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Contract Change 2021 - Official thread


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More spit-balling. After re-reading Shelly's blog post, I think a good part of this is reflected in the phrase  "allow us to deal with some operational challenges, to simplify, and to support fair growth of the contributor base, which has been exponential over the last year." So they've restructured commissions to discourage new sign ups and stop the hemorrhaging of having a quarter of a billion images, with quite a bit of it flotsam.  So we are paying with our commissions for their poor management efforts, expanding overhead because of their failure to stop the runaway train. and failure of vision. I've made the argument in the past (please don't hate me for this!) that we should voluntarily contract our portfolios by 10% and cull the crap (I could personally hit 30%), giving Alamy and buyers a tighter, better selection.  Those of us that elect to do so should earn us the right to stay at 50% commission. Many are against cutting any image because as they say, you never know what sells, and that's your option.. But if it sells for pennies...who cares? Let's face it we all know we can reach that goal by just chucking out the duplicates. I'd rather have fewer sales at higher prices than have to ride the microstock  train to hell. Just some thoughts.

Edited by formerly snappyoncalifornia
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10 minutes ago, MDM said:

 

 

 

 

This is reminiscent of being a school kid and being told the whole class is going to be punished for the sins of a few. I can think of more extreme examples of this approach but for the sake of peace will refrain from mentioning. I wonder has Emily considered the impact of the loss of goodwill with contributors which is one of the things that really sets Alamy apart from other stock agencies and indeed many businesses (contributors - customers - supporters). The tone of this is patronising in my opinion and terribly unfair to those contributors who have acted with honestly and integrity. If this is really the case then punish the perps and not the entire class. But maybe it is just an excuse 🤔.

 

PS: I had intended to make a lot of my images exclusive but never got around to it for one reason or another so the direct effect of this on me is zero right now but had I spent the time checking my images and making them exclusive then I would be pretty mad about it.

 

 

if anything i think we are penalised for the doings of prior management.  After the fiasco of the last change they turned around with the "exclusivity" notion without ever figuring out a)how it works and b)how to use it.

 

 

that said it is just an excuse, because they are still contractually using the concept of "exclusive" in their infringement push, pushing it even further by now making that unilateral with no validation with contributor.   

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5 minutes ago, formerly snappyoncalifornia said:

More spit-balling. After re-reading Shelly's blog post, I think a good part of this is reflected in the phrase  "allow us to deal with some operational challenges, to simplify, and to support fair growth of the contributor base, which has been exponential over the last year." So they've restructured commissions to discourage new sign ups and stop the hemorrhaging of having a quarter of a billion images, with quite a bit of it flotsam.  So we are paying with our commissions for their poor management efforts, expanding overhead because of their failure to stop the runaway train. and failure of vision. I've made the argument in the past (please don't hate me for this!) that we should voluntarily contract our portfolios by 10% and cull the crap (I could personally hit 30%), giving Alamy and buyers a tighter, better selection.  Those of us that elect to do so should earn us the right to stay at 50% commission. Many are against cutting any image because as they say, you never know what sells, and that's your option.. But if it sells for pennies...who cares? Let's face it we all know we can reach that goal by just chucking out the duplicates. I'd rather have fewer sales at higher prices than have to ride the microstock  train to hell. Just some thoughts.

And after we've done all the work, for nothing, as all the contributors who changed their images to non-exclusive did, then what? Eighteen months later, a kick in the face. Like this one.

Just an example. Eighteen days ago- eighteen days- we were asked to tell Alamy whether we wanted them to pursue infringements. Along comes the new contract and we no longer have the choice. What was the point of that? What's the point of helping Alamy- ever again?

Edited by spacecadet
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2 minutes ago, spacecadet said:

And after we've done all the work, for nothing, as the contributors who changed all their images to non-exclusive, then what? Eighteen months later, a kick in the face. Like this one.

Face masks. Seriously, sure they may turn around and screw us, but then just resubmit all the flotsam again if they won't play fair.

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12 minutes ago, Barry Hitchcox said:

I'm a member of DACS, and you claim for usages (UK only), and you need to know the details. In my case, editorial: ISBN/ISSN nos., page nos. date of publication etc. etc. I never use images that I've got on a library. Alamy say they claim on DACS if you've opted in, but it's a pittance. But since it's almost impossible to know these usage details unless you happen across it in a mag. or book, Alamy will never share that info. So quit Alamy and join DACS!

You can find out the relevant Alamy usages if you download your Net revenue sales report as the end column is country. 

 Dacs accepts a spreadsheet of these this so long as you can also give  the ISBN/ISSN no's of a minimum three usages. I've found these via google books by searching for name/Alamy.

