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New York Times Interview with Jonathan Klein (Getty)


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It's nice to see the excitement about the demand for images.

 

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/08/27/giving-away-photos-to-make-a-profit/?_php=true&_type=blogs&smid=tw-share&_r=0

 

...but even he explains all they're getting out of it is views.  How does a photographer pay for a home or food with just views?

 


Start-up has been spectacular. We get about 5 million embed views a day.  Basically, 99 percent of the traffic on GettyImages.com will never buy a picture. On the one hand, it is a horrible statistic, and on the other hand it’s a fabulous statistic, because it shows that people are picture-crazy.

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Brian, do you know how that system works?  I have a couple of videos up on YouTube (shared by other agents I've submitted to) and I've never gotten a royalty from somoene viewing my video on YouTube.

 

I've also had blogs in the past with advertising/affiliate links to Adorama as well as other resellers...and I never made any money to be able to even pay the web host for hosting fees (one of the reasons I no longer have a blog).

 

How does one make money from that scheme?  I keep seeing "hope" and various other similar terms passed around but (without trying to sound too sarcastic) I also "hope" one day I'll be able to win the lottery.  Hope doesn't exactly pay my bills.

 

Warren Buffett has stated he doesn't invest in tech stocks because he doesn't understand how they make money and he doesn't see anything "tangible" being sold....I'm aligning with relation to that opinion for this type of scheme mostly because I don't understand it.  If the industry is moving toward this type of thing, I am seeking answers with relation to how photographers can profit from it.

 

...and honestly I still don't understand how Trey Ratcliff makes money from his "Stuck in Customs" brand as he encourages people to download and share his images for free (another brand I don't understand about this industry)

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Thanks for that. Interesting read.

 

Glad that I am with them AND have started investing time in video and time lapse as it is a very up and coming market.

 

Alamy, take serious note of the video side as you are falling way behind in this by not making it easy for contributors to upload directly to you.

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Brian, do you know how that system works?

 

Ed:

 

Only in the sketchiest way. I have a good friend who makes several thousand dollars a month from YouTube videos and he tells me it involves the number of views you have and the percentage of those people who watch the ads.

 

The system is explained in at least a few books.

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So K advises photographers to avoid relying on one source of income, plus to become proficient in video, if not already.

 

Sounds good.

 

I'll add it's also smart business practice to avoid hopping into business bed with anyone with history of putting pillows firmly over faces of those lying next to them.

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Giving away photos to make a profit? I think Shutterstock must have them all shook up.

 

I thought the mantra was to lose money on every single sale, but to make a profit on the volume.

 

Voodoo economics in my opinion. Too bad they went private. At least we used to be able to read their annual report and have a good laugh.

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I think that it's a bit of a sign of  the times. Thanks to the Internet, a lot of people expect something for nothing... which is not unreasonable as they now often get it!  Ultimately services like Alamy and Getty have to adapt their business to a model that works today and those who make their living from those services will have to either adapt as well or go hungry.  I'm not offering suggestions as to how one should adapt or the timeframe but the reality is that we are in a very different world from that even ten years ago.  

 

In my day job, I occasionally write for a few specialist publications and get paid for my contributions (just about enough to make it worthwhile). However, talking to journalist friends, they are coming under increasing price pressure, unless they are particularly well known in their field, and are looking to other ways of making a living (general books, one-off books for private publication, web sites etc.). 

 

I love the voodoo economics idea  - I confess to being unable to understand the business models of many of the Internet companies.

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I think that it's a bit of a sign of  the times. Thanks to the Internet, a lot of people expect something for nothing... which is not unreasonable as they now often get it!  Ultimately services like Alamy and Getty have to adapt their business to a model that works today and those who make their living from those services will have to either adapt as well or go hungry.  I'm not offering suggestions as to how one should adapt or the timeframe but the reality is that we are in a very different world from that even ten years ago.  

 

In my day job, I occasionally write for a few specialist publications and get paid for my contributions (just about enough to make it worthwhile). However, talking to journalist friends, they are coming under increasing price pressure, unless they are particularly well known in their field, and are looking to other ways of making a living (general books, one-off books for private publication, web sites etc.). 

 

I love the voodoo economics idea  - I confess to being unable to understand the business models of many of the Internet companies.

 

If you're making enough money from writing to make it worthwhile, you're doing very well. I used to do a lot of freelance writing -- mainly travel-related stuff -- for magazines and newspapers. When crowdsourcing and rights-grabbing contracts came along, I couldn't make any decent money and basically gave up and decided to concentrate on photography instead. I guess this means that I failed to adapt. Had I been younger, I probably would have made more of an effort. As it is, I miss writing, but I'm glad that I made the switch. Trying to eek out a living at writing is exhausting these days. Thank goodness for Alamy.

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