What a year 2009 was! With the Aughts (00s) drifting out of our memories and 2010 taking shape before us, we wanted to thank you for your continuous support and give you a glimpse of what to expect in the next 52 weeks.

2010 represents the year of the Photo Buyer and our New Year�s resolution is to educate more buyers about the benefits of using Cutcaster and sell more photos and illustrations for all our contributors. I know you are not supposed to say your New Year�s resolution out loud because it�s twice as onerous a duty but we know the hard work before us is to prove we can find the buyers and provide them with the amazing content they are looking for.

In the New Year, expect us to introduce new tools, sign partnerships to expand our distribution and upload more great content to augment our existing marketplace. We will focus a majority of our time on the following:

    * Increasing photo buying activity on the site
    * Making the checkout area easier to use for bulk buying
    * Tweaking the search algorithm and re-weighting the results so its more diverse and relevant
    * Making more direct sales calls
    * Attending more buyer conferences
    * Introducing some Cutcaster API�s
    * Promoting more exclusive photos and illustrations on Cutcaster
    * Enhancing the clipfolders so they are easier to use and checkout with
    * Spending as much on advertising in both print and online as we can afford

How you can optimize Cutcaster for your business

    * Spread the word through our photo buyer and seller referral program
    * Link back to www.cutcaster.com from your personal site
    * Keep up the enthusiasm, and continue to be a part of something special from the ground up.  Rome wasn�t built in a day and we are on the path towards success.

Thanks you so much for your continued support, and as always you can contact us if you need any questions answered or assistance.

We raise our collective glasses to you, our valued Cutcaster member, and wish you all the success and happiness in 2010.

If you are interested in seeing a recap of 2009 follow this link to the blog. http://blog.cutcaster.com/2010/01/05/cutcaster-2009-in-review/

Thank you,

John

I released some info on bidding last month in our last press release but wanted to send along a step by step video for how bidding on content works.  Obviously we know bidding is not for everyone but this is a tool that allows photographers to see where demand lies at different pricing levels and allows them to price the content at a price that covers their costs.  The tool is being used more and more and takes place about 9% of the time.  Take a look at the short video that shows how bidding works.  Thanks to Shannon Fagan for taking a video on the spot at Picturehouse this past Wednesday.  That is Justin (in the background) and myself (describing it).  Always weird to see yourself on video ;-)

http://blog.cutcaster.com/2009/10/19/name-your-photo-and-vectors-price/

http://www.photola.com/

check it out.

Hey everyone, we are putting together two new clipfolders (our form of lightboxes) to send directly to our customers with your images.  However, we need more images for those clipfolders!!! 

If you have Fall-related and Halloween images, this is the time to upload those images!!!

http://blog.cutcaster.com/2009/08/11/update-on-betta-name-change-and-what-happened-behind-the-scenes/

So last Friday I was asked by an istock lawyer, to remove the BTV title for our �Betta� collection, which I immediately removed any mention of it on our site upon istocks email request.  Here is the new premium photo collection.

http://www.cutcaster.com/Betta

I posted some emails that I received from istock and a cease and desist letter but removed them because I didnt feel I had the right to post a conversation between myself and the istock lawyers even though i would have loved to. I did research on the Vetta trademark and istock in fact did NOT have it registered anywhere in the world but had a claim to it (according to them) due to common law.  Since the Cutcaster press release they have gone to actually register the Vetta mark and I apologize to istock for using and it won't happen again. "Betta" is now a common law trademark of Cutcaster so don't go using it istock ;-)

To be completely honest, I found the whole process of creating a collection and the legal tussle that ensued to be very interesting, a bit fun, a bit scary due to some perceived threats and appreciate everyone�s posts, whether in support or calling me a dumb idiot or an embarrassment for choosing that name. I have to say that I was once told that �what would embarrass me would cause a normal person to emigrate from their country,� so I don�t get embarrassed that easily but had a bit of a chuckle when a few of you felt embarrassed for me. It�s ok ;-) I listen to everyone�s opinion very seriously and I have to say that I am just trying to help our Cutcaster photographers get more sales, help our customers find the best images and make Cutcaster work fairly for everyone, myself included.