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4 minutes ago, formerly snappyoncalifornia said:

More spit-balling. After re-reading Shelly's blog post, I think a good part of this is reflected in the phrase  "allow us to deal with some operational challenges, to simplify, and to support fair growth of the contributor base, which has been exponential over the last year." So they've restructured commissions to discourage new sign ups and stop the hemorrhaging of having a quarter of a billion images, with quite a bit of it flotsam.  So we are paying with our commissions for their poor management efforts, expanding overhead because of their failure to stop the runaway train. and failure of vision. I've made the argument in the past (please don't hate me for this!) that we should voluntarily contract our portfolios by 10% and cull the crap (I could personally hit 30%), giving Alamy and buyers a tighter, better selection.  Those of us that elect to do so should earn us the right to stay at 50% commission. Many are against cutting any image because as they say, you never know what sells, and that's your option.. But if it sells for pennies...who cares? Let's face it we all know we can reach that goal by just chucking out the duplicates. I'd rather have fewer sales at higher prices than have to ride the microstock  train to hell. Just some thoughts.

 

 

that was my reading also, and i did see some logic for the introduction of the silver level- if you can't meet minimal sales, you need to absorb a bigger part of the overhead/fixed costs. Well introduced, and with some other improvement after, I probably would have even been able to understand had the gold level was something like $250-$2500, which i would be below, but achievable.    

 

 

though i agree with the rest of the comment, i also think they have also failed with the algorithm part.  When was the last reranking?  

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1 hour ago, Bill Kuta said:

Anyone selling on Photoshelter? How's it going?  Asking because I have a family archive project that needs a home, so could maybe kill two birds with one stone.

 

 

 

No luck at all on PS for me these days. However, these new developments are going to motivate me to spend more time improving my website. I had hoped that the Google images thing would bring some inquiries as many of my PS galleries and images are doing well in Google search results, but this hasn't been the case. The big agencies win every time.

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7 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

 

that was my reading also, and i did see some logic for the introduction of the silver level- if you can't meet minimal sales, you need to absorb a bigger part of the overhead/fixed costs. Well introduced, and with some other improvement after, I probably would have even been able to understand had the gold level was something like $250-$2500, which i would be below, but achievable.    

 

 

though i agree with the rest of the comment, i also think they have also failed with the algorithm part.  When was the last reranking?  

Yeah, they haven't re-ranked forever. In the past I also suggested that Alamy curate our portfolios (with us having veto power) to have "premium" and "standard" categories, with 2 commission structures, for those that insist on having all their images on sale. Unless there are fundamental changes to Alamy's marketing, contributor acceptance and curation of portfolios...we are on a death spiral of smaller sales at lower commissions. This is unsustainable.

Edited by formerly snappyoncalifornia
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5 hours ago, spacecadet said:

Well, yes, but you know what? I'm not sure I give a monkey's anymore. Alamy can police its own forum. Guess what we get for doing it for free?

 

I note you and Betty think alike. I don't mind helping others who are or maybe in the same boat so long as it is nothing to do with the technicalities from here on in.

 

Allan

 

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Probably done me a favour, will give me the push to find some other stock outlets rather than sticking with exclusive images on just Alamy. Now just need work out which other stock libraries are out there.......

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42 minutes ago, Nathaniel Noir said:

 

Are you serious? Can I not just write to them to terminate my permission?

Nope, I too was annoyed to discover that I had apparently signed up to Alamy collecting DACS for me without knowing about it (not having understood or read the small print of the contract) which is the only option for contributors since around 2016 or whenever they gave existing ones the option to opt in or out. However it is possible that Alamy collects more than I would be able to do myself, but annoying that we don’t know what commission they are taking.

Edited by Sally
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For DACS I get Alamy to claim only my TV uses as they have all the necessary broadcast details. I claim for all book & magazine uses as I'm able to collate enough of the data together myself. I just add new sales to a database throughout the year and the claim takes 20 minutes on the DACS website once a year.

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6 hours ago, Sally R said:

 

Yep. I basically meant the character of Alamy has changed, even though some of the same people are still on board in some capacity.

 

I've experienced it in a workplace where new management came in, many lost their jobs while management grew top heavy like a mushroom. People at the coalface like myself were massively overworked as fewer frontline staff had to cope under increasing pressure. Change managers were brought in and the environment corporatised. I still remember the painful change management workshop we had to sit through. The woman running it asked us dramatically at the beginning, "What is the biggest room in the world?". We stared at her blankly. She replied enthusiastically, "The room for improvement". Beyond cringeworthy.

 

Basically the more corporate and less personalised organisations and businesses become, the more individual humans are devalued. I liked Alamy because they did seem more personable in the beginning. I think we are now more a small cog in the wheel of PA Media.

 

I had a similar experience when I was working for a large food and dairy company. When I joined it was still run by the founding family and was a blue chip on the stock market. Later the older family retired and brought in an outsider as group CEO.  Within a very few years that blue chip company was no more except in name only. One of the main reasons was that new CEO decide the group should branch out into the finance sector. It lost millions.

 

Are you listening Alamy?

 

Allan

 

Edited by Allan Bell
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24 minutes ago, Allan Bell said:

 

 I don't mind helping others who are or maybe in the same boat so long as it is nothing to do with the technicalities from here on in.

 

Allan

 

Fair stipulation. f8 and be there, but if Alamy want help with their impenetrables they can flipping well pay for it.

