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Messages - gbalex
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901
« on: August 13, 2013, 01:23 »
Isnt a raise a reward for doing good work, so you get paid more for doing the same work? How is adding more and better images a raise for me? If more and better and newer images dont sell its even a waste of time and money. I can only agree with Gbalex here.
We're not employees. That's the difference. When you are self-employed, the only way to make more money is to produce more and produce better quality. It is all on you. Asking Shutterstock for a raise "for doing good work" is like asking Shutterstock to give you paid holidays and health insurance. Might as well ask for those, too. You have about the same chance of getting them.
That is right we are suppliers and suppliers all over the world raise prices as their own expenses go up. Just how many publicly traded companies do you think will be affected by rising supplier costs from Asia? Asia Soaring Wages Mean Rising Prices Worldwidehttp://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-02/asia-soaring-wages-stoke-inflation-as-factory-costs-rise.htmlSnip Executive Director Ernie Koh has a message for clients in 50 countries who complain about the Singapore-based furniture makers first price increase in two years: Take it or leave it. Kodas factories in China, Malaysia and Vietnam are battling rising costs as governments in Asia increase minimum wages to curb discontent over a widening wealth gap. While weak global growth and increased competition limited the ability of producers to raise prices during the past five years, Koh says they cant go on absorbing the additional expenses.
902
« on: August 12, 2013, 12:11 »
Guess another site will receive my purchase today. Yes SS we know you have been working on it for months now.
We're working on it.
Sorry, Shutterstock is temporarily unavailable.
Please try again soon.
Status Updates
Мы работаем над проблемой.
К сожалению, Shutterstock временно недоступен. Повторите попытку позже.
Estamos trabajando en ello.
Lo sentimos, Shutterstock no est disponible temporalmente. Intntelo de nuevo ms tarde.
Estamos trabalhando nisso.
Desculpe, Shutterstock est temporariamente indisponvel. Por favor, tente novamente em breve.
Nous nous en occupons.
Dsols, Shutterstock est momentanment indisponible. Veuillez ressayer dans quelques instants.
Wir arbeiten daran.
Leider ist Shutterstock vorbergehend nicht erreichbar. Bitte versuchen Sie es spter noch einmal.
処理中です。
申し訳ございませんが、Shutterstockは一時的にご利用ができません。しばらくしてから再度お試し下さい。
Ci stiamo lavorando.
Siamo spiacenti, Shutterstock temporaneamente non disponibile. Riprovare a breve.
We zijn er mee bezig.
Sorry, Shutterstock is tijdelijk niet beschikbaar. Probeer het later nog eens.
我们正在处理。
很抱歉，Shutterstock 暂时无法使用。请稍后重试。
zerinde alışıyoruz.
zgnz, Shutterstock geici olarak kullanılamamaktadır. Ltfen daha sonra tekrar deneyin.
903
« on: August 12, 2013, 09:53 »
Expenses don't matter. Our images are worth what people are willing to pay for them. No more, no less. Shutterstock pays me more for my images -- at least 10 times more -- than any other site out there. If a site comes up that can pay me more, I'd be happy to consider them.
And I'm not in this boat alone. The little chart to the right pretty much says it all. (I don't buy the iStock exclusive results either.)
You do not know what people are willing to pay for images because you have a leading site keeping prices down so that they can gain market share!
904
« on: August 11, 2013, 19:34 »
All commodity prices go up over time, even the ones with historic gluts on the market.
That's not true at all __ if you take inflation into account. When Henry VIII was king of England, for example, a simple rice pudding was quite literally considered "food fit for a king". To make rice pudding you needed sugar from as far west as the known world and rice from as far east as the known world. Rice pudding was impossibly exotic and very expensive. Nowadays those same commodities are absurdly cheap in the developed world.
Commodity prices are defined by supply and demand. I'm not sure why you might think that there exists a dearth in the supply of images that might justify an increase in their prices?
