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Poll

With new earning structure made by Shutterstock will you disable your portfolio?

Disable photo and video
130 (47.3%)
Disable only photo
15 (5.5%)
Disable only video
21 (7.6%)
Disable nothing
76 (27.6%)
Quit Shutterstock
33 (12%)

Total Members Voted: 263

Author Topic: With new earning structure made by Shutterstock will you disable your portfolio?  (Read 56526 times)

0 Members and 4 Guests are viewing this topic.

« Reply #250 on: June 05, 2020, 03:50 »
+1
Here is a paper that analyses crowd intelligence through comments on Seeking alpha.

https://sites.cs.ucsb.edu/~ravenben/publications/pdf/salpha-cscw15.pdf

Over the last years I have moved to mostly trade on sentiment instead of just fundamentals. Some stocks go to crazy irrational heights, because the investor community glorifies them.

Other stocks drop radically inspite of great fundamentals becsuse the investor community has convinced itself they have no future,

Eventually, reality always wins and a stock price settles close to the fundamentals.

But it can take several years.

So what I am trying to say: if you get involved in investor communities, not just for sstk, but simply in general, your comments matter and have a real influence.

There are professional companies that routinely scrape these comments and analyse them to predict the direction of markets.


Brasilnut

  • Author Brutally Honest Guide to Microstock & Blog

« Reply #251 on: June 05, 2020, 09:05 »
+10
Hit them where it hurts and contact their buyers!

I just did on Twitter.


« Reply #252 on: June 05, 2020, 10:28 »
+15
i disabled 4000 images and 1000 videos. I know it is just a drop. But every drop matters.

I invite everyone to join the movement at least for sometime that you can afford.
« Last Edit: June 05, 2020, 12:02 by theendup »

« Reply #253 on: June 05, 2020, 10:42 »
+10
I disabled all videos. 1000 videos is not much but everything counts.

« Reply #254 on: June 05, 2020, 11:02 »
+14
today i disabled 10.000 images.
0.10
0.10
0.14
0.12
0.10
0.10
0.10
...

« Reply #255 on: June 05, 2020, 11:06 »
+2
Very frequent selling image on several agencies, with about 1000 downloads on Shutterstock alone. Top line in relevant search results for "patriotic" and "patriotism" among 800,000 results. Not any more. Not on Shutterstock.

Are you on twitter? I see an account for @Atomazul - is that you. You should tweet about that (and where it can be found now)

Good idea. Not much of twitterer, as that abandoned profile implies. Waiting for a response from them about getting it back. Might be effective to post a barrage of high quality, eye-catching images with something like #notonshutterstock or #shutterstockdoesnthavethis tags. Constantly try to remind potential customers of what they're missing if they're with or considering Shutterstock, while promoting any companies that offer it's contributors fairer deals.

Meanwhile, I'm spending time that should be used to create, on deleting and moving content around and trying to figure out a strategy moving forward. I've been inspired by those with much higher quality and/or quantity than myself disabling their portfolios and bringing attention to all this. Thank you for that. And while it doesn't look like Shutterstock is interested in walking anything back, I'd like to think that they and their competitors will at least see all this backlash as an inconvenience they'd rather avoid and put more thought and consideration into future decisions. As glaringly naive as that sounds.

« Reply #256 on: June 05, 2020, 12:04 »
+1
today i disabled 10.000 images.
0.10
0.10
0.14
0.12
0.10
0.10
0.10
...

I tweeted about this (with your name obscured). If you want to share yourself on twitter I can retweet that too

https://twitter.com/joannsnover/status/1268951582495748096

« Reply #257 on: June 05, 2020, 12:14 »
+19
I got my May payout today. That safely in the bag, I looked at the new RPD since 1st June - it's more or less exactly $ 0,50 - that's close to 20 % less than what I used to get before. Less than half of Adobe's RPD.

And it's not just about the money - in the past five days, I cringed whenever I saw that someone bought one of my vectors and I got $ 0,10 or thereabouts. Ten freaking cents! No way. Making those took time and effort and creativity and they are worth more than that.

That's another account deactivated & another level 5 contributor gone. Goodbye Shutterstock. I hope you burn in hell.

« Reply #258 on: June 05, 2020, 14:15 »
+6
May I tell you what I did?
Instead of disabling my images I erased them. I left only my first ones: I confess they were really bad, I was unexperienced about post processing and image composition. I thought "if they have the guts of selling them, they are really good, I don't know if these images deserve 0.10$" But it just happened ! Yesterday I sold an image of many years ago that never sold before  ;D.
Okay, seriously speaking I'm going well at Adobe and Alamy and I cannot leave here my best images to compete.
If things get worse everywhere, better sell by myself (as I'm already doing for a particular niche of images), because at that time the agencies will sell only garbage. 
« Last Edit: June 05, 2020, 14:27 by gameover »

« Reply #259 on: June 05, 2020, 14:52 »
+4
I think it's a better idea to suspend the content and force them to mantain useless full disks forever 8)

Chichikov

« Reply #260 on: June 05, 2020, 15:14 »
+6
I think it's a better idea to suspend the content and force them to mantain useless full disks forever 8)
Probably in three or six months they will tell you that if you keep your portfolio disabled you have to pay for the hosting
Once greedy, always greedy...

