Quote from: gostwyck on January 18, 2014, 19:55

Quote from: robhainer on January 18, 2014, 15:50

I have no doubt that contributors with a larger percentage of older images got hurt more by the search change. I had an image that I shot in 2010 when I first started that had 1,600+ downloads. It was on the top of the search for "child." For almost three years, it generated 5-10 sales a day all by itself. They changed the search and it disappeared into the middle somewhere. So I can imagine that if you had a lot of images that were best sellers in that age range or older, then they lost popularity, which would naturally affect your sales to a large degree. Meanwhile, about two-thirds of my port is less than two years old. While I lost out on a couple of good sellers, the rest are holding up better because they're newer.

Oh, for crying out loud. Why do people always blame 'search engine changes' when one of their images ceases to generate the same level of sales? You know it just might have something to do with the 10M new images that are currently being accepted each year.

When I'd been at SS for a month I think they only had about 60 images corresponding to the keywords 'new zealand' of which about 45 were mine. Back then they sold quite nicely. Nowadays ... not so much. I'm absolutely sure it must be due to a 'search engine change'. It cant possibly be anything to do with the additional 33,150 images of 'new zealand' that have arrived since. It has to be SS conspiring against me and the higher royalty rate they have to pay me.

When people's best sellers sitting at the top of popular sort disappear to the back of the pack overnight, that's because the search changed. And then you add in millions of new images making it more difficult to sell your new ones, your overall sales will continue to stagnate until you can generate more sales on new images. It's a combination of the two.

I'm not complaining about the change. I like it. If Shutterstock's popular search was based solely on the number of sales, that would suck. You'd have five to 10 year old images sitting on top while new images wouldn't get any traction. There would be no point in continuing to contribute, and Shutterstock wouldn't grow because customers would only see old images. The quality of the library has increased dramatically over the past five years. Those images need to get in front of the buyers.

But I can empathize with people who had been relying on older images to buoy their sales. They are suffering and feeling let down. I want everyone to be successful and make money.

The reality is that many long term contributors are not relying on older images to buoy their sales. They upload large numbers each month to no avail.

One recent short thread on SS http://tinyurl.com/kb3e9f4

Snip

Joined: 15 Jun 2007 Worst January since 2010 for me. And on top of that I have added 300 images over the last 2 and half months. Sales keep going down for me..... It is a bit depressing though - new equipment (5D MkIII) and many hours of work only to see sales go DOWN!

Joined: 12 Jul 2005 I added a LOT of new Images. We all know the time it takes to do this, I wasted a LOT of time and got a backwards return for my investment. Im selling Mostly Very Old stuff due to search. What a waste of time

Joined: 29 Jan 2006 Last month and this month are about 40% less than the year before. I've been uploading new images but they rarely sell so that doesn't help much.

Joined: 29 Jan 2006 It's just crazy how sales could drop that much. My DLs were consistent from Jan-Oct. then they came tumbling down fast in Nov-Current. Is the Apocalypse coming? It makes me want to scream!

Joined: 03 Oct 2007 But there does seem to be a trend towards the people who have been here the longest (often also the people on the highest rate) who are reporting the falling figures and the much newer people reporting the increases. Obviously if you are constantly adding to your portfolio you would expect to see an increase year on year, but that's no longer the case for some of us on SS.

Joined: 20 Jun 2006 I think quite a few people have noticed that. I can only go by what I see here on the forums but so many of us who have been here for a long time are showing definite downward trends. I used to see more downloads at the time I got up early in the morning than I am seeing now at 3 in the afternoon. I have never seen it this bad.

Joined: 08 Mar 2008 Awful slow 2 weeks for me, 50% down if compared to Jan 2013. I do not know what is going on???

Joined: 11 May 2006 For me so far, the slowest month ever.

Joined: 12 Jul 2008 I'm also very disappointing with the actual policy. Everytime they made a change (and of course I'm talking about the searching rules and alghorithm) our downloads fall down. I have a big portfolio and I used to sell several thousands of images on monthly basis... When I see 20 0r 30% down in dls... from a week to another I'm always worried... in the past those kind of changes has never pickup completely.. and good old dls days of 2011 are simply gone!!

Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Very slow month so far. Just checked my sales from January 2012 and 2011 and they were higher than right now. What's up with that?

Joined: 03 Mar 2008 Very, very slow for me. Totally different than last year...

