Quote from: wordplanet on September 21, 2014, 17:50

Quote from: Mantis on September 21, 2014, 17:45

Quote from: wordplanet on September 21, 2014, 16:43

Well, they're reading this board. They sent me an email saying they're sending me a final payment. Will report back when it arrives.

Meaning they are closing your account? I wonder if Mat is the one ratting everyone out?

I closed my account a while back, but had some earnings after my last payout. No one is ratting me out. Someone from fotolia read this board and contacted me. It's a good thing. I was complaining that they didn't pay me the "credits" earned after the last payout, which are worthless to me since I don't buy photos and they have said they'll be sending payment via paypal so as far as I'm concerned that's a good result.

Well that's good to hear because that means I have a lot of respect for Mat.

Glad you saw my post. I'd hate to have someone else misunderstand and think poorly of someone when I was actually trying to report a small victory for us contributors 

Ever since they stopped letting nonexclusives nominate files for the + collection (Can't recall if it was E+ or what) I've seen the number of views my files get plunge along with my sales. I can't help thinking that some of the people who used iStock did so because they could more easily find some of the "better" microstock images there and were willing to pay a small premium for them - a low cost image is not a bargain if it takes hours to find - IMHO, trying to copy their competitors rather than playing to their own strengths is a mistake they keep making. What distresses me is seeing how many of my files that sell well on SS and DT have never even had a view on iStock. That's one of the reasons I'll leave what I have there (and collect a few payouts a year) but haven't bothered adding anything new in ages. My experience certainly isn't sufficient to show a "trend" but it does seem to mirror what others have seen. I'd be happy to see them do better but I'm not optimistic - the opposite in fact.

Well, they're reading this board. They sent me an email saying they're sending me a final payment. Will report back when it arrives.

Welcome. As Jo Ann said, tell us a little bit more about yourself, what you shoot and where you sell your photos.
Good luck!

They also send you a 1099 for income you have earned even though they haven't paid you - and may never pay you - I called them on it the first year and they said their accountants consider it income since you can use the earnings as credits to buy photos. Seems wrong to me. Most photographers have no need to buy someone else's stock photos. I closed my account this year and wish I'd never bothered with them at all.

I closed my account after making payout then earned more but they never paid out the rest. Wrote to them. Never heard back. Not going to waste my time for a few bucks but multiply that by thousands of contributors and they're coming out way ahead.

Quote from: wordplanet on September 12, 2014, 18:26

...30% of something is better than no sale at all.

And that is exactly how we got to the point that we're at today.

Point taken. But that is where we're at. They've given us the choice to opt out of the distribution program, so we are each free to decide if 30% is worth it.

That's the most recent change - distributor sales are now 30% for the photographer - so you get 50% of what Alamy gets instead of 60%. Still better than the micros but I miss the old days when sales and commission % were both higher.

So far we are starting out better this month than in August. I guess we will have to wait and see what happens. Sunday was a no sale day this week but that is the only one so far this month.

Almost same experience here - no sales Labor Day & Sunday but otherwise already well ahead of August. Hoping this means sales will be back to normal after a very slow summer.

The shutter on my D700 went while it was still under warranty and Nikon replaced it - maybe at 20K - way less than it's rated for - no problems since. It seemed to be an easy repair. Maybe check out a Canon forum and see what people have to say.

Selling what once commanded good money for peanuts has always been a numbers game and when your 10,000 files are competing against 40 million others, rather than 8 million others, it's just simple math.

I think the post from the iS exclusives mentioning the overall market and the huge influx of iS exclusives, as well as Scott's myriad explanations in this topic & the other one he linked to make a lot more sense than some conspiracy theory. To me, the fact that I frequently have multiple daily sales and rarely have a day without at least one download at SS despite the fact that I only have 212 images, a tiny fraction of the 40 million files in their database, that I put most of my best images on traditional sites yet still make SS payouts bi-monthly tells me that SS itself is going strong, that their search engine works, but it doesn't matter because we're all getting an ever smaller piece of the pie. I've been with SS since 2008, have a tiny port, heavily weighted toward travel and not the big selling lifestyle stuff, but my stuff seems to compete on a level playing field with everyone else's - the problem is, the field is just too big.

I'm not optimistic about the future. My biggest regret is that I didn't upload a few thousand files back when they'd have gotten more exposure, because despite SS's strength, I think the size of their database means that the opportunity to grow is diminishing for all of us.

I've seen my new files account for smaller and smaller portions of my sales in the past year. A year ago it was a distressing 10% and now it's down to 1%. (I increased my portfolio by 25+% in the last year - even if I doubled it, the return wouldn't be worth it). In late 2012 and early 2013, I saw a lot of growth but that growth slowed down as the SS database outpaced all expectations.

Unless you're a factory, I don't see how you can sustain growth there, which is why I'm looking toward smaller niche markets that control the number of contributors. I think Stocky's dedication to slow growth of their contributor base makes good economic sense, because if even the top earners can't keep pace with inflation, how can a stock photo site attract and keep top talent?

To me, the uncontrolled growth of the database and the contributor base which is diluting the earnings of even the top contributors, is the real problem here, since an individual contributors sales need to grow constantly, especially when royalties stay the same for 8 years (the bump of a few pennies at each milestone notwithstanding).  It's not some conspiracy. If those who can actually make a living from their microstock earnings suddenly can't, then, IMHO, the field will be left to those who do this for fun, for experimentation, etc -and if SS keeps their prices and payouts low, they may just survive. But, let's face it, part of the reason microstock has done so well is because along with the experimenters and newbies, pros got into the game and many made good money while the boom lasted, but it hurt the industry in the long run. Then again, they were changing with the times, and now, things are changing again.

It's easy to spot the problems, harder to find a solution. And I appreciate Scott trying to put things into perspective, though IMHO there's more lottery than art to a winning image these days.

Will we ever get a raise? Not a question Scott can answer, I know, but that's the only way earnings for individual contributors will grow.

Here's one I licensed yesterday via my Photoshelter site:

http://www.authenticluxurytravel.net/2014/08/clintons-live.html

If you're scanning while watching tv, listening to music, chatting with family or friends, doing other stuff while you wait for the scanner to work, then it's not the same as working for an hourly wage. $60,000 from boxes of old photos, slides, negatives collecting dust doesn't sound so bad if he makes another $30,000-40,000 a year on them for the next 5-10 years without doing any more work. Perhaps on the micros or on another traditional site, they might have earned more, but a lot depends on what the photos are, whether they'd be accepted, etc. The thing is, there's really no way to know how you'll do until you try.