Trending Topics and accurate keywords

[Foreign Export]

I have long expressed concern over inaccurate keyboarding and have endeavoured to persuade Alamy to address the issue

 

Seems to be to no avail and when I clicked on one of the image slinked in todays Alamy email about latest trends and clicked on naked planet link- I see good image of an australian rainforest taken near Cairns

 

As I look down the image my eyes are drawn to the keywords - oh what joy, what a beacon of best practice- keywords include for an image taken in Australia

 

amazon

Bolivia

Malaysia

amazonia

america

brazil

myanmar

peru

 

When will this blatant behaviour be clamped down on, and why would Alamy promote such falsely keyworded  images?

 

 

 

 

Edited June 30, 2021 by Foreign Export
spelling

[Robert M Estall]

I feel your pain. Alamy's hands-free approach to contributions (excepting techy stuff) meeting brain-dead contributors creates chaos. The theory is that the miscreants will sink out of site on the search engine. Does that work? I guess all we can do is keep our own work  as accurate and relevant as possible and not lose sleep over the idiots. But Yeh, you might think Alamy might be more careful over an image used in their Trending Topic. I think I stopped being trendy quite a few years back, more's the pity.

Edited June 30, 2021 by Robert M Estall

[John Morrison]

Oof... duplicate post...

Edited June 30, 2021 by John Morrison

[John Morrison]

Just now, John Morrison said:

With 260 million images on sale, that ship has long since sailed... 🙁

 

[spacecadet]

Just now, John Morrison said:

that ship has long since sailed...

Alamy's holed it with a big axe.

[Martin P Wilson]

1 hour ago, spacecadet said:

Alamy's holed it with a big axe.

 

Nah, Alamy forgot to close the sea cocks when they first launched.

[Martin L]

They may well get their comeuppance when somebody licenses it, sticks it on the front cover of a travel magazine about visiting Brazil and they then sue for the cost of the print run

[ManfredG]

Wrong keywording / keyword spam is (in my opinion) one of the major problems at microstock agencies. But ok, you get what you pay. - But on Alamy it quite certainly is a way to distract customers. (Though I must admit that even traditional agencies who do keywording themselves often make way too much errors.)

 

 

[meanderingemu]

1 hour ago, ManfredG said:

Wrong keywording / keyword spam is (in my opinion) one of the major problems at microstock agencies. But ok, you get what you pay. - But on Alamy it quite certainly is a way to distract customers. (Though I must admit that even traditional agencies who do keywording themselves often make way too much errors.)

 

 

 

 

see i think the problem is more the laxness of the agencies about keywording.  Plenty of reports of it and no actions whatsoever.  

One example, Alamy will once in a while write a tweet that an image can't be "sunrise" and "sunset"  and should not have both in captions and KWs, if they were actually serious about that they would just remove the 1,273,870 image that fail to meet their requirement, but they do nothing about it. 

 

i know it's not as simple as that, Sunrise at Sunset point is also included in that, but it does show how little they care about these.   

[Jill Morgan]

Don't get me started again on teepee and wigwam

 

Jill

[meanderingemu]

24 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

Don't get me started again on teepee and wigwam

 

Jill

 

 

but sometimes you are forced to put erroneous KWs because the people searching don't know the difference.  I am struggling if it's ok to add "first nations" to images of our new GG who is Inuit, which are not part of First Nations,  because many don't know the difference so i don't want to lose sales because of that. 

[Jill Morgan]

20 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

 

but sometimes you are forced to put erroneous KWs because the people searching don't know the difference.  I am struggling if it's ok to add "first nations" to images of our new GG who is Inuit, which are not part of First Nations,  because many don't know the difference so i don't want to lose sales because of that. 

 

It is up to us to help those that don't know the difference.  Identifying something intentionally incorrectly means the ignorant buyer assumes the photographer knows what they are talking about, since no buyer can know everything about every subject they search.  They in turn look like fools when they print an image and identify it incorrectly. This has been one of my tirades on this forum in the past. 

Inuit are not First Nations and should not be identified as such.  If someone is looking for a First Nations person then why would you want them to buy your image of an Inuit person?  They are both aboriginal peoples though. Perhaps that is the term you are looking for.

 

Jill

Edited July 10, 2021 by Jill Morgan

[meanderingemu]

3 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

 

It is up to us to help those that don't know the difference.  Identifying something intentionally incorrectly means the ignorant buyer assumes the photographer knows what they are talking about, since no buyer can know everything about every subject they search.  They in turn look like fools when they print an image and identify it incorrectly. This has been one of my tirades on this forum in the past. 

Inuit are not First Nations and should not be identified as such.  If someone is looking for a First Nations person then why would you want them to buy your image of an Inuit person?  They are both aboriginal peoples though. Perhaps that is the term you are looking for.

 

Jill

 

 

 

i know what the term is. others don't.  So how do i educate person who uses the wrong search word, since they will not get to me image?

Edited July 10, 2021 by meanderingemu

[meanderingemu]

6 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

 

It is up to us to help those that don't know the difference.  Identifying something intentionally incorrectly means the ignorant buyer assumes the photographer knows what they are talking about, since no buyer can know everything about every subject they search.  They in turn look like fools when they print an image and identify it incorrectly. This has been one of my tirades on this forum in the past. 

Inuit are not First Nations and should not be identified as such.  If someone is looking for a First Nations person then why would you want them to buy your image of an Inuit person?  They are both aboriginal peoples though. Perhaps that is the term you are looking for.