Joined: 07 Aug 2007 very slow week for me too... uncommonly so even for this time of year

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on January 16, 2014, 09:49

I'm wondering if they did something to the search when they changed the presentation page about a week ago. January was looking quite normal until then.

I think you may be right.  Normal for January until yesterday, but miserable yesterday and today.

I hope gbalex is wrong and Shutterstock aren't following in Fotolia's footsteps and shafting their long-term successful contributors.

I would really love to be wrong on this one, but I can not continue to discount the huge drops some long term contributors are experiencing.

These are contributors who have never complained about poor sales and have never seen large drops only gains. We only have to read the threads on SS to see that they are stand up photographers with great ports who do not cry wolf.   The trend seems to be 2007 and below.

I don't have a problem with them beating the competition. More money for me when they do.

I don't know what expenses you have, my friend, but mine are as close to zero while my earnings keep going up. I write off the cost of my equipment and travel in my taxes, so you can thank Uncle Sam for my new D800. I have Wal-Mart style photos and I don't mind selling them at all Wal-Mart prices. If I had Neiman Marcus photos, I wouldn't sell them at Wal-Mart. Sounds like to me you should be mad at people who take Neiman Marcus photos but sell them at Wal-Mart.

My expenses seem to be a bit higher than your own, however based on the numbers you have been posting I receive much higher returns even at SS.

You consistently miss the point. If you read the quotes from SS they are well aware that our assets are worth more money and they are well aware that they could successfully raise prices. They know that many of our HCV images cost more to produce, however they are low balling them long term to gain market share. They gain and our assets continue to lose value.

I no longer upload my best files to SS because I have come to the conclusion that they have no problem devaluing my assets.  I think your expectations for a return on your investments and time are exceptionally low.

Quote from: JPSDK on January 09, 2014, 09:22

Quote from: Beppe Grillo on January 09, 2014, 08:59

We always need to complain when we have unfair rejections
Systematically!

And not only complain, but sent them the links on msg forum where people complain.

Only in this way they will (maybe) understand that we are not happy of these continuous inconsistent rejections and that they have a problem with some inspectors not doing their job correctly.

For 0,33 or 0,36 per image we can claim more respect!



Fundamentally we pay them (a lot) to make a bad work�
It is not fair!

Respect?

Wellcome to the commercial world, where people suck eachothers blood. There is no such thing as respect it is all about power, and we contributers are powerless.

it compares to grow tomatoes for the market.
Sometimes the weather is bad, there can even be frost, sometimes conditions are good and everybody grows a lot of tomatoes and bring them to the market.
But on the market they can only sell so and so much.
Sometimes the customers buy peppers and pineables instead of tomatoes.
Sometimes there is a fungus.
But worst is, when the market is manipulated and 5 tomato farmers bring their supertomatos in. And everybody else is left at the city gates with their tomatoes to rot.
The stockphotography world is the real world, there is supercompetition, pirates, and fungus.

Its all random, and you have to be both lucky and clever to play a role.

More lucky than clever, that is sad.
And power and respect? you wont ever get as long as there are 3 billion cameras out there and only 3 agencies.
Buy shares in copper mines instead.

It is too much easy to do nothing� and then invoque the reason that we cannot do nothing� to continue to do nothing�
Fatalitas�

The world goes like this because too much people think in this way and always accept the status quo.
History is full of terrible examples of this�

And telling that we cannot do nothing or cannot change it, we will surely not change nothing�

If you want the respect that they don't give you, you have to fight to get it, it has always been like this from the beginnings of times.
If you don't fight to get it you don't even deserve it, and you have absolutely no right to complain then.

If you don't fight to get respect you don't even respect yourself.

And it is more important to fight to claim the respect you deserve than to get the respect itself, because this makes the difference between to be a free human or to be a slave (or an animal).

It is a question of dignity, when you lose your dignity you lose your humanity.

_____
About luck� did you never notice that the persons having more luck are always the same?

_____
I will buy rare metals shares, it is better than cooper

I completely agree, we are not powerless unless we choose to give away our power!

Quote from: gbalex on January 09, 2014, 12:04

As long as key microsite players like SS use price undercutting as a long term growth strategy to capture market share, sites like IS are under pressure to cut or keep image pricing ultra low and that does not beget healthy royalties.

