Note to add to my previous post :

I will make sure that no file of mine ever sells for anything less than 20%.
Especially at IStock.
That's where I draw the line. 20%.

Nice.... Your work is undervalued that way and again you're giving signal to other agencies that they can cut your royalties to 20%.

This all with most of logic and sense for money earning in most cases comes up to total beggars stance from most of resulting statements I saw here.
I urge to all of you who would bend and "take it from behind" to educate yourself into basics of running the business so you know what is sustainable minimum for doing stock.
There are your expenses needed to cover so you can produce stock images (no matter if you have free models or free makeup) but economical logic say that you have 2 bottom lines which are very dependent in term that you must subtract first bottom line (your expenses) from second bottom line (your income).  Then, regarding to that what stays in your pocket you must plan to sustain your production and that will make you more expenses in the future which again lead to two bottom lines and circle closed with starting again to subtract bottom lines and so on. Dont forget to add to first bottom line your new lense or camera or so which you need to stay competitive.
If that two bottom lines are giving result which is unsustainable then you should first drop all agencies which sell your work undervalued. I doubt that even 20% sale is enough to be sustainable except you sell your work like hot cookies.

Those 30% will be 1/4 less of it soon or 22.5% if all traffic stays as it is. So, you are loosing 7.5% of your total as soon as changes take effect.

But, you can adapt to new situation with spreading your port all over the places starting right now. Plus, you can afford yourself a bit (just a bit) lower quality work in this period regarding boosting your quantity in portfolio.

why would you want microstockers to not accept these terms? i'm sure many will be joining you in rm competition very soon if you instigate them any further.

It is simple: Greed ;-)

And trust me - there is quite difference about micro and macro. But still I think you all can buy you some more time if you don't accept that misery of 15%

Quote from: Albert Martin on September 11, 2010, 16:28

Regarding 2 FACTS:

1. With leaving content there you are giving signal to other agencies that they CAN reduce your royalties for 1/4 (25%) too as iStock did.

2. With leaving your content there you are giving 85% of money to iStock and Getty on any sale your images make.

Have you come up to those two FACTS?

Why would you leave your content on iStock after changes take effect?

In fact all agencies can do whatever they want, and no action taken by a single contributor will do anything at all. Then only way taking out your port could be something meaningfully would be if there was some kind of UNION in our band, and we made this as a collective group. If you and a bunch more of people take your port out they wouldn't even notice it, and the only loosing money will be you. Sad but true, we should have an UNION if we want to threaten them with our actions, and negotiate better conditions.

Exactly that your point of view will reduce royalties to that kind of "money" that you will not have enough to continue doing what you do now.
In any business there is some bare minimum of income which must be accomplished to stay in the game. While you are whining that you can't do anything and that you will loosing "money". What any independent must be educated about is what represents difference about "money" and money.
While you are calculating that 15% represents money I will be free to tell you that is much less than 85% of MONEY which they will took for what? For selling your works to buyers which they have attracted with highest prices and advertising using YOUR money.

You people seems that your logic is wrong as well that "unsustainable" 80% for iStock will make you sustainable 15% royaties. Someone has crippled mind and that for sure is not iStock management!

If you again think a bit more about this matter where is logic that you as content producer get 15% and those who only sell your work are taking 85% of sales price?
If you say that you are afraid of competition, then find other job. If you think that competition won't rise in the future then you are still sleeping. But, aside with competition when your seller is reducing your space to be creative with 25% cut in your royalties.
So, take your "money" while you can and enjoy while it lasts because this will not be sustainable for you or any other contributor in long term!

And if not some time after, before you adapt on new iStock royalties there will be reducing of mentioned all over other agencies because you as independent contributors are accepting unacceptable...

I am very sad for you!

Back to my RM...

Bye!

What counts for me is that there is limit and that limit must be known to all of us.
I mean on limit in what I can earn from my images as well what some agency can or can not do.

What is not right is that agency decides terms and conditions for authors where there is no possibility to make any pressure to them not to touch our cut!

15% for author is misery where they are constantly boosting standards sky-high so you always must have high quality results with expensive equipment.

Ok... My caclulation says that I need to upgrade my camera every year and live from stock (which means pay the bills, eat and go to vacation) plus having enough finances to fund my creations (paying for MUA, hairdresser, location, crew, renting additional equipment)... That sounds like there is no more place for hobby shooters and pros will come up as only ones who can follow this but at the end only as small additional part of income!

