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Messages - Jo Ann Snover
4401
« on: February 09, 2013, 22:26 »
A sincere question -
How many of us have our portfolios at Canstock? We have lived with 25c subscriptions there for a long time.
This is true in theory, but in practice, I almost NEVER get a .25 sub at Canstock. Most of my sub sales there are through distribution channels, and I get .34 for those. Still not as good as .38 at SS, but more in the ballpark.
34 cents? I only get 30 cents - is that something related to your Canstock camera color? CanStock is an odd critter - and I like Duncan a bunch too - because it's such a mixture of prices. The 25 cent subs are no good but relatively rare; the Fotosearch sales are nice. Even at CanStock, the XL-Tiff is $2.50; a large is $2 if it's instant (which a good number of mine are) and the Fotosearch sales are much more lucrative (though a bit thin on the ground of late) - $3.80 for XS to $19.80 for XL.
4402
« on: February 09, 2013, 22:10 »
I think you'd learn a lot by getting your work accepted at the top 4 sites. Once you have 500 images online at those you can start to think about whether you want to stay at any of them long term. Think of it as a free training course - your time is obviously what you put in, so no cash, but still an investment.
4403
« on: February 09, 2013, 19:35 »
... was thinking trying shutterstock or fotolia, pond5? what do you think?
In terms of money - at least for the moment - you should hit to the top 4. So SS, FT and DT (see the poll results on the right). I'm just starting with pond5 uploading directly (versus via partner sites having my work there) and I have no idea how it will go. You'll see if you read here that there are issues with all of the top sites  In terms of people who deal fairly, try GL Stock. Of the middle tier sites, 123rf and for some people (I'm not there) DepositPhotos do reasonably well. Ignore Stockfresh; it's some sort of poll aberration that it's there in the middle tier.
4404
« on: February 09, 2013, 16:30 »
I got one from Corbis for Veer (in addition to the ones mentioned above)
4405
« on: February 09, 2013, 16:24 »
Problem is, I've already quit Fotolia because I couldn't trust them, I've stopped uploading to iStock, but if I really want to protect my images I should quit them. If I also quit SS and BS to prevent them shafting me with a likely commission cut, then I'm left with 123 (currently stopped uploading because of the levels thing), Dreamstime, DP and Canstock out of the top 9 agencies and its no longer worthwhile producing anything for anyone because the return would be so low (in the chart on the right, all the other agencies combined don't make as much as SS, iS, Fot and BS).
It's ads on your blog and a side line with a Sandwich Board advertising a mattress discounter (that may not translate to Qatar though!) I already did leave IS; FT wouldn't have me back after I left IS exclusivity; I've stopped uploading at 123rf. There are new things - I'm uploading at GL Stock and Fine Art America, but they're not going to replace the 60% of my stock income that IS+PP+SS+BigStock represent. I've been doing opportunistic stuff of late anyway - not shoots specifically set up for stock - travel stuff because I was there and wanted to or exploring/improving new skills like HDR. May go back to doing some illustrations which I stopped doing when I was exclusive and iStock shoved them at the back of the best match for a while. I don't really know about the replacement, but I do think I've reached the end of my personal tether in terms of cutting these agencies slack because they're earning money and tolerating each cut with a "well, it could be worse, so just soldier on" attitude. I know that isn't exactly a plan, but that's where I am
4406
« on: February 09, 2013, 16:16 »
lobo emailed me the other day writing " don't make me humiliate you in public " if i went off topic again ?? for what - don't know. ...
What on earth do you think he had in mind? Leaving aside the idiocy of that sort of bullying approach for a forum moderator, in practice, how do you carry out that sort of threat - expose someone's rejected images and heap scorn on how bad they are? Judge Ross on Crestock used to do that  You'll find lots of guidance and suggestions here about making the transition to independence if that's the way you decide to go. Lots of turmoil at the moment though - not just a istock.
4407
« on: February 09, 2013, 16:09 »
I got e-mail about StolidStock art last November. We exchanged some e-mails about their ideas and I wished them well but I couldn't see that their concept made any sense for me.
