Hi Dirkr,

Just to clarify - this is a single (1) copy of an item, so it's a single mug or keychain for one person.  It is not a single payment for multiple copies of an item.  If a customer buys (5) copies of a keychain or mug, the royalty would be the equivalent of (5) individual licenses.   

Best,

Scott

Hello,

We have at least three people active in the various forums and many more than that communicating with contributors daily; I take responsibility for the MSG forums but will also post at SS; Vincent posts at the Shutterstock forums and Anna posts in the Russian-speaking forums. Forums are one of dozen(s) of communication channels we maintain, including international events, email, social media (link 1, link 2, link 3), blogs, multilingual guides (link 1, link 2), workshops, dinners and office research visits, etc.  We've added interviews with reviewers and review coordinators to our blog content, and there's a larger team that is engaged with contributors through those channels. 

Historically -- it's important to note -- email is our only "official" support channel because email tickets can be assigned, tracked, and resolved at scale.  But we do engage in the forums when there are bugs -- see examples like this and this.  Again, email is best, because we can track, quantify, forward / assign and resolve issues appropriately through the email system; forums are much more difficult to use for that purpose.

Our team investigates every single review dispute, no matter who the contributor is, whether we've looked before, or whether we've agreed or disagreed in the past.  I personally look into a number of them myself along with our team leads and we track metrics related to the performance of reviewers.  What I've found is that many reviews are the correct review, or at least, it's understandable why the reviewer made their decision.  A very small amount are found to be true errors or issues, which are then addressed with the reviewer.  If a pattern were found, we would address it; we review ten(s) of millions of images; we have a high motivation and interest in reducing the number of errors made, since errors become support requests and second reviews.  We reverse review decisions if we feel the case was an error or borderline.

There's not a lot to say on the topic because every situation is different - some cases the complaints are legitimate and we deal with it.  Sometimes, the original review was correct.  Without going into each individual review publicly in the forum, there's no single, categorical statement that can be made. We realize that might not be satisfying, but it's the truth of what we find when we investigate complaints.

The communication efforts have been ramping up every year and we're always looking for additional ways to improve, but the blog is a great destination; we also expect an upgrade to the forums in the coming months / quarters, and we're happy to meet with people locally as we travel to get direct feedback.

Best,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Thanks,

We're looking into this.

Best,

Scott
VP of Content

Hi Steve,

That team has limited staffing over the weekend, so I went ahead and PM'd you a link.  If anyone has issues with the downloader and wants to PM me over the weekend, please feel free to do so. 

I was able to find an issue where an error would be generated on a mobile device if the device doesn't support Flash.  You can request a guide, but it throws an error at the end of the download process.

We'll get it fixed, message the blog post appropriately, or switch to a different process, but in the meantime, desktop support for downloads appears to be working.  In cases that it's not, it would be greatly appreciated if you can shoot me (or the Support team) a message with any details that will help us troubleshoot, such as your browser version and/or known settings (i.e., Flash installed or not, etc.).   

Thanks!

Scott

Hello All,

One of our biggest goals here at Shutterstock is to foster a safe environment for you to license your content to third parties. We want to make sure that you are equipped with the information you need to protect your content as the digital marketplace expands.

To that end, we have created the Protect Your Content guide so that you can learn more about your rights as an artist, and what you can do to protect these rights.  It's an easy-to-understand, in-depth look at information about legal considerations in creating content � and how to protect your work.

The guide is now available in 8 languages (English, Russian, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Korean and Japanese) here: http://www.shutterstock.com/blog/protecting-your-content-a-guide-now-in-8-languages

While the information contained in this guide is not intended to be legal advice, we hope that this guide helps empower you to make informed decisions regarding your content.

In addition, we'll soon be releasing a Spanish-language version of the Contributor Success Guide (available in 5 languages + Spanish shortly), found here:
http://www.shutterstock.com/blog/contributor-success-guide-available-in-five-languages

And as always, our contributor blog contains a lot of great articles on tips, advice, contributor interviews, and more:

http://www.shutterstock.com/contributor-blog

Best Regards,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hi All,

As of the last few hours, this issue should be largely fixed.  If you're still having problems with uploads or existing images as of 5pm Eastern U.S. time, please let us know at [email protected].

