MizBrown Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 The rule for using an agency is that the buyer deals with the agent, not the creator, and the creator trusts that the agency knows more about reasonable prices for material than most of us know. People who approach the creators directly often are looking for bargains. I've had this happen with books and sending the would-be buyers to my agent tends to end up with no further interest because my agent isn't going to let movie rights go for a couple hundred dollars. I've had someone ask me directly about using for free some photos of coffee fincas for their commercial coffee roasters website and I sent them to Alamy, but they were not interested in paying for material. If people want to get into direct arrangements, they need to know what the usual fees are, what terms of use and conditions of use are, and a lot of other realities that I kinda prefer to pay someone else to handle. If people want to work directly with a client on advertising campaigns, they should know the business end thoroughly. Cutting out agencies that got you the original contact is unethical. While most of us would be ethical and not try to start selling directly to the buyer, some wouldn't be. The other thing that stiffing individual creators is easier than stiffing a major agency. Alamy can put on more pressure to collect on international sales than individual photographers can. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Morrison Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 10 hours ago, KHA said: I have no idea why some photographers are so hostile to the idea of photographers actually being told where their work is published that they feel the need to downvote people who merely agree with the OP (who got no downvotes on any of his posts) and comment that it would be a nice courtesy, but I'll leave you guys to it! I'm not "hostile" to the idea of being told how and where my pix are used. I'm just being realistic in acknowledging Alamy's business model - their way of working - which isn't going to change any time soon... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imageplotter Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 18 hours ago, Colin Woods said: I don't think any agency will give you that information. If they do then all you have to do is phone the client yourself and negotiate with them. No business is going to give you the means to cut their services. That's not true. Other, larger news pic agencies do provide a detailed by-pic-by-publication/client list of sales at the end of the month. And yes, some people do sell directly, and very successfully. But they tend to be the people who know the picture editors, they're often ex-staffers or have been in news photography for many year. 1 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rickygui Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 since am part time stock, i will be happy to see my pictures got picked up and used somewhere which is useful for someone. As for who, what, where, why i don't really bother as long Alamy pay me on due time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
antonio pagan Posted April 26, 2019 Author Share Posted April 26, 2019 19 hours ago, Thyrsis said: Alamy never have, and never will, hand out that sort of information. Also I think Alamy could be in breach of GDPR if they did so. That’s why the friendly community here and the images found thread are invaluable. Pardon but not true , when I first joined Alamy ...they were listing at any sale specifically were the picture was published and with who. It suddenly changed after some years but do not remember if they ever send a notice to photographers about that. There would have nothing to do with GDPR it just our right as copyright owners... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
antonio pagan Posted April 26, 2019 Author Share Posted April 26, 2019 7 hours ago, MizBrown said: The rule for using an agency is that the buyer deals with the agent, not the creator, and the creator trusts that the agency knows more about reasonable prices for material than most of us know. People who approach the creators directly often are looking for bargains. I've had this happen with books and sending the would-be buyers to my agent tends to end up with no further interest because my agent isn't going to let movie rights go for a couple hundred dollars. I've had someone ask me directly about using for free some photos of coffee fincas for their commercial coffee roasters website and I sent them to Alamy, but they were not interested in paying for material. If people want to get into direct arrangements, they need to know what the usual fees are, what terms of use and conditions of use are, and a lot of other realities that I kinda prefer to pay someone else to handle. If people want to work directly with a client on advertising campaigns, they should know the business end thoroughly. Cutting out agencies that got you the original contact is unethical. While most of us would be ethical and not try to start selling directly to the buyer, some wouldn't be. The other thing that stiffing individual creators is easier than stiffing a major agency. Alamy can put on more pressure to collect on international sales than individual photographers can. interesting and good to know your opinion on all that business thing but we are going off the main point....basically our rights as copyrights owner to see where the pictures are published, use them for our portfolio to promote our work, use for payback declaration, monitoring credits, and all the rest we have the rights for... I not really going on to about business to get the Client on our side and all that negotiating thing . Hope it make sense... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thyrsis Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 13 minutes ago, antonio pagan said: Pardon but not true , when I first joined Alamy ...they were listing at any sale specifically were the picture was published and with who. It suddenly changed after some years...... We’ve been selling on Alamy since 2001 and I don’t remember ever receiving that sort of information.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dustydingo Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 5 hours ago, Thyrsis said: We’ve been selling on Alamy since 2001 and I don’t remember ever receiving that sort of information.... I've been here in one form or another since we had to send hand-drawn facsimilies of our images (the richer contributors had theirs etched onto small wooden tiles), shipped by steamer if you were lucky, to an address in a far off land rumoured to exist somewhere in the Northern Hemisphere, with a turnaround of about 5 months before you found out if your images had been accepted and you then sent the originals copied onto a funny square, stiff plastic thing amusingly called floppy . . . and a disc . . . I certainly do not recall ever being informed where the image was published and by whom. Perhaps that was a premium service for those sending etched wooden tiles? . . . 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeeCee Posted April 26, 2019 Share Posted April 26, 2019 6 hours ago, antonio pagan said: interesting and good to know your opinion on all that business thing but we are going off the main point....basically our rights as copyrights owner to see where the pictures are published, use them for our portfolio to promote our work, use for payback declaration, monitoring credits, and all the rest we have the rights for... I not really going on to about business to get the Client on our side and all that negotiating thing . Hope it make sense... Essentially you forgo some of those rights when you sign up and accept the terms and conditions. If you don't like it, don't supply. Why? Because there isn't a business in the world that could survive if it handed out all it's customer information to it's suppliers. Reality check time I'm afraid... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanDavidson Posted April 27, 2019 Share Posted April 27, 2019 I sold the better part of thirty pictures this month to news outlets, both print and online. I know of the destination of one of them. One cannot expect an agency selling hundreds if not thousands of pictures a day to tell contributors where they went. I want Alamy to sell as many of my pictures as possible for the best price possible in this highly competitive market; nothing more nothing less. That is the nature of our job. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colblimp Posted April 27, 2019 Share Posted April 27, 2019 If I'm honest, I don't care who uses my pics, I'm flattered when they sell. As long as I get paid for usage, nothing else matters. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted April 27, 2019 Share Posted April 27, 2019 (edited) It may not matter to some of you, but it obviously matters to a lot of others because that "Have you found any Alamy pictures" thread stays constantly busy. And some photographers have mentioned that that knowledge has helped make them aware of infringements. Edited April 27, 2019 by KHA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted April 27, 2019 Share Posted April 27, 2019 On 26/04/2019 at 02:15, John Morrison said: I'm not "hostile" to the idea of being told how and where my pix are used. I'm just being realistic in acknowledging Alamy's business model - their way of working - which isn't going to change any time soon... Nothing changes anywhere if people get mocked merely for broaching the idea of change. And people have posted here that there are business models other than the one you insist is the only one possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inchiquin Posted April 27, 2019 Share Posted April 27, 2019 4 hours ago, KHA said: Nothing changes anywhere if people get mocked merely for broaching the idea of change. I don't see people getting mocked. All I see is people repeatedly objecting to the business model they've signed up to, and other people repeatedly telling them that change is not going to happen. Alan 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted April 27, 2019 Share Posted April 27, 2019 36 minutes ago, Inchiquin said: I don't see people getting mocked. All I see is people repeatedly objecting to the business model they've signed up to, and other people repeatedly telling them that change is not going to happen. Alan I consider "A nice courtesy, really?" and "That's two more things you don't understand" (or whatever the exact words were) mocking comments. And the fact that the person who made those comments: twisted my words to say I was "suggesting" photographers contact clients, which I thought was pretty nasty; contradicted himself by bringing tearsheets into the conversation and then declaring that tearsheets were irrelevant; has