I will keep fighting for photographers and buyers so everyone gets a fair shake.  I will keep fighting to improve sales at our site so photographers have more choices and aren�t stuck with the status quo. I understand sales and revenue are at the top of the importance list for many of you and that is why it is my main focus.  I need your best content and support as I build something that can be better for everyone.

I have changed the collection to just �Betta.� I hope istock isn�t going to try to have a monopoly on all words that rhyme with Vetta ;-)

I�m open to criticism, reactions to the letters above and any legal opinions.

Hey Guys,

I really want to improve our service for both buyers and sellers and would really appreciate it if you could please take our 1 minute, anonymous survey to help us understand better what you are looking for. http://bit.ly/ViVN8

This is to help us understand what you expect from  a website like Cutcaster and how we can improve our service to maximize the benefits you can get out of it.  I'M LISTENING so this is your chance to really let us know what you want and what is important to you.

Without your input we won't know what to change and your feedback is invaluable. Thanks for your time.

http://bit.ly/ViVN8

Forgive me for being naive, but I am going to have our developers start to build out the ability to buy different resolutions and dimensions of images at Cutcaster and was wondering what the general criteria is for determining the resize ratio of the image as you go from the highest to the lowest resolution. 

Do different agencies offer different resize options or do they follow a ratio like from XL to L you cut the resolutions in half?

What is the most file sizes that should be offered?  3-6?  Is there a ratio that the re-sizing of the image should follow i.e. divide by two each resolution down etc?

I am open to any ideas you guys can offer up on the best way to offer different sized images.  We have been getting more and more requests for it but since a lot of you are on multiple sites i would love to hear what you think are good ways to do this.

WOW.  These scammer guys piss me off more than anything and waste my time. 

We just had a guy from Vietnam (sorry if you are from there but I am sorry to say they have a problem with people from there using stolen credit cards or not nice things, not everyone is like that, only a few bad apples) try to upload stolen/copyrighted content to Cutcaster that he obviously either bought with a fake credit card or ripped off of istock. Istock needs to look into this person who purchased that image (use the IP address I provided below to track it if you can) and do something about catching him. I will do whatever I can to help stop this guy.  I did a search for him by the username he chose at CC using google and found that he was selling on ImageCatalogue.  IC has no idea that he is a fraud and they arent his images and is probably selling these images for the scammer.

http://www.imagecatalog.com/photographer_profile.php?pID=1930

And then we checked TinEye and saw that the photos he said were his on IC were actually an istock exclusive member AND an istock admin (http://www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=71254) so this scammer stole them from istock it looks like.

http://www.imagecatalog.com/image_details.php?iID=96456&icsid=255e27b2353c1faad2fce4b089d3948a
http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-380844-earth-in-a-box.php

http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-7185445-environmental-conservation.php

I'm trying to write to both ImageCatalogue and iStock to alert them to this thief.  It looks like they could be targeting istock exclusives because their images wont be on other sites or have the potential to be recognized as much and will most likely sell better. Any other ideas?  We checked two of the images and they were both from istock exclusives.

Here is some info on the guy who tried to upload it to our site.

Name
: Nguyen The Dinh
: [email protected]
IP ADRESS
: 123.18.232.113

This is absolutely a nightmare.  I am so pissed about this because it is wasting my time, money and stealing peoples money.

WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT THIS? What can istock do to protect you guys as photographers and me as an agency that is getting stolen content uploaded to my site that came from istock in the first place?

I would greatly appreciate any help in finding images and vectors that meet these requests.  I have been speaking with mostly publishers, advertisers and graphic designers and this is information that I have picked up that I hope will help you know what to shoot in the future when you are planning and upload to Cutcaster if you choose to work with us.

One of the biggest requests that I am hearing (and I am sure most of you have heard this before but it is more true than ever) is that buyers want non-posed, non stockish type shots of "everyday" or "ethnic/minority" looking people doing everyday things i.e. shopping, at home, at school, walking etc.  This is coming especially from publishers and advertisers.  You are going to need model releases for these shots as well in most cases.  We are really making a push at Cutcaster for ethnic and minority related people shots so if you have any please upload them.