SS have stated quite clearly that they are currently 'operating for growth' (as opposed to 'operating for profit'). That means that they're not going to raise prices (and therefore royalties) for the foreseeable future. If you want 'a raise' then you'll have to do the work yourself __ just like SS themselves. If they want a raise then they have to spend the money and take the risks in order to, hopefully, sell more of our images.
How can you be in business and not take inflation into account? Every year our expenses go up and it costs more to produce images. Take your example of rice for instance, if I drive to the store to buy rice and then photograph it it will cost me more to purchase both rice and gas each year and the value of my royalty has gone down via inflation. Re: Commodity prices are defined by supply and demand. I'm not sure why you might think that there exists a dearth in the supply of images that might justify an increase in their prices? You mistake the sites willingness to drive the value of our content down to gain market share with their actual worth. If the sites actually had to pay to produce that content themselves rest assured they would take much better care to guard the value of those assets! Each year their market share increases and they gain a larger RPD and they are doing it based on our investments. And yes even the price of rice goes up. As far as supply outpacing demand that is a fallacy and is not happening, despite the huge flux received over the last few months from IS exclusives. 2013 Number of paid downloads 2013 46,700,000 / Images in collection (end of 6 month period) 2013 27,300,000 = 1.7 Paid Downloads Per Image in SS collection 2012 Number of paid downloads 2012 35,900,000 / Images in collection (end of 6 month period) 2012 20,200,000 = 1.7 Paid Downloads Per Image in SS collection Revenue per download Three Months Ended June 2013 2.33 vs Revenue per download Three Months Ended June 2012 2.22 http://investor.shutterstock.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=251362&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1845768- Quarterly revenue increases 40% from prior year period to $56.8 million - Adjusted EBITDA increases 61% to $13.4 million - Quarterly image downloads increase 33% to 24.3 million - Revenue per download increases 5% to $2.33 Number of paid downloads 2013 46,700,000 Number of paid downloads 2012 35,900,000 Revenue per download Three Months Ended June 2013 2.33 Revenue per download Three Months Ended June 2012 2.22 Images in collection (end of 6 month period) 2013 27,300,000 Images in collection (end of 6 month period) 2012 20,200,000
905
« on: August 11, 2013, 12:40 »
That's not the way this business works. You get paid the competitive rate based on what your work is worth to others. We're not employees or union workers to sit around and whine about cost of living. We're individual business people. If there were more demand for our work and if the ability to create that work was more rare, we'd get paid more. Your expenses have zero to do with it. Besides, that's why you deduct your expenses on your taxes. Let the government pay for it.
Sure, I'd love more money if someone is just going to give it to me. But I'm not going to criticize Shutterstock on that front when it's the only site paying me anything worth more than a second's notice.
Also, looking at the amount you make as 38 cents is a total fallacy. It's an untrue statement to say that's all you make per download. Shutterstock offers different licenses. I'd bet nobody actually makes as little as 38 cents a download, even people on the lowest tier.
Finally, I know for a fact that if I improve my images and upload more of them, I will get a raise because I will sell more. Now that's a raise that's totally within my own hands. I don't understand how that doesn't make sense. I don't look at the my earnings on a download by download basis. I look at my earnings on a month by month basis. If it goes up from one month to the next, that's a raise. Seems pretty clear to me.
Re: Finally, I know for a fact that if I improve my images and upload more of them, I will get a raise because I will sell more. Now that's a raise that's totally within my own hands.Now that is a fallacy, it is not in your own hands it is in the hands of the sites which images and or ports they choose to display on their front pages. This month they need little kiddos. That should not last long if you keep broadcasting how well they sell. All commodity prices go up over time, even the ones with historic gluts on the market. At these slim micro margins it does not take long to hit parity between production expenses and income. So good luck with your mindset and enjoy working harder and harder to keep pace with past performance while all around you suppliers raise prices for the things you need to survive.
