I would draw a parallel with Music...there is no longer value in the music that is available mostly free. Physical presence counts such as concerts people even pay to shake hands with their heroes The situation has reveresed from when the concert was a means of marketing records.

So the money is in training/workshops event photography...any  thing that requires human presence.

Kodak tried to maintain the value of their product by resisting change they were flattened.

Quote from: rinderart on February 15, 2020, 11:12

I hope sooner than Later. someone will come along and Offer a 50/50 Split and they Better do it soon as Micro as we Know it is going away. Any company who Can't make a profit with 50% of others work Doesn't deserve to be In Business...........Period. Nuff said. Im done.

50/50 does not mean that the company makes 50% of profit. From this you have to subtract all the management costs.
In order to be viable a company must make at least 30% profit (this is a generally accepted rule, although not mandatory).
So the question is, with 50/50, once the costs are subtracted, is there at least 30% profit left?
Certainly if Shutterstock would move its offices to Vietnam it could recoup a lot on the costs�

No one has ever run a succesful stock site for very long paying out 50% as far as I can tell. Contributors hugely underestimate the costs I think. Particularly marketing. Profit margins vary widely by industry normally dictated by risk which is why succesful tech companies have big margins.

To find 10,000 contributors to risk $1,000 dollars is totally unrealistic. A small co-operative with top quality photographers with the same values and mind set is conceivable and thats what I believe Stocksy are. I can't see how taking the likes of Shutterstock/Adobe Istock head on from zero is remotely feasible.

it's a company who clearly don't have a clue of what they are doing...rejection for invisible noise is the norm, then they add fe noise crap that can be seen especially from new contributors...really go to some thread of shutter stock forum and see some portfolio, files without any clues or interest commercial value added daily,unbelievable...next financial year will be the nail odin the coffin of this company.

and yet they are the most profitable microstock company....how many years have you been predicting they will go bust? They are very good at marketing to buyers which is what really matters sadly.

This forum is about stock photography but the reality is that outsourcing labour costs to where costs are lower has been common for the past 15+ years.

I remember when HSBC and dozens of other UK banks moved their operations overseas and the controversy this caused. This was 2003.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/hsbc-to-outsource-4000-uk-bank-jobs-to-asia-91762.html

Back to the stock photography universe, obviously prices are dropping. No question about that. So what is one to do if they live in an "expensive part of the world". Perhaps some solutions:

1. Move to a less expensive part of the world.
2. If you shoot lifestyle, try to differentiate yourself. For instance, it may be difficult for those dozens of stock producers in eastern Europe to find models of different ethnic types, although I have to admit that I haven't researched.
3. As mentioned by Snow, shooting news / human interest editorials which cannot be replicated in a studio. Although putting them exclusively on Alamy is risky imo.
4. Shooting travel of places that aren't saturated still has a future because the cost barriers associated people from lower income countries. Although we're talking about more far-flung places, after all someone from Belgrade can travel low-cost to almost anywhere in Europe these days and stay at a hostel.
5. Shoot video: Less saturated, for now..especially the 4K variety.
6. Demote the stock stuff to pure hobby with some income instead of relying on it to make a living. Sometimes we all have to know when to move on.

Moving labour  costs to cheaper countries has been happening for 100s of years look at the clothing industry for example. Technology has enabled this in the more middle class "knowledge" industries. The lifespan of "microstock" as a viable business for suppliers  was always going to be limited. For people who make a living from photography probably the best strategy is to look at other avenues and have stock as a minor income stream.

Other than iStock, AS, SS and Alamy, I don't care about rejections at these small agencies.

Do others feel the same way?

Yes its probably not financially justifyable for most of us to upload new material let alone chasing down rejections. Only if I had something I thought had huge potential value would I consider resubmitting.

Unless a miracle happens its going to be my worst month on SS for a long time and as nowhere else seems to be stepping up my worst for even longer. Maybe partly/mainly my fault as I'm not really motivated to add new content.

I love Haggis specially a wild one I've hunted down myself

How would you take these stats?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You are in the top 20% of all contributors. However you are in the top 10% in terms of uploads so you are one of the hard workers....if it were me I'd take it as a sign to concentrate more on quality over quantity.

I'm amazed Shutterstock still bother with it. Not so long back they invested more in it apparently ...odd

I have earnings added for that week but the graph hasn't been updated. December was a good month for me above my 12 month running average. The last three months have been decent after a dip.

Good blog, but this part bafffled me:

Quote

I�m really trying hard to justify why I keep uploading to iStock when they provide, by far, one of the lowest Returns Per Download for the majors, at around 0.45 cents and non-exclusive commissions are at a pathetic 15%.

However, I�ll keep uploading to them because $100 a month is better than $0 but I can�t say that I feel good about it.

Uploading to one of the worst offenders in microstock for a mere $100 "because it's better than $0?"? That's flawed logic. You're saying you have a hard time justifying it.
I would understand it if you keep your portfolio online, but uploading new content to a greedy agency is exactly the reason why they're able to stay afloat.

Why is it flawed logic? I can see why people don't want to do it but its a rational thing to do.

 "�From now on I'm thinking only of me."

Major Danby replied indulgently with a superior smile: "But, Yossarian, suppose everyone felt that way."

"Then," said Yossarian, "I'd certainly be a damned fool to feel any other way, wouldn't I?�
― Joseph Heller, Catch-22

I'm not sure Microstock companies are well versed in the financial side of this as most seem unable to pay in more than one currency and either pay monthly or take weeks to process payments so I don't think they are at the leading edge of finance ;-). Given the volatility of Crypto it would probably need instant pay outs or you could find yourself earning +/- 50% of what you thought. Crypto seems to me to be as far from the mainstream as ever to me.