Contract Change 2021 - Official thread

[MDM]

4 hours ago, Thyrsis said:

This forum started in April 2013 I think. It took over from the very successful AlamyPro forum on Yahoo which was run independently from Alamy. That’s where the ‘images found’ thread originally started and the ‘BHZ’ game. Quite a lot of folk here were on that forum. There was another forum before that too but I can't remember the name! 

 

My first post on this forum was on April 26, 2013, which I reckon is pretty close to the start date. 

[shearwater]

I have carefully and slowly read this thread through several days…it is so long and increased every days. Took me so long!

About the changes in contract, as everyone stated here. My conclusion: very bad move, Alamy.
Change in commision structure is unfair, vaguely and abstractly explained and totally unjustified. Tiers are ridicoulusly hilarious. New and modified contract clauses leaves us in a greater and total indefension.
In my opinion, Alamy is telling us that they don’t care anymore in their individual contributors. They (we) are a pain in the ass for them. Too much hassle, too much time and effort. They are prefering a buch of agencies, with millions of repeated and not even well keyworded images, but everything automated. Alamy wants to be one more in the big network of agents/distributors/collaborators/affiliates…call it whatever. We, the contributors, are almost nothing in that structure…the last and expendable monkey, and we get the peanuts.
Alamy, you have to understand that you are loosing your real “core”, your contributors, the ones that took you here. The ones that have worked hard all this years. The ones that built this community. You should have motivated them, valued them, talked to them, not exploiting them as you are doing right now. They have lost the faith in you. And that is so hard to recover. They will leave, as they are doing right now, silently and sad. Others will came...but they will not be implied, will felt as cows and will left too. And you will sink and became and old memory, as it has happened many times before.

Best luck to everybody, my forum colleagues and Alamy staff.

 

 

P.D. By the way, CR email (contributors@alamy.com) mailbox is full, and it can't receive new messages. First time I have seen that. Too many contributors claiming, I suppose
 

[Cryptoprocta]

53 minutes ago, shearwater said:

Alamy, you have to understand that you are loosing your real “core”, your contributors, the ones that took you here. The ones that have worked hard all this years. The ones that built this community. You should have motivated them, valued them, talked to them, not exploiting them as you are doing right now. They have lost the faith in you.

PA won't see it that way.

They bought a 'product' and now want to wring all they can from their investment, while minimising any risks or liabilities they might incur.

It's "just business".

[Shergar]

1 hour ago, hotbrightsky said:

 

Which is why unions exist. NUJ in the UK in particular.

 

[Allan Bell]

45 minutes ago, Cryptoprocta said:

PA won't see it that way.

They bought a 'product' and now want to wring all they can from their investment, while minimising any risks or liabilities they might incur.

It's "just business".

 

Exactly. Alamy won't sink or disappear they are being absorbed.  (Or assimilated like the Borg).

 

Allan

 

[Bill Kuta]

What with their mailbox being full, I think I'll draft up my termination email now, so I can join the throng emailing them to see if it works!

[MizBrown]

2 hours ago, hotbrightsky said:

 

Which is why unions exist. NUJ in the UK in particular.

 

The US doesn't have them the way they used to (there's a law now that a new union for gig workers in computer fields can't strike).  

 

[MizBrown]

Deleted.
 

Edited May 23, 2021 by MizBrown

[MizBrown]

I've been both sad and angry over this. 

 

For me, the question was initially whether trying to make money from photography would ruin a life long hobby.  Up until this week, it probably helped me be a better photographer.   Amateur or pro, that's not a bad thing.

 

 I love documenting this small provincial capital, the daily life, the occasional drama.   The "Made in Jinotega" photos helped me understand the place where I live.

 

Most of the world knows about Nicaragua when things are going badly.   Alamy's Nicaraguan photos are mostly Granada and San Juan del Sur for tourism, volunteers coming in to Do Good (it's an industry), and the 1980s and other political tragedies.   (I'm not a fan of tourism -- and my area tends to find that coffee growing works better than depending on vacation fads in the developed world -- coffee is addicting).

 

So setting up a portfolio with Alamy wasn't a bad thing to have done for four and a half years.

