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What has happened to Alamy search results


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2 hours ago, John Mitchell said:

I don't know about Measures, but something behind the scenes has definitely changed for me. My sales numbers have fallen over 50% during the past two months after being consistent for several years. I'm hoping it's just a temporary blip, but...

It is not just you. Part of the problem is that there can be more than one set of results for any particular search. The quality of first page results has generally gone down across the board. Search for "Vancouver" (where you live) under relevant, no date restrictions and no other filters selected and you can get 2 different sets of results. (I check all the time) Version 1 is not too bad, contains mostly relevant Vancouver pictures. On the alternate search results (which sometimes show up first or often when you go to page 2 and then hit the back arrow)  you get lots of irrelevant results for a supposed 1st page 'Vancouver" search. For example there are 3 pictures of the same sandwich at a restaurant in Gastown, many pictures of laburnum trees at VanDusen Gardens. (Presumably given higher ranking because they contain the letters "Van" more often).   

The first pages of an all time search on a subject that has 319,000 images should contain the cream of the crop. If someone wants to see a sandwich in Gastown they should do a multi word search, "food, Gastown, Vancouver". 

Most buyers don't bother to search more than a couple of pages. If they aren't smart enough to use more than one search term they are going to see a lot of irrelevant images and this hurts everyone. 

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1 hour ago, Chexy said:

It is not just you. Part of the problem is that there can be more than one set of results for any particular search. The quality of first page results has generally gone down across the board. Search for "Vancouver" (where you live) under relevant, no date restrictions and no other filters selected and you can get 2 different sets of results. (I check all the time) Version 1 is not too bad, contains mostly relevant Vancouver pictures. On the alternate search results (which sometimes show up first or often when you go to page 2 and then hit the back arrow)  you get lots of irrelevant results for a supposed 1st page 'Vancouver" search. For example there are 3 pictures of the same sandwich at a restaurant in Gastown, many pictures of laburnum trees at VanDusen Gardens. (Presumably given higher ranking because they contain the letters "Van" more often).   

The first pages of an all time search on a subject that has 319,000 images should contain the cream of the crop. If someone wants to see a sandwich in Gastown they should do a multi word search, "food, Gastown, Vancouver". 

Most buyers don't bother to search more than a couple of pages. If they aren't smart enough to use more than one search term they are going to see a lot of irrelevant images and this hurts everyone. 

 

Interesting. Most of my recent sales (such as they are) have been of dependable repeat-sellers and "scarce" subjects that would have come up in very specific searches.

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4 hours ago, meanderingemu said:

Like the current Madrid Spain, starts with 39 image of the same model

They seem to be duplicated, 19 uploaded under Live News, where they are grouped under the same headline, but these and more uploaded in the normal way, or however agencies do it, and these will have different Alamy refs. even though they can be the same image. 2JCXD6M is the same as 2JCXCT8 (Live News), and I mean identical, just open each in a separate tab and switch between them.

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1 hour ago, Harry Harrison said:

They seem to be duplicated, 19 uploaded under Live News, where they are grouped under the same headline, but these and more uploaded in the normal way, or however agencies do it, and these will have different Alamy refs. even though they can be the same image. 2JCXD6M is the same as 2JCXCT8 (Live News), and I mean identical, just open each in a separate tab and switch between them.

 

looks like SOPA uploads it to Alamy, and to ZUMA who then also uploads it to Alamy, so each image gets doubled....  

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7 hours ago, meanderingemu said:

 

looks like SOPA uploads it to Alamy, and to ZUMA who then also uploads it to Alamy, so each image gets doubled....  

 

I wonder how many of the photos in the Alamy '294,035,438 stock photos, 360° images, vectors and videos' are duplicates. Before I regained live news I was in email contact with SOPA re contributing news, but when considering at worst the possibility of SOPA Zuma and Alamy taking their cut I didn't go any further. It's always the photographer that loses out.

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21 hours ago, ReeRay said:

Same here bar one or two exceptions.

 

 

This is ridiculous. Again zero zooms for both columns for the second day running. My CTR is in free fall.Dread the next re-rank if this isn't fixed soon.

 

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1 minute ago, ReeRay said:

This is ridiculous. Again zero zooms for both columns for the second day running. My CTR is in free fall.Dread the next re-rank if this isn't fixed soon.

 

No zooms for me either today - I don't think you need to worry about your rank given that this is affecting all of us equally and there is clearly something wrong with Measures. If we are lucky, when Alamy sort this out we may get our zooms back....

 

Kumar

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1 hour ago, Doc said:

No zooms for me either today - I don't think you need to worry about your rank given that this is affecting all of us equally and there is clearly something wrong with Measures. If we are lucky, when Alamy sort this out we may get our zooms back....

 

Kumar

I don't think there is anything "wrong" with 'Measures', it is unfortunately accurate, which means that the reason we have less views and zooms is a combination of re-ranking, search engine algorithm changes, and possible glitches (hitting the browser back arrow to a previous search page sometimes shows an entirely different set of images). Do a search where you know you have good images, see if you show up on the first few pages. If you don't see your pictures, buyers probably can't see them either. If you think that your pictures are among the best and most relevant then you have a complaint. I often see irrelevant images pop up on the first pages even though I have chosen the  'Relevant' filter. Likewise (and this has always been the case) the 'Creative' filter rarely shows a page much different than the 'Relevant' results. We have less zooms on our images because they are not being seen as much. Alamy must know whether 'sales' are up or down since the re-jigging. If they are 'up' is it because of the new 'ranking' or just because the world is opening up as Covid has been ramping down.  

