Funnily enough as I was reading your post, I was thinking, Photo4Me apparently already do this.

But you do know it's POS (prints), not a stock agency? So mostly pictorial images, not 'people pretending to do stuff'. Just a headsup for those who may not know the site.

New worst rpd since becoming exclusive in 2008 ...

The model you mentioned in the article (suing Getty) was apparently awarded $125K.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/model-hiv-campaign-brooklyn-avril-nolan-advertising-aids-a8680621.html
I'm slightly confused, though as this article quotes the same amount but that it was from the Human Resources Dept which used the image:
https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2019/01/nyc-used-womans-photo-hiv-ad-campaign-sued
Still, from the article you quoted, the photographer bore some responsibility. Though I thought the Getty MR precluded sensitive use, certainly without a 'posed by model' disclaimer.

In my opinion nowadays it does not really pay shooting models for micro stock. I don't do that for at least 4-5 years...

If you read model release carefully It exposes the model to be used for a lot of undesirable things and you get paid to little for it. Sometimes cents...
People use the closest ones like family and friends to this but please don't forget that we should be the first one to protect them. 

But to get the idea... An agency with a specific client work using an (simple person) model pays around 75-150 �/day depending the media type (book cover, tv, magazines or web). This is an controlled environment. Both you and model know the purpose of the shoot and where will be exactly used. It can't be used for anything else.

Quite.
It has always been a mystery to me why people would agree to be stock models, at any price; especially people for whom it isn't a profession. I think whenever this subject comes up in future, I'll just repost this apt link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpAPDc-JbHk

Before I deleted the email, I noticed this.

Briefs are moving home! Soon you will be able to browse briefs and submit your content, all in ESP. And we�re not stopping there� later in the year we will be introducing a new, simpler look to the ESP website, so stay tuned!

Maybe [idle speculation] too many people were opting out of the briefs emails, or ignoring them.

Hello:

I am preparing an article about stock photography.  Those of you who have been in this business for a number of years, do you agree that

-over the years, the quality of stock photo increased tremendously

-Prices and commissions decreased dramatically and out of the millions of stock photographers, very few make a living from stock photography and those who do have highly specialised portfolios

-Would you advise a young photographer to join the industry?

Thank you for your feedback

Quality: Was high to begin with, got higher, but in very restricted ways, for a while, now inspections are either less strict (iStock may well reject only on IP issues for photos) or randomly variable.
Prices & commissions decreased dramatically: Yes, plus vast increase ('democratisation') of photographers means an ever-shrinking share of the shrinking pie.
Advice: No, and especially not if they need it as their main income, or a substantial proportion of their income. Unless as you hint at they have a niche which requires specialist knowledge, equipment or access (so it can't be copied) AND is highly desireable and likely to stay so in the future. I'd recommend they try to get into a specialist macro agency.

Quote from: KuriousKat on January 28, 2019, 18:48

Glad it's working for you, Gillian,

One note though, when I click on any Stocksy portfolio link from here, it either takes forever to load or simply hangs and doesn't load at all. Totally off-putting in the 21st century.

no idea, works fine for me. they are constantly tinkering and optimizing their display, they are more 21st century than anywhere else.  Agencies like Shutterstock/Offset openly copy them.  I was a bit worried they'd fallen into a data driven geek nirvana for a while, and there was so much focus on optimizing the site, but it seems to have settled down now.

Still got some poor searches, though - are keywords still not being reviewed on acceptance?
(try African wild dog: 5 AWDs, two hyaenas, a landscape and a lot of photos of an African-ethnicity woman wearing a dog-head-mask-thing. "African wild dog" has one image.

Blue whale has the usual random assortment of whales; Balaenoptera musculus has an excellent pic of a Sperm Whale (spammed - by a great photographer but serial spammer) and several of an artist drawing various whales, one of which is presumably intended to be a Blue.

For the prices charged, buyers surely expect a better search experience - and it kinda negates the 'curated' claim.
If I need an image of a Blue Whale, what's better, an OK Blue Whale photo or an excellent Sperm Whale one?

As my sales are almost inexistant at Alamy I stopped to select "super" keywords (stars) and not doing any optional tagging - just uploading.
So far I cannot make any statement, I sold the pratically same number of "carefully" tagged (stars, description, category, country...) and just directly uploaded files with embedded keywords. But as I sold 10 (yes, ten!) any serious conclusion makes no sense.
Any ideas?

It's hard to know what makes a difference on Alamy.
Their searches combine any word in the keywords, even single words from keyword phrases, with any other word from the keywords or in the caption.
So a photo of Joe Bloggs and Jane Doe will show up on these searches but also Joe Doe, Jane Bloggs, Joe Jane, Jane Joe, Bloggs Doe, Doe Blogs* 

A lot of searches without zooms lowers your click-through rate, which is (was?) said to be a main factor which factored into your Alamy Rank which is how high your files appear in searches. I have no idea how relevant that is nowadays.
What they say happens and what actually happens doesn't always match up: you can check that yourself (if you can be bothered) by doing random searches.

*Depending on the algorithm in use at any time that can result in better or worse searches. In theory a keyword phrase which is 'supered' should appear higher than a non-supered tag, and a keyword phrase should come higher than randomly conjoined words, but a few searches of your own will reveal how well, or otherwise, that is working at any given time. I have a specific search that I use to see how it's doing from time to time, but really, what's the point? It's not like I'm going to change my keywords whenever they change their algorithm.

Just do your best and don't hold your breath. Like all the others, 'it is what it is'.

I tend to think of 'afro hair' (as in an 'afro' hairdo) as being more 'natural', i.e. not braided, but I can't see how your photo could be either 'wrong' or 'offensive'.
Don't feed the troll. They're just winding you up. Some people have nothing else to do.

On the opposite side, some people might boycott any site 'aligning with' bitcoin because of its environmental unfriendliness,
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-018-0321-8
for which Musk is understandably getting flak as I write:
https://www.reuters.com/article/crypto-currency-tesla-climate/insight-elon-musk-wants-clean-power-but-teslas-carrying-bitcoins-dirty-baggage-idUSL1N2KF1EF

How do I close my port at Alamy?

Had one sale there since March 2020. I don't want my images left on their site.

Thanks
Steve

Check your contract, but basically 45 days written notice.

The UK has a unitary system.

Of what?
Laws? No, Scotland and NI have their own legal systems, different from 'England and Wales'.
Taxes? No, Scotland can, and does, set its own rates and bands for tax; Wales can set its own bands and rates, but currently keeps them the same as England; NI has the same rates and bands, not sure if they can vary them)