In the meantime, though, I'd love a little help listing some good but inexpensive hosts especially for newbies. Also if anyone wants to help people set up, they should mention it.

As people list good hosting solutions we can add them to the original post.

For anyone in Australia/New Zealand/South Pacific I would highly recommend AussieHQ at http://www.aussiehq.com.au/web_and_email_hosting

We've been with them since 2003 (originally AussieHosts), and service has been excellent. AU$15/month gets you a single domain, 10GB storage and unlimited traffic.

ETA I'm willing to help with setup - I've several years tweaking Wordpress sites

From my perspective, all hope for long term good things for contributors from SS ended when they sent out the e-mail about Bigstock subscriptions and the ridiculous levels of annual sales needed to get the top level of royalties.

I think it's only a matter of when, not if, that royalty schedule is applied to sales at SS. That sort of scheme cuts SS's costs (which increases their profit) and favors the factory producers - Yuri, Monkey Business Images, etc.

There is no way, even if SS doubled their business and I stepped up production  significantly (I do this part time), I would keep my 38 cents per sub download and more importantly the higher payouts on OD and Single image sales.

So I'm glad they had a good fourth quarter, but it no longer seems to have anything to do with my prosperity there.

It could be that they are the only ones they want to keep. I wouldn't be surprised if those contributors hardly need to be inspected, so smaller players are probably more expensive for them. If smaller contributors are driven out they can reduce their numbers of inspectors and save more money.
In the end, it could be that only the factories will find micro worthwhile, and the rest of us will have to find a new home.
Where's KonaHawaii?

I think everyone who is accepted get to invite up to 5 other people, this people need to pass inspection/curation before they get accepted.
They are NOT looking for regular stock photos. they are looking for "Vetta" and "Agency" type only, more or less.
Artsy photos also work.

The great thing about that is it will give people who are not exclusive with IS somewhere to put those images. Sounds like a great opportunity

I've seen the argument a lot about not wanting to undercut SS with lower paying sub sites, but how much money are we actually talking about?

If you sell at the vaunted top level at BigStock, 50K a year, you'd make $19K a year at $.38. That same number of sales at $.25 is $12500. So, it is a difference of $6500 a year or a little over $500 a month. It's a nice chunk of change that all of us would definitely like, but it's not necessarily life changing.

Of course, most of us don't have 50K sub sales a year. If you sell 2000 images a month, it's $260 a month. 1000 images, it's half that at $130 a month. And so on.

That's not really a huge difference unless you have huge sales volumes, so why a quibbling over pennies (literally)? It seems like attacking the small, extra small and web sizes would be a much more profitable complaint area. These sizes are really undercutting your profits.

You're right, it doesn't make much difference.
The thing is, we just received the renewal notice for our house and contents insurance. We have to pay an extra $19 per month. That isn't much money either, but where is it going to come from?
Will our total earnings increase by $19 per month to cover it? Or will BS attract buyers from other sites who currently pay more?
Scott says the subscription plan is aimed at BS buyers. Are they the ones who currently result in a payment to us of a minimum 50 cents?
Maybe I'm missing something fundamental, but for years I've wondered this:-
Big corporations have to constantly increase their profits to satisfy their shareholders. They all want to drag more money out of us.  If we have less money, we can't spend it.
How are we supposed to buy their products if we haven't got any money?

Quote from: gostwyck on February 14, 2013, 20:43

Quote from: sharpshot on February 14, 2013, 18:54

So we just ignore the unrealistic RC levels with BigStock?  I think they've made a big mistake and it makes me concerned about the future of SS.

I'm a little concerned that Oringer or some other representative of SS hasn't posted any statements in this forum to reassure us that no royalty cuts are in the works for SS.  I mean if our fears are unfounded, why wouldn't they simply let us know right away and put all our worried paranoia to rest?

Agreed. Scott Braut usually appears when anything is being said that isn't correct. He hasn't done so on this occasion, which is a worry.

Quote from: Elenathewise on February 14, 2013, 11:46

I love their hair at the end of the shoot:)
But yeah, shooting with kit lens in low light will result in lots of "out of focus" rejections, and rightfully so. The thing is, they don't need stock quality - even it the image gets printed in a cookbook/magazine or gets shown on TV screen, the dimensions are not that big, so you can size down from your 18 MP or whatever and it will still look great. So many people don't realize the pain that stock photographers have to go though to get perfect sharpness and low noise levels at 100% resolution for huge files.

You are so absolutely right!  Those rejections made stock photographers the shooters with the best eye for detail in photoshop.  I often catch myself removing little logos, making the backgrounds perfectly black or white, or do other typically "stock stuff" for baby shoot clients!

