their market...can fault them on their approach though.

The only thing that could turn them around is for them to fix the many issues with the site. The site is broken and dated...they know it, we know it, the buyers know it. I am just surprised how little has been done over such a long period of time in that regard.

IStock still makes me the most money...I'd jump onto the Pond5 bandwagon as soon as they start bringing in more than IS

Will you still be allowed to sell the footage also or do they want exclusive rights? Are they asking a flat fee or can you work out a percentage based on sales? Are this footage already in the can or will you be producing new footage for them?

If it is exclusive to them then I personally would approach it by estimating how much I would make on said footage over a certain number of years. If you can still sell it on top, then I's approach it in a similar matter, but take into consideration that I am not loosing revenue...so the number would probably be lower in that second case.

One thing that happened recently at iStock really ticked me off. I submitted a video and waited the 3-4 weeks inspections time. They came back an said there was an extra frame in the beginning and to correct and resubmit and it will be accepted. So it turns out there was an extra frame so I removed it and resubmitted...3-4 weeks later it was rejected for market saturation or something along those lines...what a waste of time. They could of added that from the start and not offered the promise of it being accepted. It really made me mad. First they should have a shorter queue if fixing a quick error and resubmitting, and second they should have a log of the submitted clip to see they all ready stated they would accept it so the 2nd inspector could at least take that into consideration.

Wait... I don't see PP sales yet. Do they come in slow one at. Time? Where do you see data for January...isn't it still early?

Stocksy has peaked my interest.  Will it be the next be thing? It could be as most of us have it on our radars. I guess we just have to wait and see what it will be about.

This was brought up by Sean I believe over at iStock also. Issue is that naive buyers are hosting large images on their sites and just shrinking them down with HTML. Obviously the issue is Google can index the file at the hosted resolution. Most agents have limits the size you can host on the web(although not sure how they can track everyone's use), but with resolutions being much larger, I can see the need sometimes for larger images.  Glad to hear that there has been progress made by some stock agents and Google to help reduce this...

I agree. Most would have been okay with some simple acknowledgment of the issue(s). A little transparency goes a long way. Everything there just seems very sneaky and secretive. It's odd...this should be an honest business since they need quality contributors as much as we need them...or even more so.

All in all, they have a plan...none of us have a clue what that plan is...all we have is speculations. I will say their recent actions and lack of communication have all led to a perceived disregard for their contributors and lots of speculation.

So...iStocks sales have drastically declined over the past few months(drastically more than then they tend to be this time of year)...views seem to be down as well, although they are often broken (like most things seem to be with their system). Are the declining sales to stock in general or is this specific to iStock?

Either way the bigger question is why are they down. The lack of transparency on IS has only led to speculation.