Colblimp Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looking at all the comments. it seems I'm not the only one having problems with this car crash of an update. I see Alamy is reading the comments, but I'm in no doubt no comments, advice or anything useful will be forthcoming. What a scandalous way to treat one's contributors! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Robinson Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 So do I, most images with poor discoverability It seems I now have rather few images in my portfolio? Need to discover how to work on batches that includes images from multiple submissions. The idea that more keywords is better has been my main problem with the new system. I liked the old 'image not ready' so I could easily see which recently-uploaded images needed work, and then mark them as finished, even if they didn't have huge numbers of keywords. That is much harder to do now. You can work on batches of similar images by using the 'search' option rather than the 'filters' tab. If you go to the Discoverability tab and you tick the Not on sale box, you'll have you're image not ready images back. wim Yes, but that assumes that only the 'not on sale' images are the ones needing work. The vast majority of my images are designated 'poor discoverability', though I am happy with the keywording and regard them as finished. All my new uploads have keywords already and are also 'poor discoverability' and it's impossible to differentiate between those that need more work and those that don't. A tick box along the lines of "I've finished annotating this one even though it hasn't got 41 keywords" would make life a lot easier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Rooney Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I'm doing my first batch with the new tools. A lot of it is working well, but . . . I'm having trouble with pseudos. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Robinson Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 So do I, most images with poor discoverability It seems I now have rather few images in my portfolio? Need to discover how to work on batches that includes images from multiple submissions. The idea that more keywords is better has been my main problem with the new system. I liked the old 'image not ready' so I could easily see which recently-uploaded images needed work, and then mark them as finished, even if they didn't have huge numbers of keywords. That is much harder to do now. You can work on batches of similar images by using the 'search' option rather than the 'filters' tab. Yep... the "more keywords is better" seems like it would encourage keyword spamming, both intentional and unintentional, trying to make that bar turn green. Exactly. I have had this system for several weeks now and I find myself desperately thinking up more and more obscure tags so I can turn the image green, which is the only way to know it has been annotated after upload. If you add keywords before uploading, as I suspect most people do, it is impossible to tell which have been updated and which haven't if they are all orange. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanGibson Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 As an aside, now that Flash has been ditched, I thought I'd try MI on an iPad. It works fine, if a little fiddly. As that went so well, I tried it on an iPhone. Not a good idea. All in all, the new MI is a great update (for me), with several useful features. It happens to suit my workflow much better than the old one. The next step will hopefully be a smartphone app for true portability. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niels Quist Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looking at all the comments. it seems I'm not the only one having problems with this car crash of an update. I see Alamy is reading the comments, but I'm in no doubt no comments, advice or anything useful will be forthcoming. What a scandalous way to treat one's contributors! You cannot stop this development. I do not fear the handling of images in a new system. But the change to RF editorial as the major and recommended licence and image annotation scares me a lot, as our images will be flooded by incoming images more appropriate for customers - perhaps even from microstock - and this sometimes makes me think, do I really bother doing this any longer. But time will show. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Robinson Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I know Alamy has now placed the keywords in the order in which we have put them, but for some, it would be nice if I could sort alphabetically so could quick get rid of duplicates. Jill I have made the same point. If you are editing a large batch of images, you can have hundreds of keywords come up and trying to find one to either add to all or delete can be extremely time-consuming. I also found the alphabetical listing (as it started out) very good for finding spelling mistakes and the same tag starting with small and capital letters. Rationalising tags is a lot easier if they are alphabetical. The reason, I think, is that it messes up proximity, but it would be good if we could have the option to VIEW them alphabetically even if they don't act that way in searches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tarsierspectral Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I'm still trying to figure out what is the point of "discoverability"! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Craig Yates Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I'm still trying to figure out what is the point of "discoverability"! It must have a relevance or it would not exist,perhaps someone can enlighten us. Looking at many of my sales they fall into the poor discoverability category. Making them more discoverable would i sell more images? Craig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 From the pdf manual: Note: The discoverability bar is not in any way ‘reading’ or ‘scoring’ the quality of your metadata, it simply increases with the volume of searchable information you enter. My guess is that it somehow has no eyes yet. Just a calculator. wim If it's just a calculator, which appears to be the case, then the implication is that quantity of tags is more important than quality of tags. A lot of poor tags -- irrelevant, inaccurate, etc, -- can actually make an image less "discoverable." This could mislead new contributors into thinking that piling keywords higher (much like uploading similars) is a good thing. Or perhaps I'm missing something? Suits me. My sellers are a mixture of orange and green, mostly orange. New contributors can lower their CTR as much as they like. We know better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colblimp Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I've had a look at the new system for a fair while now and to be fair, it's a pile of old sh*te. Who in their right mind thought this was a good idea? Alamy has essentially taken something that worked perfectly well and broken it. I'm stunned at the lack of user friendliness, it's extremely difficult to navigate around and I can't even select a picture to keyword it. As for the discoverability business, of 711 pictures on sale, 699 suffer from 'poor discoverability'. How did Alamy come up with this rubbish? What makes this new system even more laughable is the 5 images I've sold in my first year are in the 'poor discoverability' section. It's just embarrassing! Don't know what my next move is now - if I can't keyword images and if almost all of my port is classed as essentially invisible, what's the point? Personally, I'll probably ignore it and carry on as normal. Except to make sure each image has the maximum number of appropriate supertags. How do you determine which is a supertag? As far as I can see there's no way of saying such and such a tag is a supertag. Yet another fail from Alamy... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niels Quist Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I've had a look at the new system for a fair while now and to be fair, it's a pile of old sh*te. Who in their right mind thought this was a good idea? Alamy has essentially taken something that worked perfectly well and broken it. I'm stunned at the lack of user friendliness, it's extremely difficult to navigate around and I can't even select a picture to keyword it. As for the discoverability business, of 711 pictures on sale, 699 suffer from 'poor discoverability'. How did Alamy come up with this rubbish? What makes this new system even more laughable is the 5 images I've sold in my first year are in the 'poor discoverability' section. It's just embarrassing! Don't know what my next move is now - if I can't keyword images and if almost all of my port is classed as essentially invisible, what's the point? Personally, I'll probably ignore it and carry on as normal. Except to make sure each image has the maximum number of appropriate supertags. How do you determine which is a supertag? As far as I can see there's no way of saying such and such a tag is a supertag. Yet another fail from Alamy... The light, grey star in front of a tag is blue if it is a supertag. You can change the light grey star to blue, and thus a supertag, by clicking on it - or the other way round. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrumu Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. The new interface looks much more modern and clean, but regarding keywording functionality I'm not convinced. If order and proximity of keywords still play a role, then it is a mess now, as you cannot change the keywording order once they are entered. When I first saw the screenshots I thought that the entered keywords can be dragged and dropped in the right order... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tarsierspectral Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. The new interface looks much more modern and clean, but regarding keywording functionality I'm not convinced. If order and proximity of keywords still play a role, then it is a mess now, as you cannot change the keywording order once they are entered. When I first saw the screenshots I thought that the entered keywords can be dragged and dropped in the right order... but we don't know if the order matters and Alamy is not telling us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Ashmore Posted January 23, 2017 Author Share Posted January 23, 2017 I've had a look at the new system for a fair while now and to be fair, it's a pile of old sh*te. Who in their right mind thought this was a good idea? Alamy has essentially taken something that worked perfectly well and broken it. I'm stunned at the lack of user friendliness, it's extremely difficult to navigate around and I can't even select a picture to keyword it. As for the discoverability business, of 711 pictures on sale, 699 suffer from 'poor discoverability'. How did Alamy come up with this rubbish? What makes this new system even more laughable is the 5 images I've sold in my first year are in the 'poor discoverability' section. It's just embarrassing! Don't know what my next move is now - if I can't keyword images and if almost all of my port is classed as essentially invisible, what's the point? Personally, I'll probably ignore it and carry on as normal. Except to make sure each image has the maximum number of appropriate supertags. How do you determine which is a supertag? As far as I can see there's no way of saying such and such a tag is a supertag. Yet another fail from Alamy... As they say where i work... RTFM http://www.alamy.com/myupload/help/AIM-InstructionManual.pdf But basically, click on the stars, the stars turn blue to indicate that it is now a supertag. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Ashmore Posted January 23, 2017 Author Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. The new interface looks much more modern and clean, but regarding keywording functionality I'm not convinced. If order and proximity of keywords still play a role, then it is a mess now, as you cannot change the keywording order once they are entered. When I first saw the screenshots I thought that the entered keywords can be dragged and dropped in the right order... but we don't know if the order matters and Alamy is not telling us. Did it ever matter? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niels Quist Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. This is actually really important. The rule has always been very strict that an image sold as RM could never be sold as RF - and vice versa. But are we now able to change the licence type for old images? Some customers may feel uncomfortable about this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Ashmore Posted January 23, 2017 Author Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. This is actually really important. The rule has always been very strict that an image sold as RM could never be sold as RF - and vice versa. But are we now able to change the licence type for old images? Some customers may feel uncomfortable with this. Yes. You have to remove all restrictions off the image first (and save). But then you can change the license type and re-add restrictions. I'm not sure if it would let you do this for an image that has already sold. In the manual for the new MI tools, it says, "This is where you select the ‘License type’. Alamy recommends a royaltyfree (RF) license as this is most popular with customers" ... so this suggests to me that Alamy are now actively encouraging the use of RF over RM. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanGibson Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I tried searching for one of my images and then clicking the "Edit Image" button. It did take me to the new Manage Images but just to the full list of images with the last submission first. I guess we can't go straight to the specific image we want to edit. Unless I am missing something. Paulette It does go straight to the image with my images, so that's probably just today's phase of the roll-out. wim +1, goes straight to a specific image here too.... Takes me to the image as well. I tried it again with a different image and it still isn't doing it for me. I shall be patient. I can't quite face working on this task yet anyway. My mind needs to get comfortable enough that I can find my way. Paulette Paulette, you're not alone. I'm facing the same problem. Cheers, Philippe Wow! I hadn't seen that button before. Thanks for pointing it out, it takes me to that image in MI, in my case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niels Quist Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. This is actually really important. The rule has always been very strict that an image sold as RM could never be sold as RF - and vice versa. But are we now able to change the licence type for old images? Some customers may feel uncomfortable with this. Yes. You have to remove all restrictions off the image first (and save). But then you can change the license type and re-add restrictions. I'm not sure if it would let you do this for an image that has already sold. In the manual for the new MI tools, it says, "This is where you select the ‘License type’. Alamy recommends a royaltyfree (RF) license as this is most popular with customers" ... so this suggests to me that Alamy are now actively encouraging the use of RF over RM. Thanks. I thought this possibility was only for new images. But I still see it as a threat as explained in an earlier post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gvallee Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I've only begun to look at the new IM (morning here in Oz) but as far as I can see, only 'Filters' displays the contributor's own reference number. In the past, when doing a search in the Search box then clicking on an image and then edit, it displayed it. No more. How can I find out my own reference without going to Filters and highlighting the submission it was in (which I wouldn't know anyway)? Is there any other way? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tarsierspectral Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Looks like we can now switch between RM and RF by ourselves. The new interface looks much more modern and clean, but regarding keywording functionality I'm not convinced. If order and proximity of keywords still play a role, then it is a mess now, as you cannot change the keywording order once they are entered. When I first saw the screenshots I thought that the entered keywords can be dragged and dropped in the right order... but we don't know if the order matters and Alamy is not telling us. Did it ever matter? I don't know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Lewis Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 Hi All Must be the only one still on the old system. Jon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 I've only begun to look at the new IM (morning here in Oz) but as far as I can see, only 'Filters' displays the contributor's own reference number. In the past, when doing a search in the Search box then clicking on an image and then edit, it displayed it. No more. How can I find out my own reference without going to Filters and highlighting the submission it was in? Is there any other way? Doesn't look like it. You'd have to track it down from "date taken" in the optional tab. Of course that only works if you upload pretty promptly. Incidentally, it is reading GPS location data now. It even applies to existing uploads. Too bad my A55 fritzed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlessandraRC Posted January 23, 2017 Share Posted January 23, 2017 On the subject of QC rating, it is possible that those partial failures when an image is small for Alamy, count against you. I can't follow up with this thread anymore, too long. Good job Alamy, putting this new management of pictures in place without interruption of service. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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