------------

Ethan - I want to keep this on-topic, but I'm happy to respond in the forums as much as possible when I've got something new to add.   We don't "officially" support the forums as a Support channel (for practical reasons in terms of tracking issues, ensuring every contributor gets a response, etc.), but our team tries to be present in the forums as much as possible.  Outside of general feedback -- which is very important -- it's often the case that contributors post a specific issue that needs to be tracked back to understand what happened in the first place, what specific account or image numbers were affected, etc....   That usually happens best or most in email.
 

Best,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hi All,

We experienced some network latency issues today.  New uploads are currently working, but images uploaded earlier today may temporarily appear as broken thumbnails in your account.   Please **do not** delete those images; they should populate correctly into your account within the next 12-24 hours. 

Thank you for your patience and we sincerely apologize for any inconvenience!

Best,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hi All,

Thanks for your patience - I'm now back in New York and able to respond better.

First, I think it's important to look at numbers.  We added over 3 million "accepted" images in Q1 - so obviously, images are getting accepted at record rates.  As I've stated, I can say that quantitatively, the number of complaints that we get is very small relative to the millions of images being reviewed - of which, accepted images are only a part. 

But let's hypothetically say that it's 10, 100, 500 or more disputed reviews out of millions of images processed.  It doesn't matter.  That could be 10, 100, or 500 people who have done work and gotten a result that they either: a) don't agree with; or b) don't understand.  We consider it an obligation to get it right all of the time, or at least do a better job of explaining the review.  One of our key internal measurements is contributor happiness and satisfaction and people aren't going to be happy if they feel that they didn't get an accurate review.

I've looked at a number of these personally.  I've explained in other posts that disputed reviews fall into three categories. 

1) The review was incorrect (i.e., the contributor is 100% right to complain).
2) The review was borderline (i.e., if you were liberal or conservative in interpreting our standards, you could argue the review either way). 
3) The review was 100% correct, but maybe not fully understood or agreed with.

In scenarios #1 or #2, we generally approve on a 2nd pass. We appreciate that contributors have invested their time, creativity and money in creating content, and the goal is of course to take re-review scenarios as close to zero as possible.

In terms of reviewers having an incentive to reject to earn more money - they don't (nor would we accept that).  Our review queues are always receiving new images and submissions are at an all-time high.  We also track a number of metrics related to reviewer activity which would result in seeing that behavior in the numbers or in feedback. 

Obviously, if and when we find an issue -- either internally on our own or via contributor feedback -- we address it.  We have a number of internal ways that we track review performance and the patterns of our reviewers, as well as extensive training programs.  Those things are built-upon daily and weekly and reviewers regularly interact with our coordinators.

I'm personally grateful for the hard work of our reviewers, most of whom come from photo, illustration, and design backgrounds.  They're quite skilled and many have been with us for years.  They're asked to get it right 100% of the time, which is no easy task across thousands (literally millions) of individual judgments. 

We have a large team of reviewers.  If there's an issue, it could be one or two batches out of hundreds or thousands being reviewed.  The best thing has always been to contact us and we'll address it. 

We greatly respect your hard work and welcome both criticism and feedback.

Thank you!

Best,

Scott 

Hi guys,
 
We've been in the process of creating a more detailed FAQ on Review, but to answer the basic question(s) in the meanwhile:
 
We welcome review disputes and feedback when you're unhappy. You guys put a lot of work into image creation and we respect that. Many people on the team are photographers, videographers and illustrators themselves and appreciate the effort that goes into content creation.

There are three basic scenarios that we find when we research review disputes:
 
1. You�re 100% right and there was an error made during the process. Please let us know. We�ll fix it.
2. The review determination was �on the line� and could be viewed either way.  A more forgiving second review can result in the images being approved.  This is a long-standing policy. 
3. The original review determination was correct.
 
In terms of communication, we have individuals participating in the various forums.  For example, Vincent administrates the SS forums, Anna participates in the Russian-speaking forums, and I�ll often respond to inquiries at MSG. We have over a dozen different communication channels, ranging from the blogs, social media, forums, workshops, contributor meetups, email tickets and more.     
 
We read all of that incoming feedback, but we often don�t participate in review threads.  We also ask that support questions only go to our email address.   Why?      
 
With a large team of individual reviewers, over 55,000 contributors and millions of images passing through this process, every single case is different.  We also need to see the exact images in question. 
 
