As soon as you get shareholders involved in any company where the business model is a co-operative model, you can kiss goodbye to being paid fairly.

I know Shutterstock was never set up as this model, but in effect, that's what it is and this is the same across the microstock market.

The reality is, they along with Getty/iStock, 123RF, DepsitPhotos have all operated this model, they are like 18th Century Mill Owners in the UK, once they had bought production in house, they consistently cut the wages of the employees, until they were dirt poor, while they lived in wacking great mansions.

Even when they went on strike these were broken up by the local militias; and no unions, in many ways this is very similar to today, except they use regressive imposed at will contracts.

The avarice of those who believe they are clever running these companies to the detriment of the artists is something that should be legislated against.

I'm not sure how this should be done, to make it fair across the board, but it does seem to me that the shareholder model is severely broken.

The other problem is of course that the size of the microstock market flies under the radar for most Governments, it's the large Tech Companies that draw all the attention, and lets face it most of these companies working practices are appalling and in some cases slave labour.

Personally, I believe that Shutterstock along with Getty in the long run are finished, talent always votes with it's feet.

Thanks @For Real for the link.

Me wonders whether SS isn't being prepared for a sell off to an 'investment' group. When you're not prepared to invest in a couple of people to manage/moderate a forum it will get out of hand (sort of Godwin's Law-light). An unmoderated forum with all its adverse comments is going to be bad for business/stock price if your main interest is to get the stock price up so that all the senior management can cash out at the top.

Those guys are the insiders and must have a good idea of how the company is 'progressing' since the new rates for contributors were implemented. What if there's a trend by the major image factories to not give their new model-released work to SS because they can no longer make any money at SS? Then you know that in time your image base will become stale and that it's time to boost the stock price before you cash out. Any indications that the peasants are revolting must be quelled, otherwise a potential investor might be a little worried by the unrest among the natives/suppliers found on the forums.

Pure speculation on my part and only time will tell.

Quote from: jodijacobson on November 23, 2019, 15:20

I have two Canon 5D4's. I fell and can't lift them so I didn't shoot in over a year. I just bought the Iphone 11pro and this phone camera blows the Canon away! Everything I am shooting is getting accepted. The color right out of the phone for stock is fantastic. It even shoots in the dark without noise!

The phone is 12 MP and the 5D4 is 30.1 MP, so you're not getting the same in resolution.  It does NOT blow the Canon away.  It's a nice phone camera, but not a replacement for a dslr.  And according to this comparison article https://digital-photography-school.com/iphone-11-pro-versus-the-canon-5d-mark-iv/ they say, "As for noise and sharpness, I don�t notice any issues when viewing the photos at a normal viewing size. But viewing the images large (which can be done here) shows significant noise and lack of clarity in all of the iPhone images."  So, you're not getting images in the dark without noise.  You're just not viewing them large enough to see it.