it is very frustrating... i understand completely. This is the reason i've chosen not to be exclusive - that and the fact that some of my photos sell very well on one site and not on another - each seems to draw its own crowd.

All sorts of reasons wayyy to many....

Composition and Impact

The execution of isolation contains stray areas that are either too feathered or rough. (scanned stuff very high resolution and corrected)

We found this file over filtered from its original appearance/quality
etc. etc.

oh well can resubmit a couple in a few weeks 

And i just started to make some money there... the upload of 20 a week is just not enough !

About a decade, at the rate they're reviewing.  I just got some acceptances for stuff uploaded two weeks ago.

That's too long.

And i still have about a 1000 files to upload ............hmmmmm how long is that gonna take me..

Well that is the same idear i got, they accepted some tulips 

Just do what all the other NON-EXCLUSIVES do:

A.) Keep submitting to IStock if you choose since their sales are good at this point in time. Or you can stop submitting to them as I have since their upload process is the BIGGEST pain in the ASS, and their commission is the absolute LOWEST in the industry

B.) Promote all the othe sites with the best commissions, on you website, with your friends, etc. etc. so that one of the other sites take over the sales  lead from IStock over time.

Then we will all benefit. Can you imagine for example if Stock Xpert or Dreamstime had the sales of IStock? You would make more than 2x the amount you are making now since Stock Xpert and Dreamstime pay 50% commission vs a measly 20% from IStock.

It's in all the non-exclusives interest if Istock loses customers to the better paying sites. It will happen over time. It's already starting. I'm gonna love watching it play out

What, "It's already starting" ? That's hardly a statement that needs a factual basis to make. Call it a gut feeling, the performance of my own portfolio, whatever. All I know is ShutterStock, Dreamstime , Fotolia, and Stock Xpert are increasing by leaps and bounds while Istock is remaining constant. Istock is making new ICONS for the forums while other sites are busy attracting new customers. IStock pays the LOWEST, is their any other reason to promote the other sites? IStock has the MOST convoluted upload process - they just redid their whole * site and didn't bother to incorporate a simple FTP upload process. They don't give a sh*t about their contributors paying an insulting 20%. Not trying to be confrontational, but I don't see any reason why a non-exclusive would want IStock to succeed. Please enlighten me if your a non-exclusive

We should promote featurepics, they pay 70 percent !!!!

yes and they put a lot of work in their site. Also they give you the tools for easy promoting have a look at their HTML-snippets they even offer you to do some individual designs if you need them.
Its a very well made site with friendly and responsive administration they obvisouly don't have the money for expensive promotion so we should do our best its in our own interest.

eyckmans:  Are you exclusive?  If so, what is your canister color?  And what do you submit (photos, vectors)?  If photos, do you have images that requires MRs?

iStock does have the lowest royalty for a per image microsite.  They only offer a 20% royalty.  Most other sites offer much more.  FT 33%, DT 50%, StockXpert 50%, FP 70%, etc.

Some people report higher earnings but that is because they either are exclusive, have gorgeous models (which sell quite well), or sell vectors (which sell much better than photos and at a higher price) or some combination.

I don't think that it is fair comparing these sites to SS, since a subscriber on SS has to pay a minimum of $169 for a monthly subscription.  This leads to a different revenue stream, since you will probably end up with a LOT more sales on SS compared to many of the other microsites.  On top of that, SS has now become the #1 paying site for a majority of submitters.

So in summary, IS is currently the "Walmart" of the micros.  Hopefully we can "unionize" and force them to give us a pay increase.

As you could tell from my other posts, I'm not necessarily a fan of Istock.  They treat non-exclusives poorly and they pay the lowest commission around.  To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of microstock; but, microstock is here to stay, and a good business person doesn't ignore trends.

As to your claims, I dispute them.  Your personal experience with daily income is hardly a basis for making claims about the performance of the company as a whole.  So, you do in fact need to use a "factual basis."  A gut feeling won't feed the cat; only true data will tell you how well a company is performing.  When you can demonstrate that Istock is losing income, photographers, or both, then show me the numbers.  (Good lord.  I'm channeling Gerry Maguire.  And, I don't even like Tom Cruise movies.)

What, "It's already starting" ? That's hardly a statement that needs a factual basis to make. Call it a gut feeling, the performance of my own portfolio, whatever.

From Alamy, you get 65% of the sale price for normal sales. For "distribution sales," where a third party sells the images, you get 45%.

Quote from: leaf on September 08, 2006, 06:41

I earn 40% or something on alamy. The low % on Istock is what people are irritated with.

Or they pay 55% if you are not in one of their approved countries and then they charge additional fees to make a payout (no fee free paypal).

You forgot to mention a couple of others:

No FTP - Istock just redesigned it's whole website at the beginning of the year yet FAILED to include an easy implementation of FTP uploading to it's site. Both exclusives and non-exclusive have been asking for this for a LONG time. All the other major players (StockXpert, Fotolia, Dreamstime, ShutterStock, BigStock) who actually CARE about their contributors have FTP, why not IStock??? Surely, this can only help us contributors.

No dissent on the forums - you'd think you're in the old school USSR with the quickness with which they lock threads over there. Well, sorry, but on these boards we can speak our minds.

Oh wait...BUT they did just give you new icons in the forums. I'm glad they're spending they're time on important things. IStock video.....now you see where the company is really heading. Trying to diversify so the stock photos doesn't eat away any more of Getty's net.

So, if you're so "in the know" about IStock's Marketing budget, please enlighten us. How much is it and how does it compare to the other major players?

" Benefits for exclusives...that's just good business sense.  If you ran the company and you had artists you wanted to claim exclusively, you'd give them perks too.  And that just makes sense as a business."

Exactly....and this extends to the rejections too. From what I've seen inspectors are WAY more lenient on exclusives.

I'm not trying to start anytihng but seriously...people LOVE to bitch about two things with iStock.� Low Comission & Favoritism to Exclusives.� I won't take the time to debate either of these issues again (but I could) but here is what you have to consider.� 1) The low comission rate is what allows iStock to have the HIGHEST marketing budget in the industry and hence the higest traffic.� Undisputedly the highest traffic.� Sorry but it's true.� 2) Benefits for exclusives...that's just good business sense.� If you ran the company and you had artists you wanted to claim exclusively, you'd give them perks too.� And that just makes sense as a business.

iStock craeted the microstock industry.� They are on top.� They didn't get there by being stupid.

As far as rejections, we all get rejections we don't agree with.� I hate to shatter any conspiracies, but I am exclusive and still get rejection I don't agree with.� When you are a serious business tryign to build up a library you want to have a direction and a vision fo that library.� iStock has made it clear that they have standards and a cohesive vison for their library.� If they don;t accept your images it's not [personal...it's not because you aren't exclusive, it's because that image doesn't fit the library. Period.

Luckily, you have options.

Go to alexa.com

Quote from: amanda1863 on September 09, 2006, 21:18

Undisputedly the highest traffic.

Can you please pass along the source of your info...