Contributor Spotlight

[JaniMarkus Hasa]

"Today the spotlight is on photographer Marko Visacki."

 

http://bit.ly/342E3q0

 

I like his images alright, but look at the keywording. First image is a woman carrying shopping bags on pedestrian zone, but tags are (along with the suitable ones):

 

architecture boat bridge chain cloud crossing culture famous holiday landmark river road ship sky traffic transport vacation water

 

Some pictures are better tagged, some worse. 

[NYCat]

Proof that Alamy doesn't look at our keywords when accepting images. Surely if they are going to spotlight someone they should pay some attention though. I just looked at one image and keywords are full of inaccuracies.

 

Paulette

[John Mitchell]

Poor keywords / captions seems to be a growing problem on Alamy. Not sure what can be done about it, though, as Alamy doesn't have the time or inclination to police contributors.

Edited November 21, 2019 by John Mitchell

[M.Chapman]

1 hour ago, John Mitchell said:

Poor keywords / captions seems to be a growing problem on Alamy. Not sure what can be done about it, though, as Alamy doesn't have the time or inclination to police contributors.

 

In my opinion Alamy urgently need to address this. What's the point of technical image QC if they don't also check keyword/captions? Previously the argument was that bad keywording would give unwanted views without zooms, damaging a contributor's CTR% and hence lowering their rank when the next re-rank happened. So their images would end up sinking to the bottom of search results.  This is all fine, but re-ranks just don't appear to be happening. So badly keyworded and captioned images can continue to appear higher in search results than they should, wasting customer's time and damaging Alamy's reputation. Alamy's spotlighting of a contributor with so many keywording errors is hardly a good example in such a competitive marketplace.

 

A spot-check on a contributor by contributor basis could soon weed out the worst culprits.

 

Mark

Edited November 21, 2019 by M.Chapman

[John Mitchell]

12 minutes ago, M.Chapman said:

 

In my opinion Alamy urgently need to address this. What's the point of technical image QC if they don't also check keyword/captions? Previously the argument was that bad keywording would give unwanted views without zooms, damaging a contributor's CTR% and hence lowering their rank when the next re-rank happened. So their images would end up sinking to the bottom of search results.  This is all fine, but re-ranks just don't appear to be happening. So badly keyworded and captioned images can continue to appear higher in search results than they should, wasting customer's time and damaging Alamy's reputation. Alamy's spotlighting of a contributor with so many keywording errors is hardly a good example in such a competitive marketplace.

 

Mark

 

Yes, I think that some checking of keywords/captions during the QC process would be very good idea. However, it would require that contributors add metadata before uploading, which apparently some people don't like to do. Also, there is the problem of all the poorly captioned/keyworded images being dumped on Alamy every day by other agencies (seemingly with little or no QC vetting by Alamy),  thereby spreading this problem like a virus.

Edited November 21, 2019 by John Mitchell

[Phil Robinson]

1 hour ago, John Mitchell said:

Poor keywords / captions seems to be a growing problem on Alamy. Not sure what can be done about it, though, as Alamy doesn't have the time or inclination to police contributors.

 

In theory the ranking system does deal with this.
I have always thought that the way the search engine decides which images are seen first is THE MOST IMPORTANT feature of the whole Alamy business.

I'm not sure how this works now - it doesn't seem to be as straightforward as it used to be.

[M.Chapman]

39 minutes ago, John Mitchell said:

 

However, it would require that contributors add metadata before uploading, which apparently some people don't like to do.

 

That's why I suggested tackling it on a contributor by contributor basis. This would involve randomly sampling maybe 10 images from each contributor's existing portfolio. If the keywording doesn't meet minimum basic standards, the contributor or agency is asked to make corrections. If improvements aren't made the portfolio is taken off-line.

 

Mark

[John Mitchell]

Because checking keywords/captions would be so time-consuming for Alamy, perhaps they should concentrate

1 minute ago, M.Chapman said:

 

That's why I suggested tackling it on a contributor by contributor basis. This would involve randomly sampling maybe 10 images from each contributor's existing portfolio. If the keywording doesn't meet minimum basic standards, the contributor or agency is asked to make corrections. If improvements aren't made the portfolio is taken off-line.

 

Mark

 

Or, at this point,  concentrate on new contributors (and agencies) -- i.e. include a keyword/caption check of their first submissions in the acceptance process, so that they get started on the right foot. This might at least stop the problem from getting worse.

[M.Chapman]

15 minutes ago, Phil Robinson said:

 

In theory the ranking system does deal with this.
I have always thought that the way the search engine decides which images are seen first is THE MOST IMPORTANT feature of the whole Alamy business.

I'm not sure how this works now - it doesn't seem to be as straightforward as it used to be.

