Author Topic: Shutterstock Creates First Silicon Alley Billionaire (Read 44613 times)

Ron · « **Reply #175 on:** July 10, 2013, 16:52 »

Hostile towards SS? embrace failure and hate success? I must be missing something completely. I am done.

Tror · « **Reply #176 on:** July 10, 2013, 16:53 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 16:37

Quote from: Ron on July 10, 2013, 16:28
Its not mollucs or whatever you call it, I am not calling you a shill either. You are all putting way to much weight on someone saying they want a raise because they are jealous or because Jon is a billionaire. Its fallacies. I even made it clear it was a cheeky comment. Everybody asking for a raise gets jumped on. Whatever. But its these kind of threads that a raise is mentioned. You dont mention a raise on a thread about rejections. Its normal for people to ask for a raise. In fact I got a raise this year at my company because the company is doing excellent. People asking for a raise has nothing to do with jealousy or envy, thats complete crap.

I don't mind anyone asking for a rise. But the terms people have couched it in here is rooted in the report that Jon has become a billionaire as a result of the share sale, not anything else. As far as I am concerned, that's not a valid argument.
If people want to talk about inflation, rising production costs etc., then, fine. But the sudden wheeling out of the "photographers are starving while fat-cat Jon enjoys his billion" really doesn't strike me as a valid argument. Do you imagine Jonathon Klein or Serban over at iS are anything other than stinking rich? Even tiny agencies might be making a lot of money for their owners - tens of thousands a month, while people take a year or more to get a payout of $100. Running a pre-paid microstock site is a fabulous way to get rich. Doesn't everybody know that?

He sold shares of a company that mainly consists of our content. Honestly, nobody is envying his success and he did a good job with SS, but he could not have done it without us. I never saw anybody selling shares for a billion worth for a empty domain lol

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #177 on:** July 10, 2013, 17:04 »

Quote from: Tror on July 10, 2013, 16:53

He sold shares of a company that mainly consists of our content. Honestly, nobody is envying his success and he did a good job with SS, but he could not have done it without us. I never saw anybody selling shares for a billion worth for a empty domain lol

And so did Bruce, and so did the StockXpert guys, and so did Canstock, and so did .....

Sure, it is hard to see how the value of our work enhances someone else's company's valuation, but that's just how the system works. Distribution of other people's work is big business - look at e-bay or Amazon, they are essentially the same. Facebook is even more nebulous.

We can post threads here or on SS asking for a rise if we like, I doubt that it will make any difference. Or, if the terms are unacceptable we can undermine his share price by stopping supplying his business - though, of course, we will suffer a lot more than the agency.

Tror · « **Reply #178 on:** July 10, 2013, 17:07 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 17:04

Quote from: Tror on July 10, 2013, 16:53

He sold shares of a company that mainly consists of our content. Honestly, nobody is envying his success and he did a good job with SS, but he could not have done it without us. I never saw anybody selling shares for a billion worth for a empty domain lol

And so did Bruce, and so did the StockXpert guys, and so did Canstock, and so did .....

Sure, it is hard to see how the value of our work enhances someone else's company's valuation, but that's just how the system works. Distribution of other people's work is big business - look at e-bay or Amazon, they are essentially the same. Facebook is even more nebulous.

We can post threads here or on SS asking for a rise if we like, I doubt that it will make any difference. Or, if the terms are unacceptable we can undermine his share price by stopping supplying his business - though, of course, we will suffer a lot more than the agency.

So, what are you basically trying to say? That our content is worthless? I cannot even get emotional about that...lol...this is really getting too stupid, I`m out too...

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #179 on:** July 10, 2013, 17:09 »

Quote from: Tror on July 10, 2013, 17:07

So, what are you basically trying to say? That our content is worthless? I cannot even get emotional about that...lol...this is really getting too stupid, I`m out too...

A sad misrepresentation. I am saying that it is worth what we can get for it. You, apparently, think it has some enhanced value becuase of the SS share price, but it doesn't.

cthoman · « **Reply #180 on:** July 10, 2013, 17:20 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 16:15

Why should someone in India be getting a full-time US wage? Why should someone who is self-employed supplying a dozen companies with their product have a right to a livable wage (by US standards) from each of those companies? Why should anybody be entitled to more than they have freely agreed to accept for their work? Why should artists with all sorts of different skills and abilities, and levels of effort, all be entitled to a US living wage? Should that apply to everyone with more than 10 images, or more than 100, or more than 1,000 or more than 10,000? Or should they all get the same regardless of everything, and regardless of whether their work sells or not?

