This edition has short items on: What Are Photographs Worth?; Some Thoughts About Microstock; GDUSA Survey; Other Micropayment News; Magazine Closing and Getty Images Adds AP Video.
Pino Granata of Granataimages in Italy, has circulated a letter to agency owners in Europe and the U.S. lamenting the trends the stock photo business has taken and questioning the future potential. I agree with his concerns and have responded to many of the points he makes in his letter.
Recently a reader pointed out, "In the past you've been negative on the potential for stock photo industry growth in terms of pricing and volumes. Currently, are you seeing any likelihood of improvement in these areas?" This story outlines why I see little to no chance for improvement in the short or long term.
This is a brief history of stock photography examining how it started and how it got to where it is today. I have tried to chronicle the key events and changes that have taken place in the last 80 years, in hopes that understanding the past will enable us to avoid repeating some of the same mistakes in the future.
This issue contains the following stories: Micro Payment; Who Uses iStockphoto?; $.25 Per Download Adds Up????; Getty Has Record Revenue Q2 2006; Where Does Riser Fit?; Alamy Reports Record Growth In Supply; Footage Market; More On Footage; Online Ad Spending Up
Corbis has reported its revenue numbers for the first half of 2006 and CEO Steve Davis told Wall Street analysts that we have "just had the best two quarters in history." The company generated approximately $127 million up from $111.6 million in the first half of 2005. Projecting first-half revenue forward for the full year Corbis should gross in excess of $254 million for 2006, up from $228 million in 2005.
Getty has launched its Riser brand that offers Rights-Ready (RR) pricing. The price for image use in Printed Marketing Material or Product/Packaging is $800. So far there are 64,770 images available, but it looks like this includes a lot of similars. For example there are 16 shots of a woman sitting at a desk that differ only in slight variations of expression.
Discovery Selects Getty Images To Distribute Footage And Photography, Lonely Planet And Navman Create Interactive Online Travel Guide, Photolibrary Acquires ABPL Food File, TemplateMonster.com Partners With Fotolia.com, Adobe Adds Collections, Corbis Appoints Co-Directors Of Outline, Marcus Benkwitz Becomes New Plainpicture Partner
Stock Artists Alliance (SAA) has written its membership expressing concerns about Getty's plans to launch its Rights-Ready collection called Riser. The issues center around the right of Getty to make images available through Riser without specific photographer approval, and the perpetual duration of licenses.
a21, Inc. has reported $4,511,000 in revenues for Q2 2006, but only $3,023,000 of that was for the stock photo side of the business. ArtSelect which provides wall art for homes and businesses provided $1,488,000 in revenue in less that a month and a half. ArtSelect earned approximately $12 million in 2005 and would be expected to earn about $3 million in a full quarter, equal to what the stock photo side of the business generates.