Istock just blew themselves up, with all this blabber from the COO - its a real laugh:
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kkthompson
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Posted 19 mins ago
   
This week was my 6th anniversary here at iStock. Probably not the easiest week in iStock history to have it on.

It does feel very 'full-circle' though. I remember standing around with Bruce in 2004, agonizing over this new idea � exclusivity for our contributors. It was excruciating. It looked great on paper, but would it fly? Would they really leave competitors to come sell only at tiny little iStock? We had only ever paid out 20% royalties. Would a jump to 40% put us in the poor house? Would competitors follow suit? None of us slept for a week. Besides selling the company, it�s probably one of the toughest decisions of my business life.

Part of the difficulty in that decision was who was on the other end and affected the most. You aren't just contributors, many of you had, even by then, become close friends. There aren�t many businesses that can say that about their suppliers.

Of course that�s what makes these last few days so hard. It's our friends calling us out in the forums, hurt and scared we�ve sold you out.

We know this news has taken you all by surprise, and we're sorry for the anguish it's caused. We know this is a big shift, and we expected that you would have strong feelings about what it means to each of you individually, and iStock as a whole.

Looking back at the decision about Exclusivity all those years ago, the team did a pretty miraculous job with the exclusive program. I�d hazard a guess that it�s a big part of what made iStock really different from the rest. But like every decision, we didn�t get everything right. We set the canister levels to what we thought would be challenging but still attainable over the long term through hard work. What we had no idea at the time was how much and how quickly the site would grow. We expected - and wanted - to pay more and more money out to contributors. But what we quickly realized was that it's one thing for the payout amount to increase over time, it's another thing for that percentage of our total cost to always increase over time. We saw it coming, but we also took the easier road. �Ehh, we�ll cross that bridge when we get to it.�

Tuesday was iStock�s "bridge" day, and we crossed it full on.

Over the last few months we've seen this coming. These decisions have been wrestled with, thought over, adjusted, re-thought and tweaked many times over, with a very close eye on all the hard data we have accumulated over the years, and in the full light of the reaction it would bring. But this is the system we need to go forward with, and there isn't any flexibility for now.

As I've said, we will re-examine targets once the year-end numbers are in, especially if our projections prove wrong. In the meantime, we are going to have to wait and see, and we ask you to do the same, if not with understanding, then at least with patience.

We�ve known this was coming for a long time, but it�s also a pretty good time for it to come. We�re in a position where we can soften the blow a great deal, and we�ve tried to accomplish this as much as possible. Like this past year, we�re pushing for significant growth next year. For those that do happen to fall a level, we�ll push to make that up to you with more sales. For the contributors with files in Vetta or Agency, they should see a significant bump from those collections being sold on Getty Images.

In the last 6 years, easily the thing I�m most proud of is how many lives we�ve changed. We�ve opened a closed industry to tens of thousands of people who love their craft. iStock contributors are earning $1.7 million each week. That number still stupefies me (I wish I could let the 2004 me know!). We expect to bring that number up over $2 million next year.

But money isn�t going to be what makes you all happy. You want to know that this is still the best place to be, to hang out, and sell your work. You may not be convinced today like you were last week, but it�s our job to make sure you feel that way again soon.

Although some of you may still be struggling with the decisions communicated this week, I want you to know that I would tender my resignation at iStock before I had to do something I couldn't stand behind. The same can be said about all Executives here at iStock.

So hang in there. We are focused on getting the work done we need to do before the end of the year.
I've heard some comments that iStock has changed. And it has � we�re a much larger, more successful company. But what hasn't changed is what we value as a company: the people that make iStock kick-ass everyday. The changes we announced this week will keep iStock successful for many years.