Thanks again and let me know if you have any questions.

http://www.cutcaster.com/info/contents

Like I said before, here is the press release for the introduction of Credits and Corporate accounts for buyers at Cutcaster.  We are seriously working hard to provide solutions for the media buying public and here are two more ways that people will be able to buy your images at Cutcaster. Very exciting stuff but trust me there is a lot more to come.

San Francisco March 11th, 2009

Cutcaster, the world�s first untapped source of user generated images and vectors that can be securely licensed through it�s dynamic marketplace, announced the release of two new ways to purchase photos and vector illustrations. Cutcaster Corporate Accounts and Cutcaster Credits will empower buyers, reward them with deep discounts and make licensing royalty free images and vectors organized and cost effective. These new payment options are in addition to the micropayment pay-as-you-go purchasing system and content bidding model that Cutcaster currently uses.

�Accounting departments and mangers can take a deep breath as they no longer need to keep track of multiple accounts, the piles of invoices on their desks or getting their private credit card reimbursed by their company later,� explains John Griffin, founder of Cutcaster.  �The new Cutcaster Corporate Account and the Cutcaster Credit packages provide total flexibility and control over media buying. Our goal is to provide the highest level of customer service and offer solutions that meet the media buying industry's needs.�

The new corporate accounts enable Account Admins to track purchases, download high resolution comps, create unlimited sub-accounts, purchase credits for their account and pass them to the sub-accounts, organize their licenses and manage their account with customizable reporting tools. The corporate accounts can be customized to you�re your changing needs and corporate structure. Cutcaster Credits can be purchased by any registered user and will be sold at a discount.  For as little as $45, one can purchase 50 to 5000 credits and when paying, 1 credit will equal $1 on the site.  Subscribers can access the same royalty-free content as the �pay-as-you-go� customers but now have the flexibility to purchase content with credits as well as the option to receive an invoice. 

�Cutcaster is providing customers two more ways to buy from the largest untapped source of user generated content on the web,� Griffin said, who launched Cutcaster last year and has been growing the image and vector library by around 15,000 new files a week. �We offer a secure way to purchase and license new content that didn�t exist before in the shallow pool of stock out there. Our larger clients kept telling us that they liked the quality and new selection we were providing in the marketplace over others in the industry, but they needed alternative payment models to provide the most flexible and cost effective licensing experience.  These new packages offer a perfect solution for our largest publishing, advertising and graphic design customers.�

To learn more follow this link, http://www.cutcaster.com/buy-stock-images-vectors

Businesses can apply at www.cutcaster.com/corporate/RegisterCorporate

About Cutcaster
Cutcaster has tapped into a new and unique source of photo and vector illustrations that can be purchased for any kind of publishing, web design project, printing brochures, advertising, annual reports or electronic usage on websites and presentations. We have created the first model that adds structure to support licensing user-generated photography and vectors when you don't have the budget to create it yourself.  Sellers can set their prices or those new to the world of licensing can use the Cutcaster Algorithm to find the fair market price.  We have been described as the "Nasdaq of digital media" or even "the answer to Flickr" for licensing images and vector illustrations. Our licenses are one time royalty free, extended use licenses and cost anywhere from 5 to 20 dollars on average for a high resolution file.

UnFreakingReal.  Not sure if this has been discussed or people have heard about this site but...This site appears to be ripping off images from many photographers and agencies around the world and allowing members to sign up and download them for free.  Our reviewers and I just stumbled on it. I just want to give people a heads up to make sure that you check to make sure that your images are not on there.  I have emailed most of the people on our site who we saw had images put up there but couldn't check them all or identify them all.  No idea how they got there but take a look at this site and send them an email or their ISP if they are ripping off your images.

http://www.heroturko.com/photostock/

This is what they say at the bottom "If you have any doubts about legality of content or you have another suspicions,feel free to contact us directly by email heroturko(at)gmail.com. Heroturko.com does not store any files listed on its server."

[email protected]

ahhhh suspicions.  All the stock content appears to be stolen.

