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Articles from January 2009
Time Warner's America Online division is cutting 10% of its workforce. Though such news is not unique, AOL's reasoning gives new cause for concern.
Many photographers found the language of the new 15-page iStockphoto Exclusive Artist's Supply Agreement difficult to comprehend. A big part of the confusion lies in the fact that an exclusive arrangement with iStock is
photographer-exclusive for royalty-free content, unlike nearly all other exclusive arrangements in the industry, which are
image-exclusive.
The New York-based Everett Collection is in hot water for attempting to license celebrity and entertainment images without their owners' permission. According to
Photo Business News, in the first development of Michael Grecco v. Everett Collection, filed in September 2007, the court sided with the photographer.
Munich-based StockFood, which also has offices in the U.K. and Maine, U.S., is once again sponsoring the FAB Futures Award for designers under 30.
Stock photography producers and sellers have lost sight of how to value their images. It is time for all sellers to reevaluate their pricing strategies.
Some believe that microstock has resulted in a contraction of total stock-image revenues, but this is not beyond dispute. Though microstock is showing signs of slowing growth, 2009 may still see an overall revenue reduction, as recession pushes buyers to lower-priced images.
After
Selling Stock published a story on the Compassionate Eye Foundation, which recently raised $250,000 for charity through its partnership with Getty Images, subscriber feedback revealed some confusion about the nature of the relationship between the two partners. Peggy Willett, Getty Images' director of community and industry relations, offers details on the Seattle agency's contribution to the non-profit.
Fotolia has put out a call for video submissions. The company said the move is a response to overwhelming demand.
Some sellers and customers argue that photos of a single subject on a white background should be less expensive than more complex shots that require models, props and additional time to produce. One of the driving forces behind the development of microstock was the buyer desire to have access to such shots for prices that are lower than traditional. Isolated subjects have since become the domain of microstock agencies.
Citizen-photojournalism Web site Demotix hopes that the pull of the
Financial Times will make its new contest a success. The two British companies have partnered in a contest that invites users to capture "the real story of the credit crunch."
Denver-based Thought Equity Motion has launched the Research Store, which the company says is the largest online library of long-form footage available for licensing. The company has also updated its search technology, integrating user ability to search video content by spoken word.
In a recent PermissionTV survey of 400 senior marketing executives, 67% of respondents said identified video as the primary focus of this year's online marketing campaigns. Video is also expected to evolve in sophistication and interactivity.
Getty Images launched rights-ready pricing in 2006 in order to meet customer demands for "simpler, faster licensing." Now, the company has discovered that "customers also want to maintain their ability to very precisely fine-tune their licensing."
Santa Monica-based GumGum, one of a handful of companies experimenting with use-based licensing of images online, has expanded its entertainment and celebrity offering with paparazzi imagery by Bauer-Griffin. GumGum co-founder and chief executive officer Ophir Tanz also told Selling Stock that the licensing platform "is experiencing tremendous growth" overall.
Though this week's inauguration of President Obama has resulted in a spike of newspaper sales, these are but a drop in a big, nearly empty bucket. Emerging studies demonstrate that 2008 was the year when news consumption on the Internet finally overtook print and newspaper ad-revenues plummeted.
The Compassionate Eye Foundation has announced that its collection of over 1,000 images has generated more than $250,000 for international aid. Distributed by Getty Images, CEF is the first organization to raise funds through stock-image licensing.
A frequent question from professional stock photographers is: "Will hobbyists take over the market?" Our answer: not even in microstock.
Many think that the stock-image industry should find a way to price images based on the cost of production. But the problem is not in the lack of a link between production cost and image price, but in the whole idea of stock photography as a primary business.
Barcelona-based age fotostock closed 2008 with 8.6 million images, which represents a 68% inventory increase since the previous year. Unlike those who say oversupply is the stock industry's biggest problem, age fotostock believes there is a direct relationship between the agency's inventory size and market share.