Snip
Jonathan Oringer - Founder, CEO & Chairman of the Board

It still multiples. So it's order of magnitude whether it's if you look at us compared to other stock marketplaces like an iStock or others, it's two or three or four times more expensive to not use Shutterstock. If you look at the higher end sort of more traditional marketed might be 6 or 8 or 10 times more expensive.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/1841072-shutterstocks-management-presents-at-the-goldman-sachs-us-emerging-smid-cap-growth-conference-transcript?page=2&p=qanda&l=last

No one's hands are clean in the race for the bottom. Contributors aren't stupid. If you sell licenses for $15 and only pay the contributor 15%, the contributor knows they are better off selling at another agency for $5 and taking 50%, as they get more sales and more money per sale (demand curves and all that), and so the cycle goes.

If you think I was defending IS on any level you are wrong. I completely agree that many sites are contributing in the race to the bottom.  I was simply responding to Ron's comment that we will see healthy royalties again at IS if and when Getty goes bankrupt. I simply detailed and documented one key reason I don't think we will see healthy royalties in the near term at any micro site.  That being price undercutting as a company growth strategy.

In addition I think we will see sites spending more $$$$$$$ attracting and then promoting new contributors in searches so that they can pay out a lower % royalties. 

How low do you suppose they will be willing to go in the devaluation of our assets?

As to the claw back, isn't this what we have come to expect when doing business with IS?  I cut them free after the Google Drive fiasco.

All you can do is wait until Getty buckles under their massive debt and they will be declared bankrupt. Once the cancer is removed from the patient, we will see a healthy growth in royalties again.

It is clear that SS views us as their own personal bank.  They expect us to personally fund and provide the lions share of SS assets as well as the man-hours necessary to fuel their long term business growth and profits.

SS would never be able to generate the growth they have been greedy enough to enjoy without the funds, equipment, training and time we invest to generate content and meta data.  They simply could not afford to fund the production of content/assets themselves, even if they begged and borrowed.

What % of our $$,$$$ investments do you suppose never see returns?  Clearly SS does not care that over the last 8 years our costs of living and production expenses have increased while the SS royalties and cost to buyers have not.

And no they are not content to take profit from our hides; they have decided they need more, they want our credit cards and they want us to develop and provide free videos that they will require to train volumes of new and naive contributors so that we will have more competition and low cost replacements.

^^^ What does this have to do with the question of whether IS have grandfathered our royalty rates or not?

In my case, no they have not. Quelle surprise!

You really need to ask this question?  The state of the market has everything to do with the moves each microstock company makes and SS's growth strategy drives business strategy at other sites. Including the latest moves by IS to retain contributors. 

I guess I am not at all surprised that key drivers of SS business strategy post undisguised business objectives and you can not make the leap.  SS's long term price undercutting has everything to do with falling revenues at IS and the micro industry in general.

By the way what does your below post have to do with grandfathered RC's at IS?

Quote from: bhr on November 19, 2013, 15:24

I believe they will want to take it public again. But not yet. At the moment they seem to be in the process of building value. The down economy and pessimistic expectations gives them a good space within which to reinvent yet again IMO.

It's a thought __ if the public would buy it. The stock owning public seemed pretty grateful to sell out to H&F in 2007 though. Revenues have fallen since then, they've got all that debt and now a major competitor/threat has emerged in the form of SS. Seems to me that Getty's prospects now are a lot less rosy than they appeared to be in 2007.

Quote from: ShadySue on December 27, 2013, 13:32

Oh, be fair. If it had been another company, this might have dragged on for weeks, especially over the Festive Season.

Yes. There will always be bugs popping up, but SS fixes things pretty quickly. Unlike some other site.

I can honestly report that I have been fortunate on other micro sites.  I can not recall my port experiencing one bug elsewhere including the small sites.  My sales on DT with fewer images bring 30% more income.  I pulled my port from IS over the Google drive fiasco but prior to that had no problems there.

To the contrary over the last 3 years SS has been one long and costly string of bugs. I lost count of how many times my port has gone missing, my keywords missing or not searchable.  Unfortunately I do not have the time to go into the numerous and long term bugs that have gone unfixed for extended periods of time (months, years) and have cost sales.

If you have not experienced bugs on SS which render your images invisible to buyers, count your blessings. Because some of us have not been so lucky.

In my past life I was a site developer, SS counts on the fact that most of it's contributors do not realize just how mangled and out dated parts of the site have become.

Looks like they pulled out the duct tape and bailing twine and cobbled things back together once again.

I wonder how long it will be before the entire site implodes.  I keep asking myself why they would pop $10 million dollars for for leasehold improvements related to SS headquarters office relocation; while leaving the SS site a mess.

