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Messages - MarcvsTvllivs
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76
« on: February 23, 2016, 02:56 »
Thanks a lot, very interesting to read!
Do you have any insight into why it seems like Western stock companies are not doing that well in China? Is it lack of local sales and marketing? At least from what I can tell from the Shutterstock map widget, I basically never get sales on the Chinese mainland, and that's even though many of my best-selling images in both RF and RM are either Asian-themed (Asian models, Asian travel images) or internationally-recognized landmarks that sell everywhere else.
Very different situation for Taiwan by the way, where I get a quite a few RM sales. My Asian model imagery also sells well in the U.S. for diversity marketing / marketing to Asian-Americans.
On the contrary, western companies are doing quite well here, but it is via distributors. VCG is the sole distributor of Getty Images, HelloRF is the sole distributor of ss, and I guess most of their sales are western content. I assume you are referring to the sales map of ss which never shown any sales in mainland China, that's because the official website(www.shutterstock.com) was blocked here, so ss doesn't have any IP from here. But instead, ss show them in the Atlantic I think. As for the RM content, I don't know, maybe it is because Asia is very big, although you are using Asian models but they are obviously different from authentic local Chinese people. And another reason is the market trends here is very different from yours, the commercials and designers here are left behind from western market, people with white background are selling well here.
Good points and very interesting information regarding Shutterstock. You're right about the models of course. Even if born and grown up in Asia, decades in the U.S. will change style and look. Not to speak of how my own perspective is culturally influenced.
77
« on: February 22, 2016, 04:27 »
Was out shooting in a city I hadn't been to before and ran into trouble. I noticed a guy across the street checking me out. Sizing me up. Then he started following me. When I went to go back down the street he crossed the street and stood in my way yelling something. I stopped and he was about 15 feet in front of me. He was probably in his early 30s, strong build, and may have been homeless, on drugs, or just a mouthy thug looking for a victim. I'm a pretty big guy and just stared him down until he backed off. He still followed me and kept yelling.
I've had a few minor run-ins with people but nothing as close to a brawl as this. When I'm in my hometown I carry a knife. Can't do that when traveling on an airplane.
Ever have any problems like this? You carry any extra protection while traveling?
The only weapon I carry is comprehensive equipment insurance. Getting mugged means a camera upgrade for me...
78
« on: February 21, 2016, 10:25 »
Thanks a lot, very interesting to read!
Do you have any insight into why it seems like Western stock companies are not doing that well in China? Is it lack of local sales and marketing? At least from what I can tell from the Shutterstock map widget, I basically never get sales on the Chinese mainland, and that's even though many of my best-selling images in both RF and RM are either Asian-themed (Asian models, Asian travel images) or internationally-recognized landmarks that sell everywhere else.
Very different situation for Taiwan by the way, where I get a quite a few RM sales. My Asian model imagery also sells well in the U.S. for diversity marketing / marketing to Asian-Americans.
79
« on: February 21, 2016, 07:26 »
..............I'm going out for dinner.............. I like your style.
80
« on: February 18, 2016, 05:35 »
OP is confusing copyright & trademark - BOTH require releases, but some agencies will accept them as editorial
This is the answer to the perceived disagreement between Shutterstock's policy and the fact that boats aren't copyrighted (although of course all the people saying "it doesn't matter because Shutterstock can just refuse them on their own policy" are right too). The funnel is trademarked, not copyrighted. If you're interested, you can check out the trademark right here: http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4806:nmeamp.6.1Now, would that trademark make it a legal problem to sell images containing it? Probably not, but it may in some cases. That's enough for Shutterstock not to want anything to do with it, and I for one understand.
81
« on: February 12, 2016, 09:56 »
Since opting out I had one request for $16. I told them to come back when it's $28+.
82
« on: February 05, 2016, 12:10 »
Not Alamy. They allow me to register for VAT payments only if I have a UK ID, which I do not. When I ask them what to do, they say "no need to worry about VAT if you're from another member state.", which is wrong.
Why should they register you for VAT charges when you explain yourself that the reverse charge mechanism allows you to skip charging VAT for international transactions?
Alamy this is totally correct. VAT only is an issue if you and the buyer/agency are within the same country because in those cases you have to charge country-internal VAT. I do get a VAT report and VAT added from my German agencies correctly. But I don't (and don't need that) for agencies based in other EU countries (nor overseas, of course).
Across borders, you do NOT charge the VAT, that's the idea of the reverse charge - unless the buyer is a private person. You just have to make sure that your business partner has a valid EU VAT ID to skip charging the VAT. Alamy is responsible for charging and reporting their VAT to the UK tax service but that doesn't affect you or your business at all.
You're right, I don't have to pay VAT under reverse charge, but I have to report it. And for that, if I ever get audited, I need a valid invoice (or credit note if issued by Alamy) that has both my and Alamy's VAT ID on it. That's what I don't have, and that's why I am worried. But there isn't really anything I can do besides not get audited.