I put all my metadata into my images anyway; they can't know the details about many types of shots - locations, species, ethnicity, etc. - so I wasn't sure how good a job they could do. I didn't see the value of PNG conversion for all files - which at the time they were planning; those files with transparency seem to be the primary target for PNG. Perhaps now it's just for selected files.
I logged back in to check the pricing and it hasn't changed. My take was that it's too cheap given the very broad license terms; their argument was that designers are abusing the standard licenses anyway so you're better off charging them a little more and making it legit
I never did get any clear answers on how they were going to pull in buyers - I think it's a "we will build this and the great features will draw them in" situation - a bit like PictureWhatever from Justin. If it were that easy, StockFresh would be blooming.
I think the closed system is a non-starter. Lots of people seem to love the idea, but from a buyer's perspective I don't see how restricting choice makes any sense. Keep it open and edit the collection more closely if quality or focus is the issue.
4408
« on: February 09, 2013, 15:43 »
...We must to do something ( a Deactivation Day is required )or we will just stay on our chairs and complain on this forum about what will happen on SS in the near future??
Subscription sites depend upon a regular flow of new imagery to get existing subscribers to renew their subscriptions (which is why Jupiter Images pushed StockXpert content onto photos.com and Jupiter Images Unlimited (in 2008 I think) because subscribers were complaining. The easiest thing to do - but it will be hard to coordinate as I'm sure the big factories will keep doing what they do regardless - is just to stop uploading for now, possibly also leaving BigStock on the Ides of March. Those in the bridge to BigStock won't want to leave right away as they get a 6 month "stay of execution" with 6 months at 38 cents for each subscription download. I'm as certain as I can be without having been in on the discussions that this was a considered tactic to defuse any opposition. Keep the major players quiet until the stink has died down. The unfortunate timing of this means that people fleeing iStock exclusivity will be uploading like banshees to Shutterstock to get their portfolio up and earning as fast as they can. That may also blunt any impact of actions by those leaving or halting uplaods. Lots of people aren't going to be able to just leave Shutterstock because of the amount of money it earns them. I think they're just starting down the road now that iStock already traveled - the one that led to me all but leaving there on D-Day. I wish they'd reconsider, but I think they're now all about the numbers and they have enough contributors and visibility they'll happily lose small fry like me as part of that.
4410
« on: February 09, 2013, 14:17 »
Maybe if we rock the boat with BS, it will stir an air of caution with SS?
It won't work. SS knows what it is doing. Many of us expressed concerns about what SS would become as a publicly traded company answering to shareholders. Here's your first sign.
They will implement first at BigStock, and soon after at SS. And that will be my cue to end this 6 year relationship with microstock altogether. Really, it isn't worth fighting for anymore. I made decent money, no arguments and no regrets. It's almost time to abandon ship.
My heart wants to argue with you, but my head's having a hard time marshaling the facts I am not uploading to SS until the other shoe droos - which I think it most certainly will; the only unknown is when. The other shoe will be a reduction in royalties for almost everyone to the chart shown for BigStock. I'll leave my port there for the moment. I think I might abandon the big micro agencies and just upload to the promising (ethical, fair) new ones in the hope of catching a future wave. I don't do this full time and I don't want to pay politics with bean counting CEOs. I realize that means a lot less money. In my case it's almost 8.5 years. What really ticks me off is that it didn't have to be this way.
4411
« on: February 08, 2013, 20:46 »
Rob Sylvan at Stocksy United just reported that iStock/Getty is canceling his account in 30 days and only referred to the ASA stating they can do so.
I don't find this all that surprising, really. If he's going to have a role in the competition at (I assume) some administrative level, then it seems perfectly reasonable they'd delete his account. I can think of others that have had the same circumstances.
Rob has been independent for a long time. A number of us independents who are part of WarmPicture, including the guy who started it haven't been kicked out. What's the difference between WarmPicture and any other new cooperative? At this point I don't see anything other than arbitrary and personal reasons versus rational policy applied across the board.
4412
« on: February 08, 2013, 18:58 »
They haven't banned you (yet) though?
