Quote from: antoniodalbore on June 09, 2009, 03:06

About the RM agencies I don't know yet what will happen in the future but for the time being I see is that my revenue from RM is falling while those from RF is ramping up.

Of course it is because that's what's happening in the overall market. I've just done an example price check for the use of one image from each of your portfolios for a billboard campaign. I was quoted about $2500 for the highly-restrictive, once-only, answer-10-questions usage of the RM image __ and about $15 for the no-questions, use-as-many-times-as-I-like RF image. That's 166x more expensive for the highly-restricted option and such a huge differential makes little sense to me (both images were taken in China btw).

As it happens there's a bill board campaign in my local area (one them just up the road from my house) which features one of my own images. The image is one from a farm animal series I took a couple of years ago. So far the series have sold about 200x on IS and I've also had 4 EL's at SS from one of the images. I would estimate that so far the series has earned me about $600 and should go on to earn much more. I was just driving past a field when I saw the potential and I stopped for maybe 15 minutes to take a few shots __ of course I wish I'd taken more now. I actually remember thinking as I clicked the shutter "That's a $100's ... that's another $100's ...". Easy and not particularly unusual either. I feel quite well rewarded for my efforts. Why do I need to demand $100's for each useage?

I cannot find the motivation to 'explore' the macro market as I just don't think it has a long-term future. Sure, they'll always be niche agencies for highly-specialised subjects, but not for the mass-market stuff that probably accounts for 99% of sales. I've spoken to a few of my fellow microstockers who have put time and effort into building an RM portfolio and without exception they report that earnings per image are well below what they get from their micro portfolio.

Micro is still relatively new __ even us 'old-hands' have only been doing it 4-5 years and it's only recently that the micro libraries have grown to the size from which to seriously compete with macro. It's only just begun. Give it another 5 or 6 years (maximum) and the 'macro market' will simply not exist as we know it now.

SS currently has a library of 7M images and, at their current rate of growth of 90K new images per week (which has actually been steadily accelerating), will have over 30M by 2015. What subjects/needs won't be covered within that?

When major macro players like Iofoto and many others start feeding the micros with thousands of images then you know that the writing is on the wall. It is surely only a question of 'when', not 'if', that at least one significant macro agency like Alamy will be forced to drastically revise their pricing structure to compete head-on with the micros. When that happens the rest will collapse like a pack of cards. The thousands of smaller agencies, unless they are highly-specialised in something like botanical images or insects, will just disappear.

They'll be very few photographers selling individual licenses for hundreds or thousands of $'s in 5 years time. The smart ones will recognise the direction the wind is blowing and adapt their business model accordingly.

Has anybody who's images were transferred in from SV had their account log-in information sent to them yet?

Just so you guys know, I posted about this on NiltoMil and Shutterstock almost immediately contacted me offering to answer any questions I can't find answers to (previous life I was in law)... so if you have questions, try to accumulate them here or post them to N2M and I'll submit them when I reply to them.  Hopefully having a direct line to some answers will help everyone.

Quote from: massman on May 26, 2009, 10:23

Quote from: Eco on May 26, 2009, 10:13

Josh is not working at Crestock anymore.

Try [email protected]

Shame, he seemed like a nice guy.

Thanks massman, i started uploading a couple of months ago. Buy/Rate here @ http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=2881663

yes but no serious editorial photographer can live with micros earnings.

they will get tons of holiday pictures, but this is scaring, as it can escalate quickly
and erode macros market share.

they were sharp enough to be sold on macros and that's all that matters in the real world.

micropayments : it's the same logic of micropayments and black hat sites as well... but it's still scratching the bottom of the barrel.

for editorial images, i don't know anybody making the same with micros.

Quote from: whatalife on May 22, 2009, 12:59

It's a shame this has once again descended into an exclusive vs. independent debate, and worse, personal attacks. Why the need to convince others they should do what you do? Can't we all make our own decisions here? It's not as if one person becoming exclusive takes something from you, or one person remaining independent is somehow a criticism of another person's choice to become or remain exclusive. It's really a silly argument.

Very well put. 

IMO the exclusive vs. independent thing is a red herring.  Without having a crystal ball, it seems that if this industry continues it's race to the bottom all contributors will lose out, whether exclusive or not.  And if it starts to trend once more to higher prices and royalties then all contributors will benefit. 

ITLR the divisions between selling exclusive or not are minor compared with all our common interest in keeping this microstock ship afloat.