The feature showed up in my neck of the woods this afternoon, and yes, it's a ton better than TinEye. Not perfect, but really useful.

I found a few uses that made me laugh - several builders with images in their "portfolio" which were my house or my friends' beach house. Then I found a site that had used several images of me to illustrate a story about "Jane" who had a horrible skin condition but then used their wonderful product to fix it. Didn't exactly say that the pictures were of Jane, so it wasn't strictly an endorsement.

Then there was the company selling greeting cards - cheaper than the store. I sent them e-mail asking them to confirm that they had purchased an extended license to allow making greeting cards with my image. Depending on what sort of answer I get, I'll post here if it sounds fishy. A couple of agencies had in the past done deals to allow them to buy small images and only purchase the EL if they sold cards. If they're one of those, I guess there's no problem.

The site honeyfund.com is using thumbs of images on multiple "customer" pages - I'm not sure how that sort of use would be classified. It's not a template exactly, so perhaps it's just like using an image in more than one place on a business web site.  It's a registry of sorts for engaged couples to try and get money for their honeymoon from wedding guests. The thumbs are of places they want to go or ways of getting there.

There were one or two images where Google couldn't identify it well at all - made a suggestion that wasn't even close - but for the most part, it did really well at matching.

Anglee - thank you very much. I did have e-mail and it appears that the size of those two images - even though they were under 20MB - was the problem. When there's no thumbnail, there's no rejection reason given.

I had a couple more that ran into the same problem. When you import the files from the FTP folder it says "upload successful" but there's no thumbnail generated.

I've made smaller versions of the offending files and re-uploaded (and now I see thumbnails).

Ideally, the FTP import process should produce an error message about the size and make the ftp log available for a while so you can go back and look for errors.

Lisa is right, I was exclusive at iStock for nearly 3 years, but just recently am back to independence again. Some things are a little different now, and I've been uploading to places in batches so I can see who likes what.

For example, I got a property release for a beach house of our friends and did one for my own house because interior shots are getting rejections without them from some sites. Navigating SS's LCV preferences; DT's similars rules, etc.

But, If I don't have a rejection reason, it's hard to figure out what they don't want. I don't much care about what the reason is, just to get one so I know what to cull from future uploads to that site.

Do they give rejection reasons?

I submitted 40 images on Thursday, and this morning saw that the batch was finally processed. Two were rejected, but there's no reason given. They were both large composites, so I don't know if there's a maximum file size, or they need a statement that all the images in the composite are mine, or they didn't like them for some reason.

If they don't want collages or composites, I'll not submit any more, but how am I to guess what the issue is?

Yesterday I tried to wiki one of the Ed Stock files which had horrible and 100% irrelevant keywords, but they're in some review state, so I couldn't. I guess they're on their own with that mess - them and the poor buyers...

Today's stuff from Getty has some very generic (and iMO not very good) images of Venice sunsets, a vase of flowers, rolled towels, power pylons silhouetted, etc. That (a) wouldn't be accepted if we submitted it to either collection and (b) competes with existing content in both collections (the only advantage regular iStock contributors have being that their shots are better).

They aren't looking at this closely enough and are just dumping expensive crap (along with the genuine editorial of shots of Einstein's papers, for example).

I went to see if your web site was up, but there's nothing yet. I did look at your blog, but there wasn't much there either beyond comments about " MongoDB - the hippest database since... well, has there been a hipper one?"

As a number of us have experienced all sorts of hiccups with non-working sites, a "hip" database isn't as appealing as a working one. And you haven't provided any details at all about prices or marketing or - anything much beyond a request for our images.

Come back when you've got a site we can look at and tell us something about how you're going to (a) market, (b) sell and (c) protect our images and maybe there'll be something to talk about.

On the downside, I think there has been a loss of confidence amongst the community such that every decision or nuance is now viewed with suspicion. That's where the arguments come from IMO. It all ends up being a bit them and us. Which is daft if you step back from it. There should be a truce.