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Alamy has alienated just about all of their suppliers except the agencies.  I am so glad that I stopped supplying Alamy years ago. 

 

I was at the meeting where Alamy slashed the photographer cut from 60% to 50% with the excuse that it would help expand the market in North America which they claimed would be good for everyone. Alamy management went away with our anger ringing in their ears and have never really tried to connect since.  They never did get it that, to us, our photographs are expression, we have pride in the making of them and that they are not just information.  

 

The NA adventure did not do much for EU photographers at all as prices continued to slip downward as Alamy went for volume over price cutting their own throat at the same time as disembowelling photographers and damaging the market.  There was no upside for photographers anywhere.  At the same meeting Alamy assured contributors the DACS money was sacrosanct and Alamy would never seek to grab any of it.  Another lie.

 

This is just more of the same but without any reason or explanation, and it smacks of contempt.  We mean nothing to them - this is what digital serfdom means.

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2 hours ago, Sally said:

his is no problem if you use Alamy Lightroom Bridge, which I keep blaming on about but few people seem to use. It will download all captions and keywords automatically once you’ve matched the images in Lightroom to those on Alamy.

I've just clicked the button to download my data .. I think everyone should probably do the same. It might just wake them up to the fact that most of us are not happy and will be looking to make up the shortfall in income by submitting our work to other outlets.

Always handy to have this date even if you never use it ..

 

The timing of this announcement is also particularly galling especially from a company that claims to looks after it's contributors .. most of the world is still dealing with a pandemic. People have lost jobs, businesses not to mention family and loved ones. I know many people on here who rely on the income from stock sales, be it as their main income (however small that may be) or to bolster their earnings from other jobs. Either way it's awful timing for many.

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33 minutes ago, Sally said:

Nope, I too was annoyed to discover that I had apparently signed up to Alamy collecting DACS for me without knowing about it (not having understood or read the small print of the contract) which is the only option for contributors since around 2016 or whenever they gave existing ones the option to opt in or out. However it is possible that Alamy collects more than I would be able to do myself, but annoying that we don’t know what commission they are taking.

 

 

The DACS grab was an easy move by Alamy because tens of thousands of contributors who never claimed DACS regarded it as money for nothing. 

 

This commission grab is different. Normally at this stage of discussion somebody would be thinking that, actually, they can benefit from this and all the old fogies are just complaining to preserve their privileges. But the fact is no contributor benefits from this. It is a blatant grab. Nothing else, no other interpretation is being presented because there isn't one to present apart from vague waffle about investing in making the company sustainable.

 

I don't see any commercial strategy here. There is just short term profiteering - taking revenue from contributors simply because Alamy are in a position to do so.

 

Alamy for most of its existence didn't have a clue about anything but tinkering with software. It was toy of a rich boy from a rich family. Eventually the rich boy got bored so the company was sold to raise cash for the next adventure.

 

Now, owned by PA it has a new CEO. Quite young, ambitious and keen to make a mark. What will be the best way of doing that in terms of the next promotion? Miraculous increase in profit despite the pandemic in such a short time! Then move on and leave others to pick up the pieces

 

We had, very briefly another CEO, who looked around and was either forced out or jumped ship. What was that about?

 

Soon we will have the infringement grab - yet another way to divert money from contributors. 

 

The software regime ended and morphed into the period of contributor exploitation. 

 

Edited by geogphotos
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5 hours ago, Michael Ventura said:

I think what bothers me most is the nearly unattainably high threshold of $25,000 per year in order to get a 50/50 split.   I bet less than 1% of the contributors can do that.  This reminds me too much of what is happening in America (probably Europe too) where the top 1% continue to gain wealth while the other 99% have to carry the water.  Here in the U.S. the tax structure rewards the wealthiest and dings the rest of us harder.  While still not right, maybe a more reasonable $10,000 threshold might give some people more incentive to upload more and continue the hard work.  There just isn't incentive now.

 

Exactly. A three-tiered system in which you have to sell $250 in order to reach (temporarily) the middle level but 100 times as much ($25K) to attain the third level sounds vaguely familiar. The top 1% (at most) get through the door, but everyone else is left shivering out in the cold.

 

A $10K threshold would be better, but I'd say that a $5K one would be the most realistic and productive one for both contributors and Alamy. It would provide both incentive and a steady supply exclusive images. As it is, Alamy is alienating contributors with the laughable $25K threshold and shooting itself in the foot at the same time. Not a great business plan...

 

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For many of us smaller ports reaching the $250 and staying within the " Gold " ( my arse ) threshold will be hard enough this being more for enjoyment\passion than my profession. Not sure if i can be bothered and pretty sure they won't be either. 

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12 minutes ago, Mr Standfast said:

Interesting to see some posts now tending towards bargaining. Just saying.

 

 

The five stages of grief - denial anger bargaining depression and acceptance...

 

Oh No GIF

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1 minute ago, Steve F said:

 

The five stages of grief - denial anger bargaining depression and acceptance...

 

Oh No GIF

 

Maybe in the UK, in France they just go out to the streets and protest until they get what they want - we should be more like the French.

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