906
« on: August 10, 2013, 13:39 »
While I can appreciate your opinion, I still see that the photo-factories will be able to turn out more photos at a lower cost than a single operator, they will put them out faster and at a lower cost and in some cases the photos will be better as you will have SME's (subject matter experts) to handle each small part of the process. I understand that the commodities are not the same, food vs photos, but I still see that in time, there will be very few photographers on their own out there unless they have a very specialized set of photos or themes. Look at iStock, now a part of Getty, which is part of the Carlyle Group. I see it as just a matter of time, maybe not today, tomorrow or in the next year, but in time.
But even with your analogy of the situation, the photo factories will flood the market, dilute the pool and make it so the single photographer can't make a living off it or won't want to put in the time to get the Pennies on the dollar that they were making. Even if there is a scale back on the new content from the factories, the photos that are there will make it a sea of photos which are mostly from the factories, thus the chance of some of us making a sale is limited at best.
Again, this is my opinion and I actually hope that your view of this is what happens.
Look ... photography generally ... just does not scale. It never has and it never will. That's why if you need portraits done, some wedding photos or a commercial shoot there are no big corporate giants to turn to. It all happens, mainly on a local level, via self-employed individuals or the owners of tiny businesses with very few employees.
Stock photography is no different. If stock photography did scale ... then why don't the agencies do it all themselves, produce their own content (or at least the majority of it) and keep all the sales revenue for themselves? The answer is because they know that they couldn't possibly produce the content as cheaply, as efficiently and as risk-free (to themselves) as we can.
The 'photo factory', as a business model, is inherently flawed and is unlikely to survive for too much longer __ 5-10 years at the outside. In the meantime they have done much damage to everyone else and they have simply accelerated the demise of their own operations and the ability of individual stock photographers to earn a living.
The fact that there are only 5-6 acknowledged 'photo factories', out of supposedly 30K-odd contributors, should tell you much about how unfeasible the long-term prospects of such businesses are. Most of us have considered the idea of scaling up our businesses and have quickly dismissed it as unworkable. When talents such as Sean, Lise and Lisa (and many other Black Diamond level contributors) turn down such an 'opportunity' to grow their businesses and their incomes it should be obvious that there isn't much of an opportunity there.
Good post
907
« on: August 09, 2013, 23:59 »
First of all, nobody sold you guys a ticket. If you don't like the payout, pull your images off. Put all your images on symbiostock, and get all the money.
For me, I have tried selling direct. 15 years ago direct sales was a great business, but now everyone with a digital camera is a photographer, so this is what you get. The cost of one click on google is over 4 dollars the last time I looked. So, if SS wants to take the risk, that's fine with me. There's a difference between selling a product and producing a profit.
Every month my income goes up at SS. It pays my studio and my mortgage, so to me it's a great thing. I make my profit from assignment work, while the SS machine just keeps grinding away. It's a machine that just keeps spitting out money. I love it.
Totally agree. Shutterstock pays out to me more than 10 times that of any other site. If I want a raise, I upload more and better images. You earn a raise through your work, not by what someone else gives you.
Your position makes no sense How many years are you willing to work for the same royalty commission fully knowing that your hard work will be eroded by inflation. By taking your position you are dooming your self to work x% harder each and every day based on inflation alone? Have your gas expenses gone up? If so it costs you more each year to produce content based on only one business expense. Unless of course you are unplugged, use solar, grow your own food and use horse and buggy for transportation. http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/$.38 in 2008 has the same spending power as $0.41 does today, therefore your royalty rate suffered a cumulative rate of inflation @ 8.5% since you last received a royalty raise in 2008. US Inflation Jumps in June 2013, Annual Inflation Rate Hits 1.8%http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23328472UK inflation rate rises to 2.9% in June. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23324635The rate of consumer price index (CPI) inflation increased to 2.9% in June, up from 2.7% in May, according to the Office for National Statistics
908
« on: August 09, 2013, 20:36 »
So you don't think Bigstock is included in that then or Offset, are they run by different people? I kind of thought Offset was run by the same Shutterstock guys.
