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Has Alamy become micro stock agency?


Action Photographer

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Depends how you look at it. Alamy is not microstock in the sense that the content here is a much wider, ecletic, range of imagery than will be found on microstock. Prices here have been dragged down to the point where we do see these images sold for a few coppers. By and large though, I still think such low sales are not the majority, whereas they are very much the rule in microstock with the occasional better licence sale. 

 

So Alamy is not microstock in spite of the downwards pressures. Microstock contributors who come here expecting it to work just as the other microstock agencies usually find themseleves vey disappointed.

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More or less, but with fewer sales.

 

Some high sales are still recorded here from time to time; but only a tiny proportion of Alamy contributors are on the forum and not necessarily representative for guaging the number of high value sales which is achieved.

Edited by Cryptoprocta
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To me it appears that a number of the new avenues that Alamy have targeted are very much of the microstock models, such as the mobile phone specific news apps, but thankfully its traditional customer base remains very much macro. Yesterday I had three reported licences at $200, $30 and $14 (gross). Sure, the next might be pennies but I'll swallow that knowing that it's not the only values that I'll be receiving unlike as would be the case if the agency was fully micro.

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We all tend to forget with micros that they don't sell everything at 10 cents, there are some very healthy fees as well from non-subscribers. I think if you are playing the secondary editorial game (especially UK centric) Alamy is still a good choice. But with 275M images our odds are quite low of being successful enough to matter.

 

I have actually uploaded some images this week, first time since the new contact. Inspired by not knowing what else to do with my B roll.

Edited by Panthera tigris
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2 hours ago, Avpics said:

To me it appears that a number of the new avenues that Alamy have targeted are very much of the microstock models, such as the mobile phone specific news apps, but thankfully its traditional customer base remains very much macro. Yesterday I had three reported licences at $200, $30 and $14 (gross). Sure, the next might be pennies but I'll swallow that knowing that it's not the only values that I'll be receiving unlike as would be the case if the agency was fully micro.

 

also one big difference is they don't seem to offer these deals to every random image users, and there needs to be more of a long term commitment required to qualify. The micro will give these deals to anyone walking of the street.

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21 hours ago, Avpics said:

Sure, the next might be pennies but I'll swallow that knowing that it's not the only values that I'll be receiving unlike as would be the case if the agency was fully micro.

Self fulfilling prophecy....... Today nett .71 and .67 cents.

 

Next sale will be the big one......😄

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Today Alamy said to me: 

 

“Hi Vincenzo

 

Thanks for your email.

 

You can opt out of the novel use scheme, but you can only do this in April because we need a consistent collection of images as some of the Novel Use Schemes have long lead times.

 

The stock photography market is becoming more saturated and in order to compete with competitors our licensing models have had to move in the same direction. Nowadays most publishers will only purchase an image for use if it allows them ‘rights in perpetuity’ due to the level of flexibility they require.

 

Kind regards”

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On 04/11/2021 at 01:54, Action Photographer said:

One of my image was just sold for US $0.21 . This is even lower than the commission  you would get from microstock e.g. shuttewrstock or istock. I'm just wondering if Alamy has become on of those cheap stock agency.

First, you should spell SS correctly.  Second, take a look at my post on images sold.

 

Chuck

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15 hours ago, VIDRA said:

Today Alamy said to me: 

 

“Hi Vincenzo

 

Thanks for your email.

 

You can opt out of the novel use scheme, but you can only do this in April because we need a consistent collection of images as some of the Novel Use Schemes have long lead times.

 

 

 

 

didn't you opt out a couple of years ago?   to be honest, i have never seen a NU sale, so not sure what is the point

Edited by meanderingemu
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No Alamy is distinctly and definitely NOT a microstock agency.  But it is in the same market as all those microstock agencies and also G Images which offers microstock pricing to favoured customers through its Premium Access offering. 

 

There are clients who need a very large number of images usuallly for very brief web uses. They might use 10,000 images a month at low res on websites. They want good images, very good images if possible, but more than anything they want cheap images. 

 

Alamy has to be in that market. That's just the way it is.

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5 hours ago, meanderingemu said:

 

 

 

didn't you opt out a couple of years ago?   to be honest, i have never seen a NU sale, so not sure what is the point

 

 

I'm not in NU any longer, and most of my RM licenses are now "in perpetutity." The whole notion of a set duration seems to be disappearing.

 

Welcome to the age of "muddlestock"?  😕

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Some months it certainly feels like micro here but like others here, I've also had a few $$$ sales this year. 

 

And like John and others, I've also had far too many RM images licensed "in perpetuity" 

 

- muddlestock indeed.

 

 

 

Edited by Marianne
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I think when sales drop in for less than 20cents gross which equates to maybe about 5 or 6 pence to the contributor then you have to admit you're a microstock agency. I'm not actually sure what else you could buy in the uk for 5p, it's just ridiculous.

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On 12/11/2021 at 19:10, John Mitchell said:

 

 

I'm not in NU any longer, and most of my RM licenses are now "in perpetutity." The whole notion of a set duration seems to be disappearing.

