I thought you were creating a new stock site. Why don't you do that instead?

Was thinking that too. Actually I�m hoping someone will come along and create a platform for us.
If it doesn�t work out then no harm done right? We already have tools such as symbiostock to get us started or we can start from scratch. I am 100% certain we have enough talented and experienced people amongst us who are capable of that.

We don�t actually have to take on the big guns, we just have to set it all up, upload a few dozen (or more) of our best images and see where that takes us.
We can guide buyers on social media, forums like this one, create websites with our microstock profile that points to wherever we want, our own stock agency in this case. We can put a link to this new agency wherever we want and you can bet those same websites that wrote about SS recent change will also pick up on this and write about it, so again extra exposure.

If sales are low but we get 50% or more from each fair priced sale then it�s still a win situation for us. Sure beats a dozen 0,10 sales!
I think this would certainly be possible without having to start a war against other agencies, so they have no reason to take war on us. I think Stocksy is no threat to others and since we are talking microstock here so far less expensive we could actually perform a lot better then them. Again we don�t have to start our own agency with a goal to compete with others or prove something. That�s not a good mind set and a lost cause anyway. We just have to start it as we see no other way forward really.

Imagine if all those who already disabled or will disable their porfolios joined this new agency. We�re not talking about a few hundred here. Also others will start getting curious and try it out, that is in our nature. Many are jumping to DT again which they know is a low seller, just to try it out again so why not our own agency?
I think there are enough people amongst us who are willing to donate their time or even money to set this whole thing up.

But then maybe im just daydreaming and we will stick to protest (in any form) but eventually give in or give up!

The choice is ours!

As many of you will already be aware, moves are afoot to create an organisation to effectively represent us and to safeguard the value of our creative assets. In less than 24-hours, a domain has been purchased and a team are already working the creation of a website at www.stockcoalition.org.

A call has already gone out for stock photo contributions for the site on the Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/261369748434285

That said, not everyone monitors their Facebook, so here are the details of the request:

Good news - we have that website build underway. However, we are calling on our community of talented artists to contribute one picture each that best represents your work and your country. The goal will be to have between three and five images for a front-page slider and then a gallery of smaller images that are representative of the broad global talent we have as a community.

Those who want to assist, please supply images no larger than 1500px on the long side. We will reference the photographer, but will not have watermarks - so treat it as if it were an agency purchase and supply images accordingly.

To contribute, please email your images directly to [email protected]. Please also include your First Name, Last Name, optional nickname or stock handle and your website or agency portfolio that you wish to promote online.

Good luck.

I'm kind of wondering though, a blank black page with a link to a private FB group. Are the photos going to the website eventually? What's the plan to get the publics attention and have something visible?

I don't know FB that well, is there a way to have something more, showing for people, without having to join the group, or is the FB page only for members and not public viewing.

By the way:

Stock Submitter Coalition
Private group  � 3.1K members

Honestly, I wouldn't keep taking the time to explain yourself. The people who are questioning you have already stated they don't plan to take down their ports or really do anything else remotely helpful to fight Shutterstock, but I'm sure they won't mind if all your hard work results in fairer royalties for them.

In roughly 48-hours we have booked and paid for a domain, installed a full WP installation and theme, a newsletter distribution system for bulk emails, sourced images from contributors, written some positioning copy and assisted with a pretty strong positioning video that is also underway at the same time.

Right now my developer is working the site look and feel, using those generously donated images from the community. I'm about to figure out why our bulk global site license for bulk email is not working.

We could have made the html on the holding page prettier - but that would take away resources from the actual task at hand that would have no impact or value in the long term. It's just a holding page instead of the standard holding page that says nothing about anything at all.

I thought it's been up longer, I mean over 3 thousand people joined already. What are you planning?

Yeah, you don't need to tell me about websites and bulk distribution apps not working. When they are, they sometimes don't. 

This is excellent idea, all Agencies started with very little.

Let's all hope this can be grown and push these other money grabbing sites off the cliff.

The quicker the better.

.�.

Quote from: Noedelhap on June 11, 2020, 14:16

Quote from: CommuniCat on June 11, 2020, 13:20

Quote from: Noedelhap on June 11, 2020, 12:09

But anyway, what is the idea, will it just be a collection of images to represent the talented artists who joined the coalition? What is the coalition planning to do then? Displaying them somewhere will not do anything on its own.

Okay, I see your point. What you are waiting for is the community to build its own stock agency and pull everyone onboard as exclusive, right?

Firstly, that's not what we are building in terms of this thread. Right now we are building an online home for stock contributors. That's what my team and I have volunteered to do, anyway. So you are quite right, we are not, at this point anyway, building an agency. We are building the site for an organisation that represents us as a first stage.

Is this the start of a fully contributor-owned agency where 80% or more of commissions are kept by contributors? I have no idea. It's certainly a possibility.

But I know where it starts.

It starts with us as a community pulling together right now as a group to send a message loud and clear not just to Shutterstock, but to every agency in the industry. That message is this:

As of this month, the global contributors are no longer yours to abuse with tinpot pricing and peanut royalties. For too long we have been pushed around like herd cattle milked daily for you to take all the cream.

We are not going to continue doing business like this. We are organising. We are working towards a unified front that represents our interests as contributors. And we will win, too, because really at $0.10 a download, what exactly do any of us stand to lose?

Sorry, but that wasn't the point I was trying to make, I don't mean building a contributor-owned stock agency. In fact I think we'd never be able to compete against the market leaders. 