Yes I do think BS is included as mentioned in the Q2 and other filings. Have you seen any information regarding numbers for Offset and Skillfeed in any of the SEC filings?
909
« on: August 09, 2013, 19:04 »
I think the $15.5-16million was paid out to contributors, which would include Bigstock, Skillfeed, maybe Offset (I'm not sure if anyone is paid there yet, I think they said it was Beta whatever that actually means), and any other things they have going on now. I wonder if the download numbers include those other sites or not? http://seekingalpha.com/article/1616602-shutterstocks-ceo-discusses-q2-2013-results-earnings-call-transcript?page=2Snip With that, Ill turn the call over to Thilo Semmelbauer, Shutterstocks president and COO, who will share some of the key operational highlights for the second quarter.Thilo SemmelbauerThanks, Jon. We remained intensely focus on acquiring new customers and adding fresh content in the second quarter as weve discussed these two signs of our network, reinforce and drive each other, fueling our growth. Now, starting with the contributors side, as in prior quarters, we accepted many new contributors. We saw strong activities from existing contributors and a small number of contributors left us. In total, we added 2.2 million images and 150,000 video clips in Q2 more than in any prior quarter. And the quality and diversity of our collection is now better than ever. As weve mentioned, we screen every image before it enters the collection and we reject between a third and a half of the images that are submitted in order to enforce a very high quality standard. Were also focused on improving the diversity of our collection so we can meet more of our customers needs along the dimensions of subject matter, style, culture, geography. In total, our library contains more than 28 million images and more than a million video clips and continues to be one of the fastest growing and largest collections in our space. In Q2, we continued to invest in growth on the contributors side making a number of improvements to our review operations and our systems to enable us to continue the scale. Even though were receiving and reviewing more content than ever before, our service levels and time from image submission to approval improved significantly in Q2. We also paid out more to contributors than ever before, nearly $16 million in the quarter.
910
« on: August 09, 2013, 18:46 »
.65 is 27% of $2.33
The following puts the monthly/daily numbers in perspective
$639,112.76 SS Q2 Revenue per Day vs $.0061 x Portfolio Number = Average Q2 Contributor Revenue per Download per Day
The average we earned per paid download for the three months in Q2 is $.65 or 27% of $2.33 SS's Revenue per download
$$$$$$$ SS Revenue per download
Number of paid downloads in three months = 24,300,000 x $2.33 or $56,619,000.00 SS Revenue per total downloads per Three Months in Q2
Number of paid downloads in one month = 8, 100,000 x $2.33 or $18,873,000.00 SS Revenue per Month in Q2
Number of paid downloads in one day = 274,291 x $2.33 or $639,112.76 SS Revenue per Day in Q2
On the Contributor side of the 27,300,000 files we have on SS each file on average received the following number of downloads.
