Author Topic: Blockchain based stock photography sites (Read 21597 times)

leaf · « **on:** April 27, 2018, 00:58 »

I thought it would be interesting to put together a list of all the blockchain based stock photography sites. I just discovered a new one this morning, Wemark, who has quite a few recognizable faces on their advisory board.

List:
Photochain
Wemark
Totem
Kodak Coin

Pauws99 · « **Reply #1 on:** April 27, 2018, 02:53 »

Would be interesting to know what stage they are at and if anyone is uploading and their experience. If it costs me nothing I will probably give it a go only time to lose and I've lost plenty chasing sales on the declining "minnow" sites.

namussi · « **Reply #2 on:** April 27, 2018, 02:57 »

Please could someone in explain in one sentence, without jargon, what the benefit is of such sites to a customer.

leaf · « **Reply #3 on:** April 27, 2018, 04:17 »

Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 02:57

Please could someone in explain in one sentence, without jargon, what the benefit is of such sites to a customer.

The benefits are toted to be .. that the money can be transferred direct from the buyer to the photographer, no paypal middle man fees. Some blockchain sites also claim to have some copyright protection embedded in the image. I'm not totally sure how that works.. .. but it could be something like this...

A buyer buys a photo and pays for it with crypto
The transaction 'receipt' .. a reference to the record of the purchase on the blockchain (which is public) is embeded in the image.
If that image gets used by a second person or multiple people, it will be obvious because you will see that they are not the original purchaser of the image. If that thief needs to prove they purchased the image, they won't be able to because there is no record of it on the blockchain.

What i'm not sure about however, is if I'm selling 'direct' to the buyer - am I going to be the one responsible for charging / reporting correct sales taxes to wherever the images are being sold. If a buyer is in Norway, I should charge them 25% sales tax. outside of Norway, no tax.

leaf · « **Reply #4 on:** April 27, 2018, 04:21 »

Quote from: Pauws99 on April 27, 2018, 02:53

Would be interesting to know what stage they are at and if anyone is uploading and their experience. If it costs me nothing I will probably give it a go only time to lose and I've lost plenty chasing sales on the declining "minnow" sites.

I tried uploading a few to Wemark.. will see how it goes. I'm guessing one such solution will be successful, it is a great idea and blockchain is here to stay, but guessing what implementations of it are going to be successful is pretty hard. Just because it's incredible technology, doesn't mean every platform and industry has a use for it. Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

Pauws99 · « **Reply #5 on:** April 27, 2018, 04:24 »

Quote from: leaf on April 27, 2018, 04:17

Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 02:57
Please could someone in explain in one sentence, without jargon, what the benefit is of such sites to a customer.

The benefits are toted to be .. that the money can be transferred direct from the buyer to the photographer, no paypal middle man fees. Some blockchain sites also claim to have some copyright protection embedded in the image. I'm not totally sure how that works.. .. but it could be something like this...

A buyer buys a photo and pays for it with crypto
The transaction 'receipt' .. a reference to the record of the purchase on the blockchain (which is public) is embeded in the image.
If that image gets used by a second person or multiple people, it will be obvious because you will see that they are not the original purchaser of the image. If that thief needs to prove they purchased the image, they won't be able to because there is no record of it on the blockchain.

What i'm not sure about however, is if I'm selling 'direct' to the buyer - am I going to be the one responsible for charging / reporting correct sales taxes to wherever the images are being sold. If a buyer is in Norway, I should charge them 25% sales tax. outside of Norway, no tax.

Yes I can see potential benefits for the seller...but I have yet to see anything that would encourage a buyer to use it. If someone approached a business and said "you should ditch SS and use Wemark" and they asked "why?" What would the answer be?

derby · « **Reply #6 on:** April 27, 2018, 05:02 »

I'm quite sure that it will take many years to takeoff
but ?m also sure that it's the future, and I'm really interested to understand more about this!