4414
« on: February 08, 2013, 18:35 »
Juan - I'm amazed that it has taken this long Like most of the recent bans, it's nuts. You have a lot invested in iStock and are understandably not happy about recent events. Lots of the conversation has moved from iStock forums to Facebook groups or here - and as the ranks of the banned grow, that's only going to accelerate
4415
« on: February 08, 2013, 16:12 »
There's a webinar Ilford is sponsoring Feb 14th with Joe Brady on creating fine art prints - might be interesting (it's free anyway) http://www.macgroupus.com/e-blast/ilford-webinars/Ilford-Webinar-Invite-02142013.htmlI have futzed with printers on and off for years - nothing right now and it was never my main business. I did small print run work for design clients more to offer full service. My current printer is a 13x19 Epson which is lovely and much less finicky than the many previous incarnations. Paper manufacturers have gotten much better about offering profiles as well as paper so it cuts down on the times I have to make my own. When something goes haywire in the middle of a large print, that's pretty expensive ink and paper you have to toss; when a printer acts up, if you're in a deadline-sensitive situation, you need a backup printer so you don't keep clients waiting. Some of what appears to be just markup is some very real cost in time spent, materials lost/wasted/damaged etc. If you have a high tolerance for problem solving, then working with printers should be right up your alley. There's a lot to be said for sending off a digital file with a profile and getting a perfect print back from a reliable supplier though
4416
« on: February 08, 2013, 16:02 »
Unless you're in business to sell billboards with a particular image on them - then it's print on demand and you need an EL - no EL needed. It's just a large ad, single copy
Print run or impressions means how many copies of a magazine or newspaper or brochure you produce. So if your image is used in a very successful book that sells 600,000 copies, the buyer needs and EL as it's over 500K copies
4417
« on: February 08, 2013, 15:59 »
And a prompt - if content free - reply from the account executive:
"We really appreciate the feedback. Please know that our goal is to create a royalty model that is fair and competitive.
Please let us know if there's anything we can do for you.
Best,"
...our goal is to create something fair and competitive, so the fact that we've come up with something wildly one-sided and stingy is just collateral damage...
And as far as what they can do for me, how about find a boat load of eager buyers for BigStock images and give me an effing opt out button for subscriptions!
4418
« on: February 08, 2013, 15:08 »
I sent back a reply to the Account Executive:
"M. xxx,
I appreciate you sending a response but it didn't really address any of the issues or concerns I raised. You restated a view of what you're planning to do next week that can most charitably be described as optimistic.
I would like to see an opt out button for contributors who do not wish their images to be offered in BigStock subscriptions. If you can sell us all on why BigStock subscriptions are great, we'll opt in. Otherwise it seems it probably isn't a good idea anyway.
If you wanted to launch something new with full contributor support, you could have considered something like 6 months, or through the end of 2013, of 38 cents for each subscription download with a realistic table of earned downloads to follow after that. And allow an opt out. In this way you'd have to put something on the table to try and build success at a web site that has never been one in terms of sales volume. If the sales volume builds, you'll have no trouble getting contributors to opt in.
If these low-ball royalties are the best you think you can do, at least an opt-out would allow me to continue at BigStock instead of leaving. I'm willing to take the minuscule risk that I miss out on wonderful new sales opportunities with BigStock subscriptions so that I avoid undercutting my royalties at just about every other subscription site.
regards,
Jo Ann"
4419
« on: February 08, 2013, 14:38 »
Here's a link to the Agoda agreement, and the only thing I see that might provide a way to enlist their help in getting this content down is in the section on Indemnification https://partners.agoda.com/en-us/agreement.htmlMost of this is about how the affiliate won't try to cheat Agoda or mimic its web site, but in section 7.1 on Indemnification, there is this" (the affiliate will hold Agoda harmless from) "(ii) any claim from any third party based on any (alleged) infringement of the third party's Intellectual Property Right by the Affiliate. "If I claim that GetInTravel is infringing my copyright by violating the 123rf license and make the claim against Agoda too, GetInTravel has to cover their costs. I just want the large images down. It seems to me that GetInTravel is trying to make affiliate revenue by putting some very thin content around wallpaper size free redistribution of stock images. Does anyone else see anything in the Agoda agreement that GetInTravel might be doing that it shouldn't?
4420
« on: February 08, 2013, 14:11 »
this tells me I need to work harder to make my own site my best earner.. It is the only place I am sure I won't get screwed..
