rickboden Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 I read the topic on the new contract and the main concern seemed to be Alamy giving away images for free. To be honest, that doesn't bother me so much as I'm sure it would be a small volume thing...unless Alamy is going to an advertising based model but I'm pretty confident that is not the case. Instead what bothers me the most is the mention of "high volume, low unit sales" under item 9.1. To me this is subscription sales and the reason I just started submitted my images in greater volume is that Alamy "doesn't" do, or didn't do subscriptions. I cannot stand those dollar or less sales and to me it is the same as microstock. Does anyone read this the same way as I do? And do you find this as big an issue? Thanks, Rick Boden Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colblimp Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 I've never had a sub $1 sale and I'll be very upset if I ever do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cryptoprocta Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 20 minutes ago, Colblimp said: I've never had a sub $1 sale and I'll be very upset if I ever do. I and many others netted under $1 on a bulk discount distributor sale in August (I had four, two netting 66c). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colblimp Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 1 minute ago, Cryptoprocta said: I and many others netted under $1 on a bulk discount distributor sale in August (I had four, two netting 66c). Oh my days, I did not want to read that because $1 sales are a tragedy, always... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cryptoprocta Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 29 minutes ago, rickboden said: Instead what bothers me the most is the mention of "high volume, low unit sales" under item 9.1. To me this is subscription sales and the reason I just started submitted my images in greater volume is that Alamy "doesn't" do, or didn't do subscriptions. I cannot stand those dollar or less sales and to me it is the same as microstock. Does anyone read this the same way as I do? Not necessarily subscriptions as such, but certainly bulk discounts. It has been mentioned in the forum several times in the past that the UKNS is, effectively, a subscription scheme, but of course we're not privy to the exact details. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cryptoprocta Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 9 minutes ago, Colblimp said: Oh my days, I did not want to read that because $1 sales are a tragedy, always... Don't know how you missed the thread in August. Here's a screenshot, these are gross prices of which I got 30% (so not two for 66c, sorry: it was 3 x 98c and 1x63c) https://www.dropbox.com/s/x7042hzp3n0ikv2/AlamyLowPrices.jpg?dl=0 NB: these were NOT novel use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avpics Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 3 minutes ago, Colblimp said: Oh my days, I did not want to read that because $1 sales are a tragedy, always... And there was a large batch of NU sales recently of which a couple were mine, for a similar value. Anger, incredulity followed by a deep swallow. It's not as if pulling out of the lower value schemes will force the customer to purchase at a higher value, they'll just buy someone else's. Lose, lose Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cryptoprocta Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 40 minutes ago, rickboden said: I read the topic on the new contract and the main concern seemed to be Alamy giving away images for free. To be honest, that doesn't bother me so much as I'm sure it would be a small volume thing...unless Alamy is going to an advertising based model but I'm pretty confident that is not the case. What makes you 'sure' and 'confident'? They may not, but they are certainly opening up that sort of possibility. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rickboden Posted October 16, 2018 Author Share Posted October 16, 2018 12 minutes ago, Cryptoprocta said: What makes you 'sure' and 'confident'? They may not, but they are certainly opening up that sort of possibility. Well, I can say I'm sure and confident they would lose most of their contributors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 47 minutes ago, Colblimp said: I've never had a sub $1 sale and I'll be very upset if I ever do. Oh you will, Oscar, you will... Certainly net, gross a bit less likely, I've only ever had one and it was NU. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rickboden Posted October 16, 2018 Author Share Posted October 16, 2018 To be clear, this is what I believe subscription sales are, and why they are so bad. I am happy to be corrected. a. Well-heeled clients like ad agencies can buy the right to download a number of images for a set monthly price. When an image is downloaded the photographer or artist gets a small percentage of the cut, which usually amounts to a dollar or so. b. Since the purchaser can afford these monthly subscriptions they likely have higher end clients with money to spend for bigger media buys. c. The idea of my photo being used in a billboard or advertisement where every other party makes good money while I make a dollar...drives me up a wall. d. Of course the stock agency gets their full share of the monthly subscription fee which is a great model for them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
isphoto Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 4 minutes ago, rickboden said: To be clear, this is what I believe subscription sales are, and why they are so bad. I am happy to be corrected. a. Well-heeled clients like ad agencies can buy the right to download a number of images for a set monthly price. When an image is downloaded the photographer or artist gets a small percentage of the cut, which usually amounts to a dollar or so. b. Since the purchaser can afford these monthly subscriptions they likely have higher end clients with money to spend for bigger media buys. c. The idea of my photo being used in a billboard or advertisement where every other party makes good money while I make a dollar...drives me up a wall. d. Of course the stock agency gets their full share of the monthly subscription fee which is a great model for them. Agree totally, if this is indeed the reasoning behind this change then it is now the final leg of the rapid race to the bottom. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
