You can see what News photos clients find most useful if you check the Live News Feed shortly after Alamy deletes most photos taken 2 calendar days earlier, their time. (unless I'm jumping to wrong conclusion)

For example, it's now after 7 PM my time (NY), and several photos from April 19 are still on Live News Feed. I assume they're still there because clients continue to show interest in them.
 
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@steheap - You're right - as soon as photos submitted via news route are OK'd by Alamy's news team (which generally takes minutes) they go straight to the Live News Feed, without waiting for contributor to first "Manage Your Images."  

As you pointed out, it's important to have the same Caption for all photos covering same event, since then they'll automatically appear together on the feed. In fact, if you then submit other batches - within about 2 hours - and they have same caption, they'll automatically be placed with the earlier batch.

I've noticed that Alamy sometimes tweaks my captions. For example, last night I listed the names of a few well-known people at a political/academic event for the Caption, but Alamy changed it to the name of the event. I appreciate that they do that, since they certainly must have a better understanding of what info is key to potential clients.

While images are in LIVE NEWS, they won't turn up in regular searches. (They have to be out of Live News feed a while to show up in regular searches.)

For ex -  I also uploaded news photos last night, and within a few minutes, they were visible when one clicked on the "Live News" live link at upper left of Alamy's main page. (They're still there now, but probably will age out soon.)

I also created a Lightbox for that set of photos, and can send it, etc, but when hovering over (or clicking on) an image, "image is not available" appears. I'm guessing that's because an image is available for purchase only through Live News the entire time it's on the Live News Feed.

 * BTW, being a space buff, I vividly remember seeing Space Shuttle photos on Live News Feed recently - they probably were yours!

Hope this helps. - Ann

I tried the Alamy News Upload process yesterday for some images of the Space Shuttle over Washington DC: http://www.backyardsilver.com/2012/04/space-shuttle-discovery-over-washington-dc/

The upload was great - it bypasses the normal QC (where I have some images sitting in the "long term failed" queue!), and you get to keyword them and put the normal release information into the file. That moves them to "Ready for sale." I finished that around 5pm EST yesterday. I thought they would then quickly move into the main database and be available for sale - no such luck. I checked just now and they are in the same state, and not visible in the main database against typical search terms.

Did I miss a step here? It seems strange to have rapid bypassing of QC and then sit for 24 hours waiting to be available for sale.

Steve

Bigstock's having a contest where people can submit whatever image they want just as long as they write where they think-know-guess it came from?

Well, what could POSSIBLY go wrong with such a fail-safe approach to protecting copyright holders rights!

Perhaps I overlooked a section where Bigstock explains they will not use/display/print any image submitted by someone other than its owner unless Bigstock first licenses the appropriate usage from owner.

FWIW, if any stock company I'm involved with enters into a relationship with any company-group-vegetable-mineral where image owners don't have proper role, I'm gone.  It wouldn't be the first time I left an agency with unacceptable practices.

Yesterday I got an email from Bigstock:
"We've teamed up with our friends at printed.com and Pinterest for a sweet Easter contest"
http://www.printed.com/competitions/easter-printed-2012

Pinterest has joined the other file sharing pirates who are using the 'safe harbor' loophole in the DMCA to steal our images, make a profit from them, and give us nothing.
Meanwhile, in other news today, I guess if you have enough friends in high places you can get away with anything. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/social-media/9170718/Barack-Obama-signs-up-to-Pinterest.html

Should we protest Bigstock helping Printerest to rob us?

Well, when it comes to credit/by line, stinkstock gets big props for promoting themselves 100% and most contributors 0%.
Major short and long term benefits for them, so they were darn clever to realize they would get away with it.
(yes, I'm a broken record on this point)

Morphart - sitting here with a big smile, thanks to your very kind words - thank you

lovely Lake Tahoe photo of you & Valerie, RacePhoto!

Morphart's angel arrived today. Awwwwwwwww! 

(BTW, name your wife liked is my middle name, so another coincidence, LOL)

Thanks for posting video, Madelaide. I'd love to see something like that in person.
(Can relate to bringing wrong camera...)

2 more cards arrived!

So enjoyed Pixart's nefarious dancers AND her full-of-personality message  - and I'm not just saying that because she's a fellow "Nikon Girl" 

Leaf - Wow, were you in a helicopter/plane when you took that?!

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reckless - When I saw your post, I checked my account, and - so exciting - I have $5 in VistaCash, and it's good until 1/5/2013. Thank you!

It will come in handy, especially since the MSG Postcard Exchange cards I mailed last night were virtually the last I have of that design.

well, as clicking the below link should show, that photo is no longer online.

And, yes, the important, larger point is: until contributors hold agencies more accountable financially, certain agencies are not going to do all possible to avoid offering photos they have no right to

Thanks for your reply, Pixart.

I absolutely never donated (or accepted 50-cents for) ANY of my fotolia files to Free section/site. Any time fotolia sent me message about option of putting photo in free section, I deleted the photo.

For example, until yesterday, I was sure that this photo had not been available for sale anywhere for over a year:
http://www.photoxpress.com/stock-photos/red/green/tree/4357240

Photoxpress has 3 photos from my closed Fotolia account. (As I understand it, Fotolia feeds Photoxpress.)

I never donated them, or ANY Fotolia files, to Fotolia's free site/section. Until now, I thought 2 out of 3 of them were no longer available on any site!

I have screen shots of all 3 photos showing up for sale on photoxpress.

Is getting Fotolia to take them off the best I can aim for?

Well, Alamy is the one non-microstock site with enough MSG member interest to have its own dedicated active board/sub-forum here, so it could be useful to include it in poll.

Having separate line for RF & RM would give extra info, but I think putting all net earnings together could also be reasonable. (For ex, neither my RF nor RM on Alamy are available on microstock.)

something like this could be at bottom of poll:
-------------------------------

Macrostock

Alamy (net)

This is first I'm hearing about option to get D800 w/o anti-aliasing filter. Why would it be more expensive?

Since Vistaprint is coming up again, I'm going to share my referral code which I posted on RacePhoto's National Postcard Month thread:

When people use this "tell a pal" link for 1st order, they get up to 80% off & I get referral credit:

ann's Vistaprint referral: http://vistaprint.tellapal.com/a/clk/3qJdd

I'm puzzled about the forced Vistaprint watermark situation, since none of my Vistaprint postcards have them.
When you go to design the back of your postcard, you should be able to select and delete any Vistaprint info you see, and replace it with your own, or leave the area blank.

Hope that works, helps.

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Thank you for your good wishes about impeding new generation to family, Morphart!