« Reply #261 on: June 05, 2020, 23:45 »
+8
Roughly 1,920,000 images deleted or disabled by now. (Within the past couple of days. May be more than that; my port e.g. was already down before we started counting.) Plus, about 800.000 which - otherwise - would have been added.

« Reply #262 on: June 06, 2020, 02:44 »
+16
Just disabled everything. It means stock is more or less pointless for me now - well, it has been since June 1, with something like a 60% cut in commission earnings (thanks for the birthday present, SS!).
I don't even believe they are paying anything close to the commission rates they have announced. For about 15 years I was getting 38c, now I get 10c as an alleged 30% commission? That means the actual sales prices is 33c and for 15 years they were paying me more per download than they got. Does anybody believe that? Otherwise they must have cut subscription pack prices by 70% - lucky buyers! ... only I don't believe that.

What I do believe is that the old commission structure was based on a statistical average of the number of downloads actually made from a subscription - perhaps only half the possible total - and the new structure assumes 100% usage of all packs, rather than allowing for actual usage. If that is so, then the 30% level is more like 15% and the 10% level is something like 3%.

I've had more than 140,000 downloads at SS down the years bringing me almost $71,000 so it hurts to disable everything, but not as much as it hurts to see my commissions slashed by around 70%. Even that isn't enough for the greedy filth: in January they plan to cut my 10c commissions down to 3c. That's a 92% pay cut!!!! Who do they think they are kidding?

I really feel quite sick over this. It's possibly worse than anything Istock has ever done to us. You've screwed up big-time SS. With considerable difficulty I will refrain from launching my first ever foul-mouthed tirade, what I would call you is probably worse than you could even imagine.

PS: I see in posts from people who are following this more closely that they have apparently slashed subscription prices and the 10c sales are more than 30% and are some sort of floor under the commission rate - but I don't care, I'm only interested in the monthly payouts that won't be coming any more, the grossly insulting commission structure/levels and the humiliating way they are treating us all.
« Last Edit: June 06, 2020, 03:03 by BaldricksTrousers »

Justanotherphotographer

« Reply #263 on: June 06, 2020, 04:10 »
+2
Just disabled everything. It means stock is more or less pointless for me now - well, it has been since June 1, with something like a 60% cut in commission earnings (thanks for the birthday present, SS!).
I don't even believe they are paying anything close to the commission rates they have announced. For about 15 years I was getting 38c, now I get 10c as an alleged 30% commission? That means the actual sales prices is 33c and for 15 years they were paying me more per download than they got. Does anybody believe that? Otherwise they must have cut subscription pack prices by 70% - lucky buyers! ... only I don't believe that.

What I do believe is that the old commission structure was based on a statistical average of the number of downloads actually made from a subscription - perhaps only half the possible total - and the new structure assumes 100% usage of all packs, rather than allowing for actual usage. If that is so, then the 30% level is more like 15% and the 10% level is something like 3%.

I've had more than 140,000 downloads at SS down the years bringing me almost $71,000 so it hurts to disable everything, but not as much as it hurts to see my commissions slashed by around 70%. Even that isn't enough for the greedy filth: in January they plan to cut my 10c commissions down to 3c. That's a 92% pay cut!!!! Who do they think they are kidding?

I really feel quite sick over this. It's possibly worse than anything Istock has ever done to us. You've screwed up big-time SS. With considerable difficulty I will refrain from launching my first ever foul-mouthed tirade, what I would call you is probably worse than you could even imagine.

PS: I see in posts from people who are following this more closely that they have apparently slashed subscription prices and the 10c sales are more than 30% and are some sort of floor under the commission rate - but I don't care, I'm only interested in the monthly payouts that won't be coming any more, the grossly insulting commission structure/levels and the humiliating way they are treating us all.
Great to see you posting again, shame it had to be over this.

100% agree. This is much worse than it even seems on the surface. Actual percentages are going to be much, much lower than advertised as we know they were previously making money hand over fist on just unused dls in the big subs packs.



« Reply #264 on: June 06, 2020, 04:12 »
+3
The 10 cents are a floor they kindly instated for THIS YEAR. No promises were made what happens next year.

« Reply #265 on: June 06, 2020, 04:25 »
+2
I am still baffled by the brutal application of a new payment system unilaterally adopted by SS and I am also frustrated to see the really poor payment of the 10 cents applied in the majority of sales in this part of the month.
I am tempted to suspend sales and / or cancel the account.
For now I will just not upload new images and videos.
From what I have read there is no possibility to cancel all your work with a single click.
I therefore developed this strategy that can allow me to give SS at least a little annoyance without compromising a possible resumption of uploads in case there was an improvement in the payment system for us collaborators.
In concrete terms, therefore:
- (maybe!) I only upload new editorial material (because Adobe doesn't accept it);
- I start to upload the oldest photos that I have and which are of poor quality.
By uploading old photos (some of which are already in my portfolio) I hope to annoy their recruiters who will have to take the trouble to examine and possibly accept photos that had previously been discarded,
I realize that all this can only tickle SS also because my portfolio is not very significant, but it is all that I now feel I can do.

