Contract Change 2021 - Official thread

[Gina Kelly]

@Alamy In the spirit of your wish to be transparent (per your blog post), can you please tell us how many contributors actually qualify for that platinum level (selling 25k per year)? So far no one on the forum has come forward to say they qualify, and some whom we know of as being big sellers, or having a very large number of images, aren't even coming close to that number. No matter how I look at it, this new system seems designed to keep people in the lower tiers, which is truly disheartening. It's knocked the wind completely out of my sails. I'm only one person, one cog in the machine, so I hardly matter, but I'm taking some time to think of how I will proceed. I'm willing to struggle WITH and ALONGSIDE an agency that is trying to survive in a difficult market, but feeling like that agency is actually working against me is a whole other matter. If I'm missing something or misunderstanding something here, please enlighten me. 

 

[KTC]

Alamy and its contributors are in an abusive relationship. When you're in an abusive relationship, you should leave. I realise that's easier said than done for those who are making from Alamy  a significant part of their total income, but you should definitely look to diversify, i.e. start focusing on elsewhere.

Edited May 17, 2021 by KTC

[Shergar]

1 hour ago, John Mitchell said:

 

Or the Onepercentium Level.

 

Actually my guess is that less than 1% of Alamy contributors make $25K annually. Whatever the number, they certainly are an "exclusive" group.

What sucks about this, and Im sure Alamy knows the age groups of its contributors. A lot of older photographers use Alamy to supplement their pensions or are working towards that goal. After what was the worst year for many of these older people and , just when we thought we could see a light at the end of a very long dark tunnel Alamy hit us all with this BS. 

What about these older contributors Alamy? what about their dream? where's their incentive to carry on? What about their student deal????? 

 

Cheers and gone 

 

Shergar 

[mickfly]

Maybe I'll sign up as a mature student at my local college and claim the 100% commission offered to students by Alamy.

This last winter I made most of my Alamy images exclusive and closed my main photo website with it's very slick shop front and now just have a small website.

I've now removed the exclusive tick from all my Alamy images, opted out of distribution and will be reinstating my own website properly in the near future.

My main efforts will be better spent elsewhere.
 

[AndrewP]

21 minutes ago, Gina Kelly said:

can you please tell us how many contributors actually qualify for that platinum level (selling 25k per year)?

I've had $25K+ in 5 of the past 18 years but the last one was 10 years ago. My lifetime total number of sales is 8850 but with about 400 sales a year in recent years I'm only going to be half way to Platinum status.

[Flash68]

What a greedy, deceitful and short sighted decision. I've been a contributor for nearly 2 decades. By pure coincidence by sales today went over $250 today so I'm 'lucky' I'll stay in the Gold [sic] tier (Alamy really must be sniggering at this in-joke). Of course like the vast majority of us I've got no hope of getting anywhere near the Platinum tier that would retain the current commission rate, so my obvious choice is to remove the exclusive flag from all my images and sell them through Alamy's competitors as well - what a great way to lose loyalty.
In addition, my wife has recently started to contribute and has been encouraged by a few sales. She's not likely to make the $250 threshold so is likely to give up, as many new contributors now will. Good news for the top contributors, less competition, bad news for the diversity of stock and Alamy's growth.
So my plan is to remove the default exclusive flag for future submissions (done), remove the exclusive flag from all my images from 1st July and suggest that my wife deletes her account and combines her photos with mine on Alamy and elsewhere.

Edited May 17, 2021 by Flash68

[Hodderauthor]

Dear Emily,

 

According to your blog post, “We will read all the comments posted on the dedicated forum thread around these changes, so this is an effective way to raise questions and concerns. We will gather the frequently asked questions and the frequently posted comments over the next two weeks and I will reply to these in a follow-up blog post.”

 

So, here are my questions:

- If Alamy are determined to “market an exclusive collection and to use this to secure stronger prices from customers. We’d still like you to tell us if your images are exclusively with us,“ I’m not clear why I should continue to offer you exclusivity on all my images (which you currently have) when the commission rate you’re paying is dropping to 40%. What’s my incentive?