 

Maybe I should use a different medium to work in.   Or take photographs and not worry about what I'm going to do with them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Andreas]

Regarding the move of liabilities to the photographer: 

It is usually the job of the agency to check if a photograph has all releases/has limited selling options, they should have specialists to identify any legal issues, they need to inspect what we deliver. Common phenomen is that Microstock agencies reject pics if logos are not removed. That is, beside hosting & marketing, why they take a share of 60%.

Alamy struggles to do its job - giving High Res for nothing (presentations), accepting tons of s..t pics, accepting obvious wrong/spammed keywords, mediocre search algorythm.... a lot options to improve customer experience.

Changing a contract will not raise the quality what Alamy offers.

 

My current plan: mail contributor service to set all pics to: exclusive to Alamy = N, editorial only.  I was carefully in assigning correct metadata, but have to limit the risk.

And collect my better future shots in order to have sufficient material to apply elsewhere, luckily still some options exist. If by whatever means (less sales or changed levels) my share is reduced to 20% I'll quit.

[MizBrown]

3 hours ago, Cryptoprocta said:

I think there was an official Alamy forum before 2013, but not in this 'home', I think it was on the main Alamy server, then they were split, so that the forum is now separate from the main Alamy site. The old one may be gone completely (?)

 

I wonder if the split was when Alamy moved development and operations to Kerala:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technopark,_Trivandrum

 

I remember when the forum was moved off to another server hosted in the UK. 

[Homy]

60-80% cut from photographers with small revenue, like me? And people complain about Apple taking 30% from the developers on App Store. At least Apple changed their cut to 15% for small developers. Here Alamy is doing exact the opposite, increasing their cut from 60% to 80% for hobby photographers. 80% vs 15% says a lot about the company.

 

This is exactly why I feel more discouraged each year from uploading photos. All the hard work just to give 80% of it to Alamy? No thanks! You don't get much help either. I have an image that was published 4 months earlier than the sale date but Alamy says they can't backdate such sales. Now it's been 6 months after the 5-year license period and the image is still online without renewal. You do also get paid months after the sale. Recently I had to report an image myself because it didn't even show in the sales report after 6 months. Contributors have to do all this work chasing their images and revenues for what? A couple of dollars for an image used for 5 years. I think I will have more luck becoming a tech youtuber than wasting my time as a contributor.

Edited May 23, 2021 by Homy

[Nodvandigtid]

Will that was the week that was, although I still find it a tad ironic that the topic above this thread for the majority of the last six days is entitled "The importance of being accurate with marking images as “Exclusive to Alamy.”!

 

I logged in last Monday, 13 years to the day that I joined Alamy. Above the dashboard sat an ominous warning that a new contributor contract would be coming into force from July 2021. I read Emily Shelley's words about why the change to commission was, in her eyes, necessary along with the comments on exclusivity and the and the new infringement team.

 

In a former life, I worked for a company that derived its income through agents/intermediaries.30% of the agents supplied roughly 70% of the business and of course the other 70% of the agents only supplied 30% of the income. Filter in costs, upkeep etc and it was obvious what had to happen and it did,

 

It is a similar position that most contributors here on the forums now find themselves in. Whenever Alamy backtracked on the commission cut to 40% in return for being exclusive at 50%, one of the questions I asked James West, was that would he confirm that all contributors regardless of size would have their commission reduced to 40%. (the original proposal). For obvious reasons it was the only one of the questions he didn't answer when he replied to me.

 

There is an old saying; “if it smells like b******* then it is b*******” and Emily Shelly's message made it clear to me that the new PA/Alamy outfit does not have a positive outcome for individual contributors going forward. To compare the initial trading period of this year with the start of the pandemic last year and and pronounce a wonderful 45% growth figure really is an insult to most people's intelligence.

 

To then rub further salt into the wound, when a great number of us spent hours and hours going through and checking that our images were in fact exclusive by saying that a “significant minority” (what exactly does that mean in real numbers?) had images which weren't exclusive shows a lack of leadership because the offenders could easily have been dealt with.

 

The smoke though began to thicken whenever it it became clear that the new “infringement team” would be chasing only exclusive images, and of course there was no detail on what ultimately you or I, the contributor, could expect to get. Many of you have pointed out that this is likely to be similarly cloaked as the “DACS” system administered by Alamy - where we have no idea of the true value of the payments that Alamy may collect on our behalf in relation to what is ultimately paid out to us.