The only "official" process at the moment for handling review feedback is to contact Support.  That logs a trackable ticket in our system which we can then assign to our review coordinators; the "Tier 2" leaders who work directly to evaluate, train, and mentor specific reviewers. They also own the maturation of our guidelines and standards. Tickets can be tracked, escalated, closed, and have the full history of the questions and feedback. We can tie the issue or question to a specific group of images and a specific reviewer.
 
We track the number of issues on a daily and weekly basis, as well as many metrics that allow us to analyze the review process. Statistically speaking, we receive very few complaints to Support relative to the many millions of images that we process, but any number of issues greater than zero is too many and we always want to improve.   
 
As always, if you have a specific batch that was an issue, please let us know at [email protected].  We're happy to help. 

As mentioned, we're also writing up a more extensive FAQ to supplement what's found on the Contributor blog and in educational materials such as our Success guide. We don't want this process to feel mysterious. More to come.

Best,

Scott
VP of Content

I agree with what others have said above. And I'll add that I find it a bit arrogant of buyers to expect very specific images from a stock house�using Scott's example, children (what nationality?) in green and yellow school uniforms�yet they're only willing to buy those images through their monthly subscription, which means the artist gets paid 25-38 cents for what sounds like an expensive and complicated shoot (paying for studio space, multiple models, assistants, hair & makeup, buying uniforms, etc.) with little commercial value outside of countries or regions�or in this case, one buyer�that need children in those school colors.

In these cases, they aren't necessarily buying them through subscriptions, since different classes of clients such as publishers can be on enterprise plans that cost more on a per-image basis. 

I think when someone with Sean's experience and success with micro says something like this, then it would be a good idea to consider it. While I appreciate Scott's input, it is an agency perspective, not a contributor's.

Of course consider Sean's input! I think the important thing to consider when hearing our (Shutterstock's) recommendations or mine personally, is that: a) it's often based on analyzing large amounts of data across diverse customer groups and successful contributor portfolios; b) we visit customers and contributors every single day on a worldwide basis and hear their feedback. That might not be the same for every agency. Next week I'll be in a series of customer meetings to hear what images they want to license and I'll be meeting with contributors as well.  Do what you will with that information! My goal is only to connect you to it so you have opportunities to make more money and have a great experience licensing images.

Best,

Scott

Quote from: scottbraut on May 04, 2014, 07:32

If an educational institution ... is looking for an image to use on their ... brochures, it's likely something more intimate and close up.   

Would you count that as a fair use for an editorial photo?

(Though in reality they'd no doubt make their own photos for their own site or brochure.)

I'm sure it depends on context (who is using it and in what capacity). I'll grab our "official" standard from our Compliance team.  We're in the process right now of translating an free eBook on these topics. I can say that schools here in the U.S. are often pressed to not use copyrighted material, or material that otherwise creates risk.   

How many buyers need images of school children in a white and green uniform? Probably only one buyer, so you get a few sales. Thats not solving the problem we are facing.

PS: I submitted an editorial shot once, of school children in Dublin on a school trip. It was rejected for lighting, even it being the only image of school children in Dublin wearing a uniform had it been accepted by SS. So much for trying to fill the gaps.

Hi Ron,

Thanks.  I was just giving a hypothetical example, but to answer your question - quite a few buyers could need that image if say, for example, the uniforms within a particular country (or countries) are similar.  Every publisher that serves educational institutions needs them and what they tell us is that they default to using the few images that they can find over and over.

Most respectfully (and in the interest of constructive criticism), your image above makes my earlier point about composition and other attributes of the image being key distinctions. If an educational institution or publisher is looking for an image to use on their website, books and brochures, it's likely something more intimate and close up.   If it's a publisher specifically, they'd be looking for different actions or activities that look natural.

Street photography can still be valuable for filling gaps, but based on what we know about how images perform, there can be very different results based on how the image was constructed.

Again - this is just me passing information based on what we've seen in practice when studying what images bring the highest returns to artists.   One thing that we know absolutely (using illustrative editorial images as an example), is that gaps in the collection -- when filled with quality content -- can be a great source of revenue.  And I would argue that quality content is not something that's always or necessarily tied to the cost to produce an image.


Best,

Scott