I'm a stock photographer who puts some of her images on flickr.

I downsize, save as a low-quality jpg, with a watermark. Large views and downloading are disabled. There's a ton of other things I disabled too. Basically what I can do, I do.

After reading some horror stories I considered pulling everything off my account, but I reconsidered when I realized in some cases, stock agencies give users equally (if not more) easily stolen images.

I also realized some those horror stories featured people who uploaded large, unwatermarked, easily downloadable copies of their images. They basically made it so easy. Many still do.

If it's on the web, it will be used without your permission.

Has anyone seen www.mygazines.com? Imagine how those publishers must feel. It's also stealing from photographers/illustrators featured in those magazines (some of them are actually us - there's some micro on those pages). Or every misused track of music out there. It's the nature of the beast. We can't kill it...we can only try to manage risk/damage.

congrats sharply_done! a well deserved spotlight - I hope you enjoy a big ol' sales jump!

thanks everyone for clarification on who got the note - and thanks to those of you who were in on the call.

it'll be interesting to see how this one turns out..."should I stay or should I go now"

I'm curious - has anyone else been contacted directly by StockXpert with apologies?

If I understand this correctly, I'm supposed to be thrilled that I get .30 for what equates to a $28 sale on SS and a $25 sale on DT. Add in the claim that the volume will be amazing and I still need almost 100 sales through photos.com to come close what I would be paid elsewhere for the same use of my image.

I'll join the ranks...I have no idea why I should be excited about this.

StockXpert, I've always liked you, but this seems simply insulting to your submitters. We've done the math. We're unimpressed. In fact, some of us seem baffled at your excitement.

So tell us...unless we're from the school of "I'm just tickled-pink to get any money for my photos"...why should we stick around?

got my payout today

jsnover - don't be depressed - I aspire to get my speedometer to look like that! I don't have much hope of iS looking better any day soon, but I'm pretty happy with DT sales...and those make me think I'm aiming too low.

I'm not really all that unhappy - many of the files I submitted early on were weak and don't sell well. One of these days I'll delete them, but then a few sell and I'm encouraged to keep them alive.

I was sent the email saying I would receive payment by the May 30th, but still no payment. I'll give them a few more days before I write support, but I am starting to get a bit concerned that I won't be seeing my money.

I'm way down with sales on iS as well. Even the images that are constant sellers aren't doing much for me this month. Don't even get me started on the review process (I have no complaints about any other site)...all that considering, it's not really worth my time at this point.

It's just good business sense to offer a product to a wide market. Locking myself into one type of customer base is limiting.

If asked I'd say, as I have, that at one time I did not have a camera with sufficient megapixels to sell on RM sites and I didn't have the money (and frankly I didn't have the knowledge) to make buying a better camera a financially-wise decision.

Learn more.
Earn more.

That's my goal every day, month and year.

Finding a fabulous new space I can live in that doubles as a studio - with lots of windows to feed my need for natural light - would really rock too. (hey universe - are you listening?!)

As much as I want to say "hey Sharply - don't bite your tongue"...I think he's got a point.

Good point Lisa - the competition is already fierce enough on the micros as it is.

On the other hand, the lack of exclusivity our micro 'club' has is also what makes us so different from many of the traditional stock sites. I wouldn't begin to try to parse whether or not that has helped or hurt them, but I do think that feeling of being in an exclusive club of photographers within a site has also created this attitude of superiority among *some* traditional photographers. I've never had much love for elitism (not directed at your statement Lisa...I'm rambling here) for just that reason. I can also see how micros have hurt those who were 'in' on these sites and wrecked the safety they must have once felt.

I don't see one as better than the other...I see them both as opportunities to earn an income doing what I love and a means to pay my bills. As a designer, I don't see their customer base as being equal - micros opened up stock photo options for those with lower design budgets and I'm sure better designs and happier customers have been the result.

Like I said before...rambling here...but when I first decided to shoot stock photography, I never in my wildest dreams imagined the politics I found in the industry. I try to stay emotionally detached to some degree and not get too caught up, but at times it's a bit of challenge. Reading sharply_done's post makes me feel like some folks would love to brand a big ol' scarlet "micro" on my chest so I can easily be avoided in the future. I hope that's not the case for the majority of traditional sites out there as there is so much talent in the world of microstock and as a photographer, there is good reason to want to market to both worlds.

just my buck fiddy and all the usual caveats.

Has anyone seen the Digital Photo Pro article this month about stock photography? (I couldn't find it on the web...sorry)

Not a single mention of iS, SS, DT or any other micro site. It was a very interesting article in some ways, but I was still surprised to see micros completely ignored in the equation. There certainly seems to be some level of industry-wide contempt for these sites and those of us who have submitted to them.

It makes me wish those who have been very successful on both traditional stock sites and the micros (Ron Chapple comes to mind), would be asked how they see things evolving. I think their opinion probably has more merit than folks like Harrington.

huge congrats! hope it brings in some great sales for you...and maybe livens up the place for all of us. 

I've had the same issue - only it's the rest of the house eating my "props"!

I've had good luck with calling up some friends before an afternoon shoot and inviting them over for some prop-leftover parties. They love free food. I love not wasting all the leftovers. Keeps me on schedule too - I know I've got hungry mouths to feed. 

Not that I'm asking for specifics, but without them it's very hard to compare sales between users. "Great sales" seems often quite subjective.

Using my own trends as a guide...my sales jumped 300% from 2006 to 2007. Fotolia is not responsible for much of that increase. Perhaps it's due to their poor programming or perhaps I don't shoot what the average Fotolia customer is looking for. I don't know the cause behind it, but I do have to take into consideration which sites give me the greatest return on investment, including my investment of time/effort.

and for what it's worth my fotolia stats are..
Overall rank: 1445
7 days rank: 2054

So....I'm a little late to realizing the extent of the search issues with fotolia. Due to pretty slow sales there, I just don't give them that much of my time.

I read a little while ago about the "first 7 keywords' issue - basically that the first 7 are the only ones that count. I kicked myself for somehow missing the info and have gone back little, by little, and worked on re-ordering the keywords.

This morning I visit their forums for the first time and read that just editing those keywords will do nothing to improve search results. I think they want me to contact support to have them manually re-index each image! Does anyone know if this is true?

At this point it feels like it might be more worthwhile to clear out all 685 files in my account and start over....maybe...or maybe not.

I know I'm late showing up to the fotolia keyword party...so I apologize if I'm beating a dead subject here. I just don't know whether or not to call this a loss and move on or...what.

Have others done the re-ordering/re-indexing? Did you see sales improve at all?

I really enjoyed this...and you even pulled me out of lurk-dom to comment.  I used to raise various color-mutations of peach-faced lovebirds...lutinos were my favorite. You brought back a lot of very happy memories - thanks for posting!