I'm not going to rant about the specifics, but you make it sound as though there isn't any reason for the loss of confidence. There's an old saying that you're not paranoid if they really are out to get you. I think the actions at iStock since September 7th last year are the reason for the loss of confidence on the part of the community, particularly contributors.

If your ox hasn't been gored by any of their actions, perhaps you can at least see how those whose ox has, have some basis for their suspicion.

I thought your comment in the IS thread on this was to the point - it's obvious when you look at the images that they compete with work submitted by real iStock contributors so don't insult our intelligence by pretending they don't.

A little honesty goes a long way - I'm reminded of a current US Representative who tried for a few days to say he didn't know if a picture of a man in his undies was him or not. It was really hard to believe that someone wouldn't know - how many pictures have you shot of your own underwear?

Given that we were going to see the images, what is the point of talking about them in terms that the images themselves will belie? I looked for celebrities in there, but haven't seen any yet

Except for those pesky SEC regs, they had a great plan...

My guess is that collecting on those pledges - particularly from beer company fans who might have been supporting their favorite organization by drinking some when they pledged to buy shares - might have been hard to collect on had they been able to continue

Quote from: ShadySue on May 27, 2011, 11:13

Having a really lousy day today. One sale just after midnight, iStock time and nothing since.
Mind you, I had only 2 XSm sales on Monday.

I haven't had a sale since June 3. This is the longest stretch of no sales since I started at iStock.

Wonder if it has anything to do with all the files I dumped into the non-exclusive perk program.

I dumped nearly 300 files into the P+ program over the weekend. It may be that the negative effects of this show up more as time goes by, but I don't see anything drastic so far.

Things have been good today compared to the snail's pace since the last best match lurch - so no barn burner, but not one of those days where I wonder if the world has a day off

Whether it's their intention to damage iStock or not, the moves to dump Getty content on iStock can have that effect if they're not careful. Then Getty is left with two sites in trouble instead of one.

Those buyers who came to iStock for value won't all stick around as the prices rise. When Vetta was initially introduced, there was pretty good acceptance of the notion of a premium collection. When they virtually doubled the Vetta prices last year, I think they pushed a good thing too far (I understand they had the Agency stuff from Getty that had to have a high price and they'd have had a bigger riot if they left Vetta so much cheaper than agency; still was a crappy end result).

@James Benet. It's clear that you strongly believe what you write, and I don't see any animosity in it. However I think you're wrong in both the analysis of why the changes at iStock have been made and also what, if anything, could change them.

You can read more about dividend recapitalization in the links in this post.

Beyond H&F's need for cash, you can look at Getty's recent track record with Pump Audio - cutting royalties from 50% to 35% with a letter saying that they needed the money for marketing - as well as the contract changes earlier this year telling contributors they could leave if they didn't like it. Folks who've been around longer than I have tell tales of similar actions with all the other Getty acquisitions along the way.

The people in Calgary can't really do anything about Getty directives except follow them or quit. Has nothing to do with whether they're nice guys or not. The fact that there is a trail of broken promises - including inducing people to become exclusive with a promise of grandfathered cannisters which they then abandoned last September - doesn't help anyone's credibility, whoever was behind things.

And as far as single minded predatory behavior being an inherent part of modern business, it's a big topic, but suffice it to say that I don't agree that it (a) inevitable or (b) long term sustainable, but I will grant you that it's very common at the moment and can look like success in the short term.

I've made my choice to resume being independent and let iStock sink or swim - obviously I hope it stays afloat long enough for me to re-establish myself elsewhere. If it swims, then that's great as it's another source of sales.

I really believe that iStock could have grown and thrived in a different fashion from the way Getty/H&F have chosen - I wouldn't have become exclusive otherwise. My take on all the recent changes is that they're not about long term anything - growth or sustainability. It's all about cash now, and if the business isn't growing fast enough then you take it from contributors.