- To earn the 50% commission rate on exclusive images (which we contributors fought hard for in 2019), I’ve got to earn 25,000 dollars a year in sales. I’ve been with you since 2004 and while my annual sales are increasing, I am nowhere near that threshold, it will take me many years to reach it, and at 40% commission, that will take even longer  … so why should I continue to offer you exclusivity (if, in reality, I’m only going to be getting 40% commission on exclusive images until I reach that threshold)?

- As “a former journalist with more than 20 years’ experience buying, selling, creating and advising on content and media” can you give me an example of when paying less money to suppliers enabled a creative business to offer higher quality content, exclusive and wider choice to its customers? (I don’t mean this flippantly, I genuinely don’t understand how you expect to encourage your suppliers to offer you exclusive images that will “secure stronger prices from customers” if we’re not incentivised to supply then … because (in reality) cutting the commission rate is a disincentive.)

I appreciate your time in reading this. 

[Robz]

6 minutes ago, mickfly said:

This last winter I made most of my Alamy images exclusive and closed my main photo website with it's very slick shop front and now just have a small website.

I've now removed the exclusive tick from all my Alamy images, opted out of distribution and will be reinstating my own website properly in the near future.

My main efforts will be better spent elsewhere.
 

Yeah I did a similar thing earlier this year, my images were exclusive, but I also set them all to RF/editorial and opted into distribution, based on Alamy's advice on how to get more sales.

Didn't make any difference and now because of this I've now reversed it, setting all to non-exclusive, set back to RM editorial only (no personal use and no advertising), and opted out of distribution. And now I'm trailing another option, so Alamy will  be a secondary concern for me.

[John Mitchell]

51 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

 

Ed, I too do not do stock for money.  It is simply a way to justify the money I have spent on equipment, and hopefully to earn enough to cover the cost of said equipment.  

And since I do a lot of graphics work, I have PS and Illustrator etc. anyway, so might as well use them beyond graphics.  But like Betty, I may spend more time creating art from my images than than scanning for dust spots at 100%.  Might find that more rewarding.  And more fun.

 

I certainly won't remove my images and I will probably add more, but certainly expand to other venues.  The stock image market hasn't really been a viable source of income for the past few years.  I certainly can't see any fresh faced college grads heading into it in the near future. I would assume right now 90% of stock contributors are like me and simply do stock for fun because they love photography and have to do something with all those images.

 

Jill

 

I actually do pursue stock photography mainly for the money (such as it is). The regular monthly payments aren't large. However, they have remained fairly consistent over the years, and they help pay a few bills. There is of course a fun factor, but I hope Alamy doesn't assume that enjoyment is all most contributors are interested in.

 

 

[MariaJ]

I’m not a fan of tiered payment systems.  If a client licenses three photographs from three photographers for X dollars each, why should the payments to the photographer depend on how much they have sold before?   And in this case, it’s not even how many previous sales (like some other agencies), but how many $$ your images have sold for per year.

 

So those with a small portfolio who have fewer sales will get paid less per sale.  Earning less per sale than someone in the next tier which means they’ll have less income which keeps them at that low tier.  How is that fair or motivating to the photographer?

 

With my past sales history, I fit into the middle category.  Most of my images are exclusive, but I don’t see the point of that now.    The top tier isn’t even fathomable (I also initially thought the 25K was a typo).   So no motivation to even try for it.   Perhaps it’s just big agencies who fit into that top income category, but then they probably wouldn’t have many exclusive images anyways.

And how does this make alamy a better picture library?

[Betty LaRue]

I have opted out of distribution. I’ve began changing my unsold RF to RM. Why should I do anything Alamy recommends? No loyalty=no loyalty.

Human beings are a funny lot. Most are more than ready to follow someone or something that is honorable. If they give their trust, they expect to be rewarded with trustworthy behavior right back. Once that is broken, it can’t be redeemed. We respond by always waiting for the other shoe to drop.  It’s a bit like the cheating spouse. One might forgive and try to move on, but one can never forget. It will always be the elephant in the room.

I’ll no longer do your job, Alamy. Those newbies who ask basic stock questions about keywords, captions RF or RM, blah blah, and all that...you do what you’re being well-paid to do. You can use the percentage you’ve stolen from me to pay for my small part of that.  I’m done. I’ll only speak to equipment and help where I can there.