And here is a link to their DMCA statement. 

http://www.heroturko.com/dmca.html

This is absolutely unreal and needs your attention to be stopped.  I hope that you guys will make sure that none of your images are on there so we can put an end to this. This type of thing kills our industry and makes people who sign up there think it is ok to steal images and use them for free. I am here to help as much as I can but this is my first dealing with seeing a site like this.  Hope this helps.

An idea to a movement

Cutcaster began 2008 as an optimistic unknown; an innovative idea that was just taking shape and full of potential.  Our aim was to develop a dynamic marketplace where buyers could easily find and license fresh and unique user-generated content while content creators worldwide could discover the true value of their work.  No one had heard of Cutcaster outside of a handful of people.  We had 800 accepted files, fewer than 300 members and I was still trading stocks on Wall Street.  At the end of January, I left the stock market to work full time on Cutcaster. What started with a few hundred files blossomed into a community of over 3600 members and 107,393 accepted files on January 1st 2009. (Congrats to both Marburg and Beth Pulsipher for having the closest predictions to our year end total accepted files http://cutcaster.blogspot.com/2008/08/cutcaster-year-end-goal-your-help.html). What a difference a year makes.

What Happened in 2008 - A few highlights:
1.   Buyers outreach program started in mid-September- Email, print and web advertising, Google Adwords campaign, press releases, direct sales calls and email blasts, SEO techniques, joined two affiliate programs, our internal referral program, handwritten introductory letters, onsite Cutcaster demos, participation in buyers� conferences i.e. Picturehouse, and participating in different forums. 
2.   Contributor outreach program- Grew from 800 files to over 107,000 by years end.  Pretty amazing growth, I�d say, and the quality has been excellent so keep up the great work.
3.   Started the year with 300 members and now we are over 3600 members and 1700 members have uploaded a file or more.
4.   Numerous site features and enhancements rolled out.  We have always been fast to correct things and roll out features that the community needs and things will continue to be like that in 09.
5.   New search algorithm - http://www.cutcaster.com/info/Search-and-Find-Tips
6.   Best customer service in the industry- We roll out the red carpet for everyone.

What to expect in the New Year
1.   I�m moving the Cutcaster headquarters to San Francisco at the end of January and you shouldn�t notice any changes except a new address.  This is so I can efficiently run Cutcaster and be close to the talent and money that I need to take on our competitors.  I�m sad to leave NYC but extremely excited to be on the West Coast.
2.   A lot more attention and work on the buyer front i.e. roll out corporate accounts, introduce credit packages and extended licensing, enhanced clipfolders, search algorithm tweaking and re-weighting the results, more direct sales calls, attending more buyer conferences, Cutcaster API�s, promoting more exclusive content on Cutcaster, tiered pricing for different resolution sizes and much more advertising in both print and web.
3.   More sales, more data to help you make better decisions, more tutorials to help you know what to shoot and how to shoot it, more image and illustration requests

Goals for 2009
1.   More sales, more revenue lines for contributors, more ease of use on the site.
2.   Surpass 1,000,000 images and vectors
3.   Get over 400,000 new images in the marketplace from sources that weren�t in the shallow pool of stock we see today
4.   Increase membership to 20,000
5.   More fun

Obviously, Cutcaster is a tool to earn money from your content or find outstanding content for the projects you are working on.  However, Cutcaster is a community in action and is only as good as our contributors, supporters and buyers.  We know we have nothing if we don�t have a strong community and that is why we work tirelessly to best serve our members. A special thank you goes out to Ashley, My family, Justin, Michael B., Zac, Lope, Barbara, Tara, Charley, InSITE, Dennis, Janie, Linda, Carolyn, Jeffbeck, Martin, Shaolan, Victoria, Moriya, Dan M, Vasiliy, Jason, the whole Blip.tv team, Gracie, Henrik, Jeff S. and Shawn to name just a few. 

There have been more, and I can�t thank you all enough for providing your support and patience as we grow. We know that it is a community in action that accomplishes more than any individual does, no matter how strong they may be.  Spread the word, keep up the enthusiasm, and continue to be a part of something from the ground floor. 

Here is to a great 2009,

John and the Cutcaster team