 

Jill

 

 

here is a simpler example from your images

 

Image ID: F32WY1-  Fans leaving the Rogers Centre

 

 

 

Plenty of people erroneously still refer to the stadium by its old name, Skydome,and the term was used in the last year in a search.  But they never got to see your image 

[Jill Morgan]

1 minute ago, meanderingemu said:

 

 

 

i know what the term is. others don't.  So how do i educate person who uses the wrong search word, since they will not get to me image?

 

I have this image up and have sold it a couple of times.

 

 

He is Ojibway.  I could have included a whole stack of different First Nations tribes, but didn't as he is Ojibway and I'm not going to identify him as anything else.

 

Jill

[Jill Morgan]

3 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

 

here is a simpler example from your images

 

Image ID: F32WY1-  Fans leaving the Rogers Centre

 

 

 

Plenty of people erroneously still refer to the stadium by its old name, Skydome,and the term was used in the last year in a search.  But they never got to see your image 

 

Yes, but it was once Skydome.  The Inuit was never a First Nations person.  I just missed adding that keyword and it would have been correct.

 

Jill

[meanderingemu]

7 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

 

I have this image up and have sold it a couple of times.

 

 

He is Ojibway.  I could have included a whole stack of different First Nations tribes, but didn't as he is Ojibway and I'm not going to identify him as anything else.

 

Jill

 

 

 

that's a totally different issue as you are not loading the image of him specifically, my image is of a specific person which is wrongfully labelled as "first nations".  Actually in the virtue of disclaimer, this is what i stated in my keyword

[meanderingemu]

8 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

 

Yes, but it was once Skydome.  The Inuit was never a First Nations person.  I just missed adding that keyword and it would have been correct.

 

Jill

but it wasn't at the time the image was taken, so no it would not have been correct.  What is correct is adding the KW for people to be able to find the specific image which more than likely fits their needs looking for Skydome Toronto. 

 

 

 

[Jill Morgan]

Just now, meanderingemu said:

but it wasn't at the time the image was taken, so no it would not have been correct.  What is correct is adding the KW for people to be able to find the specific image which more than likely fits their needs looking for Skydome Toronto. 

 

 

 

 

Sorry, but comparing Skydome/Roger's Centre to intentionally incorrectly identifying a race of people is not an equal comparison.  

 

Jill

[meanderingemu]

and there are plenty of images which fit what the client needs.  My goal with KW is for clients to find what they need.  

 

Can i use "Winter" in this image, even though it was taken before the solstice?  It wasn't "winter" but this is likely what someone wanted "Ottawa, Winter" would think about.

 

is "menacing" appropriate for this image, i think so, and 2 licences seemed to agree,  but i can't guarantee this is what the animal was doing. 

 

[Jill Morgan]

5 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

and there are plenty of images which fit what the client needs.  My goal with KW is for clients to find what they need.  

 

Can i use "Winter" in this image, even though it was taken before the solstice?  It wasn't "winter" but this is likely what someone wanted "Ottawa, Winter" would think about.

 

is "menacing" appropriate for this image, i think so, and 2 licences seemed to agree,  but i can't guarantee this is what the animal was doing. 

 

 

None of these are of equal comparison.  You cannot intentionally misidentify a race of people.  End of story.  That is all  I will say.  Time to go to Toronto Zoo for my appointment and see the wolves.

 

It is up to your conscience what you choose to do.  Also, you are setting yourself up for one of those law problems in the future.

 

Jill

[meanderingemu]

5 minutes ago, Jill Morgan said:

 

Sorry, but comparing Skydome/Roger's Centre to intentionally incorrectly identifying a race of people is not an equal comparison.  

 

Jill

 

There is no misidentification, caption reads

 

 "new Canadian GG Mary Simon , The Inuk leader the first Indigenous person has held the role in Canada."  

 

actually only misleading here is that she is only GG designate, but this is in line with all media.  

 

the point is, do you deprive yourself from a sale because some people think she is "Mary Simon, First Nations"  .

 

 

 

 

[Jill Morgan]

1 minute ago, meanderingemu said:

 

There is no misidentification, caption reads

 

 "new Canadian GG Mary Simon , The Inuk leader the first Indigenous person has held the role in Canada."  

 

actually only misleading here is that she is only GG designate, but this is in line with all media.  

 

the point is, do you deprive yourself from a sale because some people think she is "Mary Simon, First Nations"  .

 

 

 

 

 

If someone is looking for Mary Simon, they will know who she is.  But someone else could be looking for a female First Nation's person and she would come up.  There is where you would have your problem.

 

And now to the Zoo.

 

Jill

[FocusUno]

6 hours ago, meanderingemu said:

 

 

Quote

It may actually be “flehmen response”.
If you take issue, please sue me before 24th.
-----
> is "menacing" appropriate for this image, i think so, and 2 licences seemed to agree,  but i can't guarantee this is what the animal was doing. 

 

 

Edited July 11, 2021 by FocusUno
additional sobering information

[Jansos]

Apologies in advance for not having read through the full thread (its gloriously hot and sunny in London today and its just too hot to read all the way through it. Perhaps another time?). Anyway, I thought this may be of interest to Alamy Forum folk - https://www.lightroom-keywords.com/download/ . It apparently tries to do your keywords for you. It's a Lightroom plugin. Has anyone used it? Look useful???