Edited May 17, 2021 by Betty LaRue

[John Mitchell]

1 hour ago, Shergar said:

What sucks about this, and Im sure Alamy knows the age groups of its contributors. A lot of older photographers use Alamy to supplement their pensions or are working towards that goal. After what was the worst year for many of these older people and , just when we thought we could see a light at the end of a very long dark tunnel Alamy hit us all with this BS. 

What about these older contributors Alamy? what about their dream? where's their incentive to carry on? What about their student deal????? 

 

Cheers and gone 

 

Shergar 

 

I definitely fit that older demographic. My monthly Alamy payments are an important supplement to my pension and other income. I do take pictures simply for my own interest and enjoyment, but that's not the main reason I'm here.

Edited May 17, 2021 by John Mitchell

[ColdCoffee]

How many photographers will be motivated to go through their images and remove the "exclusive" check mark when uploading to other sites? .. so if Alamy felt it was not accurately checked in the past, I doubt that it will improve.

 

I have no illusion that Alamy would care one way or another what I do with my photos .. so I'll stick around as long as I stay above Silver.

 

If anyone would care to share where "elsewhere" is, feel free to send me a message

 

/Rose-Marie

[AM Chang]

My hypothesis is that Alamy no longer needs me, I am exclusive, but miniature.  Their priority is to keep the other big agencies as partners.  Or I'm wrong?

[Marcin Rogozinski]

From Wikipedia:

Greed (or avarice) is an uncontrolled longing for increase in the acquisition or use of material gain (be it food, money, land, or animate/inanimate possessions); or social value, such as status, or power. Greed has been identified as undesirable throughout known human history because it creates behavior-conflict between personal and social goals.

[Betty LaRue]

I might add, Alamy, that we are people here. We aren’t that great blob or mass who you treat like trained fleas with no feelings. Without us, you are nothing. A king is a toothless king without a realm.

Some of us barely are scraping by, yet doing our level best to supply good content for you to license, making you and us money. We get up in the morning, we put our pants on one leg at a time like you, we cry, we bleed. We dream. And we fight back.  We are your aunt, your uncle, your parents, your child, your in-laws. 
Treat us like family, because that’s what we’ve been. Quit sc***ing us over.

 

[Cryptoprocta]

This has been hinted at several times in the thread, but apolgies if I've missed it being spelled out.

Alamy has set three pricing targets. It isn't even clear whether these targets are gross or net, and it's never safe to 'assume' or 'guess' when agencies go bad.

But whichever, they set the prices, and apparently retain the right to give away our images.

"there is not and will not be during the term of this Contract, be any limitation or restriction on Alamy’s ability to license the Content" (BAD GRAMMAR - just sayin')

Thereby they are in full control of what we earn.

Edited May 17, 2021 by Cryptoprocta

[Keith Turrill]

Because of the Getty and AP duopoly in the United States I doubt that there are many other options.

[ColdCoffee]

27 minutes ago, AM Chang said:

My hypothesis is that Alamy no longer needs me, I am exclusive, but miniature.  Their priority is to keep the other big agencies as partners.  Or I'm wrong?

 I agree with you. They checked their main sources for uploads and set the limit accordingly. Of course, Alamy is a business, so they will have to do what is best for them.

 

What makes Alamy so special are all the photographers all over the world covering every little corner, in my opinion ... but I don't think Alamy sees it that way ...

[Cryptoprocta]

15 minutes ago, Betty LaRue said:

I might add, Alamy, that we are people here. We aren’t that great blob or mass who you treat like trained fleas with no feelings. Without us, you are nothing. A king is a toothless king without a realm.

Some of us barely are scraping by, yet doing our level best to supply good content for you to license, making you and us money. We get up in the morning, we put our pants on one leg at a time like you, we cry, we bleed. We dream. And we fight back.  We are your aunt, your uncle, your parents, your child, your in-laws. 
Treat us like family, because that’s what we’ve been. Quit sc***ing us over.

 

While what you say is correct, Alamy/PA doesn't care.

They know from the experience of other agencies who have trodden this well-worn path already, what will happen.

1. This thread will carry on for a couple of days.

2. Then it will run out of steam.

3. Some people will leave Alamy altogether.

4. Some people will stay, but not upload any more.

5. Some people will stay, but put restrictions on their sales.

6. 4 & 5 ^^^ are not mutully exclusive.

7. Some people will give up exclusivity and cast their images to the winds.

8. Some people will keep going as before.

9. New innocents will come on board, not feeling disgruntled as they weren't here when terms and conditions were more contributor-friendly.