isphoto Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 1 minute ago, geogphotos said: Alamy is not an island. It has to adapt to the market. As far as I see it they are not actually saying that they are going down the subscription route but they do need to be flexible. I have no RF and definitely no microstock images. I do hope that those photographers supplying RF microstock are not the ones complaining about low sales on Alamy. Not that my lowly sales will matter to Alamy, but my main reason for staying with them has been that they did not do subscriptions sales and I had the option of not par-taking in the peanuts newspaper/novel scheme etc, this contract is now looking more like a dictate than a contract. I was only looking at my average sales value per image yesterday and was smiling at how they appeared to be creeping back up and bucking the downward trend of the past few years. 30% up on this time last year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KevinS Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 ...and high volume low unit price licences. Revising the contract to include this specific text is interesting. The old contract already allowed this, but now they have set the language into the contract. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gordon Scammell Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 1 hour ago, Colblimp said: I've never had a sub $1 sale and I'll be very upset if I ever do. Prepare yourself to be upset because because that is going to happening. In my very humble opinion of course. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colblimp Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 2 hours ago, Cryptoprocta said: Don't know how you missed the thread in August. Here's a screenshot, these are gross prices of which I got 30% (so not two for 66c, sorry: it was 3 x 98c and 1x63c) https://www.dropbox.com/s/x7042hzp3n0ikv2/AlamyLowPrices.jpg?dl=0 NB: these were NOT novel use. Bad memory - I mean really, really bad. I'm surprised no one got 'The Office' reference - that's mental! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rickboden Posted October 16, 2018 Author Share Posted October 16, 2018 I started submitting to Alamy in 2003 but I stopped in 2006. But I made a plan to start submitting again in earnest and have been doing so for about a week now and specifically Alamy because they didn't do subscriptions. Thinking about it, if Alamy adopts this, I will likely continue submitting but now there will be nothing holding me back from sending the same files to other agencies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brasilnut Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 Sometimes the fear is overblown. After all, 500 sales at $1 or 10 sales at $50 both = $500 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
losdemas Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 26 minutes ago, Brasilnut said: Sometimes the fear is overblown. After all, 500 sales at $1 or 10 sales at $50 both = $500 We're talking about Alamy, here. The chances are that editorial images will sell here multiple times, but over a period of years and at different price points. Unless Alamy markedly changes its ethos and marketing, then you just won't get 500 x $1 sales. You might get 1 x $1 sale, 1 x $10, 1 x $50 and 1 x $200. The point being that there isn't the volume here to take account of lower value sales, so those ($10 and lower) merely take away from higher values. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brasilnut Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 10 minutes ago, losdemas said: We're talking about Alamy, here. The chances are that editorial images will sell here multiple times, but over a period of years and at different price points. Unless Alamy markedly changes its ethos and marketing, then you just won't get 500 x $1 sales. You might get 1 x $1 sale, 1 x $10, 1 x $50 and 1 x $200. The point being that there isn't the volume here to take account of lower value sales, so those ($10 and lower) merely take away from higher values. I take your point. Mine was an extreme example. Perhaps they're trying to tap into the small web-usage, repeat editorial market for those bulk buyers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cryptoprocta Posted October 16, 2018 Share Posted October 16, 2018 4 hours ago, Colblimp said: Bad memory - I mean really, really bad. Fair enough - I suffer from the same affliction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inchiquin Posted October 17, 2018 Share Posted October 17, 2018 13 hours ago, Brasilnut said: After all, 500 sales at $1 or 10 sales at $50 both = $500 ...and one = 500 images floating around waiting to be ripped off for nothing while the other = well, you do the math. Alan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MircoV Posted October 18, 2018 Share Posted October 18, 2018 On 16/10/2018 at 18:03, geogphotos said: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
York Photographer Posted October 18, 2018 Share Posted October 18, 2018 On 10/16/2018 at 20:10, Brasilnut said: Sometimes the fear is overblown. After all, 500 sales at $1 or 10 sales at $50 both = $500 An old Photographer, once said to me Turnover is Vanity, Profit is Sanity! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris_rabe Posted October 18, 2018 Share Posted October 18, 2018 4 hours ago, York Photographer said: An old Photographer, once said to me Turnover is Vanity, Profit is Sanity! Ah yes, but where to make that profit? I am only just getting started listing photos - I did a little bit of MS, but the low returns put me off. I still do list stuff - just what I consider rubbish. If I make something from that, well fine. I decided to go with Alamy, cause I felt they had the most lucrative approach, but this latest update feels ever so slightly like more of a push to MS - I could be wrong. I have not listed my wildlife photos anywhere yet (mostly what I take) as I refuse to put my better stuff up for pennies. Getting into the dedicated wildlife agencies is tough. Wildlife doesn't seem to sell especially well on Alamy - doing some checks in their searches. I have set up my own site, but that will take ages to even get traffic, if ever. Just going to take perseverance for everyone I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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