So what?  let them give em away free, Google, IS, Getty, anybody else?  who cares?  My RMs are still intact. Cant be touched.

tisk, tisk, tisk. What a shame, so sad.

I personally knows a guy who knows two owners of large stock-sites, they in their turn know some more and its unanimous, sales are down everywhere. 

Bingo!

Quote from: sharpshot on January 22, 2013, 12:08

Quote from: a2ndLook on January 22, 2013, 11:39

....They admitted their shortcomings. They said that they have heard the complaints of their customers and set about to make the improvements....

  If istock was still owned by Bruce, it would have a chance but its much more complicated.

If IS was still owned by Bruce we wouldn't be in this mess now.

I hope youre joking?  Bruce sold!  knowing full well the Getty track record. He wouldnt be able to do anything about IS.

Oringer OTOH, he could so something but hardly in his interest, is it.

Im still earning good money at IS. I have no reason to see them go down. I might beef at them but thats it. Never wish for another ones fall. It backfires.

I will be deactivating a minimum of 100 images from my not-so-large port.

Also, I have posted an article about the Deactivation threat from contributors. I have over 2000 followers on Twitter and nearly 1000 on Facebook, most of whom are graphic designers, bloggers, and fellow photographers. This article will be promoted through social media to spread the word to our target audience, and hopefully get the plight of artists recognized by the mainstream media.

Furthermore, as I wrote in the Selling Stock Direct Link Exchange thread, I have included a list of websites from which artists are selling their images direct from. I will have further thoughts in that forum about how to continue revealing how agencies treat artists, and the options buyers have for avoiding the agencies altogether.

http://www.warmpicture.com/blog/2013/01/21/artists-fight-back-d-day-for-istockphoto-and-google/

Brilliant article Dan!  very well written. Glad to be a part of Warmpicture! 

Quote from: ShadySue on January 20, 2013, 20:16

Interesting post by Bill Brooks over on Alamy's forum:
"I think this will work for Getty, if history is any indication. As the market leader, I think Getty can set the terms of business, and other stock libraries have to follow.

Around 2002 Getty reset the terms of the stock business, and most full time professional stock photographers found that they could not make a living. Professional stock photographers protested, formed the Stock Artists Alliance, and Getty responded with statements like "we are not the photographers friend". Full time professional stock photographers mainly went out of the stock business. They turned to assignments, books, blogs, teaching, to generate their main income. They made beer money from the occasional stock image produced as a byproduct of their non stock photographic activities.

Getty were able to keep new images flowing through istockphoto and Flickr. Amateur istockphoto photographers felt good about putting professionals out of business.

I think Getty is again resetting the terms of business. This time I think it is the microstock photographers that will feel the pinch. In my opinion the move of Getty's part is entirely legal and not outrageous at all.

I think the internet end game is to have all intellectual property free of charge. Internet sites make money by offering freebies to the general public. To obtain the freebie you have to give up personal information and agree to be monitored by your devices. The information collected is used by advertisers to target individuals with custom advertising sent through their devices. This is where the money is. As an example of device monitoring, I sometimes use a free translation app on my iPhone. It is so useful that I would have paid big bucks for the app, but got it for free instead. The translation app sends advertising for products and services to my iphone every time I use the app. The advertising is so accurate, that I realized the translating computer, somewhere in cyberspace, is reading my translating requests and determining my preferences. Accurate personal information on users is where the money is. No using the translation app in foreign bordellos.

The money is in offering the public free intellectual property as an inducement for the public to give up their personal information.

Free stock photos are part of that trend. I think Getty understands the internet."

Not arguing with you Liz.  You are just the messenger, but I think the message is full of holes.  First off, a lot of it just sounds like schadenfreude from a guy who was upset when micro photographers came along and demonstrated they could make images just as good or better than what was in the trad libraries. 

Secondly, as already pointed out, Getty had nothing to do with micro until they bought out Bruce in, what , 2006 or 07.  The three years after that, when Istock still continued to grow and flourish, it was under the guidance of Bruce.  Only once Getty became solely responsible for Istock did it begin its decline. 

And lastly, if agencies distributors cheap b@$t@rds wont pay for content, then shooters will stop spending money and time to shoot high quality marketable stock.  The stock industry will go back to being pictures of somebody's cat or a flower from their garden, or a duck in the park, uploaded just for the fun of maybe getting it in print. 

The micro industry cannot survive, much less flourish, without investment from talented image creators, and that's going to require the sites to pay fairly.  They are in the process of finding that out.  This isn't some brilliant master plan by Getty.  It is simply short-sighted, short-term, mistaken thinking.  You'd think it would be obvious of course, but evidently the geniuses running Getty aren't geniuses at all.