I mean, really, this "workers deserve a living wage" stuff - while it is fair enough for US employees - is utter nonsense when you start trying to apply it to any Tom, Dick or Harry who happens to have sent a few pictures to an agency. We are NOT employees, we are individual businesses working for ourselves and using whatever different agency arrangements happen to suit us.

It's less about deserving it and more about opportunity to achieve it.

Take SS's 2011 revenue of 120 million dollars. I assume they paid out around 30% of that to contributors ($36 mil). That works out to 3 million a month. It all sounds very respectable until you start dividing it up.

SS has 35K contributors. If you divided that evenly that would be about $85 a piece, but we all know that isn't happening. Let's say only 10K of the contributors are getting paid regularly (maybe, it's less). 50% of those (5000) are getting $100 a month. That takes out $500K of your 3 million. Another 40% (4000) are getting $500 a month. That eats up another $2 million, so I only have $500K left to pay my remaining 10%. Which would mean I can only pay 500 people $1000 a month.

Obviously, people are making more than that, but it is hard to slice up the pie to give out too much money. I could give it to 1500 contributors and pay them all $2000 a month or 750 contributors at $4000 a month, but neither of those are happening either since that would leave nothing for all the little guys.

My point in this long rambling post was that there just isn't that much opportunity to make larger wages.

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #181 on:** July 10, 2013, 17:28 »

Quote from: cthoman on July 10, 2013, 17:20

My point in this long rambling post was that there just isn't that much opportunity to make larger wages.

Exactly. A 10% or 20% increase would probably be enough to put the company into trouble but would make very little difference to the suppliers.

We need a strong company to represent us and, hopefully, to increase its reach so that we earn more from its organic growth. There is much more to be had from that than from trying to wring all the profits out of it. I got $200 from just two SOD sales there last month, more than Alamy brought me, lets see them bring us more of those.

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #182 on:** July 10, 2013, 17:31 »

I do love seeing how a couple of people methodically go through the posts putting -1 on everything that contradicts their prejudices. It's like watching someone shove their fingers in their ears, close their eyes and shout "who-nanny-na-na, I'm not listening" to try to blank out unwelcome realities. But you know you can't resist reading it, can you?

gbalex · « **Reply #183 on:** July 10, 2013, 18:46 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 16:15

Quote from: cthoman on July 10, 2013, 15:52
Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 14:29
The old socialist "we're starving and you're growing fat on our sweat and toil" line can be wheeled out by any employee who feels envious of the business owner's lifestyle.

Is it envy if it's true? How many people are making a livable wage (by US standards where SS is located) off their SS earnings alone?

Why should someone in India be getting a full-time US wage? Why should someone who is self-employed supplying a dozen companies with their product have a right to a livable wage (by US standards) from each of those companies? Why should anybody be entitled to more than they have freely agreed to accept for their work? Why should artists with all sorts of different skills and abilities, and levels of effort, all be entitled to a US living wage? Should that apply to everyone with more than 10 images, or more than 100, or more than 1,000 or more than 10,000? Or should they all get the same regardless of everything, and regardless of whether their work sells or not?

I mean, really, this "workers deserve a living wage" stuff - while it is fair enough for US employees - is utter nonsense when you start trying to apply it to any Tom, Dick or Harry who happens to have sent a few pictures to an agency. We are NOT employees, we are individual businesses working for ourselves and using whatever different agency arrangements happen to suit us.

Maybe you would like to help SS promote the company by helping them produce compelling promotional marketing material via your story. Since you reside in Qatar you might have a better chance of winning the cash prize if you move to a dark green area where I am sure they will be actively promoting these SS success stories. http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/gmaps.jsp

http://www.shutterstock.com/blog/2013/07/stories/

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #184 on:** July 10, 2013, 19:05 »

Quote from: gbalex on July 10, 2013, 18:46

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 16:15
Quote from: cthoman on July 10, 2013, 15:52
Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 14:29
The old socialist "we're starving and you're growing fat on our sweat and toil" line can be wheeled out by any employee who feels envious of the business owner's lifestyle.