Better to choose one platform, or upload to any or all of these? In the next years there will be dozens of platforms

namussi · « **Reply #7 on:** April 27, 2018, 20:16 »

Quote from: leaf on April 27, 2018, 04:17

Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 02:57
Please could someone in explain in one sentence, without jargon, what the benefit is of such sites to a customer.

The benefits are toted to be .. that the money can be transferred direct from the buyer to the photographer, no paypal middle man fees.
.

Thank you! And thanks to everyone else for their explanations too

drd · « **Reply #8 on:** April 28, 2018, 02:56 »

Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 20:16

Quote from: leaf on April 27, 2018, 04:17
Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 02:57
Please could someone in explain in one sentence, without jargon, what the benefit is of such sites to a customer.

The benefits are toted to be .. that the money can be transferred direct from the buyer to the photographer, no paypal middle man fees.
.

Thank you! And thanks to everyone else for their explanations too

+ We get 85% of a sale and the rest stays in the network. A good client will certainly appreciate this!

Pauws99 · « **Reply #9 on:** April 28, 2018, 03:08 »

Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 02:56

Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 20:16
Quote from: leaf on April 27, 2018, 04:17
Quote from: namussi on April 27, 2018, 02:57
Please could someone in explain in one sentence, without jargon, what the benefit is of such sites to a customer.

The benefits are toted to be .. that the money can be transferred direct from the buyer to the photographer, no paypal middle man fees.
.

Thank you! And thanks to everyone else for their explanations too

+ We get 85% of a sale and the rest stays in the network. A good client will certainly appreciate this!

You have a touching faith in human nature ;-). Surely the 15% will go in salaries running costs and returns for investors.....to be honest I'd be more positive if they took 50% and did more marketing.

Pauws99 · « **Reply #10 on:** April 28, 2018, 03:20 »

How much does it typically cost to convert Tokens to Dollars or to a cryptocurrency? Genuine question I have no idea?

jefftakespics2 · « **Reply #11 on:** April 28, 2018, 08:27 »

I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

Pauws99 · « **Reply #12 on:** April 28, 2018, 09:37 »

Quote from: jefftakespics2 on April 28, 2018, 08:27

I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

I think the most credible offer so far....but I think you have hit the nail firmly on the head.

drd · « **Reply #13 on:** April 28, 2018, 10:09 »

Quote from: jefftakespics2 on April 28, 2018, 08:27

I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

If buyers want new content they will make the move. Getty with their Premium Access Theft Collection will get no new content very soon!

Pauws99 · « **Reply #14 on:** April 28, 2018, 10:28 »

Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 10:09

Quote from: jefftakespics2 on April 28, 2018, 08:27
I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

If buyers want new content they will make the move. Getty with their Premium Access Theft Collection will get no new content very soon!

You seriously think new content will dry up at other sites?

drd · « **Reply #15 on:** April 28, 2018, 10:34 »

Quote from: Pauws99 on April 28, 2018, 10:28

Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 10:09
Quote from: jefftakespics2 on April 28, 2018, 08:27
I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

If buyers want new content they will make the move. Getty with their Premium Access Theft Collection will get no new content very soon!
You seriously think new content will dry up at other sites?

I think photographers are smart people and they will decide what is best for them at the time.

Pauws99 · « **Reply #16 on:** April 28, 2018, 10:39 »

Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 10:34

Quote from: Pauws99 on April 28, 2018, 10:28
Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 10:09
Quote from: jefftakespics2 on April 28, 2018, 08:27
I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

If buyers want new content they will make the move. Getty with their Premium Access Theft Collection will get no new content very soon!
You seriously think new content will dry up at other sites?

I think photographers are smart people and they will decide what is best for them at the time.

We will see but I think it would be a massive gamble to upload to exclusively to an unproven platform and hope that a significant number of competitors would.

drd · « **Reply #17 on:** April 28, 2018, 10:50 »

Quote from: Pauws99 on April 28, 2018, 10:39

Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 10:34
Quote from: Pauws99 on April 28, 2018, 10:28
Quote from: drd on April 28, 2018, 10:09
Quote from: jefftakespics2 on April 28, 2018, 08:27
I can see Wemark has some heavy hitters behind it and the concept is great ... I just wonder how they will drive buyers to the marketplace. There is really no incentive for buyers to move away from the established stock agencies. That said ... I hope they do.

