Image order in portfolio randomly re-organised

[Sally Robertson]

Hello, I've just noticed that my images have suddenly been re-organised in a randomised way. Before that they were in order of upload. Sometimes the order of the most recent upload would change slightly within itself, but otherwise the images were sequential from first upload to the most recent ones.

 

Is anyone else seeing their images re-organised this way? It's not necessarily a bad thing in that it makes it kind of randomly interesting to look at with a wide variety of images across a page. The main disadvantage is I had a mental map of kind of where things were before based on chronological order. I can obviously still find things by doing searches and with only 470 images I don't have a lot to search through at this stage. I'm just wondering what the logic behind this re-organisation is?

[BidC]

21 hours ago, M.Chapman said:

Possible workaround??

 

Looking at the full URL when selecting "Newest" I can see that the images are being sorted by DateTaken (not the date of submission).

 

If you want to see your images sorted according to the submission date instead, then remove the -datetaken part from the URL by editing the end of the "Newest" URL in the browser's address bar from;

 

....&sortBy=newest-datetaken&st=12

 

to;

 

...&sortBy=newest&st=12

 

If you want to keep that order, create a shortcut or bookmark with the modified URL. It seems to "stick" if going to next page too. 

 

Mark

 

Mine are no longer even sorted according to 'date taken'. I spilt some of the submissions myself, but now there are bits and pieces everywhere. I'm not sure modifying the URL would work for that (?) My submissions usually follow the date taken, so they should be the same ...

 

In any event, we'd have to do this each time, wouldn't we (?).

It is really Alamy's job to sort that out.

 

(Lots of queries here .... 🥴).

[BidC]

37 minutes ago, M.Chapman said:

Have you tried modifying the URL? See my earlier posting.

 

Mark

 

I tap 'reset order ...' (etc, and nothing happens - the URL doesn't change at all.

 

Anyway, life is too short. I can't attend to it at the mo.

 

Thanks anyway, Mark.

Much appreciated !

[Harry Harrison]

24 minutes ago, BidC said:

I tap 'reset order ...' (etc, and nothing happens - the URL doesn't change at all.

I think you might be looking at your Alamy 'Portfolio', the post is in fact not about that despite the title. There is nothing that can be done about the sort 'order' in the Alamy Portfolio.

[Avpics]

3 minutes ago, Harry Harrison said:

I think you might be looking at your Alamy 'Portfolio', the post is in fact not about that despite the title. There is nothing that can be done about the sort 'order' in the Alamy Portfolio.

That's not how I'm reading the initial post. Quoting Sally 

Quote

Hello, I've just noticed that my images have suddenly been re-organised in a randomised way. Before that they were in order of upload. Sometimes the order of the most recent upload would change slightly within itself, but otherwise the images were sequential from first upload to the most recent ones.

 

[Harry Harrison]

1 minute ago, Avpics said:

That's not how I'm reading the initial post. Quoting Sally 

I think that you'll find that she is referring to the images displayed from her forum link, the majority of the replies, and the fix, refer to that, and also when you click on a pseudonym.

[Harry Harrison]

7 minutes ago, Avpics said:

That's not how I'm reading the initial post. Quoting Sally 

So, quoting Sally in her next post "I wasn't referring to AIM but to the images displayed on the Alamy website. I've clicked on the number in the Alamy forum before and never seen them in that new randomised order until today."

 

Alamy have changed the default there, it is now 'Relevant' but also the way Relevant is organised seems to have changed as well to something much more random. It also seems that 'Newest' is now based on 'Date taken' whereas a lot of contributors on here have been using it to review their latest uploads. There is no option to switch between Relevant and Newest when a buyer looks at a Portfolio.

Edited April 5 by Harry Harrison

[BidC]

45 minutes ago, Harry Harrison said:

I think you might be looking at your Alamy 'Portfolio', the post is in fact not about that despite the title. There is nothing that can be done about the sort 'order' in the Alamy Portfolio.

 

The 'reset to ..' tab should do as its asked, however ..... (and reset to most recent).

 

It I possible to manually order the images ...

 

Sorry to be so dumb: wondering what @SallyRobertson is referring to ? (Sally ... ?)

Edited April 5 by BidC

[Johnnie5]

 

[M.Chapman]

1 hour ago, BidC said:

 

I tap 'reset order ...' (etc, and nothing happens - the URL doesn't change at all.