 

I would say it's fair comment that this infringement team will be pushing hard to get as much as they can (the parties to the deal – the rights chasing company and Alamy will set an incentivised contract aiming for that) and a small residue, possibly no more than on a normal licence fee after commission, will be made available to contributors.

 

When you see, as revealed on this thread by PA/Alamy, the small proportion of overall images that are actually marked as “exclusive” with Alamy, any plans for exclusiveness to benefit both PA/Alamy and contributors is a long way off, meantime it's about squeezing as much money out of images marked as exclusive..

 

I joined Alamy in 2008, I struggled in the early years with software, but since 2015, I have put extensive hours time and resources into building up a portfolio of just over 17000 images. At that time I started keeping tabs on this forum, and watched the likes off Sally Anderson (well done Sally – a prodigious output with growing sales) and Andy Gibson (living in the wonderful world of West Cork, a man selling Live News in increasing volumes via Alamy) start pushing their work through Alamy.

 

And the reality as has been clearly said on these forums is you need to be uploading regularly to make sales. In the last few years, I have earned enough to mean my average over the full 13 years of contributing is safely above the $250 figure, however there is not a snowball in hell's chance of me getting anyone here $25,000.

 

Would my collection be missed? Well the answer to that in the context of PA/Alamy's plans would be an obvious “No” (although some buyers might wonder where I have gone before commercial amnesia would set it in).

 

You will all have seen that PA/Alamy has sucked in a huge range of images from PA Media, Thomson Reuters, the Independent, and others.

 

I often wondered what PA Media paid for Alamy - please don't go to the end just yet - and whether or not what PA Media was in fact a suitable suitor for Alamy. The answer as far as the individual contributor is concerned is probably going to be “no“ over the next few years, and in fairness if any of us were sitting as the managing director of PA/Alamy and had access to the relevant data then we might come up with a similar conclusion on the way forward. That of course depends as well on what your future strategy for the business is is, and clearly agencies, (despite a small few uploading some dross, low quality images, uploaded without relevant keywords and impunity), many of whom are “connected” to PA Media will rule the day.

 

It suits both PA/Alamy and PA Media partners to get the highest rate of commission, and for the rest of us to continue perhaps staying on at a lower 40%, until the next commission cut comes along.

 

The Chief Executive of PA Media Group Limited is Clive Marshall, you may want to write to him as well, but for example, included in the 27 shareholders that own PA Media, are Century Newspapers Limited, Scottish Daily Record and Sunday Mail, Daily Mail and General Holdings, Trinity Mirror PLC, The Irish Times, DC Thomson and Co Ltd, and Guardian Media Group PLC – a formidable bunch of businesses.

 

Can PA Media's purchase of Alamy mean that it can continue to pay the highest rate to many of its related or associated companies? I also suspect that the purchase was to enable PA Media etc to benefit the greatest from pushing out images to different international markets that they had not previously great access to.

 

I could live with 40% commission if push came to shove, but what I cannot live with are the onerous terms and conditions that will be part of the the contributor contract from July.

As many of you have pointed out there are inaccuracies in there, some of you have referred to “contra proferentem” where if there is a dispute between the contract parties regarding wording interpretation, that it goes against the party who drafted it.

 

However that is definitely something that none of us should rely on; any legal action is expensive, and you or I have to weigh up the risk of that happening and if it does the financial implications and other implications under the terms of the contract.

 

In that former life, I had some dealing with indemnity clauses and legal liabilities, and I am glad to see that Keith Douglas for one has highlighted the the indemnity clause number 5, Look at the amount of additional liabilities imposed on the contributor.

 

Hold harmless agreements are nothing new, but the extent of them can vary, I have always checked the contributor contract at each update to know what the risk to me is is. Before you get into all the other problems regarding licensing exclusivity, model releases, and everything else, I do feel you really need to look at clause 5 and see whether or not you are prepared to live with that.

 

This is a kind of clause I would have seen many years ago where basically all the onus is put on to to the party signing up to the contract, There are other more acceptable versions used, where, for example, PA/Alamy would be responsible for the problems it causes, and you are I would be responsible for what we caused as contributors, and that is something which would be more amenable to most people.