And certainly in my experience, food never sell in large sizes. Except as subs

Quote from: Travelling-light on February 12, 2013, 14:43

Quote from: heywoody on February 12, 2013, 13:52

Quote from: Travelling-light on February 12, 2013, 12:41

You've completely missed my point.

Is your point not that some files should attract a higher price because they are somehow better or because they would generally not be mainstream MS subjects and, thus, sell less often?

Maybe both? or either? As I said, the trick is to work out which is which.
I know when Vetta was first introduced I didn't choose any myself because I didn't think I had any good enough. IS made the choices to get the system started, and it seemed to work. I was surprised how much money they made,  but that reduced significantly when they raised prices and reduced commissions.
Apparently less people were willing to pay the higher prices for my files, so that told me what was the best price for those files, unfortunately we weren't given a choice in how much to charge.
I've got a few ex Vettas on SS now and I can tell you for sure they don't make as much money.
I've also got files on SS which were zero sellers on IS and yet have sold quite well on SS.
It's just working out which is which

Have you posted your conclusions or thoughts about dropping exclusivity anywhere?

No, just as I didn't when I went exclusive in 2008. I prefer to keep most of my thoughts to myself

Quote from: Travelling-light on February 12, 2013, 10:56

Gostwyck, what you are missing is that not all files are equal.
Yes, some files will sell many times over and make more money as microstock/subs. Others will sell much less often but can command a higher price. The trick is to work out which is which.
I know IS didn't always get it right with Vetta/Agency, but they had the right idea. It was very worthwhile to have those V/A files, especially in the early days when they seemed to have the pricing right.
As I seem to keep on saying, it's a pity they wrecked it.

We are not selling art (when it's sold, it's sold), we're are selling the right to use a copy for a specified purpose and can do it over and over again - like cd's / music downloads, cinema tickets, books, videos etc and, like these other commodities, there may be inate difference in quality (whatever that means subjectively) but that is NOT reflected in the unit price.

You've completely missed my point.

Quote from: ShadySue on February 12, 2013, 08:59

Probably true, and Sean does have a family to feed.
OTOH, it will be difficult to get buyers to pay a fair price if you're selling the same images for a pittance on the sub sites. I guess splitting the images could make some sense, maybe putting the more generic shots onto some other sites.

But I have every confidence that Sean has more business sense in his pinky toe than I have in what passes for a brain.

You still don't understand the concept of 'microstock'? It's a low-price/highvolume thing. That's how it works.

As an independent contributor, SS generates about 50% of my monthly microstock income (with BigStock adding another 3-4%). Without the 30% or so that IS and the PP (combined) currently generates, presumeably the situation that Sean will find himself in, then SS's contribution would actually be 75%. That's how important SS will probably be to Sean's income until another player like Stocksy makes an impact. That's also why Yuri, Andres, MB, etc are all 'selling their images for a pittance on the sub sites'. Because it works.

I'm hoping that someone at Getty will have enough sense to get around the table with Sean over the remaining 25 days, discuss it properly, and resolve the issue to the benefit of both parties. What has happened is madness.

Gostwyck, what you are missing is that not all files are equal.
Yes, some files will sell many times over and make more money as microstock/subs. Others will sell much less often but can command a higher price. The trick is to work out which is which.
I know IS didn't always get it right with Vetta/Agency, but they had the right idea. It was very worthwhile to have those V/A files, especially in the early days when they seemed to have the pricing right.
As I seem to keep on saying, it's a pity they wrecked it.

And FWIW, I've just deactivated another 15 20 and will do more later when we get back from Les Mis.
Reason: "iStock idiocy. No faith in management."

Went to see that last week.
I couldn't help but be reminded of all that's happening around here.
I can't write anything that doesn't sound melodramatic, but you'll understand what I mean, I'm sure.

Quote from: Travelling-light on February 10, 2013, 18:36

Quote from: Poncke on February 10, 2013, 18:29

Basically what he is saying is that IS is aware of all the pain they are causing their own contributors but choose to do nothing about it.

Look what has come of the google deal revolt. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

If I ran a company and saw this much heartache I would make changes. But thats just me.

I'll bet you're not rich though, are you?

No I am not, but you can make a lot of money whilst running a decent company.

The global company I work for now has called for 2013 to be the year to fix the top 15 pain points from a list they accumulated over the last two years, with customer and employee complaints. Money is no object, unlimited budget. And every time the top one pain point has been fixed, they add the next one to the bottom of the list, until the list is empty. That creates trust and motivation and the company is doing better then ever and everybody wants to hit their targets and then some. Its a great vibe to work in.

If only others could realise that! However, it's been discussed many times on the IS forum, and yet here we are.

Basically what he is saying is that IS is aware of all the pain they are causing their own contributors but choose to do nothing about it.

Look what has come of the google deal revolt. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

If I ran a company and saw this much heartache I would make changes. But thats just me.

I'll bet you're not rich though, are you?