Internet advertising - including pure-play Web sites and digital extensions of traditional media - will replace newspapers as the largest ad medium in 2011, according to research from Veronis Suhler Stevenson.
RM sellers are winners under the MRR strategy. Many photographers will note that size of usage is being ignored; a few customers will get really big uses for less than they might have paid in the past.
The Tokyo-based Aflo Co. and Mainichi Newspapers Co. have signed an agreement in which Aflo will represent the historical archive and current production of The Mainichi Shinbun.
The London, U.K.-based Image Source has launched AXIS, a service that provides third-party production companies with access to Image Source's established sales channel and worldwide representation.
The Industry Measure, a specialized research and forecasting firm, predicts that graphic design and production establishments will spend $53.5 million on digital cameras between the summers of 2007 and 2008.
Soundtrack, which provides instant legal clearance on music for broadcasting and advertising, is the first service Getty Images has launched since its $42 million acquisition of Pump Audio in June.
All image sellers win with MRR. Possibly the biggest benefactor of such a pricing strategy is traditional RF (TRF).
Lloyd Shugart, a Seattle-based professional photographer, was just awarded $1.3 million in a three-day jury trial. Represented by the Mann Law Group, Shugart was a defendant in the copyright-infringement case.
BBC Worldwide has acquired the 30-year-old, Australia-based travel publisher Lonely Planet. Lonely Planet Images, a travel-stock library established in 1998, was part of the deal.
In a move that blurs the boundaries between professional and hobbyist photographers, Jupiterimages has invited the contributors of its micro-payment community Stockxpert to submit work for sale under the company's Dynamic Graphics brand.
Here are uses included in each category of the Modified Rights Ready (MRR) business model. Any use not specifically included in the first 15 definitions falls into the "Other" category and must be negotiated. In addition, uses in several different categories are not permitted unless each category is purchased, or they are all commercial uses and that category is purchased.
Here is a suggested strategy for MRR pricing. All the prices are for nonexclusive use of an image in a single project or campaign. Multiple uses of a picture for several different campaigns, or by different customers must be negotiated. Exclusive uses must be negotiated. Price is unrelated to the size used, the length of time used and the user's industry. The only factor affecting price is circulation, with the exception of cover uses that must be negotiated.
My proposed new pricing strategy can best be described as a Modified Rights Ready (MRR) model. It uses some of the basics of RR as designed by Getty Images, but overcomes many of the problems with Getty's model. In an effort to achieve maximum simplicity, Getty lumped different types of uses into a single category and ignored important categories at the low end. I have broadened the number of categories to 16.
Getty Images, Corbis and a number of other agencies rely on PicScout to monitor online use of their images. In an environment where infringement is rampant, PicScout helps copyright owners identify unauthorized image use and recoup lost revenues. While such objectives are critical to maintaining a successful stock-licensing business, PicScout's monitoring practices are becoming increasingly questioned by Webmasters.
The National Legal and Policy Center, a Washington, D.C.-based legal watchdog group, has presented members of Congress with a report detailing Google's role in the film industry's copyright violations. NLPC contends that Google Video and the video-sharing Web site YouTube are hurting copyright by hosting infringing material.
In addition to moving closer to profitability, the recent consolidation and restructuring of a21 operations was intended to free up cash resources needed to launch new products and support existing ones. Today, a21 announced plans for an online royalty-free stock-licensing business MediaMagnet.
Is it all about the customer? Customers will always want more for less, but at some point, there has to be enough revenue for the producer to justify continued production.
Online U.K. music-licensing company Ricall and BBC Motion Gallery have reached an agreement to cross-promote each other's product lines. Ricall's inventory contains 4 million tracks, including all of the U.K.'s top 40 and the U.S.' top 100, as well as independent music. BBC's archive, which contains more than 500,000 hours of footage.
ZUMA Press, a California-based photojournalism agency, is now representing the daily photographic production and archive of The Los Angeles Daily News.
Buyers want a simple, easy-to-use pricing system that allows them to use any image they can find at a price they can afford. None of the existing pricing systems adequately addresses this issue.