Comments on: Fotolia Adds Subscriptions Too

By: niagaragirl

niagaragirl — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 17:11:57 +0000

And yet another caveat – looks like referrals bought via sub will not count either. I vented about the mess on my blog yesterday and just added the referral info. Not good.

http://niagarashooter.blogspot.com/2008/06/fotolia-spanks-contributors-twice-more.html

Here is what they say about referrals

“Referring members may receive rewards from an unlimited number of affiliates in their account. The referring member can not be his own affiliate. Images sold with subscription don’t generate affiliation revenues.”

By: Destiny

Destiny — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 21:47:06 +0000

More news today – subscription sales at fotolia will not count towards contributors rank. Hardly a note of joy for most of us.

By: Photonomikon

Photonomikon — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 16:24:41 +0000

Hooray for the subscription model! …not.
I still think Shutterstock is the only place where that works. And even there… I’m not sure how long it can go and keep submitters happy.

By: R. Kneschke

R. Kneschke — Sat, 31 May 2008 21:18:51 +0000

>>Every $ is a bonus, but every $ makes you think you are worth more…

Well, a lot of good stock pictures are merely produced for that purpose, not found in a drawer or so.

By: pdtnc

pdtnc — Sat, 31 May 2008 08:13:27 +0000

the payout level is low, but I’m going to sit back and wait…
I am hoping that the current trend of Fotolia and Dreamstime catching up to iStock is going to continue, while shutterstock slips down in the last 2 months.

I think things could go either way, Dreamstime for me seems to be pulling off the credits vs Subscription battle with 123RF seeming to be getting better consistently.

Its probably good to remember for the vast majority of stock submitters that its not that long ago you were just leaving your Photographs to rot on your computer somewhere and be forgotten.
Since starting submitting those rotting images have a new lease of life that they would not have had if it was not for all these RF sites.
Every $ is a bonus, but every $ makes you think you are worth more… Catch 22, but maybe you learned a lot in the past few years to justify it…? *talking in circle here!*

By: Cory

Cory — Sat, 31 May 2008 06:12:00 +0000

This is interesting news. I’ve noticed a huge upswing in sales with Fotolia this month. Maybe they have finally got all the kinks worked out and this may be the right time to strike with a new subscription service. As an illustrator my sales are a little different from photographers, so I was excited to see my Fotolia sales increase substantially.

I could give the pessimistic view too, but I’m sticking with the positive.

By: Bob Davies

Bob Davies — Sat, 31 May 2008 02:28:11 +0000

I’m still wayyyyyy down on my fotolia portfolio below the people who will be affected seriously by this, but I can’t imagine it being very good for any regular contributors

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 30 May 2008 23:48:47 +0000

I feel very disappointed too. I have been annoyed for a while now about the rejections which were sometimes badly justified (why refuse a photo they know would sell???). The excessive quality standard is not a good thing. Illustration is not always about that: Who’s going to see the tiny amount of noise at an XS size? many buyers are not that fussed as long as they get a good illustration of their subject.
Then there has been this recent problem with the flawed searches, added to the fact that the downtime for fotolia is worse than that of other microstocks.

Fotolia are paying rather well from the moment you pass your 100th sale, which is quite satisfying for the seller.

But I can’t see subscription as a good thing. I am lucky that my photos are 97% exclusive, however this change I think will be detrimental to my portfolio still.

In the meantime, I’ve already started to upload on Yaymicro which I like a lot so far (I am your referral I believe!)… I really like the fact that they also take editorial photos…