Duncan_Andison

Mine didn't take long to sort out. Disabled.

I agree. If Alamy go ahead with this cut then it's obvious Alamy views our commission as their Rainy Day money. Nice easy money for them. And saying it shouldn't happen again means nothing given they said that the last time. The trust has gone and I'm not sure they can recover it. The prospect of further reductions from an untrustworthy agency, lower licence fees with low sales volume certainly means I will be looking to place work elsewhere now. T

Yes... don't want to go off topic

I've done alright with freebies off them this year. 12 months full CC package for free and another voucher for the Photographers (PS & LR) for a year.

Get 300 pieces uploaded and you should get Adobe Creative Cloud Photographers package for free for a year. Got till the end of December I think.

Not necessarily. Most agencies weight images by a number of factors when a client searches a particular search term and one of the main variables is image age. In other words, you are looking at a 10 years span but realistically, searches will give priority of images with within a 2-3 year age span then dropping off after that subject to how popular the image has been. You will get some images appearing from way back but this is also likely part of the search design. Libraries like to keep fresh content coming to the fore so, images with no views/sales are brought forward (in smaller numbers) for a 2nd chance. Anyway, the top and bottom of it is, when a client searches for an image, you images is not competing with the full 155m, it's competing with images of the same keyword and each image is then ranked based on a predetermined set of variables. The age variable often pushes a lot of these images of the back of the search leaving newer and more popular at the front with a mix of older stuff as well. At least, this is how I hope Alamy work it

We don't want or need you to just read the feedback. You need to listen, take note and take corrective action. It seems like you're at a crossroads here and you need to think carefully about what you do next. If you start releasing half baked changes to the website in the future, you'll suffer even more backlash on top of this as people remember who funded the failures. This has been mentioned on the other thread.... don't think you can take our money, squander it on ill thought out plans/ideas thinking it's the safe option because you don't need explain the failure to a bank manager.

Possibly. I haven't submitted much to Alamy this year and it has been a good year, could even turn into the best year yet but of course, that will change with the cut. I was intending to do more editorial work but not so sure, still might but my focus will be on work that goes to other RM's, footage and motion graphics. I haven't decided whether it is worth submitting here as even now they only represent about 8% of my stock income so it's easier for me to stop submitting to them.

Sadly the reality will be that we'll see them selling our work short even more with reduced licence fees for image use that extends over a longer and longer period of time. I'd feel more like, "We're in it together" if they also shouldered some of the costs in way of reduced salaries. It's acceptable for us to take a hit so why not them? After all, it's about securing their futures as well so why shouldn't they invest into it? Certainly bring a halt to charity payments. If they can't afford to pay us then they can't afford to give money away either. Why should they continue to reward themselves with salaries that no doubt go up by inflation each year while we suffer.

If bring $ to £ it's a benefit. I know, I rub my hands every time the pound takes a tumble when exchanging my $ each month. So if it makes a sizeable difference to me, then I guess when you're exchanging $1m's then a small jig maybe in order

You mean, as if we are partners? No.... Christmas is coming and the CEO needs to buy lots of presents and there's that bundle of cash to chuck into the charity tin

This is what I find most distasteful. We suffer so they can look good as a family giving to charity.... their own charity! If you can't afford to pay your suppliers, don't give away your profits!

Fotolia hasn't gone as such. AS was created by buying them and then they started to develop their own brand alongside. They are now combining the two. We started with one agency and it will end as one agency.

On the basis they deal in $'s, they would end up making more money when converting the $ back to £'s if we crashed out of Europe.

The issue I have here is your reducing the fees you charge to clients (a lot of them yield less than a licence at the micros) and now you reduce the level of commission we receive. You're hitting us at both ends. Now, if you turn round and say the low value licences will stop and that the majority of licence fees will be high $$ or $$$, then yes it would make me feel a little better but at the moment (given the graphs showing your increased revenues) your only fattening your own wallet..... again.