.89 average download per file in collection in three months or .89 x $.65 = $.57 Contributor Revenue per download per Three Month Period in Q2
.29 average download per file in collection in one month or .29 x $.65 = $.18 Contributor Revenue per download per Month in Q2
.0095 average download per file in collection in one day or .0095 x $.65 = $.0061 Contributor Revenue per download per Day in Q2 (average days in month = 29.530589 days)
$639,112.76 SS Revenue per Day vs $.0061 x port number = Average Contributor Revenue per Download per Day ^^^ That seems to me to be meaningless numbers being spouted without references. The numbers come directly out of Second Quarter 2013 Financial Results, they are just broken down. Start here and break it down from three months in the quarter to one month and they days (average duration in month = 29.530589 days) Three Months Ended June 30, .$ Paid to contributors $16,000,000 Divided by number of paid downloads 24,300,000 = .65 cents average paid out for each download (? "nearly" 16 million including Video, SOD, El, OD) Number of downloads 24,300,000 Divided by number of images in collection 27,300,000 = .89 average download per image in collection during 3 month periodhttp://investor.shutterstock.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=251362&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1845768&highlightPage 2 or 3 depending on how large your font is. http://seekingalpha.com/article/1616602-shutterstocks-ceo-discusses-q2-2013-results-earnings-call-transcript?page=2Snip We also paid out more to contributors than ever before, nearly $16 million in the quarter. Where does "$.0061 x portfolio number" come from? .0095 average download per file in SS collection in one day or .0095 x $.65 = $.0061 Contributor Revenue per download per Day in Q2 (average days in month = 29.530589 days) Why have you got a 'vs' (i.e.versus?) in a supposed mathematical formula? Shutterstock Revenue per Day vs Average Contributor Revenue per Day per Download x number of files in port
911
« on: August 09, 2013, 15:08 »
.65 is 27% of $2.33
The following puts the monthly/daily numbers in perspective
$639,112.76 SS Q2 Revenue per Day vs $.0061 x Portfolio Number = Average Q2 Contributor Revenue per Download per Day
The average we earned per paid download for the three months in Q2 is $.65 or 27% of $2.33 SS's Revenue per download
$$$$$$$ SS Revenue per download
Number of paid downloads in three months = 24,300,000 x $2.33 or $56,619,000.00 SS Revenue per total downloads per Three Months in Q2
Number of paid downloads in one month = 8, 100,000 x $2.33 or $18,873,000.00 SS Revenue per Month in Q2
Number of paid downloads in one day = 274,291 x $2.33 or $639,112.76 SS Revenue per Day in Q2
On the Contributor side of the 27,300,000 files we have on SS each file on average received the following number of downloads.
.89 average download per file in collection in three months or .89 x $.65 = $.57 Contributor Revenue per download per Three Month Period in Q2
.29 average download per file in collection in one month or .29 x $.65 = $.18 Contributor Revenue per download per Month in Q2
.0095 average download per file in collection in one day or .0095 x $.65 = $.0061 Contributor Revenue per download per Day in Q2 (average duration in month = 29.530589 days)
$639,112.76 SS Revenue per Day vs $.0061 x port number = Average Contributor Revenue per Download per Day
912
« on: August 09, 2013, 13:03 »
.65 is 27% of $2.33
That's probably as close to the "truth" as it gets...
Nearly 
913
« on: August 09, 2013, 13:01 »
why could IS allow contributors still having massive files on other sites to be its ex memeber?thats totally unfair to us
Agreed. But if there is one thing that is glaringly obvious about Getty, it is that they couldn't care less about fairness to (most) contributors.
Exactly
914
« on: August 09, 2013, 01:55 »
.65 is 27% of $2.33
915
« on: August 09, 2013, 00:50 »
Three Months Ended June 30,
.$ Paid to contributors $16,000,000
Divided by number of paid downloads 24,300,000 = .65 cents average paid out for each download (? "nearly" 16 million including Video, SOD, El, OD)
Number of downloads 24,300,000
Divided by number of images in collection 27,300,000 = .89 average download per image in collection during 3 month period
916
« on: August 08, 2013, 14:15 »
Did you listen to the earnings call? I just wonder if they are mixing in YTD numbers in the call. I didn't listen to it, so I cannot comment. Otherwise I don't understand the big difference between the printed quarterly report and the conference call.