I must be having a very negative day, but my first thought was "If Google derived traffic is any part of your plan to get buyers to your own site, have you read the threads about traffic falling off a cliff as a result of the image search changes?" WarmPicture and GL Leftovers have both mentioned how traffic has dropped drastically as a result of Google's recent changes. I don't know if you're seeing it too, but that's the element of risk for collectives/own sites.
4421
« on: February 08, 2013, 13:55 »
With Rob Sylvan's permission, I'm posting a note he put into the Facebook group (now secret) this morning: "Just a heads up. Some of you might have seen that we switched the status of this group to increase the privacy of those in the group. As a result it will appear to those not yet approved that it went dark. If you know of anyone who as requested access to this group, but is still pending, that it wasn't personal or anything to do with them specifically. We'll get more people added soon. We just don't have much more to say at this time, and were frankly overwhelmed at the interest level. All in good time. Thanks for understanding! "So there will be a point at which they'll start adding people - no idea for a timeframe on that though
4422
« on: February 08, 2013, 13:53 »
...That is almost verbatim the same e-mail I got in reply to my questions / concerns.
At least they're not wasting time and money writing individual responses - quick cut and paste will do fine for these peons. Gotta love it
4423
« on: February 08, 2013, 13:51 »
But if its a new revenue stream isnt that a good thing? Or are you concerned it will replace credit sales ?
I don't believe it for a nanosecond. They're not growing the market in any way I can see which means they're stealing business from existing segments of it. We heard from iStock (with the introduction of their own subs scheme and then with the Partner program), Dreamstime, Veer, CanStock, Fotolia: subscriptions are a new source of revenue and that they won't eat into credit sales. Horsepuckey! Am I hearing how they're going out to find a pool of buyers that hasn't yet been tapped and marketing some new package or product - or even a variant of subscriptions - to them? Not a word. Right now they're all just jockeying for position in divvying up the existing pie. I don't think the market is saturated, but what we're seeing is agencies either who see things differently, or who are just lazy and trying to make easy money (easier to steal customers from another site than develop new business), or don't have the skills or cash to develop new markets.
4424
« on: February 08, 2013, 12:58 »
i think there is no license in any site that allow u to redistribute...
That's true, but without a limitation on what size you can display on a web page, and without a requirement to disable Save As Image in the browser, you don't have to explicitly offer distribution (although this web site does) in order for that to be the effect. The larger of my two monitors is 2560 x 1440. If a web site wanted to offer full screen displays of unmodified stock images, that's a fast way to make the image available for anyone who wants it. Ethical companies won't do it either way, but the limitations on screen size in most of the agencies' licenses is to avoid effective redistribution when "displaying" the image on a site
4425
« on: February 08, 2013, 12:52 »
I received a reply from BigStock just now - not from Mr. Pfeifer but from an account executive. Not a great start to pass off your brush-off letter to an underling (and I'm sure the account executive is a wonderful person; it's the tone of the response being set by whether you get it from the person you wrote to vs the janitor's second helper) "Thank you for your email and feedback.
I absolutely understand your concerns. But please keep in mind that with the launch of subscriptions next week we will be adding an additional way to download images. That means, you will continue to receive between $0.50 and $3.00 per image for credit image sales, 30% of partner sales as well as up to $29.70 for Extended License sales. We will continue to keep the Bigstock and Shutterstock website separate targeting different types of customers.
Please be assured that we will closely monitor the performance of subscriptions and how they influence royalties and will keep in touch with our colleagues at Shutterstock. Additionally and as we have in the past, we will keep all of our contributors informed and communicate all and any changes to you.
All of us at Bigstock are very passionate about the company and want our products to be successful and with the help of contributors like you we are sure that we can accomplish that.
We look forward to continuing to work with you and should you have any questions or concerns in the future please reach out at any time!
Warm regards,"Blah, blah - new business - blah blah - big EL number (I don't think I've ever had one at BigStock) - blah blah - passionate - blah blah - let's tackle this together! - blah blah Not doing for me. I'm not getting any specific answers to the real concerns and a continuation of this crap about "it's just incremental revenue" I'll touch my forelock now, thank the govna for the crumbs and go back to my hovel
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