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I see on the right hand side of the seller dashboard tweets regarding picture needs. Some of us do not do twitter . would it be possible alamy to please have a thread here for picture needs. If they really are needs then you need to reach as wide an audience as possible. It would only take a few minutes of your picture needs team time

Regards

kevin

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Picture needs is a really delicate matter for all agencies, big or small. When you're as big as Alamy, you already have some examples of pretty well everything, and need updated examples of pretty well everything. And inevitably, there will be contributors who take a needs list as a suggestion to go out and shoot specific subjects who will then get their noses out of joint when they don't produce sales.

 

If you are thinking about things to shoot, it's perhaps a good idea to do a few searches on Alamy to see what's out there, but that may just put you off too many ideas.

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I do not twitter either, well just on this forum, and would like to see Alamy introduce a system of notifications that would reach the majority, if not all, contributors.

 

Allan

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Picture needs is a really delicate matter for all agencies, big or small. When you're as big as Alamy, you already have some examples of pretty well everything, and need updated examples of pretty well everything. And inevitably, there will be contributors who take a needs list as a suggestion to go out and shoot specific subjects who will then get their noses out of joint when they don't produce sales.

 

If you are thinking about things to shoot, it's perhaps a good idea to do a few searches on Alamy to see what's out there, but that may just put you off too many ideas.

 

Yes indeed. With a certain other library that puts out picture requests I would occasionally go out and photograph something fairly obscure that was local to me, and suddenly 20 or 30 pics of the same obscure location would magically appear from other photographers.

 

Alan

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Robert, its not so much not knowing what to shoot, and getting upset when you go out and get it and it doesn't sell, its just alamy do tweet when buyers cannot find what they want and not everybody tweets

 

kevin

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I have more than 4200 people following me on Twitter. In addition,I am following appx 4400. There is no way I will weed thru thousands of daily Tweets to see 'photo needs' or anything else I deem worthy.

 

Personally I think Twitter is a vast rambling sea of muck!

 

L

 

I agree. Twitter is just too ephemeral - if you don't see a tweet within 10 seconds of a posting it is buried under dozens, even 100s, of new ones

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I follow lots of people too but I set it up to send me an SMS from the ones who tweet local news as it is breaking.

 

Also, you can do it on search terms or hashtags. So set it up to sms you when someone tweets with #pictureneeds.

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I agree, Tweeting is akin to doing you-know-what in the wind, although it does have some legitimate uses, like posting late homework assignments and starting revolutions in oppressed countries.

 

A couple of months ago, Alamy posted a list of client-supplied picture needs for Canadian content on the forum. Wish they would/could do that sort of thing more often. This summer, I've actually had a couple of sales and am seeing zooms recently that look as if they could have been based on the list provided. A permanent "picture needs" thread sounds like a great idea to me.

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I agree, Tweeting is akin to doing you-know-what in the wind, although it does have some legitimate uses, like posting late homework assignments and starting revolutions in oppressed countries.

 

A couple of months ago, Alamy posted a list of client-supplied picture needs for Canadian content on the forum. Wish they would/could do that sort of thing more often. This summer, I've actually had a couple of sales and am seeing zooms recently that look as if they could have been based on the list provided. A permanent "picture needs" thread sounds like a great idea to me.

+1

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A plus one from me too, a picture needs thread sounds a great idea. What is obscure and remote to some people will be right next door to others. If alamy know of gaps or weaknesses in their collection surely it makes sense to get people to fill those gaps. And no, I neither twitter nor facebook, pinterest or any of the others. I have so many books to read, documentaries to watch and a 2 yr old son to play with (and a daughter who arrives in 10 days - gulp) and to me every minute spent twittering and facebooking is a precious minute of my life wasted. 

Cheers

Col

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A plus one from me too, a picture needs thread sounds a great idea. What is obscure and remote to some people will be right next door to others. If alamy know of gaps or weaknesses in their collection surely it makes sense to get people to fill those gaps. And no, I neither twitter nor facebook, pinterest or any of the others. I have so many books to read, documentaries to watch and a 2 yr old son to play with (and a daughter who arrives in 10 days - gulp) and to me every minute spent twittering and facebooking is a precious minute of my life wasted. 

Cheers

Col

 

Congratulations  :) !

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I have more than 4200 people following me on Twitter. In addition,I am following appx 4400. There is no way I will weed thru thousands of daily Tweets to see 'photo needs' or anything else I deem worthy.

 

Personally I think Twitter is a vast rambling sea of muck!

 

L

 

Linda I can't help but think that if you were not following 4400 people/organisations then you might find it a little less vast and maybe less rambling and mucky. Maybe now is a good time to pare that list down a bit ? Or use a tool like Hootsuite to control and coordinate what you look for, see and indeed pass out.

 

Alternatively......

 

 

Set up a twitter account and only follow @AlamyContent and @AlamyNews. Set it to sms you when they tweet. Sorted :)

 

I follow lots of people too but I set it up to send me an SMS from the ones who tweet local news as it is breaking.

 

Also, you can do it on search terms or hashtags. So set it up to sms you when someone tweets with #pictureneeds.

 

Alex's suggestions are perfect, and indeed I do the first of these so I get the tweets sent to my phone. It doesn't cost me anything, but allows me to see the news items, and picture needs as soon as they are mentioned, and not in with everything else, nor do I have to search for them.

 

You don't have to tweet, or follow anyone more than Alamy if you want to take advantage of the requests - keep your head down and indeed with the sms notification not even log on to Twitter more than once. 

 

It is about using the powerful but simple features of the tool and not getting sucked onto the hype, following everyone and everything, or feeling you need to tweet about your breakfast.

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Whenever I read about someone posting very specific picture needs (that is, other than the commonsense, evidence-driven, general advice about what makes saleable images) I immediately picture an under-6 football (soccer) game: everyone on the field madly following the ball around :)

 

The general advice given by most agencies, and also often given by some of the more savvy contributers here, seems to me to be far more important, and much more readily accessible, than individual tweets requesting very specific images.

 

. . . an opinion in no way affected by my natural distaste of tweetship mind you . . . ;)

 

dd

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So this has become the have a go at Twitter thread!

 

Like it or hate the wider use of social media is the future of promotion and getting new business, and for that twitter works.  Been on there for about two years, and for little effort it has repaid more than any other promotion I have undertaken, both for photography and other businesses.

 

 A quick look at recent commissions would point that the last eight new clients are all as a result of Twitter.

 

I do not do Facebook, and in the early days was a doubting Thomas about Twitter, but not any more

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I am wondering, apart from the regulars on this forum site, how many Alamy contributors actually drop in to the forums to see what is going on.

 

It may be that Alamy knows that out of the thousands of contributor comparatively few actually use the forums. Hence their stance on not starting an images wanted thread.

 

Allan

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