Is it envy if it's true? How many people are making a livable wage (by US standards where SS is located) off their SS earnings alone?

Why should someone in India be getting a full-time US wage? Why should someone who is self-employed supplying a dozen companies with their product have a right to a livable wage (by US standards) from each of those companies? Why should anybody be entitled to more than they have freely agreed to accept for their work? Why should artists with all sorts of different skills and abilities, and levels of effort, all be entitled to a US living wage? Should that apply to everyone with more than 10 images, or more than 100, or more than 1,000 or more than 10,000? Or should they all get the same regardless of everything, and regardless of whether their work sells or not?

I mean, really, this "workers deserve a living wage" stuff - while it is fair enough for US employees - is utter nonsense when you start trying to apply it to any Tom, Dick or Harry who happens to have sent a few pictures to an agency. We are NOT employees, we are individual businesses working for ourselves and using whatever different agency arrangements happen to suit us.

Maybe you would like to help SS promote the company by helping them produce compelling promotional marketing material via your story. Since you reside in Qatar you might have a better chance of winning the cash prize if you move to a dark green area where I am sure they will be actively promoting these SS success stories. http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/gmaps.jsp

http://www.shutterstock.com/blog/2013/07/stories/

And your point is? What on earth are you on about concerning "compelling promotional marketing material"? I can assure you that with my rent here at $2,500 per month I do intend to move somewhere more "dark green" in due course.

Look, consider this: the argument appears to be that the success of SS and its share price proves the great value of our artwork that is (apart from a bit of computer stuff) its entire asset. But if the value of our files is defined by the SS share price, then it follows that they have the same value on Alamy and on Cutcaster. We should be offering them everywhere not for a measly 38c, no they are worth more!, we should be insisting on 50c per sale everywhere.
But, hang on, I don't want to sell at Alamy for 50c (though I have done a few times) and I don't want all my iStock sales to be for 50c, either (though that might be their new average).
You get the picture? Different outlets produce different returns. Credit sales and subscription sales are different and the sales mechanism actually changes the value of the product. We are not able to set the commission rates. And if we did, 50c per sale would destroy SS and leave us with nothing. What a great outcome that would be!
Remember also that we do not sell pictures, we sell usage rights. The ultimate worth of a picture is the sum of all the rights it accumulates. That's not 38c, it's hundreds or sometimes thousands of dollars from SS alone.

PS: In case you have never been to them, there are "dark green" places on that map where you can eat your fill at the best restaurant in town for $5 and rent a spacious house and garden for $40 a month. I've been there and seen it. Anyone on an American "living wage" of say $3,000 a month could literally live the lifestyle of a millionaire in parts of Asia.

stockastic · « **Reply #185 on:** July 10, 2013, 19:20 »

This issue has nothing to do with emotions like jealousy, or with irrational feelings that some companies are "good" and some are "bad". Or with imagined ideas of what Jon Oringer is like, personally. Forget all that stuff and just think about economics.

A market in which the middleman is making an extraordinary killing, and has total control over suppliers' prices, is neither efficient in economic terms, nor fair in human terms. Nevertheless that's where stock photography has ended up. The reasons have to do with history and technology: basically, it's globablization.

Steve Jobs inspired a lot of hero worship and became virtually a cult figure. At the same time, workers in China were beaten and abused, and paid a subsistence wage, to produce Apple products at prices that were deemed necessary and appropriate. I don't hate Steve Jobs, I think he accomplished great things. That doesn't mean I think Foxconn is in fact the Best Of All Possible Worlds.

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #186 on:** July 10, 2013, 19:22 »

Quote from: Ron on July 10, 2013, 16:52

Hostile towards SS? embrace failure and hate success? I must be missing something completely. I am done.

Show me a thread about Cutcaster or Featurepics - or any of the other bottom 25 - that is critical of them and their achievements in the way people have been about SS.

Nobody criticises the sites that deliver nothing but consume our time and effort to return nothing at all, ever. But do well, pay people thousands of dollars, and, hey, you're a capitalist swine stealing the value of our work.