 

The ranking system should deal with it but they seem to have stopped re-ranks.... There appears to be an "alternative" system which Alamy seem to be using. If an image has previously been zoomed using the same search term, it is promoted in the search results (I suspect, along with all the other images by the same contributor). Trouble is that it relies on an image being zoomed previously to operate. 

 

Although the ranking system should demote images (if it was being updated), the demoted images still clutter up the system, costing money to host, and slowing down the search engine.

 

Mark

[M.Chapman]

Just now, John Mitchell said:

Because checking keywords/captions would be so time-consuming for Alamy, perhaps they should concentrate

 

Or, at this point,  concentrate on new contributors (and agencies) -- i.e. include a keyword/caption check of their first submissions in the acceptance process, so that they get started on the right foot. This might at least stop the problem from getting worse.

 

Yes, that's a good idea. Getting rid of that counter-productive "discoverability" indicator would also help.....

 

Mark

[M.Chapman]

Deleted - duplicate post

Edited November 21, 2019 by M.Chapman

[John Mitchell]

2 hours ago, M.Chapman said:

 

Yes, that's a good idea. Getting rid of that counter-productive "discoverability" indicator would also help.....

 

Mark

 

I'm going to blame the influence of the micros for the arrival of the "discoverability" thing. Big error IMO.

[Can_Chaser]

Brand new contributor here! I'm working on my first few uploads (and forgive me if I missed any Newbie 101 threads on the forum .... I looked but didn't see?) but I am confused about the discoverability indicator on the top. I see it's talked about on this thread - is there more info somewhere about what that means or how to get it higher?

[Colblimp]

On 23/11/2019 at 16:19, Can_Chaser said:

Brand new contributor here! I'm working on my first few uploads (and forgive me if I missed any Newbie 101 threads on the forum .... I looked but didn't see?) but I am confused about the discoverability indicator on the top. I see it's talked about on this thread - is there more info somewhere about what that means or how to get it higher?

Take no notice of it - trying to reach 50 keywords could damage your ranking if those keywords are irrelevant.

[NYCat]

On 23/11/2019 at 11:19, Can_Chaser said:

Brand new contributor here! I'm working on my first few uploads (and forgive me if I missed any Newbie 101 threads on the forum .... I looked but didn't see?) but I am confused about the discoverability indicator on the top. I see it's talked about on this thread - is there more info somewhere about what that means or how to get it higher?

 

There is a lot of discussion of discoverability in this thread...  https://discussion.alamy.com/topic/12236-keyword-question/?tab=comments#comment-225706  Basically, we think it can be harmful to try to reach 50 keywords unless every one is relevant to the image. Some images (like my animals) can take lots and lots but a corner store perhaps not so much. If your images are showing up in searches you want them to be what the person wants. Any extra views that are not zoomed or purchased will hurt you in the long run.

 

Paulette

 

PS. In case you haven't found Alamy's instructions...  https://discussion.alamy.com/topic/7028-instructions-help-video-and-links-for-new-alamy-image-manager/

 

 

Edited November 25, 2019 by NYCat

[meanderingemu]

latest tweet from @contributorspotlight

Authenticity is a key element to Marko's work, so he uses real subjects and environments wherever possible:

 

highlights this image W3E6F0

 

 

an nice portrait of an onion seller in a French market,,, Problem this is the caption:

 

LILLE, FRANCE - January 2, 2018: Daytime view on cafe restaurants and vintage buildings

 

(even worse, thought date states January, also includes December,Xmas as KW)

 

 

not really authentic.  Really concerned that Alamy is using this as a reference to newcommers  

Edited November 25, 2019 by meanderingemu

[Foreign Export]

in my book and i have said it before - nothing worse than a contributor who lies with their keywords to deliberately manipulate and impact others

shame on Alamy for profiling him - i would be banning him for 28 days and until all keywords were accurate

[Dave R]

I have had a quick look at this chaps work and in my opinion there are too many similars. I have access to many top London art buyers and the problem that always come up with the mention of almay is to much irrelevant content. Because its not edited by the library art buyers and picture researchers have to wade through to much similar or irrelevant content leading to going elsewhere.  Do you really need that many versions of cider tea ? 3 or 4 would do. I think it illustrates the problems of letting contributors edit there own contents.

[Cryptoprocta]

Also a lot of his pics have similars and sisters, even sometimes identical files over several rival sites. You'd have thought Alamy would have chosen to highlight a port which was predominantly 'exclusive to Alamy'.

I wonder what the criteria for being chosen are?

Edited December 1, 2019 by Cryptoprocta

[meanderingemu]

5 hours ago, Cryptoprocta said:

Also a lot of his pics have similars and sisters, even sometimes identical files over several rival sites. You'd have thought Alamy would have chosen to highlight a port which was predominantly 'exclusive to Alamy'.

I wonder what the criteria for being chosen are?

 

probably only agreed to upload these images if he got the feature the way he wanted.