If they cared at all about contributors they would have skipped the "Vanity Office Re-Location" and spent the money making their site stable functional for buyers and contributors.

Quote from: gbalex on December 26, 2013, 13:40

Quote from: Ron on December 23, 2013, 12:05

I think the royalty is still not confirmed. I dont know what my rights are to know precisely what royalty I am being paid. Its my wholly owned content, I think I have the right know exactly what my cut is. I have asked in an email, which is not public.

Why anyone would give you a - for this post is beyond me.  I agree 100% 

We provide 100% of then manpower and resources needed to produce 100% of the content on SS and as legitimate business's we need to know exactly how much we will be paid for making our assets available on SS to drive SS's revenue and ours. 

If SS decided to make our content available for 1 penny per download, I certainly will not be happy with 30% of that.

Basically you have to accept SS's concern about the sensitive commercial nature of the deals they are cutting (and therefore accept SS's ToS) ... or refuse them and remove your portfolio. Unfortunately the more they tell us as contributors, or indeed shareholders, the more they also tell their competitors. As a publicly quoted company we do at least get the financial information from the quarterly results. That's something we don't get from any other microstock agency.

To be honest I know a lot less about the percentage royalty I am being paid on many of my PP sales via Istock but I don't see Ron and yourself writing hundreds of posts complaining about that. Getty didn't even tell us (or Istock) that the Google Drive deal existed for example.

I'll bet that Getty are still seething that they missed out on the FB deal. If Getty had won the FB deal however I can pretty much guarantee that your royalty rate would have been a lot lower and you'd have had even less information about it.

I removed my port from IS precisely because of deals like the Google Drive.  If I find out SS is pulling similar stunts I will pull my port faster than you can say "they are dead to me"

Well this is quite shocking to be honest.

I asked Shutterstock in what size they are selling my images on Facebook. I was told they dont know and that I had to contact Facebook about it. And everyone who ever tried to contact Facebook knows that is sheer impossible.

One thing  they told me was that the images can not be unincorporated from the Facebook platform, this will be managed by Facebook. Whatever that means, but it sounds like the images are locked in.

I have asked again what size the images are sold, because I cant believe Shutterstock doesnt know this.

I did not get anywhere asking for specifics regarding display size, Scott dodged my direct request for facebook display size specs.

http://www.microstockgroup.com/shutterstock-com/changes-to-the-tos-at-shutterstock/msg346341/#msg346341

Gbalex

Re: Changes made to the END USER LICENSE

Does this mean that you have effectively done away with display size limitations altogether?  To date the micros do not have a great track record of protecting our assets from theft and increasing viewable size limitations will compound the problem 100 fold.

Could you please detail the specific display specifications for each media device that our content will be displayed on as well as the specs for each social media outlet.

As submitters it is important for us to understand SS's & BS's encompassing display, usage & royalty terms in regard to Facebook, Creativemornings, Skyward and any other companies we are not aware of at this time.

Will we be receiving standard royalties for our assets which are licensed to these new SS & BS accounts? If not what royalty terms can we expect to receive for our files?

Snip

scottbraut

Reply #174 on: September 25, 2013, 21:57

Hi gbalex,

Thanks for your question as well.

In our license, we have both approved uses and restrictions. The context of how the image is used is subject to a common sense understanding of what's reasonable for a particular use. We prohibit displaying an image as a standalone file on the Web and require either technical or written restrictions on the part of the user intended to prevent the use of the image by third parties. Usage is not allowed without a license and we aggressively pursue copyright infringements. It is important to note that some of our competitors do not put a restriction on file sizes (this varies) and that the 800x600 pixel limitation was a legacy restriction that was inhibiting sales and overdue for a revision.

With respect to Facebook, Skyword and CreativeMornings, these are different opportunities being offered through different brands.

In the Facebook relationship, Shutterstock contributors are getting paid subscription rates (or greater) for a license that is limited to use on Facebook at digital sizes. That license is more limited in scope than what is offered through our normal subscription model. The audience is 1 million local businesses who are advertising on the Facebook platform, with potential to reach 18 million businesses who have pages on the platform.  This relationship greatly expands the market for your images.  The original FAQ regarding our Facebook collaboration is here.

Fotolia did have senior staff at the expo, but you are right I don�t remember them sponsoring a workshop or having a stand this year. They do however have a very active presence on all kinds of photo related events in Germany, at least I keep running into them.

Yes, "special dividend" does�t sound good. Why can�t owners pay themselves from hard earned profits instead??