What is most funny of all is one of current exclusives on iStock is calculating that if he drops his exclusivity he will have 50% less income on istock.
That calculated on my and others income comes up to around at least 10% more than he is earning now with his port on shutterstock and istock only. I can't imagine how those people are awfully informed about rest of industry besides Getty and iStock... That is iStock is microstock for them and there is nothing else they ever looked at.

Other is what with his 4000 - 6000 images on other agencies which counts to at least additional 50% of his current earnings.

Total should be about 60% higher than what he earns now as istock exclusive.

Maybe my calculation isn't completely right but it is for sure that any exclusive with 2000+ images will earn more as non-exclusive with wide spread than on istock.

[added] Dreamstime offer sounds better and brings more cash per sale... That said If I must, I'd sell under Dreamstime exclusive flag.

Quote from: sharpshot on September 09, 2010, 06:24

I like the idea of working with one or a few or the sites that pay us a fair commission.  We could give them a contributors recommendation and only link to those sites and give them as much publicity as possible.

Then we could contact buyers and explain that we will no longer be able to supply some sites because they have cut our commissions and they will have to look at these other sites if they want to see our new work.

Yep! That could work!

It seems that 15% can ruin 85% in marketing very quickly...

So we need to find several agencies that MSG may issue a some kind of certificate " fair commision agency"or "photographers friendly "...
That would be a true example of the independence of this forum ...

Good Idea!

Start with: ALAMY, Shutterstock, The3DStudio, GL, FP, StockFresh and all others who are doing this with minimum 50% royalties for their contributors. Why shutterstock? Well... I like them ;-)

Quote from: larsfrisk on September 08, 2010, 04:10

I guess this have been discussed before, but isn't it time to start an International Microstock Union? An organization that could take the fight for us, try to keep royalties up and try to get buyers to think more about what the contributors get at the different microstock sites. They could also contact the media exposing the greedy microstock sites, giving them bad publicity.

I'm not a business guru, but a "union" wouldn't work.  A union has to have some sort of power - ie., the autoworkers or teachers or whatever stop working and go stand outside.  What is a stock union going to say?  Stopping a small percentage of uploads for a period of time?  The old stuff is still there.  The people who don't have a vested interest keep uploading.  No one is going to deactivate their entire portfolio for a week.

You'd only have "Bob" at the head of the group saying "We all don't like this idea!", which they (royal they) knew from the start.

Union should make incorporating stock agencies countries to legislate this problems. That is why union and how union. So, Union means that we all pay our taxes and want to be protected from corporate theft on our works. It is doable but very hard! Union should become strong political movement regarding these issues. But, designers can help us create union and even join in. So, then corporations will scratch their heads twice before they do anything with "minus" word in announcements ;-)

Quote from: lisafx on September 07, 2010, 17:16

Quote from: helix7 on September 07, 2010, 16:53

It's all about the designers, and if you guys really want to make a statement, it's going to have to be with buyers. Frankly, istock probably doesn't care if a few people delete their portfolios or stop uploading. If they are going to feel any impact from this, it'll have to come from buyers. If you're a designer and purchase stock images, look elsewhere from now on. If you know people who buy from istock, let them know what's going on and that they could actually save money AND support artists by taking their business elsewhere.

This is very smart Mike.  I have been looking into getting a site built and had been trying to decide which agency to link the images to.  Had been considering Istock just this morning.  I will be choosing another site that pays a decent % instead.  

Also, my current business cards have the link to my IS portfolio.  I will be changing that and ordering new cards ASAP.  

Maybe not much, but if everyone with their own site or blog did the same thing it could have some impact.  And what about the industry bloggers?  Hopefully they will be vocal about these changes to warn buyers.  

Someone else said it, but it bares repeating...  MANY iStock exclusives are going to drop their exclusive status and flood other sites with images that use to only be available on iStock.  I think Buyers will notice this, especially since prices are lower on most other sites.

Many Istock  EX exclusives will find that many other places will not accept wast of their images due to different standards. There is Shutterstock with almost 12 million images. Dreamstime don't accept much of similars. Fotolia has specific taste. 123RF rejects by default daily sum of images. It will be very interesting to see where will go that EX exclusives as well how will they succeed on other places... Not to mention StockFresh and Crestock ;-)

[ADDED] I wonder is this again idea of some fat-ass from Getty? If it is, then soon no more Istock.

Most of people talk about Istock as: "they are the best and greatest"... Now most will must add: "And they pay the lowest royalties in the industry"... Incredible!

"Master the challenges and stay alive or die trying."

Well put!

That says it all.