I think that any agency should:

- Announce when any new " sales strategy"  will be implemented. 
- Get feedback of Contributors. 
- Then, they should provide an option to "opt-in" and "opt-out" for all those "methods". Opt-out by default.

Will be always hard manage it trough email.

About license, one EL4 means a lot of utilization possible. How we , or even DP,  can be sure about their utilization?

In my particular case i got 2 PP sales, 2,64$ each, over same image ( 27/08 and 29/08 ).  Now how much I could win with these two images?

BTW, I got at least 20$~30 trough PP EL's... if some agencies can do it, why DP want sale them with a ridiculous price?

Let's see how things will work in future.
 

Do you mean that it would be in a template where users could generate, for example webpages?
Would the partner be buying one of these extended licenses each time a single customer creates a web page or document? (I am guessing here from you saying it is the automation that requires an extended license, not that they will be using the image lots of times).

If so that seems quite reasonable, if on the other hand you mean that the partner buys a single one of these licenses for a couple of dollars and can then sell templates or websites or products using the image multiple times then that is completely out of the question.

If you are genuinely interested in opening up the lines of communication you need to actually give us an idea of what you are doing. I am finding your responses really evasive so far.

I am sorry to try and pin you down like this, but this is an ongoing issue and we need to know whether to withdraw our images.

Hello everyone,

sorry that i only now come here to give a statement.

Well, there is no way around it � they way this feature has been introduced has been a mistake from our side. There was no communication to the contributors before it went ahead and that is not the kind of transparency and level of communication we want to provide.

We also have to admit to miscommunication inside the company as not everyone was informed this feature would already go live without informing contributors beforehand.

We then wanted to quickly present a �one click solution� with which every contributor could have unsubscribed from this feature by themselves quickly.  As this proved tricky to do quickly and save, we have then decided to do it on demand as soon as a contributor contacts their personal contact person or send an email to [email protected].

The feature is right now limited to one project and one license type. It is limited to a special use of extended license that would not have attracted the partner paying the full extended license as they only need it for a very specific use. It is not offering extended licenses generally to lower prices, but subject to specific use.

I understand, if you do not want to offer your files for this feature and a quick mail to us will unsubscribe you from the feature.

This lack of communication has been a dear lesson to us and we will learn from it and will make sure that this will not happen again. Changes of this magnitude will have to go through all company levels before executed to make sure the information towards our contributors is clear and direct � and most important happens before the launch of any new feature.

I will try to show good presence in this thread from now on and answer any upcoming questions.

Thank you for clearing this up Marius. It is always good to know that Agencies are listening, and, more important so, correct mistakes if there were some made.

? We haven't got any details at all of what a single sale of one of these ELs permits. No mistakes have been corrected, I believe the scheme is still going on and we have no way of knowing if we should be opting out or not.
Yes the communication was bad and thanks for the apology for that, but the communication is still bad right now. Let save the praise for if/ when we are given any hard facts rather than spin.

True. We still do not know many details. For me it is quite clear: opt out. Thats it for me. But at least they are listening and giving the option to opt out...

I dont understand a thing of that explanation about ELs. Its still very vague.

Well, Marius told us more or less from what company the license had been sold. That is more than we, as RF contribs, generally get to know since the clients almost always remain anonymous. Furthermore we know the license and the terms. That is actually the usual amount of information. What is missing is through which partner etc.

In general "Partner Programs" seem to be a very critical point in Agency - Contrib relations and lead to many problems later. Lately we had lots of Conflicts here because of unclear relationships. I think Marius did what he could for now and we can opt out. Off course it would be necessary to know more about the Program in general since finally they sell our material, but I guess they have to do some homework within the Company itself. If not, everybody should draw its conclusions.

Haha, that's exactly like StockXpert who started selling EL's for sub prices, while they were in 5th position on the microstock poll result in 2009 I believe. I forgot what happened 3 or 4 months later.

Marius, your coming on to explain and offer apologies and an opt out is very much appreciated.  Since I am still not clear on the usage, I guess I will have to opt out. 

If you could offer a more clear description of what this license permits then I might change my mind and opt in later. 

Again, thank you for the improved communication. 

I emailed them to remove my photos from partner sites and to opt out of the EL option, but no reply back yet

Quote from: Microbius on September 11, 2012, 08:41

If you are genuinely interested in opening up the lines of communication you need to actually give us an idea of what you are doing. I am finding your responses really evasive so far.

I am sorry to try and pin you down like this, but this is an ongoing issue and we need to know whether to withdraw our images.

I understand your point that with this information you will not decide to refrain from opting out. I�m afraid though that I can�t give you more detailed information.

That will not be the answer you want to hear, and I�m not happy about it myself, as of course I would love to have all of you staying in the current way, but I can not say more about the feature. If the explanations given are not enough, then - as much as I hate to say it - you will have to opt out of partner program sales.

Thanks for the honest reply Marius and for jumping in the thread to clear things up and provide a little more info on the situation.

Ok i will opt out also.
Depositphotos, I'm always waiting your answer for opt out in subs who are incredibly low, 30c $ is simply nothing, in Euro it's empty space, do you think our works is so crappy? Really?? Fotolia was the worst before you come, are you satisfied with your new position of the stingiest agency in the world?
I've started to send my new files at only 4mpx, soon i will ask you again to delete all my other files at 12-21mpx.

Ok i will opt out also.
Depositphotos, I'm always waiting your answer for opt out in subs who are incredibly low, 30c $ is simply nothing, in Euro it's empty space, do you think our works is so crappy? Really?? Fotolia was the worst before you come, are you satisfied with your new position of the stingiest agency in the world?
I've started to send my new files at only 4mpx, soon i will ask you again to delete all my other files at 12-21mpx.

I agree that 30 cents is nothing, its 23 euro cents, but SS commission is 25 $ cents, which is 19 euro cents. So at least DP is paying more than SS. But on SS I sell 30 x more than  on DP

You can not compare SS who includes also "on demand downloads" "single download" and sell pretty well El at 28$ with Depositphotos with its so depressing low subs.
One agency started from subs and has added some creative licenses, the other start with subs and nothing more, nothing exciting...not even the commissions. So, why the creativity has to be only on the photographer side?? And for peanuts???

Yes, I can compare subs with subs... thats all I did.

DP has been notorious for using price to beat the competition.  Instead of upping their prices to buyers, creating licenses that add greater value for the customer and generating the perception of enhanced value-to-price relationship, they take the rookie route.