What I'm talking about was: why should Shutterstock care that we all got 'united' on a website with a gallery to show off our work? It wouldn't give us any negotiating power. The images would just be sitting there, except they're not for sale, it's just a gallery. What message does that even spread? Nothing much. Clients would never see it, let alone care about our little coalition. We'd be as powerless as we are here, talking amongst ourselves.

For any power play we'd need to collectively pull our images, but we have no idea how many people would join that plan.

Suppose the coalition becomes a starting point for a small movement, even then we'd be lucky if we got 1% of all contributors on board. And that won't be enough.

So I ask you, what's the plan of action once the website is up and running? What are we organising? What action is the 'unified front' going to undertake? Are we going to protest in front of the ShutterStock HQ, #ContributorLivesMatter?

One step at a time. And co-opting Black Lives Matter when people are literally fighting for their lives is so uncool.

I felt the need to respond to this after all, because it seems people are reading this all wrong. I didn't mean to say our issue is of the same historical significance as fighting institutional racism and police brutality. That's not how I meant it; I was merely drawing a comparison to the scale and intensity of the BLM protests, questioning (albeit sarcastically) whether that was something the coalition was aiming to achieve.

Having said that, I said a whole lot more in my post, yet this is the only thing you're picking up from it?

Quote from: Shelma1 on June 11, 2020, 14:43

Quote from: Noedelhap on June 11, 2020, 14:16

Quote from: CommuniCat on June 11, 2020, 13:20

Quote from: Noedelhap on June 11, 2020, 12:09

But anyway, what is the idea, will it just be a collection of images to represent the talented artists who joined the coalition? What is the coalition planning to do then? Displaying them somewhere will not do anything on its own.

Okay, I see your point. What you are waiting for is the community to build its own stock agency and pull everyone onboard as exclusive, right?

Firstly, that's not what we are building in terms of this thread. Right now we are building an online home for stock contributors. That's what my team and I have volunteered to do, anyway. So you are quite right, we are not, at this point anyway, building an agency. We are building the site for an organisation that represents us as a first stage.

Is this the start of a fully contributor-owned agency where 80% or more of commissions are kept by contributors? I have no idea. It's certainly a possibility.

But I know where it starts.

It starts with us as a community pulling together right now as a group to send a message loud and clear not just to Shutterstock, but to every agency in the industry. That message is this:

As of this month, the global contributors are no longer yours to abuse with tinpot pricing and peanut royalties. For too long we have been pushed around like herd cattle milked daily for you to take all the cream.

We are not going to continue doing business like this. We are organising. We are working towards a unified front that represents our interests as contributors. And we will win, too, because really at $0.10 a download, what exactly do any of us stand to lose?

Sorry, but that wasn't the point I was trying to make, I don't mean building a contributor-owned stock agency. In fact I think we'd never be able to compete against the market leaders. 

What I'm talking about was: why should Shutterstock care that we all got 'united' on a website with a gallery to show off our work? It wouldn't give us any negotiating power. The images would just be sitting there, except they're not for sale, it's just a gallery. What message does that even spread? Nothing much. Clients would never see it, let alone care about our little coalition. We'd be as powerless as we are here, talking amongst ourselves.

For any power play we'd need to collectively pull our images, but we have no idea how many people would join that plan.

Suppose the coalition becomes a starting point for a small movement, even then we'd be lucky if we got 1% of all contributors on board. And that won't be enough.

So I ask you, what's the plan of action once the website is up and running? What are we organising? What action is the 'unified front' going to undertake? Are we going to protest in front of the ShutterStock HQ, #ContributorLivesMatter?

One step at a time. And co-opting Black Lives Matter when people are literally fighting for their lives is so uncool.

I felt the need to respond to this after all, because it seems people are reading this all wrong. I didn't mean to say our issue is of the same historical significance as fighting institutional racism and police brutality. That's not how I meant it; I was merely drawing a comparison to the scale and intensity of the BLM protests, questioning (albeit sarcastically) whether that was something the coalition was aiming to achieve.

Having said that, I said a whole lot more in my post, yet this is the only thing you're picking up from it?

Yes, because "contributors' lives matter" keeps popping up, and it's obnoxious. And the rest of your post was Debby Downer-ish, and I'm never gonna convince naysayers to not say nay.

Quote from: microvideo on June 11, 2020, 11:51

I thought you were creating a new stock site. Why don't you do that instead?

...
We don�t actually have to take on the big guns, we just have to set it all up, upload a few dozen (or more) of our best images and see where that takes us.
We can guide buyers on social media, forums like this one, create websites with our microstock profile that points to wherever we want, our own stock agency in this case. We can put a link to this new agency wherever we want and you can bet those same websites that wrote about SS recent change will also pick up on this and write about it, so again extra exposure.

If sales are low but we get 50% or more from each fair priced sale then it�s still a win situation for us. Sure beats a dozen 0,10 sales!
...

reality check::  50 images from (perhaps) 10 K artists(!!)[w little SEO] --> 500K images to compete with the big guys? unfortunately 0 sales is still worse than 'dozen 0,10 sales'

 go for it = prove me wrong

 

Website is in beta and not officially really launched. will check this.

Quote from: blue on June 19, 2020, 08:30

@Communicat
You are using "Stock Alliance" along as "Stock Coalition" on the stockcoalition.org website (on the Join us page and the contact page). Even the contact email address uses the domain name stockalliance.org.
Must be a mistake, isn't it ?
The expression "Stock Alliance" has already been used in this article along with Stock Coalition.

Thanks for picking this up. Care to check that it's all fixed now? I have a feeling this was my bad.

Yes it�s OK