Anyway, I hope some of that debt also gets used to move the business forward, SS is obviously making strong inroads in Europe and just opened a major office in Berlin.

I like to see balance in the market, as much as I like the SS team, I do worry if they become the only strong business in the industry.

And istock seems to have given up the fight long ago.

I agree they should not borrow to pay themselves up front at the expense of our assets. Generating instant cash for owners is a juggling act that catches up with all business's eventually when business slows down or other micros under cut pricing. They are well aware of this fact. If you notice SS is now pushing for a new crop of contributors and driving more business to BS to help drive profit in the short term. It remains to be seen how the new markets they are moving into will pan out. If SS stake holders felt confident about driving increased revenue in new markets they would not be selling personal stock, they would be holding out for higher values.

Historically @ SS "our supposedly low worth assets" provided monthly cash distributions to members of Shutterstock Images LLC with respect to their membership interests totaling $90.5 million in less than 3 years. To my knowledge there is no public information for cash distributions for the years prior to those reported via the SEC.

IS, Fotolia, etc. can see that SS paid down $12.0 million of the $12 million term loan term loan facility that it entered into on September 21, 2012 to fund working capital needs following the corps final $36.0 million cash distribution to the members of Shutterstock Images LLC prior to the pre IPO Reorganization.

Pocketing $90.5 million cash in less than three years is telling when you also consider current revenue. The micros have no problem driving the value of our assets down to participate in the race to gain market share but how long will it be before the gig is up and they hit diminishing returns?

Shutterstock Images LLC Cash Distributions prior to the IPO Reorganization

For the years ended December 31, 2011 and 2010, distributions to the members of Shutterstock Images LLC were $28.6 million and $25.9 million, respectively.

Additionally, between January 1, 2012 and October 4, 2012, we distributed $36.0 million to the members of Shutterstock Images LLC.

10Q 3/31/2013 http://www.secinfo.com/d11MXs.x17an.htm#1stPage

Snip
On October 4, 2012, we made a final distribution to the LLC members constituting approximately all of the cash generated from the operations of the LLC, since the last distribution to members and any other cash and cash equivalents on hand at the time of the distribution, other than any amounts received under the term loan facility, as described below. Following this final distribution, no additional distributions were made to members of the LLC prior to the Reorganization. Additionally, following the Reorganization, our tax rate and related tax payments have increased significantly as we became subject to federal, state and additional city income tax.

We entered into a term loan facility in September of 2012 that provided for a $12 million term loan. Following the final distribution to members described above, the borrowings from the term loan facility were used to fund the short-term capital needs of our operations following the final distribution to members described above and our IPO. On December 24, 2012, we paid down $6.0 million of the term loan and on March 25, 2013, we paid off the remaining outstanding balance of $6 million. As of March 31, 2013, we have no outstanding debt. Additionally, we believe our existing cash and cash equivalents and cash flow generated from operations will be sufficient to meet our working capital and capital expenditure for at least the next twelve months.

We plan to finance our operations and capital expenses largely through our operations. Since our results of operations are sensitive to the level of competition we face, increased competition could adversely affect our liquidity and capital resources, both by reducing our revenues and our net income, as a result of reduced sales, reduced prices and increased promotional activities, among other factors, as well as by requiring us to spend cash on advertising and marketing in an effort to maintain or increase market share in the face of such competition. In addition, the advertising and marketing expenses used to maintain market share and support future revenues will be funded from current capital resources or from borrowings or equity financings. As a result, our ability to grow our business relying largely on funds from our operations is sensitive to competitive pressures and other risks relating to our liquidity or capital resources.

Quote from: gbalex on December 06, 2013, 11:36

Quote from: Ron on December 05, 2013, 03:41

I dont really feel compelled to explain myself to people who hide behind anonymity, demanding transparency.

I am not surprised you would avoid the question.

Oh he actually does work for Shutterstock, no surprise then about the motives of this 'poll'.

Yes and it also explains the about turn in views he has demonstrated since his meeting with SS.

I do not always agree with everyone on this forum and I actually feel that is healthy.  I do value honest and varied opinions regarding various micros. I do not always agree with any one person on the boards, Tickstock included. I do read many of his posts because he makes some very good points from time to time.

This poll in its original form presented like forced SS advertising or promotion. I agree with Mike the poll in it original form is like asking people if they'd rather eat an apple or some dirt. Except at these prices we could not afford to buy one apple.