never even bothered trying to refute the argument that photographers could be contacting clients currently anyway if they were inclined to do so; never bothered to explain the distinction I questioned that he made between notification prepublication and post-publication if the photographer was going to find out in the end anyway, instead claiming he didn't understand that part of my post; and has completely ignored the poster who said other agencies do in fact give their photographers a publication list. And despite all this still gets upvotes no matter what says. All because I happen to believe it's a nice thing to let creators know where their creations appear in the world. I have absolutely no idea why I'm the one being singled out for having an interest in where things are published, when I've never even posted in the "Have you found Alamy images" thread! I'm really not understanding at all why I'm getting hammered when there is obviously a significant interest by other photographers in finding out where their work has been published. I'm not the one keeping that thread alive! (Though I'll be happy to post at some point in the future when I spot something someone else hasn't spotted already!) If some of you don't want to find out where your work has been published, that's fine. I just don't understand why people would have a problem with other photographers who want to find out where their work has been published. I don't understand why an innocent bit of support for the OP seems to be getting me singled out negatively in a way that even he hasn't been singled out. And just so I understand your stance — once people sign up for Alamy they are not supposed to support anyone suggesting changes because that was the business model they signed up to? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Morrison Posted April 28, 2019 Share Posted April 28, 2019 5 hours ago, KHA said: I happen to believe it's a nice thing to let creators know where their creations appear in the world. Then, by joining Alamy, you appear to have made the wrong decision. Lots of things would be "nice" - photographers getting 80% of every transaction, or the lion laying down with the lamb - but the fact remains that Alamy have chosen a particular business model. Photographers who don't understand the concept, or who disagree with it, are free to find another way to market their images... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted April 28, 2019 Share Posted April 28, 2019 And photographers who are still unable to provide any actual refutations of arguments, and are unable to understand the concept that people who disagree with them are allowed to air their opinions on forums just as they are, are free to ignore entire threads like this one the same way they've ignored all evidence that contradicts their stance . . . Photographers are free to choose other ways of marketing their work as you mention, and they are equally free to suggest changes to the marketing outlets they have chosen. Isn't freedom great? I'm still very new here, but I disagree that choosing Alamy was a mistake. I've been happy enough with them so far. Perhaps you're the type to run away instantly if you don't snap your fingers and get what you want, but I'm not. You do your thing, I'll do mine. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Snelling Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 I had a small sale appear this month and queried it with Alamy and Jessica was kind enough to provide a link to the article it was used in. Certanily helped when Pixsy flagged it up the follwoing week. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joseph Clemson Posted April 30, 2019 Share Posted April 30, 2019 The issue of agencies not disclosing where images or videos have been used does not apply to Alamy alone. Each of the agencies I have used over the last 12 years I've been doing this work have operated exactly the same business model and do not routinely disclose who the final customer is. They could not do otherwise or they would be out of business very quickly and we photographers would be scrambling around hawking our wares to thousands of individual potential buyers. There is no rational argument to be made for asking ALamy, or any other agency to change their practice in this respect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted May 4, 2019 Share Posted May 4, 2019 (edited) Well, I see I've lost all my little upvote points for suggesting it would be nice to know where our photos are published. Rough forum. Fortunately, I'm not the kind to let bullies shut me up. Edited May 4, 2019 by KHA Deleted an old, empty quote box Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted May 4, 2019 Share Posted May 4, 2019 On 30/04/2019 at 12:38, Pete Snelling said: I had a small sale appear this month and queried it with Alamy and Jessica was kind enough to provide a link to the article it was used in. Certanily helped when Pixsy flagged it up the follwoing week. This is great, Pete! And proof that creatives don't have to be defeatist and say things can never change. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KHA Posted May 4, 2019 Share Posted May 4, 2019 Just posting to test if the automatic downvotes I'm going to get for this will take me into the negative . . . 😁 Maybe I can set an Alamy record! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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