While it still mattered to me, Photo+ was a big part of keeping earnings up. That's gonzo in the new scheme - contributors have no control over the price point.

I wish I could say that IS will make wise decisions about which files go at which prices, but honestly I think they won't be able to manage that.

And is the dollar bin going away? Files there deleted or moved to the new main collection?

The climb continues:

Waiting approval 134453

Waiting approval 119799
...

And in just a few hours it's up more: 120628

Outdoor shots in full sun is poor lighting

That's way over-generalizing. Search for Aruba on Shutterstock and my shot is first in the list - full sun, but it makes sense for the shot.

I've no idea about the OP's shots, but for heaven's sake let's not start a dogma spat over what makes good lighting.

SS has a stick up it's whatsit about certain kinds of light - their privilege as it's their site. The fact that they reject a lot of crap images doesn't make every image they reject crap...

As I left DT when I became IS exclusive and returned in June 2011, none of my images are more than 4 years "old" (they might have been taken from 2004 on, but were made new again

I would never allow them to become free images, so I'd disable them. DT can spin it however they like, but if they have failed to sell an image that is for sale on other agencies, that's their problem, not mine and I wouldn't undercut sales elsewhere by letting them give it away.

upload limits mean little to me personally, I rarely come anywhere near even the base level as it was previously, let alone my exclusive level limit, as I'm just a part timer.

But it's strange.  Lots of people here used to complain about the upload limits on iStock;  just do a search if you don't believe me.

Now they've effectively removed the limits (for that is what they have done, no-one is suggesting you should try and meet 999/week as a target), people complain about that and say it's ridiculous.

Seems you can't please some of the people any of the time.

I think you're misreading the reaction. It's the hypocrisy that has people P.O'd (if they're indie) and the loss of a privilege (protection from the factories) if you are an exclusive. That and the impression that they're not telling the whole story.

There's also the concern that this is heralding a new wave of imported content (perhaps non Getty) as it's people with a huge portfolio to upload who will see the biggest benefit. People mostly seem to be reporting poor sales, and a huge influx of new content without new buyers isn't going to help existing contributors even if it temporarily boosts Getty's revenues.

iStock used to talk about the importance of the upload limits - only uploading your best work. Now, with no explanation that makes any logical sense, they reverse a policy of many years' standing.

The secret partner deals (e.g. Google) with no opt out hasn't changed, so for many, they could make the upload limits anything they wanted and it'd make no difference. But I suspect they're trolling for cash wherever they can (like the clipart.com imports) and this is just another sad attempt.

...It's also worth baring in mind that if you are not comfortable with the third party additional revenue opportunities you can opt out during the month of April.

I just opted out of Novel Use and the UK Newspaper scheme. I think I opted out of distributor sales (I unchecked all territories and clicked Save; there's no opt in or opt out button I could find)

If anyone else wants to opt out, April is the month to do so

I regret iStock's trail of business decisions since September 2010 but not mine to leave exclusivity (June 2011) and virtually the site (Feb 2013). At the end of 2012 (Nov & Dec) I was able to match my peak exclusive earnings from Nov/Dec 2010 so I feel that was a measure of validation of switching back to independence.

I had been indie from 2004 to 2008, so I had an easier path returning to being indie that someone who had always been exclusive with iStock - as noted above, everyone's experience is a little different. But the worse things get at iStock, the easier it becomes to slip the golden handcuffs off...

I see this discrepancy all the time, but it seems to straighten out after a few days - I assume it has something to do with how partner sales dribble in and different parts of their system updating at different times. That suggests some nasty spaghetti code with different parts of the system all updating at different times or in different ways.

Given how long this has been happening and how they haven't spent any time providing decent reporting on stats for contributors (total downloads and $$ per image, daily sales totals, "credits" totals for the new accounting system, and on and on) it's clear that they don't consider this a priority.

We're an expense and to be minimized, not an asset to be valued and supported.

Working fine for me (Seattle area)

I cannot fathom why there is a small clique of Getty apologists who refuse to believe that what Sean has said is what happened. Even further, I can't understand why they'd waste their time on MSG to set us poor country bumpkins straight - those of us who take Sean at his word.

And as for Getty's side of things, their track record speaks for itself - it'd be easier to defend Attila the Hun and Vlad the Impaler as social workers at heart than to pitch Getty as the hardly done by agency scr*wed over by the evil SuperLocke.

Go and complain about us and Sean someplace else. 

If H&F bought Getty, how does Getty still own part of their own company with the latest "sale"? Possibly H&F never bought all of Getty? Maybe someone can explain how Getty can ratain shares in the latest sale, if they were sold in the past.

H&F sold the company - part to Carlyle Group and part to Jonathan Klein and members of the Getty family. They effectively bought part of it back versus "still" owned it.

No surprise that the "contributor news" is full of bad news for indies. Lovely that they are offering convenience to their Getty360 top customers, but I see no reason whatsoever that they can't pay indies their contract rate (15% to 20%) on any sales made through that program - or a straight 20% like everyone else.

As far as the supposed improvements in the Google deal, the missing images from a few days ago (see here) are back (including Sean's tailgate images), so any thought that they'd removed content to placate iStock contributors is out the window.

Also, I do not see any license information displayed in search results as the Google text says I will - see here for the Google "Learn More" page. So there's no way to know what license goes with what.

The note that you have to say "posed by model" for sensitive uses doesn't in any way address the concerns of iStock contributors - if you license through iStock, sensitive uses are prohibited (although they never seem to want to enforce those), aren't they?

On the iStockalypses, the feedback I have seen via Facebook groups is that the new format is totally lame and not what you pay them money for, so I'm not sure where they got the idea they're giving contributors what they wanted. I think it's a training exercise so they can bring on new contributors to replace some of the disaffected exclusives they're losing as a result of their greedy and dishonest policies over the last few years.

Edited to add that the kicker for IS exclusives is that they now get 20% for their iStock content instead of their 25% to 45% when purchased by one of the Getty360 customers.

I'm sure they'll go on and on about how it's OK 'cause it's a higher price (but if you look at the complaints about the large number of low value sales from Getty mixed in with some at much higher prices, it's not clear how much more than will be) but the bottom line is that they have figured out a way to get everyone to 20% and do away with the higher royalty rates for exclusives.

Now it's just the biggest customers (and I don't suppose they'll share the percentage of total sales those big customers represent; I'm guessing it's high as lots of the smaller ones have left by now) but it's just one more small change to make that apply across the board and you've effectively done away with exclusive royalty rates while keeping exclusive contributors from selling elsewhere.

Geniuses!!