Agency Based Discussion > Shutterstock.com
Shutterstock providing images to Fine Art America
dirkr:
Searching for my images in use today I stumbled across the following:
fineartamerica.com/featured/view-from-marshalls-beach-on-the-golden-dirkr.html?product=canvas-print
Scroll down on the page, there it says:
Artist's Description
View from Marshalls Beach on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, California, USA on a cloudless evening.Image provided by Shutterstock.
About Dirkr
Shutterstock is a leading global technology company offering a creative platform for high-quality assets, tools and services. The company licenses images, video, music, and editorial assets -- as well as custom content tailored to a brand’s needs. Shutterstock offers a variety of plans for individuals, teams, and enterprise customers as well as creative editing and collaboration capabilities. The Shutterstock portfolio of brands includes Bigstock, Offset, PremiumBeat, Rex Features and Shutterstock Custom.
Anybody heard of that before? What kind of license do they sell for that?
This link:
https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/shutterstock.html
shows their profile page on FAA, looks like they have close to 10.000 images on there...
marthamarks:
--- Quote from: dirkr on August 04, 2019, 13:50 ---
Anybody heard of that before? What kind of license do they sell for that?
This link:
https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/shutterstock.html
--- End quote ---
The only thing I can imagine about this that makes sense legally (if not ethically) is that SS is offering these images as prints… and if any one of them sells, SS then pays the artist his/her basic royalty.
Everything over and above that tiny amount would plump up SS's bottom line.
Is any other interpretation possible?
Jo Ann Snover:
I hadn't heard about this before - thanks for posting. Based on the upload dates, this happened June 19 2019
Basically, Shutterstock is competing with its contributors by selling prints on FAA given they haven't eliminated duplicates with own accounts.
Some of their pricing is lower than my own, some higher. SS has only one of my images in their shop and I have no idea how I'd know if there was a sale via FAA. I'm just taking a wild guess that I'd make less because SS is taking a cut.
I don't remember reading anything about this and I definitely think they should have asked first given FAA is a place where contributors can upload themselves. And SS needs an opt out specifically for this partnership...
In practice, with one image, it's not that big a deal for me, but it might be a huge deal for others. I guess it also means that FAA have given up on their attempts to license images :)
SS announces its Q2 financial results on Tuesday. Perhaps this deal is another shiny object to distract investors from slowing growth and a collection larded with spam and Associated Press images uploaded by "contributors" who have no rights to those images...
Edited to add that there's a "Shutterstock collection" on art.com too. I did a google search as I remembered seeing the image pop up higher than expected in the last month or so and wondered. A search for Shutterstock there says there are about 18K images (search for Shutterstock to find the images)
angelawaye:
I had no idea they were doing this. There needs to be an opt out option. One thing that really upsets me on FAA is the watermark issue. Look at this photo
https://fineartamerica.com/featured/flying-pigeon-bird-in-action-isolated-mrs-ya.html
It isn't even visible.
zsooofija:
Please correct me if I am wrong, but as I read SS TOS, the Standard Image License does not include the right to resale on physical products. What do you think? I am not even sure the EL covers this usage.
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