 

I feel the new clauses shift a huge burden (including things well beyond the control of the contributor) onto the contributor. I suspect the practical reason for this is simply down to whoever reviewed the contract doing what I would term as “a belt and braces job” to make sure that they are protecting PA/Alamy to the fullest extent.

 

You will have seen in at least one of the PA/Alamy replies about what the intention of some clauses are (from a PA/Alamy perspective). The intention is irrelevant; unless you have personally got a written agreement or side contract making it clear that you are not responsible for certain things, then if a case goes to court you are bound by the terms of the contract and the way that they will be interpreted by a judge.

 

Quite simply the the financial implications of that are hugely worrying. PA/Alamy having paid their legal team to to devise these “new” terms and revise the contract, will not be back tracking on it,

 

The agencies, or most of them, will be able to pay for the relevant level of risk mitigation via insurance (professional Indemnity or legal expenses) and in some cases the agency will have the financial resources to more than easily cover it.

 

I cannot see the contract being changed so it looks like I am heading out an exit door soon, I would like to thank everyone for their contributions on the forum of the last number of years. Although I haven't posted, I have been on several times daily and I've got to know a great deal about many of you and found your experience and information provided helpful, I wish all of you well in the future.

 

In relation to my earlier question about how much PA Media paid for Alamy, here's an extract from the PA Media Group accounts up to the 31 December 2019.

 

“In February 2020, the Group purchased 100% of the share capital in Alamy Limited, a provider of stock images. Cash consideration paid on acquisition was £32.6m. Deferred consideration of £9.2m to be paid in February 2021 and £4.6m to be paid in February 2022”

 

Sleep well Messrs West and Fischer.

 

Edited May 23, 2021 by Nodvandigtid
three typos

[GeoffK]

3 hours ago, MDM said:

 

My first post on this forum was on April 26, 2013, which I reckon is pretty close to the start date. 

 

Alamy had a forum well before that - I have an email about the forum (from MS....remember them) in January 2009 and I think it had been going some time previously.

 

The previous incarnation was interesting to say the least....

Edited May 23, 2021 by GeoffK

[Thyrsis]

22 minutes ago, GeoffK said:

 

Alamy had a forum well before that - I have an email about the forum (from MS....remember them) in January 2009 and I think it had been going some time previously.

 

The previous incarnation was interesting to say the least....

The first Alamy forum started in 2007. You can still access it via the wayback machine if you go to an Alamy page from around that time and click on the forum link....interesting reading!!

[MDM]

34 minutes ago, GeoffK said:

 

Alamy had a forum well before that - I have an email about the forum (from MS....remember them) in January 2009 and I think it had been going some time previously.

 

The previous incarnation was interesting to say the least....

 

Yes I was on that for a short time. I think I first posted there in 2012. 

 

I'm just watching the footie. Great battle between Spurs and Arsenal for 7th place and entry to the Europa Conference. 😎

[Stan Pritchard]

In the midst of all the doom and gloom on this thread can I attempt to add a little levity to matters.

I have looked at Alamy's three levels for payment and could I suggest new descriptions for these levels?

Tier 1 "Platinum" should become "Pie in the Sky".

Tier two 2 " Gold" should be "Pyrite".

And Tier 3 " Silver" becomes "Any old Iron".

Any other suggestions welcome.

Edited May 23, 2021 by Stan Pritchard
mistake corrected

[hotbrightsky]

1 hour ago, MizBrown said:

there's a law now that a new union for gig workers in computer fields can't strike

 

I wouldn't call myself a 'gig worker' and I wouldn't categorise photography as a 'computer field'. When I worked at a large US-owned ISP in London our editorial/production department was one of the first to gain NUJ recognition. My membership has long since lapsed however!

Edited May 23, 2021 by hotbrightsky

[MizBrown]

44 minutes ago, Nodvandigtid said:

The agencies, or most of them, will be able to pay for the relevant level of risk mitigation via insurance (professional Indemnity or legal expenses) and in some cases the agency will have the financial resources to more than easily cover it.