Posted this earlier in the thread there are detailed numbers from Thilo Semmelbauer for contributor royalties of nearly $16 million in the 2nd quarter. Page 2 or 3 depending on how large your font is. http://seekingalpha.com/article/1616602-shutterstocks-ceo-discusses-q2-2013-results-earnings-call-transcript?page=2Shutterstock's CEO Discusses Q2 2013 Results - Earnings Call TranscriptSnip With that, Ill turn the call over to Thilo Semmelbauer, Shutterstocks president and COO, who will share some of the key operational highlights for the second quarter. Thilo Semmelbauer Thanks, Jon. We remained intensely focus on acquiring new customers and adding fresh content in the second quarter as weve discussed these two signs of our network, reinforce and drive each other, fueling our growth. Now, starting with the contributors side, as in prior quarters, we accepted many new contributors. We saw strong activities from existing contributors and a small number of contributors left us. In total, we added 2.2 million images and 150,000 video clips in Q2 more than in any prior quarter. And the quality and diversity of our collection is now better than ever. As weve mentioned, we screen every image before it enters the collection and we reject between a third and a half of the images that are submitted in order to enforce a very high quality standard. Were also focused on improving the diversity of our collection so we can meet more of our customers needs along the dimensions of subject matter, style, culture, geography. In total, our library contains more than 28 million images and more than a million video clips and continues to be one of the fastest growing and largest collections in our space. In Q2, we continued to invest in growth on the contributors side making a number of improvements to our review operations and our systems to enable us to continue the scale. Even though were receiving and reviewing more content than ever before, our service levels and time from image submission to approval improved significantly in Q2. We also paid out more to contributors than ever before, nearly $16 million in the quarter.
918
« on: August 08, 2013, 09:29 »
54
iStockPhoto.com / Re: yuri arcurs is IS exclusive
on: May 18, 2013, 01:31
Hi Guys.
We have found a good distribution partner (Getty Images) for the kind of content we produce. We will be removing all images from microstock doing the next few weeks. Microstock, especially subscription sites, are not suited for the kind of high production cost images we produce.
Best Yuri
80 days after and Yuri's portfolio is still selling at DT (we talking about 11.42 weeks)
Come on Luis, why wax on this when you know the drill. http://www.dreamstime.com/faqs-detail-2I am a contributor, how do I close my account? A You can disable all files approved more than six months ago at any time. You are allowed to disable 30% of files uploaded in the recent six months however 70% must be kept online for six months from their approval date. You can disable the remaining 70% after six months pass. Once the files are disabled, nobody is able to view/access them, except for you. The files will remain in our offline database for 12 months until all liabilities (refunds, potential copyright infringements, etc) concerning them are cleared off, then they are automatically deleted. The account cannot be closed until the above requirements of the contract expire. Accounts with activity (license/download) cannot be deleted, as they can be referenced internally in regards to past licensing. However, they can be blocked from public access. More account closure details can be found in our Terms and Conditions.
919
« on: August 05, 2013, 13:05 »
Hello all,
We received emails about this recently and would like to thank you all for taking the time to either post and/or email us your concerns.
Feel free to report issues via our new contributor Contact Us page http://submit.shutterstock.com/contact/ and also via email: [email protected] -- at any time. We are here to assist you.
Sincerely,
Anthony Correia
Director, Contributor Success
Shutterstock|Bigstock
Bu... Bu... But... what happened?
+1
920
« on: August 05, 2013, 12:58 »
Have you tried deleting your cookies?
Nope, haven't tried that. But... I don't think we're all having trouble with our cookies at the same time. 
If ss changed them on their side and yours have not been updated it can sometimes create conflicts. I tend to agree with your but it is worth a try and can get rid of old crap from third party's that they are not currently using to track us!
921
« on: August 05, 2013, 12:54 »
First four days of this August vs Aug 2012 is the same almost to the dollar. But considering how many more images I have now vs last year, I'm not too happy.
Looking at last summer vs this summer, I'm struck by how many of those "Single and Other Downloads" I had last year.
Those are down big time this year.
+1 Too soon to tell about this month, but so far sales are down by 30% over last August with more files. Overall my OD's EL's & SOD are down over previous years. It would be interesting to do a poll with results tied to royalty level.
922
« on: August 05, 2013, 11:04 »
Thanks Ron for chiming in. I would never have guessed you were from Ireland. I thought you were from Texas.
Now that is amusing
923
« on: August 05, 2013, 10:00 »
Have you tried deleting your cookies?
924
« on: August 05, 2013, 09:16 »
Interesting how the hedge fund managed to sell Getty for a nice profit when the share price was falling before they bought them and they don't seem to have growth. What are the Carlyle Group going to do that previous owners haven't already tried?
Interesting point
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