And they have factored all the above into their decisions.

Edited May 17, 2021 by Cryptoprocta

[Betty LaRue]

17 minutes ago, Cryptoprocta said:

While what you say is correct, Alamy/PA doesn't care.

They know from the experience of other agencies who have trodden this well-worn path already, what will happen.

1. This thread will carry on for a couple of days.

2. Then it will run out of steam.

3. Some people will leave Alamy altogether.

4. Some people will stay, but not upload any more.

5. Some people will stay, but put restrictions on their sales.

6. 4 & 5 ^^^ are not mutully exclusive.

7. Some people will give up exclusivity and cast their images to the winds.

8. Some people will keep going as before.

9. New innocents will come on board, not feeling disgruntled as they weren't here when terms and conditions were more contributor-friendly.

And they have factored all the above into their decisions.

You are right, I expect. When my husband began working for an utility company during his 20s, the management was run by engineers who had been there a long time. They cared about the employees.  One older man who’d been there for years digging up lines to repair, occasionally went on a bender. He’d miss a day of work throwing up his guts, then be back on the job working hard. The bosses closed a blind eye rather than fire a man who’d been working hard there for 35 years and mess up his pension. That type of kindness was widespread.

As time went on and the engineers retired, they were replaced with men who had Masters of business degrees. All they cared about was the bottom line and they didn’t care what bodies they ran over to make the most money. The whole feel of the company changed.

It was reflected by the employees having less and less loyalty, and many retiring early just to get out.

I guess I hoped Alamy still had a heart.

[Cecile Marion]

All my photos are exclusive to Alamy except for a few pictures of 3-dimensional art. To my knowledge, every box has been checked properly and every line filled in to the best of my knowledge. If Alamy had come to us and given a legitimate reason for the contract change, and shown a little consideration, understanding and appreciation for us as contributors, it might have been slightly easier to understand this new contract. Instead, they laid the blame on contributors and accused us of being dishonest. Basically, “here’s the new contract, take it or leave it and we don’t care either way.” Sure, Alamy is a business, but Alamy wouldn’t be IN business without its contributors. 

[Colin Woods]

28 minutes ago, Betty LaRue said:

guess I hoped Alamy still had a heart.

That went last year when alamy was sold and became just a small cog in a money making machine.

[jillhyland]

1 hour ago, MariaJ said:

I’m not a fan of tiered payment systems.  If a client licenses three photographs from three photographers for X dollars each, why should the payments to the photographer depend on how much they have sold before?   And in this case, it’s not even how many previous sales (like some other agencies), but how many $$ your images have sold for per year.

 

 

 

So those with a small portfolio who have fewer sales will get paid less per sale.  Earning less per sale than someone in the next tier which means they’ll have less income which keeps them at that low tier.  How is that fair or motivating to the photographer?

 

 

 

With my past sales history, I fit into the middle category.  Most of my images are exclusive, but I don’t see the point of that now.    The top tier isn’t even fathomable (I also initially thought the 25K was a typo).   So no motivation to even try for it.   Perhaps it’s just big agencies who fit into that top income category, but then they probably wouldn’t have many exclusive images anyways.

 

And how does this make alamy a better picture library?

I agree about the tiered systems.  If you think about the numbers the new contract provides a disincentive for Alamy to want the biggest sellers to sell more work.  Alamy will actually make larger profits if sales are spread out among lots of smaller contributors who are in lower tiers....  With a 50/50 split, they make money when you make money.  With a tiered system, the more contributors who have low sales and can't get to the next tier, the more money goes to Alamy's pockets. And with the massive number of images in this library I would imagine it would be to be super easy to spread those sales out.

 

The whole idea of working with an agency is that it is supposed to be symbiotic - we take the pics and they make the sales. If it's a fair business model, they make sales and both parties  win.  This new business model basically means they don't have to work as hard to increase their profits. With this business model, when you lose they win.  The more I think about it, the more I think this is a very unfriendly contract.

[Kent Johnson]

12 hours ago, DJ Myford said:

Prediction for next year: Alamy will be renamed PA Picture Library and storage fees will be reintroduced for any images submitted by individual contributors rather than agencies.

At which point one definitely pulls down all images and closes account.