Hi Lisa! how goes?

No its not some brillant master plan of Getty but look at this this way. Just the fact they have managed to stir up the whole industry, ppl, deactivating, this and that, speaks for itself, doesnt it? they have created mayhem and with a purpose.
Ultimately the success or failure in this industry lies with the buyers not us. So what do they think of all this? a big nothing!
The ones I know are not even aware, dont even care but carries on buying regardless.

Forget this Alexa ranking and all this rubbish. The end product is. If you cant get to the buyers, if you cant somehow influence their set-in-stone buying habits, its a no go.

10K  members here can sit and come up with the most brilliant scheming and conniving plans and unless its transmitted outside a small forum to the general buying industry. It means nothing.

I mean lets be frank, you know as well as I do, all stock-agencies, all of them are generating 80% of its life blood from the fulltime photographer, this is a fact and not just my words, he/she, is the one that is going to persever and try to endure during troubles, simply because he/she has to put food on the table. Simple as that.
Well, look around you. How many fulltime stock-photographers do you see here? or at IS or at SS, etc, etc? maybe what?  10%? all the rest as far as Getty or anybody else is concerned, is chicken-feed.

This is a plan it itself.

Thanks all. I am well aware of what I am doing. And to me, there is no way back. The only way to "test" this is to see a whole year including seasonal stuff at the end of the year. And at that time I will be too invested & commited in too many things to turn back. 

PS: Thanks, Christian, I know who you are. I will continue to profit from your experiences in the future.

Anytime Mike!  either here, PM or whatever, anytime.

best.

It's the quality of the booze which is a direct statistical correlation of the post.  Just sayin!

Good taste McAllens and lagavulin!  cant be better hey.

I don�t think it will affect istock much even if 2/3 leave. getty can always bring over more wholly owned, unique content where they don�t need to pay royalties to anyone. And there will always be people who want to go exclusive.

If it wasn�t for the Microsoft/Googlegate drama I would have been happy in my combination of photo exclusivity/video independence. I was really looking forward to the year. My horoscope was good

Although the bad, often depressing communication or the complete arrogant silence, which is even worse, have made the forums an uncomfortable place to be for quite a while. I think this whole community thing, just doesn�t work for getty. neither does the public transparency with working openly on this thing called "the internet". But somehow, it just doesn�t go away...

Agreeing! it wont even make a dent. The micro model is engineered to just find replacements in a few minutes or they bring in from Getty. No problem.
Perhaps it would be harder to find some nieched ports.

On another note. Many photographers at SS will have to shape up in order to stay on top. Good for competition!

But I have to get in touch with everyone and if they are my personal customers also be nice and charming. I don't feel like doing that. With few exceptions...

The advantage of stock is that I can choose my own peer group and people I want to deal with by deciding what stock themes I want to work with.

Hey!  get an exclusive sole agent!  they will do all the spadework, talk, intro, etc, etc, all of it and in case of commissions or sales you pay em 25%.
In the old days sole agents used to cart around photographers portfolios up to ad-agencies, ADs. Sole agents are normally only for dayrate photographers. THERE IS THE MONEY!  never mind stock.

Interested? well I can give you some names if you so wish. I know severall in UK and in the US.

Quote from: ClaridgeJ on January 18, 2013, 04:50

Listen fellas and try and understand something!  this is a formidable and courages effort to make things better but go back in history a bit, to the stoneage in fact.
This scenario has been tried before, a unanimous effort and that was back when agencies were not this powerful and STLL, it didnt have any impact at all.
Imagine then whats it like today and with powerful agencies, this and that.

Three years ago a large multinational group of companies decided they wanted to build a coal-fired power station near here. The locals were furious on all sorts of grounds, but most said, "It's a done deal, there's no point in fighting it". So a small group of locals, backed by some large environmental and developmental groups, had to do it ourselves, with the rest saying, "You're right, but you've no chance; save your energy."
But first of all we persuaded our local council, so that it had to go to a National Enquiry; but last autumn, out of the blue and before the national enquiry, they caved in.

There are at least five points here:
1. "It's better to light one candle than curse forever the darkness" (origin vague)
2. It's not only to send a warning blow to Getty, it's to protect our images (any I deactivate at this stage will not be going back up on iStock, even with a backtrack on their part.)
3. If Getty gets off with this, the other agencies could be champing at the bit to try similar scams.
4. You don't have to participate if you don't want to, and if you do, the level of participation is optional.
5. "A journey of a hundred miles starts with a single step" (Lao Tzu)

True!  but very differant concept, that had to do with coal, toxic, waste, smog, global warming, etc. These things takes place all the time and in most cases the opposition wins.