83
« on: February 05, 2016, 06:43 »
As a EU-based contributor who is liable to pay VAT, I have to follow EU VAT regulations. For EU cross-border b2b license sales -- i.e. when I receive money from an agency that is in another EU member state -- that means that I need to report the amounts to my local tax authority together with the buyer's EU VAT ID. The idea is that the buyer has to pay his local VAT rates on the transaction (so-called "reverse charge"). This has not been a problem with most agencies. AGE Fotostock for example is very good at following these rules.
Not Alamy. They allow me to register for VAT payments only if I have a UK ID, which I do not. When I ask them what to do, they say "no need to worry about VAT if you're from another member state.", which is wrong.
Has anybody else encountered this problem? And if so, how did you solve it? It is my duty to report the sale here at home and to give them Alamy's VAT ID with the report, but I have a feeling that Alamy won't be too amused if I do that and their own tax man comes after them for not having paid UK VAT on the sale...
Maybe you overthink a little :-) You actually have nothing to worry!
Yes, you have to file a reverse charge VAT return with them, but its a "0" declaration = thats the defintion of the reverse charge. Only the final consumer has to pay VAT and you can be safe that Alamy follows the rules. And f not its not your problem. The reverse charge mechanism in the EU has no financial consequences, it allow the member states just to monitor the transactions and B2B (you doing business with Alamy) is exempt from VAT payments.
In short:
Here you find the VAT number of Alamy:
http://www.alamy.com/contactus/uk.asp
You copy-paste it to your invoice, let you accountant do the reverse charge for that number if you receive a payment and you are done. No need to get even in touch with them.
Have a nice day :-)
So that's what you do then? Just report the reverse charge? It's what I was going to do, but my accountant told me not to because Alamy's invoices are insufficient for our revenue agencies (and it's not like we contributors invoice Alamy, Alamy just issues a credit note) and the ensuing chaos if they ever audited me would probably not be worth it. But if other contributors are doing this I guess I'll just do it too. Thanks!
84
« on: February 04, 2016, 16:16 »
As a EU-based contributor who is liable to pay VAT, I have to follow EU VAT regulations. For EU cross-border b2b license sales -- i.e. when I receive money from an agency that is in another EU member state -- that means that I need to report the amounts to my local tax authority together with the buyer's EU VAT ID. The idea is that the buyer has to pay his local VAT rates on the transaction (so-called "reverse charge"). This has not been a problem with most agencies. AGE Fotostock for example is very good at following these rules.
Not Alamy. They allow me to register for VAT payments only if I have a UK ID, which I do not. When I ask them what to do, they say "no need to worry about VAT if you're from another member state.", which is wrong.
Has anybody else encountered this problem? And if so, how did you solve it? It is my duty to report the sale here at home and to give them Alamy's VAT ID with the report, but I have a feeling that Alamy won't be too amused if I do that and their own tax man comes after them for not having paid UK VAT on the sale...
85
« on: February 04, 2016, 06:30 »
In the end I mostly used Premium, but as there aren't *any* direct sales through Zoonar *ever* and as the categories do not matter for distribution partners (I used to get 0,50 "Premium" distributor sales), it won't matter.
All in all very, very few sales and then I pretty much got shadow-banned for going after a customer of theirs who used a photo in breach of the license... not the best of experiences, really.
86
« on: January 29, 2016, 15:44 »
I've opted out as well.
87
« on: January 20, 2016, 05:53 »
I'm not sure that legally you actually require a property release for ANYTHING......so its the agencies call and they tend to be cautious
http://danheller.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/busting-myths-about-model-releases.html
This person skims over the facts and ignores the cases where we do need a release. Famous animals are protected. A neighbor dog or a stray cat aren't. Unless it's somehow a prize show dog. He gives people a false impression that we are allowed to do almost anything, when the truth is, it's each case and situational.
http://asmp.org/tutorials/using-property-releases.html
We don't need a release to take a photo. We don't need a release to sell a photo or a license. As news or art we can display and sell. But if it's used in a way that is harmful to the owner, we can be sued, should have a release. It's much more complicated than yes or no.
Generally speaking, in most laws animals aren't "protected" against photography at all. That's because taking an image of something does not reduce that something in any way, it is not an infringement on the owner's property rights. Property releases are required by platforms to avoid a couple of issues, none of which have anything to do with the subject legally being personal property of someone: 1. Copyright or design rights of the makers of a thing. The easiest here is art, of course. Sell a photo of a sculpture and you may need the artist's (NOT the owner's!) okay. This also applies to architecture and some designed objects. 2. Trademark and name rights. If I want to sell an image of my dad's MacBook with the Apple logo displayed, I need Apple's consent -- NOT my dad's. 3. Avoid trouble. In 99% of the cases where an agency requires a property release, it will simply be by their own guidelines, not because the law says so. They just want to avoid trouble with certain troublesome people -- like pet owners.
88
« on: January 18, 2016, 11:07 »
Pets are considered to be personal property so a release is needed.
Needed by these platforms, one should add. It's not like releases are generally required for images of personal property in the laws of most countries.
89
« on: January 11, 2016, 08:14 »
I never agreed to Getty distribution (on account of the exclusivity) so I don't know what would happen if I had.