If buyers want new content they will make the move. Getty with their Premium Access Theft Collection will get no new content very soon!
You seriously think new content will dry up at other sites?

I think photographers are smart people and they will decide what is best for them at the time.
We will see but I think it would be a massive gamble to upload to exclusively to an unproven platform and hope that a significant number of competitors would.

Giving away photos at $0.01 through a newly invented premium access collection through a proven and ''trusted'' platform it is also a gamble.

Noedelhap · « **Reply #18 on:** April 28, 2018, 11:58 »

Interesting (and pessimistic) article about KodakCoin:

https://www.finder.com.au/kodakcoin-is-a-failed-ico-rebranded-under-kodak-name

BoomeArt · « **Reply #19 on:** April 28, 2018, 14:52 »

I think that one of the reason for customer can be the price. It's up to us to fix the price per image and it should be lower than on other microstock sites.

noodle · « **Reply #20 on:** April 28, 2018, 15:02 »

Quote from: BoomeArt on April 28, 2018, 14:52

I think that one of the reason for customer can be the price. It's up to us to fix the price per image and it should be lower than on other microstock sites.

It should be lower?

It should be fairly valued by the content creator

Pauws99 · « **Reply #21 on:** April 28, 2018, 16:06 »

Quote from: BoomeArt on April 28, 2018, 14:52

I think that one of the reason for customer can be the price. It's up to us to fix the price per image and it should be lower than on other microstock sites.

Thats what worries me 85% of the race to the bottom price.

obj owl · « **Reply #22 on:** April 28, 2018, 16:30 »

Seems to me that these platforms have no interest in selling images, they have left the pricing and marketing up to us, their money comes from infringement technology and selling coins/tokens. One of the main reasons buyers use stock sites is indemnity, they buy trust, where is that going to come from on a peer to peer site?

jorgophotography · « **Reply #23 on:** April 28, 2018, 22:52 »

Here's a couple more for the blockchain list:

https://bitimage.io/
http://creativechain.org/
https://selfllery.com/
https://www.pibble.io/
https://wirestock.org/

I think the gamechanger in the blockchain / stock crossover is the initial funding through ICOs.
Historically, startup stock agencies just can't compete with the established brands, based on marketing budget (IMO), blockchain has the power to change this.

If you did though the whitepapers, many of these projects have dedicated a solid % to the marketing plan, so if they do well during ICO, it could bring some solid brand awareness to the project.

Wrote in detail about this here:
https://medium.com/@CryptoBlockBits/stock-photography-the-blockchain-revolution-7d5e0a7f42d9

Also did a writeup about the wemark project here:
https://medium.com/@CryptoBlockBits/stock-photography-is-broken-could-wemark-com-be-the-fix-fcdfef03c946

Pauws99 · « **Reply #24 on:** April 29, 2018, 02:17 »

Quote from: obj owl on April 28, 2018, 16:30

Seems to me that these platforms have no interest in selling images, they have left the pricing and marketing up to us, their money comes from infringement technology and selling coins/tokens. One of the main reasons buyers use stock sites is indemnity, they buy trust, where is that going to come from on a peer to peer site?

Although I'm testing the waters I largely agree I think its potential is probably "middle tier" at best. I think it would be a very hard sell to Corporate buyers. So I don't mind spending a bit of time uploading but wouldn't touch investing with a 10 metre barge pole.

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Author Topic: Blockchain based stock photography sites (Read 21597 times)

leaf

Pauws99

namussi

leaf

leaf

Pauws99

derby

namussi

drd

Pauws99

Pauws99

jefftakespics2

Pauws99

drd

Pauws99

drd

Pauws99

drd

Noedelhap

BoomeArt

noodle

Pauws99

obj owl

jorgophotography

Pauws99

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