 

Welcome to the age of "muddlestock"?  😕

 

I pulled out of NU a couple of years back, was ridiculous pricing then. While others quit PU, I remained, as PU license fees were and still are better than many other sales.

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44 minutes ago, sb photos said:

 

I pulled out of NU a couple of years back, was ridiculous pricing then. While others quit PU, I remained, as PU license fees were and still are better than many other sales.

 

I'd say about 75% of my PU sales are full price ($19.95 over here). So, yeah, better than a lot of editorial websites, which are usually the lowest for me.

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3 hours ago, John Mitchell said:

 

I'd say about 75% of my PU sales are full price ($19.95 over here). So, yeah, better than a lot of editorial websites, which are usually the lowest for me.

 

hope all is OK on your side, the images from BC are pretty scary to watch.  

Edited by meanderingemu
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3 hours ago, meanderingemu said:

 

hope all is OK on your side, the images from BC are pretty scary to watch.  

 

Thanks. The flooding sounds really bad in the BC interior and in the suburbs of Vancouver. Yesterday felt  a bit like a hurricane, but fortunately no problems where I live. The sun actually returned today, which was a bit of a shock after so much rainy weather.

 

 

Edited by John Mitchell
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Large sample, Alamy earns me 15x more on average vs the average for a microstock image. However, volumes on micros tend to be some 10x greater than on here.

 

Don't think Alamy is a microstock agency, also because it offers the option of Rights-Managed and exclusivity. 

 

On here, I would welcome some lower priced bulk sales (even subscriptions) as long as there are volumes to justify. 

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Apparently, I mistakenly thought that Rights-Managed was a time-limited license. Terms - In perpetuity and Unlimited should be more for RF license. However, RM is apparently in the same category as RF. Thank you for the explanation

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41 minutes ago, Radim said:

Apparently, I mistakenly thought that Rights-Managed was a time-limited license. Terms - In perpetuity and Unlimited should be more for RF license. However, RM is apparently in the same category as RF. Thank you for the explanation

 

Rights-Managed is most usually a time limited licence. I've looked at my sales for the last year, all RM, and each one is time limited, mostly 5 years. The longest is 2021-46 for inside page of a book.

 

Some RM In Perpetuity licences have been reported in this forum and perhaps they are more commonplace than they once were, but the fact that they are being reported tends to suggest that they are the exception rather than the rule.  It should also be remembered that there is a significant diference between RF and RM - In Perpetuity. An image issued with an RF licence can be used by the purchaser  for multiple projects with no further licence cost. One issued with an RM licence is limited to a particular project, even if it is in perpetuity. If the buyer wants to use it elsewhere legitimately, they need to buy another licence.  

 

While all is not well in the Alamy world and the deterioation is noticeable, I feel the need to resist the Henny-Penny view of the situation. The sky is not falling  in terms of either image prices or licence terms. Things are more challenging than they once were but we are not, as far as I can see, selling every image for pennies and surrendering unlimited use at the same time. That is the world of Microstock and Alamy is NOT microstock.

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3 minutes ago, Joseph Clemson said:

 

Rights-Managed is most usually a time limited licence. I've looked at my sales for the last year, all RM, and each one is time limited, mostly 5 years. The longest is 2021-46 for inside page of a book.

 

Some RM In Perpetuity licences have been reported in this forum and perhaps they are more commonplace than they once were, but the fact that they are being reported tends to suggest that they are the exception rather than the rule.  It should also be remembered that there is a significant diference between RF and RM - In Perpetuity. An image issued with an RF licence can be used by the purchaser  for multiple projects with no further licence cost. One issued with an RM licence is limited to a particular project, even if it is in perpetuity. If the buyer wants to use it elsewhere legitimately, they need to buy another licence.  

 

While all is not well in the Alamy world and the deterioation is noticeable, I feel the need to resist the Henny-Penny view of the situation. The sky is not falling  in terms of either image prices or licence terms. Things are more challenging than they once were but we are not, as far as I can see, selling every image for pennies and surrendering unlimited use at the same time. That is the world of Microstock and Alamy is NOT microstock.

 

 

what i seem to have noticed is some replacement of 5-Years with archive rights for lifetime of article being replaced with perpetuity in the Web environment, I wonder if there is any impact fee wise- would the first licence ever need a renewal.

 

I have not had a "in perpetuity" licence for anything in Print, nor TV

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8 minutes ago, Joseph Clemson said:

 

 

 

While all is not well in the Alamy world and the deterioation is noticeable, I feel the need to resist the Henny-Penny view of the situation. The sky is not falling  in terms of either image prices or licence terms. Things are more challenging than they once were but we are not, as far as I can see, selling every image for pennies and surrendering unlimited use at the same time. That is the world of Microstock and Alamy is NOT microstock.

 

 

and will restate, Alamy still seems to restrict the access to these deals to long term committal.  I can walk in to any MS shop, and download 10 image for free (i presume you will get pennies), or get a large amount of images in short time, and then cancel commitment. 

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