 

Anyway, life is too short. I can't attend to it at the mo.

 

Thanks anyway, Mark.

Much appreciated !

OK, thanks, I've edited my original post to clarify that my workaround applies to Alamy search results and not to a Contributor's portfolio view.

 

My workaround alters the results of an Alamy "Newest" search for a contributor's images (either from the Alamy homepage or by clicking on the Avatar link in the forum) so they appear in submission date order rather than date taken order. The workaround will not work on a contributor's portfolio view.

 

Mark 

[Avpics]

1 hour ago, Harry Harrison said:

I think that you'll find that she is referring to the images displayed from her forum link, the majority of the replies, and the fix, refer to that, and also when you click on a pseudonym.

Yes, her portfolio. Whether accessed from the forum link or the dashboard they are the same images and both were previously displayed in upload order, with the odd exception. Then this week both became randomly shuffled with mixed results when requested to change to 'reset order to most recent' or 'sort newest'. It appears that the latter has been fixed, but the portfolio from the dashboard hasn't.

[Harry Harrison]

1 hour ago, BidC said:

Sorry to be so dumb: wondering what @SallyRobertson is referring to ? (Sally ... ?)

She is referring to what happens when she looks at her 'portfolio' by clicking on the number in the forum, the sort order has now changed to something much more random, this is still called 'Relevant' but the algorithms underlying it have changed. This is the same order that you will see in your Alamy Portfolio beyond any images that you have manually arranged. It seems that the 'reset' is broken in hte Portfolio Admin area.

[Harry Harrison]

20 minutes ago, Avpics said:

It appears that the latter has been fixed

Is that what you've found, it hasn't for me? 'Newest' still sorts by 'Date taken' unless you apply Mark's fix and 'Relevant' is still the same randomised version for me.

Yes, the 'Reset' option in the Portfolio doesn't work and instead the sort order is stuck with this new 'Relevant' algorithm but that's a different issue, Mark's fix doesn't work for that so it might be worth asking Alamy directly to address it. Alamy have obviously decided that the new 'Relevant' sort order is the way to go for them but perhaps it is under review.

[Avpics]

2 minutes ago, Harry Harrison said:

Is that what you've found, it hasn't for me?

'Fixed' as in that it obeys the option selected, though I'd also prefer it as it was.

[BidC]

23 minutes ago, Harry Harrison said:

She is referring to what happens when she looks at her 'portfolio' by clicking on the number in the forum, the sort order has now changed to something much more random, this is still called 'Relevant' but the algorithms underlying it have changed. This is the same order that you will see in your Alamy Portfolio beyond any images that you have manually arranged. It seems that the 'reset' is broken in hte Portfolio Admin area.

 

Thank you very much for clarifying

[Sally Robertson]

Hello everyone above,

 

I'm sorry I used the word "portfolio" in the title. I just meant the images of mine displayed on the Alamy website. I have never set up the actual "Portfolio" you can set up on Alamy so I was referring in general terms to all the images we have up on Alamy on their website. In other words what you see if you click on your number on the forum or if you click your name below one of your images on the website. I was on another stock site in the past and the portfolio just meant the images displayed on the website there, so I don't tend to even think of the portfolio as a seperate thing.

 

Thanks Mark for your workaround!

[M.Chapman]

6 hours ago, Sally Robertson said:

Thanks Mark for your workaround!

You're welcome. It took a few minutes of trial and error to find what URL edit worked, but I'm glad I worked for you.

 

Shame a similar edit doesn't work for the actual "portfolio" pages, but that URL is way more complex.

 

Mark

Edited April 6 by M.Chapman

[geogphotos]

I notice that other agencies 'randomise' images in this way. For myself I don't have any problem with it.

 

Actually, I prefer it that different images are jumbled up as opposed to everything being in chronological order. 

Edited April 6 by geogphotos

[Sally Robertson]

On 06/04/2024 at 18:06, M.Chapman said:

You're welcome. It took a few minutes of trial and error to find what URL edit worked, but I'm glad I worked for you.

 

Shame a similar edit doesn't work for the actual "portfolio" pages, but that URL is way more complex.