As compared to the list of the top 50 iStockers, iStockcharts offers a more comprehensive list of iStock photographer performance. iStockcharts is updated daily and includes 21,377 shooters of the over 60,000 that have images on iStock.
Last week's mergers among German-speaking image agencies mirror a wave of similar U.S. activity. With increased interest from leading global companies, the third-largest stock-image market may be in for a shakeout.
The Publishers Information Bureau said magazine advertising generated $23.7 billion in 2008, a decline of 7.8% over the previous year. Ad pages were also down by 11.7%.
A consortium that unites Rubberball, Glow Images, Blend Images and some of Blend's partners has become the new owner of the U.S. assets of SuperStock. RGB Ventures intends to continue to operate the company.
Stock-industry suppliers ImageSpan and JaincoTech announced a partnership that expands and cross-promotes the services each offers its clients.
India-based Dinodia Photo Library has met the New Year with a new Web site and a new image collection.
Corbis and Thought Equity Motion have partnered to take advantage of each other's strengths. The two companies will cross-distribute their footage collections, increasing Corbis' content inventory and offering Thought Equity wider international exposure.
Calling 2008 a challenging year would be an understatement.
Richard Prince, the "appropriation" artist whose work is exhibited at the level of the Guggenheim and sets records at contemporary art auctions, will have to defend himself in a copyright-infringement lawsuit brought by photographer Patrick Cariou.
The latest creative trend from Corbis is "Boomeritis:" a concept that describes the mostly self-inflicted injuries and ailments of mature athletes. In addition, Corbis expands European distribution through new partners in Croatia and Denmark.
NBC Universal of Burbank, Calif., has selected Paris-based SIPA Press to become the main international distribution partner for NBCU's archival television images.
One of the world's most productive stock photographers, Jonathan Ross of Seattle's AndersenRoss, shares his strategy for controlling costs, particularly when it comes to microstock shoots.
During this week's Macworld Conference and Expo, iStockphoto unveiled "Dexter"—a stand-alone desktop application that changes the image-search and purchasing paradigm.
Construction Photography is documenting the development of the complex that will host the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games—in high definition.
Many stock photographers expressed concern that the recent changes in the commission structures of Alamy and Corbis were the first signs of an industry trend. Such predictions may have been justified.
Many traditional stock photographers question whether it will ever be possible to earn enough money from microstock production to justify the effort. Ron Chapple's experience is instructive.
In an on-again, off-again fashion reminiscent of Digital Railroad's last month in business,
JPG magazine is entertaining last-minute offers that would keep it afloat.
Getty Images has updated its Web site with a new podcast, in which award-winning staff photographer Mario Tama discusses his varied photojournalism projects.
Following recent allegations by Stefan Hartmann of
VISUELL, Jupiterimages denies any wrongdoing with regard to photographer commissions and service fees in Europe.
For traditional photographers interested in learning more about the microstock subjects in demand, much can be learned from the portfolios of best-selling iStockphoto contributors.
Ex-Getty exec joins Chicago operations of image-tracking company.
JPG magazine, a 2-year-old bimonthly print title that published reader-submitted imagery, has become the latest casualty of the economic crisis. The publication shuttered operations as of Monday, Jan. 5.
London-based Bridgeman Art Library adds an abstract photography collection.
This year, should photographers market new images as rights-managed, traditional royalty-free or microstock? It likely will not make a whole lot of difference.
There are countless stories about what best-selling stock photographers earn. However, the earnings of photographers a little farther down the food chain are more germane. It is useful to consider the likely earnings of the 50 most successful contributors to Getty Images' creative collections (rights-managed and royalty-free) and compare these figures with iStockphoto's 50 most successful photographers, paying particular attention to the probable earnings of the 50th photographer on the list.
The following is a list of the 50 iStockphoto contributors with the most career downloads and thus the highest earning as of the end of 2008. Non-microstock photographers may use this list, and the links provided, to learn a little more about microstock’s potential.