(Sorry I don't speak English but I speak Italian. I used an online translator)

« Reply #266 on: June 06, 2020, 04:36 »
+7
I am still baffled by the brutal application of a new payment system unilaterally adopted by SS and I am also frustrated to see the really poor payment of the 10 cents applied in the majority of sales in this part of the month.
I am tempted to suspend sales and / or cancel the account.
For now I will just not upload new images and videos.
From what I have read there is no possibility to cancel all your work with a single click.
I therefore developed this strategy that can allow me to give SS at least a little annoyance without compromising a possible resumption of uploads in case there was an improvement in the payment system for us collaborators.
In concrete terms, therefore:
- (maybe!) I only upload new editorial material (because Adobe doesn't accept it);
- I start to upload the oldest photos that I have and which are of poor quality.
By uploading old photos (some of which are already in my portfolio) I hope to annoy their recruiters who will have to take the trouble to examine and possibly accept photos that had previously been discarded,
I realize that all this can only tickle SS also because my portfolio is not very significant, but it is all that I now feel I can do.

(Sorry I don't speak English but I speak Italian. I used an online translator)

Actualy it's 4 clicks -> Account settings/-> Licensing options, click "NO/NO" for image and video sales, click save settings. Don't sell yourself for $0,10 per image.


« Reply #267 on: June 06, 2020, 05:54 »
+1
Actualy it's 4 clicks -> Account settings/-> Licensing options, click "NO/NO" for image and video sales, click save settings. Don't sell yourself for $0,10 per image.
[/quote]

This is true, but from what other collaborators say they have done so it seems that SS continues to sell the images and probably pocket 100% of the sale.
To permanently delete photos you have to do it for single photo !!!
Unless that's true

Justanotherphotographer

« Reply #268 on: June 06, 2020, 06:05 »
+1
Actualy it's 4 clicks -> Account settings/-> Licensing options, click "NO/NO" for image and video sales, click save settings. Don't sell yourself for $0,10 per image.

This is true, but from what other collaborators say they have done so it seems that SS continues to sell the images and probably pocket 100% of the sale.
To permanently delete photos you have to do it for single photo !!!
Unless that's true
[/quote]
It just takes a little while for the database to update. If you disable you will see your number of images go down soon after.

« Reply #269 on: June 06, 2020, 06:20 »
+3
How about a Twitter campaign where everyone posts photos, videos and illustrations that are #NoLongerOnShutterstock ? You could include a link to where the work is still available.

This would allow many more people to get involved, because you dont have to close your account or turn your port off, just delete one item. Imagine if thousands of people did this all on the same day.


A variation on your idea Michele - I thought I'd start a nice little Show and Tell thread on the Shutterstock forums. Twitter to follow. All my 2610 images opted out this morning.
https://forums.submit.shutterstock.com/topic/100375-soon-to-be-deactivated-images/

« Reply #270 on: June 06, 2020, 06:22 »
+2
Actualy it's 4 clicks -> Account settings/-> Licensing options, click "NO/NO" for image and video sales, click save settings. Don't sell yourself for $0,10 per image.

This is true, but from what other collaborators say they have done so it seems that SS continues to sell the images and probably pocket 100% of the sale.
To permanently delete photos you have to do it for single photo !!!
Unless that's true
It just takes a little while for the database to update. If you disable you will see your number of images go down soon after.
[/quote]
That was exactly my fear. As I don't trust them anymore,  I deleted my images instead.

« Reply #271 on: June 06, 2020, 06:27 »
0

How about a Twitter campaign where everyone posts photos, videos and illustrations that are #NoLongerOnShutterstock ? You could include a link to where the work is still available.

This would allow many more people to get involved, because you dont have to close your account or turn your port off, just delete one item. Imagine if thousands of people did this all on the same day.
Excellent idea !!!

« Reply #272 on: June 06, 2020, 06:27 »
+1
Just a question...

I disabled my portfolio and if you follow the SS link in my signature you can see that there are no active images there.
Also in SS search engine the images dont show up.

But, the links to the images are still working, so the are accessible from pinterest or google search etc.

So I am wondering if they will eventually vanish in a while, are they being counted as active images in SS database, can they still be downloaded?

For example:



If the count of my images i already 0 this link shouldn't be working.

What is the situation for you that disabled your portfolio before, are your image links still working ?
« Last Edit: June 21, 2020, 19:29 by Lizard »

« Reply #273 on: June 06, 2020, 07:20 »
+2
I'am not gona disable my port, but i stop uploading for a while
First i want to wait and see how this turns out

In the first week i had a rpd for subs of 31 cent (before 25 cent)
So i think whit the new structure i can earn more

« Reply #274 on: June 06, 2020, 07:22 »
+4
I'am not gona disable my port, but i stop uploading for a while
First i want to wait and see how this turns out

In the first week i had a rpd for subs of 31 cent (before 25 cent)
So i think whit the new structure i can earn more

Then you just got lucky with the first few sub sales.
It looks like not even level 6 contributors will make 0.31 avarage on sub sales


 

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