 

Mark

 

Thanks Mark. I bookmarked that version of the URL so I can happily look at my images as they used to be. It's funny but I breathed a sigh of relief at being able to do so as my brain has become used to having a mental map of where images are based on when I uploaded them.

 

On 06/04/2024 at 19:45, geogphotos said:

I notice that other agencies 'randomise' images in this way. For myself I don't have any problem with it.

 

Actually, I prefer it that different images are jumbled up as opposed to everything being in chronological order. 

 

I see your point of view too Ian. I can see value in the jumbled version as it has variety and keeps it interesting. But I'm also glad to have access to the order of upload through Mark's URL workaround as I have a mental map of things that way in my memory. Once I have many more uploads that may be less relevant as it will be harder to keep track of them in memory then.

[John Gaffen]

I've reported this problem to Alamy Members services,  as its becoming quite inconvenient, I think the search engine is not working correctly either, as my views and Zooms are far below where they should be. 

[Broad Norfolk]

On 09/04/2024 at 10:07, John Gaffen said:

I've reported this problem to Alamy Members services,  as its becoming quite inconvenient, I think the search engine is not working correctly either, as my views and Zooms are far below where they should be. 

 

Just to add to your post, it's the same with me. Monthly zooms have dropped to low single figures and CTR will soon be down to zero. Views have also dropped considerably and yesterday my port. gathered no data at all. Sales are following. I have intimated previously that I am very suspicious that my work is failing to be seen/found in searches. I have noticed keywords and tags relating to Invoiced sales that have just not appeared in searches on my images. So just how extensive is a search?!?!      

[Sally Robertson]

On 09/04/2024 at 17:07, John Gaffen said:

I've reported this problem to Alamy Members services,  as its becoming quite inconvenient, I think the search engine is not working correctly either, as my views and Zooms are far below where they should be. 

 

It would be good to have an explanation from Alamy as to what exactly is happening and why. Just now I was looking through my images on the default Relevant setting that customers would see if they choose to look at our images. I found the order is continuously randomising as in each time you click back and forth through pages. Certain images may be on Page 5, then those same images appear on Page 4 and then they are on Page 5 again. As a result, going through the pages some images I have uploaded are not even seen at all while others are repeated across pages. Obviously if the Newest option is selected then they are all seen. But I'm not sure many customers would even think to select Newest. Personally if I was a customer this would frustrate me as I'd think, haven't I just seen that image on another page already?

 

I feel if randomisation is going to be used, it should only be changed infrequently as it is actually disorienting when looking through pages of images. I don't think it is user friendly from a customer perspective. Even though I know many customers will not look at our collection of images, only the search results relevant to them, some may do so and get frustrated with everything changing constantly.

[geogphotos]

Does this same continuous randomising and rearranging occur when doing searched for keywords ( as a buyer would)?

[Sally Robertson]

5 hours ago, geogphotos said:

Does this same continuous randomising and rearranging occur when doing searched for keywords ( as a buyer would)?

 

Hi Ian, I just tried with a keyword search as a buyer would and it seemed to remain stable (not randomise) on my computer. However, doing an identical search on my phone brought up different images. So from Page 1 I could already see different images appearing for the same search. In both cases I was searching with the default Relevant selected and was logged into Alamy. So I'm not sure why it would be different between my computer and phone. I'll try the same search tomorrow and see if I'm still getting the same results.

[geogphotos]

1 hour ago, Sally Robertson said:

 

Hi Ian, I just tried with a keyword search as a buyer would and it seemed to remain stable (not randomise) on my computer. However, doing an identical search on my phone brought up different images. So from Page 1 I could already see different images appearing for the same search. In both cases I was searching with the default Relevant selected and was logged into Alamy. So I'm not sure why it would be different between my computer and phone. I'll try the same search tomorrow and see if I'm still getting the same results.

 

Thanks for that. It's a relief that the buyer experience does not seem to be badly affected. Fingers crossed 😁

[Sally Robertson]

14 hours ago, geogphotos said:

 

Thanks for that. It's a relief that the buyer experience does not seem to be badly affected. Fingers crossed 😁

 

Yes, it is definitely good that the pages seem to remain consistent for buyer searches. I just tested it again today. It remained the same on my computer and the same on my phone, even though the order was different between those two devices for some reason as it was yesterday. At least it is consistent on each device 👍🙂