Yes, lots of people here hate success and love failure, this thread proves it.

cthoman · « **Reply #187 on:** July 10, 2013, 19:46 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 19:22

Show me a thread about Cutcaster or Featurepics - or any of the other bottom 25 - that is critical of them and their achievements in the way people have been about SS.

Nobody criticises the sites that deliver nothing but consume our time and effort to return nothing at all, ever. But do well, pay people thousands of dollars, and, hey, you're a capitalist swine stealing the value of our work.

Yes, lots of people here hate success and love failure, this thread proves it.

Again, it's not about hating success. It's about sharing in that success. I don't limit that criticism to SS either. The same can be said for a lot of agencies.

Tror · « **Reply #188 on:** July 10, 2013, 20:12 »

Quote from: BaldricksTrousers on July 10, 2013, 19:22

Quote from: Ron on July 10, 2013, 16:52
Hostile towards SS? embrace failure and hate success? I must be missing something completely. I am done.

Show me a thread about Cutcaster or Featurepics - or any of the other bottom 25 - that is critical of them and their achievements in the way people have been about SS.

Nobody criticises the sites that deliver nothing but consume our time and effort to return nothing at all, ever. But do well, pay people thousands of dollars, and, hey, you're a capitalist swine stealing the value of our work.

Yes, lots of people here hate success and love failure, this thread proves it.

Many of the low end companies do their part in my income...why talk them down? To have even less competition and more power to fewer companies? None of the People here critizing SS or any other company hate success. They just have a clear business perspective and do not just think one dimensional. As stockastic pointed out: its not about people or sympathy or emotion. Its about business. And your view should remain clear on that. Worshipping a company or the leader of the company is not a analytical view neither would be envy.

EmberMike · « **Reply #189 on:** July 10, 2013, 21:29 »

Quote from: cthoman on July 10, 2013, 19:46

Again, it's not about hating success. It's about sharing in that success. I don't limit that criticism to SS either. The same can be said for a lot of agencies.

Exactly right.

Look, I'm not saying that anyone deserves a handout just because SS is doing well these days. But I don't think it's out of line to suggest that our part in SS doing well may be a little understated (yanking the rug out from under us on the referral program speaks to that), and that there is legitimate cause for concern about what the next ten years will bring for contributors. It's hard not to think that something is really wrong when I'm looking at my stats and getting seriously concerned about my future in this business while reading about Jon's billion-dollar stock holdings.

Sure I'm happy for the guy, but man does it sting a little when I watched a few grand go out the window with the end of the referral program and then see my earnings sliding lately despite new uploads. It's tough to not feel like I'm being shorted when it's a constant struggle just to stay afloat while the company itself is doing better and better.

"I am Shutterstock." That's the tagline of this new promo they launched today. Am I Shutterstock? I like to think so. I love this company, I really do. But I don't know if they realize how tough it is to be a contributor sometimes. And while I certainly do want to make a 5-minute video talking about all of the good that SS has brought me, I feel like I'd need to spend at least a minute of that video asking them to remember what we all did for the past several years to help Shutterstock become what it is. I hope they remember that we weren't just referring people to SS to make a few bucks. We were ambassadors to artists who might have otherwise bought into the anti-microstock rhetoric and passed on joining. Heck, some of us were outright mocked for doing what we do here. I worked for a design agency when I started with SS and people I worked with thought I was an idiot doing all this work to sell images for $0.25.

We all helped SS grow into what it is today by taking chances years ago and pushing this microstock thing when no one was sure where we were pushing it to. And we backed SS above all other companies because SS was doing right by us. We had a partnership. Or at least it seemed like one. Nowadays I'm not so sure.

"I am Shutterstock." Sure, I can say that. But is Shutterstock still the artists? I don't think we need another 10 years to find out. I hope this company can definitively show that they are still concerned about their contributors, and they haven't forgotten our part in what SS is today. And maybe that doesn't equate to a raise or a bonus or anything for us, but it would be nice to know that we can still share in the success of the company if we want to. Right now I'm not so sure that we have much say in it anymore.

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Author Topic: Shutterstock Creates First Silicon Alley Billionaire (Read 44613 times)

Ron

Tror

BaldricksTrousers

Tror

BaldricksTrousers

cthoman

BaldricksTrousers

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gbalex

BaldricksTrousers

stockastic

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cthoman

Tror

EmberMike

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