This is stock-photography, micro stock Sue! differant kettle of fish.

Listen just to underline my original post. I mean well, I hope it makes a dent. I dont want to see anybody losing money, etc. you know me! Im the first one to raise hell. In this case though ONLY because its sporadic images being deactivated instead of full portfolios, sorry but I cant see this make an impact.

But I have to get in touch with everyone and if they are my personal customers also be nice and charming. I don't feel like doing that. With few exceptions...

The advantage of stock is that I can choose my own peer group and people I want to deal with by deciding what stock themes I want to work with.

Heck! I would mind being nice to everybody for a few hundered grand and thats ME!

My problem with RM is that simply at that price point it is usually a lot cheaper and more efficient to have a designer whip up something totally unique for you, something noone can rent from any library and that was created exclusively for you and whatever occasion you need it (trade show, important company brochure, yearly catalogue etc...

I do see a place for RM for some highly unusual images. A polar bear dancing in a pink dress, rare animals in the wild where only 3 are deemed to exist, heart transplant surgery, very specific industry shots like engineering shots on oil plattforms all model and property released etc....

Authentic files like these, I think RM is the right place for them.

But they always have to be balanced with what a good designer can do with photoshop or illustration. He or her are the real enemies of RM, not just the masses of royalty free content.

Of course when you are doing a large advertising campaign any image renting costs are negligable. Even 50 000 to rent one image for three months is peanuts compared to what a large stand costs at a regular industry trade show.

So I do see a certain base level market that will always be there. But I would think that the only way to create a reliable income from it, would be to stay industry specific.

I used to work in the traffic engineering field, actually I grew up in it. I know all the major players, it is a very tightly knit network of companies with just very few, industry specific trade shows. the end client, cities and engineering offices, don�t go there, so the whole thing is one small club although they are serving a world market. Obviously they don�t all love each other either and waste their time and money in all kinds of aggressive ego boosting court cases.

If I wanted to, I could create great photos and videos for general use in this industry. I could use my old contacts to take images of the latest technology. I know what kind of imagery they need. I know all the magazines and websites and trade shows they advertise in, becuase I used to do it myself.

But here is the thing: to license it - I don�t need getty anymore. In the old catalogue days, i would have needed an agent to handle it for me. But for industry specific content where you need insider knowledge to take the pictures - you can handle all the licensing yourself through the internet. My family name is a lot better known in the industry than Getty or any library anyway.

And this holds true for every other niche subject, especially in technology. If you know how to shoot it, if you have the contacts, if you want to make money from "your" home industry, IMO you would be totally crazy to let an agency handle the licensing for you. After all the work of getting locations, people and shooting right, you already have everything you need to license.

So what kind of RM market is left where you as the specialized artist cannot license directly?

I believe this would be rare quality shots that however are more generic, i.e. they can be used in multiple industries. that is when an agncy like getty or any other agency might be useful.

So this is my take from a business managers perspective of the RM market.

Well in a sense youre right. Ofcourse you could market the pictures yourself and without any agency and if youre name is well known in the industry, I wouldnt sit and wait, just go for it.
I sell all my Nuclear power industry shots myself as with very specific oil industry shots. With sensitive material like this I am offline
but I sell them myself all the time. I have an exclusive agent who does lots of spade work and she gets 25%. In these two fields I am well known and hardly any competitors at all. If I were you I would go for it and the traffic-engineering field is GIGANTIC!

However in the RM agecny world theres little doubt, no matter what you think of them. Getty reigns supreme, all the others put together dont even come close, not even close.
The RM section have special editors with specialities in Technology, Medicine, surgery, engineering and industries. Most ppl dont know this, its a differant world.

one has to mentally put aside all this Getty/IS lark. Its got nothing to do with the trad Getty. One has to focus beyond the squibble and mayhem around Getty/IS. Getty came into micro via a banana peel, they bought IS and for whatever reason, we dont know, what we do know is,  its gone sour and badly wrong. Might as well leave it at that and move on.
One also have to understand that the IS-admin had no choice in this matter, they were not asked but simply told to do the job, period.

Traffic engineering is a massive field, I have done a few commissions myself there, for the Goverment actually. Now the way this stock-industry is going?  there you have it!  thats your plan B.

best.

So whats the default now, popular or relevant?  whatever it is, its working much better.