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For me the whole thing has just about died. Now, in measures, when I try to access details of my views and zooms it now tells me each of my pseudonym pages cannot be found. If only someone would restore the whole shebang to a date prior to April, 2022. But I'm afraid that's just wishful thinking! 

Edited by Broad Norfolk
Spelling!
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4 hours ago, Broad Norfolk said:

For me the whole thing has just about died. Now, in measures, when I try to access details of my views and zooms it now tells me each of my pseudonym pages cannot be found. If only someone would restore the whole shebang to a date prior to April, 2022. But I'm afraid that's just wishful thinking! 

 

I'm having the same problem - when I click on the number of views for each pseudo to get more information, it takes me to an "unexpected error" page. 

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9 hours ago, MariaJ said:

 

I'm having the same problem - when I click on the number of views for each pseudo to get more information, it takes me to an "unexpected error" page. 

Me, too. This has been happening for a few days so something clearly isn’t working right.

Edited by Sally
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I have a bookmark to bring up all my images, now it gets a code 500 internal sever error.

Same thing happens when I click image numbers here.

 

Well done Alamy , yet another self inflicted totally unnecessary b**** up. 

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I see today that my pseudonym summary shows total views for each one and that's it. That is as far as it goes. no sales reported obviously and zoom totals once again zero with CTR in freefall. 

I must be like many other contributors of fairly long standing and have been with Alamy for over 16 years and worked very hard at stock and about 6 years ago my portfolio started to sell quite well and I have achieved an upward sales trend during this period. Despite declining revenue and all the rest I stuck at it because of my love for photography and the reluctance to throw away all my hard work. We arrive at the Alamy sale and an assumed re-rank and it feels like the rug has been pulled from under my feet. My top selling pseudo dropped to Page 8 and has since gone back up to Page 3 from what was originally Page 1. This coupled with some new over complicated search system being developed apparently has the effect of diluting the search ability for my material. From the Agency point of view it will not matter because images will be found and sold but they will possibly be spread around within the wider realm of us Contributors and those who have diligently stuck with the rules will most certainly notice the downward trend.

Well, it's Friday afternoon, and most of the Agency staff will probably have gone home for the weekend and that's it until we see what turns up on Monday morning.

Sorry for my whinge folks. I am a mild mannered man and I just had to get something off my chest about the current state of affairs. Have a good weekend.

Jim. 

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6 minutes ago, Broad Norfolk said:

I see today that my pseudonym summary shows total views for each one and that's it. That is as far as it goes. no sales reported obviously and zoom totals once again zero with CTR in freefall. 

I must be like many other contributors of fairly long standing and have been with Alamy for over 16 years and worked very hard at stock and about 6 years ago my portfolio started to sell quite well and I have achieved an upward sales trend during this period. Despite declining revenue and all the rest I stuck at it because of my love for photography and the reluctance to throw away all my hard work. We arrive at the Alamy sale and an assumed re-rank and it feels like the rug has been pulled from under my feet. My top selling pseudo dropped to Page 8 and has since gone back up to Page 3 from what was originally Page 1. This coupled with some new over complicated search system being developed apparently has the effect of diluting the search ability for my material. From the Agency point of view it will not matter because images will be found and sold but they will possibly be spread around within the wider realm of us Contributors and those who have diligently stuck with the rules will most certainly notice the downward trend.

Well, it's Friday afternoon, and most of the Agency staff will probably have gone home for the weekend and that's it until we see what turns up on Monday morning.

Sorry for my whinge folks. I am a mild mannered man and I just had to get something off my chest about the current state of affairs. Have a good weekend.

Jim. 

 

PS The point here, of course, is that Alamy/PA are her to maximise their profits but in my capacity as a Contributor I am here to sell.......

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28 minutes ago, Broad Norfolk said:

 

PS The point here, of course, is that Alamy/PA are her to maximise their profits but in my capacity as a Contributor I am here to sell.......

 

..........at maximum prices.

 

Allan

 

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The search results for editorial are laughable, and I don't mean that in a good way. If you search for Boris Johnson, arguably a search term that proves popular these days, the default gives you a whole lot of old, badly sorted, often irrelevant images. Many are very low quality. If you then click on editorial (latest images no longer is a search option), the editorial tab does ironically seem to come up with the latest images post live news, but in a completely unfiltered, zero quality-checked manner. Bunched together from whichever latest event had the keyword "Boris Johnson" in it. It brings up a whole lot of images of Zuma/Sopa type "quality", hastily filed rubbish in very large, basic-edit-only sets. A gazillion high quality editorial images from a wide range of events is available on Alamy, but these do not come up in the search. It's as if the "editorial" search was deliberately set up to flush up the cr*p, for buyers to procure from the bargain bin. The entire site now has a cheap, low quality feel to it. What a shame. A site previously known for quality editorial content is being left to rot. RIP.

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Hmm, yes.

 

Search for "Boris Johnson":

 

All images - 135735

Editorial - 111718

 

Creative All - 23,775

 

Made up of:

Ultimate - 0

Vital - 369

Uncut - 23,369

Foundation - 1

 

(Hooray, at last a Foundation image, caption says it is a combination picture that includes Boris Johnson, to me it looks like a plate of uncooked pasta)

 

Sum of Creative All and Editorial is 23,775 + 111,718 = 135493 - 242 images short of the All images total.

 

It does look as if the sort order and so ranking has changed dramatically. Has contributor ranking disappeared altogether or is it perhaps just in 'All images'?

 

 

 

 

Edited by Harry Harrison
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