 

How much does it cost to form an agency in the UK?   Some of the people with the larger portfolios (over 10K) might want to consider doing that which might allow you collectively to get a better contract with Alamy or to be able to afford insurance against legal expenses, and I believe agencies are allowed to set minimum prices in the new contract.   It worked for a number of photographers from 1947 to the present.

 

Best wishes for the people who did put so much work into these portfolios and to the people with smaller specialized ports who seemed to be making repeat sales with them, whether it's with Alamy or not.

 

 

[Betty LaRue]

2 hours ago, GeoffK said:

 

Alamy had a forum well before that - I have an email about the forum (from MS....remember them) in January 2009 and I think it had been going some time previously.

 

The previous incarnation was interesting to say the least....

You are so right. There was a forum when I joined. A somewhat nasty one, where a few bad apples carrying their tremendous egos in slings started flame wars, and were particularly mean to newbies asking questions. It was this reason Alamy actually shut down the forum for awhile, then reopened leaving out some of the worst offenders, and with warnings to “play nice.”

That’s when this kinder, gentler forum was born, and I began to be an active member in it.

[MDM]

7 minutes ago, Betty LaRue said:

You are so right. There was a forum when I joined. A somewhat nasty one, where a few bad apples carrying their tremendous egos in slings started flame wars, and were particularly mean to newbies asking questions. It was this reason Alamy actually shut down the forum for awhile, then reopened leaving out some of the worst offenders, and with warnings to “play nice.”

That’s when this kinder, gentler forum was born, and I began to be an active member in it.

One very sensible thing they did was to link forum user name with portfolio regardless of pseudonym so people were not able to hide. I recall several people leaving at the time (2013) for that reason, some of whom have come back. Anonymity allows people to behave in ways that they would never do face to face.  If social media could do the same, then it might help with trolling and the vile abuse that gets reported.  

Edited May 23, 2021 by MDM

[NYCat]

I think some people were afraid their images would be copied. Alamy was somewhat more active in controlling us for a while...  and I was trying to campaign against the wretched red arrows. Some people left and I still miss Philippe.😉🤪😝,  Had to add emojis in his memory.

 

Paulette

Edited May 23, 2021 by NYCat

[geogphotos]

2 hours ago, MizBrown said:

 

How much does it cost to form an agency in the UK?   Some of the people with the larger portfolios (over 10K) might want to consider doing that which might allow you collectively to get a better contract with Alamy or to be able to afford insurance against legal expenses, and I believe agencies are allowed to set minimum prices in the new contract.   It worked for a number of photographers from 1947 to the present.

 

Best wishes for the people who did put so much work into these portfolios and to the people with smaller specialized ports who seemed to be making repeat sales with them, whether it's with Alamy or not.

 

 

 

 

Not exactly what you wrote about but on the same tangent.

 

There are obviously huge problems in doing something like this which is why so many attempts at creating a co-op agency have failed. I was involved in the every early stages of one that ended up being called Picade.  I am not even going to try and list the obvious problems relating to differences of opinions, funding, but crucially marketing,

 

A very simple practical problem is that all the platforms such as Photoshelter are for individuals. They do offer an agency option but I guess it is $1000 or month and more.

 

The short cut way of doing it would be to find an established agency that had everything in place and could do the marketing and selling and which wanted a large input of new images. But as with all of these ideas it soon hits the wall because of the level of pricing that prevails for most imagery. 

 

I don't think that portfolio size is what matters, more the niche, specialist quality - and for that there are agencies that already exist but they are choosy.

 

Let's not forget that Alamy and the other mega portals have wiped out a very large number of small specialist agencies. Very little remains and for good reason - the same fundamental reason that really limits the idea of a photographer start-up agency.

Edited May 23, 2021 by geogphotos

[Martin P Wilson]

8 minutes ago, NYCat said:

I think some people were afraid their images would be copied. Alamy was somewhat more active in controlling us for a while...  and I was trying to campaign against the wretched red arrows. Some people left and I still miss Philippe.

 

Paulette

 

I have emailed you.

Edited May 23, 2021 by Martin P Wilson
duplicated quote

[geogphotos]

22 minutes ago, Martin P Wilson said:

 

I have emailed you.

 

I this is about your discussion  group would you please also email me?

 

geogphotos@gmail.com

 

Thanks