The Calgary-based microstock pioneer iStockphoto says its community has surpassed 2 million members. Of this number, 38,000 people are contributors - and many microstock photographers moonlight as art directors and graphic designers who also buy images.
Jupitermedia acquired Mediabistro for $20 million in cash and a two-year earn-out that may result in an additional $3 million. Lauren Touby, the founder of the New York-based online community Mediabistro.com, who will stay with the company, referred to the $23 million deal as "a marriage of minds and media resources."
Alamy has released their second quarter 2007 figures on contributors, percentage revenue and average pricing which shows no major change from the previous quarter. In the quarter they added 897,277 images to their collection, slightly fewer than in the previous quarter. They now have over 9.15 million images on their site.
This July marks the first year for ProStockMaster, a shareware software package that allows microstock contributors to simultaneously upload images to eight leading Web sites. ProStockMaster also features additional capabilities designed to streamline a photographer's workflow.
Recently, I've been made aware that some photographers don't understand the difference between Return-Per-Image (RPI) and Return-Per-Image-Licensed (RPIL) and they are drawing some incorrect conclusions, particularly when Alamy reports its quarterly numbers.