For now I haven't received any emails and the Getty distribution agreement I am being offered on the site still says that it is for exclusive distribution through Getty.
90
« on: January 11, 2016, 02:52 »
yes, i noticed that too; the ppl from the States (*US that is).. say aluminum and not aluminIUM
and would of ..and not would HAVE , and wa*er instead of WAT-TER *water.
I will take some exception to that. The "English" wa*er and would of you're quoting is only heard among a certain kind of "ppl" in the US. Generally not well educated. Please don't assume every American says wa*er and would of
As for "aluminum," yep, you're right. Most of us say it that way, including me. Adding an extra syllable to emphasize the *i* in "ium" at the end sounds British to me.
But remember, many of us Americans also pronounce the name "American" as "Amur'can," so we're equal-opportunity language slobs.
Let's not forget that a certain kind of Brits say wa*er, too. Just that it sounds more like woah*ah.
91
« on: January 10, 2016, 04:08 »
I have a job. I started doing stock as a student when I had lots of time; these days I hardly shoot and upload even more rarely.
92
« on: January 08, 2016, 04:05 »
EyeEm was always non-exclusive. Only if you agreed to be distributed through Getty did it change to exclusive.
93
« on: January 04, 2016, 02:55 »
I just about doubled my income at SS in 2015 over 2014. Not sure how much I uploaded, but I definitely did not double my port, so it was a good year.
94
« on: December 12, 2015, 05:35 »
I price my images at $25 each and it works for me. I get a payout with exactly two sales that way, so I actually get a payout quite often.
Yes, Pond5 keeps telling me that I am pricing my images too high. I keep replying "is this still a set-your-own-price website?" and they leave me alone.
95
« on: December 10, 2015, 12:47 »
The number of sales at Alamy for me has been increasing steadily (year over year increase between 2013 and 2015 is exactly linear), but gross revenue is increasing at a much slower pace.
Still, I made a decent number of sales for a decent amount, so it wasn't a bad year for me.
96
« on: November 22, 2015, 10:20 »
As someone who often defended 500px on here, I feel betrayed. What a terrible, terrible move, and what a signal to us contributors.
Also note how representatives of 500px are absent from this discussion when usually they jump in after less than a page of posts. Is that a preview of the coming iStockization of contributor relations?
Makes me sick.
97
« on: November 03, 2015, 08:47 »
So, I get that you(pic) steal the terms off a well-established website like 500px, especially seeing that they are quite fair terms, and that someone clearly put a lot of work into them. What I don't get is that you then try and amateurishly astroturf complaints about those very terms. Did think nobody would compare the YouPic terms to the 500px terms when you say "but YouPic has better terms!"? Spot the difference: "The license granted to 500px includes the right to use your Content fully or partially for promotional reasons and to distribute and redistribute your Content to other parties, web-sites, applications, and other entities, provided such Content is attributed to you in accordance with the credits (i.e. username, profile picture, photo title, descriptions, tags, and other accompanying information) if any and as appropriate, all as submitted to 500px by you;" "The license granted to YouPic includes the right to use your Content fully or partially for promotional reasons and to distribute and redistribute your Content to other parties, web-sites, applications, and other entities, provided such Content is attributed to you in accordance with the credits (i.e. username, profile picture, photo title, descriptions, tags, and other accompanying information) if any and as appropriate, all as submitted to YouPic by you;" You clearly think we are idiots, which I find rather insulting.
98
« on: October 08, 2015, 01:23 »
So, if I understand correctly, you only upload minimum required size of photo and deprive yourself from making money from XL credit sales?
Or maybe, if a buyer wants your photo (even if sub sale) and sees he can't get max. size, downloads photo from another contributor which has max. size?
Neither of these things happen in the real world. XL sales are -- outside of subs -- extremely rare. And sub buyers just take the larges available size, they rarely seem to care what that size is. On some sites the available sizes don't even change with the upload size. Larger sizes just get interpolated.
99
« on: September 24, 2015, 15:25 »
And only local ruling in Rome, as I understand it. I hoped it would be more general somehow - and make more people aware that Public Domain (or I-just-found-it-on-Google) was not permission to copy and use for free....
Oh well.
Public domain *is* permission to copy and use. Or rather: you don't even need permission for that. "I found it on Google" is not public domain. *That* is what people need to learn.
100
« on: September 24, 2015, 02:57 »
I've just seen this - anybody understand it? From Rapisardi Intellectual Property:
Recently the Tribunal of Rome has established the correct interpretation for the article 2 of Facebook Statement of Rights and Responsibilities, that distinguish the concept of IP contents (i.e. photos and videos) from other contents not covered by Intellectual Property rights.
Quoting the tribunal verdict, The freedom to use contents published by users using the Public setting is strictly limited to the information and does not concern the IP content, since the users only grant Facebook a non-exclusive, transferable license
Therefore no one is free to use uploaded photographic images without the owners consent on the sole ground of being published with the Public setting.
It means you don't put your images in the public domain just because you post them with the "public" setting on Facebook. In other words: duh.
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